“Journalists are people who take in other people’s washing and then sell it,” says the Australian writing team Marjorie Barnard and Flora Eldershaw.

How true is that, you only need to listen to the news. Also listen to your friends. I did that just now in town and the news was bad.

But yesterday in the evening at 7 pm I went to a meeting at the Virtue Christian Centre here in Kaitaia and listened to Marilyn Skinner, the co-founder of Watoto Childcare Ministries in Uganda an her focus was on good News.

I remember her saying that we hear so much bad news about Africa, but she says that Africa is a beautiful country. I mentioned already that her focus was on good news, on good happenings, and at one stage in her talk she asked if we were ready for more good news, good happening, and she told as more good happenings.

Of course, we are always ready to hear more good news, but who wants to hear more bad news?

Today I am coming across the quote by Confucius:

“The more man meditates on good thoughts, the better will be this world and the world at large.”

There is no better place to find good thoughts than in the Bible. That’s why the

Matthew 6:33

Scripture says, the man who delights in the Bible and who meditates on the Bible day and night is blessed. Please read that in the Old Testament in Psalm one.

Do you want to be  prosperous? Do you want to be successful? Meditate on the Book of the law day and night. Please read that also in the Old Testament in the book of Joshua chapter one at the beginning.

It was only yesterday that I picked up the  book “HOW SHOULD WE THEN LIVE” by Francis A. Schaeffer. On the back cover of his book Francis A. Schaeffer says:

“I believe people are as they think. The choices we make in the next decade will mold irrevocably the direction of our culture … and the lives of our children.”

To win a copy of PATIENT tell us a lesson you’ve learned through illness.

Romans 8:28:

“And we know that in all things GOD works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”

ILLNESS for me is:

— one of the “all things” in Romans 8:28.

— a way in which my soul is examined and developed. 

AT THE BEACH

The first CHRISTIAN SERVICE  was held by Rev. Samuel Marsden not very far from Kaitaia, namely at the far end of the Purerua Peninsula on Christmas Day 1814.

There will be two major public events:

The first will be on Sunday morning, 21 December.

There will be a civic ceremony. The ceremony will be attended by the Governor-General, local kaumatua and leaders of church and nation.

The second will be on Christmas morning.

A service will be held around the Celtic cross in Rangihoua Bay.

I have been several times at the place where the first Christian service was held while working in Kaikohe (UMM), but I did not realize that it was such an historic place.

“The Amplified Bible”

How can we find out if teachers are teaching the truth?

We must do what the Bereans did with Paul and Silas. In Acts 17:11 we read, “They searched the Scriptures day after day to see if Paul and Silas were teaching the truth.”

In order to do what the Bereans did with Paul and Silas we must read the Bible, we must read the Bible from cover to cover. A good question to ask is, “Have you ever read the BIBLE from Genesis chapter one to Revelation chapter twenty two.” What is your answer?

 A common teaching is that “Prayer changes Things.” I have heard that and you have heard it probably as well.

I remember reading it even on some kind of a box. Someone had it written on a box in his study to remind him that “Prayer changes Things.”

But does prayer change things? Does the Bible teach that “Prayer changes Things?”

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones is a well known and respected Teacher of the Bible and he says that prayer does not change things. He says that it is God who is changing things and not we and our prayer.

In his letter, James, a teacher himself says, says two things about teachers at the beginning of chapter three.

First of all he says that not many should become teachers. Secondly he says that teachers will be judged more strictly.

And he continues in verse two of chapter three, “Indeed we all make many mistakes.”