May God bless you and keep you, and
Merry Christmas from our family to yours!
|
|
A Devotional from Jim:
This year, a lot
of people are feeling anxious and curious about the conflict in Israel.
Many have asked me for my thoughts on this, and as I look at these world
events through the lens of Scripture, there is one thought that I would
like to share with you for this Christmas season.
Please take a
moment and read Psalm 135:1-12. I want to pull out three things from
this passage. First, God has chosen Israel for Himself (v. 4)! Second,
God will do whatever He pleases in heaven and on earth (v. 6), and
finally, God removed Israel’s enemies from their land and gave them that
land as their heritage years ago (v. 8-12).
You might wonder
what this has to do with the Christmas season. To understand, we must
turn to another passage from the Bible, since we must always interpret
what God is doing through the lens of Scripture. Please read Luke
1:26-55. Just as we must do in these days, Joseph and Mary had to turn
to God’s Word, to what God had already said, to guide them through the
chaos of their lives being turned upside down by God’s plan. God did
what He was pleased to do in heaven and on earth through Mary and
Joseph, and they clung to His promises as their lives were eternally
changed.
Notice how Mary did not understand fully what God was doing, but she
submitted herself to what He asked of her. She acknowledged that God is
God, and she was His servant. She took comfort in the many promises that
God had made to Abraham that He promised to fulfill, and she worshipped
God for what He was doing in her life, even if she didn’t fully
understand it.
As we live in this time where we see the world heading to the
prophesied end, we don’t have to understand it fully either. We must
simply submit ourselves as servants to the One who gets to do whatever
He pleases with His world and His people! As we look back at Mary and
Joseph’s time, we understand God’s good purposes in that chaos a little
better than they did, and we celebrate and thank God for what He was
doing at that time (bringing the Messiah into the world)! Trust that
God’s purposes are just as good in these days as well, as He is setting
the stage for the Messiah’s return.
Don’t let politics shape your worldview, but let Scripture give you
encouragement and peace amid the chaos of this world! Trust the same God
that Mary and Joseph did.
We love you! Merry Christmas!!
“For whatever was written in former days was written for
our instruction, that through endurance and through the
encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. May the God of
endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with
one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may
with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you,
for the glory of God.
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so
that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”
–Romans 15:4-7, 13
|
|
Bible Cruise 2024
We hope you will join
us for the 2024 Bible Cruise! Jim will be speaking on the Parables of
Jesus, a series titled "What is God Trying to Tell Us?" The Bible
cruises are a great time for discipleship, fellowship with other
believers, and outreach to the other guests and the crew on the
ship. If you have never been on a Bible cruise with us before, come
see what you have been missing! We meet for Bible study on mornings and
afternoons while we are at sea, eat together in the dining room at
dinner each evening, and relax and fellowship throughout the entire
week!
We have
staterooms held at terrific prices! Please consider booking your
stateroom as soon as you can. Cruises have become more popular than
ever, and now it appears that most cruisers are booking early, up to two
years in advance. To get the stateroom and location that you want, it
is best to book early. Deposits made within our group holdings are
refundable until mid-July, 2024. Please email or call Becky Johnson at [email protected] or 321-591-5993 to reserve your cabin or find out more.
|
|
Thankfulness & Giving Freely
When we started this ministry in 2005, we
never could have imagined how God would use it and how blessed we would
be because of His work. We have been faithfully following God’s calling
for over eighteen years, and over the last few years, God has been
exploding our reach even more than we had previously imagined. Because
of tools like YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Jim’s book on
Revelation, “What Will Happen Next,” we have been able to reach people
from all over the globe (literally! Jim’s teaching has been seen by
people in Australia, Brazil, Cambodia, Canada, India, Ireland, Kenya,
Kuwait, Nigeria, the Philippines, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Thailand,
Uganda, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Zimbabwe)! Praise be
to our God who knows the end from the beginning and can use things that
we don’t understand (even social media!) to further HIS Gospel, in His
timing. We continue to freely give of our resources, believing as we
always have that the truth of God’s Word is and should be free to
everyone. Because of this, we have given away over 12,000 copies of
Jim’s two books over the years, as well as many copies of Jim’s teaching
on CD and DVD. In addition, Jim has been able to travel and speak in
churches completely free of charge.
This is possible because of God’s
generosity to this ministry through your giving. You may not have
realized this, but when you give to Justapreacher so others can receive
the Word, you are living out the exact same attitude of the early Church
that started at Pentecost (Acts 2:44-45, 4:34-35)! Those believers gave
generously so that any who could not afford what they needed would be
taken care of. The Holy Spirit shines through you in the same way, as
your generous gifts to this ministry make it possible for other
believers, who might not have the same resources as you, to receive the
same teaching and materials that you do. Your giving makes it possible
for us to give everything away.
In Matthew 10, Jesus gave His
disciples instructions as they went out two by two. One of those
instructions was this: “Freely you have received; freely give” (Matthew
10:8). God has freely blessed us, and therefore our desire is to freely
give to anyone who wants to hear God’s Word. Thank you all for being the
instruments that God continues to use to bless our ministry. Proverbs
11:24-25 says that blessing comes to those who give freely, and many
other passages reflect that same teaching (2 Corinthians 9:6-12, Malachi
3:10-12, 1 Timothy 6:17-19, Psalm 112:5-9). We pray with confidence
that God will bless you because of your commitment to give freely and
generously.
Thank you for being obedient to give
as God leads you to. We trust that God will continue to provide exactly
the resources that we need to complete the work that He wants to do
through us, and it is our greatest joy to be partners with all of you in
this. We praise God for another year of His clear blessing and
provision amidst the chaos of this world. Trust that no matter what this
next year brings, God holds each day in His hands, and every day is one
day closer to an eternity of face-to-face fellowship with our Father.
Hold onto Him through every wind and wave of this changing world.
We are thankful for you. Have a Merry Christmas, and a blessed New Year!
|
|
|
|
|
