by A.B. Simpson
Fear thou not; for I am with thee—Isaiah 41:10
Satan is continually trying to weaken our faith by fear. He is a great metaphysician and knows the paralyzing effect of fear-the great enemy of faith. If he can cause us to fear, he will stop us from trusting and hinder the very blessing we need. Job found the peril of fear and gives us the sorrowful testimony
I feared a fear, and it came upon me (Job 3:25, margin).
Fear is born of Satan, and if we would only take time to think a moment we would see that everything Satan says is founded upon a falsehood. He is the father of lies. Even his fears are falsehoods and his terrors ought to serve as encouragements.
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by A.W. Tozer
My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. 1 Corinthians 4:4
"Let not thy peace depend on the tongues of men," said the wise old Christian mystic, Thomas a Kempis; "for whether they judge well or ill, thou art not on that account other than thyself." The desire to stand well with our fellow men is a natural one, and quite harmless up to a point, but when that desire becomes so all-consuming that we cannot be happy apart from the praises of men, it is no longer harmless, it is sinful in itself and injurious in its effects. One of the first things a Christian should get used to is abuse. The sweetest soul ever to live in this world was subjected to an ever-increasing barrage of vile calumny during His walk among men; and if they so used the Master of the house, how can the servants hope to escape? The only way to avoid evil tongues is to withdraw entirely from the society of men; and even then there might be those who would raise a meaningful eyebrow and suggest that perhaps after all we may have a pretty good reason for getting under cover! To do nothing is to get abused for laziness, and to do anything is to get abused for not doing something else.
by A.W. Tozer
by J.C. Ryle
Suffering is a part of the process by which the children of God are made holy. They are chastened to wean them from the world, and make them partakers of God’s holiness. The Captain of their salvation was made “perfect through suffering,” and so are they (Hebrews 2:10; 12:10). There never was a great saint who had not experienced either great hardships, or great persecutions.
Let us try to settle this in our hearts also. The children of God all have a cross to bear. A suffering Savior generally has suffering disciples. The Bridegroom was a man of sorrows. Therefore, the Bride must not be a woman of pleasures and unacquainted with grief. Blessed are they that mourn! Let us not murmur at the cross. This also is a sign of sonship.
by J.C. Ryle
by Dan Delzell
Have you noticed the significant number of ministers in recent decades who have been promoting magic in their teaching? They truly believe that their very words contain the power to create and change reality around them. They teach people that man has the ability to speak things into existence the same way that God spoke the world into existence. They have been deceived into believing they have this power within themselves and in the words they speak out loud.
These false teachers have been seduced by the "Word-Faith movement." The arrogance of this philosophy has led its followers to believe that God must obey our commands if we speak the right words with enough faith. It makes man "god" and it makes God our servant who is limited in His activity for us by the words we confess out loud. There is no humility in this doctrine and it goes completely against the letter and the spirit of the Scriptures. Man cannot speak into existence anything he wants to happen. It is up to God to decide how best to answer our prayers according to His will and His plan for our life on earth. The humble Christian prays in faith and confidence, but always with an attitude of "Thy will be done." The Word-Faith promoter speaks magic words with the mindset, "My will be done."
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by Terry James
The Iliad and the Odyssey of the unknown Homer–the many tragedies that spun from Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and other of the ancient Greek playwrights–are but shadowy scripts of insignificance in the end-times stage lights that illuminate our headlines hourly these days. Gripping reality in the land that gave us the stories of the likes of Oedipus, Agamemnon, Prometheus, and, of course, of Zeus, Aphrodite, Hercules, and all that make up the Greek fictional accounts present movement toward tragedy with a far more bitter ending than any in mythology.
It is not tragedy for the Greeks alone of which I write. The stage is set to bring the whole world to the prophetic destiny laid out in Bible prophecy. When considering the roots of the continent of Europe, most first think of Italy or the center of that great empire, the city of Rome. The other state that most often comes to mind when thinking on where Europe began is Greece and its ancient center, Athens.
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by Todd Strandberg
Death has claimed another member of entertainment industry. Singer Whitney Houston was found in the bath of her Beverly Hilton hotel room with her face underwater. It will be six to eight weeks before the final lab results come back, but early signs point to a cocktail of prescription drugs and alcohol as the cause of death. Los Angeles cops are said to have found six prescription pill bottles—Xanax, Lorazepam, Ibuprofen, Midol, Amoxicillin, and Valium.
Houston had a long history of drug problems. She and her ex-husband Bobby Brown helped keep the tabloid industry fully employed for over a decade. Brown has been widely criticized for being a bad influence on the diva, with one friend saying: "He was there every step of the way." But Houston steadfastly refused to blame her husband for her drug addiction.
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by Jim Fletcher
The lefties in the American Church never take a day off from denigrating Bible-believing Christians.
I’ve been writing more and more about this, because while we obsess about Iran’s intentions with regard to Israel, the hippies are back, and their dissing of the Bible prophecy crowd has a direct impact on support for Israel—which, I am sad to say, I believe is slipping. I sincerely believe the emerging threat to Israel—from within American evangelicalism—is more dangerous to Israel than the psychos in Tehran.
You see, when groups like Catalyst bring folks such as Jim Wallis, Brian McLaren, and Phileena Heuertz (yoga is beautiful) to mainstream evangelicalism, it’s only a matter of time before the knives come out for the Jewish state.
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by A.B. Simpson
