nothing to gain

I have been thinking quite a bit about these two ideas.  

1.  "I have nothing to loose."  

2.  "I have nothing to gain."

I think I want to live my life as if I have nothing to gain.  These two ideas may be similar, but I think they may be quite a bit different.  If you have nothing to loose it implies that all you can do is gain or stay in the same place.   If you have nothing to gain then the only reason you are motivated is by principle.  John the Baptist had nothing to gain when he spoke out against Herod about not having a relationship that was not honored by God.  He had nothing to gain, yet he had his own head and life to lose.  He had nothing to gain.  I don't understand it.  The greatest hope one might have in that time was to be a friend of Jesus.   He died because of a word that God had him share.  He was not a disciple.  Jesus speaks very highly of this John.  He gave his life and had nothing to gain.  I can barely see the value in it.  He lost his life because a young girl motivated by the seeds of her mother asked for his head on a platter.  The friends of the bridegroom loose their lives because they have nothing to gain. 

The other thought that I have been thinking quite a bit about.  A lie is usually obvious unless one has something to gain by believing the lie.  If believing the deception of another will promise that we will benefit it is hard to discern the truth because we are "self seeking".  If we believe our own lies it is because we are "self seeking".   One who is not seeking the things of men, the things that are "scarce" or "valuable" will have nothing to gain.  We cannot serve God and Mammon.  That our hearts would be free from the lies that entice us to betray God and turn our backs on Him! 


A few years ago I went on tour for a few weeks.  I was on a tour that was about bringing music to communities that were without privilege.  One of those places was Angola Prison in Louisiana.  I was in charge of shooting video to document the tour and create an image of what we were doing.  We had to wait outside of the gates for a bit before we entered.  I was able to spend time in the Angola Prison museum.  I have never killed anyone, although t is a pretty common human endeavor.  If one is in Angola it is likely that this experience is on that one has participated in.  I make no judgements.  


(Paul Carbonara, Blondie's Guitarist for 10 years)

Once inside the prison I was a bit nervous after having surveyed the museum.  Everything that I had on my person would have been something that these guys could have cleverly used to devise a murder device.  These men could have used me as a way to bargain their release.  I was honored to be in their "Home", yet I was also respecting the reality of the situation.  I was here to capture the experience.  Our group had very little to offer these people even though it was cloaked as a "religious" presentation. I was embarrassed when it was announced that, "our album will be released in two weeks."  Aside from the clown show that I was participating in  I was very humbled by the situation.  I truly had never been in a church service where I felt so much freedom.  These men had a joy that was so far beyond most people that I know.  Almost any person that I know.  They had demeanors that were inexpressible with my current skills at description.  


These men had nothing to gain nor nothing to lose.  Most of those men will die in that prison.  They will never marry.  They will never make money.  They will never do any of the things that we free men do. It is because of this reality that they in their pursuit of God were able to experience true freedom.  I don't want to suggest I know the experience of any of these men, but I do want to say the reason that we experience so much bondage is because of our ideas about the freedoms we have and what we can do.  We must seek to lose our lives so that we can find them in Christ.  We must literally become voluntarily weak to become like God.  It is our choice of forsaking the gain that will transform our hearts.  We need to not be people bound to the lies and deceptions of gain so that we can be a real source of the presence of God in each others lives.  This world needs those who are willing to burn like lamps of oil in the presence of God and men.  We will burn.  It will hurt.  It will bring the impurities to the surface but when they are cleared away what is left is the pure joy of being a man or woman that is free to love.


(me at the time)

email

I recently sent an email to an individual that I do not know.  I shared with him some of the ideas that I have.   He responded with these words:

Dear Corey,

I appreciate your heart. What I would do if I were you is the following:

1) Write down the 3 or more areas that you would like to change most in our society.

2) Ask, given your situation, which of these areas could you reasonably get involved in (prepare for, etc.) to produce change.

3) Then pray about what steps to take & how to do it.

God richly bless you!

I thought I would share that with you.

We Need God's Grace To Set Us Free

This breaks my heart.  I came to my little café today inspired about the idea of writing about sex.  Sex is such a motivator in the lives of humans.  It is a very basic life function.  It is also a very volatile one.  I don't think I will write much about it today because I don't know much about the questions that I have.

I want to write a book titled, Love One Woman.  I want to encourage men from the moment that they read the first paragraph that it is honorable and in the heart of God for a man to chose to love one woman for the rest of his life.  God is not honored by testing the waters and seeing how the waters feel to determine if we will chose or not.  This is dishonorable.  God is not ok with the approach that we promote as a culture, even in Christian culture.  The desire to promote this idea of lovecomes from my belief that God desires us to be whole, complete, and happy individuals.  The only way to be this is to pursue His heart in our approach to the other.  I believe that with a real understanding of God's design and heart for relationships will strengthen the culture of relationships ultimately strengthening the experience  of individuals in relationships.

As it is now it is a system that is terribly hurtful.  Men and women are encouraged to test the waters and see what kind of person we are looking for.  We are free to engage the heart and mind of another and then make our judgment of them with respect to our futures based on what they shared with us.  If we don't like it at least 96% then we should move on even if we chose to experience their bodies and the commitment that is implied in the social (heart) contract of doing so.  There is no honor for commitment to our actions and what they really mean.  We are free to redefine what we meant when...we said things like "I love you", when we took off our clothes and shared some of the most intimate moments humans can experience, when we told others that we thought we found the one.  We are free to experience any experience we want to in the moment then redefine it in whatever way we want that allows us to disregard the other.

I don't want to live in a way that I would not want my children to experience.  Would I want my child to have a lover get access to all the deep important parts of their being and then just leave them by the side of the road bleeding, like the traveller in the Good Samaritan story, because someone didn't like some things about them.  This is why I want to write a book.  The book is not only about love between a man and a woman and that it is possible with great desire and effort to cultivate that love, but is also a remedy to a problem that we currently have.  The church and culture suggest that we should live "exceptional" lives that are full of all the cool things that life has to offer if we "believe big".  We push this idea of exceptional greatness for those who have the courage to live for it and wait for "God's best".  In this process you are supposed get a degree and  become financially stable by settling into a career.  These things are supposed to support the idea of having success in relationship, but by the time most people are 25-30 they have had to experience the pain and anxiety of loneliness and have mitigated it with pre-marital sex and various "romantic" relationships destroying their hearts.  We have broken the meaning of life an marriage and ruined it by the time we get the courage (aka...disenfranchised, lowered standards and a newfound willingness) to chose a mate.  We then spend much of our time as a church trying to teach people how to "get over" things stating that God makes all things new, yet we never deal with the real problem, lack of knowledge concerning God's ways and desires for us in relationship and how to view our life not as something that God wants us to find, but rather how we can chose to lose it for His sake.  We lose our lives by pursuing love.  Jesus stated that He came not to disregard the law but to fulfill it.  The Torah was a Law of Love.  The only problem was that the sacrifice for us not being able to pursue love was the blood of bulls and goats which did not have the power to cleanse the conscience from sin.  Only the Blood of Jesus was able to do that.  Only the Blood of Jesus can set us free from the burden of our conscience concerning breaking God's laws with respect to each other.

We need to seek the heart of God in our relationships and more importantly in our ideas about what is appropriate and inappropriate behavior within them.  It is inappropriate to think you have a choice to make concerning another's value if you chosen to partake in that value.  A righteous man fulfills his promises even to his own hurt.

I care about this because I have been involved in this on every level and I want my children and yours to live in a different climate with an understanding of honoring and cherishing the gift of God in another.  We must be seeking treasure and be committed to finding it in God's heart to bring to our lovers.  If we seek to bring treasure to those we invite into our lives we will always have something we can trust in...the ability to bring the presence of God through our vessels to the other.  This is the only way we can be sure that the presence and blessing of God will be in our relationships.  We must be the source of love, forgiveness, hope, joy and humility.

man.woman.family.community.responsiblity

Here is an article that is mildly interesting on the state of family and love in the western world. Considering that you are on the internet and you are reading this blog you must have a little time on your hands.  Read it.

I have very strong ideas about love.  A man can be defined by his courage or lack thereof to love one woman.  Humans are called by God to forsake themselves and give a bit of one's autonomy of desire/freedom to another and to love that person at the cost of self.  God is not interested in people seeking to "find" their lives, but rather to "lose" them.

My aim is to be a viable voice of Love and Integrity in relationships.  I want men to have the courage to Love.  I want women to have the courage to allow God to use a man to be a source of Love in their lives.   I want men to realize that their primary purpose is to Love God and the woman that agrees by a  social contract (unwritten) to be his.  I want women to realize that their primary purpose is to Love God and to Love the man she has chosen by this same contract by a commitment to commitment.  It of course makes sense to make a real contract as well.  We make promises so that we will be bound by them when we least want to be.

least like what we are not

the one thing wrong in any situation is the thing that is least like you.


aka


the one thing that seems wrong in any situation is the thing that I perceive to be the least like I perceive myself to be.


we never disagree with things that are like we are.


we will continue to be more like we are if we do not perceive that what we are or perceive ourselves to be is not what it is or seems to suggest.


we must consider that what we suggest that we are is likely what we are not, yet although seemingly right.


we are least like what we are not which is the one thing wrong in any situation.

wasting life on God

I am always in a state of thinking and considering things.  I consider a lot of things.  Sometimes I consider the animals, sometimes electrons, sometimes personal experiences, sometimes community experiences, sometimes technology, sometimes philosophies.  I am always in a state of considering things.  Entertainment has very little value for me.  I would literally rather do nothing with a measure of anxiety than watch television.  I have very little to do at this juncture in my life.  I attend a Sunday morning church service, I attend a Tuesday night beer and chips service.  I work 8 hours a day.  I am a man that has a heart for God yet I sense that something is missing.  There are several things missing but to simply state it, it feels like something is missing.

God is a great reality and force in my life.  There isn't a molecule in my body that doesn't want to be filled with the hope and glory of being God's.  There is a little room in Kansas City, Missouri where people worship God 24 hours a day 7 days a week.  I have been there many times.  There was one instance in particular on my way up to Minneapolis that I stopped in for 15 minutes grabbed a coffee and left.  I had an experience in that 15 minutes that I experienced a revelation of sorts.  I don't think I was seeking one.  I am pretty sure it was at a time in my life where I was resisting God's work in my life.  I saw these young people worshiping God from all over the nation and my heart broke.  I had to bite down on my back teeth just to avoid breaking into tears, a bit like I am doing now.  I will try to describe it.

I consider many things.  I really do.  There is something about little rooms that draw people from all over the nation that is attractive.  Things that are attractive attract things.  A beautiful woman may attract the attention of a capable lover, yet she will also attract the attention of incapable lovers because she is beautiful.  We are attracted to things that are attractive.  There is a great malaise in American youth and when we have nothing to do we seek to find meaning even if it is just for moments in time.  I know that some people who flock to places like this are seeking to find meaning, acceptance, to avoid problems at home, to avoid responsibility etc...  Even knowing this, this has never bothered me much, but some people who know about this prayer room will bring it up as an issue as an issue of its validity.

So I am in the back of the room trying to exist there in the present as best as I could knowing that I was heading to Minneapolis and had quite a drive ahead.  I was considering the ideas of these people being drawn for many various reasons to be there, but that I was thankful for what they were doing.  In a moment God broke my heart and the tears started welling up.  I sensed that God loved every single person that was in the room so much.  In spite of all the various reasons they were there He was honored and glorified.  I sensed that He was in no way offended for any of these "wrong" reasons that people chose to worship Him.  It was in that moment that I felt so humbled.  I saw that these people were walking in a great humility even if they were unaware of it.  These people had chosen to give their lives to God to be concerned with him for 8 hours a day on average.  Here I was heading up to meet friends and enjoy good food, buy some cabinets and come back home to live my life.  My heart was broken.  I realized that there was something missing.  I was not concerned with God.  Maybe I was entertained by Him but I was not concerned with Him.  I liked going to His events and hearing encouraging messages that were maybe very true.  I wasn't very concerned with Him.  These people were.  I am not putting their character's on a platform.  I am putting the reality of offering attention to God on a platform.  I sensed that anyone who was willing to waste their life on God would be honored for it.

So, sitting here in my little cafe as I listen to the worship from the prayer room I go right back to that moment.  I am not doing anything that seems important.  I will not say that important things are not happening but on a proactive level there doesn't seem much to be going on in my life.  I write a half lame blog that may have value at points, but I am not engaged.  I am for moments.  I want to waste my life on God and I am trying to determine how I can do it.  I have managed to make it 33 years without getting married.  I have very minimal responsibility.  I have considered at great length my place in life and what my role is.

When I was in high school I was sort of in a relationship.  I had some anxieties about the relationship and shared those with some confidants from my church who I trusted and respected.  When I expressed my anxieties of the relationship they told me that "maybe God was using me to be an example of sorts of what a good guy was but that maybe that was it".  I was so angry.  Please don't read anything theological into this.  I was aware of the idea that guys in the Old Testament were used as examples to our generation.  They were not able to see the fruit of their labors or the joy of the prize.   In my heart I said, "my life is not some joke, it isn't fair to use me as an example.  what about me?"  It was at that point that I decided that I would make the relationship official.  I wasn't going to be used as an example.  Please understand I am not saying that is what God was or was not doing.  I am saying that my heart responded the way it did.  In my foolishness and inexperience with being a "good example" or much of a man at all I made very bad mistakes.  I was ridden with anxiety, guilt, lack of direction, and all the human stuff we can use to paint our own psychological canvasses.  I hurt this person a great bit.  I hurt myself.  Looking back I see more of what was actually going on.  I have a better understanding of relationships.  I have a better respect for the way God respects the integrity of relating to others with confidence, integrity, and commitment.

I use that story really to point out that I said, "Don't use me as Your example!"  I avoided what I didn't want from God, yet 15 years later or so I only want to be used as an example.  I have experienced quite a bit of frustration, disappointment, betrayal, and all the stuff.  This stuff hurts.  It can make you very bitter.  I became bitter  and ignored God for several years and made terrible decisions during those years.  Being 33 years old and single with nothing really going on feeling that something is missing I ask, "What is it?"  I have been humbled enough that I desire to be an example.  Not so much to be an example of "success", but a perfect example of what it means to be a human who has been pursued by God.  I am a perfect example of God's ability to take a broken man (broken by self, by others, by expectations and realities)  to speak to that part of that man's heart where he breaks into tears thinking about honoring God and sharing in His glory.  God can take a broken heart full of disappointment much of which is internal and self inflicted with great help from others and fill it with a desire for love and hope against all worldly odds.  Whenever God speaks to us we have the opportunity to respond.  Sometimes I respond with, "here I am your servant." other times with, "hell no, leave me alone!"

I side tracked.  I really wanted to state two paragraphs ago that I want to be used by God.  My life is totally open (or at least that is what I'd like to believe) to be used for His purposes.  I want to waste my life on God.  I have desired things, ideas, relationships, existences and they all pale in comparison to God.  I realize that God can give us all the aforementioned ideas for His purposes but a desire for those things if they eclipse our willingness to obey creates an unstable thing.  It isn't like God is saying, "This particular situation is out of balance and I am going to level it until these cats realize whats up."  I think that the nature of things being out of balance will bring themselves to their own equilibrium.  When we input bad ingredients into a mix it will ruin the recipe.  We do this everyday all day long and eventually the poison creeps out and has its own effect.  God can rejoice over the marriage of two of His children but years down the road with much of the incessant adding of poisonous ingredients find that His children hate each other and want to be free of the gift that He gave them.  This is to say that the poison always comes out. It is unavoidable.  I keep getting side tracked.  The desire for God must be first and foremost.  We must fight for having Him at the center or our poisons that we bring to our relationships and dreams will take a fatal effect sooner than later.  God wants to rescue us from our own poisons.  When He puts us in relationships He is fully aware that the other will be affected by your poisons.  The effect of the poison on another, especially the one you love is grace.  God is saying, your lover is getting sick because of the poison that you have brought to this relationship.  I needed you to see the effect of it so that you would allow Me to take from you those poisons, patterns, behaviors and let Me replace them with ways that are more honorable.

I really was wanting to make another point but I have to assume it is God trying to communicate these ideas because it keeps coming back up.  We have to be aware that it doesn't matter that we have all the best ingredients available to make a wonderful cake to surprise the one we love...if we add poison to it, it will bring forth death.  We do this instinctually.  It is like there are things that we resort to out of our own personal natures that we may not even be aware of that is like poison in a glass bottle that is unlabeled that we have always added to our cake mixes.  We may have been given this ingredient as part of a family recipe yet we have never really known what it is or why we use it, but we always add a dash.  Mom always did, but only just a sprinkle.  When we bring our poisons into relationships, known or unknown, obvious or not they bring forth death.  We must ask God to come into our spice cabinets and ask Him to take anything that we shouldn't have. I think most of us really want to surprise our lovers, family, friends and we are always making cakes for them.  We are truly unaware of the poisons that we have put in the mix.  We may never realize it because we always add these things in small doses but it is making all of us sick and some of us are dying.  The Bride of Christ is a beautiful Bride.  She really does want God.  She really does want to be a gift and a surprise to her Lover.  God is aware of the desire that He has put in our hearts.  We just need to be willing to let Him come in and clear out the things that have been hurting us.  We may find that some of our favorite spices (personalities, entertainments, desires, life goals, etc) are the ones He takes.  It will hurt a great deal because they have been so important to us and the things that we have made with with them.  Let Him take them.  We are all going loose some of things that have been important to us.  What we all gain is relationship with our Father, our King, and better relationships with each other.

p.s.

the thing I was wanting to communicate is that I think it has been God's grace in my life that He has allowed me to be so disappointed so frequently.  it may be that part of His purpose in letting me hope greatly in certain things and the following disappointment of the loss of those things is that we now have a fairly strong individual who realizes that the Love of God is far superior.  I really want to be in love with a woman and the corresponding responsibilities that come with it, a very important thing in God's heart, yet I have to say that God can give or take whatever He wants.  I still want to be His!  I can be an example that knows what it means to loose.  I have lost at God's hand, I have lost at mine, I have lost at others.  I still love God.  More importantly God still loves me.  He loves all the people I know just as much as He loves me.  In my desire to not be God's "pawn" as an example I have been frustrated enough that I realize it is a great honor to be used by him.  In a sense I have been broken.  The wild has been tamed a bit.  In my brokenness I have become peaceable and willing to yield (to a degree...who am I kidding).  This is the message that God wants to share with you.  He wants to break you.  Let Him.

Be Only His

I truly care about the Bride of Christ.  We are in a time in church history that is full of syncretism.  We have simultaneously embraced the leaven of the pharisees and the doctrines of demons.   These are one and the same, just at different sides of the spectrum.  We have this holier than though self righteousness or this self-centered apathy that imagines that grace allows all men to be "accepted" by God.  Neither of these things are true nor do either of these stances acknowledge God.  God delights in those who honor Him.  We honor Him by delighting in Him.  If we read the words of Jesus we get a picture that is very explicit.  He explicitly states that we must die to ourselves and follow Him.  If we do not forsake our lives we will not enter the Kingdom.  If we try to find our lives we will loose them.  This is where we err.

We are currently being bombarded with really shallow theology that is essentially promoting that you seek to find you life.  It suggests that if you dare believe that God will offer you the things of life.  I think it requires discernment to discern what God is saying and may be saying through me right now.  I am a man and my words are my words.  I ask for grace in the humanness of my words.  The spirit must understand the Spirit.  The anxieties of the world and riches are the two things that characterizes the seeds that fell among thorns and were choked out.  This is where we are in this time.  I am not promoting a certain "lifestyle" per say.  Money is not the issue.  The heart is the issue.  Our hearts really obsess over finding comfort of our idol of mammon.  We must seek God to find what His word is in this time.  This is an important time.  This time is the Present.  We must beware of the present.  We are presently determining the trajectory of our lives.  Make that trajectory be to find yourself at the bottom of humility.  It is a race to the bottom!  This is where we are honored by God.

Jesus is not concerned with your comfort.  One could make a case that His aim is to disrupt your comfort.  His desire is that we would give Him our comforts because our hearts have a revelation of the joy of doing so.  God does not want us to be miserable.  We are only miserable to the degree that creature comforts, idols, and doctrines of demons that we  embrace are pitted against His call on our lives.  To state that another way:  We are miserable when we are unwilling to let go of our ways and ideas to follow Christ.  As soon as we let go and follow there is true joy.  If you are feeling guilty or condemned it is because you do not have a proper understanding of what is going on.  This is in fact the nature of the gospel.  Jesus came preaching freedom and love.  It didn't go over very well.  Jesus even said, "how long do I have to contend with you?  You unbelieving and perverse generation!"  We get the idea that God wants to make us into marketplace christians.  You unbelieving and perverse generation!

Really my aim in this is to bring up the notion that God's love for you has very little to do with your feelings.  God wants your feelings to come into line with His word.  God wants your heart to rejoice in truth.  If your heart is bound to untruth then it is grace that you feel anxiety and frustration.  These things are indicators that something is wrong.  These indicators do not specifically state what is wrong, just that there is something wrong.  It is for us to seek God and find out what is wrong.   I have a suspicion that if we do seek Him we will find that there is something that is within our hearts that He wants to address.  With Abram, He wanted to divide the soul from the spirit as He led Him to a place of trust.  This act of following God into the uncomfortable places if we let Him lead will lead us to true peace.  Our lives are a series of tests.  God tests us by refining our hearts.  In order to refine them He must be allowed to add heat that brings the impurities to the surface.  This is incredibly hard for us prideful humans to allow or accept.  When the impurities come to the surface He can clear them away if we will allow.  We cannot be purified if we do not "feel" it.  We will always feel it.  It will feel bad.  When we know the heart of God then we can trust it.

The fundamental point is that we need to know the heart of God.  If we do not know His heart we will interpret His actions in a manner that distances us from Him.  We may interpret that His actions are not His actions.  Any unbelief brings division and can create strongholds in our lives.  We must believe that His judgement and correction in our lives comes from a heart of love.  In the end of the age this will be very important.  The church will be divided.  The church will  think that it is honoring God when it will actually be killing the true servants of God.  We do this to a degree now.  If you harbor ideas about God's people that are not true and motivated by God's heart then you are harboring hate.  There is either love or non-love.  That is it.  No middle ground.  Please seek to humble yourself before God and ask Him to show you His judgements in your life so that you can honor Him and get on board with it.   We need to ask Him to purify us now so that we can be those who seek treasure in the heart of God to share with others.  I hope that you are able to discern the love of God in your life.  It may not always look or feel like we imagine love should look or feel like.  God has never ceased to love any of us.  It is a matter if we will open our eyes and ears to hear and see what He is actually accomplishing in our lives.  May the peace of God fill your heart with Joy.  May you enjoy the calling of God to let your heart be His.  May you enjoy the pain of tearing idols away from the flesh of your heart so that you can be only His.

Discernment

What is it?

Who could possibly say they know?  It is vitally important for us to have discernment.  Wisdom, Who has it?  Discretion, How could we live without it?  Knowledge, Without it we perish.  Faith, oh we of little faith!  Righteousness, our righteousness must exceed that of the pharisees or we will not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!

Jesus is our example.  He is also our judge.  He is a just judge.  He was tempted in the way that all men are.  He persevered to the end with a heart of love and we killed Him refusing His offer of freedom.  He is the greatest judge. There are two laws in effect.  The law of sin and death and the law of life in Christ Jesus.  Two laws.  Inescapable laws.  These laws both come from the heart of God.  God has never changed.  The law of sin and death was first.  It is still in effect.  It is the first step.  The law of Life in Christ Jesus supersedes the former.  This law is a law that takes affect when one is judged by the former law and the individual leans on the judge and pleads for mercy.  Make no mistake, if we do not lean on our judge and cry out in our hearts for mercy we will not be judged by the law of Life in Christ Jesus, but by the former.  I can say this fairly confidently because I have spent many hours before my Judge in tears asking for Him to make me like Him.  I am not much like Him, buy my heart yearns to be so.  This doesn't make me awesome or anything lame like that.  It humbles me.  It gives me the courage to speak this truth to you.

Back to discernment.  What is it?  Who has it?  How can we trust it?  Do I have any?  Does she have any?  Do the people I live near have any?  Jesus expects that we will have it.  He mentions in matthew and other places that those who have more will be given to them and those who do not have that what they have will be taken from them.  This seems to me to be a fundamental principle that we don't hear much about.  We are expected to have all the things that God desires for us to have because He has offered them to us.  If we are lacking it is because we have neglected to take the Kingdom of Heaven by force.  We will take with force the things that are most valuable to us.  James 4 says, "you do not have because you do not ask."  It also says that we fight and war to get the things that we want.  If we wanted God we would fight and war to get it.  If we wanted God we would ask Him to give us a willingness to accept more of Him in our lives.  If we wanted God we would be willing to let go of all the lesser pleasures in life.  We can only serve one master.  It is impossible to be divided.  We will serve the challenger to love if we don't give our lives to Love.

I think about God quite a bit.  I know a little about Him.  I know Him a little.  I love what I know.  I know that there is sin in my life that turns my heart sour and creates apathy towards God.  I don't know God in the way that I am expected to.  Jesus always called those to turn from their old lives and follow Him.  He never gave them a list of how they could improve their marginal lives of worldly concerns.  He said, "follow me."  In my attempt to follow Jesus this idea of discernment comes up.  Popular Christian discernment is not discernment at all but something called fear.   I know what that is.  Discernment is not skepticism.  If there is anything that is opposite of discernment it is skepticism.  There are certain features of the two that may make them seem similar but once again make no mistake, they are not the same.  Jesus had discernment and He entertained Judas for a time and even allowed Him to attend His last few moments with His friends.  I had a birthday recently and was quite rude to an individual who offended my trust and ensured that he realized he was not invited to my silly night out for drinks with friends.  Jesus was not primarily concerned with people not offending His trust.  Jesus was primarily interested in hearing the words of God and sharing those in the appropriate times in the appropriate ways.  His appropriation was not like ours.  It had nothing to do with protecting the sensitivities of the human pride.  He let prostitutes grovel at His feet without telling them that He loved them.  He in His wisdom and discernment let them honor Him with tears and humility.  His gift of grace was in the judgement, "He who has not sinned let him cast the first stone."  He didn't say, "get up off the ground with your crying.  You don't deserve this.  You didn't have sex with all of those men who want to throw stones at you.  You didn't invade the sanctity of marriages with your loose ways.  I like you just how you are!"  He did not say that.  Please bear with me.  That woman was me.  I know.  I just feel the need to state that God's love is not the same thing as the love that hippies promote.  It is not the love that the middle class soccer mom has for her selfish-ass child that has no respect for others. God's love is different.  It is quite a bit different than my love.

We need to begin to discern the love of God.  We need to discern that Gods love is not free, but that it is freely given.  To receive God's love will cost everything.  We must forsake all and follow Him.  God disciplines those He loves.  Love always has a disciplinary component.  The beloved should long for a transformation of the heart into one that is in unity with the lover.  I will give you what I think is the inside scoop...this thing that is life is so important!  It is not a game.  It is not a stage for a play that is your life.  It is a avenue with flashing lights seeking to get your attention and the question is will you follow the things that are most "obvious" or will you seek God realizing that the lights seeking to get your eyes are not lights that shine on the narrow path?  Life is a test.  God is testing your heart!  That is what life is, a test.  Will you forsake your creator, or will you resist all the flashy foolishness that men spend all of their futile lives seeking.

Most people who would be willing to read this blog are people who at some level value the idea of God.  Valuing God as a principle is foolish.  Humbling yourself before God and making your whole life about His purposes is not.  Jesus is not coming back for a bride who really doesn't care about Him.  He is coming back for a bride who will only have Him as her own!  His bride is a bride who realizes who He is!  His bride is beautiful because of His love!  She has been purified by His love and His blood!  She was born in shame!  She has nothing to give but her heart and her eyes!  This is what God wants! He wants hearts and eyes!  A foolish virgin thinks she has time to relax at His delay.  She is not worthy of His love and will not be allowed to attend the wedding.  This is the gospel.  The good news is that those who are not worthy will not be let in.  It is an exclusive event!  Only those who have been broken by God will be allowed.  The other part of that good news is that it is not that we fulfill the first law, which we can't; but that we respond to the Love of God, and the corresponding blood of Christ, with humility and appreciation, which we can do!

I apologize that most of my writings presented here are never edited when I first post.  Some of them I don't have the courage to go back to yet to correct.  I do edit a bit in the process which inadvertently creates new problems, tense inconsistencies.  Many times I get heavy handed with this "you" speak.  Many times I try to go back a day later or so and change it to "we" and "our" because it seems more inclusive and true.  When I do this I create all kinds of oversights.  I apologize, yet I realize that this is mostly for me as a placeholder.  I am getting the concepts out in their infant forms so that I can raise them into children that will go out into the world to change and challenge the hearts of men.

table of contents

My book may start something like this

Chapter 1:  Not All Things That Are Possible Are Likely...Until They Are

From the moment you read these words I want you to make a commitment to Love One Woman for the rest of your life.  If you are a woman, that you would commit yourself to loving one man.  I want you to commit that your love will go above and beyond all measures of appropriateness  to ensure that this person you have chosen will  be supported in the calling on their life, the call to being transformed by the knowledge of God.  This is a commitment that you will do whatever it takes to agree with the workings of God in their life.  When God's challenges to them cause discomfort to you, decide right now that you will submit yourself in humility and wisdom to God's work, that you will trust in Him to fulfill His purposes.  This calling on their life will become one of the greatest challenges in your life.  God's challenge to you is that you would commit and live with an unwavering trust that by giving yourself to God's work in another's life that you would be transformed into the person that God is creating you to be.  To serve this person that God has put into your life you will lay down your own which is a great honor.  This is who you were called to be!  You can step up to this calling and live with great joy as one who is blessed and honored by God as you become like Him.


Now That I am unable to surf Wikipedia at work for all the various knowledge that intrigues me I have decided to work on my book.  I have my very first version of a Table of Contents.  It is my first attempt and I know it will change.

1.  Love One Woman (introducing the concept of living for one love)
2.  A Woman Wants A Man (a man needs to be a man, defining what a man is in God's eyes)
3.  Eyes To See And Ears To Hear (knowing what you are looking for)
4.  Creating Expectations, Hopes, And Dreams (how to think about the future in a way that heightens love)
5.  The Honest Approach (the way to start a relationship, defining the parameters of heart goals)
6.  Protecting Integrity In Community (not cheating the system, holding each other accountable)
7.  A Place of Safety (creating an environment of love, safety, and commitment to commitment)
8.  Show Your Cards (being open and honest about fears, dreams, weakness and hopes)
9.  Picking Out a Ring (a word of courage to making a commitment before God to love this woman forever)
10.  You Can Do It!  (get engaged, married, and have kids...it never killed anyone, except for those it did)
11.  Adjusting To Change (living in a new paradigm, embracing it with courage and sharing with others the joy of being courageous)

I started mulling this over a little over a year ago.  I was really excited about it and was at a place in life that was very challenging in many ways.  I had the joy of being in a relationship for awhile and I got excited about the notion of maybe being able to write my book from a place that had a little more experience, so I opted for gaining experience.  I want to use this outline to make a better structure for something that I believe is on the heart of God.  I believe that God want's His people to love with integrity and hope in a way that is lasting.  Our culture has fed us lies and the church has yet to effectively combat those lies, but has rather has supported them.  God wants us to enjoy the gift of one another.  We have to be awake to God's design and heart for relationships in order to recognize them and exist within them in honor.  The mode that we exist in at this moment in history with regards to relationships is a lie and full of deception.  We promote the idea of testing the waters and learning what we like and don't like in potential mates is a good thing.  This is not a good thing.  We are directly encouraged to be deal breakers.  We are encouraged to defraud our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We are encouraged to be selfish and make sure we find a person who we deem assets to our goals and imaginations.  What frequently happens is that at the end of this process when we are sufficiently disenfranchised and jaded with our silly notions that we then settle for who is willing to embrace our broken lives at that moment, at that moment when we finally realize that our notions are no longer that interesting or lasting.  We have become different people with different ideas.  Breaking each others hearts and learning to be heart breakers has no value in the Kingdom of God.  I want to encourage a new generation to be people of courage.


Not all things that are possible are probable...until they are!

"A crushed reed He will not break."

yipee!

"Now the natural man does not receive the things from the Spirit of God- to him they are nonsense!  Moreover, he is unable to grasp them, because they are evaluated through the Spirit." Corinthians 2:14

I want to present this idea as humbly as I can.  I present it as a concept.  I don't want to be so foolish to think that I am much more than a natural man.  When we come to Christ He gives us a new nature.  We being men are still in contact with all the forces of the old nature.  We are in a manner of speaking natural men with an invitation to be much more than that.  Our natural state is to be natural men.  Men from nature with natures that are natural.  Our basic and inherent features are those of animals.  We are worse than animals because we can harbor sin in our hearts.  Animals are not judged for their ways.  They can do what they do and it is as it is and is supposed to be.  God did not create animals for intimate companions He created men for that.  We are to acknowledge God as created things yet with the breath that is different from the other breaths in the land.  God breathed His life into when you became a new creation.  Though we are new creations be can pick and chose as we will.  The things that are natural to God are supernatural to man.  It is in fact the essence of the Kingdom of God.  The Kingdom of God is not anything like this world excepting the references that we can make to it with the only knowledge that we have, which is natural knowledge.  Our limitation of knowledge and its corresponding words are what we are forced to use for things that we do not understand.  Try telling someone that you love them.  You will use a word like love because it is what you have knowing good and well that it really has no meaning that can be transferred by its usage.  The words will have no meaning without the sense of connection being established to support it.

This is part of what the scripture above is referring to.  God is an expanse of ever increasing proportion that we get to be transformed by in relationship.  There is no limit to the knowledge of God.  In this life we will never even scratch the surface of knowing Him as He is, but we are given a glimpse that will never cease to be an exponential experience even in the limited nature of what we can know.  I mean this in a very realistic way.  All of the knowledge of man and what it eludes to in all areas of interest is but a drop in the ocean of what we can know about God in this world.  He is greater in a way that is unable to be compared to any of the created things that capture our attention.  We being men, and mostly of the lesser intelligent ones frequently think our ways are pretty legit.  They are not.  We are natural men with natural thoughts.  We are self-referential by nature.  There are very few phrases in human nature that are not born of self-reference.  Only those things that are Kingdom references have much value as statements that can be made by the mouths of men.  We are lucky and honored to be able to say, "Holy, Holy, Holy!"  Only a revelation from heaven can reveal this to a man.  Any man can say it.  We desperately need men with a revelation of who God is revealing Himself to be in the present.  We need to be present.  We need to present ourselves to God asking Him to reveal Himself to us humble men from the dirt of the earth, not much more than animals.  God desires to reveal Himself to us.  I don't want to sound mean, but our notion of who God is is really shallow and self-referential.  We want God to be with us so we can have great interesting lives that are "kingdom" lives but we seem to overlook the very basic premise of the Kingdom.   The Kingdom is one that must be entered.  We do not exist in it.  To enter we must be:  meek, hungry, thirsty, poor in spirit, and prone to mourn.  If we are these things we will likely be: be pure in heart, making peace, showing mercy, and being persecuted for it.

These things that are requisites seem like very strange things to be persecuted for.  We are promised by Jesus that if we Love Him we will enter through the doors of these things to meet Him.  Jesus says that He, "did not come to bring peace but a sword!" Matt 10:34  He goes on to say that He came to make set those of one's own household against him.  He said that if we love those whom are closest to us more than Him that we are not worthy of Him.  The idea that I see in this passage of scripture is that we are not to shrink back from sharing His word that He whispers in our ears to those who we have much to loose in this world from our obedience.  If He were to whisper into my ear that the church is full of deception and is enflamed with passion for lovers whose genitals were like donkeys and  have emissions like horses then I would have a lot to lose  by sharing that with you.  You will not like me if I tell you that is what God is saying to you.

Here is what I am telling you.  God is calling you to lend Him your ear.  He wants to share with you who He is.  He is very kind and gentle to the humble.  He will resist you at great length if you are proud.  If you are proud you will not realize it.  One who God is resisting is likely not to know it.  The only way to know that God is not resisting you is to be broken and mourning in His presence seeking His Kingdom to break into this world.  That is pretty much the only way to tell.  Those who cast off the present pleasures of this world to embrace mourning and intercession are those whom are inheriting the Kingdom.  If you are seeking a life of 21'st Century Christian Kingdom entitlement complete with the honor of men you get exactly what you are looking for, acceptance from man...for a time.  A natural man wants natural things.  I am not God.  I am not much like Him.  I am a man with natural desires and natural distractions with temptations that originate within.  I will war and fight to get the things I want just like you.  I will fight for things that I have not even asked for.  When I don't get what I want even after asking I may murder and covet to get it.  Jesus makes it very clear that these things happen in our hearts.  Murdering and coveting in our hearts is no better than doing so in the flesh.  It is good for others  that we do not do these things, but the fact that we do not do them is exactly like washing the exterior of a glass to present it as clean without having ever cleaned the inside.  This is what pride is.  Pride is thinking one is doing fairly well because the outside of the glass looks good yet there is nothing but death inside.

A natural man will not receive the word that the inside of the glass is full of death and filth.  This must be spiritually discerned.  I am not sure what to do with this.  If the thought makes you cringe it is likely because you have no understanding.  If it sets your heart free it is because you do have some understanding.  If the word brings tears to your eyes because you realize that we are all bound to sin and are missing the great Glory and Honor of bowing your head to the King then you may be inheriting the Kingdom right now.  This life is not what it seems.  Life is a test.  That is about it.  Life can be very fulfilling and full of Hope and Love.  This hope needs to be in God.  This hope needs to be rooted and grounded in love.  Love is rooted in mourning and compassion that comes through intercession.  We must have God reveal to us who He is.  We have to see who we are.  When we accept the forgiveness for who we are and what we are, we can take that forgiveness and extend it to others.  We can extend it with great vigour because of what we know from our revelation of who Christ is.  These ideas must be spiritually discerned.  Seek God.  Ask Him to reveal Himself to you.  Ask Him to cast down all your notions that exalt themselves against the Knowledge of God that agree with the demonic wisdom that you are inclined to agree with.

One of the most secretive deceptions and lies that thrives in the church is that we can justify the boundaries that we have set up with those in the church.   I will be very forward here.  The church is full of divorce.  Full of divorce!  Don't be foolish, this is not ok.  Divorce is not ok!  We have created a notion that we serve a God who wants us to be happy and that if we are not then He wants us to be in situations where we feel loved and appreciated.  Of course He wants us to feel loved and appreciated, but not at the cost of your integrity!  Ask Joseph if he felt loved and appreciated as he endured betrayal and condemnation by those who had no discernment.  This man had to leave the room to cry every time he stood before His brothers years later walking in his "calling" as God was preparing to reveal his grace to them.  He let Joseph's brothers "murder" their brother so that in due time their foolish ways would be apparent to them and they would have to acknowledge the way of sin in their lives.  Divorce is not God's heart!  Many of us who are not married have many divorces in our hearts.  Jesus says that that whom God has joined let no man separate!  If your mate has a quality that is upsetting it is not a reason for you to bail.  Hosea loved his wife even through great infidelity as an honor to God and His love for His Bride.  Abraham gave his wife up twice and lied to protect his "future".  I cannot imagine the betrayal that Sarah would have felt at this gesture.  She did not leave him.  Her faith was in God.  She knew that God comforts those who mourn.  She persisted and was given a promise of faith!  God revealed Himself to them through her commitment to the covenant of being one with Abram and more importantly the covenant with God that was referenced in the human relationship.

We want others to know the Love of God, yet we don't know the Love of God.  God's love is committed.  It is committed to the truth.   It is not committed to allowing you to feel free from the Law, It is committed to you fulfilling the Law through Love.  When you hurt another you are to take it seriously and seek forgiveness.  When another hurts you you are to seek forgiveness.  Seek the Kingdom of God.  Jesus teaching us about the Kingdom says we are to pray like this... that His Kingdom would come and His will be done on earth like it is in Heaven.  That we would share in His bread.  That He would forgive us in the same manner that we have forgiven others.  We are forgiven for breaking His Law.  We are being forgiven from a law that was a Law of Love, yet the requirements of that Law were not sufficient to purify the heart of man.  It was a law that was sealed with the blood of animals.  Jesus changed the nature of the law by giving His own blood.  We are to do the same.  We must fulfill the His Law, a Law of love.  The law remains.  Jesus says our righteousness needs to far exceed that of the Pharisees or we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.  Divorce is breaking a covenant that was sealed by blood between a man and his wife as a symbol of the blood that was shed by Jesus to bring us into a covenant with Him!  My aim is not to condemn, but to set the record straight.  It is not ok to break covenant.  God doesn't encourage you to do so...maybe your friends do but they are foolish virgins with no oil in their lamps!  Don't be a foolish virgin.  Hearken your ear to God.  When this is all over God's love will cover us all.  It is not over!   Be a wise virgin.  Love your wife, love your husband!  Love them!  The greatest love one can give is their own blood, their own life.  Frustrated hopes and dreams are not so great that you should forsake God and adulterate.   I want all of us to experience hope, love, joy and appreciation in relationship.  If I had a message it would be that God wants to express these things in relationships between men and women.  I know this is true.  These things are only attainable if we are committed to God more than we are to ourselves or to our mates.  This commitment to God is expressed in honoring our commitment to one another.

well, i have to go.  the coffee shop is closing

So if you are offering your gift at the Temple altar and you remember there that your brother has something against you,  leave your gift where it is by the altar, and go, make peace with your brother. 

I just spoke with a wonderful individual from New York. As we were finishing our conversation he told me that he had been sleeping with the same woman for 62 years. "Good for you", I told him.  He had a great peace in his voice as he said, "I am pretty proud of that." It was a great statement!  We need this joy in our world. Be true.

avoid hate

The only way to avoid hate is to Love.

There is no love that is not proactive.

Love can only be discovered in the presence of God.

If we do not intentionally go into the presence of God and ask for Love, generally and specifically, we will not have it and will only be left with hate.

God hears the cry of those who are hurting at the hand of another. The other's the attitude of "am I my brother's keeper?" Is not a good reply.

We must love one another in all the specifics of our lives. To not love is to hate.

the nature of love

Sometimes I can be a bit intense.  Part of me doesn't like it, another parts says it is ok.  Sometimes we need a jolt to our systems in order to see what is going on in our lives.  God is a God of Love.  He is full of compassion and mercy.  He is love is beyond my comprehension.  It is precisely because of His great compassion and mercy that we must respond to the invitation with humility.  I don't know who my audience is.  I don't have a social media presence so what little readers I may have had I am sure I do not have now.  So at best, if I have any readers what I do may likely be what is called "preaching to the choir."

The last year or two I have been reading the Bible and asking God to show me who He is and to teach me and reveal to me His heart.  I have been in church for 33 years.  I have heard the messages over and over.  I am very thankful to have been able to learn from many who have a heart for God.  With that being said I think there is an issue that arises from always hearing what others have to say about God in a church setting.  It seems that almost all systems resist change and new information.  As time moves forward we tend to generalize and simplify and reduce truth to rules of thumb.  This process of reducing information to simple thoughts and ideas we loose the connection that individuals were required to have with the source.  God loves His church.  He loves every individual in it.  As individuals we need to seek God for what He is telling us.  God can use a pastor to speak into your life, but if that is primarily place where God speaks to you then there is a great need for drawing closer.  God wants us to draw closer.  God is fearful!  

Approaching Love is a fearful thing.  It must be done with humility.  The Light of God's love is piercing.  His bright light will shine and heal all of those things that are hurting.  There can be no insincerity in the presence of God.  God's love is all consuming.  It is a fearful thing, especially if we are holding onto sin.  Sin provides a sense of comfort, especially if it is a familiar sin.  We have created little systems of behaviors that give us a sense of structure and comfort in the ways we choose to medicate the anxiety of life and specific circumstances.  I have my systems.  They are pretty strong systems.  I hate these systems.  Letting the love of God shine into our systems is fearful.  What if He sees me to be a little ugly?  What if others see that I am not congruent?  What if it hurts?  What if I have to confess to being an adulterer?  What if I have to confess to being a thief?  The light is shining, we just have to walk into it.  That is the hard part.  To be lovers of God we must willingly walk into the things we fear the most.  

Love is a great mountain.  It is a mountain that invites men and women with courage to live, breathe and die within its borders.  Love is not something that is natural to man.  There are things in man that allude to Love and there is a desire in man to harken to it.  There is a love that man has naturally.  It has its place, but it is a pretty shallow resource.  The love of man is a resource that is valuable to man but is easily depleted.  When I meet someone that I like, whether it be a woman or man, that inspires me to be excited to get to know them more I give them some of my love.  I may share with them words of appreciation, hope, affection.  We will spend time together and I will give more from this resource.  I will give it freely because it makes me feel good.  It makes me feel connected.  I could tell a woman, "I love you, I want to spend the rest of my life getting to know you more!"  I can mean that with all that is in me.  The problem is that there is a limit to what is in me.  This does not mean that those words are insincere, just maybe a bit misinformed.  When we begin relationships we bring a set of hopes and expectations.  We bring our own history and personal experience and the corresponding fears and dysfunctions.  In the course of giving of one's love freely it is inevitable that we will hurt the other and they will hurt us.  We may "see" something about them that we didn't once see and will be thrown off by it.  This happens in every relationship.  This is the point where we are most unprepared as humans.  We are not prepared to handle the disappointment of our own expectations and how those expectations disappoint us when we project the hope of them onto another.  The result of these experiences is diverse and it seems that most of us do not recover from the disenfranchisement but rather judge, justify, and move on.  

I posit that God leads us into relationships to purify our hearts and to lead us to humility and love.  Love in my estimation is something that is a function of two things:  Humility and Forgiveness.  Without these two things Love is not possible.  God wants to lead us to Love.  He gives us the opportunity to experience real life with people.  In these experiences He has the aim of giving us a great honor.   We approach love with hope.   Love that is not tested is not love that is strong.  Love by nature is something that is persistent.  Humans have created this concept of "I don't love you anymore."  This concept is theoretical and a logical fallacy.  What may be more accurate is, "I never loved you" which is an indication that, "I do not have love."  I don't say any of this to condemn, it is just a matter of truth. God lets us come to these places where we utterly fail in our attempts to love so that He can show us a better way.  

Almost all of my romantic relationships have lasted approximately 3 months.  Most of my friendships have lasted about two years.  Since I have lived in Springfield I have managed to have some friendships  last seven or eight years.  To be honest, many of those friendships could have lasted about two years.  I am a man with a very complex system of expectations and judgements (standards...hehe).  I have been able to write people off fairly easily.  I can move on pretty quickly from friendships.  In these long term relationships  of eight years I have come to know a little bit about love.  Our love must be tested.  We all approach relationships with a perspective of how they affect us.  We are so much less aware of how we affect others.  In fact, we cannot really know how we affect others.  Most of what we we "are" is something that is internal, it is what we think and feel.  We do not know what others think and feel unless they share that with us.  In my experience of thinking and feeling things in connection to specific relationships I have been disappointed over and over.  I didn't realize that when I chose to entertain the presence of ______ that they were "that way."  I didn't realize that they were going to be primarily concerned with themselves.  You know, its ok because I can always make new friends.  There are always other cute girls out there to chose from.  

I want to make it clear that I think this type of experience is universal and it is very damaging to heart.  It was in this line of thinking and the commitment of these friends to be in my life that I learned that Love was extending its hand to me.  It finally dawned on me that I was being loved.  I was being forgiven.  All the time I was being affected others I didn't realize the affect I was having.  It was this new revelation of how I was affecting others negatively that I was being given grace by God to be invited to embrace the first quality of Love, Humility.  Until I realized that I was broken and in need of grace from others I could not relate to them sincerely.  I had been standing removed as a judge with a complex set of "high standards".  I wasn't aware that I was unable to stand justified even under my own standards.  I assumed that I was sort of a benchmark for acceptable living.  When I realized that I was not and that I was hurting others I was able to see that it was possible for me to forgive them for hurting me.  I will say that most of this "hurting" was really of no consequence.  Most of the little offenses that we make are tiny silly things, but they are the things that direct the course of our judgements on others.  It is these small things that we use to make our biggest decisions.  

God does not want us to be living and making our big decisions in life on these little offenses.  We don't need to making our decisions based on big offenses.  God wants us to be cloaked in Humility.  This humility will lead us to understanding that leads to forgiveness.  Forgiveness in light of an empathetic experience (humility) is the heart of Love.  God wants humans to see each other in His light.  He wants us to have the joy of love with others and the security that it brings.  We live in a broken world.  We are in no way guaranteed that when we love others and extend them grace that we will receive it in return.  Reciprocation of love is not the reason for love.  If one were going to make a case about love a stronger case could be made that Love is intended for situations of not-love.  I have been reading Corinthians and Paul is speaking about Christians taking each other to court for their offenses. He says, "wouldn't you rather just suffer being defrauded?"  This has been in my mind for weeks.  We are not to defraud each other.  It may happen at times that a brother or sister in Christ will deceive us and take parts of ourselves that they were not willing to pay for and it will hurt.  Instead of seeking justification from the Law he asks us if would we not rather suffer being wronged.  If we hold another's offense up and demand payment, then God will judge us with the same measure.  This is a great challenge.  It seems unbearable.  Would I not rather be wronged?  Will I turn the other cheek?  Will I walk an extra mile with the brother or sister that will ultimately take my coat and leave me in the cold?  This is what Jesus is calling us to.  I must say that the notion is offensive in itself.  God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.  A man or woman of humility and understanding will walk with a brother knowing that there is evil in his heart.  Jesus let Judas walk with him knowing that he would betray Him.  Jesus knows that the reward is in itself.  The reward of love is being able to live with love.  The reward for betraying a brother or sister is the betrayal.  Jesus knew that the pain of betrayal and the dark heart of sin was a burden enough.  Jesus didn't throw a fit that he was wronged.  He silently gave himself up.  We are to do the same.  I can't say that I I will be good at that any time soon, but that is where I want  to be.  Life is hard.  Life is complicated.  The best we can do is to take it with a pure heart of love and not hold each other to the judgements that we are so inclined to making.  

I am sorry for hurting you.  I am sorry for holding you to a standard 

that 

i cannot fulfill myself.

May the peace of God reign in your heart richly

the Kingdom

I must confess that I am going through a bit of a hard time.  Part of me is very angry.  Another part wants to have nothing to do with anger.  It is frustrating to be in a place where only a few things make sense and it seems that those are the things that are missing from everything around me.  I am man in experience, but quite a bit a boy in my heart.  I have a soft heart.  I only want to be a lover.  I guess the pursuit of love is a lonely pursuit.  Love will ultimately lead to understanding.  Understanding will lead to compassion.  Compassion will lead one to the cross.  The cross is a place of great honor in the Kingdom of God.  This place of honor is only a result of a willing heart to stand in the stead of others, "because they know not what they do."  Jesus was such a man of courage.  I can't even imagine.  I am tearing up now in my local coffee shop thinking about it.  I have exhibited the ability to be a total asshole at times.  I am in no way intimidated by loosing esteem in the eyes of others because of what I may gain from esteem.  This is a personality defect.  It is also a strength.  I need to care more.  I desire to.  When I tear up in a coffee shop thinking about Jesus being killed and hanging on a cross for me it is because I am aware of the man that He was asking forgiveness for.  He was asking for forgiveness for me.  He was asking God to forgive me, a man who knows not what he does, so that He could give me a destiny in Him.  He wanted me to have a chance at knowing Him more fully and using my life to express His love and grace to others.

I am sitting here in a café wondering what it is I can do.  My life of 33 years has led me to the seat I am sitting in right now drinking a local beer and wondering about Jesus and His greatness.  He died for me.    I am a person with many interests.  I get really into ideas of things.  I may be into snails, I may be into bees or seahorses.  I love jumping into a sea of the unknown.  I love it!  All of the things I can imagine in all their splendor pale in comparison to the knowledge of Jesus.  I really really mean this.  My knowledge of seahorses doesn't demand much of me.  My knowledge of Jesus compels all of the deepest parts of who I am to become a peacemaker.  To become a source of life.  There are a lot of deep parts to a human.  The compelling nature of that knowledge, and maybe a bit more compellingly, the unknown knowledge of Christ is truly the only thing that I really care about.



The last ten years I have been tied up with the idea that I was not what I needed to be to be loved.  I have been trying to become something that was worthy of acceptance by being anxiety ridden over my state of living as compared to others.  I became obsessed with cognitive dissonance, cognitive bias, status anxiety, the paradox of choice.  I looked at the state of man and his inherent qualities and determined that I must try to be something that would allow myself to fit in.  I have done a terrible job at fitting in.  I am just so lucky that I have come to know some of the greatest people on the earth in this time of history.  I know many people who have hearts for God and they have seen in me something that  was compelling enough to entertain my friendship and we have grown  a bit close.  I really have some of the greatest friends that I can imagine.  There is still something missing.  There are at least two things.  I have yet to engage with the calling that God has on my life.  I have yet to engage myself to my friend, the woman of courage who has the grace to see me for who I am in God.  The woman who can see the boy who I am and the man that I am.  I have been committed as they come and as repentant as they come.  I honestly don't think it gets much better.  I have to say I am a bit baffled that I am sitting here alone.  I look at the other options that others may pass me up for and it is very disheartening.  "You would walk away from me and entertain that guy!?"  Jesus was dying on a cross looking at people who were entertaining "that guy!"  He asked God to forgive them for they knew not what they were doing.


I have wanted to be a man.  I have been given exactly what I asked for.  I am becoming a man of love.  It is with great frustration and disappointment.  I am learning what it means to be a human who looks for the eyes of God scanning the earth looking for one righteous.  I want His eyes to find me.  I truly believe that God is seeking those who would just let go and follow Him.  I don't know what it is that I have to let go of, but I want to let go of it.  Jesus looked out over the crowds and had compassion on them.  He said that they were dejected and helpless like a sheep without a shepherd.  He asked His disciples to, "pray to the Lord of the harvest to bring laborers into His harvest."  At a later point in the life of Jesus he said that the Kingdom of Heaven is like the owner of an estate that hired workers to harvest.  At the end of the day he hired more for the same rate and the ones hired earlier were angered that this was the case.  The harvest was so great that the estate owner was willing to pay any and all to bring in the harvest.  The harvest that yet stood to be harvested was of such great value that any who were willing to labor would be rewarded greatly.   I look out into the world and the lives of my friends and I am saddened by the state of the harvest.  There is so much that we are to bring in but the laborers are few.  There are those who will beat the ox while it treads out the grain and will not allow the oxen to share in the reward.  These are the masters that most of us are serving.  My King will honor any of those who acknowledge Him.  He said the Kingdom is like a wedding feast that the King gave for his son and sent his servants to request their presence to celebrate and ,

"they were not concerned and paid no attention [they ignored and made light of the summons, treating it with contempt] and they went away—one to his farm, another to his business, 

They were too caught up with their own ideas to realize what they were being given.  They were too caught up with their own thoughts to realize that there is a consequence from refusing the gift of the King.  He punished those who refused and invited a whole household of people good and bad to attend the wedding reception.  He burned the city of those who were invited and refused.  At the reception the king fixated on the one person who was there who did not have on a wedding garment.  The man became speechless as he was tied up and thrown out into the dark where there was weeping and gnashing of teeth.  I don't know much, but I speculate that the wedding garment is humility.  Without humility we cannot understand the severity of what we are being invited into through the death of Christ and His servants who allow themselves to stand in the stead of others through intercession.  If we take our invitation with no second thought we will be like the man who came without giving the proper honor and respect to ceremony.  God does love all men.  Any man or woman who has no respect or honor for the gift of the King will be cast out without a second thought.  I hate to say this so directly, but every person who has gone to hell deserves to be there.  God is not a fool.  His grace will not be made light of.  If we reject God, God rejects us.  This is very simple.  A fool says, "But...!"   "Depart from me I never knew you."

We are all in a state of transience.  While we are in this state of transience we have a chance to respond to an invitation to a wedding. We have the choice to show up with honor and pleasure.  Every bit of our conscious lives is leading up to a moment where we cease to exist.  We will be gone in a vapor.  Some of us will die tonight.  The problem is that because men are not swiftly judged for their evil actions that the heart of man becomes more strengthened to pursue his sin (ecclesiastes 8).  We lie cheat and steal once or twice and we become more likely to continue in our sin.  Some of us even parade into more sin with the notion that we are given grace and that God's love will overcome.  God's love is fierce.  God does not forgive us unless we have forgiven others. The stance of arrogance and coming to a wedding feast without the proper clothing is indicative of one who has not yet discerned his own depravity  and accepted the forgiveness for it on a daily basis.  This person will not love another.  This person will be cast out.

I started this out by thinking about Jesus saying that, "one cannot serve God and mammon."  He goes on to say that we cannot serve two masters, we will love one and hate the other.  He is saying that it cannot be done.  It is not possible.  Not possible.  He isn't saying that we shouldn't serve two masters, He is saying we can't.  It is not possible.  The reason I have been thinking about this is because it is becoming very clear to me that we prefer serving mammon.  Most of us will serve anything other than God.  I find myself in a café wondering how I can become a laborer.  What is keeping me from being one.  There is part of me that wants to sell all my stuff and just go!  I ask myself why I am working at the job that I have dreaming about being used by God.  My heart breaks at least twice weekly while at work dreaming about being used by God to purify his Bride.  I want Him to come back for a bride who loves him.  I don't want Him to approach a bride who was too lazy to put oil in her lamp because she didn't realize what she was being invited to.  The parable informed us that half of the bridesmaids were foolish.  It states in Matthew 25 that they knew the bridegroom was coming but he was late.  Knowing that he was delaying their foolish hearts assumed that they had time to be lazy and ride out their grace.  He came in the middle of the night and they missed their extension of grace.  He would not let them enter.  He said once again, "depart from me I never knew you." All of these women were virgins.  They had waited, but half of them waited in vain.  Hosea 4 says that God's people perish for their lack of knowledge.  It does not pay to be ignorant. If we ignore the truth as presented in scripture we will perish.  If you are too lazy to find out for yourself prepare to hear those dreaded words.  I say this so strongly because I feel that this knowledge is what is missing.  We perish because we do not realize the severity of the experience we are having as humans.  If your life is stupid, it is probably because you are not seeking God.  If my life is junk it is because I have failed to give it the honor that it requires.  The honor that my life requires is to seek God and walk in His ways.  It is not acceptable for me to live by some demonic idea that Grace will cover my foolishness.  Grace allows us to see our foolishness and go get some oil.  If we don't do that it is all in vain.  All of it.  If the principles that you make your decisions by make you feel justified, you may want to rethink your approach.  We are taught by christian imbeciles that cloak themselves as leaders into thinking that God is our buddy who wants us to buy their books.  Try buying John the Baptist's book.  Its called, "repent now for the Kingdom of God is at hand!" It is all about humbling yourself in the sight of the Lord and letting Him rend your heart so that you too will seek to forgive others seventy times seven.  If we do not forgive others He will not forgive us.

The Bride of Christ!  I can only imagine who she is.  I see her and my heart rejoices and weeps with great fortitude as I see what is ahead.  Really the question is will we let our hearts turn toward sin because it feels good and we don't have to deal with it right now because God delays His judgement.  There is a myth in the church that people just need to know that God loves them and they will turn to follow Jesus.  This is not true.  It is very untrue.  Imagine it in a human sense.  A young man with a heart of love gives His attentions and affections and efforts to a young woman and she refuses his love to get a chance at some foolish man because He presents a challenge.  We are not looking for love.  We are looking to flaunt ourselves in such a way as to attract other lovers because it fills us with a sense of power and validation.  This is called the pride of life.  It is what makes a man show up to the King's son's wedding reception without the wedding garment.

The good news is that God is calling you right now to choose Him.  Choosing Him is choosing His ways.  You cannot serve God and mammon.  There is so much more to say about this, but now is not the time.  Seek it for yourself.  I can almost guarantee that your life is a bit of a joke.  We cannot mix the fabric of sin and the fabric of grace and not expect the garment to not tear.    God does not want us to live the way we have been living.  He wants us to pursue Him.  I have a terrible time with the same call.  It is a matter of our hearts.  Ask God tonight to challenge you with the things that He is calling you to that you are avoiding.  Ask Him to show you who you need to forgive and those you need to ask forgiveness from.  Yes, God wants you to dream of His great works.  If you think, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" it has so much less to do with thinking that you have what it takes to land some job or do some task as it does with learning to being content regardless of the circumstances.  It is learning how to be content with less.  It isn't about learning how to dream of having more.  It feels weird saying this because it seems to confront most christian literature.  It is a matter of putting the cart before the horse.   Solomon was wise and asked for wisdom.  Because he did this God gave him all the other things.  He was a miserable man because of his power to choose and get whatever he wanted.  He had a 1000 women and wasn't satisfied with one.  Riches will sell you out in a heart beat.  I see people taking jobs and missing their calling in life.   I fear on a certain level that I am one of those men.  Would you take the gig because it was an "opportunity of a lifetime" and find yourself sold out and hollow as your days come to a close.  We make all of our decisions based on the allure of what something promises our hearts.  Beware of what is promising your heart.  Anyone can put honey on their lips to make them sweet.  Choose the thing that is challenging your heart to come out of its shell and experience the vulnerability of living in the light.  You have been in the dark long enough. Come out and experience being real.  Real love.

--i found this while writing my post-- Wedding Garment