"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God..."

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Hello again, everyone. We're back again. Since this is our Spring edition, I had originally thought about writing about Valentine's Day. But...of course, that's come and gone, and well...so has Easter. We're a little behind (as usual), but "better late than never", right? J Valentine's Day is the season of love, but Easter is a season of love as well. Most of us this Valentine's Day went scurrying to the stores for a special gift for our spouse, significant other, or whoever else you felt like lavishing a gift upon. It's always good to tell others that we love them, but it's much more meaningful when we put those words into action. The words "I love you" are mere words. They cannot convey the true expression of how we feel about someone. God's love is like that, too. He tells us in the Bible that He loves us, and, of course, He does. We believe and accept that because He says so in His Word. He could have told us "I love you" on every page of the Bible, but He didn't want to just tell us that He loves us, He wanted to show us that He loves us. God sent His son, Jesus Christ, into the world to save us from our sins by taking the penalties of our sins upon Himself. Jesus was demonstrating His love to us when He went to the cross. He didn't spare Himself from all the physical and emotional pain He endured as He stretched out His arms and allowed Himself to be nailed to a cross to give His life for you and me. He was not only saying "I love you"; He was demonstrating His love for us by putting it into action Don't just tell someone you love them today....put love into action. Show them your love, too!! Jesus did... This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. (1 John 3:16) Missing "Peace"? One of my favorite pastimes as a child was putting puzzles together. A lot of times, our dining room or kitchen table wasn't used for eating. Instead, for weeks at a time it would be covered with puzzle pieces for our latest project. We might not have done a lot of formal dining in there, but at least we had fun. Of course, there was the time that keeping puzzle pieces on the table wasn't such a good idea when I accidentally knocked over a glass on the table which has become known as "the chocolate milk disaster". Wave after wave of chocolate milk engulfed the puzzle, and everything else on the table, including the teddy bears who were there to "oversee" the project. Aunt Nina, who was staying with us at the time and experienced the entire fiasco, wasn't too happy, as you can imagine, as she, my brother, and I frantically attempted to save the puzzle and bears from the impending disaster. Aunt Nina probably has nightmares about that day. J Putting puzzles together, albeit fun, was sometimes frustrating, too, as it was not uncommon for some of the pieces to turn up missing when finalizing the project. It always seemed there was at least one (if not more) piece missing when we got ready to finish the puzzle. It was always sort of a disappointment when we finally realized we didn't have all the pieces there with us, and we desperately looked for them on the floor, hoping that maybe they got knocked off accidentally, or had a little "help" from one of the cats who were living with us at the time. Most of the time, though, we were never able to retrieve the missing piece, or pieces, and although we were proud of our project, it just didn't seem the same with the holes missing where the puzzle pieces should have been. In everyday life, we all need one particular "piece" to satisfy us, and Jesus Christ is that piece. We can try to look for the other people, things, or "pieces" to fulfill our lives and make us content, but without Jesus, we will be searching in vain because only He is able to complete us. Choose Jesus Christ today and complete the "puzzle of life". But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. (Phillipians 3:7-8) The "Root" of the Problem Spring has "sprung" on us yet again. It's time for planting, planting, planting.. Sheryl and I always like to buy flowers and seed this time of year and plant them in pots. Now, of course, we have a lot more area to plant since we moved into our house last year. I usually let Sheryl do the planting because I don't have, would you say, a "green thumb". Case in point: When I was a teenager, I had bought some flowers seeds to plant. I really wanted to plant them in a pot, only problem was, at the time, I couldn't locate a flower pot to plant the seeds. So...I searched the house for anything I could find for planting purposes. I did come up with a solution, or at least in my thinking it was. I found a small aluminum pie tin like the ones you buy at the grocery store. I thought this would be a good solution since I would be able to transplant them in another flower pot later. About a week after I planted the seeds, the sprouts began to push forth from soil. I watched day after day as they grew taller and taller, even growing faster than I had originally anticipated. Not soon thereafter, I noticed that my seedlings weren't faring too well. Day after day, I watched as groups of the seedlings started to turn brown and die. Each day, I pursued another approach in an effort to revive my plants. I tried extra water...no good. I thought maybe they were getting too much sunlight, so I moved them to a shadier location. Again...no success. I even tried some plant food, hoping they just might need more nutrients in the soil. None of my attempts to save the plants phased the plants in any way. It was then I realized that the reason the plants were not responding to my "rescue efforts" was due to the fact that the roots had nowhere to grow in the pie tin because the tin was way too shallow to support any of the roots. The plants had no chance of growing to maturity because they only had so much space to grow and nowhere to root. We humans are kind of like that, too. We aren't able to grow spiritually if we don't have the necessary "rooting system". Jesus is the only "root" which will help us grow. If we try to substitute other means to accomplish our growth, we, just as in the case with the seedlings, just aren't going to make it. We can try to "root" ourselves through other things the world has to offer, but without Jesus, we won't be totally fulfilled and be able to accomplish all that God wants to do in our lives. Choose Jesus Christ today so He can "plant" and "grow" all the good things He wants to accomplish in you! :) "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. (John 15:5) WWJD? What would Jesus...Drive? When I'm surfing online, I usually go to a radio board which has a lot of info on radio in Alabama and throughout the country. While searching through some of the posts the other day, I found this rather clever play on words. Some scholars insist that Jesus drove a Honda. As proof, they cite a verse in St. John's Gospel where Christ tells the crowd, "For I did not speak of my own Accord..." - John 12:49 I had heard this somewhere before, but I was sort of surprised it showed up on a website board about radio information. I started thinking about the idea of Jesus having a vehicle, and what an asset it would have been to Him. It definitely would have made things a lot easier. He wouldn’t have had to do all that walking in the sandals that were the common footwear at the time. In addition, He would also able to get to other places He needed to be in a more expedient manner. I came to the conclusion, though, that Jesus probably wouldn’t have used a vehicle even if He had one. Sure, He would have had saved his feet and He would have definitely been able to accelerate the sharing the gospel. However, Jesus never took the “easy way” out. He didn’t have to come to Earth as a man and endure all the different experiences we face every day. He could have come as a grown man, yet He came as a little baby. He was born in a lowly manger instead of a grand mansion. When He went to the cross, He could have forgone all the pain and suffering He endured, but instead allowed Himself to experience the full measure of what we would have felt had we been there. Jesus wouldn’t have driven an Accord…It wasn’t His way.