Hosanna in the Highest

"O God, be thou exalted over my possessions. Nothing of earth's treasures shall seem dear unto me if only Thou art glorified in my life. Be Thou exalted over my friendships. I am determined that Thou shalt be above all, though I must stand deserted and alone in the midst of the earth. Be Thou exalted above my comforts. Though it mean the loss of bodily comforts and the carrying of heavy crosses I shall keep my vow made this day before Thee. Be Thou exalted over my reputation. Make me ambitious to please Thee even if as a result I must sink into obscurity and my name be forgotten as a dream. Rise, O Lord, into Thy proper place of honor, above my ambitions, above my likes and dislikes, above my family, my health and even my life itself. Let me decrease that Thou mayest increase, let me sink that Thou mayest rise above. Ride forth upon me as Thou didst ride into Jerusalem mounted upon the humble little beast, a colt, the foal of an ass, and let me hear the children cry to Thee, `Hosanna in the highest.'" --A.W. Tozer prayer from The Pursuit of God

Fighting Sin

Jared Wilson has an awesome post on his blog today, which includes an excerpt from his upcoming book. It centers on fighting your sin. I pray we would all do this. Below are some of the statements from his blog, but I encourage you to click here to read the whole thing.

"With the power of God's love and the message of the cross, stiffen your back, hold your head up high, and take a machete to the sin that entangles."

"Make bloodthirsty war with the sin in you. Watch for it, search it out, assassinate it with the word of God."

It is time for war!

Definition of a Trader

Longing For The Word

Philip Nation posted this video at Ed Stetzer's website a couple of days ago. May we never take lightly the blessing of God's word to us and may our hearts desire it as these people do.

Please watch this video. You can read Philip Nation's post about it here.

My Eye Sees You

“I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. ‘Hear, and I will speak; I will question you, and you will make it known to me.’ I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” Job 42:2-6

This passage comes after Job had been questioned by God for the three previous chapters. We all need to get to this point. Where we are broken and we realize that we can’t understand everything about God and his wisdom and power and plan. I believe it was in Skye Jethani’s The Divine Commodity where he talked about the fact that we have tried to perfect knowing God and that we have lost the mystery of God. We have forgotten that there are things about him that we can never grasp and it is foolish to pretend that we do.

The beautiful thing about this passage is that it is when Job makes this confession and repentance that God restores all that Job had lost and more. Job had finally learned what God wanted him to get out of the trials. Job had gone from merely knowing God from what he had heard about him to actually seeing the true nature of God and the mystery that surrounds Him.

I pray we will all come to the day where we can say to the Father: “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you;”

Pursuit of God

I am currently reading The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer. I highly recommend reading it. This is a short book that is so deep. I am only 1/3 of the way through and I can already tell this will be a book that I read again. Here are a couple of statements that I really liked from the first few chapters.

“The world is perishing for lack of the knowledge of God and the Church is famishing for want of His Presence. The instant cure of most of our religious ills would be to enter the Presence [of God] in spiritual experience, to become suddenly aware that we are in God and that God is in us. This would lift us out of our pitiful narrowness and cause our hearts to be enlarged.”

“The Man who has God for his treasure has all things in One. Many ordinary treasures may be denied him, or if he is allowed to have them, the enjoyment of them will be so tempered that they will never be necessary to his happiness. Or if he must see them go, one after one, he will scarcely feel a sense of loss…”

And the last thoughts I will share come from the Chapter titled The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing. This is an amazing chapter that centers on the story of God testing Abraham with Isaac.

“Things have become necessary to us, a development never originally intended. God’s gifts now take the place of God, and the whole course of nature is upset by the monstrous substitution.”

“And if we are set upon the pursuit of God He will sooner or later bring us to this test…So we will be brought one by one to the testing place, and we may never know when we are there. At that testing place there will be no dozen possible choices for us; just one and an alternative, but our whole future will be conditioned by the choice we make.”

Wartime Simplicity

I finished reading the new John Piper book titled Think: The Life of the Mind and the Love of God. In an appendix in the back he shares a sermon of his that was on the Supremacy of Christ in Christian learning. In that sermon he discusses some of the things their church and seminary believe and teach. I wanted to share one of the statements that was on consumerism and materialism.

Desiring to be rich is suicidal, and commending that desire as part of the Christian life is therefore worse than murderous because not just this life but the next is at stake. Followers of Jesus should feel a magnetic pull on their lives toward wartime simplicity so that they may be lavish in giving and alleviate as much suffering as they can--especially eternal suffering. --John Piper

"Wartime simplicity." In the great wars of history citizens have been called on to make every sacrifice they can to help the cause and kingdom. Shouldn't this be how we live now? Sacrificing whatever is necessary for the sake of others and for the Kingdom of God.

God use us and all we have to bring you glory.

Abusing This World

I loved this quote. It goes with what I posted on Monday.

Brethren, if you are ever so taken up with any enjoyment that it takes away your love for prayer or for your Bible, or that it would frighten you to hear the cry: "The Bridegroom cometh:" and you would say: Is He come already? then you are abusing this world. Oh! sit loose to this world's joy: "The time is short." --by Robert Murray M'Cheyne

May we see when this is happening in our lives!

Maybe You Will Lose Control

I read this commentary post from John Piper today titled Beware: The Bible is about to threaten your smartphone focus. It has a banner at the top of the post that says, “Man shall not live by facebook alone.” I am copying the full text here in this post because it is an awesome reminder.

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Beware: The Bible is about to threaten your smartphone focus by John Piper
Are apps a threat to God-focus? Yes. But it works both ways. Fight fire with fire.

If you are reading your Bible on your computer or your smartphone or your iPad, the presence of the email app and the news apps and the Facebook app threaten every moment to drag your attention away from the word of God.

True. Fight that. If your finger offends you, cut it off. Or use any other virtuous violence (Matthew 11:12) that sets you free to rivet your soul on God.

But don’t take mainly a defensive posture. Fight fire with fire.

Why should we think of the Facebook app threatening the Bible app? Why not the Bible app threatening the Facebook app, and the email app, and the RSS feeder, and the news?

Resolve that today you will press the Bible app three times during the day. No five times. Ten times! Maybe you will lose control and become addicted to Bible! Again and again get a two-minute dose of life-giving Food. Man shall not live by Facebook alone.

I’m serious. Never has God’s voice been so easily accessible. The ESV app is free. The Olive Tree Bible Reader app is free. And so are lots of others. Let the Bible threaten your focus. Or better: Let the Bible bring you back to reality over and over during the day. –John Piper commentary posted on www.desiringGod.org
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I don’t have a smartphone, because clearly I am not smart enough for one, nor do I have a facebook account, because clearly I am too hip for facebook. But I do have obsessions that I get my fix from and they are blogs. Now almost all of the blogs that I read regularly are focused on faith and are of great benefit to me in terms of my faith and they help me grow in Christ which I desperately need. However, why go to a person’s commentary on it, when I can go directly to the source. I have a bible as close as I have my computer. Shouldn’t the Word of God trump one person’s opinion of the Word of God?

So here is what I have decided. Before I go and check the blogs I read for updates, I am going to open my Bible and ground myself in God’s word. Will you join me? Before you open facebook or check your twitter updates or read blogs or turn on the television (and the list can go on forever) will you open up the word of God and see what He has to say?

I loved these two lines from Piper:

“Maybe you will lose control and become addicted to Bible!”

“Let the Bible threaten your focus. Or better: Let the Bible bring you back to reality over and over during the day.”

Father, be our strength as we try to control all obsessions outside of our obsession with you. We know that in Christ we have the power to do this and it is in his name and for your glory that we pray this.

The Whisper of God

And he said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the LORD.” And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold there came a voice to him… --1 Kings 19:11-13

The Whisper of God. How can we hear it as busy as we keep ourselves? We run from one thing to another. All the while wondering why God doesn’t speak. Maybe the problem is that He has been speaking be we just haven’t been able to hear Him. There is too much noise and too many distractions for us to hear what He has been saying. I have been praying for direction from God on a couple of things and I think really what I want is just a loud booming voice from Heaven. And He may choose to use that to give me the answer I seek. But I fear that with my busy life that I have chosen, I have unintentionally been drowning out His whispers. Maybe if I will get rid of all of the distractions in my life and draw close to Him, I will hear His will, soft but clear.

Father, speak to us. Speak your truth and your will into our hearts. Prepare our hearts and minds so that we may receive it and know that it is from you. In Christ’s Name and for your Glory.

Love Usually Involves Touching

“I have sometimes wondered why Jesus so frequently touched the people he healed, many of whom must have been unattractive, obviously diseased, unsanitary, smelly…Jesus’ mission was not chiefly a crusade against disease but rather a ministry to individual people, some of whom happened to have a disease. He wanted those people, one by one, to feel his love and warmth and his full identification with them. Jesus knew he could not readily demonstrate love to a crowd, for love usually involves touching…The further we remove ourselves from personal connections with people in need, the further we stray from the ministry Jesus modeled for us.” Paul Brand in Fearfully & Wonderfully Made

If the Christ who lives in us lived a life that associated and reached out to the sick, poor, and social outcasts; why do Christians often times disassociate ourselves from these people? So often we will be quick to throw some extra cash towards a need, but how often do we throw ourselves toward that need? When will we touch as Christ touched and love as Christ loved?

God change our hearts and open our eyes. We need you to start this work in us. In Christ's Name and for your glory.

My Satisfaction

When I fed them, they were satisfied; when they were satisfied, they became proud; then they forgot me. –Hosea 13:6

I used this verse in our bible class a few weeks ago. It keeps coming to mind. All that we have comes from God. Even the ability to take our next breath lies in his hand. Should he choose to stop it, we are finished. He has given us life and taken care of us. And the crazy part is that man’s response when we become satisfied is that we become proud and forget where it came from. Even the children of God do this. That is who is being talked about in the Hosea passage.

Is this something that is evident in your life? I know it has been in my life. Don’t be satisfied with the things of this world or the pleasures of this world. Be satisfied with the one who gave them. If we find our satisfaction in God and God alone, we will be able to rejoice in all situations.

This is what Paul was explaining when he said

“I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.” --Philippians 4:12

What is the secret that Paul mentions in verse 12? He answers that in Verse 13.

“I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.” --Philippians 4:13

The secret is that we must cling to Christ. Paul is saying he can face any situation because He is finding satisfaction in Christ. If we will do that, God will not be able to say as he did in Hosea, "I took care of their needs but then they forgot me."

Marriage

Below I have attached a segment from one of John Piper’s sermons which is titled Lionhearted and Lamblike: The Christian Husband as Head. He has some great words for husbands and wives. I have told Sarah Grace that I want us to go back and listen to or watch(which you can do both for free on www.desirggod.org) some of his sermons on marriage. I haven’t picked which sermons we are going to start with, but if anyone is interested, we would love to encourage you to do the same thing and maybe we could have an online discussion either through the blog or e-mail about these sermons. If you want to check out any of John Piper’s sermons you can click here to see a list of subjects and click through to find a topic you are looking for. I am encouraged regularly by his words and would encourage you to check them out also.

Children of God

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received that Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.--Romans 8:14-17

Isn’t it a beautiful thing that we are called children of God? Adopted by a holy God in spite of how unholy we are. Because of this adoption we are heirs with Christ. We deserve separation and eternal punishment but God has chosen to adopt us. I hope we can cling to this truth today, and everyday.

Our identity is now in Him, because we are His.

Headship

Awesome reminder from John Piper of what men should be doing for our families.

Accept Him??

One Year Anniversary

One year ago today, against wise advice, I typed out my first post on this blog. My goal was that I could create a place where we could discuss and debate our faith and help each other grow. To those who have read and commented, Thank you! Because I have grown this year and our online discussions here helped me do that. God has opened my eyes to so many things over the last year.

One of those things is my constant need to Treasure Him and Christ above all other things.

“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” --Matthew 13:44

When I seek Him fully and Treasure Him fully, I will see and know Him clearly and know his will. So for those of you who stuck with me for the first year, I ask you join me in another year of trying to know and love God more each day. Let us be amazed by the King of Glory each day and let us cling to Him with everything that we face this year.

This video is one I put in a post almost a year ago, but I love what it has to say. I get chills every time I listen to the words. He is our king and our treasure!

I Want To Want Thee

In a culture that is pushing the American Dream and success that is centered on more things and more experiences, our prayer should be this:

Incline my heart to your testimonies, and not to selfish gain! Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways. --Psalm 119:36-37

I was reading through part of Psalm 119 this morning and when I got to those verses, I was blown away. We need to pray this daily and pray that our hearts will continue to long for Him more than anything this world has to offer.

I liked the way A.W. Tozer stated the idea of us needing to long for God more in his book The Pursuit of God.

O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need of further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, that so I may know Thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me. Say to my soul, "Rise up, any love, my fair one, and come away." Then give me grace to rise and follow Thee up from this misty lowland where I have wandered so long. In Jesus' Name, Amen.

God, as the author of Psalm 119 asked we also pray that you turn our eyes from the worthless things of this world and that we will find true life only in your ways God. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

This Wonderful Gift

We read The Jesus Storybook Bible by Sally Lloyd-Jones to our kids. It is awesome. Every story points to Christ. The book ends with a paraphrase of John 1:12-13. I wanted to share it.

For anyone who says yes to Jesus
For anyone who believes what Jesus said
For anyone who will just reach out to take it
Then God will give them this wonderful gift:

To be born into
A whole new life
To be who they really are
Who God always made them to be--
Their own true selves--
God's Dear
Child.
--Sally Lloyd-Jones

Day By Day

2011! The new year! I prayed part of my resolution to God last night after the ball had dropped. That prayer was that I would try to walk closer to God and to His will with each day I am given. Instead of trying to focus on where I want to be by the end of this year, I decided to try to focus on my resolution day by day. I want to draw closer to God each day. I want to know Him more today than I did yesterday and more tomorrow than I do today.

That takes commitment to reading His word regularly. It also takes a constant prayer life, one that includes more time listening to what God is trying to say than it does me talking.

Today was step one. We read from Exodus chapters 14-16, where Moses is leading Israel out of Egypt through the Red sea and into the wilderness. They of course were complaining about this and Moses says these words...

"Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today." --Exodus 14:13

I need to hear those statements every day of my life! Every time I feel overwhelmed, or scared, or frustrated with life I need to cling to this verse. Don't be afraid of what you are facing! Stand firm in your faith! And see the salvation of the Lord which you were promised and which you have received in Christ Jesus.

I will probably forget this though. You will see me some time and think "Man he seems burned out, stressed out, or plum worn out." And if you do please remind me of this verse so that I can refocus and start clinging to God again. He is what we need in this new year!

May your new year be blessed with an overwhelming presence of the Almighty God! Join me as I work toward that.

Gospel On TV

It is amazing that every year at Christmas time, the good news of Jesus' birth is proclaimed in front of millions on TV through the Charlie Brown Christmas special. Let us pray that these words will sink in to non-believers enough that they will seek out a deeper understanding of the truths of Jesus Christ. God, may their hearts and minds be opened to the truth!

A Step Ahead Of The Devil

The other night at our Encounter service I opened my bible during the Communion time. It opened up to Matthew chapter 4. I just started reading there. There were a couple of things that hit me when I started reading...

And the tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread." But he answered, "It is written, "'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" Matthew 4:3-4

When I read Jesus' response the word "every" stuck out to me. "Every word that comes from the mouth of God." Do I do that? Live by every word that comes from the mouth of God. I feel like if we as believers were honest with ourselves we would have to say, we don't live by every word from God's mouth. We live by some words, the comfortable ones. The words of grace and forgiveness. We live by those and cling to those. But what about the rest? What about our call to die to everything and live for Christ? When will we be able to say as Paul did in Philippians 3, "Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ" instead of clinging to this world and just adding Jesus to it?

After thinking about the fact that I need to start clinging to every word and not just the comfortable words of God, I moved on to next few verses.

Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, "'He will command his angels concerning you,' and "'On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.'" Matthew 4:5-6

When I read this, It hit me that Jesus was a step ahead of the Devil. Go back to Jesus' first response, which says we are to live by "every" word that comes from God. Satan's temptation here comes with him taking a part of the word of God, not the whole word of God. I thought it was awesome that Jesus' first response addressed what Satan was about to do in the next temptation which is use part of the word of God to distort the truth.

Thank you God for opening my mind to what your Word has to say. May I live by and cling to EVERY word of yours and always use it to be a step ahead of the evil one of this world!

Remember

May our Christmas celebrations always focus on the gift of Love that we have been given.

Christmas Music

I heard about this on KSBJ yesterday morning and decided to see if I could find it online. The band at North Point Community Church borrowed IPhones and IPads and played Christmas music using instrument apps. I was really impressed and decided to share this. Hope you enjoy!

Roller Coaster Ride

Is that what your faith is like, a rollercoaster ride? I think back to youth camps during the summer or a big conference during the school year that I would attend, and I would get on fire for God. I would feel God speaking to me. I would know what he wanted me to do. I would go back to my life ready to take on the world for God. Then a few months later I would be back to my old self and the fire had kind of died out. Did that happen to you as well?

The reason I bring this up, is that I feel like this describes the life of many Christians, young, old, and somewhere in between. There are times that I feel overwhelmed with the presence of God in my life and I am on the spiritual equivalent to the highest peak of a rollercoaster, but then things happen and it drops off. Sometimes very rapidly and sometimes it is a gradual decline, but it always declines.

What causes it to happen? I know it isn’t God pulling away from me. I am the one that is pulling away from God. Either I am not reading my bible enough, or my prayer life is lacking, or the things of life have just distracted me. It is probably a combination of these and more.

I don’t want a faith that is like this and I don’t think that you want a faith like this either. When we are on fire for God, we feel His presence, hear His words, and are using the power that we have been given through Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit. When we are not on fire, we are relying on ourselves and we end up feeling lost and confused about where to go, what to do, and how to overcome the struggles and temptations of this life.

I had a conversation with someone a while back where I explained the peak that I had been on. I talked about feeling the presence of God in such an overwhelming way and hearing God speak for a couple of months. It was amazing to feel this way for several months at a time. I then explained that I hadn’t been feeling it as much lately and I was discouraged and I wanted to get back to that place. Their response was something to the effect of “Well you can’t feel like that always.” I disagree. I believe that everyday I can feel the presence of God in this manner as long as I am pursuing it. If I don’t pursue it, then I won’t feel that presence.

I think back to a statement that I heard from Pete Briscoe at the Right Now Conference last month. He talked about Paul being a Christ intoxicated man. I loved that statement! I believe that Paul lived out the rest of his life after his conversion clinging to the presence of God and Christ in his life. And that changed who he was and how he lived. I don’t believe his faith felt like a rollercoaster ride. If yours is, it doesn’t have to be. Let’s cling to Christ and stop having a faith that is full of highs and lows.