Skillfully Dealing with “The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly” of Thanksgiving- Purity 895

 Skillfully Dealing with “The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly” of Thanksgiving- Purity 895   

Purity 895 11/22/2022 Purity 895 Podcast

Purity 895 on YouTube: 

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a blazing cotton candy sunset sky over my favorite portion of I-787 South, highlighting the glass domed peak of the building at 625 Broadway in downtown Albany, comes to us from yours truly as I tried my best to capture some of the beauty of this spectacular November sky from my securely mounted iPhone as I drove home from work yesterday.  The beauty of God’s creation is all around us at all times and as much as we may enjoy the warmer temperatures of Summer, yesterdays sunset reminded me that we don’t get sunsets quite like this during those warmer months. Even though they don’t happen every day in late Autumn or throughout the winter, the history of my blog will testify to the truth that some truly magical celestial moments happen during these colder days of the year.  

Well, it’s Tuesday and for nearly all of us, today is “Hump Day” because Thanksgiving is only 48 hours away, making this first part of the week a 3 day work week.  

As I write these words, I am excited at the prospect of all of us coming together with family and friends to reunite in a celebration of Thanksgiving.  I myself will be celebrating Thanksgiving at my brother-in-law’s place, who I see quite regularly as we go to the same church and I attend the “growth group” he leads for our church. So while I will not be reuniting with people I haven’t seen in a while, I am filled with joy at just contemplating all the people who will be.  Over the next couple of days, people will be travelling from near and far to enjoy the company of their friends and family and I just have great joy contemplating the way God has knit us all together in relationships of love.   It makes me think of Peter’s words on the Mount of Transfiguration.  When Peter witnessed Christ in unveiled glory miraculously joined by Moses and Elijah, he:

Matthew 17:4 (NKJV)
⁴  … said to Jesus, "Lord, it is good for us to be here; if You wish, let us make here three tabernacles: one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah."

Peter certainly didn’t understand what was happening but he knew it was good to be together and he wanted this magical moment to last.   

And that’s how I feel right now just thinking about people coming together in the next 48 hours to talk, to laugh, to hug one another, to be together, and to love one another in peace and thanksgiving.   I know my visions may seem Pollyanna-ish and may be distorted Hallmark movie fantasies but even though all our interactions over the next few days aren’t guaranteed to be perfectly harmonious, the love that lies at the foundation of them all will still be there even if we won’t be able to express it perfectly. 

Let’s face it people, even family people, can drive you nuts. But usually there is more good than bad in our familial dealings, otherwise we wouldn’t get together, right? I hope that’s the case, anyway. Otherwise, maybe next year we should investigate establishing boundaries to limit or keep the dysfunction at bay.

So as we gear up for the good, the bad, and, oh My – help us Jesus, the ugly that we may encounter over the next few days, let’s promise one another that we will try to be the light that God wants us to be. Let’s agree that we will be the one’s that try to establish peace, whenever possible, with our family and friends, where necessary, as ambassadors for God’s kingdom.   

Remember some basics, presented from God’s word, on how to deal skillfully with “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Thanksgiving.”

Proverbs 15:1 (NKJV)
¹  A soft answer turns away wrath, But a harsh word stirs up anger.

James 1:19 (NLT2)
¹⁹  Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry.

James 1:2-3 (NKJV)
²  My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials,
³  knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.

1 Thessalonians 5:14-18 (NLT2)
¹⁴  Brothers and sisters, we urge you to warn those who are lazy. Encourage those who are timid. Take tender care of those who are weak. Be patient with everyone.
¹⁵  See that no one pays back evil for evil, but always try to do good to each other and to all people.
¹⁶  Always be joyful.
¹⁷  Never stop praying.
¹⁸  Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.

And finally,

Luke 23:34 (NLT2)
³⁴  Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” …

While I hope you have some mountain top moments of joy over the next few days that will make you want the moments to last forever, we have to remember that those we encounter over the next few days may not know the “peace that goes beyond all understanding” and may be bitter, angry, or hurting”.  So let’s do our best to minister to them, but also remember not to be dragged into contentions or squabbles. Let’s walk that line with skill and let’s not forget that while Christ also commanded us to love our enemies, we are not Jesus.  So know your limitations, speak an encouraging word, but if necessary, don’t forget to call on the Lord to show you the way of escape.   

If we remember who we are in Christ, we will be grounded in peace no matter what we face, but wisdom may demand we extract ourselves from difficult situations or endure them with patience.  There are no pat answers on how to deal with difficult situations but if we are diligent to forgive others and show love, we just may have something to be thankful for after this latest holiday passes.  

Keep walking and talking with God, and He will see you through.

 

 

Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse is:

Colossians 2:13 (NLT2)
¹³  You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ, for he forgave all our sins.

Today’s verse reminds us that before Christ we were dead! But because we put our faith in Jesus, God has made us alive with Christ and has forgiven all our sins.   

To be forgiven is huge gift from the Lord but our salvation is not just a “pardon” from the penalty that we would have rightly had to suffer.  In Christian teachings there are many illustrations about going to court and having Jesus show up to pay our fine so we could be set free. While that is a useful way to explain the atonement, that picture is somewhat  incomplete in expressing the new life we have in Christ.  

Today’s verse indicates that our sinful nature has been cut away and that God gives us new life with Christ. What we receive when we put our faith is more than just a pardon, it is a new existence with new capabilities that we didn’t have before. But to experience the new existence, the new life in Christ and to realize the power of our new capabilities, we have to believe that this verse is true, that this verse and all the other one’s about the new life in Christ, is true about us.   

When we put our faith in Jesus, we receive the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit who makes us spiritually alive, and powerful.  After we become Christians, we are guaranteed eternal life with God forever and we have the power to say no to sin, for good.   But we have to believe it and act on it.  Sometimes transformation comes quickly, sometimes it comes in time, but it always comes from faith and the power of the Holy Spirit.  

So believe and receive what the Lord has done for you. Keep walking and talking with God, and obey the call He puts on your life.  We can trust the Lord because we were once dead but He has made us alive and He wants us to thrive. Go with God.

 

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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “Discipleship”, also known as “The Cost of Discipleship”

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase Bonhoeffer’s books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $20.00.

The Sermon on the Mount

Matthew 7

The Community of Disciples Is Set Apart

The Great Separation concludes

Verse 22. Confessors and doers are separated from each other. Now the separation is driven in as far as it can go. Here, finally, those speak up who have survived the test up to now. They belong to the doers, but now they make demands based upon their deeds instead of upon their confession. They have done deeds in the name of Jesus. They know that confession does not justify; hence, they went out to make the name of Jesus great among the people by their deeds. Now they come before Jesus and refer to those deeds.

Jesus reveals to his disciples here the possibility of a demonic faith, point that they are indistinguishable from the deeds of true disciples of Jesus. They do works of love, miracles, perhaps even sanctify themselves, and yet deny Jesus and discipleship. It is just as Paul says in chapter 13 of the First Letter to the Corinthians about the possibility of preaching, prophesying, having all knowledge, even all faith to remove mountains—but without love, that is, without Christ, without the Holy Spirit. Yes, even more than this: Paul must even consider the possibility that the works of Christian love themselves, giving away one’s goods, even so far as martyrdom, can be done—without love, without Christ, without the Holy Spirit. Without love—that means that in all those actions the deed of discipleship does not take place, that deed, whose doer is finally none other than the one who calls us, Jesus Christ himself. That is the deepest, least comprehensible possibility of the satanic within the congregation, the ultimate separation, which, of course, does not take place until the last judgment. But it will be a final one. Those following Jesus must ask what is the ultimate standard of measure of who will be accepted by Jesus and who will not. Who remains and who does not? Jesus’ answer to those who are rejected at the end says it all: “I never knew you.” That is the final secret, which has been kept from the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount up until its end. That alone is the question, whether we were known by Jesus or not. To what should we hold fast, if we hear how the word of Jesus draws the separation between the community and the world, and then within the community until the last judgment? If nothing is left to us, neither our confession nor obedience? Then the only thing left is his word: I have known you. This is his everlasting word, his everlasting call. The end of the Sermon on the Mount connects here with its beginning. His word at the last judgment—it is issued to us in his call to discipleship. But from the beginning to the end, it remains his word, his call. Those who in discipleship hold fast to nothing except this word and let everything else go will be carried by this word through the last judgment. His word is his grace.^[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

---

^[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, ed. Martin Kuske et al., trans. Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, vol. 4, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), 179–181.    

Mall Madness - Holiday Anticipation Got You Swamped Yet? - Purity 894

 

Mall Madness - Holiday Anticipation Got You Swamped Yet? - Purity 894  

Purity 894 11/21/2022 Purity 894 Podcast

Purity 894 on YouTube: 

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a stand of trees immersed in water set against the fading light of day comes to us from Arthur Cincotti who shared these  “swamp trees” with me via text on Thursday as he and his wife Suzanna are on a holiday road trip this week and stopped long enough to capture this scene while travelling through North Carolina.  

Well, the first thing I would like to do is to apologize for not posting anything yesterday, the author of our weekly Bible Study has been on the go this week and Saturday evening was crossing the mighty Mississippi River on the way to Louisiana and despite their initial hopes to produce a study “on the Road” had to call our regular study off. So I guess Sunday was our week off from Thanksgiving.

And I honestly I was thankful for the break but although I spent some time rejoicing in the presence of my wife, I also utilized a portion of the time that was normally spent in a lively discussion of the things of God to make some significant preparations for the conclusion of the Bonhoeffer series I am producing for the podcast and YouTube channel. 

I was finally able to determine just how long the herculean effort to share Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship was going to take and while I am not sure when I will produce and release the last installment of the series, I now know that there will be 19 “lessons” in total and that I will be releasing “lesson 12” sometime this week.   I was going to say Wednesday evening, but although I plan on recording my power point presentation of Bonhoeffer’s “The Messengers” on Wednesday at my countryside home, I don’t know if my cell phone’s hotspot will cooperate with my intentions when I am in “The Great White North” of Easton.  

I also realize that I am beyond the halfway point in this series, and even though I have been releasing them once a week, I want to be true to my original intentions to complete the series before 2023 begins.  I’m not sure how or if that will work out but after we get through this week we will be better able to get a grasp of what that will look like.  

Oh yeah, if you didn’t know, Thanksgiving is Thursday as in 3 days away!

I don’t know about you but my life is somewhat filled with activity and this past Saturday, even though part of me knew, and made preparations for, Thanksgiving this week, that knowledge didn’t really become meaning full until I was relaxing at my sister in laws birthday party this past weekend. “Thanksgiving is THIS THURSDAY? As in 5 DAYS away? (at the time).    Now only three days.   Where does the time go, right?  

So like the trees in todays photo, has the impending holiday on Thursday, and the Christmas season just beyond, have you swamped yet?   

Thankfully, I am not hosting any Thanksgiving celebration this year and am very happy to be going to my brother in laws on Thursday but I can recognize the stress that we may all be under in anticipation of all that is to come on Thursday and the weeks ahead.  

In fact, I had a real freak out a couple of weeks ago and because I had the day off on election day, I went Christmas shopping and got a lot of it done on November 8^th!  

You see, I know how crazy my blogging, podcasting, ministry, working, two household, Christian Discipleship lifestyle can be and I have learned to look ahead to what needs to be done in the future and to have things ready when I get there.   With proper planning, it all works out, but you have to be diligent and sometimes, unfortunately, the world will not be on the same page you are.  

Yesterday, I had some unexpected “free time” on my hands as our regular growth group was cancelled so immediately, I thought of my need to get gift cards for Christmas and I realized that after Thursday we will officially be in the madness of the holiday season where the stores and parking lots will be filled with holiday shoppers. So I decided that I was going to “get er done” in terms of most of my Christmas shopping by getting the gift cards NOW, capital n-o-w. 

So off to the mall I went. I was positively gleeful over the availability of parking, the relatively small crowds, and the fact that the gift card kiosk had all the gift cards I needed!  And admittedly, I need a lot.  So just as I was going to congratulate myself on being super smart, the world “blocked my goal” of “getting ‘er done.  

The cashier at the store I went to informed me that there was a limit to the amount of gift cards I could purchase. The limit they were imposing would make my trip to the mall essential meaningless!

But like the male equivalent of a “Karen”, a “Ken” apparently, I decided that I didn’t need to waste my time with a drone at the cash register that was just trying to do their job according to the policies they have bee taught to enforce without question. I decided to take my request/complaint/significant purchase, $$$, to the miraculously vacant service desk.  

There were 3 people behind the service desk and at first I thought, surely one of them would sympathize with me and just help me “get ‘er done.”  But unfortunately instead of sympathy and assistance, I got apathetic, almost disdainful looks, and a repeat of the cashier’s apologies and explanations of things that I knew, from prior experience, just weren’t true.   

So I had a decision to make, I could continue to plead,  ask for a manager, or get angry or I could go around this obstacle by other means.  

You see, I always buy gift cards for the holidays in mass quantities and while you may have to play games in person at the store, a whole new level of freedom and efficiency comes from doing things on-line. I’ve done this before. So hold my Coke Zero or Bang Energy drink and watch this!

Immediately go to my phone, but quickly determine that my phone can’t move as fast as me and I was going to have to give up the quest until I could put in my orders on my lap top at home. So I more or less resolve to “get ‘er done” another day.  

So I go home and put my laundry in and take care of some other things around the house before I decide to attempt to order my gift cards and have them shipped to me instead of going to the store, which I discover I can’t do!  

The gift cards I wanted were “pick up only” but I discovered that the limit I faced online was a lot less restrictive than the ridiculous one they were seeking to enforce in person. 

Don’t you just love that it is easier dealing with “machines” sometimes than people?

For example, the self-checkout, I know some people object about the self-checkout.  “It costs people jobs” and “I don’t work here!” etc etc.  But me, I love them and even take some pride over my skill at getting through the self-checkout quickly. “Get out of my way, I’m getting ‘er done!”  

So because of that “great service” I get from my fellow man, where it is possible I will do things online nearly 99% of the time, with rare exceptions.  

So I discover that I can order quite a few gift cards at a time on line and place an order for the ones I can. Done.  But I still have more to get so I start to place another order.   When I realize that online order system, is actually trying to help me with a pop up that I ignored on my first purchase.  

The pop up invites me to bypass the limit on gift cards by creating a business account!

So, I do! My business is a not-for-profit online organization called – Mt4christ.org – where I produce Christian devotional type encouragements and educational materials for the masses, free of charge. 

So now I have a business account with this store, and I am able to order the rest of my gift cards in a single order! Awesome, right?   Oh it gets better.

I no sooner finish my second order than I get an email that tells me my first order is “ready for pick up! So even though I drove all the way home from the mall, I decide just to wait until my second order is fulfilled, and I will go back the way I came to “get ‘er done” TODAY.  

And I do, I got ‘er done. Thanks to the internet, telling the “people” to just give the guy what he wants, I got ‘er done.   

I know why “Karens” and “Kens” exist.  People stand on policy rather that on customer service and doing business.  People can’t think out side of the box that they are placed in and when some one demands that there needs be met as a right, the world turns against them and calls them entitled, privileged, or even racist, (It’s in the definition of a Karen) rather than changing policy they try to block their goals.  

But these “Mama Bears” and “Angry Old Men” know better. If they argue long enough or get to the right person with the pragmatism or authority to actually make a decision outside of a corporate flow chart, 90% of the time they succeed.  

Jesus shared the parable of the persistent widow to encourage us to keep pushing and a praying for “justice”.  So there is some wisdom in being persistent. 

However, I would recommend keeping your cool and maintaining your peace when you come up against opposition like this. People are just doing what they are told to the best of their abilities and as they say “our lack of planning, doesn’t constitute an emergency”, Karen, or Ken.  

So although, I got ‘er done yesterday – and without a fight, mind you– although I felt positively triumphant from beating “the system” with the system, I would recommend that you plan ahead in the days ahead so you won’t feel swamped by the stress that can come with the most “wonderful time of the year”.  

And remember, as Christians, we represent the King. So keep walking and talking with God and go in peace to all the world and show them you are a reasonable person who understands that your “needs” and “wants” are not “rights and that your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency, even if it feels like one.   

___________________________________________

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “Discipleship”, also known as “The Cost of Discipleship”

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase Bonhoeffer’s books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $20.00.

The Sermon on the Mount

Matthew 7

The Community of Disciples Is Set Apart

The Great Separation continues

The road of the disciples is narrow. It is easy to go past it; it is easy to miss it; it is easy to lose it, even for those who have already walked it. It is hard to find. The path is narrow indeed; there is a real danger of falling off on both sides. To be called to do the extraordinary, but not to see and to know that one is doing it—that is a narrow road. To give witness to and to confess the truth of Jesus, but to love the enemy of this truth, who is his enemy and our enemy, with the unconditional love of Jesus Christ—that is a narrow road. To believe in Jesus’ promise that those who follow shall possess the earth, but to encounter the enemy unarmed, to prefer suffering injustice to doing ill—that is a narrow road. To perceive other people as being weak and wrong, but never to judge them; to proclaim the good news to them, but never to throw pearls before swine—that is a narrow road. It is an unbearable road. The danger of falling off threatens every minute. As long as I recognize this road as the one I am commanded to walk, and try to walk it in fear of myself, it is truly impossible. But if I see Jesus Christ walking ahead of me, step by step, if I look only at him and follow him, step by step, then I will be protected on this path. If I look at the danger in what I am doing, if I look at the path instead of at him who is walking ahead of me, then my foot is already slipping. He himself is the way. He is the narrow road and the narrow gate. The only thing that matters is finding him. If we know that, then we will walk the narrow way to life through the narrow gate of the cross of Jesus Christ, then the narrowness of the way itself will reassure us. How could the road of the Son of God on earth, which we are to walk as citizens of two realms^[232] at the boundary between the world and the kingdom of heaven, be a wide one? The narrow way has to be the right way.

Verses 15–20. The separation between community and world is complete. But now the word of Jesus presses into the faith-community itself, judging and separating. The separation has to take place again and again among the disciples themselves. The disciples should not think that they could simply flee from the world and stay safely in the small group on the narrow path. False prophets will come among them, and the confusion will make their isolation even greater. Someone stands beside me, externally a member of the community. A prophet or preacher stands there, a Christian by appearances, words, and deeds. But internally dark motives are driving him to us. Internally he is a rampaging wolf; his words are lies and his deeds deceit. He knows how to guard his secret well, but under cover he works his evil deeds. He is among us, not because faith in Jesus Christ brought him to us, but because the devil drives him into the faith-community. Perhaps he is seeking power and influence, money, fame by his own thoughts and prophecies. He seeks the world, but not the Lord Christ. He hides his dark intent in the cloak of Christian piety [Christlichkeit] and knows that Christians are easy to fool. Because of his cloak of innocence, he is counting on not being unmasked. He knows well that Christians are prohibited from judging, and he will remind them of that at just the right moment! No one can see into another’s heart. So he can deceive many a person to stray from the right way. Perhaps he does not even know all this, perhaps the devil who is driving him has concealed from him the truth about himself.

Such an announcement by Jesus could drive great fear into his disciples. Who knows the other person? Who knows whether or not lies are hiding and deceptions lurking behind Christian appearances? Deep suspicion, cynical observation, and an anxious spirit of judgment could seep into the community. This word of Jesus could cause loveless condemnation to become the fate of every sister or brother who sins. But Jesus liberates his disciples from suspicions, which would tear apart the community. He says that a bad tree brings forth bad fruit. It will reveal itself in due time. We do not need to look into the heart of anyone else. We should wait until the tree bears its fruit. In due time you will know the trees by their fruits. Fruit cannot fail to come for long. Here this does not mean the difference between words and deeds of the false prophets, but the difference between appearance and reality. Jesus tells us that people cannot live for long under the cover of appearances. The time to bear fruit will come, the time of open difference will come. Sooner or later their situation will be revealed. Whether the tree intends not to bear fruit does not matter at all. Fruit comes by itself. Thus the decisive moment of distinguishing one tree from another, fruit-bearing time, will reveal everything. Whenever times of decision come, revealing the difference between the world and the church-community, and they can come any day, in quite small, mundane decisions, as well as in the big ones, then it will be revealed what is bad and what is good. Then only reality persists, not appearances.

Jesus expects from his disciples that at such moments they will distinguish clearly between appearances and reality, and see the difference between themselves and people who only appear to be Christian. That relieves them of all curious scrutinizing of other people, but it demands truthfulness and determination to recognize the decision God is making. It can happen at any moment that pseudo-Christians are torn out of our midst, or that we ourselves are revealed as pseudo-Christians. The disciples are called, therefore, to deeper communion [Gemeinschaft] with Jesus and to follow him more faithfully. The bad tree will be cut down and thrown into the fire. All its grandeur will not save it.

Verse 21. The separation caused by Jesus’ call to discipleship goes even deeper. After the separation between world and community, between pseudo-Christians and true Christians, the next sorting out takes place within the confessing community of disciples. Paul says that no one can call Jesus Lord, except by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3). No one can commit their life to Jesus and call him Lord out of their own reason, strength, and decision. But the possibility is considered here that someone could call Jesus Lord without the Holy Spirit, that is, without having heard Jesus’ call. This is even less comprehensible in those times when it did not bring any earthly advantages to call Jesus Lord. Instead, it was a confession which led straight into gravest danger. “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven.…” Saying “Lord, Lord” is the confession of the church-community. Not everyone who says it will enter the kingdom of heaven. The separation will even take place within the confessing community. The confession alone grants no claim on Jesus. On that day no persons can justify themselves on the basis of their confession. Being members of the church of the true confession is nothing we can claim before God. Our confession will not save us. If we think it will, then we commit Israel’s sin of making the grace of our calling into a right before God. This is sin against the grace of the one who calls us. God will not ask us someday whether our confession was evangelical, but whether we did God’s will. God will ask that of everyone, including us. The boundaries of the church are not the boundaries of a privilege, but those of God’s merciful selection and call. πᾶς ὁ λέων and άλλʼ ὁ ποιῶν [everyone who says … but who does]—“saying” and “doing”—this does not necessarily mean the relationship between word and deed. Instead, it is talking about two different kinds of human behavior before God. ὁ λέων κύριε—those who say “Lord, Lord” are those who make claims based on their having said “yes.” ὁ ποιῶν—“the doer[s]” are those who are humble in their obedient deeds. The former justify themselves by their confession; the latter, the doers, are the people who obediently trust in God’s grace. People’s speech here is correlated with their self-righteousness, and their deeds are correlated with that grace, before which people cannot do anything else except humbly obey and serve. Those who say “Lord, Lord” have called themselves to Jesus without the Holy Spirit, or they have made Jesus’ call into a right of their own. Those who do the will of God are called and forgiven by grace; they obey and follow. They do not understand their call to be a right, but to be judgment and pardon, and the will of God which alone they intend to obey. The grace of Jesus calls the doers: their deeds become genuine humility, genuine faith, genuine confession of the grace of the One who calls.^[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

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^[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, ed. Martin Kuske et al., trans. Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, vol. 4, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), 176–179.  

To Be With Jesus – The Chosen Season 3 Purity 893

 

To Be With Jesus – The Chosen Season 3  Purity 893         

Purity 893 11/19/2022 Purity 893 Podcast

Purity 893 on YouTube:  

Good morning,

Today’s photo of the silhouettes of an Autumn Stripped tree line against the backdrop of ethereal sunset sky comes to us from my beloved wife, TammyLyn Clark, who captured this heavenly scene back on November 11^th when she decided to take her youngest children and our canine pal, Harley, to Hudson Crossing Park in Schuylerville for an impromptu walk.  When we get to see scenes like this, I think we get a small idea of the beauty of heaven, and it makes me yearn for the days when we get to see God’s kingdom and Jesus face to face.  

Well, it is the weekend, and it is my prayer that all who hear or see this message have a wonderful weekend and will consider my recommendation to go and see The Chosen, Season Three Episodes 1 & 2 in a theatre near you. 

The only thing I was disappointed in at last night’s viewing of The Chosen, Season 3’s premier was my decision to fall in my patterned behavior of getting that large popcorn and soda. I know “say it isn’t so….” As I have said in the past, there is grace for our weaknesses and ours is a walk of progress and not perfection. 

Paradoxically,  part of my failure in the decision to indulge in the popcorn and soda (zero sugar – okay) was the result of a decision to get serious about my health goal. Say what?   

Yesterday, I was either the victim of click bait or genuinely resolved to get help by seeking the advice of experts in the field of fitness, as I purchased a fitness plan that is bold in its claims to help people transform their bodies.

After the bliss of my courtship and wedding to TammyLyn, I had let my health goal slip in 2022 but recently made steps to right the ship and have made progress. But after Halloween’s Harvest Fest candy indulgences and other slips, I have seen my progress stall.  Mercifully, I have more or less plateaued, with only gaining a pound or two back from my recent progress to reclaim the ground I had lost. So with the knowledge that I had to do something to start heading in the right direction again, I was open to suggestions. 

So I signed up for V-Shred, yup the “swipe up and take my fitness quiz”-guy, Vince Sant, that you have most likely seen on YouTube or Instagram plugging his Fat Loss Extreme Program.  So I intend to change my normal workout routine on Monday and trust this program and my personal trainer’s recommendations to “get shredded” or at least get headed in the right direction to accomplish my health goal of being in the normal BMI range for my height. 

So last night due to the excitement of going out on a Friday night, and like the alcoholic who gets drunk one last time before going to rehab, I gave into my patterned behavior of getting a large popcorn and soda, and of course had to get the refills, AND also got Cookie Dough Pieces! So, I look forward to my first V-Shred workouts Monday morning so I can atone for this latest failure.  

But, hey, speaking of atonement, I have been forgiven, right? Because of Jesus Christ, I have been forgiven of all my sins and have been delivered from condemnation, so I acknowledge my weaknesses, am seeking help and accountability, and will not beat myself up about failure 1,999.643 or whatever number this one was, and instead will repent and will press into my health goal with a new resolve on Monday.  

And that’s something I think that we should all remember,  just because we fail in achieving our goals in life doesn’t mean we should just abandon them.

This is a tough thing to discern of course because sometimes our goals can seem unrealistic, or they may indeed be impossible, and sometimes we have to give them up.

But in this area, our physical health, I believe that the Lord would encourage us to seek to be good steward of our bodies, the temples of the Holy Spirit, and would prefer that we didn’t suffer because our lack of discipline.

Gluttony is not a virtue and Obesity is its bad fruit.  Scripture doesn’t have good things to say about gluttony and there are verses to tell us to take care of our bodies. If you don’t believe me or need some verses to build a stronghold buster for you health goal, I am including links to openbible.ifo’s 100 Bible verses about gluttony (https://www.openbible.info/topics/gluttony)   and physical fitness (https://www.openbible.info/topics/physical_fitness) on the blog today.  

You see my health goal is not about vanity. I’m not looking to impress other people; I’m looking to be as healthy as I can be as I move into the last years of my life because I want to live as I can to continue to encourage other people to see what the Lord can do with your life when you follow Him. And in this latest chapter of the battle of the bulge, which has admittedly been a lifelong struggle, I hope to utilize the self-control that the Holy Spirit has brought to my life to accomplish what just about everyone says is impossible: to be a healthy, or “normal”, weight; to be strong, in the body as well as in the mind and spirit.

Guys like Vince Sant know that, with proper diet, exercise, motivation, and discipline people can transform their bodies to be healthy.  So why not me?  I have already made great strides in my physical health so why not keep going until “it is finished”?  I have already renewed my mind about my eating habits and altered my diet to have success, so why not be focused to strengthen my body and further undo the excesses of the past?  That’s what I hope to do, and I know that the Lord will be with me.  

And speaking of the Lord being with me, I have to tell you that the first two episodes of The Chosen Season Three were fantastic!  I won’t give you any spoilers, but I positively loved the interactions of Christ and His Apostles and the supporting characters in these first two episodes.  Forgiveness, the determination of Discipleship and the acceptance of some hard truths were major themes in last night’s drama, and they cause me to appreciate The Chosen with new zeal.  

Previously, I watched the show with a love/hate mentality born from my love for the Bible and the Lord. The Chosen builds a drama based on scripture and sometimes I have liked what they have done and other times I have cringed over certain moments where I thought their artistic license went too far, didn’t go far enough, or took me in a direction I didn’t expect. Admittedly, I still carry a bit of theological baggage from my long road to freedom in Christ, and sometimes my objections are born more from my personal history than what the creators of The Chosen have done.  I have issues… 

But, except for a couple of minor moments of critical scrutiny in the beginning moments of last night’s premiere, I didn’t have any issues with what the creators of The Chosen did with episodes one and two of Season 3.   Quite the contrary, I was moved to tears more than once at the unfolding drama. I was particularly moved by a realization that I, like the Apostles, would one day SEE JESUS, and just that simple thought set my heart ablaze with love and a yearning to continue to be faithful to follow Him, as I had the absurd but accurate thought that “Jesus was a really cool guy.”   

Please don’t misunderstand me. I don’t mean any disrespect by that statement. I have deep love, awe and reverence for Jesus and understand that He is fully God and Man, but The Chosen gives us an opportunity to imagine what it would be like to be with Him, to be in His physical presence, to talk with Him face to face, and to hear His voice. 

I think as Christians, we don’t think about Jesus as a Man that we could hang out with and The Chosen Season Three episodes one and two made me desire the contact that the Apostles enjoyed.  

So as we keep stumbling along in life, don’t give up on your dreams and don’t forget that Jesus walked on this earth and showed His love to others personally and as strange as it may sound He knows us and one day we will see Him. 

 

 

 

Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse are:

Romans 6:6-8 (NLT2)
⁶  We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin.
⁷  For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin.
⁸  And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him.

Today’s verses remind us that when we put our faith in Him, we died with Christ and were free from the power of sin, and now live with Him.  

When we know that Christ is for us, it doesn’t matter who comes against us. 

In terms of Spiritual warfare, when our Big Brother, Jesus, is with us, we receive all His power and Authority to cast out the spiritual forces of darkness.   We can utilize his authority to set ourselves and others free from demonic oppression.  

And in today’s verse, Paul reminds us that Christ also gives us power to say no to our personal demons of temptation and sin but the key point that Paul makes here is that we live with Christ, that we follow Him.  

If we just continue in our worldly ways, resting on the forgiveness we have received, we may be relieved and find comfort from knowing God won’t hold our sins against us.   But that doesn’t make us free.  And even worse, our continued sins will cause disharmony in our relationship with God as we will persist in living against His word and apart from His wisdom. When we willfully persist in sin, we deny our identity in Christ and reject the truth of what God has done in our lives.  

Through Christ we have been made new creations, but when we choose to sin we deny that we have been made new and our decisions reveal that we either don’t believe that God’s ways are best or that we have not een given the power that the word of God tells us we have.  

“You are always going to sin!” is a phrase that is true, but the Lord gives us power to decrease the number and to change the quality of our sins if we ask the Lord for the ability to repent and to overcome the sins that beset us.   You might need the help of others. You need to renew you mind with the word of God.   And you might need to try, try, try again but if we lean on the Lord’s strength and power, we can make a change. We may never be sin ess, but we can sin less, and the quality of our sins can change.

But first we need to believe it. Believe these verses, have faith in the word, and show your faith by demonstrating you believe with the way you live.  Victory, peace, and joy come from living with Christ, so never leave His side.

 

___________________________________________

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “Discipleship”, also known as “The Cost of Discipleship”

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase Bonhoeffer’s books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $20.00.

The Sermon on the Mount

Matthew 7

The Community of Disciples Is Set Apart

The Great Separation

“Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

¶ “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will know them by their fruits.

¶ “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; go away from me, you evil-doers’ ” (Matt. 7:13–23).

The faith-community of Jesus cannot arbitrarily separate itself from the community of those who do not hear Jesus’ call. The faith community is called to discipleship by their Lord’s promise and commandment. That must suffice for them. They submit every judgment and separation to the one who has chosen them in predestination, not by the merits of their deeds, but by grace. It is not the faith community which separates itself from others, yet this separation necessarily takes place in the call by the Word.

The call separates a small group, those who follow, from the great mass of the people. The disciples are few and will always be only a few. This word of Jesus cuts off any false hope of their effectiveness. Disciples should never invest their trust in numbers. “There are few of them …,” but there are, and always will be, many others who go to their destruction. What can console disciples experiencing this, except the fact that life is promised to them, the eternal communion with Jesus?^[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

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^[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, ed. Martin Kuske et al., trans. Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, vol. 4, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), 175–176.

Living a Lie – Traditions of Deception and Patterned Responses - Purity 892

Living a Lie – Traditions of Deception and Patterned Responses  -  Purity 892   

Purity 892 11/18/2022      Purity 892 Podcast

Purity 892 on YouTube :  

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a tree stripped bare of its leaves on a green roadside under pleasant skies comes to us from our brother in Christ, Arthur Cincotti who captured this scene while travelling through “Amish Country” on Wednesday.  Arthur and his wife, Suzanna are travelling south to spend time with family over the next week but they are taking the time to enjoy the journey as Arthur has sent me a few photos of scenes along the way that indicate to me that while their final destination is determined they are not so focused on the end that they aren’t enjoying the process of getting there. Yeah when you walk in the Spirit, the Lord will call you to go places and as I was reminded last week, sometimes there is more to the trip than what you will do when you get there. Every aspect of our travels with the Lord is noteworthy and can be a place where the Lord has something to tell us. 

 I especially like Arthur’s photo because it caught the reflections of window and “I don’t know what”, but it reminds me of imagery from Stephen King’s “The Drawing of the Three” where the hero was traveling through the countryside and was destined to encounter and go through doors that were just hanging in space with the cryptic titles on each indicating what would be found on the other side.   I researched it this morning and was reminded those doors were labeled “The Pusher” “The Prisoner” & “The Lady of Shadows”.  No spoilers from me but I particular lylike that book, of Mr. King’s in my youth.

Anyway it also reminds me of a particular meditation session I had back in my Buddhist days when I was seriously practicing and trying “to break on through to the other side”. I remember that I was doing a practice where you just meditate and look at the sky and you just rest, watching the clouds move and being open to the experience of the present moment.

 Well, in my efforts to see “beyond” to see things as they really were, I was staring at that daytime sky with such intensity and the focus to see something that I contemplated the fact that beyond the light of day, the cold dark blackness of space existed just beyond the window of my perception.  And while I couldn’t see the blackness of space, I knew it was there and when I thought of that I realized in a way the day time sky was a lie.  It was an illusion caused by the conditions of the sun illuminating our atmosphere. With that realization, I imagined that the sky was like a hologram and composed of individual tiles, that if focused on and broken, that if I focused on the sky long enough my effort would “break the sky”.  Okay, pretty crazy huh?

But the revelation of this experience pointed out the illusory nature of our lives here on earth and that two things that are seemingly the opposite of one another could exist simultaneously even though I could “see” only one.   The cold dark expanses of space were out there. The blue sky was there.  Both were true, but I could only see one. But as time would progress, things would change and one would “disappear” to reveal the other.

Likewise our world of flesh and blood is all that some people can see.  Meanwhile there is the unseen spiritual realm that exists with angelic and demonic entities.  Just because we can’t see them doesn’t mean they aren’t there.   Just because we can’t see God doesn’t mean that He isn’t there.  And just like how the day dissipates and allows us to see into the far reaches of space at night,  as time progress the spiritual world will be revealed, one way or another, to all of us.  Just wait for it!

So what should we do to prepare for that day? Well, Christ didn’t come to earth and die on the cross for nothing.  He came to reveal that which was hidden and shrouded in mystery. He came to let us know what God’s word really meant and to offer us a way to have peace with the Father, to place our faith in Him.  So do that, and read the Bible to renew your mind with God’s truth so you can expose the world’s lies and live in harmony with God.

Lies are so ingrained in our world system and crafted by our experiences in it that sometimes we don’t even know how pervasive the lies are and how they continue to imprison us with patterned responses for living.  

Addicts believe the lie that their drug of choice is “GOOD” in spite of the facts that they often experience negative consequences through its use and that the thing that gives them “PEACE” causes a lot of disruption in their lives.   

Some believe the lie that they are men trapped in a woman’s body, or women trapped in a man’s body.  This belief or feeling was once classified as a mental illness because biology, your chromosomes, indicate that however compelling those feelings may be that you are in the wrong body, that they are wrong. Biology would indicate that you are not in the wrong body, you are in the wrong mind.  Unfortunately those who believe this lie were influenced by various experiences, dysfunctions, and traumas, and possibly demonic encouragements to believe they were not the people that God created them to be.

These are easy examples of deceptions though, although there may be nothing easy about being set free from these lies.  

No, what I have come to see more and more, especially through some of the dialogs I have had through this latest Freedom in Christ course, is that we can have ingrained beliefs that just aren’t true that deeply affect how we live, sometimes in subtle or even benign ways that aren’t necessarily harmful but which cause us to remain “stuck” in the same patterns of thoughts and behaviors.  

“I’ll always be depressed”

“Celebrations always involve overindulging in alcohol or in food.”

“I am a night owl. I don’t go to bed before 11 pm” 

These are some examples of statements that are not true, or don’t have to be true, that I encountered recently that revealed to me the subtle way we can develop “traditions of deception” that keep us locked in patterned responses that go against what we would desire for our lives.   

If you believe you’ll always be depressed, you will be.  If you believe celebrations always involve overindulging in alcohol or food, you will continue to overindulge. If you believe you are a night owl you will rarely go to bed early.   

So what’s wrong with that?  Nothing…, or possibly everything.  These beliefs or other ones like them can cause us to stay where we are and not experience the abundant life God wants us to have.  

Part of the process of repentance is to change our minds to align with God’s word but in order to do that we have to break the chains of patterned thoughts and behaviors and consider alternate ways, Godlike ways, of thinking and behaving.  

If we want to receive the healing and abundant life that God has for us, we have to abandon what we know and surrender to His wisdom and adapt His ways. Part of the process of repentance is revelation.  

You don’t have to celebrate by overindulging in alcohol and food. “Everybody is doing it” is lie.  Look around some people don’t, thus you can be like them.  

I will always be depressed. You don’t have to be if you understand the magnificent gift that the Lord has given you in your salvation and if you turn from your sinful patterns of thinking and behaving.   God said:

Genesis 4:6-7 (NLT2)
⁶  “Why are you so angry?” the LORD asked Cain. “Why do you look so dejected?
⁷  You will be accepted if you do what is right. But if you refuse to do what is right, then watch out! Sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. But you must subdue it and be its master.”

Right from the beginning God encouraged us to do what was right, to cure our mental disturbances and to keep us free from the disruptive influences of sin.  

As for the night owl, that may be harmless, although children of God are to be in the light, I suppose the night time hours could meet the needs for solitude and silence to commune with the Lord in Bible study and prayer. 

But as a former night owl, I know that rarely are any spiritual practices the activities of night owls. Usually the nighttime is the time to indulge in selfish pursuits that are independent of God. However, they could be used for God so there isn’t anything necessarily wrong with staying up late.  

But what could be a major obstacle to our freedom is the proclamations that identify ourselves by certain activities and cause us to remain in patterned thinking.  

“I am”, I can’t, “I don’t”, “I never”, “I always”, and “I don’t want to” statements are all possible ways that we limit our freedom and keep ourselves in chains.  

All of this came about this morning because I am going to the movies this evening and my wife reminded me that I will have “my soda and popcorn”.  

I have been subject to my own lie or “tradition” that could be expressed in one of two ways: 

I always have soda and popcorn at the movies. 

Or

I can’t go to the movies without having soda and popcorn. 

And unfortunately, as it applies to me, my statement would have to include the word “large” – as in “I must have the large popcorn and soda” AND take advantage of the free refills at Regal Cinemas!”   

So apparently the Lord is revealing this lie to me, because as I was working out this morning I considered it and realize that I have been living in a “tradition of deception” that runs contrary to my health goals. So I intend to break the chain of large popcorn and soda tonight.

So as we go into the weekend I wish everyone a Happy Friday, would encourage you to thank the Lord, and to examine your life to see what traditions of deception that you might have.   

The Lord came to set us free and sometimes He came to set us free from the chains we willingly put on time and time again. So keep walking and talking with God and seek to discover the freedom and peace He has for you. 

 

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “Discipleship”, also known as “The Cost of Discipleship”

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase Bonhoeffer’s books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $20.00.

The Sermon on the Mount

Matthew 7

The Community of Disciples Is Set Apart

The Disciple and the Unbelievers Concludes

What should the disciples do in the face of hardened hearts? When their approach to others is unsuccessful? They should recognize that they have no right or power over others at all, and that they have no sort of immediate access to others. The only way open to them is the way to the one in whose hand they themselves are kept, just like those others. This is what the following section is talking about. The disciples are called to prayer. They are told that no other way leads to their neighbor except prayer to God. Judgment and forgiveness remain in God’s hand. God holds the key. Disciples are to request, seek, knock, and God will hear them. Disciples should know that their worry and concern about others must lead them to prayer. The promise given to their prayer is the greatest power they have.

The fact that disciples know what they are seeking distinguishes their searching from the nonbelievers’ search for God. Only those who already know God can seek God. How could they seek what they do not know? How can they find, if they do not know what they are looking for? Thus disciples seek God, whom they have found in the promise Jesus Christ gave them.

In summary, it has become clear that in dealing with other people, the disciples do not possess any special right or power of their own. They live completely out of the power of communion with Jesus Christ. Jesus gives the disciples a simple rule, by which even the most simpleminded can evaluate whether their dealings with others are right or wrong: they need only reverse the I and the You in the relationship. They need only put themselves in the other’s place and the other in their own. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” At that moment the disciples lose any claim of special rights toward other people. They cannot excuse in themselves what they condemn in others. Now they are as tough on the evil in themselves as they used to be on the evil in others, and as considerate of evil in others as they are of themselves. For our evil is no different than the evil in the others. There is one judgment, one law, one grace. So disciples will always encounter other people only as those whose sins are forgiven and who from now on live solely from God’s love. “That is the law and the prophets”—for it is nothing other than the greatest commandment itself: love God above all things, and your neighbor as yourself.^[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

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^[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, ed. Martin Kuske et al., trans. Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, vol. 4, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), 173–175.