by Joseph | Oct 23, 2008 | Preparation, Sharing
Yesterday, a member of my family called me an “Alarmist”. I really was not aware that I am an alarmist, so it came as a bit of a surprise to me. In fact, I didn’t even know what an alarmist was- or what the role consisted of. So, being the good alarmist that I am… I looked it up.
Here’s what the dictionary definition of an alarmist is:
“a person who tends to raise alarms, esp. without sufficient reason, as by exaggerating dangers or prophesying calamities.”
Perhaps my family member knows something about me that I don’t know. Or, maybe it’s possible that my actions and communications have been misinterpreted by those who disagree with my insights. To my knowledge, I haven’t exaggerated the dangers that we face – nor have I prophesied destruction. In fact, by definition the alarmist will raise concerns without sufficient reason. If you have done any research into what is happening on a global scale – there is certainly sufficient reason to be prudent in preparation.
I am not screaming in the streets that we are all doomed, but I do believe we are facing some serious challenges ahead. My call is not to warn people that the end is near, rather to encourage people to prepare for the difficulties that may lie ahead. The Bible is very clear that the King is soon coming – and we need to prepare for His arrival. There will be some difficult events as we get closer to His arrival. If a call to prepare for that is an alarm, well, so be it.
The reference that I was an alarmist came because I referred to the fact my family had just received a shipment of supplies – much of it for our pantry. Here’s a picture of some of our shipments…
The “alarmist” comment speaks more about where we are as a society, and really, the very lack of family discipline that has led us as a society to some of the difficult issues we are facing. We’ve become a spoiled people, who expect immediate gratification and constant entertainment. We have learned that we can squander our resources, and borrow to replace what we’ve depleted.
It is folly to assume that we can continue to live without ultimately paying the debt for our greed and obsessive lifestyle. Make no mistake about it we will reap what we sow. That’s not an alarm, that’s a fact!
by Joseph | Oct 22, 2008 | Preparation, Sharing
Offered By: Jeff Rowland
Four times in the scripture the bible says, “The just shall live by faith.” This is an imperative declaration. It doesn’t say that we might live by faith, but it says the just SHALL live by faith. This implies many things. Faith is the ultimate key to the victorious Christian walk. It doesn’t matter what you are facing in life, if you are walking in faith you are setting yourself up to see miracles in your life.
It is possible to go into an unhealthy extreme in this area as well. If faith becomes the object of our goal instead of the object of faith, which is Christ, then you will fall into extremes that will lead you into misapplying scripture. The power that becomes manifest in the believers life is as a result of who we have faith in and not faith itself.
I want us to consider a key element associated with faith in this article and let it encourage us to begin a lifestyle of faith that will bring us into fullness in our relationship with Christ.
Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the substance of things hope for.”
Faith can be viewed in a two-fold manner. It is an action as well as an attitude. James says that faith without works is dead. Therefore there must be action to faith or it is a dead faith. Paul lists faith as a spiritual gift in his writings to the Corinthian Church.
People who have the gift of faith walk around in an attitude of faith most all of the time. Going back now to the first line of verse 1 of Hebrews 11, we could say that our actions or attitude of faith, then we have the verb is. This makes faith a present tense action or attitude.
Next we have the word, substance. Substance defines faith as the reality of the object of faith. So then, actions and attitudes of faith are the present tense reality of things hoped for.
Hope can be defined as the future tense of faith becoming sight. I have the hope of heaven because I have been redeemed by Christ’s blood. My hope is yet future. However, in this verse we can say that the actions of faith are the present tense reality of things that are yet future in our lives.
Speaking from a spiritual perspective we can say that faith takes what is yet our future hope and places it into our present day. I can enjoy the joys of heaven while on earth through faith.
This verse goes on to say that faith is the evidence of things not seen. That is it is the proof of what is invisible. Through the eyes of faith we can see things that before we could not see. This being the case we could say that unless our faith is strong we will not see the things that God wants us to see. We will be blinded to it. I wonder how many are walking around in darkness now even though they have been saved but their faith is weak and they are blinded to spiritual realities that could be right in front of them.
This truth from verse 1 would bring us to a question that should be asked. How do we strengthen our faith? Verse 3 says, “Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.” Verse 3 gives us the basis for faith building.
Romans 10:17, “So then, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God.”
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by Joseph | Oct 17, 2008 | Preparation, Sharing
Shared By: Jeff Rowland
Romans chapter 14 is in my opinion the most pivotal chapter in the Word of God concerning relationships between believers. This chapter also gives the streamline and basic fundamental principles of Kingdom living for the people of God.
We are living in ages of social dilemma’s that shape the political landscape of our nation. Every issue that we look at, points to the rules of conduct for our leaders and our citizens. For the believer, the kingdom of God has certain guidelines and principles that are to guide our lives concerning relationships with others, ourselves and our King. Paul in this chapter approaches those principles in verse 17. He says, “For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.” This indicates it is not the matter of our liberty or lack of liberty in certain areas that allows us the joy of the kingdom.
The three elements of kingdom living emphasized by Paul are; righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. These three elements can only be received as a gift from the King; they cannot be earned through performance. They are matters of the heart and spirit, not of the will and flesh.
This leads us to the present condition of the church. Most churches spend the majority of their time trying to discover what is right and wrong. As a result of this we accumulate a list of sins, as well as patterns of behavior that leads to sin. If we focused on the heart of God and the word of God then I believe we would accomplish much more.
Jesus declared in the Gospel of John 3:18, “He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” The key thought is to believe. Faith unlocks the door to salvation and the grace of God. With that said consider what Paul said in Romans 14:23 “for whatsoever is not of faith is sin.”
This is not a profound thought but a reminder of some things. When we establish a list of sins like; adultery, lying, stealing, envy, jealousy, and taking God’s name in vain, we need to remember that the sin has already occurred before the actions ever manifest.
The sin according to Paul is the lack of faith. From a lack of faith any known action of sin can manifest in anyone given the right situation. Therefore any believer is vulnerable to any known act of sin if we walk in a lack of faith. This brings up the question, how many people are walking in sin and never even realize it until the action manifests?
Satan knows what situation or circumstance to surround us with at the time when we are walking in a lack of faith to bring about any given action of sin. Be careful when you say you would never commit a certain action.
Now based on this what do we do? Paul says in verse 23 “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin.” At its most basic root, faith is total dependence on God. Whatever makes us independent will lead to a lack of faith and leave us vulnerable to manifest whatever action of sin the situations of life will call for. Therefore we need to understand some basic principles.
1. Your strength can become your weakness.
It is important that we understand that the enemy wants to do damage to that part of you that does his kingdom of darkness the most damage. Satan targets our strength more than our weakness. It is our strength that does him the most damage. The spiritual gift that you operate in is the area that you could become weak in.
We have the tendency to forget that it is the Spirit of God that enables us not we ourselves. The preacher can become independent of God in his preaching and begin to think that it is his ability rather than God ability that enables him to declare the Word of God with power. Don’t forget that it is God that enables us to do all things.
2. Your weakness will become your strength.
Paul describes this principle in 2 Corinthians 12 in his conversation with the Lord. With regard to Paul’s thorn in the flesh, God said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” In our weakness, we then begin to trust God. Our weakness then is transformed into our weakness.
The perception of the church is that our weakness must never be seen or talked about when in fact after our weakness is manifest and then taken to the Father, we at that point have the choice to trust the Father more deeply and are transformed into His strength.
3. Prolonged circumstance will cause you to become independent of God.
David said in Ps. 13, “How long will hide your face from me O Lord.” When we are faced with a circumstance of trouble over a prolonged period of time we begin to attempt to work things out for ourselves instead of waiting on God. When we engage our will to work things out on our own we are walking independently from God.
Conclusion: Instead of looking so intently on the manifestations of sin we should be looking at the root cause, which is a lack of faith. Trusting the Father will keep us walking in the Spirit and we will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.
by Joseph | Oct 16, 2008 | Preparation, Sharing
A lot of people know that I have been working on preparation for quite a while. I am often asked to share what I am doing (currently) to prepare.
To help me stay focused (and not feel overwhelmed), I keep a working list that I continually update with items I feel are very important in the preparation journey. Of course, I also try to regularly post to this blog – as it enables me to share some insights I have from my journey, and what I feel is impressed upon my heart.
A couple of weeks ago, I posted an article on the progress of some of my family’s efforts to get ready for events that we believe are coming. Every day we work on our list – and involve every member of our family in the process.
Before I share an update on our progress, I found it quite interesting that today on CNN – Glenn Beck published an article that is right in line with this whole notion of preparation. from my perspective, his comments and insights are right on target as he mentions the need to prepare – and not panic. If you are interested, you can View the article here.
Anyway, let me get to my preparation. Let me encourage you to start your own list of things you want to work on to prepare. It will help you stay focused, and feel less stressed about the events that are unfolding.
These are in no particular priority order, and this is not at all my comprehensive list. I have some other items that I’ve prepared – but will not disclose those for security reasons:
- My family has developed a fully-stocked heirloom vegetable seed (and seed potatoes) bank. We’re going to be getting some flowers as well.
- Have a strong supply of nutrient dense URI products (dehydrated whole-food powder) for nutritional needs. The Feast and Barley Pure are a necessity for my family, and the product has a 2 year shelf life. (more…)
by Joseph | Oct 15, 2008 | Preparation, Sharing
Over the years, I have felt emphatically that I was to lead my family to be “in preparation”. When I first heard the call to prepare, I had an intellectual perception that I was going to flee to the mountains, and begin stockpiling food, water and other supplies.
Later, I began to realize that my call to prepare was NOT a call to hoard food, or to live in seclusion and fear. On the contrary, the preparation journey was to make a safe place for sharing – during a time of crisis when people would be prone to fear and panic.
The journey of preparation is certainly not easy. There has been great transition and purging that my family has endured. It would be foolish to assume that all we needed to do was to stockpile groceries and ammo, and then wait on some cataclysmic event to thrust us into our new lifestyle. Unfortunately, that’s what I see happening with many people who are looking at the chaotic times and are beginning to assume something difficult is on the horizon. So, they begin reacting to the most basic human instinct – survival – and fill their closets with food items to keep them alive until they can come out of hiding.
I won’t debate the need to store food items in a pantry. In fact, I strongly encourage everyone to get a 6 to 8 month supply of food and supplies. Not just to have groceries in the cupboard, but perhaps to help sustain you financially during lean months.
For me, it goes far beyond simply having food in the storehouse. The impression I get from some people I speak with is that – if things get really rough, they will simply sit around the house and eat their stock. That’s ridiculous!
Some families, right now, could not sit in the same room for more than an hour. Now, imagine if there was great turmoil, chaos, and fear all around. Do you suppose that family might be able to sit down calmly and sing hymns to pass the time? I doubt it. We’ve complicated our lives to the extent that any quiet, simple family time – is rare. Even Churches have become reckless entertainment hubs where there always has to be something going on to keep the flock active. What happened to “Be Still and Know…?”
Part of the preparation process is being able to find pleasure and joy in simple things. Cluttering our lives with constant motion or activity will make things exponentially more difficult to adjust to when there is global chaos.
Preparation is not just about hoarding food and water. Preparation is not about trying to outsmart fear, and simply plan ahead. God is our refuge and our strength – we can’t manufacture peace by simply working ahead of the looming chaos. We can, however, get ready for the coming events so we are better able to share hope, peace, and life in Christ – especially during times of great distress. There will be a great harvest in that day!
Prepare now by sharing quiet and peaceful times with family, or friends. Avoid the need to constantly be busy.
by Joseph | Oct 9, 2008 | Preparation, Sharing
Unless you have lived on a different planet over the last couple of weeks, you know things seem to be in turmoil. It seems that every person you talk with, are quite concerned with what is going on.
Leaders all over the world are making statements to try to calm their people, as they recognize the panic that threatens to spiral out of control. Leading financial “experts” from leading economies are apparently working behind the scenes to coordinate a global financial rescue effort in an attempt to keep the financial markets from complete meltdown.
This week, the President of Franc – Nicolas Sarkozy – made the statement that he hoped a “New World” would emerge from this chaos.
Scotland’s leading Newspaper published an Article on this “New World Order” citing the new Global co-operation, Nationalization and State intervention – were changing our world.
Even Opec has called an emergency meeting to try to deal with the plunge of oil prices which is putting oil producing economies in turmoil. With the world economy on the brink of a global depression, the need for oil products has diminished significantly.
So what does this all mean? (more…)
