GREETINGS FROM BELIZE

We are enjoying these few days of cooler weather.  Today is was about 81 degrees, but it feels cooler because of the gentle breeze.  Today was slower paced.  Studying has been our mail goal.  We're blessed to teach a class at the Assemblies of God Bible Institute in Belize City.  Tommy teaches on Tuesday night....and I teach on Thursday night.  My subject is, "Old Testament Historical Books" ... from 6 pm to 8 pm.

We have a team of workers arriving next Thursday from Arkansas -- so I am striving to get ahead on lesson preparations for the next two weeks.  Today I concluded my study guide for lesson 12, the Books of I and II Chronicles.

Although it's a relatively short lesson, it is packed with great truths....and these points show just how on target God was and is, regarding His plan for the Messiah to appear!  I Chronicles 17:14  "But I will settle him in My house and My kingdom forever, and his throne shall be established forevermore."

I'm amazed at just how steadily and perfectly God stays on course with His plan.  He used imperfect men and women and He chose them based upon their obedience to Him ... because that obedience produced the character needed for the task ahead.  Personal character actually grows out of obedience to God.

A story is included in this chapter of a minister in a large city who was beset by all the pressures of the pastoral scene.  In desperation, he searched for and found a place where he could get away from the phone and demands of his office.  He found it in the baptistry of his large church.  As he honored God by seeking His face daily and waiting in His presence, God honored him and enlarged his ministry so that the work of that church prospered and grew beyond all that could have been done through human means.

The next paragraph is one to remember:

*"Love for God will always leave its material mark.  When men of God were possessed of holy faith, something material always happened as a testimony of God's power and their faith (Hebrews 11).  In David's case it was the temple that was brought into being.  But let us be brought again to the basic truth that God's work is fundamentally spiritual in nature even though it is material in expression.  The temple of God must first be built in the human heart; then its material expression will be blessed and used of God.  The reverse order can never succeed."

LOVE is the focus of the weekend.  And I love this sentence:  "Love for God will always leave its material mark."   We love ... then we express that love.  God loved ... and He expressed that love to us through Jesus Christ.

May the love of God abound in your hearts and may your love for Him ... and obedience of His word, produce the character in you which will launch the plan of God in your life.

Much love from Belize ...

* (from Study Guide by Amos Millard, based on the textbook, "The Historical Books" by L. Thomas Holdcroft)