27 indications that we need revival

1. When we do not love Him as we once did.
2. When earthly interests and occupations are more important to us than eternal ones.
3. When we would rather watch TV and read secular books and magazines than read the Bible and pray.
4. When we have little or no desire for prayer.
5. When we would rather make money than give money.
6. When our Christianity is joyless and passionless.
7. When we know truth in our heads that we are not practicing in our lives.
8. When we make little effort to witness to the lost.
9. When we have time for sports, recreation, and entertainment, but not for Bible study and prayer.
10. When we do not tremble at the Word of God.
11. When we seldom think thoughts of eternity.
12. When we are more concerned about our jobs and careers than about the Kingdom of Christ and the salvation of the lost.
13. When Christian husbands and wives are not praying together.
14. When our children are growing up to adopt worldly values, secular philosophies and ungodly lifestyles.
15. When we watch things on TV and movies that we would not show in church.
16. When our prayers lack fervency.
17. When our hearts are cold and our eyes are dry.
18. When our singing is half-hearted and our worship lifeless.
19. When we aren't seeing regular evidence of the supernatural power of God.
20. When we are bored with worship.
21. When we are more concerned about what others think about us than what God thinks about us.
22. When we are making little or no difference in the secular world around us.
23. When we are unmoved by the thought of our neighbors, business associates and acquaintances going to hell.
24. When we have ceased to weep and mourn and grieve over our sin.
25. When we aren't exercising faith and believing God for the impossible.
26. When the fire has gone out in our hearts, our marriages and our church.
27. When we are blind to the extent of our need and don't think we need revival.

-- Author Unknown

THE STORY OF SOUL

There once was a man named Soul who was walking in a garden. He was whistling a real sweet tune for he was saved and had the joy of the Lord, but he was a baby Christian. As Soul was walking, a beautiful and seductive woman came out from behind a tree. Soul was very startled.

He said,"Hello, I'm Soul, what is your name?"

She replied, "I am Temptation, I have what you want."

"What do I want?" replied Soul.

"You want to do all things which are of the flesh," said Temptation.

Soul replied, "O.K., lead me."

So he and Temptation went off and fulfilled the desires of the flesh. When Soul returned to the garden, he met a man named Condemnation. Condemnation said, "Hey, I see you have met my friend, Temptation."

Soul said, "Yes, who are you?"

"I am Condemnation, I come after Temptation. We work hand-in-hand." Then Condemnation jumped on Soul's back and began to beat him. He hit him in the face and kicked him when he was down. This went on for several days.

On about the third day, a man named Mercy came running and said, "I command you, Condemnation, to stop beating Soul."

Condemnation snickered, "Make me."

So Mercy unsheathed his sword and cut Condemnation in two.

As Soul watched in astonished pain, he was overtaken by the power of Mercy. Mercy walked up to Soul and said, "I have dealt with Condemnation before. He should not show up around you anymore."

Soul replied, "How can I ever thank you?"

"Well," replied Mercy, "I was sent here by God and He told me to introduce you to a dear friend of mine. His name is Redemption."

Redemption walked up and said, "Hello Soul, I see that you are not doing well."

Soul replied, "Not until Mercy came along. It is a pleasure to meet you Redemption."

"Well", said Redemption," I am glad to meet you. Are you ready to accept me?"

"What do you mean?" asked Soul.

Redemption said, "Well, when you accepted Jesus and decided to walk with Him, then you chose to accept the things of Him and His love. I am a part of Jesus' love. I help you feel forgiven. You will never have to deal with Condemnation again. Temptation may come around, but I have someone I would like for you to meet who can help you with that. His name is Grace."

Grace walked up to Soul and said, "Hello Soul, I have been waiting for you. As a matter of fact all three of us have been waiting to meet you. I will help you take the way out of Temptation that God gives you as it comes up. The last person we want you to meet is Faith."

"Hi Soul, I am Faith, and I will help you stay strong and keep your beliefs strong," said Faith.

Soul began to cry. When he began to cry Redemption said, "This is what we were here for. Jesus redeemed you, saved you by Grace through Faith and gives you his Mercy. Jesus loves you Soul."

Soul said, "I love you, Jesus."

Just Five More Minutes

While at the park one day, a woman sat down next to a man on a bench near a playground.

“That’s my son over there,” she said, pointing to a little boy in a red sweater who was gliding down the slide.

“He’s a fine looking boy” the man said. “That’s my daughter on the bike in the white dress.”

Then, looking at his watch, he called to his daughter. “What do you say we go, Melissa?”

Melissa pleaded, “Just five more minutes, Dad. Please? Just five more minutes.”

The man nodded and Melissa continued to ride her bike to her heart’s content. Minutes passed and the father stood and called again to his daughter. “Time to go now?”

Again Melissa pleaded, “Five more minutes, Dad. Just five more minutes.”

The man smiled and said, “OK.”

“My, you certainly are a patient father,” the woman responded.

The man smiled and then said, “Her older brother Tommy was killed by a drunk driver last year while he was riding his bike near here. I never spent much time with Tommy and now I’d give anything for just five more minutes with him. I’ve vowed not to make the same mistake with Melissa.

She thinks she has five more minutes to ride her bike. The truth is, I get Five more minutes to watch her play.”

Life is all about making priorities, what are your priorities?

Give someone you love 5 more minutes of your time today!

Sand and Rock

A story tells that two friends were walking through the desert. During some point of the Journey they had an argument, and one friend slapped the other one in the face. The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything, wrote in the sand:

TODAY MY BEST FRIEND SLAPPED ME IN THE FACE.

They kept on walking until they found an oasis, where they decided to take a bath. The one who had been slapped got stuck in the mire and started drowning, but the friend saved him. After he recovered from the near drowning, he wrote on a stone:

TODAY MY BEST FRIEND SAVED MY LIFE.

The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked him, "After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now, you write on a stone, why?".

The other friend replied "When someone hurts us we should write it down in sand where winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But, when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it."

LEARN TO WRITE YOUR HURTS IN THE SAND AND TO CARVE YOUR BENEFITS IN STONE!!!

They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.

Do not value the THINGS you have in your life. But value WHO you have in your life!

Life's short. If you don't look around once in a while, you might miss it.

-- Author Unknown

Life and Work

This was a speech made by Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Anna Quindlen at the graduation ceremony of an American university where she was awarded an Honorary PhD.

"I'm a novelist. My work is human nature. Real life is all I know. Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work. You will walk out of here this afternoon with only one thing that no one else has. There will be hundreds of people out there with your same degree: there will be thousands of people doing what you want to do for a living. But you will be the only person alive who has sole custody of your life. Your particular life. Your entire life. Not just your life at a desk or your life on a bus or in a car or at the computer. Not just the life of your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank accounts but also your soul.

People don't talk about the soul very much anymore. It's so much easier to write a resume than to craft a spirit. But a resume is cold comfort on a winter's night, or when you're sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you've received your test results and they're not so good.

Here is my resume: I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my work stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer consider myself the centre of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows mean what they say. I am a good friend to my friends and them to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cut out. But I call them on the phone and I meet them for lunch. I would be rotten, at best mediocre, at my job if those other things were not true.

You cannot be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are. So here's what I wanted to tell you today: Get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger pay cheque, the larger house. Do you think you'd care so very much about those things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon or found a lump in your breast?

Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze at the seaside, a life in which you stop and watch how a red-tailed hawk circles over the water, or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a sweet with her thumb and first finger.

Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work. Pick up the phone. Send an email. Write a letter. Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. Care so deeply about its goodness that you want to spread it around. Take money you would have spent on beer and give it to charity. Work in a soup kitchen. Be a big brother or sister. All of you want to do well. But if you do not do good too, then doing well will never be enough.

It is so easy to waste our lives, our days, our hours, and our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the colour of our kids' eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again. It is so easy to exist instead of to live.

I learned to live many years ago. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get. I learned to look at all the good in the world and try to give some of it back because I believed in it, completely and utterly. And I tried to do that, in part, by telling others what I had learned. By telling them this: Consider the lilies of the field. Look at the fuzz on a baby's ear. Read in the back yard with the sun on your face.

Learn to be happy. And think of life as a terminal illness, because if you do, you will live it with joy and passion as it ought to be lived".

The many names of Christ

THE MANY NAMES OF CHRIST

To the ARTIST He is the One Altogether Lovely.

To the ARCHITECT He is the Chief Corner Stone.

To the BAKER He is the Living Bread.

To the BANKER He is the Hidden Treasure.

To the BIOLOGIST He is the Life.

To the BUILDER He is the Sure Foundation.

To the CARPENTER He is the Door.

To the DOCTOR He is the Great Physician.

To the EDUCATOR He is the Great Teacher.

To the ENGINEER He is the New and Living Way.

To the FLORIST He is the Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the Valley.

To the GEOLOGIST He is the Rock of Ages.

To the HORTICULTURIST He is the True Vine.

To the JUDGE He is the Righteous Judge, Judge of All Men.

To the JEWELER He is the Pearl of Great Price.

To the LAWYER He is the Counselor, the Lawgiver, the Advocate.

To the NEWSPAPER He is the Good Tidings of Great Joy.

To the OCULIST He is the Light of the Eyes.

To the PHILANTHROPIST He is the Unspeakable Gift.

To the PHILOSOPHER He is the Wisdom of God.

To the PREACHER He is the Word of God.

To the SCULPTOR He is the Living Stone.

To the SERVANT He is the Good Master.

To the STATESMAN He is the Desire of All Nations.

To the STUDENT He is the Incarnate Truth.

To the THEOLOGIAN He is the Author and Finisher of our Faith.

To the TOILER He is the Giver of Rest.

To the SINNER He is the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the World.

To the CHRISTIAN He is the Son of the Living God, the Savior, the Redeemer and the Lord.

Bono - NAACP

Nice one. Worth a watch