Words of Encouragement

Listen to my prayer, O God, do not ignore my plea; hear me and answer me. My thoughts trouble me and I am distraught at the voice of the enemy, at the stares of the wicked; for they bring down suffering upon me and revile me in their anger. – Psalm 55:1-3

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. – Philippians 4:8

What are your thoughts? Stinking thinking. On this past Sunday, my Co-Pastor, Sis. Reid preached a message from Philippians 4:8, entitled “What are you thinking? As I sat listening to the message there were some things that the Lord spoke to me that will be our focus this week in the Words of Encouragement.

As we take a look at the scripture we see David troubled in his thinking. David is troubled because of the wickedness and the treatment he is receiving. His thoughts are so focused on what is around him, that at this very moment this is all he can see. The trouble in his life while real has become consuming.

He is troubled. Troubled means he is anxious, distressed, worried, bothered and uneasy. You know what happens when you become anxious, distressed, worried, bothered and uneasy about things you are facing in life, you become immobilized.

This is just where the enemy of our soul wants us to be, stuck in our thoughts and worried about all that isn’t going our way. I call this “stinking thinking”. It smells of the enemy’s tricks! If we are stuck thinking about what is going wrong and how the wicked seems to be prospering while we are in agony and defeat, we become depressed.

Instead what then are we to do when our thoughts are focused on the things that the wicked are doing against us? Well the first thing we see that David did that was right; he took his concerns to the Lord. There is a next step then that we need to do and that is what the scripture in Philippians tells us. We have to change our focus. We have to change our focus from stinking thinking, thinking about those defeating things, to the good things of the Lord. We need to begin to affirm to ourselves that we have victory in Jesus. That the enemy is already defeated in our lives and we can trust God to do what he has said he will do.
Today I pray for someone that has stinking thinking. God change our thoughts so that we will not dwell our thoughts in those things that smell of defeat and destruction. Help us to change our thoughts so that we can think your thoughts and walk in your way.

The Week in Review

Family First!
This was taken from a conference I lead in October 2005. We will look at the points this month about how we can help our children be better prepared, and how to put family first! This is the study guide and overview. I will share the teaching on each of these areas this month.


RAISING HEALTHY CHILDREN
Conference Leader: Jewel D. Williams

And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD. Isaiah 11:2 KJV

We should desire good characteristics in our children. What that looks like through Christ.

He first has God’s spirit – We need to nurture their spiritual life.
He has wisdom and understanding - We need to nurture their understanding of the things of God.
He has counsel and might- We need to nurture their ability to influence good in others and to give Godly counsel.
He had knowledge – We need to nurture them to have fellowship with God.
He had the fear of the Lord – We need to nurture them to have reverence for God.

Christ is our example of what a healthy child looks like.And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man. Luke 2:52 KJV

Increase in stature: The natural height of a human, an achieved level. What can we do in this area that helps our children physical growth as well as their spiritual growth? What things can we do around food that directs them toward the Lord?
Favour: Friendly or favorable regard, approval or support. How do we help our children find favor with man and with God? What do we model in this area? Discipline God’s way.
Increase in wisdom: The ability to discern or judge what is true, right or lasting. We are our children’s first teachers on what is true and what is right. We are their first teachers on how they should handle the things in their lives.
A. How to suffer – I know that as a parent our first response to this is, “I don’t want my child to go through any pain”, so out of our love we will protect them from the things that will hurt them. Yes there is some wisdom in that belief. Now you don’t want to sit back and watch your child burn him or herself when you can take them away from the fire that will hurt. There are however times when your child will suffer and what you do with that situation can make a great impact on them and help them to grow in their understanding of God.

But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man. For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Hebrews 2:9-10
For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: 1 Peter 2:20
B. Encouragement - We should be our children’s best supporter.

C. What do we look like? - What are we planting in our children’s lives? Taking a personal inventory of our choices and how we handle the day-to-day situations. Do our actions turn our children toward God or away?

Conclusion – Once we understand the importance of our actions and our support of our children, what are the next steps to take? We will look at the personal changes we must make to bring about the desired behavior in our children.

The Week in Review

Jewel's Gems
“The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing but the Truth”
Originally preached by Jewel D. Williams at Faith COG 8/06
Colossians (READ 2:6 – 23)

See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than Christ” – Colossians 2:8

This letter was written by Paul to warn the people of the Jewish Zealots who pressed the necessity of observing the ceremonial law, and to fortify them against the mixture of the Gentile philosophy (worldly beliefs) with their Christian principles. In other words, Paul is cautioning them against deceptive words. The way Satan spoils souls is by beguiling them, deceiving them. He deceives them and then by doing so, he slays them. He could not ruin us if he did not cheat us and he could not cheat us but by our own fault and foolishness to listen to his lies.

Paul also writes this letter to warn them against those that try to persuade them to worship angels. We see this today, the fascination of individuals to angels as the messengers of God, and not looking to the true God for the answers to life. This letter is two fold, to assure the Colossian (as well as the Laodicians, who are supposed to receive a copy of this letter) of Paul’s interest and care. He wants them to be fully receptive to Christ in their midst. The second reason involves false teaching and teachers who may be misleading some in the church. Their arguments sound impressive, but are based on human traditions and basic principles of the world, instead of Christ. Paul’s concern was for the people to stay grounded in the truth of God. Paul presents this letter to fight against heresy (falsehood) at work. Some believed in a form of legalism, that their works rather than God’s free gift of grace was what was needed. He sends this letter because some believed harsh treatment of the body was a means of earning divine favor and growing spiritually (if you do some study you see this belief is part of some of the Hindu religions, self sacrifice, self-mutilation and self-denial). He was calling for them to hold on to the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth of God.

I read a book about how we present the gospel to individuals today. In this book, the author said, if Disney made a movie of what is taking place in our churches, it would be called, “HONEY WE’RE SHRINKING THE GOSPEL”. How is this happening?

Reflection: How do you think we are shrinking the Gospel of Jesus Christ?

Come back for part II of the message, The Truth, the Whole Truth and nothing but the Truth.

Words of Encouragement

When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the LORD thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy saviour: I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Isaiah 43:2-3

Walking over on dry ground. God is in the deep, part 2. This week, I gave the steps for walking through on "dry ground". Today’s scripture reinforces that message. I love how God's word will say something over and over again. Why? God’s word will reinforce itself so that we get the message. This scripture is reminding us of whom we can trust in. It's a scripture of comfort. It let's us know that yes, we will have to go through some things, but God is in control. He is able to handle everything we face.

When we pass through the water, He's with us. So when the "floods" of life come, we can get through it, because He is with us. Have you ever seen a raging river? When the waters are flowing, people have been sweep away, because they underestimated the force of the water. Sometimes that's what happens to us in this life, we underestimate the force of the raging rivers in our lives. But even in those situations, God says he will keep us from getting sweep away. He's able to pick you up out of the raging rivers and place you on a safe, dry ground.

When life turns up the heat on you, you don't have to get burned! Why? God is in control. Not only can He keep you from getting burned, he can keep back the smell of the fire off you. Think about the Hebrew boys in the furnace. They were in the midst of the fire, but they were not burned, and they were not loss, why? Because God was in the midst. Not only did they come out of the furnace, but also the Lord kept the flame from kindling them (or scorching their clothes). So we can go through life’s "fires" but we can come out FREE. Why? God is in control.
I don't have to walk around with anger, hurts, or anything that holds me in bondage, because I can come out of those fires, without even the scent of every having been in it.

WHY? Because the Holy One, the Savior, the LORD, GOD is in control. Praise His Holy Name! When you go to worship this week, know that victory is ahead of you. No matter what your situation is, God is already in the midst of it, waiting for you so he can see you through. God praising him for what he is already doing in you and what he will continue to do.

Words of Encouragement

The priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel passed by until the whole nation had completed the crossing on dry ground. – Joshua 3: 17

Walking over on dry ground. God is in the deep, part 1. The priests walked into the deepest end of the Jordan, right in the middle and stood firm. As they stood firm, the people walked completely across the Jordan on dry ground to the other side. Let us look at this for a moment, before all the people crossed over, the priest with the ark were already in the middle waiting for them to reach them. This is a reminder for us that before we even reach the deepest end of our situations, the darkest hour, or the most difficult place, God is already their waiting to see us safely through.

When you're in the deep end, God is there. And as the priest stood firm, you can stand firm in the depth of your situations. God will continue to be in our situations until we have made it to the other side. And you don't have to be even slightly touched by the waters. They walked on dry ground. We can walk on dry ground. We don't have to be heavy from the waters taking us over. Have you ever tried to walk in wet clothes? It takes a long time for them to get dry and they can be quite uncomfortable. We'll they didn't have to reach the other side and be held down by the load. They reached the other side, free. So can we. We can be free as we go through to the other side of our situations.

Remember that when the floods of this life would seem to be over taking you, you can still be "dry" and get to the other side, to the finish of the problem. I am praying for us this week that we hear the steps God has for us to find the victory he has for us. We must listen to him. That means we must come away from the distractions and come and here him alone. We must be willing to follow even those instructions we find strange. Then we must move to carry them out. We then have to move by faith and trust that God is already in the midst preparing our safe journey to our victory.

Words of Encouragement

Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water's edge, the water from upstream stopped flowing. It piled up in a heap a great distance away, at a town called Adam in the vicinity of Zarethan, while the water flowing down to the Sea of the Arabah (the Salt Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho. – Joshua 3:15-16

Walking over on dry ground. Step out in the water. The scripture pauses in the telling of this story to tell us about the condition of the waters. The water is at a flood state. In other words, the water is high and often not contained by the shores. Yet, this is the water they are told to walk across. How can this be, the water is too high? They simply must step out into the waters. They must step in faith knowing the waters will be cut of (we walk by faith, not by sight).

Isn't in interesting that the water didn't stop first? Why do you think that was? I believe it was because God wanted the people to trust Him. So they had to start walking right into what seemed to be an impossible situation. Well that's what God wants us to do. We sometimes try to run or hide from our situations. Sometimes we just wish they would go away. (Well most times). But the Lord wants us to trust Him and walk after Him, even when our situations look like they will over take us.

There are some situations in our lives at time that seem impossible to cross, but God has given us instruction to come and listen to his word. When we do we are given detailed information on what to do and how to proceed. It is interesting to note that God’s instruction was not for them to run away from this impossibility, but to travel toward it. God’s instruction for us is the same. He does not tell us to run away from the impossible situations in our lives but to walk toward them. He tells us to move out of our comfort zone and go towards that which seems impossible. He doesn’t tell us to go alone, however, because he goes before us.

When we come face to face with that thing, he then tells us, step out. He does not move the situation first, he test us to see if we will trust him. When we step out into the waters that seem to be uncontainable, he then shows us he can contain them. God piled the waters up so that the children could step into the water and touch the dry ground.

God will pile up; stop the water from coming in and flooding us so that we can walk through the impossible situations on dry ground. I pray for us this week so that we can know that God has our victory just ahead.

Words of Encouragement

Now then, choose twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one from each tribe. And as soon as the priests who carry the ark of the LORD -the Lord of all the earth—set foot in the Jordan, its waters flowing downstream will be cut off and stand up in a heap." So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant went ahead of them. – Joshua 3:12-14

Walking over on dry ground. Set the instruction to actions. In the 12th verse of Joshua it reads, "Now then, chose twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one from each tribe." Here Joshua gives the people instructions. First they listened, now they have to set in order those things that need to be in place. When we are going through something, we have to listen and then follow what the Lord tells us, even when we don't understand the reason why. We also have to follow Him exactly as He tells us to. We are not to change the instruction at all.

The people could not wait for God to do first and then move, they were instructed to set out and when they did, then God would move. This setting the instructions of the Lord into action is a call to living faith. We speak about having faith in God, but how often do we make it a living faith? How often do we say we believe God’s word to be true and act as if we do?

When the people were ready to move and follow what God had told them to do, they broke camp and the ark went before them first. Some of us have gotten too comfortable in our “camps” and we are not ready to break the relationship or attachments with those “camps”. Those camps are places where we have gotten comfortable and all our creature comforts are being meet. Yet, the instruction from the Lord is calling us to come from those creature comforts, to break out of those strongholds and move in the way he is instructing us.

When we move forward from those places, God promises to go before us. He promises us that he will walk before us so that we will know what way to go. I pray for us today that we would set out against that which is holding us stationary and follow the instructions of the Lord. When we do, we set out to find our victory.