BAKED IN THE SUNLIGHT

A Preacher once said, “Can a rock that has been in the sunlight all day not fail to give off warmth and heat at night?” In like manner, can a Christian who has lived in the sunlight of God’s love not fail to give off warmth and love? No. That is why you have to have first things first. You don’t say to others, “Start loving each other. Be nice.” No. First, we need to live in the sunlight of God’s love. We need to bake in the sunlight of God’s compassion. We need to absorb God’s light into us. And then, we start to give off the love of God. God’s love is manifested to us in the giving of His Son on the cross, and the giving of His Holy word. To bake in the sunlight of God’s love we must read and obey His holy precepts. As obedient followers of the Almighty the warm of the true love of God affects those around us in a positive way.

“Ye are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do menlight a lamp, and put it under the bushel, but on the stand; and it shineth unto all that are in the house. Even so let your light shine before men; that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven” (Mat. 5:14-16).

Are you baking in God’s love.

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
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THE HARRIS AND MOORE EXPEDITION THROUGH THE BIBLE

Tune in tonight (and each Monday) to the Harris and Moore Expedition Through the Bible at 6:00pm CST at www.harrisandmoore.org. A live call-in radio program. Tonight’s topic: Is instrumental music in worship authorized in the New Testament?

Call in or join us in the chatroom.

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CHECK POINT AHEAD

In Parma, Ohio a man by the name of Doug ‘Deo’ Odolecki stood on a street corner with a sign warning drivers about an upcoming drunken-driving checkpoint, but two words on the sign cost him a citation and an upcoming trial.

The sign written on a piece of white poster board simply read, “Check point ahead! Turn now!”

Police had no problem with the sign itself advising of the upcoming checkpoint. In fact, Ohio law requires that the police advise the public of the exact location, date and even start and stop times of an upcoming checkpoint at least one week in advance, and then again a few hours prior.

Their problem was with the sign’s instruction to “Turn now!” That, they said, was interference with police business and resulted in Odolecki receiving a violation.

God’s final checkpoint is just ahead. Yet many are speeding toward it completely unaware. For those who already know what lies ahead, there’s just one question: Where’s your white poster board? Where’s your warning to the souls of mankind to turn now from sin and be ready for the “check point?” Are you yourself heeding the warning?  Believe in Christ (Jn. 8:24), repent of your sins (Lk. 13:3), be willing to confess the name of Christ (Mt. 10:32), be baptized for the remission of sin (Acts 2:38), and be ready for the “check point” – the Judgment.

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

Tom Moore
P. O. Box 107
Hamilton, Texas 76531
http://www.harrisandmoore.org
http://www.fromthepreacherspc.org
http://www.parkheightscoc.com

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SHARPEN YOUR AX

One man challenged another to an all-day wood chopping contest. The challenger worked very hard, stopping only for a brief lunch break. The other man had a leisurely lunch and took several breaks during the day. At the end of the day, the challenger was surprised and annoyed to find that the other fellow had chopped substantially more wood than he had. “I don’t get it,”he said. “Every time I checked, you were taking a rest, yet you chopped more wood than I did.”“But you didn’t notice,”said the winning Woodsman, “that I was sharpening my ax when I sat down to rest.” 

Friends, as we “chop the wood” in our daily lives, we need to stop to sharpen our ax – that is, we need to spend time in studying the word of God. Many today seem to be working hard, but with a dull ax. Paul speak of this kind of person in this fashion, “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God” (Rom. 10:1-3).

Beloved, make sure yourzeal, your efforts for the Lord, are according to truth. “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves…” (2 Cor. 13:5).

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
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LOST AND DIDN’T KNOW IT

There was a little boy who got separated from his parents in a large shopping center. The Security Department quickly located the child, and took him to an office while the frantic parents were paged over the public address. One of the security guards got a large ice cream cone for the boy, so when his parents arrived at the office, there was their little son happily eating his ice cream. Suddenly, as his parents embraced him, the child burst into tears. One of the security guards said, “Bless his heart, I guess he didn’t know he was lost until he was found!”

Sadly, there are many in our world (perhaps, even a friend or a family member), spiritually speaking, who are lost and do not even realize it. Many are sincere in what they believe religiously, but they are sincerely wrong. Solomon said, “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (Pro. 14:12). This is why we must get others to “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?” (2 Cor. 13:5).

As we strive to get others to examine the lives, we must always “speak the truth in love” (Eph 4:15). May we all have the love for our fellow man that Aquila and Priscilla possessed, as is seen in the following: “And a certain Jew named Apollos, born at Alexandria, an eloquent man, and mighty in the scriptures, came to Ephesus. This man was instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in the spirit, he spake and taught diligently the things of the Lord, knowing only the baptism of John. And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue: whom when Aquila and Priscilla had heard, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly” (Acts 18:24-16).

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
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FIGHT THE GOOD FIGHT

O Church of Christ, awake, awake,

    And arm thyself with His own power;

The hosts of sin are striving hard

    To win the conflict of the hour.

O Church of Christ, thy foes are great,

    The battle calls for strength divine;

Omnipotence is thy defense,

    Let all its power, its strength, be thine.

The arm of flesh is sure to fail,

    But armed with God’s eternal power,

The Church both must and shall prevail.   

    Then up, and to the battle’s front,

Alert, and eager for the fray;

    Strong in strength of His great might,

Stand fast and watch and fight and pray. [author unknown]

Paul wrote, “Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on life eternal”(1 Tim. 6:12).

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
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TAKE CARE OF YOUR RELATIONSHIPS

There was an article in Reader’s Digest recently by a man named Patrick Cooney titled, “Why I Wear Two Wedding Bands.” Cooney says that he has worn two wedding bands for more than a dozen years. When he’s asked about them, he responds, “I have two wives.” He’s kidding, of course.

One day a stranger would not let him off with this glib answer about why he wears two bands. So Cooney spilled the whole story. He explained his father died in 1999. As they were saying their final farewells at his funeral, his mother, who had been married to his father for 50-plus years, removed his father’s wedding band and handed it to Patrick. Surprised, he placed the gold band on his left middle finger, next to his wedding band. There it has remained. He told the stranger that he wears his father’s wedding band to honor his father and his parents’ marriage. He also wears it to remind himself to be the son, brother, husband, and dad that his father wanted him to be. He is now 60 years old and has been married for 30 years. The stranger walked away, then turned back and said, “Sir, you know, I have my father’s wedding band in my sock drawer at home, and beginning today, I am going to start wearing it.”

Powerful story. But isn’t it true of all our relationships? It’s important not only to be faithful and attentive to our spouse, but to our children or our parents and our friends. I can tell you right now, without any hesitation at all that it is God’s will for us to take care of our relationships.

“Wives, be in subjection unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, being himself the saviour of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives also be to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself up for it; that he might sanctify it, having cleansed it by the washing of water with the word, that he might present the church to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. Even so ought husbands also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his own wife loveth himself: for no man ever hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as Christ also the church; because we are members of his body. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great: but I speak in regard of Christ and of the church. Nevertheless do ye also severally love each one his own wife even as himself; and let the wife see that she fear her husband” (Eph. 5:22-33).

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

Tom Moore
http://www.fromthepreacherspc.org
http://www.harrisandmoore.org
http://www.parkheightscoc.com

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”

Posted in Devotional Thoughts, Marriage, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

CHRISTIANITY IS NOT A SPECTATOR SPORT

Despite our position in the pews on a Sunday morning, Christianity is not a spectator sport. A former UCLA coach observed, “College football is often 40,000 people desperately in need of exercise watching 22 men desperately in need of a rest.” We need to stop being spectators and begin to take part in the Christian race (1 Cor. 9:24-27). We need to “run the race that is set before us” (Heb. 12:1). The apostle Paul also said that we should “war a good warfare” (1 Tim. 1:18). We must prepare to engage in the battle against the enemies of the cross. General Douglas MacArthur, the commander of the Pacific forces during World War II, once said, “In war there is no substitute for going all out to win the battle against sin.” Get off the bench and get into the game!

Think About It!

Have A Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
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IN THE TRENCHES

Theodore Roosevelt said, “It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotion, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

The apostle Paul in similar fashion says, “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58) and, “Suffer hardship with me, as a good soldier of Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 2:3).

Think About It! 

Have a Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
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ALLEGIANCE TO THE CAUSE

To whom would you be willing to swear undying allegiance? During the Crimean War between Russia and Britain’s allies, the “Charge of the Light Brigade” took place in 1854. British confusion was at the core of this disaster. Out of approximately 600 British cavalrymen, 247 were either killed or wounded by Russian troops. Later, though, Britain would be victorious in the Crimea.

After the dust had settled, the British poet Alfred Lord Tennyson would describe the allegiance of those soldiers with these words:

Theirs not to make reply,

Theirs not to reason why,

Theirs but to do and die:

Into the valley of death

Rode the six hundred.

Unswerving consecration was and still is the foundation of military campaigns.

Are you that devoted to Lord and His campaign? Are you willing to consecrate yourself to the cause of Christ – no matter what the cost? Jesus said, “He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Mat. 10:37). “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple” (Lk. 14:26-27). The apostle Paul declared, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service” (Rom. 12:1).

We are in a spiritual battle – will you give your undying allegiance in the Lord’s army? “And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none” (Eze. 22:30). Will you stand in the gap?

Shake or Nod!

Have A Great Day!

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have forgotten how it goes.”
Posted in CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH, Devotional Thoughts, Faithfulness | Leave a comment