A brother in Christ corrected me the other day, admonishing me with Proverbs 26:17 after I'd brought up my thoughts on a conversation he'd had with another brother.
My first reaction was prideful; "I know I'm right. I was admonishing him. How dare he turn it back to me. Man, this guy is full of himself."
Then I thought about it some more, a little later on; "Ok, maybe he had a point. I'm still sure I'm right somewhere though. He's not 100% right."
God hasn't let it drop, however. I caught myself doing almost EXACTLY the same thing with someone else just a day later!
It's extremly interesting to me how God paused the second conversation just as I got started. He cut the call for just a couple of minutes immediately after I nailed my coffin on the subject.
That pause made me realize what I was doing and how dead on the earlier rebuke was. Praise God!
The result was that I immediately repented, called back, confessed what I found myself doing and apologized.
I wish I could take it all back but I can't. I also called and apologized to my other brother in Christ (involved in the second incident I began discussing) for butting in where I had no business, even though he had no idea what I'd done. (I hope that's not too confusing to follow.)
I say all this by no means to pat myself on the back. For from it, I'm ashamed of myself.
I say all this because I've just been reading Colossians and got so jazzed that I had to post the understanding that I've gained from it all.
Check it out:
Paul says in Col 2:2,3 that it's our goal to attain ALL of the wealth in Christ.
Basically, there is an account with an unlimited balance. We have full access to it, when we learn and know and live according to the truth of the Gospel; that is, Christ.
The funds in that account allow us to live in complete freedom, totally debt free; Everything always paid in full.
While engaged in my sin of meddling in other peoples affairs, I voluntarily cut off my access to that account and immediately began accumulating debt, as it were. I'm not saying that my salvation was in jeopardy, mind you, just that I was becoming a slave to sin once more, after having been so graciously freed from it.
By admonishing me and helping to free me from my sinful behavior, dwelling in dishonest behavior as opposed to dwelling in the truth, my brother did the equavalent of handing me a HUGE sum of gold in which to pay off the debt that I'd been accumulating.
He wasn't giving me the back of his hand, he was handing me his wallet!
I'm even more humbled now.
I thank the Lord for brothers and sisters in Christ that are willing to stand bold in his Word and admonish on Love.
Ever get asked that question? My answer or late has trended to "Actually, no. I don't."
I've noticed a particularly disingenuous trend of late in both the larger social culture of American life (read: the last election) as well as in my personal experience; people preambling a statement with "I believe..." or "I think..." or the WORST "I feel..."
Oy! I'm really beginning to dislike this in the extreme.
Something has been knawing at me for sometime now and I was finally put my finger while reflecting on a conversation that I had last weekend.
While I honestly do respect him, I had a conversation with a guy that I know doesn't like to read. He avoids it like the plague; Scripture, news, leisure, etc. There are simple one-syllable words that are unknown to him. And yet he proudly boasted to me that he's "opinionated".
What?!?!
How can ANYONE be opinionated about anything if they're ignorant? What on earth do you base your opinions on?!?! Audio-visual media? Are you serious? Do you have ANY clue how deeply flawed the current AV media is?! How deeply it skews a single subjective opinion?
As I've reflected on this I've begun thinking about how many conversations I've been involved in, even recently, where the person prefaced any statement they made with "I feel...", "I think..." or "I believe..."
They add the disclaimer, make their statement AND THEN NEVER OFFER PROOF OR SUPPORTING EVIDENCE!"
Wow! Think about that.
Think about what they're really saying. It's VERY personal: "If you disagree, then you must be against me because my word is clearly the authority here." "What? I'm the bad guy? You don't like me?"
A fundamental lesson in writing, at the elementary school level, is that all statements need to be backed up with supporting evidence. You HAVE to backup any statement that you make with either a convincing argument or supporting facts. Anything short of that is suspect in the extreme. Absolutely useless and uttered only be a fool.
There is no substitute for reading. None. Zero. Nada. Zilch.
I heard about something called "Median Living", in which you commit to living on the national median income (about$46k) and give the rest to the Lord.
In theory, I find it very exciting. In practice, I pray that God can give me wisdom and will.
Is there such a thing as an involuntary fast?
If God removes our prosperity (or at simply allows us to remove it from ourselves through bad habits/behavior) in order to humble us and turn our hearts, is that a fast too or something else? (rf. IS 58)
Mary hid in her heart the wonderful things told her about her child.
I'll bet she used that in tough times to get her through and continue in faith.
What an example!
Sometimes I can become alarmingly astounded by my hubris; at its sheer depth; at its utter blindness.
I realize, of course, that if you know me, I've shocked you to the core. "Hubris!?!? You?!? Fie on't, good sir, fie!"
Having grown up in the brilliant white heat of Duran Duran, Def Leppard, Motely Crue, AC/DC, Survivor, Loverboy, Van Halen, White Snake, Queensryche, et al. under the warming but fading comfort of Sabbath, Zeppelin, Styx, Skynyrd, Bread, Clapton, Hendrix, Dylan, Joplin, The Dead, et al.
I'd like to think that I'm just the epitome of clever and hip;
All children, let alone my own, would do well to humbly and happily 'sup at my feet as I regal them with stories of my rock-bred youth and seek to edify them on the oh so many inerrant reasons that the "music" of their interest is truly not where it's at, nor even halfway to intelligence. What a waste they've involved themselves in.
Can I get an amen?
Saturday evening I spent some time with "my grandfather and his friends". I had the opportunity to relax downstairs in my garage with a really good cigar (an Arturo Fuente Hemingway, if you must know), my favorite beverage and Pandora Radio (an internet radio thingy. Very cool.)
As I sat relaxing and staring into the starry sky, enjoying the smoke and silk, I sat back and proceeded to get an unexpected education.
I tuned Pandora to the Buddy Rich "station", which is to say I had a Pandora's box of Buddy Rich and like-minded music opened up to me. From there, I was forced to flip over to the Count Basie "station".
I have only one word available to articulate my conclusion: WOW!
Man, could those guys compose and play. They were doing things that I'd never had the pleasure to hear before; and that long before my parents had even been born. Good grief.
All of that to give this simple thought: It seems to me that the natural tendency of a man is to consider himself the sum and pinnacle of all good that came before him. That all had been designed and implemented soley for his benefit, so that he could be assured of the perfect pleasures of life and therefore go boldly into the world performing perfect works for the good benefit of God and man. All that follows in history is a either a positive result of his life or a lesson not learned.
HA!
Forgive me, I'm still stuck on Cornelius. The more I meditate on his story the deeper the well becomes.
Six months after I came to a saving knowledge of Christ, my wife got saved. Both of my daughters (12 & 18) each have a personal and productive relationship with our savior. Beyond these three, the most important three individuals in my life apart from Christ, mind you, there are no others that I could say with any certainty who were led to Christ through me by the Holy Spirit.
For the longest time, this bothered me. I lost sleep at times wondering why I was so unproductive for my King; what was wrong with me?
Leading others to Christ was my sole metric for determining my value before the One I served. If I wasn't doing that effectively then I must be a terrible Christian. I've grown up a lot since then and have come to know better. Sadly, there are many many churches around that continue to hold to this standard.
Understand please, I recognize that evangelism is important, I'm not denying that in the least. We're commanded to make disciples. I'm simply saying it's not our sole metric nor is it a metric that we should hold in a higher place than any other.
Reading Cornelius' story is yet another reminder that Christ hasn't the slightest need for me or anyone else in order to bring men to Him. It also humbles me in regards to the above mentioned because I know now that my previous mind set was all about me and what I could do and had very little to do with Christ.
Peter, as I'm sure we can all agree, was a great man. Spiritually blessed in amazing ways and an incredibly successful servant of Christ. Nonetheless, he was completely unnecessary in regards to the salvation of Cornelius, Cornelius' entire family or Cornelius' closest friends. Christ clearly called Cornelius to Himself long before Peter ever arrived on scene. As a matter of fact, as I've mentioned previously, Peter never even finished what he was saying.
The whole situation gives every indication of having been used by Christ for His glory!
The hero of the story is Christ, not Cornelius; not Peter. Cornelius did nothing beyond respond to Christ's call, which was required and irresistible. Peter did nothing but learn a valuable lesson and involuntarily gain further insight in the the mysteries of salvation.
In this, I believe, lies the primary metric to apply in all situations: has Christ glorified himself in this; or that; or me?
