We Sure Talk The Talk!

How to become who you are not and still feel good about it.

Fat Beggars School of Prophets

Yeah, so I went to church today, the same church my recent post below warned you not to attend with me – at least not if you are homeless.  And I am stunned (yet again) at the talk we talk.  I mean our preaching is good – real good.  We even sang that song Reckless Love again.

Check out this lyric:

Reckless Love (Spontaneous)
Bethel Music

Oh, the overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God
Oh, it chases me down, fights ’til I’m found, leaves the ninety-nine
And I couldn’t earn it
And I don’t deserve it
Still You give yourself away

Songwriters: Caleb Culver,Cory Asbury,Ran Jackson
© BETHEL MUSIC PUBLISHING

How’s that for a praise-worthy description of the love God shows us?  Pretty good, don’t you think?

And so here I join the assembly where I am a regular member to sing these words AFTER leadership there tells me that…

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Don’t Come To Church With Me; You Aren’t Welcome There

It costs too much to be poor

Fat Beggars School of Prophets

That’s right.  You read it correctly.

I am thinking of the homeless particularly.  If you are rich, white, and smell good, I am sure you will be welcome, but if you are homeless, then you are not.

Yes, I actually checked on this.  I asked if we could host homeless people in our church and was told NO.  In fact absolutely not.

And, I was told that by insisting on this, that my idea of helping the poor actually does more harm that good.

I was told this by leadership people at my church!

So, don’t come to church with me!  Please… go to church, but not where I go.  We couldn’t possibly jack up church more profoundly unless we raped alter boys and held Grand Inquisitions.

No.  Find a church, alright, but find one that welcomes “the least of these” and thus welcomes Jesus.

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How Random is God’s Kindness?

Over much of the USA many have called for a proactive initiation into the performance of RAKs. While all of this is good enough in itself, how does this sit with the Christian?

Is that what it comes down to, random acts? Is this our persona, our signature as Christians?

Of course, this should reasonably reflect the LEAST of a Christian’s character, but personally I believe Jesus called us to do so much more.

In fact, our kindness to people should be anything BUT random. Our kindness should be deliberate, powerful and to everyone.

Naturally, this is impossible. However, this at least should be our goal.

Attempting to narrow down our efforts to only a random ‘chance’ is actually a sad commentary on Christians. Just how random do we want God to answer our prayers when we pray?

Can you imagine that? Can you imagine going to God in prayer and through His son requesting he answer us in a random procedure, dismissing our pleas completely on the merits? No. There is no such attribute with God. He is simply not random at all.

And the same should be true with us. This all requires discipline, a discipline that matures over time and should be replicated among all Christians as we grow from simple believers into true disciples.

An when it all comes down to it as we serve our neighbors and fellow Christians, we should then be known as a source of love. And when that happens no one would dare assert our love comes from an energy pattern of randomness, but out of an abundance of love, care and compassion. That is anything but random.

Playing Left-Out {That means you}

For those of you who remember playing outdoors as kids prior to the age of smart phones, you might remember the times when kids were chosen to play on such and such a team at any given time.

You know the gambit: One designated ‘captain’ would choose one and the other ‘captain’ then would alternatively choose the others until there were two or three kids left.

Invariably, out of the two or three remaining kids there were always at least one kid who played so bad at anything, nobody wanted him. He was simply left out.

Since this never happened to me, it is difficult for me to fully appreciate or realize how humiliating, this situation actually is. I can’t really imagine the embarrassment or unbearable feeling of shame.

Feeling excluded or left out is a terrible experience and surely everyone has been or at at least felt left out of something at least once in their life.

The hollow truth is that it is miserable to feel dejected, left out.

A person who feels he or she is a misfit is one truly horrid individual.

I remember years ago while reading an Ann Landers article in Dear Abby, of the statement that the child who was NOT invited to a party will always remember the rejection but the ones who were invited and attended will forget the event.

Oh, how so very true. We all remember our rejections.

Enter the Lord, Jesus the Christ and Son of God.

Personally, I think Jesus came almost elusively for the discarded and abhorred. The actuality of life is that MOST people are left out with only a hand full of people who make it to the top.

God, in His great mercy identifies with the ostracized and beckons all of us to Him.

I think that is why Jesus said that ‘The first one now shall later be last.’

Jesus knows and understands personally how it feels not to be wanted.

And where others will tell us to Go away, We bother them, Jesus welcomes us into his household with open arms.

If you don’t believe you fit this category of rejects then honestly you’ve never been refused by a girlfriend or boyfriend or suffered a divorce or felt shunned by a social group or community. Yet, most people have been denied a job loss or other position due to outside peer pressure almost always coming from some elevated social network.

Even the toughest of us have feelings. The hardest of us need someone out there: a feeling of acceptance. This same reasoning is why most young people even join gangs—no matter how bad they are.

And whereas you will be accepted by Jesus we are also to be accepted by the church.

And this is where it really hurts: and in the failings.

This is where the church more often than not drops the ball and puts thousands on the list of LEFT-OUT.

We have the Homeless, the cons and ex-cons, and druggies, the poor and other undesirables of groups within groups.

And it is here where we, the church should be picking up the ball, we falter and leave out, omitting the very people Jesus called into His kingdom.

Let’s hope that in excluding all that we do that we ourselves are not thrust among the other groups that walk around so high and mighty, the privileged, pretending we are not part of the left-out group.

As rejects, we are all in this thing together. We are all one and the same.

And other that same umbrella of definitions, we are left-out of everything and everyone, discovering out true identity only under the helm-ship of our Master, Jesus. Remember, until the time of our Lord’s return, let know one fool you. Expressed in real terms you are the same as me and the others. In definitive words, you are alone as everyone who has been deserted and left to themselves. You will remain one of the deplorables: those who are nothing more than LEFT-OUT.

Froggie in a Wash Pail

Anyone who has experienced High School Science Class has heard about the experiment where the frog in a bucket is placed under a slow heat: he sits there even while the temperature is turned up until finally it boils. The strangeness here is that the frog does not perceive this slow change and dies under the heat.

Most of us entertain sins something like that. We start out small, increase them daily as we grow bold until we find ourselves swamped by our progress into our path of destruction. We are unable to perceive these slow changes until the course of events overwhelms us.

This is generally true with drug addicts who soon learn to over-estimate their abilities and are ‘tricked’ into thinking they are invincible. Yet, as true as this is with various drugs, it is also true under the tension of other vices.

We witness those at the top who fall, victim of their own pride. Daily we read of a death of some celebrity who struggled with the battles of their own vanity and fame.

Neither are we any different and subject to the same flaws.

This is easy to view or illustrate with someone like a Hitler or a Saddam Husseim or other narracists who succumbed to their pride, but we also share their fate when we ignore simple advice.

This might involve ‘simple’ drinking bouts, or womanizing or buying sprees or even a small thing such as putting another person down while elevating ourselves.

Eventually we find ourselves boiling in a pail of water with our friend, Froggie right there beside us.

We go ahead and charge our charge cards, knowing we have already maxed them out.

We attempt to ‘flirt’ with another one last time, knowing really what we should do and decide to defer it to a later time.

Finally, there is no ‘later time’ and we discover we are in a quandary, a jam we can not climb out of.

For those such as the Prodigal Son who finally came to his senses, we drop to our knees and seek out the Lord.

The real question here is why should we wait until we are in dire straits before going to our Creator? Why should we continue to boil in water, knowing many simply don’t even make it out?

To this question we must be honest with ourselves: we are not quite as smart as we think we are and too, our deeds will be found out.

In Fact, there is no period of discovery with God as He ALWAYS know what we do.

So then, our choice is to live as we know we should without excuses or to die along with the frog.

And as many times as I screw-up on my own, I would hope just as you that we learn from our experiences. There is only one way in this life and that true way is a narrow one. Shall we walk together on that highway to heaven or will we all find ourselves sitting together with the frog? I would hope we are smarter than that frog.

Which one are we {The sum total of the parts}

This is tough enough and we’ve all done it at least once. We’ve pulled out a number of photographs spanning many years and pointed to one after another: this is one is when I was age one…when I was 13… when I graduated from High School…etc.

Therein it dawn’s on us: that’s how we WERE…that is NOT us NOW.

Once we are adults, gone is the innocence, the hopes and dreams we possessed as a child. And for some of us…gone too is the beauty of childhood.

Still, a greater truth exists: we are no longer those people in those photographs. We are somehow, anew.

Taking this to its logical conclusion, we are not even the same people as we were say, from yesterday or the day before or last week. Truly, we are always evolving, changing, growing and at least, aging.

Whereas it it true enough: most everyone believes people change for the worse, and almost none believe anyone ever changes to the positive.

And of course, we as Christians know this is NOT true. People change all the time for both good and bad. Sometimes they’ll even change back and forth over time.

And while our emotions and thoughts change over time, we morph constantly into one form of character into another.

In other words, we are FLUID.

All of us have from time to time been amazed about how someone we haven’t seen over a long period of time has changed physically. This is of course true when seeing a friend’s kid of whom we knew many years hence and then find ourselves meeting them once again twenty years later. Oh, so much change and to us it seems to happen over night.

With all this change, we as Christians have a question to ask and to answer…

Which one of those people are we going to be?

While our physical aspects will differ over time, we must choose which character attributes we will keep or alter.

And when I meet you once again…which one of you will I meet?

More importantly, as I see it, will be which one of me will I introduce myself as to you.

My hope is that I will have transitioned into someone worthwhile and one that is keen on boasting for Christ. And in that boast I should be able to point to Jesus and explain all my changes have come from Him.

That person from all that change is who I wish to be. I would be proud to say, I am him. He made me.

When we are so Sorry

Let’s face it. There are many, many times when we simply blow it. I mean, we mess up and mess up big time. And when we do that, there is no taking it back.

Asking for forgiveness and all is good enough but the truth is: there is simply no undoing what we have done.

Whenever we hurt someone else, the damage is done. Sure,we can wail and moan and feel bad, but none of that will take back what we have done.

In that sense, there is no justice.

There is no justice for someone who has lost a loved one due to violence or malevolent behavior. Once a person is lost, they are gone forever on this earth as we know it.

Vicious sin doesn’t always have to take the path of physical violence. It can also come with our words and emotions. As people, we have an unusual ability to spit out vile and mayhem, destroying lives and the spirit of people who are struggling just to get by day to day.

There is poison in our mouth and that venom spills into those who engage their activities with ours.

And oh, we have our excuses, our justifications:

We had a headache

Lacking sleep

Too many pressures

Felt rushed

Was sick

Wasn’t thinking

A loss of a loved one

And the list continues, endlessly whereas we have covered all our bases.

And still we ask for forgiveness:

And where forgiveness more or less will be forthcoming from others, our damage remains. The consequences of our sins are ever present.

Yes, there might be that few times when we take something and then later give it back, but most often our damage to others is permanent.

And once owing up to what we do, we are back to forgiveness once again.

And it is there we learn the truth of the world. We learn that God’s forgiveness is eternal, but the forgiveness of the world always comes with a consequence.

Whereas we rob a bank and are forgiven by God, MAN, on the other hand demands payment.

There is NO forgiveness from the WORLD.

All of this is out of our performance of sin. We demand to have it our way and over and over again, end up in submission on our knees.

Thus, our prayer should be that we should not sin to begin with. And to that virtue we need a higher power to hold back our hand.

As Christians we know to go to Christ. We know to yield, to succumb and to bend our will to HIS.

The trick here is having enough sense to first go to Jesus. More often than not, Christian or unbeliever, we generally submit to the will of our urge to sin. All in all, this is not due to ignorance, but in our inability to control the temperance of our own desires. The end result is nothing but sin.

Convincing Christians of Hell and Satan

Some Christians, including fervent Pastors spend a substantial amount of time dwelling on hell or Satan.

They will explain that the devil was here there or everywhere with all kinds of power; the end consequence is always, hell.

This blog is not a proponent of either hell or Satan, or taking a partisan view on it, but nonetheless, stating there is no requirement to believe in Satan to be a Christian.

To the contrary: the requirement is to believe on Jesus to be saved.

I have heard some sermons and otherwise through Christians who attribute all kinds of mystical persuasion to Mr. Lucifer, more so than Jesus ever did.

Some Christians explain they spend a full time job fighting Satan and his army and also indulge into all the omnipotent activities of his legion.

Nothing really could be further from the truth. In fact, to fully believe so would be to deny the full power of Jesus and His domain over Christians.

Then you have those who propel the Jezebel spirit, the lying spirit, the spirit of sickness and tons of other so named and unnamed spiritual entities.

And while I agree we fight a unseen battle of darkness, I believe most of those are driven by the desires of our own heart, not external demons as such.

More importantly, the theme here is Jesus. It is NOT Satan. The power is not with Satan but with the blood. The full reign is not with demons, but with Jesus. Our fear is not with Sir Lucifer, but with God who has the power to destroy the soul and body.

In short, our concentration should be on the Son of God, Jesus, His death on the cross, resurrection and the full promises of God’s kingdom. This means the body of our thoughts and efforts are not on some wayward angel, but on Jesus and Him alone.

God’s power does not rest outside with some external bad guy, but with the total goodness that lies with Jesus.

As Paul states, all things of which we should consider and think about—-and none of those things were bad things….but only on the virtue of all things which are good. That would pretty much exclude the deeds and influence of the bad guy, the devi

How Come, Why {Because I say so}

Some preachers are so full of themselves they’ll be quick to explain to you some so-called inspiration they got prior to arriving to church and at the pulpit.

This is often Revelation Knowledge and is said to be privy only to the original receiver, they claim. And while the ‘message’ of this oracle is not generally harmful, neither is it altogether scriptural either.

The motive, the idea here, I think is for the messengers to bring attention to themselves. Think about it for a moment if you will…wouldn’t it be great to be an ‘insider’ on the Lord and to be the first to receive ‘news’ from the Kingdom of God? Of course, it would.

In actuality these messages are often border-line if not flat out forms of prophecy. Thus, they should be held to the same rules of prophecy of the Old Testament. Yet, we know that they are not.

In this sense now, I’m speaking of prophets who are foretelling the future, not other forms of prophets who speak of behalf of God’s character and often of morality or ethics.

What this means is that if the messenger is not correct in what they say, then the message simply didn’t come from God. That’s pretty simple, isn’t it.

However, these ‘enlightened’ messengers often have a way of saying it so there message is at best ambiguous. For the ‘prophet’ it is usually a win-win situation as their words are so vague it can mean almost anything.

So then, what should we do and of whom shall we rely on?

The BIBLE.

The Bible is our standard and words that reflect something outside of God’s character should be avoided and ignored.

Still one more way to know is to go straight to God yourself. This is exactly one of the marvelous benefits Jesus gave to us through His presence and death.

Trusting God in all our ways really makes it unnecessary for us to rely on a personal prophet or soothsayer.

As much as some would like to think they have the inside scoop on God, in truth, they know nothing more than either you or I.

Go to the scriptures for answers and in turn, trust God through Jesus in all your ways…and He will set your path. There is no need for any other prophecy. God is the solution and the answer.

Viewing People as an Interruption

GO AWAY AND LEAVE ME ALONE {Viewing People as an Interruption}

Most of us are the type of people who love to stay on task and hate it when we are taken off course by interruption. Distractions are by the dozens and today’s society presents a challenge to remain focused on our work. This is also true among those who are in the vocation of helps.

During those times of concentration, everything that interferes with our work is seen as an interruption and it is there that people can present themselves as a hazard.

However much we might interfere with others work, it would seem that someone would have time for us. This most definitely should be true with GOD.

My insistence here states that nothing is more important than God’s people and that everything else is minor compared to the needs of people.

When Jesus walked this earth HE made time for the needs of people. Nothing was more important to him than them. Nothing.

This trying experience can easily be seen for those who have children and the father who finds his child tugging away at him while the father works. Our response, most often than not is to turn the child away, stating that we are busy and can not be bothered with.

The short and sweet of this is that our Christian labors are similar yet we should discover that others are by far more important than whatever else we might have on our plate.

We should hope that God is never too busy to have time for us, or that our prayers are never considered as an interruption to either Jesus or our friend of the Holy Spirit.

In like manner we too should always be available to others. And in yielding to others we sacrifice, lose our ‘life’ and gain it back by our denial of desires and wants.

Thus, our job is directly and with priory other people in our Christlike quest to become like Him. Whereas this is much easier said than done, we are positioned to give our self to others in order to gain our eternal lives forever. And with a passion like that, we will certainly always have time for someone else and never see them as nothing more than a burden or as a simple interruption.