Shackles

Shackles

Good afternoon! I hope that your week has been exceptional thus far. Today we are working in the book of Romans. This is a letter, by a missionary named Paul, written to a church in Rome. Paul is going to tackle a tough issue here that I feel many of us run into all of the time. Shall we begin?

The verses are found in Romans 7:14-20

¹⁴ We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. ¹⁵ I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. ¹⁶ And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. ¹⁷ As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. ¹⁸ For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature.^[c] For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. ¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. ²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

There is an idea in this passage that our body is a battlefield. Once you have accepted Christ as your Savior and began to work on a relationship with him your body is competing with the sin nature that it still holds. Paul struggles with this as I feel many of us do today. 

First. We always do what we don't want to do, and what we want to do we can't do. Maybe you are reading this right now and you feel very tied down because of a sin. It seems like no matter what measures you put up to stop it, it always wins and always feels stronger. You are not alone. Paul focuses on a building up and strengthening of community when he writes and this is because he realized how strong sin can feel. By not walking through it alone, we already have an advantage that God has granted us. When He created Adam He saw that it was not good for man to be alone. When sin entered the world, Eve was walking by herself in the garden. Community is a blessing given to us to help combat sin and win in this war.

There is one other point that I feel is very important to look at. Paul states he has the desire to do what is good, but can't carry it out. Continue to desire to do good. Paul understands this struggle and fights it daily. His body is a battlefield just like ours is, yet he continued to have a desire to do good. I think this is key, because God gives us strength and tools to help combat our sin nature, so never give up! Never give in to that nature because that is a victory for Satan not God and that is never ok. 

Now what does this mean for you today, sitting at your computer, reading this blog. Maybe you are dealing with something really tough right now. Sin attacks us in many different ways and I can't begin to guess what some of you are walking through reading this, but I can assure you that you are not alone. Find someone to talk to about it, set up some accountability for it. 

Maybe you have recently become a Christian and you feel awful because even being a Christian you still continue to sin. It's not just you, everyone has dealt with this frustration at one time. Everyone has had an issue in their life, a thorn in their side in which they feel they can't conquer. This is because we weren't made to conquer it alone. Jesus surrounded himself with community and His disciples and we should follow His example. Jesus brings us all together through his forgiveness, and we will walk through this together, because we are the body of Christ. 

Thank you for reading and God bless.

Teamwork Makes the Dreamwork

 

Teamwork Makes the Dreamwork

Hey all! Good to see you all again. Just as a side note before we get into today's post, I will plan on doing these posts Sunday afternoon/evening so they should be up by Monday morning at the latest. Usually they will be up before 10 pm Sunday night though.

SO! We are gonna dive straight into the scripture, we will be in Ephesians 4:29 today. I don't know if I have said this in previous posts, but I am spending this summer as the Recreation leader for a children's church camp in the Birmingham area. We have a different theme verse each week and this verse was our theme verse this past week.

Here it is:

²⁹ Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

On a surface level reading, we see this message: Be nice to others, don't say mean things. When I first started working with this verse alongside the kids this week, I arrived at the same conclusion. This is a beauty of scripture though, it is alive and can take us sooo much deeper. I feel like this passage gives us two very explicit points:

1. Build up according to their needs

The word needs is highlighted because it has a certain understanding that gets looked over. A team is comprised of different people, just as a body is comprised of different parts. Now some have more self-confidence than others, and some have more experience than others. This is where we get our title from. I at first wanted all of the children in camp to be cheering for each other and building each other up with their words. This was really effective for some of the children and not so much for other kids. 

I walked away from my first day of rec a little confused on why it wasn't working for some. Cheer louder I thought, if the kids are even louder then it will make the ones being cheered for happy. This didn't seem to work either though. It took a little kindergarten girl's tears to make this part of the verse sink in. Some of these children don't need support, they need guidance. By bringing them aside and helping explain the game a little further, children became exponentially happier. 

I think so often we see others and apply this idea of, "I would love for people to do this to me, so it must be what they want too." This verse is very clear though, build them up according to their needs and to do this we must look outside of ourselves. 

2. Pay attention to who is listening

I think it's very easy to just overlook the last part of this verse and keep moving on. We seem to have gotten the meat of the verse in the first part so what could be in the last part. The Bible is very intentional though and every word is important. That those who may listen will benefit, which raises a question. How many of you reading have ever said something to someone and you knew they just weren't listening.  I am terrible at this because I will tune someone out while texting all the time. I know that I get frustrated when people do it to me, so why do I continue to do it to someone else? I think that maybe this part of the verse is included to give ourselves a self-check when looking at the meat of the verse.

Are we saying things that need to be heard? If someone were able to hear every word that we spoke, would they benefit? This is where our challenge for today's world comes around. I think we let a lot of things slip out of our mouths that aren't necessarily beneficial or uplifting. Teams fall apart due to under the breath comments, because when we don't lift someone up with our words, it does the exact opposite.

Today's blog post may seem really simple and something you've heard before. I don't know who is reading this blog, or if I even have subscribed followers. But you've made it to the end of this post, and I like to believe that Jesus brought you to this blog for a reason.

So readers, let me leave you with this, Jesus loves you. If you don't know who that is, I'd begin reading here:

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john%201&version=NIV

If you have questions feel free to message me I'd love to chat. Also if the word becoming flesh feels or sounds weird or odd, I ask that you hold on tight, as next week we'll be walking through that passage.

Thank you for your time and for reading,

God bless.

Heart of Stone

The Heart of Stone

Hello all! It's good to be back with you again this evening. Tonight we are going to discuss something that I feel most everyone is going to be able to relate to, and that is a heart of stone. Now before we get too deep or offended, I would like to preface this by saying that I don't feel that everyone has a heart of stone. I would guess though that most everyone reading this have experienced dealing with one before whether your own or another persons.  

The passage of scripture we will be looking at tonight is found in Ezekiel 11:18-21(NIV)

¹⁸ “They will return to it and remove all its vile images and detestable idols. ¹⁹ I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. ²⁰ Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God. ²¹ But as for those whose hearts are devoted to their vile images and detestable idols, I will bring down on their own heads what they have done, declares the Sovereign Lord.”

Now as always we want to give some context to this passage. Ezekiel is a prophet of the Lord, and he has come in a time where Israel, God's chosen people, have fallen away from worship of God. God has sent Ezekiel to show them that they are not in the right path and that their worship of false gods and idols is leading them to a path of destruction. God shares these words with Ezekiel though telling him of a time when Israel is going to return to God. This is a promise that we are seeing. 
  
What do we do with this promise though? Sure it was great for them in their time, but how does it tie back to me today, June 16, 2013. I think there are three ways that we can apply this passage to us.

1. A New Spirit
  We sing songs in worship about, "All I need is you Lord, is you Lord, all I need is you." But is this really true? How would we react if we were just with God. Would it be ok to have no iphone, no internet, no boyfriends or girlfriends? Just Jesus. When asking Christ to come into your life and change you He brings a NEW spirit. He brings that element to your life that was missing before. He is literally completing you! This is how we turn away from these things that are false and bad because all this new spirit desires is Jesus!

2. The heart of stone to a heart of flesh
I am spending my summer working with children at a camp. If there is something that I have noticed with children it is this lesson. Forgiveness is so simple for them. So often we are wronged in life, and so often we hold grudges for us. Doesn't it feel better to just let it go though? To have a solid cry, to just lower all of one's walls. I must say that this is a lesson I am not too comfortable with myself. I struggle with being vulnerable to anyone, and this directly influences my relationship with Christ. This new spirit that has been given to me in Christ is directly hurt by my heart of stone. 

The inability to show emotion or weakness makes one feel that they can get it done themselves. I don't need to listen to what others are doing or their advice because I can get through this journey on my own. I can't tell you how many times in life I have ignored the wisdom of others to try to just do something on my own. I am so thankful for a dear friend recently who called me out on this. She told me how I always try to learn lessons my way. I know for a fact that Jesus sent her there saying, PLEASE! Let this heart of stone go, I just want to wrap my arms around you.

3. Follow the law
How many of you can drive? If you can drive you know how easy it is to creep faster and faster over the speed limit. We all think this phrase at one point, "I can speed on this road, there are never any cops." The bad habit is formed and reinforced because the absence of law keeps us from seeing wrong. ** I'm not condemning you if you speed, as stated I have done it too. Please don't feel awful if you read this, I once got a speed ticket for going 85 in a 70. If it makes us a sinner I'm right there with you. ** The same is true for a heart of stone. God gave us guidance in order to nurture this new spirit, and to prevent us from the heart of stone. It's so easy to go back to a caliced and hard heart once you stop listening to laws. 

This is where accountability is key. My best friend constantly gives me checks on life and how I am doing. When I feel like an awful person for having a conversation with my best friend, those are the times when I immediately see how far off I have gone from nurturing this new spirit and sticking to my heart of stone. 

This new spirit and new heart God offers is incredible. It is LITERALLY life-changing. By realizing how far off we are from complete and asking Jesus to come into our lives and begin to work with our brokenness, He can melt away this heart of stone.

 If you have any questions or comments, feel free to comment or send me a message. I'd love to talk further.
Thank you for reading, and God bless.