truth

The best BFF is one who will help you pick a life time of good ones!

 “A person who has friends may be harmed by them, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Proverbs 18:24 (NET Bible)

Many of the children grow up in the church only to leave it as adults. Those who are true believers will return but what set them up to leave in the first place. So much lost time in lives wasted on frivolous friendship with the world. Can it be prevented? I think so.

I was recently given a list of 301 things I am in Christ. I was blown away by all the things God says about those who follow Him. Then I was reading Lysa TerKeurst’s Blog. She mentioned her favorite gift from a friend was a box of Scriptures typed out with her name in them, things that God has done for each believer.

It got me to thinking about many people I know both young and old who suffer from identity theft. I am not talking about the financial kind either. Spiritual identity theft! Satan attacks daily beating down the most vulnerable with his lies about who we are. If we only had the scripture planted firmly in our hearts it would protect us from the fiery darts of our enemy. “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy;.” John 10:10 (Net Bible)

“For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but threw them into hell and locked them up in chains in utter darkness, to be kept until the judgment, and if he did not spare the ancient world, but did protect Noah, a herald of righteousness, along with seven others, when God brought a flood on an ungodly world, and if he turned to ashes the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah when he condemned them to destruction, having appointed them to serve as an example to future generations of the ungodly, and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man in anguish over the debauched lifestyle of lawless men, (for while he lived among them day after day, that righteous man was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)–if so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from their trials, and to reserve the unrighteous for punishment at the day of judgment, especially those who indulge their fleshly desires and who despise authority” (2 Peter 2:4-10)

Many people do not know that the French Revolution was so secular, anti-church, anti-God, anti-Christ, that in their rebellion, they attempted to change the seven day week to a ten day week.[1] After that, the Russian Revolution attempted to change the workers’ weeks to six days, five working followed by one day off in a constant cycle, though the calendar remained the same. It was to optimize production I’m sure, since we know the Bolsheviks[2] were moral, caring people and had no interest in destroying the traditions and practices of practicing Jews and Christians. Their rebellion was, amongst other things, a rebellion against God, His six days of creation and His seventh day of rest (Genesis 2:2-3).

In earlier days, many scientists founded themselves upon the idea that nature was orderly and discoverable because the Creator was not a God of disorder (1 Corinthians 14:33) nor was He capricious; He was a God who invited inquiry (Isaiah 1:18) and discovery and enjoyed revealing Himself through His handiwork for His glory (Psalm 19, Romans 1:19-20). Then followed the Theory of Evolution[3] which was widely embraced not because of the science, but because of the philosophy: It offered an escape hatch from God. Today many scientists may claim that they “cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door”[4] because philosophic materialism (practical atheism or agnosticism) is the only basis for science. They act as though this is a normal, neutral, and necessary thing, but it is not. Copernicus, Bacon, Kepler, Galileo, Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, Newton, Faraday, Kelvin, Pasteur, Planck, Einstein would disagree. But as one atheist philosopher has said, “I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that.”[5] The materialist atheist scientists and philosophers rebel against the foundational premise of “In the beginning God” (Genesis 1:1).

Have you ever read any statistics on how social media is affecting our sense of identity? In a world where we can post who we want others to perceive we are, we can end up with an online-induced case of plural identities. Not only does this create confusion, it also is exhausting to maintain. My daughter, Kari Ciliberti, recently in a paper on this very subject, cited “Mary Aiken’s, an expert in cyberpsychology, comments on the feedback loop of one’s cyber self, saying,  “… The cyber self is always under construction, physiologically and digitally. Even when …sleeping, the cyber self continues to exist. It is always on- evolving, updating, making friends…gaining followers, getting ‘likes,’ and being tagged. This can create a sense of urgency, a continuous feedback loop, a sense of needing to invest more and more time in order to keep the virtual self current, relevant and popular (Aiken, 2016, p. 174).”  

Jesus told Pilate, “For this reason I was born, and for this reason I came into the world – to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice” (John 18:37).

“Therefore see to it that the light in you is not darkness” – Jesus (Luke 11:35).

While skimming a book I’d previously read entitled “The Great Philosophers: From Socrates to Foucault”, a quick summary of influential philosophers, I was sometimes struck by the darkness and futility of their ideas. Yet I was open to seeing truths that might be found within the shadows so to speak. I gleaned what truthful ideas I could from Socrates and Plato, Rousseau and Hobbes, etc., and I peered into the darkness and madness of Nietzsche, a darkness and madness that some speculate, eventually killed him.

“If your eye is diseased, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” (Matthew 6:23).

But God has also said, “Let light shine out of the darkness” (2 Corinthians 4:6).

“I should be much more afraid of being mistaken and then finding out that Christianity is true than of being mistaken in believing it to be true” (Blaise Pascal).[1]

While revisiting a book entitled “The Great Philosophers: From Socrates to Foucault”, a short synopsis of many of the best known philosophers, I was struck by thoughts of meaninglessness. For thousands of years philosophers have been discussing questions like, “How do we know what we know?” “How can we know anything?” “How do we know we exist?” etc. What futility it is not to believe in God and to disbelieve in the possibility of life after death, to believe everyone eventually dies, all stars burn out, and dead matter inhabits space forever after that. As a philosopher 500 years before Socrates said when he viewed everything that was said and done under the sun:

“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless” (Ecclesiastes 1:2, NIV).

This the picture of man in all his wisdom, without God. 

Many people make New Year resolutions. Some are personal goals but others focus on work and ministry. I would like to challenge us, as teachers, to make one New Year resolution that will empower our teaching. This new method will not only change the lives of our children but is guaranteed to change our lives too, as we hear, believe and live out the truth of our position in Christ.

When Ray and I visited the Galapagos Islands, one of my favorite pictures was the two of us with a gigantic tortoise. Unfortunately, my big ol' red purse was on the ground in the picture too. So I photoshopped it out.

Many people believe that teaching the Old Testament to children is unnecessary or not as important as the New Testament. The truth of the matter is that “the New Testament is concealed in the Old Testament and the Old Testament is revealed in the New Testament.” 

My daughter and I were talking recently about the quest for satisfaction that drives women in our culture and how it is becoming painfully clear that achievement and success have not delivered the payoff of personal satisfaction that women seek. In the brief reflective spaces sandwiched between their frenzied commitments, women are now realizing that external accomplishments do not satisfy their deepest inner longings. That may be your experience. So, the search for satisfaction continues.  

What many women don’t realize is that they are created by God with a built-in spiritual thirst for a relationship with Him. This spiritual thirst is as real as physical thirst, but the way to have it satisfied is not as obvious. Yet, the desire to satisfy this thirst draws women toward the spiritual arena. I was that woman when I was invited to join a small women’s Bible study group. There, I met Jesus in the pages of the Bible. As my relationship grew with Him, I recognized a deep sense of being satisfied. My longing to know God was being fulfilled. It still is.