Month: June 2019

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You are not alone.

“The eternal life of which Jesus speaks is not knowledge about God, but an intimately interactive relationship with him.” – Dallas Willard

The song by folksinger Karen Money touches me every time I hear it. She sings, “. . . all I long for most is mine when He draws close to me.”

What is it you long for most? Surely we long for God’s gifts, including joy, peace, blessings, and answered prayers, but at some point we find our deepest longing is for God himself and not just his gifts. We desire . . .

  • To have a heart-stirring awareness of his presence
  • To know he’s leading our thoughts and decisions
  • To receive his love in life-changing ways
  • To be amazed at his holiness and power

If this kind of closeness to our Creator becomes our experience, we want it again and again. Why? Because that vibrant, feeling-level relationship with God is what satisfies the deepest needs we have. He truly is the One we long for most.

The amazing thing to me is that Jesus has the same longings for intimacy with us. He wants it so much he came to earth, lived with humans, gave himself to a terrifying death so we could relate to him. Coming to him for salvation is only the first step. After that, not to respond to his ongoing presence by communicating with him constantly is to reject the relationship he desires even more than we do.

Our acknowledgment of his unseen presence is what we need to meet our deepest longings. Every moment of every day, knowing he is with me, I want to be engaged in mental or verbal conversation with him, inviting him into my activities, decisions, and relationships. That interaction thrills us both!

“Come near to God and he will come near to you.” – James 4:8

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Are you seen as wise?

To God belong wisdom and power; counsel and understanding are his. – Job 12:13

Do you sometimes feel like we are living in a world turned upside down? We see disorder, disrespect, anger, and chaos where there used to be civil discourse and attempts at mutual understanding. Long-held moral values seem to have been discarded. Many people feel they are adrift, without an anchor in truth. They long for common sense, direction, and wisdom.

That’s where you and I might be able to be of help. There’s a passage in the Bible where Moses is summarizing for the people the commands of God and his history with his people. Referring to God’s laws, Moses says, “Observe them carefully, for this will show your wisdom and understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.'” (Deuteronomy 4:6)

My paraphrase of this directive is something like this, “Because God tells us what a well-lived life should look like, if you obey him, people observing you will think you’re wise.” It makes sense, doesn’t it? God alone knows how humans function best!

There is something attractive about a person who understands what gives life meaning, lives confidently under God’s design for humans, and is not easily swayed by the churning world around us. Scripture seems to say if we live as God has directed, others will look at us and think we are wise. And, by God’s definition, we are. Fearing, following, obeying him, he says, is the beginning of wisdom.

Our world needs wise people, living God-directed, spiritually rich lives. I want to be one of them. Do you, too? 

“Wisdom in scripture is, broadly speaking, the knowledge of God’s world and the knack of fitting oneself into it.” – Cornelius Plantinga

#Wisdom #Following God

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Thinking of Him?

” . . .we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ”. – 2 Corinthians 10:5b

Are you sometimes unsatisfied with the quality of your life? Do you want it to be more meaningful? To be more in cync with God’s will? When I’m feeling that frustration, I remember that the less I think about me and the more I think about God, the richer and more significant my life will be. He is the only source of purpose and joy. And he responds when we turn our attention toward him.

With that in mind, I’m reposting one of my poems which I published in a blog in 2016. I’m sharing it now because it’s where my heart is and I’m thinking it may resonate with you as well.  

Thinking of Him?

When the lights grow dim
Are you thinking of Him?
Or is your mind too cluttered
With thoughts un-uttered
And words unspoken
And promises broken?

When the day is at end
Do you talk with your Friend?
Or are you doing the dishes
And pondering wishes
And things yet to do
E’re the evening is through?

When you woke in your bed
Was it His name you said?
Or were you thinking of rights
And yesterday’s fights
And battles to win
When the sun comes again?

Our mind is the measure
Of what we most treasure.
It shows us what holds us
And constantly molds us.
If we’re centered on Jesus
And how He does please us,

The thoughts that disturb us
And tend to perturb us
Will crumble and cower
And lose all their power.
Then when the lights grow dim,
We’ll be thinking of Him.

“I am trying to be utterly free from everybody, free from my own self, but completely enslaved to the will of God every moment of this day.” – Frank Laubauch

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Just Glimpses

“Behold these are but the outskirts of his ways and how small a whisper do we hear of him! But the thunder of his power who can understand?” – Job 26:14

Don’t we all want to know what God is like? Moses wanted that, too, and asked God to show him his glory. God said, in essence, ‘I really like you, Moses, but you can’t look on me and still be alive.’ God decided, though, to share a little more of who he was, so he had Moses stand in a cleft on the mountain and allowed this humble human to see the remnants of his glory as he passed by. 

And, as humans, that’s all we ever see of him – glimpses of his glory. We see a bit of it in thunderstorms and Bible revelations, but just whispers, just shadows. We have to be careful not to try to figure God out based on those remnants or on our own experience. He is bigger, greater, more astounding than anything we could ever even think of! We don’t have the capacity to imagine or grasp his greatness, power, or magnificence.

So what do we do if we want to know more about him? We start with what he has allowed us to see in the Bible and in creation.  He’s strong, present everywhere, majestic, kind, all-knowing, good, holy, artistic, and loving toward all he has made (that includes us!). We, at this point, have to be content with what we can know of him. And what we know is just a faint shadow of the reality of who he is – an almighty, all-loving, awe-inspiring God worthy of our worship!

“Bring me a worm that can comprehend a man, and then I will show you a man that can comprehend the Triune God.” – John Wesley