Christian Photographers Community

Morning Devotional...


Then they went out to see what was done; and came to Jesus, and found the man, out of whom the devils were departed, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed, and in his right mind.
Luke 8:35

What a transformation!

It had been a tragic story of demons, tombs, chains, fetters, stones, and tears.

Then Jesus came.

He who had calmed the storm on the lake now calmed the storm that raged in the breast of this poor demoniac.

It is still the same today. Many are resting at His feet, delivered from the bondage of sin and enjoying the peace that He brings.
--Jim Flanigan

JONI is on again right now on Larry King

Joni, what a blessing she was on LKl.  It was good to see her.  Thank you...

Blessings in the city.
Blessings in the field.
Many children,
Ample crops,
Large flocks and herds;
Blessings of fruit and bread;
Blessings when you come in,
Blessings when you go out.

The Lord will defeat your enemies before you;

He will open to you His wonderful treasury of rain in the heavens. 

Deut 28: 6,7,12.

Jenny,

Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 are two of the fundamental chapters in the Old Testament in understanding the covenant relationship that God wanted with his people, Israel. 

Moses here was giving his final instructions to the people of Israel.  Tradition states that at this time he had the entire people gathered in a valley between two people standing on the hills on either side.  And he explained the conditions of the covenant as a sort of echo/liturgy.  One man said the first verse, and the other responded, but with the negative condition.

This is how the passage starts:
Deu. 28:1  If you fully obey the LORD your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations on earth.

Notice the first word is 'IF' and this places the condition on the blessings. 

The second part mirrors the first, but with the negative side of the covenant:
Deu. 28:15  However, if you do not obey the LORD your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:

It is interesting to note that there are almost twice as many curses as there are blessings in Deuteronomy 28.  God was really trying to emphasize to his people the seriousness of entering into this covenant relationship.  So many times I find in our churches today that we focus so much on the blessings that we forget about the conditions of the blessings.  The requirement is to 'fully obey the Lord your God and carefully follow all his commands.'  We wonder why things go wrong in our lives, and start to blame God about it, but in reality the fault lies in our own inability, or unwillingness to do our part of the covenant.  We need to focus on ourselves and start to ask are we really doing our part in the agreement?  Are we really following all of God's laws?  Are we really doing what God has called us to do to win the world for his sake?

Blessings for Obedience:                                               Curses for Disobedience:
Blessings in the city. 28:3                                              Curses in the city. 28:16
Blessings in the field. 28:3                                             Curses in the field. 28:16
Many children, 28:4                                                      Womb is cursed 28:18
Ample crops, 28:4                                                        Crops Cursed 28:18
Large flocks and herds; 28:4                                          Flocks and herds cursed 28:18
Blessings of fruit and bread; 28:5                                    Curses on fruit and bread 28:17
Blessings when you come in, 28:6                                  Curses when you come in 28:18
Blessings when you go out. 28:6                                    Curses when you go out 28:18

We see through Israel's history that they forgot the second part of the covenant, that of the curses.  They felt that since they were "God's People" that their way of life and success was assured.  However as they forgot and ignored God's laws, their life got worse and worse and eventually ended in captivity by the enemy.  Let us continue to focus on God's laws and doing our part for the Kingdom.

Blessings (as long as you are following the commands of God),
Mike

I may have been the only person on CP to not know who Joni Earekson Tada was but through you loving people, I now know.  Isn't she an inspiration?  And to be on Larry King Live!!!  Now she has touched an audience that very possibly never ever thought God could do so much for mankind.  I am hoping that his audience was so fascinated with her story that they watched the show in its entirety! 

I am all ready for church.  Looks like rain so I have shut my windows and turned on the A/C.  The fresh air sure was nice while it lasted.

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"I'm not rich and famous, but I do have priceless grandchildren."

Yes Mike...

I am sure that our dear brethren on C.P.  are following the commands of God and I pray these blessings for them.,although we all stumble from time to time. I know I certainly do. Praise Him that He remains faithful. Yes Pastor Al?

The Lord gave me this a few years ago when I had been obedient in a certain matter and He did open unto me "His good treasure" as in verse 12....wow did he!

I had the feeling today that God has this word for someone on C.P.

Thanks Mike for your input.

The Lord Bless you.

Blessings & Curses.  I thank you, Skief, for the breakdown and you too, Jenny, for the beginning of this.

I may be the only one on CP that doesn't have access to Larry King.  I am glad that Joni was able to be there.  He has had several Christians on his program and we pray that he, too, will be able to accept Christ.  I think that he is searching.

Today is the LORD's day and I pray we all have a special time of thanksgiving, praise and worship with Him.

love, kathy :-========================================================

PS I'm back after reading yesterday's posts that I missed.  A BIG congrats to Janet & Sonifofor their talent. We do have some good ones here.

Like you, Marilyn, I do not get in all the names.  I do love all of you here on CP and pray for you, too.  And for Jane...we both didn't get to see Joni.  Is there not a link somewhere here?  I'll go back and check on yesterday's posts.

Again...have a wonderful Sunday.

I didn't get to see Joni either Jane and Kathy,. I don't have cable just rabbit ears on my TV.

Thank you Mike and Jenny for the Blessings and the curses. I have often prayed the blessings over my children and grand children.

I don'thave much time to spend here right now as I have to get ready for church. After church I may be going into eureka to pick up the g-kids fromthe other grandparents for a couple of hours. Gilbert and Sarah are out of town this weekend and have asked me to give her mom a break. I will also be taking Gloria to church with me. So I must  go now.

TTYL

We certainly do need to place equal emphasis on the curses as on the blessings .....

but we need also to see that the blessings are free because our Lord Jesus Christ has accomplished the "if" AND taken the curses!

If this were not the case, then all of us would receive all of the curses, because we completely failed the "if" clauses.

He has been made a curse for us.  As Paul told the Galatians: "Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, 'cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree,' that the blessings of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith." (Gal. 3:13, 14)

Hi all.  Pat just left for Sunday school and church.  I got up and got ready to go but just feel really down with this cold.  My eyes are watering and nose running so am not pleasant to be around.  Pat took my temperature and it is below normal so my body is fighting the cold virus and suppose that is why I feel so tired.  At 12:30 pm is the computer seminar that I committed to help with but if I don't feel better by then will also stay home.  I sent the CD I had prepared to use with Pat and she will give it to the man doing the presentation as he can use it.  As soon as I finish this short posting today I am going to lay back down and rest somemore.  Of course, I didn't get up until after 8 am this mornng, which is most unusual for me.

Skief thanks for the comparison of blessings and curses. 

Sonja, congrats on your grand champion photo and thanks for sharing it.

I will try to get back later.

Good morning, friends,

Yes, I did get to see Joni because y'all talked about it. I normally don't watch "current events" type shows because there is so much voyeurism, etc., and I prefer to focus on the positives in life. But, who can GET more positive than Joni. I've read her books and own some of her prints. Also have given her books to friends.

I really appreciated the conversation thread about blessings and curses and Jesus' great love for us in that he took our sins upon him when he chose to die for our us.

Well, must hurry on - I'll have about 9 or 10 hours of labor ahead of me today, so I'm preparing food to take with me. Fortunately, I have a small radio at my desk and can tune to a church hour broadcast live to hear the worship and the sermon.

Y'all have a good day.

Ruth Ann

  I wasn't home yesterday as we were at a gathering or my late husband's family, so I had programmed my VCR to tape the Larry King Show, and something happened and it didn't tape, so I missed it again! 

Now off to go downtown to meet my late husband's best friend who is in town from Montreal for Brunch, and then will drop them at the train station after so they can head home again.

This has been a busy weekend.

Larry, I'm not a real big fan of baseball, but do enjoy the odd game here and there.  They are even more enjoyable when the tickets are free and nice tickets at that.  They are second row tickets along the 3rd base line.

Etta Sue, I enjoy a good variety of hand-crafts, and move between them.  Lately, I seem to have been doing a fair bit of cross-stitching, so probably with the next project or two will be changing to either knitting or crocheting.

QuoteSome of us, mainly myself, come in and post only a few words about our plans for the day or what our day has been like. I appreciate the way Larry and Etta Sue try to address everyone of us here. I do pray for you all, and think of you all, and I am so sorry that I don't take the time to address everyone. Sometimes it is because I don't know what to say or have much to say, other things on my mind, in a hurry, or some other excuse. That's right Excuse not a good reason. I do read all the posts and by the time I have read them all I have forgotten who said what.

Marilyn, I'm afraid I'm guilty of this myself, and would like to add my name to this apology as well (if I may).

Mom phoned last evening and left a message to say that they are back home, so hopefully later this afternoon/evening will have a visit with them.

Now, must be off.  Have a great day everyone!

Quote from: Ruth Ann Bice on August 08, 2004, 10:15:54 AM
Well, must hurry on - I'll have about 9 or 10 hours of labor ahead of me today, so I'm preparing food to take with me. Fortunately, I have a small radio at my desk and can tune to a church hour broadcast live to hear the worship and the sermon.

Ruth Ann,

I can't resist, I sure hope the labor comes out fine for you.  Be careful, you know those doctors, if the labor lasts that long, they'll be wanting to do a C-Section.    My only question is do you want a boy or a girl???   

Smile,
Mike

HAHAHAHAHA!!!
Mike, I had to read your post twice and then go back and read Ruth Ann's to see what in the world you were talking about! 

I'm still giggling.

I hope there are no sceptics about the verse shared today. I have a Christian brother rescued by Christ from an institutute for the criminally insane.
                                 
Redeemed through Jesus Christ , and washed in the blood of the Lamb, he went on to be a missionary  of the gospel in Brazil. He is now a minister of ther gospel in his own land........is there anything too hard for the Lord ? No .....nothing !

                              It is his testimony that God healed the lunatic.

Hi Mike, you don't know me, but I know about you and your work.  When friends of mine were studying at the AOG college in Retford England, your work in Belarus was brought up and we had an opportunity to pray. I feel quite privileged to be able to write to you.

On your point about blessings and curses; without Jesus my whole life was a curse.  It was at an AOG gospel meeting in South Africa I was able to be set free from the curse of a Godless life.  I have no doubt that what you say is relevant, but my whole life is filled with enthusiasm and joy, I covet God's blessing and that is because I am well aware of where I come from.  If I was to concentrate on ensuring I was not falling under God's curse I would fall back under a mantle of fear and the spontanious joy and enthusiasm would be squandered.  My experience has been that too many of us preachers will replace one heavy yoke with a new heavier one and we replace a personal relationship with Jesus Christ with pseudo Christianity that is based on "religiosity", a system of religious rules.  As a missionary you are well aware of the fact that many who come to Church are filled with superstition and fear; the key to their freedom is Jesus Christ.  I believe Jesus came to set us free from the curse.

Hope the ribs have healed, any spare?

Hi Test!

Gareth,

Must have been through a dear and good friend of mine, one of my former teachers Steve Badger, right?  I know he's taught there several times, England that is, don't know exactly where, but that would seem to be too much of a conference.

Please don't misunderstand my post about the Blessings and Curses, it is not meant to be judgmental, but rather a call for us to be sure we are doing all we can do for God.  In the book Soul Tsunami about the postmodern church, Laura Schlessinger is quoted in talking about the moral problem in America by saying, "I place the moral problem on our clergy, they spend too much time making sure their pews are warm, and not telling people that their religion requires something of them."  This is one of the main reasons why I tend to place an emphasis on doing something for God.  It could also be from being a missionary and seeing people who are making real sacrifices for God.  Recently in Southern Belarus I met a 94 year old man who had spent 14 years in prison for being a founding member of a church under communism.  As I was talking with him, he said that he was ready to go back to prison today if it was required of him, and he said, "And I think I will probably have to."  I grew up hearing the stories of people truly 'living' their faith in this part of the world, but to meet with them, talk with them, and learn from them is one of the greatest joys of my life.  A couple of months ago, a prayer request went up for a lady in a church whose husband was not a Christian.  He had threatened her that day to kill her if she went to church again.  And here it was Sunday night, and she was in church, not knowing what would happen when she went home to her drunk husband.  I see these things and begin to wonder, do we really believe like we say we do......  Oh well, don't want to ramble, but I hope you get my heart, we've been called by God to win the world for him.  So the question comes, so what are we doing???

And yes, the ribs have healed fine now.  Were painful for about 6 weeks, but good now.

Blessings,
Mike

Hi Rachel...  Those certainly are sweet photos of little Dexter.  Yes, please do make them smaller so that they can remain in that "Dexter" topic so that we can go back and look at them often.  Otherwise people tomorrow might not see them in here.

Keep up the good work with that camera!

Great to see all the discussion in here today.

I'm off for supper to Andrew's and then I'll be back later this evening.  Hope I have lots and lots of posts to read!  Hope you've enjoyed today's hymns. 

Dexter is indeed a precious puppy!      I'm glad I came in this afternoon to see his photos. 

Church was great today.  We had a couple go forward at invitation.  It is always great to know that people have come to accept Christ as their Lord and Savior. 

It has been a long day....I have been up since 5:30 a.m.  Jerry is watching the Brickyard 400 and I feel a nap coming on. 

Those of you who missed Larry King Live...here is a transcript of the interview!!!

http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0408/03/lkl.00.html

Thanks so much Etta Sue for putting in the link to the Larry King Live transcript.  I've copied it all out into MS Word so that I'll have it to show to others.  It's great!

Hi, friends,

Now, now, Skief! Four real labor and deliveries later and I'm ready for someone else to contribute to the world's population.

However, I'll have to admit that going through that unfamiliar client's data today and thinking hard about ways I could develop the data into something meaningful for my boss and the client certain did have its "pangs."

In fact, my brain is so tired that I feel like telling my son what I said a few weeks back at the end of a long struggle with data, "Well, son, I think I'll unscrew my head and put it on the dresser to rest while I go to sleep!" Next day, he wanted to be certain I'd gotten it screwed back on correctly. 

Well, must go. Will see y'all tomorrow morning - bright and early.

Ruth Ann

Good evening, friends,

We have just come home from Hugoton where we attended the Eagle Scout Court of Honor for grandson Mark.  It is such a beautiful and meaningful ceremony, if you ever have a chance to attend one, please do.  Of course, we are really proud of Mark's making this milestone in his life.

The three visiting grandsons are also Scouts, and they wore their uniforms and got to be included in the ceremony.  Justin even had a part!  And I got to have photos taken with my five Scouts!  Curtis is also an Eagle Scout, having attained that rank about three years ago.  I want to take my memory card to Wal-Mart and get prints, so will wait until after that to post photos.

My guys are wondering what's to eat, so I better go see if I can find anything!  Talk to you later, or tomorrow.

I have had three emails from folks saying that they can't see a "REPLY" button at the bottom of New Every Morning!

Please make sure that you are LOGGED IN and if you still can't see a Reply button, please drop me a PM (click on my name and send me a Private Message) and I'll see what I can figure out.

Thanks Papa John for spending time with me and giving me feed back.

I think I found the problem and it had to be a Moderator!     

Kathy was able to post but since she posted only Moderators could post and somehow the LOCK button got clicked on and the discussion was locked to all but Moderators!

It's fixed now!

Sorry folks!

Glad I was out of town!  LOL

I had a little problem with posting and have just talked with Pat and she got me straightened out.

Well, I came in yesterday and did write a post and thought I had posted it.  Evidently I deleted what I had written on the word processor and didn't post it.  This happens sometimes when you get old.

Pat, I really liked the version of JESUS LOVES ME for elderly people.  I made a copy of it and plan to use it Thursday when I speak at the nursing home worship.

Good to see everyone today.  We had good worship and Bible classes this morning and then again tonight for our evening service.

When the Jewish leaders warned the apostles not to continue their teaching about Jesus the apostles gave this reply.

Acts 5:29-32
29   Peter and the other apostles replied: "We must obey God rather than men!
30   The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead-- whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree.
31   God exalted him to his own right hand as Prince and Savior that he might give repentance and forgiveness of sins to Israel.
32   We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him."[/u]  (NIV)



--- Papa John          <)))><<   
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