Category: Gods Promises

5/9/2025 1 Comment

Supersessionism

While in Israel traveling with a group of Messianic Jews and those interested in learning more about Israel, we learned about a misguided form of teaching called replacement theology. It is also called fulfillment theology or, more technically, supersessionism. Adherents of replacement theology believe the Jews are no longer God’s chosen people, and God does not have specific future plans for Israel.[1] In effect, when Jesus came, Israel’s place as the people of God ended or was forfeited.[2] Marcion, Irenaeus, and Martin Luther articulated this position. Luther wanted Jews confined to their neighborhoods.[3]

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4/8/2024 0 Comments

Woodchoppers

He doesn’t care about me. If He did, I wouldn’t have all these problems. If He did, He would explain why life must be so challenging. If He did, I would be included and be part of a family instead of feeling alone, excluded, and misunderstood. Ferdi wrestles with a whole lot of insecure thoughts and emotions. His Venezuelan birth mom gave him up to an adoption agency. He’d lived in six different foster homes before his 18th birthday. Without ever knowing his real father, he struggled mightily to trust his Father in Heaven, whose Son he had put his faith in as a 26-year-old single dad. Hard living creates hard questions for the man who chops wood and sells firewood to pay bills and put food on his table. The name Ferdi means to be brave, but that is not always easy when life is a giant question mark.

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1/14/2024 1 Comment

I Am Claiming God's Goodness

At the beginning of each year, I select a passage from Scripture to be my verse(s) for the year. This year, I picked Psalm 65:11.

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11/17/2023 2 Comments

Blind Faith

Johnny* bought a car, a really nice new shiny red car. His wife counseled him not to make the purchase. His financial advisor warned him it could put him in unsustainable debt. But Johnny didn’t care to listen. This car was going to make up for all the “beater,” used, ordinary cars he was tired of driving. It would let everyone know he was doing well—after all he served the King and those who serve the King deserve the best. Right?!

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8/13/2023 0 Comments

The Warrior is a Child

Dad sits at the small kitchen table with his Marine ball cap covering his scattered gray hair. His brow is furrowed, and his piercing blue eyes appear deep in thought. Slowly he adds words to a journal that increasingly makes little sense. I asked what he was writing, and he shared that he was composing thoughts on how God likes eggs cooked. I had just asked him how he wanted his eggs that morning; that thought was fixed in his mind.

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9/19/2022 1 Comment

Inheritance

News flash—there was an attack by a Demon Assault Team (DAT) in heaven today, which wiped out an entire wing of the Central Automation Records Division (CARD) that contained the Book of Life (BoL) and the computerized records of those who are to receive a heavenly inheritance. Michael led a task force of angels that was able to wipe out the DAT, but the CARD facility was severely damaged, and the Book of Life (BoL) was badly compromised. It would seem that Satan hoped to disrupt God’s eternal life reward plan for His saints.

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6/29/2022 0 Comments

Understanding Delay

I hope this is an encouraging word for someone—discouraged by delays, by the hiccups of life that seem insidious; by the time that goes too fast when you want it to be slow and too slow when you want it to be fast.

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4/7/2022 0 Comments

Guaranteed!

Payne lives in the United States but is from Great Britain. Payne grew up as an agnostic. When he came to the U.S., he accepted an invitation to church and heard the minister encourage people to give in support of the ministry. Payne was surprised when the pastor guaranteed that if anyone tithed and did not see God bless their efforts and consequently lost money, he would return their total gift. After the service, he went up to the pastor and said, “Let me get this straight. You are giving us a money-back guarantee if we give and do not see an increase in our finances?” The pastor replied, “I’ve been pastoring for over 30 years, and I have never lost this challenge—so yes, I’m giving you a money-back guarantee!”

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8/28/2021 0 Comments

Withering

The Hebrew word navel, basically means wither or lose heart. It is used twenty times in the Old Testament. The word describes Moses in Exodus 18:18—warned about wearing out from trying to judge the people alone. Eleven times it refers to plants dying. Isaiah uses it to show people withering from sin (Isaiah 64:6). When you think of the condition of the world right now does it feel like it is withering? Such a thought should not be surprising for God warned us that this would happen.

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5/31/2021 0 Comments

Wilderness Lessons

If one were to find a synonym for wilderness in the Bible it would be fairly safe to substitute hardship. The Holman Christian Standard Bible uses the term wilderness 150 times.[1] The majority of references applied to Israel wandering through deserts that resulted in all but two adults over 40 dying and a whole lot of complaining and suffering. The fascinating thing is that God has a penchant for leading His people through wildernesses, to include His own Son (Matthew 4:1). Why does He do this?

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4/7/2021 1 Comment

Leaving

Meditation
Exodus 13:4—Today, in the month of Abib, you are leaving.

The month of Abib, (called Nisan in the post-exilic period), extends from March to April. Moses in the passage above was addressing his countrymen at a most historic time. God rescued them from their Egyptian oppressors and now they were headed into what would become a 40-year desert ordeal. They of course did not know that—they were expecting a fairly quick move to Canaan, the Promised Land. Their leaving was done in haste with little preparation and no doubt great anxiety mixed with the joy of liberation.

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11/24/2020 1 Comment

Thankful

It will go down in history as perhaps mankind’s most bizarre year. Never has the entire globe in unison shut down because of a virus. Restrictions in travel, work, recreation, size of gatherings etc., have ruined businesses, increased the number of suicides and deaths for those with other ailments who cannot be hospitalized, amped fear to unprecedented levels, and created a huge divide in opinion over what should or should not be done. Meanwhile political unrest, rolling waves of violence, storms and disasters add to the cacophony of 2020.

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6/18/2020 2 Comments

Despair: The Lord's Hand is Against Me

Ten times the word despair is used in the Holman Bible. Fittingly Job is the source of one third of them. The Psalmist cried out, “Insults have broken my heart, and I am in despair. I waited for sympathy, but there was none; for comforters, but found no one” (Psa. 69:20). Despair is the stuff of hopelessness. It is a sinking feeling that saps one’s resolve. If not properly addressed it becomes the lingering glue of gloom.

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5/15/2020 0 Comments

These Are Your Promises

In hard times, the assurance of help is a cold glass of water to a parched soul. Isn’t it great to know that no matter the circumstances that surround us, God’s promises are real, present, and cannot be defeated? Joy comes when we live in God’s fulfilled word—word that is for us so that we might live in victory.

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5/7/2020 0 Comments

Joshua

Meditation
Joshua 14:10-12—"As you see, the Lord has kept me alive these 45 years as He promised, since the Lord spoke this word to Moses while Israel was journeying in the wilderness. Here I am today, 85 years old. I am still as strong today as I was the day Moses sent me out. My strength for battle and for daily tasks is now as it was then. Now give me this hill country the Lord promised me on that day, because you heard then that the Anakim are there, as well as large fortified cities. Perhaps the Lord will be with me and I will drive them out as the Lord promised.”

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4/30/2020 0 Comments

Lord God, What Can You Give Me?

Do you ever have times where confusion is far more real than clarity? Has God given you a word in the past that seems impossible to fulfill based on current realities? If you answered “yes” to either of those questions, it should not be hard to relate to Abram.

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11/23/2019 2 Comments

How to Overcome Challenges to Faith

George McDonald once wrote, “A man’s real belief is that which he lives by.” One of the best measurements of a person’s faith is to observe how that person responds to adversity. Here are twelve steps that I believe make all the difference in overcoming challenges to our faith.

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4/19/2019 1 Comment

Confession Liturgy

Sarah Tegtmeier (Dan York's daughter) with her family L-R Jadon, Luca, Leili, Mark, Simeon

Meditation
Psalm 85:15--But You, Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in faithful love and truth

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3/19/2019 1 Comment

The Power of Belief

Talisa

My son Bryan was invited to share his story at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. He was one of two featured speakers on a night when almost every participant in the room shared some kind of disability. Disabilities included Post-Traumatic Stress (PTS), asthma, depression, cancer, arthritis, etc. Each person was asked to write a poem about their challenges and to highlight what was bad as well as what was good. Then, throughout the evening, volunteers could come to the front of the room and share what they wrote.

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6/8/2018 0 Comments

Bliss

Part of the retirement process when leaving the military is to make sure that one’s physical maladies or challenges are all reviewed by the Veterans Administration to determine if the veteran may be owed compensation. I had to undergo a battery of tests to see if past injuries or problems with my Achilles tendon, ankles, knees, hips, lower back, shoulder, hearing, sinuses, hair loss and sleep deprivation were service-related. I was asked all kinds of personal questions by the sleep psych0logist I met with to see if anxiety, depression, any kind of drug or chemical addiction etc. were preventing me from falling asleep. I mentioned multiple times that my problem getting to sleep is lifelong and has to do with an overactive brain that does not shut off easily. I assured her that even though it is a battle for me to rest, I am mostly full of joy and did not blame the military for my condition. I don’t think she was expecting that answer.

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