Live Like No One Else

So recently Paige and I finished Financial Peace University at Gateway. While in class, we kind of had a class motto: “If you will live like no one else, later you can live like no one else.” The Lord took me to Job tonight and I was praying and asking Him what He was trying to say to me He reminded me of this saying.  So I thought, well how did Job live like no one else? Job 1:8 says, “Then the Lord said to satan, ‘Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blamess and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.” While Job was busy living a blameless and upright life he accumulated quite a bit of stuff. You know the story, he loses it all.  Skip to the end of the book, Job 42:12 says, “The Lord blessed the latter part of Job’s life more than the first.” Job 42:17 says, “And so he died, old and full of years.” Here is what Papa was showing me in this, and it may just speak to me. He was telling me that yeah, that’s a good motto for the class, but it is more than that. That is how He wants me to live my life. If I can live like no one else here on earth, when this earth passes away, and I’m no longer physically alive then I can live like no one else up in Heaven. I use the phrase to describe Christians in general. This was really just an encouraging word for me I guess.

How can one man lead so many astray?

OK, 2 Chronicles 21 is an odd one.  Jehoshaphat dies and his son, Jehoram takes over.  Of course, to solidify his rule, the first thing that Jehoram does is kill his six brothers.  This makes sense.  Your Dad has reigned under God’s direction and with his blessing.  You take over so naturally you go out and remove the competition.

How does this happen?  How can a man be raised by a godly father and turn so completely when he is gone?  The chapter goes on to say that he leads all Judah astray.  OK, seriously, after al they have seen how do they make these choices.  I honestly do not understand how people presented with truth can completely ignore it.  These not only were told the truth, they experienced it.  How does this happen?

Can it happen to us?

Unity- continued

Unity among belivers is a big deal to God.  We are called to be of “one accord.”  I still reading Philipians, I have always liked this letter, and have felt drawn to go through it again, and dig all that I can.  I was reading chapter 2 and it’s title is unity through humility.  Verse 3 says, “Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself.   4. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.” 
I am to walk in unity with other believers, regardless of how I feel about them.  I mean I may not always agree with them or like their attitude or personality but I am still to walk in unity with them.  It says do nothing with selfish ambition or conceit but in lowliness of mind esteem others better than me…….I don’t do like I should.  I have a hard time esteeming someone that’s acts like an ass and thinks they deserve some kind of respect or special treatment.  I mean I have not problem esteeming  or respecting a person who is humble  in spirit and willing to serve the Church like Christ.  But I really struggle with living this verse out.  Verse 4 at least gives a little comfort, since it says not to look out for just my interests but for others also….. it not saying that I can’t take care of my stuff  but to help others with their stuff too when they are in need or just to bless’em.  I am totally down with that, I really enjoying serving others and helping people.  However I know that I have walked in the unity that is described here in chapter 2.  I have written people off and discounted them because of there attitudes or personalities and thought, “well, I will just have to do it without them, because I just can’t work with them”  and that’s just flat out the wrong attitude/perspective to have.    Chapter 1 verse 27 says, “…let your conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ.”

Papa, I confess that I have not walked worthy of the gospel that YOU have entrusted to me.  I have accepted division and strife instead of building unity.  I have not been the effective tool that YOU need me to be, and I am sorry for that.  I ask for YOUR forgiveness and that YOU would give me opportunities to walk in unity, that YOUwould enlarge my territories for YOUR Kingdom.  In Jesus name. amen

Battleground of the soul

I have known for some time that we are made up of three “parts”: the spirit, the soul, and the flesh.  Additionally, the soul appears to be further divided into three parts: the mind, the will, and the emotions.

The spirit-man is what gets saved when we surrender our will to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. The spirit IS saved. The soul IS BEING saved and the flesh is the enemies. It’s like the good guys vs. the bad guys (spiritually) all the time in our lives. Jesus has our spirits, the devil has our flesh and they are battling for the soul – the mind, the will, the emotions.

Romans 7 makes it very clear that the remnant of sin from our sin nature is very alive an well in our flesh (Romans 7:18).

Romans 7:22-25 (ESV) 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

It’s like the soul is Hell’s Gate (Lord of the Rings reference). The spirit man is Gandalf, Aragorn and the Fellowship, while the flesh is Sauron’s army of Orc’s. The assault is non-stop. The attack is relentless. Legions and legions of orcs and darkness continually bombard the soul. The mind wants to do one thing, but the flesh wants to do another. (Romans 7:14-20)

I find it interesting that Paul says, “… I myself serve the law of God with my mind…” How does one do that? It the mind – that part of the soul – more closely aligned with the spirit?

The Greek word used for mind, nous, in this passage means “1b reason in the narrower sense, as the capacity for spiritual truth, the higher powers of the soul, the faculty of perceiving divine things, of recognizing goodness and of hating evil.”

Jesus said (Mark 12:30) “30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.” It’s interesting that Jesus inserted the word “mind.” The original version (Deut 6:5) only has “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.”

Why does Jesus add “mind” to the list? I think it’s important. I think it goes back to spiritual discipline. Practicing and exercising those spiritual disciplines to have my spirit (and my mind?) stronger than my flesh (and my emotions?). All the spiritual disciplines involve the mind and exercise the will. Pretty soon, I’ll have my flesh outnumbered!

Church study #1

I have so many questions about the Church in today’s time.  Why don’t we live like the Acts church and the churches Paul talks to throughout Timothy and Revelations and Philippians?  So the next little study I will be doing is about the church, then and now.  Today I started trying to find answers throughout scripture about whether or not our time can look like theirs.  Can we really see or experience the things they did.  That is a huge debate among many people.  Some say that church is gone and was only for that time and place.  Others say we are in the age of that style or type of church.  So here we go……

The Bible plainly predicts: “For the time will come when [men] will not endure sound doctrine…” but “they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables” (2 Timothy 4:3,4).This prophecy has been fulfilled, resulting in many man-made denominations nowhere mentioned in the Bible.  As well all the different teachings that have come across our ears that contradict each other so well.  Since this is true, we ask whether it is possible for the church to exist today as it did in the New Testament; and if so, how?

We can begin by looking at where the church went wrong I suppose.  Tracing a succession of church leaders back to the first century would prove nothing though. For if, as the Bible predicts, a church departed from God’s way somewhere in history, that church would displease God, even if it could trace its leaders back to the first century.  Since our churches have not been corrected, whether our fault or our church fathers, it is still in sin and does not flow with Jesus’ teaching of how we are to live.

There are a lot of options I think we could take to figure out where we went wrong and how we screwed up and whether or not we can ever go back to that and, but actually, God has provided a very simple means to guarantee that His church can exist in any age. That means is the power of the gospel. The New Testament often refers to the gospel as seed. Just as plants and animals reproduce by means of seed, so people become Christians – members of the New Testament church – by means of God’s seed, the gospel.  When seed from a plant is planted into good soil, that seed sprouts and produces a plant of the same type as that from which the seed came. Likewise, 1 Peter 1:23 teaches that we are “born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides for ever.” It is by the seed of God’s word, then, that we are “born again” to become children in God’s family, which is the church (1 Timothy 3:15).  The gospel seed is preserved by God’s power so it will exist in every age, having power to make true Christians of those who are willing to obey it. In this way, New Testament Christians can be formed in any age and any place.  All we need is to plant God’s Word in people’s hearts by diligent teaching of God’s true gospel without any human changes.  When people obey, they are born again into God’s family, the one true church (Acts 2:47).

This is the beginning of answering the question of whether or not we even can get back to the Acts time of the church.  The problem then is the teaching of the gospel of Jesus.  It has either been watered down or taught with our own prejudices and opinions.  If we will teach people the way Jesus did I think we will begin to see things we have all wanted to experience and be a part of.  Can it really be that easy?