Just Believe

I couldn’t sleep last night. I’ve got insomnia and I had this article stuck in my head. I got up twice to literally put pen to paper in the dark so I don’t wake up the rest of the family. I was up first at 1:30 am and again at 2 am. My best ideas come at night when I can’t sleep and if I don’t write them down, their gone the next day, no matter how much I rack my brain, I can’t remember it.

I was up last night wondering what it’s like to be a non-believer. What’s it like to not believe in God? You can either choose to believe in God and Jesus or you can believe in nothing or maybe you believe in science. Don’t you think it takes more energy being a non-believer than it does being a believer? It’s kind of sad, when you think about it. How do you fully love if you don’t believe in Jesus? That’s a big part of being a Christian, is to love like Jesus or to try, how can we ever love like Jesus, but as a Christian, we must love one another. If you don’t believe in Jesus, it almost sounds like the absence of love.

What does it take to be a believer? I’m no expert, but I think it takes a person with an open mind and a willingness to believe in something greater than yourself.

Something that I think we take for granted, is the sun rising every day. Another miracle that we take for granted is the miracle of human life leading up to child birth. I don’t believe that these things just came about on their own. I believe that God created all living things and created Heaven and Earth. Genesis 1. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of waters. 3. Then God said ‘Let there be light’, and there was light. 4. And God saw that the light was good. Then he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light ‘day’ and the darkness ‘night.’ And evening passed and morning came, marking the first day,” Holy Bible NLT, Second Edition. But I believe in the bible, if your an atheist you don’t believe in the bible.

It’s hard for me to fathom not believing so I’ll chose to Just Believe.

Strengthening Your Walk With Jesus

First of all, I am a sinner just like you! But, in my opinion, surrendering to Jesus Christ and accepting him as your personal savior is the easy part. It’s strengthening your relationship with Jesus, improving your walk with him is the hard part, and I wouldn’t really say it’s difficult, but it takes time.

First, you need to pray to strengthen you relationship with him, secondly, to be able to hear what God wants from you or which path you should travel, you need to read your Bible and finally attend Church. It may be hard to find the right Church for you, maybe it’s not the first Church you visit, but keep looking for a Church that fills your spiritual needs. It should be a place where you feel loved and a place where you feel overcome by the Holy Spirit and when you accept Jesus into your life (with faith), ask him to forgive you of ALL your sins (with faith), pray to Jesus, read your Bible and attend a loving Church with the Holy Spirit, God will certainly bless you and your cup will runneth over.

In Psalms 23 it says “¹The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing. ²He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, ³he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake. ⁴Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. ⁵You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. ⁶Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever. ” New International Version (NIV).

Also after accepting Jesus into your life you’re going to be faced with choices everyday. It could be anything from to drink alcohol, try or do drugs, gossip, go to work or stay home, who you associate yourself with, to how you treat your neighbors. There are many choices we are faced with on a daily basis that either strengthens or weakens our relationship with God, and as Christians we need to make good decisions.

We must also love one another. John 13:34 says “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another”, New International Version (NIV). To love like Jesus loved us might just be the hardest commandment to live by because Jesus loved us so much he died for our sins, but we have to try to love one another as much as we possibly can. God Bless You and I look forward to writing more.

Reality Outreach Ministries

Dwayne and Renee Corbin, U.S. Ministry President/Team came to the sleepy little town of Mena, Arkansas and it changed my life. I have never been a part of anything as rewarding as working with this wonderful Christian family that is so dedicated to bringing people to Jesus.

To be in the production of Heaven’s Gates & Hell’s Flames, you have to dedicate some time but it is well worth it. There was a lot of praying, learning lines and practicing involved. We started on a Saturday in the morning at 9 a.m. and was at Church all day, praying, reading our lines and practicing, then we went home memorized our lines and came back Sunday, sang worship songs, prayed and practiced for our show that started Sunday night at 7 p.m., again all day, then had another show Monday and Tuesday.

I have to say, I haven’t had this much fun in a long time. It’s more fun than fishing (and I love to go fishing), going to a water park, or anything, I can think of. It was very rewarding to watch people accept Jesus into their lives. And I have grown spiritually as well. There is a lot of prayer involved to be a part of Heaven’s Gates & Hell’s Flames. It also brought our Church closer together. I would recommend every Church to reach out to Reality Outreach Ministries and book them to come to your Church. Honestly, I don’t want them to leave.

https://realityoutreach.org/

Heaven’s Gates & Hell’s Flames

The production Heaven’s Gates & Hell’s Flames is in our sleepy little town of Mena, Arkansas and when they arrived and asked for people to be in the production, to be honest, I really didn’t want to be in it, but since there wasn’t many people I was chosen to be in more than one scene, but I sure am glad I was picked.

But I have to say in the first scene, I have to beat Jesus up and nail him to the cross. Do you know how hard it is to beat the man up that died for all of our sins? And even worse, to nail the man responsible for all us to be able to enter Heaven to the cross? And even worse than that stab Jesus with a spear, which is the reason he dies. I’d much rather be in my Christian family scene.

But it is so rewarding seeing people accept Jesus into their lives as their Savior. It’s like nothing I have ever been a part of and frankly, I don’t want it to end. We have two more nights of the production. I pray that there are so many people tonight and tomorrow night that they stay for more nights, we’ll see.

Heaven’s Gates & Hell’s Flames is life changing for the people in the production and the people being saved. If you get a chance I encourage you to be involved in it in your Church.

My Cup Runneth Over

I have been strengthening my walk with Jesus and spending more time building a relationship with him (my wife and I have joined the Church, my wife and I have been reading our Bibles, daily, and I have been praying more) and I can see small miracles being performed everyday.

I commute 1 hour and 45 minutes one way to work and the road I travel is heavily populated with deer. I pray that the deer stay on their side of the road and they have. I have passed deer right on the shoulder of the road. I try to slow down and move over to the other lane, if it is possible. I pray for my safety when I travel to and from work and the last few months have seen a lot of rain and thunderstorms to include hail, strong winds and sometimes tornadoes. And God is looking out for me, whether that means my boss sending me a message to work from home, or the storms along my way dissipating and weakening, missing me, or me being allowed to adjust my time to travel to and from work, whatever the case may be God is taking care of me.

Our Pastor at Church is also leaving and we’ll be looking for a new one. God put it on my heart to be a part of the committee to search for a new Pastor and I didn’t tell anyone about this feeling to be a part of this committee, but one of the Deacons unexpectedly asked if I wanted to be on the pulpit committee. It was such a welcomed surprise and an honor to be nominated, God certainly works in mysterious ways. While I don’t want to lose the current Pastor we have, I certainly don’t want to stand in the way of God’s will and I look forward to helping find a Pastor to fill the void of losing the current one.

I feel blessed beyond measure, my cup is definitely running over and I believe the more time you spend getting to know Jesus, reading your Bible, spending time at Church, attending Church events, helping when you can, and praying the more you will be blessed. And I feel Blessed!