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Let me make this clear, God moves mountains! I don’t care how big the mountain is, just pray & have faith!

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Father God, please give us faith to trust Your plan, even when we don’t understand, amen.

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Don’t you dare get tired of asking God to bless you.

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Follow us on Youtube

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Pray for me and my family please. We have only one vehicle and it barely runs. My brother has appointments he has to get to for his surgeries and dialysis. We’re afraid we can’t make it all the time and we don’t have much money or even family we can ask for help with.

I will certainly pray for you and your family, and I will place your prayer request on my website where people from around the world pray for each other. If you want to visit the site, go to praise-and-worship.com.

Also, God's children here on Tumblr, please pray for the needs listed above, in Jesus' name.

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"Scripture speaks of both a holiness we already possess in Christ before God and a holiness in which we are to grow more and more. The first is the result of the work of Christ for us; the second is the result of the work of the Holy Spirit in us. The first is perfect and complete and is ours the moment we trust Christ; the second is progressive and incomplete as long as we are in this life. The objective holiness we have in Christ and the subjective holiness produced by the Holy Spirit are both gifts of God’s grace and are both appropriated by faith."

Jerry Bridges

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Stuck

“Remember Lot’s wife.”

Jesus drops this in the middle of today’s Gospel.

It sounds random. But it’s actually the whole point.

Because whether we’re looking at how it all ends (which is what Jesus is talking about) or how things are going on a Friday in November, there’s something you and I need to know. And it starts with Lot’s wife.

“Remember Lot’s wife.”

It’s a callback to Genesis, to the only thing we know about Lot’s wife,

“But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”

Lot and his family are fleeing the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. The Angel of the Lord tells them,

“Don’t look back! Don’t stop anywhere on the way!”

Don’t look back at what’s burning down. Don’t look back at what God is finished with. Don’t look back at what God is delivering you from.

Look to where God is taking you. Don’t stop until you get there.

But Lot’s wife stopped. She looked back. And she became a pillar of salt.

No, this isn’t the arbitrary punishment of a petty God.

It’s just the natural consequence of stopping and staying – in a place you were only meant to pass through.

Lot’s wife stopped and stayed. In a place she was only meant to pass through.

Because she stopped and stayed – in a place where she was never meant to stay – she got stuck. She calcified.

It’s the same for you and me.

No matter what’s going on in our lives right now. Whether we’re in one of the hardest moments of our lives or things are okay right now, we’re just passing through.

You and I were not meant to stop and stay here.

God has so much more in store for us.

But if we stop and stay here – in a place where we were never meant to stay – we will get stuck here. We’ll calcify.

And we’ll miss out on God’s best, on all that God has planned for us.

Today’s Readings

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Politics

A friend of mine is a pollster.

He specializes in local and state politics. He understands the dynamics of legislative districts and statewide elections. He’s got a real gift for independents.

When we talked a few weeks before the election, I asked about his secret to understanding independents. His answer?

“There are no independents. They may not want to tell me, but everybody’s got a side.”

I had to ask him how he figures out which side an independent is really on.

“The follow up questions. Here’s one of my favorites – What comes to mind when I say the words ‘Roman Catholic?’ Sometimes I change it to ‘evangelical Christian.’ It depends on the district.”

What does that tell you?

“A lot. Because the answer is usually political.”

This is the part of the conversation that stuck with me. Something about it bothered me. Still does.

I think what bothers me is that the Faith is being regularly described in terms of politics. That people routinely thought of Christianity in political terms. And not much else.

As if Christians were just another interest group, another voting block for politicians to play to.

It sent me back to Philip Yancey’s 2012 essay “Christians and Politics: Uneasy Partners.” And this passage, one that reads like it was written this morning,

“The confusion of politics and religion is one of the greatest barriers to grace…Politics, which always runs by the rules of ungrace, allures us to trade away grace for power, a temptation the church has often been unable to resist.”

That last sentence? It’s an indictment of too many of our hearts. We are all too eager to trade away grace for power.

Then add in the disconnects between both major political parties and the fundamentals of the Faith. Mix it all together. 

It means that if we really are “marked as Christ’s own forever,” our political decisions should make us think long and hard.

Our political decisions should leave us deeply uncomfortable.

No matter how we vote.

It means that while we might not go full Jesus-driving-the-money-changers-out-of-the-Temple-with-a-whip, we can never allow our Faith to be overtaken by our politics.

Today’s Readings

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Miserable

I used to work with someone who prided himself on being a realist. At least that’s what he called it.

To those of us who worked with him, he was miserable to be around. Because his idea of being a realist was to complain. About everything.

It didn’t matter what it was, he had a complaint. If he got a raise, he complained that it wasn’t more. If his daughter got an “A” on a history test, he complained about her grade in math.

For every silver lining, he found the cloud.

His negativity not only made his problems seem worse than they were. It also kept him from enjoying the good things in his life. And even the people in his life.

This is the problem that Jesus is pointing to in today’s Gospel. And why He is so excited about the one leper who came back to thank Him.

Here’s why. We have little control over what happens to us. But we have total control over how we respond to it.

If you and I choose to respond by seeing the worst. If we focus on what’s missing. If we complain. If we take the good stuff for granted.

We’ll soon lose the ability to appreciate anything.

We’ll end up with a heart that’s unable to receive the good. A heart that has no place for God’s love.

We’ve all been around people that have fallen into this trap. It has to be miserable to be them. Because it is absolutely miserable to be around them. We can’t get away from them fast enough.

If that’s not the life we want. If you and I don’t want to be miserable. If we want a place for God’s love in our hearts, then we’ve got a choice to make.  

A choice to see the best in what happens to us. Not to ignore our problems. But to deal with them, and to be grateful for the good that God gives us – even in the midst of them.

A choice to keep our hearts open to the love that God is pouring out for us. Even now.

If you want to change your life, change your heart.

If you want to change your heart, start with gratitude.

Today’s Readings

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Forgiveness is hard

Forgiveness is hard.

And the reason why it’s hard says a lot about us.

Because there’s something in us that likes to hold on to the wrongs that have been done to us. Not that we want to be hurt again by whatever it was that needs to be forgiven (although that’s what holding on to it does to us).

But because we can use being on the receiving end of something that needs to be forgiven as leverage, as an excuse.

Now we’ve got a reason why things didn’t work out. Why what we always wanted to do didn’t happen. Why we never quite did it.

We were going to. We would have done it. But then it happened, whatever it was that needs to be forgiven.

Even if we never consciously say any of that, until we forgive. Until we let go of it. Part of us will be acting as if we believed every word of it.

Let me be clear - I’m not talking about ignoring the things that have hurt you.

When you and I are hurt, we need to deal with what hurt us. Grieve what was lost. Clean up the mess. Get help.

What I’m talking about is taking the thing that hurt you, whatever it was that needs to be forgiven, and holding on to it. Dragging it out time and again. Revisiting it. Reliving it.

And by unthinkingly replaying it over and over, moving into that event (one that, with a moment’s thought, you would never intentionally revisit again) and buying furniture.

Even if we don’t mean to, holding onto whatever it was that needs to be forgiven, is one of the most effective ways to isolate ourselves.

To become lost in the thing that hurt us, will, in the end, separate us from everyone. Including God.

Which is why Jesus is so adamant in today’s Gospel about the need to forgive.

Not because whoever it was who hurt you deserves, well, anything.

But because God loves you too much to want anything – or anyone – to keep hurting you. Including you.

Today’s Readings

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Got to go

Temperate. Dignified.

Self-controlled. Sound in faith, love, and endurance.

Someone like that? That’s someone you can look up to. Someone who will always be there for you. Someone you can lean on when times are tough.

The kind of person you want in your life.

The kind of person you want to be.

The kind of person St. Paul says you and I are called to be. In today’s first reading.

How do you and I do that?

How do we make sure that this is how we carry ourselves? That this is what comes out of us?

By taking care first about what we put into ourselves.

Because the only thing that can ever come out of us is what’s already in there.

Think about it. You can’t pour water out of an empty bucket. Or a bucket that’s full of dirt.

You want to pour water out of a bucket?

Then you need to first make sure that it’s full. Of water.

You and I work the same way.

There’s a world that’s crying out for temperance. For dignity. For self-control. For sound faith, love, and endurance.

You and I are the ones to bring it. But we can’t bring it if we don’t have it.

Today, make time with me to take stock. Let’s look at everything that we’re putting into ourselves. Our media diet. Our social media diet. Our movies and shows and books.

With the cold eye of judgment, let’s look at each thing we’re exposing ourselves to. Each thing we’re making time for. Even the stuff that’s “just for fun.”

Ask – and be honest with yourself – is it leading me towards temperance? Towards dignity? Towards self-control? Towards sound faith, love, and endurance?

Because if it’s not, then it’s beneath your dignity in the eyes of the God.

It’s beneath your worth as His beloved daughter, His beloved son.

And it’s got to go.

Even if it’s “just for fun.”

Today’s Readings

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This really spoke to me because lately I’ve been dealing with temptation, so hopefully it helps you guys out as well.



Like a city that is broken down and without walls [leaving it unprotected] Is a man who has no self-control over his spirit [and sets himself up for trouble.] Proverbs 25:28

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Taken from ChristianMusicLyrics YouTube community page. God bless, Jesus loves you ✝️❤️

@cosmicfunnies @babyimlosingit @cottonpuffmouse

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Be so confident in God's plan that you don't even get upset anymore when things don't go your way.

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Sometimes, I just stop and look up at God and thank Him. He never said life would be easy, but I sure am blessed.