I used to fast because I was told I would get things, sometimes spiritual, sometimes material. This led me to the field of thought for a long time that fasting was a religious and pretentious way for selfish people to try and receive things from Father. A genie in a bottle scenario.
As I come to know Father more however, and as I seek to know and follow Jesus not as a religion but a person, I realise that true fasting is not something we do for ourselves but something we do as a loving response to the love he is pouring out into us daily. It is an indication of our hearts inclination toward God.
What a beautiful thing I have been missing out on! I long to fast before a God that I cannot see but can overwhelmingly feel. As I do this before him and him alone it becomes such an intimate experience between us.
How Exciting!!
I would like to put one contrasting view of fasting forth. The Old Testament Jewish tradition of fasting, which revolves around certain days of tradition on which all the dedicated Jews would fast as an act of atonement or an act of humble devotion to God....
As they were under law and not grace I can understand this. I am just expressing the stark contrast to this way of fasting and the way of a love relationship fast. I find it strange that it took me 4 years of been a follower to realise ‘true fasting’ despite trying so hard to play by the ‘rules’.
To think, it was while letting myself go of religion and accepting Grace and Christ as my leader instead of the albeit well-meaning man at the ‘top’, that this thought of freedom and love came flowing from my heart, the place where Father abides.
(John 15:4)
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
Sunday, May 16, 2010
When injustice becomes law resistance becomes duty.
I read the above statement on the back of a truck today and thought it was fantastic…. And then I decided to think this clever little saying through a bit more.
How do we make social change when things are already on such decline?
How do we resist certain laws, for example lets pretend gay marriages are made legal in Australia. How does a person resist the law if it has been passed? A law that I am very doubtful would be revoked once made official. Perhaps we could be more aware of our leaders’ values and convictions before electing them. Or make more of an effort to love people out of their sin and into the fathers’ arms before their united lost voice gets so loud that the leaders feel they have to cater to them in order to win votes. Please note that I am not attacking Homosexuals. That is no way to treat any one in a sinful state. infact It marvels me that we Christians somehow think that the best way to show people their misled ways is to distance ourselves from them and condemn their life choices until they come to know God’s grace.
I have only recently become very interested in the way our country is run and while still knowing very little I do know that it was foolish of me to find no interest in who and in which direction our country is been led. But having taken notice of not only the power and responsibilities that our leaders have but also the input that I am capable of having if I would just care enough to have a say, I have gained a rather passionate mind towards Australian and international politics.
There is a show called ‘The West Wing’. It is a show about the West Wing of the white house in Washington and from this wing of the building the United States of America is virtually run. Decisions of huge ramifications are made daily, often good ones, sometimes not. The show has opened my eyes to an incredibly important industry, that of managing countries. I cannot fathom the things that go through the minds of the prime minister of Australia and his associates, let alone the president of America and his.
The amount of anger that is shown them is huge and is widespread regardless of how small the decision to be made. I think if I have learned one thing so far is that the prime minister is never right and never wrong. With such a mixed culture to look after he certainly has his work cut out for him. I bet it does not help that people are often more worried about what his bank account looks like then whether he is doing a good job or not. There is one thing I am certain will never be seen, A leader who is liked by all. Or a leader who can make right decisions and be praised for them by the majority of the people without condemning personal habits, past wrongs, and the possibility deceitful motives. A leader can only do so much, at the end of the day I believe it is the countrymen who make the decisions. Think about this. If Australia was 80 percent Christian, it would not cross the prime ministers mind to pass a gay marriage law, or promote the idea in order to be elected. However, if our Country was 80 percent gay then things would be entirely different again.
All that to say this, if we want to prevent a downward spiral of national governing then we need to remove our focus from the man at the top and put it back to the people the that steer this mans decisions. We are responsible with the truth we have been given to free people from sin and show them to our father who will then lead them in their hearts toward holy living and righteous pursuits. Don’t fight the passing of laws, fight the devil and fight sin, before a majority of people become so consumed with sin that they will govern this country. If we can win that battle then we can change laws. God is sovereign and his kingdom can reign no matter who is running the country. When his kingdom reigns in power and people come to know him on a mass scale crime will all but vanish, bottle shops will go out of business, marriages will be healed, teenagers will honour their parents, families will be reunited and God’s love will free all. I can only imagine what would happen to the top if that happened down the bottom.
Perhaps we could reword the saying that I began this writing with to say the following:
As the kingdom of God becomes bigger, injustice will drop as though on the opposite end of a seesaw.
How do we make social change when things are already on such decline?
How do we resist certain laws, for example lets pretend gay marriages are made legal in Australia. How does a person resist the law if it has been passed? A law that I am very doubtful would be revoked once made official. Perhaps we could be more aware of our leaders’ values and convictions before electing them. Or make more of an effort to love people out of their sin and into the fathers’ arms before their united lost voice gets so loud that the leaders feel they have to cater to them in order to win votes. Please note that I am not attacking Homosexuals. That is no way to treat any one in a sinful state. infact It marvels me that we Christians somehow think that the best way to show people their misled ways is to distance ourselves from them and condemn their life choices until they come to know God’s grace.
I have only recently become very interested in the way our country is run and while still knowing very little I do know that it was foolish of me to find no interest in who and in which direction our country is been led. But having taken notice of not only the power and responsibilities that our leaders have but also the input that I am capable of having if I would just care enough to have a say, I have gained a rather passionate mind towards Australian and international politics.
There is a show called ‘The West Wing’. It is a show about the West Wing of the white house in Washington and from this wing of the building the United States of America is virtually run. Decisions of huge ramifications are made daily, often good ones, sometimes not. The show has opened my eyes to an incredibly important industry, that of managing countries. I cannot fathom the things that go through the minds of the prime minister of Australia and his associates, let alone the president of America and his.
The amount of anger that is shown them is huge and is widespread regardless of how small the decision to be made. I think if I have learned one thing so far is that the prime minister is never right and never wrong. With such a mixed culture to look after he certainly has his work cut out for him. I bet it does not help that people are often more worried about what his bank account looks like then whether he is doing a good job or not. There is one thing I am certain will never be seen, A leader who is liked by all. Or a leader who can make right decisions and be praised for them by the majority of the people without condemning personal habits, past wrongs, and the possibility deceitful motives. A leader can only do so much, at the end of the day I believe it is the countrymen who make the decisions. Think about this. If Australia was 80 percent Christian, it would not cross the prime ministers mind to pass a gay marriage law, or promote the idea in order to be elected. However, if our Country was 80 percent gay then things would be entirely different again.
All that to say this, if we want to prevent a downward spiral of national governing then we need to remove our focus from the man at the top and put it back to the people the that steer this mans decisions. We are responsible with the truth we have been given to free people from sin and show them to our father who will then lead them in their hearts toward holy living and righteous pursuits. Don’t fight the passing of laws, fight the devil and fight sin, before a majority of people become so consumed with sin that they will govern this country. If we can win that battle then we can change laws. God is sovereign and his kingdom can reign no matter who is running the country. When his kingdom reigns in power and people come to know him on a mass scale crime will all but vanish, bottle shops will go out of business, marriages will be healed, teenagers will honour their parents, families will be reunited and God’s love will free all. I can only imagine what would happen to the top if that happened down the bottom.
Perhaps we could reword the saying that I began this writing with to say the following:
As the kingdom of God becomes bigger, injustice will drop as though on the opposite end of a seesaw.
I May be trodding on some toes here...
I am tired of seeing people make decisions based on how they think there congregational leaders will react. Why do so many Christians think they are ok by God as long as they are ok by “the Church”? I hate to say this but in my experience I have personally been more “right” with my father when I have not been so “right” in the eyes of church structures and denominations, for the reason that my focus is not been skewed toward pleasing a certain “culture” or “theology”. My mind and heart are free to be grown by God in a truly spiritual way, they way he wants us to grow, IN HIM. People believe heresy comes from leaving the church “Covering”, I believe and history shows that the majority of the time it comes from within the denominational empires we have created, and even though unintentionally, it happens on a big scale. It is interesting to note that if we take a look at the word covering in the New testament it appears once in regards to a woman covering her head...it seems we have uncovered another nice made up rule to keep people from putting their trust in God instead of man.
What if instead of wondering how they will be viewed by their church people asked their God directly how he would have them live? That’s were individuality and diversity come from, the individuality that he birthed in each one of us. But instead of celebrating it and allowing it to reach into every culture, sub culture, man woman and child on the planet as we are capable of, we conform it to the same set of convictions and boundaries given us by a few leaders overseeing thousands of smaller leaders overseeing thousands of cattle all coming under a denomination that spends so much of its time attempting to be relevant to its surrounding culture that it creates a culture that is worthless.
God must have a lot of spare time these days because the church is doing his job for him, instead of relationship with Father we are living relationships with “Church”. We aim to get people transformed by our clever antiques and smooth rhetoric but forget to mention that they need not conform to the robotic culture we have created; they just need to let God love them and transform them by that love. Unfortunately the flood of pressure to act accordingly comes before God ever intended to bring conviction and teaches new Christians to do right by man and God will be happy with them. Without meaning to we are leading them away from an intimate trusting relationship with God.
I love the place where my wife and I go for fellowship, I love the people, I love the relationships I have with them. If we don’t feel like going, we don’t. We have no fear of what people will think of us because a persons spiritual temperature cannot be gauged by their church attendance. When people think it is they go only out of obligation and rot away with a slow resentment toward the judgement of others.
The truth is when you feel no obligation and you find a place where real brothers and sisters that are walking in relationship with father meet, it’s very hard not to feel like meeting with them at every chance you get. A good indicator of whether people are living in this way is to ask what happens more when they meet, gossip or confession? I know that sadly this is a distant feeling for many reading this and that’s why I am writing it. Not out of anger, but a desire to see people living freely in Christ, the way he intends. The wonderful thing about finding like minded people is that we celebrate our differences. We don’t bash each other into submission against our convictions and our peace before God.
Why have so many of us stopped trusting our Hearts. In the heart is where the spirit of God dwells, he guides us and loves us and if we let him, will be one with us like he is with Jesus. That is what the bible clearly states. He frees us from the shame of sin and teaches us to run to him in our darkest moments knowing that our healing, freedom, deliverance and strength is in him. Yet we are so suspicious of our own emotions that we chose to follow a set of rules given by the denomination we follow or the ‘pastor’.
What happened to Been free from Shame, free to love as he loves us, To often I see people manipulating other peoples sense of shame to bring them into a stricter less satisfying walk with a God that they misunderstand because of the route they we taken on to get to where they are. Denominations are rebuked in the bible and for the reason that they breed disunity. Often these days they used to let us presume things of others and stifle the persons gift of individuality.
Think about this, what is your first thought when someone tells you they are a ‘Baptist Christian’? Do you think of another Baptist person you have met and elate them to that persons walk with God, understanding of life, and theologies? I know I used to before I came under conviction for been so presumptuous. How insulting to God that we would take thousands of people who come under a certain title not given them by God and assume they all are just like the one prude we met at the pub who we disagree on. We are so damn closed minded and missing so many incredible opportunities for authentic relationship with the body. Not only are we boxing people into boxes we feel comfortable about, we are boxing ourselves into close mindedness.
How can our body stand united when we have separated our selves at each limb and still feel too close for comfort most the time? We Christians are a bunch of Hippocratic, shameful, controlling, self righteous and arrogant people in existence, and it seems like that is the only common thing between us.
We may as well rip every scripture to do with love out of our bibles because we have raped the definition over and over again to the point where we perceive love the way the world perceives it. This makes me very sad. God’s love exists that we may experience it and let it live in us and expand our thinking and help us show grace to others, but we don’t seem to get it ourselves. We have moved so far from it because we have been taught so often that we are only allowed that love if we live right, but not a single one of us does.
AAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!
What if instead of wondering how they will be viewed by their church people asked their God directly how he would have them live? That’s were individuality and diversity come from, the individuality that he birthed in each one of us. But instead of celebrating it and allowing it to reach into every culture, sub culture, man woman and child on the planet as we are capable of, we conform it to the same set of convictions and boundaries given us by a few leaders overseeing thousands of smaller leaders overseeing thousands of cattle all coming under a denomination that spends so much of its time attempting to be relevant to its surrounding culture that it creates a culture that is worthless.
God must have a lot of spare time these days because the church is doing his job for him, instead of relationship with Father we are living relationships with “Church”. We aim to get people transformed by our clever antiques and smooth rhetoric but forget to mention that they need not conform to the robotic culture we have created; they just need to let God love them and transform them by that love. Unfortunately the flood of pressure to act accordingly comes before God ever intended to bring conviction and teaches new Christians to do right by man and God will be happy with them. Without meaning to we are leading them away from an intimate trusting relationship with God.
I love the place where my wife and I go for fellowship, I love the people, I love the relationships I have with them. If we don’t feel like going, we don’t. We have no fear of what people will think of us because a persons spiritual temperature cannot be gauged by their church attendance. When people think it is they go only out of obligation and rot away with a slow resentment toward the judgement of others.
The truth is when you feel no obligation and you find a place where real brothers and sisters that are walking in relationship with father meet, it’s very hard not to feel like meeting with them at every chance you get. A good indicator of whether people are living in this way is to ask what happens more when they meet, gossip or confession? I know that sadly this is a distant feeling for many reading this and that’s why I am writing it. Not out of anger, but a desire to see people living freely in Christ, the way he intends. The wonderful thing about finding like minded people is that we celebrate our differences. We don’t bash each other into submission against our convictions and our peace before God.
Why have so many of us stopped trusting our Hearts. In the heart is where the spirit of God dwells, he guides us and loves us and if we let him, will be one with us like he is with Jesus. That is what the bible clearly states. He frees us from the shame of sin and teaches us to run to him in our darkest moments knowing that our healing, freedom, deliverance and strength is in him. Yet we are so suspicious of our own emotions that we chose to follow a set of rules given by the denomination we follow or the ‘pastor’.
What happened to Been free from Shame, free to love as he loves us, To often I see people manipulating other peoples sense of shame to bring them into a stricter less satisfying walk with a God that they misunderstand because of the route they we taken on to get to where they are. Denominations are rebuked in the bible and for the reason that they breed disunity. Often these days they used to let us presume things of others and stifle the persons gift of individuality.
Think about this, what is your first thought when someone tells you they are a ‘Baptist Christian’? Do you think of another Baptist person you have met and elate them to that persons walk with God, understanding of life, and theologies? I know I used to before I came under conviction for been so presumptuous. How insulting to God that we would take thousands of people who come under a certain title not given them by God and assume they all are just like the one prude we met at the pub who we disagree on. We are so damn closed minded and missing so many incredible opportunities for authentic relationship with the body. Not only are we boxing people into boxes we feel comfortable about, we are boxing ourselves into close mindedness.
How can our body stand united when we have separated our selves at each limb and still feel too close for comfort most the time? We Christians are a bunch of Hippocratic, shameful, controlling, self righteous and arrogant people in existence, and it seems like that is the only common thing between us.
We may as well rip every scripture to do with love out of our bibles because we have raped the definition over and over again to the point where we perceive love the way the world perceives it. This makes me very sad. God’s love exists that we may experience it and let it live in us and expand our thinking and help us show grace to others, but we don’t seem to get it ourselves. We have moved so far from it because we have been taught so often that we are only allowed that love if we live right, but not a single one of us does.
AAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!
Monday, April 5, 2010
If not for God then i would be an atheist!
If not for God I would be an atheist!
I just lay down on our little sofa. I’m not kidding around, it’s small. In fact I wish I was shorter so I could stretch out but I’m not so I have to lay in a banana like shape to fit my whole body on it. It’s a good thing Christine is little because it means we can both snuggle up on one and is very cosy!
I just found Christine’s glasses on the couch next to me and as my mind trailed of I pictured her sitting there watching TV or reading a book and imagined what she was wearing and whether or not she was drinking tea, my heart leapt inside my chest. I cannot describe how much I love this woman, I truly cherish her.
It’s the little things. She never closes the door when she is on the toilet. The way she has to sit on a large cushion to drive my minivan because even though it’s mini, it’s far too big for her! If there is a cupboard door open in the kitchen she cannot enjoy her dinner until it is closed. If she goes to bed before me she generally falls asleep sideway across the bed.
These are just some of the things that reflect her incredible personality, complemented by the most genuinely loving heart I have ever known. I love to hear every fleeting thought she has, it kills me when she is upset and I’m responsible for it, and I will go out of my way to make her laugh because it makes me truly happy to see that she is happy. As you can see, I love her. There is no accurate description I can muster up to give you for the feelings I have toward her.
All that sappiness brings me to the question on my mind today. If I was an atheist and did not personally know God, could I possibly love somebody this much? Or is it that discovering God’s unbelievable love toward me that goes deeper and further then life itself that makes it possible for me to reflect that love onto my wife. And not only my wife but those around me.
An atheist looks at the world and concludes “I cannot not believe in a God who sees the evil that man inflicts on its own kind, the poor who die every day of starvation while the rich and greedy get richer and greedier, and the disease that kills millions of people across the globe, a God that sees these things, has the power to stop it and does nothing what so ever cannot exist.”
Truthfully, I have pondered this myself on many occasions, before I came to know the heart of God that is; I have not always known the truth about my father.
You see what an atheist cannot feel the immensity of is the love of God flowing between a husband and wife who have realised this love and been exposed to the heart of God, they cannot feel this love that has and will continue to compel hundreds and thousands of people to dedicate huge portions of their lives to feeding the hungry, providing shelter for the poor and caring for their fellow man regardless of their background, lifestyle, colour, circumstances. Prejudice is not a characteristic of love.
An atheist will see these things but because he cannot feel the love of God within the acts; he passes it off as a fear based exercise performed to gain eternal life, or a manipulative tool to gain converts or money. And although sadly they are sometimes right, as there are many Christians who live a life trapped in a works based mentality and because they lack a revelation of God’s love they cannot accept the freedom with which this love gives us eternal life despite our level of spirituality, and I know this because of been in this boat before, I believe that generally they are wrong.
God’s love is working In the most incredible, ‘bring you to your knees’ type of way through normal people who have done nothing superior, just looked through all the mist to find the father in our God and the heart he has toward each of his creations. Atheists can argue God’s non existence inside out, past to future, doctrine to devastation, but how could they possibly convince a people who have the very heart of God beating within them. You cannot not prove someone wrong about what tangibly consumes their very existence.
This is why I was led to title this writing “if not for Gods then I would be an atheist”!
GOD IS LOVE, the kind of love that surpasses our misled human ideas of love and can only be found in Christ. He is my joy, peace, strength and comfort.
Held recently in Melbourne was the international atheist convention, this got me thinking, what do these non believers gather to discuss? If they do not believe in God, why do they work so damn hard to disprove him with these events? They really do appear to be a religious group of their own these days. A religious group of non religions!
I believe that every human being is born with a hunger to know their creator or lack of, and this hunger is put in us by God. Therefore I must speculate that these people are trying to convince themselves as much as others that God is not real.
All I had to do to discover Gods truth was open my heart toward him, not my mind, or my mouth, my heart.
People that say they do not believe in God say this because deep within them, whether they realise it or not, they are dying to be proven wrong, I know this because I have been there.
So how do you lead them to this discovery? They know fear, they know theology, they know science, and they know man. What they do not know, and need to experience, is the love of our lord, reflecting through someone who because of this love is genuinely, truly caring for them, no strings attached, no agenda. The power of God’s love has being almost completely replaced in the Christian world by a gospel of works and fear causing them to lose sight of god and focus on themselves.
When you lose sight of God you forget so quickly that his love is free, unconditional and eternal. I stress the unconditional part, just as a side note, I would love for many Christian people to show me the scripture that says, “Love you fellow man, except for the junkies and gay’s”.
Standing on street corners yelling a people to repent........ Fear.
Using clever well thought out rhetoric and educated speech to convince people of their need for salvation.......... manipulation of fear.
I could go on but that’s a dead end thought and I don’t want to get myself in trouble here! The truth is that you could do those things with the love of God in you and see amazing results, but they would look and feel entirely different to what I see the majority of the time. With love, they would not be wishy washy fear based results that miss all together the heart of love; they would be eternal results, founded in the heart of God.
If we have not love, then we are lost. I just paraphrased many scriptures concerning God’s love. Scriptures that have fallen by the way side because we live in a world where people have developed an idea of love that is sick, conditional, and fallible and everything else evil that mankind has made it. My heart breaks for those who will live a life time and never feel the indescribable love of God.
It is this love which caused me to turn my heart toward him. No amount of words, church attendance, sermons, arguments, street preaching, or billboards on the side of roads could ever have got me there. But when the love of God moved within me through a person who had truly captured it and as a natural result reflected it toward me. I jumped in head first, left everything else behind, and am on the most exciting journey I had ever dreamed of. And believe it or not this all happened after my ‘conversion’. I think it’s time we all realigned our focus.
Perhaps after reading this you to feel that your idea of God has been clouded by this world, or have paused to re examine your life and relationship with God. Just remember. Knowing the truth is only half of it; it is what you do with it that counts.
I just lay down on our little sofa. I’m not kidding around, it’s small. In fact I wish I was shorter so I could stretch out but I’m not so I have to lay in a banana like shape to fit my whole body on it. It’s a good thing Christine is little because it means we can both snuggle up on one and is very cosy!
I just found Christine’s glasses on the couch next to me and as my mind trailed of I pictured her sitting there watching TV or reading a book and imagined what she was wearing and whether or not she was drinking tea, my heart leapt inside my chest. I cannot describe how much I love this woman, I truly cherish her.
It’s the little things. She never closes the door when she is on the toilet. The way she has to sit on a large cushion to drive my minivan because even though it’s mini, it’s far too big for her! If there is a cupboard door open in the kitchen she cannot enjoy her dinner until it is closed. If she goes to bed before me she generally falls asleep sideway across the bed.
These are just some of the things that reflect her incredible personality, complemented by the most genuinely loving heart I have ever known. I love to hear every fleeting thought she has, it kills me when she is upset and I’m responsible for it, and I will go out of my way to make her laugh because it makes me truly happy to see that she is happy. As you can see, I love her. There is no accurate description I can muster up to give you for the feelings I have toward her.
All that sappiness brings me to the question on my mind today. If I was an atheist and did not personally know God, could I possibly love somebody this much? Or is it that discovering God’s unbelievable love toward me that goes deeper and further then life itself that makes it possible for me to reflect that love onto my wife. And not only my wife but those around me.
An atheist looks at the world and concludes “I cannot not believe in a God who sees the evil that man inflicts on its own kind, the poor who die every day of starvation while the rich and greedy get richer and greedier, and the disease that kills millions of people across the globe, a God that sees these things, has the power to stop it and does nothing what so ever cannot exist.”
Truthfully, I have pondered this myself on many occasions, before I came to know the heart of God that is; I have not always known the truth about my father.
You see what an atheist cannot feel the immensity of is the love of God flowing between a husband and wife who have realised this love and been exposed to the heart of God, they cannot feel this love that has and will continue to compel hundreds and thousands of people to dedicate huge portions of their lives to feeding the hungry, providing shelter for the poor and caring for their fellow man regardless of their background, lifestyle, colour, circumstances. Prejudice is not a characteristic of love.
An atheist will see these things but because he cannot feel the love of God within the acts; he passes it off as a fear based exercise performed to gain eternal life, or a manipulative tool to gain converts or money. And although sadly they are sometimes right, as there are many Christians who live a life trapped in a works based mentality and because they lack a revelation of God’s love they cannot accept the freedom with which this love gives us eternal life despite our level of spirituality, and I know this because of been in this boat before, I believe that generally they are wrong.
God’s love is working In the most incredible, ‘bring you to your knees’ type of way through normal people who have done nothing superior, just looked through all the mist to find the father in our God and the heart he has toward each of his creations. Atheists can argue God’s non existence inside out, past to future, doctrine to devastation, but how could they possibly convince a people who have the very heart of God beating within them. You cannot not prove someone wrong about what tangibly consumes their very existence.
This is why I was led to title this writing “if not for Gods then I would be an atheist”!
GOD IS LOVE, the kind of love that surpasses our misled human ideas of love and can only be found in Christ. He is my joy, peace, strength and comfort.
Held recently in Melbourne was the international atheist convention, this got me thinking, what do these non believers gather to discuss? If they do not believe in God, why do they work so damn hard to disprove him with these events? They really do appear to be a religious group of their own these days. A religious group of non religions!
I believe that every human being is born with a hunger to know their creator or lack of, and this hunger is put in us by God. Therefore I must speculate that these people are trying to convince themselves as much as others that God is not real.
All I had to do to discover Gods truth was open my heart toward him, not my mind, or my mouth, my heart.
People that say they do not believe in God say this because deep within them, whether they realise it or not, they are dying to be proven wrong, I know this because I have been there.
So how do you lead them to this discovery? They know fear, they know theology, they know science, and they know man. What they do not know, and need to experience, is the love of our lord, reflecting through someone who because of this love is genuinely, truly caring for them, no strings attached, no agenda. The power of God’s love has being almost completely replaced in the Christian world by a gospel of works and fear causing them to lose sight of god and focus on themselves.
When you lose sight of God you forget so quickly that his love is free, unconditional and eternal. I stress the unconditional part, just as a side note, I would love for many Christian people to show me the scripture that says, “Love you fellow man, except for the junkies and gay’s”.
Standing on street corners yelling a people to repent........ Fear.
Using clever well thought out rhetoric and educated speech to convince people of their need for salvation.......... manipulation of fear.
I could go on but that’s a dead end thought and I don’t want to get myself in trouble here! The truth is that you could do those things with the love of God in you and see amazing results, but they would look and feel entirely different to what I see the majority of the time. With love, they would not be wishy washy fear based results that miss all together the heart of love; they would be eternal results, founded in the heart of God.
If we have not love, then we are lost. I just paraphrased many scriptures concerning God’s love. Scriptures that have fallen by the way side because we live in a world where people have developed an idea of love that is sick, conditional, and fallible and everything else evil that mankind has made it. My heart breaks for those who will live a life time and never feel the indescribable love of God.
It is this love which caused me to turn my heart toward him. No amount of words, church attendance, sermons, arguments, street preaching, or billboards on the side of roads could ever have got me there. But when the love of God moved within me through a person who had truly captured it and as a natural result reflected it toward me. I jumped in head first, left everything else behind, and am on the most exciting journey I had ever dreamed of. And believe it or not this all happened after my ‘conversion’. I think it’s time we all realigned our focus.
Perhaps after reading this you to feel that your idea of God has been clouded by this world, or have paused to re examine your life and relationship with God. Just remember. Knowing the truth is only half of it; it is what you do with it that counts.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Sometimes life just feels...
Sometimes life just feels......... Crap.
I know, I know, you’re thinking, “There are people out there a lot worse off than you you know”. Or maybe your thinking, “Hey, You got a Beautiful wife, happy home, a bed to sleep in, a great job, food to eat.” Yeah I do have all that, and a lot more, I’ve got fantastic friends, two wonderful families, even an incredible God, who continues to blow my mind regarding to his astounding love for me. The list goes on and on concerning how good I’ve got it, and I don’t deny it. I’ve got it really good, but it doesn’t change the fact that sometimes life just feels this way. Maybe you can relate in some way, despite the blessed lives we all live, there is this ‘come and go’ feeling of melancholy or the absence of peace. It’s only subtle, but very unsatisfying.
I’m not writing this in an effort to bring some new wiz bang solution to this occasional feeling, the fact is, there is too much resource out there on the subject of personal freedom already. Sadly it only seems to work for the one lucky person who wrote it and a handful of others who it just happens to suit. I’m not trying to sound sceptical, there are some useful views getting around, but in the end, no one can truly know your personal journey but God, and in your relationship with him is the answer.
To be honest, as I write this, I’m not even looking for an answer. I just want to get this out of my tired mind and onto some paper in a hope for some clarity or quickened resolve. Sometimes I get trapped in this mind, thoughts just bounce back and forth between the walls of my head and they don’t seem to eventuate into much unless I talk them through with someone or get out the old journal.
I wonder if it’s my disappointment in my own actions that leads me to this emotional blowout. Maybe God is trying to bring some struggles to the surface he wants to set me free from, funny how we love to be free of things but whine the whole way through the process!!
If this is the case then let’s see, what could he be trying to rid me of? Hypocrisy, pretence, Pride, self-centeredness, lust, perhaps Anger. I feel comfortable listing these because I know they are not the sum of my being, they are merely a blemish on my father’s son that he is growing me out of in a process of love.
I once heard a saying in regards to Christians living in this world which said, “Its ok for your boat to be in the water, just don’t get the water in your boat. I find this a very hard statement to swallow as every Christian or group of Christians I know has a different understanding of what it is exactly that our boat is floating on, and what kind of boat we are in. I feel like I’m in a rubber dingy and the ocean is crashing down on me at a consistency so great I don’t have time to bail because I’m trying look like I’m afloat. Perhaps we could re-word that saying to read, “You will get water in your boat, but Gods in the boat with you, complete with food and a change of clothes that won’t wear out or go bad no matter how much water you let in, just be vulnerable before him and he will bail while you eat some roast chicken for strength!”
Here is a thought, why do I use worse language around my close Christian friends then I do around my work mates. My work mates speak in ways I wouldn’t replicate in a conversation with a sailor, yet I keep it clean in front of them. I know it’s not that my Christian friends are leading me down the wrong path, because they’re not. I wonder if it’s because I have been taught, or maybe I’ve misunderstood that somehow when I act holier than others or appear different to the “Heathens”, they will see God in me and seek salvation.
I’m starting to realise that all there actually seeing, is half of the real me, the part of me I feel most resembles a decent Christian life style.
Wow it looks even uglier on paper then when I just mindlessly live it!
As I write I am realising something, all these things I’m focused on are an outward expression of a religion. I’m living like a Pharisee! Doing thing’s outwardly while dying on the inside, maybe not to make myself look good for selfish reasons, but it’s still not who I am, and why would God want me to lie about myself to expose others to him? He doesn’t need that rubbish!
That explains why it is not a challenge to avoid glancing at an attractive woman walking down the road as I drive by with my apprentice plumber in the car, or with a friend or especially my wife. But find it so hard not to when I am alone. How can I expect to be satisfied pretending to have it together but truthfully having the same urges other people have and not having them under control. This issue is an internal one; no amount of external Acting can fix it.
Why is my appearance of Holiness on the outside often more important to me than my own relationship with God a lot of the time. I have really had things mixed up.
I probably sound like I am a real Crum of a man as you read this, but you should know, if you crossed paths with me before now, you wouldn’t have seen any difference between me and some of your most godly friends. The act is easy; it’s the reward for the act that is hard, hard to live with, because we know the truth about ourselves no matter how well others see of us.
So now I’m done.
I’ve been on an incredible journey the last few years. God has helped me to let go of so many ritualistic acts that were coming between him and I, and I’ve been coming to know him as a person, his heart towards me, and his truth in this life. As hard as it can be sometimes, I would never trade this journey for all the money, glory, success, and cheese you could offer me. I have backslidden write into the arms of God! He was at the bottom of the hill and I had been climbing it. When I fell it was the best thing I could have hoped for. Now I have a Father in God, not a philosophy.
I feel as though now, to continue on this journey to my Lords heart of love and freedom, I will be travelling further and further from what I thought Christianity looked like, maybe more in my heart then physically, but far away none the less.
If in this process I become so close to his heart that people see his love at work in me, then it will be without the pretence and falseness that has hidden my heart before and hidden God’s within me in the process.
I have no idea what this will look like in another year, or five, or ten. I only know that God will lead me; I won’t be lead by my own mind any more, or by others, but by his heart and mine. As I become myself in God, perhaps I will look like what I have been pretending to look like, but with the power of his love to validate me. I may look like a heathen to many, perhaps a saint to many more. This is not my concern any more. I just pray that this journey would become what he intends for it to be, an authentic love relationship between Him and I.
WOW, perhaps been honest from the start of this writing about life was just what was needed to get me to look at my own heart honestly throughout it.
How difficult we must make it for God to reveal his heart toward us when we are so caught up in trying to find ourselves in a mess of religion and feigning perfection that we continuously pass by our own hearts in which he dwells, longing for us to take a minute to realise He’s right in front of us the entire time.
I have to say, I feel a lot better having got all this out, it’s amazing how our minds can trick us into not listening to our hearts, where the answers are often found. I did not know all these things were my own feelings until I sat down and set my mind aside to allow my heart the room to speak.
I must apologise now, I know a lot of time and effort have gone into this production of Christianity called ‘Mark Greenwood’, but I must leave the stage now.
God himself is waiting for me outside in the real world, and we won’t be making any more theatrical stops until we get to where he is so eager to take me. A place called truth, just beyond Love.
Its official, I’m done with the crap that surrounds the core! God loves me so, so much. He loves me as I am and sees only my heart and who I am becoming. If he wanted me to be any different right now I would be. I am in his hands and his heart lives in me. And I am content where I am together with him. He loves me enough not to separate me from this up and down crazy life, but to carry me through it while we both enjoy the relationship that grows out of it.
I know, I know, you’re thinking, “There are people out there a lot worse off than you you know”. Or maybe your thinking, “Hey, You got a Beautiful wife, happy home, a bed to sleep in, a great job, food to eat.” Yeah I do have all that, and a lot more, I’ve got fantastic friends, two wonderful families, even an incredible God, who continues to blow my mind regarding to his astounding love for me. The list goes on and on concerning how good I’ve got it, and I don’t deny it. I’ve got it really good, but it doesn’t change the fact that sometimes life just feels this way. Maybe you can relate in some way, despite the blessed lives we all live, there is this ‘come and go’ feeling of melancholy or the absence of peace. It’s only subtle, but very unsatisfying.
I’m not writing this in an effort to bring some new wiz bang solution to this occasional feeling, the fact is, there is too much resource out there on the subject of personal freedom already. Sadly it only seems to work for the one lucky person who wrote it and a handful of others who it just happens to suit. I’m not trying to sound sceptical, there are some useful views getting around, but in the end, no one can truly know your personal journey but God, and in your relationship with him is the answer.
To be honest, as I write this, I’m not even looking for an answer. I just want to get this out of my tired mind and onto some paper in a hope for some clarity or quickened resolve. Sometimes I get trapped in this mind, thoughts just bounce back and forth between the walls of my head and they don’t seem to eventuate into much unless I talk them through with someone or get out the old journal.
I wonder if it’s my disappointment in my own actions that leads me to this emotional blowout. Maybe God is trying to bring some struggles to the surface he wants to set me free from, funny how we love to be free of things but whine the whole way through the process!!
If this is the case then let’s see, what could he be trying to rid me of? Hypocrisy, pretence, Pride, self-centeredness, lust, perhaps Anger. I feel comfortable listing these because I know they are not the sum of my being, they are merely a blemish on my father’s son that he is growing me out of in a process of love.
I once heard a saying in regards to Christians living in this world which said, “Its ok for your boat to be in the water, just don’t get the water in your boat. I find this a very hard statement to swallow as every Christian or group of Christians I know has a different understanding of what it is exactly that our boat is floating on, and what kind of boat we are in. I feel like I’m in a rubber dingy and the ocean is crashing down on me at a consistency so great I don’t have time to bail because I’m trying look like I’m afloat. Perhaps we could re-word that saying to read, “You will get water in your boat, but Gods in the boat with you, complete with food and a change of clothes that won’t wear out or go bad no matter how much water you let in, just be vulnerable before him and he will bail while you eat some roast chicken for strength!”
Here is a thought, why do I use worse language around my close Christian friends then I do around my work mates. My work mates speak in ways I wouldn’t replicate in a conversation with a sailor, yet I keep it clean in front of them. I know it’s not that my Christian friends are leading me down the wrong path, because they’re not. I wonder if it’s because I have been taught, or maybe I’ve misunderstood that somehow when I act holier than others or appear different to the “Heathens”, they will see God in me and seek salvation.
I’m starting to realise that all there actually seeing, is half of the real me, the part of me I feel most resembles a decent Christian life style.
Wow it looks even uglier on paper then when I just mindlessly live it!
As I write I am realising something, all these things I’m focused on are an outward expression of a religion. I’m living like a Pharisee! Doing thing’s outwardly while dying on the inside, maybe not to make myself look good for selfish reasons, but it’s still not who I am, and why would God want me to lie about myself to expose others to him? He doesn’t need that rubbish!
That explains why it is not a challenge to avoid glancing at an attractive woman walking down the road as I drive by with my apprentice plumber in the car, or with a friend or especially my wife. But find it so hard not to when I am alone. How can I expect to be satisfied pretending to have it together but truthfully having the same urges other people have and not having them under control. This issue is an internal one; no amount of external Acting can fix it.
Why is my appearance of Holiness on the outside often more important to me than my own relationship with God a lot of the time. I have really had things mixed up.
I probably sound like I am a real Crum of a man as you read this, but you should know, if you crossed paths with me before now, you wouldn’t have seen any difference between me and some of your most godly friends. The act is easy; it’s the reward for the act that is hard, hard to live with, because we know the truth about ourselves no matter how well others see of us.
So now I’m done.
I’ve been on an incredible journey the last few years. God has helped me to let go of so many ritualistic acts that were coming between him and I, and I’ve been coming to know him as a person, his heart towards me, and his truth in this life. As hard as it can be sometimes, I would never trade this journey for all the money, glory, success, and cheese you could offer me. I have backslidden write into the arms of God! He was at the bottom of the hill and I had been climbing it. When I fell it was the best thing I could have hoped for. Now I have a Father in God, not a philosophy.
I feel as though now, to continue on this journey to my Lords heart of love and freedom, I will be travelling further and further from what I thought Christianity looked like, maybe more in my heart then physically, but far away none the less.
If in this process I become so close to his heart that people see his love at work in me, then it will be without the pretence and falseness that has hidden my heart before and hidden God’s within me in the process.
I have no idea what this will look like in another year, or five, or ten. I only know that God will lead me; I won’t be lead by my own mind any more, or by others, but by his heart and mine. As I become myself in God, perhaps I will look like what I have been pretending to look like, but with the power of his love to validate me. I may look like a heathen to many, perhaps a saint to many more. This is not my concern any more. I just pray that this journey would become what he intends for it to be, an authentic love relationship between Him and I.
WOW, perhaps been honest from the start of this writing about life was just what was needed to get me to look at my own heart honestly throughout it.
How difficult we must make it for God to reveal his heart toward us when we are so caught up in trying to find ourselves in a mess of religion and feigning perfection that we continuously pass by our own hearts in which he dwells, longing for us to take a minute to realise He’s right in front of us the entire time.
I have to say, I feel a lot better having got all this out, it’s amazing how our minds can trick us into not listening to our hearts, where the answers are often found. I did not know all these things were my own feelings until I sat down and set my mind aside to allow my heart the room to speak.
I must apologise now, I know a lot of time and effort have gone into this production of Christianity called ‘Mark Greenwood’, but I must leave the stage now.
God himself is waiting for me outside in the real world, and we won’t be making any more theatrical stops until we get to where he is so eager to take me. A place called truth, just beyond Love.
Its official, I’m done with the crap that surrounds the core! God loves me so, so much. He loves me as I am and sees only my heart and who I am becoming. If he wanted me to be any different right now I would be. I am in his hands and his heart lives in me. And I am content where I am together with him. He loves me enough not to separate me from this up and down crazy life, but to carry me through it while we both enjoy the relationship that grows out of it.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)