Five Books of Spirituality

By Benny Tucker

For the First Time ever all five books, written by Benny Tucker, are now available in one volume. Very popular, Christian Letters is book one, Book two; Let the World Prepare, this is based on Revelations and the end times. Book three; God, Man, Death, and then the Judgment, this book reveals the story of the bible in a simple and easy to understand method. Book four; Sin and Man, explains the penalty of sin and that all of mankind are sinners, but God rescued us through Jesus Christ. Book five; Standing against Satan, is the newest book and it is based on Ephesians 6 and the armor of God. In this study we see that we are no match for Satan's power but with the armor of God as our defense and the Sword of the Spirit, God's word, we are ready to go on the offense against him, the devil. Now you can have all five books for simple easy price. Individual books are also still available.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Oct 10, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329611078

Book preview

Five Books of Spirituality

Five Books of Spirituality

Five Books of

Spirituality

Produced

By

Books by

Benny Tucker

All Five books together for the first time.

Book 1  Christian Letters

Book 2   Let the World Prepare, Jesus   is at the Door

Book 3   God, Man, Death and then the Judgment

Book 4   Sin and Man

Book 5   Standing against Satan

Copyright page

Scripture quotations are taken from the

King James Version (KJV) of the Bible.

ASV (American Standard Version (ASV).

English Standard Version (ESV).

©Copyright 2015-Benny Tucker

All rights reserved

Published by

Lulu.com

ISBN 978-1-329-61107-8

Printed in the United States of America.

Christian Letters

CHRISTIAN

LETTERS

Teaching the ways of life, thru God’s Word.

God’s Word will ensure your eternal home.

First Edition, July 2013

Scripture quotations are taken from the

King James Version (KJV) of the Bible.

ASV (American Standard Version (ASV).

English Standard Version (ESV).

©Copyright 2013-Benny Tucker

All rights reserved

Published by

Lulu.com

ISBN 978-1-304-23899-3

Printed in the United States of America.

Introduction

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.       First Thessalonians 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 it’s 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

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 simply 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 God’s 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 lives.  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 God’s 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 he 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 simply 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 every day since. 

I find that today, the Word of God is like a two edged sword, it separates the bone from the marrow, 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 you’re 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 there 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 have 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 without 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 every day.  You see our sin nature is simply 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 every day 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 every day for His Grace and Mercy in my life.

God Begins

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 God’s 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 thereof 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 fellowshipping with God, walking in the garden with Him, talking to Him and continually sensing God’s 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 them to do. They had perfect eye sight and hearing like nothing we can imagine. They had wild animals around them, they slept and played with Lions, Tigers and the like.  What happened to them?????  They found, Disobedience! to the law of God.  To put it simply they broke the rules, they didn’t listen, failed to obey, cross the line of no return whatever you want to call it, the punishment is the same.  They fell from God because of Satan. They were deceived by Satan.  How can this be when they were so much in tune to God?  She (Eve) entertained Satan and His lie about the fruit.  Eve took her eyes off of God and used her own reasoning to decide what was true or false.  Adam was as equally guilty because he listened to Eve.  Now I ask, what chance do we have, or hope to have to stand up against a villain like Satan.  We have no chance.  He will see to our destruction, because he (Satan) is angry with God and he hates us because God cares and loves us so much.  Who do you think we should serve then?

1.  Satan: Who hates us and releases all his evilness against us and his demons to destroy us.

2.  God:  Who loves us and cares about our wellbeing and wants to fellowship with us and give us His eternal blessings.

Now God will not give up on us because He loves us and wants us for Himself, all of us. Now starts the plans of God, as He makes and eternal plan to redeem man to Himself.  As we look back through History and now the Bible we see how much God did in His total redemption plan to save us.  Six thousand plus years of planning and dealing with us.  Ask yourself How important am I to God?? You can’t even imagine how much.  The Old Testament reflects God dealing with a nation (Israel) which started with Abraham.  The New Testament reflects God’s dealing with man through Jesus, God’s plan for saving mankind is complete.

God had a mystery hidden within Himself since the beginning of time, as spoken of  by the apostle Paul, Ephesians 3:8-10 Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ;  9  And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: 10  To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God,   He has now made it known to us through His Spirit and Jesus Christ, that through His Grace we are saved and nothing else.  God gave us His one and only son, which He was perfect without sin.  Yet He who was without sin, was sacrificed for our sin, because He was God the Son.  When men and women are married they become one and the woman takes the husbands name as her own because that name is the blood line of the family.  Man determines the bloodline and genes of the fetus in the womb.  All through time Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all the others had their children based on their bloodline and genes.  Yet the Virgin Mary was totally different, she was impregnated by the Holy Spirit, so Jesus was pure in the bloodline because it was from God.  This is so important in understanding the deity of Jesus.  If you study the book of John you will find that Jesus was with God in eternity and the beginning of creation, matter of a fact Jesus is referred to in John 1:1 as the Word of God, All Things Were Created by Him, from nothing, the Word spoke it into existence.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  2 The same was in the beginning with God.  3 All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made.  4 In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.   5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

So in the beginning eternity Jesus was called the Word.  But, when Mary becomes pregnant by the Holy Spirit of God Himself, the Word of God takes on a human body and becomes a man.  This is so complex and a lot of folks can’t get their minds around this concept.  See, through Mary God the Word took on physical form and became Jesus that’s the reason you hear a lot of times that Jesus was part man and part God.  My thought is simply Jesus was God in a man’s body.  Satan was defeated by God through the man body of Jesus.  Jesus was the perfect sacrifice, God gave Himself, through Jesus to save us from total damnation, which simply means, before the crucifixion of Jesus and Him taking on all the sins (our sins) we were condemned to Hell and the lake of fire.  Had it not been for Jesus dying on the cross for the sins of the world and paying for my sins and for yours, we would both have to die physically and spiritually.  The only way to correct the sin debt was a perfect sacrifice to God through Jesus the perfect Lamb.  He bore the sins of the world, yet He knew no sin.  Only God can do this, we are redeemed through Jesus’ who shed His blood at Calvary.  Therefore we are purchased with a price, just as Paul says in First Corinthians 6:19-20.  What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?  20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.

So now having said all that, one must see for himself, that God loves us so much that He gave His only begotten Son as a sacrifice for our sins,  John 3:16-19   16  For God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.  17 For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved.  18 He that believeth on Him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.  19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

The will of God is that, none should perish and He wants to save us all.  So why have we made it so confusing and complicated?  The Bible says that I ask God for forgiveness in the name of Jesus.  I believe Jesus died for my sins, dear Jesus please come into my heart and save me for I am a sinner.  Jesus will save us if we only believe.  It is true that we will change from the old person to a person with a spiritual conscious and when we do something wrong the  Holy Spirit will convict you and you will want to ask for forgiveness.  The churches today in some cases want to argue and fuss about what God can do and will not do.  Listen it is time to stop all the bickering about this and that.  The Bible says we are saved by God’s Grace and that we are one body in Christ Jesus.  How can we be one body and we are debating over things that we don’t know for sure. Jesus said, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.  When His disciples heard it, they were exceedingly amazed, saying, who then can be saved?    But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, with men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible (Matthew 19:24-26.) God decides who is real and who is not.  Don’t you realize that Satan has the power to cause delusions?  He can change into and angel of light if he desires and also his evil ministers he can change also. 2Cor 11:14-15.  14 And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.  15 Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.   Paul also states in Ephesians 6:12, "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."

God is the only One who can save us through His Grace through the Lord Jesus. We have to trust God for our salvation through Jesus. We  have to understand that our being saved or to perish is completely based upon whether or not we can believe the Gospel of Christ Jesus, can we understand the Love of God and can we Love Him in return. Why do we worry with the arguments of the spiritual gifts, or who is an apostle or prophet?  If God elects for me to speak in tongues then I will speak them. I will trust in Him and only Him.  If God gave me the supernatural spiritual gift of healing, I would go out in the highways and byways and heal them, because the Holy Spirit through the laying on of hands would heal them. We had better wake up in these last days and pay attention to what is really important.  Jesus is all I or anyone needs for their salvation, Jesus is enough there is nothing else needed. Paul teaches us in First Corinthians 13 that Love (charity) is a more excellent way and the gifts will fade away,  Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.  9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. 10 But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.  11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.  12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. 13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.

Now, please understand I am not denying the Spiritual Gifts of the Gospel.  I am simply saying that all who believe the Gospel that Jesus was born of a virgin, died on the cross, was buried and on the third day was resurrected and now sits at the right hand of God, they shall be saved.  There are churches today that state their doctrine and policies of salvation, which include the above and possibly more that you are required to do.  This is what the Jews did with the 10 commandments and the Mosaic Laws.  In the Old Testament the Holy Spirit of God was with them, but now in this Age of Grace the Holy Spirit lives within us.  Can you see the difference?

We need to understand that our works, nor our church position, nor the name of the church, not even the amount of money we give the church none of this will determine our salvation, or whether or not we are saved.   The scriptures teach that believing the Gospel of Christ Jesus and to repent our sins will get us saved, and our works as Christians for the glory of God will determine our heavenly rewards.  We can’t gain heavenly rewards if we go to church and just sit on the pew.  If you believe in the GOSPEL of Christ Jesus, you should rejoice and praise God and have a heartfelt desire to serve God and work in the ministry of the Word.  We were all given talents by God and we need to use them, some teachers and some preachers, let God direct you and your spiritual walk and call to Him and don’t let man dictate to you what they think you should do. 

Now let’s look at God’s Love for us, remember that Paul states in 1Cor 13, Love is never tired of waiting; love is kind; love has not envy; love has no high opinion of itself, love has no pride;   Love’s ways are ever fair, it takes no thought for itself; it is not quickly made angry, it takes no account of evil; It takes no pleasure in wrongdoing, but has joy in what is true; Love has the power of undergoing all things, having faith in all things, hoping all things. Though the prophet’s word may come to an end, tongues come to nothing, and knowledge have no more value, love has no end. But now we still have faith, hope, love, these three; and the greatest of these is LOVE.

God’s’ Love for us and the acceptance of His Son is the key to our salvation.  I will accept Jesus as my Lord and savior, I have committed myself to Him who loved me first, while yet I was still a sinner.  I will live to die in Christ Jesus, for He is all to live for.  What then can I say about this?  I fear my God and I shake at the idea that He might be angered by something where I have sinned against Him.  Grace through Jesus Christ has saved me.  There is nothing I can do to save myself.  My good works amount to nothing.  I can’t buy my salvation.  Only God gives it to me as a gift.  Will I accept such a priceless gift?  Oh Yes, I will!!!  I will thank and praise Him for His great grace, mercy and love.  I believe that because I am saved through Jesus there is nothing that can take that away from me it is my gift from God and He will not take it back.

For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other  creature, shall be able to separate us (me) from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39                Praise God.

So as we look at all the epistles written by the Apostle Paul we will find that the ultimate and greatest thing that we must do is love.  Isn’t that amazing?  I say to you that I do not in any way intend to say that all the other teachings in these epistles are not needed, God forbid.  All I am saying is simply this.  Jesus taught in the book of Matthew 22:37 the greatest commandment; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like it, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.  Mat. 22:37-40

Now I ask, did you catch that?  See God loves us and loved us since the day He created us.  Jesus, being God in the flesh, made the above statement to His disciples while He was on this earth.  Now God loves and expects love in return.  So you say you can’t love someone you can’t see?  Amazing, Jesus said that God is a spirit and must be worshiped in spirit.  After Jesus ascended into Heaven after His resurrection, He stated that God (His Father) would send the Comforter (Holy Spirit) to teach and help us to survive the spiritual battle that we continue to fight.  So what do you think the Holy Spirit is? Think……………Yeah that’s it, it’s the actual Holy, Most Divine, Spirit of the Living God.  Don’t you see, God’s spirit that we can’t see, touch, but guess what, it can be felt!!!  To make a long story short God lives within us.  I don’t know about you, but that is amazing to me.  Listen I wondered a lot of times about the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and I want to share with you what I found.  I saw sinners come to repentance and have a miraculous conversion as they are internally changed, and it’s like overnight they are a new creature.  But everyone is not like that.  It is so important that in order to enjoy the Joy of Christ and being saved and to know that without a doubt that you are saved you need to understand that everyone is different because we all have different levels of knowing and believing.  For example, from the time I was able to remember I knew of Jesus, because of my parents.  I remember when I accepted Jesus at about 12.  I believed the Gospel, but did not act accordingly.  I was sinning through most of those teenage and young adult life, but my conversion was complete, I had the Holy Spirit in my heart because I knew the difference, I just wouldn’t let the Holy Spirit take control of me.  I was convicted in my heart of the right and wrong, but choose to overlook it.  A lot of this was due to the fact that I was scripturally ignorant and didn’t understand.  I was always being convicted and felt bad about some of the things me and my friends did, but I didn’t understand enough to make the right decisions spiritually.  In my midlife after having 2 children and being married some 15 years or so, I went to the bible and educated myself in the Word of God.  Now I realize that during those dark times in my life, from the time of repentance till I started feeding on the scripture, God’s Love and Mercy protected me.  How wonderful is God that He loved me that much.

So here we go with a short history lesson about Moses and the Sanctuary of God.  While Moses and the Israelites were in the wilderness going to the promise land, God instructed them to build a tabernacle and even gave certain people the divine talents to know how to construct it just as He said.  God selected tribes of Israel to do certain task in the worship to Him.  After Moses received the Ten Commandments they were placed in a hand crafted box, better known as the Ark of the Covenant.  Anyway, the Holy of Holies was the most Holy place in the sanctuary and that is where God’s spirit resided.  The only people that were allowed to go in there was the High Priest, and if they were not Holy and repented to God, as soon as they stepped into this special place they would drop dead.  This was serious business and God was not playing.  Now check this out, the sanctuary that Moses and Israel build in the wilderness was an exact duplicate of the Heavenly Sanctuary. So the priest would receive the sacrifices of the people. Go to God repent his sins and theirs and go into the Holy of Holies representing the whole nation to sprinkle the blood on the Mercy Seat. So God had the angels worshiping Him in Heaven and because they (Israel) build a Sanctuary on earth He was now worshiped by humans on earth in their earthly sanctuary.  Here comes the part that should cause you to leap with joy and happiness.  Jesus died on the cross.  Why?  He was send there by God the Father to take on flesh and live among us to show us that we could live like Him also, if we would place ourselves in God like He did.  After Jesus was crucified and resurrected and went back to heaven, what do you think He does?  He intercedes for us before God in the Heavenly sanctuary and His blood was presented to God and sprinkled or placed on the Mercy Seat once and for all, and His precious blood will remain there through all eternity.  He is the one that paid the second death penalty God talked about in the very beginning.  Look, one thing we really need to remember is that Jesus was not a weak or lacking in spiritual powers.  He gave Himself as a sacrifice to God because He wanted to and His love for us was greater than anything we can imagine.  John 10:18 Jesus says this about His life,

No man taketh it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of My Father.

He could have come off the Cross that day and destroyed the world, but elected to remain for good, so what do we owe Jesus, everything.  I remember the stories of the wars throughout our history of men who gave their lives for their friends, and in turn received the Medal of Honor by our country.  Jesus states in John 13:15, (No) Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. So what reward do you think Jesus should have for given His life?  He sits at the right hand of God and God is bringing a heavenly people to His Son Jesus known in scripture as the Bride of Christ which is the Saints of the Church.  Through God’s gift of Grace in this time, we have this honor to be heirs with Jesus as Children of the Living God.  Galatians 3:26 amplifies this to us, for ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.  Other words all who believe the Gospel of Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior will be saved, and are the children of God, there will not be a second death (Spiritual) for them.  Now I am assuming that if you have read all this you might be considering asking God for forgiveness.  Then you think……..I don’t know a thing about prayer, how do you do that?  Well check out the following verse and see that prayers have no formal or informal beginning or ending.

The Pharisee, taking up his position, said to himself these words: God, I give you praise because I am not like other men, who take more than their right, who are evil-doers, who are untrue to their wives, or even like this tax-farmer. Twice in the week I go without food; I give a tenth of all I have.  The tax-farmer, on the other hand, keeping far away, and not lifting up even his eyes to heaven, made signs of grief and said, GOD, HAVE MERCY ON ME, A SINNER. I say to you, this man went back to his house with God’s approval, and not the other: for everyone who makes himself high will be made low and whoever makes himself low will be made high.   Luke 18:11-14)

You see prayer is a Christian’s weapon against the powers of this world.  You cannot live a successful Christian life without it.  God wants to hear about everything in our life and those heart felt feelings about Him.  We should always pray with praise and thanksgiving and let Him know how much we appreciate what He has done for us.  We were purchased with a price, which was the giving of His only begotten Son, Jesus.  The very air we breathe, the beats of our hearts and everything that we take for granted is given to us by the Grace of God, and at any moment it could be taken away and we would be standing in eternity.  If we didn’t believe in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, of whom our salvation comes, we would be condemned to an eternal darkness of suffering and pain in the fires of hell.  But, praise be to God that because we have accepted and believe on the Gospel of Christ we are saved and can look forward to being in His presence (Heaven) for eternity.

Not Forsaken

NOT FORSAKEN

The Bible says that everything that God does or allows to happen, even though it may seem bad at the time, is brought together for good and within His Will.  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.   Even though at the time things are happening you think there is no way out of your situation, but please have faith and God will see you through it.  There are so many things in this world that we face in day to day life that make us fearful of the world around us, but did you know and realize God has given us power, love and sound mind to conquer our fear.  In 2Timothy 1:7 For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. God wants us to be victorious in our lives because He loves us with a perfect love and uses everything in our life’s to prosper us even if it looks bad to us, God turns it to good! Amen.

Now I have to ask the most important question of all.  Do you love God with all your heart soul and mind?  This is a very important question.  It is the number one commandment that Jesus gave us.  The second commandment is, Love your neighbor as you love yourself. These verses are found in Matthew 22:37-39.  Let’s look at this rationally and use our earthly knowledge to dissect the verses.  How do you love God?  First we have to know Him, we have to realize His great and perfect love for us, and most of all we must believe He is real and exist. The Bible says that God gave every person a measure of faith.  Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.  Then we want to realize that God has only good planned for us.  We live in a world that belongs to Satan and His demons.  Remember Satan is the opposite of God and has nothing but despite for everything that God does, including attacking us and trying to make us fail.

You pray and ask God for forgiveness through Jesus Christ.  Once we pray for forgiveness we enter into the Body of Christ, the Church.   First of all let me say that God’s love is perfect and our love is imperfect.  Therefore we can only accomplish a portion and not all of this love, I believe that the love and joy for us that God has is so intense and powerful that we can only have a portion of it because of our human position.  If we experienced the full power of God’s joy and love we would surely die.  Let’s look at this Godly love and try to better understand.  First, we know God is Love and we have the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.  Even though there are three offices of God, there is only one God.  So God’s love from eternity past even till now is higher than ours, plus His ways are higher than our ways.  Isaiah 55:9 the Lord says; for My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the LORD.   For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.

The marriage between men and women is God given and that is the way it was designed to be, even since the beginning.   God selected Abraham because he believed God and God put to the account of Abraham righteousness.  The covenant was that God would raise up a people through Abraham and his descendants would number with the stars, other words a great multitude.  Now when this came to pass God considered Israel His chosen people, making them a peculiar people in the world.  God says He loved these people and cared for them and they were to love him back in return, but instead they were disobedient and hard hearted.  Now we know that due to the completion and revealing of the Holy Bible we can see that God has put Israel on hold temporarily until the completion of the church.  God is allowing this dispensation, God’s Age of Grace. 

Ephesians 1:10 That in the dispensation of the fulness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in Him:

Ephesians 3:2(AV). If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward:

Since Paul’s conversion on the Damascus road, God is saving through believing on the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the death, burial, and resurrection of His blessed Son, Jesus. God the Father no longer sees our sin once we believe the Gospel.  God sees us only through the sacrificed blood of Jesus.  Amen.  Let’s look at this love experience as explained by the Apostle Paul in the New Testament.

In the Bible the Apostle Paul stated, Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it;  Ephesians 5:25.  But, nowhere in scripture does it tell the wife to love her husband, but Paul says to the wife, Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Ephesians 5:24. Then again in Ephesians 5:22, Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.   So this is how the love between men and women develop between themselves, its set by God in the beginning and that is how it is.  We had stated earlier that God loved Israel, and Israel should have been submissive to God and loved Him for His goodness to them instead of their hard hearted attitudes.

Men love and take care of the wife and she will return her love to the man because of the goodness of his heart and his feelings and caring towards her.  The man usually says to the woman, I love you, and then the woman states not only, I love you to, but she usually states later that, "I fell in love with you." do you see the flow and meaning of how that works?  She falls in love because of his goodness to her.  God operates like this, the scriptures state that God loves us as we see in John 3:16, He has developed this type of relationship between Himself and us as He had also done with Israel, His chosen people.  We in turn see how much God loves us and all that He has done for us through Jesus Christ and now we develop the falling in love with Him.  The church in this, Age of Grace, is referred to as the Bride of Christ.  So God has given to His Son, Jesus, a bride, who is the church, and the Bridegroom will come for her when she is ready and God states that it is time, then they will have the marriage feast together.  The bible plainly teaches this relationship.  Not only is there a marriage relationship between Jesus and the church (believers), but there was a marriage relationship between God Himself and the nation Israel (Jew).  God established the marriage relationship in the very beginning with Adam and Eve.  God determined that it was not good for man to be alone (Genesis 2; 18.)  After Adam had named all the animals and saw that they had a mate or helper, he probably ask himself why he, Adam, had no one. (Genesis 2:19, 20)  So God created Eve or woman from the rib of man, Adam.  This concept of marriage in its original form was so lovingly emotional and intense that we don’t understand it today.  We turned marriage from love to lust.  Now, I am not speaking about all marriages, some still hold the truths of marriage and are united as one.  Adam said after God had created Eve that she was bone of  his bones and flesh of his flesh so he called her woman, meaning Womb-man, because she had a womb.  Think for a moment on this illustration.  Man and woman were one, both together, male and female in one body.  Does that strike you as strange, well the bible describes it exactly like that.

God states in Genesis 5:2, Male and female created He them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.

Now God has created woman from the rib of man.  Well why don’t man have one less rib than a woman?  Because, the word rib does not mean rib as we understand it, but in Hebrew is called  Tsela translated side.  So woman was created from the side of man.  I think that based on the way the scripture is written that Adam had the female reproductive system within his body and then later God removed this system and created woman.  That would explain to me why He (God) referred to Adam as them when at the time Eve had not been created yet.  But, the concept I want us to remember is a very simple one, woman was created from the body of man, and they are reunited together through marriage as one flesh, let’s see what the scriptures say in reference to this; 

(Genesis 2:24) Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

(Matthew 19:5-6)   And said, for this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?  Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.  (Mark 10:8)  And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh.   Ephesians 5:31) For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.

Now Jesus has made it possible for us to come before the Throne of God and present our supplications.  We repent and ask forgiveness through Jesus of our sins, then we praise God and give Him thanks.  God knows everything about us and in every one’s life He is personally involved and concerned.  He cares about us physically, spiritually and wants us to be happy, joyful and successful.  You may not even realize that, but His spirit works in us to bring us to the point of love and understanding of His righteousness and holiness.  No one and I mean no one loves you like God.  Now we can never accomplish the first commandment if we can’t get the second.  It is like this, I can’t love God if I don’t love my neighbor.  What does it mean to love your neighbor?  Well it is to be concerned about his or her wellbeing.  Let us be a caring and concerned people, because of God’s complete love for all of us.  God desires that none of us should perish, look at what He says about punishing people in Ezekiel 33:11 Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?

Now what do we do today as for as caring for one another?  We give to charities and think I’m taking care of my neighbor, then we see someone at the corner store that needs help, and then we think we don‘t need to help because we already gave to charity organizations.  This thought pattern even holds true with church members, I don’t have to help this individual, I paid my tithes.  Look what Jesus says, Matthew 25:35-40;

For I was an hungred, and ye gave Me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took Me in:  36  Naked, and ye clothed Me: I was sick, and ye visited Me: I was in prison, and ye came unto Me.  37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we Thee an hungred, and fed Thee? Or thirsty, and gave Thee drink?  38 When saw we Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? Or naked, and clothed Thee?  39 Or when saw we Thee sick, or in prison, and came unto Thee?  40  And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me.

Jesus tells us that by helping others we reflect God’s love to mankind through us.  We have to help others that are less fortunate.  Loving our neighbors with a Godly Love, caring for their wellbeing.

It is hard to except these facts unless you are truly a child of God and redeemed.  Can you believe today that Jesus died for you and made it possible through your believe to be saved as a gift from God because of his Grace given to us.

John 20:29, Look what Jesus says in this verse, Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have (never) not seen (me), and yet have believed.

Jesus said that I was blessed because I believe and have never seen Him. I say, Amen, Praise God.

Here is another great scripture that will show how God plans for His children and it also proofs the fact that God has given Jesus the gift of the Church to be The Body of Christ.

Luke 7:28 For I say unto you, among those that are born of women (earthly) there is not