Craig T. Owens

April 2026
S	M	T	W	T	F	S
	1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30

Augustine On Prayer

April 29, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

Some great quotes from Augustine on prayer…

“O Lord, the house of my soul is narrow; enlarge it that You may enter in. It is ruined, O repair it! It displeases Your sight; I confess it, I know. But who shall cleanse it, or to whom show I cry but unto You? Cleanse me from my secret faults, O Lord, and spare Your servant from strange sins.” —Augustine

“Grant us in all our duties Your help, in all our perplexities Your guidance, in all our dangers Your protection, and in all our sorrows Your peace.” —Augustine

“Grant unto me Your servant: To my God—a heart of flame. To my fellow man—a heart of love. To myself—a heart of steel.” —Augustine

“Hear, Lord, my prayer; let not my soul faint under Your discipline, nor let me faint in confessing unto You all Your mercies, whereby You have drawn me out of all my most evil ways, that You might become a delight to me above all the allurements which I once pursued; that I may most entirely love You, and clasp Your hand with all my affections, and You may yet rescue me from every temptation, even unto the end. O Lord, my King and my God, for Your service be whatever useful thing my childhood learned; for Your service, that I speak, write, read, reckon. For You did grant me Your discipline, while I was learning vanities; and my sin of delighting in those vanities You have forgiven. In them, indeed, I learned many a useful word, but these may as well be learned in things not vain; and that is the safe path for the steps of youth.” —Augustine

“He should be in no doubt that any ability he has and however much he has derives more from his devotion to prayer than his dedication to oratory; and so, by praying for himself and for those he is about to address, he must become a man of prayer before becoming a man of words. As the hour of his address approaches, before he opens his thrusting lips he should lift his thirsting soul to God so that he may utter what he has drunk in and pour out what has filled him.” —Augustine, writing to pastors

“And he [the preacher] should not doubt that [God] is able to do these things, if he is at all able and to the extent that he is able, more through the piety of his prayer than through the skill of his oratory, so that, praying for himself and for those whom he is to address, he is a petitioner before he is a speaker.” —Augustine, writing to pastors

“Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy.

Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy.

Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit, that I love but what is holy.

Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, to defend all that is holy.

Guard me, then, O Holy Spirit, that I always may be holy.

Amen.” —Augustine

Posted in Uncategorized. Tags: Augustine, confession, discipline, forgiveness, Holy Spirit, pastors, prayer, preaching, quotes, repentance. 1 Comment »

Links & Quotes

April 28, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

“We must be much alone with God, if we would have a clear sense of His love! Let your cries cease, and your eyes will grow dim. Much in prayer, much in heaven; slow in prayer, slow in progress.” —Charles Spurgeon

“There is no doctrine [Hell] which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay in my power. But it has the full support of Scripture and, specially, of Our Lord’s own words; it has always been held by Christendom; and it has the support of reason. If a game is played, it must be possible to lose it. If the happiness of a creature lies in self-surrender, no one can make that surrender but himself (though many can help him to make it) and he may refuse. I would pay any price to be able to say truthfully ‘All will be saved.’ But my reason retorts, ‘Without their will, or with it?’ If I say ‘Without their will’ I at once perceive a contradiction; how can the supreme voluntary act of self-surrender be involuntary? If I say ‘With their will,’ my reason replies ‘How if they will not give in?’” —C.S. Lewis

Here are 8 reasons why the Supreme Court should let the states decide their own marriage policy.

The Daily Signal has other good arguments for this marriage issue as well, including the infographic to the left.

“The nation that forgot God has never been allowed to endure.” —George Washington

“It is not our duty to leave wealth to our children, but it is our duty to leave liberty to them.” — John Dickinson, signer of the Declaration of Independence

Dr. Tim Elmore uses former NFL player Chris Borland as a case study for the benefits of long-term thinking. He writes, “When making a decision… (1) Choosing short-term benefits often leads to long-term consequences. (2) Choosing short-term consequences often leads to long-term benefits.”

Porn Is Stealing From Your Marriage

April 28, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

Here is a great article from Stephen Miller entitled 3 Ways Porn Steals From Your Marriage. Pornography is a disease that is devastating families!

Miller says, “This isn’t a how-to article on eliminating porn from your life. In marriage mentoring and counseling, I have seen countless men addicted to pornography. The ones who have successfully been delivered from that addiction all had several things in common. They recognized what their addiction was doing to their relationship with God, they recognized what their sin was doing to their relationship with their wife and they recognized the very real capability of sexual sin passing down through the generations to their children. They then after reviewing all the evidence, made a firm decision that they wanted pure relationships more than secret sin.” (emphasis added)

If you are in the Cedar Springs area, please join us on Friday, May 8, for a special presentation from Fight The New Drug on the dangers of pornography, and how you can defeat it from controlling your life. Get all the details by clicking here.

Please read the full article, but Miller lists these three areas porn hurts marriage—

Porn steals honest, open communication
Porn steal genuine, unconditional love
Porn steals the holiness God intended for marriage

You must get rid of porn before it destroys your most precious relationships! Get the help you need today.

Posted in Uncategorized. Tags: addiction, Cedar Springs, Fight The New Drug, intimacy, marriage, pornography, relationships, sexual purity, sexual sin. 1 Comment »

Links & Quotes

April 27, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

Now that the Spring weather is here, get outside for some fresh air … listen to the birds, smell the flowers, look at the beauty around you! “A study of rodents, published in Science in 2013, indicated that the brain’s place cells are much less active when animals make their way through computer-generated landscapes than when they navigate the real world.” —Nicholas Carr

“We have men of science, too few men of God. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. The world has achieved brilliance without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living. If we continue to develop our technology without wisdom or prudence, our servant may prove to be our executioner.” —Omar Bradley

“No man who enters upon the office to which I have succeeded can fail to recognize how every president of the United States has placed special reliance upon his faith in God. Every president has taken comfort and courage when told…that the Lord ‘will be with thee. He will not fail thee nor forsake thee. Fear not—neither be thou dismayed.’ … Each of our presidents in his own way has placed a special trust in God. Those who were strongest intellectually were also strongest spiritually.” —John F. Kennedy

Frank Turek has a fascinating post on why the Supreme Court of the United States shouldn’t allow homosexual “marriages” because of our 14th Amendment.

Innovation Adoption Lifecycle “If you want a population to adopt your innovation, you have to create a problem that is solved by adoption. And that problem is almost always related to, ’what about the others?’” Check out this insight from Seth Godin on product adoption.

[VIDEO] Greg Koukl addresses on Christians can demonstrate Christ-like tolerance and Christ-like tolerance—

[VIDEO] Dr. Bobby Conway and Nel Brace discuss a great tool for helping Christians defend their faith—

8 Quotes On Suffering & Overcoming

April 27, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

Earlier today I posted a recap of the message I delivered Sunday morning at Calvary Assembly of God addressing the question on why we have to go through suffering. Here are a few quotes I found during my study time last week.

“By nature, we evaluate nearly every situation according to its immediate impact on our desires, and we make our choices accordingly. Consequently, we often sacrifice that which would bring infinite eternal benefit in exchange for temporary gratification.” —Stephen K. Scott

“In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” —Jesus Christ

“Wherever souls are being tried and ripened, in whatever commonplace and homely way, there God is hewing out the pillars for His temple.” —Phillips Brooks

“Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal.” —Thomas Moore

“Sorrows remembered sweeten present joy.” —Robert Pollok

“Joys are our wings, sorrows our spurs.” —Jean Paul Richter

“Sorrow is divine. Sorrow is reigning on all the thrones of the universe, and the crown of all crowns has been one of thorns. There have been many books that treat of the sympathy of sorrow, but only one that bids us glory in tribulations, and count it all joy when we fall into divers afflictions, that so we may be associated with that great fellowship of suffering of which the incarnate Son of God is the head, and through which He is carrying a redemptive conflict to the glorious victory over evil. If we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him.” —Harriet Beecher Stowe

I walked a mile with Pleasure—

She chattered all the way

But left me none the wiser

For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow

And ne’er a word said she,

But, oh, the things I learned from her

When Sorrow walked with me. —Robert Browning Hamilton

An End To Tears

April 27, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

I was asked the age-old question: Why is there suffering and pain? This is usually accompanied by the other often-pondered question: Why do bad things happen to good people?

I’m not sure that I can answer that one, because I’m not a “good” person. I’m a sinner. I’ve messed up more time than I can count, and it is only by God’s mercy that His righteous judgment hasn’t consumed me.

Here’s what I do know:

God loves me so much that He sent His Son to rescue me—John 3:16-17
I am of immeasurable value to my Heavenly Father—Luke 12:6-7
Suffering on earth is temporal; rewards in Heaven are eternal—Romans 8:18
God develops something in my through suffering that I could learn in no other way—Romans 5:3-4
God can be glorified through my suffering if I will let Him—John 9:1-3; 11:3-6

I also know that Jesus is Perfection. If anyone ever deserved to not have anything bad happen to them, it was Him. And yet He was rejected by His family (Mark 3:21), betrayed by one of His companions (John 13:21), abandoned by all His followers (Mark 14:50), and even felt the sting of God forsaking Him (Mark 15:34).

What makes this even more startling to me is that He knew all of this was coming (Isaiah 53:3; Luke 9:22; Matthew 26:54-56). But He went through all of that pain because His suffering meant He could become the prefect Intercessor and Mediator for our suffering (see Hebrews 5:7-9; 4:14-16).

Jesus us told us, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

And the last book in the Bible promises that eventually God’s children will have every tear wiped away! There will be no more death, no more mourning, no more crying, and no more pain! (Revelation 21:4)

In the midst of your pain, hold tightly to the One Who loves you so much and is interceding for you!

If you are near Cedar Springs this coming weekend, and you don’t have a home church, I would love for you to join us as we continue to learn about the greatest words ever spoken.

Posted in Uncategorized. Tags: abandon, betrayal, Bible, Bible study, Calvary Assembly of God, crying, God's love, Heaven, High Priest, intercession, Jesus Christ, pain, rejection, Revelation, rewards, Scripture, sermon, suffering, tribulation. Leave a Comment »

Links & Quotes

April 26, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

“We know that God’s being is perfect, His essence infinite, His dominion absolute, His power unlimited, and His glory transcendent.” —Charles Spurgeon

“A great empire, like a great cake, is most easily diminished from its edges.” —Benjamin Franklin

“We will do most good for this world by keeping a steadfast freedom from its beguiling attractions. We will serve our city best by getting our values from the ‘city which is to come’ (Hebrews 13:14). We will do our city most good by calling as many of its citizens as we can to be citizens of the ‘Jerusalem above’ (Galatians 4:26). Let’s live so that the natives will want to meet our King.” —John Piper

Anyone who works with kids (parents, teachers, coaches) should check out Mark Merrill’s list of 9 things not to say to children.

Matt Chandler says, “sex can be about the Gospel, if we’re mindful enough to make it so.” Read more of his post The ‘Good News’ About Sex.

Eric Metaxas shares an alarming statistic: An astonishing 70,000 children are kidnapped by gangs every year in China! Check out the worldview that contributes to this.

Some amazing pro-life news: doctors have discovered how to counteract the effects of RU-486 (the abortion-inducing drug) and save the lives of unborn babies!

[VIDEO] John Piper’s Look At The Book series is a great in-depth Bible study. Here is part 1 in this series about anxiety—

Poetry Saturday―Seize This Very Minute

April 25, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

Lose this day loitering, ’twill be the same story

Tomorrow, and the rest more dilatory.

Thus indecision brings its own delays,

And days are lost tormenting over days.

Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute;

What you can do, or dream you can, begin it;

Boldness has genius, power and magic in it;

Only engage, and then the mind grows heated;

Begin, and then the work will be completed. ―Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Posted in Uncategorized. Tags: action, dream, Goethe, hard work, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, poem, poetry, proactive, time, time management. Leave a Comment »

Links & Quotes

April 24, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

“To some Christians today, this world is not a sinking ship or a world reserved for fire. It is an international capitol building overrun with undesirables whom these believers plan to kick out. They will then take their place, renovating and governing it all themselves. Such thinking is symptomatic of a dying love for Jesus and a clinging to this world!” —David Wilkerson

“Some of my best men are women!” —William Booth

Did you know: Babies in the womb have beating hearts at only 21 days gestation, detectable brain waves at roughly 42 days, and can suck their thumbs and yawn?

Frank Turek is exactly right: Sex Is The New Religion.

“For decades social science has found that there is an optimal family structure for a child’s intellectual, emotional and physical flourishing: being raised in a home by her biological, married parents. All other arrangements—cohabiting biological parents, marriage with one step-parent, two adoptive parents or single parents—do not generally provide the same level of benefit.” Read more in this post about children raised by same-sex parents.

Hopefully none of my pastor friends ever do this!

Good reminder from John Maxwell: How Do You Become A Successful Failure?

Important health news: What stress does to your body.

11 More Quotes From “Not Knowing Where”

April 22, 2015 — Craig T. Owens

Here are even more quotes from Oswald Chambers in his book Not Knowing Where, using the life of Abraham as the basis for a great study of our lives of faith. You can read my review of this book by clicking here, and you can see other quotes by clicking here and here.

“By means of intercession we understand more and more the way God solves the problems produced in our minds by the conflict of actual facts and our real faith in God. … Repetition in intercessory importunity is not bargaining, but the joyous insistence of prayer.”

“If I cannot see God in others, it is because He is not in me. If I get on my moral high horse and say it is they who are wrong, I become that last of all spiritual iniquities, a suspicious person, a spiritual devil dressed up as a Christian. Beware of mistaking suspicion for discernment, it is the biggest misunderstanding that ever twisted Christian humility into Pharisaism. When I see in others things that are not of God, it is because the Spirit of God has revealed to me my own meanness and badness; when I am put right with God on the basis of His Redemption and see those things in others, it is in order that God may restore them through my intercession.”

“The tendency to do instead of to devote oneself to God, is nearly always the sign of a smudged purity of relationship to God.”

“The error is putting prudence in competition with God’s will, weighing pros and cons before God when He has spoken. Always beware when you want other people to commend the decision you have made, because it is an indication that you have trusted your wits instead of worshiping God. … We have to watch that we use our wits to assist us in worshiping God and caring out His will, not in carrying out our own will and then asking God very piously to bless the concoction. Put communion with God on the throne and then ask God to direct your common sense to choose according to His will. Worship first and wits after.”

“We have to be careful lest we blind ourselves by putting up our own standards instead of looking at the standard God puts up. If we put a saint up as a standard, we blind ourselves to ourselves; it is personal vanity makes us do it. When we put God’s standard up, viz., Himself, there is no room for personal vanity.”

“The grace of God makes us honest with ourselves.”

“Always beware when you are perfectly certain you are right, so certain that you do not dream of asking God’s counsel.”

“Sanctification is not something our Lord does in me; sanctification is Himself in me.”

“The majority of us know nothing about waiting, we don’t wait, we endure. Waiting means that we go on in the perfect certainty of God’s goodness—no dumps or fear.”

“Your anxiety proves that you do not believe in the goodness of God an atom, and it postpones the time of His performance.”

“God’s ways turn man’s thinking upside down.”