Rescued

The Good News Today Is...sometimes we don't get what we want. I read this story in Guideposts magazine and learned that sometimes things happen just the way they are supposed to and it is completely opposite of what we wanted. What a heart warming story about an aspiring actor who ended up being a dog trainer for stage dogs. When life throws us curves and we roll with them instead of getting hit my them and going down, often we discover the joy of the Lord right in the middle of the disappointment. That's what happened to Bill Berloni in this story. He followed his heart rescuing a dog scheduled to be euthanized and trained him to act in a stage play - what he wanted to do was be the actor. Somehow though everything worked out and he ended up feeling like the rescued one. Read the story....it could happen to you. Let God work in your life how God wants to work in your life, instead of how you want God to work in you life. You will find out that your life is rescued also.

Sing a Love Song

The Good News Today Is...I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. When I am stressed or overwhelmed, I can still sing! Something happens to me when I sing and make a melody to the Lord, I start to relax and I am reminded that life is not all about deadlines and tasks. Life is about people and relationships. I often remind others that when they arrive in heaven God will not pat them on the back for working hard at their place of employment and getting promoted. God will ask them how they have helped their fellow man and how they have furthered the kingdom of God. No one will care anymore how well you completed the tasks of labor, but will want to how well you completed the tasks of love. Sing a love song to God today and remind yourself that God is good - all the time!

Miracles Do Happen

The Good News Today Is..."Daughter your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease." (Mark 5:34) I know that there are many miracles of healing today. People have terminal cancer one day and a few months later they are cancer free. How does that happen? The stories of meditations and healthy eating and proper exercise make it look like it is all in the hands of the person who is ill. I believe it is a miracle, no matter how it happens....a modern day miracle. Inside of me though, I also believe that these things only happen to someone else. Where is my faith? Am I not worthy of a miracle because I am a daughter of God? To tell you the truth I don't want to find out! You only need a miracle if you are in imminent danger....I'll just pass on that, thanks anyway! For now I will be satisfied with the truth that I believe that miracles do happen, all of the time.

Let Me Think

The Good News Today Is...I found this expert from www.journeywithjesus.net (click to read the entire essay):

We should not remain silent when we see attempts to legitimize sacred violence, but instead name it for what it is. We should learn the warning signs that religion has become evil and evil has become religious (emphasis mine):

* Fanatical claims of absolute truth. I do not mean the belief that absolute truth exists, but the doubt-free and uncritical confidence that one understands such absolute truth absolutely.
* Blind obedience to totalitarian, charismatic, and authoritarian leaders or their views that undermines moral integrity, personal freedom, individual responsibility, and intellectual inquiry.
* Identifying and rationalizing “end times” scenarios in the name of your religion.
* Justifying religious ends by dubious means.
* Any and all forms of dehumanization, from openly declaring war on your enemy, demonizing those who differ from you, construing your neighbor as an Other, to claiming that God is on your side alone.
* Pressure tactics of coercion, deception, and false advertisement.
* Alienation, isolation and withdrawal from family, friends and society, whether psychologically or literally.
* Exploitation and all forms of unreasonable demands upon one's time, money, resources, family, friendships, sexuality, etc.

These are tough words for tough times. Imagine someone having the idea to write "religion has become evil and evil has become religious." There is a saying that if it ain't broke don't fix it, and this is the reality - that religion is broken, we need to fix it. We need to take the limelight off from us and put it back on God. When it's all about God we don't have these problems! I'm glad someone had the nerve to write about this - it keeps us from being complacent!

The Drama of It All

The Good News Today Is....the stories in the scriptures are great dramas. As with all great dramas you can interpret them in all whole lot of different ways. Simple sentences, such as; "Why are you afraid?"(Mark 4:40) can be read different ways. "WHY are you afraid?" "Why are YOU afraid?" "Why are you AFRAID? WHY ARE YOU AFRAID?" The words are the same but the message changes. That's because the bible is a living word....we are meant to be able to take life's lessons from it and apply them to our own lives. We will read a passage and garner from it according to our needs. I think that is a drama worth rereading!

Jesus Calms the Storm

The Good News Today Is....we can hear gospel stories through children. There is something very touching when you hear a child's voice reading a story about our savior.

The Road

The Good News Today Is...we get to take the middle road. As Christians we are to steer clear of the extremes, the temptations, the evils. Yet we live in this world and we work in this world and those things are all around us. As I have heard so many times - "If you don't know where you are going, any road will do!" Well we do know where we are going and we should keep to the middle road. Follow the footsteps God has laid out for you. He has ordered your path and your road leads right to salvation. Slow and steady on the middle road. Our map will not fail us. We are not lost!

Fear

The Good News Today Is....we should be afraid, very afraid. "He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, 'Peace! Be still!' Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, 'Why are you afraid?'' (Mark 4:39-40) Sometimes we read right over the parts in the bible that should scare us the most. If God has complete control, really complete control, when he wants it....we should live in a reverent fear of ticking God off. Yet we continue to read this and think that God will always use His mighty power to save us. Did it not occur to you that God could also use His mighty power to wipe us out? Remember Noah? (Of course we do.) How about his fellow town folk? (Of course not, they were all obliterated!) That is exactly the point.

Life is Tough

The Good News Today Is....I thought I had a tough week, but really it was a piece of cake.....

Step by Step

The Good News Today Is...when you don't know what to do next all you have to do is take the next step. There are times in our life when we know exactly what to do, then there are times of great uncertainty. When we are in a quandary over what to do next all we need to do is take one small step. It's called walking by faith and not by sight. We don't always have the answers, but we serve a mighty God who can see the whole picture and not just our small piece of the pie. When we are unsure and yet we walk by faith, God can use that to complete the whole. We can be assured that anything we lift to God to complete will be done in accordance to His will. All we need to do is to take that step.

I Kid You Not

The Good News Today Is....God still talks to us. After yesterday's heartfelt entry I made to clear my conscience of the trouble I was having relating to the person I met, I received this little tidbit in my e-mail.....I kid you not.

"We all know someone who needs Christ. For you, it might be some cranky old neighbor. It might be your mom or your dad. It might be a person you can't envision ever being a Christian. She is so hard. He is so against God. You have written him or her off. Even thinking about witnessing to that person seems extreme to you.

Think again. Remember, no one is beyond God's reach. That person can come to Jesus. Pray for him; pray for her. Allow God to put a burden on your heart, and be willing to reach out as God leads you. Are you willing to be extreme for Christ? He wants to use you today."

Ok- so I got the message loud and clear!

I Really Don't Like This

The Good News Today Is...just when I thought I had it all together I was challenged again. I have been working so hard to love the way that God loves and I've been doing a little better every day. Then I met someone who was so hard to love. Even as I reminded myself that this person was broken and needed compassion, I really wanted to lash out at them for the things they were doing. It has been bothering me for a few days now, because even though the situation is past, the feelings are clinging on. Every time I think about this person I get a new wave of anger, a feeling that I just want to shake some sense into them, mixed with a feeling that I hope I never see them again. I only know that this is way beyond me and that if I meet this person again (which is fairly inevitable) I will need every bit of the Holy Spirit working in me to take over and deal with them. It is not within my humanity to be able to love them...it will have to be up to God to love them through me.

Three Pennies

The Good News Today Is...we all have at least three pennies. The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, began her orphanage with such a vision. She told her superiors, "I have three pennies and a dream From God to build an orphanage." A dream and three pennies represented resources as small as a mustard seed. "Mother Teresa," her superiors chided gently, "you cannot build an orphanage with three pennies...with three pennies you can't do anything." "I know," she said, smiling, "but with God and three pennies I can do anything." With vision and faith and three pennies, nothing is impossible-and that's my two cents for the day!

Truth or Heresy - Make Up Your Own Mind

The Good News Today Is...we have free choice and are supposed to use it. I listened to a couple of sermons on podcast this week; one promoting a particular book and one that thought the same book was heresy. I found it interesting that in each case the speaker argued their own points vehemently, but neither of them gave the listener any tools to make up their own mind. One was read it and accept it, the other was don't go near that book - don't even touch it. So what happened to searching for the truth instead of having the "truth" told to you. They can't both be right - either the book is good (in the sense of truth) or it is evil (in the sense of heresy). Well - people have free choice and I believe they should choose whether or not they should read the book. Then they should seek the truth. If this is professed to be a Christian book it should reflect the truths taught in the bible. Each one of us should be equipped to be able to look up relevant scriptures and compare them to what is being portrayed in the book. We are not to blindly follow any preacher or teacher, but to listen and discern the truth through study and prayer. We are supposed to follow the light and the truth....first we have to know what the light and the truth are!

A Know it All

The Good News Today Is....I've been reading about Nicodemus. Nicodemus the well educated man who had wanted nothing more than to become one of the learned society about Judaism. He studied and learned and studied more, memorizing, passing all the tests. He was on top of his world, he knew it all, he knew enough to be invited into the elite Sanhedrin. Nicodemus - a man of the law. Yet something spoke to him about the lessons of Jesus. He knew it all, yet he knew nothing. When he finally had the chance to speak with Jesus, he understood nothing. All of his studying and all of his social mobility accounted for total ignorance. Hmmm...am I like that? I sure hope not, I love to study, I love to be part of "the group." Hopefully though I am open to the truth and not just the law. For everything Nicodemus knew, he had so much left to learn.

Nothing is Something

I was sent my first link to The Skit Guys on You Tube yesterday. They have obviously been around awhile as when I did a search I came up with a lot of different short skits. They are fun and carry a good message. Go to You Tube and watch them all....it will lift your spirits!

We are Poor

The Good News Today Is...we are poor. I found the following story on a site that does Christian illustrations and it seemed so poignant and fitting for our world today.

One day a father of a wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the purpose of showing him how poor people can be. They spent a day and a night on the farm of a very poor family. On their way back to their home, father and son got into a conversation about all they had experienced while at the farm.

"What did you think of our trip to the farm," asked the father.

"It was very good, Dad!"

"Did you see how poor people can be?" continued his father.

"Yeah!

"And what did you learn?"

"I saw that, while we have a dog at home, they have four dogs," the son replied. "We have a pool that reaches to the middle of the garden, while they have a creek that has no end. We have electric lamps in the garden, and they have a sky full of stars. Our patio goes all the way to the wall around our property. They have the whole horizon." When the little boy was finished, his father was speechless. "Thanks, Dad, for showing me how poor we really are!"