Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
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Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. – 2 Corinthians 5:17 Happy New Year! I pray that your Christmas celebrations were filled with comfort and joy – comfort from the one who came to be with us in good times and bad, and joy at the gift of love and peace that is Jesus. And now, as a new year arrives, it is time for NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS! Did you make any this year? Why or why not? And if you did, how is it going? Many people find New Year’s resolutions to be a depress...
The New Year is here and I’m excited to see what 2022 has for us! My hope is this coming year will be a season of abundance, not just with material prosperity and success, but of love, health, and spiritual awareness. As we plant seeds of faith, may we have the patience and expectation to witness the harvest of God’s blessings. One of my personal resolutions is to be more generous and joyful even when things are not going well. I’m reminded of a quote by Mother Teresa who said, “Not all of us c...
"Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God. Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5:8-10) These are two of the last three of the eight Beatitudes that Jesus identified in his Sermon on the Mount. Beatitude means supreme happiness or blessedness. So, following these should, by definition, result in our supreme happiness in eternal life. But, how do they relate to us, today, right now? How do we live them out in our day-to-day life? There is one current issue that is...
Perfection! Painstaking perfection is how someone could describe how God asked for His Ark of the Covenant to be built. It would be here where He dwelt with His chosen people on earth. The children of Israel were told to bring their first fruits as materials for the Ark. Only incorruptible wood and the purest gold would be used to build it. The measurements would need to be exact and only the finest artisans and experts would be used to build it. "And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring "firstfruits...
How is your Advent Season going? Have you been able to spend some time prayerfully meditating on its meaning? Have you had time to reflect on how broken our world was back then awaiting the Messiah to come to save it on Christmas morning? Have you had time to examine your own life to see where, as Isaiah reminds us, you might need to prepare a way for Jesus to enter anew this Christmas, to make Him a straight path, fill in your valleys, make low your hills, and make your rough ways smooth? Or, have you had little or no time to think about...
"For this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice. Pilate said to him, “What is truth?”’ John:18:37-38 In this exchange with Pontius Pilate, Jesus leaves no doubt that there is such a thing as truth, He testifies to it, and those who listen to His voice testify to it as well. Like many in society today, Pontius Pilate asks the question, "What is truth?" The passage leaves us room to ponder whether Pilate had a genuine desire to know what truth really is, or if it was a disda...
For those who ponder about the requirements for developing and maintaining a deeper relationship with God, we must include some vital components, and one of the most critical is desire. Ask any business person or athlete about what it takes to accomplish a goal and they will always testify about the importance of vision, perseverance, and determination. Likewise, when it comes to drawing nearer to the Lord, we must begin with old-fashioned enthusiasm. The next question is where does this...
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen. It seems like everybody says this at least once every day. Where has the time gone? I know I do. It seems to me we were just complaining about how hot it was outside and now, here we are making plans for Thanksgiving, and Christmas is right around the corner. This week’s message is a prayer. We all know what the holiday of Thanksgiving is for. It is pretty much self-explanatory. We are to be thankful for the many blessings we receive; both physical and spiritual. So, rather than go through a b...
I’ve always enjoyed Thanksgiving, but many times I become distracted from the intended purpose. I confess that between football, conversations, and the delicious meals, I often forget how much I have to be grateful for. Let us once again be reminded of the history of human suffering that is associated with the Pilgrims. It’s been recorded that the new colony gave thanks to God for His blessings and protection, as William Bradford is quoted as saying, “Being thus arrived in a good harbor, and b...
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen. Last week I talked about the bible. I enjoy reading the bible and do so every day. It's not just because I'm “in the business” and reading it is part of my job. I read the bible before I started in parish ministry. Why? Well, for a number of reasons. One is that even though the New Testament was written approximately 2,000 years ago, and the Old Testament long before that, some of it reads as if it were written to us just yesterday. Take the apostle Paul's letters to the churches he helped get s...
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen. The Bible. I'm sure the vast majority of homes in the area have at least one. That's good. Unfortunately, in too many homes, we're not quite sure where it is. If asked, is your answer some place in the bookcase, or maybe in a drawer somewhere? Here is another question. Did you receive one as a gift many years ago, and it still has that “new car” smell and not even the title page has been read? I wish there weren't so many people who would agree with those answers. However, the good news is that...
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen. It is getting to be about that time of year. Halloween is over and retail outfits, big and small alike, are skimming over Thanksgiving and marching right into the Christmas season. It seems a shame, but if I were in retail, it is likely I would be doing the same thing. After all, how hard it must be to put a really big sales push into a season in which we are to be thankful for what we already have. Along with this season comes the hustle and bustle of getting ready for the Christmas season....
Change, transition, whatever name you wish to put on it, we are experiencing it right now. I've been known to repeat this a number of times so bear with me if you have heard me say this before. When I was young, I would hear grown-ups say that the older they got, the faster time went by. I would think to myself, how dumb is that? It made no sense to me at all. Time did not go fast. It went too slow. The things I wanted to happen took forever to get here. However, now as I get older, I am finding that the grown-ups knew what they were talking...
Human beings are created for relationships. We need touch, a place to belong, and to be loved. There is no doubt that modern psychology has claimed this, as well as each of the world’s religions/philosophies. It’s such a basic truth for every person, it almost seems silly to claim, yet profound to admit. Loving and healthy relationships are where you can be yourself, which also always includes your darkest side. The gospel of John includes many encounters of Jesus with a variety of people: insiders, outsiders, outcasts, religious leade...
For those who try to live for the Lord and want to please Him, I’m sure you know what I mean when I say there are times when the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. When it comes to maintaining a red-hot enthusiasm for the Christian life, we are not robots, but rather we are emotional humans who have good days along with other times that are clouded with feelings of melancholy. It does the heart good to quietly sit alone as we search within our soul trying to figure out what is wrong. I...
The John Tesh radio show told me about an experiment done on competitive bicyclists. All the participants started by competing in a hot-weather bike ride. Then they were split in half, one group continued to train physically in the hot-weather conditions, and the other group focused their training on mental health, including positive affirmations, and learning how to deal with uncomfortable situations while racing. In the follow-up competition, the group who focused on mental training improved their speed and duration by 25%. We’ve all heard s...
“Wherever [Jesus] went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.” (Mark 6:56) So much of Jesus' ministry, his miracles and healing, involved touch. The loving touch that gives life, that heals, that restores. Father Jairus wants his daughter “to be made well, and live”, and to be made well, the hemorrhaging woman simply touched Jesus’s cloak. (Read Mark 5:21-43.) Jesus’ life is full of stories about him t...
The Bible refers to a joy that is unspeakable and full of glory, but what does this mean? I believe one answer would be the contentment of the conscience for those who know God and have decided to live in the awareness of His presence. How can we do this? We can train our minds to think about God the same as we learn and become skilled to do anything else. Repetition and commitment are the building blocks of being proficient and in the Christian faith, self-discipline is the path to spiritual...
Hope is one of those dynamic words that deserves the title of catalyst when it comes to change. It is a spiritual attribute that God’s people should use regularly as it is filled with life, excitement, and positive energy. Your first reaction to the idea of hope may be one of skepticism because you are thinking, it’s easy for someone to talk about hope when they do not understand what a terrible condition my life is in. Well, I may not have walked in your shoes, but I know that being neg...
We’ve had a heavy and difficult year, and I still feel that in my frequent, deep sighs. The pandemic, the political fighting, the polarization of our world just feels too much to add to our already busy lives, filled with just normal ups and downs. Jesus sighed too. And I think we can see why. When we see Him in Mark 7:24-37, He’s traveling the countryside, performing miracles, gaining popularity and status, well-liked, getting all the accolades anyone would want. But He knows this won’t last. He knows this whole ministry thing ends in His s...
Who am I? The world, culture and politicians will give me plenty of answers. They’ll tell me who gets to identify me, how they can identify me, and which identities are acceptable and which ones are not. While the world has many answers for identity, to get the true answers we must turn to God and His Word. We are created by God. We are created in God’s image. In every one of us, there is a bit of the divine. This, however, isn’t always obvious because it’s usually buried beneath our sin and the effects of our sin. Part of being human is bein...
Outdoor notes: *Be aware of proper waterfowl identification with most ducks not in full fall plumage yet. *HIP registration and Federal Waterfowl Duck Stamp required for waterfowl hunting. *Go to the N.D. Game and Fish Dept. website, (gf.nd.gov) for information regarding North Dakota’s new electronic posting regulations and assistance. *East Totten Recreation Area boat ramp is the only available ramp on Lake Audubon during a lake draw-down to allow for facility maintenance work along the U.S. H...
Who am I? In a world that puts stock in how we identify, we must ignore the temptation to allow us to identify ourselves, and turn to the Bible. The answer to the question “who am I?” isn’t on social media, and the politicians certainly don’t have it; it is only found in our creator and in our creator’s words. Over the past two weeks, we’ve seen the first two ways to identify ourselves. First, we are created by God. We’re not accidents, experiments, or the result of random chance. We are intelligently designed. Second, we’re designed in God’s i...
The idea of not being spiritually prepared to trust Christ because of a lack of interest is like being told that you have been scheduled to box a champion fighter this coming Friday night, even though you have no boxing experience, and are in terrible physical condition. It’s too late to start training and you will easily be knocked out with one punch. Another scenario would be that you have been given one week to compete in a body-building contest against other contenders that have been l...
For the month of September, we’re looking at our identity. While the world seeks to tell us who we are and how we identify ourselves, we’re going to look to the Bible. What does God have to say about who we are? Last week, we began at the beginning. Above all else, we are created. We didn’t happen by chance, but by careful intentionality. That being said, there is another fundamental aspect to God creating us that must be addressed. When God stated His intention to create us, He gave it a specific description: “in our image.” Presumabl...
