Pushing God out of the picture

After church worship yesterday a woman thanked me for the reminder that there is more to life than what is right in front of our eyes. Holding her hands just a couple of inches from her face she spoke of the many pressures and responsibilities that kept her from seeing the whole of life, of being aware of the larger purposes of the Lord God.  She is not unique, is she?    

We all can become so wrapped up in ‘living’ that God gets pushed, unintentionally, out of the picture.  We intend to prioritize the right things, to make time for prayer, to ‘keep step with the Spirit’ but the myriad voices of work, culture, and family can become so loud that their cadence call keeps us from walking with God – unless we continually refocus, reflect, and renew our commitment to Him.

Remaining God-aware is critically important in the disciple’s daily life!  How true those words of an old hymn – “Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love;  here’s my heart; O take and seal it; seal it for thy courts above.”  (Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing)  When we lose sight of God, if we fail to acknowledge His Presence each day – we will wander, becoming irreverent, sidelining the sacred – and in the process losing the security and purpose that comes from when we are close to our Father.

How wonderfully assuring it is, what a steadying blessing to sense, as He desires, that He cares, He loves, He leads. Moses urged the Israelites to cultivate their God-awareness. He said, "Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other." (Deuteronomy 4:39, NIV)

When Hagar, the maidservant of Abraham’s wife, Sarah, was badly mistreated and sent away with her child, in the wilderness He met her and she gave Him a new name: El Roi – “The God who sees me!” The text reads this way - "An angel of God found her beside a spring in the desert; it was the spring on the road to Shur. …She answered God by name, praying to the God who spoke to her, “You’re the God who sees me! “Yes! He saw me; and then I saw him!” " (Genesis 16:7, 13, The Message) 

My friend, He sees you.  Another way to say it is that He gets you, understanding you better than you know yourself. And, He has prepared a way for you through this day.

It is my habit to offer up thanks and praise to the Lord each morning.  “Lord, make me a blessing to others today. Help my words to encourage, my life to be honoring to You.”  It only takes a few seconds, but it is a habit that helps me to be God-aware.  As I make my way through the day, I pause to look up (emotionally and mentally, more than physically) to thank Him, to ‘see’ Him in my circumstances.  I need to remember, always, that He is the “God who sees me!” This is not for God’s benefit, but for mine! When I encounter difficult situations, I may complain at first, but generally my next response is to consciously ask His wisdom, to intentionally commit my way to Him, or, as necessary, to seek His forgiveness for my lapses in Self-will and sin.

Disciple, be intentionally God-aware. It is true that when we are children of God, through faith in Christ Jesus, that the Holy Spirit lives in us, but He does so sometimes without our conscious knowledge. When this happens we tend to lose the nobility of holiness that comes from knowing we are children of God, that our Father is with us. Ask any child who has a great relationship with his parent what having a constant sense of parental care provides for life!
Parental love means safety and security.
Parental affirmation brings encouragement and hope.
Parental discipline and guidance provides secure boundaries!

We know that is true for children. Be reminded, it is true for children of the Heavenly Father, too.

Here is a word from the Word. May it be the prayer of the God-aware today.

"O Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways." (Psalm 139:1-3, NIV)

"Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast." (Psalm 139:7-10, NIV)

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(Video of this blog at this link)

Come Thou Fount Of Every Blessing

 

Come Thou fount of ev'ry blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy redeeming love

 

Here I raise mine Ebenezer  (a memorial to God)
Hither by Thy help I'm come
And I hope by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wand'ring from the fold of God
He to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood

 

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be
Let Thy grace Lord like a fetter
Bind my wand'ring heart to Thee\
Prone to wander Lord I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above

 

John Wyeth, Robert Robinson

© Words: Public Domain; Music: Public Domain

Tempted? Tell Yourself the Truth

“If I don’t get to do that, I’ll just die.”   Who hasn’t heard someone use that kind of hyperbolic language?  Or this after a temper tantrum or some indulgence of their emotions someone might say, “It’s just me, it’s who I am, what I do.”   With that lie told to you and themselves, offenders let themselves avoid responsibility for their words, choices, and actions. In one way or another, we all experience moments of decision when we will do what we know is best, or what is right, or what appeals to us most in the moment.  It might be relatively harmless, like when we choose that extra 1000 calorie dessert with dinner or something with far greater potential consequences.  The issue is temptation.

We all know the struggle between right and wrong, the tug ‘o war that pulls us between the two, don’t we? Oscar Wilde once said, “I can resist everything except temptation.”  He went on to say that he was “a man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.”  I can identify with him.  Can you?  That gossipy word begs to be repeated. That surge of prideful superiority tempts us to avoid those we consider ‘less’ than ourselves. The indulgence of some temporal desire threatens to overwhelm our convictions in an unguarded moment.

A basic part of dealing successfully with temptation is telling ourselves the truth!  Paul said that our spiritual leaders have a responsibility to teach us the truth and "Then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe because someone has told us something different or because someone has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like the truth. Instead, we will hold to the truth in love, becoming more and more in every way like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church." (Ephesians 4:14-15, NLT)

Our desires for love, security, esteem, food, comfort, warmth and such things are not wrong, at all! God made us with these desires, but they can quickly be bent towards wrong-doing and that is temptation.  Temptation is not sin; it is the result of living in a sinful world. Here’s what the Scripture says- "God blesses the people who patiently endure testing. Afterward they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him. And remember, no one who wants to do wrong should ever say, “God is tempting me.” God is never tempted to do wrong, and he never tempts anyone else either. Temptation comes from the lure of our own evil desires. These evil desires lead to evil actions, and evil actions lead to death. So don’t be misled, my dear brothers and sisters. Whatever is good and perfect comes to us from God above, who created all heaven’s lights. Unlike them, he never changes or casts shifting shadows. In his goodness he chose to make us his own children by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his choice possession." (James 1:12-18, NLT)

What truth do we learn from that passage?

a.           There are blessings found in resisting the lure of temptation!

b.           We cannot blame God for our temptation!

c.            Temptation finds a place to grow in our desires!

d.           God does not change His mind about right and wrong to fit our present desire!

e.            The True Word (Jesus Christ) makes us God’s children!

There are many ways to deal with temptation but primary among them is to know and live in the Truth. Temptation is born in our thoughts and is most easily defeated in that same arena.

We need to know what is right and wrong,
having a well-developed understanding of the Scripture.

We need to know our personality and our particular strengths,
our unique vulnerabilities.
As we learn those things, we accept them – without excuse.

We need to know, by faith, the truth of who
Christ Jesus has made us, by the work of the Spirit.

There is little power over temptation found in just trying harder. Forty years ago, the drug scourge in America was met with a simplistic slogan, “Just say no!”  Needless to say, it did not work very well. The pleasure of a “high” that allows a person to escape life’s sometimes grim realities is often stronger than the no. And once addiction took hold, human will alone lost the battle most of the time.  The power of addiction is broken with a process of relearning, of discovery of new ways to think, of discovery of what is actually true. Christians who would defeat the lure of temptation will not find much success in just saying no.  At some moment of weakness, when the right set of circumstances exist – the sinful nature and the powers of darkness will combine their forces to overwhelm every good intent … UNLESS the one tempted knows the truth!

This passage is packed with God’s wisdom. "Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body." (Ephesians 4:21-25, NIV)  

How does that happen?
The first step in God’s way is conversion, a complete change in us, brought about by the powerful Presence of the Holy Spirit Who gives us life, something Jesus called being ‘born again.’   We are not just reformed, we are ‘new creations.’ In days gone by the church I grew up in talked about ‘getting saved.’  It’s a good phrase we need to recapture.  We are, indeed, saved from the spiritual death in sin and given new life through Christ Jesus.

But, the transformation is ongoing.  In times of reflection, prayer, confession, and worship  we learn to think differently.  The Word says to "Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator." (Colossians 3:2-10, NIV)

How I wish those things were a ‘once and done’ experience, but they are not.  I must ‘put on Christ’ everyday.  I choose life over death everyday. (And sometimes I fail to do so, and in confession, I find forgiveness and renewal.)   We grow in the grace of God and live more fully in the Truth as we mature, when we choose the Truth over the Lie.

Finally, we must focus on the truthful declaration of who God says we are, so that we will live up to our high calling.   I may fail from time to time, sinning, but I am no longer a helpless victim of the World, the Sinful Nature, or the Evil One. Our word from the Word is the Truth about the God-given identify we have through Christ. So when you are tempted tell yourself the Truth. "You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us." (1 Peter 2:9-12, NIV)   Amen.

Let’s live in the Truth, not hide in the Lies.

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(Video of this blog at this link)

 

Jesus The Very Thought Of Thee

Jesus the very thought of Thee

With sweetness fills my breast

But sweeter far Thy face to see

And in Thy presence rest

 

Nor voice can sing nor heart can frame

Nor can the memory find

A sweeter sound than Thy blest name

O Saviour of mankind

 

O Hope of every contrite heart

O Joy of all the meek

To those who fall how kind Thou art

How good to those who seek

 

But what to those who find

Ah this nor tongue nor pen can show

The love of Jesus what it is

None but His loved ones know

 

Jesus our only joy be Thou

As Thou our prize wilt be

Jesus be Thou our Glory now

And thru eternity

Amen

 

Bernard of Clairvaux, Edward Caswall

© Public Domain

Better than you?

 

Who among us has not looked at another person and made some snap judgment about who they are and what they might represent?  We make instant decisions about the social class, intelligence, and status of others in a moment, even if we are not conscious of our thoughts. First impressions are strong and hard to ignore.  But, as we all know, we are far too complex for us to be able to categorize another in 30 seconds! Beside that, our ‘judgments’ are influenced by our culture, our experience, and our prejudice.  

Many years ago, when I was a teenager, my father traded in expensive purebred Arabian horses. On a Thanksgiving afternoon, a man knocked on the farm house door asking to see our horses, claiming he was interested in a purchase. He was ragged looking, unkempt beard, old clothes, worn shoes.  My  Dad, a warm person generally, was polite but dismissive as he told him that did not deal in ordinary grade horses. The man gestured to the vehicle a little ways down the drive, a Rolls Royce, and assured Dad that he could afford to buy several of his horses!  We learned that he was a wealthy man in the financial markets of New York City with a country home located nearby. He became a good friend and bought several expensive Arabians from our stable over time! 

Have you ever jumped to the wrong conclusions about another like that?  We are inundated with messages about those who are ‘different’ from ‘us’ these days. Most of those messages are about danger. As a result we tend to see threats where there is no real reason to do so. Despite our multiple connections to others, we have grown more ‘tribal’ interacting only with those who look like us, worship like us, and share our views about the world. Meaningful conversations across cultural divides have become more complicated than ever!

Christian, here is what Jesus said to us … “Stop judging others, and you will not be judged. For others will treat you as you treat them. Whatever measure you use in judging others, it will be used to measure how you are judged. And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye?" (Matthew 7:1-4, NLT)  When we belong to Him, He desires that we throw away that attitude that says ‘I’m better than you!”

Truth - God judges and tells us to love! He alone sees the full context of another's life. We are most unlike our Father in Heaven when we judge others based on one small slice of life. There are days when I fail miserably, when I am short-tempered, full of Self, in the grip of my sinful nature! But those days have a context within my whole life. Sometimes they come when I am weary from the struggle or overwhelmed with responsibilities. God does not suspend His expectations of me when life is hard, but neither does He dismiss me as a failure on the bad days! The Bible teaches me that He comes to me in those moments as my Comforter, my Advocate; Who "helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express." (Romans 8:26, NIV)

Pray for grace to love them all;
the good, the bad;
the whole, the broken;
the clean, the dirty;
the together, the fragmented;
the beautiful, the marred.

Love will not allow us to turn from those we consider “less,”  to blame others for their plight as we live in our superiority.  Godly love will engage, hope, invest, and redeem. That's what love did for me. I am a debtor to grace, with no reason for pride!   Let’s aim to love others, careful about our conclusions, quick to encourage.  To be sure the importance of having insight and being able to detect real dangers cannot be denied, but it is not likely those conclusions will be reached in a moment’s time. Scripture tells us that ‘love is patient!’

Here's a word from the Word. Meditate on it as you prepare for this new week.

"Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." (1 John 4:7-11, NIV)

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(Video of this blog at this link)

Graves Into Gardens

I searched the world but it couldn't fill me
Man's empty praise and treasures that fade
Are never enough
Then You came along and put me back together
And every desire is now satisfied here in Your love

 

Oh there's nothing better than You
There's nothing better than You
Lord there's nothing
Nothing is better than You

 

I'm not afraid to show You my weakness
My failures and flaws
Lord You've seen them all
And You still call me friend
'Cause the God of the mountain
Is the God of the valley
There's not a place
Your mercy and grace won't find me again

You turn mourning to dancing
You give beauty for ashes
You turn shame into glory
You're the only one who cares

You turn graves into gardens
You turn bones into armies
You turn seas into highways
You're the only one who can

 

Brandon Lake, Chris Brown, Steven Furtick, Tiffany Hudson

© 2019 Brandon Lake Music; Maverick City Publishing Worldwide; Music by Elevation Worship Publishing; Bethel Music Publishing

CCLI License #810055