All posts by AOCM

My name is Pastor Tony Catron I graduate from K.S.U. with a degree in electronic/electrical engineering. While doing that I became a Junior Deacon and also a musician in my dad's ministry in Cleveland, Ohio. Years later, my career took me to Michigan where I worked as a Electrical/Electronic Engineer. While in Michigan I became a Minister, then later went to Seminary training at Birmingham Bible Institute and became an Elder at a large Pentecostal church in Michigan called LLCC. I was called to the ministry by God. So I headed up an outreach ministry based on the End Times, dealing with restoration in people lives. Then my dad called me back to Ohio to help him Pastor his church. During that time, God changed my outreach ministry, turning it into a full-time restoration ministry. He gave me the name Ark of Covenant Ministries and the rest is history.
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Mark 13

Signs of the End of the Age

“For many shall come in my name saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many,” Mark 13:6. Its important to know God for yourself so that when the deceivers come you can discern what is truth and what isn’t. When the disciples didn’t know something, they asked Jesus in simple questions. We need to be in the habit of just asking questions. Wars and rumours of wars are coming, famines and natural disasters are coming. But we shall not be moved by these things, rather see them as signs. While the Lord doesn’t want us to stress about our problems, He doesn’t want us focus on them either, but find a balance in Him.

Jesus Warns of Persecution

Because of our faith in Jesus, we will be hated. We’ll even have family members turn against us, but the only One we really have is Jesus who will never turn His back on us. If we continuously remain faithful to Jesus, we will make it to the end to experience salvation.

The Detestable Idol That Brings Misery

You see so many false prophets now a days. You can’t be surprised because its been spoken that its going to happen. Yet to witness it first hand is astounding. The enemy is in the midst really trying to steer people away. There are those who are following others who really believe their half truths. The enemy is moving and tries to cover his tracks even with the holy scriptures! If you aren’t abiding in Jesus, you can easily be swayed into his lies. People think there is a grey area in life, however with God its either black or white, good or evil. You can’t be both at once. You can’t fully give your life and have convenience too. We get everything that we want, whenever we want it in this society. We need to be willing to lay down our own desires and be led by God. Its hard to let go of your comforts, but its necessary to be stretched to become more one with God.

The Appearing of the Son of Man

Jesus will come back with great power and glory to gather His elect from the Earth.

The Parable of the Fig Tree

While neither Jesus, nor the angles or us as disciples know when Jesus Himself will come, we can know by the “signs” of the rise of many false prophets, the continuing intensity of seismic events of epic proportion, famines and wars will give us an indicator as to the season that He will come.

Live Always Ready for His Appearing

We need to be found doing His will, not just twiddling our thumbs, waiting for Him to come back and not being effective for Him.

A Parable of a Man Who Left on a Journey

Watch. Jesus said watch to Peter, Andrew, James & John. Watch. Jesus says watch to all of us too. Watch over your heart posture, don’t allow yourself to fall asleep spiritually. The things of this world, the cares of this life lull you to sleep. Check your heart. Its serious. This Earth is not all there is. There is a restoration of all things and we are in the very last moments leading into it.

Summary

  1. You can’t fully give your life and have convenience too, 11
  2. If you feel, then its your will, 11
  3. Watch your walk or your soul will be lost, 37
  4. Don’t be seduced or your soul will be cut loose, 22
  5. We’re in the last days so watch and pray, 33
  6. Hear His word fast while it lasts, 10
  7. Don’t worry about packing your bag, because He’s coming real & fast, 15-17
  8. Don’t let family ties turn your from Christ, 12-13
  9. Don’t underestimate the hate for Jesus sake, 13
  10. Be not persuaded by false prophets, 5-6
  11. Don’t plan let the Holy Ghost lead, 11
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Lord Shape Me, Mold Me, and Sharpen Me to Your Perfect Will

All of us are trying to improve ourselves in some kind of way, weather by our look or style, by trying to lose weight, maybe even our personality. But we all have tried in some way to change who we are; sometimes to our detriment. In some cases, we even harming others in our process. This has been the most sought after thing to long for. Even in the time of David the king of the Hebrews proclaimed:

Psalms 51:7-10
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean:
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. 8 Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. 9 Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities. 10 Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.

During the 16th century, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon was looking for the fountain of youth, a mythical spring that restores the youth of anyone who drinks its waters. A lot of the time, all of us have looked back at what was. I would say that even today we want things to change in our lives, although most of us don’t know how or are willing to change our ways for the better. There are five things that as a person that wants a change in there life has to do:

  1. Admit who and what your are
  2. Forgive yourself
  3. Commit yourself to the process
  4. Never surrender yourself to failure in the process
  5. Allow Jesus to lead and guide through the Word of God (Bible)

Isaiah 64:6-9
6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. 7 And there is none that calleth upon thy name,
that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee: for thou hast hid thy face from us, and hast consumed us, because of our iniquities. 8 But now, O LORD, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand. 9 Be not wroth very sore, O LORD, neither remember iniquity for ever: behold, see, we beseech thee, we are all thy people.

In my conclusion: I’ll leave you with these verses:

Hebrews 2:5-10
5 For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak. 6 But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that thou visitest him? 7 Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory and honour, and didst set him over the works of thy hands: 8 Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things put under him. 9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.
10 For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.

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Mark 12

The Parable of the Tenants

God planted a nation (vineyard) and dressed it well, setting judges (tenants) over the people to maintain the nation. When the nation began to transgress God’s ways, He sent servants (prophets) to point them back to God in righteousness. However, the nation persecuted these prophets even to the point of death, one after the other. Finally, God determined that He’d send His only Son, for He thought that they would revere Him. However, they brutally murdered Him. Jesus told this parable about the priests, religious scholars and leaders, who sought to kill Him.

Paying Taxes to Caesar

The Pharisees and religious elite try to make Him fail at every turn, but they don’t realize that they are proving the point of the parable He told about the parable of the tenants. Whose image was on the coin? That of Cesar. So Jesus said give to Cesar what belongs to him and to God what belongs to Him. Don’t allow the image of Cesar to overtake your heart, but rather, let the image of God be upon your heart.

A Question about Marriage

The Sadducees were another of the prominent religious groups of Jesus’ time which did not believe that there was a resurrection of the dead. They twisted one of the laws of Moses found in Deuteronomy 25:5-10 to support their religious doctrine. This particular law required a man to marry his brother’s widow in order to bear children for his deceased brother’s name. The Sadducees tried to undermine the reality of a resurrection of the dead by coming up with a scenario in which the wife was wed to several brothers who never gave her an heir. They thought it was silly to think that she would be the wife of all those men at the resurrection, so they, in their delusion, wrote off the concept of resurrection completely. Jesus said to the Sadducees that they were in utter error because they didn’t know the scriptures or the power of God. The spiritual reality is that there is a resurrection and once resurrected, such earthly things as marriage and espousal ownership are meaningless in that realm.

The Greatest Commandment

Deuteronomy 6:3-5 says:

3 Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey. 4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord: 5 And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

Jesus, Son of David – Lord of David

David prophesied of the promised Christ many years before He came in Psalm 22 and Psalm 110:1. He peered into the future and saw the Messiah sitting on the right hand of God the Father. Jesus was telling the religious elite that He was both the descendant of David and the Lord of David.

Jesus Warns Against the Religious Scholars

The religious scholars were harped on the superficial and did not embrace the standards of mercy and truth. They loved accolades from men and to be recognized by men. Because they were tasked with the weighty and significant responsibility of being leaders of the people, to call them back to God, they will be stripped of their supposed honor and experience a greater damnation at the time of judgement.

Summary

  1. Whose image is on your heart, 17
  2. Be found doing the work not stealing the will, 2-7
  3. Don’t be a hypocrite, 15
  4. It doesn’t matter how much you cast in, its about the heart there in, 44
  5. Beware of the Scribes who love to proclamate in your face, 38
  6. Don’t play while the Lord’s away, 1
  7. Don’t let Satan still or kill God’s will for you, 7
  8. You can’t interpret the word of God with carnal understanding, 10-11, 24, 26, 29-31, 36-37
  9. Love the Lord with all you’ve got, 30
  10. There’s going to be a resurrection, 25-26

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Are You Willing to Walk the Walk and Talk the Talk No Matter the Cost in Jesus Christ?

Some may ask, what is the cost? Well I’ll ask you how long do you want to live and where would you want to live? We sometimes start out with a surety of heart and mind but later when the winds of life blow, our surety slowly becomes obscurity. Only having lead us to doubt, fear and apprehensiveness, it seems at times the very thing that is good for us is
so heard to obtain.

Luke 14:28 says, “For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it?”

Lets take look at a few things to try figuring out what might have went wrong with us. There is 6 important things that you might have forgotten to count.

  1. Faithfulness
  2. Patience
  3. Will power
  4. Dedication
  5. Vision
  6. Emotions

In life, people usually fail at things, due to one or more of these 6 things, but of the 6 things listed, patience would be most most significant hindrance of them all. One may think faith, although faith is very high on the list, but faith needs patience to grow.

James 1:3-4 says, “Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”

If we cross reference the different failed situations in our lives, we’ll see that one or maybe all of these 6 characteristics pop up in some form or another. Success in life means having a health mind, soul and body. Some may call a successful life as P.M.S. (power, money, sex ). Even though P.M.S. is the key to a form of success but it only to your flesh and is only short lived. You might get all of the P.M.S. but the out come of it is death.

James 4:1-3 says, “From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.”

Know that in this world we’re in a constant struggle, trying to gain a sense of normalcy. But don’t dismay because in the Word of God says in John 16:33, “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”

In My conclusion take a look at Matthew 11:28-30:
28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

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Mark 11

Jesus’ Entry into Jerusalem

Jesus, the King of all Kings entered into the city of Peace, Jerusalem with a spirit of peace and humility riding on an animal which at that time was considered one used for laborious tasks. Kings didn’t ride in procession upon donkeys, but strong, regal steeds. Yet, Jesus was fulfilling the prophecy of Zecheriah 9:9 in which Zion’s King would come to her riding on a donkey, lowly and just. Jesus is keeping with His lowly, humble persona. Though royalty, the Elect One who had come from the Father’s side, was willing to take a position lower than the angels, the form of a Man, not resisting the Will of God, even to the point of accepting death as a means by which all humanity could experience fullness of Life. The crowd who welcomed their King were only rehearsing a ritual which they did every year and one has to wonder if they knew that Jesus truly was the King destined to come. You never know when Jesus will come through so you must be ready and a good steward of the gifting and ministry of God.

Jesus and a Fruitless Fig Tree

He spoke to the tree saying that it would not bear fruit anymore. When Jesus speaks something it will happen, whether blessing or cursing. We are suppose to bear fruit. If we be like the fruitless fruit tree, are we really in Jesus? Do we really belong to Him? We must bear fruit through Jesus the vine who is the supplier of Life. They are known by the fruit of the vine: Jesus, the humble, lowly, servant-king. If we are not attached to the vine, we wither in our sins until we die. Choose Life.

Jesus Drives Merchants Out of the Temple Courts

Jesus’ zeal is a side of Him that many don’t speak of. He turned over tables in the temple. Why? Because the blueprints of the Tabernacle of Moses & the Temple of Solomon were given directly from heaven and pictures of the Holy Place in God’s own courts. Not only this, we discover that Jesus prophesied that this physical temple would be destroyed (Mark 13:1-2). Now each believer’s body is a Temple which houses the glory and presence of God in the person of Holy Ghost. The seriousness with which we should view the Temple is evident in how indignant Jesus was toward those who desecrated it. While our Lord is Loving, He is also Holy and displays righteous anger against evil and unrighteousness.

Lessons of Faith

The power of belief. Just believe. Faith and belief will make or break. If you are praying and you don’t belief, simply put, it will not come to pass. In your payer life and walk with Jesus you must believe. Forgive. If you don’t, you won’t experience forgiveness for your own life. Do a self evaluation in your life. Do you have forgiveness toward someone? You don’t have an excuse. Many times forgiveness is not for you but the other person.

The Religious Leaders Question Jesus’ Authority

Jesus addresses the religious leadership. The enemy constantly comes to entrap and this is exactly what the religious leaders did. With these leaders you see a people who think they understand, but they don’t.

Summary

  1. Don’t let the things of this world defile your temple, 15-17
  2. God will uses the unexpected person to fulfill His will, 7-10
  3. Don’t let unforgiviness rob your salvation
  4. You must bear the right fruit at all times, 13-14
  5. The power of belief will move mountains, 23-24
  6. Faith activates the promise of blessing, 24
  7. Your words hold unseen power & Authority, 14, 24
  8. For the sin in you to removed starts from the root, 20
  9. Jesus knows the motives of men, 27-33
  10. Let Jesus flip the tables of sin in you, 15-17