December 2007

CHAPLAIN’S CORNER

Greetings to all from snowy Nebraska, as winter has come after a beautiful fall.  Right now we are anticipating another snow storm today and tomorrow.  What fun to frolic while attempting to clear walks and driveway.  It becomes more of a chore as I get older.  I need to apologize for not writing last quarter.  I have been walking a valley of late and really struggling for the last four months.  But God!!  He has seen fit to allow me to begin to come on the other side of this trial.  Some days it is all I can do to just get up, go to work, and survive.  It is at times very difficult to understand, but ours is not to question the wisdom of a loving God.  I trust some of you can relate to what I write.

We hosted Thanksgiving this year and we were pleased to have Shane (our oldest son) and his family here along with Caleb (our youngest) home from Ft Riley.  We had a very good time together fellowshipping around the table before we ate.  We all talked of what we are thankful for and many points were discussed.  I am most thankful for my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, who saved my retched soul.  He has completely changed my life and gave my sons opportunities to grow up without some of the junk I grew up with.

I am also more thankful than I can express for the many men and women who serve in our military today, so that we can live the way we do here in the United States of America.  Thanks also to each one of you for your sacrifice to your country.  My nephew, SPC Jeptha Breece, is just now returning from his second tour in Iraq.  God and his grace has seen fit to deliver him once again.  Please pray for him as he has had to go through some tough times and is very raw right now.  We all know what that is like.

We now are on the threshold of the Christmas season.  What does this season mean to you?  To some, it is the presents.  To many, the gathering of family.  To others, perhaps it is a time that is very difficult to endure because of loved ones lost.  Perhaps you are one who has had to endure and are alone.  I would encourage you with this; you don’t need to suffer with being alone.

A little over 2,000 years ago there was a birth, one that would change the course of history.  The God who created this universe had a plan.  That plan would be for virgin to give birth to a Son.  Many today when they think of Christmas, they think of the baby in the manger.  While this is a valid point, we need to focus on the mission of this Jesus.  He was born of a virgin conceived of the Holy Ghost.  Matt 1:21 says, And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.  He was 100% man and 100% God.  He came to do what man could not do for himself.  Reconcile sinful man with a holy God. 

Born that day in Bethlehem, he had come to earth to fulfill the law, the Ten Commandments.  Something no other person could do.  No matter how we try, we absolutely are not good enough to keep the law.  If we tell one lie in our entire life, and commit no other sins, we have broken the law and are condemned to hell.  We sin simply because we are sinners.  We are born with what is called the Adamic nature, a nature we inherited from that first man, Adam. when he sinned in the Garden.  Man was created to fellowship with God, and through Christ we can once again come to that place.  Christ saw his mission through.  He lived a perfect life, fulfilled the prophetic scriptures of old, died and raised on the third day and now sits on the right hand of God.

But wait, it doesn’t stop there.  Soon God will tell Jesus to go gather his bride, the church.  This is referred to in Christian circles as the rapture.  This is the next event in God’s timetable.  You do not want to be left behind.  Who will be taken up?  Glad you asked.  Those who are ‘born again’ into the family of God.  When one is ‘saved’ from his sin, he becomes eligible to meet the Lord in the air on that great rapture day. 

My friend, I say again, you do not want to be left behind.  We only have to look around us and we can see the birth pains as the world travails.  Men are deceiving and being deceived, just as the scripture says.  Men have been turned over to a reprobate mind.  We are experiencing the children of disobedience as evidenced by the horrific carnage at the West Roads Mall in Omaha last Wednesday.  This nation is in great peril because we have thrown God from our government, our schools, and sadly from most churches.  The great falling away in the church that is talked of in the scripture is in full bloom.  Most pulpits are filled with hirelings who are just in the ‘business’ of entertaining christianettes with sermonettes. 

This last paragraph sounds pretty bad.  Yes it does, and it will definitely get worse.  It should drive you to your knees for salvation if you aren’t saved, and it should drive us all who are saved to our knees to pray for mercy. 

May the Lord bless you all during this season, give you grace in your traveling, and most of all, bless and illuminate your mind as you read this.  If you have any questions, please write or call………………………..and keep looking up as your redemption draweth nigh.