The Grands Letter

Dear Grands,

Proverbs 3:5-13, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding.
6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.
7 Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and turn away from evil.
8 It will be healing to your body and refreshment to your bones.
9 Honor the LORD from your wealth and from the first of all your produce;
10 So your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine.
11 My son, do not reject the discipline of the LORD or loathe His reproof,
12 For whom the LORD loves He reproves, even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights.
13 How blessed is the man who finds wisdom and the man who gains understanding.”

It’s not easy to stand still when someone tells you what to believe and how to (and not to) express it openly. “What’s the matter with them? Don’t they think we have any rights at all?

Truth be told, when we belong to Jesus Christ, the rights we have
are the rights He allows us to have. Furthermore, we have the right to express those rights only when He allows us to do it!

We are who we are and where we live on this earth by the unchallengeable grace and power of the LORD God Himself! If the Jews have rights (and they certainly do!), they have them with the permission of the Heavenly Father. It’s the same with us as Christians. The LORD is in charge of everything.

We are responsible to live committedly unto Him. That includes feasting daily on His Word, spending quality time with Him in prayer, and denying everything that arises solely from within our own will and by and for our own benefit. As His born-again believers, we are responsible to obey Him in all things!

Give that last verse above a clear and careful re-read:
“How blessed is the man who finds wisdom and the man who gains understanding.” God bless you in your daily walk with Him!

Heartily in Christ Jesus,

Gene L. Jeffries, Th.D.
Springdale, Arkansas
United States of America

“We never know that Christ is all we need until He becomes all that we have.” – Corrie ten Boom

Dear Grands,

Proverbs 3:19-26, “The LORD by wisdom founded the earth, by understanding He established the heavens.
20 By His knowledge the deeps were broken up and the skies drip with dew.
21 My son, let them not vanish from your sight; keep sound wisdom and discretion,
22 So they will be life to your soul and adornment to your neck.
23 Then you will walk in your way securely and your foot will not stumble.
24 When you lie down, you will not be afraid; when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.
25 Do not be afraid of sudden fear nor of the onslaught of the wicked when it comes;
26 For the LORD will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being caught.”

Have you ever met someone who (so far as you could tell) truly believed that he (or she) possessed wisdom beyond all others? Well, there are a host of people in the world today, who think they possess the knowledge of almost, if not, all things. They claim also to possess wisdom. What they do possess, you don’t want!

It’s difficult, if not impossible, to have an honest conversation with such people. They would have you to believe that no one on the planet knows what they know. They believe that you are unusual, insofar as you have been blessed with their encounter. O, my!

Yet, just a cursory re-reading of the Scripture above tells us (and I am included!) that no one knows everything –no one, that is, but the LORD!

What makes this sad is that we have the opportunity to know far more than we do! The LORD Himself gives us insight into His wisdom; yet, we too often miss it because we’re preoccupied with too many lesser things.

Please carefully re-read the Scripture above, and think of how much you have missed because you’re focused on the lesser things in life.

There’s an old children’s hymn that says:

“Turn your eyes upon Jesus;
Look full in His wonderful Face;
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.”

When our eyes are focused on Him, our hearts and minds will then be to the praise of His glory!

Heartily in Christ Jesus,

Gene L. Jeffries, Th.D.
Springdale, Arkansas
United States of America

“We will never know that Christ is all we need,
until He becomes all that we have.”
–Corrie ten Boom

Dear Grands,

Psalm 37:12-20, “The wicked plots against the righteous and gnashes at him with his teeth.
13 The Lord laughs at him, for He sees his day is coming.
14 The wicked have drawn the sword and bent their bow to cast down the afflicted and the needy, to slay those who are upright in conduct.
15 Their sword will enter their own heart, and their bows will be broken.
16 Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many wicked.
17 For the arms of the wicked will be broken, but the LORD sustains the righteous.
18 The LORD knows the days of the blameless, and their inheritance will be forever.
19 They will not be ashamed in the time of evil, and in the days of famine they will have abundance.
20 But the wicked will perish; and the enemies of the LORD will be like the glory of the pastures, they vanish– like smoke they vanish away.”

There is no way around it. When the wicked do wrong, they will inevitably pay the price for going against the LORD. The arrogance of the wicked always says, “I will triumph over the ways
of the LORD. Nor shall His people survive against me!” What has the LORD to say about that?

What does He say? “Their sword will enter their own heart. And their bows will be broken. Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many wicked.” Why do the wicked always believe they will survive victoriously in battles against the LORD?
“Better is the little of the righteous,” the LORD says; “than the abundance of many wicked.”

Two teams aggressively take to the field to play. One seems so small, in comparison to the other. They look… like… H U G E! Those supporting the smaller team, hold their breath! “They’re going to make mincemeat out of our guys,” sideline supporters of the smaller team say. They almost wish they hadn’t come!

Then the game begins! Yet, to the amazement of that fearful sideline, those BIG guys were slow. The quarterback drills the ball toward the end zone, but there’s no one there! None of those BIG guys were fast enough to grab the ball. You know the end result. And you leave the field thinking, “Ya know, bigness isn’t everything!”

The LORD is our Coach! We’ve been expertly taught. No one knows “the game” like our Coach! Why are we worrying?
We have only one genuine concern: it is that we are on the Coach’s Team!

There’s an old story of a young preacher-boy. He had been asked by the old pastor to preach to the congregation that Sunday morning. The boy was acting like he was “somethin’ else.” When the time came, he swaggered up to the pulpit, winked at a few friends, uttered a few words of prayer and began his message. He had not be in the pulpit long before he confused his Scripture. He got his notes out-of-order and fumbled his way to the end of his sermon. In abject embarrassment, he left the rostrum and flopped down on the pew by the old pastor.

“What went wrong?” the young pastor asked his mentor. “Son,” the old pastor said, “If you had gone up the way you came down, you would have come down the way you went up.” That was the very problem with the wicked in our verses above. “Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many wicked.”

Be righteous, and be encouraged!

Heartily in Christ,

Gene L. Jeffries, Th.D.
Springdale, Arkansas 72764
United States of America

“We never know that Christ is all we need until He becomes all that we have.” – Corrie ten Boom

Dear Grands,

Psalm 37:3-9, “Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.
4 Delight yourself in the LORD; and He will give you the desires of your heart.
5 Commit your way to the LORD, trust also in Him, and He will do it.
6 He will bring forth your righteousness as the light and your judgment as the noonday.
7 Rest in the LORD and wait patiently for Him; Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who carries out wicked schemes.
8 Cease from anger and forsake wrath; Do not fret; it leads only to evildoing.
9 For evildoers will be cut off, but those who wait for the LORD, they will inherit the land.”

Whenever it is to our advantage to trust in the Lord, we expect that what we want and what we’ve made known to Him is precisely what we will receive. Yet, the failure to receive what we’ve expected leads us into a variety of doubts and often into the wrong pattern of thinking about what the LORD intends.

Take this forthcoming election. Regardless of the political candidate for whom you are voting, or whether your candidate wins or loses, the will of the Father will be the deciding factor. God is neither republican nor democrat. He is higher than either.
Thus, our prayers should always be “Thy will be done.”

Despite how elections go, or who wins, the will of the LORD is always primary, and thus our trust should always be in Him, instead of centered on some political candidate. Prayer, however, should be focused on His will, not on our will for one of the candidates.

Children don’t always warmly receive what their parents give them. The key is to receive from Him and to trust and obey Him. Many things for which I have longed have never occurred. I have to believe that His purposes are, among other things, to teach me to trust Him.

Content yourself, therefore, to Trust and Obey. God bless you!

Heartily in Christ Jesus,

(Dado III)

Gene L. Jeffries, Th.D.
Springdale, Arkansas 72764
United States of America

“We never know that Christ is all we need until He becomes all that we have.” – Corrie ten Boom

Jude 1:1-4, “Jude, a bond-servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to those who are the called, beloved in God the Father, and kept for Jesus Christ:
2 May mercy and peace and love be multiplied to you.
3 Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints.
4 For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”

Only recently, I received a periodical from a school I attended. It included a pastor-list that indicated how much time each man took to prepare a sermon. It was as interesting as it was informative. I had to wonder how many times these pastors were interrupted in the course of their study.

In the case of Jude, the Scripture above simply notes that he changed his study and writing to emphasize the need to write of the common salvation they all had in Jesus Christ.

Jude’s note is a reminder to evangelists and evangelistic pastors that the churches they serve need to be fed the whole Gospel from time-to-time. It’s not that there are no lost people within their congregations; rather, it is that the regular attendees need occasionally to be built up in the faith.

Notice verse four above. Some in Jude’s thinking had just “crept in unnoticed.” There are people who need and want to hear the gospel, too. They’re not regular church members; they just need to hear about Jesus Christ.

It just may be that Jude knew some who had “crept in.” I’m sure you have people like that in your church. I’m confident there are those like that where I attend. We need to be prayerful and ready to witness to anyone as the LORD leads. Maybe that’s why they came! May God bless them; and may He bless you, as well!

Heartily in Christ Jesus,

Gene L. Jeffries, Th.D.
Springdale, Arkansas 72764
United States of America

“We never know that Christ is all we need until He becomes all that we have.” – Corrie ten Boom