A critical distinction

Posted by Bill on November 26, 2011

One of the most important lessons I’ve learnt from following the Lord is to distinguish between sinner and sin. The Lord has helped me in situations of disappointment and hurt by others to carefully separate sinner and sin in my mind before reacting. I’ve learnt not to throw out the baby with the dirty bathwater … the baby is the object of God’s love!

A great example for me with regards to this is the incident where Peter denied the Lord, three times, after His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:69-75). After the rooster had crowed, Jesus didn’t show Peter a look of rejection, nor did the Lord withdraw His love from him. To the contrary, after His resurrection, the Lord cooked breakfast at the Sea of Galilee for His dear friend, Peter, and reaffirmed His unconditional agape love for him (John 21:15-17).

In restoring Peter from his mega-failure and guilt, the Lord demonstrated the importance and power of making the distinction between sinner and sin. Through this undeserved act of grace, Peter was able to rise from his failure and follow His Lord, and became one of the greatest church leaders of the New Testament era.

Friends, with more than thirty years of discipleship experience behind me I still feel I am no more than a novice in the area of modelling the Lord’s practice of making the distinction between sinner and sin. In this matter, I have failed many times with those in my family; with friends; work associates; and others in the church. My natural default is to reject both sinner and sin, denying the sinner of the love of Christ through my life. However, my desire is to be like Christ in every way … my desire is to love sinners, no matter what they do to me. (“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” Romans 5:8).

The Lord succeeded in His earthly mission through practicing the importance of making the “critical distinction” between sinner and sin – He died to save us, not our sins!

The view gets better as we climb higher!

Posted by Bill on November 19, 2011

I have chosen to stand on a rock-solid belief that the view gets better as we climb higher with the Lord. With that belief I am determined to do all that is within my control to climb higher to the next level … and the next, and the next. From where I presently stand, I am excited by the amazing things I believe the Lord has in store for His old, but not worn out, servant.

Now, before I make the mistake of racing ahead, enthusiastic and emotionally charged, to take hold of the blessings that have been reserved for me I need to pause for a moment to remind myself of a critical principle of the upward climb … the principle of cost. Truly, I don’t expect to progress in my climb without having to pay something. Jesus, our go-ahead God, came into our world to elevate us with Him, in life and ministry. Although most people in life are happy to see their lives moving forward and higher, only few are prepared to pay the price.

For those who are serious about journeying with Jesus to the top, He says from the Book of Luke … “If you want to be my follower you must love me more than your own father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters – yes, more than your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple.” “So no one can become my disciple without giving up everything for me” Luke 14:26b, 33. Twice in this passage, Jesus says we cannot follow Him unless we are prepared to meet the necessary demand – to love Him more than everyone and everything in our lives. Loving Jesus “more than …” is the principle cost of climbing higher in your faith.

How do we prove to Jesus that we love Him more than anyone and anything, including our own lives? He says in the Book of John … “If you love me, keep my commandments” John 14:15. Before we can “keep His commandments” we must sacrifice whatever stands in our way.

Friends, at no stage of our climb with Jesus should we entertain the thought that pushing on to the next level is going to happen without having to pay a high cost. The Lord never asks from us anything but that which is necessary to accomplish His will in our lives. He wants to take us up to the summit of our climb. And, loving Him more than anyone and everything else is the bottom-line cost of our rise. The Lord sacrificed everything, including His life, to come down to where we once were; that place where were held captive and blackened by our sin – to free us and lead us up to the summit of our potential in Him. Why? Because He loves us, more than His own life!

Would you like to go to the next level of your climb in your relationship with the Lord (in your marriage, parenting, leadership, ministry, and mission) where the view is tons better than from where you presently stand (John 10:10b)? If your answer is “yes”, you must sacrifice whatever stands in your way, and obey Him.

Dear friends … the view gets better as we climb higher with Him!

Striving for a Son-ripened harvest

Posted by Bill on September 2, 2011

Experienced farmers work respectfully and harmoniously in their fields in partnership with the sun. They know the critical role the sun plays in giving and sustaining life in their fields, pastures, livestock, and orchards. They know that without their cooperation with the sun; growth, maturity, and reproduction could not take place. As the sun is critical to their livelihood, farmers submit their farming ways to the sun. They keep their ways in subjection to the sun. read on →

A prayer-produced harvest

Posted by Bill on August 19, 2011

The Bible records that during the course of His public ministry Jesus often withdrew, early in the morning, to lonely places and prayed (Mark 1:35). Now, if Jesus needed to spend time alone with His Father in prayer, then how much more do we? read on →

There’s nothing my God cannot do!

Posted by Nick on May 5, 2011

A short while ago we received this fantastic testimony from ‘Fireball Fredrick’ in Cairo – more proof that God is more than able to provide when we trust in Him and our hearts and minds are aligned with His will for our lives and ministry. Fredrick wrote…

Glory to God in the highest, indeed when He speaks He is able to finish whatever He started.

Our God is a God that makes the impossibility to be possible. It reminds me about the story of Abraham, when God told him to leave his family and go to place He will show him, God worked with him all through. What about the story of feeding the five thousand in Matthew 14:13–21, all Jesus needed was a giver and a little boy stepped forward with five loaves of bread and two fish – I believe you all know the rest of the story (multiplication!!!).

The ‘Destiny Kids Mega Food Drive’ was an idea the Lord place in our hearts during a time of prayer, and I shared it with all the leaders working with me in Destiny Kids during our weekly prayer time (which is every Wednesday) – and we decided that our main goal was to show the kids that Jesus loves them and also to wish them a happy Easter celebration, so we planned to run the program a week later which was on the 22nd of April, 2011.

We prayed about it and asked the Lord for the supply of the food, but some of us were afraid because we have no money and it looked really impossible to meet the demand within a week. But the bible says “to man things are impossible but to God everything, I mean everything is possible” Praise the Lord! During our time of prayer we asked the Lord to supply a food bag each for 40 kids in our service, containing the following:

One 1kg bag of rice
One liter of oil

After the prayer meeting I went home with a strong belief in my heart that our God is able and will do it. Later that night I shared the idea with some friends of mine by email. To my greatest surprise when I checked my email the following day one of my friend’s said “why can’t we make it 80 bags instead of 40 bags of food?” I was speechless, but two things came to my mind – Matthew 14:13-21 (God of Multiplication) and a song we sing with the kid’s ministry “my God is so big, so strong, so mighty, there nothing my God cannot do”. And I discovered that my other friends also supported the idea of asking for more!

Brothers and sisters in Christ our God is able, all we need is to believe him and obey him whenever He sends us a message, and we need not worry about how He will do it.

Within a space of one day after our prayer, God provided food bags for 120 kids! He also doubled the items in each food bag so that every child took home…

Two 1kg bags of rice
One 1kg bag of sugar
One liter of oil
One packet of tea

We had the Easter celebration on the 22nd of April, with one hundred and twenty kids attending, it was a great program and we had a lot of fun – all the kids were truly blessed and also the kids ministry of one of the Refugee Churches in Arba Wa Nous were also blessed.

For less than 40 Egyptian Pounds (around $7) per child we were able to provide

the food bags for 120 children
lunch for all the children and helpers and
transportation for the children who came from Arba Wa Nous.

All thanks to God and to you all that have supported this program in both in kind (food and money) and in prayer – may our Almighty God bless you all.

Also many thanks to all Destiny kids’ ministers and helpers, we love you all.

Fredrick

And here are just some pictures from the day – feast your eyes on the Lord’s amazing love!

You can see the rest of the pictures here on Picasa.

That is SO amazing! Thank you Jesus! Thank you Fredrick!

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