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Posts Tagged ‘Transformation’

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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Promises, Promises.

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on April 13, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Promises, promises, are you a promise maker?
Promises, promises, don’t be a promise breaker.

I have learned that the only way to not be a promise breaker is to never make promises. I would like to say that extenuating circumstances are the reason promises get broken, but at the best that would only be half-true. Whether we intend to or not, when we make promises we put our reputation on the line and make ourselves vulnerable for failing the trust of others. Yet making promises is a part of our lives. I suspect that most persons make between 1 – 10 promises everyday. Some are small… “Come straight in and do you homework.” “I will Mom.” while others are life altering… “Do you Dan take Lisa to be your lawful wedded wife… to cherish… til death do you part?” “I do”. Every time we sign a credit card slip we are promising we are going to pay the credit card company back (plus interest if we don’t pay back immediately.)

To say that our society functions on a foundation of trust comprised of thousands upon thousands of promises is not a stretch. So how are we doing? A building is only as good as its foundation, so how are we doing? An honest assessment has to say we are not doing very well. With divorce at over 50% of marriages, personal and business bankruptcies skyrocketing, and 40% of all children raised with no Dad in the picture we are not doing very well keeping our promises. So if promises are essential and commonplace, but keeping promises is apparently becoming harder – what are we to do?  What are the consequences? Should we be worried? What can be done about it?

My first comment about never making promises was obviously a bit tongue in check. Promises are essential. Every agreement includes within it a promise usually more than one promise. Lawyers exist to “help” interpret promises and see that promises are adhered to. I was raised in the day when a person’s word was his bond. I still live by this belief and I find many people who would like to, but they have been burned by others to whom a promise is superficial chatter and not a binding agreement. Even though I believe a promise is sacred, honesty demands that I admit I have said things that I fully intended to fulfill which have not come to pass. I want to hike around Mt Ranier with my youngest son and I have told him we would, but time is getting on and we have not made the trip. While technically not a promise broken since there is still time, it is definitely not a promise fulfilled.

I saw a political commercial last night which showed a candidate making many promises in the last election and then it showed him breaking those very promises.  It was obvious that the person made promises that they did not keep. If the most powerful people in the world struggle to keep their promises, then what shape are we really in? Well if our hope, trust, and faith are in them, then we are in pretty dismal shape.

Fortunately there is a higher authority that we can and should look to. And His track record on promises is perfect. He never fails to keep His promises. The bible says that it is impossible for God to lie. A broken promise is at its heart a lie. Since God cannot lie, He cannot break a promise. I have found this to be true as have millions of others throughout history. God is a promise maker AND a promise keeper.

God’s first promise to me was “Dan, I will never leave you or forsake you.” And that has been true. God has always shown up. In the most difficult times of my life He has been tangibly present. Sometimes it is through the extended arms of His children. At others it is through a perfectly timed verse. Sometimes it is a gentle peace within my spirit. The point is for 28 years God has kept His promise and I know He always will.  While this promise was whispered to me when He brought me to Himself, this is a promise He offers to each and every one of us if we but put our trust in Him.

Now it is important to mention something God does not promise.  He does not promise a life free from pain, difficulties, challenges.  No, these are a part of life that we will from time to time have to walk through.  But what we can hold on to are specific promises God has given for us at these times.  From Isaiah 43 we see God promising that when floods threaten to overwhelm His people He will be with them.  When fire is upon them, He will cause them to walk through and not be burned.  It does not say we won’t have times that threaten us and cause us pain, but it does say He will carry us through.

Now I have to say I have learned that “carrying through” includes two important considerations.  First, is a relationship with Him.  God will respect our decision to keep Him at arm’s length, but that makes His help less tangible.  It’s not His decision, but ours that makes this so.  (And people often blame Him for this?)  Second, some of His promises have a complete fulfillment in the eternal perspective.  I have a friend whose son was diagnosed with leukemia.  He fought it bravely and experienced a couple of years of remission.  The disease returned and an auto-marrow transplant was determined to be his best option so this is the path they took.  During the window of time immediately after the transplant the patient is extremely susceptible to any illness.  My friend’s son caught something and went downhill until he finally went into a coma.  For 40 days we prayed for Chase.  Our focus was upon Chase getting better and coming out of the coma.  For 30 days I prayed for this, but as time and prayer continued with little change in Chase, I began to realize that God was speaking something different into my spirit than what I was praying.  I began to see God revealing a bigger perspective – an eternal perspective to my prayer for Chase and his family.  The last days of Chase’s life here were more peaceful for Chase and his family because they recognized that God was walking with them in the working out of His will.  Chase’s life and death led to others being reconciled to God and being inspired to live a life of faith.

We are called to let Christ reign in our lives.  As His Holy Spirit resides in us and we cooperate with His transforming work, we become more and more like Him.  We become promise makers.  I started off by saying that the only way I have found not to break a promise is to not make a promise.  A more accurate statement would be to become so surrendered to God that we only make promises He prompts us to make, and become even more surrendered to Him to allow Him to help us keep them.

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Approaching Holy Week

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on March 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Only a small percentage of us approach the end of our earthly life with the clear-sighted focus that Jesus did.  Jesus came to this earth on purpose and with a purpose.  The culmination of that purpose was found in Holy Week.  Holy week is the pivotal week in human history and Easter morning is the crux of it all.  Sadly to many are not aware of the wonder of this glorious day or they are so distracted that they fail to prepare for it and miss the precious gift that it offers.  Today I offer a few tips to make the most of Holy Week.

First, if you are not aware, Jesus stands alone as unique among all persons who have ever lived.  Jesus was killed by the ancient Roman custom of crucifixion.  He was confirmed dead and put into the tomb owned by a Jewish leader, Joseph of Arimathea.  Jesus did not stay in the tomb though.  God raised Him up to life after three days.  This really happened.  It was foretold ahead of time by prophets.  Jesus said it would happen.  And literally hundreds of witnesses saw Jesus alive after His resurrection.  Jesus is the only person who has ever lived, died, and lived again in their earthly body.

There are points that critics bring up to try to dispute the fact of Jesus resurrection.  They all need a conspiracy of some sort to show why Jesus body has never been found.  Every single theory falls flat though when the evidence is analyzed.  In his book, Born Again, Chuck Colson who was a member of President Richard Nixon’s inner team explains how he was convinced that Jesus was resurrected.  President Nixon resigned in disgrace when it was learned that he knew about efforts to coverup involvement in certain illegal political activities.  Chuck Colson was in the small group who knew about this.  Chuck was among those that served prison time for their role in the coverup.  The fact that a small group of people faithfully committed to one of the most powerful persons in the world at that time couldn’t keep a secret was very telling.  Colson then draws a parallel to the 12 apostles, Jesus’ inner circle.  These men who were supposed conspirators in foisting the Jesus is Alive story all the while knowing they had stolen His body.  The fact that these 12 men went throughout the world spreading the story of Jesus resurrection.  The final end of 11 of the 12 was martyrdom.  They were executed for their faith and the message they proclaimed.  This is very telling.  A person may, and I emphasize may, die for something they strongly believe to be true.  But to die for something you know to be a lie, it doesn’t happen.  And for all of them to die for a lie takes immeasurably more faith than to believe the wealth of evidence that says Jesus truly is alive.

So point one as we approach Holy Week is that Jesus is Alive.  This brings on the question – So what?  What does Jesus’ death and resurrection mean to me?  I mentioned before that Holy Week is the pivotal point in all of human history.  That is a huge statement, but I believe it to be true from both a sociological point of view and from a personal point of view.  I shared in one of my early posts about my conversion.  This speaks to how my life has been changed by Jesus.  My oldest daughter has recently found new life in Christ and she is writing about it in her blog growingthroughchrist.wordpress.com.  Since Jesus was raised from the dead, everything He said suddenly changes from good advice from a wise man, to words from God.  He is different from prophets.  Prophets occasionally spoke words from God.  They were still fully human and for that reason we can find prophets who make mistakes.  Jesus didn’t make mistakes.

Jesus was the sinless Son of God who came to earth with a very specific purpose.  He lived long enough to prove His deity.  He touched lives mainly within the Jewish people of that day.  But His primary purpose was culminated in Holy Week when He willingly offered Himself up as a sacrifice in our place.  Sin cannot go unpunished.  Sin separates us from God and if not atoned for, will keep us forever separate from God.  Jesus took our sin, my sin, upon Himself when He died on the cross.  Unless you have put your faith in Jesus, that sin is not atoned for.  I know that God works in our lives even before we come to faith.  Faith itself is a gift from God.  Faith is what happens when we trust God.

One last thing before I close for the day.  I have discussed Jesus with a number of people.  The one thing I have found is that no one has ever been able to refute the historical and logical conclusions of the evidence surrounding Jesus life and death.  I am an engineer.  I am wired to think in a logical way.  (Which at times drives my family to distraction.)  When based purely upon well researched evidence, a jury would have to say Jesus was resurrected from the dead.  (For excellent research on this topic read Josh McDowell’s Evidence that Demands a Verdict.) In many cases where I have had this discussion, the person I was speaking with chose to ignore the facts in deference to their own world view.  In most cases they held a belief that contrasted squarely with biblical teaching on moral law that they were not willing to give up.  In other words they chose to build a world view that allowed them to do what they wanted and not try to find truth and then go where truth led them.  I have seen this enough to understand the powerful persuasiveness of sin.  But I also know the incredible freedom and joy that I now have through my relationship with God.

This is my encouragement to you.  As you approach Holy Week meditate upon the resurrection.  See if God is speaking to you about a life decision.  Ask Him to give you faith to believe for your next step in a relationship with Him.  If you do not have a church home, check out NewSpring.cc on the internet.  I pray this will be the most amazing Easter you have ever experienced.  God bless you today.

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Prayer, Power to Transform

Posted in God Stories, Prayer, tagged , , , , on March 16, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Why do we pray?  The first time we pray is usually based upon our need and our inability to fulfill that need.  It is a cry for help not unlike an infant who can do nothing for themself and must have someone else tend to all their needs.  However just like that infant that grows and matures, so to our prayer, or more correctly our life, should grow and mature as we continue to live connected to God our heavenly Father.  I believe the most important purpose of prayer is not the fulfillment of our specific prayer needs, but transformation.  The consistent, progressive development of the mind of Christ.  2Corinthian 3:18 says, “And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”

Prayer is our on-going communication with God who is our Father.  For me the imagery of God as Father is full and rich as I was blessed with a wonderful dad who loved, taught, corrected, coached, and poured life into us all the while looking toward the day when I would be a man and father in my own right.  While not everyone is fortunate enough to have an earthly father who modeled traits that forshadowed our heavenly Father, that does not limit God.  The bible also says He is a friend who sticks closer than a brother and He is a wonderful counselor.  The point is that God is able to meet us wherever we are and relate to us in a manner that begins the transformation process inside us.  That process begins as we begin that conversation with Him called prayer.

Before going further I want to point out that I am not making light of the many other purposes of prayer such as intercession for the needs of others, prayer for guidance, prayers of praise and adoration, etc.  In fact I believe that all of these carry within them the ability to transform us and others.  There was a time when I was engaged in a focused period of prayer with 2 – 3 others for an hour early every morning.  One day after leaving the Prayer Tower and going to work I was flushed with the joy that comes from spending quality time with the Father and other believers.  A little later that morning one of the admin assistants, Chris, asked me if I knew a young man who had worked at the mill.  It turns out the young man, Tim, had felt called to missions and was in Singapore with his new wife and they had just found out he had lukemia with no money and few good options.  I immediately said I didn’t know Tim, but I knew Tim’s Father and that we should go to Him and ask for Him to heal Tim.  We prayed right there and I was totally confident that God heard.  A few weeks later Chris stopped me and told me Tim had gotten to the Philipines and they were planning a procedure which among other things meant he would never be able to have children.  Well we prayed again including asking that the Lord would not make Tim unable to father children.  God answered those prayers over time.  Tim was healed, he was not sterile, he is a father now, and he continues to minister.  I never met Tim personally and I know my prayer was joined with many others in interceding for this young man and his wife.  However I know this on-going prayer with the Father helped build faith for me, for Chris, and for Tim and his family.

I have heard people say that God answers prayer with a “Yes”, a “No”, or “Wait”.  I know for a while I suscribed to this simplified explanation and on a rudimentary level that can be applied.  However this simplification of prayer tends to reinforce a picture of God as Santa Claus… “Yes, here is your present”, “No, this is not your present”, or “Wait it’s not your turn for a present”.  In our early days of walking with Him God may seem more like Santa – a distant, benevolent giver of gifts, but in reality He is so much more.  And He wants us to become so much more than consumers of gifts.  His goal is that we become obediant loving children who are being changed into the likeness of His Son, Jesus.

While yes, no, and wait may apply it is always accompanied with a conversation – if we are still and take time to listen.  I’ve just had a major decision come up.  I have been praying for guidance and asking a few close friends to join with me in seeking God’s will.  Well the answer came, but it was wrapped in a conversation with the One who loves me more than I can even imagine.  While I am happy to have a clear answer, my joy is even greater that I am a child of God Who is intimately involved in my life.  And even better He is continuously working in my life to transform me.  I know I am still far from where God is taking me.  Those who know me well can still see plenty of work for God to do, but He is making progress.  And so it is with all of us.  God wants to work in us, He wants to converse with us.  He wants to love us in tangible ways that we can see, feel, and hear.

I encourage you to take time to just tell God what’s on your heart today.  He already knows but He likes to hear it from you.  As you pour this out read His word and listen for His voice.  He will speak life into you.  He will transform your places of pain into places of victory because He loves you!

Be blessed and be a blessing.

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