My walk with the Lord is like everyone else’s, then again it is truly unique to me. I came to know the Lord when I was 18, but got mixed up in a cult which did nothing to help me seek God, so I left and turned my back on Him soon after my 19th birthday. Several years later I returned to the Lord, but I still couldn’t escape the chains of legalism and found myself enmeshed in works and utterably miserable.

Thankfully, God knows who are His and He used several people during that time to get me to see Him for who He is and not for what I must do for Him. I distinctly remember the moment in 1988 when I had a “light bulb moment” and understood that my salvation was in Him — not by my works (lest I should boast) but by the finished work of the cross. Clearly, the new covenant was all about grace (John 1:17), something I hadn’t fully grasped until then.

On that date about twenty years ago I heard a man speaking, Wayne Monbleau, who had a radio show called, “Let’s Talk About Jesus.” At first, when I heard His preaching about grace, I thought that He was watering down the gospel. But, thanks to the grace of God, my heart was stirred and my soul quickened – I realized then and there that there was nothing I needed to do to obtain God’s favor.

Wayne is still preaching from his Lafayette, NJ office and I’m sure many souls are being transformed by the truths he shares every day. I’m no longer in radio range to hear his show that way, but thanks to live internet streaming, I can listen in at any point 24/7/365. In fact, as I write this article I am listening to Wayne.

Naturally, if Wayne wasn’t pointing people to the Lord Jesus Christ, I wouldn’t listen to Him. His ministry is particularly effective in reaching churched folks, especially those who have been previously burned by their local congregation. I don’t mean to sound harsh, but when churches are preaching a graceless gospel, God’s people aren’t being taught the full counsel of God.

Wayne’s desire is to be a vessel of the Lord to proclaim the goodness of God without adding to it. Indeed the following statement on his website, Loving Grace Ministries, aptly puts all of this in perspective:

Christianity is Christ Himself for without Him we have nothing - no way, no truth and no life.

So if you’re looking for encouragement and desire to draw closer to the Lord, I recommend listening in on “Let’s Talk About Jesus” for what could be a timely word from the Lord for you.

1863 was a very trying year in our nation’s history. Engulfed in a brutal civil war, the worst battle — Gettysburg — was fought that July, leaving thousands dead on both sides and tens of thousands of soldiers wounded. It was a fractured land, a divided nation, led by Abraham Lincoln who before the war began may not have been a Christian.

Raised in a profoundly poor environment, Abe lost his mother when he was nine and, by the time he was assassinated in 1865, two of his four children had preceded him in death. Those experiences, combined with a war that seemed to be destroying the young nation, most likely brought the president to the point of recognizing the need for divine guidance personally and as a nation.

Following the end of the Battle of Gettysburg, President Lincoln proclaimed a day of Thanksgiving and later that year proclaimed another day of thanks which is now celebrated annually the fourth Thursday in November. Along with that proclamation, Lincoln made the following address, widely known as Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation:

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-eighth

President Lincoln did not start off his proclamation by focusing on the problems of the day, instead he gave thanks to God for what the country had — the proper order of prayer.

As a nation, we have so much to be thankful for. Sure, there are problems, but when was there ever a time in our history when troubles did not exist? Let us always remember to give thanks to God for what we do have regardless of the circumstances, asking him to guide our nation and to allow us to live peacefully among men so that we, too, may one day see the Lord (paraphrased from Hebrews 12:14).