Christian Letters

By Benny Tucker

Follow through the beginning with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. How God planned from the beginning the coming of Jesus to redeem the world of their sin. Looking deeper into some areas of science and scripture that are not normally taught by most Churches today. Living testimonies of how God continues to bless and protect those that believe and love Him.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jun 20, 2013
• ISBN: 9781304154521

Book preview

Christian Letters

Christian Letters      By:  Benny Tucker

INTRODUCTION

"Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall

we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with

these words."

1Thes 3:17-18

What a wonderful thought to be waiting for the coming of Jesus and know that you are a child of God and have a home in heaven with Him.   I believe that God gives His children experiences in this world and during this life that are to be shared with the world of unbelievers and to encourage the other saints of God.  Praise Be To God!!  

This book is the true and personal testimonies of what God has done and showed to me.  My prayer and hope is that by reading this you will come to realize that God does exist and that you would trust in His beloved son Jesus for your salvation, before it’s too late.  God loves us so much and wants no one to perish, but you will have the freedom of choice and God will not force Himself on you or anyone.  If you don’t believe in God then just try to thank Him every day for life and the little things that you enjoy every day and see if you don’t start changing.  God has given every one enough faith to get saved, but its our responsibility to find it and use it.  My prayer is for you and your love ones to be saved and rejoice with each other in Heaven together.  Always remember we are all on a journey through life, we are not sitting still, as we get older and as the years fly by we get closer to our final destination……… HEAVEN……OR……..HELL.

Benny C. Tucker

The Calling

After retiring from the United States Army on Oct 1, 1990 I moved back to Florida, my home state, and remain there I guess till I leave this old world.  I graduated from Austin Peay State University during my military days, in 1986.  My knowledge of the scriptures are self-taught and fine-tuned by the Holy Spirit.  In 1992 I was Ordained as a Baptist Minister and remain as such.  I feel God called me to His service and I am happy and honored to be a child of His and to be in His service.

After retiring from the Army, I found that I was not accustomed to the civilian church as most people know it.  I had always been in the military chapel, where the army assigned chaplains to their post and they were your pastors, if you didn’t like it then you simple went to a different chapel, we had some strife and backbiting but it didn’t last long.  If you waited long enough the person who was causing problems would get transferred and that would be the end of the problem.  Not so in the civilian sector. 

I have had a few bad experiences with these type of people, but I count all of them as blessings because I was able to see Gods hand at work and things always work in His favor as Paul states in Romans 8:28, And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

I started out as a Deacon and eventually became an associate pastor.  Sometimes a pastor becomes job scared and they lose focus of the blessings and turn their eyes upon themselves and forget that God is in charge of their life’s.  I had never done anything like this before so I knew very little about it.  I had preached a few times and filled in when the pastor was sick or on vacation.  One particular time I remember he was out for several days and I preached one Sunday morning on the subject of  What I thought Heaven would be like.  It was a very good sermon and God had blessed and the Spirit moved throughout the congregation.  But, when the word got back to the pastor I guess it didn’t make him happy.  Anyway that was the last time I ever preached in that church.  I continued serving there for about 6 more months until I finally resigned.  I did a hospital ministry for a few months and that died out also.  A friend told me one time, If you work for God and for His glory you will need thick skin, because Gods enemies are many.  I tell you over the past 18 years I feel I have met my share of them and some are very close to you, but I love them and forgive them.  God is my provider and I love Him for all that He has done for me.  Even when I fell into certain situations or traps, I know God allowed it, and I was the stronger for the tribulation I came through. 

For many years I was intermittent in church, my dislike for the way people acted and conducted themselves was sometimes more than I thought I could take.  After a period of time it finally occurred to me that it didn’t matter what those people thought because they were not the reason for going to church, I came to church to worship and praise God, not them.  I feel I was called to teach the word both through bible classes and the pulpit. 

It seems that no one really believes in the ability of a person to teach scripture by the power of the Holy Spirit, and if you don’t have a degree or seminary training you are not qualified to teach scripture or preach.   Well it is sad that our nation has come to this point.  Once an individual goes to these schools, most of the time, they get taught about what the school believes and begin preaching and teaching what they were taught to preach.  The modern pastor of a church, in a lot of cases, is trying to satisfy the congregation on what they want to hear and not what the message is that God wants them to hear.  They hate the thought that they might lose their job, or have to move to another church.

I trust the Holy Spirit for guidance through the power of God the Father and my Savior and Lord, Christ Jesus.   I look at it this way,  God through His Spirit reveals what is true and what is not.  We should not be judged by other Christians or pastors on the way we present the message.  I know there is a formal way to present a message, and that is good.  But, God has different ways of delivering His message.  Also, there are those that come to church and hear the Word of God and that is all  they get of the word for the week.  They don’t read their bible or have self study programs for themselves.  So when they get to church and someone is delivering a message of meat they are still needing to be fed with the milk.  The Apostle Paul explains this in the New Testament, 1Corinthens 3:2  I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.  Then again in Hebrews 5:12  For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat.

Christians need to realize that words hurt, and that if we don’t have anything good to say, we should not say anything.  There is an old story of a rich man in a small village that was constantly insulting and talking about people in the village.  One day he had a change of heart and decided that he wanted to apologize to those that he had offended.  Not understanding how to do this he went to the village church and ask the preacher what he should do.  Well the old preacher told him that he should take a bag of feathers and put one feather on every door step of those that the had hurt.  So the rich man got the feathers and went and done what the preacher had told him to do.  Now the rich man went back to the church and told the preacher that he had completed the task, and ask now what?  The old preacher simple says, "GO BACK AND PICK UP THE FEATHERS"!   Well guess what, you can’t.  Our words are the same way, once it is said, it is done.  So, when the individual makes the comment or insult, they think they are right in what they did and they go up into their house thinking they are justified in their actions.  Jesus says in Matthew 12:37, For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.  So we simply have to ask ourselves, is this that I am about to speak, constructive to this individual or destructive?  So, based on that scripture above, we see that we can be justified or we can be condemned by what we speak.

In Romans 10:14 Paul says this in regards to the preachers, How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?   I have realized, a long time ago, that someone has to tell the world about Jesus.  Then in Romans 10:15 Paul says And how shall they preach, except they be sent? As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!   Now on my ordination day a very dear friend preached my charge based on Isaiah 6:8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; "send me."  This scripture has been in my heart everyday since. 

I find that today, the Word of God is like a two edged sword, it separates the bone from the morrow, it cuts to the joint.  The word of God causes man to think about where he is, who he is and what he has to do for God   When your young and think your invincible you are living dangerously in the world of sin.  Keep in mind that as a young boy of 12, I believed on the Lord Jesus as my Savior.  Now I will say that it was far from my mind what that little kid did.  For I was now a man, I had joined the Army and found myself in the middle of the Vietnam War in 1968.  I thought and acted like a big man, if I wanted to get something I could just go and get what I wanted.  Always acting like the big man in front of my peers and contemporaries,  Hey big man!!!, what happened at night when the big man got back to his room to sleep and you could hear the explosions of war all around and the bullets whizzing by and the total darkness surrounded you and the very much reality set in that you are alone.  Totally alone.  Your probably thinking, You were not alone their was other people in the building with you.  This is true, but who were they, but mortal man as myself.  One artillery round on top of our barracks would of killed all of us.  No, what I’m saying is that fear and darkness draws you into a state of mind that you want a protection of a supernatural sort, something that bullets and bombs were not going to destroy. I wanted God back. Now my mind was racing back through memories of home and those times of 12 years old, what had I learned as a kid that I could use now.  Oh God I needed help and I need it now.   And then, it occurred to me that all I had to do was ask God to forgive me for being a total idiot and ask for repentance.  I did, and He did.  Later in life I found this truth about God.  God is not a quitter like us, Oh No, when He makes a commitment He sticks to what He says.  So I found that after being saved at about 12, God was committed to seeing me through my salvation and protecting me from the evil one, who would like to destroy us because we believe in Jesus Christ, see God did not move from His original position in my life.  It was me that walked away into the darkness, not eternally loss but completely with out fellowship.  Through those hard years in Vietnam I had changed a little, I felt that God was with me again,  that’s not to say that I didn’t mess up, Oh I messed up everyday.  You see our sin nature is simple this, when we are around other people and in the daylight we are big men or women we’re not afraid of anything.  We talk big, we are so busy bustling around in our own little worlds, but when the light goes out and we find ourselves alone in the darkness, now we are not so big anymore.  When this was happening to me I found myself praying to God, Oh God Save Me, I’m scared. That’s how my Christian  experience began, that’s been over 40 years ago.  Oh I thank God everyday for His Grace and Mercy in my life.  He has been so good to me.  I came through the  tour of duty in Vietnam, 18 months and days, plus I  accomplished a 20 plus year career in the Army without a scratch.  We raised our family in different countries around the world and the United States and God blessed  us always.  My children are now all grown and God continues His blessings on them.  I continually thank God everyday for His Grace and Mercy in my life.

GOD BEGINS

We are in one body and that is the Body of Jesus, then why so much confusion and jealousy?   Has God, The Creator and Living God made it so difficult and complex that we are unable to fill His requirements for love and Salvation?  There are so many questions people have about their salvation, but won’t ask.  God knew we were unable to accomplish our own salvation on our own, that’s the reason Jesus came when He did.   God made salvation a simple task.  Accept and belief the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the birth, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus as taught by the Apostle Paul, in First Corinthians 15:1-4,  (1  Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; 2  By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. 3  For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4  And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures)

If there is any success in the Church as for as growth and blessings they do not come from the person that is leading the church, they come from God and we need to recognize that and quit putting our church leaders on a pedestal.  Even this, what seems so simple, has become one of so much controversy.  This has to upset God Himself, because we have taken a simple thing as His redemption plan and added man’s complex rules and ideas of what we think we need to do.  Didn’t the Jews do the same thing?  God gave the Israelites 10 rules to live by (under Moses and the 10 commandments) and over a period of time they stopped focusing on what God was telling them and intervened with their own rules, laws and ideas.  When man interferes with God, what happens? Simply this, when we allow our thoughts and ideas to replace Gods leadership, God will cease to interact with  us and we find ourselves very much alone.  If Jesus is not the head of the Church there will be no growth.  We preach and teach and water, but only God causes the growth. 

God gave mankind a free will, and we need to understand that God will not force Himself on us, nor will He just up and take control.  He will allow us to follow our will even if we destroy ourselves in the process.  Satan is alive and well in our world today, yes the world we live in now!!  Just as He was in the days of Moses and the other great men in the Old Testament.  What power do we have that we can stand up against Him on our own??  Remember, Satan was an Angel in Heaven.  The most perfect of God’s creation, beautiful, powerful and leader of other angels.  He was the head of all the Angels until………We find the stories of Satan’s fall in Isaiah and Ezekiel …He thought He was above God.  He stated that He would place His throne above the Most High (God).  That was His downfall.  He (Satan and His Angels) were cast down to earth from Heaven, and by the way He has no chance ever of being forgiven or redeemed by God.  Now, what chance do we have, as mere humans that we should think we can battle with Him?  He is the ruler of this earth and all that is in it.  He wants us as humans to perish.  God created man and woman to fellowship with, to love them and for them to love Him in return.  Behold, the Garden Of Eden was created for man and woman (Adam and Eve). 

Now Satan being opposed of God and the very opposite of God enticed the Woman (Eve) to break God’s commandment on what they were allowed to eat.  I believe that at the time Eve took of the forbidden fruit, Adam was not right there, but came on the scene later and saw what she had done.  I also believe that had Adam been right there with Eve they would of never had eaten the fruit, but she offered it to the man(Adam) and he did eat there of also.  Immediately the world was changed, they (Adam and Eve) broke  fellowship with God.  Their eyes were open to Good and evil.  I want you all to grasp this for what it is.  Adam and Eve were perfect.  God stated after their creation, that He was well pleased.  They had one rule, just 1, only one to follow, Genesis 2:16-17,  And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 17  But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Now pay attention to what has happened here.  Adam and Eve were perfect they were fellow shipping with God, walking in the garden with Him,  talking to Him and continually sensing Gods present with so much joy. They were praising God with the Heavenly Angels.  Watching the Angels minister to all the needs of whatever God would have