Category: encouragement

Umbilical Cord Christianity

 

“I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who gave me strength, because he trusted me and gave me this work of serving him. In the past I spoke against Christ and persecuted him and did all kinds of things to hurt him. But God showed me mercy, because I did not know what I was doing. I did not believe.”

1 Timothy 1:12-13, NCV

 

Coming out and thanking God is a critical way we can grow.  Paul thanks God out loud.  He has in mind, through a modern metaphor, God as a power plant, providing him with everything he needs.  He is now being energized by God, and this infusion enables us to do some amazing things that others consider quite exceptional.  (Handling this piece of understanding is critical to fitting into the Kingdom.)

Umbilical cord Christianity is the way Paul seems to view his walk and ministry.  He seems himself connected with the Holy Spirit which transforms him and his work.  Without this deeply vital connection, Paul becomes open to all kinds of evil and atrocity.  It’s fascinating, but we actively expand darkness if we are not attached.  We will end up doing all kinds of evil.  There are many who can’t see this truth.

In these verses we find another issue–that of forgiveness of self.  Paul had an ugly past.  He had once been an effective tool in the evil one’s hands.  On a logical level, this should taint him completely and irrevocably.  Paul was marked to be a wicked presence in the early Church.  Everyone knew him and braced themselves against his personal darkness.  They all thought that Paul was completely evil.

But in a dramatic moment, Paul is converted to Christ on the Damascus Road.  This is a radical shifting in the early Church.  Paul points to the mercy that God has, and makes it very clear that God has exclusively arranged and administered this miracle.  He points to the Spirit’s work that has intrinsically changed everything.  Paul is now completely altered by the Holy Spirit.

Another vital point; it was Jesus Himself who was hurt, when His children were hurt.  All of Paul’s viciousness and meanness was really directed against God.  We seldom think this way.  We may admit sin, but we will rarely view it as against God directly.  There is an old Yiddish proverb, “If God had a house, people would come and break His windows”.  In my own desperate and personal war against the Almighty, I often strain and strive to strike at His children.

There is an immense mercy and grace for sinners like Saul.  And nothing is irrevocable.  Grace insists on that.  All we can do, is change our mind and our heart (repent).  Then, we must tether ourselves, reviving that umbilical cord, and connect to Him our very lives (sanctification).  The very presence of Jesus will change everything.

 

I have a definite sense that there are things in this teaching which are touching hearts.  I have very few ways to help you.  But I can pray, and hold you up to our Father.  Let me know, ok. 

 

 

 

Even More Victory in Our Affliction

 

Reach for the tape

 So we plow on in this miniseries on “Victory in Our Affliction”. 

This is part 3.

 ***

Part 1 is here–https://brokenbelievers.com/2010/09/23/victory-in-the-middle-of-affliction/ 

Part 2 is here–https://brokenbelievers.com/2010/10/19/more-victory-in-our-affliction/

*****

Can Our Pain Produce Anything Good?

Our pain tells us we are growing in Christlikeness.  When we hurt often the Lord will draw quite close, with pain focusing our eyes to see Him, others and His Kingdom.  It is far from pleasant.  Diamonds are produced in confinement and pressure.  Our faith is like a precious jewel ‘in the making’. Gold has to be refined to make it pure .  “I tested you in hard times just as silver [or, gold] is refined in a heated furnace.” Isa. 48:10.  Both diamonds and precious metals have to be worked on before they are recognized as authentic.  Often, it will be a blast furnace of affliction.

“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”  2 Cor. 4:17, NKJV

“These little troubles are getting us ready for an eternal glory that will make all our troubles seem like nothing.” 2 Cor. 4:17, CEV

We can hold a sense that our different afflictions are actually our employees who work for us.  They ‘prompt’ us for what we need at any given moment.  For example, we need to grow in love.  What does God do?  He sends us very difficult and frustrating people for us to love.  He sends us His best for us!  Our lessons are given to guide us into a Christlike identity.

The natural impulse is to regard our affliction as eroding our faith, or degrading it.  But the opposite is true.  Affliction is like the weight bars waiting for us in the gym.  The bar and weights do not have an agenda or impulse to defeat me.  They are there to help me.  The gym is a wonderful metaphor for us to grasp spiritual things.

“And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience.”  Romans 5:3, KJV

The word ‘patience’ simply means ‘endurance’.  And it seems we are starting all over in thinking that afflictions are evil, and to be avoided and rejected.  But actually the opposite is true!  We deal with the pain and frustration knowing it is working in us a ‘concentrated form of glory.’

“Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.”  James 1:3

Essentially it is all ’cause and effect’ with our provisional acceptance to the Lord’s good intention, we let Him have His way with us.  It hurts, some may call it brutal, but it seems to be the only way for God to make us ready for eternity.

Almighty Father

“Almighty Father, Son and Holy Ghost, eternal and ever blessed gracious God; to me the least of saints, to me allow that I should keep a door in paradise.   That I may keep the smallest door, the furthermost, the darkest, coldest door, the door which is the least used, the stiffest door.  If it so be but in thine house, O God, if so be that I can see thy glory even afar, and hear thy voice, O God, and know that I am with thee, thee O God.”

A Prayer of St. Columba, 521-597 AD

 

Bryan’s Note

We must travel some distance, before something like this will cling to our hearts.  Columba’s journey to the presence of Jesus most certainly gave him a perspective that enabled him to pray with this intensity and this humility.  We cannot dissuade ourselves of his effort and his overwhelming desire to be near Him.  We can only watch, and mark the zeal which took his heart and soul into the burning presence of His presence.  Columba becomes a guide of what is possible and what is to be sought.  We must become (if we are in pursuit) a people radically changed by the reality of His presence.

 

 

Sunday Funnies: It’s a Dog’s Life!

Famous Dog Quotes

  • “Some days you’re the dog; some days you’re the hydrant.” — Unknown
  • “Whoever said you can’t buy happiness forgot about puppies.” — Gene Hill
  • “In dog years, I’m dead.” — Unknown
  • “Dogs feel very strongly that they should always go with you in the car, in case the need should arise for them to bark violently at nothing right in your ear.” — Dave Barry
  • “Outside of a dog, a book is probably man’s best friend; inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.” — Groucho Marx
  • “To his dog, every man is Napoleon; hence the constant popularity of dogs.” — Aldous Huxley
  • “A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down.” — Robert Benchley
  • “Did you ever walk into a room and forget why you walked in? I think that’s how dogs spend their lives.” — Sue Murphy
  • “I loathe people who keep dogs. They are cowards who haven’t got the guts to bite people themselves.” — August Strindberg
  • “No animal should ever jump up on the dining room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.” — Fran Lebowitz
  • “I wonder if other dogs think poodles are members of a weird religious cult.” — Rita Rudner
  • “My dog is worried about the economy because Alpo is up to 99 cents a can. That’s almost $7.00 in dog money.” — Joe Weinstein
  • “If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons.” — James Thurber
  • “You enter into a certain amount of madness when you marry a person with pets.” — Nora Ephron
  • “Don’t accept your dog’s admiration as conclusive evidence that you are wonderful.” — Ann Landers
  • “Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.” — Robert A. Heinlein
  • “In order to keep a true perspective of one’s importance, everyone should have a dog that will worship him and a cat that will ignore him.” — Dereke Bruce, Taipei, Taiwan
  • “Of all the things I miss from veterinary practice, puppy breath is one of the most fond memories!” — Dr. Tom Cat
  • “There is no psychiatrist in the world like a puppy licking your face.” — Ben Williams
  • “When a man’s best friend is his dog, that dog has a problem.” — Edward Abbey
  • “Cat’s motto: No matter what you’ve done wrong, always try to make it look like the dog did it.” — Unknown
  • “Money will buy you a pretty good dog, but it won’t buy the wag of his tail.” — Unknown
  • “No one appreciates the very special genius of your conversation as the dog does.” — Christopher Morley
  • “A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than he loves himself.” — Josh Billings
  • “Man is a dog’s idea of what God should be.” — Holbrook Jackson
  • “The average dog is a nicer person than the average person.” — Andrew A. Rooney
  • “He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.” — Unknown
  • “If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you; that is the principal difference between a dog and a man.” — Mark Twain
  • “Things that upset a terrier may pass virtually unnoticed by a Great Dane.” — Smiley Blanton
  • “I’ve seen a look in dogs’ eyes, a quickly vanishing look of amazed contempt, and I am convinced that basically dogs think humans are nuts.” — John Steinbeck
  • “Dogs love us,but they are very observant animals. I’m sure they notice that we keep the best food for ourselves.” — Markoff Chaney
  •  “Ever consider what they must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul — chicken, pork,  half a cow. They must think we’re the greatest hunters on earth!” — Anne Tyler

Taken from:  http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2fy14Z/web.mit.edu/afs/athena.mit.edu/user/d/r/dryfoo/www/Funny-pages/handy-latin.html