Superman – A Message For Pastors & For Those Who Love Them – By Thomas Koester

Are you exhausted? Running on empty? Has your physical and spiritual odometer cycled over too many times?

If so, you may be a Superman Pastor.

Your identity and significance must be in your sonship and not in your pastorship. Being a son and a brother in Christ is far more relatable. Being relatable keeps you grounded, humble, and approachable. “Leaping tall buildings in a single bound, being more powerful than a locomotive, and speeding faster than a bullet,” is for Superman, not pastors.

“Look! Up in the Sky! It’s a Bird…It’s a Plane… It’s… …No, it’s just Pastor Dave.

Just be who you are, a beloved son, father, brother, and husband. If you’re going to be a faithful shepherd of God’s children, you need to be faithful to your wife and children first. You need to be faithful to your sonship as God’s beloved son and protect that relationship. Let God do all that superhero stuff.

Never use your intimacy with God as a vicarious impetus for others to synthesize. In doing this, you and your congregation will both become lost and distant from God. People will hunger for your intimacy at the sacrifice of their connection with God.

Instead, teach them how to be intimate with the Father-heart of God until their Father-hunger for God surpasses their father-hunger for you.

Won’t this lighten your load?

Won’t this save your marriage?

Won’t this free you up to be your children’s daddy?

If not, maybe your cape is showing.

As some of you have retired or have left the pastorship, you may find yourselves lost because you’ve been trapped in a service and performance role with God and others. This was never God’s doing, but the writ of men and the corporate structure of many churches.

Did you know that the word “religion” actually means to “re-bond” with God? The Latin word comprises two parts, “re” telling again and “ligare,” pointing to bind or to bond.

We Protestants are constantly harping against other religions that faith in God is not a religion but a relationship. But, in tossing out the word religion, we’ve tossed out the significance of the word. Rather than genuinely encouraging and leading people into intimacy and sonship with God, they’ve learned by our actions as pastors and enter into performance roles, as presented by the World’s false religions.

So many pastors have lost their intimate bond with God because of the performance and service trap. So, they end up helplessly modeling burnout, depression, and, believe it or not, loneliness.

Many pastors feel they must keep up the “superhero” role at all costs; that is, they must appear spiritually superior and altogether when in the public view. And, if he’s incredibly talented, he will maintain this unrealistic role even in front of his family. Being a “Clark Kent,” or just a normal guy is too risky for the sake of his job.

What happens to a man when he calls his darkness light?

“The eye is the lamp of the body. If your vision is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is evil, your whole body will be full of darkness. So if the light within you is darkness—how deep is that darkness! – Matthew 6:22-23

When a pastor calls his darkness light, he cuts himself off from God and others, and the duplicity becomes more and more costly. He loses his support from is family because the hypocrisy becomes unbearable.

If a pastor, and for that matter, any of us, satisfies our father-hunger with God and not with the ministry or titles, we will grow as true sons and daughters of God. It will therefore be the fruit of our lives, which will benefit others, and encourage them to bear their fruit by connecting to the True Vine, Jesus Christ.

The average pastor cannot maintain a pastor’s schedule, manage all the demands of human needs and interaction, attended meetings, weddings, funerals, and remain human. He’ll either suck it up, put on his cape and pretend to soar, or he’ll take on the humility of Christ.

A good and wise pastor will understand that his heart and identity is far more important than is superhero reputation and notoriety. His true strength is in allowing his humanness to be seen from time to time and not his cape.

In other words, take on the humility of Christ and the burden of Christ. Did you know that bearing your cross is a very public affair? Jesus bore the weight of his cross in public, and, at the moment where he had lost his strength, a simple man aided him and carried his cross for a distance.

Pastoring is not maintaining an Olympic-style dash from crisis to crisis, and it’s not meant to be a solo act. It’s teamwork; it should involve the aid of well qualified and faithful elders and deacons. After all, the ministry of the Church is meant for the Church and not because of the Church. By each of us, you and me, joining in the ministry, we will grow in our faith and collectively reach maturity in Christ as a healthy body.

A superhero pastor has no time for teamwork, it’s just easier and less complicated to do it all himself.

Since scripture has defined the Church as a body, the concept of real and healthy ministry is when the entire body functions together, when each member does its intended and gifted part.

When we act properly like a body, we can create a safe and healthy community where pastors can thrive within healthy boundaries. Maybe then pastors can cease leaping tall buildings in a single bound.

There is so much more to talk about on this subject. But, until then, pray for your pastors. Become more involved. Give them grace. Take better care of one another. Visit one another. Pray for one another. Support your pastor, and not just with financial gifts, but with your time too.

After all, aren’t we all children of God?

Only in DC Comics will you find a Superman.

God’s Children Are Not For Sale – By Thomas Koester

Toni and I saw the movie “Sound of Freedom” a few weeks ago. If this movie doesn’t move a person to action, I really don’t know what will. Child abduction, abandonment, child sex trafficking, and enslavement are horrible stains on America. I can’t think of anything worse!

The title of my article is a direct quote from the Sound of Freedom. “God’s children are not for sale” is a powerful statement that must be heralded worldwide! Yet, there are other statements just as vital that must also be broadcasted; God’s children are not to be aborted! They are not to be abused! They are not to be abandoned! They are not to be molested!

Several years ago, I was invited to speak at a retreat for underprivileged boys. I enjoyed speaking and sharing my message and testimony to the camp. Anthony Vasquez and Jordan Koester also shared their testimonies. I talked about the Father-heart of God and how to become a redeemed and true son. Our Father-God is no dead-beat-dad. He is faithful and true always. These boys needed a positive message about God’s heart for them.

Lots of prayers went out for these boys and the counselors throughout the rest of that week. Many of them do not have dads. I just wanted to bring them home with me and love them as sons, but I told them that God can love them, heal their pain, and father them in the way they should go.

I asked them all a question:

Which would you rather have, a broken leg or a broken heart?

They all replied loudly:

“I’ll take a broken leg!”

This is because most of these boys, unfortunately, already know the pain of a broken heart and how difficult it is for a broken heart to be healed. Our job that weekend was to reveal to these precious lost boys the Healer and Redeemer of the Brokenhearted, which is none other than Jesus Christ.

I shared with them Isaiah chapter 61 and explained how Jesus Christ proclaimed good news to the poor, that he is the Healer of the brokenhearted, and that He came to set the captives and the prisoners free! And that through Jesus, we can become saved, healed, and restored. How good is God’s Word, and How awesome is our God?

God is good, trustworthy, and true! He never fails and is no dead-beat-dad!

He is a True and Faithful Father to lost Sons and Daughters everywhere!

Jesus did amazing work that weekend. He wants you to join him in doing the same work wherever he sends you. Wherever you work, shop, or play. Lost and broken boys may not be born to you, but they can be mentored or even fathered by you.

It doesn’t take a college degree to be a big brother, mentor, or father-type to a fatherless boy. There are also men in their twenties, thirties, and even in their forties that are in desperate need to be fathered and mentored. These boys and men need good father types to help them triumph over the evil that cursed their lives.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Edmund Burke

Evil can only triumph in lost boys if you and I do nothing. Boys become lost because their dads did nothing, or worse, ran out on them. Let’s stop evil’s triumph as much as we can. One lost boy at a time!

“God’s children are not for sale!”

Killing Religion – Thomas Koester

Religion has never raised the dead. To the contrary, religion puts people in the grave.

Religion is the focus of human effort. That kind of focus leaves no room for faith. It leaves no room for the divine power of God.

You can not change the truth of who you are on the inside by your actions on the outside. Your heart must be changed. Religion can not change your heart; only a relationship with God can do that.

Religion is a ritual of observances that can lead you away from God to a god. This is why religion in and of itself is dangerous. It can lead to an empty life full of observances, rituals, and legalism.

Religion must die; after all, it murdered the Messiah. But God made good use of it to usher in redemption through the death of His Son. However, religion does not belong in any actual house of worship, nor does it belong in the life of any faithful follower of Jesus Christ.

Lately, there’s been many “religions” being thrown around, bullying lost and broken souls, for which Christ came to heal and rescue. Don’t become infected by religion or traditionalism as I did. Get cured of it and become Agents of Grace instead of Religion.

Some people invest their trust in doctors, scientists, and vaccines. At the same time, others invest their faith in a miraculous cure, prayer, and repentance. God can work in both because God is not confined to religious institutions. Religion wants to own God; it wants to control our perception. It seeks to become the sole arbiter of biblical interpretation and, therefore, regulates God.

So don’t be a pushy religionists. Be an agent of hope and grace. Exercise your faith in the explosive power that raised Jesus from the grave. Religion has never raised the dead. To the contrary, religion puts people in the grave.

Jesus Christ conquered religion the morning he rose from the grave. He left the grave clothes of the old religious order in the tomb and provided us direct access to God the Father through his glorious risenness.

The best way to kill Religion is to love the Religious into a relationship directly with our Heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, his son.

In The Gospel of Luke, chapter 12, Jesus warns the crowd:

“Guard yourselves against the yeast that puffs up the Pharisees—hypocrisy, false appearance, trying to look better than you are.”

You see, your goodness is not good enough. Only the goodness of Jesus is good enough to save you and change your life. You can not change the truth of who you are on the inside by your actions on the outside. Your heart must be changed. Religion can not change your heart. It can change your outer appearance, but not your heart.

God’s grace is sufficient to save the Religious out from their Religions.

Because Jesus lives, we live — free from religion and free from the traditions of men.

The Miraculous Power of Pain & Suffering – By Thomas Koester

When I get strong, I get lost. When I get busy, I get independent. When I get successful, I get lonely.

I was down and out from October 11th, 2013, through mid-January 2014. Life had been hard and painful, but God has never been closer than he’s been with me through those difficult months. I’ll tell you, my dear friends, I’d rather be laid up and laid out with God by my side than lonely but successful in the world any day.

I had gotten to the point in my suffering that I began to thank God for my injuries and sicknesses. I began to see the blessings and the beautiful breaking to my stubborn heart and the fresh and living water flooding into my dry soul. My pain in a miraculous way allowed God’s voice to become magnified, and the whispers of “I love you son” filled my troubled mind in those long and dark, painful nights.

I truly want God, but he’s not necessarily in my busyness, nor is he in my business. He’s not in my self-imposed deadlines, or in the deadlines of others, which weary my body and mind, and cause me to strain and to force my goals above Gods’. He’s not in the coulda, woulda, or shoulda’s, nor is he in my goals of independence and worldly success. God is definitely not in my confused tantrums, my sulking, or complaining.

God is in the midst of suffering; he’s nearby the crushed and the weary, the sick and the lonely. Our God is with the widowed; he’s with the fatherless and alien. He hears the cries and prayers of the broken, the injured, and the weak.

“He will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle.” Isaiah 42:3 (NLT)

When I get strong, I get lost. When I get busy, I get independent. When I get successful, I get lonely.

I want God, and therefore, I welcome the pain and suffering so that I might gain all that he has for me through it. This is the process that can get us found in God, which can make us strong in the right things and focus on eternal values, which can bring contentment during our seasons of affliction.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not looking for pain and suffering, only that when it comes, the goodness and presence of God is magnified through it, and therefore, I can revel in it and celebrate because of it. Through it, I have learned that our greatest changes can result from what we suffer. Pain and suffering are powerful for our good!

So, while my body was aching and writhing in pain and anguish, my soul was soaring with God. I worshiped God and thanked him through so much of my illnesses and injuries. The pain still lingers, and the scar, which I now bear on my left leg and knee, will always remind me of God’s faithfulness to me all the way through it.

And so, I thank God for all of it.

One day, I was complaining to my wife, Toni, about a difficult client. I was through and ready to cut the relationship and take a significant loss just to get out of the misery.

Then, Toni pulled the “Book of Job” on me:

“Has not God provided through this person?” she said, and then continued: “Do you really to
throw people away because they sometimes cause difficulty?”

Wow! I was called out and convicted. Thank you, Toni!

I had set aside, not only heaven’s provision for me, but I had set aside God’s provision of grace and mercy towards the one whom God set up to bring such needed financial provision.

“Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not also receive evil?” In all this, Job did not sin with his lips. Job 2:10

I am not deformed, but I am being transformed. The more we complain and lay blame, the slower our remaking through our braking goes. In my recent story with my client, God used my wife to get me back on track and with God’s program.

Our complaining always works against God’s transforming work, and so we fail to see how God masters evil for our good. Our complaining and blaming causes us to only see the badness of evil, rather the goodness of God in spite of it and His creative use with it.

“I form the light and create darkness: I make peace and create evil: I The Lord do all these things.” – Isaiah 45:7

Ha, I’ve not heard that verse preached in Church!

So, if God masters light, darkness, peace, and evil, how can we be destroyed in the day of pain, sickness, and disease? How can we lose if what we fear can not keep us from winning? How then shall we live, if even evil and the day of disaster, is under the control of such a loving and caring Heavenly Father?

I’ll tell ya how we should then live – in Total Victory and with an Overcomer’s Spirit!

Hey, there’s power in what we suffer, no matter how miserable or deadly! But you gotta put away the complaining and start the thanksgiving and praising.

I was just a young teenager of 14 years old when I got a hold of a book titled “By What Standard” by the late Dr. Rousas John Rushdoony, the father of Mark Rushdoony.

Like the late Dr. Rushdoony, the life and story of Job, set the standard of who God is and His power over evil. Page 185 through page 205 of By What Standard is what impacted me most in my life as a teenager. The Book of Job established my foundation for all my understanding of the ways of God and the ability of God. The Book of Job became my standard of biblical understanding and godly comfort.

Like Job, it is blind faith and trust in the Almighty, whereby God shall succeed in spite of our lack of understanding and even confusion. Our suffering is not the end of the means, but the means to an end, forewhich Satan’s must comply with God’s will over our lives and our wellbeing.

So, the key is to invest all of your faith and trust into God’s will, and pain and suffering will become allies to your transformation and glorification.

“In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what he suffered.” – Hebrews 2:10

Was it not God who invited Satan to consider His servant Job?

Did not God establish the boundaries after he invited Satan to afflict Job?

The Book of Job, chapters one, and two.

God masterfully controlled darkness, sickness, and disease over His servant Job, but He also displayed His power over the Prince of Darkness.

The Book of Job reveals how Satan must obey the very boundaries that God sets up, leaving Satan and all evil under the power of the God of the Universe and Creator of all things. And yes, including all angelic beings, and even those who’ve failed at the Heavenly coup d’état of God’s throne and power, and dare I say, they failed miserably!

‘God spoke to Cain:”Why this tantrum? Why the sulking? If you do well, won’t you be accepted? And if you don’t do well, sin is lying in wait for you, ready to pounce; it’s out to get you; you’ve got to master it.” – Genesis 4:6-7

We can master sin because God has mastered evil, and his Son, Jesus Christ, has vanquished our sin. He destroyed death and conquered the grave! But tantrums and sulking leave you vulnerable, and instead of victory, you’ll end in defeat.

So, we can thrive in pain and suffering, in loss and betrayal, and evil shall not destroy us. Evil becomes a weapon in the hand of God, disarming our enemy and thwarting evil’s plan for our destruction.

Do you want to disarm the Evil One? Then, praise God in the midst of all that hell has unleashed and bask in the suffering with thanksgiving. Trust fully in the God who knows what He is doing and the limits for which evil must obey.

Can we lose?

“No, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” Romans 8:37

Put your faith and trust in God and become transformed and not deformed by all that you suffer.

Your pain may be your breakthrough into victory and validation that you are a true son or daughter of God and not a fatherless victim.

As a victor, you, too, will see The Miraculous Power of Pain and Suffering.

My Failed Masquerade – By Thomas Koester

God Wants Us As We Are And Not What We Pretend To Be.

It’s been a long season of letting go and stripping down. It’s been a time of pruning and preening, until all the old feathers are removed and the old eagle remains perched, cold, vulnerable, and flightless. It’s a time of humility and powerlessness. It’s a time whereby I’ve become blind, deaf, and mute. I long for even the faintest whisper from the Almighty; a glimpse of his existence, and acknowledgement of my prayers.

It’s a time where others are making my decisions, not because I am a king (my time of reigning has deminised) but, because God’s interest are sonship and not kingship at this time in my life. God must have his way, or I will become too strong, too hardened, and too important. While my flesh yearns for such strength, independence, and self-importance; yet, His Spirit calls me heavenward.

So, I am sent back into the womb; into seclusion; into the hands of God to be reformed, kneaded, and made pliable, until my obedience becomes instinct, and my quality becomes refined. The purest gold is crystal clear and what we call beautiful, God calls dross.

In our human fragility and stubbornness, we cease the process of humility way too early. If it’s our own deconstructing and demolition, we blame it on the devil. If it is a friend or neighbor facing such travails, we jump in to save and to fix, and so short-circuit God’s best work in them. As singer/songwriter, Jill Phillips has so artfully penned into song,

“…God is both the builder and wrecking ball.”

And this truth gives good reason I cling to hope; amazingly, through it all, our God is in control. My deconstructing can be a good thing, if it is God swinging the wrecking ball.

Religious-populace thought, has dwarfed my perception and need for God. The extractible biblical principles and acquirable blessings “by cause and effect,” granted me the promised land of goodies without intimate relationship with Yahweh. I have become an idolater and have joined the ranks of “Christians,” who have reformed and refashioned their gold and silver into objects of worship. We call it “Yahweh,” and have found a way to satisfy our itch for deity worship and maintain our addiction to sin.

We’ve even learned to worship our worship! And crave “the anointing” more than the Anointer.

We’ve convinced ourselves and others that God as “Love,” trumps God as Justice, Holiness, and Righteousness. Oh, but how many of us do cry out for true justice, righteousness, and holiness?

Mainstream Christianity has reinvented God. He’s become a benevolent and tolerant God, full of winks, giggles, and thumbs-up at our sins.

So, I’ve been quiet and introspective. I’ve taken a look under the hood and it’s time for rebuilding and rethinking. Twenty-first Century Christianity is finally equivalent to First Century Phariseeism, only without the dark and flowing robes and phylacteries.

We’ve convinced ourselves that observances and the mastering of principals and rote make us acceptable to God. We are all white on the outside, but dead and dirty on the inside. We shut our ears and mouths to our own inner immorality and conflict; we direct the attention of others to our outward achievements and ministry appointments. We protect our own duplicity at the cost of our own identity.

We prefer to live in the shadows; not too much in the light or too much in the darkness. In the end, it is God we must convince, and He sees through our masks and into our hearts. There are no shadows with the Almighty!

We’ve become the generation who’d see to the arrest of Jesus; treat him as an imposter, a fake and a phony; his presence an annoyance, and his outspokenness a disturber of our traditions. We’d cast him out of our carpeted and high-tech sanctuaries and chase him and his homeless faction back to 73rd and West MacArthur.

We simply would not recognize Jesus of Nazareth, nor agree with his lifestyle and “unsuccessful demeanor” and lack of corporate-ness.

I’m on a quest to find the simplicity of what Jesus taught. To archeologically excavate and rediscover what decades of religious debris has covered over, like the sands of time.

So, that’s what has been going on in the inside. The outside is a different story. It must be mastered, or it will become my master. And this is my battleground. It’s an ancient battle fought by many, and won by so precious few. My prayer is to join the few, by relying on God’s grace and power, through Jesus Christ.

Our Sunday morning masquerading must come to an end. The pretense and fakery must be replaced with humility and honesty, or else we’ll become master Pharisees. We must capture our first love again and shed our sophisticated and false adult-selves and become God’s children again.

God wants us as we are and not what we pretend to be. Jesus didn’t come for fakers or liars, but for the broken and humble.

Pretenders pretend that their sins and shame are covered behind their false personas. Their so-called salvation is their masquerade, which, by the way, only assures them a full dance card outside with sweaty dogs and demons.

“Blessed are those who wash their robes. They will be permitted to enter through the gates of the city and eat the fruit from the tree of life. Outside the city are the dogs—the sorcerers, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idol worshipers, and all who love to live a lie.” – Revelation 22:14-16

I pray, that we as a redeemed people, can leave all the religious fakery behind and get back true redemption and rejoin God in redeeming this world. Because, if you haven’t noticed, this world is headed full speed towards hell.

Blessed are those that remove their masks and cease their love affair with living a lie.

My prayer is that God will also help you fail at your masquerade. Amen

The Prodigal Father – Turning Your Heart Towards Your Children – By Thomas Koester

Don’t wait for your kids to find your heart, be brave and pursue theirs. It’ll change everything!

Before a nation collapses, the family collapses. Before a family collapses, the father collapses. Therefore, the fall of nations is the failure of fathers.

After a three-year hiatus due to the pandemic, Toni and I finally went to a movie theater in Angels Camp, California, to watch the sequel, “Avatar: The Way of Water.” We watched it in 3D at 48 frames per second. Wow!

The movie’s subtitle should have read, “The Way of Fathers.”

While the cinematography, special effects, action, and acting were all superb, the portrayal of the father’s role was unmistakable and powerful! Matter of fact so was the mother’s role. The importance of parents and family is something we rarely see in movies produced in Holywood.

While James Cameron wrote a fantastic story and script, the importance of fathers taking responsibility for their children was something to behold. Just like in the world of Avatar, our world needs strong, uncompromising fathers to survive!

I see the role and importance of fathers in the Bible, from the first chapter of Genesis to the last chapter of the Book of Revelations. From the last book of the Old Testament, the final chapter, and the last two verses, and to the opening of the New Testament, in the Book of Luke, chapter one, verses fifteen through seventeen.

Malachi 4: 5-6 (Last Old Testament Book)

“Look, I am sending you the prophet Elijah before the great and dreadful day of the Lord arrives. His preaching will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers. Otherwise, I will come and strike the land with a curse.”

Luke 1: 15-17 (One of the First New Testament Books)

15, ff “…And he will be filled with the Holy Spirit, even in his mother’s womb. 16 And he will turn many of the children of Israel to their Lord God. 17, And he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the unbelievers to the wisdom of the just men: to make the people ready for the Lord.”

John the Baptist was the second Elijah spoken about in the Book of Malachi. It was his job to stir the hearts of fathers to their sons and daughters. Otherwise, the mission of Jesus to reconcile the lost sons and daughters of Israel to his Heavenly Father would have met hardened hearts.

Our roles as fathers are not only the most significant societal and cultural role; it is the single most important relational/spiritual role our children can have here on earth. Malachi is pointing out that a father’s estrangement (absence) from his children has the potential of cursing our land and creating avenues of destruction throughout our cities and towns. Estranged and absent fathers make ungodly and rebellious children. It also hardens the children’s hearts against the love of God, his Heavenly Father’s role, and ultimately His plan of salvation for them.

Do you fathers understand your role and responsibility in God’s plan of salvation for your children? You will be held to account. Do you want to stand before God as a deadbeat dad?

There can be no more significant failure in a man’s life than to turn his back on his marriage and children.

The career is not worth it. An affair is not worth it. Money is not worth it. One more drink is not worth it. Your girlfriend is not worth it. Even your “ministry” is not worth the sacrifice of your children.

Suppose you’re on the fence about your marriage and your responsibility for your children. Suppose you’ve walked out of your marriage and your kids’ lives. Suppose you’re in an affair or about to enter one. Even the promotion in work or ministry could take you away from your wife and kids. Consider the impact on their lives and future and our culture before you walk off the cliff of selfishness. It is not worth it, men!

Go back home to the wife of your first love. Go back home to the family you’ve left behind. Go back home to the most extraordinary life a man can live. Rescue your wife, save your children and save your legacy!

Reconciliation becomes possible when fathers turn their hearts back towards their children, taking responsibility and becoming accountable for them. To reverse the curse, which is undeniably present in our culture, we fathers must turn back to God and walk in His ways so that we can again point our children to a greater Father to embrace, love, and walk with throughout their lifetime.

The success of marriage and unconditional commitment to our wives and children must exceed the failure rate of broken families and absent fathers. If this tide cannot be turned, then as Malachi has prophetically declared, our land will indeed become cursed and worsen rapidly.

Repair the breach, men! Turn your hearts back towards your sons and daughters. Repair your marriages and live up to your commitments. Turn your hearts back to God and walk with Him as your True Father and listen to His advice and wise counsel. After all, He is the Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Wonderful Counselor, and Prince of Peace. God is everything we need as men to become the fathers our sons and daughters need and our land requires.

To those sons and daughters that have lost their fathers due to death, you can still turn your hearts back towards him. Forgiveness is your most significant path to a new life, to a new future, and to become healed from your heartache.

This is the only path to a cure; to reverse the curse and restore our great Nation through restored families! Get it done, men!

…It may only take “20 seconds of courage.”

Make this your New Year’s Resolution, a Revolution For the Love of your children.

Prodigal fathers, come home!

“Just Do It!”

Healing Your Wounded Heart – Your Greatest Day – By Thomas Koester

Don’t live with the pain. Time is not the Healer of all wounds; that’s a lie. God is the Healer.

“Keep thy heart more than anything that is guarded; for from it flows the issues of life.” Proverbs 4:23

“A wound where there are no tears is a wound that cannot be healed.” Author, John Eldredge – Ransomed Heart Ministries

A splinter under the skin, if left alone and ignored will eventually fester to a point of infection. Your body is rejecting the foreign object no matter how small it is, the pain calls out for your attention. If you ignore it too long, you could end up in the emergency room.

How about your heart?

Why ignore the pain?

Your heart is more precious than a finger; you can live without a finger, but you cannot live without your heart.

Sometimes we’re strong in the wrong things and at the wrong times, but to be weak in the right things and with a humble heart, can get God’s attention.

If you are hurting, in pain and are crushed in spirit, heart, and soul, you may be at the greatest turning point of your life. You may actually be dwelling with God in a high and protected place, but you must share your tears with God, or you’ll be swallowed up in bitterness and left alone on earth.

Isaiah 57:15

“The high and lofty One who inhabits eternity, the Holy One, says this: I live in that high and holy place where those with contrite, humble spirits dwell; and I refresh the humble and give new courage to those with repentant hearts.”

Psalm 51:17

“The sacrifice pleasing to God is a broken spirit. God, You will not despise a broken and humbled heart.”

Let God encounter your tears, after all, He is the Everlasting Father. Share it with Him as your sacrifice. Come to Him crushed, broken, betrayed; come to Him rejected and despised. His Son, Jesus is well acquainted with all of this and more. He allows it to touch your life, not to destroy you, but to draw you closer to Himself.

God wants to father you…

Simply trust and turn to God and surrender your right to be offended; your anger for being abused; your self hatred for being molested, raped, and violated. God specializes with hurting and wounded people, and He’d rather be with you than with kings and queens.

The moment you offer up to God your tears and pain, you are with Him in spirit and in truth.

Isaiah 42:3

“He will not break the bruised reed, nor quench the dimly burning flame. He will encourage the fainthearted, those tempted to despair. He will see full justice given to all who have been wronged.”

God won’t exploit your bruises. He’ll not snuff out your heart, even if its barely beating and you feel life is over.

God desires to be your daddy…

Give it all over to God. If you do, He’ll see to it that justice is served, and you can give your revenge a proper burial.

Then, you’ll knock down your walls of despair and make them into a dance floor and you’ll dance with your Abba, just as He’s always wanted.

Don’t live with the pain. Time is not the Healer of all wounds, that’s a lie.

God is the Healer of all wounds, and He’s waiting to hear your cries directed towards Him, so that He may act.

“O my people in Jerusalem, you shall weep no more, for he will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. He will answer you.” Isaiah 30:19

Give it up to God. Let it out and drink in God’s presence and love, and so be healed and restored.

Become healed in the name of Jesus! He came to seek out the lost and broken, and there is no one he cannot save or heal.

Isaiah wrote about the mission of Jesus centuries before He arrived:

“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor…

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.” Isaiah 61: 1-3

You see, God wants to do an exchange with you, He’ll give you beauty, joy, and praise for all your ashes, mourning, and despair. It happened with me, and it could happen for you too.

This may be one of your greatest days!

Your heart and soul are God’s specialty. He wants to heal your heart and set you free!

The Rapid Collapse of America – By Thomas Koester

“If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?” Psalms 11:3

While the collapsing of America has been slowly plodding since it’s inception some 246 years ago, in these past few decades, and especially these past two years, it has accelerated to breakneck speed. Like a speeding locomotive, too heavy and too fast to stop.

Historically, every failed Nation or civilization has indeed gone through what America and Western culture is currently going through. The key phrase here is “every failed Nation or civilization.”

What America is currently undergoing is the rapid decline of our freedoms of the many for the sake of individual liberties of the degenerate and the immorality of the few. Those with political power will ride the inevitable cultural implosion to greater power and dictatorial control. This is by design and not by coincidence.

Again, this is not a new paradigm but a “rinse and repeat” cycle of history and what happens with apathetic, contemporary people unwilling to learn from past historical mistakes. The treasures of historical knowledge has been purposely engineered out of our educational institutions, and unwittingly to the average American citizen and student.

This, by no means, excuses the average American citizen but is a sad and factual commentary of our collective willingness to seek pleasure and policies of appeasement in exchange for governmental control and free goodies.

In reality, we’ve all chosen to worship America and all its bounty rather than the God of Heaven, Earth’s only Redeemer.

“If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?” Psalms 11:3.

Unfortunately, 21 Century Christianity has been too preoccupied with Church. You may not think so, but darkness does, and the Lord of Darkness celebrates our easy relinquishment of the Church’s Kingdom of God duties and responsibilities. If the Church had been occupied with the Kingdom of God as an occupying force for King Jesus, we would not be this far down the river, and perhaps the “foundations” could’ve been repaired.

Our task was to occupy until He came — To preach the Gospel of the Kingdom, to bless the world with the rule and reign of God’s Son. Not hasten the day of destruction because of our misguided disengagement, our pre-tribulation theory, and premillennial exfiltration madness.

As surely as the sun rises in the East, our future leaders will be as degenerate, morally vacant, and deranged as the voters that vote them into power. Our ignominious milestones of the first this, or the first that; the first gay Senator, first transgender Congressman, first Islamic-Extremist Representative, and our first LGBTQUIZ President, etc. will become the millstone of slavery around every citizen’s neck; rich or poor, black or white, gay or straight, liberal or conservative.

Unapologetically, the only option for recovery and change is to turn away from our individual and corporate sins, repent, and turn wholeheartedly to God — without delay, seeking His forgiveness for our willful disregard of His laws, and the greatest gift given to all humanity, that is Jesus Christ, God’s only way of salvation.

Without the Church’s acknowledgment of Jesus Christ as Lord and King, America’s greatness will undoubtedly collapse, and not even Donald J. Trump or Ron DeSantis can make America Great Again.

It is my hope and prayer, as I’m sure it is yours also, that our better days as a people and a Nation are yet before us. But this is all up to God and not up to a politician or political party. The two things that can change the fate of this Nation is a repentant Church and praying Saints.

Can I get an amen?

The Children of A Lesser God, Part 2 – By Thomas Koester

This is Part 2 of my first two-part article about the plight of 21st Century American Christianity.

My “fued,” if you will, is not against the true Church or authentic Christianity. It is an article of warning, challenge, and calling out believers that have been sold a false god, making them into a lesser child.

Nehemiah prays for God’s children…

“Behold, we are slaves this day; in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we now are slaves. And its rich yield goes to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please, and we are in great distress.” Nehemiah 9:36-37

Politicians, Legislators and Presidents will not return us to a Great People or a Great Nation, but confession and repentance of God’s People will.

Nehemiah continues…

“But they- our ancestors behaved presumptuously; they rebelled and did not obey your commandments. They refused to obey and did not recall your miracles that you had performed among them. Instead, they rebelled and appointed a leader to return to their bondage. Nehemiah 9:16-17

Jeremiah laments…

Death Is on the Prowl

God ‘s Message yet again:

“Go stand at the crossroads and look around. Ask for directions to the old road, The tried and true road. Then take it. Discover the right route for your souls.

But they said,

“Nothing doing. We aren’t going that way.”

I even provided watchmen for them to warn them, to set off the alarm. But the people said,

“It’s a false alarm. It doesn’t concern us.”

And so I’m calling in the nations as witnesses:

“Watch, witnesses, what happens to them!”

And,’ Pay attention, earth! Don’t miss these bulletins. I’m visiting catastrophe on this people, the end result of the games they’ve been playing with me. They’ve ignored everything I’ve said, had nothing but contempt for my teaching. Jeremiah 6:16-19

We’ve exchanged the Glorious Gospel for a seeker friendly message so as to build our Churches in numbers rather than faithfulness to God and His ways.

We’ve changed the blood of the New Covenant, the precious blood of our Lord and Savior, into that of the blood of animals, and we therefore proclaim people sinless by emotions rather by repentance and faith. We teach tolerance but not obedience. We preach the Love of God trumps all other attributes of the one and only True Living God of Scripture. Who’s wrath against sin and those who make sin their lifestyle still remains. Though they know it or not, their day of judgment is being held back.

Faith, belief, repentance, and obedience to The risen Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ is mankind’s only escape from the wrath of God. For who needs to be saved from a God of Love? And, if we only preach God’s love and tolerance, what becomes of the shed blood of Jesus Christ? And, for what purpose does his death serve if God is only Love?

Our Country was found on Christian and moral principles, and by the rule of law. America became a people of renown, of freedom, liberty, and justice for all.

Our Nation was lost because we pastors and churches have abandoned our Christian principles and our moral standing under God and before the nations. We’ve abandoned the preaching of the cross and the resurrection of our only Redeemer. Sadly, the resurrection of Jesus Christ and his birth have become nothing more than semi-religious holidays.

We have full churches, but empty Christians. We have Christian couples fornicating, but freely worshiping. We have Christian marriages adulterating but actively serving. We have Christian youth sexually experimenting with their bodies, but attend warm gatherings and rallies for Christ. We’ve trained them with double standards, one set for school and the other for church. Our youth of tomorrow are the double standards of today’s adults. And all this is just fine?

Our Nation is lost not because the ungodly sin, but because the righteous practice, tolerate, and preach a distorted and confusing relationship with God!

The condition of the Church is directly related to the condition of our pastors; to the messages they preach, and the duplicity they tolerate. All in exchange for notoriety, fame and market share of transient Christians, and the unsaved seeking a friendly Sunday morning message. We’ve become more excited about a new visitor rather than a new saint.

One Wednesday evening service my Senior Pastor allowed me to preach a message titled: “Children of A Lessor God.” When I stopped preaching, people were weeping in their seats and falling on there knees at the alter. My Senior Pastor and I had to literally and carefully step around and over our repentant brothers and sisters, and began praying for them one by one. Others came forward to assist us with prayer or join their brothers and sisters.

After things quieted down, I will never forget what my Senior Pastor said:

“There is no way you can preach that way on a Sunday morning.”

I was both confused and shocked! It is precisely why our Churches and Christians are in the state that they are in because we don’t preach the Truth of God’s Word nor preach Christ Crucified to redeem sinners from God’s terrible wrath.

When we refuse to preach the weightiness of God, people will not experience the weightiness of their sins, and God then becomes less in their lives.

We have become children of a lesser God and therefore have a lesser Church, lesser Nation, and have become a lesser people.

Many years ago, between 1975 – 1978, I was attending two churches. The Walnut Creek Christian Reformed Church was the church my parents brought my siblings and me to. The second church, Concord Christian Center, was the church my girlfriend attended, which I visited from time to time.

At the Walnut Creek Christian Reformed Church, they read the Ten Commandments each Sunday service. The Ten Commandments were presented as God’s goodness and grace to his people. The Reverend taught in an expository manner, being faithful to context and textual meaning.

At Concord Christian Center, there was no reading of God’s law and, honestly, very little reading of the Scriptures. The worship part of the service was the highlight, with a full course band, singers, and highly emotional songs. The pastor’s messages, while loosely based on Scripture, were mostly topical, centering on physical blessings and prosperity. This church adopted the high school that I would eventually graduate from in June 1978.

At CCC, several marriages ended. Many of the divorced married other ex-spouses within the church. Fornication and adultery were not uncommon. While CCC may have been a fun and exciting place to worship and fellowship, the people there became lesser as God was lesser. This is one of my pivotal experiences that lead me to preach on a Wednesday evening service, “Children of A Lesser God,” back in 2007.

So, just as the Israelites wanted to go back to Egypt, our nation is headed back to Europe, the very place our founding fathers had fled. The ancient Israelites wanted to go back to Egypt, to return to slavery under a new Pharaoh. We seem to be headed into a new style of slavery by unelected bureaucrats, technocrats, and globalists. We want this 21st Century enslavement because we see ourselves as a lesser people.

It’s up to God’s people to stand strong as His Chosen People, as His Holy Nation and a Royal Priesthood of True Believers! We must shake off our false identity as Children of a Lesser god and be His Children of The Great and Mighty God, God of the Angel Armies!

Do you want to be a great people, a great man, or a great woman? A great nation? Then reject the lesser god of your life, cast him off like a worn-out shirt.

If you’re attending a church that emphasizes a false and fake gospel, a tolerant love guru, a genie god, or a Geico god, where it’s “so easy, a caveman can do it.” Find a God-honoring Church that worships God in Spirit and in Truth. A Church that aids you in becoming a Child of The Great God of Creation.

So goes the Church, so goes the Nation.

The Children of A Lesser God, Part 1 – By Thomas Koester

You cannot build a healthy Church by feeding the flock from your personal intimacies with God. They’ll end up living their faith vicariously through your faith without actually living by faith.

God’s people must encounter God as who he is in their lives, families, neighborhoods, and jobs, more than what they hear in a Sunday sermon. They need to encounter the weightiness of God in their lives rather than a theological supposition that tickles their intellect but does not move them to worship.

In other words, people need to encounter the Lordship of Jesus and not just the flannel board Jesus in Sunday School.

If we fail to present God as God, people will settle for a lesser god, full of winks, giggles, and thumbs-up to their sins.

David wrote:

“Fear the Lord, you holy people who belong to him. Those who fear him are never in need. Young lions go hungry and may starve, but those who seek the Lord’s help have all the good things they need.” Psalm 34:9-10

Our fear of the Lord should lead us into a healthy worship of Him so that being His children becomes our most meaningful identity.

Sometimes, even in America, we live as though there are many gods, even though we profess the Truth of Scripture. Our actions dictate our true beliefs and not simply what we profess. We cannot escape it. We belong to what we fear and to whom we obey.

Belief in the One True and only Living God requires obedience and not just belief. Demons believe yet shudder in fear. Even the Name of God’s Holy Son, Jesus of Nazareth, invokes fear and dispels demonic tactics and oppression. Darkness always is dispelled by light, and no shadow can hide from God’s brightness.

I’m sure you’ve heard the expression, “don’t be afraid of your own shadow.” This means to be extremely timid, nervous, fearful, and easily frightened. This is to live a life of fear worship rather than God worship.

So, we have become what we worship. We worship what we fear, and when we only believe and remain passive to God’s will, we cease to worship God.

The God of Creation and Author of our Eternal Redemption must be obeyed, or we’ll become quiet rebels, worshiping lesser gods. The proof of our false belief is in the quality, or lack thereof, of our true obedience. We become what we worship and a slave to what we fear.

Do you want and desire the Fruits of Heaven?

Start listening to the One who occupies the Throne of Heaven and obey His Word, even if it leads to your death; death of reputation, death of comfort, death of self, and yes, even the death of your body. For “obedience is better than sacrifice,” as it is written in 1 Samuel 15:22:

“But Samuel replied,

“What is more pleasing to the Lord…

…your burnt offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to his voice?

Listen! Obedience is better than sacrifice, and submission is better than offering the fat of rams.”

When you act as though the Evil One has equal power to The Eternal One, you have ceased in both belief and obedience to God and have become a slave to your fears and false beliefs. Sickness, disease, divorce, betrayals, these suddenly have more power than God. The fear of these things eclipses the Fear of the Lord, and therefore these “things” become the center of your life, thought, and action.

There is NO contest between the Eternal One and the Evil One. God always was, is, and will be. The Devil, well, he has a beginning and an ending. Not even his puny acts will outlast the earth. And even the Devil’s original coup d’etat against the throne of God was a failure, and his kingdom is built on lies and falsehood. Yet, more believers are motivated by fear of man and evil than they are the Fear of the Lord and His righteous judgments.

Matthew 10:28

“Don’t be afraid of people. They can kill the body, but they cannot kill the soul. The only one you should fear is God, the one who can send the body and the soul to be destroyed in hell.”

We become controlled by what and by whom we fear; the clearest evidence is in our actions and responses to all diseases, betrayals, etc. You know it, God said it, and the devil, if you fear him rather than God, well, he delights in it.

Act like Children of God Almighty, the God of the Angel Armies, rather than children of a lesser god, who is the god of fallen angels and the Father of Lies.

Your actions tell the world who your true Father is. No matter how many Church services you attend, you cannot escape it.

Read I Samuel 15 again, but from the Message:

22-23 Then Samuel said,

“Do you think all God wants are sacrifices—
empty rituals just for show? He wants you to listen to him! Plain listening is the thing, not staging a lavish religious production. Not doing what God tells you is far worse than fooling around in the occult.

Getting self-important around God is far worse than making deals with your dead ancestors. Because you said No to God’s command, he says No to your kingship.”

Maybe the consent “No” from God is because of your consent disobedience to Him. After all, He is not called the Everlasting Father for nothing; if you call him Father, does he not have the right to treat you as a true son or daughter?

Whenever God disciplines you or brings hardship into your life, sometimes you blame the Devil, chalking it up to evil. When you doubt God’s goodness and wisdom during hardship, you become a victim and fall prey to the lies of the Devil. This false belief thwarts God’s hand in your life, and you reject your son-ship. You need to STOP DOING THAT!

Do you think God is impressed by your lavish religious productions — your empty rituals of a weekly 90-minute Church Service compared to a 10,000-minute week of worldly influence? A 90-minute Church creates Christians that can only last for 90 minutes in the world!

To the many pastors that occupy America’s pulpits. Your constant grandstanding and oratorical solos have robbed the Church of prophets, apostles, pastors, teachers, and evangelists. Your job is to disciple and Sheppard people into ministry, not become the ministry. Many rather preach to attract and keep people, rather than preach to equip and send people.

Many pastors end up becoming the sole arbiter of the Word of God. This has created a Nation of dependent-class Christians whose only requirement is to tithe in support of career-focused pastors and church-centered budgets. God’s Church has become a den of weak vessels. There is more power when the People of God discover firsthand revelation from the mouth of God through their reading of Scripture than a thousand of your feel-good sermons!

You cannot build a healthy Church by feeding the flock from your personal intimacies with God. They’ll end up living their faith vicariously through your faith without actually living by faith.

Christ Jesus is the only True Manna from heaven, not your recycled sermons.

Start teaching the people to read God’s Word and hear and obey His voice!

I dare you to become lesser, so they may become greater.

This is why God says No to your “church business” and Yes to the power of the Kingdom Gospel and the people who obey it! This is why so many para-church ministries are taking up the cause of Christ, and so many so-called “religious leaders” are taking up the cause of church.

You are not raising Children of God but creating children of a lesser god, with no greater expectation than donations and attendance!

Start saying “yes” to God and obey His voice so that you may become children of God, The God of the Angel Armies, rather than children of a lesser god. After all, we can only access God the Father through Jesus Christ the Son. He has proven Himself obedient through all His actions, even death on the cross.

The church shouldn’t orbit around pulpits but around King Jesus and Jesus as King to all Nations! His command to go into all the world, “..teaching them to obey all things that I have commanded you…” It was not mere rhetoric but a divine command by the King of Kings, Lord of Lords of the Gathered Ones! We are to make disciples of peoples and nations and expand God’s Kingdom, not churches.

Repent of your religiosity, and people worship. Break off your fear of man, or go the way of King Saul.

Teach us to become Children of God Almighty, dependent on Him for identity, purpose, and calling.