It has been reported by medical science recently that praying can affect a sick person’s outcome for the better. One study showed that even when the sick person did not know people were praying for him/her, their health improved. As believers, we know personally what prayer has done for us in our times of sickness (Js. 5:15-16). But did you know that “praying in tongues” can actually make you healthier? read more »
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In his first letter to Timothy, Apostle Paul testified that he was the most unlikely person to get saved. He was “a blasphemer, a persecutor, and injurious to Christians” (1Tim1:13). Luke’s account in the Book of Acts confirms this: “Saul (aka Paul) made havoc of the church, entering into every house and haling men and women, committed them to prison” (Acts8:3). The term havoc means “to treat outrageously with personal injury” and haling means “to forcibly drag.” In Acts 9:1: Paul was “breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord.” Paul himself wrote in Galatians 1:13: “For you have heard of my conversation in time past… How that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God and wasted it.” read more »
He only wrote 25 verses! His letter is the last book before the book of Revelations (which entails the Tribulation, the Judgments, the Millennial Reign of Christ, and the eternal ages to come). In this snapshot of the days before the return of Christ, Jude does not mince words. His demeanor is urgent, and he speaks with graphic bluntness, because the times and condition of men’s hearts require it.
In his unique style, Jude was fond of using trilogies. He often gave three examples to illustrate his points, beginning with three descriptions of the believers to whom he wrote: “to the sanctified, the preserved, and the called,” and he greeted them with “mercy, peace, and love multiplied” (2-3). Immediately, however, there was an abrupt change in Jude’s approach and purpose for writing the letter:
One of the greatest “love stories” in the Bible is that of Jacob and Rachel. Jacob had to flee his home in Beersheba where he had lived with his parents Isaac and Rebekah and his elder twin brother Esau for over 20 years. He and his mother had deceived Isaac into giving him the birthright blessing that belonged to Esau. His life in danger due to Esau’s rage, Isaac and Rebekah sent him to her family in Haran to seek a wife of her brother Laban’s daughters. Esau had married Canaanite women which had greatly displeased them. On the way, Jacob had a God-encounter in which God promised to bless him with the blessings he had sworn unto his fathers Abraham and Isaac.
Arriving at the outskirts of Haran, he came upon a well where the people came to drink water and water their animals. While questioning the man at the well about his uncle Laban, Rachel, Laban’s youngest daughter, showed up with her father’s sheep. When he saw her, Jacob ran to her, kissed her and wept, telling her that he was her relative. She took him home to meet her family. When a month had gone by, Laban realized the value of keeping Jacob around, and he approached him with the offer to pay him a fair wage for his services. Jacob was quick to respond, because he had fallen head over heels in love with beautiful Rachel. He said, “I will serve you seven years for your youngest daughter Rachel.” Laban readily agreed and Jacob joyfully and diligently served Laban for the next seven years. “And they seemed to him but a few days, for the love he had for her” (Gen. 29:20). read more »
21 Day Daniel Fast Begins January 8th
What Fasting is Not:
It is not a hunger strike to force God’s hand or to get one’s way.
What Fasting is:
It is a spiritual weapon to be coupled with faith and prayer. It gives earnestness and urgency to our prayers. In the same context in which the Lord taught the disciples how to pray, He also taught them how to fast (Matthew 6:1-18). In this discourse, Jesus spoke of private fasting, and He said that such fasting done in private, and not to be seen of men, brings public rewards.
There are also corporate fasts, in which a group or a church or even many churches may band together to sanctify a fast. There are many instances of this in the O. T., and these reveal various purposes for such fasting:
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