First Things First October 27, 2015

¹⁷ The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” ¹⁸ And he (Jesus) said to them,. . .  ²⁰ Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”  Luke 10:17-20 ESV
  
Jesus sent a contingent of 72 disciples ahead of him "into every town and place where he himself was about to go."  The disciples had just returned full of excitement.  I see them sitting around the table regaling each other with tales of exorcisms, baptisms, and conversions.  Smiles.  Congratulations.  High fives.  While I am sure Jesus is rejoicing with them, he also brings them back to earth.

"Hey, guys, talk about spiritual warfare.  I was there when Lucifer and his multitude of followers were cast from heaven.  I witnessed the heavenly mutiny.  The divine rebellion.  Ya'll ain't got nothing on me."

Jesus didn't remind them of this to be a killjoy.  His intention was not to lessen what had taken place.  However, Jesus was enough a student of human nature to realize the disciples' celebration was just one step away from hubris and self-aggrandisement.  The deed would soon become the focus.  Results would replace relationships.  

Yes demons obeyed.  Sure people were converted.  But never forget our personal relationship with God.  It is that relationship that is the key to all else we do.  Our righteous acts, according to Isaiah, are but filthy rags. (Isaiah 64:10)  There will be times when, because of our lack of faith, we will be powerless against the forces of evil.  (Matthew 17:19-20)  But our name inscribed in the Book of Life, now that is cause for celebration.  Eternal life.  A forever with God.  There's the party.  That is assurance, peace, rest.  All else is possible because of our right relationship with God the Father.  Without that, all else is meaningless.

Just a Spoonful Octobe 22, 2015

²³ A word in season, how good it is! Proverbs 15:23a ESV

A growth area for me this year has been to provide more consistent, timely atta' boys/girls' to faculty and staff at school.  For years I have focused more on improvement areas than the positives.  Today's verse emphasized the importance of that, but it also reminded me of two other things. 

"A word"- Often times just to note when a teacher has put in extra work, handled a certain child in a masterful way, or completed a report on time can be what a teacher needs to get through the day.  My feedback does not have to be a long-detailed submissive.  Specific, yes.  Lengthy, not necessairly.

"In season"- With today's technology I can send an email to a teacher as soon as I note a positive.  I can place a Post-it note on their desk before leaving the room  If I wait too often I forget.  There is also a timing element to "in season".  During those stressful times of the school year, throughout a year with a stressful class, when trying something new in the classroom are all some times when a positive word is more needed.

The Stove Burned Me October 20, 2015

At Sunday School several months ago, two questions came up.
A.  Does God forget our sin after our salvation?
B.  Is it possible for us to accept His forgiveness at such a level that we forget our sin?

The class was divided on question A.  But on question B, we were  unanimous in our opinion of "no".  However, there was some disagreement as to the source of those memories when they popped up in our mind.

Some were of the opinion that our remembrances of sin past were strictly the work of our sinful self.  Satan uses our memories to rob us of joy and sense of self-worth.  While I agree that that is most often the case, I also contend that there are times when God either allows or perhaps actively activates memories of past sin for two reasons.  First it is to remind us of the incredible truth of Romans 5:8- "⁸ but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."  If we forget the levels of evil, sin, and corruption from which many of us have come, it is easy to also forget the depth of His love for us.

The second reason I believe that sin remembrance is sometimes a God-thing is to warn us away from certain situations.  A recollection of drunken nights might be the motivator to keep away from that cash bar at a wedding reception.  In a perfect world, our only motivation not to sin would be pain sin causes our Father and the damage it does to our relationship with Him.  But our world is not perfect and some, more than others, need other motivators to stay on the straight and narrow.

Of course the danger is to allow our remembrance of past sin to become a source of self-incrimination and self-loathing.  When the mind starts to dwell on mistakes of yore check to see if you are in danger of committing that same transgression, thank God for His forgiveness, then "take captive every thought" (2 Corinthians 10:5) for something uplifting and move on.

Rub-a-dub October 19, 2015

³⁶ Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”   John 18:36 ESV

The great enemy to the Lord Jesus Christ in the present day is the conception of practical work that has not come from the New Testament, but from the Systems of the world in which endless energy and activities are insisted upon, but no private life with God. The emphasis is put on the wrong thing. Jesus said, “The kingdom of God cometh not with observation;…for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you,” a hidden, obscure thing. An active Christian worker too often lives in the shop window. It is the innermost of the innermost that reveals the power of the life.

We have to get rid of the plague of the spirit of the religious age in which we live. In Our Lord’s life there was none of the press and rush of tremendous activity that we regard so highly, and the disciple is to be as His Master. The central thing about the kingdom of Jesus Christ is a personal relationship to Himself, not public usefulness to men. It is not its practical activities that are the strength of this Bible Training College, its whole strength lies in the fact that here you are put into soak before God. You have no idea of where God is going to engineer your circumstances, no knowledge of what strain is going to be put on you either at home or abroad, and if you waste your time in over-active energies instead of getting into soak on the great fundamental truths of God’s Redemption, you will snap when the strain comes; but if this time of soaking before God is being spent in getting rooted and grounded in God on the un-practical line, you will remain true to Him whatever happens.

My Utmost for His Highest. Chambers, Oswald

I was lucky to have fond memories of visits to by my sets of grandparents.  They were reminiscent of the old city mouse v country mouse story.  My paternal grandparents lived in Lockwood, a small Missouri town of barely 800 inhabitants, while the other set lived in Springfield, MO which, at that time, had a population of over 120,000.  I could enumerate on the differences for several paragraphs, but today's passage from Chambers bring one memory to mind.   At Lockwood the nightly cleansing process involved climbing into the world's smallest shower that my grandfather had installed himself.  However, cleanliness at Springfield was achieved by climbing to a 5' long bathtub, complete with stopper hanging from a beaded chain attached to the faucet.

I had not thought of the contract between the two until this morning.  The shower was built for speed.   Let the water head up, dash in, soap down, rinse, and reappear dripping, but clean.  The term, "take a quick shower" made sense.  But take a "quick" bath.  That is an oxymoron.  Wait for the hot water to flow.  Stop the tub.  Allow the tub to fill.  Climb in.  Use a cup to wash you hair.  Then soap down the rest.  Splash water up or dunk down to rinse.  After drying off you have to wait for the tub to drain so you could rinse the tub before leaving the bathroom.

Lately my time with God has been more reminiscent of a shower than a soak in the tub.  Jump in, soap down, rinse off, towel dry, then head out for the day.  How marked a contrast from a bath.  There has been no soaking.  No sitting and pondering.  No soaking in His word.  No resting in His presence.

Showers are about activity, speed.  Baths allow you to soak, relax, reflect.  Time with God should be a resemble a long, hot bath, not a get-it-done-and-move-on shower.

October 14, 2015

¹⁸ And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in^[b] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

October 13, 2015

¹¹ One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens, and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. ¹² He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. Exodus 2:11 ESV


Moses saw the oppression of his people and felt certain that he was the one to deliver them, and in the righteous indignation of his own spirit he started to right their wrongs. After the first strike for God and for the right, God allowed Moses to be driven into blank discouragement, He sent him into the desert to feed sheep for forty years. At the end of that time, God appeared and told Moses to go and bring forth His people, and Moses said — “Who am I, that I should go?” In the beginning Moses realized that he was the man to deliver the people, but he had to be trained and disciplined by God first. He was right in the individual aspect, but he was not the man for the work until he had learned communion with God.

We may have the vision of God and a very clear understanding of what God wants, and we start to do the thing; then comes something equivalent to the forty years in the wilderness, as if God had ignored the whole thing, and when we are thoroughly discouraged God comes back and revives the call, and we get the quaver in and say — “Oh, who am I?” We have to learn the first great stride of God — “I AM THAT I AM…hath sent me.” We have to learn that our individual effort for God is an impertinence; our individuality is to be rendered incandescent by a personal relationship to God (see Matthew 3:11). We fix on the individual aspect of things; we have the vision — “This is what God wants me to do”; but we have not got into God’s stride. If you are going through a time of discouragement, there is a big personal enlargement ahead.

http://utmost.org/classic/individual-discouragement-and-personal-enlargement-classic/

If a tree falls in the forest. . . October 3, 2015

Oh, faithful reader.  (Notice not a plural.)  Or at least faithful checker of blog, I appreciate your checking back periodically.  As you can see, I have been negligent in my posts.  At first I was making attempts, excuses, etc. as to why I was not posting, but for the last week or so, it has not entered my mind.  Please pray for my return to a regular, daily schedule.  Not that these postings will ever be gathered into a collection for mass printing, or that they will even be saved for posterity, but it was during the times of regular, daily entries did I experience growth, peace, wisdom. . .all things promised if we are faithful in spending time with our Father.

Yesterday two things happened that have caused me to really consider the practical application of this slow drift from the blog.  Both involved the expenditure of money.  Which if you know me, is always a concern/focus of mine.  The first purchase was $400 for a handgun.  The second was a $50 purchase for a pipe.  In and of themselves, neither of these purchases was problematic, but. . .

I had prayed about each purchase and when time came to whip out the charge card, there was no conviction that I was going against God's will.  No sweaty palms.  No rationalizations.  No "I am gonna' do it anyway" attitude.  So naturally I assumed both purchases were God-sanctioned.  All was good until I was walking Roxie this morning and talking to God.  It was then the following began to roll around in my head.  Was the lack of fiscal conviction a result of God's "okay" on the purchases, or was it the lack of my faulty, clogged receptors due to a slow drift from Him?  Just because a television set is not picking up a signal does not mean the station has ceased to broadcast.  If you are not home to answer the door that does not mean a visitor did not stop by.

Since both items cannot be returned and neither purchase will cause us to go hungry, no permanent damage has been done.  Even if the purchases were or were not green lighted by Him, the lesson taught is invaluable.  Just praying does not guarantee every decision will be in God's perfect plan for our lives.  The relationship must be strong and the reception clear so the message can be received.