True Beauty

Part of my struggle has stemmed from what I feel like is every woman’s struggle – the need to feel beautiful. So, knowing that I really just need to see beauty from God’s perspective instead of my own carnal mind’s perspective, I began to ask for insight, and I really feel like He gave me some on Sunday.

My pastor was talking about eating at this restaurant in Cali that’s on the beach and watching the sun set, and what a holy experience that moment was. And I felt like the Lord told me that our inner beauty, the kind of beauty that matters, is like that sunset. You know how some sunsets  just make you stop everything and just stare in awe?! I remember I left late to drive to my parent’s house from Waco one day, when I was in college, and I almost stopped the car and got out to just stare when I saw this sunset that was purple! Yes, purple! It was stunning!

So the juxtaposition that was set in my mind was that the beauty that God intended for us to walk in, the beauty that God intended us to exude is not a beauty that the world sees with their physical eyes. Physical beauty is only a whisper, a shadow of the beauty that God created in us. And that inner beauty has power! Just like we are stunned by the power of a beautiful sunset, we were created to stun others with the beauty that God has put within us.

But it’s not a boastful experience of sharing our inner beauty.   I know the most exquisite beauty that we have comes from the perseverance through trials and fellowshipping in His sufferings. But those “light afflictions” are forming in us a beauty that is of God, the Beautiful One! It is holy. It is pure. It draws people.  The Cross has made our beauty worth boasting about because its roots are in Jesus!

The other day, I sat in on a meeting with two girls from my homegroup who were hashing out their differences because they were both super offended with each other. The homegroup leader just wanted me there because she’s seen my gift of encouragement and thought it would be good in this situation. It was a really stressful meeting! They were both about to either beat each other or run away, and the whole time I was asking for insight, praying to have words of life and unity to speak over them. And then I did. And I know what I said was words that testified to Jesus within them both. But I would not have had those words to speak to them, words that ended up bringing reflection and not regret, if I had not given the past ten years of my life to submitting to the Cross working itself out in my life.  I know that I have a great amount of beauty wrought within me because I have said yes to Jesus so many times in the hard things.

After the meeting, one of the girls, whom I’ve been getting to know, walked me out to my car and just spoke to me of how stunned, in a holy and enlightened way, she was by what I said. But I know that what had happened to her was this: she saw the beauty that God has put within me, and she had the same reaction to it that we do to a sunset – thankful awe.  My beauty was seen!  But it wasn’t my physical beauty that drew those precious women into a greater revelation of Jesus, it was my inner beauty, the awe-inspiring splendor of a spirit given wholeheartedly to Jesus – it drew them, it humbled me, and we are all changed.

Outward beauty is so much lesser than.  How can we hold on to the faint glimmerings of physical beauty when the stunning spotlight of God-bred beauty far outshines it all?

They’re not just Laws. . .

In an earlier post, I wrote about the 10 commandments with the premise that these are not just laws but a picture of Jesus.  If they are a list of what God HATES, then we can infer a list of what he LOVES based on the opposite of the law.  I just wanted to finish the list since I left off at murder, #6.

#7 You will not commit adultery.  I watched a movie this weekend called He’s Just Not That Into You, and it was a wonderful commentary on society today and its values.  One of the numerous characters was an unhappily married man – big suprise – who meets a gorgeous woman at the supermarket and commences with a heated affair.  This really seems to be a clear representation of how the world lives its life.  I’m unhappy; my spouse does not meet my needs.  It’s time to move on to someone else.  The gorgeous woman’s friend even encourages her to continue the affair by telling her a story of how a man divorced his wife because he met another woman.  He married this woman and they’d been married quite happily for over 20 years.

      Just like that.  It’s so easy to move on.  Of *course* there’s no baggage attached to this schizophrenic decision; of *course* there’s no hard feelings.  That’s what we tell ourselves, right?  Have you ever noticed how much we lie to ourselves?  We lie to cope, lie to manipulate, lie to get what we want.  In the end it’s all about us.  What can I get from life to satiate this internal thirst for more?

         In the past few years, I have been thoroughly enamored with the book of the Bible, Hosea, especially when a certain favorite pastor of mine speaks about it.  I wish I could add in an audio clip of his sermon about this topic, but I will try to explain it without his words. 

         Hosea is a prophet.  No, he did not choose to be one, God just decided that he would be one.  He tells Hosea to go and marry a prostitute named Gomer.  I wish I knew more about Hebrew culture to understand this relationship, but Gomer, whether she wanted to be in this marriage or not, did not stay faithful.  She constantly prostituted herself out to other men, and even had children by those other men. 

         What captures me the most by this story is not that Hosea was so valiant that he chose to draw Gomer out of her life of prostitution and deign to marry her, continuing his ostensibly fruitless quest to keep her faithful.  No.  My heart has continually been captured by the fact that no matter how many times Gomer remains unfaithful, God tells Hosea in so many words to “GO AGAIN!” (this is where the audio clip would come in handy).  Each time Gomer prostitutes herself, Hosea goes again to lift her up out of her dismal existence.

          The entire book of Hosea is only an allegory for God’s relationship with Israel (and ultimately, us (Ephesians 3:6)).  It was Israel that was prostituting itself to other religions and gods.  God, in His jealousy, showed Himself faithful to an adulterous people and continually went after HIS OWN people.  And then the best part, He allures them (Hosea 2:14); He speaks tenderly to them (Hosea 2:14).  God doesn’t condemn them or ream them for their whoredom.  He hedges their way with thorns (H 2:6) so that when they stray, it is not easy but immensely painful.

          Pain is not always a punishment.  It can be a tool, much like a sculptor must use sharp tools in order to perfect his sculpture.  God, who is FAITHFUL, will not relent until we are wholly His, even if that means starving us out and surrounding us with thorns.  But within those boundaries, His voice is tender and alluring, relentless and commanding.

          He is faithful, so how can He stand adultery?  We have the living God dwelling within us.  It is within His ability in us to create faithfulness, so that we, too, can stand and say, “I once was lost, but now am found.  I will stand faithful.”

 

Well, I’m not done.  Again.  That just means I’ll continue later.  Hooray!

Locked Garden

                Monday night rekindled my hope for community in Dallas.  Since February of 2008, I’ve lived in Dallas and have had the hardest time finding friends.  I guess “hardest time” is relative, since I’m comparing it to two other places I’ve lived that were places set up for hanging out and going deep with others.  The first was my church in Waco which, first of all, had community as a core value and pastors that were superior examples that most everyone followed, and second Waco was a college town and so had an abnormal amount of single people in one place looking for people to hang out with after spending hours in classes or studying.  The second place was in Kansas City – this place was also geared towards many single people having time to hang out, though this was more because of everyone having a pretty open schedule to hang out because of the nature of the job.

                In summation, I’ve spent seven out of the ten years I’ve lived away from my parents in places that have a lot of single people with the time and vision for building a community.  People here have a different story.  There is still community, but it takes A LOT longer for the relationships within that community to go deep with each other.  Part of it is lack of vision placed within them for what true community is, part is that most are married and/or have jobs with strict schedules.   I’ve been in two different home groups for four months and am just now going deep with the women I’ve been getting to know.  That’s unusual for me.  Four months is a long time in my experience for people to go deep.  But we finally did!  And my heart is happy.

                It began with vulnerability.  In the past, I’ve learned that if someone will be honest enough to share from the depths, in the right setting it will create feelings of security and openness for others to be vulnerable.  Over dinner, I just shared some fears and insecurities I’ve had in the past in reference to events that happened that day, and suddenly all the other girls felt that it was ok to be honest not only with the rest of us, but also with themselves.  Because I put my inner insecurities on the line, one girl was even able to say, “I’ve never really admitted this to anyone” when telling us about herself, which tells me it has been hidden in her heart but never given an outlet.

                It says somewhere in the Bible that confession heals (something to that effect).  I’ve heard statistics that say Catholics are the least likely religion to struggle with depression.  Why?  Because they go to confession.  They have someone to whom they can spill their deep secrets who will not stand in judgment but only listen.  Protestants of all denominations do not have that.  In our religiousness, especially in the south, we feel like we’re expected to act a certain way to be considered a good Christian.  Load of crap!  There is no way to BE a good Christian because that assumes that our own beings are at the center of it all.  We are not the point.  It’s the life of Jesus within us.  If we stall out from the fact that we’re not acting in the correct way because we call ourselves Christians, we have lost sight of the fact of why we have to confess our weakness – it’s so that Jesus can make His life known in us, not so we can stand and say how awesome we are in being morally sound.  We must confess!  We must create communities where people feel ok being open about the fact that they are completely broken and don’t know how to find freedom.

It is in conversations like those held in our group of four on Monday that hold the true expression of community and unity of the Church.  It is conversations like those that create an inner joy in me beyond that found in a good meal or accomplishment well met.  The simplicity of joy found in that conversation was strong enough to cause exquisite glee to follow me even into the next day.  It was as if four broken down walled-up gardens sat longing to be broken out and found beautiful when out of the mist the sun rose piercing them with rays of hope infused with restoration.  Let the Son rise!

Boogey-man and Abominable Snowman

  The other day, I posted a status on facebook saying, Kristine is wishing the boogey-man and abominable snowman will stop sitting on her head and be demolished, abolished, and excommunicated forever and ever. Amen.  I’m really struggling.  Because my school is closing, all these feelings of insecurity and inadequacy are popping up.  Oh, I know those evil fears (that I have dubbed Boogey-man and Abominable snowman) of mine have been lurking under my surface, but they just have not had a huge reason to come out and play.

  Trying to get into graduate school and not knowing what I’m doing next year have certainly given them ample reason to stomp upon my head.

  But no longer.  One of my dear friends offered to pray for me this weekend, and I really haven’t struggled with those fears since.  But today, I came upon the blog of a dear pastor of mine, and I was at once encourage and emboldened to face these plagues.

  He said, “As a general rule, I love the leadership of Jesus and really believe that His ways are “just and true” (Rev. 15:3). I’m sold at a deep level that the way of weakness – fasting and prayer, giving and forgiving, serving and loving with abandonment to my own self-indulgent, self-absorbed ways – is the wisest and best way for a man to live out his days. I’m not even thinking in terms of gritting my teeth and earning a reward for my obedience – I’m thinking in terms of “wisdom will be justified by her children” (Matt. 11:19). In other words, in the here and now, I believe that the story of my life will testify to the superior nature of God’s divine order and wisdom. . . 

. . . [But] I hate [weakness]. I’m not even ambivalent or lukewarm about this point. My heart is a torrent of activity with little rest or peace – my soul is a storm of frustration – because I don’t like the weakness of waiting, the weakness of dependant trust in the leadership of Jesus, the brokenness of dependency, and the simplicity of foolish silence that seems to be costing me much in the short-term. And it is. That’s the bigger frustration – it actually, truly is costing me something in the short-term to wait for God to break through and have His way in these types of situations.”
  So, I am truly encouraged.  I don’t know what is going to happen in the short term, but I can win the victory in laying down my own vain strugglings and positionings for success b/c there is literally nothing I can do.  But what a wonderful place to be in!  I now get to sit back and watch the goodness and provision of the Lord actually be worked out in my life, so much so, that my life is a testimony to the truths that the scripture screams to us but that we hardly have an ear to hear for all our whining and martyristic lamentations. 
 
  I have the privilege in this season to be silent and let His LIFE be formed in me.  I have the honor of being a wonder to others as they see that His truth is not only foundational in my life but experiential!  HE IS WHO HE SAYS HE IS AND HE WILL DO WHAT HE SAID HE WILL DO!  In me.
 
That is wholly worth my present sufferings.

I Got Excited!

So, I started going to this new home group at a church I’ve been going to for a few months.  I’m really enjoying it.  We were having a conversation about predestination last week.  Although this is a topic I don’t really spend a whole lot of time thinking about, I really had fun listening to people sit there and try to figure it out. 

  In the midst of that conversation, our home group leader had us switch over to talk about the 10 commandments and what the promises of God are in those laws.  I admit, I’ve never really thought about the 10 commandments being promises, but then I just sat there and thought about it; the revelation I was getting just by thinking of it got me excited!  God reveals his nature in the 10 Commandments and I didn’t even know it!  Here are some of my thoughts as to the revelation of Jesus’ character:

1. No Other Gods Before Me:   Jesus is the only one we need!  If we don’t need another god to pray to for wisdom, or love, or mirth, or marriage, then that means that Jesus is our sufficiency.  We should not have any other gods before Him because He is all we need!  He’s complete and head over our mind, body, soul, and spirit!

2. No Idols: in this God mentions that He is jealous.  This verse seems to point back to how marriage is an earthly symbol of our union with Jesus (makes me think of Proverbs where it says “jealousy is a husband’s fury”).  He desires that we be united with Him and Him alone.  He is faithful to us and wants us to be the same way.  He is only united with humans.  He has only put Himself within us, not any other created being! 

3. No Misuse of God’s name: I don’t really have a whole lot of revelation on this one.  Jesus says His name is above every other name and every knee will bow in the end to it.  He places a huge significance on names in the OT.  Name changes in a covenant and naming children as a symbol of Israel’s relationship w/ God.  So, all I can think is that we’ve lost sight of the importance of a name.  Our name is a picture of who we are just as it is with Jesus, so when we defame his name, we are defaming His character.  His name is who He is and who we are found in as his Bride.

4. Sabbath Day: OK, this is just a thought.  I’ve been thinking about this for a long time.  I know that the Sabbath Day was for a day of rest.  It reminds me of this sermon this pastor I love gave about homeostasis.  Well, it wasn’t a whole sermon on homeostasis, but he mentioned it.  That is, the way God has set up the laws of nature is everything must be in balance.  If our planet gets too hot, our atmosphere gets holes in it.  If we don’t drink enough water, we’ll dehydrate.  Everything must be in balance.  Well, what if having a Sabbath Day is not just for making us keep things holy but to be a picture of Jesus and how He is in balance all the time.  He can be 100% delighted in the Israelites while pouring out His wrath on their sins.  He is in balance.  Well, maybe He set up a “sabbath” because that is our human way of staying in balance?  This is just conjecture, mind you, but if the 10 Commandments are really showing us the character and nature of God, then the Sabbath is speaking of Jesus!

5. Honor father and mother: well, there’s already a promise in that verse – “that your days may be long upon the earth”, so it seems to me that Jesus places an important emphasis on the parent.  From my own experience, I know that if my heart is not in a place of showing honor/respect to my parents, then I am cutting off a conduit of grace and blessing from the Lord.  Once again, from my experience, our parents are the ones who are to train us and be a picture to us of who God is.  Since we live in such a warped society, it seems hard to think this as true, but I know that because for many years I had a warped view of who God was because my own father, in his weakness, did not know how to father me well and so gave me an erroneous picture of God.  A parents job is not to coddle us and make us happy, but to point us to the leadership of God.  By honoring our father and mother, we have a better idea of how to honor God.

7. Murder.  This one seems easy to me.  Murdering is taking the importance off of life and putting it on death.  It is devaluing life.  From the very being of God pours forth life.  His IS life.  In Revelation 4, it talks about an “emerald rainbow encircling the throne”.  I was meditating on that one day, asking, “why green?  why not multicolored like the rainbows we know?”  I finally had a revelation that it was because green is a symbol of life and life exudes from the person of Jesus.

OK, I’ll write about the last 3 in another post.  This entry is being posted in January, but just so you know, I started it at the beginning of December.  It’s been sitting in my drafts for a month.  Oops!  

Obsession

  Alright.  I’ve been ruminating on this idea for quite some weeks now, and I’ve decided I wanted to put thoughts to “paper”.   This might be kind of long.

  A while ago, I was watching a movie, and one of the previews was for a movie called, “Twilight”.  I had no idea what it was, but it looked good because, quite honestly, I really like teeny-bopper movies.  Quite some time after that, I started hearing about a book called “Twilight” and finally put together that these were the same thing.  A girl at the Christian school in which I work gave a book report about it.  When I figured out the book portrayed a story about a vampire, I was quite intrigued as to why they were allowed to report on that type of book.  But I moved on. . .

  I kept hearing about this book time after time – by friends, postings on Facebook, and the like.  So, I finally gave in and bought the first book – just to get the curiosity out of my system.  It was a good book.  The author is very well written, even detailed to the point of describing characters’ voice intonation as part of character development – quite effectively!  I was impressed.  I was also obsessed.  With the book.  Here’s a little fun fact about me – I LOVE to read.  I can bust out a 200-300 page book in a day.  I read fast and I love to read a lot.  Staying up to all hours while getting nothing productive done just to read a book is certainly not a foreign concept to me.  But this book was different.

  I started the book at about 6 one evening and read until about 11 pm.  That got me through half of the book, but I made myself go to bed instead of staying up all night to finish it.  I read a chapter more as I got ready to go to work, but the intriguing crux of my conundrum was this: I could NOT stop thinking about that book all day.  On my planning period, I went and looked up information online to see if I could find out what would happen next, and I could not wait until the end of the day just so I could go home and finish reading this book.  The suspense was exhilarating.  And obsessive.

  More backgroud:  I have read MANY good books that are just as well written and thought capturing as ”Twilight” (go read any Ted Dekker book to understand this), so I’ve had my fair share of days where I just want to give up everything, even work, and read.   But this day was different – I even felt weird with the level of obsession that I was feeling about finishing this book.  Usually, when I finish a book, I’m like, “ahhh, that was a good ending” and put it away to read again in a year.  After finishing “Twilight”, I immediately wanted to read it again.  I could not put the book down.

  Obsession.  That was the main problem I was having connected to this book.  

  In all of my years with the Lord (20 years to be exact, although I really only count the past 10), I have learned a lot about the two realities that we live in – the flesh/world and the spirit.  One of my favorite verses is Ephesians 6:12, where it talks about our struggle/battle not being against “flesh and blood”, but against the rulers, authorities, and powers of  the spiritual realm.  In the past ten years, I’ve seen more and more that our true reality lies not in the things around us that we can see, but in the things that we can’t – things of the spirit. 

  So, when I was feeling this obsessiveness toward this book, I really began to look inward and question whether or not there were some spiritual forces connected to this book.  A few things happened that really make me think that this obsession was more a spiritual matter than mental:

1. I read Stephanie Meyer’s blog, where she was describing the way in which she got inspiration for this book.  She had a dream (and if you’ve ever studied dreams, this is really an open door to our hearts, spiritually – look in the Bible and you’ll find numerous places where people had “visitations” of the Lord or otherwise through dreams) about one of the scenes in the book (if you’ve read it, it’s the scene where Edward and Bella are in the meadow alone together), and that caused her to start writing the events that were formed to make this book.  The whole time she was describing it, she was writing about how “obsessed” she was with the story and the characters.  This is why, she said, she did not limit the story to one book but has continued on with the entire series.  That was clue #1.

2. Other people mentioning how obsessed they are with the books and couldn’t put it down until they were done with the entire series.

3. Several women’s comments about how they are not quite content with their husbands (whether it’s in joking – like, “ha, ha, my husband is only a mortal” or somewhat serious) in comparison with the perfection of Edward, the main character in the book.

4. My own struggle with obsession with the book.

 

My Conclusion:

  Truly, I believe that there is something spiritual about the level of obsession I’m seeing come from my own heart as well as other women.  I’m not going to say, “Don’t read the books.”  But I will say, there is more to the spiritual realm than we give it credit, and we are far more influenced by it than we know.  This could be true by reading this book.  But anything observed by reading these books is just that – an observation made through my own experiences.  I am not the Knower of All Things, so obviously, since this is my blog, after all, I do get to express my own personal experience.  Hooray for non-combative opinions!!! 

Shame of Youth

  My senior year in college, 2003, I felt like Jesus gave me a personal verse of redemption.  At that time, I was really struggling with a lot of issues – father issues most of all.  It was during this time of pain that I felt God speak to me Isaiah 54:4, speaking of forgetting the shame of my youth.  I really took a hold of that verse because I was so broken by all the wounds that I had received in my childhood.  I didn’t feel whole, and I didn’t know if I would ever know what it felt like to not struggle with these issues that plague me and persistently break in on my reality in most unassuming and vexing ways.

  But the forgetting has come.  I didn’t think it would take so long or be so short of a time.  Yes, a paradox, as seems to be all of the mysteries of Jesus.  But He has!  I truly feel whole for the first time in my entire life.  I didn’t realize that it was really possible.  I thought for sure that I would be struggling with it even into my 30′s.  But God has shown Himself infinitely merciful.  There are still some residual effects of stuff I grew up with, but I can now confidently walk in the affection of my Father without the shame of rejection that once marked me.

Faith – Indubitably!

I was meditating on faith yesterday and its true meaning.  If FAITH is the confirmation of the things we hope for and the evidence of things we do not see, then we need to lose our sight!  I remember watching Amazing Grace, the movie.  John Newton, who composed the song, was an old man in the movie who lived out his days serving a church.  Finally, when he had gone blind, he quotes his own song, “I was blind but now I see” and he says now he really can! 

  I heard a story of these Christians somewhere in Central or South America who have committed to speaking in the prayer language as much as possible.  So they’ll be, like, having a conversation, and while listening to the other person talk, they’ll be speaking in tongues under their breath.  Well, in Jude 20, it says to build up your faith by praying in the Holy Spirit.  So, because they prayed in the Holy Spirit so much for so long, they were able to walk up to the scene of a major car accident, pray for a dead man who was thrown through the window of his car, and see him come back to life.  They had faith to RAISE THE DEAD!

  Well, after I heard that story, I settled in my heart to start praying in the spirit as much as possible and did so for a few months.  During that time, I was transitioning where I was going to live, and ended up “homeless” for 3 weeks.  It was very stressful, obviously!  But since I walked through that trial while praying in the spirit the whole time, I have never, since then, doubted the faithfulness of God to provide a place for me to live.  And I’ve moved 5 TIMES since then!  But I’ve never worried (and 2 of those times, I really was not sure where I was going to live next).  Praying in the Holy Spirit works!!!  I’ve experienced it!!

On the Blog again. . . and The Shack

Well, I’m back!  I’ve been writing on another blog about my journey as a teacher.  I’ve gotten a bit of a writing bug, so here it goes again. . .

  To start it off, I think I might just share with you a paper I wrote.  It’s short, I promise.  Have any of you read The Shack?  It’s really an interesting fictional book that a bunch of teachers from my school read.  We had a Book Luncheon this summer to talk about it.  Well, I had to write a paper since I read it for a credit thingy.  It really gives you a window into my theology.  Here you go. . .

            One theological premise that I’ve been meditating on for the past six months is the idea of Christians being “in Christ”.  What does that truly mean?  Growing up in a Christian school, spending four years at Baylor and Antioch, and almost three at IHOP has made it easy to be lazy in simply gleaning my own theology from the godly pastors around me.  Thankfully, the Holy Spirit grabbed me out of my lethargy a few years ago and took me to a place of dissatisfaction where it became vital that I develop my own paradigms.  So the Lord began to tear down much of the faulty theologies I had picked up from not thinking on my own and brought me to a place of disillusionment with my comfort zone of “knowing all the answers”.  It was here that I began to realize that there was more to the idea of being “in Christ” than I had previously thought.

            Obviously, growing up in a Christian school and going to youth group, I would hear the basic principles of Christianity – Jesus died for my sins so that I can serve him.  Going to IHOP, the Lord began to reveal to me that I was thinking of Him as a taskmaster who is constantly disappointed in my lack and not as a Lover who entices me to serve out of a “love-slave” type relationship (to put it in the vernacular).  It was through this paradigm shift that I began of journey of seeing what a true relationship with Jesus was, as the disciples first new it.

            In the past six months, I’ve seen how much I and even the church thinks of Jesus as being an empowerment to a “better life”, not so much an exchange of life.  I’ve heard the analogy of becoming a Christian as Jesus pushing me out from the path of an out-of-control Mack truck and dying in my place.  But it seems that being “in Christ” is so much more than that.  How can I be in Christ if I am still living my life separately from Jesus – He betters my life from afar yet still lives in my heart?  What I have come to see is that there is no separation of His life in mine.  Going back to the analogy, it is not Him dying by pushing me out of the path of the truck, but me dying with Him (Galatians 2:20)!

            The entire point of writing this background information is to set up the fact that The Shack was one of the key tools Jesus used to solidify the theology of “in Christ” to me.  The part of the story that exemplified this the most was when Jesus was asking the main character to go on a journey with Him.  Instead of walking around the lake, Jesus wanted him to walk over it with Him!  Since this is a throwback to Peter and Jesus walking on water, my thoughts returned to explanations of this story that I had heard over and over in church about Peter’s lack of faith.  But when the main character tried to do it on his own and failed, Jesus essentially said that he can do not thing apart from Him – why? because he is IN CHRIST!!!  Peter’s story then takes on a more profound meaning – yes, he didn’t have enough faith, but it wasn’t because he didn’t have faith that Jesus could do what He said!  It was because he was trying to do it independently from Jesus!  When the main character got up out of the water after sinking down into it, Jesus took his hand, and they went together to the other side of the shore.  Apart from Jesus, we can do nothing!  Faith is nothing if it is not intricately linked with the person of Jesus!  Oh, victory!  Oh, revelation!  We are completely dependent on our Beloved who we have become One with in the Spirit!  Oh, happy day!   It is only through the beauty of communion with the Godhead in our spirits can we hope to find the reality of the life of Christ forming and transforming our spirits into the likeness of Him.

The Basis for Dreaming Big

This week I have the priviledge of taking a roadtrip with my mom to Santa Fe, NM, to a conference for educational administrators. I, however, am only a lowly teacher, but I tagged along to get out of school and travel, which I love to do.

So, with the scene thus set, I turned on the TV in our hotel room this morning and we watched a church service of a fairly world-renowned preacher from TX. In the past, I have not had a favorable impression of this guy, even though I know he is reaching millions and Jesus has given him favor. All well and good. Personally, I have issues with people that name their ministries after themselves, which this guy does. To me, loving Jesus and, in turn, loving others with Him in ministry should not be about us, but Jesus. And, I really hate books that people write (such as he) that include “steps” to some sort of state-of-being with God. Anyway, that’s not the point of this musing – it’s kind of an insignificant factor anyway ’cause God’s big enough to work through people with an ostensibly big head.

The beef I did have with the guy was his sermon topic. Don’t allow Critical Voices to Steal your Dreams. Now, ostensibly (once again), that’s a good topic, but what I was hearing from him made me not like it. The premise of his sermon was encouragement to dream big even though you may get criticized for it. He went on to site several examples from the Bible, Jesus being one of them (which I think would be a good idea to quote Jesus if you’re a Christian preacher) about how you need to let your actions do the talking. So if someone is criticizing you, don’t fight back with your words, but with your actions. Now, that sounds all well and good, but it got me to thinking.

It seems to me that the preacher had an empty platform on which to base his premise. Where are these dreams coming from? Exs. Is it your life’s dream to become wealthier than Bill Gates and Donal Trump combined? Is it your dream to see your colleagues crushed as you climb the ladder of success? He didn’t seem to mention that dreams need to line up with the heart of Jesus. Pondering this made me think of Psalm 37:4 that says:
“Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart.”

My interpretation of that scripture is that when you cultivate intimacy with Jesus and desire to walk according to His will, that He will actually download desires in your heart, or the previous desires that you’ve had will align with His because you want to be where He is and do what He does. So, my problem with that message is that the preacher didn’t mention the motivations of the heart and aligning them with Jesus. I’m all for going after your dreams (especially my friends who have decided to “waste” their life in a prayer room in an obscure midwest town (I love you Chi, Molly, and Katty).

Apparently, my beef with most churches is that they get off on these sermons that seem to be for our “betterment” but fail to talk about Jesus in the process. This preacher used Jesus as an example of what he was talking about, not as the source of his ideas. When will we come back to Paul’s cry of “For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” (1 Cor 2:2) I want Jesus, not the fluff of how to better myself. I will better myself when I know Jesus more.



Jesus, take your American church back to the roots of what the point of church really is – to know you. Come break off the lethargy of pastor’s to conform to the happy, peaceful, prosperous messages that people want to hear. We need a revival of hearts to be stirred for the things of You! Awake us, Jesus. And let me not just be a speaker of criticism without reality within me of Truth.