everything IS spiritual

I have been reading all the recent news articles about Rob Bell's interview with Oprah, a woman whom I consider to be the epitome of most-modern hedonism. Here is one such ARTICLE.

I had to watch the clips for myself, to hear Mr. Bell say that God's inerrant Word is not relevant for today's culture. Broke my heart to hear it.

This all brings to mind the months following Daddy's earthly passing, the long evenings and weekends of crying and grieving and missing and wishing. And then a friend, who was struggling with her own demons, loaned me her copy of Rob Bell's speech, "Everything is Spiritual."

I must have watched it close to a dozen times in the several months that I had it borrowed. Over and over.

The message spoke to my heart, plucking the out-of-tune strings of my emotions and tightening them up. It helped me to pull myself together, to know that God is good, even in the midst of the pain and sorrow.

Thank you, friend, for sharing it with me. You know who you are!

God can use anything...anyone...to perform His work whenever and wherever He wills. Even a blasphemer.

May God have mercy on Mr. Bell's soul and may he repent from the error of his ways.

a day to fill the cracks

I have been needing a day off. A day to fill up the cracks in my faith.
Off from work, from family stress, from financial pressure, from life in general.
Sometimes I get too entrenched in it all.

So today is that day. Actually, a combo of yesterday morning and today that I have managed to eek out. A day just to soak and read the Word and pray and worship and let the Holy Spirit heal my soul and minister to my spirit.

Chris Sligh on Pandoa provides the backdrop.
My old Living Bible as the Meat.
My laptop as an apply conduit of God's Grace.

I'm reading 1 Thessalonians and more.
Verses that speak to this weary heart...

1:5  "For when we brought you the Good News, it was not just meaningless chatter to you; no, you listened with great interest. What we told you produced a POWERFUL EFFECT upon you, for the Holy Spirit gave you great and full assurance that what we said was true. And you know that our very lives were further proof to you of the truth of our message."

1:10  "And they speak of how you are looking forward to the return of God's Son from heaven-Jesus, whom God brought back to life- and He is our only Savior from God's terrible anger against sin."

2:4  "For we speak as messengers from God, trusted by Him to tell the truth; we change His message not one bit to suit the taste of those who hear it; for we serve God alone, who examines our hearts' deepest thoughts."

2:7-8  "But we were as gentle among you as a mother feeding and caring for her own dear children. We loved you dearly- so dearly that we gave you not only God's message, but our own lives too."

2:11-12  "We talked to you as a father to his own children...pleading with you, encouraging you and even demanding that your daily lives should not embarrass God, but bring joy to Him who invited you into His Kingdom to share His glory. And we will never stop thanking God for this: that when we preached to you, you didn't think of the words that we spoke as being just our own, but you accepted what we said as the very Word of God- which, of course, it was- and it changed your lives when you believed it."

2:18  "...but Satan stopped us."

2:19-20  "For what is it we live for, that gives us hope and joy and is our proud reward and crown? It is you! Yes, you will bring us much joy as we stand together before our Lord Jesus Christ when He comes back again. For you are our trophy and joy."

3:2-3  "I decided...to send Timothy...to visit you to strengthen your faith  and encourage you, and to keep you from becoming fainthearted in all the troubles you were going through. (But of course you know that such troubles are a part of God's plan for us Christians..)."

3: 10  "For night and day we pray on and on for you, asking God to let us see you again, to fill up any little cracks there may yet be in your faith."

3:12  "And may the Lord make your love to grow and overflow to each other and to everyone else, just as our love does toward you. This will result in your hearts being made strong, sinless, and holy by God our Father, so that you may stand before Him guiltless on that day when our Lord Jesus Christ returns with all those who belong to Him."

God heals and speaks through His Word!

i never knew you

"Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down , and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.

Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them , I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity." -Matthew 7:17-23

I can't understand the spiritual audacity of people who use the name of God to excuse living lives of sin, wickedness, and iniquity. I try to wrap my head around it, and I can't. I want to yell and scream and cry and grieve for the state of the Church. The state of decay of the believers I know is disconcerting. And I know how we got here.

We have not sought the face of God.

We have not practiced "perseverance of the saints."

We have not worked out our faith.

We Christians are supposed to be running a race towards the mark of the HIGH CALLING of Christ. The Olympic trails have been running on tv all week. I see the track and field athletes, and hear their stories of dedication and sacrifice.

We as the Church are going to have to experience so much purification if Jesus is going to come back any time soon!

In the above passage, Jesus was speaking to the multitudes and specifically to His disciples. He was talking to the people who were closest to Him.

I want to be one of those whose ears are open and heart is set to obey.

I don't want my life's works to be burnt up. If "wonderful works" can be counted as naught, that is a serious deal to consider.
Seriously.

"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." -Philippians 2:12

faith building

Jim Mather posts and blogs some of the most challenging thoughts of any man that I know personally. Here are some thoughts he posted this past month...God has recently been rocking my spiritual world!

People with a real and dynamic faith should not only embrace change...
we need to anticipate it and plan for it.

When we resist change we ignore the spiritual realities of life.
At the center of the universe is a spiritual being...God.
God has created not a static universe but an ever expanding reality.

When we cry out to God and he "imprints" our hearts and minds with a vision and plan we MUST MOVE with him into his future, the only secure place on the planet.

As my faith is stretched in this growing time, I embrace it as a runner in the Race to the finish!

post-Christmas reflections

"...for it is good to be children sometimes, 

and never better than at Christmas, 

when its mighty Founder was a child himself."

~Charles Dickens

I showed the film "The Nativity" to my students at school over this last month. I watched most of it with them, to remind myself of the Advent of the Son of God coming to our Earth, His cradle, as a babe. The humanity and Jewishness of Mary (Myriam in Hebrew) and Joseph stood out to me. The search of the magi to find the king foretold and pointed to by the celestial "Star of Bethlehem." Kepler thought that this nova was most likely a conjugation of Jupiter and Saturn around 7 B.C., while other astronomers say that they were in triple conjugation with the constellation Pisces. The Chinese even recorded a comet standing still for 70 days in 5 B.C. Who really knows? It is fascinating to conjecture though. :-D

When I think how far we have come from that event, that day when Christ was born in humanity to be our Savior, I wonder what Mary must have thought about her role in Jehovah's master plan. The Scriptures indicate that she thought about it, pondered it, and hid those thoughts in her heart. The immense responsibility of such a young girl bearing the Messiah must have weighed heavy in her.

This brings me to the idea of faith.

By faith, Elizabeth believed that the babe that Mary bore was the Messiah. By faith, Mary believed the angel Gabriel and accepted her role in the eternal drama. By faith, Joseph took Mary to be his wife, knowing full well that they would be ostracized for the unlawful pregnancy.

There is something about faith that stirs the human soul beyond itself.

It cannot be explained with logic or psychological means.

Faith is, of course, "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1).

Some of my former students are now sworn atheists. Once visited me two weeks ago, one day after returning from his second Army tour in Afghanistan. I sat and listened and talked for over an hour. What traumas he has experienced. What bloody hell-on-earth he has seen. I would not trade places with him for the world. But I do pray for his soul, his scarred and bruised and jaded soul. I want to see him in Heaven one day, so to that end I pray and intercede.

I feel that I have come to a point in my life that God is requiring me to dig deeper into my spiritual self and find a deeper faith, one that does not murmur or complain or gripe or ask "WHY?!?" It's as though He does not want me to question Him at all, to be acquiescent to His plan for my family, and more specifically my own life. And it is hard, so hard for this logical girl! :-)

meaty quotes to ponder

Better to love God and die unknown, than to love the world and be a hero.
Better to be content with poverty, than to die a slave to wealth.
Better to have taken some risks and lost, than to have done nothing and succeeded at it.
~Erwin Lutzer

God whispers to us in our pleasures,
speaks in our conscience,
but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.  
~C.S. Lewis

The only freedom that man ever has is when he becomes a slave to Jesus Christ.
~R.C. Sproul

There is never any peace for those who resist God.  
~François Fénélon

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.  
~Galileo Galilei

It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ!  
~Patrick Henry

Only he who believes is obedient,.. only he who is obedient believes.  
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer

If you do not worship God seven days a week, you do not worship Him on one day a week. There is no such thing known in heaven as Sunday worship unless it is accompanied by Monday worship and Tuesday worship and so on.  
~A.W. Tozer

Mandisa - He Is With You