Friday 2/12/16 The Big Trip (38)

Dear Father in Heaven: I love you very, very much. Thanks for sending Jesus to the Cross to die to save us from our own self-destruction. Please forgive me of my sins and help me each day to repent from sinning and to live each day, each minute of each day, for You. Thanks for providing all of our needs and thanks for answering our prayers according to Your will for us. Dear Father in Heaven, please be with our president, our veterans, our military, our police and firefighters and all of the first responders and all others who work hard to keep us safe. Thanks, Jesus, for dying for us. You are indeed wonderful. Please, Lord, be with Jimmy Swaggart Ministries as they raise money this week to keep Your Word going out to the world. Please, Lord, protect this line and all who use it. Please, Lord, help me with the message and then please help me to get it dispatched. In Jesus' Wonderful Name, I pray and give praise. Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters, it is going to be cold this weekend, so please do your best to stay warm. Just think, spring is not far away. Soon we will see the flowers coming up through the ground and we will be planting our tomatoes and other garden things. Then the weeds will grow, the groundhogs will come out and eat at your garden, and you will  need to get out the lawn mower and mow the lawn. You will need to pull weeds and do all those outdoor jobs in the heat. So, please enjoy this weather. See, when you really think about it, it just ain't all that bad. That is because God sent it!! And He loves us!! So enjoy each season of the year for each one is very special. And remember Daytona is here, and since Jeff Gordon retired, I need to find someone else to cheer on. Maybe I will keep cheering for the 24 car.

Brothers and sisters, it is time to start thinking about working outdoors, and some people might be going to build a new house. Regardless of what you are going to do, let us all build it on The Rock!

Friday: February 12, 2016: The Big Trip (Day Thirty-eight) Happy Birthday, Mr. Lincoln!

Building on The Rock!!!

Luke 6:46-49 New International Version (NIV)

The Wise and Foolish Builders

46 - "Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say? 47 As for everyone who comes to Me and hears My words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like. 48 They are like a man building a house, who dug deep down and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. 49 But the one who hears My words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete."

Brothers and sisters, years ago when I was attending Hope United Methodist Church in Mechanicsburg, PA, it was decided to build an addition on the Sunday School building. The old Church chapel was and still is beautiful, however, it did not have restrooms. After making up all the plans and having them approved, it was time to get started. What comes first in taking on a building such as a church or church addition is not a lot different than starting to build a new house. First you need to find out how you are going to pay for it. One way or another it needs to be paid for and you must have a lot for a down payment so the additional weight of a mortgage will not be too much extra weight that it would bring down the church. Yes, the weight of a mortgage might be harder on the church than not making the roof strong enough. You also need to remember "The Church" is really the body of believers and what most people think of as a church is just the building. Someone say Amen please. You also must be sure you are building it for the right reasons. And what are those reasons? To spread the GOOD NEWS about Jesus and what He did when He went to the Cross for all of us.

Well, when you talk about a good example of building a building on rocks, you should have seen what had to be blasted away to get down to where that foundation was to be set. It was rock the whole way down. I have one very large rock that came from that basement in our front yard. We fondly call it "The Rock of Hope" as it came from Hope Church. We also rounded up all the old Bibles that had been around forever. And we carefully placed them right in the corners of the of the foundation as the cement was poured for the walls. Yes, it was at the time a way of saying, this church will be built on the Word of God. Some people put in old family Bibles, others were old pew Bibles that had been replaced years before that. In the Scriptures that God gave to me today it talks about being a wise or foolish builder. Now if that addition would have been built on the natural rock that God already had in the ground and then The Word of God in the Bibles was all that got down, that truly would not have been building that church building on The Rock, and we would have been just as foolish as a builder who just would have built it on a sand foundation. For it is not what was in that Foundation, it is what is going to go on after that church addition was built. The Word of God truly had to be taught and preached, and today I understand that is happening. Pastor Laura and her staff is reaching out to neighbors and bringing them in to feed both the body and the soul.

So as you sit in your house this weekend and it is cold outside, I want to ask you this. Is your house built on The Rock? Have you invited Jesus in to make it a home? Does He head up Your household or do you only call on Him when it seems your foundation is taking on water? If you really want to make your house into a fortress, you need God The Father, God The Son, and God The Holy Ghost on board to protect you. Sometimes you will need to make repairs to the foundation because it has slipped some, and I am not talking about the foundation of your house as in building here, I am talking about you slipping away from Jesus who must always be the foundation of your faith and life. Sometimes when I am praying I run out of words to pray and I just keep calling on Jesus by saying this. "Help me, Jesus, Help me, Jesus, please help me, Jesus." And I go on and on. We have all been there, when it seems like we are at the bottom and there is no help, so then we turn to the Lord. Please do not wait until you are at the bottom to turn to the Lord. Fall in love with Him now. It is Valentines weekend and a good time to tell the ones you love that you really love them. How about starting out with Jesus? Start out with the one who will never leave You nor forsake You.

Start out by telling Your personal foundation that He is just that, your personal foundation and you want to build the rest of your life on Him. Be a wise builder, my dear brothers and sisters, and build ALL YOU DO ON A STRONG FOUNDATION, and it just can't get any stronger than JESUS. Think about it, when He was on The Cross He had the weight of all the sin of the world on Him, and as you and I know, sometimes we have to struggle to carry our own sin weight. So as we build on the strong foundation, please turn all your sins over to Him. Can we just say this to Jesus right now? I love you, Jesus. Amen.

WHEN YOU BUILD YOUR LIFE ON, AROUND JESUS AND LIVE IT FOR HIM, YOU WILL NOT FAIL. You just will not fail.

Dear Father in Heaven: Please be the Rock of our foundation and The Builder of our faith in Jesus. Help us each day to draw nearer to The Rock. In Jesus' Name, I pray. Amen.

Please go now and serve Jesus and spread that Good News that He is The Rock of your foundation. Love ya.

Pastor Dan

And let us sing this.

Blessed Assurance!

Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine!
Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine!
Heir of Salvation, purchase of God,
Born of His Spirit, washed in His Blood.

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long.

Perfect submission, perfect delight;
Visions of rapture now burst on my sight;
Angels descending bring from above
Echoes of mercy, whispers of love.

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long.

Perfect submission, all is at rest.
I in my Savior am happy and blest.
Watching and waiting, looking above;
Filled with His goodness, lost in His love.

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long.

Hit it again and again.

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long.

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long.