To the members of Faith: What a Sunday coming up! Two special things. The 9:30 service will be something called "Making the Church Year Live," a walk through the entire Church Year to see how the different seasons work together. I think you'll love it! Then at 11 we'll have "Honoring Our Veterans," a 45-minute program featuring a guest speaker, "America the Beautiful," refreshments, and more. This event is open to the community. Consider inviting someone to come. God bless this coming Sunday!
"...but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die" (Gen. 2:17).
These words were spoken by God before the fall into sin. They contain the word "not" and prove that the concept of no is a good, blessed, and perfect one. Perhaps we have forgotten that.
A pastor instructed his congregation not to spend time gambling. He wished to keep them from vanity and the love of money. But a woman said to him, "I don't like to be told no," and left the church.
Why does a parent tell the child not to go into the street or touch the stove? To keep the child from something good? Rather, to keep something bad from happening to the child.
God's no works the same way. He tells us no in the Ten Commandments in order to protect us from harm to body and soul. Stop buying the lie that He's just trying to keep you from something good (Gen. 3:5). Look what happened when Adam and Eve bought it!
God loves you, and "no" is one of His loving words.
"You shall have no other gods" is an invitation to experience life as it was meant to be: a real relationship with God and people, based on real love.
