Gary Walter

Luke 8:22-25, 40-56 Jesus Christ has the ability to calm the storm, he has the ability to pay off the debt of sin for your forgiveness, he has the ability to take care of all of your needs when you seek Him first. Today Jesus asks you, “Where is your faith?” Your own sense of peace or anxiety will answer that question.

James 5:13-20 Prayer is not measured by its length—it is measured by its depth. It has been said that faith moves mountains, but prayer moves God. Isn’t it amazing that our prayers can move the heart of God who created the universe?

John 20:19-23, Acts 2:1-4 Let us learn from Paul in the book of Romans. He wrote eleven chapters on what God has done and will do through us before he wrote four chapters on what we must do for God. If we would spend time in our little rooms discovering what God is and wants to do with and through us, we would realize that being is more important than doing. We would discover that being brings a newer and deeper dimension to our doing, and we would discover that we will have to change some of our doings, even some of our good deeds, because they impede what God wants to do in our life, and they get in the way of what God wants us to be.

2 Cor. 5:17, Isaiah 1:18 John Wesley taught there were four aspects of understanding the Christian faith. Our United Methodist Discipline states, "Wesley believed that the living core of the Christian faith was revealed in scripture, illumined by tradition, vivified in personal experience and confirmed by reason." There are four basics about faith that Wesley taught. Scripture, Tradition, Experience and Reason.

2 Timothy 3:14-16 John Wesley taught there were four aspects of understanding the Christian faith. Our United Methodist Discipline states, "Wesley believed that the living core of the Christian faith was revealed in scripture, illumined by tradition, vivified in personal experience and confirmed by reason." There are four basics about faith that Wesley taught: Scripture, Tradition, Experience and Reason.

Paul explains that we are to be dead to sin AND alive to God in Christ. We must die to sin in order to become alive in Christ. How do we do this? How can we die and yet become alive? Paul tells us that we accomplish this through baptism. Through baptism we are united with Christ in his death on the cross. As Christ died and was buried so we die and are buried with him through baptism. It is a spiritual link with Christ. In our baptism we leave all the Sin and guilt at the foot of the cross and in the tomb. This is not the end. Paul continues saying that just as we die in Christ we also share in his resurrection. We are raised with Christ as new creatures so that we might walk with a newness of life.

Luke 10:38-42 Stress can eat us up alive and so we have to be proactive in our stress management. This means keeping our focus on God daily. This means living a life of love and forgiveness towards other people. This means talking openly and honestly with people before stress builds and builds to the breaking point. Christianity, the teachings of Jesus, are not just for Sunday school, but they are lifestyle choices that God wants us to make. They allow us to live life more abundantly and more happily in this life, not just in the afterlife. God does not want us to live stressed out, lashing out lives, and God gives us the keys to living that kind of life. We simply have to let go of ourselves and allow God to move in.

Ezekiel 2:1-5 No matter how improbable the future seems, God will pull us through, and sustain us in the fight, until that day when he calls us home to our true home land. A place with no tears, or struggles, or pain, or sin, or doubt. But until then, the refrain shall echo in our ears, no matter the odds, “My grace is sufficient for you."

Acts 2:42-47

Acts 17:22-28