Monthly Archives: December 2015

Toward Release

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What does it look like when someone trusts Jesus?  What does it look like when they put all their confidence in the power of Christ to save?

Polycarp was burned at the stake.  But when he was encouraged to run and hide from his captors, instead he invited them to a dinner in his home.  Later he said, “80 and 6 years he has served me well why should I deny him now”.

Legend has it that Peter was crucified upside down, hardly feeling worthy to suffer as his master did.  But readily willing to suffer for the one he loved.

Apparently the Apostle John was boiled in oil before he was banished to the Isle of Patmos.  In that place he told us in writing about the beauty of the living God’s Holy Son.

There is a story of a mother and her two daughters who were captured by the Romans.  On the journey to Rome, understanding that they were beautiful women, the mother fained a desire to bathe before entrance to Rome.  A raging Creek was near, so the Romans let them go and bathe.  At the side of the torrent she grabbed her two daughters and through all of them into the raging river, choosing to drown rather than be molested by vulgar men (and this for the sake of purity in regard to the name of Jesus).

If I had time I could fill up far more than 100 thick volumes of testimonies.  Even today there are stories of people who are suffering brutally because they trust Jesus.  Beheadings, burnings, stabbings, and on and on.

I knew at least one faithful loving Christian, who up into his eighties, loved the Lord more than anything else in the world.  Even to his death bed he waved us away lest we interfere with his communion.

“If you love me you will obey my commands.” 

“Never will I leave you or forsake you.”

Such a short few years we are asked to trust him like this. 

Then FREEDOM!

Living Mystery

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Billions of things I can’t explain or understand.  But the most mysterious are those things that are in our hand.

I look at myself, I look around at all the people, I listen to my heart, I listen to the fears of others.  The mystery rises up when I look at those who call themselves Christians (even in myself).

Someone needs to explain to me why those who believe in the love of God in Christ to save us, fear so many things.  We fear sickness.  But didn’t he sustain his people for forty years in the wilderness?  Curiously, they perished for their unbelief, yet we seem to carry on their tradition.

We fear economic loss.  But didn’t he command Peter to go catch a fish, that he may pay the tax?  And didn’t the widow of Zarephath find that she had plenty to eat for her and her son while she gave residence to the Prophet?

We fear our sins and failings of the past.  Yet a single drop of the Holy Lord’s blood heals the sins of billions.  How much more his dead body?  And didn’t he say that as far as the east is from the west our sins are cast from the memory of the Living God?

What is the power of Christ if those who say they believe refuse to receive?

Yes, of all the things I can’t understand, the greatest lay our unwillingness to believe.  It is as if we say, “You will get no glory from me!”

From Speculation to Understanding

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Speculation about aliens from other planets abounds.  Stories, rumors, even social traditions, talk about a foreign life form visiting this tiny little place in space.  Yet not a single interstellar alien has appeared before the public.

All the while, everything in creation is part of a giant spider web.  Everything we can perceive is hooked intricately to the center; the story of God’s Holy and Righteous Son, Jesus.

People pick a spot on the giant spider web of things that are in this created place.  From that vantage point they say there is no God.  Or at best they admit there is a God but that he can’t be understood.  Why not stand in the center where Jesus is and look out into all the things that have been made?

From there you will understand the meaning of life.

There is a God, lee Ann Womack

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They argue there is no God will they sit at their desk.  Perhaps they should get out more often.

Seasons of the Moment

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The body says,
“AHHHHHHHHHHH!”

The peace of God in my soul says,
“Ah.”

And the winter of life turns into a week on a Caribbean island.

Freedom Fighters?

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I see people fighting for freedom (so to speak).

So to speak of fighting; the fight Americans are putting up is more akin to complaining.

So to speak of freedom; the great majority of Americans have never lived under a totalitarian regime.  They have no idea what it’s like to live without freedom.  And they would be seriously hard pressed if you ask them to define what freedom is.

Passion is born of experience. 

The same is true with the Gospel of Christ.  Happy is the average person who calls himself a Christian:

.To go to Church (when he wants to)

.To be accepted in his social situation (as if saying you’re a Christian makes it so)

.To stay out of trouble and to stay out of jail

.To have some future unknown hope (leaving the entirety of heaven in the hands of those who are there; preferring ignorance over understanding)

And

.To live his life as he pleases “knowing” that the forgiveness of Christ will cover him in the end (such a man has absolutely no reason to fight for anything)

A man fights for what he knows.  The one who knows how precariously he stands as a free man, fights with all he has to keep his freedom.  The one who does not understand freedom, does not fight.  And such a man will not understand what I have just written.

The offer of Christ is free.  Accepting his offer will cost you everything you have.