Some political leaders have indicated that the current financial crisis should not be wasted. I could not agree more. But, with a very different purpose and outcome.
I am reminded of Joseph and his response to his brothers.
Genesis 50:19-21
"But Joseph said to them, "Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God? You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.
So then, don't be afraid. I will provide for you and your children." And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them."
I believe these words apply to us today. In times of uncertainty, the difficultly and stress of losing a job or any other type of financial pressure can cause us to react in several different ways.
It is very easy to allow the news of the day or the stock market drop to influence our moods and interactions with our children. They see us in these times just as when all is "good." They are observing our walk, seeing how we interact with life. Whether they realize it or not, they are checking to see if we live what we tell them. As a father and as someone who ministers to children, I am humbled by my responsibility to them.
It should not take a "crisis" to drive us to our knees. It should not take the pressure of the economy to force us into reaching out to grasp his hand. Or in making us pursue the relationship with him (that will calm our internal storm) so we can look into their eyes... and they can see us live what we say. But, often it does and thus becomes our opportunity of crisis.
So, now we are living and facing a financial turning point in this country. Of course, it is really much deeper than money issues, but that is a different topic. Here is where the agreement with the politicians comes in. We do have an opportunity in this crisis. We as parents and individuals can reach out and let God give us the words and the resolve to live as an example to the next generation. We take hope in the words that Joseph spoke "but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives." Make no mistake, we are fighting for our children.
This crisis is an opportunity to save many lives. Our children's lives.
Definition: opportunity
noun ( pl. -ties)
a set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something
As I gather my family in the evening before bedtime to pray. I understand this is another opportunity to show them the faith and trust in God they need in their own lives. As we walk down the daily path of our life, we should be strengthened and do something that will save ourselves and our children.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
Theory of Theology
Luke 17:20-21
Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, "The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, 'here it is' or 'there it is', because the kingdom of God is within you."
The word "cult", is also the root word of the word "culture", the thing in which we grow. A cultic mindset is determined by what ENVIRONMENT you have grown up in. When people have questioned individuals who had belonged to cultic groups, those questioned routinely deny that their belief system could be wrong or cultic. The word of the Lord tells us that every man's ways are right in his own eyes, in other words, our nature will allow us to justify anything we would like to believe about our intentions.
The Pharisees were absolutely sure that they were right, and Jesus was wrong. They had invested their entire lives in their legalistic pursuit of religiosity, and they could not relinquish their deeply held rules and regulations, that they believed were necessary for salvation, and pleasing to God. These Pharisees were no dummies; they had disciplined themselves to be able to quote entire portions of the Mosaic law.....disciplined themselves to not only the actual requirements of the word of God, but also to the intricate teachings that their separated sect had developed into traditions that they had begun to refer to as "The Fence". Jesus telling them that the kingdom of God would not come from their careful observance of rules and regulations, or their exact directives to pursue this way or that, cut deeply into this cultic mindset. No wonder that their minds that said that they loved God, began to devise a way to kill God with us.
Jesus makes it so simple.......men make it so hard. This is part of the curse of Adam: We now think we know the difference between good and evil. Religious people don't intend to pursue cultic mindsets.....but cultic mindsets always pursue them......and us. God has invested his greatest gift, Jesus, as a final sacrifice for our sin-state. God in fact, declared you and I as recipients of grace and mercy before you and I were ever born. Our fleshly nature never stops it's pursuit of supremacy, as Christians we declare BY FAITH, that we are saved, but our flesh does not approve! We will always be tempted to earn our salvation by our correctness, as seen by ourselves, but we must overcome this selfish lack of faith by trusting in the finished work of Christ.
The problem with our theologies, is that they are ALL theories. Theories are not all wrong.....some are more correct than others........some are horrible. Our job as Christians is to determine the essence of following Christ, not to heap on people a hopeless, endless, burden of theories, that undermine the BASIC, SIMPLE, FAITH in Jesus Christ as our ONLY savior! To many so-called Christians, it is INSULTING to them that all you have to do is believe on Jesus as your savior in order to receive God's salvation. It couldn't be that simple, could it? "What about all the things I had to do to be saved", they say! "How can you attain so easily, what I have had to work to achieve", they angrily proclaim!
Our fleshly pursuit of theologies, has birthed a pecking order of sorts......and rightly so. Like I said, some theories are better than others, but I don't base my salvation on a theory of theology, I can only claim salvation because of the sacrifice of one man.....on a cross.....bleeding his last drop of blood for me. Jesus, as the mercy and grace of a righteous God, is the only thing I can boast about, everything I do as a Christian is BECAUSE I am saved by the blood of Jesus......and that ain't no theory.
Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, "The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, 'here it is' or 'there it is', because the kingdom of God is within you."
The word "cult", is also the root word of the word "culture", the thing in which we grow. A cultic mindset is determined by what ENVIRONMENT you have grown up in. When people have questioned individuals who had belonged to cultic groups, those questioned routinely deny that their belief system could be wrong or cultic. The word of the Lord tells us that every man's ways are right in his own eyes, in other words, our nature will allow us to justify anything we would like to believe about our intentions.
The Pharisees were absolutely sure that they were right, and Jesus was wrong. They had invested their entire lives in their legalistic pursuit of religiosity, and they could not relinquish their deeply held rules and regulations, that they believed were necessary for salvation, and pleasing to God. These Pharisees were no dummies; they had disciplined themselves to be able to quote entire portions of the Mosaic law.....disciplined themselves to not only the actual requirements of the word of God, but also to the intricate teachings that their separated sect had developed into traditions that they had begun to refer to as "The Fence". Jesus telling them that the kingdom of God would not come from their careful observance of rules and regulations, or their exact directives to pursue this way or that, cut deeply into this cultic mindset. No wonder that their minds that said that they loved God, began to devise a way to kill God with us.
Jesus makes it so simple.......men make it so hard. This is part of the curse of Adam: We now think we know the difference between good and evil. Religious people don't intend to pursue cultic mindsets.....but cultic mindsets always pursue them......and us. God has invested his greatest gift, Jesus, as a final sacrifice for our sin-state. God in fact, declared you and I as recipients of grace and mercy before you and I were ever born. Our fleshly nature never stops it's pursuit of supremacy, as Christians we declare BY FAITH, that we are saved, but our flesh does not approve! We will always be tempted to earn our salvation by our correctness, as seen by ourselves, but we must overcome this selfish lack of faith by trusting in the finished work of Christ.
The problem with our theologies, is that they are ALL theories. Theories are not all wrong.....some are more correct than others........some are horrible. Our job as Christians is to determine the essence of following Christ, not to heap on people a hopeless, endless, burden of theories, that undermine the BASIC, SIMPLE, FAITH in Jesus Christ as our ONLY savior! To many so-called Christians, it is INSULTING to them that all you have to do is believe on Jesus as your savior in order to receive God's salvation. It couldn't be that simple, could it? "What about all the things I had to do to be saved", they say! "How can you attain so easily, what I have had to work to achieve", they angrily proclaim!
Our fleshly pursuit of theologies, has birthed a pecking order of sorts......and rightly so. Like I said, some theories are better than others, but I don't base my salvation on a theory of theology, I can only claim salvation because of the sacrifice of one man.....on a cross.....bleeding his last drop of blood for me. Jesus, as the mercy and grace of a righteous God, is the only thing I can boast about, everything I do as a Christian is BECAUSE I am saved by the blood of Jesus......and that ain't no theory.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
The beginning of the change
If you close your eyes......you can start to see it, all that has been foretold is even now upon us; even the great and terrible day of the Lord.
All is now in place, all is now in order: The enemy has marshaled his troops onto the battlefield of the minds of men, and the first clashes between the people of God and the minions of hell have become apparent. Sunday morning, in a small town in Illinois, people drove to church under the threat of heavy thunderstorms and tornado activity, only to be witnesses to the storm inside that would take the life of a pastor, wound two more, and traumatize hundreds of others.
The people in the pews watched as if at a Broadway play....mesmerized.....curious.....interested.... as a lone individual began to walk up towards the platform, and began to engage the pastor in conversation, mere moments before he pulled his semi-automatic 45 handgun, and began to fire at the pastor, who attempted to deflect the incoming bullets with his Bible. The people, afterwards, tell their thoughts of thinking that the air was filled with confetti, as the bullets slammed into the Bible, pushing out paper from Genesis to Revelation, as they sped toward their intended target. Two men, out of hundreds of those available, rushed to apprehend the crazed gunman as his semi-automatic jammed after the fourth shot. There they struggled with him as he drew a knife, stabbing himself and those two brave men; one seriously.
I guess we could remedy the situation by buying bigger, armor-plated Bibles, as my cousin jokingly responded to my brother, but we are in a struggle that has now begun. It is bigger than one crazy man who had a bad day. It is bigger than our religious soap operas that masquerade as the worship of the Almighty God. Bigger than the competitive gimmicks that ministries use to fill their churches with people JUST to entertain with a moral lesson. This is where the sons of God are revealed: As creation and the world observe, literally crying out for SOMEONE to arise and give direction out of this mess, BRAVE MEN AND WOMEN DECLARE THAT THEIR LIVES ARE OVER, AND THEY RUN TOWARD THE ENEMY OF THE HOUR!
Is your life OVER? Have you counted ALL as lost, but your PURPOSE? The reason you live..... the thing in Jesus that you were created for, this very hour, is now upon you. Will you run to the battle, or sit in your seat.....observing the skit.....drinking your cafe mocha latte.....texting your golf buddy.....generally "loving" Jesus, but SPECIFICALLY doing nothing? If you don't know what I mean, you're in the wrong church. If you do know what I mean; Welcome to the beginning of the CHANGE.
All is now in place, all is now in order: The enemy has marshaled his troops onto the battlefield of the minds of men, and the first clashes between the people of God and the minions of hell have become apparent. Sunday morning, in a small town in Illinois, people drove to church under the threat of heavy thunderstorms and tornado activity, only to be witnesses to the storm inside that would take the life of a pastor, wound two more, and traumatize hundreds of others.
The people in the pews watched as if at a Broadway play....mesmerized.....curious.....interested.... as a lone individual began to walk up towards the platform, and began to engage the pastor in conversation, mere moments before he pulled his semi-automatic 45 handgun, and began to fire at the pastor, who attempted to deflect the incoming bullets with his Bible. The people, afterwards, tell their thoughts of thinking that the air was filled with confetti, as the bullets slammed into the Bible, pushing out paper from Genesis to Revelation, as they sped toward their intended target. Two men, out of hundreds of those available, rushed to apprehend the crazed gunman as his semi-automatic jammed after the fourth shot. There they struggled with him as he drew a knife, stabbing himself and those two brave men; one seriously.
I guess we could remedy the situation by buying bigger, armor-plated Bibles, as my cousin jokingly responded to my brother, but we are in a struggle that has now begun. It is bigger than one crazy man who had a bad day. It is bigger than our religious soap operas that masquerade as the worship of the Almighty God. Bigger than the competitive gimmicks that ministries use to fill their churches with people JUST to entertain with a moral lesson. This is where the sons of God are revealed: As creation and the world observe, literally crying out for SOMEONE to arise and give direction out of this mess, BRAVE MEN AND WOMEN DECLARE THAT THEIR LIVES ARE OVER, AND THEY RUN TOWARD THE ENEMY OF THE HOUR!
Is your life OVER? Have you counted ALL as lost, but your PURPOSE? The reason you live..... the thing in Jesus that you were created for, this very hour, is now upon you. Will you run to the battle, or sit in your seat.....observing the skit.....drinking your cafe mocha latte.....texting your golf buddy.....generally "loving" Jesus, but SPECIFICALLY doing nothing? If you don't know what I mean, you're in the wrong church. If you do know what I mean; Welcome to the beginning of the CHANGE.
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