3rd and 4th Spoke – “Fellowship and Witness”

Point 1:  “Staring At The Threshold”

Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved.  (Romans 10:1)

Imagine lying at the door of Death.  It is inevitable that you will be going through that door, sooner than those around you.  Maybe you have a disease, the doctors won’t tell you much, other than you do not have much time, and there’s nothing they can do to help you.  You are staring at the threshold of Eternity, not standing at it, mind you…you have time, but only by the grace of God.  But you don’t believe in God, at least, not Heaven and Hell anyway….that’s what you’ve told yourself, but you always pray to Christ for forgiveness and peace when the going gets REALLY rough. 

Now, here you are, scared because you might be wrong.  You don’t know of course, who can?  Yet you will find out sooner than anyone else.  If you are right, you will close your eyes and fade from existence; this life being all you had.  If you are wrong?  If you choose not to believe what that close Christian friend told you about Christ or what that stranger said when he told you about the death and ressurection of Jesus, just for you, what then? 

Such is the attitude I need to have towards those who do not believe in Christ.  If they HAD TIME to choose, to look at deaths door, what would they choose?  What if they had no idea what was on the other side?  What if you were the only person to help them decide – Heaven by believing or Hell by ignorance?  If I could just get a glimpse of most people this way, would my uncaring attitude change?   People who scoff at the LORD, those who hear the Good News and refuse to believe, may change their tune if they just knew the end was coming.  If I can take this attitude, would I ever give up praying for them, no matter how cruel they treat me or who I stand for?  Or would I just not care because of their indifference?  If God were to give them all the grace, just one more day, one more hour, then I should try to picture what that person may do if he or she stood at the threshold of Eternity.  God forbid, they should reject the witness of our Lord in love, and step into Hell, after my heartfelt warning and affirmation of Christ’s love towards them!  But some will, we just can’t give up hope until hope is gone…because as long as God gives that person the grace to take one more breath, he may also give them one more breath to choose to follow Him and believe that He is Lord. 

For my fellow believer, my attitude changes towards you as well if I can take this attitude towards the unbeliever; because you are united with me in a cause if you share the same burden.  We have a common goal, to love the world one soul at a time that our Lord will be glorified.  I will help you, you will help me, and “fellowship” continues.  And my-”uncaring attitude” towards people besides myself, ends.  May we all “stare at the threshold” before we have to walk through it, for ourselves, but most importantly-for eachother.

The Wheel – 3rd Spoke “Fellowship”

“If you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you do well;”   James 2:8 

I have come to a critical juncture in my discipleship training…fellowship.

I think I’ve admitted once before, I’m kind of a loner.   I could hang out in the mountains (or anywhere else with solitude) with my family and really be okay for quite some time.  But it has been brought to my attention that no man is an island, and the Lord intended communion with others.  The Lord had fellowship with Adam in the garden.  He also saw that Adam was “alone” and created Eve.  Loneliness was the first thing God ever deemed “not good.”  Now I have to deal with crucial aspects of my own heart.  Things I’ve put off because “well, that’s just me.”  That’s not going to fly anymore.

I’m trying to get down to the core as to why I push people away.  Or maybe not push away, but take on a nonchalant attitude about them.  Is it just easier?  Am I afraid of getting hurt?  Is it me, me, me?  Or have I finally just come to the point to where I have to admit I’m more selfish than I am loving?  Maybe I’ve put a wall up for so long that I just don’t care.  I’ve only cared about me and what’s on my side of the wall (family, close friends, my interests) and have made some kind of conscience decision somewhere just not to get involved with anyone on the other side of the wall I’ve put between them and me.  Even fellow believers are on the other side.  The Lord has tugged at my heart all day since yesterday about this. 

Pastor’s sermon was on ”What’s the desire of your heart?”  Sunday morning.  He asked us to make a mental list of about 10 things that we had on our top most desired list.  I jotted down 5 real quick, thinking this was going to be a “God giving the desires of your heart” sermon.  What was on mine?  Well, let me just share the first 5 with you and see if you can guess where my heart was.

1.  A good, well built, clean, house that’s not been torn up by termites

2.  Poison Ivy that has festered all over my right foot to be healed and just GO AWAY!

3.  To be debt free.

4.  Go on vacation w/out worrying about money

5.  To go to India w/out worrying about money   

Sounds bad doesn’t it?  Paul’s heart’s desire was that Israel might be saved.  Mine was, well…

I took notes on the rest of the sermon and planned on going over them all day long today, but something always got in the way.  I always found something better to do than focus on this problem I have within myself.  I must learn to love people the way I love myself, and Pastor Steve gave some tips on how to do that in his sermon.  Over the next few blogs I’m going to go over those tips and write a little bit as to how they apply to my life.  Maybe as I write them down I’ll start to see that somehow the Lord through His Spirit will start providing a new love for just people in general, believers and non believers alike.  Because I really believe that is the root of the problem, just not loving people in general, and being too wrapped up in my own life.  Comments always welcome.  God bless.

The Earth Travails

And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of sorrows.   Matthew 24:6-8

A couple of days ago, I read that while Hawaii was bracing for a hurricane to tear across their tiny portion of the ocean, an earthquake of 6.6 magnitude shook them to their core.  The largest earthquake to shake Hawaii since 1983.  The very next day, I read a headline that says an earthquake is responsible for over 300 deaths in Peru, they are now dealing with looters as a result of the chaos that has followed.  Our government is also (last I heard) looking into the fact of whether or not the Utah mine which collapsed, twice now, killing at least 3, was due to “earthquakes” near the mine.

A shiver run down my spine as I thought of Jesus words to his disciples in Matthew 24:6-8.  I didn’t really start taking note of the earthquakes until after the tragedy in Indonesia in December of 2004, when an earthquake caused tsunamis that literally obliterated much of the country’s land and people.   Not that I am an earthquake expert, or that I have a morbid sense of exhileration when a natural disaster like this occurs, but I take note when I see mother nature “travailing,” if you will.  And since that time, I’ve noticed several natural disasters which have occurred; but if it isn’t natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina, it’s terrorist attacks like 9/11, and if it’s not terrorist attacks, it’s wars, like Iraq or threatenings of wars with Iran.

There should be no mistake made, there is one thing after another going wrong in the world today.  A heightened sense of “somethings not right” and we, the human race, for the most part try to blame it on something as simple as “global warming.”  The disasters occurring today are not global warming.  It’s in the Bible, for any who can read to see, Jesus said these things would come to pass.  For the Christian, our Lord commands that we “see that we are not troubled,” because these things MUST come to pass, BUT THE END IS NOT YET.  I as a Christian know what the glorious end of my LORD and His Kingdom shall be.  In the midst of this “travailing” (Romans 8:22), do you know where you stand?  Have you given these disasters any thought as to why thing after thing happens in this small world today?  What end will be yours?

Discipline From Grace

I’ve never been good about discipline.  “Discipline for what?”  You might ask.  After tonight’s lesson, I have determined…I’ve never been good about discipline at ANYTHING!

Just now, I started mentally listing all those things which I set out to do but left unfinished, and for many of those things, I’ll never have the chance to finish them again.

• guitar lessons
• piano lessons
• 6th grade football
• trumpet lessons
• Never completing an application for scholarships for college (I didn’t go to college as a result)
• my first marriage (yes, this was a special circumstance, always is, right?)
• car payments (repossesed car)
• mobile home payments (repossesed mobile home)
• community college
• roof on my house
• doornob on my son’s bedroom door

Man, this is depressing…but…

I am a new creature in Christ!  You see, most of the things listed above were absolute failures in my life, but they’ve also helped to bring about the victory I’ve experienced in Jesus.  And though I may have never been disciplined to finish anything, I now have hope to attain EVERYTHING.  God has placed within my soul, when I believed in the name of Christ and His sacrifice and ressurection, a drive to live for Him.  This drive includes a discipline of faith, prayer, reading the Bible, witnessing, and fellowship with other believers.  I have found I wish to be more like Jesus Christ, because He has given me a new heart, and because He loves and believes in me, even more than I love and believe in Him.  (I John 4:19)

I will continue in these disciplines and learn from them, they have made me patient in ways in other areas of my life.  Placing my thoughts in my journals, working on this home which God has blessed me with, and even in stewardship has patience come, and our life is becoming a tribute to God.  I look forward…not to seeing what God will do, but rather on discovering “more of who God is” (Oswald Chambers).

The Wheel – The Second Spoke “Prayer”

Very recently I’ve been what I would have to say “cautiously optimistic” about my prayer life. 

I have tried to incorporate the teachings of Dawson Trotman’s illustration into my own life as I train in a life of discipleship in Christ Jesus.  Prayer has never been a strong point in my life, despite my own efforts and desire.  Personally I’m not sure that I really understood the need for it.  I always believed it to be a request for resources, rather than a need for communication between me and the Lord.  Many times I felt unworthy…after all, EVERY SINGLE TIME I knelt in prayer I was asking for something.  So what’s the point? 

Even further study has revealed there is so much more that happens through prayer than a request for resouces.  More than I have ever realized.  I’m viewing prayer now as “a battlefield.”  I’m sure more insight will come later on, but my reasons for seeing it this way are two fold (for now).  First, I can’t be everywhere at the same time.  Physically my body MUST be in one space at any given time and I can only do so much for any other person.  But God is everywhere, sees everyone, and can do anything.  If I pray for someone’s health in India – God can meet the need.  If I pray for the Holy Spirit to move in Henryetta, OK – God can meet the need – even if I can’t.  Secondly, God is depended upon wholly in prayer.  Think about it – if he’s not depended upon – why bother?

The whole reason for prayer is to ask God to move in some way shape or form.  The very act of praying means that I am acknowledging there is a God out there and He is capable of anything asked (as long as I am not asking amiss).  I have faith God can do what He says in His Word (remember the first spoke), so I speak to Him.  Not asking resources for MY life, but in most cases lately, asking resources for OTHERS!  

As long as I am praying His Word, I know I am praying His will.  In praying his will I can be praying expectantly.  Yes – this certainly is a new attitude and fire I have found thanks to the grace of God, and I plan on it changing my life.  I have more thoughts on praying God’s Word from the Bible that I’ll write later on.  God bless everyone.

The Wheel Part 1 “Christ the Hub” cont.

One more thought on “Christ the Hub” of our wheel. 

I’ve been reading a book called Releasing The Rivers Within by Dwight Edwards.  Wow!  I mean, wow!  If anyone loves the Lord, and truly wonders how they can do all we’ve been discussing but still not have that joy; this book is for you.  It goes right along with having Christ as not only the strength of your life, but the SOURCE.  The only place in which the Rivers of God’s Spirit can fill you and overflow is from Jesus Christ Himself.

Oh, have I learned that the hard way these past weeks.  It’s been some time since I’ve written in this journal, but it is not as though the Lord has not been working.  Circumstances always come about in which God will stretch our faith, and we’ll learn just as Jesus taught (real life circumstances) if we’ll just look for Him.  Beware of sins just under the surface of your life.  Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall (I Cor 10:12).  We can be doing all the right things in life…praying, reading our Bible, reading good devotional books, Sunday School, special areas of ministry in the church; but there amidst the business, we lose why we’re doing all those things.   Our motivation starts out right, our thought process might even stay right, but then, something happens.  Maybe a disappointment that leads to bitterness takes place, yet because all the right activities are still being done – we still do all that we’ve set out to do, so we assume all is well; yet something’s changed…bitterness and judgemental attitudes creep in, disguised as righteous-indignation.  BE CAREFUL about using that word…the next time you use words like “righteous indignation,” you may do a serious reeevaluation of your life.  Here’s a thought I never really thought of before these past few weeks, consider there is a possibility you MIGHT be wrong.  Until humility is found in this instance, doing all those activities seem to be a bummer…a drudgery.  That is, until I got tired of doing the drudgery and just wanted God.  I JUST WANTED GOD.  Does this make sense?  The key now is to continue JUST WANTING GOD.  Doing all those activities I mentioned before not for the sake of doing them, but for the sake of being with and loving God because I love Him. 

Let me use another example…

Tonight my younges son came running to me from the craft table at Vacation Bible School.  The little man was holding a foam cylinder with little foam soccer balls stickers all over it.  It was the first time today Trevor had seen me.  “Look what I made you Daddy!”  It was a coozie…I think that’s what they call em…you put em over your pop to keep it cold.  Anyways, he gave it to me…told me to put my can of Diet Pepsi in it, gave me a kiss and a hug and a big smile!  He wasn’t told to make it for me, he just wanted too.  He loves me, so that’s what he did.  The action of making it wasn’t JUST to make it…it had a purpose, and that purpose was for the one he loves. 

So it should be with us, His diciples…lovingly making our devotions and studies to our Father, because we love Him, and for no other reason but that. 

The Wheel – The First Spoke “The Word”

Blessed is the man that walks not in the council of the ungodly,  nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful; But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and in His law he meditates both day and night.  He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper.  (Psalm 1:1-3)

It’s the only absolute, positive sure way we can know God’s will.  What disciple can have Christ as the hub of their life and not have a daily, conscious effort in studying God’s word?  The Bible, The Word, Jesus Christ himself (John1:1-5) is available to us in America on a daily basis and as a disciple (a real live, submissive learner of Christ) we must STOP and read His Word.  Soak it up, sop it up, read it up, breathe it, eat it, however you want to call it, just READ IT. 

In our example of the wheel (one of these days I’ll have a picture of it on here) “The Word” is the uppermost spoke.  Coming down from the top of the Wheel to the hub of the Wheel.  Signifying “The Word” (notice I didn’t say “The Voice?”) comes down to the center of our lives from an upward direction.  From Heaven – to us.  

Now, I for one, know how things go.  We think we know God’s opinion of something.  We think we know how God will feel.  We just assume because “we grew up in church” or “that’s the way I’ve always believed” that our beliefs are the gospel truth.  SO WE DON’T EVEN BOTHER PICKING UP A BIBLE?!  The other day a friend asked me “but don’t you believe there’s good in all people?”  No I don’t.  It’s unbiblical –  and that’s a Star Wars, Luke Skywalker philosophy we somehow picked up when we started swinging around our imaginary lightsabers to take the arm off some alien (some “good” huh?).  Only God is good, the rest of us have just been given grace to follow Him or had someone in our life that led us down a path to Him or His Law or His Ways.  The Bible says “ALL our righteousness is like filthy rags.”  (Isaiah 64:6).  It’s not that I’m a grouch and against all things not specifically laid out in the Bible, but where do we draw the line between our knowledge and God’s?  Why are we even wondering when it’s right there for us to pick up and look for ourselves?  Even as Christians we’re guilty of not consulting God first and assuming we know His heart.   (Isaiah 55:8) 

As disciples of Jesus Christ, hiding the Word in our hearts, reading it and studying it should be one of the first commitments we should make to our Lord.  To not do so, would make one wonder if Jesus is your hub, the center of your wheel, your life.  Pray that the Lord give a desire in your heart for more of His word.  It will be one of the best prayers you ever prayed.