Blog Archives

The Bottom Line

1/25/2018

1O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever? How long will you look the other way?
2How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul, with sorrow in my heart every day? How long will my enemy have the upper hand?
3Turn and answer me, O Lord my God! Restore the sparkle to my eyes, or I will die.
4Don’t let my enemies gloat, saying, “We have defeated him!” Don’t let them rejoice at my downfall.

5But I trust in your unfailing love. I will rejoice because you have rescued me.
6I will sing to the Lord because he is good to me. (Psalm 13 NLT)

We have all been to the place of spiritual torture that the psalmist brings to life in verses 1 through 4. I believe that all humans do. It is our great joy as followers of Christ that, by the Grace of God made possible by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we are able – in our most quiet and uncertain moments – say, “But I trust in your unfailing love” sweet Jesus. You have rescued me Jesus. You have saved me. I trust only in you and upon the rock of my salvation I will live my life with joy and thanksgiving. You are good to me God – You are more than I deserve. Salvation is more than I deserve – and so I will sing of my redeemer every day.

These are not just Christian platitudes that we banter back and forth to each other to cover up our insecurities and lack of true caring - They are Christian Truths upon which we stand when the god of this world, Satan, has does his worst to us. All around us we see men, women, and children turning further away from the reality of our Redeemer and closer to sin, destruction, and death. We watch as people we know and people we don't know delve deeper in sin; kill one another; kill themselves; and destroy the very creations of the Most High. There is no Truth in their lives; there is not the bedrock of salvation, nor the steady faith in anything, or any one, bigger than themselves; there is no love, for God IS Love. They do not know of the sacrifice God has made to draw them into relationship with Him. Indeed, when life comes crashing down, they cannot say, as the Psalmist says, "But I trust in your unfailing love. I will rejoice because you have rescued me. I will sing to the Lord because God is good to me."

I praise God every day, especially in the middle of every storm, that I can. Do You?

1 Comment

Psalm 13 - What / or Who Defines Our Self-Image?

1/23/2018

0 Comments

Money for Nothin' and Your Church for Free....

1/18/2018

0 Comments

8Don’t be surprised if you see a poor person being oppressed by the powerful and if justice is being miscarried throughout the land. For every official is under orders from higher up, and matters of justice get lost in red tape and bureaucracy. 9Even the king milks the land for his own profit! 10Those who love money will never have enough. How meaningless to think that wealth brings true happiness! 11The more you have, the more people come to help you spend it. So what good is wealth—except perhaps to watch it slip through your fingers! (Ecclesiastes 5:8-11 NLT)
24“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. (Matthew 6:24 NIV))
9But people who long to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. 10For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And some people, craving money, have wandered from the true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows. (1 Tim. 6:9-10 NLT)

Pretty clear teaching here. There is not too much left open to “interpretation.” Yet we as church leaders take little heed of the very explicit caution in the scriptures and plow ahead thinking that this is not a temptation to which we, or the churches we lead, will succumb. In fact, the love of wealth is much more than a temptation as is made clear in Matthew – it is a force of evil.

I have a saying when it comes to the construction of new churches, “when you build the beast, you have to feed the beast.” This is not an inherent criticism of large churches or what we call Mega Churches; it is simple fact. Whether a congregation is throwing $50 million into a 200,000 square foot stadium style, or 2.5 million into a 25,000 square foot “traditional,” that building is going to have to be fed water, sewer, electricity, insurance, maintenance and people to serve it – yes, I said serve it. The building must remain open and it is not long until the pressures of serving the building invade the preaching, programs, and marketing of the church. People MUST come; money MUST be made. Serving people will attract people; and people bring money and money is power in this culture. People, money and power – the unholy triumvirate of churchianity.

How true is this, however, in our personal lives? Its easy to look outside of ourselves – to churches (in which the Gospel is compromised) to schools (in which healthy, comprehensive education is compromised) and to government (in which the principles of our constitution are compromised) – but what about you? Which master do you serve? What constructs have you created that must be “fed?” House? Car? Hobby? Work? Your people? Your money? Your status? Your time? Now, what is it that you compromise in order to serve those masters? Next question… why won’t you submit and trust your Savior?

0 Comments

The Power of a Choice

1/4/2018

0 Comments

35Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? 36(As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”) 37No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. 38And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. 39No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord. (NLT)

This passage from Romans, Chapter 8 speaks of a love that cannot be fully expressed inhuman terms – nor can it be fully duplicated by human beings. We speak of this love being expressed through sacrifice, through selflessness, through the gifts with which our Heavenly Father blesses us daily – But I would contend that this love, HIS love, is most fully understood by us as a decision. God’s love is a choice and He has made the choice to love you regardless of how YOU feel about HIM. Did you get that? You see, we most often relate to God’s selfless love by thinking of it in the same terms as our human, selfish, love. We are always wondering what conditions He is placing n His love for us – or what, in our more wretched moments, what He can do for us or give to us because He claims to love us.

Admit it, it’s true – and that’s ok, for now, but part of the sanctification process – the process that we as submitted followers of Christ go through in order to reflect holiness – is to also understand the power of God’s CHOICE for while we were still sinners, He died for us so that we can be saved from the power of sin and death and enter into a relationship with Him that will last into eternity. THAT is the power of His CHOICE. If He made demands of us we would never be worthy. It is what He does, has done, not what we have done – or can ever do.

He loves us simply because, well, He loves us – because He chooses to. It is pure Love and pure selflessness. It is pure Agape love and, if we choose to believe that Jesus is the Christ and that He died as atonement for your sins, we can receive that Agape love and, in our best moments, reflect it back to a dying world. Amen.

0 Comments

The Bottom Line

Psalm 13 - What / or Who Defines Our Self-Image?

Money for Nothin' and Your Church for Free....

The Power of a Choice

Author

Archives

Categories

ABOUT US

RESOURCES

CONNECT TO US