Encouraged by God's Word

Archive for February, 2010

Hello Family,

For the past two weeks I’ve been talking about how the Washington DC metropolitan area just went threw the biggest snowfall of all time. There was so much snow on the roads you couldn’t drive anywhere. When the roads were plowed many of the roads only had one lane open which made the traffic bad. And there were piles of snow so high you couldn’t even see around the corner of some intersections.

Businesses were shut down. People were snowed in and couldn’t do anything. If you didn’t have an SUV you weren’t going anywhere. And even some of the SUV’s were having problems because of the amount of snow.

That storm was vicious and for some people that storm was devastating.

But then something happened. In a matter of 5 days with temperatures in the low 40’s and then some light rain, the snow was just about all gone.

The majority of the streets were clear. You could see pavement and grass again. Besides the little bit of dirty snow that was pushed to the side, there was no evidence of how bad those storms were. And most of the big snow piles were a lot smaller.

Isn’t that how life is? We encounter major storms in our lives and we don’t know how we’re going to handle them but God steps in, he removes the obstacles and barriers the storm created and then He makes it possible for us to continue in our lives.

Psalm 107:29 says He calms the storm, so that its waves are still.

Two weeks ago the weather was so bad you would have thought the world was coming to an end. It seemed as if we would never see the ground again but God showed himself strong.

What kept people from moving, God put it to the side. What kept people bound, God removed it. What kept people in captivity, God took it away.

God spoke to the storm so we could get back to our normal routines.

If God can do that in the natural, imagine what He can do in the supernatural. The storms of your life are nothing compared to God. He literally removed tons of snow in a matter of days and if He can do what no man and his big machinery could do, He certainly can remove the storms in your life.

So the next time you’re facing some record breaking storms in your life, be patient and wait on God to remove the burdens of the storms in your life and allow Him to shower you with His blessings.

Be Encouraged and Have a Great Day!

Hello Friends,

I took my son out last week to go sledding and we had a good time. The hill was big and fast just t he way

we like it. Now I must admit that it was a lot of work walking back up the hill but we still had fun.

Later on I spoke to my parents and I was telling them about our excursion and one of the things I told them was that I was somewhat disappointed at what I saw, or should I say I didn’t see. I didn’t see any other kids out there.

Now this hill was not in my neighborhood, it was in the neighborhood I grew up in. Where I live now, we don’t have a big hill like that so when we got to the old neighborhood and there weren’t any other kids out there, I was disappointed.

My dad made the comment that kids now a days don’t play outside like they used to. When he said that it reminded me of some conversations I previously had with other parents about the same thing. My response to other parents is why aren’t you making them go outside and play? When you were young that’s what you did. You have to train them how to have fun.

As a parent, if you buy your child a video game system, computer, cable TV, Ipod, Itouch, cell phone, CD’s and all that other stuff, why in the world would they go outside when they have all of those other things occupying their time?

Proverbs 22:6 says Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

Every time I’ve heard this scripture, it was always in reference to training up a child in the ways of God. Train them to love the Lord. Train them to live righteously. Train them praise and worship God.

All of those things are correct but I do believe it can mean even more. We should be training our children (grandchildren, nieces, nephews, cousins and others) in other ways of life.

We should be training them how to use their creativity and resources instead of always getting stuff from the Internet. We should be training them on how to relate and communicate with others. We should be training our kids on some basic etiquette and table manners. We should be training our kids on how to respect their elders and authority figures.

I saw this teenage girl at the bus stop one day talking on the phone to her friend and the whole time she was on the phone, she was cursing up a storm. The sad thing about it was she had a little girl with her that was about 3 or 4 years old and this little girl was close enough to hear everything the teenager was saying.

What do you think this teenage girl was training this other little girl to do? How to cuss and sound like an idiot? How not to have any respect for yourself?

As adults we can’t blame kids for not knowing how to do or act a certain way if we don’t train them properly so in the future, don’t criticize your child for not knowing, train them up.

Be Encouraged and Have a Great Day!

Hello Friends,
 
Unless you’ve been living in a cave in the tropics, you know that the mid atlantic region of the country has been experiencing some snow. Okay, a LOT of snow as in a BLIZZARD.
 
Yeah it’s been crazy here in the great state of Maryland as me and my kids spent a number of hours shoveling snow. And as we finished shoveling, we watched the snow fall on the ground again and then we went out and shoveled again.
 
Throughout this last week, there were a lot of folks who were tired of all the snow. I mean people were talking about how they hated it, how they wanted to move to Florida, I mean all kinds of stuff. Now to a certain degree I understand what they’re talking about but there were no complaints coming out of my mouth.
 
Me, like some others, took everything in stride and realized that some good can come out of this. I can say that I experienced the Washington DC metropolitan areas biggest winter snowfall of all time. I can say that I spent some quality time with my family while we were all snowed in. I can say that my girls impressed me with their work ethic while shoveling the snow.
 
You see the way I look at all of this snow is a lot different than most people. I’m trying to get the positive out of it. I’m looking at the good that came from it.

I’m looking at the fact that in 25 years, me, my wife and kids can talk about all the snow that fell during the blizzard of 2010. I’m looking at the fact that we’ll be able to go back and look at pictures and videos and laugh at what happened. We have good memories.
 
Now I do realize that not everybody will have good memories. As of this writing, some people still don’t have power. Some people had major damage to a car or their house. I understand that and do feel for them.
 
But those who were just snowed in and didn’t have to go to work for 4 days and were complaining; I don’t want to hear it. Shame on you!
 
Psalms 7:17 says I will praise the Lord according to His righteousness, and will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High.
 
What am I praising Him for in this blizzard?

Family, shelter, electricity, heat, food, water, cable TV (no satellite dish going out because of weather), street being plowed, health (no injuries while shoveling), toilet paper, etc.
 
I know some people had it real rough but based on what I had to deal with, I’ll do it all over again in order to avoid some of that other stuff.
 
So the next time you’re snowed in, make the most of it. Do some goal setting, read a book on personal development, hang out with your neighbors, go have an adult snow ball fight and sledding party, or spend more time with the Lord.
 
But what ever you do, don’t forget to sing praises to the name of the Lord.
 
Be Encouraged and Have a Good Day!

Hello Friends,

A few days ago I was watching a YouTube video of an interview with gospel singing artist Tonex (pronounced Toe-nay). In his interview he announced that he is gay. Now this announcement was disturbing but what he was saying in his interview made it even worse.

In his interview he kept trying to justify what he was doing as being okay.

He even made a statement that he would continue to be this way until God took it away from him.

As I watched the interview I had many feelings about what he was saying. I felt angry, frustrated, sorry for him, puzzled and probably a few more things. The reason I think I had all of these feelings is because everything out of his mouth was so disturbing and far from the truth.

All of his reasons for being gay were based on what he wanted and how it was going to make him feel. Although he made it seem as if God was cool with his choice, he didn’t have any biblical references to back it up.

Everything he was saying was a lie!

Throughout the YouTube video there was someone who would interject every time Tonex said something that was against the word of God. He would explain why Tonex’s statements were wrong and then he would back them up with scripture.

Do you make excuses for your sins? Do you try to justify what you’re doing as something that God is okay with until some magical moment when it goes away?

1 John 1:6 says If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

We can not call ourselves children of God when we blatantly live in sin. We can’t consider ourselves children of God when we purposefully go against His word.

If we lie to ourselves and others and try to justify our sins, we are living in darkness and have no fellowship with the father.

God is a God of light and of truth and Satan is the prince of darkness so if you’re living in darkness; your fellowship is with him, not with God.

So the next time you want to make excuses for your sins or justify why you’re doing wrong, remember that you are walking in darkness and therefore removing yourself from fellowship with the Almighty.

Be Encouraged and Have a Great Day!