These past few days I feel like God has really been showing me something and allowing my trust to continue in Him.

To start you should know that I have been reading “Erasing Hell” by Francis Chan. This book talks about the idea of hell and if it is real or not and the different comments, thoughts and opinions people have on the subject. In the book, Francis talks about a few of these opinions, but goes on to focus on the things scripture says about hell. I was amazed to see that there are so many passages that speak of the eternal torture unbelievers will go through if the do not trust in Christ and receive His free gift of grace in His mercy. Now most people would say, “why would a loving God do such a thing?”

But some people forget to remember the start of it all.

• We have all sinned against God and have spit in his face. We chose Satan’s fruit in place of God’s garden (Genesis 3)
• You see scripture tells that nobody is righteous, not one single person. Not one does any good (Romans 3:10-12)
• All of us have sin in our life and come short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)
• But we are forgiven, made clean and justified freely by his grace only through the redeemer, Christ Jesus can we be saved (Roman 3:24)
• Yet while we were sinners, CHRIST DIED FOR US (Romans 5:8)
• Now being justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him (Romans 5:9)
• For through the offense (sin) of one (Adam) many are dead by sin, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many (Romans 5:15)
• So what shall we do then? Shall we continue in our sin and continue spitting in Gods face, that grace may abound? God FORBID. How shall we that are dead in sin live any more in it? (Romans 6:1-2)
• For the wages of sin is DEATH, but the gift of God is ETERNAL LIFE through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 6:23)

The Old Testament says in Ezekiel:

“Behold all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also of the soul is mine: that soul that sinneth, it shall die.” (Ezekiel 18:4)

Well dang it says the soul that sin shall die…well that’s a scary thought cause I don’t know about you but I sin all the time being human and all. But the good news is the paragraph I wrote before, Jesus already paid the price for us all we need to do is repent from our ways and live for Him and we will be saved by his blood. But there is good news later in the chapter:

But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. All his transgressions that he hath committed, they shall not be mentioned unto him: in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live. Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord GOD: and not that he should return from his ways, and live? (Ezekiel 18:21-23)

He is The Potter and We Are The Clay

“ ¹⁶So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. ¹⁷ For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. ¹⁸ Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.” (Romans 9: 16-18)

Then the question arises does God decided who he gives mercy on? Then further down in the chapter Paul writes,

“Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? ²¹ Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?”

(Romans 9:20-21)

Yes God does whatever He pleases, HE IS GOD. And when people ask wow, yeah that sure does sound like a loving God and you find yourself kinda embaressed or speechless, almost agreeing with them.

But this is what we tend to forget, God is perfect and is right in ALL he does.

I have been reading through Isaiah and he writes saying that, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

(Isaiah 55:9-8)

He says it perfectly, who do we think we are that we can make BETTER decisions than the man who created this earth and all the living things in it.

We look at all the evil in the world and blame God all the time and always apologizing for God or wanting an apology from Him, but I think its time as Christians that we start to apologize to God for our little faith and start repenting and actually realizing who God is and that he does everything for His Glory and then for the good of those who LOVE Him.

Francis Chan later writes in his book all the things, that if he were God, he wouldn’t have done. Then Francis writes:

“The fact is, Scripture is filled with divine actions that don’t fit our human standards of logic or morality. But they don’t need to, because we are the clay and He is the potter. We need to stop trying to domesticate God or confine Him to tidy categories and compartments that reflect our human sentiments rather than His inexplicable ways. We serve a God whose ways are incomprehensible, whose thoughts are not like our thoughts. Ultimately, thoughts of God should lead to joy, because those same thoughts designed the cross– the place where righteousness and wrath kiss. Would you have thought to rescue sinful people from their sins by sending your Son to take on human flesh? Would you have thought to enter creation through the woman of a young Jewish woman and be born in a feeding trough? Would you have thought to allow your created beings to torture your Son, lacerate His flesh with whips, and then drive nails through His hands and feet? Parents, imagine it.”

Anyway my point in all this is that God’s thoughts are ultimately for a greater purpose whether you can comprehend it or not. He has every situation under control and we absolutely need to learn to trust in Him with everything and realize that we aren’t the smart ones here.

– Amber

Hola my amigos, sorry its taken me two weeks to write another blog I have been having computer troubles and been super busy these past two weeks!!

Last week Tyler gave Tyler Gay and I a topic that we had to give a little sermon on. I had the topic of “False Teachers”. For me this was a really new experience to find all verses and put a sermon together then actually “preach”. But I did survive, kinda. So here it is:

False Teachers

“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.”
1 John 4:1

John warns us here that there WILL be false prophets in the world, so we need to be testing to see if they are true prophets. So how do you do that? Some big warning signs will be:

• If they confesses Jesus isn’t come in the flesh (Spirit of Antichrist)
• He will deny God and Jesus
• Shall bring many heresies ( like saying Jesus is not God)
• Many people will LOVE them and follow them

How these guys work is that they claim to “know” God but there actions and fruits will deny him.

Matthew 7:15 says, “Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly they are ravening WOLVES.” So these guys are trying to deceive us and kill us. For the enemy comes to STEAL, KILL, AND DESTROY.”

“For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light” 1 Corinthians 11: 13-14

These guys know just how stretch the truth just a little bit enough so it looks good and sounds good and helps you out even though every bit of it is un-biblical. 

Another way to identify these lovely people is by their fruits.

“Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.”  Matthew 7: 17-20

Examples of some bad fruits are:

• Vain talkers
• Lovers of themselves
• Prideful
• High-minded
• Despisers of those who do good

Examples of good fruits:

• Sober
• Joyful
• Loving
• Peace
• Faithful
• Longsuffering
• Meekness/ Gentleness
• Will deny himself for God

“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.”  John 15: 4-10

So Jesus says if we love him we will keep his commandments and if these guys aren’t abiding in the love of Christ Jesus why do we listen to them?

“Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?  2 Corinthians 13:5

“if my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 7:14

So if we aren’t bearing good fruit ourselves how are we ever going to know if the pastor we listen to every Sunday morning or at youth is teaching the truth? We need to abiding in Christ and looking at ourselves and know what it looks like to follow Christ and you will be able to see when someone else may be that sheep in wolves clothing.

But I end this with a promise that John gives, “Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.” – 1 John 4:4

So there is my little sermon. This week we have been studying Revelation which is super cool. Its cool in chapter one of Revelation we get a description of what Christ looks like:

• He is clothed with a garment down to the floor with a golden girdle
• His hair was white like snow
• His eyes were as a flame of fire
• His feet like unto fine brass
• His voice was as the sound of many waters
• His right hand holds seven stars
• Out of his mouth comes a two-edged sword (The Word of God)

Then Sunday Tyler Gay and I helped lead the English bible study on Sunday as we studied through 1 John 3, 4.

God really has been teaching me and showing me a lot through His Word and He is pruning me and taking out all of my worldly desires and showing me how wonderful it is to love Him. I am so lucky to be serving and to be a daughter of such a wonderful King. I love you all and hope you all have a wonderful week

Love,

Amber

This is my half way point here in Costa Rica. I been having so much fun with Tyler and Amber and I still don’t know how they can put up with me LOL. Last Sunday Amber and I preached on 1 John 1&2. Tomorrow I will be giving a message about Jesus, His birth, life, death, resurrection and second coming……using only the Old Testament! I thought it was going to be really hard, but after prayer and studying some, it just began to pop right out of the Bible. This one verse I would have thought it was from the New Testament, I know it is talking about Jesus, this is Psalm 22:16:

“For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet.”

This is crazy because if you know world history outside of the Bible we learn that the Persian most likely started using crucifixion as a form of punishment…..which is hundreds of years after this Psalm was written! So this was written before Babylon ruled, which was followed by Persia, Greece and then finally Rome took over.

Another thing that we are doing is learning to use Matthew 6:9-13 as our model for prayer.

“9. after this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.

10. They kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.

11. Give us this day our daily bread.

12. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.

13. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.”

We take one verse at a time and each of us take a turn praying.

Here is an example:

1. First, we praise and thank Him for everything, for who He is and what He has done.
2. Then we pray that His Will would be accomplished in our lives, in the Church and in the world
3. Followed by our requests and needs as well as others; friends, family, etc.
4. Next we repent and ask forgiveness for our sins and forgive people who have sinned against us
5. Finally we pray for His protection over us, ask for His wisdom and guidance throughout the day and we finish with praising and thanking Him.

So my test to you is to try it, just open the Bible up to Matthew 6:9-13 and pray. This is helping me so much and will teach you how to pray and to pray longer.

Stay in the word, pray, and love you all,

– TyGuy #aboutthatlife

Hiya peeps.

You can rest assured that I have survived the first week living with 2 guys… I will say it has been super interesting. But I will give them credit for dealing with my craziness.

The beginning of this week we studied the poetical books of Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Songs of Solomon. In Job we looked at how faithful Job was towards God in the midst of crazy trials and we saw some insights on how the enemy works.

• Satan is accountable to God, so he must ask God before he does anything
• Satan’s dark mind is an open book to God, so God knows everything he is trying to plan
• Satan is behind the evils that curse this earth
• Satan is not omnipresent (He can only be one place at a time), nor omniscient (He is not all-knowing)
• Satan cannot do anything without God’s permission
• God’s eyes are ALWAYS on his own children

Then when we got to psalms we looked at Psalms 22:

“I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought me into the dust of death. For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet I may tell all my bones: they look and stare upon me. They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture. –Psalm 22: 14-18

It was cool that it was explaining Jesus dying on the cross over a thousand years before!!!!

Then we studied about the lovely P31 Woman (Proverbs 31)

• She is a good Woman: She works diligently (v:13,15,19); She contrives prudently (v:16,22,24); She behaves uprightly (v:25)
• She is a good Wife: She seeks husbands good (v: 12); She keeps her husbands confidence (v:11); She aids his prosperity (v23, 24)
• She is a good Mother: She clothes her family wisely (v:21); She feeds her household well (15, 27); She shops sensibly (v:14-18)
• She is a good Neighbor: She helps the poor (v:20); She uplifts the needy (v:20); She speaks graciously (26)

“Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised.” Proverbs 31: 30

This week I was dealing with a lot of anxiety and fear of what is going to happen when I return home. So studying the Psalms, where God gives us a lot of promises, has helped me a lot to trust in Him and Him alone. Later in the week we watched a sermon by Eric Ludy that God really spoke to me through.

He pointed out that when satan tries to give us evidence and gives us doubt we have to give him the evidence of what God says. That we don’t celebrate doubt we give them FAITH. And then the 6 motives satan tries to use on us:

Pollution
Tiredness
Distraction,
Anxiety/Fear
Anger/Frustration
Doubt.

So we need to start looking at the Facts:

The Word of God
The Promises of God
The Nature of God (Who He really is, based on scripture)

Instead of our Experiences:

Feelings/Emotions (How we feel about something instead of how it really is) 2 Corinthians 10:5
Appeal of Anxieties (Letting the worries of life overtake us) 1 Peter 5:6-11, Matt. 11:28, Matt 6:33-34
Appeal of Lethargy (Allowing laziness and tiredness to consume us)
Appeal of Grievance ( Using life experiences and painful situations as an excuse to deny God’s truth)

So God has been really faithful pointing me in the right direction and showing me that the gospel, which is the truth, isn’t some big complicated thing that the church makes it out to be. All we need to do is trust in what His Word says and follow him with everything we have. We need Him to give us a new heart of obedience and repentance, changing our wicked ways and allowing Him to lead us in His Way, which is so much better than anything this world could ever give us. So I encourage you to really read what God has to say and just test Him because His Word tells us that those who hunger and thirst for righteousness WILL be filled. He sent His Son to come to give you true hope. He took your place dying on the cross and taking the wrath we deserve from God so we could spend eternity with him. That is True love right there. (Check out John 15) All I wanna do is share this with you cause I wouldn’t want anyone to ever miss out on true compassion and love.

Anyways that’s all from this week, Love you all!

– Amber

Hi wonderful friends!

I am glad to tell you in this blog post how much God has been working in my life in these past two weeks.  God has really been showing me how much I depend on this world and other people instead of depending on Him. I saw how much I was letting me and God’s relationship fade and that I was going off of my own strength and not letting Him have control. So last weekend I decided to give my entire life to him and I was baptized at beautiful beach.

This week was Gospel week. We all wrote down what we thought the gospel was. I learned how it’s more than Jesus coming to earth and dying for us and rising from the dead. Here is a link you can watch that really hit me and caused me to see what the gospel really is:

http://youtu.be/nPIOkdNL-QQ

We have been studying through the 4 gospels, comparing the different points of view in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and how they perfectly line up together. I was amazed to see how many different prophecies Jesus fulfilled and how the chances of every single one of them being fulfilled by one person is absolutely impossible….but Jesus fulfilled them all!

Here are just a few:

-He was to be of David’s family.
(2 Samuel 7:12-16; Psalm 89: 3-4)

-He would be born of a virgin. (Genesis 3:15; Isaiah 7:14)

-He would be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2)

-He would sojourn in Egypt
(Hosea 11:1)

-He would live in Galilee
(Isaiah 9:1-2)

-He would live in Nazareth.
(Isaiah 11:1)

And there is so much more but I would be typing forever. The other two girls interns that were here with us left to go back to America and I’m stuck with 2 guys, but it’s been nice having more time to rely on God completely. He has really been forcing me to trust him in everything. I can say that I trust him and I know that he will use all these lonely times to teach me to spend time with just him. But if y’all could be praying for us that he would guide us in our studies and that he would continue working in our lives it would be very much appreciated!

Love y’all.
-Amber

This past month has been great God has and is continuing to work in and through us. We are going though Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. My favorite book is John. I love reading all the stores that he gives us. If you have time READ John 6. I love when he talks about that he is the Bread of Life and he live in us.  Like in John 6:56 (Jesus is talking) and he says, ” he that eateth my flesh, and that drinketh my blood, dwells in me, and I in him. I can’t wait to see what God is going to do in the next 2 months.

-TyGuy