More Than a Single Gulp

There’s a huge pond on one of my walking routes. The winter rains fill this pond to the point where the water covers a ski boat and a huge mound of tractor tires. As winter turns into spring and summer, the pond slowly dries up to where all that is left is the boat and the tires. Let me tell you, it’s not a pretty picture.
This describes the Sunday-morning-only Christian. This person comes to the Sunday service hoping to be filled through great music and an awesome message. By the time Sunday afternoon rolls around or Monday morning at the latest they’re already running dry. The peace and joy they felt on Sunday morning is going, going, gone.
An everyday faith requires drinking from the Word of God throughout your week, not just on Sunday. But, you’re not reading the Bible to check it off your to-do list, which is religion, to do a Bible study, or to understand everything you read. You’re reading to hear from Jesus in order to recognize His voice throughout the week during your everyday activities, which is a relationship.
If you’re experiencing Jesus only on Sunday, you’ll dry up like the pond and refresh no one, let alone yourself. Taking a drink throughout your week allows the Spirit to refill your pond every day where everyone can be refreshed, including yourself.

S“E”t Free Nowww

Deal With the Darkness Within

In the movie “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader” Aslan says to Lucy, “In order to defeat darkness out there you must defeat the darkness inside.”
The group was in an epic battle against evil; and yet, Lucy was fighting an even bigger battle within her. Lucy was not comfortable in the skin God gave her. She wanted to cast a spell to look like someone else, her sister, who in Lucy’s view was very beautiful. The spell offered her the beauty she craved. She would see her sister and not herself every time she looked into the mirror. This spell, however, only made way for the darkness to wreak greater havoc in her life.
This is true of all believers. We open ourselves up to the evil one’s schemes when we doubt the value God placed on us when He sent His Son to die for us. It’s at that moment of doubt, of comparing ourselves with others, when Satan shows up with our drugs of choice.
You can defeat him by stop running from who God made you. He determined the size of the jar that would hold His Spirit within us (2 Cor. 4:7). He determined the talents and gifts we’d have (Matt. 25:25; 1 Cor. 12:11). Our job is to listen to Jesus and use those talents when and where He wants us to use them (aka live with a Biblical worldview). When we do we will experience a sense of peace and security as we will be doing the “good works” He prepared for us to do (Eph. 2:10).

“S”et Free Nowww

When No is Good a Thing

What would happen if you didn’t trust Jesus when He says, “No,” to your request for victory right now? You’d probably never learn to stop returning to your vomit (see 9-10-12 blog). The Apostle Paul would have never learned to be strong despite being weak (2 Cor. 12:8-9). I’d still be one angry individual and wouldn’t have learned God’s process of changing a life, making healthy disciples, through living with a Biblical worldview. And friends of mine would have never chosen to stop drinking and various other drugs of choice.
We live in an instant society. We want everything right now without having to work for it; yet this mindset smacks up against the reality of a Biblical worldview. Believers are told in Philippians 2:12 “to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.” What is that work? A daily process of listening to and doing what Jesus says to do in every situation by faith. Trusting is hard work as it requires us to do what Jesus says to do even when it goes against the way we currently think, live and/or feel.
Victory is a daily choice to live with a Biblical worldview. Thank God He has the guts to tell us, “No” out of His great love for us.

Set Free No“W”ww

Leave the Barf/Folly Behind

My wife and I were watching our favorite TV show the other day. This particular episode was about a woman who had a gambling problem that landed her into a deep hole. The sad part about her situation was that she tried to get out of her predicament through more gambling, this time playing cards, which only made her already deep hole deeper. She was eventually rescued when her friends caught the “winner” cheating.
Her friends didn’t learn from her mistake, however, as at the end of the show they were about to place a bet on a certain horse. When she found out, she came in and threw their betting sheet into the fire. Her drug of choice almost destroyed her life and reputation. She learned and wasn’t going backwards.
This is the point of Proverbs 26:11, “As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.” I realize this is a graphic picture and verse, but it describes our reality to a “T”. Until we see our drugs of choice as vomit, we will keep going back to it over and over again. Until the woman saw the ugliness of her drug of choice, she wasn’t ready to tear up the horse betting sheet.
Where are you in the process of viewing your drug of choice – vomit or candy?

Se“T” Free Nowww

Heaven Based Security

When we understand and act upon who we are in Christ – children of God (Jn. 1:12) – even when times are tough our sense of well-being sky rockets. It’s as the Psalmist says, “Delight yourself in the LORD and He will give you the desires of your heart.” A research study that followed the winners of multi-million dollar jackpots reiterates this truth. This study “found that a year after the windfall, big lottery winners were generally less happy than before.”
A Christian website noted, “Trusting that God’s love is real and faithful offers a freedom unknown by even those with billions. Money can be lost overnight. Houses can burn. The stock market can crash. Yet, those who trust in God’s abounding love know that whatever happens, however scary the situation, everything will work out for great things. He clothes the lilies. He watches over the sparrows. He is good. When mountains can be tossed into the sea by a word, they lose much of their ability to cause stress. They become another way for God to show His wonderful power. What life could be happier than walking, child-like, hand-in-hand with the Creator of the Universe?”
“S”et Free Nowww