Tag: christianity

Insist on the Light

I’m starting to raise my voice now.  Please, in regards to your discipleship.  Please insist on the light.  Demand–don’t try to live without it!  There will only and always will be sore regret and dark confusion if you move through your life, “sleepwalking.”

We need for people to “shock” us and guide us to the certain truth of the Gospel.  This world system impedes us, and blocks our progress.  It is a deep dark mist that separates us from the light.  The darkness is a confusing presence.  It is most difficult to deal with.  Our race (the human race) is most crippled and handicapped by the presence of evil.  It scatters us and than it seeks control of us.

The one thing that can save us is to insist on the light.

“He will use every kind of evil deception to fool those on their way to destruction, because they refuse to love and accept the truth that would save them.”

2 Thessalonians 2:10, NLT

 

The battle is fierce and it is long.  Someone is hunting us.  Satan‘s great strategy is too bring us into even more confusion than we are even now experiencing.  His specialty is to lead us right into the dark.

I have many brothers that have been drawn into the dark.  They’ve now grown accustomed to it, and they say they were just going “through a phase.”  I’m deeply saddened, for Kelly, and Allen, and Jonathan.  They were, and still are my brothers.  I am ripped up inside because of their apostasy.  I know they can’t be happy.  And, part of me waits for them to rejoin the faith they once professed.  It has been 30 years since we worshipped together.  I miss them.

We must insist on the light.  We really can not compromise on anything less.  His light guides and delivers us into his hands.  Second Thessalonians speaks about having “a love for the truth.”  Could that be the reason so many have stumbled?  To “love” someone of something implies devotion or committment.  We are to become “lovers” of everything that is true.

The dark is sticky.  It more or less grabs you, and you can’t get it off your hands.  The love, power and blood of Jesus is the only thing potent enough to remove it.  Since we go through this life “hurley-burley” and a bit confused, we will need to rely constantly of God’s remedy to cleanse fully.

I exhort you most deeply and certainly, love the light.  Welcome it and seek its control over you.  Abolish any attempt on finding another way.  Be illuminated and throughly affected by the light’s presence.  There will be many who violate and distort the light.  Do not believe them.

 

 

Are You Ready For This?

Nothing compares to the joy of a child.  I think its a form of lunacy myself.  (But I’m an old man, so what do I know.)  Children love life–they are attracted to a vibrant life like bees to nectar.  They breathe it, feel it, wait for it.  They see it as an exclusive focus, they see nothing else.  It is what they want.

I, on the other hand, weigh out my options, I compare their value and I give it some time, think about it even more, then make my decision.  Children on the other hand are spontaneous and look closely at their first impressions.  They trust the innate ‘gut reaction’ and will choose accordingly.

Jesus made the outrageous statement, that we are to become as children, to enter the Kingdom, where God rules.  The obvious issue, is how do I get there?  (Nicodemus in John  3 was the typical prototype.)  Perhaps a deeper question is this,  what if Jesus decided He wanted to come to my house?  He knocks on the door.  Mom comes to the door, kicks the dog who is barking, shouts something unintelligible and reaches for the door.  She is hoping He didn’t hear her, and hopes the dog isn’t too traumatized by her feeble assault.

Jesus is incredibly gracious.  As a matter of fact, He moves and conducts Himself as if He were a member of royalty.  He steps into the foyer, as if He were stepping into a coronation hall.  But there is absolutely no arrogance, there is nothing but kindness and gentleness in His demeanor.  When He looks at the room, He is looking for people.  People are His focus, pure and simple.

My religious tendencies are idiotic and misshapen.  In my ‘spiritual’ world, Jesus has none of these qualities, and certainly not this approachable.  I simply cannot fathom such magnificence.  I have reduced Jesus down to a ‘puppet-savior’, and He is much easier to contain and understand.  He now poses no threat to me, or my way of life.  I may get assertive and even try to put a collar-and-leash on Him so He understands who is calling the shots.

You know what?  Jesus understands people like me.  He calls me ‘His brother’.  Me!  Full of ugliness and turmoil–His ‘brother’.  But His heart even now, is reaching for the children.  They have a quality that I only dream about.  These children will have a grace and purity poured on them, till their clothing is soaked with His presence.  They will run through a lawn sprinkler for hours!

The Kingdom is coming  (actually, it is rushing) to children who will embrace Him with a love and zeal that simply doesn’t compute in our calculations.  As adults, the more proficient of us, has read (and maybe written) whole books on systematic theology.  We develop nuances, and are able to parse verbs from our Greek New Testaments.  We are good!

But Jesus clearly rearranges the furniture.  And we are definitely confused.  But maybe, that is right where He wants us.  His Kingdom is wide open to everyone who has the heart of a child.  I suspect that Jesus has a plan that has a ‘shake me to wake me’ kind of an approach.  I want to open up to all that He is doing.  I need Him so much.

A Gospel That Just May Confuse Us

 

My people have been lost sheep.
      Their shepherds have led them astray
      and turned them loose in the mountains.
   They have lost their way
      and can’t remember how to get back to the sheepfold.                                                  

                                                                                      Jer. 50:6

 

Christians who wander away, or led away away, is a frequent issue with the Lord.  It’s hard to watch someone you love go in a way that brings them pain and destruction.  It hurts doubly when they get turned in the wrong direction.  Jeremiah suggests that there is a personal disobedience as well as a pastoral influence from a shepherd.

Influence from confused shepherds runs rampant through the flock of the Church.  Voices speak and men posture themselves to lure the sheep.  Programs are always percolating and brought out at an opportune time to develop and maintain a momentum and to give the sense of direction and purpose.  This sounds confusing but its not.

The prophet sees and perceives.  There is grief and pain in his words.  He witnesses of a coming judgement.  In our time, the necessity of being ‘pastored‘ has been a less of an issue because of the Holy Spirit’s contact with the believer.  We have the Spirit and His presence.  Now we can turn towards a superintending understanding of the functioning of the Holy Spirit.  But the Holy Spirit doesn’t need our pathetic attempts at pointing out our crudeness and foolishness at the situation.

Jesus Christ loves us, and comes at us through the self-generated issues that could move us to a less then a desirable condition.  But our “pastor” is Jesus, He pastors us through our confusion and sin.  His heart is looking to us.  We are to come to Him, not through a man, but through the presence of God, that envelopes us and adjusts our understanding.

We cannot pretend anymore that our issues of redemption and healing can be understood through anyone else but through the direction of our Lord except Jesus. We do not think that our intervention of a pastor, or healer will bring us any closer.  We connect through Jesus.  He has made himself the only connection of God and myself.

We dare not trust ourselves when it comes at us through so much.  He heals and strengthens through His active and present awareness of us.  We must turn from ‘deceptive noise’ and grab ahold of the promises of an authoritative voice. He rules over us with authority, and a loving voice of guidance.  He comes to us in a very real and definite way.  For He is “one on one” to us in a real recognition to us in our personal connection to the Father.

This needs to become our way that we connect.  We rest in His plan.  Nothing else will placate.  Jesus advances Himself to becoming our Lord and Saviour. We turn to Him to save us, and no one else.