My wife and IOne of the things that I had to come to understand was that Jesus Christ, was born to pay a price so that God could offer grace, forgiveness and and place you as a son or daughter of Himself, because, of the death and resurrection of Jesus over 2000 years ago. Of course there have been literally millions who have become sons and daughters of God through the death and resurrection of Jesus, but, it is still offered today and once accepted, you will be given eternal life in the family of God.
So what about that word above that is the title of this missive? Glad you asked, it is what happened when Jesus died on the cross. The Greek word for this is Hilaskomai and it is a word that was used by the Greeks of that time for the person to do something to make the gods pleased and so willing to take care of the cares of the person, meaning that the god in question was to propitiate the one who did the something. However Paul and the others did not use this word in that way.
You and I and all other human beings who live or lived since that crucifixion of Jesus on the cross had only to accept that death as our own and be “born again” to become new persons moving toward the love of God through the death of Jesus and of course his resurrection. Let’s look at the other word in the title of this missive, predestination. That is something that is actually also in our scriptures. It too has a different meaning from that which is used in many denominations. You see, we must realize that since God created all that we see and live and breath in, as we travel in our lives between birth and death. God is eternal, he was there before there was a there.
I always wondered why when they were preaching our pastors, before I became one myself, would say, God is there before you got there. What? How could that be? Simple of course, God is everywhere and everywhen, there is no time for God as he is outside of time and space. You and I are stuck in this linear life line that is our time frame, that is why we cannot take back our sinful actions nor can we know what tomorrow brings our way. God however is there in our past and in our future, so you see that the word in our scriptures, does not mean that God chose Mary and Joe and Harry to be saved, but you he did not choose. If you notice in the writings of the scripture you are invited to accept the Lordship of Jesus Christ. So if you are invited, that means you have free will, you may accept or reject that invitation.
The reason this is so is simple, we must go back to the first word of the invitation, Jesus Christ voluntarily went to the cross and allowed himself to suffer the beating, the crown of thorns and finally the nails to hold him on the cross. He did so because his death paid the price for my sin and your sin, He was the “hilaskomai” for you and for me, he was the propitiation for you and I and every other person on this planet. That is the meaning of the word for you and I today and everyday, Jesus paid the price. That is why God turned away from him, and why he cried out, “Why have you forsaken me” it was because God cannot abide sin.
Jesus was on that cross meeting you and I that day as the sins of millions of people buffeted him, my sin and your sin were all a part of him as he died on that day at Calvary, so you and I can become sons and daughters of God. The cost was a life, the life was the the Son of God on the cross at Calvary, he was the propitiation, the price was paid on that day for each of us. If you do not accept the invitation then your eternity is death over and over again, in the Lake of Fire with Satan and all his minions.
Now today if you do not know Jesus Christ, please and I mean this with all my heart, PLEASE, ask him to become Lord of you life, forgive your sins and fill your soul with the Holy Spirit. If you have done so, I would appreciate it if you would let me know. God bless you and keep you.
I have found that it is not easy to raise funds when you really need those funds to accomplish your goal. In September of 2019, I became the commander of American Legion Post 26, Uvalde TX. We, my officers and I, were sworn in by our District Commander, and then the membership of the Post was asked to vote on closing the Post, which did not pass. Then a motion was made and seconded, that we move the Post from its present location in Uvalde County, to Brackettville TX. This was a dying Post in Uvalde simply because there was not enough people (veterans) for 2 active Posts. Brackettville was outside of Fort Clark Springs, where there was a plethora of veterans, as well as the veteran population within Kinney County.
The vote was taken and it was passed unanimously, and there begins the saga of trying to raise funds to help with the move, and the sale of the property in Uvalde County. Firstly we had to change the location of the Post from Uvalde to Brackettville, that took a number of weeks. We first had to get a copy of the minutes from that September meeting, then send a copy of the resolution stating that we would move the post to Brackettville from Uvalde. It was actually easier to change the Bank account information over to the new officers, than it was to get that taken care of. We accomplished it with Department in October, but it took until December for National Headquarters to also change our address.
Then we began the work toward selling the existing property, we had to have a vote at a monthly meeting to sell the property that was accomplished. Then we had to send certified letters to all members of the Post to have them all return a vote card to us, which had to be notarized and signed. Now it is February and we have held that vote, with our District Commander present to insure the accuracy of the vote. Then send to Department with an assessment of the property and the hiring of a realtor to sell the property. One problem, well actually two problems, we had to wait on the assessment until March, and then send the paperwork to Department and wait for the executive committee to meet and approve the sale of the property. OOPS – Coronavirus, now no meetings could be held.
We asked if the Commander could give us permission as this was an emergency situation. The Commander could not come in to his office in Austin, due to the virus, and meanwhile, we ran out of money and had to pay $2000.00 to the firm that did the assessment on the property. So we had to submit paper to Paypal/GoFundMe to prove we are a 501c3 as well as a tax free entity in Texas our home state.
Well, we were OK with the IRS as our 990N’s were filed every year on time. Now comes the nightmare. We filed our 802 form with the Secretary of State’s office, and were rejected. The rejection was because we had to be reinstated with the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts because no one had filed the proper papers with them for a number of years and the Post had been involuntarily closed out. We then got all of that in order and on March 12th were able to climb that hurdle.
We then again filed our 802, with the letter from the Comptroller’s office showing we were again legal. We were again rejected, because we had not listed our Board of Directors, nor made a statement that our members were the management. Actually we had to state that Our Post has vested management in our members. We then resubmitted our 802 only to be rejected again, we had not changed the date to reflect that we were filing on the date that we were sending the documents. On 3-16-2020 we had our approval.
We are now a legal entity in the State of Texas once again. I would ask that you go to our website where we have a donation button and make donations in any amount as we work to finish this saga. For those of you who may not be up to date on your 802 filing with Texas Secretary of State, you might want to get right with them before you too will find yourselves in a nightmare.
Our website is http://www.americanlegionpost26.us
John C. Quigley II, Commander, American Legion Post 26, Brackettville TX PO Box 344, 78832
As I look at what is happening around us, the facts that people with pre-existing conditions such as bad hearts, diabetes, and other conditions which seriously affect their ability to fight off infections and other diseases like the yearly flu epidemic, I have seen the truth and it scares me. Our politicians have decided to rid us of the Constitution of the United States. They have ignored the fact that so far this “pandemic” has killed less than 5% of the deaths from auto accidents, flu, and other naturaly occurring incidents in our lives every year.
Please also note that most of the deaths from this “pandemic” have happened to people over 60 years of age, most with pre-existing conditions as noted above. Why then have the politicians decided to destroy our nation by locking down the citizens who are most able to continue the work that makes us strong? The flu kills upwards of 30,000 of our citizens every year, yet no one has called this a “pandemic”. It rages through the rest of the world killing everywhere thousands of people, yet it is not a “pandemic”.
There is a verse in the Old Testament that tells us that if we will admit to God that we have sinned against him and our fellow citizens he will heal our land.
2Ch 7:14 NKJV if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.
That means all of us people who claim the name Christian, if we will humble ourselves this day, pray and seek the Lord, turning from our wicked ways, he will hear our prayers and will forgive our sin and heal our land. REPENT today of your sinful ways, killing babies by the thousands every year, repent of sexual immorality, and any other sins you have committed. Our land has become scarred by the sins of our generation, which have led to more sins in the following generations. Repent and turn back to the Lord Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, get down on your knees, or figuratively, if you are, like me, in your 70’s or above. We have much to repent for, as we have allowed the death and destruction of today to happen, we have ignored the movement toward communism in this country and in many ways have helped, this scourge to happen.
The need for Repentance is great, and the time is NOW for that to happen, this is just the continuation of the many diseases that have been coming along more and more frequently. HN1, Swine, and the others were the prelude to what we face today. Wake up brethren, we are culpable, we could have said NO to the sins of our nation, we did not do so. Now is the time to begin the process of healing in our land, but we must recognize how far we have strayed from the path that our God has called us to.
1Pe 1:15-16 NKJV but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, (16) because it is written, “BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.”
We have been called to be messengers of the Lord our God, we are called to be Holy because our God is Holy. Yet the activity of our churches, especially those called mainline churches, but even so in the reality that all of our Christianity have slid away from the truth of what God’s word says of the way we are to live. We are to live holy lives to the best of our ability. Search your self today, ask God to search your heart today and cleanse you of the filth of sin in your life.
As Peter says to the Church of his day, so I say, and I too fall short of it, let all of us Repent, and work toward being Holy for our God calls us to holiness.
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