Tag Archives: preparation

The Coming Winter

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We work so hard among the things of men.  Everyday we add to the calluses of some certain part of our body, produced by the diligence we are expected to employ.  We are tossed into the fray by the expectations of the body.  Have we let a tumult define who we are.

Is it necessary that this tumult consume our thoughts?  Does the body need to dictate who we are?  The reason why we do these things is what is important.  What motivates us?  Doesn’t our motivation depend on the eyes of our soul?  But where are those eyes fixed?

Do we allow our eyes to be fixed on the temporary; those shining little objects offered as if pacifiers?  Or are we diligent to remember the truth that lays before every man?

Everyday is opportunity to remember the coming judgment.  Everyday is opportunity to do the will of our God.  There is a Holy pen in the Holy Hand of the Holy One of God.  Isn’t it wise to provoke it to write our name in the book of life?

Consider this prophecy in the book of Daniel chapter 12:

1“At that time Michael, the great prince who protects your people, will arise. There will be a time of distress such as has not happened from the beginning of nations until then.  But at that time your people—everyone whose name is found written in the book—will be delivered.  2 Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.  3 Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars.”

See how pale the things of man become when the judgment is remembered. 

Those who endure winter well are they who have prepared.  There is a brilliantly white winter approaching; a time when the work of man will not be possible.  Now is the time to prepare!  See how the leaves have fallen.  Isn’t the season of God imminent?

By His Grace

Habitual Behavior

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People fall because they think too highly of their feet.  While we should be considering our feet’s limitations, we place our trust in their agility.  But are feet are not sentient beings. Why do we treat them as if they are trustworthy slaves?  If you don’t watch over them, they will do the very thing you don’t want them to do. The one who rarely stumbles or falls is the one who makes it a habit to remember limitations.

Likewise, if every driver considered the limitations of his car more often than he considers its agility, there would be far fewer accidents.  If every driver made it a habit to drive as if he is driving on slick roads, he would never end up in the ditch.  He would never “swap paint” with another.  Would never donate his bumper to public disgrace.

If every Christian made it a habit to remember that he can fail, and that the source of his strength is God alone, he would never stumble.

Agility in Christ demands habitual use of Bible reading, prayer and practice.  Lack the habitual use of any of these three, and the Christian is bound to suffer loss.

To our shame, when a person falls, or crashes his car, or suffers loss in Christ, some variation of the following phrase can be heard: “I am only human”.  It is to our shame because diligent and habitual behavior could have transformed us into something radically more.  We were lazy, we were derelict, we were willingly rebellious.  What we thought we would become has escaped us.  And the fault lies clearly in our own lap.

If that is the state of your yesterdays, it need not be the state of your affairs today.  And tomorrow can be all the more secure.  All you need to do is to transform yourself into a diligent and habitual person, and this by the renewal of your mind.

What belongs to yesterday, belongs to yesterday.  Today belongs to you.  Tomorrow belongs to the one who profits from what you do today.

Don’t bother yourself with a vow.  Simply start doing the things that are good.

Write a letter to yourself, and read it when it arrives again.  Make sure you write often, you are a very lonely person.  And why wouldn’t you write back, understanding your frailty?  Its not only good social etiquette, it’s also a deed of mercy.

Begin keeping a journal or diary, and please make sure to go back and read the days before.  Do you really think anyone else will care about what you have written?  So if you’re not going to read it, why write?

Let these things become a habit and there is no need for a vow, which can so easily be broken.  Remember your New Year’s resolutions?  Haven’t you figured it out yet?  Those who have to wait for a special day to make a vow, will never be capable of keeping it.

Leave your Bible in conspicuous places.  Write down certain passages and put them in every place your eyes might go.  (On the toilet seat, on the mirror, under the cap of your deodorant, paste it on your pillow sticky side up. Do these things nightly for the preparation of the person you will be tomorrow.  While you’re at it, you might throw a few bucks into 3M stocks.) Memorize passages and think them through.  Make it a habit to do these things, and the Living Word of the Living God will begin to live in you.

When it comes to prayer you will take note that you have a distinct, “I don wanna”.  So what.  If you force your feet habitually to go to the place of prayer.  If you habitually force your knees to bend when your feet have arrived.  If you will force the first few words from your mouth, as a habit it in that place.  You will learn to adore your time of prayer.

As for practice, every man does the things he learns to love.  As our habits are, so follows our love.  And what we love is a blatant proclamation of who we have become.

By His Grace

Guilty Restraint

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It is the guilty who over react to the presence of law enforcement.  They have failed to live prepared for judgement.

I see this best when I am driving.  Car passes me doing 5 miles over the speed limit.  Then a police officer’s car comes into view, stopped along the side of the road with his lights flashing.  That same driver who passed me at 5 miles over the speed limit, now does 5 miles under the speed limit.

As I passing by in the right-hand lane I marvel at his form of obedience.  Then it occurs to me: his reaction is of fear.  While I have been obedient and have no fear.

As I see this apply on the road, it also applies to life and to God.  “It is the guilty who over react to the presence of law enforcement.  They have failed to live prepared for judgement.”

The wise prepare, in them there is no fear.  The foolish do as they please, and fear controls them.

By His Grace

The Bridal Gown

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Wisdom, please come and take me,

Show me what I don’t know.

Come, Holy Spring Storm, and shake me,

Expose me from head to toe.

I must be dressed for a meeting.

And there I shall wear no tatters.

So, seamless a gown let’s start making.

Eternity’s thread is what matters.

By His Grace

He Needs Your Help

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The promise of God, it’s  deep and it’s sure;
Lasting forever and ever.

To forfeit our standing for smallest of pleasure,
What horrible loss do we suffer.

The power of prayer is cut to the quick.
Our confidence: shattered in place.

All for the sake of a runaway smile;
On a downcast and darkened face.

Our Lord for the sake of the joy set before him,
Endured the cross, scorning its shame.

While man, for the sake of a joy set before him,
Disgraces His Holy Great Name.

Who can speak of reward such behavior does strip?
Who has understood what’s ahead?

The echoes of promise lay shattered and torn,
While our heart is filled up with regret.

Isn’t there something to which you can reach,
Inciting a love for your God?

Avoiding the places that rip you away;
Restraining your feet from the “broad”.

There’s a man who will stand on that Great Holy Day,
And his standing depends on you.

The choices you make for that hope far away,
He’s depending on what you now do.

By His Grace

The Ship of Humanity

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I am the only man who knows what has made me.  It has taken a lifetime to write the book I have become.  And it will take the perfection of eternity to read it.  This is so for every man woman and child. 

I have been wickedness.  I have endured wickedness.  I have taught wickedness.  And with all this I have brought great destruction in my years.

Before I was saved I tasted some good things.  Some good things were done for me.  Some good things I did for others.  The difference between right and wrong was shown to me very clearly.  The perspective I hold was taught by unique variety of wickedness and truth.  Thus I have become a distinctly unique creature.

Regardless my head long plunge to death God has raised me up.  As he used Pharaoh to refine his children, so God uses the wickedness of men.  (If you do not know the story of Pharaoh you will find it in the account of Moses)

Many men believe that their wickedness belongs exclusively to them.  They think it is protection and gain.  They think they stumble about, wreaking havoc as they please.  But God steers the great ship of humanity.

Every man has become what he is.  Through a variety of sources he is made to be.  It is when he is awakened by the holiness of God, that who he has become becomes useful. 

The hardness of Pharaoh’s heart grew from childhood.  There is no possible way he could know he was being used; or, if you will, set up.  Moses was sent to instruct him in the sovereignty of God.  And only God knows if Pharaoh finally understood before his death.

You, my friend, can be used by God.  He does not need what you have become.  But he can certainly put it to perfectly good use.

Perhaps you have been a gentle man.  God can use that.  Perhaps you have been a warrior against society.  God can use your rebellion.  Perhaps you have been one to fully involved yourself in the things of men, for the sake of perceived good for all.  God can use that.  Perhaps you have loved wickedness and inspired others to do the same.  You understand the ways of this wicked world.  God can use that. 

God is in control.  Regardless the chaos of men, God is saving souls.  Why not let him save yours?  You certainly need him.  And he can certainly put you to good use.