Christians Can Laugh Too!

We have been reading about people in the bible for the last few days that struggled with depression. For today I am going to defer from that subject and get back to it next time. I think it is so important that as Christians and those that aren't believers,  that we can laugh and joke and have good times even in the midst of the hard things that we are going through. That is not to say that I think that we have to always make ourselves look like we are ever joyful. Ever happy. For even scripture it-self speaks to this in Ecclesiastes 3:1, 4

To every everything there is a season. and a time for every purpose under heaven.

A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to morn and a time to dance.

Truly, there is a time to cry and laugh. A time to grieve and a time to be joyful. This is one scripture that we, the church do not hear much from the pulpit about. And yet, there it is. In black and white. An important topic that needs to be let out so that we can also be taught that there is hope.

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. "The Lord is my portion" says my soul," Therefore, I will hope in him." Lamentations 3:22=24.



Indeed, our hope is in him.  Hope should be in  a part two in a sermon about depression, discouragement, grief and all the rest of what you and I face when we are troubled.

So anyway, for today I am going to add something to  Something to smile or laugh about. Or

share with someone else that may be having a hard day. Because, we Christians can laugh too! Despite our pain. Yes, we can laugh.

Acts 2:38

A woman had just returned to her home from an evening of church services, when she was startled by an intruder. She caught the man in the act of robbing her home of its valuables and yelled, "Stop! Acts 2:38!"

(Acts 2:38 says, "Repent and be baptized everyone of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins.") 

The burglar stopped in his tracks. The woman calmly called the police and explained what she had done.

As the officer cuffed the man to take him in, he asked the burglar: Why did you just stand there? All the old lady did was to yell scripture at you."

"Scripture?" replied the burglar, "She said she had an ax and two 38s!"

(source) Christian Jokes, Clean Jokes, Best Christian Jokes, Christian Humor, Great Christian Jokes for Kids & Adults | JollyNotes.com

November 8, 2019 Promise: My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. 2 Corinthians 2:9

Have a wonderful and blessed day in the Lord Friends! For his mercies are new and his grace abounds to us.

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Depression: Elijah (part 6)

Elijah (1 Kings)

If we know anything about Elijah, it is this. He was one of God's prophets, who was used by God to defeat a very wicket king. His ministry ended the worship of the god Baal for the Israelite. (I won't go into the story how he proved that Baal could not possibly do a thing for anyone that worshiped him., but it is interesting and found in 1 Kings 17:8-16)

Elijah knew God's power in his ministry but like us today, had many setbacks going between times of victory and defeat. And he was no stranger to depression. 

He had heard that Jezebel was going to have him killed, Elijah was afraid so he ran away. He ended up in Beersheba. And there he told the Lord that he was giving up and asked the Lord to take his life.  And then, he laid down and went to sleep.And while there an angel made sure that he had food and water. And the food he had eaten gave him the strength he needed to go to Horeb which was the mountain of God. And there  God met with Elijah. 

God did not take his life. He had important work still to do. 

And so it is with you and me.When we are so desperate that we want God to take our life, or just end it ourselves, many times it does not work because God has something important for us still to do. And not only that as Job had said in Job 1:21, it is God that gives and God can take it away. Indeed  God gives life and only he should be the one to take it away. For us to try to take our life, we are not allowing God to be the one who decides that instead.

That is not saying that life is not problem free. No way. But as Elijah had found out, God does give us the strength to push through and go forward with his help. He will provide the answers when we trust in him.

November 6,2019 Promise: Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as  a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Colossians 3:23-24

Thanks for coming by today Friends. Have a blessed day!

Depression: Job (part 5)

Job 1 & 2

Have you ever felt like you had lost everything in your life? Your job. Your home. Your spouse or best friend. Your child.

Maybe. But have you lost everything  almost all at once?

Job had good reasons to be depressed, because that is what happened to him. He was a very rich man. But he began to lose not only his possessions, but his property and his family. First it was his animals, and then his servants. Then it was his children and his home.

Why did all this happen to Job?
He had, after all been a righteous man and faithful to God. Why had God allowed this to happen?

It happened perhaps because Satan was jealous that some one of such great faith could have God's favor on his life. He wanted to take everything from him so that he would think twice about God and turn from him.

But it didn't work for in verses 21-22 it says, "Naked I came from my mother's womb and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away: may the name of the Lord be praised."  In all of this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrong doing."

God had given Satan permission to take all that Job had, and yet, he was not satisfied. Satan wanted moreAnd so God to then let Satan strike Job's body with painful sores with one condition, He could not take Job's life.

It was so bad, that his wife told him to curse God and die. And his friends saw that he suffered so badly that they could hardly stand it either.
But in Job 2:10, it says that "in all of this, Job did not sin in what he said." And yet, he did suffer very deeply In Job 3:11 he wondered why he had not perished at birth. In Job 3:26, he said he had "no peace, no quietness, no rest." And in Job 10:1, he loathed his life.

I have lost things in my life for sure. But not nearly to the extent Job had. And through those times, I have even loathed my l life. But I can assure you, that I have never so completely gone through anything like that.

Can we remain as faithful to God when we even go through the slightest of problems we encounter?

Depression is not a thing anyone wants to go through. It can become so bad that we may want to just end it all. But do you know that after God allowed Job to go through what he had, and Job didn't turn away from him, God restored everything to him, twice as much as he had lost. Even a family.

God can do the same for us. When we remain faithful to him when we are going through our own  hardships. In his time and what he chooses. It is all up to him. But it can happen. Because he is good. Because he loves us. And because he rewards us for our faithfulness.

November 4, 2019 Promise: Therefore my brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord inasmuch as you know for you labour is not in vain in the Lord. 1 Corinthians 15:58

Hello Friends. Thanks for coming by. I pray this season of 'Thanksgiving" will bring you many blessings from God!

Depression: Jeremiah (part four)

Jeremiah 20

Loneliness. Rejection. Ridicule. If you have ever experienced any of these things, you can probably identify much with Jeremiah who struggled with all three from those people that he loved. His 

friends.

God had called him to preach, but he faced more then he wanted to, when people treated him the way they did. To the point that he wished he had never been born. 

Why did I ever come out of the womb to see trouble and sorry and to end my days in shame. (verse 18)

 He was human, of course and  maybe like us  he grumbled and complained to God about all that he was going through.. And yet, his faith in God was great and he trusted him.

Some of us have struggled throughout our lives. It seems that we just get past one thing, and get faced with yet another obstacle. But we are called to persevere because in the end, if we do not give up, we will hear God say to us, "Well done, good and faithful servant." Mathew 25:23. And at that time, the past will have faded away and our faithfulness to God will be rewarded. It will have been well worth whatever we went through.

If you are struggling with those around your because they have rejected you, or made fun of you, or whatever the case may be, remember that even Jesus went through all those emotions too when he was on earth. Why do we think we should be problem free when he wasn't?  He understands what we go through, and he wants to give us the answers we need to get through those hard places we find ourselves in. 

November 2, 2019 Promise: For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11.

Hello Friends. Thanks for visiting with me today. I pray that your weekend is being blessed by not only those around you, but more so by God!

We Are A Chosen Generation.....

Hello  Friends. Thanks for stopping by today. I am not going to post my usual topic for today and instead I am going to repost something I found on Pinterest that is the truth.  I do plan to be back tomorrow to continue my series on depression. In the mean time have a blessed day!

November 1, 2019 Promise:But you are a chosen people. A royal priest hood, a holy nation. God's special possession that you may declare the praises of him that called you out of darkness and into his wonderful light. I Peter 2:9

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Depression: King David (part three)

David ( 2 Samuel 12)

Most of us have lost someone in our lives that we really loved, and when they were gone, some of us didn't want to face each new day with out them.

King David had not only wanted to not eat but he didn't want to get out of bed after his son had died. That son was born of the affair he had had with Bathsheba after David had had her husband killed in battle so that he could be with her.

God forgave him of his sin with Bathsheba, but he still had to pay the consequences for it. When the child became ill, David pleaded with God to not let him die.

After Nathan had gone home, the Lord struck the child that Uriah's wife had borne to David, and he became ill. David pleaded with God for the child. He fasted and spent the nights lying in sackcloth on the ground. The elders of household stood beside him to get him up from the ground, but he refused and he would not eat any food with them. (verses 15-17)

David's son died on the seventh day and his attendants were afraid to even tell him because he wasn't listening to them while the child was still alive and if he found out he had died, David might do something desperate. But David figured it out without them telling him and so he asked them if the child had died.

It was only then, that David finally got up and and started living his life again. His attendants asked him why, now that his son was dead would he react this way. David had fasted and asked God to let the child live, but God chose to take him, and David knew that it would do no good for him to go on fasting for something that God had said "no" too.

His life had to go on and he chose to get cleaned up and go on with it. There seemed to be, by this scripture-that he himself did not contemplate taking his own life as some do when God does not take it from them when they cry out to him in their desperation, 


David struggled with much more then just this, and wrote about them in other scripture. . He was human, after all. But, what hits home the greatest to me, is that Jesus Christ was from the lineage of David. 



And God thought David's life, no matter what he faced-thought it was important enough to add it for us to learn from today. If you stop to think about all that entails, in the last 4 or 5 sentences that I have written, it is an amazing thing that God has provided this for us to learn from. 
Sometimes our own depression is rooted in sin. But by David's example, we know God is a forgiving God and he wants us to get ourselves up, dust ourselves off and go on with life until he calls us home. I know from experience that doing that isn't always easy. But I also know that it is possible. There is help for those that struggle. We just have to sometimes look for it and more then that keep praying and trusting in God to answer our cries for help. No matter how he chooses to answer us. 

October 31, 2019 Promise: For everything God created is good and nothing is to be rejected, if it received with thanksgiving. 1 Timothy 4:4

Thanks for visiting with me today Friends. May God bless you and yours!

Depression: Jonah (part two)

Jonah (Jonah 4)

Have you ever  been so depressed that you thought you would be better off dead? If so, you aren't alone. Many people from almost the beginning of time, have been in that dark place where they have cried out to God to take their lives. When he doesn't, many have tried to take their own. Many fail, but many succeed as we know.

Jonah was one that wished that God would let him die. He had been called to preach to the city of Nineveh because it was a wicked city. Jonah was not pleased with this at all. He had tried to run away and as we know, he ended up in the belly of a fish that had come along and swallowed him up. 

He was there for three days and three nights praying that for God to save him. and then  the fish vomited him out.

How depressing that would have been to first be swallowed by a fish and then be vomited out. But, Jonah knew that God was serious about his command to go and preach to the city of Nineveh. So he did as the Lord asked him to.

God had mercy on all that turned to him during Jonah's preaching. But this did not make Jonah happy either.And why was that?

Because they were wicked perhaps and he felt they did not deserve God's mercy. He would rather see them destroyed. 

 He in fact, got very mad..And he prayed:

"Now O Lord, take away my life. For it is better for me to die then to live." (verse 3)

Jonah was angry. And God had mercy on him anyway. And yet, after that, he was still angry. (verse 9) and wanted to die.

Sometimes we get angry with God. Sometimes our own mistakes and disobedience takes us to the place that we just want God to end it all. Maybe even those things that were out of our control can get us to that point.

What a tragedy especially for those that do end their lives. Not just for them but for their loved ones that are left behind.

Instead,  God has mercy on us when we turn to him. Those things do not have to define who we are or what he can do for us to bring us to where he wants us. I don't believe it is a sin to be depressed. at times.There are reasons for depression. But we should not turn away from God and be angry with him as Jonah had done. That would be the sin that we would need to confess.  Instead we need to look to him because he is where our help comes from.It may be through our church or bible study. It may be through our friends that will listen and pray for us. It may be through Christian doctors and mental health services. It is out there and God can get us to the place that we need to get past those dark places where satan wants to destroy us. Because friends, satan is the root of our despair and God wants deliver us of it. 

And that church that I mentioned yesterday that had taught we should always be happy? Instead, they could have better helped us if they would have taught us about the people in the bible that were depressed at times, and then gave us the other side. That God can and does have mercy on us when we truly turn to him.There are answers and sometimes we just have to look for them. Either for ourselves or for those that we know are suffering with it. 

October 29, 2019 Promise:Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of the heavenly lights who does not change like shifting shadows James 1:17

Thanks for coming by today Friends. God bless you and yours!.