Dump or Garden?

March 31, 2018March 30, 2018 / Mark Brady / 2 Comments

CtS21ft CamH3' 35mm 0001 Mankind’s first address was inside Garden Grove Estates. God gave Adam and Eve a home there, but they wanted more. They wanted to know what God knew, even though he told them that kind of knowledge wasn’t for them. They disobeyed, and got evicted.

Do you live in a garden? I don’t live in a perfect one yet, but things are growing. And I don’t even have a green thumb either! My neighbor one day saw me trying to plant some flowers. She said, “You don’t know what you are doing!” I said, “I know, but I am having a great time.” I desire, ache to live where God intended, meaning the kind of life, but since I don’t know what I am doing I need him. I need him to design it. I need him to remove the weeds, remove the trash, move boulders, and dig trenches for the living waters to flow in my garden.

I look around, and I see very few people living in gardens. Instead, they have, like Adam and Eve, believed the lies of the devil, and have paid the consequences. They have gotten hurt, down, defeated, or have settled. Some have given up. They act like “hope” is a four letter word, so they accept life in a dump. It stinks! It’s dirty, toxic, hazardous to your health, but they accept it. More and more broken, ugly, bent, faded, rusty things of life, gets dumped on them day after day, and they take it. They call it life, and just assume, it can’t get any better.

This is not the kind of life God intended for you. It hurts him to see pile after pile of trash dumped upon you. Guess what? You don’t have to live there! You can move out of the dump, and into a garden, but you will need the help of the Gardner. The One who loves you like you can’t even imagine. Will you accept his invitation? Will you change your address? Come live in the garden God wanted you to live in. Oh, and the cost? Free, for his Son, Jesus paid it for you.

Mark Brady 1962 – 2018

March 24, 2018March 23, 2018 / Mark Brady / 1 Comment

my tomb stone 2 We are gathered here today to pay our respects to Mark Brady. In this grave, six feet below us, lies his body, his flesh. Living by his flesh caused him to hurt a lot of people. Wife, children, friends, sibling, coworkers, and even his mother and father. Being led by his flesh opened the door to enter into a sin, where the result cast him out of the will of God.

Mark wondered around his own Mt. Sinai for 30 years. After getting tired of the heat, of the desert, and the sand, he said, “oh the gritty, annoying sand got everywhere”, he begin looking for the exit ramp.

The act of dying doesn’t hurt, but killing your flesh does. It goes against everything you know. We’re afraid, if we do, we won’t be comfortable with ourselves, or others won’t, but is that more important than having Jesus comfortable with us? It’s completely living the way Jesus showed us how to live. Meaning, how to respond to others in our world. An old man once said, “Life isn’t hard. It’s all the freakin people that make it hard.”

Then Jesus said to His disciples, If anyone desires to be My disciple, let him deny himself [disregard, lose sight of, and forget himself and his own interests] and take up his cross and follow Me [cleave steadfastly to Me, conform wholly to My example in living and, if need be, in dying, also]. (Mat 16:24 AMP)

Jesus told us to take up “our” cross and follow him. The cross being an instrument of death. So why would one want to? It’s hard to describe unless you begin to experience it, but there is such joy in becoming intimate with God. Becoming a son, like Jesus is. God loves his Son, Jesus so much! With that said, when you begin to walk in son ship with God, there is more peace, more joy, more faith, and definitely, more love than you could ever imagine! It’s living life more abundantly!

The Day Stephen Hawking Accepted God

March 17, 2018January 7, 2021 / Mark Brady / Leave a comment

Free will, to do what you want, say what you want, is a great gift from God. It does come with a lot of responsibility though. God took a risk giving us such freedom, but it opens the door for us to, of our own will, accept Him, his son Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

God didn’t want little robots, programmed to serve him, but a being, like him, to choose him, as He has chosen us. Stephen Hawking chose not to. Below are his own words:

“I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.”

Rom 14:11 Read it for yourself in Scripture: “As I live and breathe,” God says, “every knee will bow before me; Every tongue will tell the honest truth that I and only I am God.” (MSG)

Stephen Hawking died March 14, 2018. March 14, 2018 is the day Stephen Hawking accepted God! Oh how I would have preferred he had done it before he passed, but I do not know of the contrary. I pray, all living men and women will accept God, and profess with their mouths that there is only one God. That Jesus Christ is His son, and admit the Holy Spirit completes the Trinity.

So, that brings me to ask one question: What day did you accept God?

FLOW

March 10, 2018March 10, 2018 / Mark Brady / Leave a comment

080412 335 A river flows downstream. Life in a boat, doing nothing, on that stream, comes easy, natural. It takes no effort, but to go upstream is another story. The mightier the current, the harder one must paddle, or use external power. You stop for one instance, or turn off the engine, and you begin going back down.

We can’t get to our destination upstream on our own. We must have the power from the One who has been in the boat. From the One, who has walked on the water. From the One who has made it to the other side. From the One who said, “It is finished!”

I desire to FLOW with God. I will do my part, but I will rely on Him for the power I don’t have in and of myself. Following His FLOW will take me where He wants me. The more I make this my life practice it will get easier, and become more natural.

Keith Hector, recently preached a message at my church on FLOW. He said flow is:

F aith
L ove
O bedience
W isdom

Flowing with God, and in God takes all of the above. It requires trusting Jesus. It demands following the Holy Spirit. God asks us to do things that are not natural to our flesh, so we cannot boast in and of ourselves. He also knows the joy we experience when we FLOW with Him. He knows the confidence we experience, and He knows it encourages us to go further.

Check it out: “My main attempt in this short life is to deeply love humankind. I long to love like Jesus: intentionally, authentically, and with no boundaries. So here I am, a messy 14 year old making art, learning to love, and writing.” Click: ~ ava lucia ~

What Makes a Good Bridge?

March 3, 2018March 2, 2018 / Mark Brady / Leave a comment

Bridge 2 “Look, I’m not hurting anything. I just want to sit here and rest,” he said. To his right my church had a sign that stated, “No Loitering”
“It’s okay,” I replied in a gentle voice.
“Are you hungry?” I asked.
“Yes.”

I went and got him a sack of food we keep for such occasions, and some water.

“Here ya go.”
“Thank you.”
“Your welcome. You mind if I hang out with you for a while?”
“Suit yourself,” he said as the sack crinkled while he checked out the food.
“What’s your name?”
“John,” he replied. His eyes, piercing, as if searching my soul.

The small talk started. It became clear he was a philosopher who didn’t have a place to hang his diploma. He also had a sense of humor. He shared he had made a mistake with his wife and kids, and she wasn’t willing to forgive. I felt that was my que to talk about God’s forgiveness. I tried hard to get him to come inside and sit in on the church service.

“I stink,” he kept saying.
“I assure you John, no one inside will care.” He was right about the odor too, but he insisted on attending the church service there on the sidewalk.

We talked for another 30 minutes or so. Before I left I offered to pray with him.

“You can do that in private, but not in front of me,” he said.

I didn’t understand, but respected his wishes. I’ve looked, but have never seen John again. Though thought of him often, I have prayed for him even more. I regretted not taking him to a restaurant to get something hot to eat. I also wish I had been brave enough to invite him to my house. He could have showered, I could have washed his clothes, and he could have slept on a soft, warm surface, even if for one night. I have consoled myself with knowing I did something, but I know I could have done more. Perhaps next time I will.

Since I have never seen an episode of “Bridge Hunters” on HGTV he replied, “One that has a flat surface to sleep on, and that isn’t facing into the wind.

Check it out: God never intended heaven to be served from earth. heartland church