Ed Christian's World

Out Of The Larva Cell…

When a bee starts out in life, it does so as a larva and the new-born bee does nothing but eat. In a real short time, the bee leaves the larva stage and steps out of its cell and begins immediately helping out.

No longer does it have anyone feed it, it’s helping to feed others. It goes very quickly from being ministered to ministering to others, the fellow bees. In this way, bees are a lot wiser than a lot of believers.

You see, as believers, we tend to get into a mode of expecting others to minister to us and our effectiveness for God is hindered. Be free my friend. Forget about your needs, minister to the needs of others.

Forget about having others love you, you love others. Forget about having others reach out to you, you reach out to others. Forget about having others bless you, you bless others. Because only then can we attain the maturity of Jesus.

It’s time for maturity. It’s time to grow up and fulfill our calling and become conformed to His image. It all begins when you step out of the larva cell.

So that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power. We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. 1 Corinthians 2:5-7

Be the blessing to others in acts of kindness, show love, find a need and fulfill it, this is your calling to serve in His name.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

He Who Keeps Israel…

In Jeremiah 31, it is written that as long as there are stars in the sky, so God will preserve the Jewish people. One of the most famous prayers in the Hebrew language is called the Shehecheyanu.

It’s the prayer that thank God for preserving us, sustaining us. The Bible says the Jews are to be preserved. Not everything in the world is preserved. In fact, most things pass away, but everything in the world has gone against the Jewish people being preserved.

All hell has sought to wipe them out. They wandered the earth, yet God fulfilled His Word. The Hittites are gone, the Egyptian dynasty is no more, the Babylonians have vanished, but the Jews are still here.

God preserved the same people from the Bible and gathered them back to the land of Israel just as He promised.

You are also of the commonwealth of Israel. So be blessed today. Be at peace. God is bigger than your problem, don’t worry what the future holds. You just have to know Him who holds the future, because He who keeps Israel is the same who holds you in His right hand.

 “At that time,” declares the Lord, “I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they will be my people.” ‘Come, let us go up to Zion, to the Lord our God.’”will take up your timbrels and go out to dance with the joyful. Again you will plant vineyards on the hills of Samaria; the farmers will plant them and enjoy their fruit. There will be a day when watchmen cry out on the hills of Ephraim,‘Come, let us go up to Zion, to the Lord our God.’” This is what the Lord says: “Sing with joy for Jacob; shout for the foremost of the nations. Make your praises heard, and say, ‘Lord, save your people, the remnant of Israel. See, I will bring them from the land of the north and gather them from the ends of the earth. Among them will be the blind and the lame, expectant mothers and women in labor; a great throng will return. They will come with weeping; they will pray as I bring them back. I will lead them beside streams of water on a level path where they will not stumble, because I am Israel’s father, and Ephraim is my firstborn son. “Hear the word of the Lord, you nations; proclaim it in distant coastlands: ‘He who scattered Israel will gather them and will watch over his flock like a shepherd.’ For the Lord will deliver Jacob and redeem them from the hand of those stronger than they. They will come and shout for joy on the heights of Zion; they will rejoice in the bounty of the Lord—the grain, the new wine and the olive oil, the young of the flocks and herds. They will be like a well-watered garden, and they will sorrow no more. Then young women will dance and be glad, young men and old as well. I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow. I will satisfy the priests with abundance, and my people will be filled with my bounty, declares the Lord. Jeremiah 31:1-14

Do not worry about your struggles today. God is stronger, God is greater and will preserve you through all your trials.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

After The End…

Jesus rose on Sunday morning and the Resurrection is the Sunday miracle. Sunday morning is the first day of the Hebrew week. It comes after the Shabbat, the Sabbath. The Sabbath is the seventh day, the end. Sunday is the day that comes after the end.

That’s why He rose on Sunday. Jesus was on the cross on the Sabbath – that was the end. That’s it, He said it’s finished. Everything has ended, sin has ended, and it’s the end. So what comes after the end?

New beginnings come after the end. Sunday morning and the Resurrection are so radical that they had to come on the day after the end. If you want to walk in resurrection power, you have to live in the totally new beginning power.

You have to live after the end. Let the old things, old ways, old sins, angers, fears and hurts come to their end on the seventh day. Walk in the power of the miracle of the Resurrection, the power of Sunday morning and the power of the first day. The miracle will begin when you live after the end.

The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming–not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. Hebrews 10:10

In Jesus you are a new creation and the old you is no more. Let go of your former self today, all doubts and fears. Live in His power and begin a new day.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Become The Azar of God…

Azer is the Hebrew word for helpmate. In the beginning God created woman from man, to be a helpmate suitable for him. In the New Testament, the church is to God as woman is to man.

If woman was created as a helpmate to man; the church exists to be a helpmate to God, to help Him fulfill His purposes on earth. To spread the Gospel, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, heal, love, and be a light to the world.

It also means that if you’re born of the Spirit, you’re on earth to be a helpmate to God. You’re on earth to be a blessing to Him, assist Him, to be a friend to God, and together a team. You ask God for help.

But are you a help to Him? Or is your relationship to Him all about how He can help you? He wants to help you. But He wasn’t created to help you. You were created to help Him. Seek to do His will today.

Help Him with the great commission. Be His servant, ambassador, messenger, helper – for you were created to be the very helpmate of God.

This is what the Lord says: In the time of my favor I will answer you, and in the day of salvation I will help you; I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people, to restore the land and to reassign its desolate inheritances, to say to the captives, ‘Come out,’ and to those in darkness, ‘Be free!’ They will feed beside the roads and find pasture on every barren hill. They will neither hunger nor thirst, nor will the desert heat or the sun beat down on them. He who has compassion on them will guide them and lead them beside springs of water. Isaiah 49:8-10

Be the helper of God you were called to be, a light to the lost; giving food to the hungry, showing God’s love to others who need a blessing.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Under The Huppah…

In the Hebrew wedding, the bride and groom were married under the huppah. The huppah is a beautiful canopy that rests over their heads. The word ‘huppah’ in Hebrew means a ‘covering.’ Interestingly, it also means ‘chamber,’ or ‘marriage room.’

The canopy is a reminder that the marriage chamber is the most intimate, most important place in marriage. If you have the most luxurious and beautiful house, but you neglect the room that’s devoted to intimacy, you lose the marriage. In the same way your marriage to God cannot exist if you neglect the huppah; your place of intimacy with your Beloved.

You can be doing a million things for God; all good and beautiful. But if you’re neglecting the huppah, your quiet time, the deepest part of your heart and His together, your relationship with God is going to become a dead marriage.

Your zeal will become apathy, and your love will turn into ritual. He’s waiting for you in the huppah, in the secret place that only the Bride and the Bridegroom can enter.

But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. Matthew 6:6

Do not neglect your personal private time today with God; the most precious part of your everyday is spent with the Father where you can be totally His.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Name On Your Sin…

The word chata’ah is Hebrew for sin. It’s not just the word for sin; it is also the name of the sin-offering, the sacrifice that takes away sin. It’s a shadow of Jesus, He is the sin-offering, He became sin for us.

The sin and the sacrifice that takes away sin are so closely bound they become one. That’s the mystery of Jesus on the cross. He is the sacrifice for sin, becoming sin for us, receiving our sins.

By that we are free from sin. The word for sin and the word for the offering of sin are the same. That means your sin has the name of Jesus on it. Every one of your sins are covered by His name, but you have to give them to Him.

Money has Caesar’s name on it, so render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s. Sin has Jesus’s name on it, so render unto Jesus, God, the things that are God’s. Don’t get lost in condemnation. Your sin is covered, it has His name on it, it’s paid for, it’s His, only give it to Him. Your sin is called chata’ah, but so was Jesus.

For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit. 1 Peter 3:18

Surrender your sin whatever its name is; release it to Jesus under the blood of the Lamb.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Why The Fight…

For most of the last 2,000 years, with a few short exceptions, few have cared about Jerusalem. In the twentieth century the whole world is wrapped up in it.

For 2,000 years Jerusalem was largely a backwater of history. In the nineteenth century it was a flea-bitten, diseased place in the middle of nowhere. Then in twentieth century, everyone wanted Jerusalem-Jordan, Egypt, the Palestinians, the United Nations, the Vatican, and Osama Bin Laden.

Why the sudden change? In the twentieth century the Jews came back to their land, and have a date with God. Jerusalem is linked to the second coming and all hell has broken loose against this return.

Remember this principle throughout your life. If you find yourself under attack and you are doing the Lord’s will, don’t lose heart and don’t be discouraged. The fight is significant and worth it and the victory will be important.

Do as the Jewish people have done. Fight for the victory, fight all hell, and press on against all odds, because when all hell is against you, it’s a good sign. It means all heaven is for you, and you are heading to Jerusalem.

Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses. 1 Timothy 6:12

Fight for spiritual victory over your struggles today. Do all you can to not be moved and press on while you are under attack; for He fights for you, so stand.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

It’s Only Snow…

Psalm 37 says “don’t fret.” A secret of abundant life is to not worry. A man I knew with a heart condition, went out to shovel snow, had a heart attack and died.

Many people die shoveling snow. Yet in a few days it’s all gone anyway. It’s just temporary, so why die from it? It’s going to melt anyway. But we burden ourselves with snow shoveling every day. Even in summer.

The enemy is always dishing out problems, issues, burdens, dangers, threats, irritations. They take away our peace and joy; maybe even our well-being in God. It’s like the one who burdened himself with shoveling snow.

These problems in the end are only snow. They are temporary arrangements. They are going to melt. It looks real, but in the end, for the child of God, it’s only snow.

So don’t panic, don’t react, don’t lose your peace, don’t get all wrapped up in that snow. In a short time it’s going to melt. That problem will melt away, so don’t let it kill you. Give it to God; it’s going to melt anyway. Remember, God remains, but that problem is only snow.

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Matthew 6:25

Throw off your burdens and worries and give them all to God. Pray for His eternal peace to be on you unto everlasting.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Apply This…

You probably attend worship services regularly, and hear a message or sermon every week. You may even listen to Christian radio daily. With so many ways to enjoy the Word of God, it’s very easy for us to develop a consumer mentality that affects our faith, walk and causes us to treat the Word of God as something to be consumed.

We sit in services as if we are sitting at a football game, or in front of a television. Consumerism causes us to focus on our feelings. We may feel good, spiritual, righteous, or like we have done our part, but the Word is a seed designed to produce fruit, not feelings!

The book of James tells us not only to be hearers of the Word, but doers also. The Word can bring about the changes needed to produce fruit in your life. But the Word only bears fruit when it’s applied to your heart and life.

So resolve to put into action what you’ve already heard. Be a doer of the Word today, be good soil, and let the Word bear fruit. And continue to grow in God, that your fruit may remain.

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do. James 1:22-25

Apply the Holy Word to your life today, just as a seed grows to produce its fruit, so let the fruit of the Spirit to cause you do great things in His name.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Gospel Bleachers…

We tend to be a nation of spectators. We watch sports, television, even the internet. We as believers even behave like spectators when it comes to reading the Bible. We act as if the various people and stories of the Bible are only there for us to learn from, or be touched thereby.

But the Bible is not just a history book relating events that happened to people long ago. It’s about God, who is God of the living, not the dead.

Consider the book of Acts for example. All the people mentioned there are our elder brothers and sisters. They were the first, and we should learn about them. But they are no longer on the playing field.

The baton has been passed, and the ball is in our court. The book of Acts is now, and it’s our turn! Just as spectators should not be on the field, players should not be in the bleachers. You are a player!

So stop watching the glory from the bleachers. Get on the field of glory and live the Great Commission. Fight the fight, gain the victory, win the battle… and live the Bible.

The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade. Acts 5:12

You have been called to great acts. Be that heroic biblical character today and take the field of battle; be courageous in sharing the Good News.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed