Hank’s Place

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All around us we find a mental health crisis. Chinese COVID and demonically inspired hatred of our president, have raised the anxiety level of most humans to the breaking point. Depression. Sleeplessness. Inability to function. Outbursts of anger. Violence even. Social media has become a weapon of darkness. Violent and evil feelings are vented for all to see in hopes we become – infected. Be like them.

There is a pathway to freedom from this mental and emotional stress, anxiety and fear – the renewing of our minds. Ro 12:2. “And do not be conformed to this world, world’s system, world’s way of thinking, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.…”

A mind set on things of this world, of life in the flesh, a life without the Spirit, is DEATH, whereas the mind set on the Spirit is LIFE and PEACE.” Ro 8:6.
So freedom comes as we stop thinking like the world thinks.

Watching a lot of news? Lots of social media? May I suggest your mind is NOT being renewed to God’s ways. There is no transformation out of this world’s system taking place. The world’s way of thinking is thinking based only on feelings, of thinking based only on doing. Feelings and doings.

Life based on feeling says, “How do I feel today? How do I feel about my job? How do I feel about my spouse? How do I feel about worship? How do I feel about the preacher?” “The president?” How I feel is my reality. Life by feeling will never experience the transforming power of God, for it is worldly thinking.

Life based on doing says, “Don’t give me your theology. Just tell me what to do. Give me the 4 points for this; give me the 7 keys for that.” Politically, let me riot and destroy to make my point. Life by doing will never experience transforming power of God, for it is worldly thinking.

God is not against the principles of feeling and doing. He is a God of powerful and passionate feeling and He commands us to be doers. But feelings and doing are insufficient foundations for the Christian life.

The first questions cannot be: “How do I feel?” or “What do I do?” Facebook is full of people who wander aimlessly, swallowed up by feelings and doings (mostly rants and judgments). Rather, our questions must be “What is true here? Where is truth? We find truth in what God’s Word says! We find truth in what the Spirit of the Living God speaks to us.

My dear friend, take time to read and meditate upon the word of God. And pray! Speak to our Father; talk to Jesus. Ask for divine wisdom and understanding, for the unfolding of – the TRUTH. Yes, spend time with God. Ask to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

You’ll be transformed, anxieties will leave, peace will come — you will COME ALIVE!

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At Hank’s Place we love coffee. In fact, for the past several years I’ve been roasting our own special blend of love in a cup.

Recently Mary and I visited Homestead Heritage, an agrarian Christian community just outside of Waco, TX. In the course of visiting I met Ben, (PHOTO) their own coffee roaster. Ben began with the same home roaster machine I use, but in his quest for that perfect cup of coffee, he went and bought an entire coffee plantation in the mountains of Ecuador! And the totally computer controlled 40 thousand dollar Diedrich roaster you see in the photo.

In addition, he is developing a machine to sift green coffee beans. (PHOTO) At gravity speed this machine examines each and every bean, looking for rejects. (VIDEO) Tiny jets of compressed air shoot the beans that don’t make it out into the reject pile!

Too small? Rejected. Split? Rejected. Chipped or a bit of rust or blight? Rejected and so on! The machine is looking to REJECT all but the best of the beans. 

This man is on a quest to achieve the very best cup of coffee ever and he’s well on his way!

Did you know many Christians, and I hope not you, think the same way about God? That He’s looking to reject the many and accept only the very best for His eternal kingdom?

NO! What works in the quest for the perfect coffee is NOT the way the Father works – Remember Jesus? 

He was the totally perfect one — who died for us. The Father’s plan, full of amazing grace, was to QUALIFY as many imperfect people as possible for His son’s kingdom!

God simply asks us to believe it, that God so loved the world He would do this – and BOOM we join His family. Jn 3:16.

Whosoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved – no exceptions. Acts 2:21.

Don’t fear the ‘sorting machine’ at the end of your life, dear friend, for you who believe are already accepted beans in the Lamb’s book of life.

And we all, as one family, are well on our way to becoming that perfect brew for the Father. 

Smell that aroma? Smell it today — and COME ALIVE!

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Here at Hank’s Place know that you are already accepted in the Beloved – Eph 1:6, and every spiritual blessing is already yours through and in Christ Jesus. Ask in all humility and thankfulness and you shall receive. We were not made to go it alone, to prove our goodness before God. 

Because we couldn’t be good, God sent His Son, to redeem us from this world and — ourselves! Changing our nature from sinner to saint, from outcast to sons of God. 

Hey, God’s on our side. He proved it at Calvary.

I’ve heard it said many times that God gives you a promise or several promises and then you are tested. If you hold on and never give up and grit your teeth hard enough, long enough, you pass the test and God rewards you with the promise. 

This is nonsense. Rubbish. Jesus passed every test and then switched the test papers for us, remember? 

In this world we will have tribulation, John 16:33, Acts 14:22 and more. God gives us promises to be believed, ahead of time, ahead of those tribulations. Why? In order that we have hope, that we retain hope and not let go of hope. They are a kind of lifeline to hold onto.

Today my dear friend, REMEMBER the promises of God that He has given you. Dust them off, confess them once again. Declare God is the Faithful One and He WILL bring you through whatever it is you are experiencing, and those promises are YOURS.

Do this, and COME ALIVE!

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At Hank’s Place I like to say, “You’ve come home.” You are welcome to come and visit, stay as long as you wish. We don’t have expectations for you here at Hank’s Place. And while you are here, we do hope you will taste and see that the Lord is GOOD. Ps 34:8.

The world has expectations for you. You must perform in order to be accepted. Even in churches today you may hear preaching about what the Lord expects from you. Now that you are a Christian you had better get your act together. Familiar? Such preaching fails to appreciate the grace of God revealed through Jesus.

My dear friend, listen to this excerpt from Ephesians 1:3-7 in the NKJV:  Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, (Father God holds back NOTHING from us – in Jesus Christ. Receive Jesus, believe and receive and receive and receive from the abundance of God’s grace, being changed from glory to glory). 

It goes on. In Jesus we are blameless before Him, and, get this, ADOPTED as sons of God. Galatians 3:26 and 4:6. It is His good pleasure, demonstrating His glorious grace. GOD making us accepted in His Son – forever! 

So TODAY — reject those lies about God punishing you. He has already punished Jesus for OUR sins. Reject the words of anger, hatred, violence so loud in the media. You are not condemned. You are accepted in Jesus. Believe the love which God has for you. Receive it, share with others; help them COME ALIVE!

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In 1 Samuel 17, David and the Virus aka Goliath have an encounter. Fear gripped all Israel. And why not? For 40 days this virus sowed fear – day after day after day. Everyone in Israel was talking — fear. Then along came David who had been with the flocks. He hears about the Virus and responds, “What is this uncircumcised virus to taunt and instill fear in the children of the Living God?” Well, he said something like that.

Today there are Christians living in fear of — the virus. It’s doom if they get it, they think. Hopefully they don’t say it, for our confessions impact our lives – death and life are in the power of the tongue. Proverbs 18:21.

Our confession? May it be like those 3 Hebrew children when confronted by that evil Nebuchadnezzar Virus. If they worshipped his statue, all well and good, “But if you do not worship the virus, you will immediately be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire; and what god is there who can deliver you out of the hands of such evil?” Daniel 3:15.

Their answer, “we do not need to give you an answer concerning this matter. … our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the blazing virus; and He will deliver us … but even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not afraid and we are not going to serve your virus or worship the news media that you have set up.”

So, are you afraid today? 

Get the cure: receive the love of God: 1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love.… 

Get the cure: receive the peace of God: John 14:27 My peace I give to you; not as the world gives .…Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.

Perfect love casts OUT fear. Let’s confess afresh Jesus, Son of God, as OUR SAVIOR, you know, who SAVES us from – everything! 

Let’s choose — TODAY — to believe the love which God has for us, and COME ALIVE!

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In Romans 10 we learn God’s righteousness is gained by faith. Only by faith.

That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. … For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For “whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.”

Wow! ANYONE confessing and believing in the person and work of Jesus Christ — is redeemed — eternally. Confession — has the idea of agreeing with. It means we recognize that Jesus is God, that He is the Messiah, and that His work on the cross is the ONLY WAY of salvation for mankind. Nothing more need be added.

Confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus. Barclay wrote:“If a man called Jesus Kurios he was ranking him with the Emperor and with God; he was giving Him the supreme place in his life; he was pledging Him implicit obedience and reverent worship.”

Robertson wrote: “No Jew would do this who had not really trusted Christ, for Kurios is used of God. No Gentile would do it who had not ceased worshipping the emperor as Kurios. The word Kurios was and is the touchstone of faith.”

Mere intellectual agreement with the facts of the cross and the resurrection is not enough. You must believe in your heart; and even that begs an accompanying action: confess with your mouth. Now get this: Paul is writing — to Romans. In Rome. Home of the emperor who demands you acknowledge him as Lord. Or possibly face beheading or crucifixion or a hungry pack of lions in an arena. 

So on the one hand the way of salvation was and is scandalously simple: believe in your heart, and confess with your mouth. On the other hand it was terrifyingly dangerous. Such confession could mean horrifying death. 

Perhaps you lifted your hand at the end of a service, with every eye closed and head bowed and told no one wanted to embarrass you but just slip your hand up for just a moment. Not very dangerous, was it? What did you say? What did you believe? Did you really get saved?

I can’t answer that, but if you have any doubts about YOUR salvation through Christ Jesus today, why not tell a few people you believe – make the BOLD confession. Unashamed confession. FEARLESS confession. Eye to eye. You can contact us here at Come Alive if you wish – we’ll listen — and rejoice with you as you COME ALIVE!

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On YouTube there is a very interesting chap who calls himself The History Guy. He’s very good and doesn’t take political interpretations. In one episode he was speaking of the most important invention of the 20th century, that’s the 1900’s: which is the transistor. In the 19th century the most important invention was consider to be Samual F B Morse’s telegraph. Yes, there was wire-LESS transmission, think Marconi and radio, but it was limited in distance and required huge transmitters and antennas. Telegraph used repeater stations and could cross a continent cheaply and quickly.

Many consider Samuel Morse the Father of modern communication. The telegraph BEGAN electronic communication; that is the ability to transmit information across vast distances virtually instantaneously, and this transformed human culture. We are going somewhere with this, really!

The concept that speech uttered by 1 person somewhere could be printed in newspapers word for word around the world the next day…started to break down TRUST between factions. It began to break down alliances between groups/parties that had up to then kept disagreements from becoming fractures.

The timing of that invention played a critical role in the Civil War. The argument is not that the telegraph caused the Civil War, but that the telegraph: instant communication of what others were saying, broke down the system that up to then had PREVENTED the Civil War. Quite the OPPOSITE of SFB Morse’s own belief that he considered everyone in the United States a fellow countryman. He thought his telegraph would help bring people together – in 5/24/1844 the first telegraph message was “What hath God wrought?” Remember?

Now, this is just a theory, but I think a brilliant one, in connecting quick communication via telegraph with a breakdown in society. And the question for today is: do you think today’s technology can threaten our social fabric? I would say we are already witnessing the rending of that fabric, don’t you?

From the beginning, Adam and Eve, when that Garden incident transpired, we see finger pointing. That’s ALL we see in media today!

Don’t let fear grip you – Jesus is SAVIOR of all mankind. In Him we are ONE. In Him there is neither Jew nor Greek, male or female, slave or free. Point people to Jesus that we may all be one — and COME ALIVE!

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Today’s word is ‘mighty weapons.’ We are looking a 2 Corinthians 10, 3 thru 5.

We may walk in the flesh, it says, but that’s NOT how we war. OUR weapons are not carnal but spiritual – mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

Although we are in mortal bodies, we’ve been given spiritual weapons to engage in the spiritual war around us. The Enduring Word Commentary by David Guzik points out the carnal weapons Paul refers to are the manipulative and deceitful ways his opponents used.

The Enduring Word contrasts carnal Corinthian Christian weapons versus those Paul listed in Ephesians 6. To rely on these weapons takes faith in God! But they are mighty in God!

· They fought with manipulation – we have the belt of truth.

· They fought with the image of success – we have the breastplate of righteousness.

· They fought with smooth words – we have the shoes of the gospel of PEACE.

· They fought with the perception of power – we have the shield of faith.

· They fought with lording over authority – we have the helmet of salvation.

· They fought with human schemes and programs – we have the sword of the Spirit.

With this in view, think of the battles going on today and where the real battleground is.

Jesus relied on spiritual weapons when He fought for our salvation. Philippians 2:6-8. He made Himself of no reputation. He humbled Himself to the point of death on the cross. Humble obedience to God’s will offended the Corinthian Christians because it seemed so “weak.” The human way is to overpower, dominate, manipulate, and out-maneuver. These are not God’s ways!

High things exalt themselves against God, arguing they have a better way, for they are smarter than God! Do you see, Paul is speaking here of carnal, worldly thinking among — Christians. Paul is dealing with the heart and mind of the church.

Consider these words dear Christian, take up your mighty spiritual weapons, and COME ALIVE!

[You will not be defeated!]

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Today’s word is “Distracted” – Do NOT be distracted!

Let’s check out Matt 16, beginning with verse 16. There Peter gets a download of revelation knowledge from Father God: Peter suddenly knows Jesus is the Christ, the son of the Living God! It happened so ‘naturally’ that Peter did not even realize it came from the Father. Jesus had to tell him.

Soon afterward an extremely revealing interchange occurs, starting with vs 21. Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders, chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day. Peter, shocked, took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. 

And Jesus replies to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; for you are not setting your mind on God’s interests, but man’s.” Another translation says, “…you are not mindful of the things of God but the things of men.” The Message says, “You have no idea how God works.”

Again, this happened so ‘naturally’ Peter didn’t realize he had become a mouthpiece for satan! And so confident Peter was that how he was thinking and what he was speaking was ‘right’ that he unhesitatingly rebuked—Jesus! Whoa! 

Consider that expression, “man’s interests.” How man views life around him. Government. Current events. Man’s view of civil rights, equality, history, power, fame – need I go on? Satan is a master at distraction. Notice it was not a temptation to outright sin like immorality or murder, or even jealousy or envy. Satan had distracted Peter from God’s ways – don’t you think Jesus knew why He had come? And had Peter looking at ‘things’ from man’s viewpoint: the Jewish expectation of Messiah coming in triumph, not suffering. 

There are tons of voices out there today, and they seek to distract us from our devotion to God and walking in His ways, seeing from His viewpoint. Anything that will bring our thinking and speaking down to man’s level will do. 

Soon we’ll be so mired in the muck that we’ll think God has abandoned or is punishing America for her sins. Set your mind on God’s interests — keep it there — you will STAY ALIVE after you have COME  ALIVE!

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In golf, the grip is vital. Same goes for baseball, tennis, bowling, gymnastics and a host of other sports. Sometimes when we are anxious and disturbed, a well-meaning soul may say, “Get a grip on yourself!” Might help in some situations but what about now?

So much turmoil in America these days. Just look around you. So many reasons to be afraid, or certainly very very cautious. It’s time when the expression, “Take care” has never meant more.

Is fear involved? You bet! There’s the response to fear: fight – we see that these days, more than we’d like! Flight – some folks are on the run I suppose. And Freeze – holing up, sheltering in place. Government from top to bottom is affected by fear, right?

Back to the topic of grips. In life as in sports, the grip is vital. Fear is a spirit, 2 Tim 1:7, and fear – has a grip. Fear gripped Zacharias when he saw an angel – Lu 1:12. Fear gripped the crowd when Jesus raised the young man from the funeral bier in Lu 7:16. Fear gripped the people of the Gerasenes when they beheld the man from whom Jesus had cast out a legion of demons. Lu 8:37.

What about Jesus and our Heavenly Father? Do they have a grip? Beginning with John 10:27 “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My grip. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s grip.”

We are in the grip of Almighty God. SO FEAR NOT! “In the world we will have tribulation, but take courage; Jesus has overcome the world.” John 16:33.

Jesus leaves His peace with us – giving it freely, and not as the world gives. So in the most unusual times, DO NOT LET your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. John 14:27.

God is not passive about His children. While we are in His grip, a very good thing, remember God has characteristics as noted in Ps 146. He executes justice for the oppressed, sets the prisoners free. Raises up those who are bowed down, thwarts the way of the wicked, and more.

Don’t let fear grip you – you are already in His grip! Meditate on this truth – you will – COME ALIVE!

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