Dear Precious Saints,
Well, Hello there! Great to “see” ya! We trust this June note finds you relaxed like as if you’re in the shade with a nice cold glass of your favorite healthy beverage without any flies or mosquitoes or locusts to invade your space and attempt to steal your peace. It is almost officially summertime here in the northern hemisphere.
Speaking of summertime, imagine with me being at a delicious July 4th cookout in your back yard. Roasted silver queen corn, a baked potato right out of the coals, and corn bread from your grandmother’s special recipe baked in a dutch oven over the open fire . . . all of it floating in real country, hand-churned butter. How about a bowl of coleslaw and sliced, home-grown tomatoes within arm’s reach. And right in the middle of the huge platter on which this feast is served, is a great big, thick, juicy T-Bone Steak! And your next door neighbor’s rambunctious little boy comes over and sprinkles rat poison over this scrumptious meal while you’re up to get a refill of ice tea before you get started!
The foaming white ooze on your T-Bone immediately alerts you to the prank and your neighbor’s belly laugh over the fence tells you who’s to blame. You calmly walk over to the edge of your yard and start to vent your astonishment when your neighbor defensively blurts out, “Hey, wait a minute, my little boy only put a sprinkle of the stuff on your plate. It won’t hurt you!” Relieved you calm down and go back to settle down into your chaise lounge to enjoy your banquet. WRONG! You wouldn’t touch the stuff would you? Why not? Because you don’t want ANY rat poison on your T-Bone. None, nada, zero, zilch,…right?
Ezekiel 18:4 quotes God as saying, “The soul that sins shall surely die.” God doesn’t want any rat poison on His plate either!
In Romans 3:23, it says that “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” So we have a very big problem! We all live under a death sentence. But, unlike your neighbor, our Heavenly Father doesn’t think it’s funny. In fact, He was the only one who could justly do anything about it…He was the only one who could clean that plate of its poison. And He did!
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3: 16 (KJV).
May each of us NEVER FORGET this simple message. A lot follows our faith in Jesus Christ because it releases to us an eternity of wonderful, growing life, but without that uncomplicated faith we are left with no hope in this life and the ages to come!
You will find this devotional illustration in our “A Nursing Home Ministry Handbook for Volunteers” on our website. Also, on our site there are 13 Worship Service Programs and 26 Nursing Home Ministry Devotionals. This is just a sample of the free resources for nursing home ministry that you can access on our internet location (see menu above). We would be honored if you’d share this info with facility staff and volunteer ministers in your area. We spend most of our working days producing these resources, working on generating more like them and packaging them up for local facilities and mailing to places all over the country.
And, as we try to remember to say in every newsletter: please know, if you help us with prayers or donations we are grateful for your vital assistance.
Love in Christ,
Jerry and Dar Johnson