A collection of my reflections of faith and life lessons…
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Happy Thanksgiving Pact Keepers, may God bless you, keep you and have your turkey extra moist!
Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. ~ 1st Peter 5:6-8 ESV
Hello Pact Keepers.
I’m sure you have read the verse above before, if not I’m sure its pretty clear to understand, as our enemy the Devil clearly wishes to see us devoured by the sin and violence of this world a roaming lion is fitting imagery, but lets consider these words a little more before we move on with it.
The enemy our our souls will use many means to cut us off from God, its what lions do, the don’t go for the biggest, strongest well backed members of a herd, predators will always focus down on the prey that is the most vulnerable if they can and will try to cut a member of the ehrd off from the others so it is easily brought down.
When we are beset upon by dark forces it can com in many forms; Anger, Fear, Depression, Anxiety, Domestic troubles, Financial issues, Grief and more and these are the lion’s roar, these things are used to try and separate us from safety, from the closeness of God that keeps us safe. These things and more cause us stress and discomfort and when that sets in we become uneasy and begin looking for reasons to fix it or question why its happening.
We as believers know for certain that God is in control of all things…So doesn’t that mean he should have been there to block this from happening? Isn’t God pay attention, why is he letting me be harassed and letting this go on? We are unnerved and begin to question the safety of the one supposedly protecting us and we panic and leave our defender making a mad dash for safety…
…Just like the lion wanted.
When the pains and stress of life sets in Pact Keepers its so easy to blame God and wander away but once we do we are playing right into the enemy’s hands.
It is never easy to suffer but when the lion roars we must hold our ground and hold to the place of safety we have found, God will not forsake us but if we leave his side he cannot force himself on us to protect us as we actively deny he is a place of safety.
As it says….
When the lion roars rather then question or get angry at God we need to lean into him, there was never a promise that trials would not come but there are many that promise a better future for the children of God and we must believe that God cam, will and wants to save us from the lion looking to cut us off Pact Keepers.
So stay vigilant, stay sober minded and hold to God when the enemy is at the door, its hard but is our strong tower and impervious shield, if you start to run away just remember you can and must run back to the safety of God’s fold as soon as possible.
Stay safe, stay cool and God bless Pact Keepers, until next time!
One of the things we learn in this world Brothers and Sisters is that all things on this world are finite, temporary, living on borrowed time.
From the stars in the sky that will one day burnout in a fiery nova to the lowly gnats buzzing outside who will live their lives in just a few days and this can be a scary thing to think about, that nothing here on this planet is permanent but in truth some things here are, they are just not OF this world.
For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil—some, longing for it, have gone astray from the faith and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
But you, O man of God, flee from these things and pursue righteousness, godliness, faithfulness, love, perseverance, and gentleness. ~ 1st Timothy 6:11
Here we read a warning to avoid evil things, particular the pursuit of money, I can attest that being greedy and wanting money for money’s sake is a poisonous mindset, money is like food and water, its a resource we need but is not all there is, its tangible and perishes and is not worth any of our short time on Earth to idolize as something more then a resource.
So if we should not spend out time pursuing worldly things, even something as valuable as money then what is it we can pursue that is worth our important time God has given us here? Look at the verse again, we are called to pursue a set of actions, mindsets and virtues, forms of good character and love.
But why is this of any use to us, if we have already said our time is so short why pursue these ideas and actions over things we want or can lay our hands on? The answer is simply, these things are not simple attributes, these are attributes that reflect and are treasured by God himself, these things are seen as immensely valuable to the very King of the Universe who is eternal and thus these things will live on forever with him and will not share in this world’s limited lifespan.
As children of God we are called to not only want these things but pursue them because they are valuable for all time, we will take our full measure of these things with us from this world and build on them further after the Revelation of Jesus Christ (The Apocalypse). We can only take our Faith and good character with us because it is the “Treasures stored up in Heaven” that Jesus referred to so it is our acts of charity, forgiveness, faith and other redeeming godly traits that will benefit us for all eternity and we only have so many days to stake our claim in this world.
So let us not get blinded by the perishing things of this world, let us pursue them only as far as they will help us store up our REAL treasures for the world that will remain forever after this one is gone because the next one will make this world look like a simple grain of sand on the coast line.
So do not be afraid of the setting sun or the ticking clock, do not shed to many tears for the things you may or may not get in this world that cannot be invested in your eternity, live your best life each day and make wise choices in how you act and treat others, in your thoughts and actions for it is always of value when we pursue righteousness!
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God bless and have a great day!
As easy as it is to feel lost in this world its a comforting fact that as God’s chosen ones, his family here on Earth he has seen our days from first to last and will guide us through each according to his plan.
Worry won’t make life easier or the path smoother, give it to God and trust him to guide you, even when you yourself can’t see the path!
God bless Pact Keepers!
Chazak! Be courageous! Do not be afraid or tremble before them. For Adonai your God—He is the One who goes with you. He will not fail you or abandon you.” ~ Deuteronomy 31:6
I’m the first to admit that life CAN be scary, there is so much wrong in the world and so much pain within in us from trying to live in this broken world. There will eventually come a time where you feel like you cannot do this and fear grips you.
It happened to Moses, his brother Aaron, Abraham, Jacob and all of the Disciples but like these memorable figures God will strengthen us if we come to him with our fears and THAT is the most important part, we have to come to him!
When we approach God with our fears and uncertainties on ANY matter it shows that while we may be afraid we honor God by coming to him with it because it is an act of faith that HE is grater then that fear no matter how bad it is.
So trust the God who has promised NEVER to leave your side and bring your fears to him as an offering of faith and you see as you trust him with these things he will strengthen you to face them and to see them pass either by calming the storm or calming you during it.
God bless Pact-Keepers, until next time!
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#Christianselfhelp #comfort #Christianlifehacks #dailyprayer #Christianblog #christianlifeblog
Its….A little weird!
I wanna be excited for this movie, I love kaiju movies and Godzilla most of all, but will it measure up to THIS kind of cinematic splendor?
Dear Child of God, are things taking longer then you expected, are your prayers seemingly bouncing off the ceiling and the pain of following God more then you thought you could or would have to bear? I know it is, I stand in this wilderness with you as well as I wait for my prayers to come to pass as well and I want to tell you that this pain and time lost, is exactly what you need.
You don’t want to hear that, heck, I don’t wanna say it, but it is true because while we are God’s beloved treasures, his dearly loved children we are akin to gold just dug from the ground; we are dirty, rough and mixed with impurities that hold us back from being truly valuable. God mines us from this fallen world and as we know all of Heaven celebrates us being found but after that joyful victory there is much to do.
Gold needs to be put into the furnace, broken down and cleansed through fiery ordeal and then molded into a new thing and while for the gold this is an intense experience, afterwards it is now truly ready to be called treasure!
But don’t take my flowery metaphors for it, scripture is full of esteemed Believers who display this very thing!
Let us look at a person who was literally as close to Jesus as a person could get, Peter, the rock on which Jesus would build his church but the absolute joy he had in discovering Jesus was not the end, no, it was only the beginning because you cannot just grab a rock at random and build on it, it must be cut and repurposed from how you found it. We see this in Peter’s life when just before Jesus was crucified we read this interaction between Jesus and Peter…
“Simon, Simon! Indeed, satan has demanded to sift you all like wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith will not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.”
But Simon said to Him, “Master, I am ready to go with You even to prison and to death!”
But Yeshua said, “I tell you, Peter, a rooster will not crow today until you have denied three times that you know Me.” ~ Luke 22:31 TLV
We see many things here so lets break it down!
So there we see it.
God is not leaving us to die in the wilderness, he is not ignoring us and he has not forgotten us to time, pain and trials but is purifying us as we learn to wait in him and trust his process and timing so that we can learn to put our own visions and ideas of him and ourselves away and discover who God truly is and what it means to be a true child of God, to have faith that stands both in the days of ease and the torrent of trials.
As long as we seek God, learn to trust his timing despite how long the wait or how weary the trial has been we will, like Peter and the men and women before him, have the desire of our hearts, have all we need here on Earth and a bright endless future in the world to come.
Until next time, God bless Pact-Keepers!
Odds are even before you clicked this link you have seen this little character hanging around this site, my social media accounts and in many comics I’ve done before but Lil’Blue was not an intentional character, in fact I never meant for him to become more then a logo but Lil’Blue would prove to be uncontainable!
So lets take a look at the face of Pact Comics, The character that started the charge for my Christian chibi hoarde, the one who has been in the most pact comics and the character who by far has gotten the most love over the years…
In The Beginning
Lil’Blue met paper for the first time in 2014, roughly a year after I started my comic studio under the name Dy Comics and I was studying branding pretty heavily then and I remember reading that a mascot was a good way to get people to personalize your brand and make it more memorable.
The article cited Disney’s Micky Mouse and Pikachu from the Pokemon series as examples and I saw their point, these characters had long put a face to the names they were associated with and with this thought in mind I went ahead and began shaping my own brand face, taking the beloved fanatsy icon of the dragon and adding elements from my characters both past and current and before I knew it I had…Yudra?
This was the name of my very first series and I thought it would make a nice homage to my humble beginnings BUT readers, some of you no doubt, began referring to this little guy by the common moniker “Little Blue” and after several months of this I decided it was the people’s will and Lil’Blue was officially born.
But as people latched onto this little blue critter I found myself being encouraged to show more of him and little by little blue made more and more quest appearances until finally he began getting his on series.
Lil’Scriptures
Lil’Blue made his official debut as a Pact Comics character in his Christian Children comic series “Lil’Scriptures” where a one panel comic depicting Lil’Blue themed by a bible verse. These quick little comics served as fast and easy additions to my otherwise slow and painful upload schedule and served as center pieces to many blogs in the past.
Modern Day
Lil’Blue after more then eight years has grown from cute logo decoration to the heart and soul of the Pact Comics in many ways, hes a little idea God gave me that turned into a flagship that has gone on to be the most successful character I’ve had to this day with Lil’Blue comics and merch being more and more common with each passing year.
This has slowly led to the Lil’Blue we come to today, a sweet, helpful if not precocious little chibi that acts as the anchor and moral compass for his often foil and counter part Dunk and making sure that no matter how dark things can get there is always something to laugh about, an icon that no matter what happens we need to make sure we keep a little hope and humor with us in the good times and the bad.
As a comci creator and a Christian its important to remember that God gave us imagination for a reason that part of creativity is flexibility, it means starting over, it means sticking to our guns, it means grabbing every idea and letting go of some and most importantly it means being able to let the other creative minds around you help shape the clay God has given you because God gave them a creative outlook just as valuable as yours!
So next time your sketching up a character you don’t will amount to to much, stick with them a little longer because you never know what God will turn that seed in your mind into, it might end up being the best thing you ever made!
So that is a look at Lil’Blue, let me know what you think and what character you want to see in our next bio blog Pact-Keepers, until next time God bless and be safe!
Hey Pact Keepers!
High Society #12 is up and ready for you right HERE
God bless and enjoy Pact Keepers!
Now, before we move on to making actual comics there is a few details we should go over for the beginning of your comic making adventure, lets start with “Where should I host my comic series?” because as I learned when I was getting started, this is VERY important.
The answer for this can fall into one of TWO answers as a whole with exceptions but it mostly depends on what your series is going to be; Are you goin to post a webcomic when you can, keep a loose schedule and do it for fun mostly? I recommend making a dedicated social media page to host it on. Social media profiles are easy to make, have high populations of people casually browsing them for things related to their interests and are generally low maintenance for you to work with until your ready to move up to more serious hosting.
PLATFORMS THAT MAY WORK FOR YOU
Or perhaps you are more serious about making comics into something MORE than a hobby, you want to focus on building a fanbase, having a consistent update schedule and trying to find a way to make a profit off your work be it commissions, Crowdfunding or ad revenue on your website.
If your looking to take your comic creating seriously then a simple social media platform won’t be enough, it will be important but your going to need something more. Your going to need to start building up your own website or blog to host and archive your works.
Creating is a website is a more time consuming, may require some money to get you going and will come with more responsibilities such as learning to track your stats, learn how to create a clean, easy to use design and experience for visitors and will require at least monthly maintenance to keep it running smoothly.
While a website is an investment and requires commitment it gives you more room to build your brand and heighten your reader’s experience with your works, so where is a good place to find hosting?
HOSTING THAT MAY WORK FOR YOU
For hosting your works online these are your best options for a focused and strong start to building up your work online, finding a point of operation and building your work up from there is going to be the best first step you can plan when starting out.
So give it some thought and go explore these options to see if you can find a good place to start hosting comics, there is no wrong answer but it takes some time and exploration to find the BEST answer for you and your personal style. Deep roots in solid ground make for strong trees and strong trees often produce excellent fruit, so go find some promising ground and God bless Pact-Keepers!
Until next time!
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