Lessons for Living | Ain't Complicated

The Bait of Satan

Your response to offense will determine your future, temporally and eternally.

Last year I listened to a sermon preached in a little church in Texas. I was so impacted by it, I shared it with a friend. The message is “The Bait of Offenses” (preached by the now-late Mervin Graber).

Not long after, my friend was in the book section of a thrift store and saw this book title: The Bait of Satan (by John Bevere). Curious by its similarity to the sermon title, he pulled it off the shelf and saw it addressed the same subject. So he bought it. And read it. And loaned it to me.

I was so impressed by the message that I read the book. Wow! Before long, my friend’s wife found another copy of the book in a thrift store. She bought it and my friend gave it to me for Christmas or my birthday.

You can listen to the sermon version “The Bait of Offenses” at my Anabaptists website. I urge you to do so. Please.

The rest of this post is more about the book as well as some excerpts from it. Read it all

COVID-19: Hooked by Numbers and Death Projections

If you think getting hooked is a good thing, ask a fish or a drug addict or a prostitute

It has been several days since I last looked at the coronavirus world map put up by the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Here’s the screen capture I took at 7:07 this morning (here in Oregon, USA).

Johns Hopkins Coronavirus map early on 29 March 2020

I do not for a bit believe those numbers out of China and Iran. Come on, folks, really? Especially those China figures. Right. Since when do totalitarian regimes dispense negative information freely, transparently, and fully? Read it all

Pumpkins or Church Doors — What Are You Pounding On?

On this Day: October 31

Halloween

More like hollow eve.

May all our evenings be hallowed.

And all our days too.

As we acknowledge Him in all our ways to the praise of His glory (Proverbs 3:6; Ephesians 1:12,14).

Reformation

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How to Respond to Treachery in the Church

A determination to show love, forgiveness, and grace

What I say to treacherous, deceitful Brothers in Christ:

I love you.
I forgive you.
I don’t see you as my enemy.
I don’t trust you so much.
My trust is available for you to win back.

I want to say those five things consistently, dependably, and truthfully from my heart. Amen.

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Did Michelle Obama and Donald Trump Voluntarily Damn Themselves?

When people don't forgive, what consequences do they suffer?

Mrs. Obama: “I’d never forgive him” (speaking of Mr. Trump).
Mr. Trump’s response: “I’ll never forgive him” (speaking of Mrs. Obama’s husband).HT: https://www.mediaite.com/tv/trump-fires-back-after-michelle-obama-says-she-wont-forgive-his-birtherism-i-wont-forgive-barack/

Last I read, both the current President and the former first lady say they are Christians.

Then they need to forgive anyone they are refusing to forgive. The Lord Jesus (the Christ in Christians, you know) commands it plainly:

“And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses. But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses” (Mark 11:25,26).

I’m sure Michelle Obama and Donald Trump have read or quoted the Lord’s Prayer. Here’s a part that’s easy to coast over glibly, even unwittingly: Read it all