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Showing posts from December, 2006
Sin and the Christian! - Romans 7:14-25 by Pastor Lee Hemen December 31, 2006 When I was younger there were times when I was caught doing things I really did not want to do, but I went a head and did them anyway. Oh I could have blamed others, the dog, or circumstances for my proclivity to do these things, but I knew better. A good example was when I knew without a doubt my brother loved peanut butter. In fact, he loved it so much that if he saw me with a peanut butter sandwich, he would often just take it from me. Well, one afternoon I purposefully made a couple of slices of peanut butter on bread. I spread it real thick, slowly waiting for Ed to come into the kitchen. And sure enough, there he was. “Whatcha doin’, Scrawny?” (This was his endearing term he often used for me.) “What’s-it-look-like?” I replied. “Hey!” he declared, “Give me those slices of peanut butter and bread!” “You want em,?” I retorted. “Let me have them!” (Notice the intellectual conversation?) That was all I need
A Father’s Tale By Pastor Lee Hemen December 17, 2006 The Bible does not tell us anything about Mary’s family. Her mother and father, or any of her siblings, if she had any at all. However, I believe that Mary’s life exemplified a godly one. After all, she was chosen to be the mother of the Savior of the world! And we learn from the angel Gabriel that she was highly favored of God. We also know that her life was a reflection of her upbringing and so it is with this assurance, we find a father worried about his young Hebrew daughter “Miriam...” ---- I will enter His gates with thanksgiving in my heart, I will enter His courts with praise! I will say this is the day the Lord has made, I will rejoice for He has made me glad! This is both the happiest day and the saddest day of my life! But as you can see, I think I will focus on the happier part! Oh Lord, my God thank You for being the God You are. Thank You for my daughter Miriam! A father knows this day will come but he never realizes j
The Law and Sin! – Romans 7:7-13 by Pastor Lee Hemen December 10, 2006 There are always those who think they can disprove the Christian faith by regurgitating tired old arguments. You know what I mean. Things like, “Well if God is so powerful, can He make a rock bigger than He can lift?” or what some think is a new one: “If God is so good, why do bad things happen to good people?” Richard Dawkins, a leading atheist, who does not believe in evolution but angrily snipes at Christianity, touts much the same lame argument. He relates in his latest book, “The God Delusion,” that the God of the Old Testament “is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.” In other words, how could a good God allow bad things to happen? He goes on to id
We Live by Sanctification - Romans 7:1-6 by Pastor Lee Hemen December 3, 2006 Humans love to bind themselves up with legalism. It is almost as if we are so insecure in ourselves that we just need someone to tell us what to do and when to do it just so we can feel safe about ourselves! There is a commercial on TV that sells what is called a BlackBerry ® for the communication company Sprint. Three people are walking in a downtown area and one of them is holding his BlackBerry ® and using it as a GPS (global positioning device). When one of his companions takes it out of his hands to take a closer look at it, he is immediately lost and looks confused, not knowing where to turn or which direction to go until it is placed firmly back in his grasp. Spiritually, we can be the exact same way when we begin to depend on legalism to guide our faith. Christians are to live by sanctification instead of legalism. The place of legalism for Paul was a continual theological battleground because of his