I Am Living Proof

I don’t feel worthy to even call upon His name to save me.  I took a prayer request and I don’t think I can even go to Him.

Genesis 18:27 (NKJV) …”Indeed now, I who  am  but dust and ashes have taken it upon myself to speak to the Lord:”

But I will try.

ht: Matt Chandler’s Sovereign Over all (Luke Part 5)

I have prayed for months for God to uncover anything left in my heart that was not like His heart.  I looked over and over again and kept coming up with nothing.

Last night, God did just that.  Now I am a simplified idiot because of it.

I am going to go forward relying on two things for right now.  One, that my God so achingly beautiful in his continuous love and forgiveness of piece of crap like me.  Secondly, I have to trust that the word of God is good and that He will do what He says He will do.

I really don’t have anything to write.  But I am going to throw out scripture after scripture in hopes of figuring out something.  One part of me wants to figure out something so I will have peace.  A large part of me wants to not figure out anything so I can remain an idiot that is totally dependent upon the Lord.

I have just one thought of Solomon’s words preoccupying my thoughts:

1 Kings 3:7 (NKJV) “but I  am a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in.”

I am a jacked up individual.  I have to rely on God just to make it to the next day.  I have no idea where I am going.  I have no idea of what I am going to do tomorrow.  I simply do not know.  I do not know anything.

ht: Matt Chandler’s Sovereign Over all (Luke Part 5)

My pastor has mention this passage a least a couple of times since I have been going:

Matthew 7:13-14 (NKJV) “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide  is the gate and broad  is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow  is the gate and difficult  is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.

Notice Jesus says, “there are few who find it“.  Not many, few.

Listening to a lecture on Revelation chapters 1 through 3 and one particular passage caught my eye:

Revelation 3:4 (NKJV) You have a few names even in Sardis who have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy.

Again, Jesus says, “You have a few names…”.  Again, not many but few.

I know that churches love to equate themselves to the church in Philadelphia.  However, I challenge to each of us to tap the brakes just a bit.  Maybe we are the church in Sardis.  Maybe there are just many of us who are still producing bad fruit in one way or another.  I know I was for 30 years.  Sometimes I sit and be stunned on how in the world I thought I was saved and yet my heart was not changed whatsoever.

I wonder how many more people are just like me.

I challenge to go back to the each of the letters to each of the churches in chapter 3 and compare the church in America and throughout the world to those churches but compare our hearts as well.

In the past two months, the Holy Spirit has been leading my mind to search out and look at relationships. What started out as studying relationships between people and between husband and wife eventually led to the relationship between Christ Jesus and the Church and then, of course, the relationship between God and his children.

The one relationship that keeps me wanting to be closer and closer to God would have to be Cain.  Yes, the same selfish, thankless, merciless individual who murdered his brother just because Cain wasn’t gracious to God and Abel was.

What I love about this passage is how this line of questioning is so much like the Spirit of God:

Genesis 4:5-6 (NKJV) but He did not respect Cain and his offering. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.

So the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen?”

How crazy is it that God is the same then as He is now and will forever be.

I could have used verses 1-4 to lead in to tell more of the story and I could have kept going past verse 7 and told of the first murder. But those two verses right there, 5 and 6, make me yearn for something more in my relationship with Him.

It has become one of my deepest desires to get to a place where, not just in a change in your attitude or even walk with God, but even a change in how you are feeling from moment to moment causes God to ask you, “Why do you feel that way?” or to make you really think about it, “What are you feeling right now?”.

This is not like having a conversation even with people where you can still kinda, sorta hide your true deep feelings as you are trying to sort them out in your head.  This is a conversation with God, who being… well… God, already knows the answers to the questions He is asking you.  1 Kings 8:39 says “… for You alone know the hearts of all the sons of men“  I keep thinking when God asks those type of questions, He is wanting for you to see where your heart is at the moment.

Don’t be scared of letting God dig deep into your heart and letting Him change it for good and to give Him glory and to heal you.

So good is the promise of God set in 1 John 3:20-22: For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence toward God.  And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.

Think about the times where you felt feelings that you were not particular proud of.  Think about those moments as you go about your day today.  Give God a chance to turn to you and ask “Why are you feeling lonely?”, “Why do you worry?”, “Why are you so angry?”.   Give Him every opportunity to have that deep personal intimate relationship that He wants with you.

Tagged by Ric Booth for a very cool conversation starter:

What is your favorite book of the Bible?

Not to over think it, I had to really ask myself, “What is my favorite book?”. If I am really honest with myself, this is different than asking:

Favorite prophet: Isaiah
Most quoted from: Jeremiah
Most identifies with: Hosea
Mark myself against: Mark
In Awe of God: John
Wraps up everything about God: 1 John
Absolute giddy about: Ezekiel, Daniel and Revelation
Thinks is not boring: Numbers, Deuteronomy
Keep going back to: Acts
Currently stuck in: Psalm
Taught by: Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon
Could spend a year on: Genesis

Even despite my constant temptation of getting Isaiah 53 tattooed on my back in Hebrew and English, my favorite book has to be Romans.

When I think of what I am placed on this earth to do, nothing but absolutely nothing is more important than sharing the gospel of my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

It is this Epistle to the Romans that two things are established:

• Puts everybody on the same playing field when approaching the Most High God - It removes all excuses. Not only it establish how we stand with God but it challenges us into answering one very important question.  That question is not whether we can be saved but rather do we think we need to be saved. In other words, how is salvation possible if you don’t think you need to be saved.
• Despite it laying out the path to salvation in order to get to God, this letter is written out to believers - It essentially lays out the basics of Christianity: hope, faith, love, spreading the gospel, promises of His love, His holiness and righteousness, wrestling between flesh and spirit and the dismantling of religiosity by separating law and spirit. One way I have heard it put: The Gospel According to Paul. It is very good news, indeed.

Above all, Romans contains the single greatest passage in the Bible, in my opinion. We can put our faith in that when all else fails and everything is being destroyed around us, it is just God and us and nothing can separate us from His love:

Romans 8:31-39 (NKJV) What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long;
We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”

Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.