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Showing posts from September, 2022

In or Out?

And then he prayed, “God, I’m asking for two things before I die; don’t refuse me—banish lies from my lips and liars from my presence. Give me enough food to live on, neither too much nor too little. If I’m too full, I might get independent, saying, ‘God? Who needs him?’ If I’m poor, I might steal and dishonor the name of my God.” (Proverbs 30:7-9)  Neither too much, nor too little - are we operating by the "Goldilocks Principle"? We don't want too hard of a bed, nor too soft - it has to be just right. We don't want too much food, nor too small of portions to satisfy - we want them to be just right. We don't want too much hardship, but neither do we expect to live totally without any - it just cannot be too overwhelming to deal with. Most of us want to live by the standards that "suit" us the best. The only problem with this is our inability to really decide on what "suits" us best. We have a "warped" idea of what is "best&quo

I trust you to carry me

I’ll make a list of God’s gracious dealings, all the things God has done that need praising, All the generous bounties of God, his great goodness to the family of Israel— Compassion lavished, love extravagant. He said, “Without question these are my people, children who would never betray me.” So he became their Savior. In all their troubles, he was troubled, too. He didn’t send someone else to help them. He did it himself, in person. Out of his own love and pity he redeemed them. He rescued them and carried them along for a long, long time. (Isaiah 63:7-9) And carried them... Those words speak volumes about the love of God - his grace and goodness going far and beyond what any of us deserve or even imagine we have need of in our lives. I have made a mental list of God's gracious dealings in my life, and I now have lost track of where he started and where he ended. Those gracious dealings are too innumerable for my finite memory to hold onto, but I can recall many and am so gratef

More than casual conversation

Watch the way you talk. Let nothing foul or dirty come out of your mouth. Say only what helps, each word a gift. (Ephesians 4:29) We might just forget that 'words' are a gift. Each and every one we speak has the power to build up, encourage, point someone in the right direction, confirm, or enable. How many times do we hang onto the ones that do just the opposite? We get all hyper-focused on the ones that didn't actually 'do much for us', or actually weren't meant to 'hurt', but we internalized them as something that hurt us. As important as it is for each of us to watch how we talk (the words that come out of our mouths), it is equally as important that each of us begins to 'weigh' the words we hear for their true value and stop focusing on what it is we thought we heard. We can 'take' words so many ways, can't we? I could tell you the sky is cloudy today, and you take it to mean we are going to be stuck inside not doing the things w

One Aspirin, or Two?

Deal with your pain or it will deal with you. We have to actually 'process' our pain if we are to ever get beyond our pain. Pain comes in many forms - physical, emotional, relational, and even spiritual. We cannot ignore pain, but we try to push it down over and over again rather than taking it to God or seeking help for it. We hope that ignoring it will help us somehow, but it just brings repeated torment to us. Distress that drives us to God does that. It turns us around. It gets us back in the way of salvation. We never regret that kind of pain. But those who let distress drive them away from God are full of regrets, end up on a deathbed of regrets. (2 Corinthians 7:10) God's plan is for the pain to drive us closer to him - not further away. When we withdraw from the pain and try to bury it, we are allowing pain to drive us away from God. As much as God wants to be worshipped, he also wants us to be open with him in ALL our needs. Every weakness we have, he stands ready

A submissive action

God makes his people strong. God gives his people peace. (Psalm 29:11) Strength is definitely something we strive for, hold onto for dear life, and which often seems to evade us in the moments we need it most. Brute force by which we can do some things is not always the right kind of strength, is it? We probably have all passed around a jar of some condiment or pickles at one time or another, each taking turns trying to get the lid undone so we might enjoy what is inside. It goes from person to person, until someone in their wisdom takes a tact of hitting the lid ever so squarely on the side of the sink, allowing the seal to be broken, then gingerly uncaps the jar. What most of us did was rely upon our physical strength, but what the last one did was to rely upon their wisdom to figure out the solution to the problem! We have both mental and physical strength - both sometimes evading us more than we'd desire to admit! There is another type of strength which sometimes evades us

Bent nails in the workshop

Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that. (Ephesians 5:1) As parents, we know we are being 'watched' by our children all of the time. We can try that "do as I say, not as I do" thing, but we all know how well that one works! Kids see things and then they 'imitate' them. I remember my dad making things in the shop. He'd hand me a hammer and have me straighten bent nails. I wasn't doing the same thing as dad, but I was right there learning how to hold a hammer and aim at something with it. While some may not think this is a significant lesson, I will assure you I scored higher in my 'mechanic' section of my Army placement exam than

Just the basics

You are just walking along, oblivious to the world, and then all of a sudden, you find yourself sprawling forward, lunging out of control and looking like a complete fool as down to ground you go!  When you attempt to reconstruct the event, you simply cannot see the "reason" you fell.  In essence, you accept the excuse of having tripped over your own feet. I have been mortified by some of my falls. I wonder if this is how we all face our spiritual and emotional "falls"?  We find ourselves just kind of oblivious to the events of the moment, then almost without notice, we find ourselves face down, sprawled in some pretty hard places, and mortified!  Shame enters in and all we want to to is "duck and cover".  What is often missing in those moments is the helping hand of a friend!  In fact, we often fall because we don't have the right balance of accountability friendships in our lives! My question: What are God-worshipers like?   Your answer: Arrows aimed

Errant seeds

Do we just sow our wild oats in our youth? The idea of doing something wild and foolish really knows no age - so I guess we could all probably answer this question with a resounding "NO"! We find ourselves doing a good many foolish things in our older age, don't we? What about the last time you said something you regretted, or acted a little too hasty, making bad decisions along the way? Wasn't this acting foolishly? What is the one thing we hope will happen whenever we have done something so foolish and silly? Isn't it that God will forget all about it? Or perhaps that the consequences of our actions will not find us out! Either way, we know what we have done has been both misdirected and silly - all we want is to be "square" again with God, the others in our lives, and our own conscience! God is fair and just; he corrects the misdirected, sends them in the right direction. He gives the rejects his hand, and leads them step-by-step. From now on every ro

Freedom Robbers

I know I distressed you greatly with my letter. Although I felt awful at the time, I don’t feel at all bad now that I see how it turned out. The letter upset you, but only for a while. Now I’m glad—not that you were upset, but that you were jarred into turning things around. You let the distress bring you to God, not drive you from him. The result was all gain, no loss. Distress that drives us to God does that. It turns us around. It gets us back in the way of salvation. We never regret that kind of pain. But those who let distress drive them away from God are full of regrets, end up on a deathbed of regrets. (2 Corinthians 7:8-10) Any great pain or sorrow that weighs us down and almost keeps us from moving is not meant to keep us down, it is meant to drive us to God. Elements of physical suffering, or some mental anguish might have us under its control right now. Some call this "trouble", while others use a more sophisticated term like "affliction" or "trib

Living small or living large?

I can’t tell you how much I long for you to enter this wide-open, spacious life. We didn’t fence you in. T he smallness you feel comes from within you . Your lives aren’t small, but you’re living them in a small way. I’m speaking as plainly as I can and with great affection. Open up your lives. Live openly and expansively! (2 Corinthians 6:11-13) Small spaces can be quite confining. I learned much about caves, caverns, and the formation of stalagmites and stalactites while on vacations and cave exploring. The magnificence and beauty of these spaces buried way underground is truly awe-inspiring. In those moments of taking in those beautiful displays of crystalline-like beauty, I just wanted to break out in hymns of praise! I am not an experiences spelunker. I did breathe in deeply and just sigh loudly at the amazing beauty of our heavenly Father's creative power - even when it is buried deep within the hidden spaces of this earth. Being some 200-250 feet below ground didn't

A little look within

Because of this decision we don’t evaluate people by what they have or how they look. We looked at the Messiah that way once and got it all wrong, as you know. We certainly don’t look at him that way anymore. Now we look inside , and what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. The old life is gone; a new life burgeons! Look at it! All this comes from the God who settled the relationship between us and him, and then called us to settle our relationships with each other. God put the world square with himself through the Messiah, giving the world a fresh start by offering forgiveness of sins. God has given us the task of telling everyone what he is doing. We’re Christ’s representatives. God uses us to persuade men and women to drop their differences and enter into God’s work of making things right between them. We’re speaking for Christ himself now: Become friends with God; he’s already a friend with you . (2 Corinthians 5:16-20) Do you know ju

Get your shovel

I am sometimes guilty of judging a book by its cover - like when I pass a quick judgment on someone or something because I see something on the "surface" which kind of gets my dander up, but really don't understand the reality of what they are going through just beneath the surface. We never really know what another will bring into our lives until we get beneath the surface - look beneath the "cover". Lest you think you are beyond concealing things beneath a "cover" in your lives, ask yourself this question: "When was the last time I was truthful about the toughest struggle in my life today?"  That question is telling because we often don't have anyone with whom we can share the struggle; or we don't really want to be honest about the struggle because it is kind of humbling to admit we struggle in that area of our lives. In reality, we have no struggles which are not "common" among all men and women - things like fear, anx

Plucked or Refreshed?

Are you a 'radical' when it comes to change? Radical: of or going to the root or origin of something. If you haven't really thought about what "radical change" is, you might be a little surprised to find out it is change which goes after the "root" or "origin" of something in order to so totally change what has become "traditional" or "normal" in one's life. If a business wants to "re-invent" themselves because they have been losing customers to some other big-name chain with a newer look, what do they do? They go through some "radical change" to make us believe this is the store we want to be shopping at instead of the other guys. J.C. Penney did just that - they changed up the lines they carried, took out a whole bunch of their stock, remodeled the interiors of the stores to be more "hip", but they lost business! Most of us who shopped at Penney's did so for a reason - the consist

What can we learn from a fool?

A smart man makes a mistake, learns from it, and never makes that mistake again. But a wise man finds a smart man and learns from him how to avoid the mistake altogether. (Roy H. Williams) Are you the 'smart man' or the 'wise man'? I cop to being a 'smart' person most of the time, and a 'wise' person some of the time. At times, I forget there are things I don't have to 'experience' in order to 'learn' from them - through the lives of others that have experienced them. I don't have to take a safari in the African wilderness to enjoy the many things others have experienced while they did because they have photos, movies, and great stories to tell. No, I did not experience it first-hand, but I can learn much from the experience of those who did. Maybe one of the most important things we can learn from the wise man is that of learning to control our tongues - not speaking everything we think! A person who talks sense is honored; airhe

Stingy people are poor people indeed

Ever had one of those moments when you know something and no one else in the group does? You are almost chatting at the bit to get an opportunity to share it with someone, but perhaps you have been sworn to secrecy and cannot share it. The information you possess is almost too big to be contained. I think this is the way it is with what God gives us - it is almost too big for us to contain it! It leaves us feeling like we'd have to share it, or we'd burst.  Imagine heading off to the market one day in search of a new lamp for your home. Anticipation mounts, for you have a particular mission in mind. Exploration of shelf upon shelf, for there are many lamps from which to choose. Choosing just the right one, expectation begins to build for you can imagine the light it will bring to your home. Then at last, you have the joy of experience - for the light shed illuminates all you could not see otherwise. If we have such an experience in seeking, obtaining, and experiencing the

I need a trust fund

So keep at your work, this faith and love rooted in Christ, exactly as I set it out for you. It’s as sound as the day you first heard it from me. Guard this precious thing placed in your custody by the Holy Spirit who works in us. (2 Timothy 1:13-14) As sound as...did you catch that? Faith may seem like a thing that constantly isn't 'enough' for the circumstances we are in, but in truth it is our trust that isn't 'enough' in those moments. We are not without faith - we are without trust. Is there a difference? Faith is the belief we hold - trust is the action we take based upon our faith. God reminds us our faith is 'as sound as' it was when we first said 'yes' to him. In fact, it is probably stronger! It is more likely our 'actions' are not all that 'faith-like'. Faith has to be guarded - not because it can be stolen from us, but because we will find that there will always be things that influence our emotions, making us 'thi

No rest for the wicked

I am God, your God, who teaches you how to live right and well. I show you what to do, where to go. (Isaiah 48:17) It is in this same chapter of Isaiah that we get our saying, "No rest for the wicked". The exact reading is: "There is no peace," says God, "for the wicked." The nation of Israel, delivered from Egypt to enter into a great land of prosperity and promise, chose to walk away from the one thing God asked of them - undivided and unchallenged loyalty to him. In the end, they knew no 'peace' - for they chose to live as the wicked of the land. We make good choices right alongside some not so wise ones, don't we? We do it all the time - choosing 'when' to be obedient and 'when' to live as we want to in the moment. Choice will always be ours - what we do when presented with the 'options' around us is 'learned' - it doesn't always come naturally for us to choose wisely. God shows us what to do and where t

Stay green - inside and out

A good friend gave me some advice that has stuck with me that I would like to share with you again today. She said, "Green is growing, ripe is rotting." At first, this may not seem like a very "profound" truth, but I have often thought on this, mulling over decisions I have made throughout my career, in my home, with my family, and in all kinds of relationships using this simple "rule of thumb". Keep yourself in a place of being just a little greener than you may like, and you won't risk the potential of losing contact with that which will continue to produce life within! I live in a region where citrus grows better than most other fruit. That green orange is on the tree a long, long time before it ever sets its color to resemble an orange. All through that long season of growth, the orange is actually quite green. It isn't that it isn't growing, it is just not "ripening". As soon as it begins to turn its full color, it actually

Dungeon Songs and Laments

Do you ever feel like your prayers are kind a little like "complaints" to God? You see this shingle hanging over heaven's gate and it reads "Complaint Department" - come on in. I am guilty of just spilling my guts to God about stuff that comes out sounding a whole lot like I am complaining (usually because I am!) and a lot less like I actually want to spend time with him! I think we all might just go through periods when our prayers are a little more "needy" than at other times - when we just have to let it all out, so to speak. The most amazing thing to me is the way God responds to my "complaint" sessions (and yours, too). I might think he'd get a little tired of this kind of jabbering on about what is wrong in my life, but he listens, often using my very own words to give me the change in perspective I actually need. Did you catch that? He uses MY OWN words to change MY perspective - allowing me to spill my guts and then turns tho

Take the Mercy - Accept the Help

Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help . (Hebrews 4:14-16) There are times when we don't realize what we have - it is of great worth, but we don't really recognize that worth until someone points it out to us. Some of us don't realize what we have within our reach as it comes to our relationship with Jesus. Sure, we have accepted him as the Son of God, given for our sinfulness to bear the penalty of the cross and the victory over the grave. Yet, we don't really know what his birth, death, burial, and resurrection REALLY have to do with us. To us, the work of salvation is something we have just casually accepted, but we haven't stopped to consi

Plans aborted - begin again

Experience is one thing you can't get for nothing. (Oscar Wilde) Oh, come, let us sing to the Lord! Give a joyous shout in honor of the Rock of our salvation! Come before him with thankful hearts. Let us sing him psalms of praise. For the Lord is a great God, the great King of all gods. He controls the formation of the depths of the earth and the mightiest mountains; all are his. He made the sea and formed the land; they too are his. Come, kneel before the Lord our Maker, for he is our God. We are his sheep, and he is our Shepherd. Oh, that you would hear him calling you today and come to him! (Psalm 95:1-7) To truly 'experience' God, we have to come to him. We have to abandon our own pursuits in pursuit of him. There is much to be said about abandonment, but suffice it to say, we have to lay down if we are ever to pick up, give away if we are to get back, let go if we are to ever be held again. Life requires experience - it is riddled from birth to death with a plethora of

I need to talk to you about this, God...

Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life. (Philippians 4:6-7) What makes you anxious? There is something - even if you are the most well-balanced, totally 'put together' individual. It might not be consistent, but there is some stress in your life on occasion that makes you a bit on edge. There are others of us that are anxious all the time - there is not a moment that you don't feel 'on edge' and about to be crushed by the stress you feel. Anxiety is a feeling that impacts our functioning - at least at some point in our lives. God wants to address that anxiety - through is Word, by his presence, and with his overwhelming peace that cannot be moved by anything. There will a

Seen, Spoken, Heard - Made Alive

Plato tells us that "thinking is the talking of the soul with itself." He also reminds us "we are twice armed if we fight with faith." Do you ever wonder why there is so much power in the spoken Word of God? We hear it read out loud and somehow it just sounds 'stronger'. If we truly value our soul, we will 'talk' to it with the scripture. The 'strength' of those words on the pages of our Bibles actually will begin to build up our inner man as they are not only 'seen' with our eyes, 'heard' with our ears, and 'soaked into' our hearts.  The rebel walks a thorny, treacherous road; the man who values his soul will stay away. (Proverbs 22:5) In scripture, the soul refers to all the desires, wishes, cravings, and needs of a human. As such, don't you think the soul deserves some 'special attention'? Without the attention of the Word, our souls will follow some pretty treacherous, and even 'thorny' paths. T

Go for it

God desires intimacy - love demands this kind of 'renewing relating'. In our day-to-day relationships, this kind of intimacy cannot grow without depth of commitment and the willingness to be truthfully "naked" before one another in a spiritual and emotional sense. We don't need to remove our clothes to "get naked" with each other - we just need to remove our masks. Intimacy implies a certain familiarity with each other. It comes out of frequent exposure to each other - to the real you and the real me. It is the revealing of who we are, how we act, and what we like/dislike. It involves how we move and what moves us. In essence, until we reach this kind of depth in relationship with one another, we cannot truly be in a place of accountability with one another - and heaven knows, we need this type of accountability if we are to plant and harvest well! Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who