Month: September 2011

(John 13:14-15 NKJV) “If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. {15} “For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.

It’s a funny thing how we go to school to get educated and everything that the teacher teaches us we listen and take it all in. We study the material for when the test comes. Our goal is to pass that test and get an excellent grade so that within ourselves we feel confident that what we were taught, we got!

Jesus is referring to Himself here as Lord and Teacher, and how He has given us an example of how we are to treat others.

There are a lot of ways to serve people and meet their needs. Being willing to do whatever it takes is the key. It may be very humbling to us and to the one that we are helping, but never the less God knows and is faithful to show us what is necessary at that time.

Let’s pass that test not just once or twice…let’s make it a habit to pass it every chance we get!!

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(Rom 5:6 NKJV)  For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.

Sometimes I think we forget that without Christ, we are just sinners… plain and simple.

With Christ, we are still no better than anyone. We are just saved from our sin.

I am very troubled that a vast majority of the body of Christ seems to have forgotten this. Too many of us just blow through life, looking down our noses at those who aren’t Christians.

I remember being in a church service one Sunday morning. A lady came into the church. She had never been there before. She took a seat and before very long she was being asked to leave by some of the church regulars, because they didn’t think she was dressed appropriately.

Thankfully, another man and his wife overheard them asking her to leave and they invited her to sit next to them.

How sad is it that a church can’t look beyond someone’s shortcomings enough to draw them to the one who can fix those shortcomings?

It’s time for our churches to check themselves and ask themselves why they do what they do. Is it because it glorifies God or is it because it’s just what they’re used to doing. Or is it possibly because someone else told them that this is what they’re supposed to do, so they never bothered asking God about it.

I know these are strong statements, but beating around the bush never accomplishes much. We need to be about the business of God’s kingdom, not the business of meeting in a church building just so we can go through the motions again.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(1 Tim 1:14 NKJV) And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

Loving others is sometimes a complicated thing. It’s God’s love through us that helps us to love beyond our own capacity.

Keeping our faith strong can also be tough sometimes. It can be very challenging to walk in faith, when we are facing big things.

Could you imagine the faith Noah had to have to build the ark? Or how about the faith and love that Joseph had to have going through his lifetime?

Think about he things that Joseph’s brothers did to him and all the time he spent in prison, and for what? None of it was his fault, but God turned it around and good things came out of it, just as He will turn it around for us as we do what’s right, whether we are being treated right or not.

We need Him, His grace, His love, and His faith!!

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(1 Cor 3:2 NKJV)  I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able;

As we raise our children and they grow from infants into toddlers, we wean them from milk onto solid food. They need the nutrition of the solid food in order to grow in a way that’s healthy.

When they’re still infants they can’t handle solid food. They can’t digest it. If we tried to feed them solid food at this stage of their lives it could harm them or even kill them.

The same is true with God. He can only give us what we’re ready for. If he gives us something we can’t handle, we won’t know what to do with it and we will probably hurt ourselves or make a big mess of things.

Sometimes we ask God for something and it just doesn’t happen. So we continue to ask Him. Sometimes we even become discouraged and start to lose our faith when it doesn’t happen when we think it should.

There’s usually a good reason why things don’t happen when we think they should. We’re usually not ready for it, and that’s why God hasn’t given it to us. If he gave it to us just because we asked, but we weren’t ready to be able to handle it, we would probably mishandle it or hurt ourselves (or someone else).

So we need to stop repetitively asking God for the thing that we’ve been asking for and start asking Him what it is that’s keeping it from coming to us.

Many times it’s us that is the problem.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(1 Pet 5:6-7 NKJV)  Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, {7} casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.

Daily we must cast our cares upon Him.

Do we find it hard to let go at times? I do. It is so hard sometimes for me to just give it up. But it’s the weirdest thing, because when I finally let go and give it up, I am like, what took me so long? Why did I have such a hard time? When I finally let God take care of it, what a peace swept over me.

Some of us today struggle with this, but if we could just remember how GREAT God is, how MIGHTY He is, and how He really cares, we wouldn’t think twice!

God cares for us. He wants to help us handle our problems. He wants to help mend that broken relationship. He wants to heal that physical pain we’re having. He wants to pay that bill for us and get us a good job.

What’s stopping Him from doing this? US, because we won’t cast it.

Give it to Him today, and walk in His peace.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(Psa 139:14 NKJV)  I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, And that my soul knows very well.

We just finished watching a show on TV that demonstrated how human life is conceived in the womb. What an incredible demonstration of God’s creation!

The intricacies that are involved in the creation of each new person are beyond comprehension. No matter how technologically advanced we get, we can never duplicate this. We can never even fully understand how it all came to be or how it happens every single time a new human being is conceived in the womb.

This message is not to try to stir up a debate about creation vs. evolution. Those types of debates are rarely fruitful. But we all need to be aware of the wonders that are right in front of our eyes every single day.

We all need to understand how mighty and powerful God is and we need to give Him the glory and honor that he deserves.

We encourage everyone who reads this to take a little time and learn more about how we, as human beings, are made. It’s truly awe-inspiring and will cause you to see God’s creation in a whole new light.

If you’d like a link to a website where you can watch these videos for free, please check out the link below.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

p.s.  Some great information on this topic can be found on this website:
http://www.ctvn.org/programs-origins.asp.

All of their shows can be watched right online, at absolutely no cost. We especially recommend the episodes entitled “Fearfully and Wonderfully Made”, parts 1 & 2.

(Eccl 12:14 NKJV)  For God will bring every work into judgment, Including every secret thing, Whether good or evil.

The truth is, we may think we are getting away with some things, because no one caught us at the time we were doing it. But we are only kidding ourselves. God knows everything we have done and the things we plan to do, whether good or bad. Don’t think for a second He doesn’t know, care or pay attention.

The best thing we can do, whether someone is watching us or not, is to train ourselves to always do the right thing, knowing that Almighty God is the One we are accountable to. After awhile it will become natural and not hard to do at all.

If we have done things wrong and haven’t owned up to them, then today is a good day to take some time and confess to God and ask for His forgiveness, and then put it behind us.

Enjoy your day!!

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(Rom 8:38-39 NKJV)  For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, {39} nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Have you ever doubted that God loves you? Have you ever felt like you’re just not really sure about God and His love toward you?

The love of God is spread from the book of Genesis, all the way through the book or Revelation. The theme of God’s word is His love for us.

God loves us.

He has proven this time and time again, but the ultimate proof is in the fact that He sent His son to die in our place.

If you only know one thing, know that God loves you and rest in knowing that there is not a single person or thing that can separate you from His love.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(1 Tim 1:5-7 NKJV)  Now the purpose of the commandment is love from a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from sincere faith, {6} from which some, having strayed, have turned aside to idle talk, {7} desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say nor the things which they affirm.

God’s Word will keep us close to Him and teach us how to love, how to have a pure heart, and His Word will teach us how to have sincere faith. His very Words are what help us each day and if we start to thinking we have learned it all, we can get into a lot of trouble.

Some teachers think they are doing God’s will, but haven’t the slightest idea of what they are saying or doing to people. People are getting hurt from the lack of knowledge, and the deceit and lies of teachers that THINK they know it all, using God’s name to clear themselves in doing what they think is of God.

This is not of Christ; this is man-made RELIGION… the very spirit that was in the Pharisees and Sadducees, who didn’t even recognize Christ when they saw HIM.

Stay close to God; let Him teach us His ways, for they will keep us straight!! Remain humble and always learning. Never allow ourselves to get to that point where we think we know it all.

God is faithful to teach us as we remain teachable.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(1 Th 5:21 NKJV)  Test all things; hold fast what is good.

It’s common knowledge to most of us that not everything is good. Most of us also realize that not all things are Godly.

There has come such a blurring between good and evil during the past few decades that it can sometimes be hard to tell what is right or what is wrong if we don’t have God’s discernment.

God wants us to hold fast to what is good. It’s his desire for our lives to be filled with those things, not the things of darkness and evil.

We should never have to struggle with deciding what is good or what is not good. God has given us His Spirit. He leads us in our daily lives… even in what some us might think of as small things.

Have you ever been watching a movie or a TV show and they said something bad or obscene that made you flinch? That’s God’s Spirit in you, reacting to what you just heard.

We have a choice in all we do. We can choose to pay attention to God’s Spirit and refrain from exposing ourselves further to those things, or we can ignore God and continue on with absorbing ungodly things as though they never happened.

God is telling us to hold fast to what is good. What will we do?

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!

(Phil 4:13 NKJV)  I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

It is in Christ that we have the victory! Sometimes we may forget who gets us to the place of freedom, place of enjoyment, and a place of happiness!

Remember today and give Christ the Glory for the good work which He has done in you and through you.

If you’re in a situation today that has you down and out, hold onto Christ with everything in you and believe His Word today for you Whether you need Him on your job, or in your home, or even in your church, etc., He will be there!!

God bless you.

Pastor Curt & Pastor Ellie
Seven Seas Ministries
401-377-5400

If you know someone who will enjoy this or be encouraged by it, please feel free to share it with them!