An excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens July 27, 2024
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Regrets come in two forms: for what we have done and for what we haven’t done. Ultimately regrets flow from missed opportunities to do what’s right.
This is an excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens. This and all his books are available from Amazon in paperback or kindle at
An excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens July 26, 2024
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We shouldn’t turn our backs and walk away from those who need help, our hand is the hand of God to them.
This is an excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens. This and all his books are available from Amazon in paperback or kindle at Amazon
An excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens July 25, 2024
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When we’re born again everything connected with our old life must go. Whatever we hold onto will hold us back.
This is an excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens. This and all his books are available from Amazon in paperback or kindle at Amazon
My Witness July 24, 2024
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When I was young, I was not a nice fellow. Snakes would cross the street when I sauntered down the sidewalk. My all-consuming passion was getting enough alcohol and drugs to help me forget something I couldn’t remember. Playing music and living in a 24/7 party atmosphere was all I cared about. Other people were collateral damage on my way to a buzz. I had the name of my guitar tattooed on my arm so women would know where my loyalties lay.
Spiritually I was dead inside. I called myself an atheist and I was faithful to my boast. Anyone who spoke to me of any religion was automatically consigned by me to irrelevance. The closest thing I had to an actual conviction was a strident attachment to militant apathy. I didn’t care about anything, and I couldn’t stand anyone who did.
That was my life until I was thirty. Then God spoke to me. God touched me. God changed me. God gave me a new life. I was born again.
Today I can remember what I did in my former life, but I can no longer relate to it. It as if my life before God was a movie I have seen. I can recall the important scenes and the important characters, but I feel a complete detachment to being one of the actors in the plot.
God gave me a wife who is the love of my life. He gave me a son who is my heir and friend. He gave me a daughter-in-love who is the daughter I always wanted to have. He has given me two grandchildren who are the joy of my life as a seasoned citizen. He has allowed me to see miracles, plant churches, be a pastor, found ministries that fed and clothed thousands, watch people accept Him, watch people grow in Him, and hold the hands of people who went to join Him.
I was born again on Palm Sunday in 1980 so I just had my 37th birthday as a child of God. I give Him the glory for my life. I give Him the honor that is His due. I cannot even give a fraction of the love He has shown. He is my source, my summit, and my all.
As we approach the celebration of His rising from the dead, I am reminded of the fact that it is faith that saves us and that not of our self for even the faith is a gift. I look at all the traditions and customs we have developed in more than two thousand years, and I smile. I pray that everyone who calls on His name has a blessed and joyous Resurrection Day. Enjoy the season as best meets the requirements of your faith.
Let us all recall that if we confess Jesus as Lord and if we believe in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead we shall be saved.
That is the truth, the truth upon which all of reality rests. That is the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega, all the rest is window dressing. Just as one enjoys Italian food and another enjoys Chinese yet all food is good to those who like it. So too, our traditions and customs if they do not detract from the truth of by who and how we are saved are all good.
Have a wonderful time with family and friends, co-religionists and those C&E Christians who make it standing room only at so many normally empty churches at this time of year. Love them all and let God sort them out. Just remember, the biggest surprise when we get to heaven in not who is there but that we are for it is not by works but by faith that we are saved. The greatest saint and the worst sinner both need the Lord’s grace to enter in.
There is no sin so great that it cannot be forgiven if we lay it at the cross. He knows us better than we can ever know ourselves and he forgives us. Don’t labor under a load you were never meant to carry any further than the cross. Give it all to Him and he will give you rest.
I praise Him for saving me. I praise Him for giving me life. I ask Him to open doors for me to serve Him. And when I am gone there is but one eulogy, I wish anyone to hear, “God got the glory!”
Season Three Episode Twenty-two July 23, 2024
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In Episode Twenty-two / Season Three of I Took a Right Turn: We share one some more old-time gospel songs: Jesus Got Aholda My Life, and Gone at Last. We also share another of our homegrown songs: I just Want to Talk About Jesus. In our Bible study this week we do something a little different. Opening the second chapter of Ephesians we read the first sentence of the first five paragraphs and the last five sentences of the final paragraph in the chapter. This builds into a teaching on how we are saved and why. Robert reads another essay from his series of books on Christian living, (Faith, Hope, and Love) reading Essay # 16 from the book, Hope: “My Witness.”
The text of this essay will be posted the day after the release of this episode at www.itookarighturn.com and www.drrobertowens.com All of Robert’s thirty-six books are available in paper back and kindle through Amazon. We also invite everyone to visit our online art store, The Pair a Docs Shop where we offer our original paintings, prints and merchandise.
An excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens July 22, 2024
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If we go along with the crowd we’re going to end up where the crowd ends up.
This is an excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens. This and all his books are available from Amazon in paperback or kindle at Amazon
An excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens July 21, 2024
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Some people will never like you because the spirit in you scares the demons in them.
This is an excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens. This and all his books are available from Amazon in paperback or kindle at
An excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens July 20, 2024
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Praising God should be the melody of our lives.
This is an excerpt from the book New Old Sayings Volume Two by Dr. Robert Owens. This and all his books are available from Amazon in paperback or kindle at Amazon
Dr. Robert Owens’ Newest Book July 18, 2024
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Floating Through Time: What is poetry? Is it just alliteration, imagery, rhyme, rhythm, sound, stanzas, tone, and meter? Or is it something other. Something shimmering between reality and realization? Is it the charismatic sister of prose encapsulating enchantment bringing substance to what is known intuitively?
Dr. Owens started writing poetry before he ever heard of poetry. There are poems in this book he wrote while in grade school and there are poems in this book, he wrote in 2024. Therefore, it took more than sixty-five years for this book to mature from pen to print from swirling thoughts to a book in your hand.
Loose Him and Let Him Go July 17, 2024
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There’s a story in the Bible about Jesus raising a man from the dead. The man’s name was Lazarus and he was one of Jesus’ good friends. When the moment came for the great miracle Jesus stood before the open tomb and, “cried with a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he who had died came out bound hand and foot with grave clothes, and his face was wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Loose him, and let him go.”[1]
We who believe the Bible is God’s Word accept this as a true story of actual events. It can also be seen as an illustration of what happens when we step out of the smothering embrace of the religious systems humans create to reach God and thus accept what God has done to reach us. When we reject the bewildering straitjacket of rules and regulations humans inevitably devise, and accept that Jesus paid the price, finished the work and welcomes us home He stands at the tomb of our self-help religion and says, “Loose him, and let him go.”
Once we’ve confessed with our mouths that Jesus is Lord and believed in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead we’re made right with God.[2] And though Jesus has ascended to heaven He didn’t leave us alone. Just before He left, He said, “If you love me, show it by doing what I’ve told you. I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth.
The godless world can’t take him in because it doesn’t have eyes to see him, doesn’t know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you and will even be in you!” Embracing that and allowing the Spirit of Truth to guide us is the ideal for those who follow Christ.
Christ’s final command was to take this light to the world. Instead, we built thousands of competing lamps betraying the unity of the Gospel and confusing unbelievers with our multiplicity of slightly different presentations. But then again, it’s easier to make rules than it is to be sensitive to the Spirit of God. Laws and regulations can appear to bring order out of chaos, relieving the pressure of walking by faith in a faithless world. But these endless rules cannot change us from the inside out. To paraphrase Ben Franklin: if we seek order and security from religion, we’ll never find either one of them.
When following rules define the state of our spiritual life we walk in constant fear of crossing the lines, of veering off even if it’s by mistake into the deception of sin. This fear of deception won’t keep us from deception. It’ll lead us into it. We’re called to walk in faith not in fear. So if we’re walking in fear we’ve already fallen for deception. The Bible tells us that the only way we can avoid falling for deception is to embrace the Spirit of Truth.[3]
Think about it. When we open the blinds at night does darkness come rushing in? No. When we throw open the blinds light rushes out into the darkness. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness can’t overcome it.[4] If we’ll immerse ourselves in what God is calling us to, the unearned grace that flows from the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus, we’ll find the order and security we long for.
Following God which is walking forward in the light can at first feel like walking backwards in the dark because we’re surrounded by and have been raised in a world that’s in revolt against its creator. We must dedicate ourselves to following the voice of the Spirit of Truth who lives within us. It’s vitally important that we learn to recognize His voice so we can recognize it out of all the voices in the world. When the whole of creation is shaking, He’s the rock-solid foundation giving us the security of our salvation.
Does this mean we should abandon all restraint and follow the voice in our head? First, we must know whose voice we’re following, then we must acknowledge that God wrote us a book to explain it all from beginning to end. His voice will never contradict His Word and His Word shows us exactly how to live moment-by-moment.
Paul put it this way, “It’s true that moral guidance and counsel need to be given, but the way you say it and to whom you say it are as important as what you say. It’s obvious, isn’t it, that the law code isn’t primarily for people who live responsibly, but for the irresponsible, who defy all authority, riding roughshod over God, life, sex, truth, whatever! They are contemptuous of this great Message I’ve been put in charge of by this great God.”[5]
Because we live in a fallen and evil world, some laws and regulations must be imposed to maintain people’s safety to provide external order. However, rules and regulations must never be imposed to bring about spiritual purposes because only the Spirit can birth spirit.[6]
The Bible is the operator’s manual for life on earth. In it God has shared with us the greatest wisdom and the deepest insights. In it we receive not only the instructions on how to live in this world but also how to be born-again as a glorious Spirit-birthed child of God. It’s not possible to put a price on God’s gift of His revelation. But even the Bible can be used to weave a web of soul-strangling regulations keeping us imprisoned in the law.
We must always remember the Bible was given to us to lead us to Christ not to take His place. The tyranny of the law seeks to confine us in a prison of our own making. But Christ stands at the door to our cell and says, “Loose him, and let him go.”
One last thing: Having a Bible we can understand really helps us to understand the Bible. In the New Testament where Christ quotes the Old Testament He quotes from the Septuagint,[7] a translation in the common language of the day and not from the traditional Hebrew texts. The New Testament itself was written in the Koine[8] dialect of Greek. This was the supra-regional form of Greek spoken and written by the people. I’m not trying to share a lecture on biblical languages. What I’m getting at is that Jesus and the Apostles used the language of the day so that everyone could understand what they were saying. They didn’t use the fifty cent words and nuanced meanings of the intellectuals or the technical jargon of theologians. They didn’t use a language that was no longer spoken or a dialect that was from another era.
Today there are many translations that render the Bible in the language we use every day at work, at the market, and at home without all the thees and thous which no longer form a part of our daily speech. I’m not saying don’t use a Bible with those words if that’s what suits you I’m just saying use a Bible you can easily understand. Personally, my favorite is the Message but there are plenty of others. Find the one you’re comfortable with and let it speak the Words of God into your spirit and breathe the Spirit of God into your life.
[1] John 11
[2] Romans 10:9
[3] II Thessalonians 2:9-12
[4] John 1:5
[5] I Timothy 1:8-11
[6] John 3:6
[7] Septuagint: abbreviation LXX, the earliest extant Greek translation of the Old Testament from the original Hebrew. The Septuagint was presumably made for the Jewish community in Egypt when Greek was the common language throughout the region. Analysis of the language has established that the Torah, or Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament), was translated near the middle of the 3rd century BC and that the rest of the Old Testament was translated in the 2nd century BC.
[8] The fairly uniform Hellenistic Greek spoken and written from the 4th century BC until the time of the Byzantine emperor Justinian.
Dr. Robert Owens Chronicles the History of the Future 