The ones who love God have three things happen to them.
They are despised on this Earth while they love the one who made them. Somehow such open love is considered illicit.
But when they leave this place they go to be with the one they have loved so dearly. They are ushered into Eternal Joy with open arms. For they have proved they love him more than these.
And the third thing that happens to them is most fascinating. Their name, their words, their actions, are all rolled onto a pedestal called Legend.
Man is curious. He will despise and kill his enemy, then he will raise his enemy to Legendary status. With the same words he uses to lie, he now tells fanciful stories about this one who is no longer among them. By this, the work of God’s people is multiplied many-fold.
In these three things, the love of God is greatly glorified. See how the wisdom of God works to glorify love, life, righteousness, Justice, compassion, grace, and mercy. And all these things are in the being of his holy and righteous son Jesus!
So be it.
Monthly Archives: July 2016
Anacondaian tapeworms
I was filling out the work order for today’s work. I drew and N. I noticed how it was misshapen. I thought to myself, “Well you’re just not perfect are ya”.
LIGHT BULB!
How bad is self righteousness? How foolish to look down on others when we are so horribly imperfect ourselves. But don’t we do it all day long?
Imperfection lives in us like a hungry Anaconda; always looking for someone else to devour. And it’s impossible for a man to kill that massive tapeworm. You need the Lord Jesus to rule over your thoughts.
And how unenlightened are those who tell the Christian he has no right to judge. The Christian isn’t judging, my friend. He’s trying to tell it to you like it is. But see how your self-righteousness gets in the way of your ears.
Sigh……….
Marriage
Did you know that the current divorce rate in America is 50%?
I was thinking this morning about how I want my life to matter. In the end, I came to the conclusion that I want to bring gifts to the Lord’s wedding. It didn’t take a heartbeat for my mind to compare gifts at a wedding today with gifts at the wedding of the Lord.
People marry for their lifetime, at best. The Lord’s wedding to his people will be a “once in eternity” event. Never has it happened before, and never will it happen again. It would be good to let that sink in.
With divorce at 50%, what is the value of any gift we might bring to a wedding? There’s a 50-50 chance they will only be useful in the division of things. Our token of love might well become a token of division.
But then it dawned on me, the importance of the Lord’s wedding to his people. When the Lord marries us, it will be forever without the slightest chance of disillusionment. What then is the value of the things I bring him on that Holy day?
How do I bring him gifts? What can my hands invent that I can bring him in my soul? The Flesh, and all I can do, will be nothing on that day . Nothing. What then are these gifts I’m talking about? Simply put, the gifts we bring the Lord are born of obedience to him today. We bring honor to his wedding because we have let him do the work in us that brings his Father Glory.
We know what he wants. We know who he is. And we know who he wants us to be. I’m really not sure I need to say anymore.
Spiritual Mark on the Doorpost
Every human being has a religion. Religion is Man’s obedience to his version of God. It is good then to obey the constructs of our religion. But it is better to employ the trappings of faith.
Every once in awhile, when the time seems right to you, put your religion in a box and leave it outside your room of Prayer. Dress yourself in nothing more than faith. Then go to God in truth.
Once stripped of what you think is righteous obedience, you will find yourself humbly and woefully inadequate before the Living God. But when you leave the room of Prayer, and recover all your trappings of religion, they will seem far less important. You will have grown a smidge or two.
By His Grace
“I Believe”, by Brooks & Dunn
I was happily listening to Brooks and Dunn sing the song “I Believe”. I love the story about the old man. I love the story of how the young man took the news of the old man’s death; “I didn’t know whether to cry or laugh”.
Then the lyrics come what my soul has had trouble with in the past. I know the words are coming, and so I overlook them. But today they disturbed my peaceful mood. The singer says, “I can’t quote the words, the chapter or the verse”.
Here’s the rub: Well why didn’t you look into it before you wrote the lyrics!
The world always takes as much of Jesus as it wants to. It knows what makes money, and what doesn’t. If he had completed the lyrics to that song with a passion for Jesus, I doubt the song would have sold as much.
That just rubs my soul! Because the people who love that song likely agree with him. And because they sing the lyrics they think they have something.
Enough said I suppose.
To the Work
I saw a picture in my mind. An astounding revelation comes clear.
Let me be about the work I have been sent to do. I am to go to the field and harvest the crop. It is ridiculous to go to the rows that have already been harvested. But the field is large, plenty of room for animals to be found among what needs yet to be harvested.
The lion is there,
And so the bear,
Devouring delicious fruit.
But I can’t care,
Though I’m aware,
I have come to harvest truth.
I’ll harvest beside him,
“You have yours I have mine”.
My God will restrain
For the sake of his name.
As I do what I am sent to do.
Words From There 