Agents for peace [ Matthew 5 v9 ]

My son John has 4 children,and you know what children are like, they have there moments of conflict,well John works away in his job. Just recently he spoke to his oldest boy and said to him, Morgan, you be an agent for peace,and I thought how meaningful that was. So I felt I should share it with you, for how many situations would be so much better,if  people took up that challenge, to be an agent for peace. How  many families,how many churches, how many countries would be affected, for the better,if they adopted those words,So many people are squaring up to each other,there are those in Islam who want to fight the world. Our Saviour said ,have peace with one another[ Mark 9v 50],  and in Romans 12v18,we are told,/Do all you can to live in peace with everyone/.Let us take on board those words to be an agent for peace, after all we follow one who is the prince of peace.Consider how  important peace is,it is a central aspect to our relationship with God,in Christ we have by faith peace ,with God,and in our day by day walk with Him we can know the peace of God.Now as we face this day can we be agents of peace,instead of agents of conflict,if we are agents of peace,then we can make a big difference in all our different situations.
A  prayer..... Dear God in a world so full of conflict help us to be agents for peace in Jesus name Amen/

Present but gone. [ 1 Thessalonians 4 v 13]

I  was really angry with myself,I made a mistake, and it was the second time  I did it,I gave a big cry out, at my stupidity,but thankfully I was able ,to rectify my  mistake,so all is well with my world,until the next time. I wondered to myself was it  you know what creeping up on me?, I cant remember,I joke. It was only today that I was talking to someone, and he told me about someone he knew,who went all the way to Australia ,from England, to see his brother,only to find ,that his brother did not recognise him,he had dementia. Maybe some day they will find a cure,but in the meanwhile,how does one cope with a loved one suffering from this condition? ,of seeing that person they love,lost to them. The human condition can bring unto us so many things,things we have no control over,I heard a person on the radio, speaking of how he felt lost after having a stroke, of feeling his body had let him down.There so many things we cant control,but this I know my times are in Gods hands,indeed I wish them there,for they are safe hands,hands that will not let go of me,hands that will carry me through,till journeys end, hands I can trust even when I don't understand.
A  prayer...../ Dear Lord Jesus have mercy on those who watch those they love suffer,and those who no longer recognise those who are dear to them,help them not to despair Amen /

Because He lives. [John 11 v25]

I was thinking this morning about the resurrection, it would be easy to be like the Sadducees who did not believe in the resurrection,when your dead ,your dead.After all ,death appears so final, and if you are cremated ,all that is left is an urn filled with ashes.so is that it?.If that is it ,then we may as well live just for time,and the things of time,let us eat, drink and be merry. When the writers of the Bible wrote,they lived with a greater awareness of death,in our modern times,death is hidden from us,we are occasionally reminded of it when the funeral cars pass us on their way to the graveyard,or crematorium. Yes there are those who live with a fear of death,children do,but on the whole it appears to be a closed subject. Maybe us, in the prosperous west  feel ,that eventually we will solve the intrusion of death,so it wont knock on our door. Maybe we are to afraid to think upon death,it is such a morbid thing,so let us just push it to the back of our minds,but that will not help for it will come back to hunt us.As a Christian minister I continually am reminding myself ,and others of death,but not as the final curtain,but as a door into eternity,that will lead to Heaven or Hell,depending whither one has trusted Jesus as ones Saviour. As to our bodies,without faith all we see is death,its  over,its over,its over,but then I hear Jesus, telling me ,God is not a God of the dead, but a God of the living.[ Matthew 22 v23].I hear Him declare that He is the resurrection and the life,that if I have faith in Him I will live even though I die.Now Jesus did not only speak words, He showed the reality of what He said,by rising from the dead, and so it is, that because He lives,we shall live also.
A  prayer..../ Dear God we thank You for Jesus who conquered death,and that through believing Him,death will not be the end Amen

Predictable and unpredictable. [ Psalm 23]

Let it snow ,let it snow, let it snow,these words are swell in a song,but it is not on my wish list,snow is alright on Christmas cards,but it is not my favourite thing.Yet there is not much one can do about it,we can forecast the weather,but we cannot control it,was it Napoleon who told his generals, to leave the weather to him?,well if he did, he was soon brought down to earth,when he invaded Russia.There are things we cannot do much about,like growing old,like dying,like our inability to forecast the future we don't know what the next minute holds for us. The Bible tells us that we know not what a day may bring forth ,life is predictable,and yet is unpredictable,the unpredictability of it can cause us to be anxious,to loose sleep.I am sure we all have moments of anxiety,I know I have,maybe you are feeling anxious at this time,don't feel condemned,but make every effort to talk to your loving heavenly Father,it will make a difference,remember child of God He is your loving heavenly Father. We are told to cast all our cares upon Him for He cares for us [1 Peter 5 v7 ]. All your anxieties all your cares bring to the mercy seat leave them there,never a burden that He cant bear, never a friend like Jesus.
A  prayer....../ Dear loving heavenly Father,help us with those anxieties we have to bring them You,help us to trust and not be anxious in Jesus name Amen /

No harsh severity. [ 2 Corinthians 10 v1 ]

Peter in his first epistle [2 v 11] writes/, Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims,abstain from fleshly lusts that war against the soul/.The first thing that struck me was the graciousness of these words,dearly beloved,Peter the great apostle,speaks with a gentleness to them. This same Peter had denied his Lord,failed Him miserably,had been forgiven,and restored,and recommissioned, was very aware of his own failings,was not adopting and attitude of holier than thou,but as Baxter said,he was speaking as a dying man to dying men .He does not speak to them in a dogmatic overbearing manner , but in a loving pleading way.I use to be a blood and thunder preacher, but I have changed,blood and thunder may scare people,but I wonder how effective it is?.Our dear Saviour wept over Jerusalem, one of the aspects of the Messiah was,that,He shall not strive nor cry,neither shall any man hear His voice in the streets [Matthew 12 v19]. Spurgeon writing on this,/ The wrath of man in hot controversy, the frenzy of wild rhetoric...He disdained such weapons in establishing His kingdom./He also comments on the following verse,/A bruised reed , shall He not break,and smoking flax shall He not quench[v20] He is gentle,and exercises no harsh severity. He bears and forebears with those who are unlovely in His eyes./
A prayer.../ Dear Saviour help us to speak the truth in love,to show a gentle and meek spirit with all men, to conqueror by thy gentleness. Amen /

Easier but smaller.[ John 12 v24 ]

I was watching a film and a mother said to her son, to return home where it would be easier,and he replied,yes easier , but smaller.Easier but small, it is the easiest road that appears more attractive,some teams are content with just being,while others desire to achieve. Many people have chosen the easier way,and so their experience is limited and not fulfilling,but it is often in taking the apparent harder way,that we grow. It would have been easier for Dr .M.L.King to have refrained from leading the civil rights movement, but in so doing he would have been smaller,and America would have been smaller.When M. Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Castle church at Wittenberg, he was not taking the easy way,if he had refrained from doing this, he would have remained just another monk,instead of the great reformer. When people desired to follow Jesus, He did not promise the easy way,He told them ,to take up their cross, to Deny themselves.So many people clammier for instant riches,instant fame,while others strive years to reach their goal,and in that striving they grow,oh yes they may fail in their goals,they may even die in seeking to reach their goals,but there is something in the trying that the easier way can never give.
A  prayer..../Dear Saviour lead us in the way we should go,even if that way is not the easy way, Amen/

Are you an Alien?[ Romans 3 v23 ]

I must confess that yesterday was a black dog day,I was not all sweetness and joy,if I had a dog I may have kicked it ,but then it may have bit me back.There are days not to many when the flesh appears to rule,and not the Spirit, oh yes there are reasons,but that does not make it right. I watched a movie about this Alien who came with the message that they ,his fellow aliens were going to wipe out humanity,because we were so bad,you see they must have been perfect aliens. Now of course I don't believe in aliens,but then many of us act like aliens we judge others as imperfect, the prodigals brother was an alien,he was the goody,his brother the baddy,who deserved only judgement. The bad days remind me that,I am a sinner saved by grace ,it reminds me,how much I need the grace of God, and why Jesus had to come.It reminds me that the best of men are but men,likewise the best of women,there are no exceptions.The great apostle Paul struggled with his imperfections to the point of despair [Romans 7v24 ],but the despair turned to relief, when the light dawned afresh,that he had a Saviour[7v25]. Yes a Saviour,remember,He saved us ,,He is saving us, and He will save us,now let me ask you the question are you an alien.
A  prayer...../Dear God thank You that You will never leave us nor forsake us even in those days or moments when we fail to rise above our fallen humanity, in Jesus name Amen/