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Responding to the Nudge

Posted in God Stories, Holy Spirit, Prayer, Spiritual Growth, tagged , , , , , , on June 23, 2015| Leave a Comment »

I’ve heard it said that the first ability we need to cultivate in our relationship with God is availability.  Being ready and available to do what He says in His word and what the Holy Spirit nudges us to do is foundational to growing and thriving as a Jesus follower.  Last night I was reminded of that in a very powerful way.  I had a conversation with a gentleman I worked with briefly 15 or so years ago.  After not seeing Al since that time we met again here in Washington where we happen to be working on a project together.  Over dinner he shared a bit of his faith story and it surprised me that I likely played an unknown role in his spiritual awakening.

Our faith conversation started when I mentioned that I had been in church all my life, but it wasn’t until I was 23 that I realized that God was interested in a real, living relationship and not just some dry, ritualistic participation in church.  He mentioned that his story was similar and his awakening to that fact began during his one of his visits to my plant in Calhoun, Tennessee around 2000 – 2001.  He said he was sitting in a meeting and he noticed Proverbs 3:5-6 written up in the corner of a blackboard in the conference room.

Proverbs 3:5-6 “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight.”

He said he was at a point in his life that he was very successful.  He didn’t have any needs being unmet.  He described a life that many people long for – a happy marriage of almost 30 years, two great daughters, good health, a great job he enjoyed, financially sound – in short, a life that he was satisfied with.  But something about that verse on the blackboard just poked at him.  I call it a Holy Nudge.  And it began a search.  From that moment he began to seek out what it meant to trust in the Lord with all your heart and to submit to Him.  Well what happened to him is what God promises to everyone who will seek Him with all their heart – He found that living, vibrant relationship with God that has molded and shaped his life since then.  He responded to God’s nudge in that small conference room and his life has been changed from a good life to a great life in union with His Heavenly Father.

My heart swelled because I remembered my days at that plant.  I worked there for 17 years.  One of the lessons I learned while there was the vital importance of responding to Gods’ holy nudges. I can vividly remember two holy nudges early in my time at Calhoun that shaped my faith walk and put me into a position to be used in my friend’s life… whether I knew it or not.  One was a failure on my part that God has redeemed.  The second is part of that redemption and directly impacted my friend, Al.

I had only been at the mill a couple months when I was asked to attend a four-day communication workshop being held at a nearby hotel.  The leader’s name was Sid.  Sid was a large, jovial guy who liked to ask probing questions.  He began the week by telling us that he had recently had a serious health scare as the doctors had told him that he had the big C – Cancer.  But just a week or so earlier he had gotten the all clear from the doctors – no more cancer,  he was fine.  Later that first day Sid had us perform an exercise of sharing our “lifeline” with the class.  We took 10 minutes to draw a chart that represented our life to the current date.  We were to identify 2 or 3 defining moments and share them in a succinct manner.  He shared his lifeline first and mentioned the low point of thinking he might die of cancer and then his line turned up when he was told he was cancer-free and that life was going great.  As I drew my life line it had a major positive step change when I met the Lord at age 23 and I spoke briefly about that.  I remember that Sid challenged me pretty strongly about my step change.  Thinking back I remember I felt intimidated by the force of his challenges and felt even a bit like I was being attacked for my faith.

I was probably a bit more demur the next two days of the workshop.  On Wednesday afternoon, Sid said he was shutting down the workshop 30 minutes early and he was opening up a bar tab for us so we could stay and chat.  It was at this point that I got a very clear Holy Nudge to stay and speak with Sid.  I remember it vividly because I argued with God a bit about it.  I rationalized that since I wasn’t a drinker, I would feel out of place.  I was working on a piece of furniture for the house and I reasoned that I could use the extra time to make good progress on my project.  Even though God was nudging, I was coming up with reasons NOT to do what He was asking.  I even remember telling myself that as hostile as Sid was, he probably was only going to belittle my faith some more.  To my chagrin, I have to tell you that I walked out and went home to my project.  I can tell you now that I felt bad about it as I wiped stain on the entertainment center.  I even paused more than once to pray for Sid.  But I felt the conviction of the Lord as I was substituting a “religious act” instead of following God’s Holy Nudge.

The next day was the last day of the workshop.  I think I may have even told the Lord that I would stay and speak with Sid after the class or something like that.  The day started fine, but just before lunch Sid told us that he wasn’t feeling very well and that he was going to end the class early.  He mentioned that he had experienced angina a few years before associated with a heart attack and that he was feeling angina this morning.  He was going to head over to the emergency room to get it checked out.  I remember I volunteered to drive him, but he had already made arrangements.  I headed home and I can honestly say I was really praying for Sid now.  But I also expected that everything would be fine since he was heading straight to the hospital.

At work the next day, Ben, the assistant plant manager swung by my office to see if I was okay.  I relayed to him that I had enjoyed the class, but that I was concerned about Sid since he had headed to the hospital.  Ben realized then that I had not heard the news.  Sid had a massive heart attack at the hospital that evening and did not survive.  I realized that I had been in a position to offer Sid God’s Words of Grace the evening before he died, but I had rationalized and walked away.  I was ashamed and saddened to my core.  I had grieved the Holy Spirit and I missed an opportunity to obey the One Who gave His all for me.

Thankfully, God’s grace and forgiveness extends to us even when we fail Him.  Over time His forgiveness brought restoration to my broken soul.  I knew I had sinned greatly.  I knew I directly disobeyed the prompting of the Holy Spirit.  But the same Holy Spirit reached out to me, lifted me up out of my sorrow and self-pity, and spoke life to me again.

It was probably a little less than a year later when I was asked to supervise a large team of maintenance personnel on a multi-day paper machine outage.  I was a 30 year old engineer who had never really worked on tools like a craftsman, and yet I was supposed to direct, coach, and support the efforts of about 2o maintenance technicians performing a dozen or more jobs.  The work was going over the weekend of Palm Sunday.  The first day was Saturday and honestly, that day is pretty much lost to my memory.  I vaguely remember feeling overwhelmed more than once with the large amount of demands that I struggled to keep up with.  As I drove in to the plant on Sunday morning I remember clearly speaking out my frustrations to the Lord.  I even said, “Lord, here it is Palm Sunday and I am heading to work and I won’t be able to make it to church.  That’s just not right.  I won’t even be able to have a real time of prayer since I’ll be so busy.”

The Lord spoke to my heart, “Pray with your Team.”

“What Lord?”

“Pray with your Team.”

Rationalizations rose up in my mind… “I barely  know these guys… Am I allowed to do something like this? … What will they think?”

But then I remembered Sid.  I remembered what disobedience felt like.  And I remembered that I had committed to the Lord after ignoring the Holy Nudge with Sid, that I would obey when He clearly asked me to do something in the future, no matter how crazy it might sound.  Well His voice was crystal clear this time.  So I gave the results to Him and I obeyed.

I didn’t have much time to think about it, I just did it.  I handled the normal safety topic and explanation of jobs the same as I had the day before, but as I ended I then shared briefly that my preference on a Sunday morning was to be in church rather than working in the mill.  Also since I believed God was present with His followers everywhere, including when they had to work at the mill on a Sunday we could take the time to acknowledge Him while at work.  I then let the men know that I would like to start our work day with a word of prayer and that it was fine if anyone didn’t share my belief.  They could stay while I prayed or head on out to the job.  Noone moved.  Then we prayed.  I felt the Spirit of the Lord take it from there.  I’m not sure exactly what I prayed, but I know I was being obedient and that God was pleased.

That started a pattern that has remained a part of my life.  I have had a number of leadership roles.  Not every meeting results in a Holy Nudge to pray with the group… but a surprising number have.  The Lord led me to start and lead a number of prayer groups and bible studies during lunch periods and before work as well.  As Al was telling me his story last night, I was moved to tears.  One of the other habits I got into was using the blackboards and dry erase boards during our lunch time bible studies and prayer times.  And sometimes I would get a Holy Nudge to leave a verse behind… just in case.

You almost never know how your obedience impacts someone else’s life.  Thank you Lord for giving me a glimpse of this one.

Obey immediately when He gives you a holy nudge and rejoice in being a partner in the Father’s work.

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Turn Toward the Sun

Posted in God, God Stories, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Spiritual Growth, The Father, tagged , , , , on May 28, 2015| 2 Comments »

It is a coolish late spring morning where I live.  As I slipped outside into the early dawn my shorts and t-shirt provided slightly less warmth than I needed, but the beauty of the pre-sunrise sky drew me in and kept me from going back inside.  As I walked I meditated upon my study the night before on spiritual growth and the classical disciplines which help us in that growth.  As I look back on my life I can see that it has been a series of growth spurts and plateaus.  It is probably much like a tree which grows rapidly during the spring and summer and then rests through the fall and winter.  I suspect we all have “growth rings” of a sort.  I recognized two other things.  Deeper intimacy with the Lord and increased practice of one, and usually more, of the spiritual disciplines were present during the times of growth.

There is an essential order to the process.  It is crucial that we recognize and keep before us the goal of our life, the goal of spiritual growth is to grow in our intimacy with the Lord.  Jesus’ death on the cross was not simply so that we could go to heaven one day.  No, His death was to remove the curse of sin which separated us from the Father and opened the door to a life of intimacy with Him.  The curse is removed immediately, but intimacy comes over time as we collaborate with the work of the Holy Spirit inside us.  So the essential order is 1) accept Jesus as Lord and Savior, 2) make intimacy with God our primary goal in life, 3) practice those activities which lead to greater knowledge of and intimacy with the Lord, and then 4) experience all the benefits, privileges, and responsibilities of a life surrendered to Him.  The benefits, privileges, and responsibilities begin showing up as soon as we begin our spiritual journey, but what I experience today is so much more than what I did when I was a young Christian.

I had been exposed to small doses of the classical disciplines over the first couple of years of my faith walk by more mature believers, but the real breakthrough came when someone gave me the book, Celebration of Discipline – The PATH to SPIRITUAL GROWTH by Richard Foster.  It is succinct, well-researched, and written in a way that I could easily understand.  I recommend it to anyone seriously desiring to grow spiritually but unsure what steps to take.  In the near future I suspect my posts will include things we discuss in our Home Group since we will be studying this over the next three months.  I am very excited because I sense the Lord wants to do something new and fresh in our group and in me.

As I continued to walk outside a shiver hit me due to the chill in the air even as my excitement was building.  I stopped and turned to look at the sunrise just as the sun was becoming visible through the trees on the horizon.  Immediately the chill was gone and I sensed a warmth on the outside that mirrored the warmth I was feeling on the inside as I had been meditating and praying to the Lord.  In that moment I was struck by the fact that as we look to the Son, Jesus, and grow in intimacy with Him, God the Father draws us into His warm embrace and fills us with His grace more and more.

At Pentecost, God poured out the Holy Spirit upon the disciples as tongues of fire.  So it is when we make it our life goal to live in intimacy with Jesus, the Holy Spirit will warm us with His Holy fire.  The closer we get to Jesus, the more we surrender ourselves to the work of the Holy Spirit in and through us.  His fire is a refining fire though.  It will burn up the chaff in our life – those things that are not God’s best for us.  But with the purging and refining comes something so much better, so much greater – a deeper, richer faith and an intimacy with the Lover of our Soul that we were created for.

And that, my friend, is glorious!

Go forth to be blessed and be a blessing to someone God puts in your path today!

A pre-dawn sunrise viewed from our SC home.

A pre-dawn sunrise viewed from our SC home.

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Scars Aren’t All Bad

Posted in God, God Stories, Holy Spirit, Marriage, Prayer, Vision, tagged , , , , , , , on May 8, 2015| Leave a Comment »

This morning as my wife and I finished our devotion we moved into prayer for friends and family who are going through serious challenges.  In particular we prayed for couples who are striving to reconcile their marriages after betrayal and hurt.

A picture that came to mind as we were praying is that of a deep wound that must heal from the inside out.  I spoke with a friend recently who has suffered a very serious injury losing the ends of three fingers.  The doctors are leaving one of the wounds open so that it will heal properly – from the inside out.  Coming back to the picture that came to mind as we were praying, I believe that this was a word the Lord gave of what has to happen in these couples we know although it is true of anyone who has suffered deep hurt.  The emotional wound has to have time to heal.  Words and superficial actions will not bring the healing that we truly need to be made whole.

In a marriage a demonstrated commitment is essential for this healing.  Practical steps in this are striving to know and understand our spouse better and better, seeking to understand and speak our spouse’s love language, putting our spouse and their needs before our own, and walking in the character trifecta of openness, honesty, and integrity.  These same truths apply to other relationships as well, but marriage is indeed a common relationship crucible for many of us.  Sadly, for many marriages the refining fire beneath the crucible doesn’t have to get too hot before the majority of what we have built our life upon becomes ash.  Yet through this God is able to build something truly valuable with the little that is left and adding His all-sufficiency.

You see I know this from personal experience.  My wife and I celebrated 30 years of marriage last month.  As I look back I can honestly say that over those 30 years we have had 29+ years of very good to amazingly great love and life together.  But there have been times…  A little over three years ago our relationship had become quite strained.  My job had me on the road 70% of the time.  Lisa was focusing more and more on her career and when I came home looking to be pampered a little bit (okay maybe I was looking for a lot of pampering) Lisa was about used up from all the extra she was having to do.  Our communication suffered and frankly the love was a rather dim ember at that time.  Even the close friendship that we have always shared was being severely tested.  At Christmas we had booked a condo in Orlando assuming Sammy’s soccer team would be playing soccer between Christmas and New Years as they had done for four years previously.  Surprise, they decided not to play in that tournament and yet I had the condo rented.  The short story is it was not the relaxing time to refresh and rejuvenate that I had hoped for.  In fact we now refer to it as the “vacation from hell.” That is not a direct reflection on Orlando necessarily, but more on our heart condition at the time.

Driving back from that vacation I was secretly looking forward to work and being be back out on the road.  I had scheduled to be gone for the first seven weeks of 2012.  Six days later we were racing to the emergency room with Lisa’s left leg just above the ankle sitting at a grotesque angle.  It was a compound, open fracture of both bones a little above the ankle.  A week in the hospital, three surgeries, 12 weeks with no weight on the ankle and multiple PT sessions later Lisa is able to walk and generally has regained most of her mobility.  In a previous post I have written about our walk through this time.  It’s a particularly moving read called “Broken Legs, Mended Hearts.”

I allude to this story today because one of the residuals from this is a serious scar around Lisa’s leg where the tissue was so seriously damaged.  Two things the doctor later told us that we look to as a testament of God’s grace.  First when he first saw Lisa’s leg he estimated he had a 50/50 chance of saving it.  Yet her healing progressed very well.  In fact he seemed very pleased and even a little surprised at how well she recovered.  Second at her one year check up he fully released her telling her to listen to her leg and let pain and discomfort tell her how much to do.  (Oh he did forbid her from swinging on rope swings too.)  But he also said, that a break as bad as hers 50 years earlier often proved fatal.  The bones were shattered into so many small pieces and the wound was a terrible thing.

As we finished our prayer time and I shared the picture that I had used in praying for our friends, Lisa thought of her leg and pointed to her scar.  And she said that deep wounds can leave bad scars.  She was mostly right, but I don’t see her scar as bad.  To some it may not be pretty, but to me it reminds me of Gods abundant grace.  Lisa lived.  Lisa kept her leg and she has most of her mobility.  Our marriage was healed because when Lisa broke her leg, God broke my heart.  Our oldest daughter who had been estranged from us for a time not only came rushing back to be with her mama, she gave her life to the living God.  She will live with God in His kingdom and the catalyst for her final step to this decision was Lisa’s broken leg.

One final thought.  I went for a run after we finished our devotion.  I love to run and I had stopped for a couple of months, so it was exhilarating to get back out there.  But I don’t run for the sake of running.  I run so I can talk with the Lord.  He did not disappoint.  I pick up small rocks as mementos of the places we’ve travelled.  (Lisa is wrapping up a business meetings here in Myrtle Beach as I write this post.)  You may agree with Lisa and think it’s a little weird, but I have found a few other persons who share this weirdness.  Anyway I am on the return leg of this long run and I have picked up a couple good rock candidates for my collection when I feel the Lord speak to me to stop and look for a rock.  Now I like fossil rocks or intricate design rocks or even pretty rocks – something that stands out.  So as I stand by this puddle I am thinking, “Are you going to show me a gold nugget or something Lord?”  And I started looking for something special.  But the Lord said, “Look in the muck and mire.  Look for the dirty and overlooked.  Get the rock that looks the least appealing.”  So I looked and sure enough there was a little, ugly black rock.  I picked it up and as I evaluated it I decided it is a possibly a small piece of shell encased in a little bit of asphalt.  I thought, “Wow, no gold nugget here.”  To which the Holy Spirit immediately replied, “Everything can be redeemed!”  My mind went to the description of the heavenly city described in Revelation of the streets of gold and I realized that streets of gold will have an underlayment that support them and keep them strong, flat, and beautiful.  An underlayment that can include little pieces of shell encrusted in small chunks of asphalt.

Friend, I do not believe you are reading this by accident.  I feel that the Lord has a message of hope for the world that He will get out through as many means as possible.  This message is meant for you and perhaps a loved one or friend.  God loves you, He can bring about the deep healing that is needed, scars aren’t always bad, and everything can be redeemed.  That about sums it up for this morning.

Have a blessed day.  And be a blessing to someone God puts in your path or on your heart today.

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Life-long Learning

Posted in Church, God, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Prayer, Responsibility, The Father, tagged , , , , , , on April 6, 2015| Leave a Comment »

John, the beloved disciple, concludes his gospel with an interesting sentence.  John 21:25 says “Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.”  While many of us have a few noteworthy accomplishments and amusing anecdotes from our life, Jesus’ life is the life above all lives to be studied.  Although He lived for a relatively brief period, He is the central figure of history.  The book that describes His life is the all time best-seller.  It is printed in more languages than any other book.  And despite repeated attempts to blot out His story and crush His people, the church continues to grow.  As believers in Jesus we have a responsibility to become followers of Him.  In Matthew 7:21 Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.”  How do we do this?  In reality this is a simple, impossible task.  We simply read the book that tells us about Jesus and God’s work in the believers, the bible, and then we do what it says.  It is impossible for us to do this perfectly in our own strength.  That is why Jesus to sent the Holy Spirit to all who would follow Him.

As a young believer I heard someone explain the difference between being intelligence and wisdom.  Intelligence is the ability to grasp and understand large amounts of information.  Wisdom is the ability to apply the information one possesses in the right manner.  I witness this in my work with plant managers and leaders in manufacturing.  The truly special leader is one who possesses a good intelligence and exercises excellent wisdom.  Many are the leaders who are intelligent, but do not walk in the most wise fashion.  In Matthew 10 Jesus gave directions to His disciples as they were being sent out on a brief training mission.  In verse 16 we read  “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.”  Jesus does not want us ignorant of His work.  He admonishes us to become as knowledgeable as practically possible, yet walk in humble innocence. 

Our church is a good example of what God can do through a group of committed believers who seek to follow Jesus every way we can.  We are a bunch of imperfect people seeking to know and serve a perfect God.  One of our Pastor’s tag lines is a simple phrase, “Read the Word.  Do what it says.”  By doing that we see people come to faith by the dozens and even hundreds.  We do not have a final count, but as of 9 am on Sunday morning we had already seen over 200 people come to faith in Jesus.  And at the 9:15 service at our campus I saw dozens more come forward and make a profession of faith.  This is a wonderful thing to see.

This is the first vital step into the abundant life Jesus calls His followers into.  Being the first step carries the certainty that there are many steps to follow, too many and too varied to be addressed in a short post.  However the Holy Spirit, who seals every believer at conversion, is able to lead and guide each believer into the life God calls them to.  The Holy Spirit knows what is needed, what is not, where we must go, what we must do.  In short, the Holy Spirit is God living in us to guide us into all that we need to know and do.  The caveat here is that the Holy Spirit is still subject to the will of the believer.  Jesus desires to work in concert with us.  Our willful obedience, not our coerced obedience, is God’s desire.

Today, I encourage you to do a few things that may be new.  First, ask the Lord to instill a fresh desire in you to know Him better.  Second, ask the Lord to show you anything inside of you that is hindering your taking your next step in faith.  Third, read the Word and ask the Lord to help you do what it says.  Fourth, listen and respond to the leading of the Holy Spirit.  He will always lead you in accordance with the Word of God.  In fact the bible and the Holy Spirit are always perfectly in synch.

The Holy Spirit inspired the writers of the bible to put down the words we read.  It is the Holy Spirit indwelling the believer who gives us the ability to read, understand, and follow what it says.  If you feel lead to do something that is contrary to the bible, then stop and seek the Lord’s clarification.  I have had the Lord prompt me to do things that I thought were odd, things that definitely took me out of my comfort zone, things that I normally wouldn’t have thought to do, but I have never had the Holy Spirit prompt me to do something that is against the scripture.  Let this be a safeguard for you.

In the post-resurrection days, the Church literally exploded into life.  People recognized that God had done the most amazing thing the world would ever know.  It remains the pivotal point in all of history.  And people were moved to live in a radically new way, following the teaching of the One who had conquered death and called them to this new life.  We have the opportunity to follow in their footsteps.  Jesus calls us to Himself and then into the unique life He has equipped us for.  Immerse yourself into learning about and following the One who loved you so much He went to the cross on your behalf.

Be blessed today my friend.  And be a Spirit led blessing to others.

 

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Say NO to Status Quo

Posted in God, Holy Spirit, tagged , , , , , , , on March 31, 2015| Leave a Comment »

I am still learning how to live the life Jesus saved me into.  I’ve been His disciple for over 30 years.  Now I won’t argue that sometimes I can be a slow learner, but I believe it is more than that.  The forgiveness of our sins and the redemption of our souls from death to life takes place in but a moment when we repent, turn to Him and accept Him as our Savior and Lord.  But the process of sanctification takes a lifetime.  Standing still…remaining the same is really not a viable option.  It is well to remember this and to use the gifts He has provided to help us on our way.

When we become His, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit.  God comes to live in us in the form of the third person of the Trinity.  The Holy Spirit is our counselor, out helper, our advocate (John 14:15-21, 16:7-15).  The Holy Spirit is not an “it”, but rather a real and distinct person of the Godhead intimately connected to the Father and Jesus.  Looking at Jesus in the bible we observe a wise, loving teacher who also healed, delivered, and ministered in whatever way He determined was needed.  The Holy Spirit living inside the believer will do much the same to and through us.

However the Holy Spirit is gentle.  He will not force us to do what we do not will to do.  This is vitally important.  Even though Jesus saves us, He does not ruler as a dictator.  It is a day-by-day, step-by-step process of our relinquishing control to Him.  His Spirit, the Holy Spirit living inside us, will gently lead us into truth and right action. But we have the ability to choose to take the step He leads us to or not.  Jesus talked about this as dying to self and taking up our cross and dying daily.

It is a longer topic that we won’t dig too deeply into today, but a person’s willful defiance of the Holy Spirit can manifest itself in three negative outcomes – grieving the Holy Spirit, quenching the Holy Spirit, and blaspheme against the Holy Spirit.  I love the Lord and I do not want to offend the One Who paid such a dear price to redeem me, so I don’t ever want to do any of these.  However being truthful I know on a handful of occasions I have failed to obey and grieved the Holy Spirit.  It pains me to remember these times, but God is gracious.  He brought me through each of those with a greater love and determination to follow Him.  Suffice it to say my experience is a little like Peter’s.  Peter denied knowing Jesus to save his own skin and then realized he had done exactly what Jesus predicted.  He was broken and for a time his relationship with the Lord was strained.  This conviction though resulted Jesus’ restoration of Peter which brought him to a place of greater devotion and commitment.  Because of God’s grace this is possible for us as well.

This morning as I think of the other “helps” the Lord provides, I realize they are all subordinate to the gift of the Holy Spirit.  The bible is the divinely inspired Word of God, but it takes the Holy Spirit to make it come alive and apply it to our lives.  The Church is the body of Christ, but it takes the Holy Spirit to guide the leadership and connect the members so that the body moves in fluid, God-directed motion.  I have learned that rest and quiet time with the Lord is an essential ingredient in godly growth.  If we are not careful are lives can become frantic activity followed by a crash.  Our lives must have a balance that includes quality time, time when we are mentally sharp and spiritually receptive, to just sit in the Lord’s presence.  In these time the Holy Spirit will often make the connections of God’s Word to our life.

That is what I felt the Lord put on my heart to share today.

I also intended to share pics of Jerusalem with you during this Holy Week.  As we discussed yesterday on Palm Sunday Jesus rode into Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives.  He drove the money-changers and animal sellers from the Temple court yard.  Obviously the Temple is no longer there, but I have pictures of the wailing wall and the remnants of the Temple Mount that are now part of Dome of the Rock structure.

View from inside the Jewish Quarter toward the south end of the Mount Moriah with was also the Temple Mount

View from inside the Jewish Quarter toward the south end of Mount Moriah with was also the Temple Mount

Mount of Olives in the background and the south end of the Temple Mount on the left side. The city of David goes down the south side of the Temple Mount below where the Temple stood.

Mount of Olives in the background and the south end of the Temple Mount on the left side. The city of David goes down the south side of the Temple Mount below where the Temple stood.

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This is the southwest corner of what was the Temple wall. It was torn down by the Romans around 70 AD fulfilling Jesus prophecy. Later parts of it was rebuilt as fortification through he Crusades era.

This is the southeast corner of what was the Temple wall. It was torn down by the Romans around 70 AD fulfilling Jesus prophecy. Later parts of it was rebuilt as fortification through the Crusades era.

Wailing wall which is actually a portion of the old Temple was that has been rebuilt as part of the Muslim Dome of the Rock structure. Women side on the right and men on the left.

Wailing wall which is actually a portion of the old Temple was that has been rebuilt as part of the Muslim Dome of the Rock structure. Women side on the right and men on the left.

View of the men's side of the Wailing Wall. People utter prayers, write them on pieces of paper, and then stick them into cracks in the wall. We even found some around on the south side of the wall.

View of the men’s side of the Wailing Wall. People utter prayers, write them on pieces of paper, and then stick them into cracks in the wall. We even found some around on the south side of the wall.

View of the courtyard in front of the Wailing Wall.

View of the courtyard in front of the Wailing Wall.

Typical street scene in the Old City. The Old City is inside the walls and it is divided into four quarters - the Jewish, Armenian, Catholic, and Muslim.

Typical street scene in the Old City. The Old City is inside the walls and it is divided into four quarters – the Jewish, Armenian, Catholic, and Muslim.

South wall of the Temple Mount. My understanding is that it was torn down by the Romans, but later rebuilt as protection. It now surrounds the Muslim Dome of the Rock and a couple of mosques.

South wall of the Temple Mount. My understanding is that it was torn down by the Romans, but later rebuilt as protection. It now surrounds the Muslim Dome of the Rock and a couple of mosques.

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This is the southeast corner of the Temple Mount wall. Because the mount is falling away at this point this would be a high point, if not the highest point of the Temple. The story of Satan taking Jesus to the high point and saying throw yourself down from here could have taken place at the top of this wall.

This is the southeast corner of the Temple Mount wall. Because the mount is falling away at this point this would be a high point, if not the highest point of the Temple. The story of Satan taking Jesus to the high point and saying throw yourself down from here could have taken place at the top of this wall.

 

Rubble uncovered from when the temple was destroyed in 70 AD.

Rubble uncovered from when the temple was destroyed in 70 AD.

I hope you enjoy the pictures and are edified by the blog.  Be blessed today and be the Lord’s blessing to someone today.

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Joy – So Much Greater than Happiness

Posted in God, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Prayer, The Father, tagged , , , , , on March 2, 2015| Leave a Comment »

Joy and happiness are not the same.  Happiness is the light-hearted feeling we get when something goes our way.  An unexpected gift, our sports team winning, loved ones gathering together are all events that can produce happiness.  However happiness is transient.  When the positive stimuli is removed happiness drains away like water from a tub when the stopper is removed.  Happiness is based upon circumstances.  Therefore it ebbs and flows as our circumstances change.  Happiness is nice, but joy is so much better.

Joy is the uplifted feeling we have based upon the knowledge of spiritual truth.  Joy is first cousin to Peace.  They both emanate from a relationship with the living Lord and are responses to His promises and activity in our life.  Let’s follow the progression.  In John 8:31-32 To the Jews who had believed in Him Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching you are really my disciples.  Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”  In John 20:19 – 22 Jesus returned to the disciples immediately after His resurrection. He twice blessed them with His Peace and then breathed upon them imparting the Holy Spirit to them.  They were prepared to experience the Joy of the Lord in an on-going manner.  We have only to look at what happened a few weeks later at Pentecost (Acts 2) to see how the Lord poured out His Holy Spirit in a mighty, joy-filled torrent that stirred the city of Jerusalem and brought thousands into the church with one inspired teaching.

One way Joy is distinctly different from happiness is that it is independent of our circumstances.  Corrie Ten Boom was a believer imprisoned by the Nazi’s for aiding Jews.  In the midst of the horrid conditions of a Nazi concentration camp Corrie experienced the Joy of the Lord.  I think of the Stephen in His defense of the faith in Acts chapter 7.  The Word describes his beautiful countenance just prior to being martyred and I believe the Joy of the Lord was upon him.

Scripture tells us numerous times that the Joy of the Lord is our strength.  In a war it is vitally important to fight from a position of strength.  In military parlance that means things like holding the high ground, possessing detailed information about the enemy and their strategy, building superior forces through weaponry, training, and numbers.  In the spiritual realm it is just as important to fight from a position of strength.  Lest anyone fail to recognize that as a believer we are in a war, I simply point out that the world, the flesh, and the devil are all active antagonists against the church and those who follow the Lord Jesus.  So one crucial element of our position of strength is the Joy the Lord.  The parallel with physical warfare is that Joy is spiritual high ground.

Sadly many who profess the name of Jesus as Lord fail to walk in the Joy of the Lord.  All of us will have times when we struggle with our relationships.  Our relationship with the Lord is the foundation from which the Joy wells up.  Let me be clear, we are not to seek joy for the sake of having a constant happy feeling.  We are to seek the Lord and one by-product of that intimacy is the Joy of the Lord.  If your life does not reflect an over-riding, exuberant Joy at times, let me encourage you not to give up believing that it exists and is available to you.  The Lord’s desire is that we walk in intimacy with Him and experience His Joy is abundance.  Here are some practical steps to that end.

  1. Enter into a relationship with the Jesus.  We do this by recognizing we are separated from Him due to sin.  He has made a way though.  We simply turn away from our sin, believing that He died in our place, ask Him to come into our life, and then confess the truth that Jesus is Lord to others.
  2. Seek to grow in that grace by constantly looking for and taking your next step of faith.  If you just came to faith then find a bible-believing church and be baptized.  Another next step is to get involved in serving others through a local church.
  3. Read the Word of God consistently and prayerfully and do what it says.  I suggest a focus upon the teachings of Jesus, but include some from the old testament and the other books of the new testament as well.  When you read ask the Lord to make it come alive.
  4. Pray often.  Prayer is a dialogue with God.  He wants to speak to us.  One important balance that I have found is that when the Lord speaks to me it is often through His Word.  The times it is not specifically words from the bible it is always aligned with what the bible teaches.
  5. Ask the Lord to fill you with His Holy Spirit that you may understand more and more of what He is calling you to do and how to live.  As I look back over my life I see that Joy was present when I was obedient to what the Lord asked me to do.  And conversely, a lack of Joy describes the times when I was not actively seeking to know and please the Lord.

Don’t settle for less than God’s best.  Don’t substitute the world’s happiness for God’s joy.  Jesus said in Matthew 6:33 “But seek first His (our heavenly Father’s) kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” As we pour ourselves into knowing, growing, and pleasing God, He will fill our cup with everything we need… including a joy that will run out and over the cup touching lives around us in dramatic, life-changing ways.

Have a most blessed day today my friend.  An don’t forget to let your light so shine before men that they see and recognize your Father in Heaven.

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Most Powerful

Posted in God, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Prayer, Responsibility, The Father, tagged , , , , , , on March 1, 2015| Leave a Comment »

The unbridled pursuit of power has resulted in destruction and carnage throughout history.  Actions resulting from the struggle for power and domination headline the news today.  Whether it is Iran pursuing nuclear capability, ISIS striving to extend its realm of influence, or political leaders in the US seeking to push their agenda, the wielding of power comes at a great price.  Following these three conflicts too closely has a power of its own.  It is easy to be overwhelmed by the magnitude of the real and potential consequences of these conflicts.  All three of these headline-dominating topics fall short of the most powerful force in the universe though.  And that makes all the difference.  That of course is the power of God available to and through His children through intercessory prayer.  From Ephesians 1:19b and following.  “That power is the same as the mighty strength He exerted when He raised Christ from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.”

The point today is not to spend a lot of time discussing God’s power.  From creating the universe, raising Jesus from the dead, and guiding the fledgling Church from 12 frightened disciples to the worldwide instrument of good that it is today – His credentials are solid.  Ultimate power resides in the Lord God Almighty.  I have been stirred lately that the Lord has a message for the Church today that we have a role to play in releasing His power in our day.  And that comes when we enter into intercessory prayer.

Prayer is simply communication with God.  It is meant to be a dialogue.  It is not meant to be a rote recitation of sacred words.  It is not meant to be an obligation we dutifully fulfill.  It is a conversation between two parties who love and respect each other.  God condescends to meet us where we are.  And through our time together He lifts us bit by bit to a higher place.  The more time spent with God in intimate fellowship, the less the cares and worries of this world hold and control us.  This intimacy is flooded with the Word of God.  Repeatedly the scriptures come to mind as I fellowship with the Father.  This is a primary way the Lord will speak to us.  He makes His Word come alive in our hearts.  The end result is that more and more we transformed and the mind of Christ takes shape within us.

As we spend time together with the Father, His desires become our desires.  This is where intercessory prayer begins.  It is as simple as longing for and expressing God’s desires into being through our lives and with our mouth.  We ask for those things that God desires to see happen in the world.

Jesus modeled this in His ministry.  He would begin the day in time alone with the Father.  He would then come down with purpose and launch into the day’s activity.  His prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane is instructive.  He knew what God’s plan was long before he entered that final private time with the Father.  He had foreshadowed to the disciples what was going to happen on numerous occasions.  Yet when the time actually arrived His disciples didn’t recognize it.  Jesus himself agonized over what was to take place offering up one more petition for a Plan B.  He even asked, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.”  He communed with His Father consistently. He understood what the Father’s plan was.  He acted upon it and He spoke it into being.  In John chapter 17 Jesus begins with a brief petition for Himself and then intercedes for His disciples and then all who would become believers.  Through His obedience the world was forever changed and lives continue to be transformed to this day … salvation, deliverance, healing, restoration, death to life all through Jesus’ life, death, and faithful obedience to the Father.

When Jesus ascended into heaven He promised to send the Holy Spirit to the Church.  The Holy Spirit is God living and abiding in the believer.  He is our counselor who always points the way to Jesus and the Father.  Jesus speaks to who the Holy Spirit is and what He will do in John chapters 14 – 16.  In John 14:12 Jesus tells His disciples, “Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”  Jesus is passing on His mantle to whoever believes in me.  That is us!  And that is amazing!!

One of the less visible, but vitally crucial roles God has given the church is that of intercessory prayer.  Missionaries are absolutely dependent upon the financial support from home to continue their work.  I would argue that it is an even greater need for the prayer support from home to remain unceasing.  The same God who was able to put a coin into the mouth of a fish for Peter and Jesus’ taxes is the same God who will meet the needs of a missionary in the field if the intercessory prayer is taking place.

Rees Howell was the President of the Bible College of Wales during WWII.  His greatest calling though was that of an intercessor.  During the war there were numerous times when the Holy Spirit would lay the burden of intercession heavy upon Mr. Howell.  One instance the burden was so great that He was moved to cancel classes and call for the entire school to enter into intercessory prayer.  As the hours marched on, hundreds of students and faculty were on their face before God, interceding for God’s hand of protection upon those in great peril.  At times the mood in the chapel would shift as the Lord’s Spirit impressed the urgency of the situation upon the group gathered together.  Late at night the Holy Spirit let Rees know the work was completed.  A few days later news came from Italy of a miraculous intervention as the Allies moved across the Island of Sicily.  The Allies were surrounded and facing certain annihilation. Reinforcements were not going to arrive in time and the German and Italian bombardment was taking a tremendous toll.  It was simply a matter of time before the outgunned Allied soldiers were decimated.  The commanders had considered surrender, but decided to hold until they could hold no longer which wouldn’t be long.  Suddenly and inexplicably the bombardment stopped.  The bombing ceased in the night at exactly the time that the word was given to the intercessors that their immediate work was through.

Now this begs the question – does God take sides in a conflict?  The answer is simple.  God is Holy and He is His own.  We need to seek His face, grow in our intimacy with Him and then we join His side.  In the present conflict with ISIS, just like in World War II there is a very clear evil at work on one side of the conflict.  While it is surprising that a clear plan of action has not come forward to deal with ISIS this simply means we still have time to intercede.  You and I are called to pray the desires of God into existence.  He wants us to partner with Him in the redemption of the world and intercession is one of the ways we do that.

Go back to Ephesians where we started.  Pick it up at Ephesian 1:18 – 19a.  “I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and His incomparably great power for us who believe.”  Friends I encourage you to ask God to put a burden on your heart to join Him in intercession.  Consider a healthy dis-satisfaction with evil as a starting place and ask God to give you the words and perseverance to pray through.  When He does launch into it with all you are.  When we do we are tying into God’s incomparable great power for us who believe.

Be blessed and be a blessing to those the Father puts in your path and on your heart today.

 

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Choosing to Die

Posted in God, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Marriage, Prayer, tagged , , , , , on February 19, 2015| Leave a Comment »

I don’t know about you, but choosing to die is not my first choice.  In fact in almost every scenario that comes to mind I am choosing the path that provides at least a glimmer of hope of survival.  Our sense of self preservation is strong.  But Jesus preached and modeled something radically different than self preservation.  In Matt 16:25 He said, “For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it.”  As we follow His life we see that Jesus willingly lived in obedience to God’s plan and for our salvation which included dying to His self.  As a professed believer and follower in Jesus it is of paramount importance that I come to grips with what Jesus is asking me to do.

Dying to self is the foundational act of faith.  Truly living a life where Jesus is Lord means that we are not.  We, or at least I, are selfish creatures.  In most cases my world revolves around what I see, perceive, and deem appropriate.  Although I am loathe to admit it, I often want what I want and I will act in accordance with that desire much of the time.  Judging by the world around me that is true of most people.  When I committed my life to Christ, when I gave Him my life, I recognized that this innate selfishness was liable to be a problem.  But I trusted Jesus to do something about that.  As I look back over 30+ years of following Him I can see much progress yet there are still times that the old selfish man rises up.  Thankfully God has given us the Holy Spirit to help us with this.  Our response is to die to self daily and trust Him to help us.  And He does.

Jesus modeled dying to self literally.  Not everyone is called to willingly put themselves into situations where physical death is the likely outcome, but that is part of what we sign up for.  As I mentioned yesterday history is full of the faithful losing their lives at the hands of despots and tyrants who war against the one true God and His people.  Today as I write this many believers will perish at the hands of ISIS followers.  My heart hurts for them and I am moved to intercession.   We also have a dear family that we love and support that have been ministering in central Asia now for 11 years.  They recently relocated to Turkey and are beginning a new work among the Muslim population there.  Please join me in praying for God’s protection, grace, and mighty power upon all those in this part of the world.

In the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.  Yet not as I will, but as you will.” Mt 26:39.  I have prayed something resembling the first part of that prayer many times… “Lord get me out of this bad or unpleasant situation.”  That is not dying to self though.  Dying to self is the entirety of Jesus’ prayer… a request for another option other than the obvious, but total submission to the Father’s plan and purpose.

Because Jesus submitted to the Father’s will He did have to suffer an agonizing night and day of torture, humiliation, crucifixion, and death.  However, He also purchased my forgiveness and forgiveness for anyone who trusts in Him.  He also launched the Church to proclaim the truth of reconciliation with God through faith in Him.  He broke the power of hell and the grave as He proved that heaven is our final home and the grave is just a doorway into larger life.

I don’t know about you, but I get pumped up when I think about what Jesus has done for me and for you.  Before I close I want to flesh out a little more what dying to self looks like for us.  Let’s get practical.  I think the fifth chapter of Ephesians is a good place to start.

For husbands it means cherishing your wife, listening to her, working hard to understand her needs and then striving to meet them.  In the list of priorities after you wife would be your children.  These come first – before the man-cave, guys night out, or your pet project.  I’m not saying that those fun things can’t happen, but they have to be down the priority list and only occur when others are considered and acted upon first.  I have to laugh because I have handled this in every way imaginable and most of them have NOT been the right way.  To do these things for your wife and children, but be secretly pouting for the guy things, is not dying to self.  Time spent with the Lord asking and allowing Him to instill in us the desire to love and cherish our family is how we get to the place we can do this right.

Wives dying to self really comes down to a very simple word – submission.  I know that opens a can of worms and I am not going to take the time to chase and catch them all.  Staying simple, Jesus is your Lord as a believer.  You are to submit to Him just as your husband is to submit to Him.  To the extent you can do so without violating the specific leading of the Lord in His Word, you are to live in harmony under the leadership of your husband.  Just like the husband who must give up his will to seek the Lord’s will first and then serve you and your children, so too you must dwell in your prayer closet with the Father to have His heart and attitude in this.

I can think of dozens of scenarios and situations and I am sure you can think of many unique to your life.  In every case the right path is similar.

It begins with a vibrant relationship with the Father through consistent, constant prayer and reading of the Word of God.

It is undergirded by the consistent petition, “Lord make me more like you.”

It progresses through consistently asking and acting upon the thought, “what is best for the other person.”

It is solidified by celebrating the joy and blessings in the lives of others.

It finds it’s rest in thankfulness to the Father for allowing you to be an agent of His grace.

And along the way, without ever focusing upon yourself or your wants, you will find yourself blessed with peace, joy, love, and a deepened faith in the One who loves us more than we can ask or imagine.

Be blessed and be a blessing today my friend.

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True North

Posted in Church, Holy Spirit, tagged , , , , , , , on May 19, 2012| 1 Comment »

I’ve taken members of my family to the Boundary Waters Canoe Wilderness Area on the Minnesota / Ontario border four times beginning in 1998. The BWCWA is a heavily forested, roadless region dotted with thousands of lakes, ponds, rivers and streams. The way you get around is in a canoe and by foot.  The waterways are connected by portage paths that hearken back to the days when the Native Americans roamed the land.  Paddling your canoe across the lakes and through the quiet streams is an incredible experience.  Carrying all your stuff from one waterway to the next is hard work.  And while it is not “fun” in the traditional sense it carries with it a strong sense of satisfaction to successfully negotiate a difficult portage in an efficient way.

The times we have gone to the BWCWA we have used a map and compass for our navigation.  I really enjoyed the navigation aspect of our trips because we were forced to use a skill set that we weren’t familiar with and it required focus and attention to detail.  The skill of successfully using a map and compass is called orienteering.  Simply stated orienteering requires;

  • accurately identifying your place on a map,
  • determining true north with the compass,
  • adjusting the map to align with north on the map with true north, (for you true orienteering experts I am skipping the discussion of declination for sake of simplicity)
  • selecting the direction you want to go on the map,
  • transferring that direction on the map to the direction over the lake you want to travel,
  • picking out a landmark in the direction you want to travel,
  • striking out toward that landmark with a consistent focus upon heading directly toward it.

On one trip we covered 50 miles in 7 days with about 15 different portages.  To cover this distance with a group of young men required that we be efficient with our travel time.  Mutiny was a constant concern…  Okay, maybe I exaggerate a little, but it was important that we not paddle aimlessly around the lake trying to find the portage.  Being able to accurately select the location of the next portage from 1, 2, or more miles down the lake was crucial to paddling the shortest route and minimizing the pain and soreness that our “fun” generated.

As I think about those trips I realize that there are a few keys that made our orienteering successful.  Obviously the map and compass were essential.  We had to know where we were, where we were going, and what lay between us and our destination.  The map showed these things provided we knew how to read it.  The compass told us where True North was.  It gave us a constant and correct location of North which we could then align our map and then our direction to.  With the map and compass as essential tools, we also had to have the right map and we had to understand how to read it.  Finally we had to have a focus upon the point we were heading toward and we had to paddle.

I’m struck by how well this mirrors life.  Our map is the Word of God.  It gives an exact picture of the lay of the land… what lies around us, the path we should take, the dangers that lurk if we go the wrong way, where our destination is, as well as lot’s of detail about areas we aren’t likely to explore.  The compass is symbolic of the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity who comes to live in us when we are born again.  The Holy Spirit is our guide and counselor constantly pointing toward truth in a similar way to the compass always pointing toward true north.  The Word of God and the guidance of the Holy Spirit together can always show us the right direction.  However we still have to focus upon the point which they identify and we have to do the “work” to get there.

At any one of these points we can get off track.  There are a lot of lakes in the BWCWA and if you don’t know where you are, the map can be confusing.  Map reading takes some practice.  The most important concept in reading a map is to know where you are.  Unlike modern GPS which tells you where you are, paper maps expect you to be able to pick out your location.  The bible has some verses which help with this.  Romans 3:23 says “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  That’s the starting point for all of us.  But the next step is found in several places but I like the standard from John “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, to the end that all who believe in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

The Holy Spirit who resides in the believer is gentle and loving.  He does not demand or control.  He prompts, counsels, encourages, and gently corrects.  There are three terms used that describe a negative reaction that we can elicit from the Holy Spirit: we can grieve the Holy Spirit, we are told not to quench the Holy Spirit, and finally Jesus mentions blasphemy or sin against the Holy Spirit.  I’m not going into these in-depth now, but the point I want to take away is we can choose not to follow the direction the Holy Spirit much like we can ignore the information our compass gives us.  We do this to our detriment, but we do have this choice.

Picking out a landmark is one of those subtle points of orienteering that make navigating on the water so much easier than land navigation in a trackless area.  The corollary to this is being actively involved in the Church and being well read of inspirational literature.  Here are a few general landmarks that often come up – asking what would Jesus do, considering what my dad would do, reading about examples of others who have lived selflessly, observing humble, faithful followers in the Church.  These give me a landmarks to aim toward.  These are examples that the Word and the Holy Spirit point to.

The last step in this four-step process is the work we do.  We can do the first three and yet still end up dead in the water if we do not exert our will, strength, and energy in striving toward our destination.  As I think about this point it brings to mind the multiple different paddling experiences I have had… many times in beautiful weather with light winds or even a slight breeze behind me.  The time when we rounded the corner of an island and then headed into a strong breeze that was beginning to lift whitecaps.  It was day one of the week so our canoes were heavily loaded and riding low.  My anxiety was mainly for my wife who was in the canoe with our son Jon.  We really had to stroke long, hard, steady and the going was tough, but we all made it.  There were paddles in rain and mist that made the selection of a landmark more difficult and we had to trust the map and compass, constantly consulting them to be sure we were headed in the right direction.  We have made it through in all these cases.

When I say the last step is the work we do that includes the times of Godly rest.  God rested on the seventh day of creation which gives us an example we are to follow.  Our pastor is about to take a well deserved and necessary sabbatical.  We wish you well Pastor P!  Isaiah 41:31 tells us that “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, the will run and not grow weary, they shall walk and not faint.”  The work is the sum of activities that we undertake to get to the destination we are striving toward.

One of my life metaphors is that life is an adventure.  I see the map, compass, landmarks, and the work before me.  And in my heart I hear God whisper, “Dan, come out and play.”

Have a blessed day.

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I Think, I Believe, I Know

Posted in Holy Spirit, tagged , , , , , on April 20, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Semantics, the subtle nuances in the meanings of words, has always fascinated me.  I enjoy good puns and having a good grasp of semantics is essential to delivering or catching a good pun.  (I know many family members would question whether the adjective good should be applied to my puns, but humor me here please.)  As a reliability consultant the past 3-1/2 years I have been asked for guidance on all elements of reliability.  For many of these elements I have a deep knowledge and I can answer with total confidence.  These are things I know.  For some elements I have a good knowledge and I can answer with only slight qualifications to the veracity of my statements.  These are things I believe.  Occasionally I have to give my best guess.  These are the things I think to the best of my current knowledge.  I use these three compartments: What I Know, What I Believe, and What I Think not just to help me express work-related information but to guide my actions and define who I am.  I suspect everyone has these compartments even if they don’t take the time to mentally process each statement.  In my opinion the statement “As a man thinks, so he is” is true in the broadest use of the word think.  However in my definition it is what a man believes and knows that more accurately defines who he is.

A person’s worldview is the set of beliefs that determine their understanding of the world and how they interpret future data that they take in.  Fundamentally a worldview can be broken down into a list of value statements that a person holds.  Here are some examples.

  • In my work we have built a Model of what excellent Reliability looks like.  The heart of that model is the 310 value statements which give discrete elements of what equipment reliability is.
  • We are in an election year and the presidential campaigns are busy laying out their candidates value statements (or trying to pin negative value statements upon their opponent).
  • Marriage is established upon certain value statements… we are faithful to one another, we will communicate consistently, I will take out the trash… important things like that.
  • I can think of many examples throughout history when groups of people found it necessary to document their shared beliefs as value statements –
  • the Apostles Creed in the early church,
  • the Magna Carta in England,
  • the Mayflower Compact as the Pilgrims arrived in the New World,
  • our Declaration of Independence.

These are all attempts to capture what a group of persons collectively know and believe.

It is a worthy activity for a person to take the time to assess their own Life to understand what their core beliefs are and where they come from.  Over the past several months I have taken a closer look at this in my life.  I have determined that one of the greatest sources of discontent is when our actions do not align with our core beliefs.  A corollary to that is one of our greatest sources of disconnectedness with others is when our core beliefs are not well founded upon truth.  While I may cover a few of those beliefs, my main goal today is to describe an effective process to define core beliefs.

What are the sources for what you believe?  The most common is experience.  The older we get the larger the repository of experiences that we have had.  I am convinced experience provides us many lessons.  It’s important to remember that even our experiences are interpreted through our existing worldview, but that is the case for all of us.  The important point is to consider our experiences as objectively as we possibly can AND allow the other sources to shed greater light upon our experiences.

The next source is what others we trust and love have experienced.  Being married provides (or at least it should provide) a level of intimacy with another that gives us a very deep experience base.  A little less intimate, but still quite valid are parents, siblings, children, and close friends and other family.  We are not meant to do life alone.  The knowledge and wisdom of family and community are an essential safety net when we are building our core beliefs.  There is a reason that terrorists isolate themselves into cells.  They must do this to stoke the misguided beliefs they hold and to keep truth and rational thinking out.

The next source is the accumulated historical wisdom that has been handed down from great thinkers and doers in history.  For me as a believer in God and a follower of God’s Son, Jesus, I recognize that He has given us a guidebook for life.  I consider the Word of God to be paramount in setting my beliefs.  However I also recognize that the Word of God must be considered within the context of the entire bible.  I know that it has to be accurately interpreted.  (The Holy Spirit helps us with this, but at least for me I sometimes don’t listen as well as I should.)  There are more sources which do not carry the same weight as the scriptures but are nonetheless helpful.  The writings of CS Lewis are a great example in my life.  Another recent example for me was reading the Federalist Papers.  I was fascinated with the thought processes behind the development of the US Constitution.  Also I put some of the schooling and training I have had into this group.

A fourth source, and I put this source a good bit behind the first three mentioned, is the third-party accounts of others.  While there is still value in these, They must be treated with more discernment.  I have three major considerations that I find necessary for third-party accounts.  The first is that I do not know their worldview and whether truth is their standard or not.  The second is the timeliness of the information.  While prompt gathering of evidence is crucial in getting complete and exact data it takes time to get all the information to make a correct assessment of what it really means.  When building an accurate worldview, we cannot base it upon snippets of information.  The third is the accuracy of the communication from the third-party to me… did they effectively verbalize it and did I effectively hear and interpret it.

The last source is all the various means of information sharing that exist today.  The tops in this category are the few periodicals, websites, and a small number of news shows that I have developed confidence in their striving for truth.  Most fall far short of these.  I still occasionally tune in to network news, but I always take what they say with a grain of salt.  Sadly the biases on these programs must be taken into account.  (Even sadder is that many people do not and their worldview is skewed by these biases.) I also look to blogs such as this one and others that I have developed confidence in.  In a way some of these are like third-party accounts mentioned above.

Two other points before I wrap up today’s post.  First every person has a worldview whether they realize it as such or not.  I have mentioned all the primary sources of information where we gather facts to construct our worldview.  Our worldview sets the direction and course of our life, it puts boundaries in our life, and ultimately it determines who we are.  This worldview is the sum of all the value statements that we hold to be true.

Second as a believer, God has given us His Holy Spirit.  In John 16:13 Jesus describes one of the roles of the Holy Spirit, “13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.  We are bombarded by lots of information every day.  Some true but a lot of it not.  We must have help in discerning that which we should hold and that which is proper to discard.  The Holy Spirit desires to help us in this and He will if we but ask and trust.

I believe there is ultimate truth and it rests with God.  Every person sees and experiences only a small slice of life from which to build their worldview.  Consequently we have varying elements of our worldview that are and are not true.  For me it is one of my life goals to know and align with what is true.  I can only do this if I am humble enough to admit that I may not have it right… that what I think and what I believe are not true.  Finally I have to objectively and prayerfully analyze the data I receive each day considering the source and how it relates to what I know.

I want to please God by discerning and living a true, faithful, and honorable life.  Since my worldview defines me, I need to get it right.  Asking God to help me, this I strive to do.  I encourage you as you strive to know what it true too.

God bless you today and always my friend.

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