I am an extreme introvert by nature, but after so many days of ”no gathering” rules I am craving a party. We were created social beings by God. The trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is the ultimate in gathering, in community, and we are created in the image of God, the triune God. Someone asked, ”what are you learning during these times”, and my answer is ”I like people way more than I thought I did”!

The Biblical definition that I use for pride is, ”I can do it by myself, I don’t need you”! One of the basic principles taught by the Apostle Paul in all of his Epistles in the New Testament is that all that God gives us, He gives us through others, through people. The book of James in the New Testament says, ”If you lack wisdom ask God and He will give you wisdom”. How does He do that, just pour it in like filling a salt shaker? No, He gives us wisdom through other people. He gives us courage through others, He gives us joy, He gives us peace, He communicates His will, He encourages, and on the list goes of all the things that God gives us through other people. Humble people know how God works, and seek all that they need from others, but prideful people don’t want to be dependent on others.

As I have thought about this a lot this past week, one truth that really became very clear to me is that humility as an attitude is recognizing that I can only succeed with the help of others, but humility as an action is being kind, gracious, patient, honoring, forgiving, sensitive, gentle, considerate, attentive, tenderhearted, and meek.

Receiving from others what I need to grow and succeed, and giving to others so that they might do the same requires a unity between people like what exists in the Trinity. I am responsible to pursue that unity in all my relationships and hopefully others in my life will pursue unity as well.

If you have followed my teaching for very many years you know that one of my favorite slogans is, ”You don’t have to act the way you feel”. Feelings or emotions are impossible for us to control. Different emotions pop up in us all day long, usually prompted by an event that happens in our life. So if we acted the way we feel we would pretty much be controlled by the events in our life, most of which we have little control over. That being said, we can control our emotions, it just takes a bit of time. If we don’t let emotions control our behavior we can control our emotions by controlling our thinking and then reinforce that by responsible acting. ”If we don’t act the way we feel, we will soon feel the way we are acting”.

In this last week, I have often been overcome by strong emotions and feelings of frustration, depression, despair, failure, futility, anger, resentment, self-pity, apathy and weariness. Each of them are like a vulture circling over my head and they take turns roosting on my head and pooping on it. I just get one vulture chased off and another one lands and poops. So far I have managed to exercise self-control and not act the way I have been feeling, and I am hoping that this season of negative emotions will end soon as I continue to act right. Besides this Coronavirus thing that has totally messed with my routine my Parkinson’s which occasionally gets to fussing has been acting up of late. The muscle pain and muscle fatigue just gets to wearing me out and then I can’t sleep much because the minute I close my eyes all my muscles go into a spasm routine, and the only thing that helps is getting up and riding my stationary bike for awhile.

I share all of that not to elicit sympathy, but to let those of you who are going through emotional ups and downs as well that we are in this together. Life is hard, but it is supposed to be hard, and soon we will be in heaven and hard will be over forever.

If you pray for me, don’t pray that I would feel better, or that things would get better, but pray that I would have strength to act and do right in spite of life, that God would fill me with His joy and peace, and that all of my circumstances will turn out for the furtherance of the gospel.

So what is a person supposed to do with all this extra time?I have plenty of home projects and personal projects and goals to keep me busy for 6 months, but I really want to do something that will matter for all eternity, to bear some real fruit for God. I have made praying for people my main ministry right now. I have always prayed a lot but I am doubling my normal amount. I have an App on my Ipad called “Prayer Mate” that I like a lot. I can put pictures with each name and I have unlimited capacity for writing under each persons name. What do I pray about for each of you? Here is what I call “the dozen guaranteed to be answered prayers” that I pray for you all.

1. I pray that God will use the events and circumstances in your life to mold you like clay into the image of Christ, that you would grow in character until you are totally mature, and when you step into heaven you will be just like Him in character. I never pray that God will change, fix, or make better the circumstances in any person’s life because I don’t know what His will is and what He wants to do to cause you to grow.

2. I pray that God will convict you to the core of your being of anything that is sin and which is not pleasing to Him, that He will give you the desire to be holy and pure, and the supernatural strength to conquer any sin in your life.

3. I pray that God will put in you a deep longing to know Him more intimately, and the desire to seek Him diligently. That Psalms 42:1 would be the cry of your heart, “as the deer thirsts for the water brooks, so my soul thirst after You, Oh God”!

4. I pray that God would motivate you to seek wisdom with more desire than silver and gold, and to the degree that you seek it, that He would give it to you, so you would know what to do and say in any and every situation that you might be in.

5. I pray that God would fill you with the desire to influence people to become followers of Jesus, that He would open many doors for you, provide divine appointments, and that you would see the opportunities and not miss them or ignore them.

6. I pray that God will deliver you and protect you from the evil one, that He will put a hedge of protection around you.

7. I pray that God will fill you with His joy and peace in spite of your circumstances, and that you would not be discontent, grumble, or complain about any of the events or situations in your life, but that you would rejoice always.

8. I pray that God will fill you with His strength so that you will run with endurance the race that He has set before you, and that you would not quit, give up, back slide, or cool off. That you would be renewed in your strength to bear up under and manage well the pressures and responsibilities of life that God has given to you.

9. I pray that God will fill you with the knowledge of what His perfect will is for your life, and that all the choices that you make will be inside that perfect will.

10. I pray that God causes your love for Him and for every person in your life to abound more and more every day of your life.

11. I pray that you abide in Jesus, that His Word abides in you, and that you bear much fruit for Him, that your life is not unproductive and useless for Him as His servant.

12. I pray that God would work in your heart so as to remove every shred of bitterness and unforgiveness toward others, and that He would make you “one” with all those in your areas of relationship.

Creativity is a gift that we have from God having been created in His image. One of the ways that our creative juices can really get going is in the midst of problems as we figure them out and fix things. So my contact with people has dropped significantly as we try to keep from getting infected or infecting others. But I want to take advantage of the times we are in to attract people to faith in Jesus Christ. Good old ”Social Media” comes to the rescue. Let me share a few ways that I have attempted to spread the good news of the gospel.

1. Jefferson Baptist Church has done a ”Virtual Worship Service” the last two weeks. I ”shared” the sermon with all of my Facebook Friends which is accessible on Youtube. This last weeks, ”Hebrews 2” was a very good evangelistic sermon, even if I did preach it. I then prayed fervently that God would prompt all to watch it, and that they would understand it clearly.

2. I am spending one hour on Facebook most days reading entries and looking for someone I can connect with that is afraid of the future and offering to pray for them and looking for opportunities, to share information.

3. I watch a lot of sermon on line as I work at improving my own preaching and teaching skill and when I watch one that I is particularly good I ”Share”it with my friends.

I am cooking up some more ideas many of them I think I will continue to use even after normal life resumes one of these days.

I am a follower of Jesus Christ. He is my creator, my God, my Savior, and my Lord. One of my assignments given to me by Him is to be a witness for Him to others. Heaven and Hell are very real places where very real people will live forever. Jesus came into the world as a person like me, lived a sinless life, and then died on a cross as payment for my sins. He provided the way for my sins to be forgiven so that I could be adopted into His family. For that to happen I first needed to admit that I couldn’t save myself by my good works, then I needed to believe the gospel ”Jesus who is God, one with the Father and the Holy Spirit, became a man, lived a perfect life, took my sins upon Himself, was crucified, rose again 3 days later, and is alive today”. Then I made a commitment to Him to follow Him, love Him, and serve Him. At that point my name was written into the ”Book of Life” and I was born again.

Now I have an assignment given to me, a responsibility to share the good news of the gospel with others.

Romans 10:13-15 for “Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.” How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without someone to tell them?

John 20:21 So Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”

John 17:18 As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.

Acts 1:8 but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.”

Being a witness for Jesus is not easy because people aren’t interested in hearing the gospel. But all of a sudden they become much more interested when life as we know it starts to fall apart and there is an increase in the fear of death.

This Coronavirus thing is a major pain in the butt for me, but there is a major increase in the receptivity of people towards the gospel. Light is most obvious when it is dark. We as believers in Jesus are called the light of the world, and now is when our light will be attractive to people who are in the dark. Three things are necessary for me to be super bright; the first thing is I don’t grumble at all about life and people, not even a little bit. The second thing is I am prepared to share the gospel with people in a way they can understand and makes sense, and the third thing is I am always looking for an opportunity to share, an open door.

One of the main things that is contagious from this pandemic is fear, it goes from person to person. Because we are people,we are relational, we enjoy being with other people, and we tend to act and feel the way those around us act and feel. We call the general values, actions, and behavior in an area it’s culture. Various parts of the United States have different accents or ways of speaking, and those born and raised in that area pick up that accent. There are those parts of culture that are good, and there are those parts that are bad. The Bible commands us to be different than those around us when their behavior is bad.

Romans 12:2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

During this time when many are catching the virus of fear we who are followers of Christ need to be radically different than those around us.

The first thing in conquering fear is to recognize that fear is not OK with God, He expects us to be strong, confident, and brave.

Exodus 14:13 But Moses said to the people, “Do not fear! Stand by and see the salvation of the Lord which He will accomplish for you today.

Isaiah 41:10 Do not fear, for I am with you;
Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you, surely I will help you,
Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’

John 14:1 Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me.

There are over a hundred commands in the Bible to not fear. That many commands suggests that this is important to God.

The next thing is to acknowledge when we are afraid and then not excuse, justify or blame someone or something for our fear.

The last thing is to ask God for strength to be courageous, ask more than once, ask every time there is even a little bit of nervousness.

Philippians 4:6-7 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

There are four things that I do to make my prayer to God for courage and strength more formal, more serious, and I believe more pleasing to Him. The first thing is I pray on my knees. In the Garden of Gethsemane when Jesus was afraid He prayed on His knees. I also pray out loud rather than in my head, Jesus prayed out loud in the Garden. There is something powerful about hearing our own voice as we talk to God about our problems, our needs, and our fears. I often write my prayers in my prayer journal and then reread them over and over in the days following, which brings me to the fourth thing that I believe is very important if we are serious about becoming ”more than conquers” rather than wimps. God is not into token prayers, easy prayers, convenient prayers, prayers that cost us little in the way of time. Jesus prayed for an hour in the Garden as He faced His greatest fear, then went back two more times, and then He went to the cross with courage.

I desire to be a strong and courageous overcomer who is not intimidated or afraid of anything, but I can’t be that kind of person on my own, but when I depend on God He will make me strong, and then I will be an influencer of others to do the same, seek God.

Philippians 4:8 Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Philippians 4:4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!

I wrote out all the things to be thankful for and that are positive aspects of the present craziness. When I get to feeling irritated I read them over, works very well.

1. I normally spent 10 hours each week studying for my theology class on Sunday morning and 10 hours for my Wednesday night service and 6 hours for my leadership classes, and then 6 hours of the actual meeting times. That is 32 hours of extra time that I have this week. I am going to use it to pray a couple more hours for everybody in our church, I pray for everybody every week, but I will double that time this week so if anybody has needs you want me to pray for email me at deefduke@icloud.com and I would be honored to pray for you.

2. Because of the extra time I have I can get caught up on my study time and actually get ahead in my lesson and sermon preparation.

3. I can do more reading in books that I just haven’t had time to get to.

4. I can spend a bunch more time memorizing Bible verses.

5. I can spend some more time working on the 1969 Mustang.

6. I can get some “honey do’s” scratched off my list.

7. I can get some extra sleep.

8. I can fish more😀😀.

9. I can ride my bicycle more.

10. I can shoot my bow more.

11. I can spend some time writing on my book project.

12. I can get started on building my fish pond .

I have more but you get the idea. Love ya all.

I didn’t write a blog last night, I cut and pasted Psalms 91 from my on line Bible. It is a good Psalms and I used it as a substitute for writing. I decided last night that it would be wise for me not to write a blog because I had such a rotten attitude, and I was afraid it would leak out into my writing. Many people are feeling a growing fear, even dread as the information about the virus ramps up. I am feeling no fear or worry, but I am feeling a growing anger, resentment, irritation, and frustration. It isn’t so much the situation as it is the constant flow of information about the situation that after awhile get’s me so worked up I feel like yelling at somebody. The faucet in our sink leaks, just a little bit, but it drips and it makes a fairly loud sound dripping into our stainless steel sink. The sink is only a few feet from our bed, and I can hear it all night long. Proverbs says that a nagging wife is like a continuous dripping. After awhile the constant dripping just wears you out . So what does a person do? I am trying very hard to be a good model to everyone who knows me of what it means to trust God, and not fret, worry, complain, or grumble, about life, and this stupid virus and the stupider reporting of it by the media. Oops, sorry about that, bad attitude leaked out. So, I dealt with this mounting turmoil inside of me the same way I deal with every problem in life, I went fishing, surf fishing to be exact. Standing in the ocean casting out as far as I could, then reeling my line in real slow, hoping to catch a “red tailed perch”, the limit is 15 and that was my goal. All I caught was a little flounder and a sea gull that was dumb enough to get tangled in my fishing line. But it worked it’s magic on me, and I came home feeling very refreshed and ready to face some more irritating dripping. For people,who don’t fish, it would be very important for them to identify an activity that does the same thing for them that fishing does for me. A key ingredient for me is being outdoors where I see God’s creation and am reminded of His divine nature, His eternal power and invisible attributes.

Psalms 91 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High Will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress, My God, in whom I trust!” For it is He who delivers you from the snare of the trapper And from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with His pinions,
And under His wings you may seek refuge; His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark. You will not be afraid of the terror by night, Or of the arrow that flies by day; Of the pestilence that stalks in darkness,
Or of the destruction that lays waste at noon. A thousand may fall at your side And ten thousand at your right hand, But it shall not approach you.
You will only look on with your eyes And see the recompense of the wicked. For you have made the Lord, my refuge, Even the Most High, your dwelling place. No evil will befall you, Nor will any plague come near your tent. For He will give His angels charge concerning you, To guard you in all your ways. They will bear you up in their hands, That you do not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread upon the lion and cobra, The young lion and the serpent you will trample down. Because he has loved Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him securely on high, because he has known My name. He will call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. With a long life I will satisfy him And let him see My salvation.”

When I was a Freshman in College in 1968 there was a world wide pandemic called the Hong Kong Flu, it to started in China. 1 to 4 million people died globally, with 34,000 deaths in the USA in 18 months, there are 155 deaths so far in the USA from Corona, and about 9,000 globally. I remember the news and the discussions about the flu as a student in college. We had one television on campus which was in the Student Union Building, and we would crowd in there to watch the news, most of our interest then was in the Vietnam war, which we were in the middle of as a country, and then switch over to Mission Impossible. There was some concern back then about the pandemic, but not even close to what is happening in our day. Some might suggest that the reason it is so much more of a big deal now is because it is so much more serious. I guess we will have to wait and see what the numbers are when it all blows over. I have and will continue to follow the “rules” mandated by the government on preventing the spread of the present disaster, but my guess is that when we get to the end of this adventure it will not be any worse than my Freshman year in College.

My purpose in writing this is not to be a sceptic or critical of government leadership in controlling the spread of this present pandemic, but to ponder in writing about the real cause of the country wide hysteria among many people. As I read the news articles and watch the various reports on my IPad there is an obvious sensationalizing of facts and information. Most would assume the purpose is to sell programs and increase income. Because of social media and the internet the information gets repeated over and over with each cycle growing a bit in magnitude and seriousness. The interesting thing, (I guess if I wanted to sensationalize a bit myself I could say, “the alarming thing”, but I will stick with “interesting”) is how easy it has been for the media, which is controlled by a relatively small group of people, to control the general mood of our country.

Many are asking me if I see any prophetic significance in the present events. One of the clear Biblical truths is that the devil, his demons, and the kingdom of darkness will become increasingly more active in controlling the world and the lives of people as we get closer to the end. The Apostle Paul in the New Testament says he was not ignorant of the devils schemes, but I think we mostly are. In asking again the question, “ what is the media’s motive in puffing up and sensationalizing the news and current facts and information, my conclusion is that they are being controlled by the kingdom of darkness and they don’t even know it.

So, the bottom line of this whole blog for me is, I will keep my wits about me, I will not allow the devil to lead me around by the nose, I will read the Bible every day as my main source of truth, I will pray a lot asking God for wisdom and discernment, I will not grumble about anything, I will rejoice about everything, and I will attempt to influence as many people as possible to follow Jesus, and do my part to thwart the devil’s plan to control the world through fear.