Author Archives: cameron

158 Uno

Posted on by
Reply

El número uno es importante en la recta numérica de Dios. Solo hay uno de Él y solo uno de cada uno de nosotros. Cada uno es único, cada nacimiento es único para nosotros y cada muerte es única para cada uno. Tenemos un nacimiento, una vida y una muerte segura en la que no regresamos. Hay una sola esperanza, una fe, un solo bautismo, un solo Dios, un Hijo, un Espíritu Santo y un Padre que está sobre todo, a través de todos y en todos. Pablo lo señala en Efesios 4:4-6. Uno puede multiplicarse o dividirse por sí mismo y sigue siendo uno. Es un número tan interesante porque es independiente de otros números, pero aun así todos los números están compuestos por él. Como el número 3 es 1+1+1.

Consideremos entonces un pequeño misterio poético: Uno es Dios, fo Él es el Primero y el Último, Él es Uno, y solo Dios es Uno. Al unísono, Él es suficiente por sí solo, autosuficiente, autoexistente y autorevelador. Solo él, como uno solo, solo por Sí mismo, es suficiente y abundante. Uno puede mantenerse solo. El Señor es Dios y Él es Uno. Ahora, Uno más Dios es el majoridad, por lo tanto, Uno más uno es 2, y 2 es mejor que 4 porque, como un taburete de cuatro patas, El cuarto punto siempre es buscar su lugar. 3 es superior y cada pOint acompaña a los otros 2 puntos. Tres es Uno, e incluye Uno y dos; En el caso de Dios Uno es Tres, Tres es superior a cualquier cosa más que Tres… THree incluye uno y dos.  Uno Dios ¿quién es suficiente, uno más Dios es la mayoría, haciendo que Dos mejores que 4 … siempre. Padre, Hijo y Espíritu Santo son Uno y el Uno es Tres, los Tres son Uno, y dos y tres son mejores que 4 o 5. Siempre.

David mató a un gigante con una piedra en el primer disparo, y no está registrado que nadie volviera a hacer eso. Solo ocurrió una vez. Israel rodeó una ciudad, Jericó, y las murallas se derrumbaron. Dios no volvió a hacer eso como si fuera un método. Fue una situación puntual. En Mateo 17:27, Pedro fue enviado al mar para lanzar un anzuelo, para atrapar un pez, el primero, que tenía una moneda en la boca para pagar sus impuestos. 2 Juan, 3 Juan, Filémón, Judas y Obadías son los libros más cortos de la Biblia, con solo un capítulo.

En Juan 10:30, Jesús, por su único sacrificio, de una vez por todas, que nunca necesita repetirse para siempre, representa la unidad del Padre y el Hijo. Con su único sacrificio, hizo posible que TODOS nuestros pecados fueran perdonados. Él es el único mediador y el buen pastor, y no hay otro. Solo hay una puerta para entrar en el Reino, y solo hay un Reino. Juan 14:6, “Jesús le dijo, “Yo soy el camino, la verdad y la vida. Nadie viene al Padre salvo a través de mí.” Cristo mismo es la personificación de un camino, una sola verdad, una sola vida y una sola puerta.

El primer día, Dios puso en marcha todo esto creando los cielos y la tierra. Empezó a moverse el tiempo diciendo una vez, “luz” y lo había, y no tuvo que repetirlo unas cuantas veces más como alguien intentando encender una cerilla o intentando hacerlo bien. Lo dijo una vez, y la luz era correcta y vio que era bueno. Luego lo separó en día y noche, y luego en la noche y la mañana. Ese fue el primer día. El primer mandamiento de Dios es guardar el sábado. Colosenses 1:15 dice que Jesús es la imagen del Dios invisible, imagen en el sentido de representación y manifestación, Él es el primogénito de toda la creación, el único Rey y Señor eterno que reina en una eternidad.

El primer mandamiento es que no tendrás a ningún otro Dios que a mí. El primer mensaje público que dio Jesús fue de Isaías 61:1-3, y no trataba sobre la maldad de la humanidad, ni sobre pecadores o líderes hipócritas de la iglesia, ni sobre la necesidad de guardar la Ley. Su primer mensaje público fue sobre cómo Su Padre Único había enviado al Hijo Único para liberar a los cautivos y liberar a todos los que fueran de su esclavitud si creían en el Hijo Único de Dios, un mensaje de esperanza y un futuro más brillante.

En Génesis 2:24 y luego reflejado en Marcos 10:7-8, dice que el hombre dejará a su madre y a su padre y se aferrará a su esposa en matrimonio; allí los dos serán uno solo, ya no serán dos sino una sola carne.Jesús es el primogénito de los muertos en Colosenses 1:18, y en Romanos 8:29 es el primogénito entre muchos hermanos. En 1 Corintios 15:20, Pablo llama a Jesús el primero de los primeros frutos. En el Apocalipsis se refiere a sí mismo como el Alfa, solo hay un Alfa, y es la primera letra del griego alfa-bet. Es solo por Cristo, el único, por el cual podemos ser salvados, y Su nombre es el ÚNICO nombre bajo el Cielo, el único Nombre bajo el Cielo por el que nos conectamos con nuestro verdadero destino.

Uno, el primer número entero después de cero. Es el valor del primer número en el aleph-beit hebreo, y son varios comienzos, como que Génesis es llamado el libro de las primeras cosas, y el Apocalipsis es llamado el libro de las últimas cosas. Ahí lo tienes, esa es la idea del número uno en la línea numérica de Dios.

¿Qué opinas?

Soy Portero Social de Living In His Name Ministries.

Traducción por Alfredo MagniSozzi

157 Cero

Posted on by
Reply

Todos los números en las escrituras son importantes, pero para mí, hoy en día, hay cuatro números significativos: 0, 1, 2 y 3, siendo cero nuestro punto de partida.

De niño me dijeron que siempre sería un cero, y nada más que cero. Sabes, al principio me dolieron tanto esas palabras que actué según las expectativas de quien me lo dijo… Trabajé para estar a la altura del potencial de cero. Pero aquí, en los últimos 18 años, el Señor me ha abierto los ojos para ver el valor del cero desde su perspectiva.

Si sumáramos todos los números al infinito, positivo y negativo, la suma final sería cero. Puede que eso no tenga sentido para ti, pero aquí va la idea. Para cada número positivo hay un número negativo, así que si sumas un 1 positivo a un 1 negativo la suma es cero, y si sumas todos los números positivos y negativos correspondientes juntos, su suma siempre sería cero. Cero es un lugar y es un lugar muy importante en la recta numérica de Dios. Fíjate bien, cero no es nada. “Nil” representa la idea de “conjunto vacío”, simplemente es vacío. Pero cero, eso sí es importante y está en el centro de la recta numérica básica. En un gráfico podemos graficar 0, pero no podemos graficar lo de Nil, que es simplemente … vacío. Génesis 1:2 utiliza la palabra “vacío”, que significa un “estado sin nada y vacío”, que es diferente de cero. Dentro del Señor están todos los números, incluido el cero, porque Él mismo es la personificación de todo lo justo. Jesús se humilló hasta cero en el Calvario, y resucitó de entre los muertos como el Glorioso todo. Él es la suma de todas las cosas espirituales. Según las escrituras, Dios ha formado todas las cosas, ha hecho todas las cosas, entiende todas las cosas, Su nombre está exaltado por encima de todo, todas las cosas le sirven al final, Él es el Todo en Todo, y ha puesto todas las cosas bajo Sus pies. Él es Dios de todo. El Padre ha entregado todas las cosas en mano del Hijo, y un día, Jesús volverá y nos dirá todas las cosas. Romanos dice que nos dará todas las cosas con gracia, y de Él, por Él, y para Él son todas las cosas. Él lo es todo y eso incluye cero.

Así que, dado cómo hemos comprendido ese concepto, necesitamos reposicionarnos a una perspectiva de Dios y ver el cero como un lugar distinto a un lugar nulo. Desde la visión de Dios, cero no es nada, es absolutamente algo, no es nada, es totalmente algún lugar. Ve el cero como un punto de partida, no como un lugar sin ningún lado. Cero es donde empezamos todos los cimientos sólidos en el sentido de que cuando la vida parece haber quemado tus sueños hasta los cimientos y no queda nada más que cenizas, cuando todo lo que somos se ha reducido a nada más que un trapo podrido, es un gran momento y lugar para empezar una nueva base. Cuando estamos en el fondo de lo poco, es la mejor temporada para echar cimientos nuevos para una casa mejor. He mantenido el pensamiento durante un tiempo que Jesús es muy fácil de encontrar cuando estás al límite. Cero. Él estuvo ahí todo el tiempo, esperando a que dejáramos ir todos nuestros propios esfuerzos por hacer que la vida funcionara.

Tendemos a contar y valorar “cosas” definidas y cero como “ninguna cosa”. Pero la idea de cero de Dios es mucho más grande de lo que entendemos. Imagina tu mundo como el lugar cero… Aferra todo lo que sabes y ves como si estuvieras en la superficie del océano y esa superficie reflejada fuera todo lo que veías y conocías. Imagina tu posición como si estuvieras en cero. Sin embargo, muy arriba, muy por debajo y más allá de esa superficie reflejada, hay un mundo inmenso de posibilidades aparentemente infinitas. Es real y existe en un ámbito mayor que nuestra percepción del tiempo y el lugar, más que cero.

Romanos 3:10 dice que “nadie es justo”. Ese es un estado cero donde la intervención de Dios es necesaria para superar la injusticia, pero a menudo razonamos para salir de la posición tan poderosa del cero. El útero de Sarah estaba vacío y necesitaba a Dios para crear algo desde cero. En mi propia vida, sin Cristo, yo era cero, y sin la intervención de Dios, estamos perdidos cada uno de nosotros.  Pero gracias a Dios que envió a Su Hijo unigénito para salvarnos.

Algunas personas dicen que el catolicismo marcó el tono de muchas cosas, luego llegó el protestantismo, que afirmaba ser diferente, pero en realidad, la forma en que se hace la iglesia hoy en día, no ha cambiado mucho salvo las etiquetas. Para estar en el ministerio de la manera correcta, tenemos que pensar como un servidor, lo que significa que el ministerio correcto lo realiza un mayordomo y no un dueño, y el verdadero liderazgo piadoso ha llegado a un estado cero donde el arrepentimiento y la libertad son reales. Si realmente creemos que Dios guía nuestros pasos y Él es el único que nos define, ¿entonces qué pasa con la máscara que ideamos para ocultar nuestro estado cero? Creo que muchos creemos que estamos en un lugar de cero, pero lo que creemos tener y lo que realmente tenemos son diferentes. Me recuerda a un tipo que conocí en la cárcel que dijo que no se sentía culpable por su crimen porque le habían perdonado. Eso sí, llevaba bastante tiempo seduciendo adolescentes en internet y viajando largas distancias para tener una relación íntima con ellos antes de que finalmente le pillaran. Solo llevaba 6 meses en la cárcel, pero dijo que no se sentía mal por su crimen porque Dios le había perdonado y él se había perdonado a sí mismo, así que estaba bien. ¡No es broma, fueron sus palabras! Sin tristeza por su pecado. No hay estado cero. Sin arrepentimiento. Pero él dice que estaba bien.

Como se mencionó antes, cero no es ninguna parte, está en algún lugar, no es nulo, pero en realidad ocupa un lugar muy importante en la recta numérica de Dios. Cuando nuestras vidas se han quedado destrozadas, reducidas a escombros, y estamos en el fondo del poco, cero, es un lugar ideal para poner cimientos y comenzar una nueva base con el Señor.

¿Qué opinas?

Soy el Portero Social para el Ministerio Viviendo en Su Nombre

Traducción por Alfredo Magni Sozzi

Provision

Posted on by
Reply

Pro-vision holds hands with vision in the same way a thesis serves as an early discovery process for purpose. The word finds its roots in the Greek “pro-thesis”—meaning purpose—where “pro” speaks of looking ahead or, more poetically, “breathing forward”. Thus, pro-vision is the forward sight that provides everything necessary to advance and fulfill the vision. It is how God brings something into being with the certainty of its existence—His pro-vision is the guarantee that establishes His vision.

Hear this: In God’s mouth, His Word carries holy weight: He speaks a thing into being with divine certainty. His pro-vision is the unbreakable guarantee that His vision will stand.

This is why, when we see God’s preparation (“He prepares a table before me”), we can know there is revealed the sacred order: vision — provision — preparation. There was first a vision and then a pro-vision. God holds a vision for our well-being, releases His pro-vision (providing all that is needed for the accomplishment of that vision), and then brings forth preparation as the visible manifestation of both His vision and His pro-vision. Preparation, the visible beauty of both vision and pro-vision, laid out in glory for all to see.

i do believe though, we often mistake God’s vision as an idea of how it’s going to prosper ourselves, and we take His pro-vision as the things He’s giving us to make us wealthy, comfortable, and living a life of convenience. That’s NOT what He means. He does love that we would do well, of course, but His idea of prosperous and our of prosperous are pretty different. The Lord’s vision for us is to be reconciled to Him, to be healthy and whole, mature, and be filled with the Spirit, bearing out all the fruits and gifts of the Spirit, that’s the vision. His pro-vision is about what He provides us in order that we would prosper His vision. Our error is that we take the wealth of God’s provision and tell ourselves, “it is all for me”, building ourselves large homes, buying huge amounts of property, fancy cars, flashy clothes, when in truth, all along, sometimes, if not often, it all amounts to a misappropriation of His provision, and i consider a misappropriation of Kingdom gifts and benefits to be traitorous. The Lord makes us prosperous not to prosper ourselves but to advance the Body of Christ, yet i do believe many of us have gotten lost in our own self-centered ways, with self-centered meaning, to be centered and focused on ourselves (as if you didn’t know that) … excluding God. Our weight is far more shifted toward ourselves then toward Kingdom purposes. Shift your weight friends.

The eyes see and the soul encourages the little eyes to see again. The mind wants, and the more it sees the more it wants until the heart follows suit and then … gradually, almost unnoticeably, we have lost our relish for righteous things and our relationships with other people have been set adrift, little by little by little, because of the destructive trajectory by which all began in a very subtle place. Many of our errors begin in subtleties, such “small little seemingly nothing things” that don’t appear to make a difference in the now, at the zero point, but out at a distance and over time, the error is staggering. It’s like the teenager who finally decides to take a hit of meth to just try it out for the first time. The first experience is so amazing they decide they’re going to have to try it again. Then again. Shortly, they’re hooked, always trying to relive the original high that will never happen again, ever. Almost all addicts spend all their time chasing that first high. It all began in the turn of a thought in their head that THEY wouldn’t be like THOSE others, that THEY would be able to just try once and stop, that certainly t-h-e-i-r lives would never turn out horribly like the infamous THEY.

In light of all that, it’s a provision all right, but the question is … who made the provision? It wasn’t the Lord. In light of that, we can safely say the vision behind the provision was one of hatred towards God with a full heart of destruction for mankind.

Arthur Bert used to say “Where God’s appointment is, therein is the provision”. Before the Lord made an appointment for you, He already possessed a vision of what He wanted to happen. With His vision of your destiny, in His “looking ahead sight”, He prepared, in advance what you would need to accomplish His purposes. We can completely walk in confidence knowing this: my creative metaphor here, that while you are on your journey, God is already waiting for you just beyond the bend, standing on the path ahead with open arms and a knowing smile. This is why it’s easy to say “the Lord has prepared a table before us”, because in the Hebrew word for “provision”, it comes to us with the idea of “prepare”, as in “from His provision we prepare a meal”. From His provision, the armies of the called prepare for intercession and action. From His provision, we prepare a timely word to the body of Christ. From His provision, we prepare to feed the multitudes of starving and excluded people. He extends us the vision of bringing medical aid to remote places, He makes the pro-vision of supplies, doctors, nurses, vehicles, fuel, food, plane tickets, border passes, and necessary facilities in order to advance the vision, so when we finally get to our destination, we use His provision and prepare to serve with all our heart. David meant something far, far larger than just getting to eat a great meal when He said, “You prepare a table before me.” With vision and  pro-vision comes preparing. Isaiah 45:2: “I will go before you and make the crooked places straight…”

In Romans 13:14, Paul writes to “make no provision” for the flesh. In other words don’t use, not one ounce of your “looking ahead sight for the things which advance the vision of sin” which so easily besets us. The Lord’s provision is always tied to His providence, and to use our gifts to advance the vision of ourselves, again, is a misappropriation of God’s provision, Holy Spirit gifts and benefits. i do not want to be an embezzeler of Kingdom wealth. Let us see His vision, use His pro-vision, as a noun, be guided by His purposes which are set in front of us, and prepare, as an action verb, preparing the way of the Lord, making His paths straight.

What do you think?

i’m Social Porter with Living In His Name Ministries.

The Court Case

Posted on by
Reply

Let’s look at salvation from a legal perspective.

Because of the choosing that happened in the Garden of Eden, sin entered in. Because of that choosing, satan held a pseudo-sovereignty over humanity and held mankind for ransom on the principal of “government by consent of the governed”, which is when we live without Christ, we consent to whatever weakens our reason, impairs the tenderness of our conscience, obscures our sense of God, or takes off our relish of spiritual things; in short, whatever increases the strength and authority of our body over our mind, thereby we are governed by sin. The Supreme Judge in the Supreme Court of Heaven is sworn to uphold the demands of the law in every case.

In order for man to be free, by law, an innocent and willing substitute had to be found to take his place who could fully meet the demands of the law and represent both God and man. The only solution was for God to become man, paying the penalty, thereby letting man go free. Because God loved us from the beginning, He saved us from the legal penalty of death due to iniquity,

transgression, and sin.

We need to understand some of the principles of Redemption. Redemption means that one who is capable of redeeming and taking the place of another actually meets the demands of the law and becomes the legal substitute by paying the redemptive price for those who are condemned to death because of breaking the law. God decided that through the atonement and the substitution of an innocent victim to take the place of the guilty kidnapped race, He would free it from satan, thereby legally and forcefully evicting satan, restoring man’s dominion, so as to carry on the eternal purpose, as it was intended from the beginning.

Genesis 1:26 “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

Jesus was sent to pay the price for the death penalty man incurred in the garden, thereby breaking the power of the pseudo-sovereignty which satan

had. It was a redemptive work based on the principles of redemption for man, who being under the penalty of death, was unable to pay.

When satan put to death the sinless, innocent Son of God, the High Court of Heaven cancelled all his claims against humanity. The Lamb of God, the Righteous Son of Glory paid the penalty of ransom, thus meeting all the demands of God and the Holy Law, defeating satan and his host with his very blood. Now then, we who believe are “alive to God, in Christ”, as Paul wrote in Romans 6:14 “…sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”

For the reasons stated in Romans 6:14, if we confess our sin and consecrate our lives to God, satan loses his case in the High Court of Heaven, and man comes away from court with power of attorney by the blood of Jesus, and we are made representatives and officers of God’s law, and can dispossess and cast out, can heal and strengthen, and do whatsoever the High King of Heaven says for us to do. Because of the work of Jesus Christ, it is our legal, redemptive, blood bought, divine right to be free and resist the enemies of Heaven until the intimidating grip of false authority on mankind is brought down to the ground. The walls of hell WILL fall, all the way to hell!

But for those who refuse to believe and turn from their sin, satan gives to them the sole right and power to suffer.

Christ has once and for all hurled satan from his position of power, so that he is a conquered enemy. We don’t have to bind what Christ has beaten and bound. The might of satan, the prince of all diabolical powers, is already broken. Our greatest strength against the enemies of Heaven, is not to fight against the devil, who is exhausted and defeated, but our greatest strength is to come into the likeness of The Son, Jesus, the Christ of God. Jesus has broken the powers of satan, so that those who look to God in faith are liberated from the influences of darkness.

In the heart posture towards Christ in our hearts and lives, there is no room for sitting on the fence. Every person is either for or against Him, whether we realize and acknowledge it or not.

The privilege and the seriousness of following Christ are of such tremendous magnitude that there is no room for excuse for compromise with the world, or for half-heartedness.

By faith, we live everyday in the splendid opportunity of being citizens of the kingdom of God.

The Lord’s Prayer Expanded:

Holy God, You are The One who is near us in mercy and love and at the same time You are high exalted above us, for your Name is the expression of Your Being, the Name who is sanctified in all creation. Let Your divine rule come, Your divine sovereignty which more and more fully attains it’s rightful place in the heart and life of mankind, as in Heaven where your will is obeyed, spontaneously, with perfect joy, in a perfect manner without a shadow of unfaithfulness. Lord we ask for Your supernatural aid and blessing in all the fields of our lives where Your dominion is perfect and all the real needs of man are replenished, not just for us as individuals on our own merit but in reliance on the grace of God. We ourselves ask for forgiveness as we absolve and acquit those who are indebted to us, who act wrongly towards us on the full ground of Your grace, the sweeping love of God. We concede and admit that we are weak, and are conscious of our own weakness that You would direct our path away from circumstances in which we are exposed to evil temptations, but also celebrate and are glad in You who gives us the victory and causes everything to contribute towards the good of those who love You. Help us that our prayers and life habits would not degenerate into mechanical, and ceremonial formality. For You are the Glory and power, the Perfect Friend who reigns forever. Amen.

What do you think?

He Looked And Saw

Posted on by
Reply

In Genesis 18 we are privy to a conversation displaying all sorts of heart attitudes which are still applicable today, right where we are, everyday.

As the conversation opens we see Abraham sitting in the door of his tent, which was his dwelling place, his home and covering. It’s probably somewhere around midday, so it’s hot and he’s taken shelter from the sun. As it goes with us, when it’s hot and we’ve gotten out of the sun for a bit, the same was probably for Abraham in that he may have been dozing a little, waiting for the heat to fade. There are some really key points in this story for us to notice.

The Lord drew my attention to a process in vs. 2, where it says, “he lifted up his eyes”, then “he looked”, and “when he saw”. If we look a little deeper than the English “simplization” of the verse, looking at the Hebrew, variations of seeing come to light. To say, “he lifted up his eyes” is an idiom meaning he was casually looking around, not looking at anything specific, like someone who is waking up from dozing, noticing their environment, with no particular focus. The next phrase is “he looked”. For some reason, something or someone has gotten Abraham’s attention, and now he’s not just generally looking around, now he’s focusing, specifically, on someone or something of special note. It would be the difference between my saying to you, “look” as opposed to saying look with a specific purpose, like not just “look”, but, “look at that tree”. Do you get what i’m saying? Three people suddenly being within his scope of vision was completely out of the ordinary of his visual environment, not to mention, i believe God was pointing them out to him, resulting in his sharpening his focus to see specifically. They were people who were not normally at his camp there in the middle of nowhere. The third phrase, “when he saw them” is a phrase used in reference to a type of prophetic seeing, it is used denoting that he was fully engaged, head and heart, like someone seeing, with eyes wide open, looking, specifically, at something amazing, something to be contemplated with intent. Using the word “when”, which is a time word, reveals that he must have rolled it around in his mind for a second as realization and revelation came to light.

i’m not saying all this to establish that i know something. It is easily understood i absolutely do not. God alone is the sole source of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding, and if God doesn’t give us wisdom and insight we simply won’t have it. i am saying, though, there is wisdom here to be grasped in a modern society where uncertainty is deliberately advanced by those who’s hearts are darkened to leverage others for their own advantage at the expense of those held in uncertainty. God operates in the opposite. He wants us to be certain, and to be wise and have understanding. As a result the three facets of seeing, we can see how they describe how we come to understand things, they reveal God’s process, and point to His preferences, and standards.

The Lord’s heart is not only for us to wake up and grow up, but also to be interested enough in Him to take notice and understand. Today, too much of the church is simply spending their time being continually cycled through an organized program every Sunday. Typical leadership seems to have the attitude that congregations need to be managed, and as long as people are engaged in “activities”, they feel like they’re being a part of something larger. It is government by consent of the governed.

From the beginning, God almighty desired to be known by the object of His affection, us. He not only offers us deliverance and salvation, but He shares His attributes with us. He desires we be involved with Him, doing more than simply possessing fire insurance, but knowing Him and understanding, certain and confident He is all He says and more. His ways are better than ours, higher and profitable. He will, indeed, if we are willing to do more than just casual looking, God will open our eyes to “see” and comprehend. He wants us to do more than simply go to church, His desire is for us to advance our relationship with Him and the body of Christ. That is the “having life more abundantly” part spoken of in John10:10.

Not too long ago, upon hearing the scripture from John10:10, where Jesus said that He came that they may have life, and have it more abundantly, an inmate said, “i’ve been living a two part life. A life as a rebellious criminal, and another life as a believer. All my days i’ve been in poverty on both sides of that two part life, and now you’re telling me that Jesus wants me to have life abundantly? i’d sure like all that abundantly to show up about now.” The man was looking but not seeing, he may have been focusing in general, but not on the Lord specifically. His head and heart operated independently of each other, and were not in sync. There was always the undercurrent of criminal thinking, and if he got entirely too honest then the thrill of leveraging the outcome at the expense of someone else would be gone, his eyes would be opened, and then he’d have to be responsible. Just going to church didn’t solve any of his problems, but for a while, he sure did look good without actually having to be righteous. Let us do more than just live a life of continually rising from our drowsy state, more than just looking around with unfocused eyes, but be fully engaged with God, head and heart as one.

What do you think?

The Fitting Room

Posted on by
Reply

Now that we believe Jesus is Lord, we don’t fit in the world anymore, so where do we fit?

In the last many months, on and off, i’ve been in a discussion of being indifferent versus having excessive compassion? Many times i was pegging the meter because I was indifferent, and felt guilty about being indifferent, and wondered why I didn’t feel bad because I didn’t feel bad about being indifferent? Other times i was pegging the meter in destructive compassion because I knew God was compassionate and I should be compassionate also, but I couldn’t help but become a real mush brain, getting sucked into the downward vortex of being sympathetic instead of empathetic.

Finding the middle ground on that was completely a work of the Lord. Not being indifferent, while not being angry, and not being excessively compassionate at the same time is all entirely a God thing. When I brought up the initial topic of indifference versus being compassionate to my own deprivation, I think the, metaphorical wheels on my airplane were clipping the tops of the trees, with the wingtips occasionally scraping the ground. If i wasn’t flying too high nearly passing out from lack of oxygen, i was flying too low nearing a crash moment, but thank you Jesus it didn’t happen and the Lord leveled me out soon enough.

I guess the parachute in that whole dilemma was me coming to grips with… Where am I in all of this, not where are other people in all of this, but where am i? …and learning to not be angry or indifferent with the rest of the world because of all the things their relationship with God is Not. The Lord reminded me again, after reminding me again, after reminding me again that there will always be a long line of irritating people with the wrong view of just about everything, but I don’t have to keep standing there agonizing with them over the torment and woe they’ve generated for themselves, or unwittingly bought into.

I am reminded of the story a friend of mine named Wilson told me about when he was in prison many years ago. He said he gave his life to the Lord and suddenly woke up to see the long line of people always wanting to either get him in trouble, getting him into fights, or wanted to sell him drugs. He said he cried out to God and asked over and over, Lord please remove from in front of me the long line of difficult people. He said one especially distressful day, the Lord said to him very plainly, Wilson, there will always be a long line of those kind of people, but you don’t have to keep standing there. Oh.

If we don’t fit with the world, and the Lord has called us out of religion and church-ianity, where do we fit? In the past, i’ve been burdened day and night in weeping prayer asking the Lord where I fit? His reply to me was simple… “You fit with me and I will make you fit where you need to be fitted.”

Consider the time after the Lord came to heal the sick and made salvation available to all who would believe. At the end of things, God will have given plenty of time for the world to prove to itself we will never possess righteousness through evolution and that God is the only One who decides when the end of a season is over and a new one starts. We are right on the tipping point of a big transition as written about in the Bible. Isaiah61 and in Rev19 are two passages which run parallel to each other, both referring to the bride who is making herself ready.

Imagine, right now we are in God´s fitting room trying on our wedding garments, and we’re starting to get the idea, this is no ordinary fitting room.

We don’t get to choose our own wedding apparel, that is the Lord’s doing. Isaiah61:10, “For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness”. The world’s way of fitting the wedding attire is to cut or let out some material to fit the body of the bride. The Lord´s way is to fit the body of the bride to the one and only wedding garment, the righteousness of Jesus as opposed to the self-righteousness of man. Some of us are too fat, so He dresses us down, adding frailty, and some of us are too thin, so He builds us up, adding strength, so that we all come to the right size, personally and collectively, as a body. Righteousness is the size of the wedding apparel, and it only comes in one size.

This refers to one purpose, among many, concerning sanctification as steps to maturity. Look at this from another direction …in Revelation the Lord is both Lion of Judah and the Lamb without stain who is the only one able to open the scroll. Some of us are lions transformed into lambs like Peter, and others, are like Gideon, lambs who God transforms into lions. The Lord knows exactly how to fit us into righteousness, He knows exactly what we need that He might present the church to Himself in majestic brightness, without spot, wrinkle or even a smudge, that we would be holy and without blemish, just as it’s written in Eph5:27. There is how we fit.

Along with other references to God’s party and marriage invitation in the Gospels, the Lord also has something to say to the guests trying to crash the party without the proper attire…. the door is shut to them because of the refusal to submit to His will and values.

What do you think?

Pruning 101

Posted on by
Reply

To be a teacher is more than just knowing stuff. It is more than simply telling answers. It seems to me that anyone who only wants to walk among other people, never asking questions but only telling answers, doesn’t want to really be involved with the body but only needs subordinates. i figure teaching is a lot like being a pruner. If someone is considered a professional pruner for grapevines and fruit trees, they’ve got to have a deep appreciation for the vine or tree, they’ve got to be patient, gracefully disposed, willing to be involved, possessing a huge understanding of how it works, and an ultimate goal of making the vine bear as much fruit as possible.

In early Greek culture, someone who was a teacher was spoken of as you would speak of someone who was a choral master, someone who blended voices and choral poetry for public performance, and was also responsible for a correct performance. Aren’t pruners and teachers very similar? i think yes. The pruner helps train the vine to go a different way for the reason of keeping the vine healthy and to bear more fruit. The calling requires real wisdom and insight for a plan of action. It may take the pruner several seasons of tying up branches and limbs in a certain direction, trimming some off and letting others grow in order to achieve the goal of the master of the vineyard. Can you see how the pruner, like a teacher, creates a grape vine which functions like choral poetry? Sure you can. It can also be said that anyone who teaches is also characterized with learning, for to teach is to learn, and every time a pruner puts his hand to the vine he learns a little more about the characteristics of what makes it tick.

i’ve heard it said that every vine, to the discerning pruners eye, has unique characteristics, and each variety of grape vine is as an individual. We, as the people of God are individually unique, and every good teacher should carefully become familiar with their subjects, gently being involved with their pupils, shaping them, snipping a little, directing in a better direction, all with the purpose of improving each one to be more fruitful. That is a good teacher, or a good pruner.

Yet here, i want to point out an observation about the teachers/pruners of today. There are indeed some very good teachers/pruners around. But there’s also a multitude who are pruning the vines, not with a set of sharp shears, a well honed knife, and a keen eye, but they’re pruning with a club, beating the branches off the vine. Many who say they are teachers are brutalizing others by only telling answers, being very unsympathetic to the agony of their pupils, and filling their heads with twisted notions and half-answers framed more to control rather than make them fruitful. A good teacher is a poet in the classroom as well as in the field, instructing and explaining specific talents, and even strategy. Don’t professional pruners also teach the vine the best way to go, and strategize with the vineyard owner? The vine is purposely planted north to south so it gets as much sun as possible, with the sun going east to west. As a result, the pruner must prune some leaves to cover parts of the grape cluster from the heat of the sun, as well as remove just enough so as to allow the sun to ripen the yield of the field evenly. It’s a very intuitive business, and one requiring great understanding about how the vine grows.

If, in God’s constant agriculture analogy, from Adam and Eve being tenders of the garden to the call for us all to be fruitful, i see apostles as planters, and teachers as pruners. In the O.T., the word for pruners came with the idea of someone who strikes the strings with their fingers. It was a delicate touch on the strings to make a beautiful sound, not in the sense of pounding the instrument in a effort to beat a melody out of it, which would be like pruning with a club. In fact, the way the Lord gave us the Hebrew word, the first letter is a knife, and the last letter is a picture of constructive or destructive cutting away, and the letter right in the middle is one of wisdom. So, for pruners, between the knife and trimming of the vine is a flowing stream of wisdom. Can you see the picture there … can you see the sequence of a knife, wisdom, and cutting? With a little knife, choice and wise constructive cutting away draws out the greatness of the vine, as in a creative process to prosper all the little knife trims.

If we prune with a club, the vine will be years in recovery before it bears fruit again. Aren’t brutal teachers who choke their students down to “make” them learn, aren’t they trimming the vine with a club, and their brutalized students might well be years recovering to become fruitful again? No wonder in James 3:1, scripture reads, “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.” Why? Because the fruitfulness of the vine is in your hands as a teacher, probably more than anyone else. Pruning 101 says you’ve got to be gentle, prayerfully consider to understand each branch and vine, use wisdom and think carefully before you cut one back or let another stand. Be wise and don’t cut down fruitful trees. C’mon, i know you’re probably irritated with a lot of poor students, but in the mean time, don’t cut down fruitful trees.

What do you think?

i’m Social Porter with Living In His Name Ministries