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Like A Thief In The Night

One night a thief broke into a house he thought was abandoned. As he walked then the darkened house with a flashlight he heard a voice from the kitchen that said, “Jesus is watching you.’ He stopped and said, “who’s there?” There was no answer so he thought he must have imagined it. But after he took a few more steps, the voice said again, “Jesus is watching you.” He decided to walk toward the voice, just before he entered the kitchen, he heard it again, “Jesus is watching you.” He swung the flashlight up and saw a parrot talking in a cage. The parrot said, Jesus is watching you.” The their turned flipped on the kitchen light and said, “Why you’re just a dumb bird.” The he looked in the corner of the room and seen a huge Rottweiler couching. And the parrot said “Get him Jesus.”

You might think it’s strange that Jesus would compare Himself to a thief. Of course, Jesus isn’t identifying with the sin of stealing. But just a good thief (that’s a oxymoron).that tries to sneak in quickly and quietly and escape with His people. That’s an accurate description of how Jesus will rapture His church.

We should all be living as if Jesus was crucified yesterday; raised from the dead this morning, and is coming back this afternoon.

1 Thessalonians 5: 1-4 tells us, “But concerning the times and the seasons, you have no need that anything be written to you. For you yourselves know that the day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night. For when they are saying, “Peace and safety,” then sudden destruction will come to then, like birth pains on a pregnant woman; and they will in no way escape.

We should know these 4 things

1. Jesus will return, But we don’t know the exact day.

Can you imagine a thief sending you a text or email saying, “Just wanted to know that I’m coming to rob your house tonight.” Of course not. Thief’s don’t announce when they’re coming. They sneak in and out.

When I was growing up my Dad used to do military funerals when a soldier or veteran would pass away. My father would keep all the guns in his closet. One night when no one was home the house was broken into and all the M16 rifles were stolen. He was very upset because they trusted him with these rifles. For a long time there would be someone home, or a neighbor would be watching the house.

Jesus told us to keep watch, because you don’t know on what day the Lord will come. We need to understand, if the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and not let the house be broken into. So we must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you don’t expect him (Matthew 24:42-44),

There have been times throughout history when many people expected Jesus to return. We use the Gregorian calendar now, but when the Julian calendar turned from year 999 to the year 1000, people expected Jesus to come for a new millennium, the same was true in the year 2000. People were on their best behavior, In the year 1000 history says that worldly goods were sold and money was given to the poor. Prisoners were set free, and many traveled to Israel to wait for Jesus’s return,

In the second and third chapter of Revelation, Jesus gives messages to the 7 churches, which represent all churches of all time. When He wrote to the church at Philadelphia, He says, “Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I also will keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come upon the whole world to test those who live on the earth” (Revelation3:10).

In Luke 17 Jesus compares His return to a couple of Old Testament events. “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the dat Noah entered the ark. Then the flood cane and destroyed them all. It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating, drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and suffer rained down from heaven and destroyed them all. It will be just like this on the day the Son Of Man is revealed (Luke 17:26-30).

Are You Ready?

What’s Something You Used To Worry About But No Longer Do

The simple answer is everything. I used to be a chronic worrier. I felt that if I weren’t in control of everything and everyone the world would fall apart. Then someone told me, that I could change my thoughts. If I didn’t like what I was worried about, I could change it. I slowly began transitioning from being a chronic worrier into having a calmer mindset.
That required me to shift my focus from unpredictable outcomes to actionable present-moment behaviors. I began training my brain through intentional techniques, broke the cycle of continuous low-level stress, and found peace of mind.

The human brain is a marvel of biological efficiency and adaptability. It operates on about 20 watts of power, that’s roughly the energy needed to dim a lightbulb, meaning the brain can effortlessly process meaning, adapt to new environments, and fuel our consciousness.

I learned I could train my brain to perceive different situations. I could change my thoughts and perspective to become a calmer, peaceful, person, all by learning to trust God in every circumstance. And it began by trusting God almighty because He has everything under control.

They Call Him Holy Spirit

There is a distance between most people and the Holy Spirit. The relationship between the Holy Spirit and us is not physical, but relational, caused by human choice, sin, and spiritual apathy rather than God’s absence.

Many people feel that God or the Holy Spirit is far away, yet Scripture teaches that God is omnipresent. The barrier exists because people harden their hearts or sin. This creates functional distance.

When people chase worldly desires or ignore moral truths, their spiritual perception grows dull.

In John 14:15-16 Jesus spoke these words to His disciples during the Last Supper in an upper room in Jerusalem before His crucifixion.

“If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever.”

One thing I’ve found is that people will say they know the Holy Spirit, but knowledge of Him and intimacy with him are two different things.

If you’ve been saved the Holy Spirit comes to lives in us. While He is so close to us, few even acknowledge Him. We must yield our lives to Him and walk by His guidance, and live under His control rather than the desires of the flesh. Ephesians 5:17-18 tells us, “Don’t be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. Don’t be drunken with wine, in which is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit.”

Having a good relationship with the Holy Spirit means letting go of personal control and choosing a daily walk of trust, active listening, and simple obedience. To achieve spiritual intimacy with the Holy Spirit requires total dedication and quiet time to listen to divine guidance.

The Bible tells us the Holy Spirit has divine attributes. He is Omnipresent –Present everywhere at all times. (Psalm 139:7-8). He is Omniscience – All knowing searching the deep things of God ( 1 Corinthians 2:10-11). He is Omnipotent – All powerful, active in creation and miracles (Romans 15:19).

The Holy Spirit is our advocate that supports us. He allows the world to know that God is with you. He allows His anointing and power to be on display in our lives.

He is our comforter. He is something we can wrap around ourselves to keep warm. The Holy Spirit is our covering. He surrounds us and wraps us in love, peace, and presence of God. He gets us through troubled times and will forever be there when we need Him and most. Yet most people do not acknowledge Him as they move through their lives.

He is our intercessor. Although Jesus is our intercessor with God, the Holy Spirit also acts on our behalf. He prays the will of God through us when we don’t know what to say (Romans 8:26).

He is our strengthener. As our strengthener, the Holy Spirit provides additional stamina when we need it, spiritually, mentally, emotionally, and physically. He is our personal trainer and enforcement. If fear or the desire to quit overwhelms us, the Holy Spirit can infuse our heart with the power to stand strong.

He is our stand by. As our standby, the Holy Spirit is ready for duty or deployment, especially in times of emergency. We can rely on him as a resource to move in the places we ask Him.

He is our counselor. He’s the one qualified employee equipped to give us guidance in our personal, business, and ministry of life. He has answers to every social, relational, business, and psychological situation or problem.

He is our helper. By revealing the word and heart of God, the Holy Spirit support and helps us walk out our lives as believers so we can be a powerful witness for Jesus.

This is who the Holy Spirit is in our lives. When we yield to him, allowing him to manifest through us, our life can become an example of Jesus to the world. Other people can be drawn to you and God will get the glory.

We were created to live a life dominated by the Holy Spirit. When we step into that reality, we can find strength and peace like we’ve never known.

When Humans Try To Play God

There are people who seek total control, supreme power, or the ability to create and destroy life. Whether it’s the human drive for control or human pride its dangerous.

There is a huge problem that will come along with it. Making choices about life, death, and nature without having the wisdom to handle the outcome. Along with using power to rule over people or force their personal will on the world.

The Bible references Ai as an ancient Canaanite city meaning “a heap of ruins” in Hebrew, this is found in Joshua 7-8 and it sounds identical to AI.

In Revelation 13 it speaks of an image of the beast that is given breath and given the ability to speak as a symbolic foreshadowing of conscious machines or robotics.

The Book of Isaiah warns against bowing down to man-made idols of wood and metal. Theologians speak of the risk of treating human inventions like AI with misplaced awe or supreme wisdom.

Recently Yuval Noah Harari warned publicly about AI’s potential to invent new religions and sacred texts. I would suggest that if you can get your hands on the written Word of God, because anything other than that can be manipulated into something other than the truth of God. And people will get deceived easily if they don’t have a good physical grasp of God’s truths.

I think we are all in for a wild ride and we had better know our Savior or the world and Satan will take over

Top Favorite Travel Destinations

I have a few travel destinations, but definitely not 10 that the writing prompt suggests. I would like to visit a beach towns, But I would love to visit a few off the main beach towns, such as Anna Maria Island, The Gulf Shores in Alabama, or Siesta Keys in Florida, or Carmel-by-the -Sea in California. Somewhere that the tourists don’t visit, and off the beaten path.

The Prophets Burden

Badlands National Park -South Dakota

Every prophet in the Bible carried a burden of heavy spiritual and emotional weight from God. It is both the solemn truth a prophet must speak and the deep pain they feel for people.

The nature of the burden is a divine weight from God that feels like a fire burning inside, that is impossible to hold back.

The emotional pain of sorrow from seeing things the way God sees them, often watching people turn away.

The hard truth that delivers messages of coming judgment, correction, and calls to turn back to goodness.

There is a cost that the prophet must endure as a messenger for God. They face anger, loneliness, and pushback from the very people they are trying to help.

The cost of exhaustion carries a strong sense of duty and urgency for the spiritual state of others.

Take the prophet Jeremiah, known as the weeping prophet because he cried often and felt deep sadness for his people.

He cried over the sins of Judah and the bad things nags that would happen to them. He wrote in Jeremiah 9:1 that he wished his eyes were a fountain of tears so he could cry day and night for his people.

It is said he was thought to have written the Book of Lamentations. A sad biblical book full of grief over the fall and destruction of Jerusalem.

He faced hard times. He lived alone because God told him not to marry or have children because of the coming trouble.

People made fun of him, hit him, put him in prison, and threw him into a muddy pit for speaking God’s warnings.

He faced severe rejection while serving a demanding 40-year ministry. His core duties involved warning Judah that judgment was coming through his scribe Baruch. He was burdened and paid the cost for being a messenger for God. He prayed and wept for the spiritual survival of his nation. He was chosen by God to be a messenger for a people who thought they knew better than God.

God demands total obedience despite our personal cost. Living in obedience to God sometimes brings Isolation, rejection, and speaking out an unpopular message.

God’s Word is an unstoppable Internal fire. It often comes from an internal conflict. Jeremiah 20:9: Jeremiah experienced deep depression and tried to quit speaking in God’s name. But he had a burning fire that was shut up in his bones, and he couldn’t hold it in. He was compelled to speak, because true prophecy is not a choice, and he was consumed by the weight of the message.

Favorite Quote

My favorite quote is from Albert Einstein it says, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

There’s A Purpose For Your Path

The San Rafael Swell – Utah

Our paths in life often serve a purpose that challenges us to grow and develop spiritually. This journey can lead to new heights and opportunities, as God guides us through obstacles and detours.

Understanding the Purpose of our Paths

Our paths in life are not just random occurrences, they serve a significant purpose that often challenges us to crow spiritually and personally. This journey can lead to news insights and opportunities, as we navigate through various obstacles and detours.

Spiritual Growth Through Challenges

  • Obstacles as Opportunities: Challenges often present us with the chance to develop resilience and faith. They encourage us to seek guidance and trust in God.
  • Learning from Detours: Just as a GPS may reroute us, life’s detours can leads to unexpected blessings and lessons. Embracing these changes can open our eyes to new possibilities.

God’s Guidance

  • Divine Direction: Many people believe that God guides us through our paths, helping us to navigate life’s complexities. This guidance can manifest in various ways, such as through scripture, prayer, or the support of others.
  • Trusting the Process: Trusting in God’s plan is essential. Proverbs 3:5-6 emphasizes the importance of relying on divine wisdom rather than our own understanding, promising that He will make our ways straight.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and don’t lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight” -Proverbs 3:5-6

The purpose of our paths is to challenge us, foster growth, and deepen our spiritual understanding. By recognizing the value in our experiences, we can embrace the journey and trust in the guidance provided along the way.

A Life-Changing Tip

If I could give you one life-changing tip, it would be to replace your negative thoughts with positive ones. It involves rewriting the negative thought, checking if the negative thought is true, and replacing it with a positive or balanced thought.
I believe anyone can write themselves a new story by changing their attitude and perspective in life.

Sometimes The Only Way Out Is Through

Robert Frost echoed this famous wisdom in a poem he wrote in 1914 it was called “A servant to Servants.” It reminds us that running away from hard things does not work. Instead, facing our problems head-on is a true path to healing and growth.

I was reminded of this recently. I have been praying for God to show me why my mother treated me so badly when I was a child. I have struggled with this for years. I had no way to learn why on my own, but I had faith that God would prepare a way. Recently I received the reason. I finally have closure on that part of my life. She did it because she was ashamed of the Native American heritage on her side of the family. I recently wrote that I found my Native American bloodline with the help of an ancestry website. Once I learned everything, it started falling into place. Another path in my life closed and I can heal.

When we face our hardships we can stop delaying the pain. Pushing our problems away only hides them for a little while.

One thing I’ve learned is that going through hard times teaches us how to handle the next one. I believe there is a purpose to our path in life: growing, learning, and connecting with others. It helps us face hard times and gives us a reason to keep moving forward.

Destroying Strongholds In Your Mind

Cottonwood Canyon -Utah

Did you know that our minds are a battlefield. And that Satan try’s to set up strongholds within them.

The truth is, God and Satan are not equals. Yet strongholds are real.

2 Corinthians 10:4-5 states, “For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty before God to the throwing down of strongholds, throwing down imaginations and every high things that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captive to the obedience of Messiah.”

Our strongholds are fortified places. They are, according to the Bible, false arguments and lofty opinions that counter God’s truth. They are areas where we are in bondage that affect our thinking in the worst way. When we believe these false arguments, a terrible thing happens -we develop a new false way of thinking that captures every thought.

It is easy to see why the Apostle Paul tells believers to take every thought captive to obey Jesus.

God wants us to think like His Son because we should have the mind of Jesus. He doesn’t want us to allow Satan to set strongholds in our minds, because these false arguments can become our new way of thinking. Satan’s lies only brings nasty habits that cannot be unbroken until we recognize that we’ve believed false arguments.

Satan lies because he wants us to doubt God and continue down a path of habits that will hurt us. A stronghold opens the door to life sucking habits. But, God provides a way out.

I came from a home that was plagued with negativity. Satan attacked every one in that home. One brother who had everything going for in life turned to drugs and was later murdered. Another brother drowned on a boy scout trip because he wasn’t being watched closely, my step-brother was a sexual predator, one brother I have lost touch with, one day he just left the house and I haven’t seen him since. My sister lives about 4 hours away and we hardly speak. I’m telling you this not to feel sorry for me but as an of what Satan can do through strongholds in our minds. Satan ruins lives and he does it through our minds. He sneaks in and tells us lies to build strongholds that causes us to sin and run away from God.

God empowers us to change. He empowers us to change for the better.

Too many people think they have to stop sinning to choose God as their Savior. God knows we are flawed, and He knows Satan’s tactics. And He still accepts us because He loves us and wants to help us change. I’m not going to lie and tell you it’s easy because it’s not. We have to choose God every day, and we will still sin, but that’s what “The Last Supper” was for. To take communion, ask for forgiveness, and turn from that sin.

Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”

Relying on Jesus’s strength we can smash the strongholds in our minds and see victory.

We need to see ourselves as God sees us – accepted, blessed, forgiven, chosen, His precious children. And to accept the truth that we are completely loved now and that we cannot earn God’s favor because we have it now.

Ephesians 2:8-9 tells us, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is a gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

There’s no doubt we live in a physical world and a spiritual world. And Satan and his demons want to stop all people from believing in Jesus, and if that doesn’t work, stop believers from growing spiritually in Jesus and stop them from enjoying the abundant life God has for us.

John 10:10 tells us, “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life and have it more abundantly.”

I believe there is a spiritual war going on, and we are seeing the effects of that war on earth. The spiritual war is raging around us now and Satan wants to set up strongholds in our minds to keep us from embracing God’s liberating truth. Satan wants us to believe hid lies and paralyze us.

But, the beautiful news is because of what Jesus has done we will be victorious.

Satan tries to one up God Almighty. But he’s a defeated foe, he wants to steal our joy, peace, and destroy any belief in God we have.