Unless One Is Born Again, One Cannot Enter The Kingdom.

The jihadist believes that his acts of terrorism for the cause of spreading Islam will earn him credits to enable him to enter paradise where 72 virgins would await him to serve him. 
Notice again the male chauvinism coming into play - appeals only to the male and not the female. How sad they will be when the truth be made known to them that theirs will not be a place of eternal bliss but of eternal damnation.
Another group will have us believe that the more good works one does, the better the chances of scoring enough 'charlie' points to get them their entry ticket into heaven.
Nothing can be further from the truth. Jesus Christ Himself said that no man can come to the Father except through Him. He should know as He came from the Father and He and the Father is one and the same. It is very clear as far as the Bible is concerned; he who would receive the Jesus, the Son of God, will have eternal life and he who would not would be eternally damned and nothing can save him because he has rejected the only source of salvation.
And so my friends, unless one is born again, one cannot enter into His eternal kingdom but will be thrown into the lake of fire to face eternal condemnation. Make the right choice and choose LIFE - receive the Lord Jesus Christ into your life and you will immediately be saved. Please pray the believer's prayer at the bottom of this blog and you will be a child of Jesus immediately.

Relationships In A Marriage

When a person believes in Jesus as his Lord and Savior and receives Him into his heart, the Holy Spirit comes and indwells him and with the Lord's presence, he becomes a blessings magnet. Now, imagine what it is like when two believers come together in a marriage and form a family unit - that relationship is doubly blessed since Christ is now not only present in each believer's life but, being united, He become the third cord in that family unit and soon that relationship will begin to flourish.

Ecclesiastes 4:12 tells us, "Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken".

So a marriage that is centered around Christ (the third person in the marriage) will be strong (see picture on the left - Three-strand Cord) as each strand twines around the other two and hence strengthens each other.

However, looking at the second picture  (see picture on the right - Four-strand Cord), one can easily observe that alternate strands will not touch each other (the two black strands do not touch each other; similarly, the two brown strands never get to meet each other).
When a party outside of the marriage relationship enters into the fray, one of the two will become intertwined and 'break away' from the family unit and soon the entire marriage will be weakened.

When a new person is added into the family nucleus, the marriage relationship has to be worked on with double vigor, else the distraction will impact the tenacity of the marriage.

More strands do not automatically mean a stronger cord; unless conscious effort is put in to avoid crowding, the entire rope will be weakened and the cord will have to be discarded or rewoven. This conscious relationship building applies also to members of the family - children can occupy the place once held so lovingly by the spouses and if nothing is done to correct this, precious marriages can start to crumble and disintegrate.

The Lord commands the couple in Ephesians 5: 21-28

²¹  Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

²² Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord.
²³ For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.
²⁴ Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
²⁵ Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her
²⁶  to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, ²⁷ and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
²⁸ In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.
Marriage has to be worked at but not with human strength for that too can fail. Only with the strength that our Lord gives us when we look to Him can we succeed.

The Spirit Quenches Our Thirst

The past few days were rather hot and humid and many a times I had a dry throat and had to run to the tap to quench my thirst. When we are physically thirsty, we drink to wet our throats almost like on auto-pilot.

However, whenever we are thirsty in our spirit, what do we do? Some turn to their 'gods' (whatever those may be) hoping that their desires be satisfied but I know nothing can and will do except by the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is God Himself and as we have been created in HIS image, He is the only Person who can satisfy us. I encourage you to turn and receive your blessing from Jesus who freely gives us the Holy Spirit when we have Him in our hearts and He will teach you how to draw from Him.

Gaining A Son

This post was originally made on April 27, 2010 and it is reproduced here as a reminder to myself as well as a friend who is about to give his first daughter away.

Having walked my daughter down the aisle, I was asked during the wedding lunch how I felt and I remembered telling my friends that it was a mixture of three emotions;

1. Relief as the important day had finally come after almost one year of planning;
2. Sadness as she will be emigrating to live in Birmingham, UK where my son-in-grace works and reside (for the time being);

3. Joy as I know she will be in good hands having picked a man whom she loves and who is a Child of Christ.

Of course, as I turned the corner and proceeded down the centre of the Chamber, my thoughts went to what I would be saving to my son-in-grace as I place my daughter's hand into his at the altar.

Nobody knew what I had planned to say to him - not even my wife - as I wanted to give it to him as a surprise and so I had been allowing the 'speech' simmer in my mind the entire week (we had a rehearsal on Monday March 29).

And so when Pastor Mathews asked me whether I had anything to say to Joshua as I handed my daughter's hand over to him in marriage, my greatest moment had arrived.

With moist eyes from a joyous attitude, I turned to Joshua and told him,
"On behalf of Aunty Alice and I, I entrust this treasure in earthen vessel to you.
Take this jewel and love her, cherish and encourage her and together, build your house in the Lord.
Today your parents receives a daughter and we have gained a son".


Now I understand how God the Father must have felt when He became Father of the Bride (the Church) and the Father of the Groom (our Lord Jesus Christ) all at the same time - such joy and love. No wonder our Lord Jesus performed His first miracle at a wedding He was invited to and He blessed them over and above all that they could ever imagine.

Blood Of The Lamb

In the Old Covenant (before Jesus' death at the cross), the children of Israel would come before the Lord once a year on the Day of Atonement to make a sacrifice to the Lord and hope the sacrifice will be accepted. If the sacrifice does get accepted, the entire nation will be spared of the punishment and they get to live one more year.
However, should their sacrifice not be accepted, then there will be difficulties for  the coming year.

You see, the acceptance or non-acceptance of the sacrifice depends on the value of the sacrifice - whether there are spots or blemishes and also on the standing of the high priest who goes into the Holy of Holies to offer the sacrifice.

Praise the Lord, at the cross, not only did God the Father find the Sacrifice more than acceptable but also the High Priest Who offered the Sacrifice is more than worthy of performing the act of offering the Sacrifice.

In the Old Testament times, the sins of the people were only put away once a year but now, with the Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, we have been washed with His Blood and made clean forever.