Experiencing life as it was meant to be!

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We do not have to wait until we get to heaven to experience God’s banqueting house. His overflowing grace is something we can experience in this life. Jesus said, “I came that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly”. Now that is a cup running over with God’s grace. He does not just give us the gift of eternal life when we believe, but He keeps on giving eternal life. The life He is willing to give us means, “to have a surplus,” “superabundance,” “till it overflows.” 

Jesus gives us Himself. He is this abundant life. It is God’s kind of life. When we read “my cup overflows,” that means it is not just full; it is “running over,’ filled to the brim and overflowing. God’s saving and sustaining grace is always like that. His grace is always in fullness, abundance and all-sufficiency. 

Are you prepared to believe the evidence?

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Believing the Evidence

J. Warner Wallace was an atheist for 35 years. He was passionate in his opposition to Christianity, and he enjoyed debating with his Christian friends. He became a Police Officer and eventually advanced to Detective. Along the way, he developed a healthy respect for the role of evidence in discerning truth. When he took time to be honest with himself, he had to admit that he never gave the case for Christianity a fair hearing. When he finally examined the evidence properly, he found it difficult to deny, especially if he hoped to retain his respect for the way evidence is utilised to determine truth. J. Warner found the evidence for Christianity to be convincing.

Deception

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None of us likes to be deceived, yet we may be subject to some kind of deception almost every day. Perhaps you have been deceived in the purchase of some commodity; for example, if the car you bought was ‘clocked’. That means the milometer (the device recording the number of miles the vehicle has travelled) had been turned back to give the impression that the distance travelled was a lot smaller than the true mileage. Along with this, the price was increased because supposedly you were buying ‘a very nice low mileage car’. Sometimes a soccer player is tackled and the tackler hardly touches him but he rolls around the turf so that the referee is deceived into awarding a ‘free kick’. Many people have been deceived by politicians who promised lots but delivered little.

We remember, when we were at school, the excuses we made because we did not have our homework done. We deceived the teacher. One of the worst deceptions was when we deceived our parents by lying to them about places we had been and the company we were with. As we look back over the past our cheeks blush and we feel most uncomfortable.

God can make something of your life.

Apparently it is a true story that in a particular city in the United States of America an advertisement appeared on posters around the streets which announced that a great violinist would play in a certain theatre.  The attraction, which whetted the appetite of many people, was that he would play on a violin worth a thousand dollars (a huge sum of money in those days).  The people packed into the theatre and it was soon filled with the most beautiful music which enraptured the audience and it was a wonderfully exquisite experience.  People were so glad they had come to the theatre and paid the entry price. It was all worthwhile.

Then the whole atmosphere changed because suddenly, to the alarm of the people and to the consternation of everyone in the audience, the musician stopped playing and threw down the violin onto the stage floor. His actions, so unexpected, were done with such violence and it was all compounded as he stamped on the violin and crushed it to pieces and walked off the stage. He left what seemed to be just a mound of broken parts and there was stunned silence as the shocked audience looked on in horror.  They tried to assimilate what had happened and why such a gifted musician had done such a dreadful act.  Some people thought that he must have lost his mind and become deranged in some way to have deliberately destroyed such a beautiful instrument which had cost so much. It all seemed such a waste.