Defining the Word of God

February 24, 2011 in Theology with 0 Comments

As a Christian, I constantly hear about the term “Word of God”, but what does that really mean? Sure, it might mean the bible, but isn’t there more to that? What makes a letter from Paul to the Romans a word of God? Wasn’t it written by man? These are some questions that I will try to clear up, but let me forewarn you, I am not a pastor, or a theologian, merely a man who digs into the bible seeking questions and answers.

Jesus Christ

The first thing that I want to point out is the first mention of the “Word” in regards to a timeline. In John 1:1 it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. Since the written bible we have in our hands right now didn’t exist in “the beginning”, he must be talking about Christ. Why do I say this? Well, in the beginning, before Creation, only God existed, so Father, Son and the Holy Spirit existed together, one of which was called “Word”.

In John 1:14, it continues “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth”. Obviously this refers to Christ because of the nature of his coming into this world, being born fully man, but fully God, and living perfectly so that He could die for us. There is no doubt here. But the question now is why is Christ refered to as “Word”. He never actually wrote any scripture himself. His apostles wrote directly of their experience with Christ through the Holy Spirit, so the Holy Spirit technically provides more “Word” of God characteristics than Christ, doesn’t it?

I would argue no, Christ is the Word of God. Besides explicitly stating so in John 1:14 (quoted above), by his mouth, the voice of God is heard. By his example, the law was upheld perfectly. It’s for those reasons that Christ easily defines the “Word of God”.

The Bible

The Old Testament clearly holds its own in regards to the “Word of God”. It clearly states in Exodus 32:16 that the “Ten Commandments” we know of today were from God. “The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets.” In my mind, I can hear skeptics saying that any book could have the words “This is the word of god” written in it and it doesn’t make it the word of God by its own admission. I fully agree with that statement, but peer review is a great concept to ensure accuracy of written works.

I’m not talking about the Jewish Scholars and church leaders during the time the Old testament was compiled. While they are certainly considered peers and their opinions noteworthy. The mere fact that we have to rely on a sinful human to validate Gods word is ridiculous. The peer review I am talking about is still a man, but also God himself. Yes, Jesus validates the old testament by never denouncing it while on earth.

Our God, who sent Jesus down to earth to die for us because of His love for us, would not by nature withhold any errors in the old testament from our knowledge because it goes against his nature. Christ came to save the world, so why wouldn’t he point out books of the bible that shouldnt be there? He didn’t say anything to this regard because they are inerrant.

The New Testament is written from a couple different “Word of God” sources. First, the holy spirit was given to the disciples as promised by Jesus in John 14:26, “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you”. So now, using the word of God, the disciples were able to write of Jesus’ ministry in the gospel. As for Paul, he too was given the Holy Spirit and given the “Words of God” to be included into the New Testament.

Also, there are prophets in the new testament. Consider words spoken by Moses (Deut. 18:18-20) or Jeremiah(Jer 1:9). according to those verses God gave them words to speak, as if from God himself. Even though a man spoke the words, they are still considered the “Word of God” since God spoke through the man.

God Himself

In Genesis, the phrase “And God said” occurs often during those six days of creation, followed by a day of rest. Whats important to note here is that whenever “And God said” occurs, something amazing happens. Let there be light, water, earth, sun, moon, stars, animals and people. There was only God and his creation. I believe that this is the most powerful “Word of God” example, but it is also the least accessible to us. I don’t know of anyone who actually heard God speak to them, but rather through the Holy Spirit. I know that when God speaks, his will is done, there is no hesitation, because he is God. You could relate it to the Kings of old, who would create “decrees” that would exist throughout their kingdom, which in essence were laws, but could not be refuted because the law came directly from the top.

There is so much to the Word of God and there is no way to sum it up in a single post, or a dozen, but I will write a few more posts on this topic because it has been on my heart a lot lately.

My side…

February 21, 2011 in Testimony with 0 Comments

Well I am, as my title suggests, the wife:) Nate asked me to share my side of our story and I would love to do so. If you would like to read his side first, visit here.

I think I’ll begin with a bit about my growing up years. I accepted Christ as my savior when I was around 4 years of age. My parents were Christians who took me to church, Sunday school, and AWANA regularly. I am very thankful for the family God placed me in, and I am also thankful for the body of believers that He gave me in my church. I was 17 and quite involved in my church’s youth group when Nate and I started dating. I liked Nate a lot and was thrilled to have a boyfriend, but I could not ignore this nagging feeling from the Holy Spirit that I was disobeying God. Nate was not a Christian and I knew it. God continue to tug at my heart and I continued to rationalize the situation by having Nate come to church and youth group as often as I could drag him there. Finally, after five months of dating, I ended the relationship. It was one of the most painful things I have ever endured in my life. I obeyed God but didn’t instantly feel better by any means. I spent many nights crying out to God and praying for comfort and peace. It was during one of these times that God spoke lovingly to my heart and directed me to Isaiah 43:1-7.

1 “But now thus says the Lord,
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine.
2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.
3 For I am the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.
I give Egypt as your ransom,
Cush and Seba in exchange for you.
4 Because you are precious in my eyes,
and honored, and I love you,
I give men in return for you,
peoples in exchange for your life.
5 Fear not, for I am with you;
I will bring your offspring from the east,
and from the west I will gather you.
6 I will say to the north, Give up,
and to the south, Do not withhold;
bring my sons from afar
and my daughters from the end of the earth,
7 everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory,
whom I formed and made.”

What stood out to me the most from this passage is that God declared that I was His, I was precious and honored in His sight, and He loved me deeply. This is definitely a major growing point in my walk with Christ. From then on, my relationship with Christ continued to deepen.
Although Nate and I were just friends after this time, my love for him did not dissipate.  We attended prom together and finished our senior year of high school.  It was during that summer that I discovered Nate had accepted Christ the very night we had broken up.  You can imagine my surprise and excitement!  Although we probably weren’t prepared, we started dating again before college.  I didn’t realize that Nate had a lot of growing to do, and I needed to trust Christ.  However, I plundered ahead as I had before and found myself struggling.  Nate’s college experience away from home was not positive (as you know if you’ve read his blog entry) and I spent my time on weekend commuting to see him and spending my trip home in tears.

When Nate decided to come back to our hometown to join me at the local University I was thrilled!  We could finally be together.  This, however, brought on a new set of challenges as we struggled to maintain purity while feeling so strongly for one another.  By God’s grace we were married on June 10th, 2006, and now have a very beautiful (almost) 2 year old girl.  We have not been solid and faithful in our walks with Christ, but He has been forever solid, faithful, and trustworthy.  I give Him praise for His steadfast love for us.

Westboro Baptist Church is not a Christ following church

February 21, 2011 in Reflections with 0 Comments

This is an open letter to this church. I am disgusted to constantly hear about this church and their protests concerning homosexuality. What I am disgusted about is the mere fact they are misrepresenting Jesus Christ with their actions. You are not reading in the news about the church who is following Christ, growing in love for each other and the community….Instead we read and hear about a radical church that does not understand or even read the word of God. In fact, lets not even call this a church, because it’s not. A church is the body of Christ, and to be honest, I believe this Westboro Baptist group is the opposite.

I would like this church to know, since apparently they haven’t read the bible, that the greatest commandment is told in Matthew 22:37-40:

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Love your neighbor as yourself… I am misunderstanding the concept behind your approach to evangelism? godhatesfags.com is a horrible way to treat your neighbor as yourself. At least by the name of your website, it clearly says to me “I am not a Christ following church” Oh…but you are right…Gods hates sin…He detests it and rightfully so…He should destroy us for our sins, but as Romans 3:23 says “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”. Westboro Baptist, you have sinned as well and fall short of the glory of God.

I believe your argument will now be, “but those sins are homosexuality, which God hates and so do we”. Seeing as you have never read the bible, I should mention that the sin doesn’t matter. All that our sin does it make our reliance on Christs sacrifice even more significant. No sin is to great for God to forgive. He is God and can forgive any sin, which he did by sending his son to die on the cross for us.

I do believe that homosexuality is a sin, but not one that can separate you from Christs forgiveness.

Psalm 103:9-12 He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever;
he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;
as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.

If that passage isn’t clear enough for you, then I don’t know what is… The Westboro church reminds me of the parable of the unmerciful servant who received forgiveness and mercy then went on to show malice and harshness to his own debtors. But as Jesus states at the end of the parable, The Master called the man wicked and threw him in jail to be tortured until he could pay back what he owed.(Matthew 18:21-35)

“Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. 25 Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had to be sold to repay the debt. At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ 27 The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.”

“But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins.He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back. But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.”

“Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34 In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

I believe that when the Master threw the man into jail to be tortured until he could repay the debt, this is representative of hell. That servant would never be able to pay those debts off and will spend the rest of his life in jail. Likewise, whoever acts like this servant (Westboro Baptist), you will spend an eternity in hell.

Remove yourselves from that cult and realize who Christ really is. Learn his love and spend the rest of your life faithfully evangelizing a message of Christs forgiving love, not your own hatred.

Radical…Not Mere Christianity

February 18, 2011 in Reflections with 0 Comments

I have always said that if you combine radicals and religion together, the combination is dangerous. Radical, as a noun, is defined as “a person who holds or follows strong convictions or extreme principles; extremist.” extremists and religion can be very dangerous. I was reading an article about Islamic extremists taking advantage of the recent Egyptian rioting. Islamic Extremists have become suicide bombers in recent years, using their faith as an excuse for violent “holy” crimes.

Radical Christianity could be misinterpreted as the same thing. A group of extremists take the Bible and find what they want to find. A command to mistreat your wife, or worse… to kill others…. I want to become a radical Christian, but not in this sense, no….Let me explain further about the kind of radical change that pray takes place.

C.S. Lewis rights in his book “Mere Christianity” about basic principles of thought and the reasons why men and women ought to act a certain way.  This may very well have been because of the era the book was written, but Christianity has taken a nose dive into the shallow end of the pool. Today, our children are growing up “sexualized” by the time they turn six. We have allowed them to become sexual objects, but whats worse is that it has become acceptable. Not acceptable as in “We’ll tolerate it for now…She’s growing up and finding her own way”…The thought has become “She looks cute in that”… We no longer attribute this act of “sexualization” with being an actual problem, but accept it as a societal normalcy.

Mere Christianity is taking literally, that we are merely Christians trying to live in a society of sex and sin, go to church, attend a bible study…. Did Christ merely die on the cross? Does his death deserve a “mere” attitude or a “radical” one? God made man for his glory and today, what we have become is not glorifying to God, Christians and Secular alike. We failed at providing him glory.

Sure, God was glorified in the sense that creating us in his image gave him glory, but instead of worshiping Him, we pervert his most wonderful gifts, life and sex. I know, I know..Sin is the issue here and it exemplifies our need for a savior all the more….But are you sharing that news?

I implore you to become a radical Christian. Become bold in your faith. Why be ashamed of sharing the greatest news you’ve ever heard of in your life? Christ died to save us from our sin. Christ being Gods son, fully man, but fully God, literally had our sins placed on him past, present and future. With that in mind, are you going to allow the “mere” Christianity nature we’ve gotten ourselves into? We need to act, and act now. Did you know that more people have most likely heard Gods Word, or read it than have listened to Lady Gaga, Eminem, Usher, Justin Bieber, and the Black Eyed Peas combined? Why then are we allowing them to shape our society?

I would propose that in a day, someone listens to and talks about Justin Bieber more than Christ. If we are in Gods word the same amount of time we are listening to music or watching television, could you imagine the society that we would be living in? It won’t be perfect, no…But can you imagine the change? Step out in your faith and lead by example. Pray with your kids every day. Let them see your passion for Christ and that passion will be contagious to them. Teach them to be bold and real with their friends. Teach them to be unafraid of sharing Christ and that there is no more in life than him.

JB or JC…Who died for you? Become a radical!

My Testimony – Part II – College and Marriage

February 14, 2011 in Testimony with 0 Comments

If you came to this post before reading the first half, you can read part one here. How fitting this part of my testimony is that it lands on Valentines Day. It wasn’t intentional, but pretty cool nonetheless. After coming to know Christ, I immediately hit a rough time in my life. My girlfriend and I were both going to college, but I was going to one 120 miles away. I had my first taste of living away from the parents and wanted to enjoy it.

I tried finding a Christian college group, but failed to feel connected in any way and soon decided to hang out with people who would welcome a college freshman. Unfortunately, these people like to party and I soon got caught up into it. I would drink with them at a different party 2-3 nights out of a week and my grades slipped…In fact, I hardly went to class at all. My girlfriend and I saw each other a couple weekends a month perhaps and I lied to my teeth to her. I told her nothing related to the truth. I was obviously ashamed, but didn’t realize it until I got back around people who followed Christ.

I was in trouble, my dad is an alcoholic (he’s been alcohol free since 1983 though) and I was following in those footsteps. I realized I had a problem when I could drink a 12 pack and be barely buzzed… I didn’t care though, I was living in sin and Satan was enjoying the life he was destroying.

The turn-around

Summer came and the very first weekend back home I was invited to a party. I hadn’t had a drink in a week, so it was a welcome invitation. However, it was at this party that God spoke to me. In my head, as audibly as I hear someone speak to me, I heard him say, “What are you doing?!” I immediately left that party and vowed to not re-enter that life. I believe i slipped once more that year, but I am not sure as Gods redemption is more prominent to me than my past sin. It was at this time, during the summer that I knew I needed to flee from temptation and decided to stay home and go to school. This was the best decision I had ever made.

I got connected with my old friends, who were followers of Christ and I got connected with some great college ministries. My understanding of God grew more through this time and felt God leading me to ask my girlfriends hand in marriage. She said yes. How awesome is it that God, who asked her to break up with me because I wasnt a believer in Christ during high school,directly resulted in me following Christ, and finally he brings us back together in marriage!

We married on June 10, 2006 and now have a wonderful baby girl, who turns two on March 13, 2011! But the story doesn’t end here because over the last year, God has challenged each of us. I know his basic message to us is trust. We needed to learn to trust in him!

Marines

In the summer of 2010, God reminded me of something he placed on my heart all the way back in 2002. When I finished highschool, I felt God leading me to join the Marines, but chose to ignore him and go to college. During college he reminded me again and again and I would always say, “When I’m done with college, I will join”. After college, I got married, and ignored God again, citing another excuse. The  same thing happened after the birth of my daughter. More excuses…

It wasn’t until I got into the word of God that I actually listened to God and started the process of joining the United States Marine Corps through the Officer Candidate School. I had to lose 80 lbs and run 3 miles in 22 minutes. At that point I couldn’t walk up the stairs without feeling winded. But through faith, I trained and met the physical and weight requirements, with room to spare. They sent me to MEPS, where they perform medical and physical evaluations to determine your eligibility to join the armed forces.

I passed everything I had control of with flying colors. I failed the hearing test. Since I was born, my hearing in one ear has been horrible and evidentially this was a problem. They sent me back again several weeks later for a specialist exam and the results were the same. I was then consulted by the doctor at MEPS that this issue will DQ (Disqualify) me for the Marines, and to my shock, every single Armed Forces branch of the US military…

I drove back home from this appointment in shock, questioning God…Angry that he would put me through this. I was angry that he would put my family through this. The thing is, my hearing has always been bad. It’s not as if my hearing got bad over the last 10 years, which revealed to me Gods intention. God wanted me to act out in faith and to trust God, much like Abraham when he was told to sacrifice his only son Isaac.

Gen 22:2  He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” ….Gen 22:9  When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.

Like Abraham, who was at the altar, moments before his son was to be sacrificed, I was at MEPS, ready to sign my contract immediately following the exams like everyone else.

Gen 22:12  He said, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.”

God stopped this from happening. He was merely testing my faith. After this event in my life, I have experienced a more significant growth in my walk with Christ. I actually yearn to get into his word more and to put all my trust in him. I am not perfect, nor will I ever be, but through Christ and his unbelievable love for me, I became perfect with sins removed. I am ready to enter the kingdom of God. I am ready for my next test of faith and I will not hesitate. Trust God!

My Testimony – Part I – Finding Christ

February 13, 2011 in Prayer with 0 Comments

In 2001, I was a junior in high school and interested the usual things. I liked sports and girls, but not necessarily in that order. I had a great group of friends at that time too. We hung out all the time, usually picked fights and a few of them smoked. We also frequently drove around and went to lunch, even though I had a school permit. In Nebraska, a school permit allowed someone under 16 to only drive to and from school… Great group of friends and a great influence? Right?

Around that time, I had a friend who participated in a church “Lunch Bunch” where the church would pick up the students and as a group they would all head out to go to lunch together. I had a friend named Nick who was involved with this and I decided to tag along for the free ride. After doing this for a while, a friend convinced me to ask out a girl who went with this group periodically. I didn’t have a date to the upcoming school dance so I decided to ask her to the dance.

After she said “yes”, I hung out with her during most lunches and was invited to their Church Youth Group on Wednesday nights. I really hated the idea of going to a church “thing”, but obliged because I knew this girl I was dating was a Christian and it would please her. I remember the first Youth Group night. I left with more questions than I had answered. They were watching the movie “Left Behind” and I was totally confused about why the people had disappeared, so I asked my date about this and she told me it was in the bible. I went to several more youth group evenings and made a few friends during this time, but I really enjoyed the extra time with my new girlfriend. After one youth group evening, I was handed a note by my girlfriend. It went something like this…

Nathan, this is hard for me to say, so I am writing this to you. I need to let you know that I feel that God doesn’t want me in a relationship right now. I need to listen to God on this and I am sorry, but we need to just be friends.

I was floored. I thought everything was alright! I had no idea why she broke up with me and was angry. She wanted to talk about it after I read the note, but I stormed out and left her crying with her friends.

That night I changed

That very night, I came home and went into my room. I read and re-read that note, completely perplexed about what happened. It was then I prayed to God. I had prayed with the youth group before, but never prayed on my own to God. I prayed to God for understanding and realized then, through tears, that I needed Christ’s salvation, through his death on a cross for my sins. I was still upset about my ex-girlfriends note, but felt a sense of renewal and thankfulness for Gods mercy.

The next day I remember hanging out with the old friends, and the words they were saying felt like bee stings to my ears. I spoke the same way prior to this and heard this everyday, but know they were painful to hear. I couldn’t stand being around it anymore and stopped hanging out with this group of friends. Luckily God had given me a bunch of new friends at the church to hang out with. Looking back, I realize that God is in control because not a single one of my friends ended up graduating high school and I wouldn’t be shocked to hear if a few of them have had jail-time. God turned my life around at that time. That summer, my “ex” girlfriend became my best friend and during that summer I shared with her that I was now following Christ and the night we broke up was the night that I had my sins lifted from me because of the death and resurrection of Christ.

That summer came and went. The next school year, my “best friend” and I decided to go to the prom together as friends. We tried dating and obviously that didn’t work, so we decided to go as friends.  It was then I found out the reason she had broken up with me the year before. She felt God telling her that she should not be dating someone who didn’t believe in Christ.

2Co 6:14  Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?

It is amazing to see that God asked her to break up with me because of my unbelief and that very night I came to know Christ. We didn’t know about Gods intentions with this situation until months later, but God knew before he even asked her to break up with me that the result would be my salvation. After we learned this we starting dating again and quickly feel in love. High school ended and college was approaching. Little did we know what a difficult time the first year in college would be…

Continue reading… My Testimony Part II – College then Marriage

Would you consider joining this site?

February 13, 2011 in Administration with 0 Comments

Hey friends! Would you consider joining this site? It’s free and its purpose is to further the kingdom of God by sharing our faith with others! You can choose to remain anonymous if you wish! You don’t have to put your actual name in the registration page!

I would really love to see God use your testimony and faith to reach others! Even if you don’t want to write a post, please prayerfully consider joining and inviting your friends as well!

He is faithful

I had been praying to God that other would find this site, not just my friends on Facebook and God answered. I firmly believe that if a single person comes to Christ or grows in their faith from any ministry, then that ministry was worth the time and cost it takes to make it available…JUST ONE… I know God will do great things with this site and the posts you create, but I wanted you to know he answered my prayer that someone would find this site because it can be difficult to get visitors, especially then its a brand new site.Just today, I was reviewing the sites analytical tracking to see if anyone search for something and found this site and they did. God is faithful and our site was found!

Prayerfully consider becoming apart of this ministry, even if it’s just a single post. Share your testimony and your faith and give God the glory!

The journey is hard, but God promised…

February 10, 2011 in Prayer with 0 Comments

I was reading about Joshua, in none other than the book of Joshua and am completely floored by his story. This man is an example of a man with great faith. Huge faith. Extreme faith. Whatever you call it, it’s probably one of the biggest examples of a man of God in the entire Bible. Joshua was a faithful man, recognizing God as a powerful God… I should note though that it would be hard to not be faithful when God provides food from the sky for you for 40 years… Who wouldn’t be? But the point here is that  he knew Gods magnificent power. Whether it is shown to us or not, we need to understand his power. Now Joshua knew of Gods power, sure, but the real thing that kept him praying and confident in the Lord was Gods promise.

Gods promise was that Joshua would enter his promised land and he held firm to that promise. Joshua had to endure 40 years of homelessness before he could enter the land the Lord prepared for him. Could you stay as faithful as Joshua after 40 years, while waiting for Gods promise? Today, we hold firm to a promise that Gods sacrifice is enough to cover our sins and allow us to enter our promised land, heaven.

I want my faith to be as strong as Joshua’s because he endured what we are enduring today….An extended wait until we can enter Gods kingdom, which was promised to us.  Joshua’s faith was so strong, he could ask God for anything and in confidence, know it will come to pass. That is faith!

I just witnessed a miracle! Or I can’t count…

February 9, 2011 in Prayer, Testimony with 0 Comments

Today at lunch I was reading about God providing food for the five-thousand with five loaves of bread in Matthew 14:19-21

Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass, and taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

After reading about that I prayed about it, completely amazed at Gods miracle even though I’ve read this many, many times before. I thanked God that he would show us miracles, but that I desired my faith to be strong since I’ve never “knowingly” seen a miracle. Then my day went on from their until dinner time. My wife was away tonight, so doing the fatherly thing, I cooked for my daughter…McDonalds that is. Bringing it home, I began to eat my 10 piece nugget meal with my daughter. After a short while, I decided to count my nuggets because I was considering giving one to my daughter, who had a chicken nugget kids meal. I remember clearly counting 6 nuggets on my plate and didn’t question it because I ate about four nuggets prior to that.

About 10 minutes later, I was getting full and counted my nuggets again.1..2..3..4..5..6.. plus one in my hand…I had been eating nuggets for 10 minutes and was feeling stuffed…I immediatly questioned my sanity, but then I looked at my dipping sauce and I had used two of them up completely. I know I ate around 6-10 more nuggets during those 10 minutes. Then it struck me…God has a sense of humor…I was really hungry when I started eating and I was stuffed when I was done. I prayed to God right then and there that God is amazing and that even in the slim chance I miscounted, that this miracle would not be impossible for him because he’s done it before!

I am 100% confident in my ability to add and am 100% confident I counted correctly and I verified my container was in fact a small container that said 10 piece nuggets on it…It wasn’t a 20 piece container! Through faith, a miracle was witnessed! God, thank you for making faith in you so easy to have! Your demonstration of love through Christ is enough, but you continue to show us your love in everything we do! I pray that we can all recognize the fact that you are our only source of life and that we don’t need anything else!

Wow thank you God for your simple yet profound demonstration of your power!!

Why have you forsaken me?

February 8, 2011 in Prayer with 0 Comments

I still can’t get over the fact that Jesus would die for me. I used to have this picture in my head that he simply forgave me of my sins, but Jesus did much more than that. He took on my sins. He quite literally took all my sins onto himself. While on the cross, Jesus cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)

I can’t even begin to imagine what he was feeling. He incurred all of Gods wrath and anger because of the sin he took from us. He experienced agony, sorrow, guilt, pain and so much more. All of that was what we felt carrying that sin and he took it onto himself. Wow…

Before I go on, I need to be clear about mentioning his death because it should be noted that through this death, he defeats Satan and is resurrected. In Hebrews 2:14-15 it says:

Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

So not only do we have a God that loves us. One who dies for us. One who saves us from death, and concurs death himself through his resurrection. But defeats Satan! So obviously Jesus can be described as loving, sacrificial, death-defying and powerful and yet he cries out.

What this tells me is that his sacrifice was the most loving thing anyone has ever done for me. I owe Jesus my life because he died for me! I was reading Mere Christianity, by C.S. Lewis and he likened his forgiving our sins to this example.

If you were to step on a mans foot, you would have wronged that man, but if you were to apologize, then the wrong is righted. Now imagine someone comes along and says “I forgive you for stepping on that mans toe”. As a man, he would have no right to forgive someones wrong-doing against another man, but as God, Jesus can do this because he took the wrong and attributed to himself.

I wasnt quoting that word for word, but by memory, so I apologize in advance! Anyhow, the very nature of God was shown in that one-act of sacrifice, proving he loves us. This is amazing because God was sick of the sin of man in the past and destroyed the earth and all its inhabitants, except Noah and his family (Genesis 6-8).  There was no chance at salvation for them. This time God gave us that chance. Choose to believe in Jesus and know what it means to have your sins forgiven!

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