This was where my splinter sat. 

Whitney and I helped build my mom a craft room. We converted my old bedroom into a large craft room with lots of shelves. As I was cutting the shelves I got a huge splinter that was the size of a log. Ok, so it was only 1/2 inch. Most of it was sticking out so I pulled it out, but the part that wasn’t remained in my hand for 3 days. As I spent today digging through my hand to pull the rest of it out I thought about our christian lives.

We often have things in our lives like this splinter. The size of our problem doesn’t have to be huge to really bother us. This splinter really bugged me even though it was so tiny. I couldn’t close my hand without it really irritating me, and sin, pride or arrogance can easily do the same thing. Many times in our lives we let a splinter cause us pain and suffering because we don’t allow true healing into our lives. We can’t get relieved of pain until we get help from God, or in my case a good set of tweezers. Even though it hurt when I dug into my skin to remove the remaining pieces of wood my hand doesn’t hurt when I close it. I can grab things and hammer nails or whatever with it because I removed the splinter.

When we allow God into the painful areas of our lives we can experience freedom like He originally intended. God’s heart for us is to be pain free because we know He can heal us. I have to learn that when I get another splinter to immediately pull out the tweezers and start digging. I believe that God is always willing to reach out and remove the painful things in our lives, BUT we must humble ourselves and let Him.

Till next time.

Dustin

I have a question… Why do we as Christians seem to get so complacent? I mean we don’t put much effort into our relationship with God beyond Sunday services and/or devotionals? What about healing the sick, praying for the poor, seeing people saved, etc? 

I think we get complacent because we get busy with our own lives and forget about God’s command to love people, and go out into the world baptize and make disciples. I have been really having some major soul searching about how I can cooperate with God to further develop my maturity in Him and to love people more. I am going to start taking steps to be more bold in my faith by finding people that need prayer and praying for them. I am really going to find people down on hope, sick, and just need prayer. I want to see the book of Acts come to life unlike anything I have ever seen. I have prayed for people and seen them get healed, but not in years, and it was someone in my church. I’m setting out to the streets, to the poor people of this city and I believe that God is going to start something amazing.

Would you join me? You don’t have to go pray for people, but seek out how you can mature in your walk and take steps in that direction. Get out of your comfort zone and be challeneged! Send me your name and I will post it up here so people can pray for you.

I’ll start…

to pray for courage and strength-

1.Dustin Beasley

Whitney took this picture

I was talking to a friend tonight and I said something without realizing the truth contained in it. I said, “Forgiveness is only true when it comes before and apology.” I was amazed that this came out of my mouth. What I mean by this is that forgiveness isn’t just something you do when someone apologizes to you, but rather a reaction that comes from your heart. When we forgive someone only when they apologize we are making it conditional. Conditional forgiveness sucks. It says, “I’ll forgive you if you are sorry, but if your not I won’t forgive you.” I’m not saying you can’t forgive someone after the fact, but it’s nice to have a heart that is prepared to forgive any pain caused to you.

Now I am not saying that I have all the answers in this one comment, but I do think it is where forgiveness must begin.  I do know that the next time someone hurts me I will make it a point to forgive them before they ask for it. Jesus exemplified this perfectly when He asked God to forgive the men crucifying Him before they realized what they did. He didn’t wait for them to apologize. He just loved them before they responded. That is a great heart to aspire to. I hope that we can all come to a place where forgiveness isn’t a second thought, but rather an immediate action. Don’t keep people out of your heart because of your pride. Forgive today!

Written on this cross is John 3:16. I found it in the woods on the island of Kauai where it was tied to a tree. If you are new to the world and grew up in a cave the verse says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son. That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

So what does this really mean? So what if God sent His son? I mean I’m not playing this down, but I really wonder if people know what this involved. God sent His son to die, but He really sent Him so that WE could live. The point of Jesus’ death was to give us a chance to accept His love and kindness, so that we could be the recipients of an unending grace and mercy. The love that is offered to us is truly greater than anything we can ever experience. We can’t even begin to love anyone the way God loves us.

If God loves us without regret or expectation to receive something then shouldn’t we? I recently volunteered at a homeless shelter here in town where I experienced a great picture of God’s love. Whitney and I made 8 pounds of dry spaghetti  as part of a church effort to feed the people at the shelter. We fed about 150 portions and it was encouraging to see their thankfulness.

Moving on…After we fed them Whitney and I were leaving. As I walked towards the exit this little girl run up to me. As she ran up to me I noticed how dirty she was, but the only thing that I could focus on was her smile that seemed to brighten up the whole room. She ran right to me and hugged me. It was the most innocent display of love that I have experienced in quite sometime. This little girl displayed a love that only comes from God. She didn’t expect anything in return. She simply wanted me to know how grateful she was. I was so moved by this love because it reminded me that there can be so much beauty in this world. With all the wars and violence in the world there is still enough love to brighten a room or brighten up my heart.

I am inspired to love without expecting anything. After all, it is how we have been loved by the One who died for us. The One who sent His only Son to Die not because of what it did for Him, but what it did for us. Seek out the innocent and beautiful love of our Savior.

I must begin with a quote from Chuck Missler. “A God small enough to fit inside your head is not big enough to meet your needs.” 

I don’t believe there is a better way to describe my frustration with most Christians. If you can understand God you can’t possibly know Him. Now don’t get me wrong we can know His character, His personality, or attributes, but we can’t always know His ways. God is consistent in His love for us, but He is also unpredictable in how He deals with us. He is more dedicated to us than anyone in our life including our parents…Sorry mom!… 

How many times have we said, “God wouldn’t do this or that” only to find out later that He does? How often does He surprise us? I love not trying to figure Him out. I personally don’t think that He wants to be explainable. I just believe He wants us to grab onto His characteristics such as His love, kindness, joy, laughter, forgiveness, grace mercy and the list goes on and on forever. We can never say enough good things about Him. There are no words in the world that could even come close to declaring God’s goodness. I think that is why we are supposed to give Him our lives. Our lives are really all we have, so it must be all we can give. 

When was the last time you tried to put God in a box? God is the only one who can put Himself in a box and it was called the Tabernacle, and He said, “If you touch this thing I’ll kill you!”. Besides that I would let God be God and you be His beloved. He will be the only person to pleasantly surprise you on a daily basis. Keep your eyes open for His blessings every single day. God can’t contain Himself, so He will love you at every possible moment He can. 

Open your eyes and give Him the credit He deserves and for crying out loud take Him out of your box!

Alright, so I have to admit that I have been discouraged that this site hasn’t picked up many readers except for my wife and mom. Thanks by the way. It causes me to question all the work I have put into it. I ask myself, “Should I continue this?” When I begin to doubt this I talk to myself, sometimes outloud, and I ask myself why I do it in the first place. I think, “Well if one person is encouraged then it is all worth it, but that isn’t true. I mean it would be great if someone was encouraged, but I need to do it for God and not for myself or anyone for that matter. I write these posts because I want God to be lifted up and His name be glorified.

I have learned that by doing this for God I’m encouraged. I guess God is teaching me to be more like Jesus, and it is very hard. I guess I will just keep trying to grow and focus more on God and less on me. 

God thank you for keeping my heart pure even when my flesh wanted more! You have always been patient and kind especially when I walked away. Thank you so much for this outlet to lift up your name and encourage your kids! 

feeling alone? let me know and i’ll pray for you! 

I bought this shirt from One Truth and it says, “Hope Never Fails”. While I was wearing it I got so many looks from strangers, and it made me wonder what they were thinking. I wonder if they were looking at it so strangely because their hope always fails. To us christians our hope is in Christ, so it is strong, sturdy, and unwavering. I can’t imagine what how people can live without assurance of an eternal love. I mean people do it everyday, but that doesn’t mean I can understand it.

Have you ever really thought about our Hope? In the New Testament hope meant “a sure thing”. It wasn’t a wish, but a guarantee. So if our Hope is Christ then we know He is our Guarantee for this life. He is our Sure Thing! How comforting is that? I am constantly amazed that we as christians often forget about the Guarantee that Christ is. Take a moment to stop and think about the goodness of God and the Hope that we have in Christ. 

What do you think?