The Christ In Him
S
ometimes you do things just because. There shouldn’t have to be a special day of recognition and there should always be the edge of your seat suspense with what will have next in marriage.I talked about a couple posts ago, that I am reading the book Do You Think I’m Beautiful. Angela Thomas talks about how a mate is there to be a vessel of God’s love to us but isn’t there to fulfill us. Many times in marriages we can think that our spouse is there to help do the laundry, clean the house with you, earn the paycheck, and even fulfill those intimate desires when the time comes, but man have we missed the boat.
I came home from church last night with such a broken heart. I feel a lot of times that you try so hard to share God’s love and His Word with them, and they still turn away. They get involved in things that they have no clue what they are doing. Josh walked in the door and knew something was wrong. He asked me what was bothering me and I told him I thought I would being taught a little lesson on how God feels when I disobey Him.
I constantly sit back and think how we got where we are. How we somehow took the responsibility of ministering the Gospel to so many teens in such a short amount of time. Our entire lives are wrapped around teenagers, and I was thinking this morning how grateful I am to have such a godly man to share the experience with. I get frustrated with couples sometimes that say they are surrendered to ministry but have absolutely no clue what it means to come home from what should be a place of rest and shelter, and feel nothing more than failure and frustration.
In marriage you have this mate that ultimately loves you despite your faults. As Matt Chandler would put it, “It’s someone that says I don’t want to be anywhere else than right here fighting with you while dishes are coming at my head.” Its a committment to be there when everyone else turns against you for no valid reason at all. Its a commitment to be there when things aren’t easy and the way out is so much more appealing. Its a discipline. Josh was preaching last night on how discipline has a very big role in our Christianity. Discipline to love on kids no matter what their decisions. Discpline to continue walking, continue running the race.
Nothing comes easy. Nothing worth having comes automatic, it comes with discipline and work, whether it be marriage, ministry, or our Christian walk.
I thank God for the vessel He has put in my life to keep me up, to pick me up sometimes, and to share in this what sometimes seems overwhelming call.
I love you Josh!
Can You Afford It?
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ny of you know that I am going through Beth Moore’s Daniel study with our ladies at church. We just completed week 4 and I feel so beat up and heartless as ever. We focused on Daniel chapter 4 last night with Nebuchadnezzar’s second dream. I went through my Bible and started circeling the I’s and my’s in this chapter and I looked down afterwards seeing circles all over.
Even after witnessing the three go through the fire and come out not even smelling like smoke, and seeing God’s miracles, He still chooses to worship Him. He still stated that the god daniel worshiped was one of the “holy gods” but not the God. He was to be casted out until he acknowledged God as the Most High and that Heaven rules. He was still so consumed with himself and with his legacy, he had still missed the Creator of his precious jewels and the Giver of life.
Beth had mentioned something that has somewhat stuck with me since the first week of our study. She stated that our society doesn’t ask the question “do we need it?” insted we ask “can we afford it?” Many can’t afford it and just slap it on the plastic, thinking thats o.k. The question shouldn’t be can we afford it or even if we need it, but instead is God honored with us getting it.
We shower ourselves with creating an enviornment of new clothes, and the highest technology in computers and t.v. We try to make the biggest or the best in whatever we find will make our worth that much more. We are so rich! We have an education to read our Bibles daily, and most of us don’t. We have money to have not just a home, but a home with new furniture and new dishes. We have the resources to eat, not just a can of beans, but a steak and several sides that we don’t ever finish.
Our culture is so obsessed with more. We are so obsessed with keeping up with everyone else, we are so obsessed with trying to look like something we aren’t.
Can we afford it? Can we afford to equate our lives with nothing more than a journey of trying to obtain and be more and more, and compare it to Christ on earth saying that “I have come to give you life”. I don’t think thats what He was talking about.
Hookers for Jesus
I was f
lipping through the channels last night and stopped at a coverage on Hookers for Jesus. Of course I was a little confsued, angry, and interested all in the same instant. Dr.Phil was covering a case of a cult called the Children of God. As I watched my heart broke more and more through the images and teachings of this cult that was all in the name of Jesus.
The Children of God is know for its liberal view of sexuality, and a continual press for adult-child sexual relations. The program highlighted the push for women even though married, to sleep with outsiders to “convert them to christianity.” They were to use their bodies as a lure, or literally, to fish for men. To be fishers of men took on an entirely new meaning.
Over 30 people directly related to this cult have committed suicide. The founder’s son video taped a message to his dad before taking his own life, and it was all in the name of Jesus.
If you’d like to read more on it here is a link on their beliefs and history. More...
