A challenge for you

The objective of this story is to get to get to Grandma's house. Can you do it?

You are walking in a dark forest, all alone, at midnight. You should have been to Grandma’s house an hour ago. You look around you. Instantly it strikes you that you are lost. You no longer know where you are. You have seemingly walked these paths a thousand times before but today you must have been dreaming and missed a turn or something. You are lost. You sit down to take stalk of the situation when all of a sudden you hear footsteps. You know that it is not safe to be in the woods alone at night. You know there are rumours of monsters in these woods. The footsteps grow louder and louder as they seem to come closer and closer. They now seem to be running towards you but who’s or what’s footsteps are these? You notice a tree beside the path in the dark woods…

If you climb the tree to hide while seeing what is running towards you, turn to Page 3.

If you decide to stand in the path and greet whatever is making the footsteps, turn to Page 5.

Holiness Test

http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2012/08/holiness-test-deuteronomy-51-21-exodus.html

Is The Salvation Army still an evangelistic movement?

Are we still an evangelistic movement? On my desk I have a copy of my Officers’ Covenant and my book, Praise The Lord For Covenants. Everyday I have the opportunity to glance at them and often I do. The Officers’ Covenant, through which every Officer in The Salvation Army is bound to God for the duration of our lives, declares that we are, I am “called by God to proclaim the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ as an Officer of The Salvation Army” and that I will “live to win souls and make their salvation the first purpose of my life.”  As with other Officers, I had the opportunity to sign this Covenant at the Mercy Seat with the Lord as my covenant partner and the Territorial Commander, the Training College Officers, and my session mates as my witnesses.

Are we still an evangelistic movement? My signed Soldiers Covenant I keep at home but in any given week while sitting at my desk I often, especially during times of sermon preparation, refer to any one of the unsigned copies at the corps awaiting our next soldier enrolment day or the pdf version that I have on my computer desktop. The Soldiers Covenant which every Soldier in The Salvation Army has signed before God promises that we, “I will be faithful to the purposes for which God raised up The Salvation Army, sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, endeavouring to win others to Him.” God promises that even if we are unfaithful, He is faithful and He will be true to His covenants (Romans 3:3,4; see Deuteronomy 31:6, Joshua 1:5, Hebrews 13:5). Covenants made with and before the Lord are holy and they will not fail.

Covenants in this way are like seatbelts. One spring when my daughters and I were coming home, we were driving the highway like we did a couple of times every week when all of a sudden we hit black ice. We swerved into on-coming traffic then off our side of the road where the car proceeded to flip: it rolled over a time and a half. In the car accident our seatbelts did not break. Even though the car was totalled, the seatbelts held. This is similar to our covenants before the Lord. Sometimes we might make a mistake. Sometimes we might sin before the Lord and sometimes our lives just come crashing down around us. When my car rolled there was that moment of panic as I looked to see if my daughters were all right. To my relief they were safe and sound. We were all right because the Lord protected us through our seatbelts that did not break. We were safe and sound and soon restored to our normal life. For all of us who are in a covenanted relationship with our Lord, when our lives come crashing down around us, we will be safe and sound as we rely on the strength of our holy seatbelt - our covenant with the Lord. The Lord will not let His covenants break no matter what happens to the automobile of our life.

Are we still an evangelistic movement? Absolutely. Evangelism is one of the conditions of being a Soldier; it is the first priority of an Officer’s life. We have all sworn an oath to God to that effect. I am sure that no Christian would dare defy God by transgressing such important covenants. This is great because as we rely on the strength provided through our covenant, God will respond to our covenant faithfulness and our decline in numbers in North America is bound to stop and more and more people will enter the Kingdom of God everyday.

Are we still an evangelistic movement? Yes. As long as our Soldiers and our Officers continue to bind our lives to Him in a holy covenant for that purpose, we are still an evangelistic movement. God does not release us from our vows for simply transgressing them (see Leviticus 26:42-44; Numbers 6; Deuteronomy 7:9; Judges 2:1; Mark 10:1-12; Romans 3:3-4, 7:2; 1 Corinthians 7:10-14; etc.). Praise the Lord; God will hold us to our sacred vows. He is faithful even when we are faithless. With that said, I would like to ask myself and every Officer and each Soldier reading this article, am I faithfully sharing the good news of Jesus Christ and endeavouring to win others to Him? Have I been living up to the promises through which I am bound to my Lord and Saviour? If there are any of us who have not been living in a right covenant with our Lord, I would encourage us to take this time now to repent and to turn to our Lord and experience the wonderful blessings that come through living in a holy, sanctified, covenanted relationship with our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Quiz for you...

This weekend is a long weekend. Does anyone know what the holiday is this weekend? It’s Saskatchewan Day. In honour of that, I thought that I would have a little quiz for us that I found on the Saskatchewan government’s website (answers below).[1]

1. Name Saskatchewan's official mineral.

a)      Uranium

b)      Sylvite (Potash)

c)      Gold

2.   What is Saskatchewan's provincial tree?

a)      White birch

b)      White spruce

c)      Jack Pine

3.  Where were the first dinosaur bones discovered in western Canada?

a)      Eastend

b)      Cypress Hills

c)      Killdeer Badlands

4. The original name for the place that eventually became Regina was a Cree word "oskana" which later became "Wascana". What does the Cree word mean?

a)      Treeless Prairie

b)      Bones

c)      Place of many mosquitoes

5. Which Saskatchewan community has the warmest annual average temperature?

a)      Maple Creek

b)      Leader

c)      Assiniboia

6.  How many times was John Diefenbaker elected a Member of Parliament?

a)      5

b)      7

c)      13

7. Who was the longest-serving premier of Saskatchewan?

a)      Woodrow Lloyd

b)      Tommy Douglas

c)      Roy Romanow

 

Click here for the answers and more: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2012/08/numbers-30-rock-climbers-rope.html

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God’s Horeb-Bull Experience with Moses and other thoughts and ideas.

Exodus 32:7-14: God’s Horeb-Bull Experience with Moses

Presented to Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 08 July 2012 By Captain Michael Ramsay

Do you ever notice that when you hear a certain song or smell a certain smell or see a certain thing or go to a certain place where something has happened in your life then all of a sudden all of these memories come flooding back from that different time? You go somewhere you haven’t been for a long time and you find that there are all these memories of experiences attached to the place.

We will be heading ‘back home’ to Vancouver Island this week....

read more: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2012/07/exodus-327-14-gods-horeb-bull.html

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Numbers 15:22-29: Go and Sin No More!

Presented to Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 22 July 2012 By Captain Michael Ramsay.[1]

We just came back from furlough (vacation) yesterday afternoon. It was a good time visiting both Susan and my families. Susan’s family lives right on Sproat Lake on Vancouver Island so we were able to spend a lot of time just relaxing there. My folks brought us down to the ocean so that Susan could show our older two girls tidal pools and other Island things that one doesn’t get to see here.

We had a good time but we also acquired a story or two.

read more: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2012/07/numbers-1522-29-go-and-sin-no-more.html

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Numbers 22-24: A Balaam Blessing

Presented to Nipawin Corps, 22 March 2009
and Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army 29 July 2012
By Captain Michael Ramsay

God has a plan for Israel’s Salvation that could not be thwarted here in this story. We know – because we have the Book and have read the beginnings and the endings – that God promised Abraham that his descendants would occupy the land promised to them – at least for a time[1] (beyond that is up to them to remain faithful to their covenant responsibilities; cf. Exodus 19:5, Leviticus 23:33-35, 2 Chronicles 36:20-21, Amos 3:1-2, etc.).[2] As we are reading through the Bible together we notice that He used Moses to deliver people from slavery into the wilderness and Joshua to deliver them from that wilderness of Sin into the Promise. Today we have a very interesting story before us. One of the most interesting – I think – in the book of Numbers, complete with even an angel and a talking donkey: the story of the prophet Balaam and King Balak of Moab. Now we know that God’s plan for salvation will not be thwarted[3] but listen to this, it is interesting.

read more: http://sheepspeaks.blogspot.ca/2009/03/numbers-22-24-balaam-blessing.html