THE INCOMPROHENSIBLE LOVE OF GOD (Continuation)

A different sermon is begun on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. 

  If you want to share this blog with a friend go to the bottom of these comments and click on TELL A FRIEND

  The sermons found on this blog are selected sermons preached by Rev. Wyrick during a ministry of over 50 years.  This syndicated columnist/minister thanks you for visiting.

 
GO TO NEIL’S OTHER BLOG ONE A DAY, YOUR SPIRITUAL VITAMINS and read the following brain teasers.  CLICK ON URL BELOW
http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

There was a man named Rollen Stewart who developed a novel idea to constantly receive what Andy Warhol called his fifteen minutes of fame.  He would attend major sporting events and then at the right time jump in front of a TV camera wearing an oversized, rainbow-colored wig. 

       This was his goal in life, to shine the spotlight of public attention on himself.  To try to make his name, Rollen Stewart, a household name.

And then one day he was converted.  His personality did not change.  He did not sell his oversized, rainbow-colored wig.  He just added something.  Now he appeared at not just sporting events but anywhere and everywhere, even appearing in the crowd during the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Di, where he duly leaped in front of a TV camera wearing his oversized, rainbow-colored wig…along with holding a sign that read “John 3:16.”

He got himself thrown out of any number of events.  He was arrested, and while in jail his followers continued his placard-raising ministry.  Not everyone understood.  At one football game a man looked very perplexed as he was being surround by signs that read “John 3:16”  “What is this John 3:16 thing?” he asked.  And that the shame of the matter. 

       He had no idea.  He had no idea, but he may well have gone looking for an answer and that is the point of Mr. Stewart’s rather bizarre actions.  The Lord works in strange and wonderful ways to make Himself known to his wandering children.

I’m obviously not suggesting that you wear outlandish wigs and jump in front of TV cameras but that isn’t the point, is it?  The point is that when Rollen Stewart learned about the love of God he was overwhelmed.  And he couldn’t keep quiet about it.  And overwhelming the world with placards that read “John 3:16” made perfect sense to him.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

That’s strong spiritual meat.  What it is really, is the offer of a spiritual pilot’s license.  An invitation from God to come fly with me.  Trust me.  I did that a long, long time ago with God.  And I did that a long time ago with a friend who was a very good pilot, at a time when I had not yet earned my wings.  In fact, I had never even been in a small plane before but there we were speeding toward electric wires that seemed to be getting terribly close. 

Was I scared?  Not really. I had no doubt we would clear them.  I trusted my friend’s flying ability.  So it is with God.  “Come fly with me” He says.  “I love you, so trust me,” He says.  So here I am, day-by-day, lining up on the runway of life for another 24 hour trip.  And because I love Him and am loved by Him, I watch us every day gain speed and become airborne and there it is, life, all around me…I am no longer just earthbound, though to everyone else it seems I am.  Oh no.  I have said, “Fly with you, my loving God?  How could I do otherwise unless I want to be grounded.  Unless I do not want to have the wings of an eagle and soar in the midst of this adventure called living.”

Have you ever popped the top off a bottle of Pepsi or some other drink that advertised, if you have the right number you may win something or other and then read, “You are not a winner.”  And it kind of disappointed you but not really, because you didn’t really expect to win.

Well, give yourself to this loving God and expect to be a winner, because He guarantees it.  All you have to do is look for the right numbers.  And what are the right numbers?  Well, you already know, “John 3:16.  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son.

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CLICK ON  www.go60.us   IT WILL TAKE YOU A NEW WEBSITE FOR SENIORS....click on "Voice" on the home page and then on the list of authors click on Neil Wyrick 

Recent articles Rev. Wyrick has written for this web site are:  REFLECTIONS

·         Many Kinds of Slavery - But Are They Not All Very Much The Same? (July 2012)

·         Here Comes Summer (July 2012)

·         Spring (May 2012)

·         Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow (April 2012)

·         Wayward and Windy (April 2012)

GO TO ONE A DAY YOUR SPIRUTAL VITAMINS...Neil's other blog...over 900 stories and comments...

click on the URL below

                        http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

++++++++++++++++++++

GO TO AMAZON.COM TO BUY NEIL WYRICK'S THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN...still receiving RAVE REVIEWS 8 years after it's publication.

        "Positive, powerful utterances...skillfully enhancing our understaning and appreciation of Lincoln...(Lt. Colonel C.A.Olsen (Ret.) Asbury College (Professor Ret.)

        "Wyrick has authored a wonderful examination of the spirituality of one of American history's most devoutly religious leaders...a pleasant and readable book that has a rich depth of information.  (Maynard Pittendreigh, Presbyterian Minister)

        "THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN is an extremely well written book...it is both scholarly and very readable.  I came away impressed at Mr. Wyrick's portrayal of that President with an altered and enlarged vision of the man. (William Hoffman, Award winning fiction writer, author of Blood and Guile, and Wild Thorn.)                                             

GO TO SPEAKER.NEIL TO SEE NEIL'S ONE MAN AWARD WINNING DRAMATIZATION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

  CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING

http://www.speakerneil.com/

 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

BELOW...ON... ONE A DAY, YOUR SPIRITUAL VITAMINS BLOG....PAST POSTINGS

“WHICH IS BETTER TO BE?  A WINDOW OR A DOOR” ” “BE A RAINBOW SEARCHER AND FINDER” “IS YOUR SENSE OF HUMOR STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION?

Click on the URL below to WATCH NEIL IN HIS WORLD FAMOUS ONE MAN DRAMATIZATIONS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, BEN FRANKLIN, CHARLES WESLEY AND MARTIN LUTHER

TO WATCH NEIL WYRICK IN HIS ONE MAN DRAMAS (Presented to millions all around the world) (Ben Franiklin, Martin Luther, Charles Wesley and Abraham Lincoln (this Lincoln film takes 11 seconds to download but is worth the wait)

CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING

http://www.speakerneil.com/

          V. Neil Wyrick’s ninth book THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN and is available at

MAGNUS PRESS

          AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.COM’S Kindle

            http://www.magnuspress.com/OurProducts2.html 

A LEFT OVER GOD/Reaction or Response

A different sermon is begun on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday.  

  If you want to share this blog with a friend go to the bottom of these comments and click on TELL A FRIEND

 
       The sermons found on this blog are selected sermons preached by Rev. Wyrick during a ministry of over 50 years.  This syndicated columnist/minister thanks you for visiting.

 
       GO TO NEIL’S OTHER BLOG ONE A DAY, YOUR SPIRITUAL VITAMINS and read the following brain teasers.  CLICK ON URL BELOW
http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

A threefold life?  Of course! 

There is that first stage of your life, only nine months long or there about.  A short but highly creative process in your mother’s womb. 

Your second stage, an unknown period of time with the earth beneath your feet.  A learning time.  A doing time.  A decision time.  A  time to dignify the process by what you become and what you give yourself to.  Dignify by not playing games with your soul.  Dignify with an honest gratitude that drives you to your knees before the throne of grace.

Your third stage, eternity.  And if you have truly believed the ultimate truth, “He who is the way, the truth and the light” then heaven, your final, eternal destination is the pay off.  “Yes, I do,” you said and meant it.  “Here I am,” replied the Lord, “living and dying for you.”  And He meant it. 

Three men were building a cathedral and each when asked what he was doing gave a different answer.

The first man said, “I am cutting stone.”

The second man said, “I am making a living.”

The third man said, “I am building a cathedral to the glory of God.”

Whatever you do in this life, whatever you say, whoever you are…let it not be a monument to the mundane, rather let it be to the glory of God.  Otherwise you may well mold your life with a left-over faith and you will then have what you deserve…a left-over God.

A businessman was in serious financial trouble.  His business had more cracks in it than Humpty Dumpty did after his great big fall.  His list of debts was long.  His list of assets had shrunken almost to the point of nonexistence. 

       As a last resort he knocked on his pastor’s door and once inside began to relate his sorrowful tale.  When he had finished, his pastor said, “This is what I want you to do.  I want you to go to your car, open up the back, put in a beach chair and your Bible.  Then drive to the beach.  Once you get there carry your beach chair and your Bible to the waters edge, sit there and wait for the wind to rifle the pages.  When finally your open Bible comes to rest on a page, look down at the page and read the first thing you see.  That will be your answer.  That will tell you what to do.”

A year later, for the man was not, to say the least, a regular church attendee, he returned to visit his minister and this time brought his wife and children with him.  He was decked out in a new, custom-tailored suit, his wife a luxurious mink coat and the children equally as prosperous in their dress.

“Ah,” said the pastor, “You did as I suggested?”

“I did, indeed,” came back the reply, “I went to the beach, put my beach chair down at the water’s edge, opened my Bible and waited for the wind to rifle its pages.”

“And?” pressed the pastor.

“Then I looked down and the first words I saw were ‘Chapter 11’.”

The attitude we bring to the Bible, to the God it describes, to His commandments and teachings, makes all the difference in the world.  And most appropriate to the just told tale, if we bring the wrong attitude we can indeed declare a spiritual Chapter 11.

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CLICK ON  www.go60.us   IT WILL TAKE YOU A NEW WEBSITE FOR SENIORS....click on "Voice" on the home page and then on the list of authors click on Neil Wyrick 

Recent articles Rev. Wyrick has written for this web site are:  

·         Many Kinds of Slavery - But Are They Not All Very Much The Same? (July 2012)

·         Here Comes Summer (July 2012)

·         Spring (May 2012)

·         Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow (April 2012)

·         Wayward and Windy (April 2012)

       GO TO AMAZON.COM TO PURCHASE Neil's best selling book"THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN" that is still receiving rave reviews 8 years after it's publication.

       "Positive, powerful utterances...skillfully enhancing our understaning and appreciation of Lincoln...(Lt. Colonel C.A.Olsen (Ret.) Asbury College (Professor Ret.)

       "Wyrick has authored a wonderful examination of the spirituality of one of American history's most devoutly religious leaders...a pleasant and readable book that has a rich depth of information.  (Maynard Pittendreigh, Presbyterian Minister)

       "THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN is an extremely well written book...it is both scholarly and very readable.  I came away impressed at Mr. Wyrick's portrayal of that President with an altered and enlarged vision of the man. (William Hoffman, Award winning fiction writer, author of Blood and Guile, and Wild Thorn.) 

                          

GO TO SPEAKER.NEIL TO SEE NEIL'S ONE MAN AWARD WINNING DRAMATIZATION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

                  &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

       Click on the URL below to WATCH NEIL IN HIS WORLD FAMOUS ONE MAN DRAMATIZATIONS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, BEN FRANKLIN, CHARLES WESLEY AND MARTIN LUTHER

       CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING

       http://www.speakerneil.com/

       V. Neil Wyrick’s ninth book THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN and is available at MAGNUS PRESS

       AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.COM’S Kindle

http://www.magnuspress.com/OurProducts2.html 

      

BECAUSE CHRIST WAS BORN (Continuation)

A different sermon is begun on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday.  

 
          IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEND THIS BLOG TO A FRIEND GO TO THE BOTTOM OF these comments AND CLICK ON THE ENVELOPE.

 
       The sermons found on this blog are selected sermons preached by Rev. Wyrick during a ministry of over 50 years.  This syndicated columnist/minister thanks you for visiting.

 
       To visit Neil's other blog One A Day Your Spiritual Vitamins click on the following

  
 http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

During the most productive period of his life John Weslet  traveled on horseback 5,000 miles a years, preached fifteen sermons a week and looked every hostile and petty man square in the face  and did not flinch. 

 

In his wide journeying, he carried a Bible, a change of linen, and the implements of his simple diet.  So deep was his devotion, so complete his dedication and consecration, that it has been movingly said of him, “When at length he came to die, he left only a knife, a fork, two spoons… and the Methodist Church.”

   William James put it well, “Give yourself to something that will outlast you.”  And a Christian looked at me the other day and said, “I’ve stopped passing the buck and started bucking the line.”

   When people hear you speak, or watch your actions, let there be no doubt in their minds that you believe in the brotherhood of man and the fatherhood of God.  Let there be no doubt for all who observe your life that you believe that happiness is not a thing of matter, but of mind; not a hillside full of gold, but a heart full of God.

 

       Know this, if we do not bow down before God our maker, we will bow down before gods of our own making.
 

+++++++++++++

CLICK ON  www.go60.us   IT WILL TAKE YOU A NEW WEBSITE FOR SENIORS....click on "Voice" on the home page and then on the list of authors click on Neil Wyrick 

       Recent articles Rev. Wyrick has written for this web site are:  REFLECTIONS

       Many Kinds of Slavery - But Are They Not All Very     Much The Same? (July 2012)

       Here Comes Summer (July 2012)

       Spring (May 2012)

       Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow (April 2012)

       Wayward and Windy (April 2012)

       Click on the URL below to WATCH NEIL IN HIS WORLD FAMOUS ONE MAN DRAMATIZATIONS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, BEN FRANKLIN, CHARLES WESLEY AND MARTIN LUTHER

       http://www.speakerneil.com/

        DO YOU HAVE A HISTORY BUFF IN YOUR FAMILY?...Why not give THIS HIGHLY ACCLAIMED  BOOK

        To buy Neil's 9th book THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN or other of his books click on the following

http://www.magnuspress.com/

OR GO TO AMAZON.COM

       AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.COM and amazon.com Kindle

OTHER BOOKS BY REV. WYRICK

Poor Richard's Almanack for the 20th Century

Sixty Plus and Not Holding

Boundaries Unlimited

I Am

The ABC"s of Parenting and Grandparenting

Letters to America

http://www.magnuspress.com/OurProducts2.html 

   

THE INCOMPREHENSIBLE LOVE OF GOD (Continuation)

A different sermon is begun on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday.  

  If you want to share this blog with a friend go to the bottom of these comments and click on TELL A FRIEND

  The sermons found on this blog are selected sermons preached by Rev. Wyrick during a ministry of over 50 years.  This syndicated columnist/minister thanks you for visiting.

 
GO TO NEIL’S OTHER BLOG ONE A DAY, YOUR SPIRITUAL VITAMINS and read the following brain teasers.  CLICK ON URL BELOW
http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

Ernest Hemingway is one of my favorite authors and in one of his stories he tells of a father who had a rebellious son named Paco.  Ultimately, Paco became a modern-day prodigal son and ran away from home.  Overwhelmed with grief and concern, the father finally, in one last desperate attempt to find his son, put an ad in the local newspaper.  It read:

“Dear Paco, meet me in front of the newspaper office at noon.  All is forgiven.  I love you.”  The next day 800 Pacos showed up.  They all were responding to the fact their father loved them and forgave them. 

And God says, Dear John, Jane, James, Nancy meet me in the front of your soul any time during your life.  All is forgiven.  I love you.” 

I like the way God’s love is described in 1 John 3:1 “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!”

It’s all there, everyday in every way…the love of God.   It’s there in the excited cry of a child at close of day.  It’s there in the kneeling response of a man or woman in prayer.  It’s there every time we reach up and God reaches down.  What is it the marines are always saying, “We’re looking for a few good men.”  Well, God is certainly looking for good men and women but also realizing that even good men and women can sometimes be ungodly and not so good, not always worthy of forgiveness but forgiving them anyway.  And do you want to know something?  “There is nothing you can do to make God love you more.  There is nothing you can do to make Him love you less.”  (Anonymous)

Yes, His unbending love is beyond our complete comprehension but not beyond our complete acceptance.   Wise and well-choosing folk do it all the time.  It is called faith.  It’s called how could anyone in their right mind turn down an offer with an eternal guarantee.  

Pure and simple, to allow yourself to buy into the love of God for all that it offers is a lesson in humility and passing this lesson in humility can keep you from a lesson in futility.  It is no small thing where you are sending your love and where you are receiving love back from.  Because you see, you cannot accept the love of God and ignore what is good and right and precious.  You cannot accept the love of God and not work hard at giving the same to others.  You cannot accept the love of God without examining the goals you have set for life and whether they are worthy.

+++++++++

CLICK ON  www.go60.us   IT WILL TAKE YOU A NEW WEBSITE FOR SENIORS....click on "Voice" on the home page and then on the list of authors click on Neil Wyrick 

Recent articles Rev. Wyrick has written for this web site are:  REFLECTIONS

·         Many Kinds of Slavery - But Are They Not All Very Much The Same? (July 2012)

·         Here Comes Summer (July 2012)

·         Spring (May 2012)

·         Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow (April 2012)

·         Wayward and Windy (April 2012)

  

GO TO ONE A DAY YOUR SPIRUTAL VITAMINS...Neil's other blog...over 900 stories and comments...

click on the URL below

                        http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

++++++++++++++++++++

GO TO AMAZON.COM TO BUY NEIL WYRICK'S THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN...still receiving RAVE REVIEWS 8 years after it's publication.

        "Positive, powerful utterances...skillfully enhancing our understaning and appreciation of Lincoln...(Lt. Colonel C.A.Olsen (Ret.) Asbury College (Professor Ret.)

        "Wyrick has authored a wonderful examination of the spirituality of one of American history's most devoutly religious leaders...a pleasant and readable book that has a rich depth of information.  (Maynard Pittendreigh, Presbyterian Minister)

        "THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN is an extremely well written book...it is both scholarly and very readable.  I came away impressed at Mr. Wyrick's portrayal of that President with an altered and enlarged vision of the man. (William Hoffman, Award winning fiction writer, author of Blood and Guile, and Wild Thorn.)                                             

GO TO SPEAKER.NEIL TO SEE NEIL'S ONE MAN AWARD WINNING DRAMATIZATION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

  CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING

http://www.speakerneil.com/

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

BELOW...ON... ONE A DAY, YOUR SPIRITUAL VITAMINS BLOG....PAST POSTINGS

“WHICH IS BETTER TO BE?  A WINDOW OR A DOOR” ” “BE A RAINBOW SEARCHER AND FINDER” “IS YOUR SENSE OF HUMOR STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION?

Click on the URL below to WATCH NEIL IN HIS WORLD FAMOUS ONE MAN DRAMATIZATIONS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, BEN FRANKLIN, CHARLES WESLEY AND MARTIN LUTHER

TO WATCH NEIL WYRICK IN HIS ONE MAN DRAMAS (Presented to millions all around the world) (Ben Franiklin, Martin Luther, Charles Wesley and Abraham Lincoln (this Lincoln film takes 11 seconds to download but is worth the wait)

CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING

http://www.speakerneil.com/

          V. Neil Wyrick’s ninth book THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN and is available at

MAGNUS PRESS AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.COM’S Kindle

            http://www.magnuspress.com/OurProducts2.html 

A LEFT OVER GOD (Continuaton)

A different sermon is begun on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday.  

  If you want to share this blog with a friend go to the bottom of these comments and click on TELL A FRIEND

 
       The sermons found on this blog are selected sermons preached by Rev. Wyrick during a ministry of over 50 years.  This syndicated columnist/minister thanks you for visiting.

       GO TO NEIL’S OTHER BLOG ONE A DAY, YOUR SPIRITUAL VITAMINS and read the following brain teasers.  CLICK ON URL BELOW

http://oneadayyourspiritualvitamins.blogspot.com/

I know I keep talking about camping, but I have done a lot of it so here I go again. 

       As a Boy Scout, I learned to make a fire using a magnifying glass, or a piece of flint, or rubbing two sticks together.  It was a fascinating study in patience and perseverance.  There would be smoke and then a teeny, tiny flame and if I fanned it and feed it I would end up with a roaring campfire. 

       I think faith is like that.  A new Christian is a tiny flame seeking to grow bigger and stronger, but at the beginning it can too easily be blown out, or kept weak by the slightest adversarial breeze.  It certainly won’t grow very fast or very much if we don’t give it proper attention and fuel.  

A good prayer life, an on-going spiritual study – these are the magnifying glass, the piece of flint, the rubbing of two spiritual sticks that make “this little light of mine” not little anymore.     These are what make one more on fire to the presence of God.  

Do you practice an inadequate faith?  A faith struggling to survive with only ere-now-and-then prayers prayed by an ere-now-and-then practitioner?   

       A left-over faith and attitude toward a left-over God denying the importance of fulfilling a personal destiny?  An inadequate belief system invites the Lord to come into one’s life, but with built-in restraints.  It loudly whispers that it is nothing to get excited about it. 

But what the Bible teaches, who Christ is and how your destiny and mine fit into the great scheme of things, really is something to get excited about.  We are personally created by a divine plan.  We are not an accident.  He is the Maker.  We are the clay.

I said the Bible teaches…did I say it because as a preacher I’m supposed to say it? 

No. 

I said it because we need the Bible to under gird our faith.  Without it you may have trouble backing up your faith to yourself and to others.  Without it people are running on low octane spiritual fuel, aptly named assumptions or surmises.

“In the beginning was the Word, (which is Jesus) and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”  (John 1:1)  “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”  (John 1:14)  “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16)  We need these WOW phrases.  They are vitamins for our souls.

Did you ever consider that the whole Christian belief process is a come-as-you-are-party?  He doesn’t ask that we be clothed in perfection, just that we believe in Him and accept His forgiveness for our sins.  And, if we really believe, we will work harder at not having so many sins to be forgiven. 

What is faith?  Certainly it is more than just a feeling.  It is complete trust.  A consciously made decision, not a wishy-washy maybe.

Sometimes one of the best ways to describe something is to name some people who didn’t just know but followed.  Take Noah in the book of Genesis for example.  While all around him were those who were rebellious toward God and the idea that God had spoken directly to him, but not Noah.  Even though the sun was brightly shining and continued to shine, he went ahead and built the Ark anyway. 

Belief systems get things done. 

Abraham was declared “right with God” not because of a list of human achievements he had accomplished, but rather because of his belief system. 

Moses gave up the riches the Pharaoh of Egypt offered him to devote himself to his faith in God.  A belief system created a leader who took his people to a promised land.

Bottom line, your faith is what you believe in.  There was a man who was very rich and when he knew that he soon would die, he negotiated with God that when it happened he would be able to bring all that he could cram into one suitcase.  And so it happened, and there he was standing at the pearly gates with his huge, extremely heavy, suitcase by his side.  St. Peter walked up to him and looking at the suitcase asked how it was that he had managed to come all this way with “that bundle with a handle.”  

“God said I could,” the man explained. 

“Very unusual,” said St. Peter, “but if you have been given special permission then I suppose it is alright.  May I see what is inside?” 

The man opened his suitcase and there they were, one gold bar after the other.

St. Peter shook his head and said, “This is the wealth you brought from earth?  You bought pavement?” 

Everyone has a belief system.  Where they aim that belief system is the difference between a rainbow-life or one that is tattletale gray. 

The atheist, because his belief system demands he believe in something, believes in himself.  Or he believes in what he accomplishes, or his psychic well-being is tied to his bank account.  Saddam Hussein believed in his power over the tiny kingdom of Iraq.  

Some CEO’s believe in their little kingdoms that get them listed among the world’s richest men.  Power, pride, greed, the list is long.  Oh, yes, everyone has a belief system.  And yes, I ask the expected, what is yours?

I remember a physician friend of mine telling me that in his experience almost everyone prays before they die.  A left-out, left-over God becomes very important when eternity may be only a heartbeat away. 

It is to this innate longing I have been speaking, and the need for each of us to give Him our all rather than give Him our spiritual, emotional and mental leftovers. 

To not fall victim to what I call “The Hometown Syndrome.”  What do I mean by that?  Well, remember how it was when Jesus went back to His hometown and their response?

 He had fed 5000 people from a meager measure of food.  He had healed sick people in Capernaum.  Enormous crowds had followed Him with great faith and hung on His every word.  And then he came back home to Nazareth where he was met with a complete lack of enthusiasm.  In these hometown folk he found no praise, no acceptance, only cynicism, and what happened is duly recorded, “He could do there no mighty work because of their unbelief.”

In another town a woman called out, “Lord, Lord,” and received back from the grave her son.  But not in Nazareth.  Elsewhere a woman reached out and touched his garment and was healed.  But not in Nazareth.

All those who have written the mighty hymns we sing, is it because they reached out to the Lord and He mightily touched their souls?  The great hymns you have sung and been moved by, can you really believe they came from someone who gave God the leftovers of their lives?  Is what you feel in direct proportion to how much you have given of yourself to God, a kind of spiritual boomerang effect?

While Rome fell the church grew, conquered the conquering barbarians by bringing many of them to the Lord.  And what of the church in our 21^st century?  I will tell you what of.  It is still a great force, often despite rather than because of us.  And why?  Because it teaches what is true, that “this earthly life is an intermediate stage in a threefold life.”  (Bruce Barton)

 

++++++++

 
CLICK ON  www.go60.us   IT WILL TAKE YOU A NEW WEBSITE FOR SENIORS....click on "Voice" on the home page and then on the list of authors click on Neil Wyrick 

Recent articles Rev. Wyrick has written for this web site are:  

·         Many Kinds of Slavery - But Are They Not All Very Much The Same? (July 2012)

·         Here Comes Summer (July 2012)

·         Spring (May 2012)

·         Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow (April 2012)

·         Wayward and Windy (April 2012)

       GO TO AMAZON.COM TO PURCHASE Neil's best selling book"THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN" that is still receiving rave reviews 8 years after it's publication.

       "Positive, powerful utterances...skillfully enhancing our understaning and appreciation of Lincoln...(Lt. Colonel C.A.Olsen (Ret.) Asbury College (Professor Ret.)

       "Wyrick has authored a wonderful examination of the spirituality of one of American history's most devoutly religious leaders...a pleasant and readable book that has a rich depth of information.  (Maynard Pittendreigh, Presbyterian Minister)

       "THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN is an extremely well written book...it is both scholarly and very readable.  I came away impressed at Mr. Wyrick's portrayal of that President with an altered and enlarged vision of the man. (William Hoffman, Award winning fiction writer, author of Blood and Guile, and Wild Thorn.)  

                          

GO TO SPEAKER.NEIL TO SEE NEIL'S ONE MAN AWARD WINNING DRAMATIZATION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

                  &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

       Click on the URL below to WATCH NEIL IN HIS WORLD FAMOUS ONE MAN DRAMATIZATIONS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, BEN FRANKLIN, CHARLES WESLEY AND MARTIN LUTHER

       CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING

       http://www.speakerneil.com/

       V. Neil Wyrick’s ninth book THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN and is available at MAGNUS PRESS

       AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.COM’S Kindle

http://www.magnuspress.com/OurProducts2.html