Speaketh
I have some friends that if what you say is not prefaced with "Thus saith the Lord" they will not hear something that may be from God. I like how at Rustle we are encouraged to hear the still small voice. As a Church, I think we don't want to miss when God talks and I have seen even very progressive, out-of-the box Churches miss what God was saying to them, because it was not prefaced with the was they thought a prophetic word should come.
Help us not to limit You. Help us to hear and obey.
All
We are working on Romans 12:1-2 this Sunday. I read a sermon called
"Challenged to be Changed"on these verses.
J. David Hoke ends the sermon with:
Let me ask you, "Are you His?" I am not asking if you have made a decision for Christ here. I am not asking if you are a Christian. Are you His? Have you given Him all?
A friend of mine was telling me of the kind of church we are developing these days. It is "Church-Lite" or "Christianity-Lite" in its approach. It is the home of the 5% tithe, the thirty minute service with sermonettes for Christianettes. It is the place where the hymn of commitment is "I Surrender Some." Instead of "Standing on the Promises" we are merely sitting on the premises. But this isn’t what God has in mind at all.
You see, He wants everything. Everything! He wants all your time. He wants all your money. He wants all your work hours. He wants all your leisure hours. He wants your family, your wife, your children, your car, your house. He wants all of you! Are you really His?
Be challenged to be changed. Do not be conformed — be transformed. Come to Christ for a change.All can be a lot. And He deserves it because He died for us. When we first start all may only be a little. We're happy to have God take all of it, because we've made such a mess of it anyway. Looking back, giving all may have been easy, but there may not have been a lot God wanted in that. It seems to me, as one matures in Christ that all becomes harder when one thinks it should be easier. As God reaches down deeper and puts his finger on things closer to your heart.
This 'giving all' certainly also goes against what the world says- that your rights are important- that it's important to take care of yourself, what you want and need. All. All. All.
On a separate note (may or may not be related!) I am having issues with integrity at work. My boss has me write emails that are not the truth. He has me say he's away when he's not. He has me say that a document is at the printers when it's not. They are only little things, but they do bother me because we could easily tell the truth. I like truth. But he doesn't want to look like a 'bad guy', so we say that the document is at the printer instead of saying that they missed the deadline (deadline was sept 7, they handed it in sept 21). Why not say they missed the deadline and we don't have time to get it all fixed up for the printer, which would be the truth. But I think he sees it as the truth because the copy was ready for the printer and so *virtually* at the printers. When writing these email I would say to my boss "So we're pretty much lying to them aren't we?". What do you think- is it better to lie and (possibly) not hurt their feelings so much or better to tell the truth?
Scary but good
Tonight I went with Kim to her church. They had a special guest Kevin Leal. She said he is a prophet, so I like to go to that stuff because my dream stuff sometimes flows in a prophetic way (though it's normally a scary prophetic way, but that's ok)
Before Church started, I saw some old friends Barry and Tammy. I told Kim I saw them. She didn't really believe me, but I had already vaulted out of my seat to go see them and Kim followed in my wake. I didn't ask why they were there, but after the songs there was a marriage rededication that they were a part of. So that explained that.
Then Kevin talked. It was really good. It was mainly about spiritual growth and keeping a long term outlook.
Then Kevin prayed for the pastor. I found it easy to pray and support kevin while he was praying.
Then Kevin had the leaders in church come up, which included Barry and Tammy because they are pastors out in Belleville. He had all of the leaders say a phrase into the mic. Except he skipped Barry and Tammy. Odd, I thought- as they were the only ones up there I knew- did they get missed cause they don't go to the church? Nope kevin came back to him and started praying over him. At this point I was totally crying. I'm still now quite sure why, but it was just really powerful.
Kevin also had this music (not sure if it was before or after praying for people) that was played so loud that your molecules resonated. And if you closed your eyes, you really did feel like you were in heaven. Every now and then I did open them to see that there were still other people around. It was so enveloping. This music made you think of heaven and as I did I was thinking that this was so scary, so unknown and I'm pretty used to living in the body I have with the experience I'm having. And I thought- God it's scary, but I was reassured that it was scary, but it was good.
I talked to Barry and Tammy after the service and caught up (briefly) on 10 years.
Asking God
This morning I was reading Zechariah 7 and the people of Israel ask God "Should I mourn and fast in the 5th month?"(vs. 3)
You would think this would be an easy question for God- either he wants them to and says 'yes' or doesn't and says 'no'. He knows the motivation of their hearts and what is best for them, it would be easy to answer. After questioning their motivations for fasting his answer is
'Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. 10 Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor. In your hearts do not think evil of each other.'
Not really a yes or no answer to a yes or no question.
If you ask God a question, you have to expect an answer that might not really answer your question!
But the people didn't listen to Him.
Now, how hard would it be to do the above things? Logically, you would think it would be easy, but if your hearts are set on going one way, even if GOD tells you different it can be difficult to change.
And so because they did not listen the land became desolate.
But God still loves Israel and in the next chapter promises to bless them again. God is very longsuffering with us.
Prayer meeting
Last night Kim and I went to a prayer meeting. I thought it was good, that it brought people from a lot of different denominations together to pray for our city. But I didn't think we prayed enough!(there was a lot of talking and the prayer times were pretty short, at least for me they were short!)
Kim and I were partners in prayer. One thing I talked to her about was my uncertainty of how to pray for people who are resistant to the gospel. Because God does not go where He is not invited. But as soon as I started to pray, I realized, I can pray that their hearts will be softened and receptive to the gospel.
Rejection
In the last week I was reading Max Lucado's book "A love worth giving" and in the chapter I read he talked about the amount of times rejection happens in the Bible. And it happens quite a bit- from God and from man. And a lot of times the response to the rejection was anger. The anger stemming from the hurt of the rejection.
In his chapter Max doesn't mention Moses. First all the little boys were to be killed. He wasn't even wanted alive. Then with the plagues time and time again his father that he grew up with (if it was the same pharoh- if not it would have been one of his friends growing up) rejected him and his people. But he kept calm there.
Rejection can also make you see people differently. At work when my funding was going to be cut (for the one week until the solution was reached)- it was in a way a rejection- though not so much a personal one. But I see the people involved in a different way. I see the people who value me and the people who do not. How to keep that from interfering with my work, though.
Samson's parents
I laughed out loud when I read Judges 13:22-23 last night. Previous to these versus the angel of the lord comes to samson's parents (Manoah and wife) and gives them the instructions for the pregnancy and then that samson must be a Nazirite and the no head shavy thing. In vs. 21 they figure out it was an angel of the lord. (so he must have seemed kinda ordinary?). In v.22 Manoah gets a bit dramatic, saying now they were going to DIE because they had seen an Angel of the Lord. And in v.23 the wife tells him to get a grip, because the Angel wouldn't have given them all these instructions if they were just about to DIE.
I thought it was incredibly funny because it seemed so realistic and a very real funny conversation.
Running
I feel the summer come to an end. I've negotiated for lots of work this year. Patrly because I'm not sure when Myron will be working again. Partly because I'm a workaholic. But right now all I want to do is run away from my obligations. Homeschool James and enjoy him.
But I know that I will continue to do what I think is the right thing for my family at this time. Which is work hard and try to make sure James enjoys school. I KNOW he needs this challenge. I know he will have much more confidence at the end of the year. I know it will be good for him. But I also know it will be a challenge and require lots of prayer. I have to look to the end and see the desired end result.
Praying for the strength to face the transitions
Transitions
It's the start of September- a time of transitions for many people as the kids go to school. Some kids move away for school. Family life changes. For Lisa, there will be a new life. A new transition.
Praying for all in a transition time this fall
