Urgent prayer requests. My phone’s still broken (american phone line (text only) I can get texts but I can’t answer you. I do have wassap however +55050510927 🙂 Horrible transportation problems (finding a GOOD used car) All are mission critical. Pretty demoralizing). Also pray for the guaymi indians that I worked with in Panama. Severe persecution for them right now. Many are murdered or imprisoned. Pray Especially for Guaymi Christian friends in Panama. Especially Rogelio, Idolia and Pastor Septimo (ex witch doctor). Pray for all of his 7 Guaymi church plants. Must be extremely difficult for all of them. Google bocas del toro guaymi!
Matthew 12:2 They departed into their own country a different way
This verse shows that after meeting Jesus, they went a different way because God told them to. They changed their direction.
The message of the Bible is simple. BELIEVE AND REPENT. You can’t really repent until you really meet Jesus and believe in Him. He will CHANGE your life. Often people say ‘I tried going to church and being a Christian, I didn’t work’. Trying has nothing to do with being saved. And the repentance comes naturally afterwards. Because you will REALLY BELIEVE IN JESUS ONCE YOU’VE MET HIM. Once you really believe in Him, you WILL REPENT (CHANGE) OF ANYTHING THAT HE DOESN’T LIKE!
Are the saved born again Christians sinless? No way! But, speaking for myself, sin is falling off of me, and it’s attraction, every day. It’s a process. I can honestly say I don’t intentionally sin anymore after 30 years of being saved. I still blow it bad. But out of stupidity, not intentionally. If I realize I sinned, for example by exaggerating, or telling a half truth, I force myself to go back and ask for forgiveness. Boy, doing that a couple times cures you fast!
I have a friend who said he met a Christian who was the ‘real deal’. My friend is a Christian too, but that phrase ‘real deal’ is really demeaning. If we’re really saved, we are all the ‘real deal’. Many are called and few are chosen for sure, but those ‘few’ are in the millions, maybe billions, We are all the ‘real deal’ if we believe in our heart that Jesus rose from the dead and confess Him with our mouth.
Then my friend went on with demeaning other Christians. He said this ‘real deal’ didn’t shove tracts at people and annoy them with preaching. I couldn’t believe my ears. I’m glad this ‘real deal’ impressed him, the way he described the ‘real deal’ impressed me too. But annoying people with tracts and preaching (might just be giving your testimony) is our job. We are commanded too! Winnie and I personally give out about 5000 tracts (one at a time) a year and I share the Gospel continually with all people I am with. I lose many friends, family, opportunities doing so, but I love them and don’t want them to go to hell.
I really believe if you are not changed when you get ‘saved’ you really aren’t saved, you haven’t met Jesus. You only change when you truly repent. 2 huge changes happened to me when I got saved. 1. I fell in love with children. Before I couldn’t stand being around noisy kids. I didn’t go to Mcdonald’s for that reason. I have loved kids madly ever since I got saved, even the noisy ones. 2. I am truly concerned about other people’s souls. BURDENED! I am constrained to tell them about Jesus.
2 Cor 5:14. For the love of Christ constraineth us
I mess up continually for the concern and love I have for people but it comes out of good intentions. I think if you don’t care if someone is going to hell, you need to see if you are really saved. Everyone I see, I see as going to heaven. I get criticized a lot for calling everyone brother and sister. I do that because I see everyone I come into contact with as going to heaven, by faith.
Hebrews 11:1 says, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”