Mary’s Song: A Christmas Day Message

Mary’s Song: A Christmas Day Message  

12-25-2022 By Kelly Durant 

Christmas seems to always arrive with so much resistance! The “prince of the air”, Satan, seems to always blow in a storm, or always brings the focus away from Jesus by whatever means possible in the news. Christmas often comes with discouragement, family issues, greediness, sickness/pandemics, and breakdowns, loneliness, but still Satan cannot stop us from worshipping Jesus!   

In the past weeks I mentioned how we all should strive to be pure and Holy like Mary, but do you know in what way she was holy? We know she was willing to let God do with her anything He chose but look what it cost her emotionally! We know she followed in the footsteps of her Judah-ian predecessors from her family’s bloodline, but from her own words, what was she like?

Do not let the words of traditional prayers made up by other past church members be the only thing you know about her, pray to know God’s spirit in her. In her own words, what did she reveal?  Why do people not read her words more often? Let’s read below and learn how she thought, how she was inspired.  

 
46 And Mary said: “My soul ^[i]magnifies the Lord,⁴⁷ And my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior.

Let’s start there, do you praise the Lord and lift the Lord up in your day-to-day activities? Do you get happy in your soul like she does in your spirit, and let the Lord be your joy, your everything? Her passion was God her savior! And how are you?

⁴⁸ For He has regarded the lowly state of His maidservant;

What is a low state? It means she was not anyone important to the world, nor she wanted to be. She was a humble person. She called her own self a maid-servant of the Lord, one who serves God. Who here can say that? …Lord I am yours to serve and nothing else matters in life?
“For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed”.

Who gets blessed by God? Those that are willing to do anything God wants! The blessings of the Lord are for those who love and obey Him, but of course Mary was very blessed to be the mother of Jesus, that was special! She would not have wanted to be worshipped though. Not even the angels in heaven want to be worshipped! She is honored but it was her son, not her, that came to be the savior of the world, to be born, to live healing and teaching, and then to die as a sacrifice for our atonement.

⁴⁹ For He who is mighty has done great things for me,
And holy is His name.  Every week I ask for testimonies. Do you tell of the great things God has done in your life? God has done something great for all of us and we must tell it, so others praise God’s name! We must always be reminded that God is Holy, which means pure, clean, and righteous. He wants those qualities in our lives reflected back to Him.

⁵⁰ And His mercy is on those who fear Him
From generation to generation.

This reveals that if you fear, or obey God, you gain His mercy! (In this context, through Jesus!) We know full well that God will punish every person for not doing right, for resisting His Holy Spirit of conviction. With mercy, however, you have a chance of correcting yourself with a total change of lifestyle, with the guidance of His Holy Spirit, repenting from your pride, wrong deeds, and lack of love for God and others. His mercy is for all the future generations of whosesoever will, meaning for everyone, for all generations; Jesus is the door for a clean slate. KD      

⁵¹ He has shown strength with His arm;
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.

Often God’s word speaks of how the “arm of the flesh” will fail us, how we in our own strength are nothing compared to God. But Jesus was different. His flesh, or human body made up of the mix of the Divine with the human, had a power no one had ever seen, that of doing miracles, of casting out demons, of being superior in all regards, a strength firm like a rock. His strength was also in His wisdom to respond wisely to not allow the bullying hypocrites and arrogant leaders out smart Him. He exposed their evil concocted schemes. He came to bring truth, salvation, and to tear down the proud.

⁵² He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
And exalted the lowly. Jesus chose common people to be His disciples, those who were low nobodies to preach the gospel. By empowering the humble, ordinary people like you and me, he has bypassed the arrogant ones in high places. People in power don’t care to be humble disciples of Jesus as they already follow Satan. They are usually corrupted and perverted condemned souls that are psychopaths having no love or compassion for God or anyone! His return will be the ultimate de-throning event! Jesus will set up a kingdom that will reign forever and ever!

⁵³ He has filled the hungry with good things,
And the rich He has sent away empty. The people who seek Jesus with a hungry empty soul find Him and He fills them up with His comforting Holy Spirit. Those that want to learn about God get filled through Him. But the people full of themselves, have nothing for God, you and me, or nobody. These are the ones that remain shallow, ignorant, arrogant, and ugly, ugly to be rejected by God because they are full of themselves.

 
⁵⁴ He has helped His servant Israel,
In remembrance of His mercy, 

Jesus first preached to the Jews, so He did help Israel as many did believe in Him, while the leader Jews, wanting power and wealth, wanting the filth of this world, rejected Him. He spoke to them about how the merciful will obtain mercy, and all who believe may receive His mercy and love. But when His ministry began, how did He show you obtain mercy? By repentance, by washing away, or burning away your sins so that forgiveness and mercy from God could take place.

⁵⁵ As He spoke to our fathers,
To Abraham and to his seed forever.” This part implies that Jesus responded to the desire of all the past forefathers, that the Messiah would come and then His seed would be established forever. And Abraham had many children, not just from Sarah, but from Hagar as well. In other words, His salvation came for all the tribes and nations of the world. And everyone born throughout the ages are descendants from the seed of man and Jesus saves all who choose Him forever. His seed (His descendants) are the mega millions of followers who join Him on earth and remain with Him in heaven forever!

Who are Abraham’s children? Those who have faith in God! And with Jesus you must have faith for Him to work in your life! Without faith, without Jesus, without God’s mercy, we will not be with God in the future! A child of God must be one who is full of faith following Jesus all the way for all his/her life!

Mary’s song is a prayer! A confirmation of what Jesus would bring, of what standards we should heave, a fulfilment of prophecy, a new start for those of faith, plus it’s a warning that the proud would be humbled, and that His salvation by His birth and death on the cross would bring on a mercy that would last for all generations! Amen!

Christmas Controversies: It’s Been Scandalous from the Beginning!

Christmas Controversies: 

It’s Been Scandalous from the Beginning  

By Kelly Durant  12-18-22

                                                                                                                     

And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God. And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.

Luke 1:30-33 KJV

 

2. We have known for the past 20 years that many U.S. companies have created policies that do not allow greetings or signs with Merry Christmas in them anymore. Evil people want Christ out of Christ-mas! More and more the persecution of baby Jesus persists! How does Satan attack God’s people? Quite often he uses the scandal tactic! Satan and his followers are the ultimate guilty hypocrites seeking always to scandalize all the things of God. Satan empowers demons in humans to create conflicts, commit murders, start wars, spread disease and immorality with the goal to destroy humanity through the lusts of the flesh with pride while accusing others of being guilty of his or her own game. He hates the pure and innocent as represented by Jesus birth. The people of the world are already in Satan’s pocket but his target is God’s men and women who are active Jesus lovers, and sadly some fall from temptation due to their pride, adultery, theft, and scandal! Some abandon the Christmas tradition as well!  

 

Scandal is a violation of the society’s norms. Today the ruthless media uses a double standard to create scandal. For example, they steal information and then instead of paying for their crime of theft, they defame others with this scandalous information which often turns out to be outright lies. Both parties may be guilty and should be punished but only the one attacked gets condemned and that public condemnation comes with no trial or any proof of truth in the accusations. Satan is the ultimate hypocrite who accuses and condemns others while being totally corrupted himself! But God beat him at his own game by creating scandal for him with something wonderful, something we love and enjoy, Christmas!

 

The Nativity starts with an out of wedlock baby scandal! Who likes babies? Everyone, right? A baby seems to make even the hardest hearts warm and smile. Most people inherently want to give new life a chance in this world. Most everyone when they smile and talk to a baby will get a smile back! How controversial of God to send a baby to rid the world of evil! God controls countless legends of angels but instead of an attack on earth to right the wrongs he sends baby Jesus! God’s attack on evil and Satan begins with innocence and purity in a body weak and dependent on the father and mother for survival. Our lives in Jesus must start there too, in a rebirth of purity of mind, heart, and soul, with a total dependence on God.

 

3. All of the elements in Christmas and in Christians are controversial according to the world’s double standards! Have you ever noticed that? Jesus was a shock to the world and the world has never been the same ever since! Christmas keeps surviving by the efforts of all Christians! 

 

The next controversial Christmas principle, that for many philosophical types is an illogical absurdity, is that God could claim to have a Son that is born from a human, of Mary the virgin. This premise, that God can be the Father of an earth born child, was scandalous when He was born and is scandalous still today with many other world religions and is considered heresy. People are getting beheaded and killed daily even today for affirming that God had a Son whose name is Jesus and His name is above all names! That name, offensive to some yet dear to us who love Him, is Jesus Christ the Lord! His life of miracles and resurrection prove He was God’s son, supernatural, glorious, and worthy of our eternal adoration! 

 

The problem originates from the Greek agnostic line of thought that erroneously deducts that God is made up of pure good positive spiritual material, but that man and this earth is made up of all bad imperfect negative material so therefore the good and bad can never mix together for there to be a son of God. This is an absurd conclusion since the obvious is we as humans contain a spirit, a piece of the pure God, living in our degenerating material bodies. 

 

No evidence supports this idea, or premise, yet millions hold onto it. All things are made up of positives and negatives and common knowledge taught in science proves that matter in our material world, as in atoms, contain negative charged electrons and positively charged protons. God, however, is not containing Himself within or without the material physical systems of our simple universe operating solely within harmonious duality systems. We observe that His material creation is one huge conglomerate of mixtures, of the light and of the void, yet purity is refined out of the material earthly mixtures as one refines gold. Our spirits must be refined as well.  

 

God’s person is in fact pure holiness but God’s attributes are not paralleled succinctly into to His diverse created worlds. God is above restricting Himself within the world He created because He transcends His own creation of weak and great physical forces and spiritual mysteries. Satan desires that all people reject the fact that it is possible for purity, as in baby Jesus, to have entered into our imperfect world but the scandal remains that it did! Another fact is that because Jesus came, you and I too can become perfected by holy living as Jesus lived full of love, grace, and truth. God’s purity of heaven can exist within this hell of a world within our hearts if we connect with the source, Jesus! Christmas with its pretty lights cause many to imagine how wonderful heaven must be where Jesus is preparing a home for us!

 

4. The next scandal that many cultures have a hard time accepting is that God chose not a noble person but a humble woman, a simple pure person, a virgin, through whom to manifest Himself and fulfill all prophecies through in order to establish a righteous kingdom forever. God found only her to be willing and worthy enough to become the mother of the future savior of the world. It is obvious that this world is filled with evil, but for God to choose to combat evil with the weapon of a simple, respectful, obedient woman is too humiliating for many men of distinct cultures to accept. In general 9/10ths of the world’s men are macho with little regard for women and what they can do in the things concerning God’s mission.

 

Imagine, Mary was told not to fear over the fact that she would become pregnant by the Holy Ghost and she, contrary to an average person, actually trusted and did not fear! She knew that by trusting God she was risking rejection from her future husband, rejection and maybe a death sentence from her own Jewish people for a perceived fornication, or the possibility of living the rest of her life as an outcast in shame. Yet she obeyed and trusted God. How many people have this kind of trust in God today? In her shoes, would you accept a challenge similar to this one and be found worthy for your willingness gaining God’s favor on your life? 

 

So the scandal hitting Satan in the face was the fact that a pure, humble person, Mary, honoring God would actually accept anything that God wanted to do in their life. Satan lost this same battle with Job (trying to prove that humans will betray God if subjected to adversities or seemingly unfair requests). Satan is persistent and what he wants is for everyone in the world to believe that it is unfair and unreasonable to accept the controversial things God wants you and I to believe or go through for His high purpose. The truth is many Mary’s do exist in the world, and humble sweet, obedient to God people do suffer rejection by the world but God protects them supernaturally as He protected Mary! Take note: Mary did not fear rejection; she preferred God’s will above all! Are you close enough to God to not fear but to trust and accept whatever God wants to do with your life?      

 

5. Here is a detail we must not overlook in the verses of today, what is implied by the part of the verses of today in verse 33? “And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end. 

 

Certain Jews were familiar with this prophecy and the local ones would also have known that Mary was from the house of David, a bloodline descendant. But the spiritual leaders of the Jews, the ones chosen of the 12 tribes to teach and live exclusively in service to God were the Levites. You had to be born within that family to grow up to be a high priest, leader, teacher, or guide. 

 

David was from the tribe of Judah so what do we conclude? The Levites must have been scandalized to discover that God would choose his Messiah from the tribe of Judah and not from their refined hierarchical spiritual ranks.  So Jesus came to establish a kingdom like David’s. Didn’t a form of this kingdom already exist within the Jews? The verses here indicate however that Jesus would reign over all the tribes of Jacob forever. This is in essence inferring a new kingdom that would be established over all people and His kingdom will be forever and ever. This was a scandal for the Levite bloodline!

 

6. Referring to a new kingdom presenting itself, scandals occur when the envious controlling people of Satan in this world get threatened by someone hinting that they may suddenly lose their power. Herod was scandalized when he found out through the wise men that a king was born in his region so decided to kill all the babies soon afterward! What a horrible way to prevent a new king from rising! In the 1980’s they found a mass grave of baby skeletons near Bethlehem in Israel confirming this account of what is recorded in God’s word. 

 

Imagine Roman soldiers pulling the babies from the arms of their mothers and fathers and killing them! The entire region of Bethlehem was scandalized by the fact that their despotic envious leader was killing all their babies over a jealous rant believing the prophecies were true, that a new king was born. But the infant king was protected by God and escaped to Egypt. Imagine Herod, a despotic man with absolute power to kill anyone and yet he was in fear of baby Jesus! 

 

7. So Christmas began with several scandals and true Christians that worship Jesus Christ still draw ire by those who will not accept the celebration of Jesus birth. When you declared that you had received Jesus Christ in your life and that you would serve Him, repent, and follow Him, did some of your friends or family get scandalized by your announcement? Mine did! Most everyone’s does!

 

The message of Jesus birth communicates that one who accepts Him must have a total change of mind, heart, and soul. The mind programed by the world, by Satan’s indoctrinations, refuses to accept the fact that God did send his perfect Son and that He is the savior of humanity in this disastrous world. It goes against our logic to believe in the virgin birth, but faith confirms to us it is miraculously possible.

 

Human hearts have to get over having pride to understand Christmas. Most people are shocked at how rich wise men and poor shepherds alike contained so much humility that they bowed to worship Jesus even when he was just an infant. To connect with Christmas one’s soul must merge with God’s spirit in obedience to become touched by the innocence and holiness which implicates one’s repentance. Mary’s heart was holy, so we get the message that it is imperative we too must submit to God’s will to bring about His plan for a new kingdom. The implication is that God expects that we let our lives get totally interrupted by Jesus birth and this creates an internal controversy that all of us must resolve. Scandal and all hell breaks loose when you speak up for Jesus and serve Jesus!

 

Accepting God’s kingdom means we leave behind our petty dreams of grandeur in order to adopt the kingdom dreams of Jesus, to bring about a new world with new loving people with hearts converted made new full of joy and love for God and their neighbor.

 

8. Jesus said that offenses (scandals) would come but he also said in Luke 7:23 And blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me. And imagine today some people refrain from even pronouncing the words Merry Christmas because it offends some people! They replace Jesus with only gifts and Santa too!

 

Concerning Christmas and its original message that some deem offensive we can conclude that the people without faith, that people with mental confusion concerning the mechanics of God’s creation, that the people who reject God’s miracles, that the proud jealous people in high places, that the people governed by their own closed-minded cultures and base carnality, that the people who believe they run God’s kingdom or Jacob’s house already… all collectively are rejecting Jesus until this day! Christmas to them is an offense! Christmas to us who love Jesus, however, is a beautiful wonderful time to celebrate and remember the fulfilment of prophecy that a savior was coming and He did. It is a story of dedication and humility. It is a happy celebration that reminds you and me to be thankful, humble, pure, giving, and loving. Christmas is where our salvation began! Culture has jazzed it up with lights and decorations, but each year there is a new chance to tell the wonderful story of Jesus to others!

                 

Is there a controversy happening in your life? Is it from God to use you for something great? This Christmas don’t let the date pass you up without thanking God and appreciating what it meant for God’s love to be expressed through baby Jesus willing to come down in frail human flesh to be one of us. Merry Christmas and may Jesus’ love flood your soul!

Christmas Is About Bringing Odd People Together Who Normally Would Never Meet!

Christmas Is About Bringing Odd People Together!      By Kelly Durant 12-11-22

 

Psalm 68:6 God sets the solitary in families; He brings out those who are bound into prosperity; But the rebellious dwell in a dry land.

 

2. Sometimes I feel very sad for many people! You and I can all observe that there are a lot of people out there that have very few friends! They often don’t have any family nearby either! Often my wife and I will get a call from someone, can you take me to the hospital, can you take me to work? Can you help me move because I’m getting evicted? Too many people are very alone in this world!

 

We are here to serve one another in love and not let our right hand know what our left had is doing but I am shocked and saddened over the poverty of many people! It is a poverty not so much of a lack of food or money, but a poverty of having no friends or family! It’s sad when no one is willing to do anything for another, right? But God makes us meet people we normally wouldn’t meet!

 

Thank God Christmas can change this! Christmas is all about giving and receiving, and in supporting each other, in supporting strangers you may never even meet either! This happens when people buy gifts to donate to children. The kings gave gifts to Jesus but the gift of Maria and Joseph getting to make friends and meet new strangers such as the kings and the shepherds was what made it all special. 

 

3. The first strange encounter that Mary had was with the angel that told her she would bear a child by the Holy Spirit. Of course, messengers, such as angels, do not stick around for you to make friendships with, but Christmas would not be what it is without the sudden appearance of the angels. Christmas connected us humans with God’s angels, and that is a rare thing we must value!

 

The shepherds got to see all of the angels in heaven as well.  13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:  Luke 2:14 “Glory to God in the highest,

And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!” 15 So it was, when the angels had gone away from them into heaven, that the shepherds said to one another, “Let us now go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us.”  

 

So, the first ones on the first Christmas got to meet angels! Have you ever wondered how many people have been angels to people they didn’t know at all? This happens at Christmas time. Christmas has inspired many people to act as angels, to be messengers of the good news of the arrival of Jesus, and be generous to help people with gifts, and they are helping people they do not even know. 

 

4. Another unusual uniting of people was that of the shepherds meeting Joseph and Mary. This divine couple was chosen by God to raise the savior of the world, but they were nothing more than small town folks whose friendships probably did not extend any further than with their neighbors and family nearby.

 

So now they are making new friendships with the shepherds who live outside the city. Imagine a bunch of strangers arriving after your baby is born saying we have come here to this barn door to see you and to worship the newborn child?! It must have surprised them for sure!

 

Mary and Joseph made new friends that night! These were humble folks, and they were humble as well. What they had in common was they both experienced something heavenly and supernatural, and they both were aware that a chosen special child was born, Jesus the Christ.       

 

5. The next characters to appear on the scene were the kings of the Orient, the wise men. Think about this, these men were strangers and did not know each other until they met each other in Bethlehem after their long journey. They probably did not speak the same language, but they did have the same purpose in common, to meet Jesus! Here we see it again, Jesus is uniting people together.

 

They then went on to meet Mary, Joseph, and Jesus by following the unexplained phenomena of the star over Jesus’ temporary residence. These kings would never have left home and travelled for months had they not been on a spiritual mission to see the mystery at the end of their journey. They wanted friendship with the King of kings whose presence was foretold and foretold even in the stars!

 

These wise men knew to bring gifts, but how? They knew the star was leading them somewhere special, they knew they would meet someone special, but I suspect they really did not expect to find some common folks with a baby so small! What we observe here is that when you have Jesus with you, you can expect kings to come, pay respect, and be generous to support the mission of God’s work! Common people make friendships with the rich to do Jesus’ work!

 

6. I love the verse of study today with God’s promise of “God sets the solitary in families”. This is what Jesus was all about, to bring together you and me and all kinds of groups of people together that never would meet under ordinary daily circumstances. With Jesus we become family! Forget your flesh family as many of them may often let you down, Jesus gives you a real family in God!

 

I think most everyone, either rich or poor, live quite isolated from each other. But Jesus wants to bring us all together over Himself! Jesus is the supernatural uniting force that causes you and me to meet and to be friends with each other!

 

The people of the Christian faith travel to do mission work and make friendships that last a lifetime. Christians make deep friendships with unusual characters far and wide because it is all about Jesus! Jesus was the first one to get poor shepherds and rich kings to come together and be in awe at the work of God, was He not? With Jesus and your Christian family, you should never be alone!

 

7. Here is something to ponder, Jesus not only united odd people together, He was the first to unite us on all levels, a socio-economical-racial-&-religious one! He united the uneducated with the educated, which was Mary & Joseph with the shepherds, He was with the kings and wise men, and He is with you and me! KD 

 

Jesus united the rich and powerful with the common folks, Mary and Joseph with the Orient Kings. And here is another factor, the kings were of different races too, Jesus unites us from different races!

 

And what about religion? Jesus unites those of other faiths to Him! The kings had a religion that included astrology and who knows what else, they were not Christian before meeting Jesus. God loved them anyway and revealed Himself to them. Jesus and God brings us all together when often our own people will not be close to us. Spiritual brothers and sisters are formed over our common faith in Jesus, and we should value each other as family.  When Jesus called His disciples, they too were from very diverse backgrounds; Jesus was iconoclastic to the established set of societal customs. 

 

8. Psalm 68:6 God sets the solitary in families; He brings out those who are bound into prosperity; But the rebellious dwell in a dry land. So, we see now how God unites us, an odd family, over Jesus but what about the rebellious, the faithless, the haters and the ones who refuse to honor Jesus?

 

The rest of this verse makes it clear, if you have God with you, and His Son Jesus as your focus, you can expect prosperity and the blessings of God. It is an observable truth that many of the children of poor immigrants, or people in poverty, have risen above their level because they received the support of their family of friends, those from the Christian church community.

 

“But the rebellious dwell in a dry land”! In all families, and throughout the world, there are so many that seem to go from bad situations to worse ones and why? Often because they are just brute beasts, living selfishly to survive, never thinking of helping others, never considering making friends with people very unlike their own selves. If a person doesn’t have Jesus, either by ignorance or flat-out rejection, then this person will not learn the beauty of being made rich with friends and family that are near them everywhere.   

 

9. Christmas is about family and friends, and the sharing of good experiences together, even with people very different from you. Giving gifts and getting gifts can reveal to you that there are good people out there! Who knows, you might even make a new friend this Christmas.

 

Take advantage to tell others about Jesus this Christmas, that is the best gift you could ever give anyone! Giving Jesus to another means you are opening up the door for them to learn a new way of life, one where God is in control, one where God forgives, and one in knowing you are loved that you will go to heaven in the end! 

 

Because of Jesus, life is worth living! Because of Christmas we can all meet new people! I have made friendships with a few thousand people in my lifetime, and this never would have happened if it were not for Jesus telling me to go into all the world to preach the gospel. I have been to more than a hundred cities and Jesus has blessed me beyond my wildest dreams!

 

I thank God I have met you, you who are here today, and I met you because we share in the same faith, that of having Jesus! And I thank God you are in the Salvation Army serving God as well!

Christmas: A time to reflect on the EFFECT Jesus made

Christmas: A time to reflect on the effect Jesus made       Kelly Durant

 

John 3:16 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. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. 1 John 3:16 By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

 

2. How many of you have seen a movie, “Back to the Future”? It was about a young man that went back into time and then goes back into the future, and he saw how it would be if something were changed. 

 

There is one part where something didn’t happen the way it was suppose to in the past, and if Marty McFly, the main character, didn’t get things the way they were supposed to happen while in the past, and in this case it was the getting together of his parents, then the world was going to become a different, horrible, hell of a place. 

 

This scenario caused me, and should provoke us all, to reflect and ask ourselves this question, what would the world be like today if it had not been for the birth of the Son of God on Christmas over 2,000 years ago? God made hundreds of things come together for Jesus birth at the right place and time.

 

3. Imagine a world with people who are living as Jesus commanded, as salt and light, who are following Jesus’ love and salvation, how would that world be? We could have the ‘kingdom of God’ on earth! Now, imagine a world without the leadership of God’s righteous people, without God’s people doing good, without missionaries bringing a better standard to the pagan idol worshippers, without the message of eternal life and the forgiveness for sins through Christ. This world would be a worse hell than what it already is! 

 

Without Jesus the world would be a thousand times more full of evil, with more human sacrifices than our current infanticide ones; we would be overcome by violence and war as before the flood ‘as in the days of Noah’. There would gross darkness on the people, being devoid, evil, and ignorant. Starvation and misery would prevail more than what it does today. When the European missionaries went out to reach the world with Jesus travelling by ships, establishing colonies worldwide, it is recorded in the history books that they brought prosperity and peace in many places. 

 

Even in the 1700 and 1800s there was still cannibalism on many islands and places, along with idolatry, human sacrifice, and the slave trades. Where the people had never heard the gospel of Jesus, they lived in constant war with their neighbors. It has been the Christians who helped the world progress out of the dark ages and the ones who founded most all of the prestigious colleges of high learning world-wide. It was the Christians who developed the world scientifically, through Galileo, Pascal, and others. It was the Christians who fought to free those enslaved. The world cannot deny that Jesus’ gospel has brought more peace and development wherever it has been practiced. The problem is it must be practiced to work!

 

4. Jesus was the best gift this world has ever received from God! But let’s look at what attributes were necessary in order for there to be the desired effect by God. First, there had to be a willingness to give on His part. God loved the world and gave us Jesus and He too gave of his own self. He renounced heaven, a place of pure perfection and love and peace in order to come here on earth to give Himself to live a life in frail human flesh. He knew His life was going to end torturous but victorious being a sacrifice on the cross, dying in a horrible manner to redeem whosoever would receive Him! Realize this, Jesus’ resurrection means that He can give anyone anywhere the gift of eternal life if you and I, or anyone, chooses to belong to Him! There is no gift that could be better, ever!

 

The first thing that Christmas should do is convict us to give, to give our lives in obedience to Jesus! He gave the example, he was born in a humble little manger, and came not to be rich and spoiled, nor powerful as the kings of earth are, but he came to serve and to give his life for the souls of us all! 

 

There are many people though that live by the contrary. They believe that Christmas is a time to receive and to get, not to give, forgetting the whole picture of Jesus’ life. We must give to be blessed!

 

5. I recall that as a child I got picky and demanding about what I wanted my mother to give me for Christmas and that was being spoiled and wrong, but it happens often with all kids and adults. Since I had no father in the home, my mother always tried to make it up by giving me many toys. 

 

The toys were fun but only for a few days before the reality of life would return. All that I had received did not bring me a lasting happiness, only a temporary one. It was later in my life that I learned the joy of giving after I dedicated my life to the Lord Jesus Christ. 

 

If you want a lasting happiness…then give! It is more blessed to give than to receive! One more time, Jesus said, it is more blessed to give than to receive! We need to teach ourselves and our children to give to others, so we don’t just think about their selves at Christmas time. 

 

6. Give your life in service to God, give your time, your money, your will, everything; and if you do, then you will be following the words and example of Jesus correctly and you will be celebrating what Christmas should really be all about! 

 

The problem is that many people get so materialistic and worried about gifts and the Christmas party and the food that they forget who the party is for and how He wants those at His party to be behaving. Imagine that, Jesus is being left out of His own party in many homes!

 

Another attribute is that we must announce the coming of Jesus, ahead of time. That is what the tradition of the ‘Advent’ is for. John the Baptist’s mother, Elizabeth, recognized Jesus before He was born. The message prepared was that Jesus would bring us peace, hope, and salvation and for all the world. What did God have all the angels announce to the humble poor shepherds when Jesus was born? They all declared, “Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth and good will to men (all humanity)”. If God’s angels praised Him, how much more we must praise Him and give glory to Him!

 

God showed His love and favor to all of us in all the world for all people and for all time. He gave us a new hope, a new life, a life of peace, an internal peace that gives us strength.  He gave us good will, and God gave His example of healing goodness. Without Jesus we would not have learned how real goodness, righteousness, and love was to be practiced! We would also no know that we could have eternal life in heaven either. 

 

7. The effect or reaction God wants by Jesus coming is that we honor Him as the angels did, knowing that the way we honor him is by sharing the story of His life obeying His words sharing salvation! We must give our lives as Jesus gave His. 1 John 3:16 By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. This verse is a follow up to John 3:16 which should be the effect Jesus has on us. How has Jesus affected you? Has His effect on you made you do something to make the world a better place? Have you shared His gift of salvation and love?

 

History proves that we as humans usually behave as brute beasts, full of jealousy for power, full of hate, adulteries, selfishness, and even murders, but when we pause to remember the birth of Jesus at Christmas, we are giving ourselves and everyone in the world a chance to see hope and love: that there is an example of a pure life much better than what we ourselves could ever be. We accept Jesus at Christmas and accept that we must change our lives in order to be like Him! Those that have done this, those that have allowed Jesus to take effect in their heart, mind, and soul, they are the world changers! 

 

Jesus caused prostitutes, drunken partiers, greedy tax collectors, and religious hypocrites to repent and live a holy life! What a powerful effect! For over 2,000 years now His story from start to finish combined with His God-breathed Words of teachings have changed millions of lives for the better! The effect is peace with God and freedom from the desire to sin! I know about this because I am one of those whose life turned around completely! What an effect Jesus made on me to leave behind sex, drugs, rock ‘n roll, and new age religions! 

 

Please share Jesus, in your giving and receiving, share His story, and share your story of the effect Jesus has made on your life this Christmas!

Thanksgiving Days & The Sacrifice of Praise: It's God’s Idea!

Thanksgiving Days & The Sacrifice of Praise: God’s Idea  

By Kelly Durant  11-23-14 Re 11-20-22

 

Ps 107:22

22 And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with rejoicing.

Ps 50:14   

14 Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High:

Jonah 2:9

9 But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.

 

2. It’s our Thanksgiving Day Sunday! It is obvious from the verses of today that giving thanks to God by sacrificing was God’s idea a few thousand years ago, long before the forming of this country! The verses of Psalm and Jonah today are around 3,000 years old, so we conclude that God wants His people to take special days of sacrificing reverencing Him doing it together with others.

 

Do you know how the U.S. Thanksgiving Day began? It began with a group of Christian Immigrants, immigrants just like you and me! Plymouth, Mass. 402 years ago was inhabited by Native Indians, and then one day a ship of Englishmen landed to set up a colony. This happened in 1620 as they were escaping religious persecution in Europe. Under the tyranny of King Henry VIII just a few decades earlier and even afterwards an estimated 70,000 lost their heads for not submitting to the abusive dominating monarchy that imposed their church hierarchy system on them. Are you thankful you have not lost your head due to an abusive authority? In history and even today millions have lost their heads, or lives, over religious and governmental persecution!

 

The problem is these desperate immigrants arrived too late in the year to have a harvest of food that would keep them alive throughout the cold winter. But thank God the Natives, or Indians, had compassion on them and gave them food in a special fall festival. One of the most common foods then was turkey, along with corn, and other vegetables, it was fall harvest festival. Historically, most cultures celebrate the beginning of spring, and this coincides with Easter and Passover; and to celebrate in the fall as well as did the Jews celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles and the Torah, while Christians have come to celebrate Thanksgiving Day. 

 

Thus, the tradition of eating turkey! Many more of those immigrants would have died if they had not been helped! Half the colony later did die of hunger anyway! It was Sqanto, a native slave of the English who taught them how to raise corn and fish eel. He sacrificed his time and food to help these immigrants who were ignorant of living from nature since they came from large European cities. God bless the natives!

 

3. But many people have immigrated to many different lands throughout history so what makes this thanksgiving festival so special? 

These Christian immigrants took the time to rejoice, and have a party and celebrate, and praise the Lord and thank Him for freedom, life, and new friends, that’s what is special! It is a sacrifice to create a big celebration, many of you here sacrificed to make our lunch special, and sacrificing your self is what pleases the LORD! Psalm 54:6 I will freely sacrifice to You; I will praise Your name, O Lord, for it is good.

 

Before it was common that the government authorities, and all the townspeople, would get together to celebrate expressing their faith and thanks to God in the public square. Never succumb to secularists that in this country that insist you must keep your faith private and secret! To the contrary, celebrate as is traditional, show God your thankfulness and be public about it anywhere, and everywhere! Be generous and share with others! How ironic that in this country today some people even get arrested for sharing food publicly with the needy! Christians traditionally have fed the needy in shelters and on the streets and we should not allow lawmakers make our traditions un-compassionately illegal.

 

Over 200 years ago congress recognized the importance of the Thanksgiving Day observance, and President George Washington issued a national Thanksgiving Proclamation in 1789. He wrote, "Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be—That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks—for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country”...

He understood the basics of being Christian and he recognized the need to set aside a day to show God that we as Americans are thankful for this land under God!

 

Ps 107:22 And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with rejoicing.

 

4. Thanksgiving Day in reality is all about thanking God for maintaining your life and for sharing with others your thankfulness! (repeat)

 

In the verses of today we observe that David and Jonah, and we know well that all men of God, have always made a special event out of praising God for victories, protection, and supply! The problem in the world today is there is not much of an ‘attitude of gratitude’ anymore! For the past few decades unthankful Godless people have been rudely drowning out the thankful polite people! There are many sins in this nation and many people in the media are like rotten apples that incite bitterness over the past, and they promote hate between races, and insult the goodness of God’s people. But on the first Thanksgiving Day the natives and the Pilgrims were both good people being good to each other! 

 

In our community you would assume people would come to worship and thank God for their blessings but instead often they offer only negative comments (the opposite of praise) about personal frustrations or unhappy situations, and this makes God very sad and angry! God allowed a whole generation of Jews who escaped Egypt with Moses to die in the desert because they were unthankful to Him! 1 Corinthians 10:10 Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer. 

 

Thankful people are happy people who recognize God as their provider, and they are blessed by God, and they make others feel good nearby them! Unthankful people disturb the peace and bring others down and they are on the path to their own destruction!

 

5. Just think, this country now has 63 million Hispanics, and about 40 million have arrived within the past 30 years. I personally have a hard time understanding why most all of them are not going to the church of their choice giving thanks to God?! I think I read about 15% do start going to a church of some kind but that is too few! In their countries about 80% go to church! You and I need to awaken more thankfulness in these new immigrants! We already have too many arrogant, Godless, unthankful people in all sectors of society! Let’s encourage new ones to thank God! 

 

Most immigrants, like the first European ones, recognize that they are strangers in a strange land, and they could literally die if they were not having God on their side providing, protecting, and guiding! I know when I moved around in South America I literally cried out to God every time to provide and protect my family because arriving somewhere not knowing how the system functions, not having friends, not speaking the language, and arriving with almost no resources is a situation that will make one desperate and thankful for every place to stay and every plate of food!

 

You who are here today to thank God are special to God!  I am thankful to God for you, and always we must be thankful for our Christian brothers and sisters, because you are the special ones of God! Being here to thank God today is comparable to being with the one leper that was healed that came back to give thanks. Ten were healed but only one returned and expressed thanks! Eternally we praise God and Jesus in recognition of thanks. Sadly, in infamy, there are the unthankful nine others. Never be one of them!

 

6. In order to show you are thankful, you must sacrifice something for God’s work from time to time. You must make a commitment and then keep it.

If you are thankful in life in general, you are always praising and happy, you are willing to do anything, and willing to give up anything to show God your love and appreciation, and thankfulness to Him!   As David the Psalmist words it, Ps 50:14

14 Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High:

 

We should all be dedicated to God’s work and to God’s people to have a proof of our thankfulness! Some people serve in shelters, and some give food to their hurting neighbors during these holidays, but really you can show thanks anytime!

Serve others with a need! Invite them to eat and tell them about your love for Jesus!

 

It is the tradition of many countries, even here, that when someone has been nice to you and done something special, you invite them to eat with you. Everyone likes to eat, right? What a great way to get to know someone and learn to love and like them!

 

7. Jesus commanded his disciples to travel and basically immigrate or integrate as they preached. No one can understand the full extent of being thankful for a bed and food unless they have had to be at the mercy of others for it! I have been in this situation many dozens of times in my life! Matt 10:9 Provide neither gold nor silver nor copper in your money belts, 10 nor bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor staffs; for a worker is worthy of his food. 11 “Now whatever city or town you enter, inquire who in it is worthy, and stay there till you go out. 12 And when you go into a household, greet it.  In other words, bless those that bless you!

 

Back to our U.S. lesson in history, imagine these defenseless Pilgrims in a new land with no homes except the ones they could build before winter, and no with no food stored for the winter either! Just think if right now I were to tell you, you are condemned to die in two months! In two months, your life will be over, you will die a slow death of starvation!

But then if suddenly there appeared a group of strange people of another race unexpectedly putting food on your table, just think how happy you would be! The reality is some of them survived in that Plymouth colony throughout the winter yet quite a few of them did die!

 

We praise and thank God this time of year (but we should every day!) and celebrations are good for all of us! And let’s also recall we must thank the native people for supporting the immigrants because your great-great grandparents were able to arrive here and work and have a life! All of us should thank all immigrants here including Latinos, Blacks, Irish, and Asians all of which helped build America’s major cities, railroads, and farmlands. The ones before us suffered painfully through extreme hard work and hard times, and their great grandparents suffered as well! People use to die at age 40 something, remember?  We have a super nation full of prosperity with wealthy cities, superhighways and mega factories all due to the labor of the many races that make up the population of The United States! 

 

8. Thankfulness to God involves being thankful to those different from you, by accepting and loving them, and respecting them. God’s glory invokes praise for His creation of the entire diverse human race, and the maximum thankfulness we can show Him is to love Him and love one another as Jesus commanded!

 

Because the lives of those few hundred immigrants that were saved almost 400 years ago, we now have a great nation today with many millions of immigrants who are Christian! This is still the most generous nation on earth because many thankful people still have faith in God and want to give back to their communities.

 

Did you know Jesus said He would celebrate a meal with us sort of like Thanksgiving? Let’s look up, Rev 3:20-21

 20'Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.

Even Jesus offers to eat, fellowship, and celebrate with us! But the food Jesus is offering is not physical food, it is spiritual which is more important! 

 

It is sad to see people with hungry bodies, but we must also see that many people are dying of starvation spiritually! Many of your friends and family are weak and dying inside due to not understanding the roots of why we give thanks to God! Tell them the story of Jesus and take opportunity to emphasize the story of the Pilgrims. It is your and my job to tell everyone about God’s food, this bread of life, that He offers so ‘whosoever will’ can live forever! It is our job as Christians to teach others to always be thankful to God for even a cup of water! We must be a light to others in this work of feeding the sick and the suffering! Physical food is just a temporary aspect of life but spiritual feeding is what will keep us motivated to be alive!

 

Now, let us conclude that as we are thankful today, that we will recognize that it is by God and Jesus, and the Holy Spirit through which comes our Salvation. Any of us can die at any moment so being alive today let us, as in the book of Jonah, do our part to be fair with God and honor Him for his goodness and be sacrificial; Jonah2:9 But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.

 

Ask yourself right now, have I shown thankfulness and sacrifice to God lately as I really should by being loving and doing something kind for someone else in need as happened on the first Thanksgiving Day?

Why I Hate Evil…And You Should too!

Why I Hate Evil…And You Should too!          Kelly Durant.  Re: 10-30-22

 

Proverbs 8:13 The fear of the Lord is to hate evil; Pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverse mouth I hate. 1 Thessalonians 5:22 Abstain from every form of evil. 3 John 1:11 Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. He who does good is of God, but he who does evil has not seen God.

 

2. How many of you have watched ‘youtube’ videos of someone getting beat up or being run over by a car and no one stops to help them? It makes you feel sick to see the evil and the indifference of the people, doesn’t it? How disturbing to know we live in a world where few have a heart for those suffering! Satanic indifference and hate produce the same effect, a lack of love for another that could save a life or a soul! It’s a direct disobedience to loving our good God and loving our neighbor as ourselves! Unloving sick people fail to realize that that victim could be them one day!

 

I know my wife and daughter, myself, and anyone with a conscience at all has felt sick to see a video of a person being cruel to an animal or to another human being. And do you recall only a few years ago there were horrific videos of people being beheaded, burned alive, and executed? The murder of Christians continues in dozens of countries and how disturbing very few speak up against this! 

 

These things make you feel sick enough to vomit, and make you feel angry at the wicked people who murder, torture, and destroy God’s innocent people. And have you seen pictures of destroyed cities where evil people have waged war? Think of Africa, Syria, Iraq, or of dozens of cities which have recently been demolished by invaders, making millions of families homeless to move with nothing in their hands. Imagine being sent out in a desert with nothing at all!

 

3. Jesus came to teach all of humankind to love one another, but what do people who do not know Him, or do not accept Him, do? They hate, kill and rob! They hate anyone different from their sinful self selves over differences of ever-changing politics, religious convictions, or certain lifestyle choices. Hate is like an infectious disease and people without the cure, which is Jesus and living in obedience to God’s word, are condemned to carry out evil on those they dislike. This evil in the hearts and minds of the devoid, seriously damages others by their evil words and acts. Their evil also destroys their own soul as stated in Romans 6:23 ‘For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord’.  

 

‘Hate’ today is a hot topic! Usually, you see people holding signs saying ‘Stop the Hate’ while they are the ones red faced ranting and raving, accusing, and defaming, even bearing false witness over how things are not how they want them to be. The question is, Is there any system anywhere in the world that is flaw free and making everyone perfectly happy?’ The answer is, no! People who want to do evil are never happy with God’s people battling against them!

 

The answer to broken systems has always been to change the system, but problems will always continue as the new system brings within itself a whole new set of problems. Venezuela and dozens of countries prove that in the name of fairness and equality and helping the poor much damage can and will happen, so everyone must wise up and be extremely careful as to what changes are being demanded. The righteous must not back down nor cave to the relentless attacks of the erroneous ones who demand change excluding God, love, and freedom to worship Jesus. Evil people always seek power by all means possible!

 

4. David was ‘a man after God’s own heart’, so let’s see what he has to say about evil and ‘hate’. Hate is a passionate rejection (which usually involves inciting anger), an abhorrence, to loathe, and to despise.  

Psalm 5:5 The boastful shall not stand in Your sight; You (God) hate all workers of iniquity. (God hates evil and those who practice it)

Psalm 11:5 The Lord tests the righteous, But the wicked and the one who loves violence His soul hates. (God hates those who bring on violence) 

Psalm 21:8 Your hand will find all Your enemies; Your right hand will find those who hate You. (God knows who are the ones who hate Him)

 Psalm 34:21 Evil shall slay the wicked, And those who hate the righteous shall be condemned. (God will allow evil people to be defeated and God is on the side of the persecuted to defend the righteous, which are the true Christians)

 

We can conclude from hundreds of verses in the Bible that…Psalm 7:11 ‘God is a just judge, And God is angry with the wicked every day’! God’s purpose for all of us is to live as in ‘The Kingdom of God’ blessed, happy, healthy, and with peace loving Him and one another as we obey Jesus commands. But rebellious God hating people are not having any of that in their life as they want to raise hell, sew dissention, and divide and conquer hating (while accusing others of hate) those who defend God’s statutes, Jesus, and love. We fight to stop hate & the devil!

 

There are people so perverted with evil, including many world leaders from de-generate family blood lines, that they will never submit to loving God and his humble servants. If one would, it would come only by a miracle from Jesus! Submission to Jesus is opposite to the oppressive pyramid paradigms they rule by. Satan controls this world by evil, and Jesus came to destroy his cruel kingdoms! 

 

5. Listen to their words, evil people will overtly or covertly declare that they ‘hate’ God, and they insult Him by denying that He exists or by breaking every law in His book; the law to love your neighbor above all! These extreme ignorant ones claim the Bible is a lie and contains worthless fables. How ignorant is this claim as any historian knows much of the Bible’s record of past cities and tribes are provably real. The Bible is the most important book in the world exposing evil!

 

Most haters as well reveal that they hate Jesus and His people, the Christians. But as a mirror God reflects back to people what they send up to Him. 

Psalm 18:26 With the pure thou wilt shew thyself pure; and with the froward (defiant and aggressive) thou wilt shew thyself froward.

 

All people will reap what they sew; if one sews love, one reaps love. The same, if one sews hate, then hate you reap but much more than what you expected. Hosea 8:7 ‘For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind’. It is gross ignorance to believe one can mock God’s laws or people and not suffer the consequences! In the end, God’s laws are universal and it is common sense to respect others and God so as not to invite anger and wrath on yourself!

 

6. So as Christians how are we to respond to this evil generation of ‘haters’? Proverbs 22:3 A prudent man foresees the evil, and hides himself: but the simple pass on, and are punished. There are times to battle and times to evade.

 

In general, we must avoid getting involved with troublemakers who have offensive mouths, who spew hate and promote violence. To join them in their ‘group think’ is to make one’s self an instrument of them and a fool. You cannot fight them on their level as they entice you to do. Proverbs 26:4 Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him. Don’t participate in evil in the cultures!

 

The Holy Spirit must give you and me wisdom and we must not get involved with people who shout out slogans that most usually are misleading with ulterior objectives. Proverbs 14:15 ‘The simple believeth every word: but the prudent man looks well to his going.’ Never be ignorant and conform to evil abusers.

 

7. As Christians, as lovers of God and of others, even being lovers of our enemies, we must learn tactics to control our anger, or we will insult back and sin in the same manner these haters do. Jesus always pulled the rug out from under evil hypocrites with questions and tactics that exposed their schemes.

One acceptable way of diffusing attacks is with diversion. Proverbs 26:5 ‘Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit.’ You cannot have a serious conversation with an evil aggressive person who is attacking you so you must deflect away their words and vile mouth.

 

Here is an example of how to skew an attack. You might get mocked in a group (or by text) with a slogan, ‘I bet you drink the kool-aid of Fox News! Look everybody, a racist conservative religious freak!” These commonly repeated phrases imply that you will die from the poison that comes from hearing differing opinions from theirs, those whom they identify as on the wrong side. And to counter, on the defensive if you say, “You are wrong, you just can’t handle the truth!”, only brings on more mockery, cursing, vulgarity, and insults by these evil people.

 

In some cases you can divert like this,”Well, medieval kings made their selves strong by consuming small amounts of poison”. (Within yourself you know this is off subject, but it is replying folly for folly; it is just playing with their silly accusation of poison to unsettle them). So, do you see how preparation is needed to not fall into the argument trap of the haters who already have pre-schemed dialogues? They really will not listen, I know, I have tried, better is to spend your time with ‘sheep’ who want God’s word than with these rebellious evil goats.

 

8. Matthew 5:9 Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. 10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. 12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

 

We cannot avoid getting attacked for our beliefs, faith, and Biblical worldview in this life! So, if you stand for Jesus, you might as well do it with boldness and let you light shine and remain strong through the attacks, deceptions, lies, humiliations, and hate coming from the evil people of perverse opposition. Do good always to prove you are a child of a good God! Abstain from evil! Onward Christian Soldiers! May your Cry of Battle make hell’s doors tremble! 

 

Proverbs 24:16 For a just man falls seven times, and rises up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief. We will be free from reaping the consequences of evil by remaining faithful to our Lord and Savior, but we have to keep getting up back into the battle. 

 

9. Evil comes in many forms, by words and by deeds, and the counter is by the same, by words (God’s Word!) and by good deeds done for others in need. What is curious is even evil people will often leave you alone when you help and serve others. To fight evil we must do good in place of it! And pray God protects as well! 

 

For example, the Salvation Army in several countries have the circumstance of working in neighborhoods that are full of crime and gangs and it is dangerous work. But I know of several cases (Brazil, Jamaica, & U.S.) of how even the violent gangs do not bother us because they know that if they were to attack us who are doing good and helping others that it would bring on the ire and anger of the neighborhood people to the point they would turn them all in to the authorities. 

 

James 2:19 Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble. Never lose sight as to who is going to win this battle against evil doers and haters, against those with terrible pride and arrogance: it is Jesus and His conquering army! And who is in that army? You and me, His soldiers who are already doing battle for Him saving as many souls as we can! A soft answer turns away wrath and the wisdom in of the Psalms and Proverbs guides us concerning evil and hate. Study to make yourself strong in God’s word and put yourself in the front lines so Jesus will use you to do good! Fear God and labor to save souls with Jesus and by this you will be countering the world’s evil, hate, pride, arrogance, perverse voices, corruption, violence, murder, and absence of love in our communities! God hates evil and we do too!