Testimony about this Past Weekend

Salvation Breaking Forth from Joey Roper on Vimeo.

Here is a picture of those who accepted the Lord and prayed for the baptism of the Holy Spirit

Joey, Rico, Rico's mom, Marion, Waldimar, Anabella, Romina, and Rebekka

Family Time

A couple of weekends ago we had an opportunity for a weekend family vacation to Holland. It was only about a 3 hour drive, with some traffic, and we had an absolute blast! It was such a great time for all of us as a family just to simply have FUN. The kids were able to play until they dropped. The location that we went to was called Landal de Lommergergen. There are all kinds of these places throughout Europe. They are really great family vacation spots. At this particular location they had such things as an indoor pool area that was absolutely a blast, bowling alley, outside parks, miniature golf, a little zoo, you could rent bikes, and so much more. Like a said, it is really a place for a family to go on a vacation.
One of the great blessings was that we were able to go with great friends of ours, the Ermert family. They also have a son and a daughter that our kids could run around and play with.
It was a great weekend getaway. We really needed it! We were so thankful for it! We are so thankful that the Lord provided for this.
It was the kind of vacation that you need a vacation from - when is the next one?

Saturday, April 2nd - (Jagdfieber)

Hello Everyone
I wanted to write to each of you in regards to some prayer support and since I know that you guys are willing to do that, I can take all that I can get.
This coming Saturday, April 2nd the Lord has opened a door for me to be able to teach at CC Stuttgart's Men's Day. CC Stuttgart is hosting the day and they have invited 4 other churches, most of which are in southern Germany. There is also a pastor bringing some men from Switzerland for this day.

In the day, there will be a total of 3 sessions. I will be teaching the first one, an elder from CC Heidelberg will be teaching the 2nd one and Roland (senior pastor at CC Stuttgart) will be teaching the final one.

The theme for the day is "Jadgfieber." There is not a direct translation into English - so I will best translate it as "What are you hunting (pursuing) after?" The theme verse is Hebrews 12:14.

My topic that I have been given to for the first session is "Holiness is not an Option" and I will be teaching out of the theme verse.

So once again I want to ask that you would pray for the following points:

• Preparation - that I would really hear from the Lord ( I am studying today as you read this)
• Proclamation - that I would be faithful to proclaim God's powerful and living Word
• Translation - that the translation (through Daniel) will be really clear
• Unity between the translator and I
• Preparation - that the Holy Spirit will really begin to prepare the hearts of each of us men for this day and what the Lord will want to speak to us
• Salvation
• Rededication
  
• Shepherding - that we would really be able to shepherd these men throughout the day

One of the other blessings about this weekend is that Rebecca and I will be getting away (just the two of us) from April 1-4 there in Stuttgart. We have some great friends of ours that will be watching the kids for us so that we can get away for the weekend. We are also blessed that we have a place to stay for free throughout the weekend. Please pray for us to be strengthened in our marriage as well throughout this weekend.

We love you all and are very thankful for your support in prayer

The hammer, the file, & the furnace

A great friend of mine sent this to me yesterday and I thought that I would share it with all of you. This is a great read!

It was the enraptured Rutherford who could shout in the midst of serious and painful trials, "Praise God for the hammer, the file and the furnace." The hammer is a useful tool, but the nail, if it had feeling and intelligence, could present another side of the story. For the nail knows the hammer only as an opponent, a brutal, merciless enemy who lives to pound it into submission, to beat it down out of sight and clinch it into place. That is the nail's view of the hammer, and it is accurate except for one thing: The nail forgets that both it and the hammer are servants of the same workman. Let the nail but remember that the hammer is held by the workman and all resentment toward it will disappear. The carpenter decides whose head will be beaten next and what hammer shall be used in the beating. That is his sovereign right. When the nail has surrendered to the will of the workman and has gotten a little glimpse of his benign plans for its future it will yield to the hammer without complaint.

The file is more painful still, for its business is to bite into the soft metal, scraping and eating away the edges till it has shaped the metal to its will. Yet the file has, in truth, no real will in the matter, but serves another master as the metal also does. It is the master and not the file that decides how much shall be eaten away, what shape the metal shall take, and how long the painful filing shall continue. Let the metal accept the will of the master and it will not try to dictate when or how it shall be filed.

As for the furnace, it is the worst of all. Ruthless and savage, it leaps at every combustible thing that enters it and never relaxes its fury till it has reduced it all to shapeless ashes. All that refuses to burn is melted to a mass of helpless matter, without will or purpose of its own. When everything is melted that will melt and all is burned that will burn, then and not till then the furnace calms down and rests from its destructive fury.

With all this known to him, how could Rutherford find it in his heart to praise God for the hammer, the file and the furnace? The answer is simply that he loved the Master of the hammer, he adored the Workman who wielded the file, he worshiped the Lord who heated the furnace for the everlasting blessing of His children. He had felt the hammer till its rough beatings no longer hurt; he had endured the file till he had come actually to enjoy its bitings; he had walked with God in the furnace so long that it had become as his natural habitat. Such doctrine as this does not find much sympathy among Christians in these soft and carnal days. We tend to think of Christianity as a painless system by which we can escape the penalty of past sins and attain to heaven at last. The flaming desire to be rid of every unholy thing and to put on the likeness of Christ at any cost is not often found among us. We expect to enter the everlasting kingdom of our Father and to sit down around the table with sages, saints and martyrs; and through the grace of God, maybe we shall; yes, maybe we shall. But for the most of us it could prove at first an embarrassing experience. Ours might be the silence of the untried soldier in the presence of the battle-hardened heroes who have fought the fight and won the victory and who have scars to prove that they were present when the battle was joined.

Excerpt from A.W. Tozer in his book The Root of the Righteous,

G.O.S.P.E.L.

Great Message!

You are definitely going to want to listen to this message! GREAT!

Britt Merrick - You are so dumb, you are really dumb... fo' real from Reality on Vimeo.

Great Quote

"The man who has God for his treasure has all things in One. Many ordinary treasures may be denied him, or if he is allowed to have them, the enjoyment of them will be so tempered that they will never be necessary to his happiness. Or if he must see them go, one after one, he will scarcely fell a sense of loss, for having the Source of all things he has in One all satisfaction, all pleasure, all delight. Whatever he may lose he has actually lost nothing, for he now has it all in One, and he has it purely, legitimately, and forever."

A.W. TOZER

How Japan's Religions Confront Tragedy

Here is an article that I believe is very important for us to read regarding the Japanese people.

By Dan Gilgoff, CNN.com Religion Editor

Proud of their secular society, most Japanese aren't religious in the way Americans are: They tend not to identify with a single tradition nor study religious texts.

"The average Japanese person doesn’t consciously turn to Buddhism until there’s a funeral,” says Brian Bocking, an expert in Japanese religions at Ireland’s University College Cork.

When there is a funeral, though, Japanese religious engagement tends to be pretty intense.

“A very large number of Japanese people believe that what they do for their ancestors after death matters, which might not be what we expect from a secular society,” says Bocking. “There’s widespread belief in the presence of ancestors’ spirits.”

In the days and weeks ahead, huge numbers of Japanese will be turning to their country’s religious traditions as they mourn the thousands of dead and try to muster the strength and resources to rebuild amid the massive destruction wrought by last Friday's 9.0 magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami.

For most Japanese, religion is more complex than adhering to the country’s ancient Buddhist tradition. They blend Buddhist beliefs and customs with the country’s Shinto tradition, which dates back to the 15th century.

“Japanese are not religious in the way that people in North America are religious,” says John Nelson, chair of theology and religious studies at the University of San Francisco. “They’ll move back and forth between two or more religious traditions, seeing them as tools that are appropriate for certain situations.”

“For things connected to life-affirming events, they’ll turn to Shinto-style rituals or understandings,” Nelson says. “But in connection to tragedy or suffering, it’s Buddhism.”

There are many schools of Japanese Buddhism, each with its own teachings about suffering and what happens after death.

“There are many Buddhist explanations of why calamities happen: from collective karma to seeing calamities as signs of apocalypse,” says Jimmy Yu, an assistant professor of Buddhism and Chinese religions at Florida State University. “And perhaps all of them are irrelevant to what needs to be done.”

Indeed, where Christianity, Judaism or Islam are often preoccupied with causes of disaster - the questions of why God would allow an earthquake, for example - Eastern traditions like Buddhism and Shinto focus on behavior in reaction to tragedy.

“It’s very important in Japanese life to react in a positive way, to be persistent and to clean up in the face of adversity, and their religions would emphasize that,” says University College Cork’s Bocking. “They’ll say we have to develop a powerful, even joyful attitude in the face of adversity.”

Japan’s major religious groups are still developing responses to the disaster, but experts say the impulse toward maintaining a positive outlook will likely translate into calls for Japanese to help friends and neighbors clean up and rebuild.

At the same time, Japan’s Buddhist priests will be preoccupied with rituals surrounding death and burial. Japanese Buddhism is often called funeral Buddhism because of its concern with such rituals.

Despite the Japanese penchant for blending their religious traditions - even with Western traditions like Catholicism - the overwhelming majority are buried according to Buddhist custom: cremation and interment in a family plot.

With many bodies swept away in the tsunami, many Japanese will have to come to terms with having to forego that ritual.

After burial, Japanese typically continue to practice rituals around caring for the spirits of the deceased. Most Japanese keep Buddhist altars in their homes, Nelson says, using them to pay tribute to dead ancestors.

“In the days ahead, you’ll see people praying, with hands folded, for the spirits of those killed,” he says. “It goes back to a really early understanding of human spirits and rituals designed to control those spirits, which can take 49 days or, depending on the type of Buddhism, could go on for up to seven years.”

One popular school of Japanese Buddhism, called Amida - or Pure Land - believes in a paradise that spirits of the dead can enter with help from living relatives.

Despite what is likely to be a mass embrace of Buddhist rituals after the earthquake, there may also be some grievances expressed over those traditions.

Many young Japanese have left Buddhism, accusing priests of profiting from grief because of their paid roles in burials. Critics say the priests spend money from funerals on temples without playing a broader role in society.

“The earthquake is an opportunity for Buddhist priests to step up and show they are still relevant,” says Nelson. “Young people just aren’t buying it anymore.”

Oh how my heart is breaking for the Japanese people. As I have been praying for them through all of the tragedies that have been taking place, obviously a huge concern of mine is their eternal salvation. As you can read in this article, they have NO HOPE, NO PROMISE, NO COMFORT, NO FOUNDATION, and so much more. Oh how we need to be praying for the Japanese people and that the Spirit of the Living God would be working in their hearts and minds. That He would be preparing them for the Gospel message that I do believe will be coming to their land. I do believe that the Lord is going to do a great work through all of this, but I do see how it is very important for us as believers to be "gearing up" in prayer and preparing the soil of their hearts in prayer.

PRAY FOR THE JAPANESE PEOPLE!

Devo from Spurgeon

When no eye seeth you except the eye of God, when darkness covers you, when you are shut up from the observation of mortals, even then be ye like Jesus Christ. Remember his ardent piety, his secret devotion how, after laboriously preaching the whole day, he stole away in the midnight shades to cry for help from his God. Recollect how his entire life was constantly sustained by fresh inspirations of the Holy Spirit, derived by prayer. Take care of your secret life: let it be such that you will not be ashamed to read at the last great day.

JAPAN

May we all be in prayer for what is taking place in JAPAN right now! If you do not know yet, get onto the news channels and check it out!
Let the Lord lead you how to pray!
LORD MAY YOUR NAME BE GLORIFIED IN ALL OF THIS FOR WE KNOW THAT YOU REIGN AND ARE IN COMPLETE CONTROL!

May the TRUTH of Your Gospel go forth into this land and bring for salvation!


Everyone, we need to LOOK UP - for our redemption draws near!

WORSHIP: where it all started (Pt.3)

(painting by Neal Parrow - check out his art here.)

The last detail that we want to look at and consider in this story of Abraham offering up Isaac in Genesis 22 is...
God's Response to our Worship
As we consider this point it is very important that you once again read through the story, especially focusing on vs. 11-18. So go ahead and do that right now...
Do you not see the heart of God in these verses?

I want to point out two things in these verses:
Vs.12 “And He said, "Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me."
The first thing that I want you to know is that God always saw what was in Abrahamʼs heart. God already knew that Abraham would be willing to offer up his only son. He was simply revealing Abraham's heart to himself.
And can I say something about this? I believe that He is doing the same thing with you and I as we seek to live for Him. He knows our hearts and He is using these "tests" in our lives to show us what is really taking place in our hearts. May we be those who are like Abraham, willing to give the Lord our very best!
The second thing that I want you to notice is that it is the very heart of God to BLESS His children!!! Look at vs.17-18 "blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies. "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice."
If you read this story in a wrong way – you can get a wrong picture of God. You can begin to think that God is crazy. To ask Abraham to offer up his only son on the altar, I mean, what kind of God would do something like that? But wait a minute, is that not exactly what He did when He offered His only Son upon the cross for you and I? You have to read this story in its totality!

What was the end result for Abraham?

• He didnʼt offer up Isaac, he offered the ram instead
• He drew closer to the LORD in his worship
• Worshiping Him as JEHOVAH JIREH (the Lord will Provide)
• His Faith was strengthened
  

Consider this quote from David Guzik from his commentary on Genesis...
“This was not so much a test to produce faith, as it was a test to reveal faith. God had been

building Abraham slowly, piece by piece, year by year, into a man of faith.”

This is exactly the same thing that God is doing in each of our lives. He is transforming us step by step. He is not in a rush. He is patient.

May you know and understand today that it is the very heart of God to bless you. What parent would not desire to bless his or her children? As you seek to live for Him and be obedient to the things that He is asking for you, know that He has ALWAYS got something BETTER for you. If He is asking you to give up something, then give it up. I can personally say and testify that every time that I lay something on the altar, God has always blessed me with something greater!

TRUST HIM! GIVE YOUR ALL TO HIM! WORSHIP HIM! HE IS SO GOOD!

Rejoice with Us!

"Likewise, I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents."
Luke 15:10

We want you to join in with us as we celebrate what the Lord did in the lives of some individuals at our church this past weekend. I do believe that the Lord worked in many lives this past weekend, many of which we are not aware of because they did not make it know. But that is okay. We believe that God is working and trust in Him.
But I do want to share with you about 3 individuals who made a public profession of faith this past weekend. One of them simply rededicated his life back to the Lord this past weekend and in that we do rejoice! The other two are younger women that have been recently coming to our church for the past month or so. The Holy Spirit has been working in their hearts from the first time that they attended a service here. I can definitely testify to that!
This past weekend as we continued in our "Worship" series, we discussed the fact that unless we are born again or born of the Spirit, we cannot worship God at all. For Jesus said in John 4:24, "God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." And so through this point the Lord made it really clear to me that it was important to proclaim the Gospel and that salvation needed to be offered! I know that as one who is called to proclaim the Gospel, that is all that I am called to do; proclaim it faithfully. The results are left up to the Lord!
And so considering this verse in Luke 15, we just wanted to ask you to join in the celebration that has been taking place in heaven over the lives of these women who surrendered their lives to Jesus. Please as well continue to pray that we can be faithful to disciple them in God's Word!

God Bless you all!

New Website

Hello everyone,
I wanted to let you know that our church has a new website! This is something that we have been working on for quite a while now, but it is finally ready! We are really excited about it and excited to see how the Lord is going to be glorified through all of it!
For all of you English readers, it will only be in German, but I do believe that as you check it out, that you can kind of figure your way around it.

So go to www.calvarychapelherborn.de and check it out!

This is just the beginning. We will be adding more to it in the future!

God bless and please continue to be praying for the work of the Lord here in Herborn, Germany!

Continuing in the Worship Series

Tomorrow we are going to be continuing in our Worship series. As I have been praying and studying throughout the week, I believe that the Lord has revealed some very important truths in this topic of worship. Tomorrow we are going to be looking a some prerequisites to our worship that are a foundational.
For those of you that are reading this and you go to CC Herborn, then I do pray that you would invite some of your friends, neighbors, relatives, or strangers to come. The gospel message will go forth and so this will be a great time to invite someone to hear the gospel in the midst of this worship series!

For those of you who are not able to come, I have some specific topics that you can be praying for:

• preparation for the study
  
• proclamation of the Word
  
• translation
• salvation
• re-dedication
  
• and a transformation of our lives in this area of worship!

God bless you all!

devo on worship

You are ALL that I need from Joey Roper on Vimeo.

WORSHIP: where it all started (pt.2)

(painting by Neal Parrow - check out his art here.)
As we continue to look at the story of Abraham and Isaac in Genesis 22, the last point that we considered was what our heart "beats for" and whether or not we would be willing to lay it on the altar. For in our worship, the Lord asks for our ALL or our complete dedication. Now let's look at this a little further...

WORSHIP: trusting in God's Word
Before we look at this, open up your Bible right now and Read Genesis 22:3-10, as this will help you get an understanding of what we discuss here. Now that you have read it, I have a question for you. What would drive Abraham to complete obedience?
Something that we must first understand is that the Lord did not ask Abraham to do this at the beginning of his "walk of faith." This was after 55 years of learning to walk by faith. He had his failures and his times of success. I believe that one thing that Abraham learned after all of that time, was that God was completely faithful to His word and because of this Abraham learned that he could put all of his trust in God's word. With that in mind, let us look at a verse that is given to Abraham in Genesis 21. Look at vs.12, "...for in Isaac your seed shall be called."
When you look at this verse, there is not anything special to it. It is a simple statement, but what Abraham understood is that GOD said it and so if He said it, then He would be faithful to it. So when the Lord spoke to Abraham in Genesis 22:1-2, notice what Abraham's response was:

• vs.3 "So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey...”

• vs.5 "And Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you."

• vs.7-8 "“But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, "My father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." Then he said, "Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" And Abraham said, "My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering." So the two of them went together.”
  

Do you not see the COMPLETE TRUST that Abraham in God's Word. Although this may have not made sense in Abraham's mind. Why would God ask him to offer up the son if it was through him (Isaac) that God would continue to establish His covenant?

Notice the following verses...

Hebrews 11:17-19 "“By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, "In Isaac your seed shall be called," concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense.”

Let’s remember what worship is...

Christian worship is when Christ is in the place of highest worth in our lives. When we exalt Him above anything or anyone else. This is worship.

I believe that Abraham is demonstrating unto the Lord a few things:

• He Trusts the Lord!
• He is going to hold the Lord to His Word
• He is declaring (through his action) that God is more important than anyone or anything!

What About Us?
Something that we must ask ourselves is this. Do we trust in God's Word? Are we willing to demonstrate that to Him through our actions? Do we trust Him that no matter what He may ask of us, even if it is to put it "all" on the altar, that HE IS BETTER? He is trustworthy. He is faithful. He is worthy of "all."

I encourage you to spend time with the Lord and pour out your heart to Him with these truths.

We will finish this up next time...

WORSHIP: where it all started

(painting by Neal Parrow - check out his art here.)

This past weekend I picked up in a series that I had started last year. It is going to be a series that takes place on Sunday mornings and evenings here at CCH when Pastor Edmund is gone or sick. Since Edmund is currently in California with his wife grieving the loss of Martha's mom (please pray for them during this time), he has asked for me to teach in his place. In these next weeks I will be teaching on the topic of WORSHIP. We are going to be looking at the Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How of Worship. But before we get into those teachings, we started with the first story in the Bible where the word worship is mentioned. Genesis 22. The story of Abraham offering up Issac.
The depth of this story is absolutely amazing. There are so many biblical truths that you can look at in this story, but our aim was to look at the topic of worship.
A definition that we considered throughout this study for worship was the following:

Christian worship is when Christ is in the place of highest worth in our lives. When we exalt Him above anything or anyone else. This is worship.

WORSHIP: our faith is tested
Here in this story we see how Abraham's worship would be tested by the Lord. The Lord asked Abraham to take his son, his only son, whom he loved, and to offer him as a burnt offering. Now I want you to stop and think of the depth of this. Try to put yourself in the place of Abraham.

• Isaac was Abraham's only son
• The son that he had waited 25 years for
  
• The future of the covenant rested upon Isaac
• Isaac was a miracle child
• Abraham and Sarah loved Isaac very much
• They built their whole future around him
• It looked like God was wiping out everything Abraham and Sarah had lived for

So we see Abraham's faith and worship being put to the test. Who does he love more? Is he willing to sacrifice the very love of his life on the altar?

WORSHIP: we must give our "ALL"
As you look into the verses a little more closely you will see that the Lord tells Abraham that He wants him to offer Isaac as a burnt offering. For you and I, that might not mean that much, but Abraham knew exactly what this meant. He knew he would have to do the following things to Isaac:

• First he would have to cut the offeringʼs throat
• Then dismember it
• Finally all of the body parts would be offered up in the fire and consumed by the flames, there on the altar

You can read more about the burnt offering in Leviticus chapter one, but the burnt offering was the basic sacrifice that expressed devotion and dedication to the Lord. When we surrender ourselves to the Lord, we put “all on the altar”and hold back nothing.

The Lord was asking for complete dedication from Abraham! He was asking for ALL of Abraham! He would have to put ALL on the altar and hold nothing back. With this understanding, we see more of the "dilemma" that Abraham was in.

Your love on the altar
Before we continue, I want to stop right now and ask you something...

What is the MOST IMPORTANT thing in your life right now?

Jesus put it in this way...

Matthew 6:21 "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

What is it that your heart BEATS FOR right now?

What would be your response if the LORD asked you right now to...

PUT IT ALL ON THE ALTAR

Depending on how you answer that question will reveal to you where your WORSHIP with the Lord is right now

Remember this...
Christian worship is when Christ is in the place of highest worth in our lives. When we exalt Him above anything or anyone else. This is worship.

To be continued...

A Visit from an old Friend

This past weekend we had the opportunity to host a friend of mine, Cameron Marvin. He and two of his friends were traveling through Europe, preparing for, Lord willing, a future high school tour that he will lead throughout Europe. It is his aim to bring high schools students here to Europe to show them, first hand, some of the world and church history that has taken place here.
How amazing it was as we began to ask him about this future tour that he began to share with us about Ann Frank, Corrie ten Boom, and Dietrich Bonhöffer. I am currently reading about the life of Bonhöffer and Rebecca had just finished reading Ann Frank's book and is currently reading about Corrie ten Boom. So all of our hearts were stirred and encouraged with what the Lord might do through this tour.
It was a blessing to meet his friends as well, who are brothers who are from Holland, one of whom is a missionary in Tansania.
Here is a picture of Cameron and I as I showed them downtown Herborn. Behind us is the castle that is in Herborn. In my mind it is crazy to think of Cameron and my family sitting together in our home here in Germany. We would have never thought that would have taken place when we were younger!
I do pray that Cameron will be able to do this tour in the coming year and will be able to impact the lives of these high school students with God's heart for Europe!

Saying "Goodbye" for now

This past weekend we said "Goodbye" to some new friends of our, Alex and Catie Adams. Alex and Catie came to help serve here at CC Herborn for the last 3 months. We were tremendously blessed by the both of them! Not only were they a help and a huge blessing in many ways in serving here at the church, but they were a huge blessing to us as a family! It is amazing to think that we did not know them just 5 months ago and yet now we would consider them to be some great friends of ours.
I will never forget the first time that I talked with Alex on Skype. We had previously never even talked with one another and yet he told me, "Joey, we are going to become best friends." I absolutely loved the heart behind that statement. It reminded me of how we are co-laborers in Christ and it is so important that we are unified in heart and purpose.
These past three months went by so fast! It seems like they just got here and yet we were already saying goodbye to them. Well, one thing that we know for sure is that Alex and Catie will be missed here in Herborn. We know that they will are continuing to seek the Lord as to what is next in their lives. At this point, we are not sure what that is, but we know that as they continue to seek the Lord, He will faithfully lead them in those steps that He has prepared for them.

We pray that it is His will that those steps will lead them back to Herborn, Germany - FULL TIME!