Ramblings on "taking God's love out of the four walls"

These are totally random and have no real order. They're just a bunch of thoughts and you must determine their value. You must allow the Holy Spirit to show you how to apply them to your life.

Why be light in dark places? Why get dirty? ...because He shined so I could see his love; He got dirty so I could be cleansed. For those reasons I love him, I want shine in the darkness and get "dirty". I want others to see his love and receive his cleansing and forgiveness.

How can I get dirty?  (Getting dirty has reference to previous thoughts shared and internet conversations with a few college students. Jesus, perfect and holy God, came and lived in the world, among the dirt and the dirty. We should do likewise. This is the reason for the question, "how can I get dirty?" Philippians 2:5-8)

1. Pray - Jesus spent hours in intimate relation with Father God. John 8:38 "I am telling you the things I have seen while with the Father; as for you, practice the things you have heard from the Father!" NET (New English Translation)
2. Go where the Father says go and do what the Father says do - Jesus did only what He saw the Father do. John 5:19 "So Jesus answered them, "I tell you the solemn truth, the Son can do nothing on his own initiative, but only what He sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise." NET
3. Shine at all times - where ever Jesus went people saw the light.
4. Speak God's truth and demonstrate God's love where ever you go - Jesus ministered to Nicodemus, the woman at the well, the tax collectors, the prostitute and the rich young ruler there was no condemnation, just forgiveness and the charge to change.
5. Jesus the Christ and his life, death and resurrection are the good news, nothing else (1 Cor. 15:1-9). Never allow theology and being right or wrong to be the center and focus. I'm not saying correct theology isn't important, but Jesus' sacrificial love for us is the focus.
6. Share the love of God; shine the light of Jesus; show (demonstrate) the power of the Holy Spirit.
7. Do all for the glory and honor of the Father.

We can never merit God's love, but we can show him our sincere love and genuine appreciation by obeying him, sharing the good news and making disciples of all nations.

Faith without corresponding action is dead.

I came to you in the power of the Holy Spirit, not with fancy, convincing words.

Some of the darkest, dirtiest places in the world are clean, well lit offices.

Getting dirty is...

• being generous,
• not letting the right hand know what the left is doing (what you do, do it for God's glory, not for personal recognition, gratification or merit),
• caring for a friend,
• helping the helpless,
• encouraging the hopeless.

Getting dirty is being Jesus where ever you are.

Lazarus: a dead man walking

At four-thirty the curly headed drunk I call Lazarus wouldn't let me open the door at church, so I went to the store and bought us each a can of juice and a piece of bread.

As I opened the plastic bag to share the prize he mumbled, "when you left I thought you were mad at me."

I was a bit upset, but I let it go.

We sat in the van and ate and drank together. He continuously slurred incoherent words while he ate his breakfast, lunch and maybe supper for the day and I understood that he was thankful. As I said my good-byes his semi-toothless smile and dirty smelly hug let me know the twenty minutes it took and the two dollars I spent, instead of shaking him off him by dropping twenty-five cents for a fictitious tortilla, was worth it. Jesus was there.

I went inside to set up for class.

Maybe your Lazarus isn't a drunk; maybe he isn't dirty and smelly; but there is somebody in your life, today, that needs to be touched with the love, grace and patience of God.

Be ready.

The Shepherds

When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us."

And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them.   Luke 2:15-18 ESV

The Shepherds and the Angels: Luke 2:8-20

The shepherds acted instantly on the angels’ song and that rocked their world. They went to Bethlehem to see what God had spoken to them: the baby lying in a manger. They shared their story with Mary and Joseph, they told all they met about the child, and they returned to their sheep “glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen.” Their lives had been forever changed.

The shepherds were transformed because they acted on the revelation God sent them. They changed the world because they shared that revelation with others. What an awesomely simple story!

“God of the Heavens, speak to my life and transform my world. I praise your name for all you have done in me. I am your willing messenger.”

Advent 29 – The Wise Men
Advent 1 - In the Beginning

I Send My Messenger

As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,” John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Mark 1:2-4 ESV

Prophecies of John's coming: Isaiah 40:3-5; Malachi 3:1

John the Baptist was the messenger that prepared the way for the first coming of Jesus, the Messiah. He announced the need for changed hearts and the forgiveness of sins. When Jesus came, people were ready and waiting for him.

Today, we are the messengers that prepare the way for Jesus’ coming: the coming to people’s hearts and the second coming to the earth. We must proclaim the forgiveness of sins for the repentant heart that believes in Jesus and accepts his love. If we do not share the good news, how can the world know the Christ and who will be waiting?

“Jesus, I want my heart to be prepared and I want to tell others of your love.”

Other verses: Matthew 11:10, Mark 1:2; Luke 1:76; Romans 10:14-15

Advent 23: The Announcements

Advent 1 - In the Beginning

Proclaim the Good News from the Mountain Top

I rewote this post as The Shepherd King I think it better follows the sequence of the prophetic names of Jesus. Still, we do need to go and tell the good news to the world. - Earl

You who bring good tidings to Zion, get up to the high mountain. You who bring good tidings to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with strength… be not afraid; say to the cities of Judah. Behold, the Lord God will come with might, and His arm will rule for Him. Isaiah 40:9-10 Amplified

We emphasize the less important things so much that we often forget the actual reason we celebrate Christmas. We must remind ourselves and others of Jesus’ birth, God became a man.

Go to the top of the Mountain and proclaim the good news and publish His peace. Especially at this time of year, don’t be ashamed of Jesus and CHRISTmas. The angels sang it to the shepherds and the shepherds told it to the people they met. Their joy was uncontainable. They had to shout it out. And You?

“Emmanuel, God with us, I want to share the good news. I want to express the joy of You in my life. I want to shout it from the mountain tops.”

Other verses: Isaiah 52:7; 61:1; Nahum 1:15 ; Romans 10:15

Advent 1 - In the Beginning

Can't Do It. -- OK, Watch This

Interestingly, Andrew, in John 6:9, brings forward a boy with 5 pieces of bread and 2 fish to ask, "but what is this worth when there are so many people? Jesus, we can't do anything. What we have just isn't enough."

Andrew was presenting the impossibility of the situation: 5000 men plus others and this kid gives us his lunch.

Jesus took the very challenge of only having 5 pieces of bread and 2 fish, and used it for a miracle. He used the very proof of lack to provide for the masses of people.


Jesus, take my life and make it a resource for your miraculous working to provide today for the masses of hungry people.  

To My Lord, My Grace

Joy and pleasure in Your presence
Knowing You in effervescence
Not in public presentation
Nor Spirit power demonstration,
But peace and joy -ecstatic grace-
Alone with You in the secret place.

Life

 "Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well." - Josh Billings

thanks for the reminder

"be subversive, missional, relational.......please"

 

My friend, thanks for reminding me to never forget we have a mission achieved primarily by relations in a non-religious manner. Forward with the cause!!!

A Strange Pligrim

While reading 1 Peter 2:11 today, I began to reminisce over the distant past and memories from teenage days long ago.

I call upon you as strangers and sojourners, to keep from the fleshly desires, that war against the soul. 1 Peter 2:11 Young's Literal Translation

I entreat you as pilgrims and foreigners... Weymouth New Testament

...foreigners and exiles... New English Translation

We are in this world but not of it. Through Jesus we are a totally new race. We are sheep among wolves. Our minds are to be transformed and metamorphazised into God's way of thinking . We have been moved from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of His dear son, Jesus. We are light in the darkness. All these are ideas of differentness. This is what we are to be; not weird, but different. The idea of being a foreigner and pilgrim, a stranger and sojourner has been a concept in my mind since I was a teenager. I guess it's always been an integral part of my destiny. It's part of who I am.

Being Christian, not participating in "the world", moving to a new city between my 10th and 11th grade in high school, going to Jamaica right after high school and then a year later living a in Venezuela for 13 months, all go together to put the Third-Culture-Kid into me [TCK - someone that is a combination of two cultures but doesn't fit completely into either]. Even though I grew up in the States the all of my early life, til I was 18, I have always had a bit of a different culture in me. And that is probably the reason I so identify with the idea of being a stranger and sojourner in this world.

Maybe that's why being a "foreigner" to me is no big deal. Maybe that's why moving from city to city is not a major event. Maybe that's why this Strange Pilgrim is such a content sojourner in this world. I'm still uncomfortable with change and uncertainty, but I'm willing and ready to go forward. And, I see that I'm even more uncomfortable with the status quo and the danger of becoming stagnant. What contradictions I find in my life, feelings and emotions! Desire for security and comfort, yet the need to take risks and move forward to new challenges and adventures. That's a part of who I am. I am a stranger, a foreigner and a pilgrim in this world. My home is in another land.