RELIGION

What dire offense from religious causes spring

What mighty contests arise from trivial things

What tearing doubt transpires from misunderstanding

What faith is lost in the heat of our own meandering

(Partly Pope)

I REACH FOR YOU

If you keep your passion hot

God will keep His presence close

God loves lovers

***

I reach for You

When things are good

Or when things turn bad

Whenever I am happy

Whenever I am sad

When I think I’m going under

 My heart knows this is true

I reach for You my Savior

I simply reach for You

PASS THE SALT PLEASE

Let me tell you why you are here.  You’re here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the GOD-FLAVORS of this earth.  If you lose your SALTINESS, how will people taste GODLINESS?  You will have lost your usefulness and will end up in the garbage, wasted. Here’s another way to put it: you’re here to be light, glowing brightly with the light of God’s love in your life, and bringing out the GOD-COLORS in the world.  If you hide your light, like money buried in the ground, how will people see God’s beauty manifested in His creation?  We are going public with this, as public as a city on a hill, so SHINE, SHINE BRIGHTLY!  Keep open house; be generous with your life by sharing the love of Jesus with others, you will prompt people to open up to God, our generous and loving Father in heaven. Jesus commanded us to go into the world – NO COCOONING -- love people, including our enemies -- NO COMBATIVENESS -- and to transform the world by making disciple’s -- NO CONFORMING. The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. We are the answer to Jesus’ prayer for workers in today’s harvest.  Our faithfulness in obeying the great commission, our compassion, our witness through a credible life and knowledge of the word of God, our determined purpose to bear fruit (plant spiritual seeds and water) and our total reliance on God to give the increase, will make us quite SALTY to the taste, just the way God loves us. (Ref: Matt. 5:13-16; 9:37; 25:18, The Message)

REGENERATION

My disposition of sin is my claim to my right to myself.  I am my own god.  I am not holy nor likely to be. I am doomed to failure because “self” rules.  But Jesus is the Regenerator, the one who can put into me His own heredity of holiness.  Regeneration means that Jesus can put into any person the holy disposition that is in Himself, and all the biblical standards He gives are based on “that” disposition: His teachings are for the life He puts into us.  The moral transaction on my part is to recognize my need and yield my will to His will, allowing the Holy Spirit to form Christ in me. Without holiness, without Christ formed in us, no one shall see God.  This is the crucified life.

ONELINERS TO LIVE BY

 * The cross is the signature of God, endorsing His new and final covenant with mankind.  * God tugs us toward His kingdom with cords of adversity while captivating us with His chains of love. * Truth is an arrow and the gate is narrow that it passes through.  (Bob Dylan) * When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die. (Bonhoeffer) * God cannot be to us the life of God without being the death of self. The fretful, greedy, fussy, self-centered, lustful, hateful “flesh-life” must die for the abundant life to live. * No one grows in the Lord nor in their capacity to serve the Lord unless they are pressed beyond measure. * All difficulties are within God’s purposes. * It is never the trial that makes us stronger. It is what we choose to do with it that strengthens us, so choose wisely. * We must drink deep of the word of God, for shallow draughts intoxicate the brain and drinking deep sobers one again. * Sometimes truth causes love to hurt. * We are so easily satisfied with lovers less wild. * Temptation’s response: In Christ I died, in His name I refuse. * Prayer is understanding what God wants to do, then asking Him to do it. * We need to hold all things of this life loosely, except Jesus, hold tight to Him. * God is our Sabbath – the day of rest is but a picture of Him.  * God builds by design – we are to be obedient to the blueprint. * My job is the relentless pursuit of who God has designed me to be. Anything else I do is superfluous.

You hold my breath in Your hands

And own all my ways

So I will glorify You

My soul gives You praise

HE LOVES ME

What kind of God

 Just takes us as we are

Paying the ultimate price

While ignoring what we are

And our innate inability

 To ever be anything better

***

Just as I am without one plea

But that Your blood was shed for me

In Your great love I come to see

How much You simply wanted me

***

In the great nursery rhyme of eternity

The end is fixed

For all the flower’s petals say

He loves me!