Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Spirit means breath in Greek (pneuma), Hebrew (ruah), and Latin (spiritus). In Genesis 2:7, God breathed into Adam and gave him life, so spirit means life. Now the verse makes sense. Blessed are those who are poor in their own lives and […]
Do You Love Jesus? If you really love Him, you won’t ask Him to follow you around like a little puppy dog. You won’t treat Him like a vending machine to supply everything you want. Do not ask Jesus to follow you. You follow Him. It’s not, “Where I am Jesus is,” but rather, “Where […]
“You need the Holy Spirit’s witness every day – on your job, at home, out and about, in recreation and social events, at rest. This is what Jesus was trying to tell us about the foolish virgins who ran out of oil in their lamps (Matthew 25). They had a supply of the Holy Spirit […]
You need the Holy Spirit’s witness every day-on your job, at home, at school. You need to rightly judge politicians and leaders so you will not suddenly be sucked into the antichrist system. This is that Jesus was trying to tell us about the foolish virgins who ran out of oil in their lamps (see […]
The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.Joel 2:31 The days roll by in this dimension, one after another, but not forever. There will be an end to this life, only God knows when, and we’ll stand before the Creator of the […]
I met with John again a week later. His face looked like he’d just been told his best friend had died. “What’s wrong, John?” I asked. “That getting rid of all the impurities in my heart and seeking all that’s true is really hard, Pat,” he mumbled. I smiled. “It’s more than hard, John; it’s […]
I was studying the beatitudes with John, a man in his 30’s struggling with alcohol addiction and freshly out of jail – again. We had reached the 6th beatitude when he asked, “Pat, what does it mean to be pure in heart?” “What do you think it means, John?” He had a blank look on […]
Some time back I was going through a spiritual dry spell during a time I had taken on two new clients in my business coaching and was editing a book that had almost as many errors as there were sentences in the manuscript (a slight exaggeration). In addition to this were the controversies over wearing […]
This is a metaphor, based on Scripture. Each person is a vessel, filled either with himself/herself or God. He is the Potter; we are the clay. He is the Creator; we are the creatures. Without Him, there is no vessel. The outer wall of the vessel is the body; the inner wall, the soul. You […]
Blessed are the poor in spirit…who are empty vessels ready to be filled by God, who take no account of themselves or their accomplishments, who serve their Master with all their hearts and with all their souls…for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.