Transforming Power

Christine Wyrtzen Devotional: 

WHAT KIND OF LOVE IS THIS?
 
May the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another, and for all men, just as we also do for you.  I Thess. 3:12

    God has commanded His children to love all people.  Does that mean that I must feel affection for everyone?  No.  That would require that each person in my life, including my enemies, act lovable. I have often felt guilty for not having feelings of love toward a certain person.  I just couldn't conjure up the warm affectionate emotions that I thought characterized God's love.

    Warm affection was not what Paul was speaking of in today's scripture.  The kind of love he prayed would abound is the kind he referenced earlier in I Corinthians 13.  It was a love empowered by the Spirit of God, one impossible of humanly manufacturing.  This love is not dependent on what another person does or doesn't do.  Paul described it well.

• Love is longsuffering ~ it takes a long time to get hot.
• Love is kind ~ kindness includes compassion and tenderness.
• Love is not jealous ~ it rejoices at the success of the other person.
• Love vaunts not itself ~ it has encouragement for the other on its tongue.
• Love is not puffed up ~ it is characterized by genuine humility.
• Love does not behave unseemly ~ it operates with determined politeness.
• Love seeks not its own ~ it does not think of its own rights, but serves the other.
• Love takes no account of evil ~ it does not ignore evil and is willing to confront it when necessary, but it will not plot to take revenge.
• Love believes all things ~ love is not gullible, but it chooses to give the benefit of the doubt.

    Sometimes my love for others is heartfelt and the fellowship with them a moving experience.  How wonderful when that is the case.  What more accurately showcases my heart though, it how well I love someone I'm not naturally fond of.  At that point, I am not to act out the feelings of my heart but rely on Christ and the transforming power of His Word to empower actions and words that can only be birthed in me by the Spirit.

The inclinations of my own heart leave others wanting.  You tell me to love all people.  Only Your Spirit makes it possible as I submit to You and wait for Your grace.  Live in me.  Amen

Heard of Your Faith

First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world.   For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God’s will I may now at last succeed in coming to you.  Romans 1:8-10

For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints,   I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, ..  Ephesians 1:15-16

We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, ...   Colossians 1:3-5


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Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  Hebrews 11:1

Thankful for Rain

Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth.   Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.

James 5:17-18

Providing Fresh Water

We've received a report from Samaritan's Purse on how our $11,240 contribution is being used in Bolivia to provide clean water:

According to National Geographic, “Nearly 900 million people in the world have no access to clean water…dirty water and lack of a toilet and proper hygiene kill 3.3 million people around the world annually, most of them children under age five.”  This certainly holds true for residents of the altiplano region in Bolivia.

...


Most of the water used in the altiplano is taken from open, hand-dug pits or shallow water reservoirs that are easily contaminated by animals and other sources.  Using this water often results in diarrhea, a leading cause of malnutrition and death among the campesino, or subsistence farmers; young children in these families are especially susceptible.  Half of the year, during the dry season, many families are forced to move closer to the nearest source of water. 

At a cost of less than $500 per well—which also includes a fixed hand-pump—Samaritan’s Purse is changing conditions for entire families and communities in the Bolivian altiplano.  In addition to providing clean, potable water, the project is also bringing together indigenous Aymara communities as they help each other with the arduous work required to complete a well.

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None of this would be possible without your help.   You contribution is helping hundreds receive the life-saving water they so desperately need.  More importantly, not only we are helping indigenous communities in these arid highlands quench their physical thirst, we are also introducing them to “springs of living water” that are found only in Jesus Christ (Revelation 7:17b).

Your continued prayers are greatly appreciated.  Thank you for partnering with Samaritan’s Purse in this life-changing work.  

Good Name and Favor

A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches,
   and favor is better than silver or gold.

Proverb 22:1

Never Get Beyond the Gospel

Excerpt from Tullian Tchividjian :  The Ongoing Need For The Gospel

...


In Colossians 1:6 the Apostle Paul writes that the Gospel is the instrument of all continual growth and spiritual progress after we are converted. He writes, “All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God’s grace in all its truth.” (Col. 1:6).

Years ago I found great help from Tim Keller’s comments on this passage. I hope you do too. Keller writes:

Paul is showing that we never “get beyond the gospel” in our Christian life to something more “advanced”. The gospel is not the first “step” in a “stairway” of truths, rather, it is more like the “hub” in a “wheel” of truth. The gospel is not just the A-B-C’s but the A to Z of Christianity. The gospel is not just the minimum required doctrine necessary to enter the kingdom, but the way we make all progress in the kingdom.

We are not justified by the gospel and then sanctified by obedience, but the gospel is the way we grow (Gal.3:1-3) and are renewed (Col.1:6). It is the solution to each problem, the key to each closed door, the power through every barrier (Rom.1:16-17).

It is very common in the church to think as follows. “The gospel is for non-Christians. One needs it to be saved. But once saved, you grow through hard work and obedience.” But Col.1:6 shows that this is a mistake. Both confession and “hard work” that is not arising from and “in line” with the gospel will not sanctify you–it will strangle you. All our problems come from a failure to apply the gospel. Thus when Paul left the Ephesians he committed them “to the word of his grace, which can build you up” (Acts 20:32). The main problem, then, in the Christian life is that we have not thought out the deep implications of the gospel, we have not “used” the gospel in and on all parts of our life.

Richard Lovelace says that most people’s problems are just a failure to be oriented to the gospel–a failure to grasp and believe it through and through. Luther says, “The truth of the Gospel is the principle article of all Christian doctrine….Most necessary is it that we know this article well, teach it to others, and beat it into their heads continually.” (on Gal.2:14f) Paul says that the gospel only does its renewing work in us as we understand it in all its truth. All of us, to some degree live around the truth of the gospel but do not “get” it. So the key to continual and deeper spiritual renewal and revival is the continual re-discovery of the gospel. A stage of renewal is always the discovery of a new implication or application of the gospel–seeing more of its truth. This is true for either an individual or a church.

Do Small Things with Great Love

LifeToday Devotional: Words of Life

Small Things, Big Results
by Leigh Anne & Sean Tuohy

The Oscar-winning film The Blind Side tells the story of the Tuohy family and their adopted son, professional football player Michael Oher. Now, the Tuohys tell their story in the new book In a Heartbeat. This week’s Words of LIFE comes from their book.

If the message you take from our experience is that a rich white family tried to save a black kid, then you will totally miss our story’s meaning. It has nothing to do with where we were from, ow we lived, or how much money we had. It’s not important what color we were, whether we had glasses or didn’t have glasses, what kind of shoes we wore. All of that is irrelevant. Some people have tried to make it relevant – but they emphasize the wrong thing.

It so happened that when we first met him, Michael was a black, sixteen-year-old male. But those words are just adjectives that describe the person we tried to help and ultimately came to love. Making him a part of the family was an unconscious act, and it happened in a heartbeat.

It’s equally true, however, that the outlook on life that allowed us to open our hearts and home to Michael was developed over the course of our lifetimes. If the impulse was sudden, the two of us had been thinking for several years about our philosophy of giving.

One of our deepest beliefs is beautifully captured in the Second Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, or 2 Corinthians. The seventh verse of the ninth chapter of 2 Corinthians reads: “Each must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” After many years of attending church together, and helping to found one of the fastest-growing congregations in Memphis, Grace Evangelical, we came to believe that a cheerful, spontaneous offering, no matter how small, could be increased and made powerful by God. Our faith helped us understand that it was up to us to be generous and make ourselves available to be used by others.

We also became convinced that in order to really give, we had to get our hearts right. We had to learn that it was important to let go of any particular agenda. What were we hoping to achieve when we gave? We knew that it couldn’t be “We’re looking to go out and help a fourteen-year-old Hispanic boy today.”

So many people we knew wanted to make a difference and yet they waited for a really important cause to come along. Or they waited for their big bonus check to come in. they said to themselves: “I want to save Africa.” Or: “I want to save the American Indian.” They had an agenda. But why is it necessary to have an agenda? Because it relieves our conscience? Or makes us look good to our bosses? Or makes us feel good about ourselves? Because it makes us more appealing to the congregation? Or gives us more points on our Visa card? Or means the United Way is going to give us a plaque?

The more we thought about the nature of true charity, the more we realized there’s a paradox in Americans’ general attitude toward giving: as a citizenry we are at once charitable and stingy. According to the National Philanthropic Trust, 89 percent of American households give to charity. Sounds impressive, but think about this: on average, we donate just 1.9 percent of our household income. To be frank, that’s miserly. Especially considering how enriched some of us are, that percentage is well below what it should be. And by biblical standards – as most Christians would undoubtedly agree – it’s downright shameful.

As we reflected on our ways of giving, we came to see that we often approached charity too formally. Giving shouldn’t always be a prescribed ritual or ceremony: it doesn’t need to be accompanied by properly stamped paperwork. If we worried less about the procedures and methods of giving and concentrated more on a giving state of mind, we might have more to offer than we know.

It pained us to realize that we too often failed at the simplest kind of giving. While we were waiting for a great cause, or focused on an agenda, we chose not to notice someone standing right in front of us. We looked right past the woman in the grocery store taking things out of her basket because she was short on cash or the elderly disabled man in line at CVS.

Ultimately, we agreed that by embracing a smaller and more cheerful kind of giving, we might ease a lot of everyday problems. It took several years but slowly, informally, we found ourselves arriving at a simple conclusion: it wasn’t important to do something great.

Instead, we decided to take this approach: do small things with great love. If we could do that, little opportunities to give might grow beyond our wildest dreams.



Excerpted from the book IN A HEARTBEAT: Sharing the Power of Cheerful Giving by Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy, published this month by Henry Holt and Company, LLC. Copyright (c) 2010 Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy. All rights reserved.

God Looking For

All these things my hand has made,
   and so all these things came to be,

         declares the LORD. But this is the one to whom I will look:
   he who is humble and contrite in spirit
   and trembles at my word.
 
Isaiah 66:2 [ESV]

God's Message: "Heaven's my throne,
   earth is my footstool.
What sort of house could you build for me?
   What holiday spot reserve for me?
I made all this! I own all this!"
   God's Decree.
"But there is something I'm looking for:
   a person simple and plain,
   reverently responsive to what I say. 

Isaiah 66:1-2 [Message]

God-Traveled Roads

And how blessed all those in whom you live,
      whose lives become roads you travel;
   They wind through lonesome valleys, come upon brooks,
      discover cool springs and pools brimming with rain!
   God-traveled, these roads curve up the mountain, and
      at the last turn—Zion! God in full view! 
[Message]

Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
    in whose heart are the highways to Zion.
As they go through the Valley of Baca
   they make it a place of springs;
    the early rain also covers it with pools.
They go from strength to strength;
   each one appears before God in Zion.
[ESV]

Psalm 84:5-7

In His Own Time

Excerpt from Didn't See This Coming post:  ... enough to make a grown woman cry in public ...

These private wrestling with God, the tears, the seemingly calm days when inside I knew a storm was brewing...is it the right time Lord? Are you listening? What is the answer? I have been through enough things to know affirmative answers are not because God is a Santa Claus, just handing out things we decided we wanted from the Sears catalog. God is all knowing, always giving us GOOD gifts...which means to me, appropriate gifts in his will and in his own time.

Only Hope Is the Resurrection of Christ

Excerpt from Brad Hambrick (Crossroads Counseling):  Jesus Is Alive!  So What?  1 Corinthians 15

How often do you battle a particular sin without ever thinking of the resurrection? I’ll admit it, most of the time. Yet Paul says, “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.”  I’ve also tried to change a light fixture without thinking about the breaker box. That did not work out so well either.

Our only hope against the power of sin in our lives is the resurrection of Christ. We get so caught up in learning “practical steps” that we forget that it was Calvary that gave our dead legs the power to take any steps (practical or not). When we forget this we battle sin as if we must conquer (in our strength) an already defeated enemy. We forget the only admonitions we have against sin and Satan are “Stand firm (Eph 6:13)” and “Flee (II Tim 2:22).”

Application: Memorize I Corinthians 15:17 and repeat it during your moments of temptation. Let the verse remind you of the nature of the moment’s struggle.  Christ is raised! Your faith is not futile! You are not still in your sin!  Temptation is not a time to “prove” or “earn” something; it is a time to “reveal” and “display” the effectiveness of what Christ has done. Temptation gains its effectiveness by making the moment about you (your desires or your weaknesses). When you make the moment about Christ (standing firm in His truth or fleeing to His presence) temptation is transformed into a moment of worship – you have declared Christ as worth more than anything Satan could offer (pleasure or protection) in that moment.

Dive In

Ray Ortlund post:  My endlessly recurrent temptation

“This is my endlessly recurrent temptation: to go down to that Sea (I think St. John of the Cross called God a sea) and there neither dive nor swim nor float, but only dabble and splash, careful not to get out of my depth and holding on to the lifeline which connects me with my things temporal.”

C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory (New York, 2001), page 187.

Have Conquered By

And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, "Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.  And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.  Therefore, rejoice, O heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to you, O earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, because he knows that his time is short!"

Revelation 12:10-12

Voracious Appetite

Christine Wyrtzen Devotional:

IS IT FELLOWSHIP OR NOT?
 
In all our distress and affliction we were comforted about you through your faith; for now we really live, if you just stand firm in the Lord.  I Thess. 3:7-8

    Two things are true.  1.) If my life is going well but those I love are struggling with their faith, I can not fully enjoy my good times. And, 2.) If I am being tried by fire but those I love are alive to Christ, my valley experience is eclipsed by the joy I feel as I watch them soar.

    Paul has been beaten, thrown in jail, but when he hears that the new believers at Thessalonica are standing strong in the Lord, his spirit is infused with new energy.  He puts it well.  "Now, I can really live!"  

    Is this not the essence of fellowship, that I am energized for having spent time with those who love Jesus with an intensity that is contagious?  By being together, we mutually inspire each other to be bold in our faith.  As we share stories, I am more willing to move to the edge of a new precipice in faith, all because I walk arm in arm with someone else who is doing the same thing.  This must be what God dreamt of when He urged me to live in community!

    I think of the groups of Christians who will meet over lunch today.  One may drain the life out of the other.  Or, both may be spiritually malnourished so their relating has little to do with Jesus.  Their flesh has caused the attraction.  Gossipers love gossipers.  Angry people want an angry audience.  Despairing souls want to air their pain to another who also lives in hopelessness. 

    The process of choosing spiritual journey partners is critical, for I give them license to deeply affect my life.  My associations need to be built on Spirit connections, where we share a voracious appetite for the things of heaven. What spills out in our conversations sparkles with the glory and light of the Spirit who indwells us, the One who is stirred by our passion.

I love hanging out with those who are in love with You and think nothing of living on the edge, even if it costs them.  Amen

Inside Out

In our Sunday morning discussions we have been talking about "story".  I thought this video might have useful implications for us:

Spillover

Excerpt from John Piper:  What Is the Will of God and How Do We Know It?

Three Stages of Knowing and Doing the Revealed Will of God

There are three stages of knowing and doing the revealed will of God, that is, his will of command; and all of them require the renewed mind with its Holy-Spirit-given discernment that we talked about last time.

Stage One
 
First, God’s will of command is revealed with final, decisive authority only in the Bible. And we need the renewed mind to understand and embrace what God commands in the Scripture. Without the renewed mind, we will distort the Scriptures to avoid their radical commands for self-denial, and love, and purity, and supreme satisfaction in Christ alone. God’s authoritative will of command is found only in the Bible. Paul says that the Scriptures are inspired and make the Christian “competent, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16). Not just some good works. “Every good work.” Oh, what energy and time and devotion Christians should spend meditating on the written Word of God.

Stage Two
 
The second stage of God’s will of command is our application of the biblical truth to new situations that may or may not be explicitly addressed in the Bible. The Bible does not tell you which person to marry, or which car to drive, or whether to own a home, where you take your vacation, what cell-phone plan to buy, or which brand of orange juice to drink. Or a thousand other choices you must make.

What is necessary is that we have a renewed mind, that is so shaped and so governed by the revealed will of God in the Bible, that we see and assess all relevant factors with the mind of Christ, and discern what God is calling us to do. This is very different from constantly trying to hear God’s voice saying do this and do that. People who try to lead their lives by hearing voices are not in sync with Romans 12:2.

There is a world of difference between praying and laboring for a renewed mind that discerns how to apply God’s Word, on the one hand, and the habit of asking God to give you new revelation of what to do, on the other hand. Divination does not require transformation. God’s aim is a new mind, a new way of thinking and judging, not just new information. His aim is that we be transformed, sanctified, freed by the truth of his revealed Word (John 8:32; 17:17). So the second stage of God’s will of command is the discerning application of the Scriptures to new situations in life by means of a renewed mind.

Stage Three
 
Finally, the third stage of God’s will of command is the vast majority of living where there is no conscious reflection before we act. I venture to say that a good 95% of your behavior you do not premeditate. That is, most of your thoughts, attitudes, and actions are spontaneous. They are just spillover from what’s inside. Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil. I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak” (Matthew 12:34-36).

Why do I call this part of God’s will of command? For one reason. Because God commands things like: Don’t be angry. Don’t be prideful. Don’t covet. Don’t be anxious. Don’t be jealous. Don’t envy. And none of those actions are premeditated. Anger, pride, covetousness, anxiety, jealousy, envy—they all just rise up out of the heart with no conscious reflection or intention. And we are guilty because of them. They break the commandment of God.

Is it not plain therefore that there is one great task of the Christian life: Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. We need new hearts and new minds. Make the tree good and the fruit will be good (Matthew 12:33). That’s the great challenge. That is what God calls you to. You can’t do it on your own. You need Christ, who died for your sins. And you need the Holy Spirit to lead you into Christ-exalting truth and work in you truth-embracing humility.

Give yourself to this. Immerse yourself in the written Word of God; saturate your mind with it. And pray that the Spirit of Christ would make you so new that the spillover would be good, acceptable, and perfect—the will of God.

Remember

Perry Noble post:  10 Things We Need To Focus On!

So, it’s Monday…and you feel like a one legged man who entered a butt kicking contest!

From all of the research I’ve seen…Monday’s are the days when we are most tempted to quit, to give up…to just walk away and start a brand new job as a people greeter at Wal Mart.

Just remember…

#1 – He called you…and it wasn’t to get to this place so He can drop you on your face!  (Philippians 1:6)

#2 – He WILL build HIS church!  (Matthew 16:18)

#3 – He did not necessarily promise to deliver you from the fire…but He did promise to walk with you through it!  (Isaiah 43:1-3)

#4 – There is MORE in STORE for your life and ministry!  (Hosea 10:12)

#5 – When we obey the voice of God we are unstoppable (Joel 2:11)

#6 – Have courage, be strong, don’t back down from what He has called you to do!  (I Corinthians 16:13)

#7 – God didn’t call you because of your greatness but rather because of HIS…and HE’S STILL GREAT despite at times you may feel like you are not!  (II Corinthians 4:1)

#8 – “This” problem will NOT destroy you!  (II Corinthians 4:8-9)

#9 – STOP comparing yourself to others…the same God who called and empowered them did the same for you!  (Galatians 2:8)

#10 – STOP praying for protection…PRAY FOR BOLDNESS!!!  (Acts 4:29-31)

Labor and Perseverance

Miscellanies post:  Active Love

Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov, Pevear/Volokhonsky edition (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1990) p. 58:

…active love is a harsh and fearful thing compared with love in dreams. Love in dreams thirsts for immediate action, quickly performed, and with everyone watching. Indeed, it will go as far as the giving even of one’s life, provided it does not take long but is soon over, as on stage, and everyone is looking on and praising. Whereas active love is labor and perseverance, and for some people, perhaps, a whole science.

Life and Peace

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. [ESV]

If your sinful nature controls your mind, there is death. But if the Holy Spirit controls your mind, there is life and peace. [NLT]

Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. [MSG]

Romans 8:6

But Let God

Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is.

Romans 12:2 [NLT]

Come Upon You

Ray Ortlund post:  Revival

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.”  Acts 1:8

In Acts 2 the Holy Spirit does come upon them, revealing four things about revival:

One, revival is miraculous (verses 1-4).  Humanly uncaused.  “Suddenly there came from heaven . . .” (verse 2).

Two, revival is mysterious (verses 5-13).  Humanly inexplicable.  “What does this mean?” (verse 12).

Three, revival is meaningful (verses 14-36).  Humanly undeniable.  “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth” (verse 22).

Four, revival is mighty (verses 37-41).  Humanly irresistible.  “There were added that day about three thousand souls” (verse 41).

God grant it.

Faith to Stand

Christine Wyrtzen Devotional:

THE ENEMY'S NARCOTICS

I sent to find out about your faith, for fear that the tempter might have tempted you, and our labor should be in vain.  I Thess. 3:5

    We weren't created for pain, but for the garden.  Adam and Eve loved God and life was absolutely perfect.  Their world was utopian!  Then, the serpent spoke, they listened, and their first introduction to heartbreak occurred.  God judged their sin and they felt shame, remorse, and other emotions that had no fix.  Life was never the same again.

    We, as Adam and Eve's children, are sick to our stomach over what's wrong in our world, globally and personally.  The worse it gets, the more frantic we can be for a means of relief.  Satan knows this and that's where temptation starts.  He gives us all kinds of options to get out of distress except his ways are not God's ways.  Think of Jesus' time in the wilderness.  When he was hungry, Satan tempted him with bread.  When he might have felt powerless, Satan offered him the kingdoms of this world.  Temptation always begins with a need.

   Paul writes to Christians in distress.  They are being persecuted.  The pain is acute.  The tempter has undoubtedly come and provided a way of escape.  "Abandon the faith and your families will stay in tact. Stop preaching and you can save your life."  Quite surprising, even though they were young in the faith, they stayed strong.

    Alleviation of pain should never be our first priority.  Many of us are in the fire because we have taken a stand for God.  There is no resolution on this earth without God's miraculous intervention.  The tempter visits us often but by God's grace, we don't take his shortcuts to escape. We know better.  Following him only offers a narcotic with short-term relief.  We can know that along with it comes a violation of conscience that numbs us out from the voice of our Comforter.  For any who are hanging by a thread today, this devotional comes with fervent prayers for God's grace to poured upon your shoulders.

You told me that there will be rewards.  Just not here.  Give me faith to stand.  I won't sell my soul for temporary relief.  In Jesus' name, Amen

What a Way to Live

Tozer quote from Didn't See This Coming:

"A real Christian is an odd number anyway. He feels supreme love for One who he has never seen, talks familiarly every day to Someone he cannot see, expect to go to heaven on the virtue of Another, empties himself in order to be full, admits he is wrong so he can be declared right, goes down in order to get up, is strongest when he is weakest, richest when he is poorest, and happiest when he feels worst. He dies so he can live, forsakes in order to have, gives away so he can keep, sees the invisible, hears the inaudible, and knows that which passeth knowledge. What a way to live."

Infinite Supremacy

Excerpt from Tullian Tchividjian post:  The Supremacy of Christ

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Paul’s goal is to help us see the infinite supremacy and beauty of Jesus so we would be able to resist looking to anything smaller for the freedom and fullness we long for.

As I closed out the series yesterday, I read the lines below from Malcolm Muggeridge (1903-1990)–lines that I have gone back to time and time again since I first read them in college. Muggeridge was a British journalist who, later in life, became a winsome defender of the Christian faith (if you have never heard his debate from the 1960’s with the atheist Charles Templeton, track it down somehow–it is wildly entertaining). Muggeridge’s unique journalistic perspective on 20th century world history (he lived it and wrote about it) and the preeminence of Christ is both true and poetic.

He wrote this in the 1970’s. Enjoy…

We look back upon history, and what do we see? Empires rising and falling, revolutions and counterrevolutions, wealth accumulated and wealth disbursed. Shakespeare has written of the rise and fall of great ones, that ebb and flow with the moon.

I look back upon my own fellow countrymen (Great Britain), once upon a time dominating a quarter of the world, most of them convinced, in the words of what is still a popular song, that ‘the God who made them mighty, shall make them mightier yet.’

I’ve heard a crazed, cracked Austrian (Hitler) announce to the world the establishment of a Reich that would last a thousand years. I have seen an Italian clown (Mussolini) say he was going to stop and restart the calendar with his own ascension to power. I’ve heard a murderous Georgian brigand in the Kremlin (Stalin), acclaimed by the intellectual elite of the world as being wiser than Solomon, more humane than Marcus Aurelius, more enlightened than Ashoka.

I have seen America wealthier and, in terms of military weaponry, more powerful than the rest of the world put together–so that had the American people so desired, they could have outdone a Caesar, or an Alexander in the range and scale of their conquests.

All in one lifetime, all in one lifetime, all gone! Gone with the wind!

England, now part of a tiny island off the coast of Europe, threatened with dismemberment and even bankruptcy. Hitler and Mussolini dead, remembered only in infamy. Stalin a forbidden name in the regime he helped found and dominate for some three decades. America haunted by fears of running out of those precious fluids that keeps their motorways roaring, and the smog settling, with troubled memories of a disastrous campaign in Vietnam, and the victories of the Don Quixote’s of the media as they charged the windmills of Watergate.

All in one lifetime, all in one lifetime, all gone! Gone with the wind!

Behind the debris of these solemn supermen, and self-styled imperial diplomatists, there stands the gigantic figure of One: because of whom, by whom, in whom, and through whom alone, mankind may still have peace–the person of Jesus Christ.

I present him as the way, the truth, and the life. Do you know Him?

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Spirit Bond

Christine Wyrtzen Devotional:

SOUL TIE OR SPIRIT TIE?

We, brethren, have been bereft of you for a short while - in person, not in spirit - were all the more eager with great desire to see your face.  I Thess. 2:17

            Paul was in Corinth when he wrote this to the believers in Thessalonica, but though they were geographically separated, they were together in spirit.  He felt it.  The Holy Spirit, in him, was connected to the Holy Spirit, in them.

            Spirit ties are healthy, conceived by God.  The common denominator in their unity is the Holy Spirit who binds people together.  This very phenomenon is what makes for a great marriage, an enduring and strong friendship, and a harmonious home.  God desires that all of us fatten our Spirit, that place where His Spirit speaks to us, so that one Spirit-filled believer can connect to another Spirit-filled believer.  The result is a bond that spans distance and time.  It will take them into eternity where their relationship will continue where it left off on earth. 

            A soul tie is a completely different thing.  The soul is the place in me where my 'flesh' lives.  It consists of my beliefs, my feelings, and my mental grid from which I am tempted to rule my life.  My soul can be ruled by my spirit if I submit to it, but I must be infused enough with scripture to live that way.  Because I am prone to idolatrous ways, the needs of my soul may rage.  If I'm not careful, I will perceive that I need another person to thrive.  My soul reaches out to that other soul, and we begin to feed off of each other.  (soul-mates)  Anytime there is manipulation, control, or domination, you can be sure that a soul tie exists. 

            This is not of God and He wants me to sever the soul tie, that unhealthy connection, which exists between me and another.  I am not to be controlled, nor control, anyone else.  Those in soul-tie relationships are tied to the other person just as surely as if a spiritual umbilical cord connected them.  Only God can sever that cord, in response to our prayers, so that we can hear and obey the Spirit instead of our flesh.
  

Help me see every relationship in my life today through Your eyes. Amen 

Every Detail Is Worked

Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good. 

Romans 8:26-28 [The Message]

Group Faith

Ed Stetzer post:  Barna on Group Expressions of Faith

A new study done by the Barna Group "examined various expressions of "group" faith, such as: church attendance, small groups, adult Sunday school programs, church volunteering, and house churches." Below are excerpts from the nine insights they provided. (Be sure to read their whole article here.)

1. Women drive most faith participation. A majority of weekly churchgoers are women (53%). Small groups that meet for prayer or Bible study (60%) and Sunday school programs for adults (59%) are also more likely to be attended by women...
2. Religious activities are typically missing single adults, especially those who have never been married. Just less than half of Americans are unmarried; however, the Barna study found that two-thirds of those who attend church, go to small groups, and participate in Sunday school are married; and 69% of church volunteers are married...

3. Older adults also dominate faith involvement. Conventional wisdom suggests that older adults are more likely to participate spiritually, and the Barna research confirmed such thinking...

4. Regionally, Americans' faith involvement falls along stereotypical lines. Residents of the South make up half of the nation's small group attenders as well as a majority of its Sunday school attenders...

5. Catholics are not particularly active beyond worship attendance, while evangelicals participate in many different forms of "group faith." While Catholics make up one-quarter of all the nation's worshippers each week, they are only one-tenth of small group attenders, Sunday School participants, and church volunteers...

6. Attenders of larger churches involve themselves in the broadest spectrum of faith activities. Americans who typically attend a church of at least 500 adults were among the most likely to also attend small groups...

7. African-Americans represent a significant share of those involved in participatory faith. True to their community-oriented religious heritage and experience, blacks help to power the group religious expressions of the nation. While blacks are 13% of the nation's adult population, the segment accounts for one-quarter of America's small group participants (27%)...

8. Personal Bible reading is most common among small group attenders. In comparing a personal spiritual activity with participatory involvement, the study showed that two-thirds of church attenders (67%) said they had read the Bible outside of church in the last week - whether their church was a conventional or house church. Small group attenders were more likely to read the Bible personally (84%)...

9. Many religiously active Americans lean toward conservative political views, though there is more diversity than expected - especially among house church attenders. Churchgoers, small group attenders, and church volunteers are likely to be either politically conservative or moderate. House church attenders are unique in that one-quarter of such participants describe themselves as political liberals and nearly half are registered Democrats - uncharacteristically high levels compared with other faith activities, perhaps connected with the above-average proportion of black adults who report house church attendance. Further demonstrating their non-conventional and independent inclinations, one-quarter of house church attenders said they are not registered to vote, twice the national average.

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Not Share Glory

Mark Batterson post:  Delighting in Numbers

Numbers are a dangerous thing. They help us measure things, but measuring in the spiritual realm isn't always a healthy or holy thing. In one sense, we count people because people count. I get that. But there is a great danger when it comes to churches. Numbers tend to produce pride or jealousy. And both of those things will eat you alive spiritually.

I find it interesting that counting numbers was one of David's downfalls. In II Samuel 24 he tells Joab to number the people. Joab asks an insightful question: "Why does my lord the king delight in this thing?" David wasn't just counting. He was delighting in it. But I don't think it was always that way. When the people sang about David killing his tens of thousands it didn't translate into pride, but something changed over time. David is relying on numbers. David is delighting in numbers. It's a prideful numbering. David was conscience-stricken after he took the census, but it was too late. The punishment for David adding up? God subtracted 70,000.
The point? Be careful how you count. And if it results in pride or jealousy, stop counting. The Lord will not share his glory!

He Is

Perry Noble post:  Don't Look At What Is Wrong But Rather Who He Is

I have found during my most stressful times it is best if I just stop and focus on who God is…it’s a time when I set my requests aside and just seek HIM…

I’ve made a list that helps me when I tend to freak out…

HE IS…

• Sovereign…He reigns over everyone and everything and has never been stressed out.
• Unstoppable…and so are those who follow Him.
• Holy…perfect, which means everything He wants/desires for my life is so far greater than anything I could have thought up.
• Consistent…I don’t have to worry about Him being in a bad mood.
• GREATER than any temptation the enemy throws my way.
• Better than anything the world has to offer.
• BIGGER than any sin/failure in my life.
• Gracious in that He knows every stupid, foolish, sinful thing I’ve ever done (or will do)…and yet He loves me anyway!  (Romans 5:8 ALWAYS amazes me!)
• ALWAYS there with me…He has NEVER walked away from me.  He doesn’t always deliver me from the fire…but He has ALWAYS walked with me through it!  (See Isaiah 43:1-3)
• Faithful…if I fail to see His faithfulness in my past I will probably not recognize the fruitfulness of my future.  (Philippians 1:6)
• The ONE who pursues me…even on the days I tend to walk away from Him.
• RELENTLESS…He NEVER has given up on me!
• PASSIONATE…His passion and zeal that the Scriptures reveal cause me to be in AWE.

I could go on and on…the point being is that when stress comes it is an awesome opportunity to KNOW HIM.  SO…if you are stressed out, freaked out and feel like you are about to give out…then “check out” for 10 minutes from your busy life, sit down with a piece of paper, make a list of who the Scriptures say that HE IS…and focus on that rather than your circumstances.

Just a thought…but it sure has helped me!

Context

Excerpts from Dan Kimball post: Avoiding Scary Mary: The importance of the whole Bible and knowing context

I am in the last stages of going through my next Zondervan book (tentatively titled "Adventures in Churchland") - which is quite late (Sorry Paul and Ryan!). But finally getting it done. It is my first non-church leaders book, so quite excited and nervous about it. I am directly addressing a couple of controversial and very sensitive issues such as homosexuality and the Bible along with fundamentalism and the Bible, pluralism and world religions. I am  showing how so many of the arguments we have about certain theological views are focused on isolated verses from the Bible pulled from context. Now every sentence and word of the Bible is inspired and incredibly important of course. But we have to be looking at things in context and in the whole story of the Bible.

...


Now this isn't anything new, it is really basic hermeneutics. But my goodness, from spending a bunch of time reading arguments pro and against things (from both sides of various arguments, I am not talking only about conservatives or liberals here) - it is amazing how often we make Scary Mary videos from the Bible narrative to defend or teach something we want to believe. We can revise the original whole narrative and create a different Mary by piecing together what we want to in order to create the Mary we want. So if we want to believe a certain thing, we then can piece together our own Scary Mary version of the Bible. It can even sound convincing. If someone didn't know the original entire storyline of Mary Poppins and only saw that revised Scary Mary version - the story of Mary Poppins would be thought of entirely different than the actual Mary Poppins full movie. It isn't as though those isolated clips aren't in the movie. But pulling them out and revising them into something out of the whole story makes Mary a very Scary Mary.

We do have to study and  look at isolated verses in the Bible, of course. But we better be very careful what we do with them. So we aren't taking verses or even small sections of the Bible and piecing them together and revising the narrative to what we hope the Bible says or wish it would say. We can create our own Scary Mary version of the Bible. You can turn the Bible into almost anything if we do that. I wonder if we may do that more than we realize. And I wonder if we may also read someone's Scary Mary version of the Bible and think it is the true Mary more than we realize too. If it is pieced together well and has a good soundtrack behind it. And if we never really understood and studied the whole storyline of the Bible, how easy it is to then be swayed into a Scary Mary version of a doctrine or theology or biblical narrative.

For those that know me, and what I wrote in the chapters I am not a universalist and do hold the church's historical view of sexuality.However, I didn't use to hold these views as I was raised outside of the church and believed the opposite because of my cultural background. When I first read the Bible narrative I was hoping it was the opposite of what I believe now that would be true and the biblical narrative. But it was from reading the whole Bible and narrative and then looking at verses in context and then in holistic Bible context (we need to do both) is why I then went against what I personally hoped and yielded to the Scriptural holistic storyline. And then on these issues as I wrote about them in these chapters I personally then checked with scholars again - NT Wright, Scot McKnight, Stan Grenz's writings and scholars whom I respect and who give me confidence about what I was writing as I looked to them for guidance .

But the Scary Mary video was in my mind as I wrote these chapters as it reminded me of the importance of narrative and context and the danger of arguing only about isolated verses.

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Out of Solitary Conceit

Ray Ortlund post:  "I saw great merit in it"

“When I first became a Christian, about fourteen years ago, I thought that I could do it on my own, by retiring to my rooms and reading theology, and I wouldn’t go to the churches and Gospel Halls. . . .  I disliked very much their hymns, which I considered to be fifth-rate poems set to sixth-rate music.  But as I went on I saw the great merit in it.   I came up against different people of quite different outlooks and different education, and then gradually my conceit just began peeling off.   I realized that the hymns (which were just sixth-rate music) were, nevertheless, being sung with devotion and benefit by an old saint in elastic-side boots in the opposite pew, and then you realize that you aren’t fit to clean those boots.  It gets you out of your solitary conceit.”

C. S. Lewis, God In The Dock (Grand Rapids, 1970), pages 61-62.

Desperate

Perry Noble post:  Extreme Desperation = Revelation

#2 – Extreme desperation often brings undeniable revelation!

I’ve personally experienced that the times that I’ve truly become the most desperate for God are the times that I’ve been able to hear His voice SO much clearer than ever before.
He doesn’t bring us to times of desperation to reprimand us but rather to remind us that, apart from His power, we’re screwed.

I believe the reason that so many times the church isn’t hearing from God is because we don’t really think we need Him…we have ceased to be desperate.

YET…over and over again in the Scriptures we see that extreme desperation brings undeniable revelation.  Take a second and read Acts 16:6-10.  Seriously…go ahead, either look it up or just click on the link.  Here we have the Apostle Paul in a desperate situation…He is passionately pursuing the vision God gave him back in Acts 9.  (AND…he keeps meeting resistance to what he thought he needed to do!)

YET…in Acts 16:9 God’s purpose and plan for Paul becomes UNDENIABLY clear…the vision was straight forward, all because Paul was willing to stay DESPERATE until he heard from God.
Pastors…church leaders…when was the LAST TIME we were truly desperate for God?

Because…extreme desperation often brings undeniable revelation.  Let’s be leaders who are not merely dependent upon our own strategies…but rather are DESPERATE to see Him move in a way that is unexplainable and undeniable.

Community

Ed Stetzer post excerpt: Transformational Churches and the Value of Community

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Our study revealed that community is highly valued in Transformational Churches. Sixty-four percent of TC members agree (strongly or moderately, here and throughout) with the statement "New members are immediately taught about the importance of living in community with other Christians." In these churches, community is a way of life.

Here are three observations from the research:

1) Valuing community empowers people to do ministry. Sadly, empowering only vocational pastors to do ministry is a common problem in our churches. But in a TC, everyone is empowered to do ministry. Seventy-two percent of TC members agree with the statement "When people are plugged into a small group at our church, they are ministered to and well cared for."

2) Strong small community structure leads to a new reality of service. The "80/20 Rule" comes up - a lot - as I speak to pastors of varying backgrounds. For all the resources consulted and prayers offered, we still struggle to mobilize people. On the other hand, TCs do not. We found that 71 percent agree "Serving is considered normal behavior at our church." It's not 100 percent, but it's worth celebrating.
If serving were "considered normal behavior" at your church, how would it change both the members and the city? The recent flooding in Nashville, Tenn., displaced thousands, but churches mobilized to help. For several weeks, service was "considered normal behavior." In a TC, that mentality lasts.

3) Multiplying groups is a blessing, not a curse. There is a rule among small-group pastors and education ministers: Never say "split." "Start," "multiply" and "reproduce" are acceptable, but never, ever "split."

Small groups in TCs work to gather and to scatter. Gathering leads people into a relationship with Christ and teaches them to participate in His mission. Thus, the scattering. Starting new small groups gives room for new people and opportunities for new leaders.

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Everything

Through your faithful prayers and the generous response of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, everything he wants to do in and through me will be done.

Philippians 1:19 [The Message]

Interceding

Mark Batterson post:  History Belongs to the Intercessors

Walter Wink once said: "History belongs to the intercessors." I love that statement and I believe it's true. Prayer has no expiration date. In a sense they are timeless. It's almost like prayer is a spiritual wormhole. We pray with our four-dimensional limitations, God isn't limited to four-dimensional answers! Why? Because He exists outside the four spacetime dimensions He created.

I dedicated my last book, Primal, to my grandparents with this statement: your prayers outlive you. There have been moments in my life when the Holy Spirit has whispered to my spirit: I'm answering the prayers of your grandparents in your life right now. Those are powerful moments.

Intercessors typically don't make headlines, but if you read between the lines, they are the ones writing His-story!

Steadfast Love

But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love,
   will enter your house.

Psalm 5:7a

Great Story

"People love to have lived a great story, but few people like the work it takes to make it happen.  But joy costs pain."

Donald Miller, A  Million Miles in a Thousand Years (p. 100)