Category Archives: Relationships

Blogs in this category deal with relationships between ourselves and God, family members, other Christians, and the lost.

Not perfect but still learning

Posted on July 25, 2016 by | Comments Off on Not perfect but still learning

not perfectNot perfect but still learning is a statement that defines my walk with the Lord. I’m under no false belief that since I became a Christian in 2006 that somehow I am perfect. Certainly, I am not the same person I was before I received Jesus’ free gift of salvation. I am also not the person I will be when I am in Heaven with my Lord and Savior, Jesus. What I am is a sinner saved by grace who is learning about my relationship with God. I am still learning my place within the family, and my place within the local church.

Following the leading of the Holy Spirit

I’m not one who lives for the spotlight and am quite content to be behind the scenes. A couple of months back, I was asked to lead the Sunday School introduction. Within the Salvation Army, this is commonly called prelims or preliminaries. As I began to pray about what the Lord would have me do, the idea hit me.  I would create a character that really doesn’t care what others think of him. He would be goofy, strong-minded, but in love with his Lord and Savior. So, with a name suggestion from my father-in-law, Professor Bib Lical was born. Since then, he has become a much-loved character by both adults and children. He uses science and the scientific method to show the nature of our faith, the wonders of creation, and the grace of God.

For some reason, this character, in spite of his funny appearance, clumsy manners, and really bad accent, has a way of getting to the heart of what the Holy Spirit leads him to say. As I’m delivering the preliminary thought, I often watch the faces of old and young as the message the Holy Spirit is leading me to share is heard by all. Then there are times, as it was this past Sunday, where I feel that the Holy Spirit is speaking through him directly to me as if I am the only person in the room.

A teaching moment by the Holy Spirit to me

This past week the Lord laid on my heart to illustrate how many of us approach prayer. I began with the familiar verse, Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God (Philippians 4:6). After having this verse read by a member of the congregation, I put some flower seeds in the hand of my assistant. I asked them to plant the seeds, then ask the seeds to grow. When that didn’t work, I asked the young man to yell at the seeds. Much to the laughs and giggles of everyone in the room, the seeds never sprouted and we didn’t see blooms.

We then shared the next verse, But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking (Matthew 6:7). I asked the assistant then to beg the seeds – five times – using the same words each time. Yes, it was funny. Some of the young people laughed. But it was at this point the Holy Spirit began working directly within my heart.

At the point of life I am at, I still have issues with worry. Last October, as I have previously shared, I surrendered to the Lord’s call on my life and am working towards entering the full-time ministry within the Salvation Army. It is a long process and while I do pray each day that the Lord will bring me to the point where I am actively serving His will, I still worry. I worry that I won’t be good enough. I worry that I won’t make it through the application process. I worry that my past will hold me back. I worry that I won’t be able to serve. I also worry that I will be rejected by those who makes the decisions as to whom is allowed to attend the required training.

Yet, in the middle of all this worry and fear, I was in front of people teaching what the Lord laid on my heart – “be careful for nothing…” in other words, God tells all of us not to be anxious – and as I was sharing this with those who were there, He was reminding me as well. I, too, needed to hear His message not to worry, to have faith, and to put my trust in Him.

God’s message is always common sense

I ended this particular lesson this last Sunday with the verse, I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry (Psalms 40:1). Since yesterday, I’ve really thought about the lessons the Lord taught me about my own prayer life. Oh, it is so easy to pray about something and then worry about it. Yet the Bible tells us that God wants us to pray about whatever is on our heart. We are then to adopt an attitude of thanksgiving, believing that God will answer our prayer: Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving (Colossians 4:2). There are countless verses where Jesus tells us that God knows our needs, we are more valuable than sparrows, and we need to have faith. Yet, for many of us, we come to the Lord filled with worry and doubts.

We come to our prayer time filled with expectations of unfulfilled prayers and doubts. We lift our voices to the Lord without an attitude of thanks or faith that He will answer. We let our doubts and fears get the better of us. We effectively shut down our prayer life and wonder why we don’t hear from God. We wonder why He doesn’t answer our prayers. But when we pray, we do everything the opposite of the way the Bible instructs us to do. So, as I begin this week, I’m asking the Lord to help me develop a new attitude of prayer; one that is more according to the will of God than filled with worry and doubt. 

 

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Posted in My Walk, Our relationship with God

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Is your life cluttered with boxes?

Posted on July 13, 2016 by | Comments Off on Is your life cluttered with boxes?

boxes

Boxes are a common sight in our modern world. They come in cardboard, plastic, wood, and metal. We’re surrounded by boxes in our workplace, in stores, and in our homes. Right now, in various closets in my home, there are boxes that have remained unpacked since the family’s last move in 2011. The truth is that boxes are a part of our world and are around us everywhere. This morning, as I watched my cat play inside a box, I was reminded of a conversation I had with one of my college students yesterday.

Who are you at your core?

William Shakespeare, the great English playwright and bard, wrote a line in his play, Hamlet, that is actually very sound advice: “This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man” (Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 3, 78-80). We are living in a time where society demands the opposite.

As a college-level instructor, I am often asked how, in modern American society, should a person’s faith be apparent. In fact, I was asked a variation of this very question yesterday and was able to explain to her why her interpretation was not dangerous. She approached me with the idea that somehow she must leave her faith at home when she is at work, performing some civic duty (such as jury duty or voting), and while at the college. She then explained that society demanded she do just this very thing. Her actions and this view, which is held by many, is far from the advice offered by Shakespeare’s character, Polonius, or the Bible, for that matter.

I believe that one of the mistakes made by many Christians is the idea that our faith is just a religion. After all, how can we hold any other view of Christianity if this is all that has been taught for generations? As a part of my responsibilities at the college where I work, I also teach world civilization. This includes a fairly lengthy discussion on religions and philosophies of the ancient world to about 1500. One of the things that has always intrigued me is that Christianity, in its purest form, is not supposed to be just a religion. Biblical Christianity is supposed to be a way of life, a philosophy and a religion. And this is where we fail to adhere to the teachings of Jesus. When we do anything but allow our faith in Jesus affect all that we do, we are living a double life and have two sets of standards – the “secular” and the “religious.” It is when this happens that we transform the power of the gospel from something that is truly life-changing into something that has very little impact in our life.

The apostle James wrote, A double minded man is unstable in all his ways (James 1:8). This double-mindedness is what happens when we begin to place parts of our lives in boxes. One box has everything about our faith, one box has how we are to behave at work, and another box for school, and another box for social organizations, and yet another box for family… Pretty soon, our lives can begin to look like a warehouse of boxes stacked to the ceiling. Instead of being one complete person which is the way God created us to be, we divide ourselves into parts to fit every situation and demand.

When we divide who we are and how we behave among any number of boxes, we are actually dividing our loyalties. We are no longer Christ-centered. Our faith becomes a small part of our lives instead of being what God intended it to be – the core of our existence. There is so much that Jesus tried to warn us about during His earthly ministry. In fact, he told all who would listen, No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon (Matthew 6:24).

Vaya con Dios: Go with God…

I am a fan of older movies, especially Westerns. In many of those movies, the phrase, vaya con Dios became a popular part of the western movie genre vocabulary. It is a simple phrase meaning, go with God. In the context used, it was a blessing that one bestowed on a friend, compatriot, or family member as they departed on some quest or journey. It is actually a great reminder in whatever we do, wherever we go, we should go with God. Our belief in Jesus as our Lord and personal Savior should be a part of everything we do and everything we are: And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men (Colossians 3:23).

We have to come to the understanding that as Christians, we are still living in this world. Just because we live in the world does not me we have to live as the world. In 2006, I made a promise to the Lord that I completely gave Him and him alone lordship in my life. I noticed that as my excitement and love of the Lord began to grow, so did the impact He had on my life. It changed the way I studied history. It changed the way I performed at work and in my graduate classes. It changed the way I studied politics and foreign policy. It even began to change how I saw myself and my relationship with others. This is God’s intent with the free gift of salvation He offers to all – it is to be a life transforming moment! From that moment, it is meant to be a continual process of spiritual growth and development. It is meant to be an active faith that takes us from this life and beyond.

Emptying the boxes of our cluttered lives

Once we fully accept obedience to Jesus is to be the central focus of our life, everything else falls into its proper perspective. For me, the most challenging part of it was unpacking all the mental boxes I had created over nearly a lifetime. I was not a Christian until 2006 but I still had those mental boxes. It is actually a liberating experience when we come to the realization we do not need the boxes and we can be the same person and behave the same way regardless of where we are.

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Posted in Chrisitian Philosophy, Christian Living, Our relationship with others

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Following Jesus wherever He leads

Posted on June 27, 2016 by | Comments Off on Following Jesus wherever He leads

following JesusFollowing Jesus wherever He leads is often a journey that is easier to discuss than to simply begin in complete obedience. This past October (2015), I made a decision that was not easy to make. Since 2012, I have been an active member of a local Baptist church and had a variety of roles. I had the privilege of serving as a trustee, a Sunday school teacher, a Christian discipleship mentor, song and worship leader, and even operated a small printing ministry, and video recording and editing of the various services for the church’s YouTube channel. I was active in the various ministries of the church but had struggled with the ministry the Lord had laid on my heart. Starting in November of 2012, the Lord began laying a burden on my heart that I could no longer ignore – the small and struggling congregation.

Following Jesus: the first steps are the most difficult

There’s a hymn that immediately comes to my mind. It’s chorus goes, “footprints of Jesus that makes the pathway glow; we will follow the steps of Jesus where’er they go” (full text of the song available here). It’s an easy song to sing; it is a much harder thing to actually do. All through the gospels we see people who came to Jesus but for some reason, when it came to following Him, they were simply unable or unwilling to let go of what they understood and were comfortable with what following Jesus would require them to do.

I think of the passage in Matthew, And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead (Matthew 8:21-22) and the one found in Mark, Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me. And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great possessions (Mark 10:21-22). In both cases, these men were willing to follow Jesus until they realized the personal sacrifice that would be required. Both men decided the cost was too great. Both men walked away.

Since 2012, when the Lord began working on my heart, I knew that He had a purpose for my life and a specific way He wanted me to serve Him. What the question came down to was I willing to step out on faith and accept the work that Jesus set before me? I could either be obedient or I could stay where I was – which would be continued disobedience. For a while, I was willing to stay in disobedience and even congratulated myself for “working” on the calling through my efforts to meet the needs of the church we were already attending. In the process, we began a printing ministry, became the administrators for the church’s Facebook page and web page, and began filming the Adult Sunday School and a.m. service for YouTube and DVDs for shut ins, plus many smaller ongoing projects. 

Being busy is not the same as being obedient

Yes, we were busy, and for a while, I believed the Lord would be pleased with our best efforts. Many people, myself included, make the mistake of thinking that just because we are busy doing things at the church, then we must be serving the Lord. One of the ways the Lord has taught me about my relationship with Him is by the use of my relationship with my daughter. A while back ago, she wanted to help me do chores; instead of putting the pillows back on the couch as I had asked, she went into the bathroom and began to reorganize the items in the sink cabinet. Yes, she was busy, but she wasn’t helping me accomplish the goals for the day that I had set out. I remember thinking to myself, this is how the Lord must feel about what I am doing. Yes, we were extremely busy at the church but it wasn’t the right kind of busy. Our efforts were simply getting in the Lord’s way.

By early 2015, I had reached the point in my life where I could no longer just sit by in comfort and in continued disobedience. I began praying that the Lord would make it painfully obvious what He wanted me to do and that I was ready to do whatever it was He had for me to do. It was hard, beginning in October of 2015, to start the process of preparing to change from one church to another, to fully surrender to the full-time ministry, to leave friends behind at one church as we strive to be faithful to the calling placed in front of us by the Lord. It hasn’t been without some pain. There have been some earthly costs.  We have lost some friends along the way.

Following Jesus is an ongoing process

While most of this post has been about following the calling of Jesus into a specific ministry, there are other ways we follow Jesus. Recently, the Lord laid on my heart to purge my CD collection and as a result, nearly 14 inches of CDs were taken and sold to a used CD shop. Did I like the music? Yes. Was keeping those CDs more important than my obedience to Jesus? No. If I had kept the CDs then I would have allowed things – possessions that I cannot take to Heaven – become more important than following Jesus. Everything in life boils down to a simple and child-like choice: is it bringing us closer to the Lord or is it pushing us further away. I think at times we have a tendency to make things more complicated than absolutely necessary.

Jesus encourages all who will listen, Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 18:4), and Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein (Mark 10:15). As I began to seriously study what these verses were saying, I was again reminded of my interactions with my young daughter. She will come to me and ask me the same questions every child asks, “why do plants have flowers” and while she is looking for an answer, she’s not wanting the scientific explanation complete with chemical formulas. She just wants to know why on the level as a child. It is how she can understand and it is all her young mind can handle. When we set to follow after Jesus, we have to have the mindset to see the decisions that must be made on the same, simple terms. It is either going to bring us closer to Jesus or it will keep us separated from His complete and perfect will for us. And once we have made our decision, follow through with it to the best of our ability and daily seek His help to do it.

 

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Posted in Journey in the Salvation Army, My Walk, Our place within the local church, Our relationship with God

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