Losing Faith

He is the Lord, God Almighty.

It is that simple and certainly true; being so - how do believers not lose their faith?

Amid the trials and difficulties of life, the pain that comes physically with age and emotionally through time's experiences, when confronted that we do live in an imperfect world where God does not always move on our behalf, does not always act like we believe He should and seemingly abandons us to our circumstances (or so we believe), how do we not lose faith in the Lord, God Almighty?

It is a difficult question; one that should be asked and considered - not in halls of theological discussion but in a real way; a way that renews our personal commitment and life for Him.

With physical pain and suffering, questions tend to surround the victim of pain. 
'Why do bad things happen to good people?'
'Why doesn't God just take me out of this pain?'
'What have I done to deserve this severed leg?'

These are but a sampling of physical issues that confront believers, but we tend to grasp some type of understanding with them. We can see cause and effect.
Sometimes, there seems to be no reason at the time for someone to physically suffer and then later find out there was indeed a reason present; God just revealed it at a later time.

With these things, we can cope - but it is much harder when it comes to emotional pain.
It is the pain of feeling you have been betrayed; it is feeling that God has let you down.
And when we feel this way we struggle, we struggle with being disappointed with God.

Let me give you some fairly strong examples of believers feeling abandoned by God.

There was a woman who was pregnant; she and her husband spent months readying the home for their new arrival whom they considered a blessing from God. The shower was given, the nursery prepared in soft, baby-like colors; family and friends alike were rejoicing with them.
The woman never had an ultra sound or anything else that would indicate a gender or a problem with the child in her womb. And the pregnancy had gone unbelievably well for the new, expectant mother.
But when the baby arrived, although arriving in a world of love from the mother, it was found to have one extra chromosome and diagnosed as having Down's Syndrome.
The couple had prayed for the child before it was even conceived; yet, they couldn't understand why they didn't have a child like all the other children in the hospital ward.
As time went forward, the child had other medical issues and the mother, who was now stressed and worried, spent herself into bankruptcy.
The relationship with her husband also went into default; he left several months into the new family he had fathered. Maybe it was jealousy over the amount of time with the child she spent, maybe it was feeling he had failed, maybe it was anger at God - but it didn't matter, he left never to return.
And while all of this was happening, the woman grew disillusioned with her faith until she gave it up completely.
Simply put, she just couldn't believe that a loving God would 'bless' her in such a way.

And what about the man who struggled with depression for most of his adult life while listening to sermons about 'living triumphantly?'
He was embarrassed to even admit he was depressed.
Admittedly, he had a fantastic job, a great family and conceded that he had no reason to be depressed. Still, daily he struggled to get out of bed and then it was only to struggle with suicidal tendencies.
He prayed and prayed and tried to 'confess' his reality - but he still had those tendencies anyway; soon, he felt God wasn't answering and later he felt there was no God at all.

These type of struggles seem to make the proclamations of many evangelical churches silly. 
The root of each of these situations we face in life where we feel despair is - 'IS GOD TRUSTWORTHY?'

Often, we hear evangelicals preach a sermon or repeat lines that basically tell us that God wants us to be healthy, happy and prosperous. Anything less than this ideal is because you lack faith; therefore, whatever is wrong in your life must be your fault.
On the other extreme is trying to rationalize praying and thanking God for the safe arrival, ministry and return of missionaries to Iraq, while other missionaries were caught, tortured and beheaded and we can only pray for their families.
If God is to be glorified for one, why is He not blamed for the other?

If all Christians are to be healthy, happy and prosperous, what does that say for the solid, elderly woman who has served the Lord her entire life - but is now suffering because cancer has riddled her body and placed her in constant pain?
Is our lack of faith the cause of the world's multiplying tombstones?

I think not.

You see, what we believe really, really matters.
God does sometimes act in puzzling ways and sometimes, He doesn't act at all.

Here on Earth, we expect God to act and move and do what we have seen and read Him do. When He doesn't move or act the way we think He should, we are sharply disappointed and begin to lose faith, one grain of sand at a time.
At times, we even feel betrayed; and betrayal in our emotional state is as bad as murder in the physical realm.

So, what are we to do about this?
Well, it begins with thinking rightly, because what we believe really matters to our life.

You see, what we revere the most about God is what we will value about God- it is also what we will become; that's what it means to be a 'follower.'
No civilization in the history of the world has ever risen above their image and thought of God, not in morality, or ethics or spirituality. 
No faith has ever been greater than their idea of God.
For the Christian, if you serve the Lord, God Almighty, then there can be no greater thought than your thought of God.
So, the real question is - Right now, what do you believe about God?

One of the problems we have today in the Church is the fact that so many have a very low idea of God. 
There is no one culprit, although some blame contemporary Christian music; others blame the loose morals of the publicly exposed evangelists; still others blame corrupt religious denominations that function like political machines.
This cannot be because each of these is a 'thing;' 
Christianity involves people with a personal relationship with the Lord. The blame on music, immoral preachers or immoral/unethical/doctrinally unsound churches is misplaced because the greatest blame lies with those who have let degeneracy continue.
None are guilty in and of themselves but rather, all Christians hold the blame for this low view of God because we have gained outwardly while watching ourselves deteriorate inwardly and spiritually. 
As a result, over time, we have sacrificed the holy for a 'common' approach to God.

It is important to think of God how He really is - not how we want Him to be. 
If you will study the history of the church, you will find that if God's people believe rightly, many of our temporal problems are solved.
These problems are also solved when the one, main problem is solved - the eternal problem that each person has with their soul.

In the Bible, whether it is speaking of Israel or a pagan nation, the degrading passionate acts and fleshly desires of worship began first with idolatry. 
And idolatry is a substitute for the real God.
When people believed perverted notions of God, it soon rotted the religion in which it appeared. 

The first step down is the surrender of a high view of God.
The next step is surrendering God altogether.

What are we to do about it? 
How can we preserve our faith and not go by the wayside or despair and disappointment?

First - we must never give up a high view of God; He is the Lord, God Almighty. We should never bend this view, and when others disagree with us, we can defend our belief but always in love.

Secondly - You must make the decision not to give up on God.
I know emotional challenges, depression, despair and loss are just as painful as physical ailments. I know because I have experienced them. It is hard to persevere.
But don't give up.

I have heard of people giving up and abandoning the faith because they could see what happened to Job in his book and their life didn't have a happy ending to it at all. So, they walked away from God.

If nobody has ever said this, let me be the first - it doesn't always work out that way. The truth is that some of the most precious saints I have ever known have endured some of the most difficult trials in their life and some of them without relief.
And sadly, I can't explain this and I don't know why this is; but I do know that God has used their faithfulness to bless others. Maybe that was the purpose; maybe it is something I cannot yet see.

Either way, don't give up on God.

Finally - Remember who He is and who you are.
He is the Lord, God Almighty; you are His. Nothing will ever change that fact if you are a Christian.

When I was dying of cancer, my faith did not waver; it actually grew stronger.
I did not know why I had the disease, but I had it anyway. 
Though I did not like the prospect, I accepted early on that I was probably going to die; but I was going to die rightly. I held to the truth that there were only two escapes; one was death and the other was a miraculous healing.
I was healed.

Yet, if it had went the other direction and I had died, I was OK with it because I knew who God is and who I am. 
If I had died, the worst thing that could have happened to me was heaven; my main concern and prayers were for my family, but I digress.

The point is that regardless of how thing are working out in the present, God is still on His throne and if you are a Christian you are still His child. 
And friend, there is a lot of comfort in that relationship.

In closing, I want to stress the importance of a right view of God; a holy view; a high view. 
A view that He is the Lord, God Almighty, maker of Heaven and Earth.
It is to Him, that I preach each week and witness of daily.
It is Him who is to have No Rivals in our lives and No refusal in our hearts.

And it is to Him that I speak of when I testify and ask you -
Until next time, win one for the good guys.

The Voice

A Word is a medium by which thoughts and ideas are expressed into an understandable format among humanity. 

As such, it is a comfort to know that God is speaking to us; He has spoken and does speak personally to every person who knows Him personally.
God's voice to the human race carries with it a 'cause & effect' mode into our lives. 
For example, the Bible states in Genesis, 'God spoke...and it was so.'

Without this speaking of God, mankind would have no revelation of God whatsoever. 

Unlike other faiths, God did not give us a book to learn of Him → God spoke a book which revealed Himself to all who will trust Him.

We also learn through this that God's Word to humanity is final; when man disobeyed God, we were condemned to return to the dust from which we were formed. 
It is here the finality of God's Word is revealed because all men experience the finality of death.

One of the great tragedies of our time within the Christian world is the fact that our welfare depends greatly on our hearing the voice of God; yet, we have trained ourselves not to hear Him.
In one place in God's Word, when God speaks the description is in human terms - 'It Thundered.'
This is an appeal to the natural to describe something we are not use to hearing although He is constantly speaking through His Spirit and through His creation to His creatures who choose to remain deaf.

The truth of the matter is that every Christian has events in their life that they are not able to understand, nor explain. And some things occur that are contrary to all which we have learned.
Yet, the true believer does not need to always understand.
Although when it comes to God we often fear His voice as our first reaction; no person needs to fear because God's voice is a friendly voice.

Jesus said, 'He who has an ear, let him hear...'
And it is true, whoever chooses to listen will hear Him.

Sadly, listening for God's voice is not a part of today's popular religion.
Noise, size, activities and bluster are the things that are taught which make a man dear to God's heart.
This being true - the Christian is caught in an awkward place because God teaches us to, 'Be still and know that I am God.'
Therefore, our strength in the Spirit and our safety in Christ lie not within noise, but in silence before the throne.
For God says to our hearts that it is still important that we are quiet, patient and wait on Him to speak.

It is often said the Bible is a Living Book. 
Charles Spurgeon once declared of the Bible, 'You can cut this book into a thousand pieces and every piece would grow and live.' 
He was right.

Yet, the Bible will never be living to us personally until the individual is convinced that god has articulated in it His truths for the universe.
Most believe that the Bible is a record of what God said when He was in a speaking mood; the Koran is a believed to be a revelation of such nature, being dictated to Muhammad. 
I wonder when a person holds such a notion, how can they be a true believer at all?

God is not silent at any time;Never. 
It is in His nature to speak and He does speak to His children as often as we choose to hear His voice.
The Bible, far from being a simple record of God's speaking, is in fact the infallible declaration of God's mind put into familiar human words.
And if you read the Book He has spoken to us - you may very well hear the very voice of God rustling through its pages, bringing life to a deadened heart.

If you are a Christian and you have suffered under the yoke of a sterile, stagnate spirituality - there is a way to fix your situation.For no man or woman who listens and hears the voice of God will remain spiritually sterile.
If in such a state, approach the Bible expecting God to speak to you personally; He will.
This is not a notion or a thing you can manipulate; it is listening to a voice, a small, still voice which speaks directly and with authority. 
It is the Word of the Living God.

It is my prayer that the voice of God becomes a familiar melody in your life.
It is possible when the sounds of thousands of tunes flood your spirit that you can drown them out with the one melody and the others die away.
Only then will God's voice become as music to your heart.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.

The Sacrifice of Living

1 Corinthians 10:31
"Whatever you do, do for the glory of God."

In the ministry, I have seen a lot of people do some fairly strange things believing it glorified God. As a practice, even though I might not approve of something a brother or sister does, I do my best to leave it to God as to why they do it.
And sometimes that is very, very hard to do.
But I believe the Apostle Paul well states the commitment every Christian should make in living life to its fullest in obedience to God - whatever we do should be done for the glory of God.

Yet, the great hindrance to our constant praise and glory to God is the fact we live in two totally separate worlds which forever divide our lives - the Sacred and the Secular.
These two are morally and spiritually incompatible; or so we think.

Those of us who follow Christ know that we must be in two worlds at once.
As such, we have two separate lives and we try to compartmentalize each life.
One life is as a son of Adam or daughter of Eve - subject to the limitations of the flesh and its desires we inherited from so long ago.
The other life we lead is more spiritual and has a higher calling for we are children of God.

As a result, in the back of our minds that our two lives in our two worlds constantly struggle with one another.
We are constantly and continually engaging in two separate acts - one set is to always please Christ; these acts spring solely from our faith.
The other side is secular acts which seem to us to be ordinary, natural and repetitive. And we tire easily and get bored with these acts.

Have you ever wondered why there are so many divorces? 
Some stop seeing their marriage as an act of worship and it becomes an ordinary, repetitive thing they just 'do' in life.
We get bored with what we see as a secular act and we quickly have no time or energy for it.
But I digress.

The truth is that somewhere in the middle, the Christian somehow believes he is caught.
We tend to think the humdrum acts of life are a waste of time as we walk the tightrope of life.

But the problem with this dilemma we seem to have is the fact that the dilemma is not real at all.
There is no foundation of separating the sacred from the secular in the New Testament.
Once we belong to Christ, there is to be no such thing as a divided life.
Jesus' summary of deeds in life - 'I do always the things that please Him.'
That 'Him' is of course God the Father; we should do the same.

Now, this is not pious idealism; nor is it an unrealistic faith.
Jesus Christ never performed a non-sacred act in His entire life - now, let that sink in for a moment.
Jesus, the One who we say we follow, never once in His entire life from childhood through adolescence to adulthood and death, ever committed a non-sacred, non-holy act.

As an example, when Jesus sent the disciples for the donkey in the last week of His life, He commanded if anyone asked what they were doing, they were to say, 'The Lord has need of it...'
The same should be applied to us.
Every act should be considered a sacrificial, sacred act before God Himself with the purpose of worshipping Him.
The Lord has need of us and we should have an aggressive faith - offering all of our deeds to His glory and demonstrating His goodness through our lives.

This thought is demonstrated throughout the NT: an aggressive faith, a sacrificial faith, a living faith which glorifies the Lord at every turn.
And it is possible.

In Israel, the holy teachers would always teach principles and their subjects by starting at the beginning.
When Jesus appeared on the scene, He taught in this manner: 'You have heard it said....but I say to you...'
It didn't matter what the subject matter was, Jesus took the principle and made it into an act of the living; translation - it is great to talk about principles, but it is better to let people see the principle alive in you every day.
This is what glorifies God.
In  more practical terms - school is over, let real faith beget real living that praises God at every step.

In essence, all we do is to praise and glorify God; and all we do is the sacrifice of living.

The Apostle Paul taught us that everyday was to be treated as Holy, all meat was clean and that all acts are acceptable to God.
Now, this does not mean everything is of equal importance or of equal value before the Lord.
Paul's sewing of tents in the Mediterranean heat is not equal in importance to writing the Book of Romans, but both are accepted of God as true acts of worship and praise.

When it comes to Christians, all are to engage in the sacrifice of living because it is through this we can glorify God and praise Him in all that we do.
In Christ, our seemingly separate worlds have been joined for the purpose of the glory of God.

But it should also be said that while all men are created equally in the sight of God, not all men are equally as useful.
Yet, a 'layman' should not think of himself as being inferior to a 'minister.'
Serving God and glorifying Him is not just a minister's job, it is the privilege of every man or woman who has been called of the Holy Spirit to grace.
Every man is to serve where he is called and we are all called as His ministers with the purpose of serving, worshipping and glorifying Him.

It is not what the individual Christian  does that determines the sacred or the secular. 
It is Why He Does It!
When it comes to honor before Christ, motive of the heart is everything.

May we all have the right motives in our hearts with all that we do, so that God may be honored, praised and glorified in this sacrifice of living in which we engage in each day before Him.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.

Man & His Creator

The word 'Creator' is a powerful word.

It speaks of Ownership, of Supremacy, of Power, of Ability and there are many other things which it encompasses. No wonder then that many of the New Testament authors point to creation as God's first attempt to reveal something of Himself and nature to humanity.

Yet, our Creator did not just create; He loved and loved supremely.

Years ago, a little boy had built a toy boat complete with a fabric sail and shiny paint job. One day, while playing with the boat in a nearby creek, a great gush of wind came and it escaped the boy's sight. He tried to find it, tried to chase it down; finally, he caught a glimpse of the boat as it headed out to the river which was much more swift and deep.
The boy was devastated, believing he'd never have the boat again.
He rejected proposals to build another one like it, knowing it wouldn't be the same. It would not be that boat. That boat was his heart's desire. He didn't want another. He didn't want one like it. 
He wanted the boat he had built himself.
Several months later, with his mother at a  yard sale on the other side of town, the boy was shocked to find the boat he created in a box of discarded toys. He tried to explain what had happened but the woman in charge of the sale didn't buy his story.
So, the boy ran back home, cracked open his piggy bank, scraped together the $10 the woman wanted and retrieved his boat.

As he was going home with the boat, his mother overheard him say - 'Now you're twice mine: I created you for myself and now I have bought you with all I could give. You'll be mine forever.'

Amazingly, that is what God says about us. 
He created us and then He purchased us with the blood of all He had to give - His only son.
Yet, God would not have had to purchase us if the right order was obeyed and the fall had never happened.

Order, whether in the universe or in church or in school houses, order depends on right relationships. When the fall of man occurred, it destroyed the rightness of our relationship with our Holy God.
Through Christ and His offer of salvation, we are given the restoration of that right relationship with our Creator God.
But it goes further.

If a person is a Christian, a satisfactory spiritual life begins with a complete change between man and His Creator.A person may believe, but if a moral change hasn't taken place, we must ask if the Holy Spirit is being quenched within the man's soul.
This change is made possible because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ; again, it is possible. But it isn't always the reality.
One of our great challenges as believers is not to settle for second best when it comes to Christ; we should always strive for the greatest relationship we can have in Christ with God. And if we strive for this, we will soon find out that it is this relationship which is greater than any other relationship we can ever have.

All relationships begin somewhere; they start at some point and for some reason.
There is a fixed center when it comes to spirituality just as there is a fixed center for every relationship and every activity.

Before the advent of GPS, soldiers were trained (when temporarily disoriented but never lost) to use a map and a compass to find where they were. 
The soldier would pick out two points on the map, shoot the azimuth, plot the coordinates and where they intersected, that is the location of the person. 
I remember in Basic Training, Fort Knox 1994 (Huah), I became fairly proficient; I can still do this today.

The navy didn't have this option. 
In the old days they either read the sun's location or waited until the night fall to be able to calculate their position on the sea. And while this is slightly different, millions of seamen throughout the centuries were able to find their fixed center.
But regardless of what branch a person may serve in, there is always a manual way without modern technology to be able to find your fixed center and location.

When it comes to spirituality, there is only one fixed center - God Himself.
While we may lose our place, our moral bearings are always reset and established when we solely look to God.
This seems so simple and easy - and it is but so many times we neglect the one answer that is right in front of our faces. Christ is the answer and it is in Him by which our moral equilibrium is set.

I have found that many of our problems in life and in our own hearts are due to not accepting God as He is and then adjusting ourselves to that fixed point.
Instead, we insist on trying to mesh God into our image rather than seeking His Spirit to conform us to His image and His perfection.
With God being who and what He is, the only way we can have our bearings right and the right relationship established and maintained between us is when we have complete submission to His full Lordship over our lives.

In the moment we decide to do this - to have our total personality of self conformed to Him, we step out of this world of death and step towards His Kingdom and the eternity of life.
And Jesus proclaimed the great promise of this event: 

 John 5:24

"Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.

When we break with the world for a greater and more abundant life - it is a direct result of our change in our hearts because our relationship to God has changed.

Now, when we come to this point in our lives, many Christians begin to look around and see other people calling Jesus 'LORD' but question the commitment of others.
This is something we must fight against because it produces a very judgmental attitude; the rule of thumb is to remember that we may not like something our brother/sister does, but we are to leave it to God as to why he/she has done it.
And that is very hard to do.

As one has rightly said: 
To dwell above with those we love, that will be glory.
But to serve below with those we know - that's another story.

But it is true that there are many within the church who only pay Christ a token respect. 
There is a simple test that each Christian should test themselves with and judge themselves with. It is a test of choice.
We are given in life a choice between God and money; between God and men; between God and personal ambition; between God and human love - and the list is never ending.
The determining factor in this test - who will take Second Place.
The other one is Lord in your life.

If you have your personal bearings centered on God, you may make mistakes but you will be well grounded in Him and in your relationship with Him.

But let me say this - no man has ever lost anything by giving it over to God. Our test is a test of choices; one is the Lord and the other is something else which we must give over to Him.
If you give something to Him, you never lose it.

Nothing is ever restored to the right order, right relationship until the heart is made right.
By the Holy Spirit, God wants to make your heart right with Him.
It's not about just the mind. It's not just about the heart.
It is the mind and heart being quickened to life and to service by the Spirit of God as He centers us on Him and guides us forward in a right relationship with Him.

To each He has given the option - seek Him and choose wisely because He wants to 'twice by His' through faith in His Son and Creation by His hand.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.

Burdern & Surrender

The Gospel of Matthew, in chapter 5, begins the record of the Sermon on the Mount with what have become known as the Beatitudes.

The Sermon on the Mount is the greatest sermon ever preached in the history of the world, but these Beatitudes offer to humanity the best possible scenario as to how we can live and what we can be.

Truthfully, if I had to describe humanity, I would take the Beatitudes and turn them inside out.
What we seen in the every day lives of people whom we love, with whom we attend church, our leaders - secular and spiritual, can only be described as the opposite of the virtues we see in Jesus' ideal.

The seedy, the unholy, the disgusting outworking of emotions - these are the things we see in human life and conduct today; ranging from the school house, to the church house and in the state house.

Instead of humility, we find pride.
How many families have been ruined by pride? The world may never know.

Instead of mourners, we find pleasure seekers.
Is there any place more apt to try to fill the seeker with pleasure than the modern megachurch?

Instead of meekness, we find arrogance.
What ever happened to the football player who cried when he won, being overwhelmed in gratitude for his family, friends, coaches and God?

Instead of mercy, we find cruelty.
Sadly, it is a true statement that Christians don't pick up our fallen; we shoot the wounded and call it honesty and reality, telling ourselves, 'it will be good for them...'

Instead of finding peacemakers, we find resentful.
But are we resentful because someone tried to help or that someone won't give us our way?

And instead of beating our spears into plowshares, we often find people more than willing to fight and if capable, they will use every weapon at their disposal.

Culture and education may help some; it may refine the human barbarian a bit - but we are barbarians nonetheless.
These total reversals of the virtues of the Beatitudes which Jesus describes aren't limited to society in general; these attributes are found vividly available in many of our 'Christian' churches of all denominations, stripes and flavors.
If you are a Christian, surely you are alarmed at this worldly trend among the bretheren.
I can promise you this - these things I have mentioned as the reversal of Jesus' ideal for mankind, they have caused more human pain and suffering than all diseases combined.

As for Jesus, when we read His words they seem strange and out of place.
Given the world in which we live - why wouldn't they?
His words are indeed peaceful in a warring world. They are the essence of truth in a society whose own leaders lead first and foremost in deceit to retain power.

Jesus, on the other hand, does not need to deceive to retain power; nor is keeping His followers confused what makes them conform.
Instead, Jesus uses what leaders on all levels fear the most - truth.
Only those who fear Truth are those who fear what will result in the knowledge of truth, which is freedom.

Whether we are talking about a government, a people, a race, or a Christian finally freed from sin, culture or legalism - it is the truth of Jesus Christ that sets us all free.
Yet, we cannot be free without a burden and a surrender.

Jesus Christ has never given an opinion; He speaks only out of the fullness of the Godhead.
And what He taught was a truth about His yoke being easy and His burden light.
In a society where nobody uses a yoke for oxen any longer to plow fields and nobody really knows what a true burden in their heart is like because we value easiness- Jesus' words fall on, not deaf ears but uncaring ears because the truth is no longer understood.
On a side note - maybe this is why when a pastor is burdened by the Holy Spirit over something and expresses the concern publicly, he is greatly misunderstood and criticized.
But I digress as the reversal of the Beatitudes are once again brought to mind.

Jesus has proclaimed out of the fullness and truth of the Divine Godhead that His yoke was easy and His burden light.
If you do not see the correlation - they're opposites.
A Yoke is not easy and a Burden is not light - to a listener of Jesus in the first century, it would seem like a ridiculous statement to say these things.

Yet, to the one who was listening with spiritual ears, with eyes turned toward heaven and a heart seeking God as His Son taught, that person would realize, as men do today when their spirit is quickened by the Holy Spirit - Our Burden is Internal.

The burden which is within us, which is introduced by sin and spreads like cancer - it is this manifestation we see as the reversal of the Beatitudes in our lives.

Of all the outworking, pride may very well be our greatest problem.
People will cover up so much out of self-love; they learn to fear 'being found out' that they're not as holy, or as good, or as nice or whatever.
And this fear gnaws at thousands upon thousands in American Churches like rats in the sewers of New York. Seriously, it is hard to give yourself totally to God when your favorite idol is in the mirror each day.

That could very well be why Jesus instructed us to come as little children.
You see, children don't compare.
Children don't judge.
Children don't base their enjoyment or pleasure of something by relating it to someone or something else. This doesn't happen until they've been corrupted by adults.

Part of the sin or pride we have often evidences itself in our acts and words of artificiality.
While Jesus was always true and never false, many times we find our spiritual beacons surround by reefs of artificiality.

Recently I had a conversation with a man about Christ, churches, marriage and life. He complained one of the reasons he had left previous churches was because the people seemed false, not real, or as I have put it - artificial.

As much as I hate to admit it - the man was only expressing what has frustrated millions of Christians and non-Christians alike. Many times our churches become our country clubs with steeples on top to make us feel better about ourselves.
While this artificial flavor is sadly evident in some churches, it isn't true in all churches.
And personally, the best people I have ever served with in the ministry, military or have encountered medically; all of them had one thing in common - they were real.
If we can harness this realness in love, we will do well for the Lord; but it will only come after a surrender.

You see, it is so easy in life to get trapped into things that are artificial and we've been lured by our own fallenness to believe they are important. And this isn't an indictment, it is just what happens when our bearings are off, even slightly.
And we will use books, programs, people, money and a myriad of things to help us play 'the game.' All of which is of no avail.
All of this, of course, drops when we surrender to Jesus.

In Christ, we understand that we are truly weak as God as said man is, but at the same time, we understand that a man in God's sight is more important than the angels which guard the throne room in heaven.
In ourselves, we are nothing; yet, in Christ we are everything and anything as He leads.

In our time, the heart of the world is breaking under theweight of spitefulness, meanness, arrogance, pride and pretense. So, while Jesus' words seem strange, they are strangely welcome.
For it is Jesus who gives us rest.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.

Universally Present

To most people God is not a reality.

God may be an inference. God might me a deduction from evidence; but He is not a reality in an individual's life.
Others know of God by hearsay. Some say that He is an 'ideal.' Some say that our concept of God is the absolute thought of what goodness is, or beauty or of truth.
God may be these things to individual people - but He is not a Living Reality.

Yet, on a human level - it is very difficult to love an ideal; it is hard to be eternally loyal to a principle. This notion of God being anything but a Living Reality stands opposed to Scripture which reveals a personal God to the vast of humanity who will seek Him.

While God dwells in His Creation and is everywhere, not in the sense of pantheism but in the truth of omnipresence, God must be known through a personal experience. 
In the notion of Pantheism, God is described as being the Sum of all that is created. Therefore, a leaf or a stone has the same characteristics and value because 'God is in them.'
This thought degrades the incorruptible glory of the Living God.

The truth is that God is real, absolute and final - all other realities that we may know in life are contingent upon Him. And the Bible assumes that men can know God to the same degree of intimacy and immediacy as any other person. There is no point nearer to God than any other point; therefore, wherever we may be, whoever we may become, there God is as well and is available to us.

This begs the question - 'If this is true, why do Christians know so little of God?' 
That's a good question, it makes me wonder why we settle for so much less than He wishes to give.
It is a question that I cannot answer.

The object of the Christian faith is an unseen reality - God Himself. 
Our worshiping heart has not created God; He has found the heart and has awakened it through regeneration. It is in this renewal that we find the Living God in a personal experience.
From this encounter, we realize that God is inescapable - a truth known since the beginning of time. When Adam sinned in the Garden, he did the unthinkable act of trying to hide from the presence of God.
David later tried to escape the presence of God.
Neither succeeded because God is inescapable; this truth only becomes real when our hearts have come alive in regeneration. It is there too, we learn restoration with God happens only through repentance and faith.

When Jacob was in the wilderness, he realized a universal truth, 'Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not.' 
Like Jacob, many of those who call themselves Christians do not know God is here; what a grand difference it would make if they knew He was present, knew He was near, and knew Him as a Father knows a child. It would be a difference that would shake the world.

Yet, we have settled for so much less and have demanded for so little in our generation that knowledge of God and true brokenness over the state of the world has gone by the wayside.
We are in a generation of the push-button. A time period of instant everything - from oatmeal, to instant ovens called microwaves and the abomination known as instant coffee. We have machine-like methods.
The slow cultivation of the relationship with our Living, Personal God is cast aside, and we are all suffering because of it in the church.

Our suffering may evidence itself by extremely loud music from the instruments in a worship service. It may be seen in the video clips preachers use instead of proclaiming the gospel. You can also see it in the numerous sermons preached in the 'how to' line instead of the 'thus says the Lord' line.

From these things, Christians do not know the Living God; they cannot.
Their lives are too shallow and are focused inwardly with a hollow religion. Worship is intended to be entertaining and 'fun;' away with the mourner's bench of old and in with an LCD projector.
And what we see has bee the glorification of men using salesman type methods - all of which, when combined with the other things going on in our churches, are nothing less than a huge mistaken identity for the power of spirit when it is actually the power of the spirit of men.

If God is the Living Reality of the Ages - Why do we settle for so much less and why do we know so little of Him?
I don't know the full answer to the question but I do know that we have all contributed tot he state of church and we all stand guilty.

One thing I do know - all that God has ever done for any of His children, God can do for all of His children because God does not have favorites. The evidence of this is my own body; I was healed just like any miracle from the New Testament.
I have found that the difference in our era is not with God, but with us. The saints are not alike; we are different from person to person. Yet, God is the same.
God, being the same, may require us to go back to the very beginning of our faith so that we can learn once again what it is like to experience a solid relationship with God Himself.

In the beginning...GOD, and it is here we all must begin.
God is the beginning of all things spiritually or otherwise; any activity, church service, mission or desire within the body of Christ which does not begin in God and end in His glory - is wrong and out of His will. 
Our faith in Him is not an imagination it is a reality which has been reckoned by His Spirit; without this power, we are nothing and will accomplish nothing for His namesake.

This weekend is Mother's Day and millions of Mothers will be honored. 
We take one day a year to honor our mothers and many men will, and we will give little thought to our Living God who is universally present. In fact, most will honor their mothers over this weekend more than they will honor their Lord in a year.
What does that say about our personal need to return to a personal experience with Him?

Friend, it must start with going back to the beginning in your walk - back to God Himself and that personal, real experience with Him. It goes back to God awakening your heart for Himself; you coming alive in Him and seeing and knowing Him by faith as never before.
In this - the world becomes more clear and God is more real.
In essence, you come alive in a humdrum world; you become something greater than before, better than ever.
And if this describes you then you need to describe to another person that they too may come alive in Him and know His universal presence in their lives.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.

Commitment & Sacrifice

It has been four months since God healed me.
In those four months, much has changed. And there's other things that have remained the same.

My body seems to be getting stronger, but then like every aging male I overdo what I should be doing and realize I'm an idiot for trying to do anything at all.
My stamina is getting better; which I didn't really expect. After all, I did have a portion of my lung sliced out along with a tumor. I still can't run and I don't have the capacity I once did - but I actually believe that I will.
It's not everyday a man walks away from stage four lung cancer and lives to tell about it; but I'm thankful that I have.

On the down side, my weight has exploded. 
I look like someone has placed an air hose in my hear and blew me up like a balloon.
In past years, I wrongly believed that people were just fooling themselves or trying to fool others when they said that they couldn't lose weight no matter what they tried. 
I cannot communicate to you the sorrow I have over believing they weren't trying hard enough.

In four months, I have gained 40 pounds.
The weight gain is a combination of inability to exercise and medication but the emotional/psychological toll is enormous. This struggle is almost as great in my mind as having cancer.
My clothes don't even fit anymore and the helplessness that goes along with weight gain and cancer is about the same in a person's life.
Without this happening to me, I would have never believed it. 

Another downside is trying to get back to doing what you are used to doing. Inevitably, a person must come to the point of physical realization and know in their heart - they just can't do some things anymore. 
It hurts, but I am there. 

I have a friend on whose farm I had been accustomed to helping out from time to time in the summer months.  He is a good man; pure heart - honor and integrity would be the words I would use to describe him. 
But yesterday, I was at his house and did a very minor task with him and his wife; then we went to my house and he plowed my garden area because I'm not able to handle a tiller. After this, we spread fertilizer.
These are common, easy tasks; today, I am in so much pain and so tired because I couldn't sleep last night. You'd think I'd take something for it but since I realized the medications are causing my weight gain, I won't take anything and I am absolutely miserable right now.
I tell this story because my friend is 15 years older than me and I can't keep up with him. 
My body has thrown in the towel for the time being - yesterday was just another event telling me that I'm not well. 

In the last four months, a lot has changed with me personally - it's the result of the experience that I've had since September 2011. 
But the world hasn't changed. 
People haven't changed.
For a time it seemed the world and the people in it - suspended the normal routine; that we hung up our stop watches and weapons. It seemed that we, those in my realm of the world, that we forgot about grudges and issues; that we forgot about getting ahead for our own personal gain and just wanted to get along for the good of the Body of Christ and for love of one another.

But that indeed was the problem, there was a suspension in reality; there was no permanent change within the heart. 
One of the reasons this blog began was to allow me to give what I believed was 'Final Instructions' or a final teaching to the believers who knew me or even cared a little. 
Amazingly, it worked.

Yet, once the prayers were answered - everyone went back to what they considered normalcy. And this very well could be the greatest failure of my entire life. 

My one prayer for this whole situation was for the Lord to use what happened to me through the Church that more would come to know Him. 
I have shared the story on social media, this blog and in public speaking - others have as well. In truth, I don't know why God healed me, but I know it isn't for the the Body of Christ to return to a humdrum existence.
I know it isn't for things to return as they were before I got sick.
I know it isn't for us to let the power of God slip from our presence just because we're complacently happy.

No, there must be something more, much more - we as the Body are missing something. This something isn't necessarily found in a mega-church. Just because something is bigger does not mean it is more spiritual. Following that logic, it would mean that Woodstock 1969 was more spiritual and godly than Pentecost - and everyone with any sense knows that can't be true.

No, what we are missing is something much more personal. 
What we are missing is internal; it is as real as the compassion in a human tear and as abundant as a child's love. We are missing that 'IT' factor most cannot describe but we know it is in the heart. 
I believe I can describe it with two words - Commitment and Sacrifice.

If you will look closely, you will quickly find that we, as the Body of Christ in this world, are lacking the Commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ we should have and we don't make the sacrifice in this world of ourselves to glorify Him.

I have only began to realize recently that my health challenges will continue for a very long time, even though God removed any sign of cancer out of my body.
As the challenges continue, God also continues to open my eyes to things I couldn't have seen before, which is the method He often uses in our lives to teach us.

This month, promotion paperwork came through to my Air National Guard unit - I have made Major. I was informed the ceremony will be Saturday. At first, I was excited but then I realized this was an impossibility. 
Also impossible was the date in June; so, it turns out that I won't be wearing oak clusters until at least July even though my unit went out of their way to make it happen on my behalf when I was sick - for which I will always be grateful.
The reason I can't attend my own promotion this month is because of my son.
When I was sick, I saw how much it really affected my children and I promised myself that if God did choose to heal me that I would do my best not to break my commitments to them.
This Saturday, May 4th, while it would be perfect for me because it is Star Wars day (May the 4th be with you) and because the unit made this happen for me - it wasn't a perfect date for my son to whom I have made a previous commitment.

What this means is that I made a commitment I am going to honor and make a sacrifice of my own out of love for him. I don't want any back pats because this is how things are supposed to be among parents with their children.
But I do want other parents to do it for their own children.
And if a parent is not willing to make a sacrifice over something that is important to them for their children, how much less are they willing to sacrifice something in their life to honor God?

In these modern times, I do not see the commitment to God or the sacrifice necessary to honor the Lord Jesus Christ as in ages past. It simply isn't there.
Unlike the first Christians who won the nations through the Roman Empire and spread the faith to the entire civilized world;
Unlike the men of the Protestant Reformation who took a stand for faith alone, grace alone and Scripture alone - winning countless thousands across Europe;
Unlike the missionary minded Baptist Societies that sent men like William Carey to lost lands out of a commitment to God and a sacrifice to self; 
Unlike those Christians of the early 1800's whose dedication to Christ gave birth to what we called the Great Awakening...
Today's Christians lack Commitment. 
Today's Christians lack Sacrifice. 
Today's Christians lack direction, faith and the courage to accomplish the will of God in our lives - and it shows because our churches are filled with unrepentant members and our lives are breaking down around us.

Today's churches and the people within them are jumping from fad to fad; new idea to new idea - like drunks in a fog. We do not know where we are going or what we are doing; little wonder why there isn't more blessings from above.
Friends, we don't need a new book to tell us what's happening.
We don't need another 'how to' conference which will accomplish nothing. 
We don't need something that tells us how to cope or how to build a bigger church. 
We do not need a boost from beneath but a birth from above.

No! 
We need holiness.
 We need repentance. 
We need commitment to the Lord and self-sacrifice.

When God healed me, I thought I would wake up every day with a smile on my face and sing to the heavens all day long. I really thought because of what had happened, not only would I have changed but it also would change the world.
I was wrong for I feel the great pain of the burden of Christ's great work within us slipping away as sure as the ocean tide moves along the seashore.

Honestly, the most disappointing thing about being healed is that nobody really cares except for my children. The reason for this is because they have what we were instructed by Christ to have, which is the faith of a child. This means they can rightly see what we are missing in the work of God in the world.
Everyone has returned to their own lives, their own problems and the one thing I thought would happen was that Christians would take their eyes off of themselves and turn more to the power and will of God simply because He had shown Himself if our midst.

I shared these thoughts with a friend; his reply: 'Well, now you know what Moses felt like.'
I don't know how true that is, but if there is any truth in it at all - I better understand Moses' anger with the Hebrews. 

There are thousands around the world who read this blog - I love to see the hits from China and Russia; Germany and the rest of Europe. It blesses me.
But each of us were drawn to this site because of Cancer in some way. If there is anything that can come out of cancer that is good - let it be our commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ and our personal sacrifice to make His will a reality in our lives, in our churches and in our communities - regardless of where we are in the world.

May we continue to pray for those who do not understand the urgency of the hour; for the time is near. 
May the Lord readjust our minds to view things as He would have us see them in this world.
May we continue to pray for those in 'closed' countries and the persecuted church.
May we work for the Lord together as best we can where we live; so that all people may know Him. And if we must change, may that change be for His glory and honor.

And may we all, until we meet again - win one for the good guys.