In The Potter's Hand

I am thankful that I am still in the Potter's Hand. In this life, its easy to fall into the thought mode of thinking we are leading our own lives. However, the footsteps of the righteous are ordered of the Lord. When I look over my life, I can see times when I walked away from God and at times deliberately walked away. Even in those times, God was leading my life. When God told Jonah to go to Ninevah, Jonah deliberately disobeyed God and went the other direction. The people of Ninavah worshiped a fish god. So when Jonah got swallowed by the whale for his disobedience and spit on the shore of Ninevah after he repented, the people were even more determined to hear what this prophet had to say, because he was delivered to them by a fish. God is always in control!! All I can say is, Lord, mold me into what you want me to be and help me to be submissive to your will for my life today. amen.

Only The Blood

It is good to hear or read stories of how the Lord has worked in the days gone by. Before there ever was a earth, stars, or even angels, all there was, was God. Yet he wasn't even God yet, because God is object of worship. He had all of these attributes inside of Him to be a creator, father, healer, comforter, savior, and many more wonderful attributes including the one great attribute-God. However all there was that filled all was Himself and His thoughts. A person can have the gift to be a musician, but until they come to the point of playing music they will never come to that position of being a "musician". God having these attributes on the inside of all these things put a longing in Himself to be all of these things the same way a young lady has the attribute to be a wife. At some point in her life, she will have a longing in the inside to be loved and desired by the man she will spend the rest of her life with in holy matrimony. There came a time where He created the angels that worshiped Him and He became "God" object of worship. The scriptures read that He created heaven and earth. He created man in His own image and then created him a body to dwell in. Now He is creator and father. He allowed the serpent to beguile Eve to bring the fall of man to bring into play the opportunity to display Himself as "savior". Satan expecting to see God bring death upon man for partaking of the forbidden fruit was surprised by a new attribute of Him that he never saw before-Mercy. God clothed Adam and Eve with sheep skins. I can imagine as Adam and Eve began to leave the garden seeing the charibum standing on the east side with the flaming sword Adam began to remember what a blessing it had been to have been able to dwell in the presence of God in a perfect Garden. Now he is going to leave this wonderful place and as Adam had tear filled eyes he began to feel something running down his legs. What was it? The blood of the Lamb! I can imagine he now receives the revelation that by the blood of the lamb he will be coming back one day. And friends that is where salvation lies is in the blood of the Lamb. Its not in church attendance, paying tithes, or even how we dress though those things are good and will follow the believer. We are saved by His Grace through faith in the blood of the Lamb.

God Bless You,
Bro Daniel

It's a New Day

Today is a new day! The thing I like about a new day is that you can examine your attitude from the previous days and the decisions you made and make improvements. We have the ability to constantly be working on the building. You see houses around and some are well kept up and the place looks nice even when its old. Many houses on the other hand, even new ones,  look very ran down. It could be that the owners don't have the finances or the physical ability to keep the place up. Yet then again some people just don't care what things look like. We have something about us that we can work on that doesn't take finances or even great physical strength. That is our attitude and our approach. The way our home or vehicle is kept up reflects our character. If you see a house or vehicle that is clean and smells good it speaks of the environment that the owner is comfortable in dwelling. If you see a vehicle or home that is filthy inside and out, it speaks that the owner is too busy to clean, not able to clean, or doesn't care. What is it that defines being clean? There is something we must compare to in order to judge whether something is clean or not. The Word of God is the Absolute, so lets examine our life today and ask ourselves; do I need to clean today or make adjustments?

Another Spring

I was cutting my grass this evening and I was thinking to myself about how spring is here again. I can remember being a young child mowing the lawn and just thinking. I would think about school, life, and where will I be in ten years. Now its been over ten years and very much has changed. I am serving the Lord now, I am married, and I have my own children who like to mow the lawn now. I would of never thought that the world would still be going on today back then. I can now look back and remember how many of my family and friends have past away. My stepfather past away last July. I was present and seen them shocking him with the fibulator and performing CPR on him until we lost him. The day after his funeral I seriously injured my back and had to have back surgery and was told by the doctors that I will never be able to lift over 25 lbs for the rest of my life and will have to do seditary work. I really miss my stepfather and I really miss having my full strength in my body like I used to have. I have been seeking for employment, however I haven't been able to find a job yet, because of my work restrictions. I am confessing the Lord has healed my back, He will restore my back, and He is going to provide me with an income. I recently went on a missions trip to Honduras and from a financial standpoint, it looked like a foolish decision to go when I didn't even have employment at the time, but I felt the Lord called me to go so I went and He really blessed the trip. Several souls came to the Lord and many rededicated their life to the Lord. The scripture says that Job was a righteous man, but I bet if you asked him if he felt righteous he would tell you he did not. I am looking forward to the eternal spring. At that spring, there will be no body aches, no painful memories, and no more valleys.

A Testimony of God's Mercy

I would like to share a testimony I have seen the Lord do this week. Monday night my family and I sat down to do our bible study before bed, however the Lord moved upon my heart and I began to get a little more excited than usual to say the least. One of my boys has been struggling lately and I knew he was fighting some battles. In the little service we had here in our home on our couch, the Lord convicted his heart and he spoke to me with tears in his eyes," Daddy, will you pray for me? I want to get right with God." I tell you saints, it brought joy to my heart! We all knelt right here in my living room as we prayed together for our precious brother in the Lord. My daughter has been asking me about water baptism since I've been back from my missions trip to Honduras. I told her its very important to me that she understands why she is being baptized, so we have been studying over true repentance, water baptism, and why we need to be baptized. My daughter is only 7 years old, so I want to make sure it is God dealing with her rather than just doing it because its sounds like a neat thing to do. My wife walked up on her and our neighbor's child yesterday and heard my daughter telling the little boy,'' I have accepted Jesus into my heart and me and my Daddy are praying about me being baptized." The little boy sat their and listened so intently, my wife told me. It brings joy to my heart! I am a Sunday School teacher for the older kids. One of our young brothers and one of the young sisters has rededicated their life to the Lord since last week as well. By His Grace, I will be baptizing these three this coming Sunday. It brings joy to my heart to see these young souls coming to the Lord. It is a joy to serve the Lord! My God is real. Its not just a bunch of rules to live by, but accepting the Person Jesus Christ into our heart and He is living through us.

Let Not Sin Reign in You

In Romans 6:12, it speaks: Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. When I think of reigning, I think of a king that is reigning over his kingdom. That king decides what will be permitted in his kingdom and what is acceptable. He decides the standard that would be set for his kingdom. We have a kingdom within ourselves and we decide who we will be servants to. Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness? (Romans 6:13) A tree is known by its fruit. When you see apples all over a tree, that's a pretty good indication that its an apple tree. However, if it has lemons all over it, but its professing to be an apple tree, there is something wrong there. Lets take some time to examine ourselves by our fruits. What kind of fruit am I bearing? There must be a standard to gauge ourselves by and that gauge is the Word of God. The world's standard is to go by what you feel or just follow your heart. Friends, that is a deception. Your feelings and your heart will deceive you. Blind people go by feelings. Christians walk by faith. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. You can look at the world and see the results of not have a true standard. I am so thankful for an anchor! The folks on a ship won't truly no how to appreciate an anchor until a strong storm arises. It is in the time of a need for an anchor that the anchor will be appreciated. My anchor is my faith in the word of God. I heard a person say one time, I would do this, but I gotta keep my faith. Not to be disagreeable, but its not me that keeps my faith, but its my faith that keeps me. Faith comes from God. It is when true need arises and what needs to be attained can not be attained by ourselves when faith is needed. Until then, you don't realize how to appreciate faith. When death comes knocking at your door unexpectedly, you then realize how much you have in life that honesty doesn't amount to anything. The one thing we need during those times is Faith in the Word of God. Faith comes from God through the preaching of the word. There is going to be a rapture one of these days and it will be by faith which worketh my love that it will be attained. The rapture of this body is unattainable by ourselves. However if the same spirit that raised Christ from the dead dwell in you, it will quicken your mortal body. What is reigning in you? Sin or Faith?

Meditate on Him

I read this yesterday morning and thought is was very inspirational. I thought I would share it.

HIS.WONDERS.TO.PERFORM_  CHICAGO.IL  SUNDAY_  58-0112A

  E-29    Oh, friend, I hope the little lady doesn't take this too personally, but it's my daughter-in-law, who's setting present now. This has been the greatest week of her life. Last evening while we were setting together waiting for Billy to bring the car back, in the lobby of the hotel, and on the ballroom floor they were having a rock-and-roll, or some kind of a amusing dance. And little children, little boys no more than twelve years old or less, smoking cigarettes, and little girls. And the little lady looked at me, and she said, "Billy, pray for me." All week over in her room, I've heard her singing songs. I heard her singing last evening before she went to church, my favorite song, "Down From His Glory." She started reading the Bible, and she's pretty near read the Bible through this week. You go to singing hymns; you start reading the Bible; and that Stranger will appear to you too. Meditate on His Word.

It was while those who went to Emmaus, along the road, begin to talk about Him, that He stepped out of the bushes and walked with them through the day. The reason we don't have the spiritual blessings, we have too much time to watch television, too much time to read the newspapers or listen to something that we ought not to be listening to. And we are not redeeming the time, but we're giving it to the things of the world instead of our time to the Lord Jesus. And the Bible said, that, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceedeth from the mouth of God." Christians live on the Word.