Month: January 2019

There are have times in my life when I go full tilt at what I think is the right direction for me to head. Most of those times, almost all of those times, I haven’t stopped and prayed to find out if what I want to do is what God wants me to do. Almost without exception, the times when I lack guidance from God is when I run full tilt into a wall.

That hurts! There’s nothing like pouring your heart and soul into something that fails or which is taken away in a manner you cannot control. The problem, for me at least, is that while I have poured my soul into it, it isn’t something from God. It turns out I was heading the wrong way, the world’s way, once again.

While failing may hurt in the short term, I’ve found that, in the long term, I am best to have lost it. Whatever it was that I wanted was something that would keep me from what I was really supposed to be doing.

It’s that competitive spirit, that need to be best, that sometimes drives me. It isn’t the spirit of love and truth that shows God’s mercy and goodness to the world. So, it was not really of the spirit but rather of my own prideful flesh. God has told us that in and of ourselves, the heart of man is wicked. It is only through Jesus that we learn to love and to think of others as we do ourselves.

When you make that leap, the competitive nature is checked. It doesn’t go away and competition in and of itself is not wicked. When a person in sports works hard and wins, that is a great thing. When a company provides a great service and becomes the most popular at what they do, that is also not necessarily a bad thing.

It’s when the reason behind the drive is flawed that the nature of winning becomes evil. At least that is how it has been for me.

I’m learning to slow down and look for what I am supposed to be doing rather than what I want to do. What it is that God wants me to do. I’ve found that many of the tasks that I do are not that important. Also, the tasks that I have allowed to drop off are the ones where I should be spending my time and effort.

It’s funny, really. We can go to God and ask that he do this thing or that to help us. We can ask over and over again without looking at it from his eyes. So, when we don’t get what we want, we say God isn’t listening and he isn’t helping. Oh, but he is. He is listening and he is helping.

He hears our selfish prayers and does exactly what he should – which is nothing. By doing nothing, he is providing the most help he can do. Then, sometimes gently, and sometimes (like with me) with the feeling of a smack across the noggin, he gets us to look at something else. The something else is always better even if it is not as successful by the way the world measures it.

Learning to hear God and then to heed him is an unending struggle for me. The struggle is against my own thoughts and desires and not anything to do with God. His way is true and right and just. What he wants for us is the right thing and the thing that we should be working toward.

Short of the Damascus experience which Saul of Taurus experienced (a literal blinding light and the voice of Jesus from heaven), we have to go in search of God’s word. The search isn’t far or difficult. It can be found in the Bible. You can also ask for guidance from God in prayer. Another way is to watch a sermon or read a book by a godly man or woman who encourages you to look to God.

These are all ways that I have approached God. When I search diligently, he is good to show me my way. Not the entire way, as that would be too much for me to take on and I would, more than likely, misunderstand it. He gives me enough guidance to get me walking where he wants me to go and talking about the things he wants me to say.

I don’t know if you have experienced anything similar to the failures that I have had. If you have, try looking to God to have him show you where he wants you to go. This is true of those who know and follow Christ as well as those who don’t.

For those who don’t yet follow Christ, the first step is to find him. He isn’t lost, you are. He is there waiting for you with all the love you could possibly imagine. There he was, two thousand years ago, looking directly at you as he hung on the cross. Jesus willing went there to pay for the sins you have and will commit over your entire life.

He died for you and rose again so that you could be forgiven, have relationship with God, and have eternal life. All you have to do is accept him as your Savior, repent of your sins, acknowledge him as the resurrected God in flesh and start to live your live for him.

You don’t have to be sinless (only he was sinless), you don’t have to be good (who is apart from Jesus?), you don’t have to do good works (anything we do on our own are filthy rags to God) and you don’t have to do anything special to merit his love. He already loves you.

Start there and then, as with other Christ-followers, ask God to show you your path and to help you stay on it. Ask him for help in the areas you struggle with. You’ll fail from time to time but he still loves you. Just tell him you are sorry that you have strayed and ask him to forgive you (he already has) and to keep you focused on what he wants you to do.

Romans 12:1-2

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God — this is your true and proper worship.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is — his good, pleasing and perfect will.

I wonder how many people have already broken their New Year’s resolutions?

I stopped making resolutions when I was just a teenager. I figured out fairly quickly that setting goals of this sort was an invitation to failure. Once I had failed, I would feel bad about myself and whatever it was that I had wanted to do. Rather than double down and work harder, I would head the opposite direction.

Setting goals is something that I also avoid. I either do or I don’t. I might have short term plans – things that I need to do and/or want to do. I don’t consider them goals but things on a to do list. They are things which I can accomplish, sometimes with a little more work and time than a regular task but not a goal. If for some reason, life intervenes and changes my plan, so be it. It is not as if I have failed, just changed.

Maybe it is just a matter of wording and something that I need to do to be in the right mindset. Goals seem to be something not quite in reach. I refuse to be depressed or sad because I haven’t accomplished something that I myself set as a plan.

In a workplace, goals can and should be set as a measure of productivity. Based on the results, you are rewarded or not. That is understandable. But in life outside of work, I don’t understand it.

Some people take their “goals” too seriously. It can be a matter of do it or literally, die. I know someone who had this type of thinking but was able to get his head on straight before he did something drastic. He did this before he became a Christian and he thought it was of his own work to accomplish. Having failed, he thought death was the only solution.

Once he became a Christian, he realized that God was working with him and that God’s love was the key to his happiness in life. He was given a reprieve from his earthly path which would have ended in death by his own hand. He saw that God wanted him to live and to live abundantly, no matter the circumstances, no matter which goals were attained or not attained. That the only goal that really mattered was living for God.

We’ve been asked by our church to set an attainable goal for the New Year. I won’t do that. I will schedule a plan for something to do. Something that I currently don’t make the time for but which is important for me to do. That way, I am sticking to my plan but if I fail, okay. I’ll just start again the next day and continue on.

Maybe for some, the idea of a goal works well. Maybe it does for you, too. If not, perhaps doing as I do will work. Part of my schedule is spending time reading the Bible and spending time in prayer. This is something that I try to do every day. I had some problems recently reading the Bible as the book was too heavy for me to lift (as is any book right now.) I was sad about this and prayed about it asking for help.

My husband was able to download a copy of the Amplified Study Bible to my iPhone that works great for me now. The thing is, don’t give up. Look to God and ask him for guidance and help with what you should do. Perhaps the goal was good to begin which or, perhaps, it was wrong. In failing, you may have done the best thing you could for yourself.

There are some things in life that we really have to do. They are the purpose of our lives and those are the things that God has for us to do. Not really goals at all but, instead, the reason we are alive to begin with.

Jesus came to this earth for a reason. He was God, the son, who created the entire universe. We are his creation and he loved us so much, rather than let us wallow in sin in eternity without him, he put on the flesh of his own creation to become one of us.

He was God and man in one flesh. He did this so he could live without sin. He had the same temptations, the same pains and suffering that we do. As God, he was able to go through these without sinning as we do. He did so by obeying the words of the Bible. By being sinless, he was able to communicate with God, the father.

It wasn’t that he could not sin but that he would not. Satan tempted him regularly but he was able to withstand it by sticking to the words of God. He did it for us. His purpose, his reason for being, was to come to earth and live a sinless life. And then, he was to willingly die for us and provide us with a covering for our sin.

The blood that he shed is the covering for those who accept him as their resurrected Savior. When God the father looks at man, he sees sin and as a perfect God, he cannot have sin in his presence. When God looks at a Christ follower, he sees only the blood of Jesus. He does not see sin. We are able to pray to him and have a relationship with him as our Father in heaven because of the atoning power of Christ’s blood.

Jesus had a purpose for his life and he fulfilled it. Just like him, we have a purpose that God has set for us. Part of our lives are spent trying to find that purpose and then, once found, living to accomplish it.

We aren’t sinless like Jesus, so we will fail and fall away from our purpose time and time again. Just don’t give up. Ask God to pick you back up and give you a renewed spirit. Then start again. You may find that your understanding of your purpose is altered. Not because it has altered but rather your understanding is improved by your continuing relationship with God.

One purpose that we all share is that we are to spread the good news of Jesus sacrifice and his free gift of pardon for everyone in this fallen world. It does not matter who they are and it does not matter what we think of them (or what they think of themselves), they are still a creation of God and he loves them. He loves them so much that he died for them. That’s true of a child who lies or a mass murderer or a child molester. He still loves them and they can find his salvation.

That is not an earthly pardon but one in eternity. Those who break the rules of this world will have to pay the price that society dictates. So, in earthly terms, each person’s sins or rule breaking are measurable. To God, the sins are all the same and will keep you from his presence.

If you are not a Christian, no matter what you have done, God loves you. Look to Jesus for your redemption. He will by no means turn away from an earnest and sincere prayer for forgiveness. Once you have accepted Christ, ask for his help in living each day. He has sent the Holy Spirit to live in us and guide us and to keep us on track for the purpose of God that we are here on this planet to accomplish. Just like with my friend, learn to let God’s love be the key to your happiness in life.

Mark 8:34-38

Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.

For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.

What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.”

Some days, I find that the things I do seem very, very hard. Other days, the tasks slip by almost unnoticed in their ease.

Today is one of the more difficult days. I’ve been asked to include a new physical task that is so small, it doesn’t bear mentioning. For me, however, it has turned into a very painful task, indeed. One that I will have to postpone for a while during which time I will work at an even more humble task in order to prepare for it in the future.

However, I know that in order to move forward, I have to go through the smaller tasks that are so hard to do. In getting ready for it and then used to it, I will be then be ready for greater tasks in the future. It’s kind of like a baby learning to crawl before they walk. The baby needs that learning phase that may never be of great use to them in the future. They do this in order to progress to the walking that will, for most, make up the rest of their lives.

So, I am busy learning to do really small tasks in order to do a bigger one later. The latter task is one that I look forward to and hope for and wish I could do now.

That’s kind of how our walk with Christ can begin. We want to do great things for him. However, when we are asked to do the small things, we often decide that we won’t do the small things at all. They are too simple and not the grandiose things that we had in our mind.

By our neglecting the small things, we will never be asked to do the larger things for God. He needs to see that we are mature and ready before being led in those directions.

That isn’t always the case. There are some few who God calls on for huge tasks right from the beginning. There are some who are even asked to give their lives. You can’t be given a greater tasks than that, can you?

Most of us don’t think in terms of dying for Christ. We may say that and think that and sing that loudly at church. But really? How many have given great thought to dying for God? Dying in ways possibly too painful to think of. The day may be coming when that is exactly what followers of Christ will be expected to do on an on-going basis.

Here in the United States, we Christians suffer some forms of persecution but in some parts of the world, there are Christians who are, quite literally, dying because of their faith. They are asked to give it up, to renounce it, to express no faith in God or to accept another religion. There are some who will fall and do what society expects rather than pay the ultimate price for believing in Jesus Christ.

There are those, however, who stay strong and true. God is working with them and through them. He strengthens them and allows them to see beyond the circumstance they are in to see the eternity they will have with God.

I hope that if and when we are confronted with a choice to letting God go or being strong and standing up for Jesus Christ, that we will all make the right and eternal decision. Denying God has consequences and I truly hope that we don’t have to suffer those. Of course, standing up for God also has consequences in the here and now. Today is fleeting and it will pass in the blink of an eye. Eternity is forever and ever. I want to spend eternity with God. I hope you do, too.

So, in the meantime, when God puts it on your heart to do something small, be glad. He is getting you ready for something larger. It’s like learning to walk again one step at a time. You need to learn to walk so that you can climb mountains later.

It may be your mountain to climb is during this life or it may be that your mountain is during our eternity with God. Remember God wants you to do as he asks no matter how large or small it is. He doesn’t measure the task but rather the willingness with which you are willing to do work for him. He is looking for your heart and not for the greatness of your deeds.

Colossians 3:23-25

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for their wrongs, and there is no favoritism.

A new year has started. It began with bangs and clangs and even fireworks. A lot of those bangs were gunshots and I really, really wish that people who do that would stop. Stop right now! Those bullets end up somewhere, even when they are shot into the air. I’m sure that those who shoot their guns don’t mean harm but harm is what they can do. It’s a thoughtless action and that is something that is becoming more common as every day passes.

We do things without thinking. We buy without thinking. We speak without thinking. What are we not thinking about? Consequences. Everything we think, do or say has consequences.

It’s like we have decided that, both as a people and as individuals, we no longer care about who might be hurt by what we do. As long as we get what we want, do what we want and/or say what we want to say, who cares for anyone else? The most important person in the universe, the one we love more than any other, has been served and everyone else, essentially, can eat dirt.

This isn’t how we were made. We were made to love one another. We are all brothers and sisters, created by the same loving God. He wants for us all to be together, but after we sinned, we stopped loving one another as we should. Instead, everyone else is our enemy. Someone to one up, to beat out, or to show up in some way or another.

I know that I have felt that way over the years. It’s shown up in many ways and places. It may be a niggling thought or it may be something I obsess about. If I feel I need to “beat someone” to get something, I can work really hard to do it. The work I have done in this fashion is much more than I have ever devoted to God’s kingdom.

What does that say about me?

Well, I guess it shows that I am the same as everyone else. I’m a sinner. The difference may be that I am a sinner who has been redeemed by the Living God.

When I allow my behavior to go off the rails, I hear from God in short order. Sometimes, I obey immediately and repent and change my ways, apologizing to anyone I have hurt. Most times, I put blinders on and stick my fingers in my ears, saying “Na, na, na” trying to block out God’s reproving and loving voice.

During those times, I continue on my way, doing what I want without regard to others, let alone God. My efforts don’t end well. I may accomplish what I set out to do but it is like ashes in my mouth. It is not only unsatisfying but makes me feel as if somehow, somewhere, I didn’t do, say or think enough about how to get whatever it was done. If I had, it would have made me feel great, wonderful like I had won the best prize in the world.

Sometimes, these efforts have come at great cost. It could be emotional or physical. It is always at a spiritual cost. During these times of my open rebellion, I lose my connection to God. If I pray without repenting, he doesn’t respond. I can’t be sure he is even listening but if he is, he is waiting to hear me say I’m truly sorry and ask for his help in changing my ways. And then, for me to actually work at changing my ways.

This always happens at some point and God is always good and just to listen and forgive, to reprove and to set me back on my path walking with him again. More humble and, at the same time, more committed to him.

That is the difference between a person who has been saved by grace through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and those people who are not saved. The saved have a venue to God and those who are not, do not. The unsaved can, if they look to Jesus and ask for his forgiveness, repent of their sins and acknowledge that he is God in flesh who lived a perfect and sinless life, died for them and then who rose from the dead to save them and provide them with eternal life. Along with that, they must truly repent of all of their sins and ask for his help in leaving their sinful ways behind.

I wish I could say that, at some point, we are without sin. Actually, that will happen one day but not during a day of our regular lives. It will be when Christ returns for his followers. He will return to place judgement on the earth and to all those who have ever dwelled on it.

The Bible says that the heavens will be shaken and that those who did not accept him will look to the skies, see him returning and will mourn that they did not see him as Messiah before that day. You see, once that happens, your eternity has been sealed. It takes faith to be redeemed. You must meet and accept God by faith before that great and terrible day.

Those of us who have accepted the gift of pardon will be transformed. We will be remade to be like Jesus, without sin and with a body that will last for eternity. We will live with God forever and ever.

Those who did not accept him will also have a place in eternity. It will be a torturous and horrible place with more awful things than we can image.

The way to avoid it is to look to Jesus. Accept him and learn to live a different way. While it will not change the outcome of the world, it could make a positive impact on those we live with and who are influenced by our thoughts, words and deeds. At the very least, it will certainly change you. It will help you see that you are not the most important person in the universe.

That person is Jesus. The humble servant who came to die for us and to show us how to live. That same person who will return and show us that he is the conquering King who will rule in justice and goodness forever and ever.

2 Timothy 3:1-5

But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God – having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.