Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Jesus told us, “Do not be worried about the food and drink you need in order to stay alive, or about clothes for your body. ... Do not start worrying, ‘Where will my food come from or my drink? Or my clothes?’ (These are the things the pagans are always concerned about).” (Matt. 6:25-32, GNB).

Our modern malls are the temples where “the pagans” come to worship; more and more architects are designing them to resemble great houses of worship. And even for many who say they worship the Lord, the true God, the malls are the places to go in order to while away the hours, fun to be “concerned” about. The malls feed our robust modern economy, which in spite of the daily horrors of war has never before reached the heights of the Dow Jones and Nasdaq readings.

But the culture is basically pagan!

Then Jesus adds (in the KJV), “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness ...” (vs. 33). It’s probably for centuries that “we” Christians have understood that to mean, Make sure of your own soul’s salvation in the kingdom of God! (I can remember as a child hearing the elders tell me that the most important question for me is my own salvation.)

But is this egocentric concern what Jesus meant? When He spoke of “the kingdom of God,” could He have been referring to the issues of the great cosmic controversy between Christ and Satan? Is it possible that mall-centered Christians can “henceforth be no more children, ... but ... may grow up into Him in all things” and learn to share with Christ the burden of heart which He carries?

Yes! Jesus appeals especially to those who have at least some awareness that we are living in “the time of the [world’s] end” (Dan. 12:4) and of the great “Day of Atonement.” He begged Peter, James, and John to stay awake and “watch with [Him] one hour” while the fate of the world (and of the universe) was in the balance (cf. Matt. 26:40). But no, they slept soundly through that most solemn hour!

Hasn’t the time come for us to “overcome” even as Christ did, and take our position with Him on His throne, to share with Him the state affairs of “the kingdom of God” (read Rev. 3:20)? Let no one despise the unprecedented invitation that is pertinent for us today!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

We are invited to come to Jesus, “just as I am.” He “receiveth sinners” (Luke 15:2). We don’t have to make ourselves good before we come, in fact, we can’t.

But there is one thing we must “do” before any prayer can be listened to and answered; don’t misunderstand, this is not a “work” that we must do; but it’s a serious step that we must take if we are serious about coming to God.

It’s not that God is putting up a barrier to keep people away; it’s just that we have already put up a bad barrier ourselves that is hindering us, and it’s only common sense that any barrier we have erected between ourselves and God must be removed—by ourselves.

Here it is: “He that cometh to God must [1] believe that He is, and [2, believe] that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him” (Heb. 11:6, KJV).

This is a step that you and I must take.

I know someone who confesses that she is tempted to believe that God has dealt with her severely, that He has been, well, not nice to her in permitting all the trials He has suffered to come upon her. Everything looks like it has been against her, from girlhood. (She probably has many “sisters” around the world!). I know someone else who believes that God made a promise to her many years ago which has never been fulfilled.

And yes, I have had “dreams” which have never been fulfilled.

Dear friends around the world, whoever you are, yours and my job is right now to get on our knees and tell the Lord frankly, “Father forgive me for doubting You; I choose to believe that you are ‘a Rewarder of those who seek You diligently.’ It’s the hardest thing I have ever done, to confess that I believe this, for it makes me now to be a fool ever to have doubted Your goodness, your faithfulness, Your, ... yes, Your love. But You told me to pray this prayer and if I do, I can never be lost: ‘Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief’” (Mark 9:24). Thank You, Lord, for welcoming beginners in your kindergarten.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Millions of Christians around the world this weekend are studying the Bible story about Abraham and Sarah. It appears quite certain that young Abraham was the only person in the world at first who worshipped the one true God, for his father Terah was still an idolater, and still worshipped the moon. Jewish legend says (which may have a grain of truth) that young Abraham was so vociferous in his promotion of the worship of the one true God that the townspeople of Ur of the Chaldees ran him out of town.

Even so, Abraham was not a good example (through most of his life) of faithful trust in the Lord. In unbelief, he lied twice (to Pharoah and to Abimelech) about his wife Sarah; and he permitted Sarah to lead him astray, in unbelief, to marry Hagar (he same mistake Adam made, in putting his wife Eve before the word of the Lord). While it is true that a husband must love his wife dearly, putting himself out for her, he must also be sure to worship the Lord first! Love must never become idolatry.

Was it kind and generous of the Lord to let Abraham and Sarah wait so long for the fulfillment of the promise to them of a child? The Lesson Book being studied suggests that the Lord Himself was the One who “delayed” the fulfillment of the promise; true or false? Did the Lord delay it, or was it the unbelief of the couple themselves who delayed the promise being fulfilled? Let’s not accuse the Lord of violating His own promise!

In Genesis 22 we read the story of how the Lord told Abraham to offer his “only son, Isaac,” as a burnt offering. In Romans 4:11-16, we read that Paul was able to say that Abraham was “the father of the faithful,” “of all who believe,” because Abraham passed this exceedingly difficult test. What effect did this have on the waiting and watching universe?

Doubtless it convinced the unfallen worlds that God’s plan of salvation will be a grand success! He will have at last a mystic number of “144,000” who “follow the Lamb wherever He goes” (cf. Rev. 14:4, 5).

Have we come to that glorious time as yet? Or will our unbelief postpone it for another generation, or for generations?

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Pope Benedict XVI has captured the world’s headlines by claiming again that no one can be sure of eternal salvation in the kingdom of God except by coming through the Roman Catholic Church.

Doubtless he is sincere in this belief, having been trained from boyhood to believe it. The immense wealth and prestige of the Roman Catholic Church headquartered in the Vatican at St. Peters in Rome are impressive; but a still small voice of the Bible story of Jesus of Nazareth intrudes upon the conscience. The immense prestige and power asserted in the Temple in Jerusalem also commanded the devotion of the multitudes when Jesus faced them and said, “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate” (Matt. 23:38).

The teachings of Jesus call for our reverent attention today:



He waited until very near the end of His three and one-half years of ministry before He challenged His disciples with the ultimate question: “Whom say ye that I the Son of man am?” (16:13-15, KJV). They were clear that He is the long-awaited Messiah, but who is He? Peter was the first to voice the conviction: “Thou art the Christ [Messiah], the Son of the living God” (vs. 16). Jesus congratulated him for the courage of his convictions, “Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven” (vs. 17). “And I say unto thee, That thou art PETROS, and upon this PETRA [rock solid truth as massive as Pre-Cambrian granite] I will build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

PETROS is a little stone one can throw around; PETRA is the foundation rock which is Christ Himself. After poor unstable Peter had denied Christ three times and thus disqualified himself from being an apostle, he repented. Any thought that he was important was given up: he told the church of his day that Christ only is “the Rock” (1 Peter 2:8, PETRA). He knew he was nothing more than a PETROS.

Jesus urged us to study and “understand” Daniel’s prophecies (Matt. 24:15), and assured us He would “bless” us as we study and understand Revelation (1:1-3). There is an assurance that someone high up in the Curia will repent and join the 144,000 when the “everlasting gospel” is finally proclaimed so clearly that the earth will be lightened with its glory (15:2; 18:1-4). Perhaps it may be the present Pope! Don’t discount the power of the Holy Spirit to bring conviction, and to lead to Christ in repentance. Many things will happen when Laodicea chooses to repent.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

We knew something was wrong, but what, we didn’t. Grace wasn’t well, her color not good. Finally, the physicians said it could be the bile duct in the liver-pancreas assembly is blocked; and a Cat-scan said yes.

The surgeon warned: it’s an invasive, difficult procedure, and the picture is not definitive; there might be something incurable there.

For our 65+ years “family worship” we were this week reciting the 23rd Psalm (KJV) together (yes, we can; the Lord made us “one” that many years ago!):

“The Lord is our Shepherd; we shall not want.
“He makes us to lie down in green pastures, He leadeth us beside the still waters.
“He restoreth [heals] our souls.
“He leadeth us in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.
“Yea, though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death [Grace’s voice faltered here, and so did mine; then we went on] we will fear no evil, for Thou art with us.
“Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort us.
“Thou preparest a table before us in the presence of our enemies;
“Thou anointest our heads with oil;
“Our cup runneth over [anyone who can pray this prayer after turning 90 has a running-over-cup].
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives,
“And we shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

The procedure came this morning; our fears of something incurable were lifted.

Now we renew our dedication of ourselves and all we have to the One who is our Shepherd and Savior (and yours, too!).

And we pray for those whose fears have not been dissipated, who have to wrestle with a burden the Lord has spared us now; we are a corporate “body in Christ.” We “rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep” (Rom. 12:15), and rejoice to remember that the Lord Jesus Himself intimately shares corporately with all of us our rejoicing and our weeping. None of us need feels alone.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

We would once again like to invite you to attend the mini-conference, August 31, September 1 & 2, at the Meadow Vista Seventh-day Adventist church, Meadow Vista, California. The topic will be: The Book of Revelation vis-á-vis the Gospel of Justification by Faith.

So that the Meadow Vista Church can plan the September 1 noon meal appropriately, would you please let us know if you will be attending, and how many will be coming with you. Just reply to this e-mail with your name and number of guests.

We would love to meet all of you this coming weekend, but know that's impossible. Please join us in prayer for the meetings.

Sincerely,

Carol Kawamoto
For "Dial Daily Bread"

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The recent TIME article on “The Science of Addiction” has touched raw nerves in those who sense that “the gospel of Christ ... is the power of salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16). “Investigators have begun to figure out exactly what goes wrong in the brain of an addict, ... how deeply and completely addiction can affect the brain, by hijacking memory making processes and by exploiting emotions ... the craving that drives an addict irresistibly toward relapse—the greatest risk facing even the most dedicated abstainer” (emphasis added).

The writer of the article probably does not realize that he is commenting on “the science” of the gospel of Jesus Christ; it is the only ultimate solution to the addiction problem that captivates so many millions. In God’s plan, the church in the last days, “the remnant,” is to plumb these depths of gospel understanding, to proclaim to “every nation” of those “who dwell on the earth” a special understanding described as “the everlasting gospel” (Rev. 14:6, 7). It is to culminate in a message that “lightens the earth with glory” (18:1-4), in the process preparing a people to stand in the close of human probation, face and challenge the final “mark of the beast,” endure “the seven last plagues,” and constitute the welcoming committee who will greet the Son of God upon His return to earth.

Nothing short of this is worthy to be called “the gospel.” But God’s church in the last days, the seventh of the historical series of Revelation 1-3, has disdained this deeper understanding of the “everlasting gospel,” resting upon her self-appointed laurels as “rich and increased with goods, in need of nothing” (3:14-21).

The TIME article makes clear that addiction is a love affair with death. Christ in Proverbs 8 says, “All who hate Me love death” (the final thing; vs. 35). There is where we find addiction; the cure? Nothing short of “the mind of Christ” (cf. Phil. 2:5-8). To have the mind of Christ means that we are “crucified with Christ” (Gal. 2:20). The addict would fellowship with Christ as He dies on His cross; experience with Christ what the second death is (by faith); “taste death” with Him “for every man” (Heb. 2:9). Thus the addict “comprehends” the “breadth, and length, and depth, and height of the agape of Christ that passes knowledge” (Eph. 4:17-19, KJV). The addict will hear some rare preaching of “Christ and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:1, 2).

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The latest issue of TIME has a cover article on “How We Get Addicted,” confessing that all of us without exception will get addicted to something if we are allured or tempted enough; we would say, we all could become addicts if we did not have a mighty Savior to save us from it. “Humans ... will always want to experiment with things to make them feel good.”

Addiction: “Has a specific definition: you are unable to stop when you want to, despite [being] aware of the adverse consequences. It permeates your life; you spend more and more time satisfying [your cravings].”

Addiction: “Is a chronic and relapsing brain disease characterized by uncontrollable drug-seeking behavior and use. It persists even with the knowledge of negative health and social consequences.” Addiction will sacrifice heaven for the craving!

TIME rejoices in the hope that new brain physiology and technology will provide a cure. The egocentric motivation of the Old Covenant is powerless to deliver from an addiction. The article is full of the popular fear or hope-of-reward motivations; in principle, they are no different than the treats the animal trainer gives his pets.

The “light” that is yet to “lighten the earth with glory” will break through the present clouds and reveal the love of Christ at His cross as the true motivation for delivering any addict from anything, liquor or drugs. But most Christian churches believe in the pagan-papal doctrine of natural immortality; automatically, they are prevented from being able to comprehend the dimensions of the love that moved Christ to die the world’s second death. Hence, addictions win the day.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

We read often about “the faith of Abraham” and how he is “the father of all that believe,” etc., but only once about Sarah his wife being a woman of faith, and that at the very end of the many years of their waiting for an heir (Heb. 11:11).

She was bitter in her heart against the Lord all this while that He had been proclaiming New Covenant truth to Abraham (Gen. 16:2). In her unbelief, she did not state the truth when she said that “the Lord has restrained me from bearing,” from getting pregnant; the truth was quite different:

When the Lord promised Abraham that he would be “the father of many nations,” the promise naturally included that Sarah would be the mother of many nations because the two were married, they were “one flesh” in God’s sight. God recognizes and honors the marriage relation. Sarah was a faithful wife when it came to “works;” she prepared food for example, for the entertaining of his guests (18:1-8); there is no hint that she complained about her husband’s hospitality that made her extra work. All this while she was the good “Laodicean” wife of good works (cf. Rev. 3:15). Meanwhile, Abraham humbles his heart to believe God’s gracious New Covenant promises (Gen. 12:2, 3) and has this rich “Christian experience” of walking in the light while Sarah nurtures her dark unbelief.

Admittedly, her “burden” was heavy for her to bear: all around for miles, all the wives of the neighbors were getting pregnant and bearing children (every woman’s dream of success!), but Sarah apparently was being passed by, and this by the Lord Himself. It seemed that God was against her—“the Lord hath restrained me from bearing”(!). He leaves me to be humiliated before everybody!

She was as honest as Martin Luther when his father-confessor Staupitz told him to just “love God, that’s all you need to do!” and young Luther blurted out, “But I hate Him!” That honest confession from his heart was the beginning of Luther’s conversion.

Sarah at last confesses her resentment against the Lord; and now she is on the way toward resolvement of her problem when Hebrews 11:11 could eventually come: “Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.”

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.
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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

This week millions of Christians around the world will be studying together the story of Abraham and Sarah, how they waited until they were 100 and 90 respectively before the birth of their long-awaited child Isaac. It seemed that God was nowhere to be found; all their prayers and efforts to provide an heir were in vain.

When you have to wait that long for a promise to be fulfilled, you would think that you could be excused for getting impatient. But impatience is a sin. The Lesson book everybody is studying suggests that God Himself was responsible, who delayed the fulfillment of His own promise.

It’s this writer’s job to teach (or preside) at a class that will discuss the lesson; but this bothered me. Is it true that God Himself delayed the fulfillment of that promise of an heir to be borne by Sarah herself? (She was always his only lawfully wedded wife!)

This bothered me; if God Himself gives a promise and then deliberately delays its fulfillment, this looks like it casts aspersion on God’s character. It makes Him work against Himself!

Or would it be more correct to say that the unbelief of both Abraham and Sarah was what delayed the fulfillment of the promise?

Abraham’s and Sarah’s decision to get Hagar mixed in as a second wife was sinful unbelief; the result: family pain and tension. Ishmael “mocked” Isaac when he was finally born, suggesting that all through the experience, the affair with Hagar poisoned the family relationship of Abraham and Sarah. Let’s be very careful here; people need to be reconciled to God, not alienated from Him through misunderstanding His character of fidelity.

Up to almost the end Sarah’s heart was like cold stone against God (see Gen. 16:2; she was the first to blame Him for “delaying” things; she anticipated the Lesson book!). But Hebrews 11:11 makes clear that she finally repented, fully; and that spiritual experience made it possible for her to have sex with her husband with a melted heart so that the Lord could at last do what He had always wanted to do—enable her to get pregnant.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Would you like to have the joy of falling on your knees and thanking the Lord profusely for some huge blessing He has personally given you?

Like saving you from involvement in a split second car crash; you realize now how your life is not your own.

One day you wake up and realize that you have somehow escaped the ravages of cancer, that afflicts so many; you realize it is due to no virtue of yours; it’s just a reminder that your life has never been your own. Now you gladly consecrate your all to the One who died for you, just out of sheer gratitude.

Maybe you are a pastor: pastors are as susceptible to temptation as any other humans. But they are supposed to know how to endure and to conquer temptation. To fall victim to a sexual temptation would cover you with shame, would traumatize your church, discourage the teens who are in it; would break your wife’s heart and horrify your own children; and yet there are charismatic pastors we have all known who have gone down in that painful disgrace that never truly ends as long as they live.

You too have known that wrenching and alluring temptation at some point in your ministry. The Master Enemy cruelly assails busy, devoted pastors; if he can make a conquest here, Satan has won a significant triumph, and how utterly crushed is the pastoral victim: “The mouth of an immoral woman is a deep pit; he who is abhorred of the Lord will fall therein” (Prov. 22:14, NKJV and KJV).

If you realize you “stand” only because Someone held you tight when you were about to stumble into that awful “pit,” you can know that exquisite joy of thanking the Lord for saving you from yourself! The sun will shine now for a long time for you.

This is called “a heart appreciation for what Christ has done for us,” very close to being a definition of what it means to “believe.” “Henceforth” this is your motivation for obedience and service, not fear of hell or hope of reward.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Would you like to have the joy of falling on your knees and thanking the Lord profusely for some huge blessing He has personally given you?

Like saving you from involvement in a split second car crash; you realize now how your life is not your own.

One day you wake up and realize that you have somehow escaped the ravages of cancer, that afflicts so many; you realize it is due to no virtue of yours; it’s just a reminder that your life has never been your own. Now you gladly consecrate your all to the One who died for you, just out of sheer gratitude.

Maybe you are a pastor: pastors are as susceptible to temptation as any other humans. But they are supposed to know how to endure and to conquer temptation. To fall victim to a sexual temptation would cover you with shame, would traumatize your church, discourage the teens who are in it; would break your wife’s heart and horrify your own children; and yet there are charismatic pastors we have all known who have gone down in that painful disgrace that never truly ends as long as they live.

You too have known that wrenching and alluring temptation at some point in your ministry. The Master Enemy cruelly assails busy, devoted pastors; if he can make a conquest here, Satan has won a significant triumph, and how utterly crushed is the pastoral victim: “The mouth of an immoral woman is a deep pit; he who is abhorred of the Lord will fall therein” (Prov. 22:14, NKJV and KJV).

If you realize you “stand” only because Someone held you tight when you were about to stumble into that awful “pit,” you can know that exquisite joy of thanking the Lord for saving you from yourself! The sun will shine now for a long time for you.

This is called “a heart appreciation for what Christ has done for us,” very close to being a definition of what it means to “believe.” “Henceforth” this is your motivation for obedience and service, not fear of hell or hope of reward.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Does the Lord respect the prayerful commitment of a teenager? Or, because he is so young, does He trivialize it?

(a) He very seriously noticed the devotion of teenage Abraham in Ur of the Chaldees when the boy insisted on worshipping the one true God, the God who made the moon rather than worship the moon itself, as father Terah did. Apparently young Abraham was the only teenager in the world at the time who worshipped the one true God (Gen. 11:27-12:1-3).

(b) When teenager Joseph wept his eyes out the night after he had been sold as a slave to the Midianites, he resolved in solemn prayer to dedicate himself heart and soul to God; his prayer was respected in heaven. Even though great trials of faith followed, the Lord never trivialized Joseph’s teenage devotion. He loves to interact with serious-minded teenagers!

(c) Samuel hadn’t even reached his teen years when the Lord chose him as the only person in Israel He could entrust with a serous message for Eli (and thus for the nation; 1 Sam. 3). And even as a teen, Samuel’s words were not permitted to “fall to the ground“ (vs. 19). Many a mature pastor would love to know that the Lord will bless his “words” accordingly!

(d) David was a shepherd-boy-teen when a “lion ... took a lamb out of the flock, and [he] went after him, and smote him, ... caught him by his beard, and ... slew him.” He also slew a bear! (17:34-36). Whether David had time to pray during these exploits we do not know; but his devotion to duty was total; God respected him. David set his course for life, during his teen years.

(e) Daniel was another teen who committed himself heart and soul to the Lord, and the Lord respected his commitment and the boy grew to be a man “greatly beloved” in heaven (9:23). Wouldn’t you like to hear an angel tell you that?

(f) Jesus wasn’t yet quite a teen when He watched His first Passover; when it dawned on Him that Someone sinless must die for the sins of the world, as “the Lamb of God,” His young heart thrilled with the resolve that He would surrender himself to be that Lamb. The Father noticed His prayer and took Him seriously.

Yes, teens: grow up! You are very important in the economy of God, especially in this cosmic Day of Atonement. The Heavenly Father takes you seriously!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

If you wish that you knew how to pray a prayer that would be answered by Heaven 100% in the affirmative, here are a few examples:

“Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief” (Mark 9:24, KJV). Read the context of the prayer; the man was absolutely desperate; he confessed the truth of his latent unbelief that he knew was deep in his heart. He was on the verge of losing everything, for Jesus had told him plainly that “if thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth” (vs. 23). The man didn’t know how to believe! He felt he couldn’t because three-fourths of the pastors and evangelists of his day also were helpless to lead him to genuine faith (it’s pathetic even today when a sincere soul seeks the Lord but finds the majority of pastoral leadership simply mocks your heart cries). And yet the distraught man chose to believe when he did not feel like believing and saw no evidence that believing would do any good. That is an inspired pattern of genuine “Christian experience”! Linger on it; it’s pregnant with good news.

Another prayer that will surely be answered in the affirmative is this: “God, be merciful to me, the sinner” (Luke 18:13, margin). The article is in the original Greek; the man was saying, Lord, of the two of us praying here, I know that this great man here is more worthy than I am; of the two of us, please answer his prayer. But Lord, I am so unworthy in contrast. All I can pray is, please be merciful to me, the one who is most unworthy, THE sinner.

You have a divinely inspired assurance that the man’s prayer was answered in the affirmative for eternity (vs. 14). He could become the happiest man in heaven when he arises in the first resurrection!

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

This week millions of Christians around the world are beginning a 13-week series of Bible studies into marriage, studying some Bible marriages that were happy (few!), and others that exhibited problems. The series will culminate in #13, devoted to “the marriage of the Lamb.”

Our infinite heavenly Father looks with kindness and mercy on the many people who suffer unhappiness in marriage; He also looks with the same grace on those who long to get married and experience the love of a spouse, but cannot. All should “rest in the Lord” (Psalm 37, please re-read the entire psalm), and let Him encourage you.

One can be terribly lonely in an unhappy marriage; Adam was very lonely before the Lord brought Eve to him. His loneliness would have been impossible to assuage. But the infinite Creator performed a surgery to fulfill His ministry of mercy.

Drink in Psalm 37 and let Him bring you “the ministry of healing.”

We read of one man who had been forced to be castrated in the cruelty of war (the prophet Daniel) who was in a special sense “greatly beloved” of heaven ( 10:11). The man who was bereft of earthly or human love was granted the love of heavenly beings; you can be sure that his heart thrilled with this “companionship.” But such “love” from heavenly beings did not make him in any sense arrogant; although no human loved him as a wife would love a husband, he loved people with heaven’s disinterested love.

And he was happy—which married people long to be!

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If you would like to receive weekly e-mails, “Insights,” which relate this 13-week series of Bible studies to the gospel message of righteousness by faith, please reply to this “Dial Daily Bread,” and add the words Subscribe Insights to the subject line. “Insights” are written by several authors, one of whom is the author of “Dial Daily Bread.” If you are already an “Insights” subscriber, please do not re-subscribe. (To read these in a blog: click here.)

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

To “believe” in Christ is to let one’s little shriveled up selfish heart be “enlarged” and “quickened” (made alive) to at least begin to “comprehend” the “breadth, and length, and depth, and height” of the love of Christ which “passes knowledge” (Psalm 119:25, 32; Eph. 3:14-21).

It’s painful, not because the Lord wants to hurt us, but because we have been “brought forth in iniquity” (Psalm 51:5, “shapen” in it, KJV), and every cell of our souls is egocentric in its being. You sit with legs crossed, your leg “goes to sleep,” you lose consciousness in it, it feels as though it is not there; then when it begins to “awake” it tingles with painful feelings. When you’re being converted, you’re being “born again” and it tingles with painful feelings; it’s always painful to be “born,” much nicer to stay snug and cozy in mother’s womb.

But your Creator and Savior says No, come out into the world and face Reality; be what you are; share life with its Author. The New Covenant gospel assures you that even though you have left the “womb,” you are still as secure in the battlefields of life as if you were still in the womb. The Lord assures you, “’I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we may boldly say, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?’” (Heb. 13:5, 6). So, now instead of cozying up in the “womb” you are living by faith. Exciting, but it’s living with Christ.

To refuse to be “born” is therefore the sin of unbelief.

God is not saying that you must DO this or DO that in order to be saved eternally; but He has to tell us, You MUST believe: “without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe [1] that He is and [2] that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (11:6). Hard work, learning to believe? It will stretch every “muscle” of your soul, but it’s the beginning of eternal life.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The Samaritans were right when they declared Jesus of Nazareth to be “the Savior of the world” (John 4:42). He is not just the Savior of the Jews. They discerned that it is He who “gives life to the world” (John 6:33).

The Father “laid on Him the iniquity of us all” (Isa. 53:6). He has “tasted death for every man” (Heb. 2:9). He is a cosmic Savior, “the last Adam” who is the true “Father” of the human race having taken over the lordship of the world from the first Adam (1 Cor. 15:21, 22).

Thus Christ has reversed the evil that the first Adam brought on the entire human race (Rom. 5:15-18). The Samaritans at the village Sychar knew nothing of what Romans and Hebrews were later to declare, but they were dead right in their conclusion about who Jesus is. (And they didn’t ask any theologians!)



If the Samaritans were right (and they were!), then Christ also is the world’s great “High Priest” that Hebrews talks about so much (2:17, 3:1, 4:14, etc.), not just the high priest of the Jews or of the professing Christians.

And if so (and it is true!), then the great antitypical Day of Atonement is the world’s Day of Atonement! Fox, CNN, the NY Times, Time, Newsweek, all should be trumpeting the news everywhere.

According to Revelation 18:1-4, they will—when the “earth [is] lightened” with the glory of the good news. The Enemy can not succeed forever in keeping that truth of the fourth angel’s message “from the world.” The Lord Christ is to be “crowned King of kings and Lord of lords” and His “angel” knows how to get the attention of the world.

And all this glorious good news need not await another century; all the Lord needs is a people who will not further oppose the message, but whom He will be safe to put on the stage for the intense scrutiny of the world (and of the universe!), a people in whom He and His truth can be glorified, a people who have “grown up” out of their spiritual infancy to become “the Lamb’s wife” (Eph. 4:15; Rev. 19:7, 8).

Isn’t that a truth worth living for, worth giving your all for?

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Who is Jesus Christ? The glib, thoughtless answer: “The Son of God.” Yes, 100% true. But more:

He is also “The Son of man.” The Father “sent” His Son in “the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom. 8:3). He became One of us, eternally to bear our human nature as well as His divine nature. That also is 100% true.

But what has He accomplished by this great condescension and sacrifice?

Jesus’ job description, when the Father sent Him down to this dark world, was: save that lost world! He told His Father that He had “finished the work You gave Me to do” (John 17:4); yet why is the world more sinful than ever?

Christ did His work; He did “save the world.” The grace of God has abounded “much more” than all the sin in the world (Rom. 5:20, 21); but people have “frustrated” that grace (see Gal. 2:21). They don’t appreciate the cross where that grace was displayed. What has gone wrong?

The answer: something that popular Christianity seems unable to grasp. Even the seventh of those great churches of history (“Laodicea”) reacts to the cross in a lackadaisical, careless way, “lukewarm” (Rev. 3:14-21). There is a little Greek word in the Lord’s message that doesn’t get through in any of the English translations—“ho,” which makes Jesus say, “Of all the seven churches of history, you are the one outstandingly wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked” (vs. 17).

Both “Babylon” and Laodicea fail to grasp that Jesus died the second death of every person who has ever been born: “He by the grace of God tasted [the second] death for every person” (Heb. 2:9). Not just our “sleep.” The sacrifice on the cross was infinitely greater than “we” have been able to “see.” The teaching of natural immortality is the bottom-line factor that makes distortion of truth possible; it says Jesus didn’t truly die the real thing, our wages of sin—death! Thus He didn’t “pay it all.”

No wonder the general response has been so lukewarm!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The story of Joseph in the Bible is no fairy tale; Egyptian history and archeology attest how true to historic life the details are.

It fits well in the Hyksos era, for the Pharaohs were not native Egyptians. They could well have employed a Hebrew in a high government post.

Egyptian records show how there came a change in national economy when all the land except in temples was acquired by the crown. We can trust our Bible story!

Is Joseph a type of the church that will proclaim a message that “lightens the earth with glory” in our last days?

This special church is given “the spirit of prophecy” as Joseph was gifted (see Rev. 12:17; 19:10).

It must pass the test of moral purity, as Joseph passed the test with Potiphar’s wife tempting him. “Fornication” or “adultery” is not to be even mentioned among that people who “overcome even as Christ overcame” (Rev. 3:21).

The church that proclaims a message that lightens the earth with glory will suffer persecution, as Joseph suffered it from his brothers and even his father.

The last-days’ message will save people; lives will be changed; characters will become “at one” with God. Joseph saved many people’s lives; the “remnant church” will proclaim a message that will lead many souls to eternal life.

But every one who will partake of the blessing will know first-hand “the chastening of the Lord” (Heb. 12:5-12). That will make more distinct how much the Lord loves him/her! That agape will be the dominant element of the final message.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The world is stunned by the tragic news of a 13 year old girl getting her legs cut off on a “thrill ride” at a carnival. Kids flock in droves to these “Superman Towers of Power,” a ride that lifts them 177 feet straight up and then drops them at 54 miles an hour; they love the “wham” feeling it gives them (incidentally, those carnivals which appear to be a harmless atmosphere are not healthful for youth who are serious about following Jesus Christ).



These thrill rides manufactured in Switzerland have been ridden by millions in many lands; but this time a cable broke, and the teenage girl is left to suffer for life.



Joseph in the Old Testament suffered the original painful “thrill ride” when the Lord “lifted [him] up and cast [him] down” (see Psalm 102:10, KJV). The “lifting up” came with the gift of the spirit of prophecy when the Lord gave him those two wonderful dreams of future vindication: his brothers would bow down to him and even his father (see Gen. 37:5-11).



The “cast him down” came when they all turned against him; the ten brothers “hated him yet the more” because he had been given this gift of prophecy, and even his father “rebuked him.” Joseph’s teenage world was shattered, even worse than that of this 13 year old girl in Kentucky.



And then his ten brothers sold him as a common slave into the darkness of Egypt. Joseph cried his eyes out that night. For teenage Joseph, this was “whom the LORD loves He chastens” at the most painful point imaginable; a teenage boy may be shattered when the girl he loves rejects him, but this was an even more painful rejection—the ten brothers and his father were his precious, beloved “true church” of the day!



Did the heavenly Father still love and respect him? In that answer you find the comfort and encouragement your heart yearns for.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Does the Lord love some people more than others? Peter, James, and John were special disciples to Jesus, and John was the one whom in a very special sense, “Jesus loved” (John 13:33). They were eager students in the “school of Christ” like those who sit on the front row in class.

The Holy Spirit tells us:

(a) Don’t “despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him: for whom the LORD loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives” (Heb. 12:5, 6).

(b) Some people go through life like it’s a picnic (“have a continual feast ... ,” Prov. 15:15). Others are “gifted” with pain, sorrow, and disappointments. In the end, “gifts” more valuable.

(c) Did the Lord love Joseph more than He loved the ten brothers who sold him into slavery? All eleven were in “the church” of that day; He had a very special work for Joseph to do—hence his special “chastening” (discipline). Joseph seems to be a type of Christ, the Savior of the world, because he saved his family and yes the Middle East world of that day, from starvation in the great famine of seven years (Gen. 41:41ff).

(d) For Joseph to have become able to hold that high position required all that special discipline. The LORD’s love therefore had to be manifested in that very unique way.

(e) No discipline (“chastening”) “seems to be joyful for the present,” that is, when you endure it you seem to be missing out on the picnic. It’s “grievous,” painful; “nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it” (vs. 11).

(f) It may be hard to see through your tears now, but it’s New Covenant training because it prepares you for that place of honor in the Lord’s economy: “You shall be a blessing” wherever you go throughout the earth in your life time (Gen. 12:2, NC promises!); all who knew you will thank the Lord for giving you to their world!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

What does it mean to “glory ... in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” as the apostle says in Galatians 6:14—“God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ”? To “glory” in something is to revel in it, to be absorbed in it, to think of it day and night, to live for it; we do that all the time when we “glory” in our speed boat, or in our wardrobe, or in our palace-like house, or even in our garden, or in our special abilities that make people envy us. How can we learn to “glory in the cross”?

To “glory” in earthly things is idolatry; and the end is boredom (the nursing homes are full of people who have spent their lives in various forms of idolatry and now have nothing to live for).

To “glory in the cross of Christ” would be a delightful experience if one knew how to do it; but what does the cross mean to us?

Christ suffered for us, but the soldiers who are dying in Iraq are also suffering; some of them lie in agony, wounded, for longer times than Jesus suffered on His cross. What is so special about the suffering of Jesus? When Paul “gloried in the cross” the world itself was “crucified to [him]” and he was “dead” to its alluring temptations; the cross of Christ had done something for him and to him. The love (agape) demonstrated there impacted him so deeply that “henceforth” he was “constrained” to devote himself to the cause and mission of Christ; he was “crucified with Christ” (2:20). It wasn’t because Paul was a super-hero; he was a sinner by nature as much as any of us; he said he was “less than the least of all sinners” (Eph. 3:8).

What the apostle “saw” we can “see” today: the death that Jesus died on His cross was not the ordinary “death” we know; He died “the second death” (Rev. 2:11; 20:12-15), which meant under “the curse of God,” the horror of the endless darkness of hell; and Christ suffered it for every human soul on earth (Gal. 3:13; Heb. 2:9). Let the solemn truth stretch your mind and “enlarge [your] heart” as David prays (Psalm 119: 32), so you can “comprehend” its vast dimensions (Eph. 3:14-19).

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The last book of the Holy Bible is “the Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants—things which must shortly take place” (1:1).

This presupposes that God has people on earth whom He acknowledges as “His servants” who appreciate the gift of this “Revelation.”

Throughout history “the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity whose name is holy [who] dwells in the high and holy place” has had those “servants.” They have always been of “a contrite and humble spirit” who “tremble at [His] word,” not in fear or abject terror but with holy excitement as they have traced in history the fulfillment of that “prophecy” (Isa. 57:15; 66:2). A special angel had “signified” the holy “revelation” in symbolic language that enabled inspiration to tell a vast amount of truth in only a few words (Rev. 1:1), words that scoffers and fools might despise but which God’s “servants” would reverence until the end of time.

One such “contrite” person was a man now almost universally despised for his part in sacred history—William Miller, honored by those who knew him as “father Miller.” A veteran of the War of 1812, he did his share of mocking the holy Word until the Holy Spirit solemnized his heart as he was reading a sermon about the cross of Christ one Sunday morning; he broke down in tears and spent the remainder of his life seeking to lead others to reverence the Bible and its Author.

There has now arisen a new movement that rehabilitates this man and honors him for his ministry in recognizing the “day for a year” principle of symbolism in understanding Daniel and the Revelation. There was in the early 19th century a cadre of sober-minded young men bent on studying out the application and fulfillment of those prophecies. They were led by the Holy Spirit as the responders to the inspired two books. Christ has not always been “crucified afresh,” for there have always been some who have consecrated their all in the energetic study of His Word.

Be one of them!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The Jews of old waited long for their Messiah to come, and many said, “The days are prolonged, and every vision fails” (Ez. 12:22).

But their Messiah came, precisely on time according to the prophecy of Daniel (9:24-26). Furthermore, Daniel had foretold His rejection and crucifixion (vs. 26). Some precious few in Jerusalem were “awake” and ready to welcome Him (Simeon, Anna; Luke 2:25-36). All might have been!

Now we have again come to a time when many say, “Every vision fails”! Ezekiel describes our time: “Son of man, look, the house of Israel is saying, ‘The vision that he sees is for many days from now, and he prophesies of times far off’” (12:27). What is “the house of Israel”? The “angel of the church of the Laodiceans” (Rev. 3:14-21). The “times afar off?” The coming of the Lord Jesus the second time.

It used to be that those who reverence the books of Daniel and Revelation expected that the “this generation [that] shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled” was the generation that recognized the “signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars” (Matt. 24:31; Luke 21:25); they followed the chronology of Archbishop Usher who worked out the “time” of world existence to be some “6000 years.” But, confused and perplexed because it seems that “every vision fails,” many are trying to work out some kind of synthesis between “short chronology” of the earth and the indefinite time periods apparently dictated by “science.” Result: faith in the nearness of the Lord’s return wanes.

To abandon that faith is like jumping off a precipice into a fearful black hole of despair. Let’s let Ezekiel finish his paragraph: “Thus says the Lord God: ... in your days, O rebellious house, I will say the word and perform it, ... the word which I speak will be done’” (vss. 23-28). It may be lonely standing atop a precipice; but if it’s the word of God, stand!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

We all wish that the Bible could tell us more about the earthly life of Jesus, the divine Son of God, what He was like when He was with us “in the flesh” as a man, as a child, as a youth. Luke spends a little time telling us some, in his chapter two (vss. 40ff), but we long for more.

For example, when Jesus prayed, how did He pray? We read often that He prayed, and one prayer we have (John 17); but what would it have been like to listen to Him pray?

We have a vivid picture in Hebrews 5 where He is compared (and contrasted) with the earthly high priests (the words “so also”):

(a) He, like they, “is taken from among men” (vs. 1). Jesus must be one of us!

(b) He has “compassion on those who are ignorant and going astray, since He also Himself is beset by weakness” (vs. 2). Note: Jesus was not beset by His own sin, for He had none; but He was beset by the kind of our “weakness” that left Him utterly dependent on His Father. He is needy, one of us!

(c) He “did not glorify Himself to become High Priest” but was “appointed” by the Father (vs. 5, 6). He did not push Himself.

(d) “In the days of His flesh ... He ... offered up prayers and supplications” (vs, 7): two words—the latter derived from the custom of an utterly bereft suppliant carrying an olive-branch (Vine, Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words). He begged the Father for help!

(e) When Jesus prayed, it was “with vehement cries and tears” (vs. 7). We say He was “broken up.” The climax of course came in Gethsemane when He prayed so “vehemently” that He sweat blood (Mark 14:33, 34; Luke 22:44), but He came near to that many times in His prayers.

(f) As one of us, He begged to be “saved from death” (vs. 7), the most anxious praying imaginable. “Death” to Him meant the second death.

(g) He was “heard because of His godly fear,” not because He was the Son of God! As one of us, He had humble reverence for God!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Just before Jesus was to be crucified, His disciples wanted to show Him their glorious Temple, in their eyes the wonder of the world. As they were able to grasp that He was the long-awaited Messiah, they naturally associated His coming “kingdom” with the glories of their Temple.

Its coming ruin was the most ignominious national ruin in the history of the world (70 A.D.), more devastating than Nebuchadnezzar’s destruction (586 B.C.), more horrible than the Sack of Rome (410 A.D.). In Matthew 24 Jesus lovingly cautions us of a similar devastation to come before He can return the second time. Imagine the disciples’ bewilderment when He tells them that of its huge stones “not one ... would be left ... one ... upon another, that shall not be thrown down.”

He was especially concerned that we not be “deceived,” for over a dozen times He mentions some aspect of spiritual deception or apostasy that will ruin the souls of “many.”

(1) The name of “Christ” or “Christian” will cover a huge amount of poisonous deception (vss. 5, 23, 24, 26). He cannot copyright His name.

(2) A large part of the “deceiving” will be “lawlessness,” which is anti-agape in spirit (vs. 12; that’s the word in the original).

(3) Because the agape will “grow cold,” it means those who have that experience will have professed the service of Christ; in other words, they are church members.

(4) Anti-agape is the spirit that pervades the lukewarmness of the world church of Laodicea. Why? It humbles self.

(5) The experience of agape is what happens when the soul understands the “breadth and length and depth and height” of agape (Eph. 3:14-17), the love that drove the Son of God to go to “hell” to find us and die our second death (cf. 2 Cor. 5:14, 15); that agape “constrains” the believer to take up his cross and follow Jesus—it’s the cross on which self is “crucified with Christ”(Gal. 2:20).

(6) But there’s a big BUT in what Jesus says: “But ... this gospel ... will be preached in all the world ...” (vss. 13, 14).

(7) And there is the great angel of Revelation 18:1-4. Lukewarmness is impossible in the light of his message!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.