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Nehemiah 4:1-23 - Building the Church -- Learning how to trust God! By Pastor Lee Hemen May 29, 2011 AM Why is it that some of us seem to face more opposition in life than others? Perhaps it is because of our circumstances, the results of our choices, or could there be another dynamic at work in our lives that we have not understood before? When children are little, they often love to be thrown high into the air and caught by their father. However, as they get older the rules for the game became different. As the child is tossed into the air, as has happened so many times before, they now become frightened. Why? (No, it is not because they have been dropped so many times before!) They began to trust their head more than their faith in their father to catch them! When trying to build our lives in Christ we can go through the same kind of fears. We start out trusting Jesus, but as we face physical and spiritual obstacles, we begin to trust our head more than we trust Christ. ...

Building a strong church--accomplishing the impossible! Nehemiah 3:1-32 By Pastor Lee Hemen May 22, 2011 AM Has anyone ever told you that you cannot do something and so to prove him or her wrong, you went ahead and did it anyway? That attitude can be seen as being headstrong, if it is motivated by pride. I remember when I was in High School I told a young lady I could ski. I had not been on skis since I was a very young boy and I knew nothing of getting on or off a ski lift! This fact was embarrassingly revealed when I agreed to take her skiing at Crystal Mountain near Mt. Rainer. The first time down the slope, I nearly killed several others and myself all because I wanted to impress a girl. However, if your attitude is motivated by what God has shown is possible in your life, then, there is a whole new dynamic at work! The Apostle Paul wrote that he could “...do everything through Him (Jesus) who gives me strength.” (Philippians 4:13) We discover that Nehemiah had the same...

Nehemiah 2:11-20 - Building a Church through F. A. I. T. H. By Pastor Lee Hemen May 15, 2011 AM We have all heard the old adage that states, “Heaven helps those who help themselves!” However, many might be surprised to learn that it is not found anywhere in the Bible. In fact, it comes from an Aesop’s fable! The story does give out some good advice. It seems that a teamster got his heavy wagon stuck deep in the mud. As he stood there, helpless, and crying out for help, Hercules shows up! Hercules looks disgustingly at the man and tells him, “Put your shoulder to the wheel and goad your horses. Then, call on Hercules to assist you. If you won’t lift a finger to help yourself, you can’t expect Hercules or anyone else to come to your aid.” Some mistakenly think that faith works that way that they have to be good before God loves them. They have to “help” themselves before God will. This simply is not true. God already loves us, if he did not, he would not have sent Jesus to di...

Building the Church--Allowing Time for Proper Preparation Nehemiah 2:1-10 By Pastor Lee Hemen May 7, 2011 AM I had received one of those plastic model airplanes! This was going to be great stuff! With eager anticipation I opened the box and out fell hundreds of pieces of tiny little plastic parts, decals, and plans. What had started out as eager anticipation was reduced to utter disappointment. How was I going to build this thing with all of its hundreds of parts and pieces? My mother happened to come into my bedroom delivering a pile of clean clothes, she inquired why I was so depressed looking. I showed her the hundreds of plastic pieces and she responded, “You’ve just got to allow time for proper preparation. Read the directions and take it one piece at a time.” Now a ten-year-old kid doesn’t have a lot of patience with details, but I learned that spring that if I planned properly I could build a pretty detailed plastic model airplane! A church can be a lot like a ten-ye...

2 Chronicles 7:13-15 - Building a Strong Church -- How to Pray With Power ! By Pastor Lee Hemen April 17, 2011 AM We live in a day and age where the church has become pretty much irrelevant, why is that? I believe it has become irrelevant because the church has immersed itself and adopted the ways of the world instead of changing society. When Jesus came, he did so to bring the kingdom of God back into creation. Jesus established his body in the world, the church, in order to change the world one individual at a time. When an individual gives their life to Christ, they then can experience and know the power of God in their lives on a daily basis! How? It’s simple--through prayer. Sadly, most people do not experience a powerful prayer life and then they begin to look for outside experiences to satisfy the spiritual void they have. There are reasons why so many have never experienced powerful prayer, one is the simple fact that they never learned how to pray with power! When S...

The Victory! - Mark 16:1-20 by Pastor Lee Hemen April 10, 2011 AM Victory can come in many forms in our lives. Getting a good grade on a test, which we have studied endlessly for, making a promotion at work that we have worked hard for, or retiring in comfort and contentment. Parents see victories in their children all the time. Perhaps one of the greatest victories that were totally unexpected happened during the 1980 Winter Olympics when the USA hockey team beat Russia at Lake Placid, New York. It was called "The Miracle on Ice" for a reason because no one expected it to happen since Team USA had been badly beaten by the Russians earlier in the year. Today's verses in Mark show us a different kind of victory. It is one that does not give out gold medals, good grades, or future monetary compensation. It is the victory that gives anyone who believes in it the power over death and the newness of a whole new relationship with Almighty God. It was a victory that few expected...

Today's Thoughts - What are you living for? - Mark 15 by Pastor Lee Hemen April 3, 2011 What are you living for? It is a good question to ask. I have often asked others this very question yet in a different way. I ask, "Suppose you were standing before God, in heaven, and he asked you, 'Why should I let you into my heaven?', what would you say?" Yet, this week I have been encouraged by another writer, to consider asking another series of questions: "If you live for many more years, what quality of character will you take into eternity? For what will your life have counted? What lasting spiritual legacy will you leave to those left behind you?" The author of these questions goes on to state that everyone accepts--intellectually if not emotionally--that they eventually will die. What they do with their remaining years is crucial. A legitimate question to ask anyone--and most of all ourselves--is: What are you living for? In light of eternity, ev...

Are We Like Peter? - Mark 14:66-72 By Pastor Lee Hemen March 27, 2011 AM There is a certainty and assurance that true Christians know and reflect in their lives. Others have noted the peace that believers display no matter what occurs in life. During the cold war a KGB agent for the Soviet Union had nearly beaten to death a young Christian woman. He warned her to never be caught again. Her crime was having a Bible study in her home and owning a Bible. Later, she was again caught by the same KGB agent. In disbelief he could not shake the peace that he saw in her face even after she was finally murdered by his squad. It haunted him from that day on. Later, he gave his life to Christ and had to escape Russia himself. How could that lovely young woman continue in her faith even after she was severely beaten and then later die for her belief? Faced with a similar situation we find Peter not only backtracking away from his friendship with Jesus, he flatly denies he ever knew him! ...

The Trial of Jesus - Mark 14:53-65 By Pastor Lee Hemen March 20, 2011 AM If we are lucky in life we will have the opportunity to meet someone who exemplifies what true heroism means. In a day and age where heroism is often defined by what one suffers through rather than the sacrifice of one’s life for another, we need to take a fresh look. The English word for hero was first used in 1387 and comes from the Greek meaning “protector” or “defender.” Originally, Hero was a priestess of Aphrodite at Sestos a town on Hellespont. She loved a young man named Leander, who lived at Abydos, a town on the Asian side of the channel. They could not marry because Hero was bound by a vow of chastity, and so every night Leander swam from Asia to Europe, guided by a lamp in Hero's tower. One stormy night a wind extinguished the light, and Leander drown. His body was washed ashore beneath Hero's tower; in her grief, she threw herself into the sea. Not exactly what we think of as a her...