Pulling up your anchor and Setting your Sails

Gal 5:16 So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature.

Did you notice that the Apostle Paul's verse in Gal 5:16 does not say that you must FIRST not gratify the sinful nature before you can be filled with the spirit. This is an extremely significant principal in living a SPIRIT RENOVATED life. You see it is utterly impossible for the flesh to overthrow the flesh. (Romans 8:7-8) The flesh can learn coping skills, can create certain disciplines that can try to harness and train the flesh in the very same way a circus performer trains a bear to dance. That type of disaplined performance will always remain contrary to the bears inner programed character, and given the right sense of circumstances the bear will reveal its true character. Thus for the believer the FIRST step to find VICTORY over the destructive behaviors of the flesh is to be filled with the spirit. Being Filled with the spirit is first admitting your weakness  (Romans 7:15-25 and your need and then yielding of ones mind,will and emotion in complete submission to God. It is like a Sailboat offering the tattered cloth of its sail to the wind in order that it might receive a fresh billow of fresh wind and fresh power that propels the life into those amazing ports of destiny God has designed. (Joshua 3:5,Rom 8:2) The word for wind in Hebrew is Ruach and the Greek word is Pneuma both of these words are also used to translate the word for the Spirit of God. So how much have you sails have you set towards god today ? Are you aimlessly drifting by your weak fleshly strength ?  Cast off the Anchors of doubt and self reliance today and offer the members of you body to God today as instruments of His rightousness.

DISCOVERING DAILY

Discovering Daily Who Christ Really Is

Discovering Daily Who Christ Really Is
a poem by Bonnie Hain

Discovering daily who God really is,
Thanking Him daily He’s mine and I’m His,
Discovering daily God’s great love for me;
Such mercy, forgiveness, amazingly free.

Discovering daily that God really cares,
Discovering daily He does answer prayers,
Discovering daily what grace really means:
Unmerited favor beyond all my dreams.

Discovering daily God speaking to me;
He speaks through the Bible. Once blind, now I see.
Discovering, discovering each day that I live
That all that I need, He freely will give.

Discovering daily Christ working through me,
Accomplishing daily what never could be.
Discovering daily: I can’t, but He can;
Thanking Him daily for my place in His plan.

Discovering daily how real life can be
When I’m living in Christ and He’s living in me.
Discovering daily a song in my heart
With anticipation for each day to start.

Delighting and basking in love so divine,
Secure in the knowledge I’m His and He’s mine.
Besides mere contentment, excitement I see!
A daily adventure: Christ living in me!

This poem was written and given to a friend of mine Bob Hobson who led Bonnie to Christ days after she tried to commit subside by cutting both wrists in her bath tub.. Bob also helped Bonnie discover how to daily allow Jesus to live His life thru her which dramatically transformed her life. Bonnie Discovered THE SECRET TO HIGHLY EFFECTIVE CHRISTIANITY

Yesterday was an amazing Jesus day...read this letter 

08/28/2012

About a year ago, I was caught with a controlled substance and the situation of that was very strange to say the least but that is a different story, but because of that I was required to do 50 hours of community service. I went to CrossFire today to complete some of those hours and when I was there I met a very nice young man, named andy and worked with him all day. At around 1:45 pm, a man named David Twite came into crossfire and asked us if we had eaten. I was starving, but I didn’t bring any money, thinking well I can not pay for anything; he immediately said his treat. We went down the street to a sandwich shop, we sat outside and for most of the lunch he was talking to andy about his issues and the internal struggle of your old life and your life with christ.

Honestly it seemed like every thing David said was directly related to my situation and resinated inside me and just made sense perfectly to my situation. All of a sudden he stopped and looked right into my eyes and pointed at me and said “I believe I’m here for you.” This immediately raised hairs on the back of my neck because of how it seemed like everything he was saying was too me anyway. He continued to say that “You have a great purpose in life, Christ has plans for you.”

 My entire life I have always had this intense feeling that I was meant to something great; That everything would be okay no matter how bad things got, I knew at the end of the day I would be fine and have everything I need. I think a lot of people have this feeling but the difference I feel is that I just knew, there is no doubt in my mind. Everything just clicked for me from then on, a few minutes after David had directed the conversation to me, my brother Bryan Rensberry, came to pick me up for work. Which was just as David asked me if I was ready to accept christ into my life.

This was all part of god’s plan, something that took place over one year ago, sent me to crossfire to meet David, and gave him the words to reach me and I will be forever grateful to him for that. It was like a bolt a lightning struck me in the heart because I did something that for 23 years I never thought I would and I accepted Christ and committed my life to Christ right there on the spot. There were too many signs so obviously placed in front of me I couldn't ignore them, and earlier in the lunch David had even talked about Christ is always there and the signs are always around us but it is ultimately our choice to accept or ignore them. My eyes and heart our now open to the love of Jesus Christ and I will do everything I can to spread his love through me to others around me.  

Thank you very much David, I could never repay you for what you have done for me. I honestly feel like weight was lifted from my heart today.

Forever Grateful,

Craig Rensberry 

Below is the web address to the message I gave last Friday night at a Men's conference.

THE SECRET TO HIGHLY EFFECTIVE CHRISTIANITY

http://www.firstfree.org/content.cfm?id=328


August 24  7pm  First Free
in Personal Change
A Powerful Lesson
Sadly, many people today have settled for a "dumbed down, low octane" version of the Christian life– a life that is far from God’s intended purpose. David Twite will share how one biblical secret has impacted every area of his life, and how it’s been a dynamic game-changer in his Christian walk. Failure to discover this one vital
principal will leave sincere Christians with a dull, ineffective faith experience.
Speaker: David Twite
David Twite is the President of MacDonald & Owen Lumber Company - Inc. 5000,
and also serves as the Executive Director of Crossfire Ministries.
He is married and has 5 children.

The Rise and Fall of Nations

(1787)Edward Gibbon, author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, has attributed the fall of the Empire to:

1. The rapid increase of divorce; the undermining of the dignity and sanctity of the home, which is the basis of human society.

2. Higher and higher taxes and the spending of public monies for free bread and circuses for the populace.

3. The mad craze for pleasure; sports becoming every year more exciting and more brutal.

4. The building of gigantic armaments when the real enemy was within, the decadence of the people.

5. The decay of religion -- faith fading into mere form, losing touch with life and becoming impotent to warn and guide the people.

Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

2 Tim 3:1-3 But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. ² People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, ³ without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good,

LIBERTY UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR EMER TOWN'S INTRODUCTION TO THE DEEPER LIFE
Since my conversion experience on July 25, 1950, I have never once doubted my salvation. I have had a presence of Christ in my life that I can only explain by the phrase ". . . Christ lives
in me . . ." (Galatians 2:20 NKJV).
However, Easter Sunday following my conversion, I experienced a special communion
with God that I had not previously felt. At the time I was discouraged, even though I knew I was saved and I knew Christ lived within me. At about 9:00 A.M. I was waiting for my ride to Sunday school. At the time I taught in a small Presbyterian mission called Capital View Community Chapel, outside Columbia, South Carolina. My ride was approximately thirty minutes late that morning. During that time I meditated on the meaning of Galatians 2:20, especially the phrase ". . . Christ lives in me. . . ."
Another phrase in that verse, " . . . I live by the faith of the Son of God. . ." challenged me. For the first time I realized that Christ rose on the first Easter of history, but that morning He lived in my heart. I experienced His fullness, and for the first time I experienced His faith working within me. As I stood in the warm sun, waiting for my ride, I volitionally yielded anew to God. I asked Jesus Christ to give me victory by living His faith through me. Jesus Christ had never gotten discouraged, and I wanted to live above discouragement. I wanted not only faith that could trust God for money, but also faith that would not worry about anything. I wanted to trust completely in Him. What I experienced was inward reality. I did not kneel in prayer, nor did I close my eyes. I simply talked to Jesus and yielded everything to Him. I asked Jesus Christ to live His life through me. That morning, for the first time in my Christian life, I fully experienced the meaning of the resurrection life. The previous year, when I was still unsaved, Easter had simply been a historical fact. Now I had come to know personally the One who was raised from the dead; and He was not only at the right hand of God in heaven. Christ was alive in my heart. Little did I know that the inner presence of Jesus Christ in me would be tested. But that morning I did not have a care in the world, because I had the faith of Christ.
Later, Dr. R. C. McQuilkin, president of Columbia Bible College, explained in a class that he too had sought victory that comes by Jesus Christ. He explained that each year he went to a youth conference and got his spiritual bucket filled, but during the ensuing months the bucket went dry. Then one year he completely surrendered to Jesus Christ and accepted the Word of God by faith and "sank a well of his own." That Easter Sunday morning I experienced what Dr. McQuilkin and thousands of others experienced. Jesus promised, "But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life" (John 4:14 NKJV). 

So Great Salvation

this is an awesome book on the Christian life which you can read free on line.

Blessings

Dave

http://www.ccel.us/keswick.intro.html

ARE WE LIVING A LIFE WORTH IMITATION?

1 Thessalonians 1:6 And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, when you received the message with joy that comes from the Holy Spirit, despite great affliction

William J. Bennett once said, “We—all of us, need around us individuals who possess a certain nobility, a largeness of soul, and qualities of human experience worth imitating and striving for.”

Sadly far to many Christian’s are living far beneath their spiritual potential of influence. “I once saw a bumper sticker that said, “don’t follow me, I’m lost too. They are like the commercial airplane pilot who told his passengers, “I have some good news and some bad news. The bad news is we are lost, but the good news is we are making good time.”

A life worth imitating is a life fully submitted to our indwelling Lord Jesus.

( 1 Cor 11:1)This is a life lived in the fullness of the Holy Spirit (Gal 6:5) so that  the resurrection life of Jesus Christ is the origin of our actions.

The Christian life is not hard ,it is impossible to live in human strength. (See Galatians 3) Major Ian Thomas told me once something I would never forget. He told me “The only thing God expects from you in your humanness is failure.” In John 15:5 Jesus makes this clear when he say’s apart from me you can do “nothing.” I came to this amazing discovery that God intends to do his work thru us. All I must do is Submit to his enabling power and cooperate with his work in our life. MINISTRY is not what we are doing for God, Ministry is only that activity that GOD DOES THRU US.

2 Cor 4:10 our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies.

The life worth imitation is a life that by submission and obedience to Christ indwelling presences is allowing Jesus to express his life and character thru us.

ARE YOU LIVING A LIFE WORTH IMITATION?  

Are you spending time at the feet of Jesus?

Luke 10:41  Martha, Martha you are worried and upset about many things, but only ONE THING is needed. Mary has chosen that which is better and it will not be taken away from her.

Martha was busy for Jesus-
Martha - comes from the same root as MARA=BITTER- Since bitter was a strong taste it also means Lady Boss a strong personality. Here is a woman bitter in her efforts to earn the approval of Jesus.

Martha and Mary were sister's to Lazarus who dies.

Martha religion DISTRACTED her from a relationship.
Martha's faith was PERFORMANCE CENTERED  -She may have been seeking his approval. - She was questioning if Jesus CARED (vs 40)
Martha was SELF focused rather than JESUS FOCUSED


What we learn sitting at the feet of Jesus and listening can never be taken from us.

John 11:2  describes what Mary was doing while at the feet of Jesus. “Now Mary was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.

ARE YOU SPENDING TIME AT THE FEET OF JESUS?

These are deep truths
At the feet of Jesus we deepen our relationship to him.
At the feet of Jesus we have personal one on one talks
At the feet of Jesus we get his personal custom made answers to our deepest questions
At the feet of Jesus we communicate our deepest pains and our greatest needs
At the feet of Jesus we grow in our experiential knowledge of Him allowing us to deepen our Love
At the feet of Jesus we have intimate dialogue
At the feet of Jesus we can have our questions answered
At the feet of Jesus we can escape the distractions of lives business.


Our ministry can get out of Balance when we neglect spending meaningful intimate time with Jesus
Author AW Tozer his readers of warns of THE BARRENNESS OF A BUSY LIFE.

Christ in You

The greatest discovery I made since coming to faith in Christ was discovering how allowing Jesus Christ to live in you is the secret to a powerful Christian life. Major Ian Thomas has been my spiritual mentor after reading his book the Saving Life of Christ.  Here is a link to a power video that could be the game changer in your life as well.

Salvation made simple

Here is a great audio by Rick Warren that I have used many times to share with non-believers on what it means to receive Christ.
click link to download audio

Discovering your Blessings in Christ

Far to many people are experiencing only a small portion of what God has available for them to live a dynamic and victorious Christian life. Discover more on how you can tap into the unsearchable riches of Christ.
Click here to download audio

Where is Jesus during the Storms of Life

Many of us experience the storms of life from time to time and this message will help discover how to navigate during lives challenges and draw upon the power of Christ.
Click to download this audio