
THE GRANDFATHERS OF JESUS: ABRAHAM
I’m a mutt. Part this, part that. My dad’s grandfather was part Cherokee, while my mom’s maternal grandfather was Chickasaw and her paternal grandfather was German... Wessel, pronounced Vessel, with emphasis on the “V”. Beyond that, I’m quite sure that in my family tree, there must have been famous inventors, dukes, and tycoons... and maybe a stagecoach robber or the like. I’m really just part this and part that... a slumgullion of DNA. Jesus was a Jew. He could trace His Heb

MY GOD IS IMMUTABLE!
Exercise your mind... use your noodle... your grey matter! Think about this... Contemplate the astounding fact that our lives will never, ever cease. We will never expire. We’re gonna live forever! The fourth stanza of the grand old hymn, Amazing Grace, is correct! “When we’ve been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun, we’ve no less days to sing God’s praise than when we first begun!” Okay, when you have wrapped your noggin around that, try a harder one. Consid

MY GOD IS SOVEREIGN!
Our God is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient. He is limitless, infinite, boundless. He is sovereign. By this we mean that He has both the authority and the power to accomplish his will as the supreme Ruler of all things. Isaiah wrote, “I declare the end from the beginning, and from long ago what is not yet done, saying: my plan will take place, and I will do all my will... Yes, I have spoken; so I will also bring it about. I have planned it; I will also do it” (Isaiah 46

MY GOD IS OMNISCIENT!
I grew up in a small town. My folks had spies inside the school and throughout the community, so when I did this or that, my parents knew what I’d done before it was done. I couldn’t get away with anything. My folks were omniscient. They knew everything. Almost. Our God actually does know everything. Nothing escapes His attention. David, the psalmist, wrote, “Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I stand up; you understand my thoughts from

MY GOD IS OMNIPRESENT!
There are nearly eight billion people on this planet. Eight billion ... that’s eight thousand million! I have eleven grandchildren. When three of them are talking at once, I can’t keep up. Sometimes all eleven get tuned up at the same time... it makes my head spin. But not God. He is present with each of His creatures in all of our comings and goings... He is omnipresent. God is always everywhere. He is not limited by space. When He is with you, He is also on the opposite sid

MY GOD IS OMNIPOTENT!
I introduce myself in various ways. “Hi, I’m Mike Martin, pastor of South Georgia Baptist Church.” Or sometimes, “Hello, I’m Carla’s husband” or “I’m Lizzy’s dad” or even, “I’m grand-papa to eleven practically-perfect-in-every-way grandkids.” When God said hello to Abraham, He said, “I am El-Shaddai ... Almighty God!” (Genesis 17:1). God might have said, “I’m God, the creator of heaven and earth”, for the Almighty “spoke, and it came into being; he commanded, and it came into

WORSHIP ... PAUL AND SILAS
They stripped them, beat them with rods, flogged them with a cat-of-nine-tails, shackled their hands and feet, and dumped them into the inner dungeon. In the darkness, they sat bruised and broken, beaten and bleeding. That reminds me of Amarillo today, with the COVID-19 pandemic raging and wreaking havoc. Our community’s hospitals are breaking records for numbers of patients, while increasing numbers of hospital staff members are infected or quarantined. Almost 39% of hospita

WORSHIP ... THE TEMPTATION
The devil is real. He was present in the Garden of Eden with the power to reveal himself to mankind. He was also welcomed into God’s presence in the throne room of heaven. Read Job’s first and second chapters and note the devil’s ability to appear before God, and the freedom granted him to roam, “going to and fro on the earth” (Job 1:7, ESV). But also recognize the limitations God placed upon Satan’s powers. He is powerful, but God has ALL-power! The devil came to “steal, kil

WORSHIP ... ON THE WATERS OF GALILEE
James and John grew up in Zebedee’s boats on the Sea of Galilee. Peter and Andrew had similar upbringings in and around Capernaum. The fishermen knew the oddities of the local weather, having often experienced the dangerous storms that blew in suddenly, turning the placid waters intensely turbulent. That’s precisely what happened on a certain memorable night. The previous afternoon, Jesus had miraculously fed the multitude of five-thousand weary men and their families. “When

WORSHIP ... ABRAHAM
These amenities weren’t available when Abraham and Isaac visited Mt. Moriah Baptist Church. Abraham and his son went to worship, not to be entertained. The story is familiar. We learned it in VBS a lifetime ago. God had promised to bless Abraham with a large family and a lasting legacy. Of course, large families start with a first child, missing from Abraham’s household until he was a centenarian and Sarah was ninety. A few years later, God called Abraham to join Him at Mt. M