Immediate Judgment

One of the worst judgments that God could ever do to man is to remove His Spirit from us. In the book of Romans, Ch.1, the Apostle Paul (under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit) writes that the "wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men..."

But why is His wrath being revealed? Because even though all men know of God, the vast majority do not glorify Him as God nor give thanks to Him. Rather than worshiping and serving Him as Lord, they worship and serve themselves. We hurry about with our lives doing what we want. We don't stop to give Him thanks or credit for the wonderful blessings we enjoy; in fact, we think we deserve them. That's why we get so terribly upset when things go bad. But not only are we not thankful, we also fail to yield ourselves over to Him as Lord. Men don't want another authority in their life; we have too many already. Instead, man is determined to be his own lord, his own king... he will do what he wants, when he wants!

And what is God's immediate action to this at times? Romans 1:24-28 basically tells us that God gives us exactly what we want. Three different times in these verses, the Word of God states, "God gave them over...." But gave them over to what? God gives us over to ourselves! Since we don't want to have anything to do with God, God gives us over to ourselves and allows our depraved hearts to do and go exactly as it desires. And the downward spiral of our wicked hearts set free to do as it wants takes us to unimagined depths of wickedness and depravity. And the results... all kinds of sexual impurities, the degrading of our bodies, unnatural affections, shameful lusts, costly perversions, and absolutely warped thinking.

"Oh dear God, do whatever necessary to keep me in Your will... fill me with guilt, burden me with conviction, lame my physical body, crush my spirit... but never, never take Your Spirit from me. Don't ever, ever leave me to myself. In Jesus' name... Amen."

Back from Winter Conference

Myself along with 3 other adults and 10 students just got back last night from a winter conference in Gatlinburg, TN hosted by Crossroads Worldwide. And boy was it a great conference!

First of all, God blessed every aspect of our trip... from the drive down and back to the hotel rooms to the weather... just everything.

And second, the staff of Crossroads did an absolutely phenominal job as always of hosting a great Christian conference. The worship was awesome and the speakers were powerful!

And lastly, I really believe God did a very special work in the hearts of some of our young people. One young lady was saved... another repented of hard, bitter feelings and recommitted her life to Christ... another repented of being a silent Christian...and others were exposed and challenged to go to a higher level of Christian discipleship.

It was just a wonderful time of fellowship and discipleship with some really great young people!

If any youth pastor out there stumbles onto this blog... let me just say that I STRONGLY recommend the ministry of Crossroads Worldwide founded by Clayton King. I've been going to their events going on 6 years now, and I've never once been disappointed. They're faithful, humble, trustworthy servants of God... and they are a wonderful blessing to the Church in this generation!