The solution is progressing

Don't worry, be happy. God knows why things are the way they are and has the solution in process.

From the Twitter page http://twitter.com/dougtaddison

Saint Nicolas - Santa Clause

“Saint Nicholas … (15 March 270 – 6 December 343), also called Nikolaos of Myra, was a historic 4th-century Christian saint and Greek Bishop of Myra (Demre, part of modern-day Turkey) in Lycia. Because of the many miracles attributed to his intercession, he is also known as Nikolaos the Wonder-worker ... He had a reputation for secret gift-giving, such as putting coins in the shoes of those who left them out for him, and thus became the model for Santa Claus…

“In 325, he was one of many bishops to answer the request of Constantine and appear at the First Council of Nicaea. There, Nicolas was a staunch anti-Arian and defender of the Orthodox Christian position, and one of the bishops who signed the Nicene Creed…” (wiki)

Saint Nicholas reportedly participated in various miracles and supernatural activities, including healing miracles, casting out devils, supernatural multiplication of food, and raising at least 3 from the dead. He was also known for radical generosity, such as giving gold to three teenage girls to save them from becoming prostitutes. In one version of the story, he threw the gold into their chimney, which may be the origin of the stories about Santa Claus... After his death, his grave/bones/relics became a site of pilgrimage, and the reports of miracles haven’t stopped yet…

There you have it. Santa Claus is real! His name was Saint Nicholas—and he’s another colorful character in our wonderful History!
www.facebook.com/GodsWillisAlwaysHealing

Hallelujah (Christmas Version) - Cloverton LYRICS

Christmas Miracle

The miracle of Christmas is that God fit everything we will ever need in a manger.

( by Louie Giglio @louiegiglio )

Live daringly, Love Passionately

Joy

From John Crowder's Book 'Cosmos Reborn - Happy Theology on the New Creation'

He doesn’t say: Why no faith? He says: Here’s the Answer. He doesn’t say: Why are you sick? He says: Here’s the Answer. He doesn’t say: Why are you poor? He says: Here’s the Answer. He doesn’t say: Why is your marriage broken? He says: Here’s the Answer. Having spent years in healing ministry, I’ve seen the whole machine become obsessed with looking for roots and causes to the problems of sickness, rather than resting in the simple reality that by His stripes we are already healed. The Gospel is always the antidote. Let’s start with the answer, not the problem. It is the higher reality to which we continually appeal, even when circumstances fly seemingly opposite.

He never fails to help you

from:                  https://www.facebook.com/TheNatureofHisLoveFREEBook

A new adventure

Faith

Islands by Godfrey Birtill.

Falling from grace?

"You don't fall from grace. You fall into grace." 

Traci Vanderbush

Time to start

The creator of the universe dwells within you. Take time to write that song, start your book, paint that picture, dance like never before. 

              - Bethel Music ‏@bethelmusic

Your heart for me

When I read a promise in God's word, I pause and say, "Thank You that this is Your heart for me."

- by  Mike Bickle @mikebickle

A mixed life of guilt and grace - No way

"God doesn't desire for you to live a mixed life of guilt and grace. He desires you to be truly free, alive, and active in his grace alone. When a Christian sits under a mixed covenant teaching for long enough and as Paul says, “puts up with it easily enough,” they can, like the churches in Galatia, truly start living in confusion and never grasp the reality of their God given right to find their rest in his grace. Instead they find themselves on a religious performance tread mill and end up spending their time striving to receive from God based by what they do instead of freely receiving everything from him based on his love. The foundational truth of the New Covenant is one of grace."

From
God's Grace Apart From Law: A Biblical Explanation On Living A Victorious Christian Life By Grace Alone  by Mick Mooney

By His Grace, for His Glory

Living towards the finish line instead of from the finish line

Elana Rachmian Polinger poses the following question:

What if we're living TOWARDS something (a finish line), when real life is living FROM the finish line?

What if we're trying to attain something that was already achieved for us? (and we just cannot see it/understand it). Towards victory, instead of from victory. Towards healing instead of from healing. Towards  completion/perfection, instead of from perfection. 

 It's the difference between finished works and unawareness of His finished works.It's living in Adam, or living in Christ. I myself am learning and realizing what life in Christ and as Christ means.

We all know and are familiar with life in Adam and as Adam. The Spirit is revealing to us life in Christ and as Christ. Living in our true reality.

Astonished, Stunned, and Mouths Wide Open

“We should be astonished at the goodness of God, stunned that He should bother to call us by name, our mouths wide open at His love, bewildered that at this very moment we are standing on holy ground.”

a quote by Brennan Manning,
The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt Out

Spiritual Maturity

by Phil Drysdale Ministries

Spiritual maturity is not a process of you working on your sin - it’a a process of you discovering your righteousness!

Joy of the Lord

Georgian and Winnie Banov

The joy of the Lord is an actual substance; 

it's the core strength that sustains and enables us to 

supernaturally endure hardships.

A better medical report

I woke early this morning to a phone call from a friend in another country calling me as he has just received a not so positive report from the Doctor. Whatever you are going though today, God has a better report for you. Who's report will you believe. Your Doctor may have presented you with facts, but Jesus is the spirit of Truth. Facts and Truth are two different things!

by Chris Gore

No shame

Today I present you with a liberating article by Mick Mooney. Enjoy it and be set free. Bob Lipsys

 

by Mick Mooney

Religion thrives and succeeds by keeping people's sins the central problem within the human experience. Enter Jesus, who succeeded by making the hypocrisy of the religious leaders the central problem within the human experience.

Yes, they killed him because of it, but he did rise again, and his message is still the same. God loves you, right here, right now, and his focus in not on your sins, but on your heart, and your heart he loves perfectly—and if any religious clergyman tries to shame you with the weapon of your supposed sins, Jesus is still standing up for you, defending you against religious condemners with their stones, declaring: “Woe to you, teachers of the Bible and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.”

Every time someone tries to shame and judge you, there is Jesus, ready to defend you. That's who he is. That's why he is our Savior. That's why he is the perfect representation of Love. Religion's interest is in keeping you submissive to its demands. God's interest is in liberating you from all fear so you can truly live a life defined by freedom and love.

It is for freedom Christ set you free, be free then. Live daringly. Love outrageously.

Living Sucessfully

The key to "living" successfully is knowing who you are in Christ. You don't need to strive to achieve this. Your inadequacies cannot take this away. Jesus Christ has achieved all this for you and has freely given all this to you. (I came across this wonderful summary by Joyce Meyer  and pass it on to you.) According to these truths you are awesome in Christ, and your life is well worth living.  Bob Lipsys

This is who you are is in Christ

I am complete in Christ Who is the Head of all principality and power (Colossians 2:10).

I am alive with Christ (Ephesians 2:5).

I am free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2).

I am far from oppression, and fear does not come near me (Isaiah 54:14).

I am born of God, and the evil one does not touch me (1 John 5:18).

I am holy and without blame before Him in love (Ephesians 1:4; 1 Peter 1:16).

I have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16; Philippians 2:5).

I have the peace of God that passes all understanding (Philippians 4:7).

I have the Greater One living in me; greater is He Who is in me than he who is in the world (1 John 4:4).

I have received the gift of righteousness and reign as a king in life by Jesus Christ (Romans 5:17).

I have received the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Jesus, the eyes of my understanding being enlightened (Ephesians 1:17-18).

I have received the power of the Holy Spirit to lay hands on the sick and see them recover, to cast out demons, to speak with new tongues.  I have power over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means harm me (Mark 16:17-18; Luke 10:17-19).

I have put off the old man and have put on the new man, which is renewed in the knowledge after the image of Him Who created me (Colossians 3:9-10).

I have given, and it is given to me; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, men give into my bosom (Luke 6:38).

I have no lack for my God supplies all of my need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:19).

I can quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one with my shield of faith (Ephesians 6:16).

I can do all things through Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:13).

I show forth the praises of God Who has called me out of darkness into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9).

I am God’s child for I am born again of the incorruptible seed of the Word of God, which lives and abides forever (1 Peter 1:23).

I am God’s workmanship, created in Christ unto good works (Ephesians 2:10).

I am a new creature in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17).

I am a spirit being alive to God (Romans 6:11;1 Thessalonians 5:23).

I am a believer, and the light of the Gospel shines in my mind (2 Corinthians 4:4).

I am a doer of the Word and blessed in my actions (James 1:22,25).

I am a joint-heir with Christ (Romans 8:17).

I am more than a conqueror through Him Who loves me (Romans 8:37).

I am an overcomer by the blood of the Lamb and the word of my testimony (Revelation 12:11).

I am a partaker of His divine nature (2 Peter 1:3-4).

I am an ambassador for Christ (2 Corinthians 5:20).

I am part of a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people (1 Peter 2:9).

I am the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21).

I am the temple of the Holy Spirit; I am not my own (1 Corinthians 6:19).

I am the head and not the tail; I am above only and not beneath (Deuteronomy 28:13).

I am the light of the world (Matthew 5:14).

I am His elect, full of mercy, kindness, humility, and longsuffering (Romans 8:33; Colossians 3:12).

I am forgiven of all my sins and washed in the Blood (Ephesians 1:7).

I am delivered from the power of darkness and translated into God’s kingdom (Colossians 1:13).

I am redeemed from the curse of sin, sickness, and poverty (Deuteronomy 28:15-68; Galatians 3:13).

I am firmly rooted, built up, established in my faith and overflowing with gratitude (Colossians 2:7).

I am called of God to be the voice of His praise (Psalm 66:8; 2 Timothy 1:9).

I am healed by the stripes of Jesus (Isaiah 53:5; 1 Peter 2:24).

I am raised up with Christ and seated in heavenly places (Ephesians 2:6; Colossians 2:12).

I am greatly loved by God (Romans 1:7; Ephesians 2:4; Colossians 3:12; 1 Thessalonians 1:4).

I am strengthened with all might according to His glorious power (Colossians 1:11).

I am submitted to God, and the devil flees from me because I resist him in the Name of Jesus (James 4:7).

I press on toward the goal to win the prize to which God in Christ Jesus is calling us upward (Philippians 3:14).

For God has not given us a spirit of fear; but of power, love, and a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7).

It is not I who live, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20

Don't need a thing!

What happens when the Lord is your shepherd? 

In plain English, you don't need a thing.

 Georgian and Winnie Banov

transformed into good

The Christian Life in two steps

by Andrew Farley

 

The Christian Life--

Step 1: Learn who you are in Jesus Christ.

Step 2: Wake up every day and be yourself.

From a joy deficiency to doing cartwheels of joy

 A quote from 

The Happy Gospel  by Benjemin Dunn

One current, joy-robbing idea of Christianity is that it is little more than a new start on an old life—just a second chance. If this is true, that Christianity is simply a new beginning at the same old kind of life, what makes me think that I’m not going to make a mess of it again?

 The “old life,” our pre-Christ existence, was filled with sinfulness and the inability to choose God even if we desired to. Even if we had been given a new start, it would still be the “old life"!

 But what Christ gives us is a “new life” in quality, a new kind of life. It is not the same kind of life just patched up bit, with a few moral guidelines to keep us on the straight and narrow. We have entered into a new world full of love and life. We’ve fallen heart-first into endless rivers of holy enjoyment.

 Jesus said you couldn’t put a new piece of cloth on an old garment. And you cannot pour new, vibrant, and living wine into an old wineskin.  The two cannot go together.

 No wonder so many Christians have a joy deficiency. The “old life” and joy cannot coexist.

And the truth is that you are not the same old you; you are a New Creation living in a new world.

Absolutely everything is new!

 I don’t know about you, but this makes me happy! In fact, I feel like doing cartwheels right now!

I’m singing joyful praise to God. I’m turning cartwheels of joy to my Savior God.