|
| Well look at that - 3 and a half months without a post. Nice work, Mr Reliable. (and thanks especially to Facebook for most of the distraction!) God's shifting things in my life. I've had tough decisions to make, but I've taken the view that if there is equal benefit either way, it is probably best to walk down the new paths until something comes up. Church is the big one. I've become more and more dissatisfied with my church, and I am only now starting to realise that it is because there is no feeding going on. Now, I would be one of the first to say that going to church is not a "me, me, me!" deal, and we should aim to serve others not ourselves. But when you realise that nobody in the church is actually moving forward and any spiritual food being served up is dry and unnourishing (is that a word), you have to ask questions. God's shown me a lot of things, as well as opening doors at another church, and I am planning to use the Christmas break as a transition time to shift over to this new place. I want to do it gradually, because I don't want to burn the bridges completely - God has spoken to me a lot about the prophet Jonah, and how I am not allowed to now go away and eagerly await God's destruction of Nineveh. And I am OK with that - I will continue to warn the church leaders and pray that that church be restored to its former glory. It is comparable with the church of Sardis in Revelation 3. The new church I am attending has been great. The first time I visited, I almost fell off the pew because the preacher actually mentioned sin! I didn't think you were allowed to do that in church! (tongue-in-cheek). Not only that, over the next few weeks I realised that this preacher couldn't give a message without being clear about the depravity of man and the need for repentance! Every message came back to the cross, and whilst I wouldn't say the sermons were groundbreaking revelations, I suddenly felt like I was being fed again! God manouvered me very quickly into a small group led by the Senior Pastor of that church, and without any action on my part has pushed me into a mentoring relationship with that pastor, and even though I tried to literally hide my heart for preaching, God has pushed me into a place where the pastor is eager to train me in that role. I had visited the church a total of 5 or 6 times, and here was the senior pastor agreeing to mentor me and offer me the platform! All the while, I was trying to just blend into the background and not make a fuss! It is funny how God is patient for us to lay down our desires, but as soon as we do, he allows us to take them up again, and opens the necessary doors. I had given up on preaching, and I had given up on running away from my church. Once I had done that, God not only opened doors, he practically pushed me through them! In other news, it's roughly the same story with my work situation. I have been teaching in Middle School this year, but have been desperate to teach a primary class - that is my heart and my gift. Right when I had given up and agreed to willingly stick in my job next year, the school deputy principal called me in and offered me a job in the lower grades! Amazing. And exciting! And the bell has just gone and I have to go to class. | | |
| I met a new preacher the other day (and by "met", I mean I downloaded one of their sermons). It seems he's fairly well known, but prior to 2 days ago, I wouldn't have a clue who you were talking about if you mentioned Zac Poonen. But I like him. A lot! (and that's not just because he sounds half Indian and half Irish!) I've been listening to the first 2 of a 3-part series from sermonindex.net, and it's great. As I said to a friend last night, we are used to hearing messages with "The three keys to such-and-such" or "The four signs of whatever", if we are really lucky we'll go up to "Seven steps to freedom in Christ" or even "Nine marks of a healthy church". But Brother Poonen blew me away when he announced he was preaching on the FIFTY (50!) traits of a pharisee, and that he would justify EVERY ONE with scripture. I was hooked. I recommend you listen to these. It's 3 x 1-hour audios, some which inspires, some which convicts. Poonen finds an amazing balance between preaching holiness and emphasising non-judgemental attitudes. It's quite amazing. Some of the points (and I am only up to #33 so far) have made me excited, thinking "That's a great way of explaining what I have always felt!", and some have made me recoil, because I know I display that trait. Please, listen everyone. And to use Poonen's words, let's squeeze all the pharisee pus out of our lives. Part ONE-
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/mydownloads/visit.php?lid=8151
Part TWO-
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/mydownloads/visit.php?lid=8316
Part THREE-
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/mydownloads/visit.php?lid=8318 | | |
| Find rest my soul, in God alone;
My hope comes from him.
He alone is my rock and my salvation;
He is my fortress, I will never be shaken.
My salvation and honour depend on God;
He is my mighty rock, my refuge. One thing God has spoken,
Two things have I heard:
That you, O God, are strong,
And that you, O Lord, are loving.
Surely you will reward each person
According to what he has done. - Psalm 62:5-7, 11-12
(Forgive me for breaking the mood of such a powerful passage, but don't you just love the number of semi-colons in the book of Psalms? What? You don't? Must be one of those English teacher things.) This was the passage I read as I went to bed last night, and I've decided to make it my onofficial "Passage for thinking-over for the week". It seems so simple, but I am sure that the more I look at it, the more I will find. One thing that strikes me is verse 12 - "Surely you will reward each person according to what he has done". Words like surely and verily and O are those Bible-speak words that we've learned to ignore. Have you noticed how we all seem to naturally read verse 12 as though it began with "You" - the surely has become as meaningless as our modern use of "like" (He was like, so tall, and I was like, "Whoa!"). In our days of lazy language, it's almost nothing more than a comma. But what if we gave it's meaning back? Surely - it is certain. "It is certain [agreed, definite, ordained, guaranteed] that you will reward each person according to what he has done". Ah, that's better. But last night it led me to something else... This Psalm (and others) extoll God's great strength, and ability to defend his people. Verse 6 says we will never be shaken when we stand on the rock. God is our fortress, our defence against our enemies. We should notice that God is able and willing to protect us from any temptation, any evil, any sin. Verses 11 and 12 tell us why: He is able to defend, because he is strong, and he is willing to defend because he is loving. Often we fall to the weakest of temptations because we foolishly believe that sin is just part of life and being human. That is a lie - read Genesis 1-3 and compare the difference between God's life and the judgements of death. God commands holiness, and we should pursue it. I am ever-increasingly offended by people who shrug their shoulders at sin and excuse themselves with "Well, we'll never be perfect". To them I answer, perfection is our goal, but excellence will be tolerated. If we shrug at God's ability to deliver, we sell ourselves (and him) short, show a lack of faith, and essentially tell God that he isn't really that disgusted with sin after all. Now, even if we never quite make it to sinlessness, it should always be our top priority to worship and honour God, and we should make every effort to live at peace with him. Premeditated sin has no place in the believer's life. Why is it certain that God will reward each person according to what he has done? It is certain [definite, determined, sure], because this entire psalm has shown his power to save. He is justified to judge, because he offers the protection from evil. Those who accept his forgiveness and ongoing strength will be rightfully rewarded with eternal life. Those who refuse to accept his freely offered sanctification will be rightfully rewarded with their due punishment. "Surely you will reward each person according to what he has done" because you have given us everything we need for life and godliness, and left the choice entirely up to us. Thus, your judgements will be true and just. | | |
| It's been a rough time. But I am on the mend. Two weeks ago, I realised that the emptiness of my life was quite significant. A week and a half ago, I realised that what I was going through had actually been grinding away at me for well over a year, but it was finally wearing me down. What was that "thing"? I don't know, really. But I knew enough to deal with it. I went out in the night and got some things out of my system, then drove up a mountain to have a good pray. There was unrepentant sin in my life. I felt trapped - unable to change, unable to pray, longing for the 'olden days' when my life was fully alive in God. It really highlighted to me how significant my Christian faith is. It's not until it is truly gone and dead that you realise how real your spiritual life is! So anyway, cryptic mumbling aside, I dealt with things in the middle of the night in the freezing cold on top of that mountain looking out across my city. And the change was instant, just as I always preach that it should be. For the second significant time in my life, I experienced God's release. I am not a believer in the "little-by-little" gospel in the way that it is preached today - Jesus died, it is finished. The "work out your salvation" passages of the Bible do not speak of a struggle to get right with God, which is the way they are often portrayed (but then evangelicals realise that salvation is by faith and not by works, so they have to then balance that preaching, which leaves the hearer believing that sin is undefeatable, but really not all that an important topic). Over the past week and a half, I have been doing the things that have been missing for so long (longer than I realised at the time): The Bible is a joy to me again, and I am finding it alive; I have been able to lift my hands in worship for the first time in months; prayer is flowing again; I am able to actually say "no" to temptation (which has dropped right off and become a rarity, incidentally, as I believe it should when we repent and become a new creation, hidden in Christ. It's not gone, but it's certainly lost its debilitating sting); zeal has returned for the things of God; my uber-critical heart and mindset has been softened; and today, out of the blue, I wept for the salvation of my city and nation. There needs to be some reconciliation between me and some peers - I suddenly realised that I have separated myself from those who used to build me up, and done nothing but criticise and (incorrectly) judge them behind their backs. When I began to excitedly share what I was learning from 2 Cor 5 with a friend of mine, he said, "It's good to have you back". All I can say is, IT'S GOOD TO BE BACK! | | |
| Well, right when I started the blog you KNEW I wouldn't stick with it. But when I start getting "Where are you?" comments from people I have never met, I know that I am letting fans down somewhere! It's been a month since the last post. Lots has happened, and not much has happened. I went out with the street team last Saturday night for the first time in ages, and gave them another quiet night, for which Josh seemed slightly thankful. Got to speak to a few people, and tried the new fangled "slightly-less-aggressive" approach that I have been hearing Ray use on WotMR recently. I learned this lesson the hard way after running the "script" with a few strangers and repeatedly stepping on their religious little toes. If you hit too strongly, it can be hard to get people to examine their salvation honestly. In recent weeks, Ray has almost given people the benefit of the doubt when they claim to be Christian, and then has brought in the Law gently for specific reasons. I like that.  Teaching still progresses. This term I am aiming to teach algebra and ratios to Grade 9s, whilst my Grade 7s get a broad mix of: Grammar and sentence construction; morphographic spelling principles (which I am learning about 1 day ahead of them...); fractions, decimals and percentages; natural disasters, with a focus on tsunamis; Biblical apologetics; and most of all, SOCIAL SKILLS!!! A little side-story... last week events conspired to upset me greatly. I made a meeting the deputy principal to ask why he seemed to distrust me. It was scary. I told him he was scary. I think he was laughing on the inside. But he told me that if he had reason to be upset with me for any reason, I would definitely know about it first. I found it to be a very reassuring experience. And I've noticed he's trying to smile at me a bit more now  . Oh, and I am also "helping" to run 24-7 Prayer at my church at the moment. If you've not heard about it, look it up. There's something very peaceful about praying from 4 till 5am. | | |
|
