You Make Strong Whatever I Attempt

When I think of the days you materialized and walked on earth with Adam and Eve, and returned as Mary’s Son, I lift0-THEY MET JESUS-Medium-front cover up my soul to you. When I think of the angels announcing your appearance, I offer my heart to you.  When I think of your miracles and words of wisdom you proclaimed, I sing my song to you. When I think of the sorrow you bore and the cross of your suffering for me, I offer to lay down my life for you if your enemy ever demands it. My spirit communes with your Spirit. You love me so.  Though I may feel unloved by others sometimes, I feel your love always. The God of Love breaks through barriers and is victorious.

How amazing your Plan, God, to give mankind free will, let us fall, then forgive and lift us back up. Satan did not understand forgiveness. It was a mystery to him. Even your angels did not understand forgiveness. You can forgive anything and anyone. Your mercy tempers your justice. Forgiving tempers accusing. How angry Satan became after your Word died like he wanted, then came back to life. Your Word paid the ransom for our souls and Satan had no choice but to set us free.  How amazed the angels were after your holy Plan was carried out. How overcome I am that you forgive me over and over for the same sins.  I do try to resist Satan, Lord, and that is all you want. Still, I am awed. This is what makes you so great. You are the God of second chances. You are the God of extreme love. I worship you.

Help me not spend so much time studying your Word that I neglect relationships. Learning is just the beginning. Applying is what you want. Forgive me when I neglect people.

Thank you for the opportunity to wait. I make plans and they do not always come about as I desired. So, I wait, and as I do, I think a little deeper, I let go, I rest. Thank you for making my dreams of spreading your words of saving grace far greater than I could imagine. You stretch out your hand to make my puny efforts take hold and grow. I struggle, I am weak, but you make strong whatever I attempt in your own way. You are my strength.

.

0-THEY MET JESUS-Thumbnail-front coverTHEY MET JESUS, all eight books in one. Come meet the people who met Jesus.  You are one of them  Probably you are several of them. Go ahead and struggle with him as they did.  Laugh. Cry.  Do mental battle with him.  Emotional battle too.  Fight for your faith as they fought.  Pause to listen for what you’ve never heard before.  Then touch Jesus.  This is the story of faith in the impossible.   Hope in the inconceivable.  Love for the invincible.  It is the dreams of youth, the desperations of infirmity, the hopes of age, and the song of eternity. To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste this: https://bit.ly/TheyMetJesusAll         

https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/historical-novel-about-jesus/they-met-jesus-all-8-books-in-1-adults-childs-versions/?frame-nonce=9bf6873c93

You’re Almost Home

0-Stephen-Cover-Kindle-MediumMy Father, you are my king. You are crowned with the sun. Your scepter is tipped with the moon. Your robe spreads across millions of galaxies.  Your throne is the dome of the cosmos encircled with a thousand rainbows. Your eyes sparkle like stars, your laughter is like the thunder, your tears like raindrops, your touch like billowy clouds gliding across the sky. Oh, my Lord. I love you, adore you, worship you.  I am your bride and long for you.

My Lord, you have given me so much. I have a decent place to live with air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter. I have decent clothes to wear, nutritious food, doctors nearby. I even have the luxuries of a TV, cell phone, and computer. I take them for granted far too much. I sometimes forget others in the world who live in fear their freedom and luxuries will be taken from them.  If it is your will that I become one of them, grant me strength to do it.

Ah, Lord Jesus. What a life you lived!  You never sinned and that means you never passed up anyone who needed you. I think you must have been skinny. You must have skipped many a meal to get to everyone. And the awesome miracles you performed! Growing cut-off arms and legs back, returning the noses, fingers and toes to lepers, making the forever blind see, opening the ears of the deaf so they could hear your voice and the amazing words that came from your lips. Thank you, thank you for showing us who you really were ~ God materialized.

.

00-Stephen-Cover-Kindle-ThumbnailSTEPHEN: UNLIKELY MARTYR.   Saul goes after both Stephen and Simon of Cyrene. They rush to save each other’s lives. Stephen distracts the Sanhedrin with a long history lesson until Simon can escape to Antioch….As Stephen takes his final steps toward the stoning pit, he can still hear his father in years past. “Take another step, Son. Now another. Hold your head high. Don’t let them see weakness. You’re doing fine. Now another step. I’m here, Son. I will never leave you. You’re almost home.”  To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste this:      https://bit.ly/StephenUnlikelyMartyr    https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/books-more-biblical-historical-novels/book-7-stephen-unlikely-martyr/

Joy in fasting?

00-cover-kindle-medium-newThe scripture for today, June 17 (6/17), is Matthew 6:17 as found in the New Testament of the Bible:

“But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face.”

This is interesting because Jesus did not say “If, you fast,” but rather “When you fast.” It was as though he was teaching us to take for granted that we would fast ~ it would be second-nature to us. In a sense, it is, for when most people go through a sudden tragedy such as loss of a loved one, they often cannot eat.

But what about voluntary fasting? The early church sometimes fasted. Acts 13:2 says a congregation in Antioch, Syria, fasted and worshipped, then chose men to go out as missionaries. Queen Esther fasted before going to the king uninvited with a request he might not like (Esther 4:16). Isaiah 58:3 says people fasted in order to humble themselves.

Some people respond, “I’d die if I had to fast.” Perhaps that’s kind of the idea. We know we would die if we went without food long enough. So perhaps one day of fasting is a way of saying, “God, I would die for you if I had to.” Yes, fasting is a humbling experience and frightening to some people. But perhaps that is the point.

Is something important coming up that you know you will be urgently praying about? Once you skip one meal, you will have conquered your desire to eat. Then, with your brain not having to concentrate on digesting food, it will be able to focus more on that important thing happening in your life. Your prayers will be more focused. You will be more focused with your eyes more clearly on God.

So, take a shower, comb your hair, put on some nice clothes, and look like you have something important to do. Then fast.

.

00-Cover-KINDLE-Thumbnail-NewAPPLIED CHRISTIANITY:  A HANDBOOK OF 500 GOOD WORKS.  Handicapped? Wanting to do good works for others anyway? Too busy to add good works to your already cluttered life? What do you say when a friend’s relative dies? Wonder how to handle gossip, baby showers, mean bosses, etc. in the workplace? Do the poor in other countries bother you? Want to teach your children to do good deeds? To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste this:  https://bit.ly/APPLIEDCHRISTIANITY  https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/1107-2/my-book-applied-christianity/

 

What’s in the blood?

The scripture for today, June 14 (6/14), is Numbers 6:14 as found in the Old Testament of the Bible:

0-BK 7-ShadowOfDeath-Cover-new-Thumbnail“There he is to present his offerings to the Lord…a year-old ewe lamb without defect for a sin offering…. “

 A lot of people don’t understand what Jesus dying on a cross has to do with going to heaven. Romans 6:23 says, “the wages of sin is death.” ~ both physical and soul death. It is what we earn when we sin.  It is Satan who pays us our wages.

In the Garden of Eden, God told Adam and Eve, the day you sin you will die.  Indeed, the day they fell into Satan’s deceptive trap and sinned, their souls were separated from God.

Leviticus 17:11 “The life of the body is in the blood.” Although Hebrews 10:4 says the blood of bulls and goats cannot take away sin, their blood was a reminder of the horribleness of a violent, bloody death – whether physical or spiritual.

Finally, God the Word came to earth as a human, and John the Baptist called him the Lamb of God (John 1:29). Jesus was perfect; that is, he never sinned, he had no defects (Hebrews 4:15).  Therefore, Satan had no hold on him (John 14:30). But he took the blame for our sins (II Corinthians 5:21) and faced down Satan with them.

What does blood do?  It delivers oxygen to the lungs and it delivers poisons to be destroyed by the liver which is in our side.  So, after Jesus took that last belabored breath, a soldier opened his side with a spear, and out came all our poison sins along with the water which symbolizes rebirth.

Hours before his crucifixion, Jesus said in John 12:1, “Now judgment is upon this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out.”  How? In his dying, he could now cast out Satan’s greatest weapon – death.  Just when Satan thought he had won, Jesus came back to life so that “through death, he destroyed him who had the power of death – the devil” (Hebrews 2:14).

Then God said, If you’ll believe and imitate sinless Jesus, I will forgive and consider you sinless too (Romans 6). Then I’ll bring you back to life in heaven.

Power in the blood?  Wonderful power!

And, by the way, since he came back to life on Sunday, that’s what makes Sunday so special. It’s the I’m-sorry-you-had-to-die-for-my-sins Day. It’s the “Do-this-in-remembrance-of-me” Lord’s Supper Day.  It’s the Gratitude Day.

.

0-BK 7-ShadowOfDeath-Cover-new-ThumbnailTHEY MET JESUS:  SHADOW OF DEATH.  It takes two chapters to entirely cover the crucifixion of Jesus — one chapter for the first three hours, a second chapter for the last three hours.  Then the measly funeral held in the cave with two secret followers, his mother. and four other women just as the sun slipped away on the most terrible day in the history of mankind.  The following book, COME FLY WITH ME, is the victory book.  To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste thishttps://bit.ly/ShadowOfDeath-7                                           https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/historical-novel-about-jesus/book-7-shadow-of-death-adults-childs-versions/  

Tears Blended with Your Blood

0-BK 7-ShadowOfDeath-Cover-new-MediumLord, you never forget me. You have so much to do in the universe to keep the stars in their heavens, the planets in their orbits, and the seas in their bounds. More, you are always thinking about me. I am always on your mind. You watch me and do all that is necessary to guide me, though you leave the choice up to me. You are so boundless in knowledge and wisdom, yet you respect my decisions ~ right or wrong. Even when my decisions are wrong, you do not interfere. You give me room to think and change my mind. I lift up my hands in praise to you. You are the Great God of the universe, Ruler of heaven & earth and King of my heart. 

Your eyes were so sleepy on the day you were born. Ah, what a journey you had made. By the time the wise men found you, your eyes were big and wide and full of curiosity.  As you grew up, your eyes looked intently at what was around you and a vague memory approached of you having made it all. As a full-grown man, your eyes looked with pity on the sick, the crippled, the diseased, the handicapped and you healed them all. Then one day those eyes were filled with tears as you looked down from the cross at people bragging they were at last killing you. Those tears blended with your blood fell on the hearts of mankind. I kneel before you, my tears mingling with yours and I worship you.

.

0-BK 7-ShadowOfDeath-Cover-new-ThumbnailTHEY MET JESUS:  SHADOW OF DEATH. The priests thought they had killed him.  The Romans thought they had killed him. Satan thought he had killed him.  Wrong. They had all been wrong.  You cannot kill God.  In holy defiance, he re-entered that mangled body, renewed it, and came back to life to live on forever.  To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste this……….https://bit.ly/ShadowOfDeath-7 https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/historical-novel-about-jesus/book-7-shadow-of-death-adults-childs-versions/

 

Altogether Love

0-REV-Cover-No Logo-KINDLE-lg-thumbnailI lift up my praises to you, the self-existent one.  Both Father of the Son and Son of the Father. The great wellspring, mind, and will of all things. The only life giver to all things. You are all life, all truth, and altogether love. You are so far above me and yet so near. You fill the universe, yet make your home in my heart. Even the stars bow to you in effervescent awe.

Thank you, God almighty, for all you did to save me. So complicated. Yet you stayed on track. You gave mankind a chance to earn and deserve our salvation by giving us the Law of Moses which we just could not to keep perfectly. You let the rest of the world come up with their own god-laws. Nothing worked. We could not be perfect. Then Jesus came and did it for us, for me. You were perfect for me and for everyone. You see me as perfect as Jesus was. Oh, Lord, you are so wonderful and merciful. I do not deserve your presence, but you love me still and stand by me always. And so always I worship you.

.

0-REV-Cover-No Logo-KINDLE-lg-thumbnailREVELATION: A LOVE LETTER FROM GOD.  Revelation is not a book of gloom and doom. It is a book of hope. A book of reassurance that, no matter how bad things get in the world, God is still in control and still loves us like light shimmering in the soul. This is a history of the world before Jesus was born, especially the world of the Israelites. Then it moves on to Jesus’ birth, ministry, and death. It ends with the final doom of Satan and the final victory of the church, the heavenly Jerusalem. After all, does not chapter 1, verse 19 state that John was to “write, therefore, what you have seen [past], what is now [present], and what will take place later [future]”? To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste this:  https://bit.ly/REVELATION-LOVE   

https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/1107-2/my-book-revelationa-love-letter-from-god/

Powerful, magnificent and glorious

0-BK 5-FloodGates-Cover-Medium-NewI magnify your name, Jehovah, God of the universe. The only God. The God who is  just and yet merciful.  The God who loves the unloving. The God who is sinless but has patience with sinners.  Such love fills me with lofty gladness. You overlook what I do wrong and make it all good and right. You behold my puny efforts to make a difference in the world and make them multiply and expand and become beautiful. Such attention and love I cannot comprehend. So I worship you.

Ah, my Lord Jesus, thank you for leaving heaven for me and facing Satan in a human body on earth. He tried everything he could think of to make you sin just one time. That one time would have been all he needed to bring you down to his Sheol. But you were too strong for him, even in your human body’s weakest moments! You hovered over Satan and dared him. You brought Satan to his knees. You rose up powerful and magnificent and glorious. I was too weak to face down Satan. No one could. No one but you. So, you did. You did it for me. You took my place.  How can I thank you enough? I will spend eternity finding new ways to show my deep gratitude.

.

0-BK 5-FloodGates-Cover-Thumbnail-NewTHEY MET JESUS:  FLOOD GATES. Jesus survived death threats, calmed misdirected power, and talked with the spirit world.  He released people of handicaps,  gave an adulteress hope, rested with friends, then raised the dead.  And the hypocrite religious leaders finalized plans to kill him.  To BUY NOW, click a book cover or paste this……….https://bit.ly/2XsOXDS   

https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/historical-novel-about-jesus/book-5-flood-gates-adults-childs-versions/

 

Soar through the universe to you

Love Letters of Jesus & his Bride, Eccelsia-THUMBNAILShout for joy, all mountains. Sing with exhilaration, all stars. Declare it, all tongues, across seas far and wide: You, Lord, reign on earth and in heaven. You keep all things in order, rotating in their paths, blooming in their seasons, reproducing kind after kind.  You are faithful and true and let nothing stop you. You are the ultimate in love, kindness, mercy, gentleness. At the same time, you are strength, potency, might. You never change. You stand for right in the face of Satan who convinces mankind rebellion is good, doing things for self is best, following what you declared wrong is true life. You alone are good. You alone offer true life, marvelous life, forever life.

Ah, my Lord, thank you for making me your bride.  How anxious I am for us to be together at last. I think and dream of that day when you will close the door on my life here and open it on my life with you.  Help those who love me here understand my new happiness when I go. Help them smile through their tears. You and I will be waiting for them to join us. Oh, happy day when my life will end here, for it will be the beginning of true life. To be the bride of the Creator lifts my heart and makes it soar through the universe to you.

.

Love Letters of Jesus & his Bride, Eccelsia-THUMBNAILLOVE LETTERS OF JESUS & HIS BRIDE, ECCLESIA.  The Song of Songs written by King Solomon is a love story between a man and woman but overflows with the symbolism of Jesus Christ and his love for his Bride, his Church, his Ecclesia.  Each chapter thereafter coincides with the same chapter number in the Song of Songs. Come along with me now in this expansion of the greatest love story in the history of heaven and earth.  To BUY NOW, click a book cover or copy this: https://bit.ly/39LBpK3 

https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/love-letters-of-jesus-his-bride-ecclesia-2/

 

Easter Every Sunday. You gave me your name

Supper-Front Cover-MediumHow can I praise you enough? Tell me and I will do it. You are in my thoughts and my dreams. You are my light in dark places. You are my warrior, my comforter, my hero.  You make promises and keep them. Even when things do not seem to go right, you are still keeping your promises. Even when a thousand years have passed, still you are keeping your promises.  Even when I have forgotten them, you never do. You are truth, integrity, fidelity. You are justice tempered with mercy. You are all I need and more than I can fully understand. You are above and beyond all things. Most of all, you are in my heart.

Please forgive me when I complain. Nothing happens to me without your permission. Help me see how my problems can only make me stronger if I let them. You did not set me in a lazy world where I do not have to lift a finger. You set me in a world with work to do, places to go, people to see. When I grow lazy, make me take a second breath and get out there and get back to work. It is the only way I can become spiritually strong.

Thank you, Lord, Jehovah, materialized in Jesus, magnified in his works, glorified in his words. You did everything possible to save me from hell.  You go after me when I wander away. You shine your light when I go into dark places. You love me even when I forget you.  I am unworthy. Yet you made me and I am yours. You protect me and give me strength. You give me your perfection just by believing all this. You even gave me your name.

.

Supper-Front Cover-ThumbnailTHE LORD’S SUPPER: 52 READINGS WITH PRAYERS.   This book contains 52 Bible readings about Jesus’ perfect life, the horrors of his death, and inexpressible glory of his resurrection. Two prayers accompany each reading that will touch the hearts of participants.    It will stir worshipers who have been keeping EASTER EVERY SUNDAY for decades with a fresh and deeper insight into the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord. Not only the readings from scriptures but also the prayers will help worshipers touch Jesus and say thank more than ever.  To BUY NOW, click a books cover or paste this:  https://bit.ly/LordsSupper52   

https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/the-lords-supper-52-readings-with-prayers/

 

just ordinary? Not so.

0-Joseph-Cover-Kindle-MediumThe scripture for today, March 29 (3/29), is Luke 3:29 as found in the New Testament of the Bible:

.” ..the son of Joshua, the son of Eliezer, the son of Jorim, the son of Matthat, the son of Levi….”

Who in the world were these five men: Joshua, Eliezer, Jorim, Matthat, and Levi? Some were named after famous Jews, but no one in this list was famous himself. In fact, nothing else is said in the Bible about any of these men. They’re just a single name in a single but long list made in obscurity.

Who were they that they earned even one brief mention in the Bible?

They were ancestors of Joseph, the human “father” of Jesus. What else? They were born and survived long enough to have sons. Not important at the time? No, but eventually, it was.

We read obituaries and sometimes wonder about our own. Our whole life reduced to born, married, had a job, had children, died. That’s it. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just another one of billions in the world having come and gone.

Hold on! Maybe not!

Maybe your life, as ordinary as it seems now, will someday serve a greater purpose through your descendant or someone you become friends with. In a later generation ~ maybe ten or twenty generations from now ~ someone may do something extremely important for souls of the world. And it was made possible because of your “unordinary life” way back in the early twenty-first century when you survived one day at a time.

.

0-Joseph-Cover-ThumbnailINTREPID MEN OF GOD.  JOSEPH: THE OTHER FATHER.  Imagine being told by God to guard His Son in a violent world until he is grown. How does Joseph choose a city in strange Egypt to hide 2-year-old Jesus from Herod’s spies? Does he dare take 4-year-old Jesus to the temple where now-dead Herod’s son slaughters thousands? How can Joseph protect Jesus with all the skirmishes and killing on roads everywhere with dozens vying to take over as king? How does Joseph handle the persecution in Nazareth by people who could count and knew Mary was pregnant before marrying Joseph? What does Joseph do with Jesus in Nazareth, just three miles from Sepphoris, hotbed of zealot protesters, when a Roman legate burns the city and crucifies 2000 more zealots in Jerusalem? In what ways does Joseph teach Jesus how to be a skilled carpenter in sometimes dangerous situations, and avoid being mauled in the mountains when they cut trees for lumber? How many times, when Jesus was in danger did Joseph cry out, “God, help me protect our Son!”?  To BUY NOW, click  book cover or paste this:  https://bit.ly/The-Other-Father

  https://northernlightspublishinghouse.com/books-more-biblical-historical-novels/book-5-joseph-the-other-father/