Patience with Each Other

"Do you know what he did to me!?"

"Did you hear about my job? She took it from me!"

"He cheated! I should have won!"

"She took the credit for what I did!"

All of us, at one point or another, are forced to deal with the hurt and disappointment of someone doing something against us that causes us pain. Whether it's done directly to us, or indirectly, it is always painful. But what does the Bible tell us about such things?

When we are hurt, offended, passed over, rejected, betrayed or just ignored, remember that Jesus suffered the same kinds of things. When we think of all He suffered, how can we moan and complain about what others are doing to us.

So remember, friend, that God's Word is clear. Be patient in suffering...especially when it is the result of what someone else has done.

God bless you, and we'll see you on Sunday!

A Lack of Exercise

When I look in the mirror these days I see a lot of evidence that I don't exercise nearly as much as I ought to. The simple fact of the matter is that I'm fat, and I need to shed a few pounds (or maybe many pounds...anyway...). But the problem is not just in how I look. When I fail to exercise there is a much bigger problem that comes into play...namely, my joints in my lower body become hard-pressed to do their job effectively. When I put extra weight on my knees, hips and ankles, I cause them to break down and deteriorate much faster than they would under normal conditions. So, thus, begins what I call the "vicious circle." I need to exercise to loose the weight. The more I exercise, the more of a pounding my joints take. The more of a pounding my joints take, the more sore they become. The more sore my joints are, the less I want to exercise. The less I exercise, the fatter I become. The fatter I become, the more weight I gain, making my joints more sore, causing me to exercise even less...and so on.

The reason I say this, is because I feel that we have a lack of exercise in the Body of Christ. As members of that Body, we tend to get lazy. We feel fat because, let's face it, here in America we haven't been forced to exercise at all when it comes to our faith. We say we have suffered persecution when are laughed at for talking about what the pastor said during his Sunday sermon. Or we are called "preacher man/woman" because we pray over our meal at lunchtime. But friends, that is not persecution. That's not the kind of persecution the majority of the church in other parts of the world face. Some face excommunication from their families and even death in the wake of choosing to follow after Jesus Christ.

Paul said, "I want to know Him (Jesus) and the fellowship of His sufferings" (Philippians 3:10-to read this whole chapter, click here). Why did Paul want to "fellowship" in the suffering of Jesus? Because in doing so, he began to realize just how much Jesus gave up for him. He began to realize just how much Jesus exercised for the purposes of being that perfect sacrifice so that we might have our sins forgiven, our debts covered and paid for.

Friends, we need to remember that Jesus' death, burial and resurrection give us strength to be disciplined enough to exercise each day through the reading of God's Word and prayer so that we might be lean, mean, spiritually strong fighting machines! And in that we should rejoice.

Comment and/or share with me how you keep in Spiritual Shape. And we'll see you on Sunday!

Words and Deeds

Okay, so this week, we will be in James 2:14-26.This passage of Scripture just happens to be one of my all time favorites for a number of reasons, but the biggest reason is that the message contained therein is so appropriate for the church in America in these last days. So often we are big on the talking about prosperity, God's love, and the all of the cushy benefits of following Christ. But the truth of the matter is that we are called to live broken lives, persecuted lives, lives that look more like Jesus in His sufferings than His majesty.

The fact of the matter, church, is that we are promised two things in this life as we follow Jesus. We are promised His majesty, but not here and now. We are promised His majesty when we see Him face to face in His glory in Heaven. That is the promise we have...His presence with us forever and ever.

Francis Chan has illustration where he pulls out a huge rope that goes on and on out the door of his church, and on the end of the rope that he is holding is a small one inch section colored red. And he makes this connection. The church in America is all about living in this one inch space, not realizing that the whole rest of the rope is ours to be with our Lord, to find our rest and to have our reward. The insignificant amount of time that we spend here on this blue ball called "Earth" is so short in light of eternity, and yet we live to make this short time more important and more comfortable than the rest of eternity.

Yes, we are promised peace and paradise and rest and reward, but not here...not now. That all comes in the future, and we can be assured of it.

The second thing we are promised as followers of Jesus Christ is trouble. Jesus said, "In this world you will have trouble..." Paul said in one place, "I want to know Christ and fellowship in His sufferings." To Timothy, he writes, "In fact, everyone (not some, or a few, but everyone) who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be (a guaranteed fact) persecuted." (emphases added)

Now look, I know that this isn't popular to say nowadays, and I know that this particular blog post won't bring people flocking to follow my posts, but I can't help it...it's true. And we have to remember, folks that as followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to suffer. And I'm not talking about, "Oh! The girls at school mock me because I've chosen to keep myself pure, and I'm still a virgin," or "The guys at work think I'm a prude because I don't laugh at their dirty jokes." No, I'm talking serious hatred for us because we have chosen to be identified with the King of kings. It's coming sooner than we think, so I want to challenge you as we get ready for this week's message:

Do your words and deeds match up? Are you living like you say you believe? If you aren't, then you need to take stock of what you are doing and saying, and then make sure they line up.

Comment below about a time that God had you suffer for doing what was right, or a time that you've seen someone else do it. And we will see you on Sunday!

Knowing God's Will

People tell me all the time that it is difficult to know what God's will for their lives is. But the fact of the matter is that there are only three things in the New Testament that specifically tell us what God's will is.

The first is found in 1 Thessalonians 4:3, where Paul tells us that "It is God's will that you should be sanctified...". He then goes on to explain what he means by that in the next 5 verses. He says that sanctification (while it is deeper than just this issue) begins with committing to sexual purity. God's will for you, Christian is that you should be sexually pure, avoiding the lusts of the body. When you come to think of it, if we can get a hold of our own passions, then we will find that much of the rest of life will take care of itself.

The second is found in 1 Peter 2 and verse 15, where Peter tells us "it is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish people." Basically what God is saying through Peter here is that He wants us to not only not do stuff, but to also do things that are good by His standards and not some arbitrary feeling or emotion that is coming from us. You see God's purpose for us is that we do things for Him. We aren't to just sit around waiting for His return, but we are to get to work. If you are a Christian, and you're breathing, then there's work for you to do my friend!

The last thing we'll mention today is found again in 1 Peter, but this time in chapter 3 and verse 17, where it says that it is God's will for you to suffer for doing good, if you suffer at all. But add 2 Timothy 3:12 (In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted), and suffering seems to be pretty certain for all of us. So let's make sure that when suffer, it's because we've done the right thing.

So God's will, as it is spelled out for us here in these three passages, tells us that we need to avoid sexual sin, get busy doing the work that God has for us to do, and then get ready to suffer for doing it. Now I know this isn't going to make me "Mr. Popular" today for saying these things, but it is a place for us to start doing God's will.

Now there is a lot more to God's will than just these three verses. In fact, if you read the entirety of the Scriptures then you'll have a better grasp on what God's will is for your life. But the truth of the matter is that God hasn't hidden His will from us. He wants us to know...that's why He gave us His Word. So read it, live it out and rejoice every day that you get to be counted among those who love Him and are called according to His purposes!

Feel free to make a comment (I'd really love to see some of those!) and we'll see you on Sunday!