Because it's a heart, not a political problem - getting involved for revival

 Something like this may eventually go in my personal prayer call blog,but it's similar to other things I've posted there, plus god's laying something else on my heart for it. So, this is here.

The recent death of Justice Scalia proved several things. First, the 24/7 news cycle has become so thirsty for news that some people don't take time to honor the life of a man before discussing his replacement. Second, this election is vital, meaning we should be active. And, third, and most important, only God can truly solve our problems - meaning we must be on our knees figuratively speaking consistently. Repentance revival is possible, but we need God's help now. Our activity won't help alone because at its heart this is not a political problem facing our country.

The problem America faces is a heart problem. This makes it spiritual and not physical - of course, I don't mean that America has a physical heart condition.

Even though it can't be fixed by actual physical medicine, there is a solution, though. You can be part of it, in fact.

It may seem much harder, if not impossible, to solve suvh a heart problem in others. However, it isn't as bad as it sounds. After I expand upon how we know it's a heart problem, I'll provide the solution.

How do we know it's a heart problem?

It is easy to identify a heart problem by what the Bible says about such times, andby the things that aren't working.

People of all political parties, of every political persuasion, have ideas. To some extent, all have been tried, just not in the most extreme way. At times it feels like we are just repeating the same things over and over.

If there was a human solution, we would see improvement. However, the example of political correctness is a perfect way to show this is a heart problem. The proper words for things continue to change, as people try to eliminate insulting comments and behavior. And yet, such things continue.

However, if hearts changed, people would not mistreat others no matter what word was used. There would be no hurtful comments, so there would not be a need to create such societal rules.

I could cite many other examples. For instance, poverty still exists long after the pledge to end it. And, if all guns disappeared,  people would make them and use knives and swords in the meantime. Or, if everyone had equal things, some would still take others' stuff out of a sense of entitlement.

Imperfect man cannot create a perfect system. It would be like someone who does not know the first thing about piloting an airplane trying to teach someone how to fly a major commercial jumbo jet without the computers, and with just the instruments. Even if this person knew something about flight, or even knew something about letting the computer run things, they couldn't teach about all of the instruments and everything that was needed unless they actually knew how to do it.

This means that when laws have been written enforcing really strict things like Prohibition, they haven't worked either because it was still imperfect people trying to change the outside and not change in the heart.

So, there is clearly a heart problem which no candidate will solve, no matter what party they are in.

However, there is a solution.

How do we solve it?

2 Corinthians 5:17 says, "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away, behold, all things are become new."

We must repent, turning from our evil ways. However, we can't bring revival on our own because the heart of man is exceedingly wicked. We can only impact the outward appearance. And, that's not good enough for God.

In other words, just having all moral laws won't bring this nation back to God if we don' also trust Him to change our hearts. it would be just like Prohibition days.

In 2 Chronicles 7:14, God promises "If my people, who are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray, and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and I will answer their prayer, and I will heal their land."

Notice what order these are in. first is humbling oneself in prayer. Second is seeking His face. Only then comes turning from wicked ways.

What are we praying for? For God's forgiveness and also His healing for our country, His changing of hearts. Our turning from our wicked ways is a sign to Him of our commitment to live by the principles of His Word - honesty, faithfulness, unconditional love, and so on. Accepting all as equal before the Cross and abandoning our racial animosity. Things like that.

Some will say this promise is only to Israel, but remember we have been grafted in, adopted by God into His family whereby we cry "Abba, Father." that "Abba" is a term of total trust and endearment, like a small child saying "Daddy."

But, even if that verse was only for Israel, it doesn't matter. God has another set of verses where He promises to heal even the heathen nations.

They are in Jeremiah 18:5-10. God promises to bless the heathen nation that turns from its evil ways.

Now, by making that commitment to follow Him, this is where we get involved. This is where we say, "Lord, we will follow the candidate You lay on our hearts.

But, before that, we must seek God to change not only our hearts, but those of others. Repentance begins in with the Church, but we also need God to move int he unsaved, too, so many people will come to know Him.

Since not many churches preach the Gospel anymore, that could mean lots of people going to the Internet with sites like Godlife, or a variety of places like Child Evangelism Fellowship. it could even mean that if you trust Him to, the Lord will lead you to people who are ready to be saved if you will just share with them the clear, simple, plan of salvation. They just need to see you are genuine and really are seeking to live for the Lord yourself. You don't have to be perfect, but we do need to be striving - as Paul said, pressing toward the mark of that high calling.(Phil.3:14)

So, in other words, turn our hearts toward the Lord and seek His forgiveness, seek Him to heal our nation and change hearts to turn back toward him, and then commit ourselves to Godly principles as a way of showing that we truly do want this nation to have His blessings.

Then He will hear from Heaven, answer our prayers, and heal our land.

What is love? What is true love? Four types of love and the most special

There are four kinds of love - well, at least in the Greek. And they say French is romantic! :-)

The first type of love in the Greek language is the word eros. This word is more appropriately called lust because it only deals with the outside.

We say this not just about people but about things. We say I love pizza but we don't have anything more than and attraction based on our favorite foods. Some pizza, if enough yucky stuff is put on it, might not be very appealing. It could still taste good though. Others might look really good, but tastes really bad if someone doesn't make it right. This just shows what the Bible says. Man looketh upon the outward appearance, but God looketh upon the heart.

When we say we love pizza, it doesn't cause too many problems. But when we use that eros love to describe how we feel about another person, it can often leads to disaster. Even if it doesn't, broken hearts still take time to mend. And, God doesn't want that for us.

God wants us to have a wonderful, close relationships that lasts forever, because He loves us. So while there are people who joke that they would marry chocolate, it's not really something when was marry. And yeah, when they say that, I found it's a good way to lead into explaining about not following youthful lusts. I often joke that blend you look at your crush, ask your self if you would still love that person when you were both in your nineties, wrinkles up like prunes, with no hair or teeth, and probably other physical problems. If not, you should not be with that person.

Another way to put it is, be so lost in your love for God that your mate needs to seek God with all their heart to find you.

The next type of love is phileo. This is the root of Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love. BFF, which stands for best friends forever, is a good way to describe this kind of love. The Bible refers to it as a friend that sticketh closer than a brother, the way that Jonathan was with David.

This type of love is very deep, but it is not as deep as family love, let alone God's love. Yours truly recalls growing up with grandparents who were best friends as well as a married couple. That is the way a couple should be. That is why the comments above about making sure you are best friends with the person who will be your future mate are so important. The love a couple must be more than just about outward things.

The next kind of love is storge. That is what families should be. Obviously, a husband and wife are not related until they are married. Unless you were a Hapsburg Royal in the early modern era, but we won't get into that. The point is that this is another reason a couple should be such close friends before considering marriage, so they can easily build that storge relationship.

Families should love each other unconditionally. God created us to be loving, caring people who help each other and help young people grow and learn in a safe environment of unconditional love.However, by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, so that deth passed unto all men, for that all have sinned.(Rom.5:12) People choose to turn against God sometimes, and that hurts people. Thankfully, God provides help through others. Quite a few people have been known to be an "emotional family" for others, or siblings known to be the emotional parent for a younger sibling, or something similar.

Storge love means family members should always be there for each other and be willing to give anything for each other. One example would be how an uncle, when one of his kids was in the hospital, took time to stay with him rather than take advantage of a special golf outing with Arnold Palmer he'd had the chance to go on.

Those with phileo love give for each other do give for each other, but even that love is not as deep as the giving a family should do. That married couple's love should grow each year, so the phileo and eros work together to create a deeper storge love each day - but only storge allows one to truly love unconditionally, to truly stay together "for richer or poorer, for better or worse, in sickness and in health, till death do you part." Only that storge love allows a couple to care for a severely handicapped child his or her whole life. And so on.

There is, however, a love even deeper than that.

It is called agape love.(Pronounced "a-gah'-pay)

Agape is the kind of love God has for us. While that family love grows over time, God's love is there for us even when we don't know Him. First Corinthians 13, called "the great love chapter of the Bible," is filled with wonderful things about love. It truly does bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, endure all things. And, while that's what family love should be, God's love is special because he loved us like that before we even knew Him. In fact, while we were His biggest enemies.

God gave us freedom to choose so we wouldn't be mindless robots who just did thigns automatically. He wanted us to choose whether to follow good or evil. So, man chose evil and sin came into the world because people chose to disobey God? They chose to turn against Him and do mean, hurtful thigns to each other, to themselves, and to Him.

We do that, too. Yet the Bible says, "We love Him because He first loved us."(1 John 4:19) It was "while we were yet sinners Christ died for us."(Romans 5:8) God Himself loved us so much that though we rejected Him, He still came to this world in flesh, Jesus Christ. he was born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, yet suffered and died to take the punishment for our sins, His blood was shed to atone for what we ourselves had done. And, he rose from the dead the third day! He is alive and always making intercession for us.

it is by faith in Him and Him alone - calling on Him to save you from your sins - that any of us enter His perfect heaven, where there is no pain, no suffering, no tears, no sin can be there. Nobody has seen, heard, or even imagined the wonders that await us. And, you can simply call on Him right now to forgive you and saved you from your sins, trusting that he took the punishment for your sins. Here is a good summary. 

But, God not only will save you and get you to Heaven, Jesus came that we might have life and life more abundantly.(John 10:10) Eternal life with Him begins the moment you believe in Him and call on Him, trusting Him to save you. He will be a constant guide, comforter, helper, friend, and so much more.

That is true love. He will never leave you or forsake you. You can e-mail our show with questions - I know this might be read anywhere in the world so if you want we can even try to help you find a good church. But, most importantly, a relationship with Jesus is forever. He lives in each believer through the Holy Spirit. And, any holes in your heart that have come from past problems, you can be sure He will fill with His unconditional love.

Because God's agape love is true love, the best love there is. It is the definition of real love.

Answered prayer, God's plans, rebuilding programs, and more prayers, pleaseain))

Thank you for your prayers. God provided us a minivan for a great price with which we can transport at least a handful of kids to different activities.

It's great to see God at work. We will continue the radio show, because this is a great way to encourage others to serve the Lord. And, who knows, perhaps some people are being saved who listen to it.

Now, I'd like to share some comments with a little bit of what we plan to do now that we have a minivan. Because, we need leaders. Young people are going to listen to the Lord more willingly if wthey have the opportunity to see other youth who are already actively involved. Peer pressure is often seen as negative - and, in the Bible is certainly is, such as the crowd turning against the twit spies with faith - Joshua and Caleb - and believing the twn without faith, and of course the crowd which was egged on by the Pharisees to demand Jesus' crucifixion. However, it also has a good side, that being whe4n a strong leader emerges to bring people back to God.

We are clearly in a rebuilding phase after 2.5 years without a van. These youth need to see quality youth who are on fire for the Lord. One in particular especially thrived in Youthquake even though several different things prevented him from regularly attending a good Gospel-presaching church till recently. however, while he might have been able to lead a prayer and devotion club with a few more years of Youthquake and getting into that church's youth grou sooner, without those intervening 2.5 years of club he really  has struggled.

Hope is not lost for him or the others we find, though. that one young teenage boy still has the eagerness and enthusiasm that made him a great prospect, to use a baseball analogy. He just has trouble hitting the curveball.(Those being the fiery darts of the wicked that the devil throws our way.) or, perhaps he's the pitching prospect who lights up the radar gun but couldn't control that breaking pitch, either way then missing a year with injury and rehab. Whichever analogy you wish to use, he's still got the enthusiasm to let the Lord overcome through him.

But, he really needs prayers! So, please, pray for him.

We are rebuilding, but we still have great prospects. of course, the main reason is because God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we may ask or think.(Eph. 3:20) However, also, others will be coming to our first club meeting on Feb. 13, in addition to him and whatever friends he brings. one who plans to come has a great testimony and was featured on this show. She is graduating but has someone in mind from her youth group who may be able to start a prayer and devotion club in her school.

Others could eventually come, but the key is, with only 5 kids able to ride in the back, we can't do the big rallies we used to for a while, although eventually as we get Yyouthquake prayer and devotion clubs in the schools we can again. Instead, the minivan can be like a mini-YLTI - Youth Leader Training Institute - helper, and our club meetings can become like YLTI training. If a kid brings 1-2 unsaved friends, or invites them and they come some other way, then it would just become more evangelistic that day.

We want young people to be ready to lead their friends and classmates to Christ. We want them to be ready to take the ball and run with it, to be able to identify when the Lord is leading.

Of course, that means listening to the Holy Spirit, which means a right relationship with god. And, that's where it comes back to the youth who are good examples, who are able to triumph over all the problems in life, wherever those battles may come from. In an open letter on our site to our young people when the van finally bit the dust 2.5 years ago, I noted that our young people had to step up and be the club, because they were the life of the club, they were the reason for the club,and it was always they who would be needed to grow the club and reach other youth with the Gospel. Now that we are starting to rebuild, it may feel to some like we're almost starting from scratch, but god knows the future, and He has given us a vision to reached the many unreached youth of our area. And, God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we may ask or think.

What is said of our missionaries overseas is equally true here. Of course, God is the real provider, but of the things we can provide to help, while it is ministry funds that get us there, it is your prayers that keep us there. Speaking of funds, we'd welcome any donations, as our site shows, we're raising funds to get underprivileged kids to a great church camp this summer, among other thigns. However, most importantly, we need your prayers. That boy I mentioned needs them, our club meeting and basketball on Feb. 15 need prayers(especially with weather concerns), and so much else does, too.

this has been more of an open prayer letter, but I hope it's been an encouragement to see that no matter how small, the Lord can bless any endeavor to serve Him.