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What Does Jesus Mean: The SabbathIs Made for Man; Not Man for the Sabbath? I think what Jesus was saying was that He gave us a day to rest, and we turned it into a religion. In other words, we believe that if we keep the sabbath holy, we are going to find favor with God; and whoever does the best job of keeping the sabbath holy finds the most favor with God. I don’t believe that’s true. Why we keep the sabbath holy might give us favor with God. But God is not a religion. He …

How to Break Your Child’s Will Without Breaking Their Spirit Watch Video It is critical that we break our children’s will--we help them to surrender their will. Because, eventually, if we don’t, their will begins to break their own spirit But we have to be careful that, in an effort to break their will, we don’t also break their spirit. I remember getting frustrated at some point, early on with my first child, and telling my dad, from now on my yes is going to be yes and my no is g …

How to Find The Love of Your Life You’ve got to live a loving life. That’s the only way to get it done. Love follows the truth wherever it takes it. There are seven things that love is. One of those seven things is the truth. If we are unwilling to follow it because of what it may cost us, we are not going to find the love of our life. It’s loving that leads us to the love of our life. This is what I mean by that. If you are with someone who is selfish, there are two problems: not just …

Story… My Atheist Neighbor Ted This is the story of my atheist neighbor Ted. I learned a lot from this guy. He kind of forced me to learn it—to learn to love him. We live in the rice fields in the country. Across the pasture from our house is my parents’ house and across the pasture from their house on the other side is a third house where someone new had moved into…actually they had moved into the house about two years ago. But no one knew who the not-so-new neighbors were, they …

How Do We Know Who God Is? God is love. And if you know love, you know God and if you don’t know love, you don’t know God. How do we know that? First of all, His Word tells us that. And secondly, every person ever created in all of creation desires love. They were created to desire love. Did you know that Jesus said that many will come to Him and say they did all these things in His name, including miracles? And He will say, “Depart from me. I never knew you.” How could someone do …

The Only Time Respect Is of No Value The only time respect has no value is when I demand it. When my children were little, I was hard on them. I demanded they respect me. But it didn’t take too long for me to realize that something wasn’t working quite like I had hoped. So, I asked myself: Why did I demand that my children respect me? It wasn’t so that I would be respected, but that my children would be respectful. So, I went to my children and explained it to them to help them to …

You Are Not Enough and It’s OK I think the only people who really believe they are enough are the people who haven’t lived long enough to figure out that they really aren’t. I am over 50 years old and I have chased so many dreams--and more than I ever imagined I would say chased me down and they’ve come true. But I say that because in every case, it didn't happen until I gave up, came to the end of myself, until I surrendered. But then my dreams chased me down or found me or ca …

What is Self-Love?First of all, you usually don’t know who someone loves, based on what they do. It’s why they do it that reveals who they love.They could be nice to you, but not really for you, for them.They could be somewhat critical of you, but it’s not for them, it’s for you. That is love.Love puts you first. Self-love puts me first.If I love God, I put God first. If I love my wife and my children, I put my family first. If I love myself, I may, at times, put God and my family first, but it’ …

If their Response is Absolute Outrage, Pride and Dismissal Not only do you know they are not standing on the truth. You know that they know they are not standing on the truth. Because no matter how much we disagree on something--no matter how shocked I may be at what you believe, that’s no reason for me to be outraged. If I am seeking the truth, I will just ask you to help me understand why and I am willing to talk about it. Because, if the truth is you are right but if I am not goin …

What Happens to You When You Hate? A fruitful person is fruitful because they are the 7 things love is: patient, kind, truthful, trusting, protecting, hopeful and persevering. But in life, people come along and hurt us. They can take your fruit but they can’t touch your root. In other words, they can hurt you but they can’t change who you are. If you love through the hurt, keep protecting, keep trusting and hold on to the 7 things love is: that loving restores everything that …