We have forgotten God

Dr. James Merritt

Dr. James Merritt once quipped, “If we’ve learned anything from history it’s that we haven’t learned anything from history.”

Idols

It used to be that only some off-the-wall religions and pagans worshipped idols. But look at us now. We make idols out of almost anything that satisfies our worldly lusts. Shiny cars, football players and teams, movie stars, singers and music groups, clothes, our cell phones, (yes we do) money, shopping, crystals, astrology, success, personal image, . . .an idol is anything in our lives that we consider more important than God.

Sexual Immorality

We have completely forgotten what God said about marriage, dating back to Genesis

“That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.” Genesis 2:24…Genesis 1 and 2 indicate that God created marriage as an institution for the purpose of man and woman to fulfill God’s purposes for man–procreation.

That means at the end of the day homosexual couples are and will always live outside God’s law and His purpose for man. Gay couples can not procreate, that will always render them shy of God’s original and eternal purpose. But God’s love is for all people and those living in sin will always have the freedom to repent and follow God’s law.

But homosexuality is only the tip of the sexuality immorality iceberg in our society. All you have to do is look) around to get a dose of every kind of immorality. Examples of immorality prevalent in our society: incest, adultery, prostitution (all pornography is merely glorified prostitution), fornication–having sex outside marriage, rape…abuse of women or children, lust after sex, cars, alcohol, drugs, riches, food, covetousness, lewdness. . .and the list goes on.

We have forgotten what God thinks about all this sexual immorality. Much of this disobedience has become commonplace and accepted as normal to many in our society today. Some turn away and claim just not to care or be moved by the behavior or beliefs of another. They claim it’s none of their business what others do.

“If it feels good” they rationalize, “do it” with no regard for who gets hurt.

Iniquity

And we’ve forgotten all about iniquity and how our heavenly Father feels when He sees it in us.

But sin is sin and ours has to be dealt with. We know from John 3:16 that Jesus died on the cross to pay the sin debt for all of us we owed: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. But when we’re saved by the blood of Jesus, the rest of our lives we have to make choices every day about how we’re going to live. We will choose to make choices that glorify God or choices that glorify us. Choices that glorify Holy God come with rewards and a heaven full of grace and blessings or those choices that live for us. Those choices lead to disappointments, costly outcomes, unnecessary suffering and regret–never fulfillment.

Unity please.

We inaugurated a new president, Joe Biden, and Vice President Kamala Harris, on January 20.

We’ve just completed the most significant benchmark in our entire democracy–the transfer of power from one presidential administration to another–pageantry we perform and celebrate every four years.

Vice President Kamila Harris

President Joe Biden

The quote that impacted me most in Mr. Biden’s inaugural address, and one I can imagine myself quoting in future blog posts, is what he said about unity. Mr. Biden said, “With unity we can do great things. Without unity, there is no peace.”

Unity please. We so desperately need unity in this country in this day and time, especially since Trump, in his last weeks in office tried to split our country apart even more.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King said, “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.”

Paul urges us in Ephesians 4:31 to “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.

We can’t even begin to change our attitudes about being united with our fellow man until we undergo a transforming change of our collective hearts.

And God is the only one who can do that.

Are you prepared for Him to do that in your heart?

He never invited her to church

How Rosaria Champagne Butterfield met Jesus is an incredible story. This radical unbeliever despised Christians and didn’t believe Jesus was real, according to her story published on the Christianity Today¹ website in their February 7 issue. She calls her story My Train Wreck Conversion. “Stupid. Pointless. Menacing,” she said. “That’s what I thought of Christians and their god Jesus.”

Her story, despite being an amazing work of God in her life, is not what grabbed my attention. Ken Smith, a pastor at the Syracuse Reformed Presbyterian Church, wrote Dr. Butterfield a letter. The lesbian radical wrote a vehement assault on Christianity in a local Syracuse, New York paper in 1997 after Promise Keepers came to town.

The story drew both fan mail and hate mail, but Ken Smith’s letter, Butterfield said, was engaging, not condemning, not judgmental. “And he didn’t invite me to church,” she said.

THAT’S what caught my attention.

He didn’t invite her to church.

In a few words, Butterfield and Smith and his wife, Floy, became friends.

“They entered my world,” she said in her story. “They met my friends. We did book exchanges. We talked openly about sexuality and politics. They did not act as if such conversations were polluting them. They did not treat me like a blank slate. When we ate together, Ken prayed in a way I had never heard before. His prayers were intimate. Vulnerable. He repented of his sin in front of me. He thanked God for all things. Ken’s God was holy and firm, yet full of mercy. And because Ken and Floy did not invite me to church, I knew it was safe to be friends.”

When I first moved to Alabama and met new people the first thing many of them asked me was, “Do you have a church home?” Regardless of my answer, they’d invite me to church.

Ken Smith, in my opinion, employed the best and most effective evangelism tool–friendship. Ken and Floy knew what Jesus meant when He taught His disciples to “Love One Another.” As a result of their friendship, Dr. Butterfield made a conscious and independent decision to go to church, where she met and accepted Jesus Christ.

She calls her story, “My Train Wreck Conversion”. I urge you to read her full story on the Christianity Today website. Or watch the video version below.

She has written a book about her life and her conversion experience, “The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert.”

We truly serve an Awesome God, and we never know when, how or who He will draw someone unto Himself.

¹The Christianity Today website story © 2013 by Christianity Today, My Train Wreck Conversion, was the inspiration for this blog post. Direct quotes from her story appear in quotation marks in the post.https://www.youtube.com/embed/hkJZSeUGzWw?version=3&rel=1&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&fs=1&hl=en&autohide=2&wmode=transparentAdvertisements

Child Abuse and Domestic Violence

Thousands of children and women won’t have anything to eat today. Or have anywhere to sleep tonight. Or they’ll be terrified and huddled in a closet so the man mom brought home won’t explode in a fit of drunken, angry abuse.

Not a pretty sight. But it plays out all the time in too many places in America every day and every night. It is a never-ending toxic plight that is eroding our society relentlessly.

Can we cure it? Probably not. The hate and anger and rage is so deeply rooted in the souls of those that abuse that change is virtually impossible

Jesus is the only one who can transform a heart. And abusers often don’t have courage enough to reach out for HIM.

But there is hope – FOR THE ABUSED

Kerri McKenna Reece can help

Find her at Kerri Coaching

Some brave, survivors of abuse themselves, have chosen to share their experience, strength and hope with others living in the aftermath of childhood abuse or in the midst of adult domestic abuses. The long term hope is for victims of abuse to learn the life skills, tools and truths that enable them to rebuild their lives. Skills that will empower them to move beyond the behaviors and people that don’t serve them well. Techniques that commission them to live truly authentic, and unafraid, embracing the life God intended them to live.

Kerri says, “I know the depths of your pain and struggles first hand. I’m a survivor of abuse myself and my journey to recovery led me to become a Certified Professional Life and Trauma Recovery Coach.

“I’ve been where you are and have recovered and survived. Together we can walk the road to your recovery. Free of abuse forever.

Arrange a complementary consultation with Kerri today. Click on the link below.

https://www.kerrimckennareece.com/lets-connect

George’s patio

As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. Proverbs 27:17

My wife Marie and I lived in Montgomery, Alabama before we moved to Georgia 20 years ago. We were still in the honeymoon years of our 27 (so far) year love for each other. Early in our marriage in Montgomery (like most couples’ marriages of any length) our ideas, our relationships, and our wills often collided and differed widely.

We had a couple we both knew and loved in Montgomery for years before we married.

George and I were dear friends. So was Marie with George’s wife. We trusted each other and could share intimate personal stuff with each other and be vulnerable with each other without being judgmental

We spent hours and hours sharing our victories as well as our struggles on his patio in his back yard. Marie knew this. When we had a tiff or were headed for a major disagreement she would look at me and say “I think it would be a good idea if you spent some time with George on his patio.

It was magical. I’d call him and tell him I needed some patio time. We’d meet and hash out my dilemma no matter how long it took.

Talking with George on his patio, no matter the weather, always helped me understand what I needed to do or say to do my part to help Marie and I resolve the issue at hand. More times than I care to admit the issue would get resolved if I stopped acting like a jerk.

Every guy needs a George.

And a patio.

Does age matter?

COVID-19 has taught us a lot of things about life. One thing we’ve learned is that age is not a factor when we need to reach out and help other people. (Read Job 12:12; 32: 6-10.) Here are four quick examples:

Cavanaugh Bell is a first-grader in Maryland. He heard about the coronavirus, and he started thinking about what he could do. He had $600 in savings. He asked his mom to go shopping with him. He bought cartloads of hand sanitizer, snacks, cleaning supplies, and toilet paper. He made 65 care packages.

Cavanaugh then went to his grandmother’s senior living community and passed them out. He observed all the social distancing guidelines. He wore gloves and a mask and kept his distance. He said, “I like giving back. That’s my passion.”  How passionate are you about giving back?  

10-year-old Chelsea Phaire was quarantined at home when she decided to use her time wisely to find a way to turn a tough situation into a terrific solution. She started Chelsea’s Charity. She sends out art kits to kids in homeless shelters and foster care facilities. In the past three months, this first-grader from Danbury, CT, has shipped more than 1,500 packages containing coloring books, crayons, markers, and other materials.

Chelsea says that she hopes her kits will give other children something creative and fun to do when they’re feeling down. She said, “Whether I’m happy or sad, art is always there for me.” God has something there for you. Are you willing to see it, use it, and make somebody else’s life better?

Meet Anna Adcox and her sister, Francis Trimble. They live in Dadeville, Alabama. They are 95 and 87 years old respectively. They are very productive. They spend their mornings working in their garden, and in the afternoon, they sew dresses and shorts for children around the world. These two ladies have finished about 7,000 dresses!

You’ll never hear Anna and Francis saying, “I’m too old, I can’t do that, I don’t know how.” They are continually learning, serving, and making a difference in the world. Several thousand boys and girls are glad they didn’t know how old they were!

Tom Moore is a 99-year-old World War II veteran who wanted to do something for Britain’s National Health Service. He decided to walk 10 laps around his garden every day and complete 100 laps by his 100^th birthday on April 30,2020. His goal was to raise $1,000. Tom’s 16-year-old grandson, Benji, shared his vision on social media. Donations started pouring in. I saw the TV clip of him walking his laps with his walker and several British Military officers saluting him. He raised over $36,000,000!

In July, Queen Elizabeth II used the royal sword to bestow knighthood upon Tom Moore. At 100 years old, he did ask if he could remain standing during the ceremony, saying, “If I kneel down, I may never get up again.”

If your age is between Cavanaugh and Tom – you’re the right age to make a difference!

Horoscope Hijinks

What’s your sign, man?

Horoscopes used to play an important role in my relationships–especially with women.. This was during my prodigal son romp through my recently divorced mid-life wilderness. 

When I became interested in a woman, the first place I went was Linda Goodman’s book Sun Signs to see if the woman and I would be horoscopicly (my word) compatible.If our signs didn’t cross and our stars didn’t align I was history. No way was I going to spend time, energy or money  on a horoscopic misfit.  

 It took me almost a decade and some serious Bible study and a boatload of God’s grace to figure out that I was born under a very different sign.  It read, ‘”Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.”

And I was adopted that moment by my Heavenly Father and became a son of God with all the riches in glory through my Savior, Jesus

Later it was hard to believe but for several years I looked to Satan’s lies in those horoscopes. That I would allow something Satan authored to help me make life choices and influence  some of my  personal relationships with so much Satanic bunk.

“So do not listen to your prophets, your diviners, your dreamers, your fortune-tellers, or your sorcerers, who are saying to you, ‘You shall not serve the king of Babylon.’ For it is a lie that they are prophesying to you, with the result that you will be removed far from your land, and I will drive you out, and you will perish.”.  Jeremiah 27:9-10

“If a person turns to mediums and necromancers, whoring after them, I will set my face against that person and will cut him off from among his people .Leviticus 20:6.

I don’t think any serious believerr and disciple of Jesus Christ can justify astrology or horoscopes. Dare I say, you can’t believe in or follow Jesus authentically and follow astrology at the same time? I have known people claiming to be believers who check their horoscope in the morning paper religiously.  they read their horoscopes more religiously than they read their Bibles.

 If you are reading horoscopes now or relying on astrology to influence you at all let me encourage you do a word study on astrology. Find out what God’s word says. God’s word is truth. Horoscopes and astrology are both based on lies straight from the pit of hell.

My inevitable but necessary 31-day sabbatical has ended. I am home. I will publish my next “For His Glory” post on Wednesday, May 17.

What is your FQ–focus quotient?

By Dr. John Ed Mathison
Executive Director
John Ed Mathison Leadership Ministries

One of my good friends in ministry was Dr. Bill Hinson.  We knew each other in college, and we were in seminary together at Emory. He became the pastor of the largest Methodist Church in America at First Methodist in Houston, Texas.  I had the privilege to work with him on a lot of things for renewal in The United Methodist Church.  He retired early to North Alabama; sadly, he suffered a heart attack and died.

Bill was a great preacher.  I’ll never forget his telling about lion tamers who go into the cage with lions.  They carry a four-legged stool.  They also carry whips, poles, and pistols, but the purpose of the stool is fascinating.

The lion tamer always holds the stool by the back and points the four legs toward the face of the wild animal.  The animal tries to focus on all four legs at once.  When he does this, a kind of paralysis comes over him, and the animal becomes weak and disabled because his attention is fragmented and is unable to focus.

Too often we try to focus on too many things, and we become victims of discouragement and disappointment, and ineffective living.  A lack of focus is destructive.

One of my favorite passages is Hebrews 12:1-2.  The backdrop is an athletic event, the race.  The writer describes that the runner always runs with focus and purpose.  He says, “We must keep our eyes focused on Jesus, who is the Alpha and the Omega of our faith.”

You never see a runner win who is multi-focused while he is running.  You don’t see him waving to people up in the crowd, or “hot-dogging.”  The runner who wins focuses on the finish line and runs straight towards it.  He  doesn’t  look at his competitors!  He doesn’t get distracted.  He is focused!

One of the big differences in success and failure is how well we are able to focus.  Someone has said, “The successful man is the average man – focused.”

When a football team goes out of town for the big game, much of the planning centers on how to keep the team focused.  Play off and championship games carry with them many distractions.  The more focused a team can be, the better it will perform.  Last year a German soccer team immediately changed hotels for its training camp.  They found that a beauty contest was taking place at that resort hotel with 400 Russian models.  Smart coach!

There is a convicting Old Testament story about a guard who was looking after an enemy who had been captured.  His responsibility was to focus on keeping the prisoner secure.

When his leader came to check on him, they discovered the prisoner had escaped.  The leader wondered how that could happen.  Was the guard overpowered by the prisoner, or did some colleagues come and help the man escape?  He asked the guard to explain.  His explanation was, “While I was busy here and there, the prisoner escaped” (1 Kings 20:39-40).  The guard had not stayed focused on his duty!

Stay focused on your purpose.  A huge traffic jam recently occurred in Alabama where a truck driver took his hands off the wheel to pull out a loose tooth.  He crashed his 18-wheeler along Interstate 20.  While he grabbed hold of the troublesome tooth, he lost control, jack-knifed and veered off the road.  He forgot about driving and focused on pulling his tooth.  The highway patrol verified his dilemma when he said, “He had the tooth in his shirt pocket as proof!”  But that did not untangle the traffic jam or fix his truck.

Remember, a lack of focus can paralyze you.  Stay focused!

What is your FQ – Focus Quotient?

John Ed’s blog posts appear in For His Glory each week.¹
Contact: JAM Executive Suite 4,4131 Carmichael Road, Montgomery, AL 36106 Phone: 334-270-2149 Email:info@johnedmathison.org

¹Listen to John Ed Mathison's one-minute daily devotional on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/johned.mathison/ and click “PLAY" on the audio YouTube in order to listen.  Or you can go to his ministry page at  https://www.facebook.com/JohnEdMathisonLeadershipMinistries/

Ever notice isolation around you?

Let go (of what?) and let God

Radical Generosity

Down With Christmas!

The First Thanksgiving

Missionary To Cannibals

A.W. Milne was a missionary to cannibals.

In the 19th century Milne joined a group of men known as “One Way Missionaries.”

Milne embarked on the mission but didn’t take a suitcase. He packed all his worldly belongings in a coffin. Milne and the other one-way-missionaries bought one-way tickets to their destinations, but no return ticket. They fully expected to spend the rest of their lives on mission and die on the mission field.¹

Milne spent decades loving on cannibals in a tribe in the New Hebrides in the South Pacific. He journeyed to their village knowing the cannibals had murdered every other missionary who went there.

When Milne died, the cannibals buried Milne in his coffin in the middle of their village. On his grave the cannibals wrote this epitaph:

When he came, there was no light.
When he left, there was no darkness.

¹Source: All In small group Bible study by Mark Batterson

Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

 

When kindness shows up folks get blessed.

Bored, Burned Out, Broken or Blessed

The Cycle Of Abuse

Smart Chopsticks

By John Ed Mathison
Executive Director
John Ed Mathison Leadership Ministries

Health inspectors give a report each week on restaurants in the River Region indicating a numerical score for how clean they are.  The report ends with Mark Bullard giving a robust “Clean Up!”   But what about the food the restaurant serves?  Is it pure – untainted?

The Chinese have now developed a pair of “smart chopsticks” that will help you gauge the quality of the food you are about to consume.  These chopsticks have been developed by the Chinese tech giant Baidu and they were recently displayed at a technology conference.

These chopsticks feature built-in sensors that “can detect oils containing unsanitary levels of contamination.”  They have named the chopsticks Kuaisou, and they link to a smartphone app, which displays a “good” or “bad” reading depending on the quality of the food’s cooking oil.  The smart chopsticks will also record temperature, nutritional information, and calories.

Evidently the Chinese markets have had some challenges with food quality scandals such as “gutter oil,” or cut-rate cooking oil made from recycled garbage and sewage that is used by some street vendors.  These smart chopsticks will help determine the quality of the food.

We can see where external things are clean or not.  But we sometimes have real difficulty seeing how pure and untainted ideas, philosophies, opportunities, etc. are.  How do we discern that?

One way is the use of our conscience.  The problem with the conscience is that it is oftentimes based on education, values taught as a child, etc. and cannot be totally dependable.  The conscience can also be dulled.

I like the definition of the conscience by a little boy who said, “It’s a three-cornered thing in my heart that stands still when I am good, but when I am bad it turns around and the corners hurt a lot.  If I keep on doing wrong the corners wear off and it doesn’t hurt anymore.”  Another kid defined conscience as “something that makes a kid tell his mother before his sister tells her.”  You can’t depend on your conscience.

We need God’s divine help.  His desire is to help us discern where there is evil, even though it is well disguised.  We are tempted to consume a lot of things intellectually that are “gutter oil” and recycled from garbage and sewage.  Check out some of the things we watch on television or see at the movies.

God’s spiritual chopsticks come from a close relationship to God like Paul had when he wrote, “It is no longer I who lives but Christ who lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20)  This relationship causes sensors to go off when we are about to consume something that would be unhealthy for us morally, intellectually, or spiritually.  The Chinese app is new.  God’s app has been around for thousands of years and it is the smartest app you can ever receive.

Eating food that is unclean can make you sick for a while.  Consuming things that are impure for our minds and souls can do permanent damage.

Do you have your “spiritual chopsticks” yet?  They carry with them a “life-back” guarantee that includes this life and eternal life.

Together

By John Ed Mathison
Executive Director
John Ed Mathison Leadership Ministries

An organization functions best when each person correctly accesses his/her gifts, then deploys those gifts as a part of a team effort. Organizations get into problems when some people try to assume responsibilities for which they are not gifted. Another deterrent to productivity is having one person think that his/her gifts are more important than another persons’.

A good model to follow is I Corinthians 12. Paul describes the church as the human body. My body has different parts, such as feet, hands, ears, eyes. My body does not function well if my eyes try to hear or my ears try to see. There is also dysfunction when one part of my body starts claiming that it is more important than another part. Each part is extremely important and essential for my body to function as a coordinated unit.

There is a beautiful example of this recently reported in China. A couple of eco-warriors in China are redefining what it means to work together. Jia Haixa is blind and Jia Wenqi is a double amputee who lost both his arms at age 3. They both found it very difficult to find a job.

In 2001, they decided to engage this basic principle. They began working together planting trees along the riverbank in their hometown of Hebei. Despite the fact that neither one of them could do the work by himself, they discovered that together they could accomplish amazing things. They saw their respective situations not as disabilities but as possibilities if they worked together. The 53-year-olds have now managed to plant 10,000 trees over the last 10 years!

Today they are making a modest living which is helpful to their families, but is also helping to protect their village from dangerous floods. Haixa says, “I am his hands. He is my eyes. We are good partners.” It is amazing what can happen when each person contributes his best gift to the work of the entire organization.

Working together is the “together” that makes for success. Sir Thomas Beecham, the eminent conductor of the London Symphony, on one occasion was the guest conductor in another venue and was frustrated with the seemingly undisciplined group of musicians. During the rehearsal the concert master asked Mr. Beecham how he wanted a particular section played. After a long pause, and with great emphasis, he replied, “Together!”

We may not have it all together, but together we have it all!

John Ed’s blog posts appear each week in For His Glory.
Contact: JAM Executive Suite 4,4131 Carmichael Road, Montgomery, AL 36106 Phone: 334-270-2149 Email:info@johnedmathison.org

Chest Pains Postpone Tuesday FHG Post

I spent Most of Monday and all day Tuesday in the hospital. Had some chest pains, dizziness and shortness of breath (I had open heart surgery

Battle For The Spotlight

How Big Is Your But?

Read Any “Self” Help Books Lately?