Maybe it’s a Southern thing, but I love a big ole porch!
One of my earliest memories is when I was very little and we lived in an apartment in Lillie Mae’s comfortable white house with a huge porch.
At night, Mama and I would sit in the wooden swing and watch and smell the white moonflowers bloom on the trellis making shade in the daytime and magic in the evening.
Gary and I have lived many places and in lots of different houses and apartments in our ministry years. My favorites had porches.
When we retired, we wanted a back porch and built one. We were able to roof and screen it in; we do have to wage war against the mosquitoes around here!
For a good while, everything worked out great. Then we started having small leaks. As time went on, the leaks grew more serious. Gary, Andrew and Daniel worked to fix it, but we soon found it was beyond our skills.
So we had to call in an expert to fix the drips and make the roof leakproof so the floor and the rest of the porch wouldn’t be damaged.
Some things we can’t do ourselves.
The same holds true for some spiritual things. We can confess our sins to God and ask for forgiveness as we repent and turn away from living that way.
We can pray and submit to God daily asking for the power of the Holy Spirit to help us learn and be strong against temptation. We can read our Bibles and study God’s word prayerfully. We can attend a Bible-preaching church and learn more about our Heavenly Father and how to live in harmony with Him. We can listen to God and follow His directions on how to live and how to serve Him by serving others.
We can fill our time with good works and help others, making the world around us a better place.
We can do so many things in our relationship with our Savior. But we can’t save ourselves.
It takes God to save us! The sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross as He died paying the death debt of our sin and His rising again is all that would pay the price we owe.
We can’t fix it. We have to depend in faith on Jesus to be our Savior.
John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”
Romans 10:9-10: “Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.”
Many students on America’s college campuses are turning to God and being saved. We hear of the Gospel spreading powerfully in Africa and other places around the world as the Spirit moves. Praise God!
People have realized they need God and His salvation. Manmade philosophies and human efforts in human- designed belief systems only provide leaky assurance of false security.
Turn to God and find salvation, security and safety: “For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Romans 10:13)
