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    My Name is Dan Masters and this is my blog about attempting to live The Abundant Life as a Christian. Here I have posts about family, church, and my recent battle with Cancer.

He is the God of the Little Things Too

I spent a good portion of yesterday crunching on this task for a project that I am working on for a client. It seemed that no matter which angle I tried to attack this task that I could never get it completed in an easy way. I ended yesterday with a plan on how to complete it that was less then desirable.

This morning I woke up and had the oppertunity to spend some time with God. While I was with Him I felt him tell me that it was easier then I thought. While that made me feel a little better I wasn’t convinced because I still did not know exactly what I was going to do.

After that I checked my email and read the daily message sent to me by Joel Osteen. The title of the email was "The Great I Am" and started off with the scripture:

"God said to Moses, ‘I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you’ " - Exodus 3:14

The email went of to talk about how big God is and how He is on our side. It explained that God is saying "I am everything you need. I am your strength. I am your wisdom. I am your protection. I am your provider. I am your way maker. I am your problem solver."

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The Diagnoses – Esophageal Cancer

Previous Post in this Series: Having Cancer as a Christian

“The biopsy came back positive, you have cancer of the esophagus” the doctor said as I sat in the hospital bed. The words were unreal. Here is was, 34 years old, with cancer. I had never had anything wrong with me in my life and here I was with word cancer now permanently attached to my life. How did this happen? Was I going to die? Those and a million other questions started to flood my mind.

How it All Started

This whole event started several months back when while eating. While attempting to swallow I felt like the food I was chewing got stuck in my throat. I didn’t think very much of it at the time. I mean who hasn’t eaten a little too quick and had the same thing happen to them? Unfortunately as time went on this happened more frequently.

Most normal people would go to the doctor when things like this happen to them but I didn’t. The first reason for this was that I am not the type that went to the doctor unless I felt like I was dying. The second was that in some weird way I had learned to live with the little catch in my throat and could swallow most of the time without choking. The third reason was that we did not have health insurance at the time and I didn’t think it was all that serious of an issue. I remember telling my wife if I needed health insurance God would make sure I had it.

After a few months of having this issue I got a job where the health insurance would kick in after three months. Perfect I thought, I’ll just wait it out and then go to the doctor. Three weeks into the new job my stomach started bothering me as well. Uh oh I thought, maybe this is a little more serious, I thought that I might have an ulcer. I finally broke down and went to the doctor.

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Having Cancer as a Christian

It is weird to sit here and think about everything that has happened in the last few months. In life you hear of other people who go through difficult times in your life but you never really know what is involved in their situation. As a Christian we often think because we are on God’s crew that those types of things will not happen to us. Unfortunately that is not true.

The Bible says:

…He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. – Matthew 5:45

The truth of it is that we live in a fallen world and while I believe serving God has its benefits, Christians still can experience their fair share of challenges and disappointments in life. Shoot, if giving your life to God guaranteed that you would have no more trouble in life everyone would serve Him. While serving God does not keep us free from trouble He can turn bad situations ultimately into good ones.

But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive. – Genesis 50:20

My Situation

My situation was being diagnosed with Esophageal Cancer at age 34 and it has been one of the scariest situations I have ever been in. The fear that comes along with a report like that ranges from “Am I going to die?” to “My God, what is the treatment going to be like and am I going to die anyway?”. Those are just the natural fears that anyone would have in that situation.

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Growing in God by Getting Involved

growingOver 2 years ago I wrote a post on this blog on how I was stepping out and getting involved in church again. The ministry that I had volunteered for was the media ministry. I went to a meeting and even sat up in the media booth during a service to see how to operate their system for the projector.

I thought I was ready but it just wasn’t time.

The service that I sat in was the first and only service that I did anything in regard to the media ministry. I am not exactly sure why things did not work out, but I think there were still some areas in my life that God still needed to work on. It was kind of weird not being involved but I think you need to learn how to receive as a Christian and walk the walk before you can minster. So that is what I did. During that time my wife and I attended a couple of small groups so we still had fellowship and got to know people in the church. We are still involved with the small groups today.

Over the last six months due to some personal circumstances I saw the need to spend more time with God personally and began to do so. During that time I read the book Caught Between A Dream and A Job and am currently reading The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For? In both of these books they talk about how God has a plan for your life and how you were created for a purpose. I believe both of these things and set out to see what it is that God has to do for me here on earth.

There are a couple of ways that I am seeking God in order to find out my purpose. Read More »

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Christian Perspective on the Financial Crisis

image description I feel that it is time that I chimed in on the current financial crisis that is gripping the world. I think that I am not alone in my concern about the future and while I have not been directly affected at this point sometimes not knowing is as bad as something actually happening. Hopefully my personal experience in dealing with this will help others that may be struggling during this time.

The Last Financial Crisis

Before tackling the current financial crisis let’s look at the one that just happened seven short years ago. Back in 2001 it was the golden age of the internet. Billion dollar valuations of companies grew on trees and we were all going to be millionaires by 25 and retire billionaires by 30. It was a time of extravagance and money flowed freely.

During this time I was a couple of year into my Christianity and was newly married. I had gotten it into my head that God wanted to bless me and thought that these blessing were flowing through credit. I had gone wild and bought anything and everything that they would let me buy on credit including a house. Three weeks after buying the house I was laid off from my job due to the economy. I hadn’t even made the first payment on the house.

For the next 2 years my wife and I struggled along as she worked full time and I tried to start/run a business in the technology field. After 2 years we were stripped of just about everything (including the house) and found ourselves renting from her dad once again. I struggled another couple of years with the business until we started having kids. A couple of events happened and I found myself hitting rock bottom.

The Turning Point

The turning point for me was when I got into a business financial dispute with a really good friend that cost me our friendship. I remember sitting in my car with my wife looking at her knowing that if I didn’t change things that I could very well lose her next. It was at that point that I decided to quit the business and go get a job and try to take care of my family the way that a real man of God should. Read More »

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New Theme Here at the Abundant Life

I have uploaded a new theme here at the Abundant Life. I had been having several different issues with the previous theme so this one not only looks better but it should funtion better as well. 

Please let me know if you find and problems with it.

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It Can Be Tough Being A Transparent Christian

difficult While looking over a couple of posts here at The Abundant Life I noticed some spelling and grammar errors and started to correct them. In the process of cleaning up my inconsistencies I had to actually read some of the posts that I put up here and started to get a little embarrassed. The reason for my embarrassment was the fact that it has been tough being a Christian, going to church, and having a relationship with God over the last few years. Not only was it was it tough but I was sharing my struggles with the world. Looking back I wonder if that was a good idea as people (especially Christians – sorry) can be really judgmental.

To combat this concern I have to separate what I think people would say about me from what I know God says about me. Read More »

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Blast From the Past – Jason Lozano at Freedom Christian Center

I was setting up my iTunes podcasts with various ministries that I have been apart of and searched to see if Freedom International Christian Training Center with Pastor Jason Lozano had one. While I did not find Podcasts for his ministry I did find this cool video of his testimony that Kenneth Copeland Ministries did on him.

The thing that got me about this video is that I knew him when he first got started and actually helped him knock down a couple of the walls that he mentioned. The other part of the video that got me is that there is actually a picture of him and I together at around the 2:29 minute mark. It is really something to remember where he and I can from and to see where we are now. 

My congratulations go out to Jason, his wife and family, and his ministry for the blessing that God has on their lives.

P.S. Jason, if you read this setup some Podcasts of your messages so I can listen to them!

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A Little Maintenance Around Here

maintenance I have done a little maintenance around here so that things hopefully run a little better. I updated my email address so that I will actually get notifications when someone leaves a comment. I also added the feed from my blog network to the side panel. The final piece is that this blog is signed up at Text Link Ads so you can by an ad on this sit that will appear in the sidebar right below the search box.

Please let me know if you see anything funky.

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My Yearly Update Here at the Abundant Life

space-passing-time My last post was almost a year ago to the day. The reason for lack of posting here is several different reasons. The biggest reason is that I have 15 different blogs that I write and I have scaled down my writing on all of them. Another reason is that I have not been "engaged" spiritually as much as I was before which prompted this blog. My family and I attend church pretty regularly but are not currently involved in any ministries but do go to a connect group. I guess the message here is that things have settled down here spiritually – thank God.

Personally I feel pretty comfortable with my relationship with God and do have daily contact with Him. Recently I started reading several times a week out of my Bible and have started to listen to messages from different churches via Podcasts while at work. I feel that I am where God wants me to be and the recent step up in reading and listening are just the next step in my journey with Him. Also I have setup a personal journal that only I have access to where I can express my feelings good or bad and allow me to have another avenue to interact with God.

All-in-all it has been a good year and I feel that I have grown in my relationship with God which where I think we all want to be.

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