Category Archives: Be Encouraged

Thumbs Up! (My Pulpit is the World.)

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Thumps up to the mobile coffee man you can find before you enter Pukenui at the edge of the Houhora Harbor, a locality in the Far North District of New Zealand, coming from Kaitaia.

He did not accept payment from me, when I ordered a second cup of coffee. And it seems to me that I forget to thank people properly, when they do a good deed for me. And I don’t think I thanked him as I should have done.

His place is like an open air restaurant with table, and chairs and it is a gathering place for a good number of people.

Long ago I remember reading that someone said something like this:

I have met born again believers who were ardent readers of the Bible, but they were not really full of the joy of the Lord; I have met born again believers who were great prayer warriors, but they were not really full of the joy of the Lord; but I have never met a born again believer who was a witness for the Lord and was not full of the joy of the Lord (Personal Evangelism).

That “coffee shop” at the edge of the water became especially last time when I was there a witnessing place for me.

“‘But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.'” – Acts 1:8

And once more thumbs up to the mobile coffee shop man, who did not only not accept payment for my second cup of coffee, but also gave me a chocolate fish with the coffee and let me tell the GOOD NEWS to his customers.

And when I am going to Pukenui again and stop at his “coffee shop,” for coffee, I intend to thank him as I should have for the free coffee received.

“BUT I AM PRAYING”

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“I have a book in my library …”

An engineer said this about the slender volume in his library:

“I have a book in my library, which I have borrowed. With a heavy heart I am returning it to the rightful owner. I am going to miss it very much.”

I have that book also in my small library. I did not borrow it. It is my property. I have had it for a long time. I must have bought it in Germany when I was a new believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. I am amazed that I still have it after all that travelling from one end of the other, so to speak.

And so far as I know I have never read the book properly.

But reading what the engineer said about the slender volume makes me want to read it properly.

The title of the book is in German ICH ABER BETE, and the author is Alfred Christlieb (“BUT I AM PRAYING”).

“It is not the length of life, …”

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“It is not the length of life, but the depth.”

KERIKERI is a township in our district, in the Far North District of New Zealand, I really like, and where we are going to do our shopping sometimes. “To keep on digging,” is the meaning of the place.

The name of the township reminds me to dig deep in God’s Word, the Bible, and invest more time in my spiritual well-being.

A German pastor in a little lonely village in Germany was known to dig deep in the Word of God. He was digging for treasures in the Bible. Bordering the church property was a silver mine. That gave him the idea to think of the Bible as a mine of treasures. Prayer was his tool to dig for the treasures not only for himself, but also for others.

I own two books written by him, and I am blessed whenever I pick the books up to read. One of the books is a devotional treasury.

It is not the length of life, but the depth,” I saw not long ago here in Kaitaia in Commerce Street. What a message!

So let us keep on digging in the Bible, the Word of God, to feed ourselves and others.

I am reminded again of what we read in Matthew 24:35:

“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.”

Quote

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“A moment of conscious triumph makes one feel that after this nothing will really matter; a moment of realized disaster makes one feel that this is the end of everything.” – J. I. Packer