As I look back over the weekend even though it was exhausting I see how God is working in our church.  Over the past week I personally felt disconnected and even though I was spending time in the word and praying I just felt like my prayers weren’t getting any higher that the ceiling fan.  I spent all week in a funk…just irritated all the time and just off mentally and emotionally.  I told you Friday that I went to lunch with a brother and talked and found out he had felt the same way.  Well after more discussion with other Christian brothers we found that they were the same way and eventually even talked with our senior pastor only to discover he was also the same way.  So we corporately had a time of alter prayer yesterday during service and that was the final lifting straw and I think that we all realized that some of our church has lost it’s passion for going the extra mile.  That we have “settled” into a place where we are getting comfortable and starting to plateau.  It was just awesome to see God work in our men to call our attention to the things that we as a church body needed to figure out.  So I again really encourage you to find an accountability partner that you confide in and trust.  I hope that you have already taken the time today to seek God and his wisdom!  I hope that everyone has a blessed day! ~ In Christ Tyler

Well as you can see I missed yesterday so I will be transparent as let everyone know that I got under satan’s yoke yesterday and got so busy that I didnt do my blog like I was supposed to.  Remember this:

BUSY
B = Being
U= Under
S= Satan’s
Y= Yoke

Today’s blog is going to be a little different in that I am not going to blog about a certain peice of scripture, rather a biblical principle that was re-inforced to me today by one of the men that I respect the most in my life.  Now I want to preface this by saying that he is probably the closest thing I have to a brother.  He has not been a christian more that 5 years but he has put christian principles in place in his life that he walks.  I know christians that have not done that and they have been saved their whole lives.  But my whole point is that he and I met for lunch today and he and I just talked and were very transparent with each other about what was going on in our lives and out struggles and all the things that we were dealing with.  And we found areas that we needed to be accountable on and were able to discuss and talk through and it was a time to get all of the stress of life and guilt that satan puts on us behind us and get back to what matters.  Serving God and living a life that is honest, true, and devoted…not just going through the motions but really devoted.  So my principle for the day is do you have someone in your life that is not your spouse that is a brother or sister in Christ that can ask the hard questions and personal questions and help you get through the tough struggles in life.  If not you need to find one…we as Christians need accountability partners that can love us enough to hold us to the fire.  But to have an accountability partner you must be willing to be accountable and willing to be transparent to them.  I encourage you to find one…it makes the struggles and the walk in life much more bearable.  In Christ ~ Tyler

I tell you what…the devil wastes no time.  As all believers know when you step out in faith and do God’s will the devil hates it and I believe that when you are taking steps to further God’s kingdom he hates it even more and begins to bring a “shock and awe” to your life.  Well this morning as I wake up to do my bible study and found that the MBR and the partition table on my main hard drive on my desktop are corrupted.  To the non-IT professional that means my computer wont boot.  Now the “funny” thing about that is that I just spent 20 days restoring my back up solution from a partition problem (that one I caused) and did not want to put all of the data back onto the external drive so I left it on the main drive (which is the one that is having the issue) which means that I will have to recover the recovered data again (slightly irritating).  But in all of this chaos and feelings that everything is falling down around me (remember I am a computer geek…when your computer is messed up you have problems breathing ha ha ha) the Lord was still there with me this morning and continued to show me things out of his word.  Ok so now that I have all of that of my chest here is the devotion.As we come into the end of October we are just overloaded with halloween from candy sales to it seems everyone is putting witches in their windows and graves in their front yards.  And the scariest fact of all is that we have Christian believers that still celebrate this day.  I know it is because they probably do not understand the history or origins of halloween but I challenge anyone who is reading this and a believer to research it and pray that God give you wisdom on the issue.  I want to give a real brief synopsis here of the history as well as some scripture to mull over.  And the very cool thing about God is that this devotion ties into yesterday’s as well.  Let me start by giving you some facts

Halloween Facts

* Traced back to the Celtics in Ireland.
* Celtic priests, called Druids, would offer sacrifices to ghosts and spirits who were believed to be wandering the earth during Samhain. Some sacrifices were humans. Their intent was to please these demons so they would leave them alone.
* The orange and black colors that are depictive of Halloween come from the bon fires that the Druids made to perform their sacrifices. The fire gave off orange color against a dark sky.
* “Halloween” literally means, “c.1745, Scottish shortening of Allhallow-even “Eve of All Saints, last night of October” (1556), the last night of the year in the old Celtic calendar, where it was Old Year’s Night, a night for witches. Another pagan holiday given a cursory baptism and sent on its way. Hallowmas “All-saints” is first attested 1389.” (Reference: Dictionary.com)
* “Hallow” means to honor as Holy.
* Those who follow Wicca in today’s world embrace Halloween as a high and holy day.
* Here is a sample off of a wicca website their opinion of the day…(this is the only thing that I felt comfortable putting on my site there are other things that are much worse)”Hallowe’en is undoubtedly the most magical time of the year in many people’s minds, but do you know what special, seasonal spells are traditionally cast? This time of year requires a certain sort of magic”

What the Bible Says

1 Thessalonians 5:21-22 (“Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil.”)
James 1:27 (“keep oneself from being polluted by the world”)
3 John 1:11 (“do not imitate what is evil”)
Romans 12:9 (“abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good.”)
Deuteronomy 18:9-14 (do not learn to imitate detestable ways, including spiritists, sorcerers and witchcraft)
Ephesians 5:11-12 (“Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness” / “live as children of light”)
1 Timothy 4:1 (don’t “follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons”)
2 Corinthians 6:14-17 (“what fellowship can light have with darkness?”)
Philippians 4:8 (think about pure, lovely, noble things)
1 Corinthians 11:1 (“follow the example of Christ”)
1 Corinthians 10:31 (“whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God”)
James 4:7-8 (submit yourselves to God / resist the devil / purify your hearts)
Ezekiel 44:23 (“…teach my people… to distinguish between the unclean and the clean.”)
Proverbs 22:6 (“train a child in the way he should go”)
Matthew 18:6 (“if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin…”)
Hosea 4:6 (“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.”)
John 3:19-20 (people love darkness instead of light)
Romans 13:12 (“put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.”)
Ephesians 6:11-18 (“take your stand against the devil’s schemes.”)

Ok well this has been a long one so I hope that you will pass this along to those that you know that still participate in this day and remember that if we train up our children right to know the difference between dark and light they won’t feel like they are missing out on something.

Take Care and God Bless ~ Tyler

This morning as I was reading the book of Titus, I came across scripture that absolutely came alive to me and I wanted to pass that along so that we could all benefit from it. As Christians that live in a godless world, a world that thinks we are hypocritical and judgmental we must always be mindful of our thoughts, actions, speech, and attitudes. Look at this scripture from Titus 1:7-9

7Since an overseer is entrusted with God’s work, he must be blameless—not overbearing, not quick-tempered, not given to drunkenness, not violent, not pursuing dishonest gain. 8Rather he must be hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined. 9He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.

To live in this world and not uphold these standards is to be of this world. And this is clearly against what scripture tells us in James 1:27

27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

This came alive to me in that when we fail at these things the world discredits us and God. They see our failures as proof that we are no different from them so why do they need God. So as we go through each day we should prepare by spending our early moments with God and putting on the armor of light as we are instructed to do in Romans 13:12.

12 The night is nearly over, and the daylight is near, so let us discard the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.

I hope that we are all spending that time with Him and growing closer and stronger.

God Bless ~ Tyler