Powerful Words.

O Holy Night! The stars are brightly shining,
It is the night of the dear Saviour's birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining.
Till He appeared and the Spirit felt its worth.
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.
Fall on your knees! Oh, hear the angel voices!
O night divine, the night when Christ was born;
O night, O Holy Night , O night divine!
O night, O Holy Night , O night divine!

Led by the light of faith serenely beaming,
With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand.
O'er the world a star is sweetly gleaming,
Now come the wisemen from out of the Orient land.
The King of kings lay thus lowly manger;
In all our trials born to be our friends.
He knows our need, our weakness is no stranger,
Behold your King! Before him lowly bend!
Behold your King! Before him lowly bend!

Truly He taught us to love one another,
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains he shall break, for the slave is our brother.
And in his name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
With all our hearts we praise His holy name.
Christ is the Lord! Then ever, ever praise we,
His power and glory ever more proclaim!
His power and glory ever more proclaim!

Woman Up.

I'm going to keep this short and sweet.

We hear men all the time telling other men to "man up"...to grow up and do the things that they need to do...to get off the couch and get a job to support the woman that they have committed themselves to...to give up their selfish pride and do what is right for once. There is all this talk of becoming the men that God created them to be...to be the husband that God wants them to be to their wife...to be the daddy that their kids need. Amen!

But what about the women? Can women ever set aside their emotions for long enough to listen when other women tell them what they need to hear? It's ridiculous. There are certain taboo topics that women don't think they are allowed to talk about with each other because they are afraid of offending them or making them mad. Who cares? If God lays some wisdom on your heart, you would be sinning to ignore His urging to share it! We need to become the women that God created us to be...not the women that we see on TV or in magazines or read about in books...if we are going to model ourselves after someone (besides, Christ, of course), it needs to be Ruth! Or Esther! Or Elizabeth! Or Sarah! I mean, goodness gracious...God gave us all of these women as examples and we are just ignoring it...even Christian women seek approval and security and pleasure more than holiness! Ahhh! We need to be the wives that God needs us to be to our husbands! If girls spent half as much time in the Word trying to become Godly women and wives as they do worrying if they'll ever meet the "right one," I can only imagine that the world would be a much better place. Calm down, God is taking care of you...you aren't responsible for finding a husband anyway! Be the Godly woman that a Godly man can't pass up...be the one that fits perfectly into God's plan for a Godly marriage. Then God can make you into the mommy that your kids need...He is much better at that than you will ever dream of being!

Just as men need to man up, women need to woman up. So...go for it!

Suspend Your Disbelief.

Suspend: to set aside or make temporarily inoperative.

Unbelief: incredulity or skepticism especially in matters of religious faith.

Suspend Unbelief: to set aside skepticism in matters of faith.

Why is it easier to doubt than to believe? To be skeptical than to have faith? What happens as we mature to make it harder for us to believe?

"I tell you the truth, anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.” --Mark 10:15.

We all remember what it was like to be little...to think the best of everyone...to trust so easily...to make friends and never even think of being mean to them...to understand that God loves us. What changed? Or maybe the better question is: why did we allow ourselves to be corrupted by the world? God never changes, just as His love for us never changes. That is what we can believe in. Faith is stable...hope is certain.

"Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see." --Hebrews 11:1.

God is the ONLY thing we can believe in. We have been so hurt by the lies of the world that we have trouble believing in anything at all, forgetting that God created us...He humbled Himself by coming to earth to sacrifice Himself to cleanse us from our sins...He is there for us through everything...He forgives our sins...He is worthy...He reigns!

"Let all that I am praise the LORD; may I never forget the good things He does for me. He forgives all my sins and heals all my diseases. He redeems me from death and crowns me with love and tender mercies. He fills my life with good things. My youth is renewed like the eagle's!" --Psalm 103:2-5.

"'I will be faithful to you and make you Mine and you will finally know Me as the LORD.'" --Hosea 3:20.

Romans 3 tells us that even when we are unfaithful, God remains faithful. Believe it! Trust Him! He is our Only Hope! Suspend your unbelief! It should not be easier to doubt than to believe...because God continually proves Himself and pours out His love on us!

Full Salvation.

All too often, we doubt the power of that momentous decision we made at one time in our lives to accept Jesus Christ as our personal LORD and Savior. The enemy makes us think that nothing comes that easy, that there must be a catch, that we didn't really mean the words that we said. Lies. When we make the decision to become fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ, it's all over for sin and the enemy.

"God is light, and there is no darkness in Him at all." --1 John 1:5b.

"For darkness is disappearing, and the true light is already shining." --1 John 2:8b.

This decision completely changes the course of our lives. We go from living solely for the flesh and what feels good and right to us (humanism and relativism) to living for Christ!

"Dear friends, we are already God's children, but He has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He really is. And all who have this eager expectation [hope] will keep themselves pure [holy], just as He is pure [holy]." --1 John 3:2-3.

"Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law. Instead, you live under the freedom of God's grace." --Romans 6:14.

Full salvation means justification and sanctification. The point of decision when we put our faith in Christ and God declared us righteous as well as the continual process of striving to be more holy and more like Christ. Understanding this, the implications of that one decision lead to increasingly greater and more noble results as we die to ourselves and live only for Christ. The way we become holy is through our faith in the Son of God. He is the Way.

"Holiness appears to me to have a sweet, calm, pleasant, charming, and serene nature, all of which brings an inexpressible purity, radiance, peacefulness, and overwhelming joy to the soul." --Jonathan Edwards.

"Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases Him." --Philippians 2:12b-13.

(white) (yellow) (yellow) (white).

That is what I saw as I spent a few hours with God tonight. Those were the lines on the road that led me and my parents from freezing cold Charlotte to freezing cold and windy Boone this evening. Over the years, that road has been the location of some of the best times I have spent with my Savior.

Even before I knew what a quiet time was or understood the importance of time in the Word, I remember looking up at the sky and adoring the Creator. There's something with me and the night sky...I just can't get enough. Even if it's frigid or rainy or windy, I could look up at the stars for hours! So when I'm sitting in the backseat and looking out the window on that northbound highway 321, I just get caught up. I remember listening to old Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman CDs on my CD player and breathing in the cool night air and just thanking Jesus for allowing me to be alive and experience such a peace in knowing Him.

I had that again tonight as I listened to my Hymns playlist and worshiped my LORD for who He is. And this morning when I wasn't ready to get out of bed...I just made myself think about everything that is going on now, everything that God has brought me through, the ways that He is working in my life, and all of the times when He has proved Himself faithful. Do you ever just stop and think?

The love of the LORD endures.

Unafraid.

What makes us settle for anything less than the sacrifice of our very lives for the Kingdom of God? What in this world could possibly be more important than accomplishing the work we were created to do? What is attractive enough to make us take our eyes off the ultimate goal to which we have been called in Christ Jesus? What in this world are we clinging to so hard that we would have to think twice about surrendering it to the LORD before we follow Him?

Nothing. No. Thing. Nothing.

No amount of success, no measure of affection, no degree of recognition, no dollar amount, no relationship, no possession...no thing can ever compare to the cruciality of the Kingdom. Those of us who are believers have something that the world can never offer, something that seems foolish to those who don't believe, something that is more valuable than anything else. We have been granted the responsibility of taking that Good News to the rest of the world and explaining to them this Savior whom they have always felt in their hearts (Romans 1), but have never known.

This great treasure can solve all of the world's problems, if people would drop their pride long enough to let it. It can bring peace to the restless, hope to those with no hope, love to the abandoned, and stability to the madness. It is the answer to all of life's questions. It is all we ever need to talk about, because it contains the greatest mysteries of the universe that we are never to understand...we are not meant to, we are not capable of it, we could not comprehend it.

It is...He is...the Truth.

Those who think they are ready to tackle this Truth are the farthest from it. The only way someone can get closer to the Truth is to realize that they cannot. In fact, the only way that any progress or success can be attained is through the realization that we are called to do things that we, in ourselves, cannot possibly do.

But, we know Who can.

These tasks that the LORD calls us to are the most important tasks that are done on this earth. They are, in fact, the very tasks that allow us to prepare those coming after us to do the next set of tasks in this depraved and fallen world. This world that is desperately crying out and searching for this Savior that we have put our faith and trust in...the Savior that we once had felt but never knew. This One and Only Savior is the only reason we are still alive, having being pardoned from our sins by the shedding of His precious blood...He is above all and in all and through all...and He is the means by which we can accomplish anything of value for the Kingdom...He is always within us, encouraging us to press on through His Holy Spirit.

Therefore, let us not be distracted by the trivial things that the world thrusts upon us. Let us be all the more eager to spread the Truth to all the ends of the earth...whether that means right down the street or halfway across the world. Let our minds be filled with thoughts of the Kingdom, rather than thoughts about what will happen tomorrow, next week, next year, or 15 years from now...God has all of that taken care of.

And to be honest, those things aren't even worthy of our thoughts. What is the point of thinking to the point of frustration about some silly guy who could never fulfill your needs anyway? Why should we spend so much time worrying about what color we are going to paint the living room? Shouldn't we just be thankful for the house that God provided that contains that living room? Why should we seek after things that can never meet our needs when the King of Glory is standing right in front of us, holding out His arms to adopt us into His royal family? Don't we trust that He is enough? Don't we believe that what He has to offer is far more important than anything this world can offer? Honestly, think about it...why is it that we would much rather talk about other people behind their backs than shout the Truth from the rooftops for everyone to hear?

Because we have been deceived. This began long ago, at the fall of Satan, in fact. Do not lose heart and allow him a foothold in your life. Stand strong in the LORD and in His mighty power...unafraid.