What dirty diapers are teaching me about God!

Before I begin, every time I sit down to start to type one of these there is a inner monologue that occurs, and strangely enough it reminds me of Doogie Howser. (for those of you under 30, wiki it)

......Dirty diapers and God...........

Seems odd but allow me to explain. We recently had a little baby boy. I love him very much, and his mother does too. He is 4 weeks old and screams and poops A LOT.

I can change his diaper and it is an ordeal, his mother does it and it is a smooth transaction. He knows I don't want to do it I think and for some reason she does not mind it. There is something about the nature of the person that he can recognize.

When he cries, I can bouce him, rock him, sing to him, and yes................even pray for him to stop crying (I am sure I am not the only Dad that has been there). But she can pick him up and immediately he stops crying. The touch of his mother gives him a peace, a familiarity with her that started all the way back at conception links them, and her presence consoles his cares.

Like my child my life is often full of "poop", and I know that at times other and even myself don't want to deal with it. God however always seems to be there ready to help get me cleaned up once again.

Just like my child when nothing else can console me, God's presence can give me peace. I know he will make things OK or be there until they are. It is based on the fact that way back at the point of salvation God started this for me.

So I have been thinking on the fact that God demonstrates how he works in all things. I got a glimpse at how God loves me by watching my wife change a dirty diaper. We must be open for God to show us, but he is always teaching us.

So I will leave you with this, when was the last time you cried out to the Father God

Psalm 116:1-6The Message (MSG)

 I love God because he listened to me,
    listened as I begged for mercy.
He listened so intently
    as I laid out my case before him.
Death stared me in the face,
    hell was hard on my heels.
Up against it, I didn’t know which way to turn;
    then I called out to God for help:
“Please, God!” I cried out.
    “Save my life!”
God is gracious—it is he who makes things right,
    our most compassionate God.
God takes the side of the helpless;
    when I was at the end of my rope, he saved me.

Continual Baggage of Sexual Sin

Grace, thank God for grace, sins are forgiven.

The danger of sin is that while the sin can be forgiven the consequences can last a life time. I know what you are saying, I did not murder someone and end up with life in jail. It was just a little sexual activity as a teen or young adult with an ex, God forgave me so no harm, its all good.

I could go on and on....... but for the sake of time and because I am a lousy typist we will stop there. When we have stepped out of the will of God and committed a sin such as sexual immorality, the sin is forgiven but we cannot undo the action.There will be times that you will be with the the wife years down the road and play the comparison game, you will remember things from the past and let them affect the future.

Sometimes the consequence of sin is the fact that cannot forget all that occurred. Premarital sexual sin is just as damaging as infidelity during a marriage from the consequence of comparison.

We are often tempted to say that under grace all is good, and it is true that there is no condemnation for those of use under the blood of Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). But do not think for a moment that actions do not carry with them consequences, and in the case of sexual sins they can create a door way for new sinful thoughts and actions.

Be honest about this with those you teach and disciple so that they will understand the dangers that even forgiven sins pose.

Punching someone for Jesus

     Here is a statement that will throw you guys for a loop; I believe that we need more people willing to punch someone for Jesus. I would go as far as to say that we need more MEN to punch people for Jesus……..if you’re still reading, I will tell you why….
 
     I often say I feel like “Punching someone for Jesus” and it is true. This is not a new statement or something that I have come up with on my own, I actually heard Peter Haas say it, and if memory serves he may have even placed in his book.

     Men will argue until they are blue in the face over brand of truck, fastest muscle car, best motorcycle, or sport team. Even to the point of potentially punching each other. However this never occurs when God is involved, we never will takes such a visual stance before the world.

     Picture two men, one is working on a fence, attempting to put it up on the other guys property. The first guy tries to get the other to stop. They are in disagreement and they discuss, argue, maybe even call each other names, they get loud. What fascinates me is that the passion, anger, urgency, and emotions build up in them and after they have tried everything else, and one of them punches the other. They are willing to go as far as needed.

     Now change scenes, we have two men in a group at church, the one man is sowing discourse and even saying things that are biblically unsound and undermining church leadership. As a good “church guy” the first guy will allow this to continue because………. We have taught it’s not his place to judge, everyone’s opinion is valid, and after all we must be tolerant. So no real confrontation occurs………I am not saying that “church guy” should have clocked his fellow member, but I am saying there should have been a passion, a righteous anger, the emotion should have resulted in an action.

     Outside the church when the society tells us we must be tolerant of everyone, we need to say no. We must love everyone and that is different, sometimes love comes in the form of action that says “your wrong”, even if that makes the person feel as if you have just “punched” them.

     Read Genesis 32 and 35 and see how men use their resources to do what God has called them to, watch how places of God are created and honored, see how men defend their family, and how God protects those who act on what he has told them to do. These actions included talking, contracts, trading and gifts, and even violence when needed.

     Read about how Moses stood before the king of Egypt and said “God says…” or Elijah as he walks into the king’s court and stops the rain. Basically we have one man of God willing to “punch” a king.

     While I would hope we can resolve things in a way in which never lead to violence. I would pray that should we find ourselves in the situation Lot found himself in during Genesis 19, where in order to appease the evil of the community he was willing to give his daughters up to be raped. Thank goodness there were angels there will to act, and it says they “struck” the would be attackers, making them blind.

     I hope something as silly as the phrase “punch people for Jesus” remind us that we are to be a people of action.

Have you met Jesus? Or did you show up and sing songs?

If you follow me on Twitter you will have seen a rather long conversation between me and a very challenging atheist. That is not uncommon for me as I am fascinated by atheist, I can understand the rejection of Jesus or any religion, but to think that no one created all that is bothers me logically. That being said God used the conversation to reveal to me a few things. I will share them now:

1-     He stated he was a Christian for a while (I am not questioning or discounting his personal experience), I think we do a poor job as the church as a whole of defining Christian. Showing up for a while and singing songs and reading stories does not make one a Christian. Jesus does, and with him comes change. New creation as Paul says.

2-     God is an experienced accepted fact. This gentleman wanted facts to support God. I began to think about that. What do we know about the world, universe, and so on…. We know what someone with a better understanding has told us is true. I have never seen an atom, but we except it is there. So if we can accept this based on the experience of someone else, then it should come as no suppose that God is proven through a relationship with Jesus. Jesus testifies to the facts of the Father that I cannot understand but accept as true.

3-     The devil attacks statements of faith. This whole conversation started when I made the statement that my God is big. That statement was met with someone to cast doubt and attempt to make me believe I was small because God was small. The thing I learned in this is that the attempt is made, but if you stay in the presence of God for the duration of the attack all you feel is peace in the truth of faith.  

God is a Big God!!

Am I good enough?

Am I good enough?

I normally try to have some word of wisdom when I write a blog post, something that God has enlightened me with and filled my heart to share with others. Today that is not the case. Today I would like to share a personal struggle. 

I am a person that has a reckless past, I am a guy who made every mistake short of murder and that only by God’s grace is left off the rap sheet of my past. I am a man that still struggles with all kinds of issues and way to often those issues are foremost in my mind. I know what God wants of me, but I hold off on pressing towards that goal based on the nagging little voice that says, “You are better than you were, but you’re not good enough yet”! Have you ever heard that voice, the one that says there is another person is better suited to do what God has laid on your heart? The voice that says if you start it you will be a stumbling block. The voice that is arrogant enough to question God?

Is that the voice of fear, the voice of the devil, or in my case the voice of the church? See church members don’t want imperfect leaders in any position. I think it is not out of any reason other than to protect the church and even in thoughts that they need to protect Jesus and the Gospel from us imperfect people.

My conclusion, we are all imperfect and screwed up, I think the same Peter that denied Christ is the same Peter that preached on Pentecost. The same screwed up Peter; the same confused Peter, the same fearful Peter. I think he just decided he would rather be used by God then left behind. He wanted to perform the role God had for him and trust that God was enough. Why should I think Jesus can cover my sins and make me righteous but not cover me in the grace needed to share him with others? In my imperfections I will continue, so that God gets the glory. I cannot fix me, but He can use me.

Why Jesus? And the age old question…..Why are we here?

I am often asked why Jesus? Man I don’t need Jesus I am just as good as those guys. Actually you may be better than them; there are a lot of really moral non-Christians. Seriously, I see Christians and they still got problems so I guess all that church stuff doesn’t work. Yep, that is true, Jesus doesn’t take away all the problems of this life, work is work, bad things happen, and sometimes you get a raw deal. So if that is true then why do I need or want Jesus, why do you? Here is what I tell them.

We were created in the image of God and were intended to be in communion with Him which we see in the garden. Genesis 2:19-20 God brought the animals to Adam and allowed him to name them, Genesis 3:8, God walked in the garden, calling to Adam. By these statements we know that Adam had a relationship with God. There was communion of the created with the creator. Isaiah 43:21 states that the people God formed for himself will proclaim his praise, so he created us to glorify him, so He alone is praised. 1^St Corinthians 10:31 tells us “do all to the glory of God.

So I will submit that we are here to glorify God and walk in communion with him. Either you have agreed to see where I go with this and you will keep reading or you just determined I am untrained, poorly educated, and clearly unskilled and are not going any further with this. Awesome!!

 for the those still reading let’s look at why Jesus?.......

So do we need communion and glorification of and with the Father God in order to be happy?? Yes, without the communion we were created for we will have an empty spot in our life. We see this all the time, a generation of people that promote themselves through social media, everyone wants to have value. There is a need to feel purpose. We attempt to find purpose in career, we find that in family, we find that in social causes, or the next material thing we desire. We seek things to fill the empty spot that was meant for God, and when we seek stuff to fill that we sin, the more we put between us and our intended function of communion and glorification the further that we get from God. All that is not of God is sin. Since the beginning of time, with Adam and Eve the devil has been telling us that we can use the “fruit” of sin to fill the spot intended for God. The fruit of sin has always been choosing our desire over what God has created and instructed for us to be. This is the lie that the devil has been telling us for years. “You don’t need to give up all the stuff your pursuing, it makes you a better person”, but does it bring you closer or further away from God?

I know what you are thinking, we still haven’t gotten to why Jesus? I told you about what you need to be happy so that I can tell you who can get you there. Jesus came and created a way for us as sinful creatures to no longer live separate from God. Through Jesus (his selfless actions and sinless life) he carried our sin to the cross, he died willingly, then rose again. Allowing us to return to communion with God through the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit comes to us after salvation and allows a two way communion between us and the Father God.

The Holy Spirit does this by replacing all those things that we tell no one about with Joy. All of us have those secrets we want no one to know about, those things that the devil will drag up when we start to turn to God. The devil uses them to remind us why we should or could not be accepted. Jesus has already paid for all of those things; the devil reminds you of things God no longer remembers.

God remembers no sin that was washed away by the blood of Jesus.

Jesus takes those sins away, provides the Holy Spirit, allows communion, and brings JOY. JOY guys, is doing what you were made for. JOY is better than happiness, happiness can be found in things and will pass way. JOY is forever,  it is communion with God.

So why Jesus? Because there is a Joy you were intended to have, but you cannot get there on you own, only through him.

 Jesus is the key to JOY!

I dont like that kind of worship...........

We hear a lot about this church or that church has better worship, or I like this type of worship. I even found myself having that conversation Sunday.

I came out of my prayer time today convicted. God asked me if I worshiped before I got to service or if I waited on someone else to create the atmosphere. He said David danced till his clothes fell off, but he didn’t wait till he got to the temple and he didn’t wait till God’s presence got there. He danced on the way and brought the presence of God with him.

So if worship isn’t the way you want it, is it because God isn’t good? Maybe you can’t look past the style? Is it because you like your worship routine more than you like worshiping God? Or is God presence not there because you didn’t bring him with you with the spirit of worship like David did?

People say we need to rebuild the house of David and be a people of worship in church.

I say God wants a people like David who will worship on the way to church and bring his presence with them.