‍ Our Heavenly Father Cares

By Tim DeBusk, a Member of the Board of Directors for the Apostolic Faith Church.

In the United States, 18.2 million children are growing up without a father. That number is just staggering to me. That means that about one in four children in America are living without a dad in the home.[1] According to the Pew Research Center, America leads other nations in the number of single-parent homes at twenty-three percent, which is far above the global average of seven percent.

Lest this information discourage us, the beauty of the Gospel is that no matter where we came from in this life, we have a wonderful Heavenly Father! My own mother did not have a father in the home, but I’ll tell you, the advantages of having a Heavenly Father far outweigh the disadvantages of not having an earthly father. Psalm 68:5 says, “A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, is God in his holy habitation.” We all have a loving Father in Heaven. My mother may have been at a disadvantage from a societal perspective, but she was at no disadvantage when it came to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She was one of His children, and that meant everything.

Jesus went to great lengths to convey just how engaged our Heavenly Father is with our wellbeing. In one place, He chose one of the smallest members of His creation—a little sparrow—as an illustration. Matthew 10:29-30 says, “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.” Think of that—each little sparrow is noticed, and there are many of them around the world. Those birds are insignificant. When we see one, we probably don’t think anything of it, but our Father in Heaven does. He notes when they fall to the ground. How much more attentive He is to your needs and mine! He is well-informed of the very slightest detail in our lives and He wants us to cast our cares on Him.

Jesus continued His explanation by saying, “But the very hairs of your head are all numbered” (verse 30). In the last year or so, I’ve had some health issues that cause my hair to fall out when I comb it. I never thought much about it until I read this and realized, My Father is taking note of even that! That’s how close our Heavenly Father is to us today.

It pays to remember how good our Father is. I don’t know about you, but I can get caught up with cares and concerns, the things in this world that seem to be out of control. Yet, when you combed your hair this morning and a few hairs fell out, the total was immediately recalibrated. God knew how much was there before and what is now. It gives me courage and strength to know that I have a Heavenly Father who is watching out for me, and He is watching out for you too. We don’t just blend in among the billions of people in the world. God sees us, He knows every detail of our situations, and He is able to take good care of every one of us.

[1] U.S. Census Bureau. (2025). Living arrangements of children under 18 years old: 1960 to present. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Census Bureau.

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Do You See Jesus?

By Raju Rayudu, the leader of the Apostolic Faith work in East India and pastor of church in Kaikavolu, Andrah Predesh.

For us to see an object, three things are required: the object must be present, we must have healthy eyes, and there must be light. If any of these three are not in place, we cannot see the object.

God knows these three requirements and so does the devil. We read in 2 Corinthians 4:4, “. . . the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” This verse does not refer to physical blindness, but spiritual blindness. There is an “object” God wants us to see, and He is Jesus, who is the image of God. For that to happen, we need healthy spiritual eyes and we need the light of the Gospel to shine.

The devil, who is called “the god of this world” in this verse, does not want us to see our Savior, Jesus. First, he tried to stop Jesus from becoming our Savior. He tried his level-best to keep Jesus from being born, from being crucified, and from rising from the dead. Thank God, the devil failed every time. He could not do anything to get rid of the “object” that God wants us to see.

The “light” that we need in order to see our Savior is the Gospel. Only by hearing the good news of Jesus’ birth, crucifixion, and resurrection can we see that He is the Savior. The devil also tried to stop people from preaching the Gospel, but he failed at that too. This glorious Gospel spread from Israel to the ends of the earth! Almost everyone now has heard the name Jesus, and we are so thankful for that.

The devil tried to attack the “object” and he failed. He tried to stop people from sharing the light of the Gospel and failed again. Now, he can only succeed in one thing, and that is to attack our spiritual eyes with blindness.

The devil is tricky, but for every problem he causes, God has the solution. If the devil brings death, God has a wonderful plan and He brings resurrection. If the devil brings a curse, God brings a blessing. If the devil brings darkness, God brings light. In Revelation 3:18 God said, “I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.” The devil causes spiritual blindness, but God has eye salve to heal our eyes.

When I was fourteen years old, my spiritual eyes were blind. One day, I heard a man preach the Gospel, and the Lord opened my eyes. I saw the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and understood that He died for me. From that moment, I gave my heart to the Lord and started following Him. He opened my eyes and saved my soul!

God sent our Savior and He caused the light of the Gospel to shine on us. If anyone is spiritually blind today, ask Him for His eye salve. He will heal our eyes so we can see the Lord and be saved.

The Right Support

By Francis Odudu is Director of Mainland Europe and a minister at the Bexley Apostolic Faith Church in London, England.

Have you ever thought about how much you could accomplish if you had the right support? I am from the Yoruba tribe in Nigeria, and we often talk in proverbs. One Yoruba saying is, “A dog that has the right support will kill a monkey.” Normally, a monkey could kill a dog with ease, so the point of the proverb is that the right support makes all the difference.

In our lives, God is the support that makes the difference and He is there for us at all times. We see an example of that in 1 Samuel 17, when David was victorious over the giant Goliath. Victory for David did not come through his weapons; King Saul wanted to lend his armor to David but he said, “No, I’ve not tried this before. I can’t trust it.” David’s trust was in the Name of the Lord. Still today, the Name of Jesus is tested and tried, and we have found that Name to be the greatest weapon in a spiritual battle.

Victory over Goliath also did not come because of the size of the warrior. God raised up David, just a young shepherd, to save the Israelites from the giant. At times, we may feel spiritually weak or our faith may be little, but God does not need to wait for our faith to grow before He can use us to win a battle. He is all we need.

The biggest “Goliath” we can ever face in life is sin, and no amount of good works, fasting, or other effort on our part can conquer it. Victory over sin can only come from God through the Blood of Jesus Christ. I had the Goliath of sin in my life for a very long time. Back then, I was battling nightmares, and I wondered who could deliver me from them. My father took me from one spiritualist to another looking for relief. The nightmares drove me from the spiritualist to white garment churches, and from white garment churches to Islamic priests. They tried different ceremonies, but nothing took away the nightmares until the day I gave my heart to Jesus Christ. Then, the Goliath of nightmares fell down flat! The Goliath of sin was also conquered. I could not defeat them in my strength and no one else could either, but I found the right support in God and He gave me victory.

The “Goliath” in your life may be an academic problem, a situation at work, a health issue, or a relationship. Don’t tell God you have a big problem. Tell your problem you have a big God! Whatever giant you are facing, God is the support you need. Look to Him and He will conquer it for you.

Don’t Get Tangled Up!

By Donald Fittin is pastor of the Apostolic Faith Church in Van Buren, Arkansas.

Last summer, I had the opportunity to go fishing with a group that included a young boy named Nehemiah. Nehemiah loves to fish and we had a lot of fun out there on the lake, but he was continually getting his fishing line hung up. He got hung up in the rocks, in his sister’s pole, in the seat behind me, and even in my shirt! He had been given good instructions from his father about where to cast, where not to cast, how to cast, and everything else. But he was just so excited he could hardly control himself. He was casting out there everywhere.

To be an effective fisher, you have to be careful not to let your line get tangled up in places it shouldn’t be. Likewise, to be effective for Christ, we cannot allow our lives to get close to things of the world that would entangle us.

In 2 Timothy 2:3-4, Paul told Timothy, “Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.” You may not consider yourself to be a soldier, but if you are saved, you are one. We are in a spiritual war. In these verses, Paul gave young Timothy some very valuable instructions about spiritual warfare, and they are still good for us to follow today. If we are going to be effective soldiers for the Lord, we cannot get caught up in the affairs of this life. When our focus is on the things of the world, it moves away from the Lord, and then we are no help to ourselves or others in this warfare.

Becoming entangled can happen in different ways. Some activities are obviously foolish, but some are not. We have to be on guard because most likely the devil will tempt us with a subtle entanglement that looks harmless. It could be a friendship with an unbeliever. It could be a career path or a hobby. A few years ago, I was watching politics really closely, and little by little, that took too much of my time. I found myself waking up in the middle of the night thinking about those topics, and waking up in the morning with them on my mind. Eventually I thought, I’m becoming entangled by this. It is not bad to know what is going on in the world, but we are in a spiritual war and our focus needs to be on Jesus.

The cares of this life are all going to pass away. May God help us not to allow ourselves to get entangled with anything that would take our attention away from Him.

Trust God’s Guidance

By Nathaniel Segres, Jr., is pastor of the Apostolic Faith Church in Atlanta, Georgia.

In Atlanta, we have really bad traffic sometimes. That’s why I am thankful for the Waze app. It uses global positioning to give me driving directions. Every time I go somewhere, I enter the address in the app. It might tell me, “Go down I-75,” and as I’m driving down I-75, sometimes it will reroute and tell me to get off the freeway. I can’t see what is ahead, so I might think, That isn’t the right way. But if I ignore the app, I will run into a major traffic jam.

That is how God works with us. Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” The word guidance simply means advice or information aimed at resolving a problem or avoiding one. In the world today, we need guidance. We do not always understand situations as they really are because we are limited in our knowledge. God sees everything plainly and He knows what is coming ahead. He knows if we are getting into trouble and He will tell us, “Don’t do this,” or, “Stay away from that.” We  might think, This isn’t that bad. But God knows our personalities, our attitudes, and how we will deal with whatever lies ahead. When He says, “Get off on this exit. Go this way. Go around that,” we will avoid problems if we follow God’s guidance.

It is important to trust God’s directions more than our own because sometimes He may lead us to an unexpected place so we can be a light to someone. When I first moved to Atlanta, I got a job for the FedEx delivery company. My coworkers there were vulgar and unpleasant to be around, and I started wondering, Lord, why am I here? But I held fast to my faith. I even sang Gospel songs at work. I stuck with it. Then one day, a young co-worker came up to me and said, “You are different.” I smiled a little bit and said, “Yes, I am different. Oh yes, I am different!” He said, “Why are you different?” I told him, “Because I am saved. I have a Savior who can save you, too.” It did my heart good when I could witness to just one person! When we follow God’s guidance, we will get the blessings.

God’s guidance leads, protects, and helps us avoid problems. He is always available, ready to direct which way to go and what to do. When we trust God’s guidance, He will lead us from earth all the way to glory.

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