March 2, 2014

We will have a Fellowship Dinner next Sunday. Pastor Bruce Crabtree will be preaching for us. Everyone please plan on staying!

I Am Not Home, Yet

A beautiful home my Lord has prepared me,
Where I'll see my Savior; there ransomed and free.
There my Father and my Brother a place sets
For this redeemed sinner. I am not home, yet!

A stranger and pilgrim in this world I roam.
I found that I have here no abiding home.
This world with its sin I'll leave with no regret.
I will go to heaven, but I am not home, yet!

By faith I believe the promises of God,
Though here in this
Christ said He would come for His
Then, no longer I'll say, "I am not home, yet!"

I long to see my Lord's face and know I'm home.
I must have His mercy while here I do roam.
He is the Lamb of God that paid my sin's debt.
He loves this poor sinner who is not home, yet!

When I get to glory at His feet I'll bow;
He is my Redeemer who chose by His pow'r.
I'll bask in His love; He my sins did forget;
Justified and welcomed, but I'm not home, yet!

By Gary Spreacker Tune: ‘How Firm a Foundation’ #268

One Answer to Ten Thousand How's

"Faith brings God into the scene. Therefore, it knows absolutely nothing of difficulty; it laughs at impossibilities. In the judgment of faith, God is the answer to every question; He is the salvation to every difficulty. Unbelief says, how can such things be? Unbelief is full of flaws; but faith has one great answer to ten thousand hows‘, and that answer is God Almighty."

Scott Richardson

~~~ O ~~~

"God never changes in His affections for His people or His purpose of good toward them. It is for this reason, and no other, that our salvation is sure and certain. Four thousand years of human rebellion did not cause God to abandon His promise of a Substitute to redeem His people; and our few years floundering in this world cannot move Him from His purposed grace toward us. What a comfort! Our salvation is not founded upon the shifting sands of our righteousness, confessions, or faithfulness, but on the bedrock of Divine consistency."

Pastor Joe Terrell

"Scripture is very clear that when a believer is born again, there is a new nature born in that believer that has never been there before. The new birth is not a change, an enlightening, nor an improvement of the flesh. The new birth is the birth of a new man created in the image of and with the nature of Christ Jesus. This is why the warfare with sin does not begin before a sinner is born again. Before the new birth, the old man has no one to fight against, but after the new birth, the old man and the new man war against each other until the flesh dies and the new man departs to be forever with the Lord. The only reason anyone would deny the existence of two distinct, opposite natures in a believer is because that person only has one nature: Adam's sinful nature."

- Pastor Frank Tate

Someone wrote to me recently and asked, "What was Paul's thorn in the flesh?" I replied, "I do not know, but it really does not matter WHAT it was; the important thing is WHO gave it and WHY He gave it." The Heavenly Father gave the thorn, and it was given for Paul's spiritual good and well-being. The Lord's answer to Paul's prayer that the thorn be removed was satisfactory to Paul. "MY GRACE IS SUFFICIENT FOR THEE!" Our Lord has a purpose for every trial I encounter, and He will fulfill that purpose for my good and His glory. I believe I have learned this: His grace, his gospel, and His strength are more manifest, more glorified, and more appreciated in my weakness and during trial. When I have nothing to SAY, nothing to CONTRIBUTE, nothing in which to find COMFORT or JOY, I will look more to Him and find all I need. Then, if infirmities and trials serve to make me look more to my Lord and have less confidence in and concern for this flesh, then I rejoice in infirmities!

- Henry Mahan

To deny the absolute efficacy of Christ's sin-atoning blood is to deny His very deity. If Jesus Christ died to redeem some whom He fails to save by His grace, He is not God.

- Pastor Don Fortner

Isaiah 53:11 By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. How do I know Christ bore my sins? By the same authority which tells me I have sins to be borne: God's Word.

- Scott Richardson

Two men were talking. The first man said, "A man should repent and believe the Lord the day before he dies." The other answered, "That is impossible, no man knows the day he will die? It might be tomorrow." The first man said, "Then today is the day to repent and believe on him."