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Archive for the ‘God’ Category

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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Lent 2015

Posted in Jesus Christ, The Father, Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 18, 2015| 1 Comment »

Good Morning and Welcome to Lent 2015. Lent is the season of preparation immediately preceding Easter. In the early church this time was spent in final training for Easter baptism for persons who had decided to give their life to the Lord.  While the faith and commitment of a life given to God remains the same, there have been many adaptations through the years.  As we begin our Lenten journey together this year let’s take a look at some of the roots of the Christian faith and allow our Father to inspire us this year to deepen our walk with Him.

Life commitment.  For much of the history of the church, being objects of persecution has been the norm.  The Roman Empire had a god and he was the Caesar.  In reality they had a lot of “gods”, but what was officially frowned upon was a religion that espoused a solitary, supreme God that was not under the Roman boot.  As such the early church experienced repeated periods of intense persecution which included being treated as second-class citizens, torture, and even publically sanctioned murder simply based upon the fact they were Christians.

Jesus’ words in Matthew 16:24 – 27 sets the bar for what it means to follow Him.

“Then Jesus said to His disciples, “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 will find it.  What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?  For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with His angels and then he will reward each person according to what they have done.” 

Becoming a Christian is not simply responding to an altar call to receive a get-out-of-hell card.  It can start there, but the Lord is calling us to something so much more demanding and so much more rewarding than that.  And the early church dedicated time to teaching initiates about that with Lent being the final exam if you will.

As Christians in the western world we have experienced very little persecution directly impacting our lives, yet the reality is it has always existed.  The prince of this world, Satan, has and still does wage a relentless attack against the people of God.  Recently we have had the brutality and evil of it exposed in the atrocities committed by ISIS.  This is not really new however.  In the past 1200 years over 270,000,000 people have been murdered in the name of Islam.  To be Jewish or Christian and to hold to that faith was to be under a death sentence.  And in large parts of the world today it still is.

The point of this is that a commitment to follow the God of the bible, to trust in the saving work of Jesus Christ on the cross, cannot be taken lightly.  What God calls us to is not a life of ease (although we are to rest in Him) nor is it a trouble-free life (but do not worry because Jesus has overcome the world), but it is a life that will be filled with God’s grace and abundant love.  When a person accepts Jesus as their savior and Lord, they truly move from death to life.  While that may make us targets of Satan (and Islam) it also comes with so many amazing benefits – Jesus’ promise to never leave us or forsake us, we are given the Holy Spirit as our counselor and helper, we are sealed as God’s possession forever, and the list goes on.

Over the coming weeks let’s dig deeper into what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ.  I would love to hear back from you.  Please share your thoughts or experiences with how God has stretched you, taught you, and helped you grow in your faith.

Until tomorrow I pray you will be blessed and be a blessing to another.

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My Healer

Posted in God Stories, Prayer, The Father, Uncategorized, tagged , , on February 17, 2015| Leave a Comment »

As some of you know I had a miraculous intervention last March where the Lord used a dream to send me to the doctor where they found and corrected three blockages in my heart with stints.  Since then I have been on medications, I changed my diet, and I have worked to remain consistent in my exercise regimen.  What I did not change until the beginning of this year was the stressful work situation.  I have exchanged what was a stress-filled job with a slightly less stress filled beginning of a new career as a Reliability Consultant.

One week ago today as I was driving to meet two of my three brothers for breakfast I felt a twinge of pain in my chest.  It lasted about 10 – 15 seconds, but it was a real pain right above my heart.  It was not unlike other pains that anyone who is over 50 has periodically, but the fact that it was where it was caused me to take note.  As time went on, I began noticing this pain come more frequently… 2 or 3 times on Wednesday, 5 or 6 times on Thursday.  It was not severe pain, more like a slight crick in my chest.  The pain was not nearly as bad as the thoughts that began going through my head.

Now some might ask why I didn’t go to the doctor immediately to have it checked out.  Well, I was praying for guidance, the pain was really minimal, I didn’t have any other symptoms, and I didn’t want to be like Chicken Little saying the sky is falling.

Friday night I woke up with some pain.  At that same moment with no words spoken Lisa reached over and put her hand on my head.  I remembered thinking, “Well the Lord has Lisa praying for me, it’s going to be fine.”  When she pulled her hand away I was fine.

Saturday morning I told our daughter Christin who had come down for a weekend visit about it.  She has completed a year of graduate school for Physical Therapy.  She performed some checks and found that I had tenderness in the connecting tissue around my ribs right above my heart.  That made me feel better mentally, but when she asked if I had hit my chest or done something to cause this I couldn’t think of anything.

Saturday was a great day as we visited with lots of family.  The only problem was that the pain in my chest was the worst it had been.  So while Christin’s diagnosis gave me some sense of relief that it wasn’t my heart, the fact that I couldn’t think of what I had done to cause it still had me concerned.

Now I know the Lord is able to make things clear enough that I truly trusted Him to let me know if I was supposed to go to the doctor.  Since He was not leading me to that I knew the answer was either that the pain was not something to worry about or He was about to take me home and He would use my home-going for good in other people’s lives.  That didn’t remove the niggle of doubt that kept trying to creep in periodically, but it did give me a place of faith to stand.

Our Pastor felt the leading of the Lord to change the service on Sunday.  The new message was one of God’s Grace Gives us Freedom.  It was specifically aimed at proclaiming God’s promises that as believers we can walk in healing, deliverance, restoration, and wholeness.  I am a member of the Care Team and at the end of the service all Care Team members were invited to come down front to be ready to pray with people that come forward asking for prayer.  It was also mentioned that if we needed prayer that we were to simply face the other way and other Care Team or staff members would pray for us.

Well I really wanted to pray for others.  But I also had the question about should I get prayer for my heart.  When I went down front I decided I would pray for others and then afterwards I would ask for prayer.  A staff member I had never met brought a young man in front of me and was talking with him.  I couldn’t hear them over the music, but I felt a prompting to go up and join in agreement with them for whatever the need was so I stepped up to lay hands on and pray with the young man.  I did not know either of them and when I came up they already had eyes closed and were praying.  This is what I heard immediately upon stepping up.

“Lord, I know you love Dan (my name is Dan for those who don’t already know) and you desire wholeness in his body.  You have knit his body together and you know how he was made.  I ask now for healing for all stomach and digestive issues (I had also been having some stomach and digestive issues which I had only mentioned to Lisa because they were just a nuisance).  Father I pray for every cell in his body which you have created to function as it is supposed to and that he will know complete health.”

By this time I was weeping because our Father was allowing me to both pray with someone who needed healing, but He had brought forth someone with my name so I was being prayed for too.  I can’t tell you how encouraging it was to know the Lord had orchestrated this.  Afterwards I shared with the staff member my story an we prayed again.

When I came home my daughter-in-law, Jordan came in.  I told her about what I had been feeling in my chest.  She said said, “it sounds like you have Chondritis.  That’s inflammation of the cartilage around the ribs.  I had a friend who would swim in the morning and she would sometimes get that from swimming too much.”  With that she provided the final piece of the puzzle.  Christin had diagnosed me correctly, but didn’t offer the link to swimming.  On the Monday before I started feeling the pain I had swum 32 laps at the Y in training for possibly entering a sprint triathlon this spring.  I even remember pulling particularly hard trying to improve my stroke.

Now I share my stories because I am absolutely convinced that if the Lord loves a lug like me enough to intervene in my life like this, I know that He loves anyone who has read this far.  If you are already a believer take encouragement that God knows every situation and circumstance you are going through and He walks them with you.  He is your healer too.

If you have never met the Lord, I encourage you to reach out to Him right now.  God loves us so much that He sent His Son, Jesus to be our Savior.  He died in our place.  You see God is absolutely Holy and sin cannot dwell in His presence.  If it were left at that we would be doomed to live in separation from God for eternity.  However His love for us is so great that He chose to send His Son to actually live on this earth as a man.  He was perfect and He always lived in unity and harmony with His Father.  But His ultimate purpose was fulfilled on the cross.  Jesus let Himself be captured, falsely accused, judged, beaten, and then crucified because it was the Father’s plan to fulfill the requirements of justice.  And while Jesus was on the cross, God put all sin – every sin that had ever been committed, all sin that will ever be committed, upon His Son,  When Jesus died God judged the sin and the penalty was paid.  On the third day after His death God raised Jesus back to life.  Before Jesus returned to heaven He was seen by hundreds of people.

Our act to have our sins covered in this is really very simple.  We simply recognize that we have sinned, we decide to turn away from our old life of sin and we chose to follow Jesus.  Romans 10:9 says it like this – “If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”

If this encourages you or helps in some way please let me know.  If the Lord tugs at your heart and you want to talk about what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ, please send me a comment and I will be happy to correspond with you.  Jesus loves you and He wants you to know that.

Be blessed and be a blessing today.

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Perfect Peace

Posted in God, Uncategorized, tagged , , , on January 29, 2015| Leave a Comment »

There is a term that occurs fairly frequently in the bible that bears deeper consideration – “Perfect Peace”. I read in Isaiah 25:3 today.  You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in You.  I don’t know about you, but there are times when chaos, stress, and difficulties bear down upon me and anything resembling peace – especially perfect peace, seems like a distant dream.

The past year has contained a number of extremely challenging events – unbelievable work stress, health issues, a heart procedure, job losses within the family – you get the picture.  When I think back it is interesting to note that there have been windows of light and peace throughout this time that were not related to external circumstances at all, but rather they were related to fixing my mind on the Lord and putting my trust in His eternal goodness and love.  In fact some of the most blessed and peace-filled periods have also been when the external situation was the most dire.

I recognize that this is because when things get so bad that I have no recourse, I turn fully to God for help.  You’d think I would learn to stay in a posture turned to Him, but I must admit, I am sometimes a slow learner.  Way too often I proceed with a “I’ve got it from here, Lord” attitude.  I recognize this for what it is – sin.  In my own self-sufficiency I stray from God’s calling upon my life to walk with Him.  Instead I often want to run ahead and do it my way.  As I write this I repent and turn to the gracious Lord and ask His forgiveness.  Because of Who He is and what He did on the cross, I can rejoice that He has forgiven me and I am empowered to walk with Him.

Because I have experienced the Lord’s perfect peace for periods and seasons in my life, I have identified a few primary keys to achieving this.  They are the tools He has given us to keep our minds steadfast on Him.

1) Read, study, mark, and obey the Word of God.  God has chosen to reveal Himself through the bible.  This is the chief means of understanding His will for us.  It is the instrument He gives us to weigh our thoughts and concerns against.  The writer of Hebrews under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit gave us this admonition.  “For the Word of God is alive and active.  Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” Hebrews 4:12.

2) Become engaged in a local church.  We are made to be connected to one another in the body of faith.  In fact God has created us to be members of His family and that family is the Church.  We need to have persons we can emulate and learn from within the church as well as people we are peers and friends with.  As we mature we will also become mentors and coaches of others who are younger in their faith.  For this to be a tool the Lord uses there are two characteristics that must exist.  First it must be a church that is passionate about Jesus and sharing the gospel.  Second it must be bible-based.

3) Consistently talk with God.  While many people understand that this is prayer, I specifically use the term talk with God because my experience is He wants to have a conversation with us.  Granted His side of the conversation is not usually in spoken words, but the Creator of the Universe is able to communicate to us… through His creation, in gentle impressions in our heart, through an appropriately timed comment by another, through just the right reading at just the right time – God is able and wants to be engaged in our lives.

The bottom line, Our heavenly Father wants us to experience Perfect Peace.  And Perfect Peace comes from minds that are steadfast on Him.  My desire is to get to this place all the time.  The bible talks about the “mind of Christ”.  Jesus and the Father were connected.  Even though Jesus took on humanity and lived among us for a time, He never moved out of the place of Perfect Peace.  He lived in intimacy with the Father.  He invites us to do the same.  Join me in this endeavor, won’t you!

May God’s peace overwhelm and fill you today as you seek to maintain a mind that is steadfast on Him.

 

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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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Party Animal?

Posted in Jesus Christ, tagged , , , , , , , , , on April 23, 2012| 2 Comments »

We attended a beautiful and fun wedding this weekend.  By the way, May God richly bless your marriage Ryan and Jessica.  Make God first in your marriage and He will make it the most enriching and fulfilling experience you can imagine.

As we left the wedding party I was struck with the thought – “That’s the setting Jesus often joined.”  His first miracle recorded in John 2:1-11 was at a wedding in Cana.  At that wedding the party was obviously pretty big as the wine gave out early in the evening.  Jesus’ mother noticed and pointed it out to Jesus, drawing Him into the host’s dilemma.  To run out of wine would be a big disgrace.  Jesus responded by turning water into wine… between 120 – 180 gallons of it.  Thus ensuring many more wedding invitations in the future.

This isn’t the only party Jesus attends in the three years of His earthly ministry.  In fact as time goes on Jesus shows up in so many party situations that His detractors began deriding Him for being a “friend of sinners”.  We know that on a couple of occasions Jesus taught thousands at a time out in the open fields away from the towns.  In terms of popularity He was an ancient world rock star.  He was as comfortable seated at a friend’s wedding as He was in the pulpit of the synagogue.  Jesus went wherever there were people in need and He offered them life and hope.

Jesus is unique in many ways, but in the context of today’s discussion one aspect strikes me as particularly profound.  Jesus entered so many different life situations and yet He was without sin.  He lived a perfect, sinless life.  This was essential so that when He died on the cross He was able to be the perfect, sinless sacrifice for our sin.  If He had sinned at any time, then His death upon the cross would have been just punishment for His own sin.  As it was, the plan He and the Father had devised was that Jesus would live a life like all of us, but without sin so that He would be able to be our substitute when God’s rightous judgement punished sin.

Jesus did not come for just the righteous.  Nor did He come for just the Jewish people although He came to and for them too.  He did not come for just the poor and needy, although they were definitely on His list.  Jesus did not come just for the rich, affluent, and powerful although it’s obvious that He came for  them.  He was in the midst of every one of these groups in party and dinner settings.  In all cases He shared words of life that spoke to the group and to individuals.  In many cases He also performed miracles which both met real needs and spoke of God’s real and present power.

As I look through the scripture there is only one group that really struggled to like Jesus – the religious leaders.  Jesus never condoned sin, but He always treated sinners with gentleness and compassion… except for religious sin.  In fact the times we see Jesus angry, and yes He got quite angry, was in confronting sin within the religious leadership.  Greed, pride, hypocrisy were all sins that Jesus confronted head on.  Interestingly even many of these rebukes were delivered in private parties in the homes of the religious leaders.  Jesus was just too amazing a person to ignore.

Now some might point to Jesus’s divinity as the reason He did not sin.  While I know that He was fully God, Philippians says He emptied Himself of all the privileges His divinity might give Him and He became fully human.  He was tempted in every way as we are and yet He was without sin.  So as Jesus entered all these situations which held many temptations, He was not immune to their allure.  He did not fall to them though.  Jesus spent time alone with His Father… consistently… intimately… frequently.  This was the source of His power over sin.  And this same source of strength is available to all who call upon Him and rely upon the Lord God.  We’ll talk about this more in a later post.

The children’s song – “Jesus loves me this I know, for the bible tells me so” is absolutely true.  Jesus’ engagement with people in any and all situations shouts that loud and clear.  Was Jesus a Party Animal?  Jesus was (and still is) a lover of people and if that requires entering a raucous wedding party, a gay bar, or a high brow dinner party to share the gospel and save a soul He will.  Since we are His hands and feet today, then we must listen to His voice and follow the prompting of His Holy Spirit in this.  Jesus example was to enter places fraught with darkness and sin, yet He carried light, love, and faithfulness to God as He went.  He touched lives, He spoke life, He gave hope.  He expects us to do the same.

Love you all.  Grace and peace to you in the Name of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

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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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Conversion?

Posted in God, Jesus Christ, Prayer, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 9, 2012| Leave a Comment »

I mentioned to a loved one recently that I was so thankful for the conversion of our oldest daughter.  They got this bewildered look and said, “Conversion?  What did she convert to?”  When I said, “To Christianity”.  He said, “But wasn’t she already a Christian?”

If you had asked her for a religious preference she would have put down Christian.  She could have recited some bible verses for you.  She would even tell you that Jesus was God’s Son and that He died for the sins of the world.  But was He Lord of her life, I know she would tell us no, he was not Lord of her life.  And this makes all the difference.

Judas was one of the 12 persons closest to Jesus.  From the hundreds of followers Jesus selected just 12 to become His disciples.  These men were given intimate access to Him for 3 years as He healed, taught, traveled, and preached across Israel.  Judas knew Jesus personally… closely.  Judas was committed to the cause.  He had given Jesus his life.  But, he had not given Jesus his heart.

There is a school of thought that Judas’ betrayal of Jesus was based upon a misguided attempt by Judas to “force Jesus hand” to make Him declare Himself king.  The main thinking is that Judas was simply a greedy manipulator that Jesus selected knowing he would be a willing pawn in satan’s plan to have Him killed.  Either way, Judas chose his own way rather than to put his whole trust in Jesus.  At this crucial point in history his heart guided him to forsake an intimate life with Jesus and the family of God to do his own thing.

Although everyone’s story is unique, our daughter’s conversion has the characteristics that define a heart surrender to Jesus.

  • She had lived her life following her own rules for a long time, long enough to know that it didn’t fulfill her.
  • She recognized that there was something more, a sense of joy and peace that some people possessed that she couldn’t seem to attain.  She could do happiness and laughter, but these were always for the short-term.
  • She recognized that she did some things that broke even her own rules.  And that she broke God’s rules even more.
  • She came to a point of a broken heart.  She wanted to be a better person.
  • She trusted God.  She asked Him to help her.  She surrendered her heart to Him.
  • He entered her life and made her a “new creation”.
  • The transformation on the inside began immediately and it is visible on the outside as well.
  • She had worn a lot of masks and her life contained a good bit of lies and half-truths.  Part of the transformation is that she and God are identifying and discarding these.  This process, which the bible calls sanctification, is a life-long activity.
  • Today she is practicing reconciliation on a consistent basis.
  • She has given up several habits that were either harmful to her and others or were simply not helpful to growing in her new life in Christ.
  • She and her husband are closer than they ever have been as they are growing together.
  • She is devouring the bible and the Holy Spirit is opening her mind to the truth it contains.

I could go on, but the point is established – there is a fundamental difference between knowing about Jesus and knowing Jesus.  When you know Jesus, His love captures you and your heart is His.  You can know about Jesus and not experience the life-change that comes from a conversion experience.

On Easter 2000 years ago, Jesus emerged from the grave alive.  He is the living Lord.  No one else has ever died for you and risen.  Since He is alive, He is available to meet and talk with you.  It is His desire to meet with you.  To talk with you.  To help you with your needs.  To show you the right path.  To be your friend first.  But to also be your Lord.

Everyone has gods that they serve.  Some are obviously bad for us.  Others, like religion, promise to help us please God.  Religion is man’s attempt to reach God.  But God came to us.  He wants relationship, not religion.  Religion is like the workaholic father who buys his wife and kids all the stuff they want but does not invest time with them face-to-face.  Stuff and activity on their behalf is not what is needed.  Intimacy… time… relationship is what is important.  Religion can never substitute for relationship.  The best it can do is help give depth IF the relationship with God through Jesus already exists.  The worst it can do is kill people in the name of god.  More on this in another post.

God sent His Son, Jesus to live, die, and live again for you and for me.  Trust Him.  Seek Him.  Give Him your heart and you will KNOW that He is, that He loves you, and that He will live with you from now on.

If you want an intimate life with God speak to Him now.  You can pray this prayer.  You can be specific about where you miss the mark.  And about your needs.  He knows them already, but it helps us when we give them voice and share them with Him.

God, I come to you right now asking for your help.  I have run my life for so long and frankly I have made a mess of things so many times.  I am sorry for the times I have missed the mark.  I am sorry for the times I have sinned against you and others.  Please forgive me.  I turn away from my sin and I turn to you.  I want you in my life.  I want to be a new creation.  Thank you Jesus for hearing my prayer.  Thank you Lord for forgiving my sin.  Thank you Father for guiding my life from this moment on.  I give you my heart.  I accept your Lordship over every area of my life.  I give myself to you.  And it’s in the name of Jesus that I pray.  Amen.

If you prayed that prayer tell someone.  Tell me if you do not have any other believers around.  Just comment back to me.

Scripture to read – 2 Corinthians 5:17, Romans 5:1-5, Ephesians 2:1-10

God bless you today and always.

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When Wings Make Flight

Posted in Church, Holy Spirit, Prayer, tagged , , , on March 21, 2012| 4 Comments »

The most wonderous and perhaps the most hazardous period in a bird’s life is when it first learns to fly. Given wings by the Creator a bird is meant to fly. Yet in those first few days of flight a young bird is liable to find itself on the ground stranded and within reach of cats and other animals that are more likely to swallow it than help it back up into a tree.  New believers are a lot like those young birds.  Entering a life changing relationship with the Lord gives us wings and prompts us to desire flight.  But it is dangerous to believe we are ready for all the world, the flesh, and the devil are going to throw at us now that we are on God’s side opposing them.  We must realize that becoming a believer in Jesus Christ means we are at war.  The verse, “the devil prowls like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour” certainly applies and new believers are his particular target.  Knowing this to be true and having a daughter who is enthusiastically embracing her newfound faith, I thought it would be appropriate to share a few keys that I have learned about flying the flight God created us to fly.

As in many list of “To Do’s” the following will be categorized into what I understand are 1) Must Do, 2) Ought to Do, and 3) Nice to Do.  I encourage you to ask the Lord to highlight to you which of these you need to prioritize more or less.

MUST DO

1) Get an easy to understand bible and dive in.  I read several translations, but I recommend getting one that has a fair amount of scholarship behind it like the NIV or NASB.  While all the bible is “God-breathed” (See 2 Tim 3:16) the gospels are the best place to start.  Get to know Jesus, our Saviour and Lord.  After the Gospels I would move through the New Testament before tackling large portions of the Old Testament.  I have gone through Psalms and Proverbs a number of times reading small sections each day with longer readings from the New Testament. 

2) Since the bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit ask the Holy Spirit to give you understanding as you read.  It is His story and He wants you to understand and apply it to your life.  Take time to think about what the Word of God is saying.  This time of meditating upon the Word should be intentional.  A time to quietly talk to God and listen for Him to speak through His Word is a vital element in our life.

3) Talk with God.  When we are His, God says He will never leave us or forsake us.  Take time to begin to converse with Him.  This will begin with our talking… most of the time.  But be aware that He will impress truths from the bible upon your heart.  That is one of the ways He communes with us.  There are many types of prayer: adoration where we simply glory in Who God is, supplication where we lay our needs before Him, intercession where we lift up the needs of others, confession where we open our hearts to God and pour out the dirty laundry of our lives and ask His forgiveness.  All of these have their time.  But every day set aside time to just talk with the Lord.  And whenever you think of Him offer up a word of thanks.

4) Find a local body of believers and join them.  The Church was God’s idea.  He calls the Church His bride.  Therefore we should joyfully seek out a faithful, bible-believing, gospel-living church and join.  As in all our decisions after we become believers we should ask Him to guide us.  Sadly not all churches are faithful or bible-believing, or gospel-living.  Steer clear of those churches.  The Lord wants you to be plugged in and nurtured so He will guide your steps.

5) Give.  Jesus is our model… He GAVE His life for us.  God is our model… He GAVE His only begotten Son.  We are encouraged to give over and over.  I suggest reading about giving and tithing then praying for God’s guidance in this area.  Jesus talked about money more than prayer.  I think it is because money and how we handle it are a much clearer indicator of the condition of our heart than whether we pray or not.  Prayer comes easily and in a way it is usually doesn’t cost much.  Tithing always costs us, but the growth of our faith is assured when we tithe trusting in God to provide.

OUGHT TO DO

7) Get plugged into a small group.  This may happen through your association with a local church, but if not then seek out a group of believers who share your faith and a lot of your interests.  If there is a co-worker, a neighbor, or friend who exemplifies the faith you want to have, ask them if they know of any small groups that might accept a new person.  As in seeking a church to join, pray for the Lord to help you land in the right place. 

8) Seek ways to minister to others.  I am not talking about immediately getting a guitar and beginning street evangelism.  I am saying take an inventory of your giftedness (and God has given everyone at least one gift and usually more than one) and offer it up to God.  The list of ways to minister is just about limitless.  To minister is to simply find ways to reach out and help others in Jesus name. 

9) There are 3 types of individuals that everyone should have in their life – a Paul, a Barnabas, and a Timothy or in other words a Mentor, a Friend and Peer, and a young protegé. 

Paul in the bible was a leader in the early church and wrote many of the New Testament epistles.  One of the characteristics of Paul’s life was that He took a few individuals under His wing and acted as a mentor to these younger believers.  So a Paul is a mature believer who can mentor you. 

Barnabas was a peer with Paul.  Barnabas was known as an encourager.  He acted as an intermediary in a personality clash between believers and helped bring reconciliation.  So a Barnabas is a friend and peer in the faith.

Timothy was one of the young men that Paul mentored.  He was following in Paul’s footsteps although he seemed to lack a lot of Paul’s confidence early on.  Two of the epistles are actually letters from Paul to Timothy where Paul exhorts Timothy in the work of the church.  Timothy is a young believer that you can pour into from what God has given you.

A word of caution here as I felt the Holy Spirit prompt me – these should be persons of the same sex as you.  If you are male these persons should be male and if you are female then they should be female.

10) Practice spiritual introspection.  Those are fancy words that simply mean you ask God to reveal things in your life that need to change and then, with His help, you change them.  If you are doing the things mentioned above; reading the Word, Praying, having Godly fellowship then these will come up sooner rather than later.  I was intentional about this early in my walk and there were several things that I realized did not fit with the new person that I had become.  The bible says we are a “new creation”.  It is incongruous to be a new creation and walk in the same old sin.  You will not know lasting peace until you go through this.  In reality you will still have deep-rooted things to address later as you mature, so you might as well get started early.

11) Ask God to fill you with His Holy Spirit.  This is closely related to the item above.  I would rather put this in the must do list, but…

I am a strong-willed person.  That can be positive and negative.  In the positive, when I commit to something I am going to fulfill my commitment.  In the negative, I can go good places that God did not intend for me to go.  I have realized that I must be submitted to God completely, even to the point of giving Him authority over my will.  When we are born again His Holy Spirit is placed within us.  However the Holy Spirit is a gentleman.  He does not dominate or dictate.  He moves and fills what we give over to Him.  I realized I wanted the Holy Spirit to fill all of me.  That is my continual prayer… God have your way in me completely.  Holy Spirit fill me completely.  He has transformed much of me and I anxiously await His continuing work in me.  I urge new believers to begin this transformation. 

NICE TO DO

12) Begin reading good literature.  CS Lewis is my favorite author.  There are outstanding thinkers and there are outstanding writers.  CS Lewis was one of the greatest of both.  There is a plethora of great things to read that edify the mind and spirit.  I encourage you to read deeply of the godly authors and classic literature.

13) Begin listening to uplifting music.  There is an area of our soul that music touches that talks, sermons, and writings can’t quite reach.  Music that glorifies God is a balm that soothes the spirit.  While my personal preference is contemporary christian music, there is much that does not specifically fall under that genre that can still be refreshing and uplifting.  For both of these two follow the admonition of Philippians 4:8, “Fix your thought on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable.  This about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.”

14) Get fit.  The bible says our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit.  We should treat that temple as something special.  Diet, exercise, and getting out of addictive and hurtful habits should become our goal.  While this may have the same end result physically as getting in shape for vanity reasons, it is radically different.  We don’t look good for others to admire.  We are fit because we are made in God’s image and we are special to Him.

15) Work diligently.  As Christians we reflect on our Lord.  If we are poor workers then we give people a bad impression of the Lord.  Paul admonishes us to “work as unto the Lord.”  We should be the top performers where we work because we have reasons to have a great attitude, we are empowered by God’s Holy Spirit, and we know that God’s got our back.

These are 15 areas that I have found as helpful in my walk with Christ.  Even as I wrap up I can think of other helpful steps, but for now these will do.  Please send comments with the steps that you found most needful when you first came to faith in Jesus.  I would love to hear from you.

Take care and God Bless.

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Noblesse Oblige

Posted in Jesus Christ, Responsibility, Uncategorized, tagged , on March 9, 2012| 3 Comments »

The phrase Noblesse Oblige has been running through my mind for quite some time now. It struck me as I listened to a commentary yesterday about a study coming out of UC Berkley that purported that rich persons are more unethical than poor people.  While there were some obvious flaws and a degree of bias in the study, it does effectively raise the question of the personal responsibility we each have.

I looked up the term Noblesse Oblige in Wikipedia and I found that it is of French origin and it simply means that with nobility comes responsibility. I was raised to believe that we have an obligation to do for others less fortunate than ourselves. In the home where I was raised this did not manifest itself as a political ideology but rather a personal responsibility. It was to be carried out at least partly in thankful response to God’s provision for us.

In Hebrews the people of God are called a royal priesthood and a holy nation.  As a child of God we are adopted into God’s family.  Children of kings are princes and princesses.  Since God is the King of kings we His children are princes and princesses of the most high king.  We are royalty.  But this is not an honor to be crowed about, but rather a responsibility to be lived out.  Rather than a status to become puffed up and proud about this should provoke a response of humility and gratitude.  All the resources of heaven are at the disposal of God’s children, but they are not there solely for our benefit and consumption, but so that we can further God’s kingdom.  We are blessed to be a blessing.

I think a lot about the legacy I am leaving my children.  My parents were able to provide more for my siblings and me than their parents provided for them.  There is no condemnation of my grandparents in this but the simple recognition that coming out of the depression my grandparents had little, so their opportunity to provide was diminished.  My parents trained us that we in turn were to provide appropriately for our children when our time came.  But that provision carried within it the clear mandate of responsibility to others beyond our children.

While I am fortunate that I can look to the pattern my parents set not everyone has the good fortune to have the role models in the home that I had.  However we all do have Jesus, the penultimate role model that we can look to.  Jesus was the Son of God and yet He condescended to live among us as one of us.  His time here on earth was a model of obedience to His father and His Father.  And the expression of that obedience was to always do the Father’s will in serving, helping, teaching, and ministering to others.  A quick scan through the gospels reveals that Jesus helped rich and poor alike.  All social classes were drawn to Him.

Even though I would postulate that the religious and political elite of the day were generally antagonistic toward Him, Jesus still reached out and ministered to those who would listen.  Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea were members of the Sanhedrin who could easily have gone with their religious leaders, but they followed Jesus instead.  And even in His final hours Jesus was not hostile to the leaders who were condemning Him.  He spoke the truth and then offered up His life as a sacrifice for them as well as for the admiring followers.

The practical application of Noblesse Oblige falls to us today.  As children of the King we are to further God’s work of redemption in this fallen world.  Kindness, courtesy, and treating others with respect are the basic fundamentals we must exhibit.  Noblesse Oblige is as simple as listening to God’s voice and responding when He gives us a task or reveals a need that we can address.  Serving others like Jesus did is a wonderful privilege and holy obligation that is ours as believers.

Be blessed in your service to our Father and unto those He puts in your path today.

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