A New Creature. . . an Apostolic Pentecostal blog

I wrote this while thinking about our meeting in the jail last evening: In the jail ministry, I always try to emphasize that the relationship with God must come first. If we attempt to live for God without loving God first, we are really bound for failure. Love Him first, and that love will mold you and shape you into something you never expected. There is within you a beautiful new creature awaiting to be released by God’s love. . . Mar 12:28-31 And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? (29) And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: (30) And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. (31) And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself....

First seen as curiosities. Room sized behemoths. . . massive complexities consuming vast quantities of money and power to operate. . . 98 pound weaklings in strength. Soon reborn as servants. Doing menial tasks. . .calculating, filing, sorting, printing, mailing. . . the drudgery of low level clerical operations. . . ever onward they progressed to playing games. . .chess, Jeopardy. . .Now contemporarily driverless cars, trucks, planes, and ships. . .Again still newly rising to medical diagnoses, traffic control, systems management, law enforcement. . . currently robotic domestic help is being offered to the cutting edge market. . .almost invisibly a line will be crossed where there is nothing that a man can do, which a machine can not do better. . . quicker. . . more accurately. . . more creatively. And what then was there left for mankind? What purpose is there in doing anything, when what you do is always second best. . . when there is no market for your efforts. . . no demand for...

Matthew 20:26-28 But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; (27) And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant: (28) Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many. The very notion of who is the greatest or most important in the church is anti-Christ. We have differing roles. We have differing functions. We have different ministries in the church, but we are members of a body, which must function as a complete and healthy whole if it is to exist at all. 1 Corinthians 12:12-24 For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. (13) For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit. (14) For the body is not one member, but many. (15) If the fo...

For the past 14 years I have ministered in the local county jail. Ministry in the jail is a microcosm of ministry in any setting. It is a controlled environment, with fewer variables than in the world at large. Ministry failure. . . the stumbling of the saints is in some ways easier to track in jail ministry, than in a more typical church setting. When someone drops off the radar screen in a regular church, we often do not know why. But in jail all too often we see a person return to jail. . . many times all too quickly, and that is a pretty certain sign of problems in the person’s life. Rare is the person who leaves incarceration with the thought of returning. Most spend at least some of their time in jail, contemplating how they arrived there, and what they might do to avoid coming back in the future. To see this in a series of time lapse shots it becomes sadly humorous, if that makes any sense. One particular fellow I remember got into trouble after a night of drinking i...

The recent fatal shooting of a young man by a police office in Missouri, has polarized large segments of the population.  People are choosing sides, aligning themselves behind either the righteous act of a courageous police officer, or the tragic murder of an innocent young man by a police officer. Each side has the same basic facts available to them, but they see totally different scenes out of those same facts.  What they see in those facts and their reaction to them, have little to do with the facts themselves, but are rather a type of ink blot test. . . given random shapes of ink on a little card, a person is able to create a scene, not from anything inherently in the black and white shapes on the paper, but from their own past experiences. . . . Lay on your back and look at the clouds. . .see soldiers, horses. . . castles. . . No soldiers, or horses, or castles are actually there, and a friend sitting right next to you will find completely different shapes in the same...

The burning stars rotate perfectly and obediently in their proscribed orbits through the cold harsh vacuum of space. . . . totally subject to and submissive to the God ordained. . . God created laws of physics. Their severe obedience unwavering in the slightest. Any variance of motion from the path prescribed for them is inconceivable. Thus entire galaxies, great clusters of galaxies. . . indeed the entire observed universe submits, obeys without questioning the laws laid before it. Wheeling silently through the boundless sky. . .In every direction of the celestial globe, order and adherence to the rule of law. . . as a perfectly beautiful and wondrously complex mechanism. . . perfect on what ever scale it may be viewed. Interlocking facets of cause, effect, and consequence. . . death. . . rebirth. . . wheels within wheels. Turning and moving ever onward through countless eons of time, in silent harmony, and unity . . The entire universe that is, except for Man. Man alone ...

Common reasons to attend one church over another. . . You like the building. You like the pastor. You feel comfortable there. The choir is great. They have a really good youth group. The pastor’s messages are uplifting. The people are very friendly. The pews are comfortable. You really like the music. Your best friend/family member goes there. This is where my family has always attended church. We could no doubt continue adding many more reasons to the list above, without any danger of exhausting the list of why people choose once church over another. . . but none of those reasons will get you into heaven. When you stand before God, He will not care about anything in the list above. By various counts Jesus issued around 50 commandments. He stressed how important it is to obey His words: John 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments. John 14:21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my...