TEMPORARY VS EVERLASTING...I CHOOSE EVERLASTING

Temporary: lasting for only a limited period of time; not permanent.

Everlasting: lasting forever or for a very long time

Eddie Murphy has a song called Temporary. Yes the same Eddie Murphy that did Party All The Time. Anyway the chorus goes like this, "Temporary. Everything is only temporary. But God is everlasting." Before you get thought that Eddie is trying to sing Gospel. Nah. It's just an inspirational song. Inspirational and Gospel go hand and hand, but just cause a song is inspiring don't make it gospel.

Let me go back on topic. Some of us that are addicts tend to look for the temporary fix. Whether it's a swig of alcohol, a hit of a joint, or sex, whatever it is, the satisfaction is only temporary. Why? Cause the next day or sometimes minutes later, you're looking for another fix. Why go for the temporary when you can go for everlasting? God's love is everlasting. It lasts forever. To me that's a no brainier. Don't get me wrong, I understand addictions. Some addictions you can't stop cold turkey. James 4:7 says, "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." How do you resist? Don't talk about it. Don't watch it. Get away from certain people that are no help to you. You may have to literally run away from it. Certain shows I can't watch. I have to change the channel. Music is usually my get away from a lot of things. A major way is to pray about it. Read the Bible. Fast. Mark 9:29, "And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting."

Matthew 5:6, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled." Another word for "filled" is satisfied. We go back to the temporary fixes looking for satisfaction but nine times out of ten we don't find it. If we start to seek ye first the Kingdom of God, we'll find an everlasting satisfaction worth it all. I know there's a saying out that says, "After you try everything else, try Jesus." Why not try Jesus first? Try God first. Don't try religion. Try relationship. Relationship with the try and living God. Temporary fixes vs an Everlasting loving God. Makes sense to me.

Stay Saved,

Daniel Richerson

YOU SAY THAT YOU ARE MY SHEEP, WHY AREN'T YOU FOLLOWING ME?

“You say that you are my sheep, why aren’t you following me? You say that I am your shepherd, why aren’t you following me?” “I told my sheep to visit the sick and to take the stranger in. When you see someone who’s naked, you throw wool to cover their skin. And you say I say I am your shepherd, why aren’t you following me?”

You got everybody claiming to be a Christian, but don’t want to follow. You got everybody claiming to be a Christian, but don’t want to live it. You see most of the entertainers that receive awards thank God, yet don’t want to follow.

“Why aren’t you following me?”

 Jesus wants you to follow him. Everybody can praise him. The Bible says, “Let everything that have breath, praise the Lord.” So if you’re breathing, you can praise. But being a Christian is more than praise. Don’t get me wrong, being a “praiser” is important. When praises go up, blessings come down. Like a parent that God is, he wants to be praised to perform. But how many people are praising but not following? Those secret habits that we can’t break, or should I say, don’t want to break, whether we know it or not, is hindering the way we live as a Christ follower. When we should be seeking God, when we should be seeking Jesus, we’re stuck in our habits. When we should be waking up thanking God for another day, we’re waking up stuck in our habits. We shout on preachers saying, “Jesus is a habit breaker.”

“And you say that I am your shepherd, why aren’t you following me?”

 We know who can break the habit, but we’re not following him. Some entertainers know where their gifts and talents come from, but refuse to follow him. We say amen when we hear, “Without God, we can do nothing. Without God, I am nothing.” Yet refuse to follow. Sheep follow the shepherd. Goats have to be pushed. Goats have to be forced. What are you a sheep or a goat?

“You say that you are my sheep, why aren’t you following me?”

 Many big brothers are annoyed when their little brothers follow them everywhere. Many big brothers try their best distance themselves from their little siblings. So we claim to be Christians, right? As Christians we have the best big brother ever. God is the father, Jesus is the son. Jesus, the son of God. As Christians we are adopted into the family. Therefore Jesus is our big brother. He is our shepherd, and he’s welcoming us to follow him. We got to stop with the secret habits. We got to stop getting away from people to get our habit in, whatever that habit may be. Seek ye the Lord while he may be found. Now if we want the habit broken, we can’t continue to entertain that habit. You know what gets you off. You know your weakness. If you can help it, don’t entertain it. Circumstances happen, believe me, I understand that, but that’s not an excuse. You may have to literally walk or run away, listen to music, read the Bible. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in prayer, but praying while you’re in the mood to do whatever your habit is won’t do any good because your mind isn’t in the right place. I know what I’m talking about. You’re in the mood. You’re a couple of seconds away from doing what you know is wrong. So while you’re 99% in, you try to pray. After you open your eyes and get off your knees, you still end up doing the habit. Why? Because your mind wasn’t on God. Your mind wasn’t on Jesus. Your mind was on the habit. God will keep you in perfect peace if you keep your mind on him.

“When my sheep hear my voice, they come running to me.”

Sheep knows the voice of their shepherd. So the question comes who are you listening to? Are you a sheep or a goat? What are you a sheep to? Who are you allowing to be your shepherd? Who are you following?

Leave a comment. Share this around if you got something out of it. Follow this blog. Friend me on Facebook. Follow me on Twitter. Follow me on Dailybooth. Follow me on Tumblr. Subscribe to me on YouTube. Thanks for your time. Thanks for reading.

Stay Saved,

Daniel Richerson aka Big Dusty

Breaking Generational Patterns

Remember when you said, "I don't want to be like my parents?" Then all of the sudden you find yourself slowly following the same pattern of your parents habits, specifically bad habits. Lets just say that one of your parents had bad money spending habits. You say to yourself that you'll never be that bad. Then you take a look at your wallet and you realize that you're doing the exact thing you said you wouldn't do. I think now is the time to break the pattern. We should all strive to be better than our parents or whoever is raising you. It's crazy some of us know that, yet we're still stuck in the pattern.

A lot of us know how to talk, but we can't walk. Heck, some of us can't even crawl. It's time to start crawling. We've talked a good talk for too long, but because we haven't done anything but talk, nothings being accomplished. For example, I've said for weeks that my room needs to be cleaned, but I spend most of my time watching DVD's or playing my PS2. So, you guessed it, my room still isn't cleaned. Some of us say we need to pray, but we still stay depressed and let life beat us down. Some of our spiritual lives are so dirty, and we know we have to get back to the Bible, but we're still being Sunday Christians.

We got to get to the point where we are so determined to not follow the paths of our parents. One major problem is that we don't want to go through the rough times to not be like our parents. Like the saying goes, "No pain, no gain." The Bible says that faith without works is dead. Which leads me to a question. Why are we relying on things that are dead to get us through? In the play, "Tyler Perry's: What's Done In The Dark," the character Cora said this, "Sometimes we hold on to stuff that God has already gotten past." The Bible says that if any man be in Christ he is a new creature. Old things are passed away.

We all got our own life to live. Our parents already lived or are living their life, let's not relive it for them. It's time to break the pattern. How do we break the pattern? First go to God and ask for direction. Then follow that direction. Please don't get to thinking that this is going to be an over night thing. That's not likely because you have to break away from things that we're comfortable with to truly break away from generational patterns. That old addiction that you can't seem to get away from? Time to let that go. The Bible says that we are slaves to whatever masters us. A lot of us are still controlled by what our forefathers did. A lot of us are controlled by the addictions we won't let go. A lot of us are controlled by the television, Internet, or whatever else we use to get entertainment. If we would just let Jesus be our master...

Stay Saved,

Daniel Richerson

Addiction is a heck of a thing

Addiction is a heck of a thing. If you don't control it, it will control you. Sometimes you think you've broke the addiction, but you haven't killed the source of the problem. So you go from day to day doing what's right. You're praying constantly, you're fasting, and you're reading the Bible. Again you haven't killed the source. One day you're searching through the internet and you see one link, one word, one picture...the specific thing that triggers the addiction you thought you killed. All of the sudden you're back in a funk. You're back to hiding and driving everybody away just to satisfy your fleshly desires. We try to crucify our flesh, but do we really know what that means? Or do we really know how to do it? If we don't kill the source of the habit, addiction, or what ever the problem is, we'll never get rid of the addiction. That means if we have to stop watching certain programs on television, so be it. If that means we have to stop going to certain sites, so be it. It's like you're trying to lose weight. You know you got to sacrifice certain foods. In essence you got to sacrifice what's feeding your addiction, but unlike most diets, no free day.

So my right ear has been giving me trouble for the past number of days. It's not infected or anything, it's just full of wax. All and all, make sure you clean your ears daily. The wax will build up. You can't imagine how hard it is to sing in the right key, while you can't hear out of one ear. It's annoying. Wednesday night at church, I went up with the choir, and when I started singing, I could literally hear my voice in my head. At some point, I stopped singing all together bercause of how annoying the sound of my voice was in my head. By the way, if you comment the blog and you coment about my voice being annoying, I'll consider that judging.

As like last week, I'm writing this blog by pencil and paper, and then I'm going to transfer to the lap-top. I'm sitting here thinking of what else to put down, and Ginger, my dog, is begging to me to take her out. I don't know how, but I think Ginger knows how cute she is. That has to be how she gets me to take her out early in the morning because if she was an ugly dog, I don't think she'd have the same luck. Either way, I'm going to take Ginger out and end this blog. Stay saved.

~Daniel