| November 7, 2005 - (Best viewed in 800 X 600 resolution) |
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Hello! I hope you had a great week. Please pray for the upcoming election in California. We will be voting on a number of important issues. Let's pray that God is glorified through the outcome. Last week, I started coaching soccer at a local high school. Please pray for my team and our season. I've coached several teams and I have two coaching licenses, so God has been preparing me for this opportunity. Let's pray that the athletes see Christ through me and become more and more mindful of Him. This Friday, Switchfoot plays in Los Angeles. The concert has been sold out for awhile, but you could probably get tickets if you look hard enough. Alongside P.O.D., Switchfoot is the biggest Christian band to influence the secular mainstream, so let's support them any way we can. I pray that God blesses you richly as you love Him. Be mindful of Him throughout your day because He's mindful of you. Welcome to the new readers of this message! Here is your Devotion, A Moment of Introspection, JCSM's Challenge, the Word of the Week, a faith-builder from "The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained," and the Quotes of the Week. Have a fantastic week and God bless you! Love in Christ, Jason Gastrich Contact Us: http://jcsm.org/contact.php
JCSM's Weekly Devotions (click here to listen!) "Resist the Devil's Temptation" Proverb 97:10 "You who love the LORD, hate evil! He preserves the souls of His saints; He delivers them out of the hand of the wicked." Matthew 26:41 "Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." Matthew 5:48 "Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect." James 4:7, 8 "Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded." 1 Corinthians 10:13 "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it." Insight: Christians should do all they can to follow Christ. This means we need to know what sin is and avoid it. The tempter will try and lead us astray, but we need to cling to Christ with all we have. Prayer: "Dear Lord, protect us from evil. Lift us up and give us spiritual strength. We need You. Help us to read your Word, know the truth, and live it. Thank you for your Holy Spirit that lives within us and helps us more than we know or understand. Help us to identify evil quickly and easily and help us to resist and flee from it. Thank you for giving us a perfect example to follow. In Jesus' name, Amen."
Charles Sumner (1811-1974), was a United States Senator from Massachusetts for twenty-three years, 1851-74. He was strongly opposed to slavery and was persecuted for taking that unpopular stand. So firm was his conviction against slavery, that he was once physically assaulted on the floor of the House by Congressman Preston S. Brooks of South Carolina, the injuries of which he never fully recovered from. As one of the founders of the Republican Party, Charles Sumner declared: "Familiarity with that great story of redemption, when God raised up the slave-born Moses to deliver His chosen people from bondage, and with that sublimer story where our Saviour died a cruel death that all men, without distinction of race, might be saved, makes slavery impossible. "Because Christians are in the minority there is no reason for renouncing Christianity, or for surrendering to the false religions; nor do I doubt that Christianity will yet prevail over the earth as the waters cover the sea." ¹ ¹ E.C. Lester, Life and Public Services of Charles Sumner, p. 321, 171. Stephen Abbott Northrop, D.D., A Cloud of Witnesses (Portland, Oregon: American Heritage Ministries, 1987), p. 436. If you'd like to see more quotes from those that framed and founded America, please click here: http://jcsm.org/AmericasFounders/.
One person's sin hurts many.
What would you do if someone was choking? What would you do if you were somewhere and someone was unconscious and needed your help? Hopefully, you could before CPR on them. If you can't, then take a CPR class. They are sometimes free and can take as little as one hour. However, this time you wisely invest could save the life of another. God bless you as you meet this week's challenge!
pirasmos (Greek, see 1 Corinthians 10:13): a putting to proof, experience, solicitation, discipline or provocation; by implication adversity: temptation
The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained "The Skeptic's Annotated Bible" asks: Genesis 36:2 - Was Zibeon a Hivite or a Horite? "The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained" responds: The Hivites were a branch of the Hittites. The word "Horite" meant "cave dweller" and was a specific name for a Hittite and Hivite. Therefore, Zibeon was both a Hivite and a Horite. This would be akin to saying someone is both an American and a Californian. (This explanation came from "The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained", by Jason Gastrich. This book is on CD and explains over 3,000 difficulties regarding the entire Bible at http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.org. There is also a 300 question workbook that accompanies the CD-ROM.)
There are no new quotes this week, but we have thousands in our archive! Visit http://quotes.jcsm.org. Plus, if you'd like to receive a new quote every day, please go to http://jcsm.org/Wisdom.htm and bookmark it!
Jesus Christ Saves Ministries
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