IT’S THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN
Daylight Saving Time begins on Sunday, March 8th. Therefore, be sure to turn your clocks FORWARD 1 hour on Saturday night, March 7th.
Daylight Saving Time Facts
Most western nations advance the clock ahead one-hour during the summer months. We call this period Daylight Saving Time. Benjamin Franklin originally suggested the idea. He wanted to take advantage of the additional daylight time in the summer when many people were sleeping. The United States did not adopt Daylight Saving Time until World War I, and today every state but Arizona, Hawaii, and part of Indiana observes Daylight Saving Time.
Daylight Saving Time lasts from the first Sunday in April to the last Sunday in October in the United States. It begins one week later in Canada and Mexico, except in Saskatchewan, Canada, which does not observe the period. The nations of the European Union observe Daylight Saving Time, but they call it the summer time period.
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THE MARK OF A TRUE DISCIPLE OF CHRIST (PART 1)
“If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow Me.”
—Matthew 16:24
These words strike at the heart of the self-centeredness we see so often today in the Church of Jesus Christ. There are many people who profess to be Christians and are members of a church, but their only concern for the church is what they can get out of it. The words that come from their lips are, “What’s in it for me?” They are what we call consumers. They take as much as they can for themselves, but they never contribute to the life and health of the church. They do not understand what Jesus teaches about true discipleship and how He calls every believer to live a life of self-denial.
Self-denial is a mark of a true disciple of Jesus Christ, and it’s a principle Jesus taught many times to His disciples. However, we must understand that Jesus is not saying to His disciples, ‘I will love you and save you if you deny yourselves.’ Rather, Jesus is saying, ‘Because I have set my love on you and have drawn you to Myself, therefore deny yourself, take up your cross and follow Me.’ Jesus is not talking about how to be saved, but how those who are already saved demonstrate the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit in their heart by living a life of self-denial. Does your life demonstrate that you are a true disciple of Jesus Christ? "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow Me.”
Tuesday Encouragement: March 3, 2026
In Christ,
Pastor S. Henry
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A CHRISTIAN'S SUNDAY MORNING PRAYER
My Father and My God!
Bless Your church this morning as we gather for corporate worship.
Protect Your church from the world, the flesh, and the Devil.
O Father, confuse the council of the ungodly who may be planning to attack Your people this morning around this world.
Keep Your hedge of protection over Your redeemed as we desire to gather for corporate worship to hear Your Word, praise and confess Your name, offer ourselves as living sacrifices to You, and exalt the name of Jesus.
You have revealed in Scripture that You are the Sovereign God.
One God in essence and yet three in person: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit!
You created all things by the Word of Your power, and You uphold all things that exist, both in Heaven and on earth!
There is nothing outside of Your sovereign governance!
You alone rule in the kingdoms of men as You so easily demonstrated with the powerful worldly rulers such as the Pharaoh, King Nebuchadnezzar, Herod, and Pontius Pilate. Your sovereign rule is the soft pillow that every believer can lay his head on at night!
Thank You, dear Father, for salvation!
Thank You for the forgiveness of sins, reconciliation, righteousness, adoption, and sonship!
I have absolutely no hope of salvation unless I am rescued by Jesus Christ alone!
My only hope is Jesus' righteousness, His atoning death on the cross, His rising from the dead, and His being seated in Heaven as the sovereign Ruler of the nations, and His coming again to gather up His people from the four corners of this earth!
And I know, as You have revealed in Your Word, that Jesus did all this on behalf of and in the place of His sheep, His church, His bride!
Thank you, Lord Jesus!
Holy Spirit, thank You that You are working all things together for every believer's good and our conformity to Christ (Rom. 8:28-29).
Thank You that You have promised to never leave nor forsake Your people, Your sheep, Your church, even me (Heb. 13:5).
We are living in a fearful, discouraging, and confusing time in human history.
Thank You for the promise that nothing can separate us from Your love (Rom. 8:38-39).
Please strengthen the heart of all Your redeemed! Strengthen my heart! Fill me, Holy Spirit, with Your power and Presence!
You have not given us a spirit of fear but of power, love, and of a sound mind (2 Tim. 1:7).
Keep my eyes focused upon the Lord Jesus lest I become weary and discouraged in my soul.
Thank You, Lord Jesus, that all power and authority is in Your hand, the very hand of the One who purchased the church and sustains and keeps every sheep of Your pasture!
Yet, as believers, we are, at best, partially sanctified in this life and therefore we must fight against fear that at times floods our hearts!
We must continually fight against the world, the flesh, and devil in this life as they assail us continually.
We realize daily that the Christian life is labor.
We must be diligent, self-controlled, and hard working even as soldiers, farmers, and athletes (2 Tim. 2).
The battle is exhausting, courage can wane, and many times we become discouraged!
Help us, dear Lord, to "gird up the lions of our mind and be sober, and rest our hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 1:13).
Help us to put on the full armor of God (Eph. 6) so we can make a firm stand against the world, the flesh, and the devil!
Help us, sovereign, gracious, and merciful Lord, to be faithful, diligent, persistent soldiers of the cross of Christ!
O God: Father, Son, Holy Spirit: I love You! You are my Sovereign Lord, My God, My Savior, My King, My Redeemer, My Shepherd!
I bow to no man! I bow only to my Sovereign God and Savior, Jesus Christ!
And yet I know I am inconsistent, sinful, weak, frail, fragile, and broken!
I do know that I love You because You first loved me and You shed Your love abroad in my heart the Your Holy Spirit (Rom. 5).
But I also know that my love for You is not what it ought to be! I know my love is growing, but is less than perfect.
I know that I have not loved You with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength!
But even though my love is imperfect, incomplete, weak, and at times vacillating, Jesus' love for You, Father, never vacillated, was never imperfect, never incomplete and never weak!
Jesus loved You perfectly, completely, with all His heart, soul, mind, and strength!
And He did so in my place and on my behalf and that of all the sheep that You, O Father, gave to Him!
And this is the righteousness I wear! Jesus imputed it to me in exchange for all my sins, past, present, and future!
Hallelujah! What a Savior! I have no hope apart from Jesus!
Yet, in Christ I am complete! In Christ, I have all that is necessary unto my salvation! In Christ, I stand righteous, holy, and just in Your sight because of Christ's righteous robes!
O Lord, bless me to walk in Your ways, and with greater courage to live unto Christ in this fallen, sin-cursed world!
Help Your sheep in the United States as the government has launched an attack against Iran.
We know in this world there will be wars because of man's unregenerate heart.
Keep Your people safe in Your hand as we live in this hostile world that hates God.
Watch over Your sheep in Iran as bombs explode and many people die.
Keep Your church praying for peace and crying out to Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
"He who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming quickly." Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!" (Rev. 22:20)
Heavenly Father, hear my prayer for the sake of Your Son, my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ in whose name and authority I pray.
Amen!
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My Father and My God…
Protect Your Church from the world, the flesh, and the Devil.
Confuse the council of the ungodly who may be planning to attack Your people around the world.
Keep Your hedge of protection over Your redeemed as You did with Your servant Job.
You created all things by the Word of Your power, and You uphold all things that exist, both in Heaven and on earth!
There is nothing outside of Your sovereign governance!
You alone rule in the kingdoms of men as You so easily demonstrated with the powerful worldly rulers such as the Pharaoh, King Nebuchadnezzar, Herod, and Pontius Pilate.
And Your sovereign rule is the soft pillow that every believer can lay his head on at night!
O Lord, bless Your people to walk in Your ways, and with greater courage to live unto Christ in this fallen, sin-cursed world!
Help Your sheep in the United States as the government has launched an attack against Iran.
We know in this world there will be wars because of man's depraved, unregenerate heart.
Grant wisdom to President Trump as the Commander in Chief.
Help him make the right decisions as he strives to protect the citizens of the United States from an Iranian nuclear disaster.
O Lord, put down the tyrants of this world either by regeneration or elimination.
Keep Your people safe in Your hand as we live in this hostile world that hates God.
Watch over Your sheep in Iran as bombs explode and many people die.
Keep Your Church praying for peace and crying out to Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
Keep us longing for the coming of the Lord Jesus, who alone can bring and consummate the Kingdom of righteousness and peace!
"He who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming quickly." Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!" (Rev. 22:20)
In Jesus' holy name I pray.
Amen!
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PREACH THE WORD!
In 2 Timothy 4:1-2, the Apostle Paul wrote the following words, “I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.” This is the charge the Apostle Paul gave Timothy and subsequently every minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
However, we live in a day of confusion, a day when many so-called preachers do not faithfully preach God’s Word. We read in 2 Corinthians 2:17, “For we are not, as so many, peddling the word of God; but as of sincerity, but as from God, we speak in the sight of God in Christ.” The word “peddling”, “Kapēleúō” in Greek, refers to a merchant who adulterates wine by diluting it with water for personal gain. Paul said in his day there were many men who were peddlers of God’s Word. In other words, they corrupted God’s Word by watering it down for personal gain. They ignored the truth and told people what they wanted to hear, and we have many such peddlers of God’s Word in our day.
Amos prophesied of Israel that the people “shall wander from sea to sea, and run to and fro, seeking the Word of the LORD, but shall not find it” (Amos 8:12). In the same way, today you can go from place to place seeking the Word of the Lord and not find it because many “preachers” are afraid to preach the Word of God with boldness and conviction. Too many “preachers” have a fear of men rather than a fear of God. Yet the Apostle Paul told Timothy that “God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind” (2 Tim. 1:7). The preacher is not called to be a man pleaser, but rather one who seeks to please the Lord by faithfully proclaiming His Word. “For do I now persuade men or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ” (Gal. 1:10). Many “preachers” do not understand their responsibility as a herald of the Gospel who are called to preach the Word of God in season and out of season. Simply stated, whether it is convenient or not convenient, the duty of the preacher is to always be about the task of proclaiming the truth of God’s Word. He is in truth a servant of God’s Word.
The sad result produced by “preachers” who do not preach the Word of God is weak church members who do not hunger for the truth of God’s Word. And because of this, many who call themselves Christians would rather be entertained on Sunday morning than hear the faithful preaching of God’s Word. The truth really is not important to many people who sit in the pew. If the truth were important to them, they would not put up with men who do not faithfully preach God’s Word from the pulpit on Sunday morning. Yet amidst the confusion of our day, the Apostle Peter wrote, “…as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby” (1 Peter 2:2). The duty of every believer is to cultivate a hunger for the Word of God in order that God might be glorified, and the church edified.
Do you hunger for the faithful preaching of God’s Word? Do you realize how important the truth of God’s Word is in the life of the believer? May the Lord give His people an insatiable hunger for His Word in order that He might be rightly, faithfully, and confidently proclaimed by preachers, and diligently, humbly, and joyfully worshiped by all those who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Friday Devotional: February 27, 2026
In Christ,
Pastor S. Henry
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WHAT THE BIBLE TEACHES CONCERNING HELL (PT. 2)
“Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.”
—Matthew 25:41
Have you ever heard this statement, “My God is a God of love and would never send anyone to Hell”? Those who make such foolish statements have forgotten at least two things: the holiness of God and the cross of Jesus Christ. God’s holiness demands that sin be punished with extreme, and the words of Christ from the cross, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me?” demonstrates that God does indeed punish sin. Therefore, to not believe in Hell is to reject the truth of God’s Word because Scripture teaches that Hell is a real place.
In the Bible, Hell is called a bottomless pit (Revelation 9:1), and a lake of fire burning with brimstone (Revelation 19:20). It is a place where unbelievers are tormented, held in chains of darkness, and the smoke of their torment ascends forever, and they have no rest day or night (Revelation 14:11). In Matthew 23, Jesus called the scribes and Pharisees the “sons of Hell” because they were leading the people astray with their false teaching. Do you realize that Jesus spoke more about Hell than He did about Heaven? He said in Matthew 10:28 that we must not fear those who kill the body and then can do nothing, but fear God who can cast both body and soul into Hell. In Matthew 8:11, Jesus described Hell as a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth where the worm doesn’t die, and the fire is not quenched.” He said in Matthew 22 that everyone not found on the last day robed in His righteousness would be cast into “outer darkness.” In Luke 13, Jesus warned that those who rejected Him as Savior would forever suffer the condemnation of Hell. And in Matthew 11, Jesus said it would be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the Day of Judgment then for those who heard His Word and did not believe.
In Matthew 25:41, Jesus speaks of the final judgment when every person will be gathered before Him, and He will divide them as a shepherd divides the sheep from the goats. “Then shall He say unto them on the left hand, depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” The time will come when unbelievers will hear the awful words of Jesus, “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.” To be under the curse and wrath of God is God’s just penalty against all who break His Covenant. To be cursed is to stand before the throne of God as a law breaker without the Mediator, Jesus Christ. “Cursed is every one that continues not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them” (Gal. 3:10). Yet Galatians 3:13 also tells us that Christ redeemed every believer from God’s wrath when He was made a curse upon the cross.
If you do not trust in Christ as your only Savior, I urge you, RUN to Jesus for He alone is your refuge against the wrath of God. Flee to Jesus because He alone can deliver from eternal torment all that come to Him by faith. But for those who trust Christ as Savior, Jesus has delivered you from the torments of Hell. On the cross Christ suffered all the blows of God’s holy wrath, which should have been directed against each of us, so that on the Day of Judgment, when Christ separates the sheep from the goats, all who trust in Him will hear the sweet words of Jesus saying, “Come you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” Therefore, give Him all the honor, praise, and glory as you endeavor to live a life of thankfulness for such a wondrous redemption.
Tuesday Encouragement: February 24, 2026
In Christ,
Pastor S. Henry
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A CHRISTIAN'S SUNDAY MORNING PRAYER FOR REVIVING
My Father and My God!
YOU alone are the sovereign God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit! You exercise all Your good will and pleasure in Heaven and on earth, and no one can stay Your omnipotent hand. No one can thwart Your holy will. You are fulfilling Your sovereign, holy will, which You have purposed from all eternity, and You are working it out day by day in Your glorious Providence. O Lord, You are awesome in holiness and infinite in power and You do all Your good pleasure. Your works are wondrous and innumerable, even as the psalmist wrote, "O LORD, how manifold are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all. The earth is full of Your possessions—this great and wide sea, in which are innumerable teeming things, living things both small and great" (Psalm 104:24-25). Your decrees are ineffable! As the psalmist declared, "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain it" (Psalm 139:16).
FATHER, You are wonderous in holiness, magnificent in splendor, and abundant in Mercy and Grace. You are the infinite, eternal, incomprehensible God, whose ways are past tracing out. As You declared through the prophet Isaiah, "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways," says the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:9-10). Father, if You do not reveal something to us in Your holy Word then it is impossible for us to know it! For "The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law" (Deut. 29:29). Thank You for forgiving me of all my many sins. Thank You for not remembering my sins against me ever again because of the person and work of Jesus in my place and on my behalf!
LORD JESUS, I pray for Your church! She seems to be in a sad state of lethargy! So many other things seem to take precedence over Your worship on the Lord's Day. So many other things seem to eclipse the corporate worship of Your church. Your church seems to be chasing the temporal things rather than the eternal things, even though You have called us to "seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness" (Matt. 6:34). As sheep of Your pasture, we shamefully allow so many temporal and earthly things to crowd out corporate worship on the Lord's Day! O Lord, forgive us! Forgive our slothfulness and laziness for Your worship! Forgive our indifference in Your service! Forgive our lack of thankfulness in all things! Forgive the sluggish way that we confess and turn from our sins. Revive us, O Lord, for Your glory and Your name's sake! Give Your church a renewed zeal for Your righteousness, glory, and honor! Give me a renewed zeal, renewed courage, and greater dependency upon You, Lord Jesus! For when I am weak then I am strong!
HOLY SPIRIT, revive us again! Grant us zeal for Your glory! Grant us zeal for Your worship and service! Grant us zeal for Your Word, for prayer, for giving and living for Christ! Grant the church singleness of mind and purpose so that we aim in all things to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ! Begin, Holy Spirit, in my heart, and in the heart of all those you have called as ministers of the Word. Grant us a holy zeal for Your glory and a deeper love for You, for Your people, and a heartfelt compassion for the lost of this world. Help us preach the whole counsel of Your Word and not fear the faces of men. Grant us courage as heralds of the truth. Help us bow to no man but only bend the knee to Christ our Lord and Master! As it has been said, "If we had a holy, reverential fear of the Lord, we would not have a fear of men. If we feared You more, O Lord, we would fear men less."
Revive us again, O God! Be magnified in the church!
Exalt Your holy name! May You be magnified!
For Jesus' sake and glory, revive Your people, O God!
Revive us again, O Lord. Awaken Your church to holy zeal, worship, and service!
Ignite our evangelism and boldness in declaring Jesus as Lord!
For in this, O Father, You are well pleased and glorified!
In Jesus' Name I ask these things!
Amen!
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