Are You A Square Peg?

How many, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, feel like we are a square peg living in a round hole, without a good fit, without validation and with few friends if any?

If you feel this way, then you are blessed to have been born again, chasing hard after Christ while the world all around you races to destruction.

Psalm 34:17-20
"When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all. He keeps all his bones; not one of them is broken."

Even though we are alone often, we are deeply comforted and confident because of Jesus Christ Who lives in us.

Luke 6:26 "26 Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers treated the false prophets in the same way."

Trust in Christ not Food and Exercise

There is no where in the Scriptures that say eating right and exercising will gain us long life, however God says this;

1 Peter 3:10
"For “Whoever desires to love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit;"

Jeremiah 17:7-8 "7 "Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD And whose trust is the LORD. 8 "For he will be like a tree planted by the water, That extends its roots by a stream And will not fear when the heat comes; But its leaves will be green, And it will not be anxious in a year of drought Nor cease to yield fruit.…"

Psalm 146:3-5
"Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation. When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish. Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God,"

Deuteronomy 5:33
"You shall walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess."

A President Can't Fix Us

Our culture will not be changed by a better president, the hearts of the people must change toward Christ.

No political figure will change the hearts of a nation.

Until there is repentance and the hearts of people are cleansed by Christ, no one will be able to bring us out of the mire we are in, we will continue to sink deeper and deeper into sin.

You see.....If every individual would resolve to follow Christ, there would be no abortions, no matter what the law allows.

If every individual would resolve to follow Christ, pornographic companies would fold because no one would buy their product.

If every individual would resolve to follow Christ, the movie industry would have to clean up their act because no one would pay money to see their movies.

If every individual would resolve to follow Christ, divorce lawyers would go out of business because no one would avail themselves to their services.

If every individual would resolve to follow Christ, there would be no hirelings in the churches, because all the men would participate in serving the Lord through teaching and preaching.

If every individual would resolve to follow Christ, we wouldn't need a state welfare system, the body of Christ would see to individual needs of those in their neighborhoods and communities.

If every individual would resolve to follow Christ there would be no robberies, no murder, no greed and no rebellion.

The law is for the law breaker, not for the righteous. The more the lawless control the country the more chaos and evil reigns.

1 Timothy 1:9-10 "9 We realize that law is not enacted for the righteous, but for the lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinful, for the unholy and profane, for killers of father or mother, for murderers, 10 for the sexually immoral, for homosexuals, for slave traders and liars and perjurers, and for anyone else who is averse to sound teaching…"

Proverbs 29:2 "“When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.”

God gives us the leaders we deserve, right now that should frighten many.

Believer have nothing to fear, but unbelievers, those who have not trusted Christ, do not have the hope that we have.

A Religionist

"A religionist is more intent on keeping step with other Christians than with Christ." Larry Jones

Are you seeking to please Christians or are you seeking to please Christ?

A heart transformed by Christ is one that is no longer dependent on man but desires more of Christ and Him alone.

A Call For Repentance

The people running for office need to call for repentance and confession of sin. God will not hear the prayers of a nation that does not respect or honor Him. He will not heal the land of a people who hang tightly to their sin while claiming to be Christians.

Matthew 15:8 "…7 You hypocrites! Isaiah prophesied correctly about you: 8‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me. 9 They worship Me in vain; they teach as doctrine the precepts of men.’”…"

Jeremiah 14:10-12 "…10 Thus says the LORD to this people, "Even so they have loved to wander; they have not kept their feet in check. Therefore the LORD does not accept them; now He will remember their iniquity and call their sins to account." 11 So the LORD said to me, "Do not pray for the welfare of this people. 12 "When they fast, I am not going to listen to their cry; and when they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I am not going to accept them. Rather I am going to make an end of them by the sword, famine and pestilence."…

There is no indication whatever that this nation is getting ready to repent, just the opposite. The nation continues hard after sin, increasing in wickedness every day. Babies are still being murdered in the womb, pornography is rampant, children are in rebellion, arrogance abounds as though self is the god we worship.

No, there is no movement toward repentance and will not be unless a terrible disaster occurs to wake up a sleeping people. Even then the hearts of the people have become so hardened, that admitting sin and confessing it is unthinkable to most.

The hearts of this country have turned to stone, it is evidenced in the manifestation of 2 Timothy 3:1-5 as God describes the end of the end of the church age.

Looking to go home soon!!!! Who wants to come? The only way to become born again is to trust Christ Jesus, confess sinfulness and a desire to be changed into a new creation by Him. He will then come to live in you, cleanse you until He comes for you. No one can trust in any good work, no matter how good or how many, nothing of ourselves will be able to get us into heaven.

Ephesians 2:8-9
"8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast."

The Hypocrites Do It

A person without God can do good deeds on the outside but they cannot be good on the inside. Those who do good deeds on the outside without God, are doing them to self glorify. God wants the glory for our behavior and that can only happen if Christ is working in us.

Matthew 6:1-2 "1 Be careful not to perform your righteous acts before men to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven. 2 So when you give to the needy, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be praised by men. Truly I tell you, they already have their reward.…"

It is the hypocrites who do their good deeds to be seen by others. Verse 2

Only One Hope For America

We don't see the public at large imitate the Lord's Supper as we do so many other holidays that were implemented and orchestrated by human institutions.

The Lord's Supper is completely Christ centered, ordained of God to recognize Christ as our propitiation for sin as well as our helper and mentor after we have become born again. This is the very reason the apostate church and the unsaved public have no interest in it. In fact, most churches today either ignore the Lord's Supper or do it so infrequently that it is hardly noticed.

Celebrating life is the focus of Christ, celebrating death is the focal point of Halloween. Every man made holiday is designed to foster pleasure seeking, the opposite of holiness, the antithesis of blessings for others. Pleasure seeking is always associated with personal fulfillment even to the exclusion and mocking of those who do not indulge in it.

Holidays in our culture concentrate on self and pleasure. Christ is concerned about holiness and blessing to others. Those who do not know Christ lack the understanding that brings great joy from obedience to the principles of Christ in His Word. Superficial fun is the desire of those who need these man made holidays, they have little tolerance for an expectation of selflessness.

Happiness that comes from self seeking pleasure is superficial, does not last and is somewhat like a sugar high. The temporary uplift from a sweet and tasty candy only lasts until the sugar is quickly absorbed, after which there is a let down, only to be satisfied with another dose of sugar.

Those who derive enjoyment from the use of cultic practices such as Halloween, horoscopes and necromancy, are only as thrilled as the duration of each event, in the same way hard drugs control the bodies of those that use them. There must be a continual supply to perpetuate the feeling of ecstasy during the use of external stimuli such as drugs and the occult.

Has anyone else noticed that the holidays have become increasingly intense and bizarre? From Christmas trees hanging upside down in the window to a tree that can double for both Christmas and Halloween depending on which topper is placed on the tree, either an angel or a witch.

If anyone really thinks that this country can come back from the brink of disaster, perhaps they are not thinking about all the practices that are prevalent in the culture as a whole, from ungodly holidays to the murder of the unborn and everything in between, pornography, couples living together without the benefit of marriage, children born out of wedlock at an astounding rate. Let's not forget the encouragement of the young people to treat their elders as equals without respect for them.

Anything that is holy and Christ centered in our culture is either ignored or disdained continually. Those that attend "Christian" gatherings are hardly indistinguishable from an unsaved heathen.

The only hope for this country is mass brokenness and confession of sin. The shame that comes from knowing we have offended the Holy God is what is necessary to take us to the place of brokenness and confession of sin.

Deuteronomy 18:10-12

"There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who casts a spell, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. "For whoever does these things is detestable to the LORD; and because of these detestable things the LORD your God will drive them out before you.

Revelation 21:8

"But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death."

1 John 1:9

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

James 5:16

"Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working."

Acts 19:18

"Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices."

James 4:17

"So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin."