12.11.13

Revelation 2:19 "I know all the things you do. I have seen your love, your faith, your service, and your patient endurance. And I see you constant improvement in all these things." 

My Thoughts
I love this! Jesus sees what we do! Jesus notices our improvements! Jesus knows that we have to grow as Christians and He appreciates our growth! He sees what we have to endure and when we endure in faith He knows! When we get lost for a day or two but find our way back, He knows. We don't ever need to feel like what we do does not matter, Jesus tells us here that He sees! I love that!

12.21.12

Revelation 12:11 And they have defeated him (Satin) by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony. And they did not love their lies so much that they were afraid to die.

 

My Thoughts

Look how important our testimonies are!!!  We defeat Satin by the blood of the Lamb and by our testimony.  How do we use our testimony?  We remember...we make a conscious effort to notice, recognize and remember all that God does for us.  We do this so that when Satin lies to us about what God will do we can say, "God does this and this and this for me!!"  We defeat Satins lies with the truths of God that have played out in our lives!!  When Satin says, "Nobody cares about you!!" We say, "You are lying, God cares about me! I know because He has done __________ for me and __________ for me."  Our testimonies are out stories of God's love for us!!  Those stories in our lives of what God does for us are as important to our well being as the stories from the Bible of what God has done for the people of the past.  Those stories of the Bible help us to recognize God in our lives. Being aware of God and what He does for us is one of our greatest strongholds against Satin!! 

 

And the part of the verse about the angles not being afraid to die... they got their strength to be that strong from the blood of the Lamb and from their own stories of God's love in their lives!! 

 

This verse says to me... take notice, pay attention... close attention to all that God does for you. Knowing will make you strong and knowing will keep you strong.  I like this verse!! 

12.12.12

Revelations 3:15-16 I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one of the other! But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.

 

My Thoughts

We can't love Jesus when it is convenient or on Sundays.  We can't pray to God just when we are in trouble. We can't know God when we are with our church friends and not acknowledge Him when we are at work.  It is more dangerous than not knowing God at all.  We fool nobody but ourselves when we are part-time Christians. The lies that we tell ourselves are the most dangerous of all!

 

In verse 22 Jesus says, "Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what He is saying to the Churches."  We must listen and be honest with ourselves.  Are we walking around being neither hot or cold?  I don't want to be standing before God and hear Jesus say, "I never knew you!" 

 

Revelations 23:6 Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what he is saying to the church's.

My Thoughts
This verse is repeated after each letter to the seven churches.  We are told here, by Jesus,  that we must listen and understand. 

If we don't understand we should ask God to help us.  We don't want to miss a thing. Jesus was sent with a message for us and it is important that we make every effort to understand that message. It is on us if we listen or not. We can't make excuses. 

When we go to a book store there are thousands of books... but no book in our bookstore takes up as many shelves as the different Bibles take up.  God has made sure they are there for us.. Written in enough ways there is one that each of us can understand enough to read.  If we pick one up and do our part God will do the rest!! 

12.9.11

Revelations 1:3 God blesses the one who reads the words of his prophecy to the church and he blesses all who listen to its message and obey with it says, for the time is near.

My Thoughts

God is always telling us to do what He ask...and always telling us that if we do he will bless us! The only way to do what God aks is to take the time to hear, read and learn what God has commanded us to do.  His commandments are for our good... just like we make rules for our children so they will grow up safe and strong, and good... God makes rules for us to make our lives better...and to make the lives of the people around us better. God wants to bless us... he leaves nothing secret making us guess about it so hopefully we will get it right... God tells us exactly what he wants us to do so that he can bless us!!.. Right here He adds "for the time is near." God does not want us to run out of time... to put off what we know we should do...God does not want us to miss out on all that he has in store for us.

I love that,  all that God has "in store" for us... I just had this picture in my head of a store filled up with God's blessings... full...packed out!!... Blessings in boxes, ours just for the asking...Jesus paid the price for us to have these blessings... all God ask of us is that we act responsible and follow his rules...the we can have all the things in the store we want if we just ask for it!  God is saying... Jesus paid for your sins... and now all I need you to do to get your blessings is be responsible human beings....then I will pour out all these blessings I have "in store" down upon you! 

God wants to bless us... God does not want us to miss out on heaven and all those blessings... God loves us so much. We just have to do our part...and we always have a part... we need to learn what God ask of us... we need to become responsible Christians.

12.30.10

Revelations 21:3-4 I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, "Look, God's home in now among his people! He will live among with them. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever."

My Thoughts

If somebody told you today do what I say... all day long and tomorrow your day will be beyond perfect...and you knew this person always told the truth and always kept his promises you would give this a try! God ask us for things as his followers... instead of living a day as he tells us...he ask us to live this life as he tells us....and then in our next life he will wipe away ever tear,, there will be no death, sorrow, crying or pain... yet somehow we have trouble doing the things that God ask of us... we just get too caught up in ourselves.... when I do my best to really try to do what God ask of me I think of it this way... "Today just today can I go without sin... can I do the good that comes to me to do?" .... and when I try really hard.... and make sure the Holy Spirit guides my way I can come pretty close... but when I get lost in all of life that is ahead of me...I get lost from God and I don't do it so well... God tells us in Matthew 6:34 "So don't ever worry about tomorrow. After all, tomorrow will worry about itself . Each day has enough trouble of its own." If I can learn that... and learn to keep my eye on God... and learn to only worry what God thinks about me... if I do my best every day, one day at a time to be the person that God ask me to be... it is a lot like trading this day of doing what God wants for another day of wonderful love and perfection! Today... just today I will do my best to make God pleased with my life...and tomorrow... well tomorrow I can give that to God to... but not until tomorrow.

12.22.10

Revelations 13:10b This means that God's holy people must endure persecution patiently and remain faithful.

My Thoughts

During the end of time Christians will endure persecution.... and we are expected to remain faithful... in our "politically correct" world we so often keep our mouths shut... sometimes we use the excuse of politeness and manners to keep our mouths shut.... worst of all we don't truly, on our own know the Word of God enough to defend it... so we keep our mouths shut.  We need to be bold enough, strong enough to live our lives, to speak God's words... we need to learn and grow and remain faithful to God in all areas of our lives... so when times get harder... when evil gets bolder ... we are strong enough, wise enough, faithful enough... to remain faithful..... we need to learn to feel and hear the Holy Spirit inside of us, guiding and directing us and act on what the Holy Spirit is guiding us to do in all situations so that we are practiced in hearing God's voice, practiced in standing for God's word... practiced in doing right when everything around is doing wrong so when life gets harder... when evil works harder... we can fight the fight...we can know how to hear God so that we can remain faithful.  It is like how the army teaches soldiers drills to go through and they practice over and over and over so when the moment comes...when they have to make a choice they make the choice to start the drill and the hard stuff follows automatically... We need to be armed with the Word of God... we need to me armed with the ability to always hear the Holy Spirit... we need to be "use to" depending on prayer and communication with God in all that we say and all that we do...so when we are placed in the heat of battle we automatically depend on God... and his grace takes over and keeps us faithful!

12.12.10

Revelations 3:20 "Look! I stand at the door and knock.  If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together and be friends"

My Thoughts

Did you ever wonder what to talk to Jesus about??... well right here it says we can be "friends" with Jesus.  We can tell him anything we would a friend!!... We can run to him when something good happens!!... When we are proud of something we have accomplished and tell him all about it!!.. and we can run to him when we have had a bad day, somebody has hurt our feelings, the boss has been unfair.  We can tell Jesus when the devil is tempting us... Jesus is the best friend we can have... he can help us always... and when he tells us what to do it will always be in our best interest.  Jesus is proud of our accomplishments without jealousy... Jesus is in our corner... our cheerleader. We choose what kind of relationships we have with Jesus...but right here in Revelations it says that Jesus wants to be our friend. Today when you have something on your mind, good, bad or anything in between and want to tell a friend, try telling Jesus first and see what happens.

12.11.10

Revelations 2:19 "I know all the things you do. I have seen your love, your faith, your service, and your patient endurance. And I can see your constant improvement in all these things."

My Thoughts

The first thing this verse tells us is that we can not hide anything from God!.... we only fool ourselves if we think we can...he created the universe, he created everything in it.... something as all powerful as that knows everything about all that he created...he knows our actions and our heart.... more he knows our actions actually reflect our heart....Matthew 12:35 tells us this... so we nee too be very careful not to fool ourselves into thinking that our good thoughts make us a good person... if we want to believe our bad thoughts are the devil sneaking in and as long as we don't act on those thoughts we are not bad... we need to also believe that when we have a good thought it is the Holy Spirit speaking to us...and to be a good person we need to act on that good thought.... this verse also tells us that we need to have love, faith we need to serve others and we need to be patient on this earth and with this earth while we are waiting for the return of Jesus....and last, and this is very important, this verse tells us that God expects to see a constant improvement in the way that we serve him... he expects us to grow in love and faith, in service and in patient endurance... God expects us to grow, to learn, to get better and better... the person we are is wonderful, he made us, but God expects us to become better and better and he knows that we can!