Hand Everything Over To God!

My Friend,

What are you holding onto? Or, What are the things that you are trying to "take care of yourself" but you should really be letting go of? What are the wounds, hurts, and fears that you are packing with you wherever you go? 

Do you realized that all these things hinder your growth and forward walk? These burdens are too heavy a load for you to carry and you aren't supposed to carry them in the first place!

Sometimes we have a very hard time letting go of the past and present hurts. 

Let me encourage you to pray and ask The Holy Spirit to spotlight your heart, mind, and life for areas you've been hanging on to things that you really need to let go of. Then...LET IT GO! 

Hand everything over to Him! 

Hand it over to God as He's The Only One Who can carry your burdens and remember...He never intends for you to try and carry that which He can only carry. 

Let's pray for one another to more readily give things over to God. Let's pray that we'll stop trying to take the place of Jesus, The Holy Spirit, and God The Father as we're Not them so we need to stop trying to be our own "god" or someone else's. 

Your Brother and Servant in Christ,

Randolph Koch

Read, Pray about, and Take to Heart 1 Peter 5:7.

Are You Dead In Sin Or Dead To Sin?

My friend,

Which kind of person are you? Are you dead in sin or dead to sin?

Jesus came so that you can receive His forgiveness and salvation in Him and then you will be dead to sin and alive in Him! 

It's of utmost importance that you know Jesus personally through receiving His free gift of salvation!

The following is known as The Romans Road as it's comprised of Six Pillars of Truth drawing from a group of six verses from The Book of Romans.

If you walk down this road you will arrive at an understanding of how you can be saved.

Let me encourage you to grab a Bible and dig into the following verses! You need to understand that:

1. No One is Good – Romans 3:10-12

2. We all Fall Short – Romans 3:23

3. Everyone is Guilty – Romans 5:12

4. We're All Guilty of Sin and Sin Earns Us Death – Romans 6:23

5. God Loves Us – Romans 5:8

6. Confess and Believe – Romans 10:8-10, 13

If you’d like to take a step of faith and receive Jesus as your Savior then here is a suggested prayer you can pray right now to enter into a new life with Jesus Christ fully forgiven and secure!

This prayer does not save you (Jesus does) but it’s a way to help you confess and receive in faith God’s Free gift of Salvation!

“Dear Father in Heaven, I believe in Your Son, Jesus. I believe that He died on the cross for my sins and that He rose up from the grave. I know that I am a sinner and I repent of my sins. I ask for Your forgiveness and I know that I'm forgiven. I want to trust and follow You as my Lord and Savior. Help me to walk with You.Thank you for saving me. In The Name of Jesus Christ, Amen.”

The Romans Road....this is a pathway you can walk, right now!

The Question is – will you walk it?

If you’ve already walked The Romans Road and have received Salvation, praise God!

I'm praying for you! May you listen to God's voice as He draws you to Himself either in salvation or day-to-day as a follower of Christ as He guides and directs your path. 

You're brother and servant in Christ, 

Randolph Koch

Nothing Can Separate You From God's Love!

Hello My Friend,

What's that? Your past is too messy and you've done too many things that God could never forgive you for and love you?...
 
Or, maybe you think you're "not good enough" to be loved and forgiven?

Or, What's that? You're a follower of Christ and you messed up again and now you think God won't forgive and love you anymore?
 
First off, let me encourage you to stop listening to the lies of the enemy or the lies you keep telling yourself and instead get into The Word and listen to God's truth!
 
He died once for all of your sins and His forgiveness isn't based on what you do or have done...it has nothing to do with your good works. You can't work your way to heaven!

 

What Jesus did for you so you couldn't be forgiven for your sins and no longer be separated from God because of sin, wasn't based on your works, rather, it was all based on what Jesus did! What He did for you was and is complete! You can't add or subtract from it!

 
He Loves you...period. If you've received His free gift of salvation then you're forgiven and He'll continue to forgive you when you sin. We should never doubt that or take it for granted.
 
Nothing can separate you from His love!
Nothing you do can make you love you more or less than He already does!
Nothing you do can make Him not forgive you!

So, stop building a self inflicted wall between you and The Lord and instead: repent, believe, receive His love and forgiveness completely!
 
Yes, you should strive for holiness but when you fall down, (we all do) get back up, repent when you need to repent and seek The Lord as He's not mad at you, He's not going to withhold His love and forgiveness from you!

Rest in His love, forgiveness, and grace and never stop seeking Him with all that is within you!

Rest in the fact that His love for you will never change. His love is perfect!

Praying for you!

Here are a few of the many verses for your you to read, study, pray over and take to heart:
John 3:1-17, Romans 10:8-10, 13, Ephesians 2:8-9, Romans 6:10, Romans 8:38-39, Jeremiah 31:3, 1 John 4:18-19

Your Brother and Servant in Christ,
Randolph Koch

P.S. Please share this encouragement with others and please also pray and give if possible to our first ever fundraiser. https://www.gofundme.com/f/Please-Help-AShepherdsHeart

You Will Be And Are Accountable To God.

Read and Study: 2 Corinthians 5:1-10

My Friend,

Who or what do you live for and who or what do you embrace and promote?

We live in a broken world, and yet I have to admit that I find it absolutely shocking to see what's going on in our world today at times.

People calling good bad and bad good. People promoting and embracing the most heinous things. Their behavior is horrible and yet they are deemed "good" and "moral" in the eyes of this world.

This is even true sometimes of those who call themselves followers of Christ. They promote some of the most ungodly and vile things and people. Some even claim that Jesus would as well?!

My Pastor recently reminded me that we will be accountable to God for what we embrace or promote.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Then ask yourself:

-Do you embrace that which is unbiblical and ungodly?

--Do you care more about the world than God?

-Do you live more for the world than God?

-Do you love the world more than you love God?

We need to care more about people's eternal well being, their very souls, and eternal destination than that which is momentarily popular.

If you're a follower of Christ then you and I need to stand on biblical principles with Jesus as our foundation. We need to stop playing games. The world is not our foundation but Jesus is.

Furthermore, the world does not and should not dictate our behavior and morals, but God's Word should as it's full of principles for life and godliness.

Friend... I challenge you to seek to live for Him, His kingdom, His glory and your eternal future and not for this world, it's ways, and this little temporal "kingdom".

I challenge you to love people in Jesus name but to not embrace or promote that which goes against God and His Word. If you choose to do so anyway, just remember that you will stand before God one day and you will be accountable.

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Randolph Koch

P.S. Please share this encouragement with others and please also pray and give if possible to our first ever fundraiser. https://www.gofundme.com/f/Please-Help-AShepherdsHeart

Finding Strength & Hope In Forgiveness

Read and Study Proverbs 3:5‭-‬6 ESV; Romans 10:9‭-‬10 ESV; Psalm 103:12 ESV; and Psalm 139:14 ESV

To the people who care about you, you are not a nuisance or a waste of time. 

Don't let doubts discourage you from living a full life. Time is short and you can't change or take back regrets, but you can control where you focus your energy now clear into the future. 

Realizing this empowers you to feel in control of your journey. Anxiety and fear numbs, but forgiveness brings a visceral freshness unparalleled by anything that could be conjured in an impaired mind.

Dig deep, push back, fight the lies, forgive yourself, and be strengthened. YOU are worth the time and energy even if it's a challenge to believe it.

For my fellow believers Proverbs 3:5-6 is a great launching point to maintain a healthy idea of what is truth vs a lie by "not leaning on your own understanding." V5. It says the Lord "will make your path straight" V6. That straight path is hard to find without the forgiveness given on the cross. 

When you confess and become saved (Roman's 10:9-10) you are forgiven in the deepest way possible. As far as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12)! Now we have to decide if we want to accept that God's free gift of grace and forgiveness is enough. 

He is the only one who constantly says you're worth the time when you believe a lie. He is the only one who will continually wash you white as snow all the while not leaving or forsaking you even when the accuser roams. You are a child of God and therefore loved, cared for, forgiven, and wonderfully + fearfully made (Psalm 139:14).

Hold on to hope my friends!!

God Bless 

- Noah

Picture of a view of The Pacific Ocean From Otter Crest By Noah Koch

We're blessed to have Noah Koch as a guest contributor to A Shepherd's Heart. He hails from the Pacific Northwest in the USA where he actively and passionately lives life on purpose for The Lord. He's very creative and talented as a communicator, photographer, musician, and writer. He has a true servant's heart. We prayerfully look forward to further guest posts from Noah in the future.

Please prayerfully consider helping this ministry through a gift of any size via our first ever fundraiser: https://www.gofundme.com/f/Please-Help-AShepherdsHeart

Focus On Jesus, Not The Storm.

Hello Friend,

It was during a storm that Peter saw someone walking from the shore over the crashing waves to the boat he was in. 

Once He recognized that it was Jesus, he said, "Lord, if it’s you,” “tell me to come to you on the water.” Then Jesus said. "come." and then Peter stepped out of the boat. 

Note, he was the only one who had faith enough to step out of the boat.

Once he started walking toward Jesus, Peter made one error though, he took his eyes off of Jesus and looked instead on his circumstances. Then he started to sink into the water and of course Jesus saved him.

We're kind of like Peter sometimes because even though we know what we should do, instead of fixing our eyes on Jesus, we fix our eyes on our circumstances and then our troubles get worse in the process. 

My friend, We need to fix our eyes on Jesus as much as possible and not the storms of life.

Read, Study, and pray about Matthew 14:22-33.

Then ask yourself, am I willing to step out in faith, keeping my eyes on Jesus no matter my circumstances?

Let's pray for one another that we will keep our eyes on Jesus.

Your Brother and Servant in Christ, 

Randolph Koch 

P.S. Please prayerfully help me with my first ever fundraiser for my little ministry which I've extended for 1 additional month as I'm trying to raise just enough for some basic resources to serve you with.

Please share this small fundraiser with your church family and friends. Please help A Shepherd's Heart meet the goal of it's first ever fundraiser. 

Here's the link to the main fundraiser site: www.fundly.com/a-shepherd-s-heart-2020-fundraiser

Or here are 3 other options to help in this friends helping a friend fundraiser:

1. You can use Cash App and send your gift to user name $ashepherdsheart or if you haven't used Cash App before, if you use this link https://cash.app/app/GHCJWXG we'll both receive $5! :-)

2. Use PayPal sending to giving@ashepherdsheart.org.

3. Use PayPal's Venmo app by sending to @ashepherdsheart

You're continued prayers and sharing this fundraiser with friends and family would be greatly appreciated!

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