The Walk Saturday, Sep 18 2010 

Motivational and Uncategorized kennethbow 7:04 am

This is a wonderful piece by Michael Gartner, editor of newspapers large and small and president of NBC News. In 1997, he won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing. It is well worth reading, and a few good chuckles are guaranteed. Here goes…

My father never drove a car. Well, that’s not quite right. I should say I never saw him drive a car.

He quit driving in 1927, when he was 25 years old, and the last car he drove was a 1926 Whippet.

“In those days,” he told me when he was in his 90s, “to drive a car you had to do things with your hands, and do things with your feet, and look every which way, and I decided you could walk through life and enjoy it or drive through life and miss it.”

At which point my mother, a sometimes salty Irishwoman, chimed in: she said “He hit a horse.” “Well,” my father said, “there was that, too.”

So my brother and I grew up in a household without a car. The neighbors all had cars — the Kollingses next door had a green 1941 Dodge, the VanLaninghams across the street a gray 1936 Plymouth, the Hopsons two doors down a black 1941 Ford — but we had none.

My father, a newspaperman in Des Moines , would take the streetcar to work and, often as not, walk the 3 miles home. If he took the streetcar home, my mother and brother and I would walk the three blocks to the streetcar stop, meet him and walk home together.

My brother, David, was born in 1935, and I was born in 1938, and sometimes, at dinner, we’d ask how come all the neighbors had cars but we had none. “No one in the family drives,” my mother would explain, and that was that. But, sometimes, my father would say, “But as soon as one of you boys turns 16, we’ll get one.”

It was as if he wasn’t sure which one of us would turn 16 first. But, sure enough, my brother turned 16 before I did, so in 1951 my parents bought a used 1950 Chevrolet from a friend who ran the parts department at a Chevy dealership downtown. It was a four-door, white model, stick shift, fender skirts, loaded with everything, and, since my parents didn’t drive, it more or less became my brother’s car.

Having a car but not being able to drive didn’t bother my father, but it didn’t make sense to my mother. So in 1952, when she was 43 years old, she asked a friend to teach her to drive.

She learned in a nearby cemetery, the place where I learned to drive the following year and where, a generation later, I took my two sons to practice driving.

The cemetery probably was my father’s idea. “Who can your mother hurt in the cemetery?” I remember him saying more than once.

For the next 45 years or so, until she was 90, my mother was the driver in the family. Neither she nor my father had any sense of direction, but he loaded up on maps — though they seldom left the city limits — and appointed himself navigator. It seemed to work.

Still, they both continued to walk a lot. My mother was a devout Catholic, and my father an equally devout agnostic, an arrangement that didn’t seem to bother either of them through their 75 years of marriage. (Yes, 75 years, and they were deeply in love the entire time.)

He retired when he was 70, and nearly every morning for the next 20 years or so, he would walk with her the mile to St. Augustine’s Church. She would walk down and sit in the front pew, and he would wait in the back until he saw which of the parish’s two priests was on duty that morning. If it was the pastor, my father then would go out and take a 2-mile walk, meeting my mother at the end of the service and walking her home. If it was the assistant pastor, he’d take just a 1-mile walk and then head back to the church. He called the priests “Father Fast” and “Father Slow.”

After he retired, my father almost always accompanied my mother whenever she drove anywhere, even if he had no reason to go along. If she were going to the beauty parlor, he’d sit in the car and read, or go take a stroll or, if it was summer, have her keep the engine running so he could listen to the Cubs game on the radio. In the evening, then, when I’d stop by, he’d explain: “The Cubs lost again. The millionaire on second base made a bad throw to the millionaire on first base, so the multimillionaire on third base scored.”

If she were going to the grocery store, he would go along to carry the bags out — and to make sure she loaded up on ice cream.

As I said, he was always the navigator, and once, when he was 95 and she was 88 and still driving, he said to me, “Do you want to know the secret of a long life?” “I guess so,” I said, knowing it probably would be something bizarre. “No left turns,” he said. “What?” I asked. “No left turns,” he repeated.

“Several years ago, your mother and I read an article that said most accidents that old people are in happen when they turn left in front of oncoming traffic. As you get older, your eyesight worsens, and you can lose your depth perception, it said. So your mother and I decided never again to make a left turn”

“What?” I said again. “No left turns,” he said. “Think about it.. Three rights are the same as a left, and that’s a lot safer. So we always make three rights.”

“You’re kidding!” I said, and I turned to my mother for support. “No,” she said, “your father is right. We make three rights. It works.” But then she added: “Except when your father loses count.”

I was driving at the time, and I almost drove off the road as I started laughing. “Loses count?” I asked. “Yes,” my father admitted, “that sometimes happens. But it’s not a problem. You just make seven rights, and you’re okay again.”

I couldn’t resist. “Do you ever go for 11?” I asked. “No,” he said ” If we miss it at seven, we just come home and call it a bad day. Besides, nothing in life is so important it can’t be put off another day or another week.”

My mother was never in an accident, but one evening she handed me her car keys and said she had decided to quit driving. That was in 1999, when she was 90. She lived four more years, until 2003.

My father died the next year, at 102. They both died in the bungalow they had moved into in 1937 and bought a few years later for $3,000. (Sixty years later, my brother and I paid $8,000 to have a shower put in the tiny bathroom — the house had never had one. My father would have died then and there if he knew the shower cost nearly three times what he paid for the house.)

He continued to walk daily — he had me get him a treadmill when he was 101 because he was afraid he’d fall on the icy sidewalks but wanted to keep exercising — and he was of sound mind and sound body until the moment he died.

One September afternoon in 2004, he and my son went with me when I had to give a talk in a neighboring town, and it was clear to all three of us that he was wearing out, though we had the usual wide-ranging conversation about politics and newspapers and things in the news.

A few weeks earlier, he had told my son, “You know, Mike, the first hundred years are a lot easier than the second hundred.”

At one point in our drive that Saturday, he said, “You know, I’m probably not going to live much longer.” “You’re probably right,” I said. “Why would you say that?” He countered, somewhat irritated. “Because you’re 102 years old,” I said. “Yes,” he said, “you’re right.”

He stayed in bed all the next day. That night, I suggested to my son and daughter that we sit up with him through the night. He appreciated it, he said, though at one point, apparently seeing us look gloomy, he said: “I would like to make an announcement. No one in this room is dead yet”

An hour or so later, he spoke his last words: “I want you to know,” he said, clearly and lucidly, “that I am in no pain. I am very comfortable, and I have had as happy a life as anyone on this earth could ever have.”

A short time later, he died. I miss him a lot, and I think about him a lot. I’ve wondered now and then how it was that my family and I were so lucky that he lived so long.

I can’t figure out if it was because he walked through life, Or because he quit taking left turns.

” Life is too short to wake up with regrets. So love the people who treat you right. Forget about the ones who don’t. Believe everything happens for a reason. If you get a chance, take it & if it changes your life, let it. Nobody said life would be easy, they just promised it would most likely be worth it.”

Thanks for reading today.

 

How far is it from happy to unhappy? Tuesday, Jul 20 2010 

Motivational and New Testament and Uncategorized kennethbow 6:33 am

Is there a zero point where you go from 1% happy to 1% unhappy?

Is there a scale that tips ever so gently and you cross from satisfied to unsatisfied?

Is there a continuum that you cross from content to contentious?

It would appear there is some line of demarcation that must be crossed.

It seems a bit far fetched to happy and unhappy at the same time.

Can you be satisfied and unsatisfied simultaneously?

Are contentious people content while they “Do their thing?”

To be content according to the New Testament greek, it means you raise a barrier.  You keep things out.  You guard yourself, especially your mind.

You bring every thought into the obedience of Jesus Christ.  You raise a barrier and say whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are good, a good report, etc.

When we fail to do that, we cross over that indiscernible, unseen line to being contentious.

In Corinth, Paul had contentious people who asked how long is long hair on a woman? These people had dropped a barrier.

In the letter to the Romans, Paul equates contentious people with being disobedient (2.8).

In three missionary journeys Paul had learned to be content.  He had been opposed numerous times by contentious people.  How did he survive their attacks?  He raised a barrier.

Proverbs informs us both men and women are prone to being contentious.

Contentious people are easy to spot. They find fault.  Their life is worse than anyone else’s.

Their church just isn’t what it needs to be.

Their pastor just needs to be more like Mr. Neighboring Pastor.

The music is too loud.

The sermon is too long.

The standards are too strict.

Sitting next to them on the pew or maybe a few feet away is a new convert who is content!

The new convert says,

I love our music.

Wow, what a sermon!

Amen Pastor, preach holiness!

This is the best church I have ever been to!

Our pastor is the best pastor in the whole world!

Both in the same church, same pew.  Same sermon, same choir, same nursery, same hostess, same ushers, same pastor, same music, same songs.

What is the difference?

I guess the difference is the distance from content to contentious.

The distance from satisfied to unsatisfied.

The distance from happy to unhappy.

Thanks for reading today!

 

The secret of the Apostle Paul’s success Monday, Jul 19 2010 

Biblical history and Biographical and Family and Marriage and Motivational and New Testament kennethbow 9:05 am

Paul was about 51 years old.  He was slowly making his way from Athens to Corinth.  His mind and body were on overload.  The events and journeys were taking their toll and he was off balance and on the ropes.

On the first journey there had been the opposition in many cities.  It had been a  continual fight until he reached Derbe.  Included in this section of his life was the near death experience of the stoning at Lystra.

Now he was headed toward Corinth with Athens in his rear view mirror.  He reveals his thoughts in his writings.  He was in despair.  He was so low he actually despaired of life.

Paul was at his lowest point. Looming in front of him was his greatest challenge.  Greater than the cities of Asia minor, greater even than Athens, the intellectual capital of the world.

Recently, he accepted the failed completion of a church in Philippi, then Thessolinica, then again in Berea, and finally the collaspe in Athens!

Somewhere along the dusty travelled road in AD 51, Paul decided I will preach Jesus Christ and him crucified, and nothing else.  Beaten and discouraged, Paul was not ready for what would happen in Corinth.

Corinth was the second largest city in the empire, boasting a population of 700,000 people.  Only the capital, Rome was larger.  The city was new, as it had been destroyed only 100 years before by the Romans and then rebuilt.  It show cased modern architecture.

Corinth was only a few miles from a seaport so there were sailors who came to visit the temple that offered 1000 prostitutes as a form of worship to the Gods of Corinth.  There were Roman officials, a large Jewish population, soldiers, orientals, and every strata of life.

Into this morass walked Paul at his lowest point.  The greatest apostle at his worst, pitted against the greatest challenge of his day.  The result is history!

In eighteen months Paul built the largest church in the history of the world.  The lowest estimates are 40,000 and most historians say the number was more like 80,000 people.

The failures of Athens, Berea, Thessolinica, and Philippi, faded as Corinth unfolded.

At the end of his second missionary journey, Paul had fully recovered in every way.  What was his secret?

While reading the books written to Corinth again recently I was struck by the big picture of chapter seven of the first letter.  So often I have seen the mechanics of this chapter, marriage, virgins, widows, servants, free men, etc.

I realized in all this discussion there rested the secret of Paul’s life and success like an un-mined diamond.

He addressed people that were unhappily married, he addressed virgins, he addressed servants, he addressed free men, he addressed widows, he addressed circumcision.

In all of it he stressed for people to be content!

That was Paul’s secret, to be content! He weaves this thread into many of his other writings.

To the Philippians…be content, 4.11

To Timothy…with food and clothes…be content, 6.8, 6.6

To the Hebrews….be content…13.5

It was the balm for every running issue of life.

Servants, be content!

Free men, be content!

Unhappy married people, be content!

Widows, be content!

Whatever your calling, be content!

Maybe, just maybe, if you could forget your Lystras, your Bereas, your Athens, you might reach your Corinth when you least expect it!

Maybe, just maybe, your greatest season of life is waiting for you when you become content.

When the servant seethes in resentment because they are not free, when the unhappy marriage poisons your daily life, when the past disappointments over whelm you, reach out and pick up Paul’s secret of success!

Find contentment in your life and maybe just maybe, there is a Corinth waiting for you!

Maybe at your lowest, and life’s challenge at it’s most formidable, contentment will bring you your greatest moment!

Godliness with contentment is great gain!

Thanks for reading today!

 

Barnyard Wisdom Wednesday, Jun 30 2010 

Motivational kennethbow 7:13 am

God uses nature as a classroom.  God says things like go to the ant thou sluggard.  God mentions many critters as teachers to us humans.

One time a donkey spoke to a greedy prophet.  The man’s name was Balaam.  We don’t know the donkey’s name.

We do know the donkey’s nature!  Her nature was to be faithful!  When chided by her ignorant owner, she let him know that had she not always been faithful?  Balaam had to say yes she had!

Then there was this certain rooster.  Simon Peter one of Jesus’ disciples was warming his hands at the fire.  The  rooster crowed.

In Israel it was very important to have a faithful rooster!  In fact if the rooster did not crow at the same time each day, it became Sunday dinner.

Time was critical and it was considered treason by the Rabbi’s to give a false time signal.  So Mr cock-a-doodle-do must have been very faithful to his job or he would have been dispensed with long ago.

My point is that God would not even use a jack, er, a donkey, unless that animal proved to be faithful!  God used the rooster only after it had been faithful!

Does he require any less of us? Shouldn’t we strive to be faithful?

Are you faithful in:

  • Church attendance
  • Giving finances to God
  • Prayer
  • Fasting
  • Daily devotion
  • Witnessing
  • Worship and praise

Hey what do you say let’s all use a little barnyard wisdom and be as smart as a donkey and a rooster.

When we prove faithful, God will use us also!

Thanks for reading today!

 

Kill The Indian Monday, Jun 28 2010 

Biographical and Doctrine and Motivational kennethbow 8:41 am

In the late 1800’s the United States government was faced with the issue of how to deal with the Native American.  It was a perplexing problem.

First of all there were many different tribes.  Then there was the distances and areas where the tribes lived.  Mostly there was the issue of war.  The native American was a formidable warrior!  If the Indian tribes had joined forces and fought the U.S. military as a coalition, who knows the outcome?

History tells us the Indian did not join other tribes to resist and consequently, the tribes were slowly methodically eliminated.

Their story is a long, brutal, heart wrenching story.  It is a sad epilogue on our government that they made promises and then broke those promises many many times.

If you have never read the story of the Nez Perce, it would be my recommendation to add it to your to do list of reading.  It is the story of Chief Joseph leading his people 800 miles to attempt to escape to Canada.  The Nez Perce chiefs astounded the Calvary over and over with their tactics.  They used brilliant manuvers like the best trained generals of the world.

Eventually Chief Joseph and his survivors were brought to bay, and his surrender speech is still a classic today.  You can google it and read it.  It will make you weep!

As the government wrestled with the problem of resettling the Indian, and signing treaties, a speech was given in Denver in 1892.  Captain Richard Pratt spoke and in his speech he made a statement that has entered into American lore.  He declared…

“A great general has said that the only good Indian is a dead one, and the high sanction of his destruction has been an enormous factor in promoting Indian massacres.  In a sense I agree with the sentiment, but only in this: that all the Indian there is in the race should be dead.  Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”

There began an effort to change the Indian into a white man.  He was forced to no longer speak his native tongue.  He was forced to change his appearance to look like his white captors. It was an all out effort to kill the Indian, but save the man.

John 10.10 says our enemy is determined to steal, kill and destroy.  It is my opinion that Satan wants to kill the Apostolic, but save the christian.

Satan wants us to change our Apostolic appearance to look like the christians around us.  His desire is we become what everyone else is.

Satan desires that we surrender our Apostolic worship and adopt the more calm, respected ways of other churches.

Satan desires that we surrender our Apostolic doctrine of Acts 2.38 so we can live peacefully with those of differing views.

Satan desires to kill the Apostolic, but save the christian.

Just for the record, there is a small band of Apostolics in the Northwest corner of the United States that have decided we will not surrender!

We will not surrender our Apostolic appearance.  We will not surrender our Apostolic worship.  We will not surrender our Apostolic doctrine.

Like Chief Joseph, we have no desire to fight and war, but when Satan attempts to take away our identity, we have decided we will fight.

Thanks for reading today!

 

The 67th Book Of The Bible Saturday, Jun 12 2010 

Motivational and New Testament kennethbow 8:43 am

“There is an earthquake in your mouth”   Acts 16.16-26
When God decides to use you – it is always after he tries you.
Greatness is chosen out of the furnace of affliction and adversity.
Find somebody mightily used of God – somewhere they have been broken – they may look humble – but they can fight or they wouldn’t be where they are.
We are broken in private – it is lonely – no one really understands.  We want people to understand our woundings and hurtings – God wants a vessel for oil to flow through.  (His love is perfect & unknowable)
They that live godly shall suffer persecution.  We have almost made people believe if you have great faith – you won’t go through anything – that’s not true.  No one is exempt from pain.
In the text, Paul and Silas got in a prison.  From prominence to prison.  God is sovereign. He can bless you in a mess.
Some of the most wretched ungodly people make the best christians.  Nothing worse than a bunch of goody two shoe christians who brag about what the haven’t done.
Some folks are just so glad to be saved.  They’ve been through so much, they have hurt so long, they’ve wept so many nights, they’ve suffered and wrestled with anger and sin and violence.  They’ve been victimized and abused, mistreated, some have been molested and ostracized.  They are full of guilt – then they hear about the blood of Jesus that washes them and gives them a 2nd chance.
While you argue over who’s gonna get this position, who’s got the biggest church, who’s the greatest preacher, who can hit the highest note, they are just so glad to be saved, don’t care if they ever get called on – just glad to be washed in the blood!
When you start doing things for God you are gonna run into opposition.  Paul and Silas got on the enemies hit list by doing the will of God.  They had fooled around and delivered a witch, broke a yoke, and put some evil men out of business – that’s what good church do – they shut down some things.
We need to shut some things down.  Quit being so nice – Paul just shut it down – didn’t ask anybody – Don’t let anybody tell you that doing the will of God won’t get you in trouble – it will.
I have learned from personal experience, you can be right and be treated wrong.  Be criticized – doing right, be lied on – can’t even defend yourself.  You can be victimized and have to hold your peace – can’t say nothing – just have wait on the Lord to straighten it out.  You can suffer many days – God does nothing – he lets you suffer.
God moved Paul’s ministry into the prison where he was treated like an animal, stripped and beaten.
Paul had had a bad day.
There are all kinds of prisons.  Sometimes you can’t even explain your prison – people make assumptions – yak, yak, yak (like Job’s friends!)
I came to tell you – God is gonna get glory out of the worst circumstances of your life.
You need to tell someone – something good is gonna come out of this – it hurts, I’m crying, I’m in trouble – I’m not in this for nothing.
Without trials – You only have a theory.

You are only looking in the window – you can get in a prison and not know how you got there!  When you get there you’ll learn how to pray!  You won’t need books or tapes or seminars.  People talking about you like a dog – you will pray!  (When you hurt bad enough)
Learn to say with me – Glad for the Bad – it made me pray!
Some of you have resented your problems – they made you – you have to take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’ – nobody helped me – but check it out I’m still here!  I’m tougher than I look. I’m a survivor!
Tell yourself about your friends – Thank you for not helping me – or I’d have had to praise you – but I had to pray – now I praise Him (I think I’ll praise Him for things I can’t testify about) (The victim – perpetrator)
Ez. 3.10-15…Ezekiel
I was hot, wroth.  God said sit where they lay sat – you must sit where they sit.  Put your books up and sit where I sat – 7 days.  I was astonished.  He lived as a captive.  He visited the jailhouse.
I’ve spent some nights in a prison and I wanted out, but, can’t think or figure or budget my way out – I was in prison.  Did not know how to get out.
God did not deliver us from on high – He came through 42 generations, into a dressing room called Mary’s womb wrapped himself in flesh and for 33 years sat where we sat!  Touched by the feelings of our infirmities.  Tempted in all points.  Sat where we sat!  (He feels what I feel)
God is not into child abuse – you are coming out of your trouble! God is gonna get a lot of glory from your pain.  God will reverse your trouble and pain.
The bible says the enemy must pay you back double for every night you cried and suffered, every injury.  Is. 61.7
Paul and Silas went from notoriety to obscurity – why??  Someone beating your child and you don’t stop them?  God suffered it for greater glory.
When people see what you have been through they are going to believe in God!  They have seen God’s power in you.  Tell yourself I am a testimony. I haven’t lost my mind, haven’t thrown in the towel, I’m in church – I am a testimony to the power of God.
You are the 67th book of the Bible. People are gonna read you and believe in God.
I don’t have to argue with you if Jesus is real: look at me!  If He wasn’t real I wouldn’t be here!
Paul – the man of faith, power – epistle writer, beaten – stripped – sitting where they sat.  When he went in there was no singing.  Sometimes you can’t sing – I told myself I’d never go through this and here I am in it.  No shouting – they beat him, took all day late into the night.
God – I thought you loved me – Here I am bound.  I’m doing my best.  No deliverance – no escape no release – torment, suffering – God where are you – they are gonna kill me –I thought I’d be out of this by now.

God doesn’t even clear his throat.  You did it for Peter in Acts 12, why not for me?
No wind, no earthquake, no apostles pleading his case.  Where are the people I helped and blessed? Where are they? Where are my “friends”?  God why am I in this situation.
I might not even get out, but since I’m in this jam, I might as well learn how to survive.
I don’t see anything to be happy about I don’t feel happy. No cards, no letters, no good news.
But at midnight – I’m gonna think myself happy – whatsoever is good, pure, lovely, if there be any virtue, and praise and at Midnight.
In somebody’s life it is midnight.  You have been depressed, ostracized, criticized.  You have thought about giving up, throwing in the towel – now it’s 11:59 – you might as well praise God.  Open your mouth and cause an earthquake.
I will bless the Lord at all times – his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
Even in bad times, I’m a single parent, I’m divorced, been mistreated, and misunderstood – but I’m gonna praise Him.  I’ve had some pain and I’ve had some scars but I will bless the Lord.  I’m a disciplined soldier!!
It’s midnight – it’s time to praise Him.
Time to get out of your prison.  Now or never!
There’s an earthquake in your mouth – open it up and praise him!  Give God praise!

You’ve gotta change your attitude while your are in the prison – then God delivers you.
You could have been out a long time ago – your deliverance is in your mouth – stop murmuring, complaining and feeling sorry for your self – stop blaming other people – throw back your head and praise God!!
Somebody needs to say – I’m coming out of this.  Excuse me – I’m coming out.  I’ve been in this long enough – I’m coming out!
C’mon survivor – get out right now!
When you get loose – everything in the prison gets set free, everything around you, connected to you – family, friends –
Devil I’m mad – you should have never let me get in the prison – cause now I’m not coming out alone I’m bringing everything out with me.
If you praise him – no prison can hold you!
Thanks for reading today!

 

Bara, the divine fiat of creation. Tuesday, Jun 1 2010 

Biblical history and Motivational kennethbow 6:52 am

In the beginning, God created.

There is great debate about how long the creative process was.  There are advocates for each creative day being 7,000 years long.  There are others who contend for each day being 1,000 years long.  Finally there are some who say no, each day was a 24-hour period.

Regardless of which position you take, as a Christian I certainly hope you take the position that God created all things.  Christians do not embrace evolution in any form.  We reject it wholesale!

Creation is one of the bedrocks of Christianity!  It is impossible to believe in God and not believe in creation.

In the act of creation Almighty God did many wonderful things.  The Hebrew word used in creation is bara.  This word means to create by divine fiat.  It signals that God had no help and no material to work with! (Fiat: origin: 1384, from fiat lux, “let there be light” in Genesis)

God did not remake, or re-design.  Almighty God stepped out on nothing in the inky blackness of eternity and simply spoke!

God created out of darkness!  When there was not so much as an angel’s wing disturbing the air, when there was nothing but God himself, God spoke.  There was no light but God himself!

One of the attributes of God that is His essence, is light.  John tells us that God is light.  It is what He is and who He is.

God opened his mouth and said, let there be light.  Suddenly all of creation blazed with blinding brilliant light.  Suns appeared, and stars spangled the night sky.  It happened in a nano second.

The speed of light was created by God in His original word and still confounds man today!  Every thing astronomers measure they measure by the first word out of God’s mouth!

God created light at the speed of light, and light maintains that speed today.

Is there darkness in your life right now?

Fear not! God is the same yesterday, today, and forever!  He can create light in your dark world by His divine fiat!  He longs to speak light into your world.

God also created from deadness.  When God opened His mouth and spoke there was no life anywhere.  When God spoke, when God Bara-ed, the amazing world of flora and fauna sprang for.

The incredible world of flowers, and birds, oceans, quasars, animals, and ultimately man sprang forth with prodigiality.  It staggers our finite mind at the completeness of creation.

Every form of life on earth today sprang from deadness. There was no life!

Does your life feel dead and pointless?

Take courage, in one word God can and will speak life into your deadness and things will spring forth!  People will be amazed at the abundance of your life, because of your God!

God created from chaos and disorder!  When God finished days one through three, He then repeats the cycle, and perfects on days four through six what He had created on days one through three.

When light was undefined, God created the sun, moon, and stars.  When the atmosphere above was empty and unpopulated, God created every bird of the air and every fish of the sea. When the dry land was uninhabited God made every beast, creature, and Man.

Don’t despair when your world seems like everything is disconnected and in pieces! Wait on God.  God will complete the work He began in your life.

Because our God is the same yesterday, today and forever, He still creates by divine fiat!  If you are in darkness, or in deadness, or in disorder, take heart!  He will create things in you and in your life that will astound the experts.

They will look at you and shake their learned heads and wonder how in the world did this ever come to pass!

Thanks for reading today!

 

You can live for God anywhere! Thursday, May 20 2010 

Biblical history and Biographical and Motivational and Old Testament kennethbow 9:44 am

You can live for  God anywhere!

He lived in the bulls-eye center of one of the worst times of history. Every man was doing that which was right in his own eyes!  There was no King in Israel.

Less than 10 miles from his ancestral home where he still lived, idolatry had just been introduced to Israel.

Idolatry would dominate every facet of Israeli life for the next one thousand years.  It would take a seventy year exile in Babylon to purge the southern nation, and a permanent exile of the northern kingdom to finally get rid of idolatry.

He was there to see the birth of Idolatry!

About five miles from his home one of the tribes had just forced a priest to become the priest of their tribe. They were dissatisfied with their land along the coast, and their tribe was looking to expand their boundaries beyond what God had allocated their tribe.

He had a ring side seat to watch a tribe lose its place forever in Israel. Dan’s heritage disappeared before his eyes.

He was right in the midst of a controversy that eventually cost the nation 65,000 fighting men.  He saw the results of infighting among tribes and saw the results.

He saw the grisly piece of evidence sent to his tribe and was close enough to hear the battle cries over three days that finally left only four hundred men to the tribe of Benjamin. To see a piece of a mutilated woman and the war that erupted among the people of God was no small issue!

Yet through it all he stayed true to the word of God!  When others had no regard for the law, he lived by every letter down to the smallest detail.

The world around him was going to hell in a hand basket, but he never flinched!

Let others fight among themselves.  Let others worship idols.  Let others lose their inheritance.  It never touched him!

If the law said take off your sandal and meet the near kinsman in the gate, that is exactly what he would do!

If the law said another man had first claim to the woman he was interested in, he would honor and defer to the law!

He stands as a silent sentinel to those who make up their mind no matter what others do, I will live by the word of God!

He is a testimony against every excuse maker, and compromiser that says everybody is doing it.

While his nation fell to idolatry, killed itself off, and gave away their inheritance, he stayed true to the law of God!

Is it any wonder his great grandson became the greatest King Israel ever had?

Thank you Boaz, and thanks for reading today!

 

When Justice Was For Sale To The Highest Bidder Monday, May 17 2010 

Biblical history and Biographical and Motivational and Old Testament kennethbow 9:28 am

It was the most prosperous time in their history.

Money was flowing.

The Northern Kingdom of Israel was being led by the dynamic and charismatic Jeroboam II.

Jeroboam had waged successful war against Israel’s hostile neighbors and won control of the trade routes that poured wealth into Samaria.

The land was fertile, the rains fell, and the bumper crops swelled their barns and their bank accounts.  It was a golden age.  Public buildings were being built.  Private residences were large and expensive.  The public worship was now ostentatious and full of pomp.

The rich landowners with total disregard for God’s law,  built great personal estates.  They did so at the cost of dispossessing their poor neighbors.  The poor were further treated badly by the greedy merchants who used unjust weights to buy and sell grain.  These dishonest merchants mixed husks with barley kernels.

More and more of the people were being forced to sell themselves and their children into slavery.

Justice was for sale to the highest bidder!

The wives of the rich demanded more and more luxuries.  No one seemed to give a thought to those who were cheated to pay the tab of the greedy.

No one that is except God!

Ten miles south of Jerusalem, a poor farmer heard an inner voice speak to him.  He was of the poorest part of society.  He dealt in Sycamore figs.  The modern equivalent of someone who gathers cans along the roadside to get money.

His name was Amos.  He left Tekoa to challenge the greatest nation on earth at the zenith of it’s wealth and power.

Has there ever been men like those prophets of old?  Fearless men who gave account to no one but God!

When that poor country boy walked into Bethel, don’t you know his eyes were wide?  No doubt his mouth was hanging open.  He had never seen anything like this in the poor region he lived in.

He walked the streets and saw the luxurious homes of the wealthy.  He saw the opulence of the rich and famous.  He observed women reclining on ivory inlaid couches, feasting on meats and drinking exotic wines while they listened to the lastest popular music groups (Amos 4.1, 6.4-6).

He saw a nation that was hardened by selfishness and greed.  He  spoke to them about the need for their hearts to be touched with the needs of the poor and oppressed.

Does any of this sound familiar?

Does God still care about injustice?

Is Justice for sale to the highest bidder in your life?

Thanks for reading today.

 

The Ugly Christian Wednesday, May 12 2010 

Biographical and Motivational kennethbow 7:50 am

Many years ago when I was in High School I was required to read a book for English class.  It was called “The Ugly American”.

You never know when you pick up a book how it will impact your life.  I was not prepared for the effect that one book would have on my walk with God.

The book is a satire written by some former State Department men who evidently disagreed with the government’s policy of dealing with the growing communism threat globally.

Back then, we were in what was called a “Cold War.”  It was not open conflict with Russia, but rather Democracy and Communism both trying to sway countries to follow their example.

The feeling at the time on the news and in the press was that the whole world would go one-way or the other.

The book is about an engineer that was independently wealthy and decided to go to Asia and attempt to educate the people there and better their lives.

It called “The Ugly American” because the engineer is a large ugly gangly man.  All his life he has been conscious of his appearance.

When he helps the people there with simple projects he is no longer ugly, but is in fact very beautiful to them.  He shows them how to use bicycle parts to irrigate their crops and saves them backbreaking labor they have practiced for years.

The authors illustrate how the communists live among the natives but the Americans live in ivory towers.  Their criticism of American policy and technique are very glaring.

The part of the book that grabbed me over forty years ago was about the engineer’s wife.  While her husband was working with the native people she decided to try an experiment on her own.

It involved a broom.  She observed the old people of the village had bent backs.  She thought it might be from using short handled brooms.  She was sure they would not take any advice from an outsider so she put her plan in action.

She went out into the jungle and found some long reeds and cut some down.  She then made a handle for her broom from one of the long reeds.

As she swept her porch, some of the elderly people came and watched her.  Then the old man asked her about the reed. She said he could have one of hers but they could go into the jungle and get as many as they needed on one water buffalo.

What followed in the book is what influenced my life for the last forty years.  This is what happened.

And it was not until four years later, when Emma was back in Pittsburg, that she learned the final results of her broom handle project.  One day she got a letter in a large handsome yellow-bamboo paper envelope. Inside, written in an exquisite script, was a letter from the headman of Chang Dong.

Wife of the engineer:

I am writing you to thank you for a thing that you did for the old people of Chang Dong.  For many centuries, longer than any man can remember, we have always had old people with bent backs in this village.  And in every village that we know of the old people have always had bent backs.

We had always thought this was part of growing old, and it was one of the reasons we dreaded old age.  But, wife of the engineer, you have changed all that.  By the lucky accident of your long handled broom you showed us a new way to sweep.  It is a small thing, but it has changed the lives of our old people. For four years, ever since you have left, we have been using the long reeds for broom handles.  You will be happy to know that today there are few bent backs in the village of Chang Dong.  Today the backs of our old people are straight and firm.  No longer are their bodies painful during the months of the monsoon.

This is a small thing, I know, but for our people it is an important thing.

I know you are not of our religion, wife of the engineer, but perhaps you will be pleased to know that on the outskirts of the village we have constructed a small shrine in your memory.  It is a simple affair; at the foot of the altar are these words.  ”In memory of the woman who unbent the backs of our people.”  In front of the shrine there is a stack of the old short reeds which we used to use.

Again, wife of the engineer, we thank you and we think of you.

For me as a seventeen-year-old boy, my life purpose suddenly became clear.  No matter what else life demanded, my first purpose was to live in a manner that people could see a better way.

I have not always succeeded, but I have always striven.

May God help us all to unbend the backs of the people we live around.  When you make their life better you will never be ugly.  They will not care if a woman has long hair and no cosmetics.  When their back no longer hurts, you will be beautiful!

There should never be an ugly Christian!

Thanks for reading today!

 

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