Ruined

“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.” Isaiah 6:5....."A true revival will bring about a manifestation of the God of the Bible which most are not prepared for.....When true revival comes, we, like Ananias and Sapphira, will be found out." Chris Tiegreen

Many churches have, I believe, a deep and sincere desire for a great move of His Holy Spirit to come upon them. I know the fellowship that I'm a part of does. This is a desire that the Father wishes to fulfill. However, the question we must ask ourselves is, are we prepared for such a move? Someone said that He has prepared works for a prepared people. No one can control a move of His Spirit, but we can be prepared for it. I think it begins on our knees, with our hearts reaching up to Him as His reaches down to us. It's been said that every great move of God began with a broken heart, many broken hearts, kneeling before Him, crying out for Him. John Bevere said that "He's looking for a people to inhabit, not visit." I believe the people and fellowships that seek this will be the ones to experience Him in His fullness.

Part of our preparation must come in our realizing the truth of what Tiegreen says in the above quotes. We may want revival, but too many of us are unprepared for what a real manifestation of His Spirit will mean for us. All that has been kept in the darkness, be it in our lives, families, and churches, will be exposed in a true revival. In the early church, His Spirit was moving mightily. Miracles were happening in the midst of the people continually. Hundreds, even thousands were being converted and added into the church. People were coming together, and Scripture says that "they had all things in common." Annanias and Sapphira were two such. They had sold a piece of property and made a show of giving all the proceeds of the sale to the church to be shared among all believers in need. Except that they didn't, having held back a portion for themselves. Peter, filled with the discernment of the Spirit, called them out. Their sin was exposed. All that is in our life and that we may have sought to keep covered in darkness will be brought out into the Light when He manifests in the midst of His people. We will be like Isaiah was in the presence of a holy God. We will be undone, ruined, as concerns our old life. Whatever deceptions, lies we have held about ourselves, others, the church, and God Himself will be exposed. We must understand that this is what happens when He comes. I don't think anyone or any church can really be prepared for what happens when a holy God comes to His people, but I think we can be prepared to expect the unexpected.

This can only begin to happen on our knees, broken, yielded, totally surrendered to Him. We seek Him as He is. We welcome Him as He is.....and all the transformation, and yes, upheaval that will bring to our lives, our families, our marriages, and our fellowships.

I guess what I'm saying is that if we are truly seeking Him, seeking His heart, the fullness of His life and Spirit, The real Father, the real Son, and the real Spirit, we must be prepared to be ruined, undone, and remade. I'm not fully sure that I am, but I want to be. What we pray for when we pray for revival is terrifying to our flesh, but it is the yearning of the Spirit of Christ living inside us. Terrifying because the things of the flesh must die so that the things of the Spirit may live. Ruined but remade. May it be so Lord, may it be so.

Blessings,
Pastor O

 

A Few More

 Some shared thoughts from my prayer journal.....

"Behold, now is the acceptable time. Now is the day of salvation." 2 Corinthians 6:2...."What are you doing with Jesus right now?"  Vance Havner......What ARE we doing with Him right now? As concerns choosing to believe Him, receive Him, and live for Him, what have we done? What have we decided about His claims? His words? His truth? What are we doing with Jesus as concerns are daily lives? What are we doing in the matter of obeying Him, trusting Him, following Him, no matter where the following may lead us? The Bible tells us that our lives are but a breath, that we are here in temporal time for but a moment....and then comes eternity. Yet, all of our time and energy goes into that which is passing away, and very little into what will be unending. Jesus has told us that "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes unto the Father except through Me." What are we doing with that statement? What are we doing with His claim? Jesus came to a fallen race trapped in sin. He who knew no sin, took the sin of the world upon Himself and said that all who believed upon Him in truth would be saved from the penalty of eternal death. On the cross He paid the price for our sin. In His resurrection, He gave us the promise not only of eternal life, but of the fullness of that life now. Wonderful promises from His heart, which is also the heart of the Father. What are we doing with them right now? What are we doing with Jesus right now? What will we do? What will you do?

"God puts His saints where they will glorify Him, and we are no judges of where that might be." Oswald Chambers

It has been said that the chief end of man (and woman) is to glorify God. This means that all aspects of our lives are to point to Him and bring Him glory. We are to live in such a way as to reflect His holiness, His goodness, His love, mercy, joy, and strength. All the aspects of His life are to shine through, to some degree, in ours. We are to do so right where we are, not wait until we are in circumstances more to our liking and so easier for us to do so. The truth is that He will indeed put us in places that test us greatly. He puts pastors and leaders in assignments where they may be unnoticed, obscure, even seemingly useless. It is His desire and command that even so, in that place, we would bring Him glory. Putting us in places where we will have success, applause, and notoriety are not even among His priorities. His purpose for us there is first and foremost that we bring glory to His name, because even if no one is noticing, He is noticing, and it brings Him great joy. And the bonus is that even if it seems no one sees us, people do see us. Eternity is affected by how we live for Him.....even when we live in the most difficult of places. The lyrics of the old chorus ring so true; "In my life Lord, be glorified, be glorified." May it be so for you and for me today.

"Be still and know that I am God." Psalm 46:10... "Where fear, anxiety, and stress reign, we do not know Him." Chris Tiegreen This Psalm exhorts us to be still in His presence. The outflow of that is that we will grow more deeply in our knowledge of Him. It makes it only natural then that the opposite is true when stress, fear, and anxiety are ruling our lives. In those times, we don't know Him. We don't because knowledge of Him vanishes when we give in to those attitudes. Where they are found, He is not. This should be sobering news for each of us given how often we yield to them. When they invade our lives, they remove all sense of His presence. It is not that He vanishes, but its more a matter that we are vanishing from Him. In those places, we really don't know Him. If we did, we wouldn't be giving in to that which He has told us can have no power over us if we are trusting in and believing upon Him. As someone said, wherever He comes, He brings His peace with Him. Perfect love casts out all fear. The key to knowing all this, and to knowing Him, is to be still in Him. Most of us have little or no idea how to be so, and as a result, fear, anxiety, and stress wreak havoc in our lives. The enemy would have us living at the mercy of these three, and as long as our eyes are fixed upon what is not Him, we will not see Him. In those times and places, we will not know Him. We will only know the dangers. Yet, when we come to stillness before and in Him, we behold HIm, and when we behold HIm, we know Him. When we know Him, we will not "know" and be victim to that which is against us. We will know His perfect peace. We will know Him.

Just a few more thoughts from my journal. Blessings upon you my friends......Pastor O

The Calf

 2 Aaron answered them, “Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me.” 3 So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. 4 He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, “These are your gods,[a] Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.” Exodus 32:2-4......"The golden calf was a preferred image of God to the Israelites. How often do we come up with our own preferred images?" Henry Blackaby

We commonly misunderstand this passage of Scripture concerning the making of the golden calf. We think the Israelites are rejecting God completely and choosing instead a golden idol, much as the surrounding nations did. We think that they were choosing a completely different and false God. They weren't, at least not in their own thinking. They couldn't grasp the kind of God that was being revealed to them through Moses. They wanted a God they could understand, and in some sense, control. John Bevere said that "Moses knew God's ways, but the people only knew His acts." Moses had an intimacy with Him that the people didn't, and sadly, didn't desire. They had been living amongst the idolatrous Egyptians for 400 years. The Egyptians had a host of images for their gods. The Israelites couldn't accept God as He was revealing Himself. So, they wanted to create a God that they could relate to. They wanted their preferred image of Him. Where are we doing the same with Him today?

As we read and study His Word, there are so many aspects of His character that we love, particularly those that we see through His Son, Jesus Christ. His love, compassion, mercy, complete willingness to forgive, and the abundant life He offers us through Christ. We love the gentleness of His nature, His kindness, patience, and long suffering towards us. We stumble at His wrath, His sense of justice, His demand for holiness of life. We embrace His grace, but we don't like the thought that He will not have it abused. We love the Father revealed in Christ, but we have major problems with the God of the Old Testament. Indeed, there are many who choose to act as if God as revealed in the OT no longer exists, and that in the coming of Christ, He's undergone a transformation. He has not. All that He was and is before the coming of Christ He continues to be since His coming. For many in the church, this is something that boggles our minds and disturbs them. So, like the Israelites, we come up with an image of Him that we prefer. One that fits our concepts of what He should be instead of who He truly is. And, like Israel, we do so because we don't possess the intimacy He wishes us to have. We know Him by His acts. We don't really know Him by His ways.

The Father is a mystery. Even in Christ, He remains covered in it. The key though is that He is a mystery that He wants us to discover. He invites us to discover Him in ever deeper ways, but too few of us respond to the invitation. For that reason, we don't come to understand and know Him. Never completely because He is infinite and we are not, but we can know Him to the fullest extent we are capable of. When we do come to know Him, we begin to have an understanding as to how His justice and love are not opposites, but that His justice flows out of His perfect love. We may not understand all that He has done, or that He is doing, but we have reached a level of knowing Him, knowing His love, goodness, and mercy, and yes, holiness, to know that these are the core elements of who He is, and that we can trust Him, cling to Him, in any place where we don't know everything else. As we go deeper into our knowledge of Him, we realize that nothing in His acts takes away from or is contrary to who He is. We realize that the "preferred God," the "preferred Jesus" we have created is inadequate to who He really is. The Isaraelites were afraid to find this out. Moses was not. Who are we more like?

I think our greatest problem is that we think God should act and do like we would. We forget that He has said, "My ways are not your ways." We think that they should be. He also said His ways are infinitely above ours. This offends our pride, and opens the door to unbelief. Not unbelief that results in rejection of Him as God, just a rejection of Him as He's revealed Himself. So, we make a "calf" that better fits what we want. We may call it "God," or "Jesus," but it is still a calf. It isn't Him. Can we each dare to look for the "calves" that we've created for ourselves that aren't Him, but we worship as though they are? All of our calves have to go. Are we willing that they should?

Blessings,
Pastor O

Unapproachable Light

 "Then Moses said, 'Please, show me Your glory.' And He said, 'I will make all My goodness pass before you. And I will proclaim the name of the Lord before you'.....But He said, 'You cannot see My face. For no man can see Me and live.' " Exodus 33:18-20...."He is..the King of kings and Lord of lords: who possesses immortality and dwells in unapproachable light." I Timothy 6:15-16...."The Bible reveals not first the love of God, but the intense, blazing holiness of God." Oswald Chambers

I am so thankful for the all powerful love of God. Love, that as the great old hymn says, "will not let me go." I'm thankful for His love that sought me when I had no desire for it. Love that kept me when all else seemed lost. Love that sustained and still sustains me in every part of my life. Love that took Jesus Christ to the cross. Love that died for me and that rose for me. Where would I be, would any of us who name Him as Lord be, were it not for His all consuming love?

Yet, I feel that we, His church have entered some extremely dangerous ground. I believe we have so overemphasized His love that we have cheapened His grace, His sacrifice, and above all, His holiness. I think we have lost our sense of His glory and majesty. We have made familiar, even casual, a God who does dwell in unapproachable light. We have tried to bring Him down to us, rather than Him lifting us up to Himself. In many ways, I fear we have made Him common. The Bible says that Moses spoke to Him as a friend, yet Moses could not look upon God because of His blazing and intense holiness that Chambers speaks of. I admit, even as I write, that I cannot begin to fully conceive of the intensity of His holiness and glory. Moses hungered to behold His glory. I have to ask, how deep is our hunger, yours and mine, to behold His glory? 

This is not an easy matter for me to write upon because the church has in so many ways misrepresented and misunderstood the holiness of God, and the resulting holiness of life that He commands of us. We have made it about behaviors and lists of do's and don'ts. We have made it about what takes place on the outside, and missed that He makes it all about what is taking place in our hearts, and through our hearts, our minds and entire being. His Word says that, "without holiness, no one will see the Lord." We think that means that we've got to get all our behavior in order. He means that we should allow our hearts to be fully aligned with His. We are transformed from the inside out, and with that transformation comes a total makeover in how we live. We have fallen in love with a holy God whose holiness in turn makes us holy. And our spiritual eyes are opened to behold Him.

I began this by talking about our overstressing His love and negating His holiness, and in turn, His command that we "be holy as I am holy." I think, in my own walk with Him, I first began to understand something of His holiness when I thought about those Scripture passages that invite us into His presence. I had taken that for granted, like it was my right to do so. I had little thought of His holiness and glory because I was focused on myself; what I wanted and needed from Him. The thought just came to me that what I needed to realize when I came to Him was just how unworthy I was to be in His presence. That was an insight from His Spirit, not mine. I was beginning to recognize His glory and holiness and how unholy so much of my life was. With that, everything began to change for me. That change continues to this day. The reality of His holiness should leave us speechless. It should result in abject worship. But does it?

Well, I've rambled on enough. Who can even begin to adequately explain or describe His holiness? Certainly not me, but I hope at the least this writing has made you more deeply consider it. To repent of any casual attitudes we've adopted towards Him, that are unworthy of Him. May we ceaselessly give Him the glory due His name....and may we never cease longing to behold His glory in ever deeper ways. He dwells in unapproachable light, yet in Christ, He is a most approachable Father God. I can't explain how that is. I can only rejoice that it is.

Blessings,
Pastor O

Prepared

⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving,     and his courts with praise!     Give thanks to him; bless his name!⁵ For the Lord is good;     his steadfast love endures forever,     and his faithfulness to all generations. Psalm 100:4....."We must never rest until everything inside us worships God."  A.W. Tozer

Back in the 1990's, I was involved in what were called "The Worship Wars." Church folk, who can find most anything to fight about, were fighting about the style of worship in their church. There were basically two main views, with a third entered for compromise. There were people who wanted a traditional service, highlighted by hymns, choirs, organs, and pianos. Then there were the contemporary worship folks who wanted more modern choruses, with a faster beat and rhythm, and the use of guitars, keyboards, drums, and whatever else was handy. The third option was to offer a blend of both, with not too much emphasis on either. As I look back, I realize that very little of it was about worship. Tastes and preferences, yes, but not about worship. Not really about it at all. Someone said at the time that we didn't love each other enough to participate in each other's style of worship. They were right.

As I think back on all of that, I realize we had little interest in worship at all. Someone asked the question recently as to whether our response to our music was centered in our emotions or in our spirit. I think the fact that we can get so heated about style gives the answer to that. A worshiper will worship, as Jesus said, "in spirit and in truth." He never said anything about style.I think in the modern western church, we put a great deal of time into planning and preparing for our worship services, centering on practicing what we'll be singing and playing. How much time do we use preparing our hearts? From the worship leader, down to each team member, and out into the congregation, do we come with hearts not only prepared to worship, but have already entered into worship before we arrive. Does our worship spring from a lifestyle of worship or are we looking to the leader and their team to "get us in the mood?" It's been my observation that half the crowd doesn't arrive until the 2nd or 3rd song. They're usually distracted and tend to stay distracted through the service.

I've heard many a worship leader complain about lack of participation from the fellowship. I have to ask, how much time have they, as leaders, spent in prayer over the very people they're serving? Praying that they would become those who do worship Him in spirit and in truth. What's the main motive? The feeding of their own egos or pleasing and honoring the heart of God? Indeed, how much time does the average leader of worship, be it musician, singer, overall leader, spend preparing themselves through the week for the coming together of His people? Coming together for the purpose of centering on Him, and giving Him all the glory? What is really the focus of our worship? Man centered or God centered?

Let me stress that worship is not just about the music. Not at all. The bringing of His Word is really the center of it all. In my particular denomination, the decision was made in the beginning to have the pulpit be in the center of the platform, symbolizing that the preaching of His Word was central to all. This then demands that the pastor, as overall spiritual leader of the fellowship and the worship service, must have the most prepared heart of all. They should enter every service with a sense of reverence, awe, and unworthiness to be there. They should be totally yielded to Him and completely dependent upon Him for everything. I wonder how many of our current pastor/preachers do? I'm reminded of a story I heard years ago. A young man studying for the ministry was invited by a church to preach. It was his first public sermon. He was educated, well spoken, and believed himself completely ready to bring a wonderful message. The results were just the opposite. It was a disaster. He had entered that pulpit filled with pride and self-confidence. He left it humbled and humiliated. A kind and saintly brother took him aside afterwards and said, "Young man, you should have come into the pulpit in the manner that you left it. Humbled and broken. Learn from this." I hope he did. I hope we will.

There is so much more to say about this. I pray we really will be skilled worshippers of the King. I pray we will enter into it not just with our emotions, but all of our being. I pray we will take seriously and with reverence and awe, the worship that is due His name. I pray that it begins now. With you, and with me.

Blessings,

Pastor O 

Baggage

 "At the cross, at the cross, where I first saw the Light, and the burden of my sin rolled away." Isaac Watts

I've never really enjoyed the experience of flying, and I enjoy the procedure of checking in my baggage even less. I don't know anyone who does. Checking our baggage can be aggravating and even unpleasant. It is far more so when we are confronted with all the emotional and spiritual baggage we are carrying in our lives. It is so because we tend to want to hold onto it. Christ calls us "check our baggage in" at His cross. We want to carry it on board our journey and relationship with Him, and so indirectly, with everyone we come into contact with. He directs us to bring it, and leave it, at His cross. The first choice causes us ongoing and ever deepening harm. The second, brings us freedom. His freedom. Yet we're prone to continue to make the first. Why?

I have seen and experienced the havoc my own baggage has created in my life. I have seen what others baggage has done in theirs. Not just once, but many times over. We keep carrying it, and as we do, it increases, because our baggage will intrude into every aspect of our lives. Into every relationship. It will end up defining us. It will become our identity. Satan will delight in it, and with every failed relationship, every disastrous experience, he will add another piece of worthless "luggage" to the pile. We hate it, but at the same time, we cling to it. We're captive to our baggage, and it's killing us. Emotionally, mentally, spiritually.....literally.

Why do we go on like this? Part of it is because we are so invested in our baggage through anger, bitterness, and unforgiveness, that we can't see any possibility of ever being without it. To let it go means we have to let go of all our grudges and deeply rooted desires for getting even. Or, we nurse the wounds that life has brought us. These are what keep us imprisoned, and they are what sabotage every relationship we enter into. We, and they, never become what we hope for. We end up grieving that, but we continue to hold on to our baggage. Let me ask; are you ready to check your baggage, all of your baggage, at the foot of His cross? Are you ready for the lyrics of Watt's great and powerful hymn to become your reality? Your testimony? He has always been ready that it would be. All you need do is come to His cross. Burdens, and all baggage, really are lifted at Calvary.

Do you hear His still small voice inviting you to come? To come with every piece of baggage you've accumulated in this life. To bring them all, and lay them at His feet, at His cross.....and be free. His promise is real. Burdens are lifted at Calvary, at the cross. All we need to do is come. Come with our baggage, all of it. He calls us. Do we come? And here's a beautiful truth. Unlike at the airport, we never have to pick up that baggage again. It disappears, and in this case, we rejoice.

Blessings,
Pastor O

Good/Bad News

 "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you." James 4:8

Several years back a good pastor friend gave me a number of his books. In one of them, he had written in the margin in reference to James 4:8, "Draw near to God: Good and bad news." I'm going to write a bit on how he is right about that and use some of the thoughts and quotes from my prayer journal to do so.

"When Jesus draws near, He draws near as Lord." Mark Galli....We like the idea of Him being near to us. Comforter, Gentle Shepherd, the loving Jesus. He is all these things, but more than all, He is Lord, and when He comes to us, He comes as Lord. Lord over all. Most especially, Lord over us. This can be part of what my friend saw as the "bad news" of His drawing near. As Lord, all that we are and all that we desire must be submitted to Him. We are not our own. We are His. We don't get to choose how He will manifest Himself to us. Kindness, mercy, tenderheartedness are all part of who He is, but they are just that, a part of Him. He is Lord, Almighty Lord, and He comes to us in that role. John Eldredge said that He wanted Jesus, "the real Jesus." So do I, but having the real Jesus means that all the unreal things I've believed about Him will fall by the wayside. The apostle John, called the one whom Jesus loved in the Gospels, fell at the feet of Jesus when he beheld Him on the isle of Patmos. Yet we can have lifted hearts in this because the bad news is only bad for those parts of ourselves that have resisted Him in some way. When we surrender completely to Him, we find the riches of the good news of His coming to us. Only that within us that needs to die will die. And that, my friends, is good news indeed.

"The closer He gets, the more calamity we'll know." Mark Galli.....This is true. Scripture speaks of "following hard after God." This is the picture of being so joined to Him as to be one with Him, which in Christ, we are. When we are so with Christ, He will lead us into the many "dangers, toils, and snares." Into, and through them. It will not be a journey for the fainthearted. He will lead us into trouble. He will take us on a collision course with the fallen world He came to redeem. The collision will be a violent one. Sometimes literally. He will put us at risk, and as He does so, He will expect that we trust Him there. He's not interested in "country club" followers, or those who check in on Him once a week on Sunday's. He leads us into engaging a lost and hostile culture, and at times, a lost and hostile church. And His path will always lead to our own personal Calvary. The only thing He may speak as we journey may be, "Fear not, I am with you." That must be enough. That will be enough. Is it enough for us?

"Too often, we don't want the true God as much as we want the God of our imaginations." Or the true Jesus. We have come up with a lot of imaginary ideas as to who He is. So many of them reduce Him to either a kindly old grandfather, or a kind of "hippie Jesus," who adorns Himself in flowers and gives the peace sign wherever He goes. We create a God, a Christ that is acceptable to our flesh. We're usually very comfortable with our version. So comfortable that we lost our sense of awe, wonder, and reverence for Him. He's more like us than we are like Him. He's committed to changing what we don't like that is around us, while leaving those things He might not care for within us alone. This is where we get back to the bad news of James 4:8. When He truly draws near, all our imaginary renderings of Him collapse. He'll refuse to fit into any of them. It will be Him as He really is, dealing with us as we really are. Good news.....bad news.....desperately needed news. May we receive the news with all our being.

Blessings,

Pastor O

Shakings

 After this prayer, the meeting place shook, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. Then they preached the word of God with boldness.  Acts 4:31......"The church from the Upper Room invaded the world. Now the church from the supper room is invaded by the world......Before God shakes the earth, may He shake the pulpits." Leonard Ravenhill....."The world will never believe in a religion in which there is no power." Samuel Chadwick

We tend to think of a church that is moving in power as one that is showing great and miraculous works, where wondrous things are happening and to which people flock to be a part of or at least witness. That can certainly be an element of it, but I think His power being displayed is often more subtly displayed but just as mighty in effect. It begins with the church on its knees, crying out to God. Someone said that the church has many men and women who pray, but few men and women of prayer. And the one who fills the pulpit must not only be among them, but a leader in prayer among them. Ravenhill said that the preacher who touches God in prayer touches the hearts of the people who hear the prayer. May He raise up a generation of preachers who do just that.

There is much crying out for an awakening, a revival, and I count myself among them. Yet what exactly would be the fruits of such a move of God? Miracles? Large crowds? Excitement? Such may accompany a move of His Spirit, but they would not be the center of it. It would be the witness of lives transformed from the inside out. It would be the production of lives that understand that the "greater things" Jesus promised we would do were not what would bring applause and notoriety, but simply meant living a life that mattered and spoke a powerful witness of the message of His transforming grace. It means a church and people where His love is freely demonstrated and given. Someone said that it was not the miracles that took place for which the early church was known, but the great love they displayed toward each other and to a surrounding world that was often hostile to them. It meant a church and people that freely gave of themselves, who freely forgive one another, and who made no distinction concerning social or economical position. These are all marks of a church that moves in power. These are the marks of a church that has not only been shaken by the Holy Spirit, but one that in the Holy Spirit, shakes the world around it. 

What would happen in your church, my church, if when we next come together, God shook us as He did so regularly in the early church? Do we even expect that? Do we even want it? How disruptive would that be? How much of our agenda would not be accomplished? How inconvenient would it be to our after church plans? It is all those things and more that keep such a move of God from taking place. Meanwhile we go on praying for an outpouring of His Spirit, but an outpouring that we control. A move that changes what we wish to be changed around us, but doesn't touch or change anything within us. God forgive us. May it be that He lays hold of us as He never has before, and then lays about us in His Spirit as He never has before. May we cease just being people who pray and become a praying people. May He awaken us from the inside out. A lot of shaking must happen before that can take place. Let the shaking begin. In you, and in me.

Blessings,
Pastor O

Perishing

 That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet this is no cause for shame, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day.  2 Timothy 1:12....."It's not important that we understand every detail of our lives but that by faith we yield control of every detail to the Spirit." Patrick Morley

I wrote in my prayer journal this morning, "May we bring all of our unknown unto the One who is known." We can only do this if we actually know Him. Just as we can only live out the truth of 2 Timothy 1:12 if we know Him. It is a great tragedy and blemish upon our witness that so many of us who inhabit seats in multiple worship services each week, don't really know our God. We don't because we don't know His Son, which in turn means we don't have any real knowledge of His Spirit. Vance Havner once said that today's churches are filled with believers who have never been made disciples. We are believers who do not know the One we say we believe in.

There are positive signs of change though. Just in my small circle of influence I have had people say to me, "I have no real prayer life and spend little if any time in the Word.....but I want that to change." Most don't know how that can change. It's easy for us to say "just dig into His Word and set up definite times of prayer." That's what I did, but if it was all that I had done, I doubt I would have gotten far into my knowledge and relationship with Him. I was fortunate to have been surrounded with people who spoke into my life and helped nurture me in my walk. It started with a pastor who took an interest in a young man fresh out of the world and with the "aroma" of the world still upon him. It continued with professors and pastors that He brought into my life during my years of study for the ministry. The reality is that my walk has always been centered on prayer and time in His Word, but equally upon the mentors and influencers that He brought into my life. They were willing to teach, and I was willing to learn. They showed me a Jesus I wanted to know more, as well as a  Jesus who deeply wanted to be known. 

I think the problem in the church today is two-fold; the hunger of the average believer for Him is not deep. At the same time, the desire of the church, particularly those charged with seeing to the spiritual welfare of their people, is also not deep. I think the greater lack lies with church leadership. John Eldredge said, "I want to know Jesus. The real Jesus." I don't think we're presenting "the real Jesus" in much of the Body these days. We either present a Christ who is nothing but warmhearted, totally accepting love, and who requires very little of us. Or, a Jesus who is harsh, demanding, and doles out His forgiveness and mercy very slowly. Neither is real. A.W. Tozer said, "The God worshipped in many places in America today is simply a God of the imagination....not the God of the Bible." In the modern church, we are interested in drawing crowds, but not so much in presenting the "real" Jesus and the real God. In "doing discipleship." If we do, we risk some leaving our churches, because the real Jesus does make demands, does call us to a cross life, and a life of sacrifice and denial. We prefer a Jesus that allows us to seek His blessings but not His presence. A Jesus who is useful, but not a Jesus who demands total surrender.

As I said, I'm seeing signs of this changing. I'm seeing churches making real discipleship a priority. The need to do this is beyond desperate. In the OT, Scripture says that the Israelites were "perishing for lack of knowledge." I believe it is even more so today. May we see Him raise up a generation who can proclaim with Paul, "I know who I have believed." It must begin with His raising up a generation of disciple makers. Will you be one of them?

Blessings,
Pastor O

Pearls

"For our momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison,"  2 Corinthians 4:17

In our humanity, we can see little good in suffering. That's why we go to such great lengths to avoid it. That's understandable, but the Father would have us learn and grow through that which we suffer. He does not put it upon us, but He will lead us into it. If we will trust Him, press on with Him, He will bring forth what He promises in the above Scripture, " a weight of glory far beyond all comparison." His Word says He will bring us forth as gold, or for the purposes of this writing, pearls. Pearls of great price.

A pear is formed in an oyster when a grain of sand embeds itself in the soft flesh of the oyster. This bring about an acute irritation to that flesh. In response, it begins to wrap that granule in a combination of salvia and calcium. Eventually, in a process that can take as much as three years, a pearl is produced. That which began as pain produces a pearl of great and lasting beauty. He will do the same in us with even our deepest sufferings and sorrow. There is a classic work titled, "Don't Waste Your Sorrows," which I read in a time of great sorrow and suffering in my life. I determined I would not waste mine. I can only hope that pearls have been produced in my life. He, and others will have to determine that.

Sheila Walsh tells the story of a little girl with a severe reading disability. One of the ways her mother sought to encourage was to tell her how pearls were formed, and that God was working through her hardship and pain to produce them in her life. Later on, the mother went past her daughter's room as she tried to come to grips with a reading assignment. She could hear her daughter's expressions of frustration, and with a mother's heart, sought to comfort her. She was taken back by the young girl's reply; "It's OK mom. I'm making pearls." The little girl, even at her age, was grasping the truth of 2 Corinthians 4:17. God was bringing her forth as gold, and for His glory and her good. In our suffering, He enters into it with us, but in it, He seeks to bring us forth as His pearls. Pearls that display His glory to an onlooking church and world. Yet the pearls will not come forth unless we yield ourselves to His process. The life that seeks to give Him glory will also give Him, and a world in desperate need of them, pearls. Pearls that give Him glory and hope to the hopeless and despairing who are walking through their own sufferings and sorrows. 

None of us will ever look for suffering, and He doesn't expect that we should, but we will suffer. Jesus said that we would, that suffering would be a part of life. It was a central feature of His life. He called Himself "the Man of Sorrows." His ultimate suffering was upon the cross, but it was also His ultimate means of glorifying His Father through His death and resurrection. His sacrifice brought forth the ultimate pearl of great price. It still does to this day. Will ours?

Our own trials, hardships, and tears will either bring forth bitterness, anger, and other destructive effects to our spiritual and emotional lives, or......they will bring forth pearls. As the mother was with her daughter in her own pain, so is He with us. As we walk even through the valley of the shadow of death, can we trust Him, believe Him, press on in and with Him, knowing that as we do, we proclaim His glory and......we produce His pearls. Will we be His pearls? What have your hard places produced in you? What are they producing now?

Blessings,

Pastor O 

Location

 "Then the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?” Genesis 3:9...."It's 'location, location, location.' Where am I in relation to Him right now?"  Ann Voskamp

Adam and Eve had sinned, disobeying God, partaking of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. With their disobedience, sin entered the human race and all of creation. They instantly knew they had sinned and their first impulse, as it always is in relation to sin and a holy God, was to hide. God, who knew exactly what had happened and exactly where they were, came looking for Him. He didn't need to know where they were. He needed them to know where they were. Where were they in relation to Him right now? It's a fitting question for each of us.

We are born separated and disoriented to Him. We were created for fellowship and intimacy with Him. The presence of sin in our lives has broken that connection, and nothing we can do of our own efforts can restore it, though so many have tried mightily to do so. All other faith systems provide some path of works and self effort to connect with Him. You must work your way to Him. All those efforts are futile. Only the Christian faith shows forth a God who does not seek to have you come to Him, but who has come to us in His Son, Jesus Christ, and all that exercise true and believing faith in Him, have the barrier of sin broken. We are forgiven, cleansed, freed, and restored. If this has not happened with you, please, my friend, it must, for as Jesus said, "No one comes unto the Father except through Me." 

Yet even those who have entered into this saving, restorative relationship with Him can become disoriented to Him. Open sin and disobedience will certainly cause that, but I think the more common and subtle way it happens is by simply becoming more preoccupied with that which is not Him, than He Himself. We can seek the good things of life over the best that is Him. We can become overly busy or stressed. We can pursue our dreams more than we pursue His dreams for us. We can become captive to destructive attitudes and behaviors that quench His Spirit and diminish His presence. I think more than any of these, we just become lazy in our relationship with Him and slowly have a gulf develop between us. We are not so much hiding as drifting. A drifting that will eventually lead to destruction if not corrected. We lose sight of where we are in regards to where we once were. In the Book of Revelation, Jesus warned the church in Ephesus of how far they had drifted from Him and how their love had grown cold. They were doing all the right things but their hearts were not alive in His. He told them to go back and do again the first works of love and devotion. Might it be that many of us need to do the same? Where is our location to Him right now?

Realtors say that location is everything. How much more is that true in the spiritual realm? Jesus knows right now where you really are. Do you? If you are trapped in the darkness of not knowing Him, you can, as I saw someone say, simply cry out, "Jesus, come get me!" He will come, and you will have the choice of receiving Him or rejecting Him, but He will come. If you are one who simply has drifted from Him, perhaps far from Him, you can cry out with those same words. He will come, and He re-orient you to Himself. Anyone who has been spun about for any real length of time knows the resulting imbalance and disorientation we feel. Life has a way of spinning us about and doing that same thing to us spiritually. The difference is, physically, we can just be still and all around us stops spinning. Not so in the spiritual realm, because it is we who are spinning. Only the Lord can make things balanced again. Do you need that today? All you need do is call out, "Jesus, come get me!"

Blessings,
Pastor O

The Broken

 For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”  Luke 19:10....."Don't fear broken things and places, for its where He'll do a new thing." Ann Voskamp

Luke 19:10 has long been a precious verse to me. Precious because of how real and true it has been in my life, and in the lives of so many others. Precious because of how He has worked its truth and power into my life. It has always seemed to me that no one was more lost, broken, cut off, than me, and yet He came. He laid hold of me. Made me whole and made me new. 

It is also precious to me because it not only was what He did in me personally, but what He did as concerns me. He saved and restored so much that I believed had been lost to me forever. Lost hope and lost dreams. Lost relationships and lost ministries. Lost future and lost identity. All had at one or another seemed lost beyond recovery, and yet they were not. There's a chorus from the 90's that goes, "He went into the enemy's camp and took back what he stole from me." There is great biblical truth in that, and it is exactly what He did for me, and countless others. I pray that truth has been experienced by you, and if not, that it will be. No one seeks, finds, and saves that and those that have been lost but Jesus. Believe upon Him to do so.

Voskamp's quote connected to Luke 19 is also powerful. Powerful because it is so true. We fear the broken places and things of this life. The devil convinces us that the broken place will be our permanent place. God wants us to know and experience that He is the God of new things, and He does these new things through His Son Jesus. Jesus said in His Word, "I make all things new." All things, even the most broken things. I can't explain how He does so, but He does so. He turns the dead end into a doorway. A doorway into a new place filled with new opportunities. He takes our shattered dreams and hopes and gives us new ones, better ones. 

There is an old saying that when one door closes, God will open another. He will, but sometimes we may spend some real time waiting for it to open. As someone said, "It can be hell in the hallway." It's there we must hold on, trust, and believe that the hallway will not be our lifeway. Voskamp says that "faith gives thanks in the middle of hard stories." It can do so because it knows that the hard story is not the end of our story. He won't leave us in the hallway. 

Whatever you feel has been lost forever, trust Him, in ways only He can, to seek, save, and redeem it. He knows where you are, and He knows what has happened. He made no promise that He will not keep. Hold to it, and experience His making all things new in you, and even around you. He is faithful.

Blessings,
Pastor O

Nuggets

 I wanted to share a few nuggets of truth from my prayer journal today. I hope they speak to you.

"The level at which we're willing to be honest with God is the level at which we'll trust Him." Sheila Walsh I have so often preached and taught the Scripture, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not unto your own understanding, and He will direct your path." Yet, so many never seem to be able to live it out. I think the central reason is our inability to live out what Walsh says in the above quote. We're not really honest with Him. Not really willing to come clean with Him. As a result, we never really are honest with ourselves either. Nor do we come clean with ourselves. Because of this, our trust levels in Him are low. We never achieve more than a shallow faith. We may pray, but so much of our prayer is just repetition. We say the same things in different ways. We talk around things with Him. We rarely if ever talk directly to Him. We never enter into His depths, and we never truly know what it is to trust Him. We give lip service to it, but nothing more. For all of us, isn't it time, past time, to truly be honest and open with Him? Isn't it time to launch out into the deep things of what it is to trust Him and know Him? He calls us to launch out into the deep. How much longer will we ignore His call?

"We were never meant to build an identity. We were meant to receive it." Michelle Cushatt....Starting in the 60's, and growing ever stronger was a movement for people to "find themselves." It seems they didn't know who they were so they embarked on a journey to discover who they really were. As a result, husbands and wives often left their families on this journey of self-discovery. People quit jobs, left professions, even abandoned the church, all with the hope of discovering who they really were and what their identity really was. All the while the answer was before them in Jesus Christ. His Word is filled with the Father's and the Son's words addressing who we really are and who we were created to be. Scripture says that He knew us even before we were in our mother's womb, before even the creation of the world. Our true identity will never be found in a journey that centers upon self. It will be found in a heart that seeks Him. As we discover who He is, we will discover who we are. Paul wrote a great deal on what our inheritance in Christ is, of the depth of the riches to be found in Him. St. Augustine said that our hearts will never be at rest until they find their rest in Him. The identity seekers who seek their identity apart from Him will never find anything but emptiness if they have never discovered Him. We may fill our lives up with an abundance of counterfeits, but all they do is leave us hungering for more. C.S. Lewis said in effect, if we find in ourselves a hunger which nothing in this world can satisfy, then perhaps we must realize that we were made for another world; His. As you read this, do you know who you are....really? We will never make a true identity for ourselves, but in Christ, we can receive it. May we each receive its fullness now.

"Success is doing what we're called to do and having peace there." Anthony Evans I can't think of any Scriptures that specifically promise us success. At least, not success as we define it. Jesus never promised us position, possessions, or power, at least not the world's kind of power. The book of Hebrews, in speaking of the heroes of faith, only mentions a handful of names, and then points to the multitudes who also displayed heroic faith, but are never named. They're unknown. Anonymous. The world has forgotten them, indeed if they ever knew them. Their names are lost to the church, and lost to us. I can remember when I first came into the faith some of those who were highly visible in the Body of Christ, but who now, forty plus years later, have passed on, and for the most part, are forgotten. We are destined for a life of futility if we measure success by the world's standards. One day, we will stand before Him, and as Alicia Britt Chole has written, He will not ask us if we were appropriately recognized and sufficiently applauded. He will ask if we loved people to Him. If we lived for what He died for. If people around us saw Him, and not us. If we are hungry for this kind of lifestyle, He will grant it. He will be blessed and pleased by our desire for it. We will be doing what He has called us to, and we will have peace there, and that will be enough. That will be a success.

Just a few nuggets. Receive them as He would have it for you.

Blessings,

Pastor O

The Mystery

 "I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings." I Corinthians 9:23......"In the mission of God, you can never sacrifice more than you'll receive.....Remember that when it's time to give, pray, or go. The mystery of the mission is waiting to be discovered."  Chris Tiegreen

Jesus said that in this world we would encounter suffering. We live in a fallen world where death reigns, albeit temporarily. We will not be exempt from its effects. This will be especially true for those who have given their life to Him, though many think that they are. Suffering has no place in their belief system, which is strange as it certainly had a place in Christ's. And He uses it for His glory and our good.

If you have set your heart to follow wherever He leads, you can be certain that He will lead you into the "valley of the shadow of death." There will be pain there. Sometimes deep pain. We must remember though that it is only the shadow death. He is the Lord of Life and He will not permit what is in that valley to destroy us or cause us permanent harm. Moreover, if we will trust Him in that valley, He will take us ever deeper into the mystery of who He is, and who we are in Him.

The Father has always said of Himself that He is covered in mystery, but it is a mystery He means for us to unravel and discover ever more about. A great part of eternity will be about going deeper and deeper into His mystery, but the discovery begins now, and part of the mystery is that He chooses to show Himself most clearly to us in the place of darkness. Likely that's because in the dark, we can see little of anything, which makes for a perfect opportunity to see Him. If the eyes of our heart are searching for Him, then He will use the darkness to blind us to all that has distracted us, kept us from seeing Him, so that our heart eyes may now see the One that all the world's darkness cannot keep us from seeing, if our hearts truly desire to.

The people who have most impacted my life for Him are those who have suffered the most for Him. The riches of what they discovered of Him in the darkness and pain were treasures for them to share. Treasures that they could not have known in any other way. Someone once asked if we were leaving "footsteps worth following." I have found that the footsteps that have been the most precious to me have been those left by those that have traveled through the valley of the shadow of death. Friends and mentors who followed Him onto mission fields where their faithfulness cost the loss of a child or a mate. Others who, in walking the path of pastoral ministry, suffered hardships that tested the very foundation of their faith, but who emerged stronger and more in love with Him than ever. This is the great mystery. Our enemy, the devil, would have us renounce Him due to the pain, but it was the pain that drove us into His arms, His life, and His love. It was there that His mystery was, and is revealed.

To follow Him is to be a life mission, but the mission is not to accomplish something or reach a goal or achieve a result. That may be a part of it all, but the crux of the mission is to know Him in the deepest levels of intimacy. To unravel the mystery of a Father God who longs for His children to know Him. This will be costly. It won't happen along sunshiney paths. It happens in what one called "the shadowlands, where light and darkness clash." Scripture tells us that He often comes near to us "covered in darkness," and in Exodus, it's written that Moses "entered into the darkness, where God was." Darkness isn't darkness to Him, and if we will cling to Him, we will discover and know what He longs for us to know, but few of us ever do.

The great writer and believer Francis Shaeffer said, "Modern Christians are so committed to personal peace and affluence that they never get to really know God." They never even begin to discover the depths of holy mystery He means to reveal to us. The pathway is frightening to our eyes of flesh, but not so to the spiritual eyes of our heart. May we not fear the mystery that is our God, for in that mystery is a love and a life beyond all that we ever believed possible. Let us enter in, no matter how daunting the way appears.

Blessings,
Pastor O