PastorBlastor

Ramblings from Retirement – Get Dressed! By Retired Pastor Lee Hemen April 9, 2021 Man it can be tough to try and get kids dressed, ready, and out the door on time. It can be especially if one of them is a preteenager (tweener) who moves at the pace of a snail or if one is so concerned about what she wears that it is impossible for her to make any decisions. Then there are the arguments about “why” “how come” and “where are we going”. I remember well when my father would come and tell us three kids to “Get dressed and ready to go. You’ve got five minutes!” My brother would grumble around bumping into things and looking for something clean to wear, my sister would gripe about that she didn’t have anything to wear, and I would just hop out of bed and get dressed and eat breakfast before the other two were dressed. I loved getting up and going places and you did not have to ask me twice. In Luke’s gospel he relates that Jesus told the crowds “Be dressed ready for service and keep your lam...

False teachers exist! – 1 Timothy 1:1-11 By Pastor Lee Hemen October 1, 2017 We live in a day where any convoluted and faulty theology is readily accepted and protected by a non-critical thinking society. My Daddy used to say that it is “okay to be open-minded but not to the point where your brains fall out and you step on them.” Far too many think that acceptance of the individual means we can never disagree with or question what the individual thinks, says, or does. I say “hogwash!” There are false teachers who want you to believe or follow their latest form of theological perversion. Take for instance the recent proclamation that the world was supposed to end last week or is it next week or the week after? Who knows? And do not get me started with those who come up with the latest and greatest end-times scenario, bleah! False teachers exist! The Apostle Paul wrote his friend and new pastor Timothy in order to mentor and help him in his new ministry as a young pastor. Evidently h...

The judgment of God! - Joel 3:1-3, 6-8, 9-13, 14-17, 20-21 By Pastor Lee Hemen May 22, 2016 None of us likes to be judged by anyone, and especially by God. In fact there is a societal heresy that thinks that God should never judge anyone. I oversee a blog that I have edited for over a decade now. It deals with my own comments on society, politics, theology, and I upload my sermons to it as well. I cannot tell you the number of times I've had folks argue that I could not counter their arguments because as a believer I could not judge them lest I be judged! This is utter hogwash. Jesus' command to not judge others dealt with a hypocritical judgment without first taking care of one's own problem in the same sin arena. We can in fact "judge" others by their words, actions, and deeds. And certainly God will indeed judge all people everywhere when he returns. Joel had been up until now trying to get his people to repent and return to God. Now he focuses on all nat...

Jude - Be On Guard! By Pastor Lee Hemen February 17, 2013 AM What motivates you in life? When I was in a JNROTC program, we were stationed for several weeks at Quadra, a Canadian military base. We had to learn basic commands in French because of the cadets that were from Quebec that were there training with us. All I remember is “stand easy” was “repos,” “dismissed” was “écartée!” and “attention” was “garde à vous!” We were motivated to be alert because if we did not follow the commands quickly enough, we were punished for our lack of knowledge. Our drill instructors did not care that some of us did not know French. We had to learn them correctly and quickly. We were highly motivated. For the Christian, our motivation needs to be Jesus Christ. When Jude wrote his letter there were those who had begun to get discouraged because they thought Jesus was going to return any day. The signs were all there but He still hadn’t come back. Then, in the midst of mounting persecution,...

Be On Guard! - Mark 13:31-37 By Pastor Lee Hemen January 30, 2011 AM Before becoming a Christian I studied various other religions, from the esoteric to mainline faith practices. Each one left something to be desired. Hinduism was too foreign and based mainly on mythology and magic. Islam and Mormonism sounded the same, were hard-lined, strict, and full of inconsistencies. Buddhism and the new age were just revamped versions of self-help methodologies. And Scientology, like est (Erhard Seminars Training), or Eckankar were just plain weird. Then I was challenged to read the Bible and I could not believe what I had missed. I learned Jesus shared with his disciples, “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.” (Matthew 7:15 NIV ) I came to realize that I had almost lowered my guard and allowed myself to be influenced by false teaching. We would do well to be on guard. In this section of Mark’s gospel we find...

The Sign of the Times! - Mark 13:21-30 By Pastor Lee Hemen January 23, 2011 AM We have a tendency to think that what happens to us personally should affect everyone else. And while some of the decisions we make can affect a whole lot of folks, compared to the rest of the city you live in, the State you occupy, or where you reside nationally – what you do affects relatively few folks. That is, until you do something so stupid that you garner the media’s attention and gain 15 minutes of fame. However, the Christian is supposed to impact those around them in a good way. Believers are commanded to make a difference in the lives of those they come in contact with. Sadly, too few do. Far too many of us have come to think that it is simply the sign of the times. The sign of the times can be good or bad depending upon what it depicts or exposes. It can be good if it shows discoveries that benefit society. They can be bad if they are the result of society going haywire. Too many peo...

The Coming Crisis! - Mark 13:14-20 By Pastor Lee Hemen January 16, 2011AM We can be taught things over and over so many times that we begin to think what we are being taught is absolutely true, whether it is or not. Here are several examples: In Rome a thumbs up signal meant let a defeated gladiator live, but a thumb down signal meant kill him. In reality a thumbs up meant kill the loser, however, if the thumb was concealed in a fist, it meant let the loser live. We also think, because of Hollywood movies like Spartacus, that slaves manned the oars of Roman galleys, yet most were free men who were sailors trained to row and then fight. Rowing was considered a skilled task. Can things we come to think of as true yet are false infect our Christian thinking as well? The answer is “Yes.” Here in Mark’s gospel we find Jesus continuing to answer his disciple’s question about when the temple would be destroyed. His response and what it meant has been so analyzed that what we may t...

The World Will Continue! - Mark 13:7-10 by Pastor Lee Hemen January 2, 2011 AM I will never forget when my father died. It was right after New Year's Eve in 1968. He had gotten up to get a drink of water and smoke a cigarette. He was dragging his oxygen tank behind him when his heart gave way. My brother Ed and I were the first ones to find him. We heard him sigh and fall in the hallway of our little house. As Ed tried vainly to revive him I phoned for an ambulance. We now know there was nothing we could have done. His heart muscles were so weak, he died instantly. It has impacted my entire life. I can still smell the mixture of cigarette smoke and the Aqua Velva aftershave he always wore. Even at my age of 57 I still miss him and think of him often, but life goes on. What would you do if the one person you depended upon the most in life was suddenly taken from you? As I have shared, some of us have already had to face such a prospect and it is not an easy thing to go th...