The Woodpecker

All God’s doing, and His provision, but Carol and I recognize how blessed we are, at this stage in our lives, in our senior years, to live in North Vancouver in a two-bedroom, two-bathroom suite on the third floor. The view is beautiful; we are only three blocks from the Harbor, Sea Bus, and all busing facilities and all transportation is provided and excellent for people our age. We have a million dollar view, we are retired, and God provides all our needs like He promised, you cannot find no better spot in the world! The view is of the Harbor and the tour boats, overlooking the city. All mountains behind us, Grouse, the Lions, and people come from all over the world for the views, boating, fishing, skiing etc. We are really blessed.

They say a happily-married life is when you each have your own bathroom, and own bedroom!! We are thankful for that! Our place is surrounded by big trees, beautiful. EXCEPT at this time of the year, there seems to be an influx of woodpeckers, and every morning at 4:30 or 5 o’clock, they do a lot of pecking on Carol’s bedroom roof. They probably do on mine too, but I am hard of hearing, so I don’t hear them!! So, she wakes me up, because she has got good hearing, to go take care of the woodpeckers! So the sight is this: I am standing in my shorts, with a broom handle, hitting the ceiling, and the woodpeckers fly away, looking at me through the tree, but as soon as I go back to my room, they come back knocking and wake her up again!

The reason I bring this up is there is a scripture in the Bible in Revelations chapter 3, that says Jesus is at the door of your heart, always knocking; He wants to come in! You know, before we were born, before we knew anything, God created us in His image in the womb, and he created a House for Himself, which is our Heart!!! Our Heart is God’s House!! He knocks at it and wants to come in and live in it!! He never gives up (like the woodpecker!). The reason He never gives up is because it is His House! And when we die, He takes it with Him. While we are alive here, He lives in it! I have preached myself, and heard a lot of preachers say “Give your heart to the Lord,” but I am now the other way around – I see it now as “Give Him His house back.” It is His in the first place! Our heart is His House.

When you think about it, the creator of the universe, the all-powerful God, the all-knowing God wants to live in His House, the human heart!!! All we have to do is believe Him and let Him in! Then the nice thing about that is no matter what you have in there, when he knocks and comes in, we read that God, Jesus Christ on the Cross, shed His blood to erase our sins, to take them all away. You know, when you are born, God establishes a place for Himself, and it is the heart. He does not knock at your head or feet, but he knocks at His door! He knocks at the door of His house! Whether we believe it or not, this is the creator of Heaven and Earth, and all the Universe, who created us in His image, and He is the God of Mercy, of Grace, who lives in His house, our hearts, to guide, to care, to protect, and to love us. The scripture says “Christ in us, the Hope of Glory!”

Because our heart is His, when we die, and go to eternity, the Bible says we go with Him. He takes His House with Him. “Away from the body, we are Present with the Lord.”

Jesus our redeemer came to wash away our sins, Past, Present, and Future by dying on the cross for us. He said “It is finished.” He accomplished it all!! Our role in all this is just to believe!

When I hear the “blessed” woodpeckers, I am again reminded of our great blessings in Jesus Christ, the Love, the Mercy, and the Grace of His eternal life.

God loves you; all we need to do when we hear the “knock” is to let Him in! I guarantee He will change your life, as He did mine!! God bless you, He loves you so much, may He prosper you and meet all of your needs today, in Jesus’ Name.

I Chose You

John 15:16

You did not choose me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.”

When Jesus first knocked at the door of my heart, I let Him in. My eyes were opened to everything new, new life. But I really did not know what happened! Because I had never really read or seen a Bible. Therefore, I thought I had discovered a great thing and when I mentioned that to a few people who had knowledge, I was talking as if I had discovered God, who had been lost for a long time!!! But thank God for His written word, how He speaks to us through the Bible! I then discovered Him speaking to me through these scriptures. Then I realized when I read these scriptures – He was not Lost at all!!!!! All this new life was not my idea! I was chosen by Him before the creation of time! I was already punched into His computer by Almighty God, the Creator of the universe! His purposes were already set in place for my life before creation!

Jeremiah 29:11

“‘For I know the plans that I have for you’, declares the Lord, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.’”

One of the most important things for me is this, which shows us how much God cares for and loves us:

Romans 8:38-39

“For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the Love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We can rest assured and be grateful today that we are in the Hands of a Loving Father who always cares for us and keeps us forever.

Jesus always knocks at the door of our heart. Just let Him in and enjoy Him!! God bless you; have a good day!

Encouraging Ourselves in the Midst of Disaster and Pain

One of our family members a few years ago experienced a devastating time as her home burned down. We as a family understand the emotions, problems, and suffering that people can go through in a time like that. After receiving support and much encouragement from her family, friends, and strangers, which she was very grateful for, there was still a need in her life, which was met by encouraging herself in the Lord.

In the time of big disasters, losses, hurts, fears, and grief, much suffering goes on. With what is happening during these great devastating fires in Northern Alberta today, we are encouraged to be part of others who are trying to help these people as much as possible. There is a mighty outpouring of help coming from so many sources and we rejoice for that!!

In I Samuel 30, what we see in the scriptures, is what David had to do to encourage himself when he also was faced with a major disaster. The story goes that while David was away with his 300 men fighting wars, the enemy sneaked into his home town, stole all their goods, their wives and kids, and burnt the town to the ground. Well, while David sat there thinking about all this, his 300 men were wailing, crying in desperation, having lost all their families. At that stage, they wanted to turn on David and kill him. David, after seeing all this loss and facing the threat of his army wanting to kill him he came to the conclusion that there was only one thing left to do. Nobody was encouraging David anymore; there was no more source of encouragement! His soldiers were bitter towards him and wanted to kill him, and he was alone. So David decided to find his encouragement in the Lord. His last hope was to encourage himself in the Lord His God.

To do this, he REMEMBERED and reminded himself of all the grace and mercies and love he had received in the past which God had given him before. He kept remembering and reminding himself over and over again, how good and merciful God was to him in the past, by providing for him and protecting him in the past. His only hope left was that God was coming to him again with More mercy, More grace, More love, More comfort, More hope.

When we look at it all, our only hope is in the Lord our God, who knows it all from the beginning and to the end, and has prepared the way out for each and everyone of us. Healing is in place, hope is in God, our loving Father.

Encouraging ourselves in the Lord means that we, like David, remind ourselves how many times in the past God protected, provided, and took us out of many major problems! As David did that, according to the story, the the joy of the Lord came upon him and he was dancing and singing, and then ordered his men to go after the enemy. The story goes on to say that they recaptured all their children, wives, and goods!!

With this in mind, I want to pray with each and everyone of you today, that together, the best way we can encourage ourselves in the midst of major disasters is putting fully our trust in Him, asking our all-powerful, all-knowing God together, that His healing hand, His Love and his grace, will surround and support and provide for each and everyone of you, in Jesus’ name.

Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart today. Let Him in, because He loves you!!!