Don't Follow the Crowd!

     What do you stand for? What do you believe? Do you have a set of core values that you don't compromise regardless of the pressures to conform? Do you ever change them to suit a certain situation? When your with a crowd of people who do or say something that you don't agree with, do you speak your mind about it? Or do you just stand on the sidelines and say nothing? One of the things I've noticed all too often is that people say they stand for something, but when it gets time to actually make a stand for it, cop out and sit on the sidelines as people take advantage of this. It happens in politics all the time. A set of people are scared to come out in opposition of a cause they don't believe in because society has told them that you are not suppose to believe that. Or that your not suppose to side with a certain group because society has placed you already in this group. What do you do?

      Let's take another example. Football. Tim Tebow. Tim Tebow grew up with Missionary parents. Sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ all over the world. They stood for something. You've heard the story of his mother's decision. Abort or possibly die. She stuck by her core beliefs and neither of them happened. Now I'm not saying that because she did this is why she is alive. Only God knows. But the implications of her standing up for her beliefs even in the midst of what I would imagine, tremendous pressure to conform, has had an even greater impact. Tim Tebow's life has been one huge impact, that those in the "system" mindset have already labeled him. All his life, he's been told he can't play football. He's too slow. Can't throw. Never make it. All Tim Tebow wanted to do is play football. He broke High School records. He broke College records. And we've all seen what he can do in the what, 4 games he has played in the NFL? He took his team 2 games away from the Super Bowl! Tim Tebow is a linchpin. He stands for something. What he does, he does with passion and commitment and is not afraid to stand up for that. If he would have listened to everybody, he probably wouldn't be playing football! Who knows? 

      So again, I ask you. What do you stand for? Are you working for something you don't believe in? Are you letting others dictate your life? Don't settle for what life gives you. Find your calling and seek it with passion and commitment!  Trust me, you'll feel better. In closing, I want to share with you something my favorite English Teacher in High School wrote in my yearbook upon graduation that I cherish & have never forgotten. She wrote, "The most important thing I can tell you is to believe in yourself. There will always be people who try to tell you how & when to do things, but you carry within you your own best understanding of how to lead your life."

Linchpin

International Acumen Excerpt

Birth Pains

   

      The World Economic collapse.  Lawlessness everywhere.  Anti- Christian philosophies being uplifted.  Strange Astronomical occurrences.   Earthquakes.  Floods.  Famines.  Apostasy of the church.  War.  The alignment of the Nations against Israel.  The forming of the Ecumenical Movement.   Everyone's talking about it.  Some make fun of it. Some are scared.   But one cannot help but sense that things are spiraling out of control.  If you are a true Christian, you have nothing to fear.  Your destiny is secured.  But to those who deny the Good-News of Christ, I challenge you to examine the evidence before its too late.   


   Signs of the End of the Age

     "Watch out that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.  You will hear of war and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed.  Such things must happen, but the end is still to come.  Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  There will be famines and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of birth pains."
    " Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me.  At that time many will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people.  Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.  And the gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come."  - Mathew 24: 4-14
    

Godlessness in the Last Days

    But mark this:  There will be terrible times in the last days.  People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God- having a form of godliness but denying its power.  Have nothing to do with them.  They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth. - 2 Timothy 3:1-7