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Priorities Whose priorities are at the top of our lists in any moment? Is my top priority to be in control? To prove others wrong (assuming I am right)? To be comfortable now and free from any pain? To eliminate by force anyone who doesn’t agree with me (enemies)?
These are all things that

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Created to Worship This morning we will look at the beginning of Revelation chapter 14 where John describes his vision of the one hundred and forty-four thousand saints. There is a lot of conjecture over the exact identity of who these people might represent. But today I would like for us to look

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The Great Revival In my recent devotional from two days ago that was titled “Counting the Cost”, we discussed the choices that we will all have to make as followers of Jesus. We read at the beginning of Matthew chapter 24 about the description that Jesus gave of the “end times”. He described how

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Keeping Our Eyes Fixed on Jesus The bible encourages us to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus no matter where we go or what is going on around us. We should not try to figure things out on our own (making many mistakes) or run to and fro as if we are gods, but we should simply follow His example. He knows how this

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Counting the Cost The question that the Lord placed on my heart this morning is “At what point does the cost of following Jesus become too great for us?” It is connected with the theme that we have been discussing about the war that has been raging between the serpent and God’s seed from the

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Word of God Speak For today’s devotional, I will not offer any commentary of my own. I will simply read excerpts of encouragement from God’s word. In the order presented, they are from Psalm 37 and 2 Peter 3. Let’s meditate on God’s living and active word as we begin with Psalm 37.

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The Good Shepherd In my devotional message from two days ago, I discussed how Satan uses the fear of death to try to deceive us and to trick us to draw us away from God. I talked about how God already knows everything that we need and He is the only true source of those needs. Throughout that

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The History of Israel and the Church In yesterday’s devotional, we looked at the middle section of Revelation chapter 12. This overall chapter covers the history of good and evil in the world, describing it as a huge spiritual battle. The first six verses of the chapter give a pretty clear picture of how God used

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The Threat of Death – the Use of Fear The overall story of the bible is a battle of good vs evil. This has always been the essence of our struggle since the very beginning. But closely interwoven in this battle, there has always been a choice of life or death. God has always encouraged us to choose life with Him. And

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More on Why We Praise the LORD
The Spirit of Revival Continues Yesterday we looked at and discussed what God’s word says about why we praise the Lord. We read Psalm 100 to see how it says that we should praise Him for who He is (the Great I Am), and not for what He can do for us. Then later yesterday morning during a time of intimate

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Why We Praise the Lord
The Spirit of Revival The essence of the reason why we praise the Lord is because of who He is. This is why I live to praise Him with all of my soul in any case. When we fully come to understand who He is and to embrace the fact that His presence is always with us, our natural response always becomes

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The Process of Perfection from Two Perspectives
Being Renewed Everyday This morning’s message is a view into the example that the Lord spoke through Jeremiah to the people of Judah about the Potter and the clay. In today’s verses we will examine this example that was illustrated. God is using a metaphor to illustrate what He is doing in and through

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Live and Let Live
soundcloud.com/gerald-prater/… In our world today there are many who think that we have an endemic race problem. We seek to fix it by forcibly educating or indoctrinating people into thinking that they must lash out because they are the victims of other groups who hate them. There are many who think that we

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How Did We Get Here? The theme that the Lord placed on my heart this morning is about a well-known scene from the Old Testament. The people of Judah suddenly found themselves uprooted from their own land of promise and comfort. In what seemed like a very quick invasion, they suddenly found themselves

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Finding True Life The theme that I woke up with this morning was “True Life” and what it will look like for the follower of Christ. The Lord pointed me to a few scriptures where He personally spoke about this theme in particular. But He also pointed me to the lives of His disciples and others as

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Bless My Mind – a Humble Prayer LORD, God in heaven, this morning as I awake and prepare to go into the mix of life in this world, I pray that You would bless my mind. Bless it LORD, not that I would think what I naturally want to think, but that You would press in and make my thoughts into Your thoughts.

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Bigger Than Our Problems – Words of Life During times of stress in our lives, we all have the tendency to give our enemy more credit than he deserves. We do this by giving the problems and situations that he throws at us more of our focus and attention (our time) than he deserves. Before we even realize it, we are

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The Power of God in Us This week we have been discussing the identity of the actual source of power that sustains us. The true power comes from the One who created us, loves us, fights for and rescues us; who heals us and ultimately lifts us up in glory. We have all of that power living right here

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The Power of the Word Hebrews 4:12 says:
“For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”

This is such a powerful and true word that has been

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Power and the Symbol of the Serpent Throughout the bible the symbol of the serpent has represented Satan and his power over the people. We see these symbols from Genesis 3 where he first appeared in the garden to Revelation 20 where he is cast into the fiery lake. Symbols of the serpent are often used by Satan to

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Reliance on Mediums In yesterday’s message, God warned about harming the children and He demanded severe consequences for those who did these things. He called these acts of spiritual prostitution because the people were using their children to worship Satan. But the abuse of the children was only