I love you. ( Galatians 2 v 20 )

 I was praying ,and I found myself saying,' I'm your Billy', and I am His Billy, I am not just one of the crowd,no,for my relationship with God my heavenly Father is very personal. What applies to me applies to every child  God,you are His Liz,Sam,and so on.I recently met up with a cousin,and it was a good while since I saw him,and I said,'and you are?' ,it was Brian.I do not know why it is but many of us old people have  a problem remembering peoples names. But not so with God he never forgets His children's names, in fact He never forgets us in anyway, we not just a number to Him,we are His children.It is the apostle of  love who declares, 'See what great love the Father has lavished on us,that we should be called the children of God! and that is what we are'. (1 John 3 v1 ) It is the blight of some family relationships that the parents have a favourite, such was the case of Jacob,and what animosity that created within that family. Consider the words of Peter spoken to gentiles,I now realise how true it is that God does not show favouritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears Him and does what is right.'  (Acts 10 v34 - 35 )And so when I said in my prayer ,''I am your Billy,'' I can imagine God would reply,'You are my Billy, and I love you, and I love all my Children.

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Don't worry. ( Philippians 4 v19

 One of the most popular birds in our country is the Robin,with its red breast,to my very great disappointment I rarely see one in my Garden. Recently while on holiday I purchased a hand - crafted coaster,with a Robin painted on it,well I thought at least I will have a Robin to look at everyday,well ,'sort of'. Why am I writing this?,to remind us of what our Saviour taught as regards God our Fathers care ,for His children, He said look at creation,consider how your heavenly Father feeds the birds,if He does that,remember you are more valuable than them,In essence what He is saying don't worry ( Matthew 6 v 25 - 34 ). Even though He said those lovely words,we do worry. There is a little ditty that goes,'Said the robin to the sparrow; why these anxious human beings rush about and hurry so.''. Said the sparrow to the robin,'' I think that it must be, that they have no heavenly Father such as cares for you and me''.

Friendship ( John 15 v14 )

 I  was visiting a friend  ,who I have known a long time,he comes from Ulster our homeland,a land of division,a land torn apart at times.It still is tribal, but things are a bit better, as I spoke to my ,we discovered that when we were young,we each had a very close friend,and they both married girls from the the other tribe. It makes one smile,friendship is very important,one my favourite movies is ,'Lord of Rings', in it we have Frodo who  has the awesome task of taking the ring to be  destroyed,he faced tremendous dangers,but he had friend called Sam, who stuck with him till he accomplished his task.In Proverbs 17 v 17 we read,'A friend loves at all times', In 2 Timothy 4  ,the apostle Paul is in prison,he  was facing opposition,not only that he declares ,'At my defence , no one came to my to my support, but everyone deserted me'. But he adds. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength''.Christ is that friend that sticks closer than a brother, (Proverbs 18 v 24),someone has Said that Christ is a friend of the friendless,and here is the great thing ,He will  never leave you nor forsake you.

                                                      'Do thy friends despise forsake thee?

                                                      Take it to the Lord in prayer.

                                                       In His arms He'll take and shield thee,

                                                       Thou will find a solace there'

                                                             Words J M. Scriven

No finger pointing. ( Romans 8 v28)

 It  was said of Spurgeon ,that the black clouds of depression never permanently left him until he went to be with the Saviour, and of course he suffered from other severe illness'es.often he struggled to get to the pulpit to preach,with a twinkle in his eye he once said,''God gives  to some a talent for suffering''.I don't know about a talent for suffering but I know He gives grace. as the Apostle Paul experienced in his suffering ,he recorded what God said to him,'My grace is sufficient for you,for my power is made perfect in weakness',2 Corinthians 12 v 9 I am sure Spurgeon  would have agreed to that. What applies to Spurgeon and Paul applies to every child of God,He is no respecter of persons,There are those who will speak as if the Christian should not suffer depression ,not so,the Christian can suffer all sorts of things,that does not give anyone the right to criticise them,The fact is God brings us into many  difficult experiences for a reason,to teach us many precious lessons.Lets consider the case of Spurgeon what lessons did he learn ?this is what someone wrote,'His own vulnerability to his condition and the  criticism he received for it, made him acutely sensitive to the experience of others'.Let us lift this to a higher level to our Saviour, who is are great High Priest we read this in Hebrews 5 v 15- 16.

                                 'We have one who has been tempted  in every  way, just as we are- 

                                  yet He did not sin.Let us then approach God's throne  of grace with

                                   confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us

                                   in our time of need'

                                 

Denial and Delay. ( Luke 12 v 13 - 21)

 Recently I my met with 2 cousins,John and Brian they both live in Dublin,and in conversation with Brian he told me about his medical history,he had two occurrences with cancer, but with treatment he has come through it,he mentioned that they had caught the disease early on,and that saved his life. But then he mentioned his father my uncle Jack,who died of prostate cancer,that was sad,but he added that his father ignored the early symptoms,and the result was the cancer could not be treated,so he died.Not so long ago a neighbour  of mine,who suffered from diabetes,instead of watching what he ate,he behaved foolishly,and when he got an injury to his leg,he acted carelessly not getting it looked at and it turned to  gangrene,he  became ill was rushed to the hospital,but he died on the operating table. It is all very sad and brings a warning to all us to have  things checked out ,like my cousin did. Denial and delay has consequences that can be very serious,let us move it into the spiritual,let us consider denial, the Bible says we are all sinners,but so many people don't take that serious, don't want to know about it.Then there is delay ,the old hymn speaks of one more convenient day,so instead of trusting  Jesus,they end up in a lost eternity. The Bible tells us now is the day of salvation,the important word is now,don't delay trust the Saviour now,you may not have some more convenient day

Don't be deceived. ( 2 Timothy4 v 1 - 5 )

There is book called ,'The sky was going to fall on them,' by Tom La  Padula, it  is about a silly hen who panicked and believed a lie, that the sky was going  to fall on them,and everyone began to panic,the sly old fox reaped the benefit,by eating them all up. Then there was a radio broadcast in 1930 of an episode of ,'War of the worlds', read by Orson Wells a famous actor. A  lot of people tuned in late and didn't hear the introduction,and so they panicked believing that this was an invasion of aliens,it caused quite a stir at the time.I often watch You Tube,  recently one contributor informed us that a famous actor had died,but it wasn't true. We can so easy be deceived ,everyday people believe  telephone scammers,and they loose a lot of money. Likewise many believe religious hucksters who promise them healing and prosperity,if they contribute money to them,it is all lies. The Jw's have said Christ would come back on  certain dates of course it didn't happen,and so we could go on. The bible is not a fictitious book,it is rooted in history,and the prophecies concerning the historical Christ came true ,what it says is the truth the whole truth,although many can  twist it to meet their own ends.There are many deceivers in this world ,Jesus said that would happen,but believe them not, (Matthew 24 v 5.) so do not be deceived, hold fast to the truth.

The curse He bore. ( 2 Corinthians 5 v21)

Recently  there was an  outcry because an ancient tree got cut down ,it was a Sycamore tree, that had stood for hundreds of years near a Roman landmark of Hadrian's wall. Trees are not only things of beauty, the wood from trees has many uses, but there is one thing that it can be used for,for hanging people on.We read in Deuteronomy 21 v 22 - 23 ,' And if  a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree,but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God.'Now let us move forward to Galatians 3 v13, 'Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become as a curse for us,( for it is written, ''Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree) Let me point out that the cross of Christ symbolically is seen as a tree.What is this curse? that we read about, in Galatians 3 v 10 we read' Cursed is everyone who does not observe and obey all the commands that are written in God's book of the law.'.The fact is no one can keep Gods law,so all of us are under a curse ,and under the judgement of God. John 3 v36  tells us that the wrath of God abides on those who have  never trusted Jesus . So God provided a way for the curse to be removed, by Jesus becoming a curse for us,in other words that curse He bore was our curse, it was our punishment He bore,so that we might not bear it.

                                                    ' The wrath of God that was my due

                                                      Upon the Lamb was laid;

                                                       And by the shedding of His blood

                                                       The debt for us was laid.

                                                            Words El. Nathan