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There are certain places you don’t want to be. You don’t want to be standing in the middle of highway in the path of a semi truck heading toward you at 70 mph. You don’t want to be outside in your swimming suit when it’s twenty below zero. You don’t want to climb into the polar bear’s cage at the zoo.

You get the point, I’m sure.

Freedom has boundaries, just like we have boundaries. The moat between you and the polar bear is a very nice boundary. If the polar bear is hungry, he won’t have you for lunch because of the moat. In the same way, as soon as we disconnect from the Spirit, we are no longer free.

Let’s put it another way. Why is the Spirit here? He’s here to keep you free. He’s here to keep you on the right side of the moat. God cares so much about our freedom that He send His Spirit to keep us in the wide open places of freedom.

From the Bible: In Jesus, you are free. That freedom doesn’t give you an open door to sin. Instead, it empowers you to love and serve each other. The whole law is summed up here: “Love others as much as you love yourself.” Take your lead from God’s Spirit. Then you won’t try to satisfy your evil desires. Part of you wants what God hates. God’s Spirit stands opposed to that. But if you let God’s Spirit lead you, then you won’t need to center your life around rule keeping. Galatians 5:13-18 selections The Easy Bible

Dwight

Growth means facing our fears and stepping out of our comfort zone.

Remember the three wise men who brought gifts to Jesus after He was born? Before visiting Jesus, they stopped and talked to the local king: Herod. They asked where the new King, the Messiah had been born.

Matthew (2:3) records the response: “When King Herod heard this, he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.”

No surprise. The world is full of people who are disturbed by the news that a King has been born.

Herod is so crazed with power that when he finds out the news that the Messiah has been born, his first response is to try to find Him and kill Him. The people of Jerusalem also somehow seem to know that this Messiah came to save them from their sins, and they wanted no such salvation.

Why do we resist letting Christ be King? I suggest it’s because we believe a lie. Herod believed the lie that he could hold on to power and that power would protect him. But he died, just like everyone else, and all his power was stripped from him.

Where are we unwilling to let Christ reign? In our fears? In our lusts? In our pride? In our greed?

We all have a line someplace in our souls. On one side we say “yes” to Christ; on the other side we say “no.” In between is the lie. That is our spiritual journey. Find the “no,” and we face the lie. Let Jesus tell us the truth, so that another “no” can be turned to a “yes.”

I’m not saying this is easy. It requires great courage to find the border of our faith—but that is where Christ takes us—out of our comfort zone, out into the deep. But it is out in the deep that we let down our nets and discover what we never dreamed was there.

Dwight

Deception has one primary purpose: to keep us from the life Jesus offers.

If lies didn’t sound like truth, they wouldn’t be any good. Lies deceive precisely because they sound or feel so very true. And most lies contain a grain of truth.

Lies can sound intellectually sophisticated, socially tolerant, and/or culturally acceptable. Intellectually sophisticated thoughts, socially tolerant attitudes, cultural norms sometimes reflect truth. Sometimes they deceive. But if we use these things as our only barometer of truth, we are probably deceived.

Common lies:

Lie: God is whoever you conceive him/her to be.
Truth: God is who He is (Exodus 3:14). He is not sculpted by our beliefs. But, if we allow Him to, He can shape our beliefs.

Beliefs can contradict reality. We see this with schizophrenics all the time. I can believe that I can drive into oncoming traffic and be fine. But I will wake up to a far different reality if I try.

Lie: Jesus is one of many.
Truth: Jesus is one and only.

Not only did Jesus claim that He was the only way to God (John 14:6), but He asked God before His death if there was any other way (Matthew 26:39). If there was another way for humanity to be reconciled to God, Jesus would not have voluntarily submitted to a painful and humiliating death by crucifixion. Jesus’ claim to be the only way was reiterated by His close followers (Acts 4:12).

Many other lies permeate our culture and define our experience. Education does not necessarily drive them out. Some lies are reinforced by education. Some lies are transmitted by Christians, and reinforced by well-meaning sermons.

Quite often, a speaker can tell the truth, but a listener hears a lie.

In response to deception, Jesus offers Himself as the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6). He makes it clear that the truth will set us free (John 8:32).

Photo credit: Adapted from a photo by Courtney Carmody, Flickr, Creative Commons License

God sees.
God knows.
God cares.

He sees that our lives, our relationships, our communities are messed up, and He is not aloof. He hurts with us.
He sees that our efforts to fix what’s broken aren’t working.
So He devised a plan to make all things good once again.

That means the day is coming when He is going to purge the world of all that is evil, hurtful and destructive.
He is angry that little children are molested, needy people are oppressed, the people He loves are abused.
Perpetrators will answer for their crimes.

But that creates a dilemma.
We are all of us perpetrators. We are all guilty at one level or another.
We are all stained with sin.
So how does He purge the world of evil without purging us along with that evil?

Enter Jesus.
God becomes vulnerable.
He moves in range so we can take a swing at Him if we want.
And that’s exactly what we did.
We hated Him.
We nailed Him to a cross, and left Him there to die.
But while He was absorbing all our wrath, He also absorbed the wrath of God.
He took our punishment, so that we perpetrators could be set free.
He met hate with love, and overcame.

Jesus and death had it out.
Death lost.
Jesus won.

Now the life and love of Jesus is available to all—
if we want it.
If we invite Jesus in, His life and love rebuild our lives, our relationships, our communities, our world.

This is an opt-in or opt-out arrangement.
No one will compel you to participate.
It’s your choice.
You may want to define yourself with evil.
You may want to draw a line between you and God.
You have that power.

But the day will come, when God will honor all those lines,
and finish His work
of purging our world
of everything evil, hurtful and destructive,
and rebuilding
everything good.

Photo credit: Adapted from a photo by Khánh Hmoong, Flickr, Creative Commons License

A word for someone out there…

Terrible things have happened—
horrors beyond imagination.
But these are sand castles on the shore of eternity,
and the tide is coming in.

Dwight

Adapted from a photo by Damian Gadal, Flickr, Creative Commons License

Every so often I run into someone who tells me that religion is the root of all problems experienced by humanity. To that person (or to anyone who will listen), I say:

Imagine a world populated with people who care for and about one another—people who truly value one another. What would it be like to be able to walk all day and all night through any neighborhood in any city in the world and not only be perfectly safe, but also meet person after person who not only wished the very best for you, but also stood ready to sacrifice their time and money to make sure you were okay…what would that be like?

Suppose every person on this planet was filled with some kind of delicious happiness—no need for anyone to get high because everyone is already high—high on life. And suppose deep down, each person was at peace—at peace with oneself, at peace with one’s neighbors, at peace with the world. You couldn’t meet a grumpy person because there wouldn’t be any such thing.

This world we’re imagining is stress free because its people simply cannot get stressed out. They’re beyond that. Nothing rattles them. It’s not that they’re delusional; instead they’re triumphant. They greet every problem, every set back with a cheerful smile. Along the way they’re dreaming up ways to make one another’s world a better place. They leave a trail of kindness wherever they go.

These are people of integrity, people who keep their promises, people who can be fully trusted. The most fragile person is safe with any of the inhabitants of this world. Nobody flies off the handle. Nobody loses it because deep inside, there’s nothing to lose. This is a world of people who have already won. They are complete. They are good.

Now where do you find a world like that? I only know of one place—it’s the place where you throw open every door in the basement of your soul—throw them open to Jesus, and allow His Spirit to come in and transform you into the you imagined, created, redeemed and forever enjoyed by God.

I don’t know how you define religion. If you define it as a bunch of people trying to control each other or people on a jihad or crusade, then maybe you’re right. Maybe religion is the problem. But if it’s opening the door and inviting Jesus in, then I cannot imagine a better way to create a perfect world.

As the Bible says: The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Galatians 5:22-23

Remember, you are designed to make a difference!

Dwight

Photo credit: Adapted from a photo by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Flickr, Creative Commons License

I heard this story years ago from a missionary I know in Mexico:

An evangelist was traveling from church to church in Mexico. As he concluded his meetings at a small village church, he told the congregation, “I need to purchase an airline ticket to fly to my next destination. I don’t have any money to do that, but I believe God will speak to one of you, and this need will be supplied.”

After the service, everyone filed out of the church—except one person. A poor widow remained. She walked up to the pastor and the evangelist and offered to pay for the airline ticket.

“How will you do that?” the pastor asked. “You have no money.”

“I will sell my milk cow,” she said.

“You can’t do that,” he said, “That’s your livelihood. If you sell the cow, you will have no means of supporting yourself.”

The pastor and the evangelist both did their best to talk her out of it. But she would not be dissuaded. “You’ve always said we should listen to God’s voice and do what He says,” she told her pastor. “And I believe God is telling me to do this.”

She sold her cow.

Meanwhile, the evangelist tried his best to raise the money some other way, but no funds came in. Finally, he reluctantly accepted her offering, and flew on to his next destination.

He almost forgot about this widow, until one day many months later he was preaching in a church in Mexico City. After the service, a woman invited him and others into her beautiful home for a meal. After the meal was over, she said to him, “You don’t remember me, do you?”

Then it dawned on him that this was the widow who had given up her livelihood to buy him an airplane ticket.

“Tell me the story,” he said. So she told him what happened.

“When my husband died, his brother cheated me out of my inheritance, and left me with nothing but one milk cow. But when I sold it, an angel of God found my brother-in-law in a bar. He stood there with a flaming sword, and helped my brother-in-law understand that he needed to give me my share.”

Sometimes we need to push into the unknown with God. I don’t think this widow had any idea of what was on the other side of her sacrifice. But when you know that Jesus is telling you to step out of the boat, know also that He takes responsibility for what happens to you.

From the Bible:
…when your treasures consume you; you come up empty. Instead, make God your treasure; then your wealth will serve His purposes. Luke 12:21 The Easy Bible

Photo credit: Adapted from a photo by Tatters (Tatiana Gerus), Flickr, Creative Commons License?

The Bible says that all who live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. (2 Timothy 3:12) Some look at world events and predict that persecution will intensify in the near future. That may or may not be true. But it does raise an important question:

How do we prepare for persecution?

To answer that question, let me ask you a few questions:

• Have you ever been lied about?
• Have you ever been misunderstood?
• Have you ever experienced grief and loss?
• Have you ever been trapped in an unpleasant situation?
• Have you ever suffered pain, injury or disease?
• Have you ever seen someone you love suffer?
• Have you ever experienced financial loss?
• Have you ever been around an unpleasant person?

I’m guessing you’ve answered “yes” to some or maybe all of those questions.

So let me ask a follow up question: What did you discover about God in these situations?

I don’t know about you, but I’ve discovered that God has always been really nice to me in times of suffering and pain. As His child, it’s almost an automatic reflex to go to Him when I’m hurting.

Sometimes troubles trigger in me lies that I believe about God or about myself. Lies such as: You (God) don’t care about me. You’ve forgotten about me. I’m not worth protecting. I’m just some kind of cosmic experiment. Or whatever.

I’ve learned that it doesn’t help to hide these lies from God. Instead, I go to Him honestly with what I’m feeling, and ask for His perspective on these things. Always He brings back the comforting, freeing truth that He does care about me, that I am worth protecting, and so on. The end result is this: I’m much more at peace, and much less inclined to sin after the trial than I was before.

Maybe that’s why the Bible says that he who has suffered in his body is finished with sin. (1 Peter 4:1)

People say that God will never give you something you can’t handle. That’s pure baloney! Most likely we will all experience things in life that are too big for us to handle. But none of these things are too big for God to handle.

Persecution is not something that only happens to super Christians. It happens to ordinary people who feel hurt and pain just like we do. But these ordinary people are serving a super God.

I love the story that Richard Wurmbrand (who was tortured and imprisoned for his faith) tells: There was a young man who was wayward, and, as a result, was excommunicated by his church. When the communists took over his village, all the members of the church were taken to the top of a hill to be shot and killed. Before the executions took place, however, the young man ran up the hill shouting, “Wait! Wait!” When he arrived at the top, he explained, “I too am a Christian. I’m not a very good one, but I am a Christian. Shoot me too.”

The Bible says that we get grace to help in our time of need. (Hebrews 4:16) As far as I know, I don’t currently have cancer. So right now I don’t have grace for a journey through cancer. I don’t expect to get cancer, but if I do, God will be there. He won’t desert me. He will give me grace for that journey. The same is true of persecution. God’s grace doesn’t leave just because we’re persecuted. On the contrary, the Bible says that God is near to the brokenhearted. (Psalm 34:18)

Hopefully, you’ve lived long enough to understand that your life here is short. With or without persecution, you will leave this earthly life soon, because all lives here are short. The Bible tells us to number our days so that we may present a heart of wisdom. (Psalm 90:12)

This is probably what motivated Jim Elliot, the famous missionary martyr, to write in his journal, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”

I have not experienced intense persecution. So I don’t have the experience that some other people do have. But I have experienced God, and I have experienced trouble. I know that God is always faithful in times of trouble. He will not desert you. He will be there for you.

The best way to prepare for persecution is not to worry about it, but rather to keep seeking God whether we are in times of trouble or not. It is His grace—not our own—that will carry us through.

Remember, you are designed to make a difference!

Dwight

PS. Do you get my daily email?

Photo credit: August Brill, Flickr, Creative Commons License

God doesn’t need the heavens, of course. But we need the heavens and the earth to begin to comprehend who God is. The same God who arranged the galaxies, has a lofty plan that includes us. The God who shaped the earth is shaping our lives. The God who weaved together strands of DNA, is weaving our circumstances with His love. And the God who built protons and neutrons and sent electrons flying around them is the One who cares about the tiniest detail of our lives.

I really enjoy the slide show on this page, and had it in mind as I wrote these comments:

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/scienceopticsu/powersof10/

From the Bible:
Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. Genesis 2:1

Remember, you are designed to make a difference!

Dwight

PS. Are you getting my daily email?

Photo credit: Adapted from a photo by Bob Familiar, Flickr, Creative Commons License

I’m not much of a TV watcher, but I did enjoy watching Extreme Makeover: Home Edition a few years ago. For those of you not familiar with the show, people contact the network explaining why they need their home remodeled—often there’s an illness or some other tragedy or disaster that requires a change in the person’s living environment. The network gets 1,000 applications a day and, of course, can choose no more than one family per week.

In one episode, an eight-year-old cancer survivor, Kassandra, sent a tape to the network explaining that she didn’t want her home remodeled. She only wanted help going back to the children’s cancer ward to brighten it up and make it a happier place for the children who were there.

The network sent Kassandra and her family to the hospital with a team of Disney animators to create beautiful murals on the walls in every room of that children’s ward. They remodeled the play room and made it beautiful for those who were suffering.

What Kassandra and her family did not know was this: While they were busy painting rooms and encouraging patients, over 300 people were busy with their home. They tore it down and built a beautiful mansion in its place. Kassandra, her mom and dad, and her five brothers and sisters came home to the surprise of their lives.

Well, I cried. This is so much like God. While we are busy losing ourselves caring for others, God is building a mansion. Some day the door of that limo will open, the crowd will cheer, the bus will move, and we will experience far more than we could ever ask or imagine.

From the Bible:
“Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Luke 6:38

Remember, you are designed to make a difference!

Dwight

PS. Are you getting my daily email?

Photo credit: Adapted from a photo by Duncan Harris, Flickr, Creative Commons License