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    Simply God: Gods Messages of Love and Encouragement
    Simply God: Gods Messages of Love and Encouragement
    Simply God: Gods Messages of Love and Encouragement
    Ebook271 pages4 hours

    Simply God: Gods Messages of Love and Encouragement

    By Rick Richards

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    About this ebook

    When pastors and evangelists preach, they try to convince you to change your lifestyle now. This is not their fault. They know that they have to do this. They have to get you close to God because time could be short. That is not equipping and preparing. Equipping and preparing means giving you the tools of the trade. That is living Gods Word and how to plan to do this. The Word teaches that pastors are to equip the servants. All that time convincing and not equipping is destroying Gods world. Jesus equipped and encouraged Gods children and changed the world. What is our excuse?


    We need to divert all our mental and physical abilities to become like Jesus and begin to feel these changes in our bodies. We have to stop becoming people of behaviors. Over many generations, we have reacted to what we have seen and heard and to the pleasures the world has given us. We dont look and listen to God anymore, because he doesnt give us what we want when we want it. When the world sees this, it gives us what we want and we take it. We are not patient enough! God gives us what we need. As long as the world dangles that carrot in front of our faces, we will continue to pull that heavy, burdensome load of sin and pain. It is only by seeing and hearing what God does in this world to bless his children that will show us how his grace and greatness will tower above our fears.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateOct 10, 2011
    ISBN9781449727086
    Simply God: Gods Messages of Love and Encouragement
    Author

    Rick Richards

    Rick Richards lives on an orchard in southern Ohio with his wife of forty-one years. They have two kids and two grandkids. Rick struggled for many years trying to understand God’s plan for reaching the kingdom. He knew that the Word was the answer, and God had to make it simple. Rick was saved when he was twelve, and he knew who God was, but at eighteen, he was lost and confused. He had no idea what he wanted to be. God finally sat him down the hard way and gave him two choices. Rick has been writing God’s messages for more than twenty years and never knew why until now.    

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    • 1/5
      The description of this book promises to discuss the difference between convincing people and equipping people. It is supposed to be about seeing and knowing God, making these things our priorities. That is, what we need is simply God. These are, in themselves, excellent points. We do need God more than anything, and we ought to be equipped, not just convinced, to live well. You will not find that here. Unfortunately, Simply God is actually a long, unedited, unorganized, mostly unhelpful, self published book that needed, but clearly did not get, a lot of help. Something in the very preface of this book made me uncomfortable. As I finished reading it I had to stop and consider what it might be. I wasn't sure, so I reread it more carefully. There it was, clear as day, in the first lines. Richards claims that this book "was inspired by our Father so that all his children would know how much he loves them and wants to encourage them. My part was listening and collecting his thoughts. As for me, I am just a messenger." Don't misunderstand. I believe God does indeed reveal Himself, and it is certainly possible for us to receive a message from Him. But this claim, at the outset of any book, is huge. The last person who made such a claim was Jesus Christ. He was sent to reveal how much God loves us, and he didn't write a book to accomplish this, he died for our sins. As for the model of inspiration and revelation implied in these sentences... well, it gets worse. Phrases like: "while spending time with my Father, I can blot out my perceptions and let him roam and control my thoughts as I write" are not uncommon. In fact, after about chapter 10 they are all too frequent. In chapter 14, we have New King James scripture reorganized and quoted (yes, the entire chapter, the longest one in the book, is just this) and Richards claims God is the one who lined them up. Implicit in this idea is the fact that we understand scripture if we just read it open to the Holy Spirit, no matter the context, or original meaning and setting. This is ridiculous... If God had wanted us to have a book like that, I suppose he could have given it to us. Instead he gave us a bible which provides us with an entirely different horizon of understanding by virtue of it being from a different time, place, and culture than our own. It takes effort and the proper tools, still under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, to read the bible well. Perhaps this is what was wrong with the whole book... Maybe Richards prayed and read and then, in all sincerity, wrote. If so, that would certainly explain his more egregious mistakes (such as claiming that Paul was a Roman soldier who killed Christians for the government, or that there are no differences in God's creation, or that reinterpreting Genesis for other than 24 hour days would be to strip the word of God of its power). Whether this is what Richards did or not, this is a terrible book. Conclusion: 0 Stars. Not Recommended. How can I say more? Terrible. Book provided through Booksneeze for review.
    • 1/5
      Simply God: Gods Messages of Love and Encouragement by Rick Richards was recommended as "his most powerful work to date. In teaching pastors, evangelists and everyday Christians the difference between “convincing” and “equipping,” Richards delivers a radical new view of what it means to be a leader in Christ:" Unfortunately, the book's content wasn't radical, about leadership or explaining God as He revealed Himself in the Bible. Somehow this manuscript sneaked in through Westbow Press (a self-publishing imprint) to HarperCollins publishers, and got this appealing blurb.I read 35% and turned off, already have marked a lot of locations in my kindle edition that I had questions about. Why call satan / the devil "the dark angel"? Why share you whole life story in 4 pages, including mysterious phrases like "On my fourth death experience, God got my attention."? Claims like "God wrote this book to help and encourage you, and he chose me sixty-two years ago to do this" I cannot accept. The author grants himself too much. Instead of letting the Bible speak for itself, the reader gets much of Richard's own words and interpretations mixed with single verse quotations in every available Bible translation.What to think of "The dark angel confuses us by telling us to believe that having hope and peace now is better than waiting for God's correct timing.", "If we know that God is real, then nothing else is impossible.", "In the Old Testament, there was not a spirit. That was given to us after the death of Jesus. God did all the discerning through his spoken words and through his prophets." or "The outcome of Jesus' death was the disobedience of his children." I could continue pointing at serious flaws in Richard's theology. Instead of Simply God I'd recommend reading the Bible itself if you want to know God.

    Book preview

    Simply God - Rick Richards

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