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Friday, October 23, 2009

How can young people deal with tough decisions?

It's interesting how adults often look at us young people and lecture us about how lucky we are for not having a lot of responsibilities.Some of them think we barely have any pressure to handle and stress in our lives.
Truth is we have to take the biggest decisions of our lives at this stage because they are going to affect our destiny and our future.The places we go to;to people we interact with and a lot of other matters are a big influence on how we are going to live our lives and take those decisions like:
-What to major in? how to live? how to find a good partner? how to know if this is a good thing to do? etc...
And a mistake in one of those matters can result in a loss of time;money;energy;resources and maybe suffering and tears. Now if that's not a big responsibility tell me what is.
some less fortunate have to deal with bad
advices from so called friends.
Hopefully there's a way to find help in making the right choices by seeking God's wisdom;and a lot of good advices can be found in the book of Proverbs.I looked it up and selected the best ones i could find and put up a little step by step plan. I really hope it helps any of you guys going through a hard time making up your minds

1-Talk to God about your plans 

I invite anyone on the verge to take a big decision to take some time in prayer and meditation before making the big step:


"Trust the Lord with all your heart,and don't depend on your own understanding.
Remember the Lord in all you do, and he will give you success" : Proverbs 3:5-6 (NCV)


2- Analyze what you have in mind


You might find ourselves in situations where you feel like doing something because it feels good...even if it's not right.That's when you should be even more careful because your thoughts will have a big impact on your decisions later:

"Be careful what you think,
because your thoughts run your life"


"Be careful what you do,and always do what is right."  : Proverbs 4 : 23,26 (NCV)


3- Look for counsel

In order to clarify your ideas you can also look for the company of older persons who appear to have an understanding at life and seek their advices.


"Plans fail without good advices,but they will succeed with the advice of many others" : Proverbs 15 : 22


"Spend time with the wise and you will become wise,but the friends of fools will suffer." : Proverbs 13 : 20 (NCV)

4- Avoid bad company 

In order to make faster progress you should consider avoiding any association with other people promoting alcohol and substance abuse as a good and noble thing. Their lack of understanding causes them to be unable to realize that such actions are surely going to have some bad consequences later and you must
tell them the truth; without following their behavior.

"Stay away from fools,because they can't teach you anything."


"Fools don't care if they sin,but honest people work at being right." : Proverbs 14 :7 , 9 (NCV).


5- Surrender all to God
  
When you are constantly making plans and calculating what your next move shall be;you might feel a lot of pressure and stress coming your way; learn how to let go and allow God to work with you in order to deal with it. It is good to surrender all to him who is almighty and able to help us.

"People make plans in their minds, but only the Lord can make them come true."

"Depend on the Lord in whatever you do,and your plans will succeed." : Proverbs 16: 1,3(NCV)

Let's not forgot these powerful words : PRAYER is the key!

Monday, October 19, 2009

Why divorce?



Why do so many people are getting divorced each and every day?
Why did they have to get married in the first place if it had to end that way?
what happened to the romance and passion they shared when they said:” I do”; and most of all...what happened to the Love?
So many questions; like why I am even writing about this matter since I’ve never been married before?

The pain is real, it’s everywhere; it affects children, family, friends, churches and even society itself.
According to Wikipedia the online encyclopedia; It is estimated that 40% of all marriages have ended in divorce as of 2008, and 46% of them involve a remarriage for one or both spouses. When we think about it...
Why is it so hard for two persons to stay together? Is it because they didn't take enough time to get to know each other before getting involved? Or is it the result of their way of living after getting married? Which doesn't allow them to strengthen their bonds?
Not all marriages fail for the same reason

The most common causes of divorce are said to be:
-poor communication
-financial problems
-lack of commitment to the marriage
-a change in priorities
-infidelity
-unmet needs
-substance abuse
-lack of conflict resolution skills.

As a Christian I believe divorce is mostly the result of bad communication; the absence of a shared vision or goal and adultery. We know that to start a business on good terms one needs to find people who share the same vision in order to build something strong. So we can assume that the same goes to marriage. Both parties have to be on the same page in order to keep on going strong.
For example; it is said that married couples tend to argue about money a lot...or children but what they argue about is not as important as how they argue.
The choice of our spoken words is very important; they can hurt deeply and sometimes it might be just impossible to take it back.


"A gentle answer will calm a person's anger, but an unkind answer will cause more anger" proverbs 15:1.

"Foolish people lose their tempers, but wise people control theirs" proverbs 29:11.


There’s still the problem of adultery.
When we start taking what we have for granted we often start to lose appreciation for it. Someone who finds a good spouse; only to cheat on them later is doing something wrong to their marriage; their other half and to God their creator also...they do not understand the importance of taking that oath to be together through thick and thin as one; since the foundations are weak; everything else just crumbles, slowly but surely, until the only way out seen by the victim is to get out cause they feel like they can't stand it...
Our best option seems to develop an intimate relationship with God and allow him to make his presence felt in
Our life in everything we do....
  I'm still talking from my point of view; and I will gladly appreciate more light and feedback on that matter.

No one understands what his life is all about anyways!

Sunday, October 18, 2009

how can i go to heavens?


How can I be sure I’ll go to heaven?
Back in the days I used to think that going to church and praying on a regular basis would guarantee my salvation. That’s when I heard that sermon about Marc 16:16; "Anyone who believes and is baptized will be saved...."
I was surprised to learn that baptism plays a major role in our salvation;
that caused me to think a lot...like what about the Ten Commandments?!...
If I accept Christ and baptism in my life and forget about the commands does it mean I’m still going to benefit that salvation?
I found the answer in John 14:15 " If you love me, you will obey my commands..."
accepting to follow the ways of God shows people around us that we belong to him and believe that he has plans of peace and happiness for us. He loves us and he wants to save us; this is so true that he sent his only son Jesus to die for our sins at Calvary so we can have eternal life.
We are all sinners and our mere efforts cannot save us; the only way is through our savior Jesus;
sometimes I sin so much that I feel like I don't deserve God's forgiveness and am unworthy to pray him.
As human; it’s hard for us to forgive others the wrong they did to us and therefore we expect God to act likewise towards us but truth is that God loves us with an everlasting love and nothing; even neither sin nor death should be able to block us and prevent us from enjoying his love in our lives.
He knows everything; the best we can do is to surrender all to him and allow him to help us becoming better persons; then; when we are able to truly experience his blessing we shall let others know how great he is....

I invite you to think about how you are living your life now...what place does God occupy in your life? Are you letting him take over and show you the way to heavens?