The Pastor’s wife …to be

A woman, who was commonly known to be addicted into alcohol, drugs, and does prostitution for her living, stood by the front of the church as she was struck by the message being preached. As she continually listen to the message, she felt the tug in her heart that she needed Jesus as her Savior. The Holy Spirit worked in her, and there he received Jesus.

 

Cleansed by the blood || Photo Courtesy of Moha Barakat

 

Her conversion was no longer questionable because the change and the fruit of the Spirit was so evident in her life. As years pass by, she became active in the church and was given the privilege to lead various ministries. She worked side by side with the pastor and soon they fell in love with each other.

As they were planning their wedding, the old people in the church was in any way disagreeing to their relationship. They spread the rumors about the past of the woman and convinced the congregation of the church to stop the wedding of the said couple. The news spread to all members of the church and the woman was in great tears as she was sitting in one side of the church. Members came by and continued to rant about their plea for the pastor to break-up with the woman, and stop the wedding.

The pastor caught all of these things happening. He then went to his condemned fiance, and tried to comfort her. But the tears couldn’t just stop flowing as she hears the old members telling the pastor to think very carefully of his decision. The members were telling him more filthy things her fiance did in the past. They said it is not enough that he would marry this kind of Christian with that kind of background. The pastor was so upset when he heard all these judgments and condemnations but he couldn’t do anything aside from comforting his fiance.

The elder of the church came and found out all the accusations being said against the pastor’s fiance. He was as well upset with the people, so he stood up in front of the congregation, got their attention, and spoke with all boldness:

Brothers and Sisters! We all believe that this woman is already a believer of our Lord Jesus. In that case, what is being tested now is not this woman anymore. What is put in the test is the blood of Jesus. Whether Jesus’ blood is efficacious to cleanse the past of this woman or not. The words you said against this woman, is not actually said against her, because you were pertaining to her past. Rather those words are against the blood of Christ. We, therefore have no right to condemn this woman anymore. Because “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has gone, therefore, new things has come.”

With this speech, the congregation was rebuked and was silenced.

A better celebration of New Year…

Every New year, I see people making New Year’s resolution. And while browsing through Google, I saw this survey from abcactionnews.com about people’s top resolutions every new year.

And you know what’s the funny thing? Few people make it up to the half. And almost no one make it to the end… Let’s see if you have some similarities…

photo from 'the drive blog'

1. Get fit

2. Manage Debt

3. Save money

4. Get a better Job

5. Get a better education

6. Drink less alcohol

7. Quit smoking now

8. Reduce stress

9. Take a trip

Whether your New year’s resolution is here or not… that is not the issue…

The issue is this:

New year‘s resolutions are just for new years… They only last for some months. Sooner our passion on doing the stuffs we planned to do fades.

Then we find it hard to forgive ourselves for making another goals that weren’t achieved. Thus, at the back of our minds, we think to have a reset on the next new year by making the same new year’s resolution… and so the cycle never stops.. until you finally realized that you’re old enough to make new year’s resolutions, so you stop making one. And the potential for you to become a better person is simply deteriorating…

A friend reminded me that new year is just another new day. She added: Why doesn’t a person greet another person (nang bonggang-bongga), Hey!! Happy new day!!! For her, it simply is a tradition that does not really give a big help to humankind (this is how I interpret her way of saying it).

After hearing that, I paused for a while and thought deeply of what the statement really meant… And I find it logical, practical, and Biblical.

The book of prophet Jeremiah in Lamentations 3:22 says that the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning…

When I got home, I took a look of this verse and found out so much truth about what she said. And these questions popped out of my mind…

If the Lord’s faithfulness and mercy is available at its fullest everyday, why don’t we celebrate it daily? Why do we easily take it for granted? Weren’t we commanded to thank God always, not One-time-Big-Time ‘thank you’? And why do we have to make such distractive noise every new year -’some people do this for superstitious beliefs’? Why are we so busy preparing for grand celebration, great feast and helps a lot of people from Christmas to New Year, but eats little and barely help people from New year to Christmas?

These questions I leave to you to ponder.

After all, we should realize, that there are more people who have wrong perception of celebrating the new year than the Christmas.

Most people think, since it’s NOT CHRISTmas, it must be my day…

CHRISTmas happens just once a year. MY DAY, happens everyday.

What a fool.

New year’s resolution is just for new year. So I propose that we make new day’s resolution.

simple actions to make in the beginning, that would lead to big results in the end. You do not need another year to pass by to have a reset. Every day is God’s great gift for us to change the things we need to in our lives, By His grace and by His power.

God’s mercies are new every morning… Great is His faithfulness!

A blessed New Day!!