Ed Christian's World

The Foundation Act…

The first act of the American Government took place in 1789. President Washington, the House of Representatives, and the Senate, were together for the inauguration of the President.

After he made his speech, they all proceeded to a church, went inside, prayed and committed America into God’s hands. The first initial act of the American Government was to pray.

That same day, Washington gave a warning that if America departed from God, it would lose the blessings and favor of God. Pray for America. It’s easy for a nation to forget its foundation when prayer is often banned.

When we talk about the nation and say, how America has gone away from its roots – what about you? Have you gone away from your first love, prayer, the Word, your foundation? It’s easy to do so.

Get back to your foundation, because everything else in your life will only be as good and strong as your foundation on which it rests. Like America, get back to your foundation in God, for that’s where your blessing is.

Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. Revelation 2:4

Dedicate this day to God and His will for you today before you do anything else. Set a good solid foundation and build on it.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Looking Where You Are Going

When I was 13 years old, I was in summer camp and wanted to impress the girls. I was waving to one of the girls, walking away and kind of looking back at her, smiling, waving again, walking away, turning back.

It looked really cool until I walked straight into a tree. I must have looked very pathetic. The simple, but profound truth is you can’t walk ahead if you’re looking behind. If you’re dwelling on what happened in your past, what people did to you, you’re not going to move ahead in the Lord in your life.

If you’re turning around to see if the enemy is following you, you’re not going to be following the Lord. Stop looking behind you. Paul said, this one thing I do, forgetting what is behind, I press on, looking forward to what is ahead.

This I do, fixing my eyes on Him. Keep your eyes ahead of you, fixed on the One you’re walking to. Run the race with endurance, fixing your eyes on the greater things God has for you and you’ll do fine. Otherwise you’ll find yourself crashing into trees.

Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:13-14

Stop looking at your past life and instead focus your sights on where you are going. Keep pressing on completing God’s calling for you today.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Lessons of the Little Children…

It’s one of the first lessons we learn in life–you make a mess, you clean it up. We tend to forget that, but it’s still a lesson we need as adults.

When Zacchaeus came to salvation, he didn’t say, praise God I am saved– I ripped off people and it doesn’t matter because I am saved. No, he said, “I’m going back because I sinned against others, I’m going to make it right. If I have wronged them, I’m going to pay back four times.”

Grace isn’t to make you irresponsible, it’s to make you responsible to the Lord and to others. The sign of an adult is to fix, redeem. Did you make a mess in your life, hurt someone, gossip? Go back and clean it up.

Make good and lift up that person. Do you have enemies? Do good, bless them. God will bless you. Until you clean them up, in some way you’ll be living it. Whatever good you can do, do it. God will bless you. If you made a mess, clean it up. It’s that simple.

But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. Matthew 5:44

Make amends with anyone you have wronged in any way before you enter into the Lord’s presence today. Keep a clean slate and walk humbly before God.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Missing Light…

In the temple of Jerusalem was the menorah, the seven- branch lamp stand. One light, the western light, was the central light that lit up all the others.

The rabbis recorded that suddenly, forty years before the destruction of the temple, the western light would go out. The temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. so that puts the change at around 30 A.D.

The time Jesus was on the cross, the western light went out in the temple according to the rabbis. He said, I am the Light of the world. It says in John, He is the Light that lights up the light of men.

If you’re born again, He is your light – no matter what you’ve done. If your own lamp has kind of gone out, He can light you up again. Maybe you don’t feel that love, that zeal anymore. He will light you up.

Come back to Him, His light. He is the Light of lights that lights up our hearts. He will restore the fire of your first love. Just come to Him and let Him light you up because He is the Western Light.

When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12

Spend time in His presence today. Let His light light up yours.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Four Seasons of Joy…

Thanksgiving comes from a Hebrew feast called Khag or Festival. In Deuteronomy 1:6, Moses commanded Israel “Three times a year shall all males appear before the Lord thy God in the place that he shall choose; in the feast of unleavened bread and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles: and they shall not appear before the Lord empty handed.”

The Jewish people were to celebrate the feast of Unleavened Bread in the Spring, the feast of Shavuot or Pentecost in the early summer and the feast of Sukkot or Tabernacles in the autumn. Later God gave the feast of winter called Chanukah.

How did they rejoice in every season? In every season they give thanks to God for His blessings. Learn the lessons from God’s festival. These are God’s rest days.

If you’re a child of God, your life must be characterized with rejoicing. Rejoice in season and out of season. Learn the lesson of the Jewish festivals; give thanks to God in all seasons of your life and live a life of celebration.

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Philippians 4:4

The Moedeem and the Mystery of Your LifeSeek out the joy in all you do today. Celebrate every blessing with true thanksgiving to the One who rejoices over you.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

To Haves and Have Not…

Thanksgiving comes from the feast of Sukkot or Tabernacles. The Hebrews were commanded by Moses to leave their houses and dwell in small tents called Sukkahs. On the 15th day of the 7th month they were to celebrate the Hebrew feast of Thanksgiving.

Living in these tents or huts was not comfortable, but God uses this act of obedience to show how blessed they were in their houses in the Promised Land.

Their houses, the fruit of the land, was a gift from God and should not be taken for granted. In order to have something, you have to lose it.

Imagine if you lost your health or your closest friends, your family, your dreams, every blessing. These things are all gifts from God and can’t be taken for granted; and should not be taken lightly.

Learn from this act of the Hebrews – for all good gifts cometh from God. The next breath that you breathe comes from God. Don’t you think that’s a blessing that should be celebrated?

Stop taking God’s gifts for granted, thank Him today and every day. Your life will become a celebration.

“‘So beginning with the fifteenth day of the seventh month, after you have gathered the crops of the land, celebrate the festival to the Lord for seven days; the first day is a day of sabbath rest, and the eighth day also is a day of sabbath rest. On the first day you are to take branches from luxuriant trees—from palms, willows and other leafy trees—and rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. Celebrate this as a festival to the Lord for seven days each year. This is to be a lasting ordinance for the generations to come; celebrate it in the seventh month. Live in temporary shelters for seven days: All native-born Israelites are to live in such shelters so your descendants will know that I had the Israelites live in temporary shelters when I brought them out of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.’” Leviticus 23:39-43

Give thanks to the Lord in all His goodness. Take nothing for granted. Count all your blessings – as gifts given by God.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Calah Identity…

In the ancient Hebrew marriage, the bridegroom comes to the house of the bride and proposes marriage. If the woman accepts, she’s now the bride, the Calah.

The two are separated for about a year. The Calah still lives at her house, but she’s no longer of it; she’s of the bridegroom now. Everything looks the same, but is now different because she belongs to the bridegroom. She’s not bound by the old house anymore.

That’s where you are right now. Jesus came to this world, to your life to propose, and you said yes. You’re now the Calah. The wedding day is coming, but you’re still in the old house. The old circumstances may look the same, but you’re not of it.

You belong to the new life; the bridegroom. You’re free from your circumstance, problem, past, your sin. Stop living by what is around you. Remember who you are and whose you are.

Live for the Bridegroom. The more betrothed you live, the freer you will be from this world. For the Calah is not bound by the house.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 2 Corinthians 5:17

Live as the Calah today. You are no longer of this world, or your circumstance, or your past. Break free of these things.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Real Saints…

The difference between actors and real people is that actors are following the script. Real people don’t follow a script. They do it from their heart. If you’re just doing good because you have to, you’re following the script, trying to conform to a law.

That’s the Old Covenant. Jeremiah says that I will write the Law in their heart. In the New Covenant, it will come from the inside. Not doing things because you have to, but because you have love.

It’s coming from you because it’s coming from God in you. God calls us not to act like children of God, He calls us to BE children of God. He doesn’t want you to play the part of a Saint, He wants you to BE a real Saint by living in His Spirit.

Get beyond the requirements of the Law. Get into the heart of God. Seek with every ounce of your being to make His will your will, His love your love, because God didn’t call you to act the part. He called you to be a real person, a real Saint, a real child of God.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Matthew 5:8

Don’t simply act right today, be right. Do what is right from your heart. Love from your deepest part.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Holy Rebellion…

How often we used to rebel as kids. I rebelled as a little kid. I rebelled in school, life, against authority. Generally, rebellion isn’t a good thing, especially when it’s against God.

Yet it can be good in one sense. Jonah arose and fled, rebelling against God’s will. Finally he repented when he arose and went. The same way he went away from God, now he’s serving God. The way he rebelled, now he’s serving the Lord.

There’s a way to be a holy rebel. The way we used to rebel against good, now we need to rebel against what’s evil. The enemy gives us commands and is always issuing things like you have to submit, sin, fear, depression, fall into this bondage.

You have to rebel against that. Rebel against sin. Rebel against the darkness. Rebel against all the orders of sin and habit. You can rebel against all the orders of the old life and the flesh.

You don’t have to obey the voice of sin, flesh, darkness, or the enemy anymore. Be a Holy Spirit rebel. Obey God, but be a rebel to the enemy.

Peter and the other apostles replied: “We must obey God rather than human beings! Acts 5:29

Stand firm against the enemy. Rebel against that temptation. Break the law that sin.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Palestine Strategy…

People talk about the land of Palestine in Jesus’ time. But Palestine didn’t really exist. Philistines were enemies of Israel. The naming of Palestine was the Romans’ strategy of removing the Jews from their land.

They wanted the world and the Jews to forget that they ever had a land. The Romans did a good job because the world forgot that it was really Israel, their inheritance.

The enemy tries to use that strategy of Palestine. He wants you to not believe in God’s power that will make you the person you are meant to be, to be victorious in Jesus. It wants you to live a substitute life, a messed up, sinful life. It wants your circumstances to discourage you. He wants you to forget God’s promises,

God’s calling on your life, and your inheritance in God just like the Jews. The world may not believe that you can be what God created you to be. Believe in the promises of God.

For Palestine is just a strategy, a substitute life to make you forget. But God will not forget His promise. You are an heir to the Promised Land.

“I, even I, am he who comforts you. Who are you that you fear mere mortals, human beings who are but grass, that you forget the Lord your Maker, who stretches out the heavens and who lays the foundations of the earth, that you live in constant terror every day because of the wrath of the oppressor, who is bent on destruction? For where is the wrath of the oppressor? Isaiah 51:12-13

The enemy wants you to forget God’s calling on your life, and who you are in Him. Don’t let him make you forget. Hold to His Word, to your identity, and your calling.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed