This is a 60 second commercial used on TV in New Zealand for a couple of years. It functioned as a sort of PSA raising awareness. It features part of a catchy song by Des’Ree, entitled “You Gotta Be.”
It’s a great commercial, and it is a great visual effort to communicate to those who know little about mental illness, and then go on to stigmatize others of us who battle staying sane and whole.
But it certainly isn’t a panacea for all the issues that are out there. But it is a start. Hope you enjoy this. I know it is a different kind of post, and it may not be “your cup of tea.” (I personally have a slight aversion to videos from YouTube, but this is really an exception.)
When I was a boy I was terrified of death. The very thought of being six feet deep in a small box, with maggots, rottenness and decay terrorized me. I also had an incredible fear that someone would make a
mistake and that I would wake up entombed in a buried coffin. Just thinking about it now unsettles me. It was an anxiety that required diversions. Which I suppose led me down the road of escalating drug and alcohol abuse. It undoubtedly led to much of my psychological issues that I deal with today.
Here is 2 Timothy 1:10, “Which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.Scripture says that Jesus has ”abolished death”. I have learned to love that word, “abolish”! It means to nullify, eliminate or make obsolete. This is a decisive and a dramatic word which soothes my fear, and calms my mind.
It’s like he pulled the plug. Death does not operate for the believer, because he did a disconnect for us. I used to think my terror was unique to me. I felt like I couldn’t tell anyone that I had those moments alone when I would be overwhelmed by morbid thoughts of death. But Jesus destroyed the devil!
“We are people of flesh and blood. That is why Jesus became one of us. He died to destroy the devil, who had power over death. But he also died to rescue all of us who live each day in fear of dying”, Hebrews 2:14-15 NCV.
“The fear of death is ingrafted in the common nature of all men, but faith works it out of Christians.“– V. Powell. When an athlete goes into intense training he/she will develop in their muscles “lactic acid” (or for the geeks out there– 2-hydroxypropanoic acid) Lactic acid is what causes the soreness and cramps in an overworked muscle. Trainers will stretch and manipulate the athletes limbs to extract this acid. Death has infused our souls, faith works it out of us.
Fear of death is nothing to be ashamed of. Almost all of us have had those disturbing moments that seem irrational. But it’s not a question of rationality, but of faith. Do I really believe that Jesus unplugged death for me? He made the deliberate decision to change the status quo for me. It wasn’t an afterthought, but a definite act, purposeful and well thought out.
“I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, if anyone observes My teaching [lives in accordance with My message, keeps My word], he will by no means ever see and experience death.“John 8:51, Amplified.
A tremendous promise for the believer, especially the believer who is anxious about death. We are free now, free to live life in outrageous freedom! I proclaim Jesus’ promise to you, you are free!
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These are odds and ends that would not fit in this post. I didn’t want to trash them so here you go. <3
“Christian! Death cannot hurt you! Death is your best friend – who is commissioned by Christ to summon you from the world of vanity and woe, and from a body of sin and death – to the blissful regions of glory and immortality, to meet your Lord, and to be forever with him.” –Wm. Mason
“Death is no more than passing from one room into another. But there’s a difference for me, you know. Because in that other room I shall be able to see.” —Helen Keller
Within our walks, as we attempt to follow Jesus, we need to be seriously evaluating our hearts–and the issues that affect them. If we make a short list, but the make-up would probably be justification, sanctification, glorification and deliverance.
Of this list, perhaps ‘justification’ takes the biggest hit. Being declared ‘right with God‘ is targeted especially as the most significant . But justification is quite potent, it will stand when all the other issues will stumble. Justification is the starting point, and then it carries us quite a bit further. It stands when everything else crumbles.
We come to this place, it almost seems bizarre and garish as it comes to us. But our simple faith in Jesus Christ has made us righteous. But it seems, if we start to extrapolate it out, we start thinking of realities and probabilities. These often confuse and darken our way, when they not really meant to.
“What if?” “But what might happen?” “Isn’t this a bit bizarre?” “Can’t I really make this ‘Christianity’ work?” And yet at times, we won’t take a solid position, but we operate out of a miasma of thoughts that flit through our hearts.
In the courtroom of heaven, where God sits as a judge, we are given fair hearing. But simply put we aren’t so much as made righteous, but we are declared righteous. The Greek word in the original is centered on this exclusive sense of “declaration.”
You have been declared righteous! It is definitely not a feeling, or a sense of being just or righteous– because this changes 24x a day. It seems I feel that I can never truly accumulate enough to save me. And since I am always moving, I can never really figure it out. And this makes me afraid. I become very disturbed.
We are meant to walk out a sincere justification. The enemy scrambles it before we can grasp it. Satan‘s presence must be nullified in this. There is something radical and decisive here. And it is here he puts his crack troops. This is a definite attempt to destroy your witness.
Larry David Norman (April 8, 1947 – February 24, 2008[1]) was an American Christian musician, singer, songwriter, record label owner, record producer, writer, playwright, actor, photographer, and humorist, who is credited as “a key figure in the development of contemporary Christian music“,[2] “the most significant artist in the creation of contemporary Christian music (CCM)”,[3] the “father of Christian rock music”,[4] the “Godfather of gospel rock”;[5] “Christianity’s first rock star”,[6] the “bad boy of Christian music”,[7] and “the poet laureate of the Jesus revolution”.[8] “By 1970, Norman had the most recognized name (and face) in the Jesus Movement and the Christian music scene”,[9] with Time magazine soon describing him as “probably the top solo artist in the field”.[10] While he had long been associated with the Jesus people,[11][12] and was even described as “the personification of the Jesus Movement of the late ’60s and early ’70s”,[13] Norman himself “did not particularly identify himself with the youth-oriented ‘Jesus movement’ of the time”.[14][15] He has been credited with having a significant influence on many artists, both secular and religious.[16] Norman has also been described as having a “propensity for spinning stories”,[17] and a “penchant for revisionist history”.[18]
Since Norman’s first professional release in 1967, more than 100 of his own albums have been released through such commercial record labels as Capitol, MGM, Verve, and his own independent labels: One Way Records, Solid Rock Records, Street Level Records, and Phydeaux Records. Norman’s first album, I Love You, recorded when he was one of the lead singers for the group People!, was released in 1968. The band’s cover version of The Zombies song of the same name reached number 14 on Billboard magazine‘s top twenty list in 1968 as a single.[19] Norman left People! in 1968 and subsequently performed as a solo artist, appearing both on mainstream and independent labels.[20] In 1969 Norman recorded Upon This Rock, “the first commercially released Jesus rock album”,[21] and in 1972 one of “the most influential Christian rock records of all time”, Only Visiting This Planet.[22] Norman’s recordings are noted for their Christian and social subject matter, having successfully “wed the rhythms of pop music with the spiritual and social outlook of Christianity to create a kind of flower-power gospel.”
–Copied from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
My note: Larry Norman seemed to struggle most of his life. He was a very talented and gifted songwriter. Some of his “issues” seem to be proceed from what some considered bipolar disorder, but that probably was never medically confirmed. He was known by many to be a rascal (the kind of person we minister to at BB.)
An excerpt from Christianity Today, announcing his death.
“Christian music legend Larry Norman died Sunday of heart failure, according to his brother Charles Norman. He was 60.
Norman, a blonde, long-haired rocker who is often called the father of Christian rock music, was a giant in the Christian music industry, said Chris Willman, senior music writer for Entertainment Weekly.
“His influence outweighed his sales so much that it’s comical,” Willman said. “He certainly had a heart for evangelism — almost to his detriment, I might say. He really could’ve been a star if he were singing about something other than Jesus.”
Norman’s 1972 Only Visiting This Planet album is regarded as one of the top contemporary Christian music albums of all time. His many hits were at the cutting edge, said Larry Eskridge, associate director of the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals at Wheaton College.
“The song ‘Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?’ was one of his enduring trumpet blasts against the stodgy, old Christian establishment,” Eskridge said. “‘I Wish We’d All Been Ready’ fit with the end times, apocalyptic feel that was in the air at the time.”
“I Wish We’d All Been Ready” was also featured in the 1972 end times film, A Thief in the Night. In concerts, the singer gave his trademark “One Way” gesture, pointing an index finger toward heaven.
Eskridge said Norman was an icon during the Jesus People of the 1960s but distanced himself from the movement when it became a fad and eventually faded.”
