When new Christians begin memorizing Bible verses, Philippians 4:4 is almost always included. It says “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice!”

But when those young Christians discover that Paul wrote that verse while confined to prison, shackled in chains, it suddenly takes on a whole new meaning. Rejoice always, even when your faith might cost you your life!

Crises have a way of forcing us to clarify what we actually believe. Paul was excited when his faith landed him in prison because he discovered that the Gospel was being preached even more. In Philippians 1:12, he says “But I want you to know, brethren, that the things which happened to me have actually turned out for the furtherance of the gospel.”

In other words, his crisis was not a crisis of faith. It was a crisis because of his faith. And it was a crisis that resulted in his faith being strengthened, not weakened.

When Peter was charged with being friends with Christ he denied the relationship existed (Matthew 26:69-75.) The shame he felt caused him to clarify his faith. And it never failed him again.

The next time you face a crisis, your faith will be clarified one way or the other – either strong or weak. Plan to be pleased with what that crisis reveals!

Here is your copy of firstIMPRESSIONS, Volume 8.18. Live for God, on purpose.

The Pathway of
Personal Readiness

I was just a new Christian when someone gave me a copy of a manual that their church used to train people to share Christ with others. It was a fairly thick binder, that gave very specific instructions on how to start a conversation with someone, and how then to turn that conversation around to talking about the Lord. The manual contained what seemed like every possible combination of questions that a person could ask, as well as the answers that the “soul winner” should give. It even contained fully scripted conversations, including directions of what to say if the conversation turned this way or that way.

I was very impressed. I thought to myself, “Here in this one book is every possible encounter you could have while telling someone about Jesus.” And, I set about to memorize the instructions and the conversations in the manual.

It wasn’t too long afterward that I found myself very frustrated. I found it very difficult to memorize all of the scripted conversations, and even more than that, I quickly discovered that real-life conversations bore very little resemblance to the scripted patterns of the manual.

There is a far better way than memorizing a manual of soul-winning conversations. And that way is to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and allow the Lord to lead you and guide you – always being ready to give an account for the hope that lies within you. Perhaps the most powerful part of walking on Pentecostal Pathways is experiencing the opportunities the Lord opens for you to share your faith, and allowing Him to give you the words to speak at just the right time and place!

As a Spirit-filled believer, you can walk each and every day, ready at all times to powerfully do great exploits for Him! That is what we see Philip do in Acts 8:26-40 as he is led by the Lord to “go south... down from Jerusalem to Gaza” and has a divine appointment with an Ethiopian eunuch, leads him to a saving knowledge of Christ, baptizes him in water, and then is whisked away in the Spirit to Azotus, where he preaches in all the towns along the way to Caesarea.

Walking on the “Pathway of Personal Readiness” – that’s what we will see from Philip’s example this Sunday here at WFA. Don’t miss it!

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Stuck in the Church

In 1874, on an otherwise ordinary day, Elisha Grey walked into the sanctuary of the Highland Park Presbyterian Church and made history. He strung a large spool of telegraph wire throughout the church in an effort to create the telephone – a Greek word: tele, meaning “far away,” and phone, meaning “voice.” Grey believed two people could speak to each other from distant points using nothing but liquid-based microphones and wire.

Low and behold, the crazy thing worked. Crowded pews of gaping onlookers were wowed by the success. The sound of the first telephone was born – and in a church no less! Grey had a much harder time swaying his investors with his ingenious product. Based on the bad advice of his dentist, who thought the telephone was “a waste of investor’s money,” Grey’s prototype went nowhere.

After two years of painful delay, a self-determined Elisha Grey packed up his notes and stormed the halls of the U.S. Patent Office to file paperwork on his invention. He was anxious to tell the patent committee all about his success in the Highland Park Church sanctuary.

Unfortunately, another inventor had been working on a similar concept, and as Grey unveiled his story to the committee, he learned Alexander Graham Bell had dropped off his own plans and applied for a telephone patent just two hours earlier.

Although Bell’s plans did not include a working model, nor did his conceptual prototype ever work, the courts found in Bell’s favor and rewarded him the rights to the telephone invention – all because Grey was two hours late with his presentation.

He had left his idea hanging in the sanctuary.

Isn’t time that Christians started taking their ideas beyond the walls of the church building? Let’s get out and reach souls... let’s touch lives for Christ... let’s plant new churches! Instead of just talking about what we can or should do – LET’s DO IT!

portions from Pastors Newsletter by Ron Walters, VP for Ministry Relations, Salem Communications

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Sacrifice is Part of Service

by Jon Walker

“We understand what love is when we realize that Christ gave his life for us. That means we must give our lives for other believers.” – 1 John 3:16

Serving others comes at a great price.

When you become a servant, you always give up something you could have kept for yourself – time, money, energy. But the greatest cost of all is yourself.

Serving others exacts a personal toll that cannot be measured in dollars and cents or hours and minutes.

In 2 Corinthians 6:8-10, Paul describes the price he paid for serving others: “We serve God whether people honor us or despise us, whether they slander us or praise us. We are honest, but they call us impostors. We are well known, but we are treated as unknown. We live close to death, but here we are, still alive. We have been beaten within an inch of our lives. Our hearts ache, but we always have joy. We are poor, but we give spiritual riches to others. We own nothing, and yet we have everything.” (NLT)

Later in the same book, Paul describes being jailed, whipped, stoned, shipwrecked, and robbed – all while serving the churches God entrusted to his care. (2 Corinthians 11:23-28)

God’s servants find the sacrifices worth the price because they can look past the present pain or inconvenience, fixing their eyes firmly on Jesus who “for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:2 NIV)

It is in serving others sacrificially, says the apostle John, that we begin to grasp as well as experience godly love: “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” (1 John 4:10-11 NIV)

What does this mean?

Serve on God’s terms; not your own – You’ve been seeded with the Spirit of Christ, and even though you can’t, his Spirit within you can enable you to give yourself for others. You can draw from his sacrificial strength.

Love finds meaning in sacrifice – “We understand what love is when we realize that Christ gave his life for us. That means we must give our lives for other believers.” (1 John 3:16 GW)

Your sacrifice of service – Is God asking you to give up something – or sacrifice in some way – in order to serve others? Talk to him about your fears, concerns, and confusion. Affirm your willingness to cooperate with his plan for you.

as seen in the January 11, 2007 issue of the Purpose Driven Life daily devotional. Copyright © 2007 Jon Walker. All rights reserved.

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When Envy Creeps In

by Rick Ezell

How can we overcome envy? How can we remain calm in the midst of a competitive society? The next time envy creeps into your heart and mind do the following.

Acknowledge envy as sin. Many people struggle with envy for years, yet never acknowledge its true character. Envy is sin. The envious person is not just a victim; he or she bears responsibility. The Scripture says, “For where you have envy... there you find disorder and every evil practice” (James 3:16 NIV). The failure to confess envy will only lead to more sin. Envy causes conflict with others, it travels with its cousin anger, it leads to depression, it manifests itself in gossiping, and it can even pull the trigger on murder.

Resist comparing yourself to others. “We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves... [it] is not wise” (2 Corinthians 10:12 NIV). Envious people are always comparing themselves to others. One way to bolster their own poor self-esteem is by finding fault with others. But when we compare ourselves with others two things happen and both are destructive. One, when we compare our strength to another person’s weakness we become prideful. Two, when we compare our weakness to another person’s strength we become envious. Either way we lose.

Recognize God’s goodness. In other words, we need to be grateful for what we already have. A myth has circulated since the beginning of time: I must have more than you to be happy. And, you must have more than me to be happy. This is simply not true. Instead of focusing on what we don’t have, we need to remind ourselves what we do have, giving thanks for God’s graciousness in our lives. Do you have life? Health? A job? A house? Clothes? Friends? When we understand God’s goodness in our lives, comparisons are meaningless.

Respond to others in love. “Love does not envy” (1 Cor. 13:4 NIV). When we love other people we appreciate their strengths and their gifts. We acknowledge that God loves them like God loves us-no more, no less. And when we choose to love, envy is eradicated from our lives.

Refocus on God. “Don’t be envious of sinful people; let reverence for the Lord be the concern of your life. If it is, you have a bright future” (Proverbs 23:17 GN). There are only three things that will last for eternity – God, his Word, and his people. Not houses, or cars, or jobs, or vacations, or clothes. When we look at people and their achievement and possessions, we need to look at the long haul not the short term. When I focus on God, my neighbor’s achievements and advancements don’t matter.

from The 7 Sins of Highly Defective People , Copyright © 2003 Rick Ezell

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Pray or Act?

by Jim Liebelt

“Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly as I should.” – Colossians 4:2-4

It has been reported that seconds after the kickoff in a memorable soccer match between the Corinthians and Rio Preto at Bahia Stadium in Brazil, Corinthian striker Roberto Rivelino scored a goal, after a single pass, with a left foot drive from the half line. The ball sailed past the ear of Rio Preto goalkeeper Senhor Isadore Irandir while he was kneeling in the goal finishing his pre-match prayers.

Here is a reminder that there is a healthy balance between prayer and action. Prayer is the foundation of our ongoing recognition of God’s rightful place in our lives and that He is our Creator and King. There is no doubt from the Scriptures that God’s people are to be people of prayer. Action is our recognition that God does not primarily work His will in the world without our participation in that work. Notice from today’s Scripture that the Apostle Paul asked people to pray for an open door of opportunity. I think it is significant that Paul didn’t ask for prayer for God to somehow proclaim the good news of Jesus supernaturally – on His own, but rather that God would provide the opportunity for Paul to minister the gospel effectively. We see that prayer and action are both parts of how God works.

Over my years as a Christ follower, I have experienced the tension that exists between prayer and action. It’s not always easy to know where and when to move beyond prayer to action or vice versa. Perhaps like me, you know people that seem focused solely on prayer and those who seem focused solely on action. Neither of these approaches is the complete answer. Most of us need to pray more. Some of us need to be willing to act. I believe that each situation in our lives requires balance between prayer and action. Like the goalkeeper, I’ve found that there almost always comes a time when we need to get off our knees and act.

as seen in “Today’s HomeWord,” a daily devotional with Jim Burns. Visit them online at www.homeword.com

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Rescued

by Dr. Michael A. Halleen

“Give thanks to (God) and praise his name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever.” – Psalm 100:4, 5

One night many years ago, Ed Spencer, a student at a seminary near Lake Michigan, was awakened by shouts that there had been a shipwreck offshore from the campus. An excursion boat from the nearby Chicago harbor had collided with a freighter and was sinking. Spencer ran down to the lakeshore from which he could see lights from the boats. A strong swimmer, he plunged into the icy water and started searching for survivors.

For six hours Spencer swam out and back, pulling people ashore, battling stormy waves and powerful undertow. By dawn he had personally rescued fifteen people in as many trips. Exhausted, he sat down until someone spotted two more still in the water. Spencer dove in again and found a man and a woman clinging desperately to a piece of wreckage. He brought them in too and collapsed on the beach.

Fewer than one-fourth of the 400 passengers on that boat survived the shipwreck, seventeen of them rescued by Ed Spencer. His own health, however, was irreparably damaged by his act of heroism, and he was never able to return to school, ultimately living out his days as an invalid.

Years later, a reporter doing a story on Great Lakes tragedies found Spencer as an old man in a nursing home in California and asked for his recollections of that night. He said bitterly, “The only thing I remember is that not one of the seventeen ever thanked me.”

The late British actor Robert Morley once said, “I am not an introspective man, but I am, I hope, a grateful one. Life has treated me kindly, and I hope I shall always be mindful that for over fifty years the sun has shone on my back. Thanks be to God.”

At a Thanksgiving gathering several years ago we invited our guests – in the spirit of Robert Morley – to list several things for which he or she was grateful. We wrote each one down and arranged them into a song which we then sang as a group, using a familiar tune. The variety itself (from “clean sheets” and “my boss,” to “cancer survived” and “Randy Moss” – amazing how the rhymes fell into place) became a feature of the hymn, our recognition that God’s gifts are far-reaching and never-ending.

Thanks be to God for life, for its circumstances common and rare, and for the sunshine on our backs. Thanks be also to the people who touch our lives in great ways and small, and for the sunshine they bring to our hearts.

as seen in the April 28, 2008 issue of “Monday Moments,” by Dr. Michael A. Halleen.

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The Last Impression

The traffic light wasn’t working at the corner, so a lady stood with a large crowd of people waiting to cross, while a cop directed traffic. Finally, the cop blew his whistle and stopped the eastbound traffic, motioned to the crowd, and shouted, “Okay, pedestrians!”  The crowd surged across the intersection – all except the lady, who stayed on the corner.

When the walkers were safely on the other side of the street, the cop moved the cross-traffic through the intersection. Half a minute later, he stopped the cars westbound traffic, and sent the eastbound traffic into motion. Again, he got around to the lady’s corner; where by this time a crowd of people had again joined her. Tweeeeeeeet! “Okay, pedestrians!” The crowd crossed the street, but again the lady stayed put.

She looked at her watch and tapped her foot as if she was in a hurry to get somewhere, but never budged from the sidewalk. The cop ran the traffic through seven more cycles, each time blowing his whistle and then yelling “Okay, pedestrians!” the lady never moved.

Finally, after the cop yelled “Okay, pedestrians!” for the eighth time, the woman shouted across traffic, “Hey! Officer! You keep letting the Presbyterians go, isn’t it about time you let those of us who go to other churches cross?”

Come on across the street to WFA for this week’s wonderful time as we fellowship together in the Lord, and as we worship Him in Spirit and in Truth, and as we proclaim the Word of God that changes lives! Looking forward to seeing you this Lord’s Day!