Satan's Plan

(Read it, even if you're busy, especially if you're too busy) 

Satan called a worldwide convention of demons. In his opening address he said, "We can't keep Christians from going to church. We can't keep them from reading their Bibles and knowing the truth. We can't even keep them from forming an intimate relationship with their savior. Once they gain that connection with Jesus, our power over them is broken. So let them go to their churches; let them have their covered Dish dinners, but steal their time, so they don't have time to develop a real relationship with Jesus Christ." "This is what I want you to do", said the devil. "Distract them from gaining hold of their Savior and maintaining that vital connection throughout their day! "How shall we do this?" his demons shouted. "Keep them busy in the nonessentials of life and invent innumerable schemes to occupy their minds," he answered:
a.. Tempt them to spend, spend, spend, and borrow, borrow, borrow.
b.. Persuade the wives to go to work for long hours and the husbands to work 6-7 days each week, 10-12 hours a day, so they can afford their empty lifestyles.
c.. Keep them from spending time with their children. As their families fragment, soon, their homes will offer no escape from the pressures of work!
d.. Over-stimulate their minds so that they cannot hear that 'still, small voice.'
e.. Entice them to play the radio or cassette player whenever they drive...to keep the TV, VCR, CDs and their PCs going constantly in their home and see to it that every store and restaurant in the world plays non-biblical music constantly. This will jam their minds and break that union with Christ.
f.. Fill the coffee tables with magazines and newspapers. Pound their minds with the news 24 hours a day. Invade their driving moments with billboards. Flood their mailboxes with junk mail, mail order catalogs, sweepstakes, and every kind of newsletter and promotional offering free products, services and false hopes.
g.. Keep skinny, beautiful models on the magazines and TV so their husbands will believe that outward beauty is what's important, and they'll become dissatisfied with their wives.
h.. Keep the wives too tired to love their husbands at night. Give them headaches too! If they don't give their husbands the love they need, they will begin to look elsewhere. That will fragment their families quickly!
i.. Give them Santa Claus to distract them from teaching their children the real meaning of Christmas.
j.. Give them an Easter bunny so they won't talk about his resurrection and power over sin and death.
k.. Even in their recreation, let them be excessive...have them return from their recreation exhausted. Keep them too busy to go out in nature and reflect on God's creation. Send them to amusement parks!, sporting events, plays, concerts, and movies instead.
l.. Keep them busy, busy, busy! And when they meet for spiritual fellowship, they will leave with troubled consciences.
m.. For those who resist all the temptations of television and worldly pursuits, crowd their lives with so many good causes that they have no time to seek power from Jesus. Soon they will be working in their own strength, sacrificing their health and family for the good of the cause.
'It will work! It will work!!"
It was quite a plan! The demons went eagerly to their assignments causing Christians everywhere to have little time for their God or their families, and to have little or no time to tell others about the power of Jesus to change lives. I guess the question is, has the devil been successful at his scheme? You be the judge! Does "busy" mean:

B-eing   
U-nder
S-atan's
Y-oke

Pass this on, if you aren't too BUSY!

(author unknown)

THE RIGHT THING AT THE WRONG TIME IS THE WRONG THING

Our culture teaches us that if something is good we should seek to enjoy it immediately. So we microwave our food, e-mail our letters, and express mail our packages. We do our best to escape the confines of time by accelerating our schedules, speeding up our pace, and doing whatever it takes to beat the clock. You probably know exactly what I mean. How did you respond the last time you had to wait in line for something? Did you patiently wait your turn, or did you tap your toe and try to rush the experience?
Our "do it all now" mentality has tremendously affected the timing of today's dating relationships. Kids involve themselves in dating and even sexual relationships at an increasingly young age. As young people rush prematurely into these adult activities, most of their elders do little to correct them. After all what can adults say when they live by the same "grab it all now" attitude?
Why do we insist on living this way? In my opinion, we adopt the immediate gratification mentality because we've lost sight of the Biblical principle of seasons (see Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). Just as spring's role is different from that of fall, so each of the seasons of our lives has a different emphasis, focus and beauty. One is not better than the other; each season yields its own unique treasures. We cannot skip ahead to experience the riches of another life season any more than a farmer can rush the spring. Each season builds on the one before it.
God has many wonderful experiences He wants to give to us, but He also assigns these particular experiences to particular seasons of our lives. In our humaneness, we often make the mistake of taking a good thing out of its appropriate season to enjoy it when we want it. Premarital sex is a prime example of this principle. Sex in itself is a wonderful experience (from what my married friends tell me), but if we indulge in it outside of God's plan, we sin. Like a fruit picked green or a flower plucked before it blossoms, our attempts to rush God's timing can spoil the beauty of His plan for0 our lives.
Just because something is good doesn't mean we should pursue it right now. We have to remember that the right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing.

By Joshua Harris, "I Kissed Dating Goodbye" (excerpt)

"An Interview With God"

I dreamed I had an interview with God.

“So you would like to interview me?” God asked.

“If you have the time” I said.

God smiled. “My time is eternity.”
“What questions do you have in mind for me?”

“What surprises you most about human kind?”

God answered…
“That they get bored with childhood,
they rush to grow up, and then
long to be children again.”

“That they lose their health to make money…
and then lose their money to restore their health.”

“That by thinking anxiously about the future,
they forget the present,
such that they live in neither
the present nor the future.”

“That they live as if they will never die,
and die as though they had never lived.”

God’s hand took mine
and we were silent for a while.

And then I asked…
“As a parent, what are some of life’s lessons
you want your children to learn?”

“To learn they cannot make anyone
love them. All they can do
is let themselves be loved.”

“To learn that it is not good
to compare themselves to others.”

“To learn to forgive
by practicing forgiveness.”

“To learn that it only takes a few seconds
to open profound wounds in those they love,
and it can take many years to heal them.”

“To learn that a rich person
is not one who has the most,
but is one who needs the least.”

“To learn that there are people
who love them dearly,
but simply have not yet learned
how to express or show their feelings.”

“To learn that two people can
look at the same thing
and see it differently.”

“To learn that it is not enough that they
forgive one another, but they must also forgive themselves.”

“Thank you for your time,” I said humbly.
“Is there anything else
you would like your children to know?”

God smiled and said,
“Just know that I am here… always.”

-author unknown



hi....