Ed Christian's World

It’s a New Year 2024…

This poem was one of Grandfather’s favorite, written in about 1855 by Helen Hunt Jackson.

New Years Morning

Only a night from old to new!
Only a night, and so much wrought!
The Old Year’s heart all weary grew,
But said: “The New Year rest has brought.”
The Old Year’s hopes its heart laid down,
As in a grave; but trusting, said:
“The blossoms of the New Year’s crown
Bloom from the ashes of the dead.”

The Old Year’s heart was full of greed;
With selfishness it longed and ached,
And cried: “I have not half I need.
My thirst is bitter and unsolved.
But to the New Year’s generous hand
All gifts in plenty shall return;
True love it shall understand;
By all my failures it shall learn.
I have been reckless; it shall be
Quiet and calm and pure of life.
I was a slave; it shall go free,
And find sweet peace where I leave strife.”

Only a night from old to new!
Never a night such changes brought.
The Old Year had its work to do;
No New Year miracles are wrought.

Always a night from old to new!
Night and the healing balm of sleep!
Each morn is New Year’s morn come true,
Morn of a festival to keep.
All nights are sacred nights to make
Confession and resolve and prayer;
All days are sacred days to wake
New gladness in the sunny air.

Only a night from old to new;
Only a sleep from night to morn.
The new is but the old come true;
Each sunrise sees a new year born.

Helen Hunt Jackson (1809 – 1884)

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Romans 5:1-2

From my house to yours – Happy New Year to all, may your New Year be full of love, joy, peace, and hope!!!

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Your Pain – His Pain…

The Scripture says you are Jesus’s body. When your body hurts, you feel it; when it’s sad, you have tears. If you’re His body, then when you’re wounded or rejected, He is too.

When you’re alone, He’s alone along with you (so you’re never really alone). When you feel unholy and far from God, He feels it too. You’re not alone, God isn’t distant, He’s right there feeling even more than you feel. You don’t have to convince Him- He knows your tears already.

God is with you so close that He feels everything you do, as close as His body. So be at peace; when you feel far from God, He’s feeling it with you. He knows. Start partaking of His nature.

As He weeps with your tears, start rejoicing in His joy. Start living holy in His holiness. Become strong in the power of His might, love in His love, and overcome in His victory. You are His body, and that’s about as close as you could ever get to Him.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Give whatever you’re going through today to Jesus, who is with you. Know that He truly feels your pain and all that you’re feeling, and strengthen your heart in that.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

That You Might Know…

Paul said, “My goal is that I might know Him.” He didn’t say that I have known Him, but that I might know Him. If Paul, who knew so much of Him, could say “that I might know Him,” how much more should we say that? Paul said, “that I might know Him” as if he didn’t. And it’s true.

There was so much more that he didn’t know, and really knowing God is never ending. Paul actually would be the one chosen to write much of the New Testament, and yet, he can still say that I have yet to know Him.

Those who will truly know God are those who admit that they don’t know half of the story. Those who are open are those who don’t stop seeking. That was the goal of Paul’s life. Let it also be the goal of your life.

Do you have another goal? Take it away to know God – His peace, His love, His presence, His heart, His holiness, His joy, and His glory. It’s a simple goal – the highest goal. Make it your own, that you might know Him.

This is what the Lord says: “Let not the wise boast of their wisdom or the strong boast of their strength or the rich boast of their riches, but let the one who boasts boast about this: that they have the understanding to know me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,”
declares the Lord. Jeremiah 9:23-24

Make your goal the same as Paul’s today, “that I might know Him.”

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Exposition Of Him…

Synagogue centers on the reading of the Torah. The rabbi reads from the appointed section of the Torah – called the Parashah. Then he expounds on it.

We have Yeshua; Jesus. He’s the Grand Rabbi of the universe. He expounds on the Torah, God’s word, better than any other rabbi. He’s the greatest expounder of God’s word. But it’s not just that He expounded on the Torah – it’s that the Torah expounded on Him.

He didn’t just teach about the Torah, the Torah and the prophets taught about Him. The Word is about Him. It’s not just that He teaches about life – it’s that life teaches us about Him! He’s the center.

If you want to live in the power of the blessing you were meant to live in, make Him the center of everything. Let everything you do be about Him.

Let your heart, your life, and your purpose be to expound Jesus so that everyone can see. While many have rabbis who expound on the Word, you have a Rabbi so great that the very purpose of your life is to expound upon Him.

They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?” Luke 24:32

Make it your purpose to make your life expound Jesus on all those around you today.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Paul With No Training…

Soon after Saul, or Paul, comes to the Lord, we find him already teaching and preaching with no real training. He didn’t wait to know everything before preaching, he just started.

How do you learn to encourage someone, to lead someone to the Lord, to meet someone’s needs, to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, or visit prisoners? You just do it. Don’t wait until you know everything, until you have all the degrees, diplomas, and certificates – there’s no way you can know everything.

Minister now anyway. Share the gospel now. You don’t have to know how. Just do it. Touch the sick, visit the lonely, reach out to the unsaved, feed the hungry, and encourage your brother and sister now. Paul started doing it when he didn’t really know what he was doing, and he didn’t do too badly.

You don’t have to know what you’re doing in the Lord. You just have to know the One who does. You just have to do it, and God will take care of the rest.

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. James 1:27

Don’t keep waiting for the right time and ability to minister. Step out and minister now, and it will be the right time, and God will give you the ability.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Lepers Solitude…

Leviticus 13 says, “The one with leprosy shall wear torn clothes, uncover his head, cover his upper lip, and cry unclean…. He’s to dwell alone.” The leper in the bible is a picture of how we are spiritually, dwelling in this world as spiritual lepers.

That’s how most of us start out in life, unclean, with guilt inside. When you’re guilty, you’re not clean; you dwell alone, out of fellowship with God. Maybe you’re saved now, but you still feel like you’re not worthy.

We have this account of the leper who didn’t let his condition stop him from coming to Jesus. He comes to Jesus and says, “You can make me clean if you’re willing.” Jesus says, “I am willing.” Yeshua touches him and he’s cleansed and is at the end of his aloneness.

Whatever the thing is in your life – no matter how bad or shameful – bring it to Jesus. Let Him touch it – your guilt, your shame, your infirmity – and He will remove it, and your conscience will be cleansed. You won’t dwell alone anymore, but with Him as a beloved child of God.

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9

Bring your leprosy, your infirmity, your weakness, your shame, your wounds, your sin, and any unclean thing to Jesus today, and let Him touch you and set you free.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Jesus In The Pulpit…

The house of parliament in Israel is called the Knesset, which means the meeting place or the gathering. It’s also translated as the word synagogue.

Jesus’s ministry is also connected to the word synagogue. It was there that Jesus’s ministry began, where He taught and healed, where the Gospel first spread, where Paul preached. That’s where the first Jewish and gentile believers came together.

The church began in the Knesset or synagogue. There’s only one nation on earth whose house of government is called by the name by which Jesus’s ministry began. That’s another sign that there’s a special link between the Jewish people and Jesus.

Jesus’s ministry will not be complete until it comes home to Israel. That’s where He’s going to set up His kingdom. As believers, we must be praying for the peace of Jerusalem, to prepare for it by working for the salvation of the Jewish people through our prayers, through our sharing the Gospel. The kingdom is going to come when Jesus returns to the synagogue of Israel to the Beit Ha Knesset.

For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’ Matthew 23:39

Take time today to pray for Israel and the salvation of the Jewish people.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Preparing For Your Marriage…

Most churches have premarital counseling. Marriage is sacred. Thus, ministers counsel the couple on how to prepare for married life. Preparation makes a big difference. Premarital preparation has been shown to greatly increase the chances of having a successful marriage.

So too, there’s a wedding coming for every true believer – the wedding of God and us. Heaven is married life, but you can’t prepare for heaven in heaven. The only time you have to prepare for heaven, as for a marriage, is now.

This whole life on earth is premarital, and the wise person spends their time preparing for the marriage to come. The only time you have to store up your treasures in heaven is now. Life’s joys, sorrows, victories, and losses are all to prepare you for the marriage so that you might become beautiful and spotless.

Don’t lose sight of the reason you’re here. Remember, it’s the only time you have to prepare for eternity. It will never happen again – so, use it wisely.

Use everything in your earthly life to prepare for heavenly life because heaven is the marriage, and this entire life is your premarital course.

This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. Ephesians 5:32

Treat every situation today as a class in Heaven’s premarital course.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The First Christmas Gift…

I look at the fallen snow laying across the fields like a warm blanket of white covering the ground in a quiet, serene peace.

I stand there in quiet prayer as I prepare for my journey into the canyon for three days of solitude at the Angel Grotto a few miles inside the Grand Canyon. If you have never been to the Grand Canyon in the wintertime, you have never realized the real beauty of the gift God has given us.

Grandfather comes up beside me and asks “Graywolf can you tell me what the first Christmas gift was?” I turn and look up at him and smile, saying I think that would be love. He responds that I should ponder on that during my retreat and give him an answer when I return in three days.

As I begin my journey, I think more about what Grandfather had said. When I told him that would be love, he just smiled at me. So was the first gift of Christmas love?

Father, I laid my head upon Your chest
Your arms encircled me,
It was as if we were
What You meant us to be,

I closed my eyes and heard your heart
Your soft smile in my hair,
I’d never felt so whole and safe
Our hearts beating as a pair,

You found my eyes and told me of
A love for me undying,
You kissed my face, and I knew right then
It was in Heaven we were lying.

Yes, Father, you were there,
To warm and comfort me in my despair.
It was Your glory that I sought,
It was Your love that You brought.

Certainly love is the greatest gift from God, and it must have been the first Christmas gift. but wait, what about Joy, what about peace?

May the light be with you.
May your life be filled with joy and abundance in all areas of life.
May the light shine in your hearts so that love may be expressed.
May love and peace fill your life.

Christmas is all about love, joy, peace, and hope. One is not more important than the other, for they are all needed to complete our life. It was in this revelation that I discovered the first Christmas gift, it’s Jesus.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:16

When I returned to the reservation, I looked at Grandfather in the eye and gave him my answer. He responded, “God’s greatest gift!”

That was on November 28, 1955, a few weeks before I turned 12 years old. I had just completed my intense training to become a Shaman. This retreat was my final lesson, and I was to spend three days in seclusion to examine myself and present my being to God.

Today, I think people are so wrapped up in what is under the tree that they overlook the real meaning of Christmas. Let us all take time to thank God for everything He has given us and remind ourselves of the real reason He has blessed us.

From my house to yours, I wish you a very Merry Christmas full of love, joy, peace, and hope!!

With all my heart,

Ed

Hedges…

You need hedges in your life. They’re meant to protect you. The word in Hebrew is charootz – which means a hedge or a trench, but it also means a decision or determination, as in digging in.

It’s a decision, as if you’re digging a trench, of what will be in your life and what won’t be. Draw the line. This is the line for the hedge in your marriage, in your prayer life, your relationship with the opposite sex, for your time in the Word.

You can’t have hedges without determination. Make your decision, protect your life, build your trench, and build it big. That means you stay far away from that sin, far away from the temptation, and you’ll have a blessing and a lot of room for growth in God.

You need to make your hedge, which will only be as strong as your commitment. Dig your trench, build your hedge, make your decision and make it strong, for as the Hebrew “charootz” reveals, your hedge is only going to be as strong and as real as the decision you make in the Lord.

And do not give the devil a foothold. Ephesians 4:27

Make the commitment today to put up strong hedges and stand firm on your commitment.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed