Atheists Want to Remove World Trade Center Cross

Here is the link from CBN News

http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2011/July/Atheists-Want-WTC-Cross-Removed/

Is this going to far? I think, YES!!! What do you think?

LOVE GOD

By Richard Spangler

     Matthew 22:37 Sets the stage, for talking about the greatest commandment. The Sadducees have come to Jesus, remember they keep trying trip him up. They are so upset with him. They couldn’t see who they were dealing with, they were so wrapped with tradition and the law and trying to fulfill the law, which we all know you can’t do. They had literally lost sight of the love of God and their love for God. They were doing everything they could but they had lost their love for God. The Law and their traditions had become more important than God.

    Jesus puts its point blank when they ask, “Teacher which is the greatest commandment in the Law.” And Jesus replied, “ To love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.”  And we know the latter part, love your neighbor as yourself, all the Law and prophets hangs on these two commandments. I having been reading Practice the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence (1614-1691). This man had physical problems, what we would call disabled today, He had lot of issues. He was sent out to go buy provisions in the town nearby and also took his turn in the kitchen preparing food.

This was a hard thing for him to do. But he did everything with the attitude of love towards God. This book has challenged me. He states that with the grace of God everything becomes easy. Remember in those days they didn’t have wheelchair ramps, they didn’t have wheelchairs. Then he goes on to say, “that many to do not advance in the Christian progress because they stick in penance and in particular exercises while they neglect the love of God which is its end.”

   How many of us get so wrapped up in what we do, that we forget the love of God, of loving God, of taking time with him. I got to go sing in the choir, I got to go to do this or I got to go and do that, I got to be here at such and such a time. We got to all this stuff to do. Whether, it’s what we consider spiritual things or natural things, we get so busy doing the stuff we forget to take the time to love God. We know God loves us. Jesus is saying Love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul and mind. Brother Lawrence is saying, we neglect the loving of God. What we learning about the love of God and about Loving God is not a new thing. Everyone thinks that the Father’s love, loving God and soaking prayer and spending time in His presence is a new thing. It’s as old as Jesus. It changes the perspective on what happens when you do the stuff, not for the love of man but for your love of God.

There are a lot of organizations and people that do things out of the love for mankind. Many of these organizations started with a love for God and man, but they forgotten key, the real key for everything we do, is loving God. Whether you are in Wal-Mart buying chicken for dinner,  whether you are home being with your spouse or your children, whatever you are doing, you are to it with your love of God. As I was reading Brother Lawrence’s teaching, it is challenging me to say, “O.K. God I really want to love you more. I want to love you in everything I do.”  That’s challenging. 

Loving God is the underpinning key for every one of the Giftings of the Holy Spirit to operate. We say, “We don’t need to seek the gifts but to seek the giver.” But more importantly than seeking the giver is to love the giver.

 Being in His presence, I know a lot people say, “I don’t have time to spend time with God. I have my devotion in the morning, then I got to fix breakfast, I got to get the kids out the door, I got to go to work, I got to cut the grass, I got to watch television, I got to play on the computer for a while” What’s important to you, you find time to do. If it’s not important to you, it’s a struggle to find time to do it. If it’s important to you, you will find time to spend time with God and love on Him.

   That’s the beginning, everything we do we should do out of our love for God. Whether it’s what we call natural  things or spiritual things we should do them out of our love for God. It is out of love that we see things happen. As we love him, God pours out more than we can contain.

God gets excited; He gets overjoyed for we are loving him in everything we do. God responds by pouring out His love into us and all that He is and has is available to us. God says, “I love you so much, Here it is.” Taking time with God is not just doing bible study or reading through the bible in a year. Those things are important because you gain knowledge of the Word of God. But we all get so with the doing we forget to say, “O.K. God I am here just to love on you and spend time with you.” When we do that, we change, it is almost automatic, our attitudes change in how we deal with stuff and people. Whatever it is, it doesn’t seem as important as it did, because you are in the presence of God. When I am caught up in His presence, the cable bill doesn’t seem to matter as much. What’s for dinner doesn’t seem to matter. Physical problems don’t matter. The struggles of life don’t matter, for you are in place where you are loving God and He is loving you. Our little bit of love we give Him, gets overwhelmed by His love for us.

  Jesus is saying, “to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all of your mind.” I we think of the heart as the spirit, the soul is a place of the emotions and the mind is a place of your will. In other words, you are to love God with all that you are. It is an act of your will, it is your choice to spend time with and to love God. Concentrate on loving God with everything you are and with everything you do.

©COPYRIGHT 2011 RICHARD SPANGLER

The Mountains of Refreshing Part 5

By Richard Spangler

Climbing up the path of one of the Mountains of Refreshing, I looking back down to give a last wave of good-bye to John, but as I do I see he has already returned to position sitting on the edge of the Foundation of Signs and wonders. I also see some else lying on the ground, glowing with the power of the Holy Spirit. My own curiosity wants to go back down the mountain and see who it is but the Spirit is urging me to move upwards.

 As I turn and start up the mountain, I hear a roar off in the distance and roaring is getting louder and louder, then suddenly I see a great cloud of God’s Glory racing towards me. It’s height and width is infinite (as far as I can tell). I am quickly engulfed by the cloud and find that the Cloud of Glory is more like the ocean than a cloud. I am soon picked up off my feet and I am carried along by the powerful currents flowing in the Glory of God. I have the freedom to move this way and then back another way, it is like swimming and skydiving at the same time. The love and power I feel flowing all around me is amazing. I this point I feel like the currents are moving me downward and I soon see the ground coming from below. I touch down like superman in the movies and start calmly walking up the mountain again.

  The path winds upward and comes to a place around on the side of the mountain where I can see the view. The beauty of the panorama before me is breath taking. I see off in the distance, great mountains, going far higher than the one I am standing on.

Some of the mountains look like they are made out of pure gold, others out of silver still others look giant diamonds, others like rubies and still others like sapphires all glistening in the sun and seemly giving off wave after wave of the Glory of God.  Then, I look down to valley below and realize that it is the Valley of the Foundations of God stretched out before me. Forgive me for being a little slow it is then it dawns on me that the Glory had sweep me up and me perhaps hundreds maybe even a thousand or so miles up the mountain. As I stand there trying to take it all in I hear a familiar voice saying, “Having you been waiting for me?” I turn around and standing there is Katherine Kuhlman with a beautiful warm smile and the Glory of God surrounding her. I am speechless. She says to me, “You are right, the Glory of God and the Spirit have carried you up the mountain, but they will carry you only as far as you are willing to go. I learned this long ago before I came here to be with the Father, in His house. Then, I say, “But, we are outside not in house.” Then Katherine says, (in a lovingly beautiful way) “Stop thinking in earthly terms of a house, Father’s house encompasses all that there is, in both the physical and spiritual realms and beyond. And before you ask, Yes Father’s house even encompasses those places, the evil one thinks are his and yes there are realms beyond the physical and spiritual that you cannot even begin to understand, now.

  Learn as much as you can about the Father’s Love, learn how to express your love for him in all you do, let him teach you who truly are and are called to be. Then mediate on what you learn and spend time with God. Get to know Him; that is the secret to all. Teach others to do the same.”

 Then Katherine gave me a loving hug, turned walked away and was gone. I hear the roar once again and see the Glory coming down the mountain towards me. I am again, caught up in the cloud or the tidal wave of the Glory of God. This time is different, I not only feel and see the glory all around but I feel it flowing inside me as well. I feel myself racing up the mountain, to next encounter. Before I can realize it, I am set down once again. Waiting for me there is a woman, sense I that I somehow know but I do not recognize her. She has a great authority around her.

   She begins to speak, I am Aimee Semple McPherson, and there is not much time before the next wave, so just listen. I preached, living a holy life before God and God blessed me with many signs and wonders in my day. Learn that holiness does not the outward things you say or do. Holiness has been imparted to you, into your spirit by the Father, release the Holiness of God from within you, and it let flow out like a mighty river. Many have learned that the Love of God flows out of you and yet they try to impose Holiness from the outside in. It is the same for God’s Holiness just as it is with God’s Love. God’s Holiness is within you, given to you at salvation and it must released from within you, out to the world that so desperately needs it. Anything else is dirty self-righteous that does no good and only causes harm and destruction. Release God’s Holiness from within you. Now Go.” 

With that I am Swept up again by the Glory of God, this time I feel myself becoming one with the Glory and Spirit of God, somehow flowing together as one, yet separate. Which I can no more describe than I can trinity; the three being one yet separate, flowing together as one, yet flowing separately.  I come to rest on the peak of the Mountain of Refreshing, I look around and all I see is mountain tops and other mountains reaching up skyward and out of sight, I look down, and cannot even see the valley below. I have learned much and there is much to mediate on yet I feel totally and completely refreshed. I hear the voice of the Holy Spirit within me saying, “It’s time to go”

©COPYRIGHT 2011 RICHARD SPANGLER

The Mountains of Refreshing Part 4

The Mountains of Refreshing Part 4

By Richard Spangler

I as walk towards this beautiful fountain, I hear a sound almost like singing. As move closer to the fountain, the sound gets louder. At first I think it coming from the fruit trees surrounding the fountain, but it is not coming from them.

   The fruit trees themselves are larger than the ones surrounding the Healing Fountain; they are almost as large as oak trees. The fruit on them is the size of round watermelons and have a gold and silver color to them with stripes of red mixed in. I am hungry, so I pick one of these watermelon size pieces of fruit. Immediately, as I picked the fruit and beautiful bloom, having the same markings as the fruit, appears. As I am looking at bloom, there appears in the center of the bloom a very small miniature of the fruit I just picked.

I sit down and begin to open the watermelon, to my surprise it opens easily and it’s full of seeds. As eat the meat of the fruit, I begin to feel the love and compassion of God flow all through my body, soul and spirit. The love and compassion overwhelm me. I begin to think of all the hurting people in the world that need the love of God. I begin to weep and pray for them, this was similar in experience to when I was praying, many years ago, asking God to show me His heart, and He did it while I was driving a trolley along the oceanfront during one of the many summer festivals we have here in Virginia Beach, Va. It was a life changing experience for me then, and actually prayed Lord please lift the experience from me because I couldn’t take it anymore and the Father did lift it. Then God spoke to me and said, “I had not even scratched the surface of His heart and His love and compassion for all His children.” I was truly changed forever by that experience and now what I am feeling is a thousand times more powerful than that experience.

  After what seem like hours, the power of love and compassion seem to begin to subside but I could still feeling it flowing powerfully inside me. I rose up and moved to fountain and found the sound I heard was coming from the water in the fountain. It seemed as if the water was inviting me drink and I was thirsty, but after the experience with the water of healing, I carefully took a little sip. Instantly, a surge of Holy Power raced through my body and I was overcome again.

   I open my eyes, and once again I am looking up at the sky. I raise up I notice a man sitting on the edge of the fountain. See me and comes over and helps me up. He introduces himself, “I am John and no I am not beloved, for he sits as one of the elders around the throne of God.” I ask John, “What foundation is this?” He replies, “It is the Foundation of Signs and Wonders of course.” Then I say, “I would think there would many more people here at the fountain, for there are many that I know who want to see signs and wonders in their lives.”John responds, “Yes, that is true, but they are not willing to pay the price. They must be willing first, to seek an intimate relationship with the Holy One and then must be willing to eat of the Fruit of Love and Compassion of God, then and only then can they drink of the Fountain of Signs and Wonders. Instead, they seek only the gifts of the fountain and of the other fountains of God and not God himself and are unwilling to eat of the fruits that God provides. It was the same in my time, people coming for the healing and signs and wonders, and not for a deep intimate relationship with God.” I sadly agreed that this so, even today, that many of God’s people are the same way. They seek the gifts and experiences and the giver of the gifts.” John speaks again, “And seeking the gifts and experiences only, they will never become what God has called them to be on earth. You are called, as you know, to teach God’s people who they truly are in Him. Take what you learn and have learned and teach it to the people. All that you experience here is not just for you but for all God’s people. God desires for all to have an intimate relationship with Him. Now it is time for you go, follow the path up the mountain.”With this we say our good-byes and I start up the path.  

                      

©COPYRIGHT 2011 RICHARD SPANGLER

Independence Day-Let Us Pray

Our nation celebrates it's 235th birthday today with parades , fireworks and cook-outs with family and friends. But how many of us have actually read the Declaration of Independence http://www.constitution.org/usdeclar.htm and understand its beginnings. This nation was founded 404 years ago when English colonist came ashore at Cape Henry (what is now Virginia Beach, Va.) planned a cross and dedicated this land to the Lord Jesus Christ and to the preaching of the gospel to the world from the shores. This came directly from the Reformation that was sweeping northern Europe and changing the face of nations and planning the seeds of freedom. The Reformation brought an end to the old feudal system of society and gave freedom to the common man.
  The Great Awakening in the colonies in the mid-1700's played a major role.It's message that Jesus Christ came to set men free in this life as well in the life to come let to the preaching that all men had rights given to them by God and that no other person or government had a right to take those rights away. It was in the churches that the American Revolution began long before the first letter of protest was written or the first shots fired or the writing of the Declaration of Independence. ( I do realize this a shorten version of what happened but it would take and has taken volumes of books to study these events in detail.)
  The founding fathers clearly called upon God, specifically the Lord Jesus Christ for guidance in these matters. They repeatedly called the colonies to days of prayers and they themselves at critical points would stop and pray asking for divine guidance.Yet today when a governmental leader calls for prayer, just as Texas Gov. Rick Perry recently did, he is criticized and told he should not call for prayer, see link http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/06/07/perrys-planned-prayer-event-draws-condemnation/ It is amazing that we have gone so far from our foundations that we now call public prayer meeting to seek God's forgiveness and wisdom and guidance wrong.  Here is the declaration http://governor.state.tx.us/news/proclamation/16247/.

It is time for us to fast and pray, the nation is divided, the economy is not growing, with high unemployment, there floods, there have been massive and destructive tornado outbreaks and wildfires across the nation. What this means for food prices, no one is talking about, most of these have effected farmland and will effect everyone else soon. There are Islamic terrorist who out destroy this nation, and kill everyone who will not submit to their political/religious system. Some government officials are now saying they don't have the answers.
  Yet we continue now the same path we have traveling, where it is not politically correct to say anything about sin, or the reality of what we are facing except when some one calls for prayer then it is O.K. to attack them as wrong, backwards thinking and a person who is out of touch.
 
WE MUST STAND FIRM, WE MUST PRAY AND WE MUST SPEAK OUT  AND STAND UP FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS. It is time, like no other to pray, to repent and ask for forgiveness of our sins both personal and as a nation and ask once again for our Lord Jesus Christ, for wisdom, and understanding and guidance. So please join me on August 6,2011 and pray for this nation. God has promised if we do this He will hear from Heaven and heal our land.

 If you are going join in this Day of Prayer August 6,2011, Please post a comment saying "Yes, I will pray."

                          ©COPYRIGHT 2011 RICHARD SPANGLER