No copyright infringement meant by linking this video. Words and song belong to Laura Story.
This is another song by Laura Story that reminds us of His promise to keep us in peace in the midst of the storms. No copyright infringement meant by linking this video. Words and song belong to Laura Story.
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The song 'Blessings', by Laura Story, has ministered to me and reminded me that He is my blessing; that it is Him whom I seek through sunshine and through storms. I pray it encourages you too! The song and lyrics are by Laura Story - no copyright infringement is meant by posting this slide show. The video was posted on youtube by someone else. Short Post:
We have been studying on Wednesday nights the book of 1 Kings. Last time we met, we studied how the Temple was built by Solomon. Of interest was the very ornate and high value materials that were put in building the Holy of Holies. What spoke to me the most was the fact that this room was incredibly beautiful, the carvings on the wall and then layered with gold, and only one man got to see this once a year. The rest of the children of Israel did not see it, only the priest whose turn it was to go in to the Holy of Holies during Yom Kippur. Who saw it all the time and every day? The room was decorated for the Lord, for that is where the ark of the covenant was placed and was to reside. The question now is, when we bring forth our 'creations' (be it a song, a picture, a poem, a word) are they for other men to see or are they for the Lord to see? I ask the Lord to give me a heart that only works for what He sees, and that the fruits that my hands bring forth are not for others' eyes but for His eyes. "So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten..." Joel 2:25 This song by Selah, titled Unredeemed, is a beautiful reminder that the Lord redeems - He brings beauty from ashes. I found this youtube video with the song put to a slide show. I pray this blesses you. The song and lyrics belong to Selah, so I assume they are copyrighted by Selah. No copyright infringement is intended with sharing this video. Incidentally, I highly recommend buying the album of which this song is a part - really powerful. Amazing testimony of the transforming power that is found in Christ. Past abuse does not need to dictate your future - find freedom in Christ.
Allow some time for video to load (~ 15 seconds). The Church is an organism and not an organization - as such, there should be division in the Church.2/19/2011 The Church is made up of sons and daughters of God, whom have been born again through Christ Jesus, and whom have been sealed with the Holy Spirit.
Why do we expect for such an organic body to not change? Is it better to have the Church follow the marketing strategies, the governance strategies, the vogue strategies, and humanistic strategies that organizations implement and adhere to, in order to guarantee their survival in our society and in the market place? Is it better (or even possible) for the Church to remain static? These are questions we need to ask, and more importantly, ask the Lord. I don't think the Church should follow the strategies organizations employ in order to survive - the survival of the Church is in the hands of the Lord and in His power, not on our efforts and our merits. What we are to do is to steadfastly seek Him and let Him work in and through us to reach the hurting world. But in order for this to happen, we have to be flexible to Him - and Him alone. We must abide in Him that He may be seen through and in us. Should there be division in the Church? Absolutely! Let me explain. When a diploid cell (a cell in our bodies) divides, it produces two identical daughter cells. We see this happen before our eyes when children grow from newborn to adults. In like manner, there should be 'cell' division in the Church. This division of which I speak is a personal one and should not be confused with the tragic divisions we see when entire Churches split; that type of division is not from God. What I mean by 'cell' division is that when I share the redemptive news with someone and that someone is born again, the cell (in this case me) hasn't divided to produce an identical cell yet, this is just the beginning. I am to disciple him/her and teach him/her to observe all that Christ has commanded us, teach him/her to walk with Christ by coming long my side and walking with me for a time. Just like the first disciples walked with Jesus and beheld His glory, this newborn should walk along my side in order to see the glory of Christ through me (making it essential for me to stay close to Christ and abide in Him). This newborn will learn from me how to walk with Christ day by day, trial through trial, joy through joy, fall through fall. After this newborn is grown and ready to have others walk alongside him/her, then the process of 'cell' division has taken place. He/she will repeat this process with someone else and produce an identical 'cell'. And this, my friends, is the strategy Christ left for us to follow. He lived this out with the 12, they lived this out with the Church. Luke is a product of cell division, as is Theophilus, Timothy, Mark, and so many others. If this strategy hadn't been employed, then where would we be today? Would we have the Gospel of Luke? What about the New Testament? Each one took the time to take people under their 'wing' and pass on all that Christ had commanded; and so we are blessed to receive His teachings in the 21st century, but even more blessed to pass on His teachings to others. This is the division that we should see in the Church - because the Church is an organism and not an organization. Don't know if you remember high school biology, however, I was taught that all living organisms would be classified as such (living) if they performed MRS FREG activities. Who is Mrs. Freg?? No one - but here is what MRS FREG stands for:
M: Movement R: Respiration S: Sensitivity F: Feeding R: Reproduction E: Excretion G: Growth These activities/attributes came to mind as I was listening to my discipler teach on pouring our lives into others, so that they might also learn to pour out their lives into others. So the question is, do I perform those activities (those listed above)? Do you do these activities? I don't mean physically, I mean spiritually...for our life is not in the physical, but in the spiritual. Remember, the dead don't feel, hunger, move, breathe, grow, excrete, etc., the dead are dead. So are you dead in your sins or alive in Christ? Movement: Do you move? Are you moving toward the Light and the Life or are you standing still in the darkness and loving it? (John 3:19) Respiration: Is the oxygen your brain and body need circulating throughout your body? Has the Holy Spirit come to dwell in you - is there life in your being? Is He permeating every area of your life or are there areas where He is not allowed to dwell or where He cannot dwell because He is Holy? (Ephesians 4:30) Sensitivity: Do you respond to your surrounding environment, to stimuli? Are you discerning the spirits of those around you, the situations, the work of the Holy Spirit vs the work of the enemy of God, the calling of God and His voice? (Philippians 1:9-11) Feeding: Are you feeding yourself the nutrients that your body needs or are you feeding yourself junk food (and possibly clogging your arteries)? Do you hunger for the Word of God? Do you feed your spirit the Word of God or do you feed your eyes, your flesh, and your pride of life - whether with images, sounds, conversations, opportunities, etc.? (Ephesians 4:14, 2 Peter 3:18) Reproduction: Are your cells reproducing healthy cells? Are you making disciples who are rooted in the Word of God, who memorize scripture, pray without ceasing, witness to those around them, and who are preparing to disciple others? (Note the difference between witnessing and discipling) Or are you investing your time in reproducing cells that are not healthy and that eventually can and will grow into tumors? A simple way to check this out is to turn around and see who is behind you, who are your disciples? (Matthew 28:19-20) Excreting: Is your body eliminating waste, is it removing harmful matter from your body? Are you putting off your old self? Have you put off falsehood, stealing, bitterness, rage, anger, slander, brawling, any form of malice, etc.? (Ephesians 4:22-32) Growth: has your body grown since you were born? Have you grown since you were born again? Are you more like Christ today than you were yesterday? Are you maturing or are you still a spiritual babe needing to feed on milk instead of meat? (1 Corinthians 3:2) I can't help but observe that the Christian life is an organic life - it is not static or fruitless. Are we static and fruitless or are we bearing fruit seen in those branches that are connected to the true Vine? Are you alive? It is my prayer that as I decrease (you too), Christ increase in me (and you) and these activities become more evident of His work in and through me (yes, and you!). How big is your God? Can He fit in a box? Does He meet your expectations? Is He bigger than your imagination?
I thought I believed the Lord was bigger than any of my problems, bigger than any of my sins - in essence, bigger than me. I used to encourage other believers with the truth that He is bigger than any of our expectations, bigger than any of our needs. What I didn't realize was that I didn't believe this myself. Now that's a tough cookie to eat - how can someone encourage others in Truth and not believe it herself? I know, I know, this sounds...well, it sounds fake and hypocritical. And yes, it is fake and hypocritical. The problem is I didn't know that I really didn't believe this - which is the scary part. In the first ten chapters of the Gospel of Mark we find three instances where sickened men approached or were brought to Jesus that He might heal them. What is interesting is that each request was different, each answer was different, yet the outcome was the same. The ill men or the individuals bringing the men to Jesus requested that He heal the men, however, two of these men not only requested healing but also added the manner in which the healing should be done. Can man tell God how to act? The first man to need healing was brought to Jesus in Mark 7:32-35. This man was deaf and could hardly speak, and those bringing him to Jesus were doing it so that He might 'place His hand on him'. They believed that Jesus could heal, they had faith in Him - but they were dictating how the healing should take place. The Lord strengthens their faith by healing the man NOT in the manner in which it was requested, but in an unconventional way: he separates the man from the crowd, puts His fingers into his ears, spits on the man's tongue and says 'be opened'. Quite hard to put Jesus in a box... The second man seeking healing was a blind man we meet in Mark 8:22-25; he, too, is brought by other individuals and beg 'Jesus to touch him'. Perhaps the trick to healing is not for Jesus to place the hands on the person, but to touch him. Again, Jesus strengthens their faith by healing the blind man NOT in the manner in which they requested, but in a gentle and 'inconsistent' way: He takes the man's hand and leads him out of the village, spits in his eyes and puts His hands on him. Jesus doesn't seem to fit the mold or conform to the people's expectations... The third man, a blind man by the name of Bartimaeus (Mark 10:46-52), heard that Jesus was passing by and cried out with a loud voice for the Son of David to have mercy upon him. When Jesus asks him what does he want Him to do for him, he responds 'that [he] may receive [his] sight'. Bartimaeus does not tell the Lord HOW he wants the WHAT, he just tells him the WHAT, which is to see. Jesus heals him in a radical way; He affirms Bartimaeus' faith by telling him to 'Go [his] way; [for his] faith ha[d] made [him] well'. He doesn't touch Bartimaeus, spit in his eyes, place His hands on him, or commands that the eyes be opened. Jesus was bigger than Bartimaeus' knowledge, expectations, and imagination... After seeing these examples, the Lord showed me that many a time my prayers to Him where not only WHATs but also HOWs; I was like the first two men who were seeking healing but were telling Him how to go about it. I was limiting the Lord to my expectations and requesting Him to work within the box of my imagination and knowledge. That is why I say I didn't believe Him to be bigger than my problems or bigger than myself, because I was limiting His omnipotence to my knowledge and expectations. I think it is not wise to expect the Lord to always operate in the same manner, because in so doing, we miss Him when He is working in manners not known or not common to us. Is your Jesus bigger than a box? Is He bigger than your expectations? Is He bigger than your knowledge? After being rescued from entertaining myself to death, will I entertain myself to slumber?12/8/2010 Seeing how the Chilean miners survived was so inspiring. How they organized themselves, rationed their foods, used the limited battery supply; amazing what was done on their own initiative.
I was thoroughly impressed by how the Chilean government led the efforts, in a very calculated and orchestrated manner, to not only rescue the miners, but to maintain them alive while they were in the belly of the earth. What was more captivating, though, was how strikingly similar their story was to my story. You see, many years ago I was buried alive - I was dead in my sins. Like the miners, I could not dig my way out. It was Jesus who, like the capsule, had to come down to me, take me in, and transport me out. And while these similarities where readily seen by many watching this story unfold, what caught my attention was not the drilling of the mine to reach them. What caught my attention was what was going on down inside the mine. Worried that the miners might despair due to their reality (namely, that they were buried alive and could very well die there if they couldn't get them out), a team of professionals was assembled to help and guide the miners to deal with their new reality. What does one do when sitting in the middle of the earth doing nothing? One thinks, thinks of things past and present - was there a future? What does one think when one is 2,300 ft below the surface of the earth and not able to get out, but to depend on an outsider to get you out? It is totally understandable why the miners where told to get busy, get a routine, get entertainment, get on a schedule. They were told to divide their living quarters by areas: sleeping, eating, praying, exercise, entertainment. They were told to follow the schedule and the activities that had been planned. All these were efforts to reduce the impact of the trauma. What I find similar to my story is that I too would try to entertain myself and get myself on a routine in order to avoid the obvious - I was dead in my sins. I would entertain myself (or be entertained) to not feel the emptiness, pain, sorrow, and fear. But that which I was doing to 'keep me alive' was the very thing keeping me dead. These activities became distractions that kept me from facing the reality that I was in: Pain, sorrow, fear and emptiness. Therefore, I did not see the need for Jesus (or capsule) to get me out. By His grace, my eyes moved away from these distractions and I saw the Capsule, got in, and was transported out of the mine. The story does not end there, after being taken out of the mine, instead of doing what the miners are doing (traveling around the world telling their story of survival), I decided to continue with the activities that entertained me when I was in the mine. Why?......So while I was in the mine I entertained myself to, unknowingly, keep me dead; now I would entertain myself to keep me slumbering. Again, by His grace, my eyes were opened to this truth: Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Did Christ die for us so that we can have a nice life? Did He die for us so that we have a good family, husband, wife, children, friends, career, etc.? If we are to be like Christ, and Christ came to seek and to save that which was lost, why are we not acting like Jesus? The answer: Because I am more concerned about the activities that cater to my life and this, in effect, sends me into slumber. While I slumber away, people who are hurting, suffering, needing Christ's love and the gospel, continue to hurt, suffer, need the love of Christ and the gospel. I find that being born again is more than a nice story - it is a life altering event. Like being taken out of the cave of death and brought to the light of life. Why continue chasing after the wind of ideals that worldly wisdom offers? Why continue chasing after holograms? My new reality is outside the cave, there is no need to entertain myself to death - I must now actively seek to not entertain myself to slumber, lest I slip into a coma and ignore the cries of pain and agony of people around me. Are you slumbering? Or are you in the mine? |
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