James G. Owen, Author

God’s beauty can be described. His beauty is so vast it is infinite, and infinity is one of his hallmarks. His beauty is found in his nature, personality, and his light.  Yet, his beauty is deep, and has no ending.

We find his beauty all around us, in his creation, nature, and in the universe as we peer through mighty telescopes on earth, and suspended in the heavens. The colors he uses surpasses our palette, and his palette is filled with pure color.

His beauty refreshes my soul as I sit by a stream under the shade of a tree on a cool morning, and I listen to the water flowing providing peace and relief from the stress of previous days. The light I feel upon my face replenishes the vitamins as my skin absorbs it. His Holy Spirit does the same for my soul in refreshing, strengthening, giving me joy and peace, and watering my thirsty soul.

His light pierces the darkness both physical and spiritual, and all darkness has to yield to him. His beauty is also expressed in his love as he cares for his children through atonement, redemption, grace, love, and salvation through the sacrifice his son made on the cross outside of the city gates of Jerusalem.

Many things can be said, but let’s take his beauty with interludes and savor each recess. Just like being at an opera, or a symphony, bask in the lapse of time to enjoy the infinite beauty of God.

My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up.

Psalm 5:3

 

The prayer shawl is not just a reminder to keep God’s commandments, but is a tabernacle in which to come to him about any need and to visit him intimately. The garment is for the warrior in us to go to battle over our needs, our nation that it remain free and be governed in godliness. It is a garment of warfare, and the tzitzit being the most important part of the tallit, the prayer shawl.

We go before him as we pray under the prayer shawl by placing the crown, the atarah upon our foreheads and begin praying. If we want to pray in confidentiality, then we place the crown over our foreheads and close the wings.

What type of prayer should be prayed in secret under the shawl? The prayers for the nation, this nation, because we are having spiritual warfare in our nation between the forces of good and evil. When the people of God come together and agree then the matter agreed upon is brought forth. We should pray for our nation in secret so Satan cannot know our battle plan. Of course Satan is not omnipresent, and neither are any of his demonic followers.  Another type of prayer would be those prayers for your family who are going through tribulations and difficult times, and prayers to seek God’s advice and guidance. There are times we find people here on earth to go to for prayer and we do not wish that others know our business. Another would be for time in intimacy. All of us can understand intimate conversations as we have them among ourselves especially when we are talking seriously with the opposite gender, like one’s spouse.

The other prayers under the prayer shawl would be of praise and worship, of everyday prayer for needs of everyday life. An example would be of healing. Does God require us to wear the prayer shawl when praying? My answer would be no because I have seen many prayers answered without the wearing of the prayer shawl. I have seen many delivered of addictions, and healing, and more. So, when I want to have intimacy with God, or to study his word sometimes I may elect to wear my prayer shawl, and I have taught having the prayer shawl around my neck.

Those who have prayed under their prayer shawl their prayer fragrance have seeped into the garment, and the shawl is full of anointing. I am sitting here recalling two men from the bible whose shawl was full of anointing and they were Elijah and Jesus.

 

Note: All Scripture is from the King James Version Public Domain Biblegateway.

God has a plan for us, all of us, and that is why he created us to live here on earth. We have a purpose and a destiny. He created man for his glory, and to serve him and to do his will. Like many kids I was raised in church. Every time the door opened I was there because my mother and dad made sure of it. My dad was a Pentecostal preacher and they wanted me to raised in the admonition of the Lord, that I would grow up to love the Lord, live for him, and follow him. Even though I went to church and Sunday School I only had a head knowledge of God and Jesus from what I had been taught, but did not have an experience in knowing him through repentance and being forgiven. Things changed when I began to go into my teenage years. At that time I gave my heart to him and received forgiveness of my sins having been born into sin like all of us, and began a journey.

The journey I led from that point on was a path when I acted good, and tried to live right. Then there were times I would falter and need to be forgiven again. During my teen and college years I was back and forth because I was not established and mature spiritually.  Living in this manner for many years, I finally got to the point when I was tired of living in sin, and had to make a decision to follow Jesus. My reasons for following him are the same as other people, but I knew I had to get my heart and mind right in order to do so. What helped me was getting my head into the Word of God—the scriptures in the bible. I prayed for the Lord to help me, read many books from the Christian bookstore, and made sure I found a Holy Ghost led church to help ground me. I stepped out in faith and began to pay my tithes. From this point I began to grow spiritually, and also the Lord is faithful and blessed my effort.

My reasons to serve Jesus are:

Salvation. After reading many scriptures and a study on Hell, I wanted to make sure I didn’t end up there should something happen to me. I made a decision to follow Jesus and made a point to pray often to ask God to purge my sins. Now, I do that daily. I wanted so much to be in the heavenly place with Jesus, the new Eden, and to escape eternal death and torment that sin brings.

Deliverance. We all have burdens, troubles, tribulations, and needs. Others have addictions that they need God to help them overcome. Within deliverance is healing, and this can be anything of the body and soul, whether it be from a disease, or mental issues. Since God created us, he can heal and make us whole again. The disease will not be present, and our mental issues, troubles, hurts and all will be gone.

Forgiveness. This is the matter of the soul. One cannot enter heaven without God’s forgiveness and grace. Also, if we  have ought (an offense) against someone, then we must clear up the offense by going to them to set things aright.  Forgiveness brings about joy, happiness, and faith in knowing that God is providing for us, and having spiritual success. When we do need forgiveness at any point in our walk, Jesus is our intercessor between us and God.

Strength. Days come and go. Sometimes the days are hard, and people get on our nerves, or trouble happens and saps our strength. Sometimes we have family troubles, burdens, strife, stress, and at times demonic attacks warring against us. This is when we call on Jesus to send angels to minister to us and to give us strength, joy,  and peace in our spirits so that we won’t live depressed or pressed down, but to be lifted up living victoriously and overcoming Satan.

There are more reasons to serve Jesus, and it is a pleasure to walk in his light and beauty. Also, it is a joy to help others know him, and if I can answer a question from people who are needing answers, then that is a blessing to be able to impart the knowledge I have gained from study, and listening to God’s voice. An excellent reason to serve Jesus!

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

Matthew 16:24 KJV

 

Note: All scriptures were taken from the King James Version Public Domain Biblegateway

Crossroads. They are everywhere and we experience them many times throughout our lives. With the crossroads there are bridges we must cross as well. You and I are not the only ones to have met crossroads in our lives. All of us who have lived on earth has experienced this phenomenon. First, it is growing up to experience life outside the home, then school. The crossroads require a decision to be made, and the decision can be easy or difficult. The decision may also affect you the rest of you life. Along with the crossroad experience paths and doors come into our way. These paths can bring us pain, or victory, and it depends on the decision to be made. Within the decisions are doors that we must decide to open that will lead us into positive experiences, higher spiritual planes,or if we choose the wrong door in a decision it will cause us to walk the wrong path in life. So, the crossroad experience shouldn’t be taken lightly, but with wisdom we can make the right choice.

How do we decide to walk the right path, cross the right bridge, or open the doors we need to be successful and to bring us higher in God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? The decision to be made first is to humble ourselves before God in prayer and ask him his will and direction for our lives. To ask him if this is the right crossroad to cross, or do I need to turn right or left. We have already seen the back road and we don’t want nor need to return, especially if that road was full of sin and now are forgiven. We are to look forward, to the left and right, to think before we make any decision and to talk to God. If we don’t our life could pay the circumstance.

Making the right decision at the crossroad will bring us to a new dimension in Jesus, new growth, and within this new dimension we will come to a new door. These new doors we just need to have the faith to open and step in. It will be alright being believers because the Holy Spirit will direct us having been prayed up, and continually testing and asking the Holy Spirit for guidance. After stepping into the open door, we will find a new path, a new work that God needs us to perform, and we must obey in order to perform and do the task, but also reap the blessings within that new path. Each door we step into brings us to a new beginning in our lives, and as long as we live we will always have a crossroad to experience.

The right way in experiencing crossroads is to live for Jesus. Not every path will be paved with the luxury of gold, but will have potholes along. Without these potholes there would not be any growth, and with growth comes knowledge, wisdom, and understanding. Those potholes along the paths are the experiences that we will have to help others along their way as they experience their crossroad experience.

Take care. Find a friend and both of you pray for the other. We all need each other.

Sometime ago before early Fall set in here at my house I had an avocado surprise. I had planted an avocado seed and waited a long time for it to germinate. After a reasonable period of time I felt that the seed had passed, but one day I came out of the house to meet my day and there was the avocado surprise.

Now, some weeks have passed and I have let the avocado surprise grow outside in the favorable weather as it was cooling down, and the season of Fall was approaching. The avocado surprise was doing well, until one morning after being out in the cooling temperatures below 60 degrees. I looked down and the leaves had drooped a bit and I felt the avocado was telling me I need some extra care. So, I decided that evening to give the tree that extra care.

What extra care have I provided? I named the tree Avocado Belle. Yes, that’s right I have given the avocado a female name because she was telling me that morning she was cold and fussy.  So, I brought her inside, and cleaned up the pot, and gave her sustenance to bring her back up. She was really glad and showed her appreciation by showing her leaves in a rising manner lifting up to the light I provided and enjoyed the warmer temperature. I knew then by learning from her she loves light, sunny, and tropical weather, and cannot stand to be cold in fall rainy weather, and would be favorable to the Caribbean, Acapulco, or maybe Belize. She doesn’t care as long as it is above 60 degrees.   She is young beauty being only one foot tall, but her mane is growing and increasing to nine new leaves. Avocado Belle is really doing good and is very healthy.

She loves lots of hydration, and is very nutritional minded. Avocado Belle, if she was a human would definitely be working in the nutrition field because of her many qualities and her interest in helping people lose weight.  The tree is really growing fast and showing signs of quick maturity, even though it will take years before Avocado can bear fruit. She is rooting in well and on a good start to her adulthood of twenty feet in height.

So, you may ask since I have given her a first name— have I given her a maiden name? My answer to this question is yes, I have. Her maiden name is Haas. I told her the maiden name may get confused with Hoss Cartwright from the television show of my yesterdays, but she didn’t care because she learned he was a famous and very loved character.

So, this is the update on the life of Avocado Belle. Maybe she will have more adventures before she gets too big for the house.

 

How do I describe the love of God? To describe the love that my Father who is also called  the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob is to state his love his unconditional. All of us are looking for love, and the love we need is from God Jehovah that is found in the Old and New Testaments of the bible. His love brings joy, goodness, kindness, and his love brings salvation to which we have everlasting life with him should we perish here on earth. His love was demonstrated on the cross by his son Jesus who was the blood sacrifice that would bring defeat to Satan, and open up communication with God the Father through Jesus, and then later bring us the ministry, person, and works of the Holy Spirit in our stressful world. It is through his love that never fails that not only is salvation available, but healing and deliverance is available too. If we ever get sick, or our health fails to more complicated situations like cancer, we can bring our petition to God and ask him to heal. If we are in situations that needs deliverance from our sinful actions of drugs, alcohol, or any other situation that brought you into a place where you cannot break  yourself out of, God has the power, actually he has all power, to break these chains of sin that keeps us bound to them by the recurrence of those sins.

The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.

Jeremiah 31:3 KJV

 

And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.

1 John 4:16 KJV

You may ask has God done any of the above for me? Yes, he has. I am living in God’s love everyday and his blessings. He has healed me of diabetes years ago, and I am walking healthy today.

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

Isaiah 53:5

You may think that God doesn’t love you, but he does. He created all of us, and knew us from the beginning of the world and the universes. He has loved us with an everlasting love which never runs out, and his well never runs dry either because he will always be able to provide for all of our needs. No other god can do any of this. Jehovah is the only one, the only way to eternal life and heaven, and the only One who can bring life to all of us. You may know some people who are worshiping in other religions like Hinduism, or Buddhism. These gods cannot provide life nor can they provide any sustenance. They always fail. But the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob can NEVER fail at anything. His love is great! His love is far reaching, and he extends his hand to you today. If you cannot remember anything I have written here tonight, just remember this phrase God’s love never fails.

 

Note: All scripture used is from the King James Version Public Domain Biblegateway

Tonight I have added an author’s page to Authorgraph. This is a website in which ebook purchasers are able to find the digital book they wish to have autographed. After finding the book of the author place a request to the author through Authorgraph. When the author receives the request he will sign the book online. My book The Breaking of the Pumpernickel: Savoring the Beauty of God can be found by going to one of the vendors at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes. To see the Authorgraph website please follow the link. This may be a feature you will love to have for all of your ebooks.

Adding the Feature of Authorgraph

Weeds. We usually think of them in our gardens, lawns, and farmland, but the weeds I am referring to are from the behavior and actions of people. You have seen them and certainly heard them. You may have been their target, or know of someone who has had the displeasure of their confrontation.  What are some of the weeds that ignoble people present? I began to look in scripture and found in Proverbs 18 these weeds:

• contempt
• ignominy
• reproach
• contention
• the words of a talebearer; a gossip, or backbiter.

There are many more weeds, but with a discerning spirit we can see people trying to influence us in the negative way. Does it have to be from a friend, or someone we know for these seeds to be shown? No, it doesn’t. There are many influences like literature, television, news, speeches, and any other source that we may read or encounter. How will we know what is a weed that is trying to be planted? If it is negative, does not speak into your spirit, encourages, or is a good influence, then it is a weed. We must protect our minds and spirits because this is how we are deceived. We are deceived through half-truths, and lies.

What should we do? Be in the presence of positive, encouraging friends and listen and read  from positive soul nourishing sources. We are not to be friends with the “world” and to worldly things. We all know what they are. The worldly things that causes us to sin against God. If we participate in the ways of the world, then we are at enmity with God. With God in our lives, he helps us walk through the weeds and to a pure, fruitful field of fresh fruit.

 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.    James 4:4 KJV

If someone is speaking to you and it causes you to feel bad and you can’t get it off your mind, then this is what I would identify as a “weed”. Don’t accept this weed, nor allow it to get into your spirit, nor dwell on it, because that is watering and feeding the weed, and it will grow to cause anxiety, worry, and other distress. Any one who treats one in this manner is not a friend. They are the weeds.

If you are a Christian, then the weed has sensed your faith, and is trying to bring you down and to defeat. Continue to be friendly, yet be separate showing your light that God has given you and walk in faith.

 

Notes: All scripture used is from the King James Version Public Domain Biblegateway.

What is truth, and where can we find it? In my lifetime I have seen many ask this question, and some are still asking the question and are making journeys in reading, traveling, and seeking out various religions and philosophies in order to find truth.

The truth is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the truth. In him we find stability, love, peace, trustworthiness, dependability, and certainty. Yet there is more, and always be more to him as truth. His truth is inexhaustible. How do we find his truth? We must go to his son Jesus, who was born of a virgin and died on the cross. He is the world’s messiah. The way we find truth is giving our lives over to him believing in him as the messiah for our salvation by repenting of our sins. This opens up a link between us and God in a relationship which he desires, and was originally created in Eden before the deception by the evil one Satan.  In John 14:6 he tells of who the truth is.

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

In truth there is life, and his truth is forever, sure, stable, in righteousness being pure and undefiled. In truth there is wisdom, knowledge, and faith. By faith, we begin to see the light and to discover the way to eternal life and to break the shackles of sin that has us bound. How did we get bound by sin? The truth is mankind was bound by sin because of the deception by Satan who promised Eve that we will become like gods and know good and evil, and this is recorded in Genesis 3: 5,

 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

Again by faith we attain truth and eternal live through the process of belief, and that belief is enacted when we pray for forgiveness and sets us on the path to know God more and better, and also to discover more of his truth through his word, in prayer, and by listening to his Holy Spirit. As our relationship grows in God, HaShem Adonai, and as Christians know him as Jesus, then more truth is revealed. His wisdom and knowledge is revealed by our fear of God, that fear is defined as “revere”, and this word means respect and to obey his commandments.  There is no other way to find truth. Any other way, and I mean through New Age, paganism, occultism, or any other means that is not of Jesus, then truth is not found, but only spiritual death.  Satan’s form of truth is deception, lies and destruction.

To find truth is to get on the path of righteousness and giving your life totally over to him living, walking and obeying his commandments as you read the bible.

Notes

All scripture used is found in the King James Version Public Domain, Biblegateway.

What is a prayer closet you may be asking? It is a place where the believer in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob can go to have a secret talk to God about their needs, wants, desires, and an intimate visit with him. It is a place where the devil cannot visit, nor is welcome. It is a time of tarrying in the Holy Ghost seeking his anointing and answers to the needs or questions we may have. It is a weapon of warfare in which to go to battle for  you loved ones, your nation, and for all the nations of the world, and of course the unsaved people who do not know Jesus.

Is the prayer closet biblical? Yes, it is. First, we find it in Numbers 15:28,

Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue:

The Hebrew people call it the tallit. It is a place of prayer, a place in which to war in the presence of God, and I think of it as a tabernacle to sit in the presence of God. My maternal grandmother’s place of battle was literally in the closet. My mother would tell me she would go into the closet and shut the door and pray. When my mother went to visit she could hear my grandmother praying outside in the yard and knew to come back later until her battle had been won!  In the New Testament, Matthew 6:6, Jesus tells us of this place.

But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

Choose you a place in which to do battle, a prayer closet, where you can feel comfortable and have no distraction from people, or any happenings in the world. Turn off  your phones and completely disconnect. This is the place where all of us will find the answers to our questions, our needs, to get the peace of mind, and the peace in our hearts. There are many things in this world that brings trouble, trials, and temptations, and this is the place to carry to place it at the Lord’s feet.

The world is seeking answers and truth. God, His son Jesus, through the workings of the Holy Spirit is where  you will find the answers you are looking for. It is in the presence of God that you will find answers to your needs. Also, do not forget to ask another believer to agree with you in prayer. You are not alone in the battle. Having friends to pray with you is part of the battle. Always believe, and know that God goes before us in battle as well. He wants your time and a relationship with him. Get alone with him, and enter your prayer closet often. You will notice the change in your life.

 

Notes

All scriptures used are from the King James Version Public Domain, Biblegateway.