Truth Tellers

We practice a form of falsehood when we withhold that which we have and know that our neighbor needs.  We lie to those who need hope when we have hope and fear sharing the reason for our hope with our neighbor.
"Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak the truth each one of you to his neighbor, for we are members of one another." Ephesians 4:25
Coach/PJ

Truth Tellers

I had been instructed all my childhood, “Do not run through the dining room!”  One day I ran through and pushed into the kitchen through the swinging door, cape flying behind me in my wake!  From the kitchen I heard a crashing and breaking sound. I laid the pieces back together and balanced them perfectly and escaped to my room on tip toes.  I remember missing Mom those days that I kept her in my deception.  Looking back I recognize that my falsehood created separation.  Then I heard it.  Crash!  I discovered my mother with the four pieces of her grandmother’s dish on the table…weeping!  That lie leapt from my guts as if someone had performed the Heimlich maneuver.  And we are to be lovers of truth once we put off the old and put on the new self!

Ephesians 4:17-24

Coach/PJ

MY HOPE

The other week while at Ridgecrest, I was the lone witness of seeing an older Junior Hill make his way from the lower parking lot, up the hill, climb a flight of stairs and then, with a hearty smile and a sense of victory enter the sanctuary with his worn Bible in hand.  This giant of a man looked at me and said, “I made it brother!”  The many years of travel and evangelistic crusades could have rendered him put out to pasture.  But here he was with a gait that showed him more akin to a thoroughbred coming out of the gates at Churchill Downs. I wish I had run down the hill when I first spotted him.  I wish I had walked with him; and if he had allowed me to, even offer a shoulder of support to make that climb.  Another climbs a mountain this week to his 95^th birthday and an appeal to America to embrace the cross, receive the message of hope that is found only in Christ Jesus, and be saved.  As of early October, 25,000 churches in the US and Canada have run down the hill, embraced Billy Graham in a nation-wide gospel presentation The Cross, a powerful presentation of hope through the testimonies of Billy Graham, Lecrae Moore and Lacey Sturm.  Check your local listings for the Friday and Saturday night telecast at 7:30 p.m.  You can also catch it Thursday night at 10:00 on Fox News!

Coach/PJ