We’re Inconsistent Rascals

jesusembrace
Unknown artist

“Loving Father God, my heart is filled upon rethinking the greatness of your love and the completeness of your plan.  I want to please you, but how often my flesh folds under the pressure of temptation.  I thank you that you know my frame, and you remember that I am but dust.  And I thank you for the abundance of Grace and the gift of righteousness that you have made available to me through the cross of your son, the Lord Jesus Christ.  Thank you for receiving me back, my gracious Lord.   Amen. ” 

Jack Hayford

When my children do wrong I ache inside.  As a father I so want to hear their confession and see their repentance.  But I cannot imagine disowning them. Never, ever!  How much more is our Heavenly Father ready to receive us back, and hold us close to his heart.

This profound love turns us back to Himself. The very fact you feel the Holy Spirit’s tug is evidence enough that you haven’t been permanently forsaken and ‘cast aside.’ You’ll need to take a step of faith however. Always remember— proximity to Jesus is always a good thing. Stay close, and watch the enemy flee. He will, but only if you make a stand Satan.

Become brutally real with yourself, but never despairingly.

Confess your sin to the real God who loves you unconditionally. Let Him fill you with His Spirit again. Sin is not the ultimate place or condition of the true believer in Jesus–his love has the incredible power to bust through all of our disobedience and rebellion. And he is the only one who can do it–you can’t.

66 At this point many of his disciples turned away and deserted him. 67 Then Jesus turned to the Twelve and asked, “Are you also going to leave?”

68 Simon Peter replied, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life.

John 6:66-68

Who else would take us in after all the evil we have done?

Jesus loves each one of us as if there were only one of us. Sink into that love, and have the assurance that He alone has the power to save us- We’re his; even when we’re rascals. And he has decided that we are now his friends. Isn’t that wild!

God is not against us because of our sin. He is with us against our sin. Let’s remember that.

Bryan Lowe

I’ve got another site for you–alaskabibleteacher.com.

The Healing Power of Jesus

“They came, bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. 4 And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him, and when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay.”

Mark 2:3-4

In this Gospel story recorded in Mark 2:1-12 we read of the four friends who brought the paralyzed man to Jesus. What a privilege it is to carry those we love to our Lord for His healing presence to surround them.

Their simple faith is what we are called to. “Paralyzed” people are waiting for us to only act. If God gives us eyes to see, we will see them.

I was inspired to write this simple poem as I thought about this man and his friends. I hope it blesses you. 

Let Me Carry You

You lie alone broken and weak
Unsure if you will make it through
Seeing a future dark and bleak
To Jesus let me carry you

Your daily troubles set in stone
Seem heavy with unchanging hue
And though you think you’re all alone
To Jesus, I will carry you

You struggle to remember love
Ev’ry feeling painfully blue
I will bring God’s grace from above
To Jesus let me carry you

aasignLinda

My personal blog is at anotherfearlessyear.net.

Doctor’s Orders

 “And hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Mark 2:17

I am convinced that as “master strugglers,” who just happen to be believers, that there is a deep truth we must understand. In a nutshell, the terribly weak get sprinkled purposefully into our churches–they have a much needed ministry, a honest calling to become the ‘audio-visual’ (AV) department of our churches.

Remember “show-and-tell’ in grade school?

We display for all who can see, especially us, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. We can be really mixed up, and really confused. But in contrast, He has become our everything, Jesus is now our all in all. As AV people, we show and declare the deep kindnesses of God. We stumble more than others, and we definitely display His grace.

We are meant to be seen and heard, because that is what the AV department does best.

But that is really not our natural tendency. We hate our many failures. But Jesus spoke of becoming a “candle on a lamp stand,” that gives light into the house. I suppose because of all our inconsistencies, this is often frightening–but this is our certain place in a dark, and very foolish world.

We’re now on display, whether we like it or not.

Because we belong to the AV department, we’re compelled to announce the solid mercy and kindness of God. Maybe in this short life, that is all we can really do. Fair enough. But still we hear that frightening call to become visible for Him, and to point to His fantastic glory. Jesus deserves this, and it seems He uses the worst He can find.

It seems we know far more about sin than we do about holiness.

We may become quite intimidated by this ‘special ministry.’ It seems we know far more about sin than we do about holiness. Quite a few of us are expert sinners. Some of us have our  Ph.D in sin and failure. We have taken training in failure, and are quite proficient in it.

“This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”—and I am the worst of them all.”

1 Timothy 1:15, NLT

Our sins and weaknesses, depressions and sicknesses, have become even more evident over time. We are the ones who walk with a definite limp. We will falter, and we stumble. But we continue to turn to Jesus–over and over. And in this persistent action, others will see the immense mercy that is poured out on rascals such as us. We will be those AV people.

As messed up as we are we keep coming repeatedly, over and over and over. We keep hanging on, and keep finding forgiveness and grace.

We dare not let go.

“Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

John 6:68

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‘Snowflake’ Discipleship

“Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.”

Psalm 139:14

“God is not a duplicator, He is a Creator. You are an original.”

-Reinhard Bonnke

The Bible states many wonderful things. One of them is that we are created in the image of God, and I’m quite certain that each of us are shaped completely different. I recently read that an estimated 117 billion people have lived on earth. That’s amazing; and to think we are all unique.

Sometime ago I found my Grandmother’s Bible.

I was somewhat intrigued, and I supposed that it might just ‘impart’ some special spiritual blessing to me. I sat down on the couch, and reverently opened it up. It was filled with wonderful handwritten notes.

As I sat down to read it though, I slowly began to realize that it was exactly like my own! The verses and the promises were the same, they had not changed. What was true for my grandma was true for me. That amazed me, and it kind of sent me spinning. But I suddenly started thinking.

Each of us struggles differently.

We endure depression, PTSD, schizophrenia, even suicidal thoughts. We struggle with different addictions and lonely divorces. There are those believers who are epileptics or disabled. There are some of us who have been raped or molested. I have a paralyzed right arm, and am typing this with my left hand. I also struggle with depression and anger.

Each of us are the same in a basic sense, and yet we are all distinctly different. We all have gone through things, some good, some quite awful. These issues are uniquely our own. Our “personal” testimony with God is unlike someone else’s. We respond to our different circumstances in different ways.

We are “snowflakes’ that have been artistically crafted. Our circumstances are individually tailored by God, who is the ultimate Artist. I opened this post with the idea that God creates “snowflakes,” and I’ve been told that every one of them is unique.

I do believe that when we stand before God we will all have these fantastically different stories. Each of us have found forgiveness, mercy and grace that the Lord freely gives us. As “grace-walkers” our life can be mixed with His love, filtered through a myriad of circumstances.

And they mix exceedingly well.

Reading the Word we must realize that each man or woman who walked with God had a different story to tell. We rightly consider them in amazement. And yet none of them knew they were special at the time, all they understood was “the daily grind.”

We can trust Him. We slowly begin to see, and understand, that there are implications of being ‘snowflakes.’ God took Joseph and ‘molded’ him by His unique circumstances, he went from prison to the Prime Minister overnight. Each of us has testimony of His incredible care.

“People are special, and human life is sacred, whether of not we admit it. Every person is worth fighting for, regardless of whether he is young or old, sick or well, child or adult, born or unborn, or brown, red, yellow, black or white.”

–Francis Schaeffer

Your very unique brother,

Bryan

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