American River Messenger-Church News

Marlys Johnsen Norris (Life Message Workshops) Marlys Johnsen Norris believes strongly that every person has a Legacy worthy of writing and she has held workshops during 2006 to help people write them. Marlys is a published author of five books, one of which won Best Christian book from Northern California Publishers and Authors for 2003-2004.

I know of no other book whose words “come alive or have power to transform” lives like the Bible. Daily I hear stories where the God of the Bible has spoken to the heart of someone and made a huge difference in the direction of their life. They share about having an experience with the Living God who gives them a spiritual birth that is recorded in the word, called born-again. (John 3:3) It seems throughout their life from this time on, the Word of God gives them clear directions.

God provides a roadmap for life in His word. He demonstrated His profound love for His creation when He sent His Beloved Son to earth to provide mankind a way to be reconciled to Himself through His death and Resurrection. A simple life of a Servant and the Lamb of God willingly laid down His life for you and I. Old Testament scriptures tell of His coming and New Testament scriptures give us the story.

Words preserved for thousands of years. Words dynamically powerful because the Creator of all that is-- inspired the writing. Words about His love and His design for mankind are written as a guide to live the best life possible. Words of truth and instruction to demonstrate the power provided for a life surrendered to God.

A loving God of justice gives words of warning to direct a path set on destruction. God being mans final judge shows the consequences of sin and rebellion, and why they are, needlessly, on their way to the eternal fire. Yet, this God of love provides a way of escape through the “door” of His Beloved Son to those who will heed His call

To those who refuse to listen and reject His words, they shall reap what they sow! God sends no one to hell, man chooses that for himself. He chooses to take the wrong roads of sin and rebellion against God.

Marlys Johnsen Norris LIFE MESSAGE WORKSHOPS “Intimacy Begins Going God’s Way” Marlysj@sbcglobal.net

You only have your kids at home for a season. They’re not going to be with you forever, so you’d better make the most of it. You’d better enjoy them while you have them. Children are to be enjoyed, not endured.

Someday your kids will be grown and gone. It will be then that your kitchen will become incredibly neat! Just the way you always wanted. You won’t have any more sticky counter tops, spoons down the garbage disposal or spills on the floor. The refrigerator will no longer be stuffed with nine cartons of milk, sticky jelly jars, cool-aid or messy ketchup bottles. Someday you’ll actually be able to see out of your car’s side windows! The finger prints, the tongue licks and sneakers prints will become conspicuously absent.

One by one, they’ll grow up and leave your nest, and the house will then begin to resemble a place of order, maybe even a touch of elegance. The clink of fine china and silver no doubt will be heard on occasion and the crackling of the fireplace will echo through the empty hallways. The phone will grow strangely silent. In fact, the entire house will be quite calm and quiet, filled not with the pitter-patter - the noise of little feet- but the memories. You’ll spend your time not looking forward to the day, but looking back at what was and reminiscing.

Your children are a gift from God and parenting is the greatest privilege and responsibility in the entire world. Nothing compares to the honor and responsibility of raising another human being to know God.

As a parent, you may be hurting inside. You may be emotionally exhausted. You’re worried about your kids. You may feel frustrated or disrespected. You may be fearful about the direction that one of them is going. You may feel a little guilty, like a failure in some areas. You may feel hopeless. You may be broken-hearted, maybe disappointed by your child or children, and the deepest hurt of your heart is when you think about that child and you want to resign from being a parent…but you can’t resign, because you signed on for life.

If you try to parent on your own, in your own strength, in your own wisdom, you’re going to fail. It takes God’s wisdom, because human wisdom fails. It takes God’s love and God’s power, because human love and energy runs out. As you plug into God, He will give you His power and His love and His wisdom. Jesus said, "Come to me, all of you who are tired from carrying heavy loads, and I will give you rest.” Matthew 11:28 (TEV)

No matter how you feel emotionally about your kids today, Jesus is ready to help. He's ready to step into the gap, anytime and anywhere. You just need to ask Him. Do that today. Turn to Christ and He will give you His love, power and wisdom as you love and enjoy your kids no matter where they’re at today.

Calvin and Lisa Wulf

Do not run until your feet are bare and your throat is dry. But you said, "It's no use! I love foreign gods, and I must go after them." Jeremiah 2:25 (NIV)
The alarm clock rings, "Time to get up."
The grandfather clock chimes, "Time to go to work."
The computer beeps, "Time for your next appointment."
The time clock punches, "Time to go home."
The microwave dings, "Time for dinner."
The cuckoo clock sings, "Time for bed."

We live on the clock. It tells us when to go out and when to come in. We either try to beat the clock or kill time. So the pressure mounts. We juggle our lives to keep as many clocks in the air as possible. If one should fall, the whole system shatters

Ever notice that the clock is often the focal point of a room? It's given an honored place on the mantel. Even churches aren't immune. The cross used to be center stage. Today many sanctuaries have no cross but there's a clock in the back so the preacher can get us out on time.

Jesus never said, "Hurriest thou for we are late!" We don't see him rushing around. Yet he accomplished everything that was necessary. That's because he fixed his eyes on the Father, his compass, and not on the clock. Let's get real. Time consciousness fuels our modern world so we can’t eliminate clock tyranny altogether. But we can make better use of our compass. God gives us all the time we need to do what he has for us. Want to stop dividing life into seconds and minutes? Here's how:

Does your wristwatch have you by the throat? Perhaps now is the time to stop juggling and let your timepieces fall to the ground. Don't let clock worship eclipse God's plan for your life. Free up your hands and eyes to follow the one true compass.

Living for God (TM) offers resources on Christian living. Check them out at www.livingforgod.net or call (719) 578-8837.

OPINION, June 2 /Christian Newswire/ -- Pastor John Hagee is a towering leader in the Evangelical Church who has dedicated a great part of his enormously successful ministry to reaching out in love and loving-kindness to the Jewish people and the State of Israel. He has admirably defended our right to our historic homeland even when our enemies have attempted to disgorge us from our homes and drive us into the sea; he has praised the Lord for having imbued us, the "post- Holocaust dry bones of Ezekiel," with renewed life and vigor even when our arch-enemy and the arch-enemy of the free world has called us a "stinking corpse." He has organized Christian lobby groups for the only true democracy in the Middle East across the length and breadth of the United States even when a former American President and professors from Harvard and Chicago Universities have denounced our own lobbying efforts as un-American and anti-Democratic.

Pastor Hagee has expressed his profound affection for us even when it has been most unpopular to do so. Can we, the recipients of his heart and goodwill, dare be silent now, when the political frenzy of primary elections hysterically seeks to defame and discredit one of the greatest voices on behalf of Christian- Jewish healing and cooperation? No, for the sake of Jerusalem and for the sake of the God of love and peace we must raise our voices in support of and friendship for the very individual who has never faltered in his support and friendship for us!

Does this mean that I must necessarily agree with all of the theological positions taken by Pastor Hagee? Not at all! True friendship means that I continue to love and even partner with my friend, despite disagreeing with him on even fundamental positions of theology and ideology - as long as his views do not threaten the life or limb of innocent human beings. And in fact in subsequent articles I hope to express my own theological position about God and the existence of evil, Jewish history and the place of Hitler (may his very name be blotted out). But if I can only love those with whom I agree completely, then I cannot even love myself - because I may very well come to disagree tomorrow with whatever I may have thought and said today! As Pastor Hagee himself has remarked, if I am completely in accord with whatever you think and say, then one of us becomes superfluous.

We are living in a world divided between those who believe in a God of love and peace, and those who believe in a Satan of Jihad and suicide bombers. Any attempt to marginalize and slander leaders of the camp of the former will only serve to strengthen the camp of the latter, with the future existence of the free world perilously hanging in the balance. And so I continue to proudly shout from the rooftops that this rabbi in Israel stands firmly alongside -his beloved friend, a true friend of Israel and the free world, Pastor John Hagee.

Shlomo Riskin
Chief Rabbi of Efrat, Israel
Founder: Ohr Torah Stone Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding & Cooperation

PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A new analysis entitled "Pope Benedict XVI on Marriage: A Compendium" and published by the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy on the eve of Benedict's historic U.S. visit, finds that in the first three years of his pontificate, Pope Benedict XVI has spoken publicly about marriage on 111 occasions, connecting marriage to such overarching themes as human rights, world peace, and the conversation between faith and reason.

"Over and over again he has made it clear that the marriage and family debate is central - not peripheral - to understanding the human person, and defending our human dignity," says Maggie Gallagher, president of the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy.

For example, when receiving the credentials of the new U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican, Harvard Law Professor Mary Ann Glendon, Pope Benedict XVI expressed his appreciation for America's recognition of the importance of a dialogue of faith and faiths in the public square and linked this to respect not only for religious freedom but for marriage as the union of husband and wife:

Pope Benedict devoted about half of his message for the January 1 World Day of Peace to the significance of marriage in developing a culture of peace:

Marriage essential to world peace? This may strike American ears as an oddity. If so, Benedict has made clear it is not an unintentional one. On September 21, 2007, in an address to participants in a conference of the Executive Committee of Centrist Democratic International, Pope Benedict prefigured the same theme:

"The short pontificate of Benedict XVI is already a standing rebuke to those voices of our time who seek to make us ashamed or embarrassed of caring about marriage and sexual issues, who try to get us to view the contemporary marriage debate as merely a distraction from more important issues," notes Gallagher, "Pope Benedict clearly connects life and marriage, the human person in the human family, with the most fundamental international issues of peace and human rights facing our times."

Source: Institute of Marriage and Public Policy
CONTACT: Maggie Gallagher of the Institute for Marriage and PublicPolicy, 1-914-522-5310, maggie@imapp.org
Web Site: http://www.marriagedebate.com/