Tag Archives: love

Dignity

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No one digs a grave for the broken rotting tree. 

Exposing its inward parts, it lays exposed for all to see.

Though it gave shelter and shade, and a break from the troubling winds, dignity in its trouble escapes its mortal grasp.

Gone unnoticed all its hundred years, it goes unnoticed by the caring hands of its benefactors.

How long has this been true for man?  Like a cow shot among the herd, the rest go about eating and drinking as if their fellow had never been.

Are we but animals?  Are we not designed to live in God’s image?

Then where is mercy?  Where is godly compassion?  Where is patience among the days expectations?  Where is dignity if we gather it only for ourselves?

Is this indeed, what Christ showed us?

Shall we honor a man only to cover him in dirt?  Or at best, shall we attribute sayings to the things he did among us?  Or will he carry testimony that a few cared deeply?  Deeply enough to give what no one can take.

Dignity is a living cause.  Many take it upon themselves to receive such from others.  But you cannot snatch dignity from the air.  If it is contrived it is apparent and useless.  Dignity must be given, and that by humble hands.

Beginning of the End

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Think hard about the following.

Right now I don’t care what the theologian says.  Right now I perceive far beyond my perception.  I write this for my sake (whatever the years may bring).  If it is at all useful to others may the Lord bless as his wisdom dictates.
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It began as a joke; a singular break with eternal love.  A demeaning of another’s position; that which was given to every creature according to the wisdom of God for the fullness of life.  Laughter filled the air in a certain place.  Perhaps, even the one that was demeaned saw the humor for a moment.  But division was born.

A small distortion of truth began the dissension of unity.  A lie gave birth to death.  And didn’t death give birth to laughter?

Who did this?  Didn’t Jesus tell us?  “. . .He is the father of lies.”  Eventually 1/3 followed him.

Do you want to see his handiwork?  Take a good look at humanity.  See how prejudice rules with an iron fist.  See how ridicule is so dearly beloved.  Sarcasm is a breastplate of shining jewels, and how proud is the one who weilds it with a deft mind. [Don Rickles the king of demeaning]

Color, culture, history, ability, social position, economic status, political affiliation, nationality, and doesn’t the list seems endless.  Love does not do these things.

We laugh at one another’s faults because every man is full to overflowing with them.  But how quickly the laughter turns to murder.

BEGINNING OF ETERNITY

See how “the ones” go back to the things of a baby.

See how the colors of red and blue are new.

See how innocence begins to develop.

Because they heard the whisper from You.

Discord dissipates.

Acceptance is embraced.

And how the faithful hateful lie,

Is by Love replaced.

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4)

By His grace;
By His grace,
By His grace!

The Sum of Love

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The prowess of the inkwell is on vacation. Tis the Sabbath of expected diligence.

The following article will not be dressed for the egg head ball; that certain gathering of literary elegance. I will not even bother to knock on the door of the seamstress. Considering the content, let this article be ugly.
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In my youth, we constantly moved from place to place. I don’t remember spending a full year in any one school. I was always the new kid. I was always the threshold for the wannabe bullies. No one knew me, no one cared, I was a walking target for hatred. No more than an unknown animal in society, I was prime to be abused.

My first 17 years of life taught me that there is no such thing as love. There was only social acceptance. But social acceptance took time that I never had.

I quickly learned that this is what men call love. I endured their hatred, despising, outcasting, and beatings because I knew there was no end in sight. Needless to say, I became a despicable human being.

I found that the love of man is based on competition. If you perform well, according to their expectations, they embrace you readily. But let a fault show and they are heartless pursuers. And I was full to overflowing with faults.

I saw the accepted ones make mistakes. But there seemed to be an unwritten code of tolerance. A “one off” is accepted as if a simple mistake. Yes they paid a price for their mistakes, but it was not terminal.

If you want to beat the bully, believe in Christ the Son of God. If you want to strip your life of the competition that men call love, believe in the love of God.

God is not a man that he should pit us against one another.

God is not a man that he should honor the strength of body and social position.

As you are willing to believe, the power of God becomes greater than any persecution.

Blessed is the man who endures because he believes. The man who does not believe endures all things as punishment. And to whatever extent a man believes so his perception of punishment is lessened. His perception of life’s difficulties is reduced.

Where there is a solution to a problem a man may be willing to wait patiently for it and endure the problem. Such endurance confounds those who live to hate. When they find they cannot break something, eventually they become bored and walk away.

Looking over your shoulder is no way to live at peace; always in fear of punishment.

Do we believe our problems are temporary or do we believe they are the end of us?

Consider what Jesus has told us.

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!

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.

To the Journey

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We have a tendency to trivialize everything.  But we come to own this tendency with good reason.  Absolutely everything we know deteriorates.  Even the compassion of Man is in a state of flux; needs come and go, the sick get better or die, poverty evaporates at the end of its work, hatred goes to sleep when it is tired of destroying.  So even Man’s compassion (what is considered the best Man can offer) rests from its work.

We strive hard, but at the end of the day everything we know is trivial.  Everything we know is in a constant state of repair or deterioration.  Isn’t that why we sleep?

Most people, including myself, tend to apply this trivial mindset to the gospel of Christ.  We can’t help it, it’s in our nature to perceive things as if they are passing.  And without the constant help of the eternal Living God’s Holy Son we would never perceive the gospel as eternal.  It would remain in a mode of choice.  And isn’t that what we see when we look at those who call themselves Christians; constantly making the choice to do (or not to do) Christ-like things.

We need to be reminded that his promises last forever and never change.  That’s why we read the Bible often; to renew our decaying mind.  That’s why we pray, with whatever earnest soul we can muster.  Isn’t that why we are told to encourage one another?

Connected to this is an understanding that has come again to me this morning.  Everything we do is manufactured.  It’s in a constant state of repair.  But a love for righteousness cannot be in a state of repair.  For whatever constantly needs repair is also constantly deteriorating.  Love does not deteriorate, and eternal Righteousness does not fall into the realm of choice.  Let’s be honest, we either love righteousness or we don’t. 

What an amazing place God has created; it is not a place of deterioration, it is a place of potential eternal life.  There can be no better testing of a man’s heart than the state of affairs I have spoken of here.  On top of that, God knows the difference between a manufactured love of righteousness and one that is ingrained and sincere.

This is the nature of salvation.  It is not something that will be.  It is something that IS.  Christ has come, as the great power of God, to redeem the humble of heart.  He has come to teach us eternity.  Imagine that!  The sum of what we know about eternity is the simple word itself.  And without the presence of God, that’s where our knowledge remains.

Every man is encouraged to begin the journey of truth.  The journey is called Christianity.