For God Loved The World So Much That He Gave His Only Son,
So That Everyone Who Believes In Him May Not Die But Have Eternal Life.

GOD LOVES YOU

He has shown us how much he loves us - it was while we were still sinners that Christ died for us!

By his blood we are now put right with God;

How much more, then, will we be saved by him from God's anger?

We were God's enemies, but he made us his friends through the death of his Son.

Now that we are God's friends, how much more will we be saved by Christ's life!

- Romans 5:8-10

GOD'S PROMISE FOR YOU

Sin pays its wage - death;

but God's free gift is eternal life in union with Christ Jesus Our Lord.

- Romans 6:23

 God has given us eternal life, and this life has its source in his Son.

- 1 John 5:11

Jesus said:

" I have come in order that you might have life -

 life in all its fullness."

- John 10:10 

IS CHRISTMAS FOR YOU? 

Whoever has the Son has this life;

whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

- 1 John 5:12

Jesus said:

" I am telling you the truth: those who hear my words and believe in him who sent me have eternal life.

They will not be judged, but have already passed from death to life."

- John 5:24

MAKING IT PERSONAL

You are not alone if you are still wondering whether to open your heart to the offer of God gift of salvation.

Many more are afraid they'll be obligated to somehow repay God for His gift.

Yet the decision to receive the gift of salvation is yours.

The apostle John wrote, "He came to His own people, and even they rejected Him.

But to all who believed Him and accepted Him, He gave the right to become children of God"

(John 1:11-12)

If you are ready to receive the greatest of all gifts,

the openness of your heart is what God is looking for.

You might want to use your own words, or express a prayer like this:

"Dear God, I have sinned against You. I believe that Jesus is Your Son,

that He died on the cross to pay the penalty for my sins, and that He rose from the dead to prove it.
Now i accept Your offer of full forgiveness and eternal life.

I accept Jesus as Your gift for my salvation." 

If this is the honest expression of your heart, you have entered into a personal relationship with God!

We encourage you to start attending a church and to let a pastor know of your decision. 

HAVE A BLESSED CHRISTMAS!!! 

1969 by The Navigators

NAVPRESS

thank you for making such a wonderful book :)

Ashley turned the beautiful stone over and over again in her hand. “Are you really giving this to me?” she whispered in awe and wonder. 

The thought that her father was giving her this priceless diamond seemed almost too much to comprehend.

“Yes, my darling daughter, I am giving you that diamond. Love and cherish it, and keep it ever in your thoughts.”

Ashley threw her arms around her father’s neck. How she loved him! She couldn’t imagine life without his love.

For the first several months after Ashley’s father gave her the diamond, she guarded the diamond as she would her own life. 

She spent hours gazing upon it, then went and told everyone she knew about her father’s marvelous love. Her heart of gratitude showed in everything she did.

She was kind and loving toward others because her thoughts were focused on her father’s kindness to her. 

She was always eager to serve and praise her father because her thoughts were completely consumed with him.

I’d like to stop here and say that Ashley faithfully treasured her diamond for the rest of her life and continually lived in the same joy she had those firs few weeks. 

But I’m afraid that would not be true. Ever so gradually, Ashley began to become accustomed to the diamond she’d been given. 

Although the diamond itself never diminished in value one bit, she stopped thinking of it as much throughout her day. 

While she was still kind toward others and told others of her father’s love, she did so more from habit and duty than from gratitude and joy. 

Her words sounded like hollow recitations instead of heartfelt realities.

“Ashley, can I talk with you?” Ashley’s friend Eliza asked one afternoon.

“Of course,” Ashley replied, wondering what Eliza could want.

“The diamond your father gave you—can you describe it to me? 

And can you tell me what that diamond means to you?”

“Why, of course I can,” Ashley replied. 

She stumbled through a description that sounded strangely vague even to her.

Ashley’s encounter with Eliza awakened Ashley’s sleeping conscience.  

I have forgotten to gaze upon the diamond my father gave me! I’ve forgotten to let it bring me joy. 

Saddened at her folly, Ashley slowly walked upstairs and knocked on her father’s study. 

One look at her father’s face showed Ashley that he already knew how she had neglected his treasure.

“Come, my dear, let’s go look at the diamond again together,” he said as he gently wiped her tears.

With that, Ashley’s father led her to the special case in which she kept her diamond. 

Ashley broke into a fresh set of tears when she saw the diamond. She had forgotten how beautifully it glittered and glistened! Her heart felt overwhelmed once again by the incredible gift that her father had given her.

“Oh, Father, please help me to never forget!” she whispered, looking up in love and admiration into her father’s face.

“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field.” Matthew 13:44

“But I don’t want to change,” Deborah repeated for what must have been the fifteenth time that afternoon. 

For years, Deborah had lived the life of a pauper. 

The open sky had been her shelter; the generosity of passerby’s her income. 

Now her father stood before her, offering her what he had offered her every day of her life—to give her a new life with him.

“But, Deborah, why would you insist on clinging to your pauper ways when I offer you a way of escape?”

Deborah could hear the pain in her father’s voice. Nevertheless, she stubbornly shook her head and replied, “I don’t want to change,” she repeated again. “I like the way things are.”

“But just last week, you complained about how you went to bed hungry. 

And don’t you remember how miserable life can be in the rain?”

Deborah paused as she contemplated these points. 

It was true. Life could get very miserable out on the streets. But give up the life she’d known? Oh, no, that she could never do! She would much rather go on complaining, even while ignoring the solution to her complaints.

“I can’t change, Father,” Deborah argued. “I’m too set in my ways. It’s just a hopeless case. 

I tried a few months back to give up this life, remember? 

And the very first day I was back on the streets! I just can’t help it!”

“Oh, but you could! I would help you! You could come live with me. I would give you other things to do besides aimlessly roaming the streets in this fashion. We could have so much fun together! Oh, do come!” Deborah’s father reached out his hand as if to invite her to join him in happiness.

Deborah shook her head. “I just can’t change,” she repeated.

“You can’t, or you won’t?” The question was made in a voice barely above a whisper. 

Deborah made no reply. 

She simply turned and walked down the street to continue her self-imposed miserable life.

Deborah’s father forced back the tears as he watched his daughter leave. 

He slowly turned and walked away. He would come back again tomorrow.

 Maybe then his daughter would be ready to accept his gift of love.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16

There once was a little boy who had a bad temper. 

His Father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper, 

he must hammer a nail into the back of the fence.

The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence.  

Over the next  few weeks, as he learned to control his anger, the number of nails hammered daily gradually dwindled down.  

He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence.  

Finally the day came when the boy didn't lose his temper at all.

 

He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now 

pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper.

 

The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone. 

 

The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. 

 He said, 'You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence.  

When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one.  

You can put a knife in a man and draw it out.  

But It won't matter how many times you say I'm sorry, the wound will still be there.  

A verbal wound is as bad as a physical one. 

Remember that friends are very rare jewels, indeed.  

They make you smile and encourage you to succeed.  

They lend an ear, they share words of praise and they always want to open their hearts to us.

Show your friends how much you care. 

this sentences changes everything.

Professor 
 You are a Christian, aren’t you, son ?

StudentYes, sir.

Professor
So, you believe in GOD ?

Student
Absolutely, sir.

ProfessorIs GOD good ?

StudentSure.

ProfessorIs GOD all powerful ?

Student
Yes.

Professor
My brother died of cancer even though he prayed to GOD to heal him. Most of us would attempt to help others who are ill.
But GOD didn’t. How is this GOD good then?

(Student was silent.)

Professor
You can’t answer, can you ? Let’s start again, young fella. Is GOD good?

Student
Yes.

Professor
Is satan good ?

Student
No.

Professor
Where does satan come from ?

Student
From … GOD …

Professor
That’s right. Tell me son, is there evil in this world?

Student
Yes.

ProfessorEvil is everywhere, isn’t it ?
And GOD did make everything. Correct?

Student
Yes.

Professor
So who created evil ?

(Student did not answer.)

Professor
Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness?
All these terrible things exist in the world, don’t they?

Student
Yes, sir.

Professor
So, who created them?

(Student had no answer.)

ProfessorScience says you have 5 Senses you use to identify and observe the world around you.
Tell me, son, have you ever seen GOD?

Student
No, sir.

Professor
Tell us if you have ever heard your GOD?

Student
No , sir.

Professor
Have you ever felt your GOD, tasted your GOD, smelt your GOD?
Have you ever had any sensory perception of GOD for that matter?

StudentNo, sir. I’m afraid I haven’t.

Professor
Yet you still believe in Him?

Student
Yes.

ProfessorAccording to Empirical, Testable, Demonstrable Protocol,
Science says your GOD doesn’t exist.
What do you say to that, son?

StudentNothing.
I only have my faith.

Professor
Yes, faith. And that is the problem Science has.

Student
 Professor, is there such a thing as heat?

Professor
Yes.

Studentis there such a thing as cold?

Professor
 Yes.

Student
No, sir. There isn’t.

(The lecture theatre became very quiet with this turn of events.)

Student
Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat.
But we don’t have anything called cold.
We can hit 458 degrees below zero which is no heat, but we can’t go any further after that.
There is no such thing as cold.
Cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of heat.
We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy.
Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it.

(There was pin-drop silence in the lecture theater.)

StudentWhat about darkness, Professor?  
Is there such a thing as darkness?

ProfessorYes. What is night if there isn’t darkness?

Student
You’re wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something.
You can have low light, normal light, bright light, flashing light.
But if you have no light constantly, you have nothing and its called darkness, isn’t it?
In reality, darkness isn’t.
If it is, were you would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn’t you?
Professor
So what is the point you are making, young man ?

Student
Sir, my point is your philosophical premise is flawed.

ProfessorFlawed ? Can you explain how?

Student
Sir, you are working on the premise of duality. You argue there is life and then there is death, a good GOD and a bad GOD.
You are viewing the concept of GOD as something finite,
something we can measure.
Sir, Science can’t even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one.
To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that
death cannot exist as a substantive thing.

Death is not the opposite of life: just the absence of it.
Now tell me, Professor,
do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?

Professor
If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, yes, of course, I do.

Student
Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir?

(The Professor shook his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument was going.)

Student
Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavor.
Are you not teaching your opinion, sir?
Are you not a scientist but a preacher?

(The class was in uproar.)

Student
Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor’s brain?

(The class broke out into laughter. )

Student
Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor’s brain, felt it, touched or smelt it?
No one appears to have done so.
So, according to the established Rules of Empirical, Stable, Demonstrable Protocol,
Science says that you have no brain, sir.
With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures, sir?

(The room was silent. The Professor stared at the student, his face unfathomable.)

ProfessorI guess you’ll have to take them on faith, son.

Student
That is it sir … Exactly !
The link between man & GOD is FAITH.
That is all that keeps things alive and moving.






P.S.
I believe you have enjoyed the conversation. And if so, you’ll probably want your friends / colleagues to enjoy the same, won’t you?

“ LORD, remind me how brief my time on earth will be.
Remind me that my days are numbered - how fleeting my life is.
You have made my life no longer than the width of my hand.
My entire lifetime is just a moment to you;
at best, each of us is but a breath."

We are merely moving shadows and all our busy rushing ends in nothing.
We heap up wealth, not knowing who will spend it.
And so, LORD,
where do i put my hope?

MY ONLY HOPE IS IN YOU.

Psalms 39:4-7 (NLT)