Letters from Samuel 4/28/08

A few updates from Samuel. SO much good stuff going on there. I really want to focus my efforts on what they are doing. I am working on pulling back from my efforts in Africa for a while. So much great work is happening in India that it deserves our attention. Here's the latest:

Samuel Writes:

Precious Brother Jason in the Lord,

Brother Jason, I have something to share with you.,..

Glad to share with you that One man from Vijayawada is willing to send Bricks for the walls of the Church.. Praise Jesus and we thank God for HIs Help.. and we have already one truck of Sand.. So, we need cement bags to continue with the walls work..So, the work will be ReStarted............
As my dad is planning to have the opening ceremony of the church on my mom's 1st memorial service..that is on June 30th..
Keep praying for the work here..
Brother Jason , I just want to share with you that my son Shalom Joy got 3rd place in the Guntur City and 355th place in Andhra Pradesh state and 785th Rank internationally in the Maths Olympiad competetion..Thank God for HIs wisdom.. And one more thing, God is helping him to recover from jaundice and he got 1st Rank in his annual examinations..Halleluiah..
We are proud of him.. Thank God for his mercies on him..

This May 3rd is our 9th wedding anniversary and Thank the Lord for His help and hoping long blessed years in the years to come. May my family will be faithful in serving God and leading perishing souls to the Cross of Christ..Amen
I am led in my heart to keep a Thanks Giving Treat to all the church members on this May 3rd evening for 9th wedding anniversary, Shalom;s healing , shalom's rank and Solomon's health..... But it depends on money...
If God willing, next week , there will be VBS Camp for the Emma's home kids with our church kids here..Pray for God's help.
Pray for me.. Pray for my family...
Iam so much of Encouraged by your emails and Prayers...
We love you and we pray for you..
Regards to all who are with you,
yours brother who takes comfort at your mails,

REV SAMUEL KOTA
Phil 1:29

Here is his previous email:

Precious Brother Jason in the Lord ,

Brother, We are keeping ourselves busy in GOd's work due to the
summer holidays in many places.. I am invited to preach in various
places and I thank God for these privileges.Keep praying for me and
for my ministry for the Glory of God..
Jason Brother, The Children at Emma's home have finished their
final examinations..Now, these kids are started going for work in
Tobacco Companies, Cotton mills and Red Chilli Godowns.... Ohhh,
horrible works.. Many of these children are below 12 years old..
According to Government Rule, Below 14 years children should not be
sent for work..

But who will stop these kids.? Parents send them for money..
When they go for work...they leave at 8 am and come back at 6 pm..
Please Pray for them... I am praying and planning to have VBS Camp for
them sometime in May ..may be during 1st or second week..Pray that
the Lord would be gracious to have this Program for them.. we have
32 kids right now and at our church, we have 50 odd kids..so, we
try to bring all the kids to our constructed church and have these
camp for 5 days..

Pray for the Program and also for the Financial Help for this
Program It is quite expensive ...even VBS books and
materials..We must give them Lunch also.We need to pay to the
Teachers too...Pray for God's leading......

Brother Jason , we love your family and all....

We are feeling very hot during day time and by the Grace of God,
we feel cold during nights.. Its a wonder for us..Cool breeze , we
get during nights.. Strange.......!

I have firm determination to buy one Cooler......but it would cost
11000 Indian Rupees..
I cant effort it.. But I desire for it..Its a needful thing..We sweat
more during day time.. Horrible heat and we are just 60 kms away from
sea shore..so, we can understand about the humidity.............lol

Sorry for making you bore with our things..
As far as church work, its tentatively stopped.. NO money,
sooooooooooo NO work at the church..
Any way, thank God for you and for all your Prayers.. We do pray for
you and may the Lord bless you more,
regards to your family and Hoping some reply from you,
yours brother in the Lord,
Pastor Samuel KOta
India

(Because this is a public blog I have removed his address and phone # for protection of his privacy. If you would like this info, please just let me know.)

Biblical Parenting

A lot of good stuff I have been learning but just some little things I would like to share.

You know parenting these days is so goofy and certainly not biblical. Parent's are so worried about the child's psyche and self-esteem and being friends with them that they give a young child too many freedoms.

Think of an upside down funnel. Very wide at a young age with little restrictions or rules, the child has way too many freedoms. As the child becomes a teen the parents are frustrated with the way they are turning out, so they get very strict and try to control them. Like the narrow end of a funnel the teen is often choked and rebells and the train wreck ensues. There is a battle for control that the parent has lost years ago.

The biblical model turns the funnel the other way around. More control of a young child teaching them obedience and as they grow and mature they get more freedoms until they become their own person.

This is a very general guideline, but let me share the phases of biblical parenting.

The discipline phase happens from birth to age 5 or so. They don't understand moral reasons behind why things should be done, but we teach them obedience to protect them from harm and to teach them proper outward behavior.

Next the Training phase from around ages 6-12. We begin to direct their course giving the moral reasons for why we should obey. Here we start to work on the heart issue of why we obey. We now give reasons why and instruct them in the ways of living a proper life in the Lord's eyes.

Then the coaching phase from ages 13-19 years. They now begin to live more independently and you allow them to fail and help correct them, instruct them and cheer them on and discipline as needed but it's more about their heart and their thought processes for how and why we obey God and how we live a practical everyday Christian life.

Finally the friendship phase. The end result is a sweet relationship with a child that loves and respects you and you love and respect them. Ultimately two adults who have had hearts changed by Christ living for Him and enjoy life in His service together.

I strongly recommend Shepherding a Child's Heart by Tedd Tripp

There is SO much here I don't know how I could possibly share all the great stuff I have learned over the last few years, but I will try my best to pass along some of the highlights.

Here's the bottom line. You must have a heart converted by Christ by repentance and trusting in His death for your sins. You must FIRST live the life yourself. Then from a life of walking "in the Spirit" as apostle Paul says, you will guide and teach your children in the way you are walking. They will learn from your life and patterns. You can't say one thing and live another before them. They are no fools....then they just learn to be hypocrites. Little pharisees who only obey outwardly around other people....that's not good. The goal is to win your child's sinful heart over to Christ. We want them to live a proper life of faith.

If you have some questions, pass them along....I'm no expert but just like everything else here, I only am sharing what I am learning.

Love you and have a great day!


Jason Younger
Letters In Grace
heavenisafreegift@yahoo.com
http://lettersingrace.blogspot.com/

Letters In Grace 4/14/08

Glad to be back with you! I just wanted to share some information I have been studying in my theology class. We are in a section of satanology. Who is he, how does he work....etcetera.

As important as it is to know God and how HE works, I think we need to know and understand our enemy. Satan is a real, created being. He was once God's most powerful angel named "Lucifer" meaning "beautiful".

He was filled with pride and wanted to become like God and fell from grace and took 1/3 of the angels with him in rebellion.

Just as God has angels and man to serve Him, satan also desires to have angels and man to serve him.

He's not the red devil with a pitch fork, as the popular image we have had burned in our minds suggests. He is "beautiful" and he is the master of lies.

So we will look at satan's work in relation to God, in relation to the nations, and in relation to the unsaved. Later we will look at his relation to the saved.

First in relation to God:
Satan is active and preoccupied with the task of imitating and counterfeiting God's work.

2 Corinthians 11:13-15
2Cr 11:13 For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ.
2Cr 11:14 No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
You see some are influenced to present "another gospel" Oh, they seem religious and they use the name Jesus. That is not their concern. A counterfeit bill looks like the original right? Very subtle twists lead the unsuspecting into hell. It says satan disguises himself as an angel of light.

He looks like an angel, not a devil! Beware!

Revelation 2:9,13,24
Rev 2:9 'I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.
Rev 2:13 'I know where you dwell, where Satan's throne is; and you hold fast My name, and did not deny My faith even in the days of Antipas, My witness, My faithful one, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells.

Rev 2:24 'But I say to you, the rest who are in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not known the deep things of Satan, as they call them--I place no other burden on you.

See just as there are deep things of God we don't know, there are deep things of satan we do not know. Is ignorance bliss? Ask a sheep when a wolf in in the flock.

Next we see satan's work in relation to nations. Of course nothing happens outside the permission of God, so understand that God restrains satan and also allows his evil to take place for a time. It will ultimately be to God's glory.

Satan is the power behind many world rulers and government leaders. He deceives the nations the scriptures say.

Daniel 10 also Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14

Look at Luke 4:5-6
Luk 4:5 And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.
Luk 4:6 And the devil said to Him, "I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish.
How could satan offer to give Christ all the earth's domain if he did not possess it? Who gave it over to satan? Adam and Even when they obeyed satan and not God. They handed the dominion of the earth over to satan.

Satan is called the prince of the power of the air. He is the power working in this world (but only to the extent God allows)

Mat 4:8 Again, the devil *took Him to a very high mountain and *showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory;
Mat 4:9 and he said to Him, "All these things I will give You, if You fall down and worship me."

Again here scripture mentions how satan deceives the nations
Rev 20:3 and he threw him into the abyss, and shut {it} and sealed {it} over him, so that he would not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were completed; after these things he must be released for a short time.

How about in relation to the unsaved?

Satan's ministry in this area is to blind the minds of the unsaved so they can't understand or receive the truth of the Gospel.

2Cr 4:3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing,
2Cr 4:4 in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

How does satan blind people?

2Cr 11:13 For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ.
2Cr 11:14 No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.

He uses false apostles, he uses deceitful workers, people who claim to belong to Christ. Beware! Are you watching for the enemy from within?

In the parable of the soils it talks about how people hear the Gospel but satan comes and snatches it away from them.
Luk 8:12 "Those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, so that they will not believe and be saved.

What is keeping you from trusting Christ alone and never lifting up the work of a church or a man or anyone or anything other than Christ's death for your sins?

Act 13:6 When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they found a magician, a Jewish false prophet whose name was Bar-Jesus,
Act 13:7 who was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, a man of intelligence. This man summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God.
Act 13:8 But Elymas the magician (for so his name is translated) was opposing them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith.
Act 13:9 But Saul, who was also {known as} Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, fixed his gaze on him,
Act 13:10 and said, "You who are full of all deceit and fraud, you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease to make crooked the straight ways of the Lord?

False teachers distorting the way and leading people astray!

Make no mistake, satan desires to use men to distort the pure faith and turn it into religion. Religion feels good and sounds right, but will not save you from the hell earned by our sins. Christ has already purchased your soul from hell with His blood, you need no act, no work, no sacrament to save. No church, no man, no ritual, no prayers, no water....you need to believe in the death, burial and resurrection of Christ for the complete forgiveness of your sins.

2Ti 2:25 with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth,
2Ti 2:26 and they may come to their senses {and escape} from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will.

I will make no more argument of my own. I stand on God's word. Please study it, and examine you heart. Ask God for wisdom. Beware of possible devilish schemes around you. How will you know what is true? The Bible is true, know it and you will know fraud. Pray for wisdom. May the Holy Spirit fill you and give you the answers you seek.

God bless.

Well I'm Back in the Game-Lifeology

The last few weeks have been so eventful. So many things I have wanted to blog about but just couldn't get to a computer. Now it's gone... But just something that I got to talk to Cole about yesterday I wanted to mention. (I am so thankful that I had the opportunity to have such a wonderful conversation with him.)

But the important thing I wanted to say is that we are called to build on what our parents have built. Our parents did their best to teach us. Their goal was (and is) for us to do a little better than they did in life. Where they made mistakes they want us to succeed. What they knew about life, they tried to pass on to us. Now we are called to build on that. We should be growing and learning and striving to be better, standing on the shoulders of our parents and reaching higher.

Now with our kids we want them to be more than we are, to do better than we have done. Really for the first time Cole and I got to really talk about that. I want him to know that I am a flawed person. I am not a perfect parent and I sin against him and I sometimes parent from anger or I make mistakes. My goal is to work through that with him and encourage him to develop better self control than I have, to be more disciplined than I am. These are important skills I never really ever even thought about.

Think about it. Lack of self-control is probably THE biggest weakness a person can have. Once your emotions have been stirred up you are at your weakest. Instead of weeks or months of temptation, satan only needs to give you a bump, just a little nudge to send you over the edge.

What are areas you need to have self-control? Anger? Greed? Men, (and women) is sexual temptation something you struggle with? It only takes a situation for your emotions to be stirred and satan can give you a little bump and you jump into terrible sin.

Let's take anger for example. When your anger is stirred up, you HAVE to stop for a second and gather your thoughts. You have to settle your heart before you even speak a single word. In my job I see adults come to me like children throwing temper tantrums. They are so blinded by their emotions, they are not even capable of working through the problem. All logic is blinded by the anger. I have to do it for them. Remove the emotions and look at the basics of the problem. I have to assure them it will be OK and we will work through the problem. I then have to ask them the questions they should be able to ask themselves. What happened? How did it happen? What needs to happen now to make it right? How can we prevent it from happening again? But, because the emotions are not under control, what should be a simple problem to solve becomes world war three.

What's the source of the wild emotions? Sin. Our selfishness, our love of self, pride, insecurity.... Be upright and confident before the Lord always doing right and speaking truth, deal lovingly with others. Yes, even the hateful ones.... They are just sinful hearts with no self control. Be patient with them. Think of them as they are... Adults are just children who grew up right? Maybe no one ever taught them self-control or how to act. You can be that influence that helps them work through problems.

Mom was always saying "Go with the flow". Really good advice that has been very helpful. Especially in the sense that it implies a calm demeanor. You have heard the saying "level heads prevail". Self-control, know it, love it, live it....

Remember to build on where your parents have lifted you up. Let's go forward not backwards. No matter your age there is always time to turn. It all begins with a heart surrendered to Christ. Then read your Bible and grow and learn.... "Lifeology" is a class we should all be enrolled in. Almost no one is teaching how we should be living before God. You must seek out this wisdom. It's all right there in the Bible. Principles, commands, freedoms....you will find what you need for every one of life's situations. Good news you have the best teacher of all... The Holy Spirit will teach you as you study and seek wisdom.

Just a side note-Did you know the pastor of the nations largest congregation doesn't even study theology? Wow! These people who are leading us in churches are not even studying theological issues. As we know from scripture, that is how satan works.... feel-good, looks-right religion that is close but is not the faith that will get us to heaven. Counterfeit faith will lead you to hell. Have you examined the differences and the issues of Christianity? Can you spot a counterfeit faith... Just like a fake $20 bill will have Jackson's picture on it, a false Christianity will have Christ in it. Be VERY careful.