Redeemed for Christ's Service Ministries / RCS Ministries

A favorite dessert for most people is good old apple pie. It is common at many family gatherings. It can be prepared in several ways. You can purchase the ready-to-eat pies, or purchase the pie fillings and frozen crust to combine and bake quickly. You might even grow your own apples to cook. You could roll out a made from scratch dough for a flaky crust. Best of all, you could add all of the tasty "extra" ingredients and serve a homemade fresh apple pie. No matter how you purchase or prepare this favorite dessert, you still have apple pie. It seems that the long recipes taste better than the superfast, heat and serve, store-bought pies. Maybe it is the hands that know how to add the extra ingredients or the "TLC", that help improve the taste. Apple pie will always be apple pie. If it comes out of a box, or out of Granny Vicki's kitchen, it will still be the same dessert. Being saved is the same way. You can kneel at an altar in a big or small church, at home, o

A pastor read a letter from an elementary school teacher who attends his church one Sunday morning during the service. Last school year, her classroom was made up of third graders, every one of which came from either a single family, or a dysfunctional family, was undernourished and/or uncared for, lived in an abusive home, and was either beaten, bruised, or raped by other family members. One little girl's dad died of Aids, and the list goes on. Her heart bled for these kids. Before this school year started, she and her husband went to her classroom and prayed over each desk in the room. They prayed that God would place an angel behind each and every child throughout the coming year to watch over them and protect them. A month or so after the year started, she gave the kids an assignment to write about what they would like to be when they grew up. Everybody was busy with his or her assignment, when "Andrew" raised his hand. When she asked him what he needed, he asked how

The story goes that some time ago, a man punished his young daughter for wasting a roll of gold wrapping paper. Money was tight and he had become infuriated when the child tried to decorate a box to put under the Christmas tree. Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift to her father the next morning and said, "This is for you, Daddy." He was embarrassed by his earlier overreaction, but his anger flared again when he found the box empty. "Don't you know that when you give someone a present, there's supposed to be something inside it?" The little girl looked up at him with tears in her eyes and said, "Oh, Daddy, it is not empty, I blew kisses into the box. All for you, Daddy." The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little girl and begged for her forgiveness. It is told that the man kept that gold box by his bed for years and whenever he was discouraged, he would take out an imaginary kiss and remember the love of the child who put i

  A voyaging ship was wrecked during a storm at sea. Only two of the men on it were able to swim to a small, deserted island. The two survivors, not knowing what else to do, agreed that they had no other recourse but to pray to God. To find out whose prayer was more powerful, they agreed to divide the territory between them and stay on opposite sides of the island. The first thing that they prayed for was food. The next morning, the first man saw a fruit-bearing tree on his side of the land, and he was able to eat its fruit. The other man's parcel remained barren. After about a week, the first man was lonely and he decided to pray for a wife. The next day, another shipwrecked, and the only survivor was a woman who swam to his side of the island. On the other side, there was nothing. Soon the first man prayed for a house, clothes, and more food. The next day, like magic, all of these were given to him. However, the second man still had nothing. Finally, the first man prayed for a sh