Category Archives: religion

Onward.

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The religion of a man comes about because he thinks he has found the extent of God’s requirement for him.  How far the man goes in Christ depends on how much he desires to learn.  Doesn’t our obedience to the Living God’s Holy Son depend on our will?

God has in mind for us great things.  He has in mind for us beautiful, holy, righteous, eternal, and glorifying things.  But far too often man settles for some small routine.  He gathers about himself just enough to say, “I have done the Lord’s will.  He is pleased with me”.  Such religions have a veneer of righteousness.  But consider the following.

God is not my co-pilot.  He is the one at the helm.  He owns the ship.  He owns the Sea and the Wind.  He owns the place we are going to.  He owns the place we have come from. 

The religion of man tends to say, “I have pleased God by coming through that door.  I will then go back through that door and return to the place I am”.  How can that be reasonable?  It is so easy to do the things we have learned to do.  Still, the Lord beckons us unto death; death to self and Life to Him.

The Sprout of Salvation

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It is not frustrating.  And it is not in vain.

It is frustrating when we perceive the things of God from our own mind and heart.  For then, our work for the Living God seems fruitless.

We speak to our brother about Christ, but he casts us away as if we are insane.  He goes about his business of death with a smile on his face, as if he has just vanquished a foolish enemy.  Calling us names in his mind, heart, and words, he considers us vile and useless.

He happily goes back to his useless gods:  “To these I am familiar.  I understand when they speak about my dreams and ambitions.  They are set concretely by the evidence of History.  This nation or that has relied heavily on the traditions I love so much.  The after life is mysterious.  But these gods give me consolation in my sorrow.  They speak well of my potential.”

With the sleight-of-hand that belongs to death, he throws away our testimony for Christ.  Our words are full of fault in his eyes.  For they give no praise or quarter to man.  The testimony of Christ is foolishness to such people.

I consider this with sober mind.  I want his salvation.  I want to hear the praise of Christ on his lips.  I want to see a changed heart that is willing to learn and love.

But I am caught up in frustration.  The very thing I do not have a right to own.  For salvation does not belong to me.  It is not within my grasp to grant or to take away.  I cannot open the eyes of his heart.  I cannot open his ears that he should hear.  And I cannot manipulate his heart that he should learn to love and to be humble.

Salvation belongs to our God and to the Lamb.  For he dispenses his wisdom from heaven.  What he gives, when he gives, and how he gives, is dictated by eternity.  And he does not speak the Gospel to us in words that can be spoken or perceived by Man. 

God speaks his Gospel to us in the faithfulness that surrounds us.  He speaks in a language that never ceases.  He speaks vast volumes of books in a short and poignant sentence. 

All the while Man looks for the key.  But his hands are not big enough to handle the object of release which God offers from heaven.

What is the summation of this?  I confess I do not know. 

I have spoken to my brother.  I have acted toward him in a godly fashion, full of love and desire to understand.  I have prayed for him consistently.  And I strive, with all I have, to be patient.  Still the sun has not risen in his heart.  And now he has ordered me to stop speaking to him about such things.  In fact, he has vowed to stop speaking to me altogether. The door to him is now slammed shut.

Here I sit, just outside his door, wondering and perplexed.

Let the wisdom of God be the wisdom of God.  What more can I say?  It is not mine to wield the mystery of salvation.  It is simply mine to cast the seeds about, letting the wind of God direct their fall.

I cannot give the Living God counsel.  It is mine simply to be faithful.  In war we can watch as others are killed.  And there is nothing we can do to stop it.  In life, some will live and some will die.  Who are we to say no to the One who has made all things perfectly well?

But I wonder.  What are we learning through all this?  What are we gaining through the loss that is so prevalent about us?  Who are we, as we stand in the midst of a Slaughter?  Hip deep in spiritual blood, what is the value is our life in Christ to those who die?

The answer lies in a language I have never heard.  This puzzle piece fits perfectly in the vast array of God’s glorious eternity.  God is not anxious about such a question.  For he has had the answer long before the world was ever made.

Does this give me peace?  The peace this gives me lives in the place I cannot translate.  For still I am anxious to see Christ appear in my brother.  And doesn’t every Christian feel the same?

Holy Father, we leave these things in your hand for that is where your wisdom has dictated it shall be.  Salvation is yours.  Still we pray in earnest that your love should appear. 

“By Your Grace”, you have taught me.  And I am convinced there is no other answer.  Your strength is Christ Jesus.  Still we beg you to move, yet according to your wisdom.

In the Beginning

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84 steps required

Before the engine can ever produce.

Miss or replace even one tiny one

And the product becomes juice.

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So the world was created:

From all that never was.

So void chaos clothed in body

Holding to God’s Holy Laws

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How many of us endeavor

To crack  the Holy “Code”;

To produce their own salvation

And that, by their own accord.

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Please take note of Genesis 1: 1

How the Spirit of God gave creation Birth.

Void and empty,

Man’s work undone.

We surely struggle in vain

Without God’s Holy and Righteous Son.

Stability, the Fragrance of Love

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Night or day, rain or shine, storm or tranquil afternoon; I carry within me a Spring time born of eternity.  The Love of God in Christ Jesus plays out in my heart and mind without ceasing. 

This love is like a musical waterfall of exquisite emotions, thoughts, doings and experiences.  It’s no more a religion then the beautiful explosion of love between the young man and a woman, his new found lifelong best friend.

God’s love causes me to smell the colors of the world around me.  He shows me the dance of sound in the fabric of air.  Words, all words, become living creatures as the Word of Life comes near to caress with truth.

I am useless to man.   The Living promise has finally caught me in an eternal embrace.  I tried to pay attention to the things that matter most to men, but fail miserably and often .The beautiful patience of God stoked a fire in me to make him blessed with his desire.

All of this, and vastly more, gives me reason to ponder the definition of love among men.  So very much is made of the love between a man and a woman.  Books, songs, poetry, movies, and all the trinkets produced as a celebration of joy and longevity.  All this commotion for something that cannot possibly last.  The hurricane of reality sweeps down from the mountains to devastate the joy of first love between man and wife.  Most marriages disintegrate to a bond of friendship at best.  At worst, they disintegrate to nothing.

The captivating emotions of human love produce something similar to the love of God within his beloved ones.  But people are people.  They are everything but stable.  Greed, impatience, expectations, and everything associated with self begins to ruin first love’s beauty.  Eventually death takes it all away.

But how is it that so much is made of the love of man, which is so transitory, while virtually nothing is celebrated toward the love of God?  The love of God simply becomes a place to cry out for help when everything we wanted falls apart.

Faithless Prayer

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2 “Thus says the LORD who made the earth, the LORD who formed it to establish it, the LORD is His name, 3 ‘Call to Me and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’ ”  (Jeremiah 33:2)

They have said, “Prayer is such a burden”.  They respond to me, “When have we said such a thing?”  The compassionate answer comes:  “Every time you did not do it.”

But this can be given to you: you did not do it because you did not understand.  

You think that prayer is like writing a letter that may or may not be read.   You have no faith so you do not bothered to write.  For lack of faith there is lack of understanding.

God speaks.  But who hears him?  He speaks in what is.  He speaks in what did not come.  He speaks of his Holy promises; those things which will be, for he cannot lie.

Prayer is only a letter if it is given by a faithless soul.  And truly such letters are sent among the wind, to blow to this place or that.  But the faithful will believe and wait.  They will have patience for they know that God is true.

The faithful will live abundant lives.   They will be blessed in all they do.  For what they do is to trust and wait.  What they do, is ask for ears.  They ask for eyes that see.  Ask for understanding, and that their lives may testify.  See how abundance arrives.

Rather, Be Trivial

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We are taught to give up.

We are taught to be trivial.

“Do these things and you will be satisfied.

Abstain from the things of God;

See how complicated and unknown are God’s things to man.

See how many versions of God scream to be first.

See how it is right to give up the search.

Be satisfied with what you have, and do not seek more than is reasonable.”

Rather be trivial.

Rather live with the love that you have.

Rather be diligent with the things you already know how to do.

Perceive the beautiful things of living life;

among your fellow men,

Among the sustaining of this world.

Among the limitations of chaos,

Among the decaying pattern of this place,

And among the innate desire to laugh.

Truth says clearly:

“You KNOW this is not the sum of things.

You KNOW there is More to be had.

You KNOW the ways of man are not the fullness of life.

You KNOW you will one day cease here.

You KNOW you will be inspected with absolute scrutiny.

Do you KNOW the name of the One who will inspect?