Tag Archives: God

Voice Detection 

04 Monday Sep 2017

Posted by in Spirituality

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I recently had a conversation about hearing the voice of God. The person was doubtful and scoffed at the idea that God speaks to us and that we can discern it. Can we?

It’s an interesting question because many people believe they hear from God. Personally, I had an experience where I sensed God call me to ministry. It was definitely out of the ordinary and it didn’t feel like I was just talking with myself. In the Bible, there are numerous stories where people hear from God. They seem to be really clear concerning who they are talking with.

My thinking is that, the more time we spend getting to know God, through the Bible and prayer, the more we can recognize his voice when he speaks. The person that I was chatting with scoffed at that, too.

Do you know the musical “Hamilton”? We recently discovered the soundtrack and as we’ve been travelling a lot over the last year, we have listened to the soundtrack several times. My wife is a gifted singer and it’s a treat for me to hear her sing along. I try to keep up.

Then, one day, spending time with our GBs, we watched “Moana.” My wife said, “The composer is ‎the guy who did Hamilton. She meant Lin-Manuel Miranda and of course, I had to check it out to see if she was right and she was!

You see, she knows his voice.

 

I believe from Jesus own words, my experience and other’s testimony, the more time we spend in the Bible, particularly the Gospels, the more we will know his voice.

Want to try it out?

The Love Letter

05 Wednesday Jul 2017

Posted by in Discovery, Spirituality

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Rules are hard to follow. Sure the ones we directly benefit from are easier to keep but generally we try to bend them here and there. I mean, have you seen what people do at stop signs? Have you noticed that the best motivation is love?

One of the most beautiful parts of the Bible is God’s testimony*, a revelation of his character, what most people call the ten commandments or in other words, rules. People struggle to keep these rules – even those that believe they’re valid. Others, thinking they are hard rules, ignore or undermine them. What we miss is that they’re not rules. This testimony is beautiful because it’s an invitation into a loving relationship. My friend José Sánchez recently shared God’s testimony this way:

Today, my personal love letter to Jesus based on Exodus 20 says:

Jesus, as I meditate on what you did at the cross for me, my heart overwhelms with joy
and love.
1. I can’t imagine living without you!
2. Nothing can replace you!
3. I’ll never take you for granted.
4. I’m looking forward to spending quality time with you.
5. I’ll treat my parents as you treat your Father.
6. I’ll love others as you love me.
7. I’ll love my spouse as you love your church.
8. I’ll be content with the blessings you provide for me.
9. I’ll be just to others as you are with me.
10. I’ll rejoice when I see how you’ve blessed my friends.
Thank you for your love, Jesus. I love you, too.

Isn’t that beautiful?

*Over and over the Bible refers to what we call the ten commandments as God’s testimony. Even the box they were held in was called the ark of the testimony. 

 

Blame Casting

16 Friday Jun 2017

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I’m a fan of Ty Gibson. He has an amazing way to talk about the things that really matter.  Recently, I came across one of his short article’s and my mind was blown.

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Here’s an excerpt. You may have to read it twice, I did.

“The dark mental enterprise is encapsulated in God’s penetrating diagnostic question to Job: “Would you condemn Me that you may be justified?” (Job 40:8).

Here God puts His finger on our most sensitive nerve. We blame God as a self-justification maneuver. The guilty conscience possesses an impulse to fabricate an image of God that resembles ourselves in order to evade the shame His perfect goodness would thrust upon us if we were to allow ourselves to be confronted by it in one quantum leap of consciousness. “If God is like me,” we subconsciously reason, “then I need not be any different than I am, and I need not feel guilty for the way I am.” My actions and attitudes are justified by attributing them to God.”

Check out the whole article at http://reknew.org/2017/06/psychology-theology-meet/.

The Meeting

31 Wednesday May 2017

Posted by in Beginnings, Inspiration, Spirituality

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One of my favourite authors had a picture given to her of the great reunion that is coming soon.  I did a little editing for length.

“(At the second coming) The living righteous are changed “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.” At the voice of God they were glorified; now they are made immortal and with the risen saints are caught up to meet their Lord in the air. Angels “gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” Little children are borne by holy angels to their mothers’ arms. Friends long separated by death are united, nevermore to part, and with songs of gladness ascend together to the City of God.

Before entering the City of God, the Saviour bestows upon His followers the emblems of victory and invests them with the insignia of their royal state… Upon the heads of the overcomers, Jesus with His own right hand places the crown of glory. For each there is a crown, bearing his own “new name” (Revelation 2:17), and the inscription, “Holiness to the Lord.”

As the ransomed ones are welcomed to the City of God, there rings out upon the air an exultant cry of adoration. The two Adams are about to meet. The Son of God is standing with outstretched arms to receive the father of our race—the being whom He created, who sinned against his Maker, and for whose sin the marks of the crucifixion are borne upon the Saviour’s form. As Adam discerns the prints of the cruel nails, he does not fall upon the bosom of his Lord, but in humiliation casts himself at His feet, crying: “Worthy, worthy is the Lamb that was slain!” Tenderly the Saviour lifts him up and bids him look once more upon the Eden home from which he has so long been exiled.

The Saviour leads him to the tree of life and plucks the glorious fruit and bids him eat. He looks about him and beholds a multitude of his family redeemed, standing in the Paradise of God. Then he casts his glittering crown at the feet of Jesus and, falling upon His breast, embraces the Redeemer. The family of Adam take up the strain, “Worthy, worthy, worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and lives again!” and cast their crowns at the Saviour’s feet as they bow before Him in adoration.

This reunion is witnessed by the angels who wept at the fall of Adam and rejoiced when Jesus, after His resurrection, ascended to heaven, having opened the grave for all who should believe on His name. Now they behold the work of redemption accomplished, and they unite their voices in the song of praise.”

Would you like to be there?

Glory

The Stench — BeautyBeyondBones

26 Wednesday Apr 2017

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Here’s another powerful insight from BeautyBeyondBones. Please check it out. Just in case it interests you, I’ve included my comment that I left with the post.

You know what I love? I love when you’re watching or reading something for the 100th time, and then all of a sudden something “clicks” and it’s as though you’re seeing it brand new, with fresh eyes. That happened to me today. At church. We were reading the Lazaraus story, where Jesus raises Lauzarus from […]

via The Stench — BeautyBeyondBones

When the apostle John wrote that, he wanted to make sure everyone got it – Lazarus was dead. Anyway, I want to embrace your epiphany and raise you one more. I hope you don’t mind…

I would like to suggest that one doesn’t have to have an ED or have a bad temper and so on to have a stench. Paul says that all our RIGHTEOUSNESS is filthy rags (very nasty smelling).

In Zechariah 3, the prophet is given a vision of the high priest. There are several clues this is on the day of atonement. The cleansing – physically and spiritually – that the high priest would do was far beyond what any of us might do. And yet, he stands before God with “filthy clothes.” The words there indicate excrement and/or vomit.

But the Good News is, God, unlike us, seems to have smell blindness. He comes near the wretched, the filthy, the smelly and even the dead; not just near but touches them and by that touch says, “I accept you, you are my beloved.” It’s hard to resist a God who loves like that.

A Conversation

25 Saturday Mar 2017

Posted by in Discovery, Inspiration, Observations, questions, Spirituality

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I stumbled across this and it’s too good not to share. The reference is at the end. I did a little editing so it makes sense out of it’s original context but the meaning is intact.

Imagine that our Good, Good Father appears visibly among us this evening. How would we speak to him? Or to make it more personal, let us say that he is willing to meet us in our living room. As many of us as could, would go over there and gather around him, just as the crowds did around Jesus—Mary loved to sit there at his feet.

Now, as we walk into the room, we know that God is the all-powerful Creator of the whole vast universe. We know that the mighty angels, sinless as they are, stand overwhelmed with awe and wonder at the majesty and glory of our God. Yet, though that all be true, if we are afraid to go in, then God has failed to convince us of the truth about himself. And Jesus has failed to convince us, not just with his words, but with what he has demonstrated to be true when he was here, that God is infinitely powerful, but equally gracious, and there is no need to be afraid. How could we turn down what he has paid such a price to reveal?

God is seated there and we are gathered around him. What should we say? Should we be the first to speak? Once we have started speaking, would we talk all the time? Or would we let God speak for a while? Normally, when we pray we do all the talking, don’t we? And then we say Amen, and go about our business, or go to sleep. It would be like meeting in the room with our Heavenly Father, and talking to him incessantly for several minutes, and then saying, “Amen, thank you very much,” and then going home. It wouldn’t make sense, would it? It certainly wouldn’t be conversation as with a friend.

Supposing we should have the inestimable privilege of talking there freely with God the Father for a whole hour; would it be appropriate at the end for someone among us to arise and say, “This has been such a special occasion, don’t you think we ought to close this meeting with a word of prayer?” Or would it be correct to understand that talking, conversing, having conversation with our God as with a Friend for that whole hour actually is real prayer, and we have been praying the whole hour long?

Conversation means at least two people speaking. But how do we converse with God when we can’t see him just now, because of the present emergency? We all understand that emergency and why in mercy he does not reveal himself visibly to us at this moment. And so, the Bible is called the Word of God—God speaking to us. If we wish to hear God speak, except in most extraordinary occasions, God speaks to us through the Bible. We speak to him in prayer.

Truly, as someone has said, “We commune with God through the study of the Scriptures.” I certainly find prayer much more meaningful while reading the Bible. Have you ever had the experience of talking to God while reading certain parts of the Scriptures? Have you ever found yourself talking out loud, “That’s magnificent!”? Who are you talking to? But that’s real conversation. We read, we listen in that way. And then we talk back to God.

Graham Maxwell. Excerpt from the audio series, Conversations About God, #15, “Talking to God as a Friend” recorded May, 1984, Loma Linda, California. 

 

 

For Sale Cheap

15 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in Observations, Spirituality

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When I was a child, our family regularly travelled to “the big city” to visit relatives. The signal to me that we were nearing the city (are we there yet??) was a large grain elevator right beside the highway on the outskirts of the city. What’s a grain elevator?  They used to look like this:

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On the side of the grain elevator, in huge letters, was written Mark 8:36:

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Now I didn’t grow up with any kind of faith practice. I had never read the Bible or even  attended a church. Even so, Mark 8:36 really impacted me and I would think on it often, both when we drove by it and throughout the year.

Now the word soul here doesn’t mean a disembodied ghostly thing that exists beyond your body – what some call an immortal soul. That whole concept is foreign to the Bible. Soul is an old timey way of talking about ourselves – our personhood or being. Even though I had no clue about that as a young person, that’s how I internalized the message: who I am is worth more than the whole world so don’t sell out; don’t compromise the truth of who I am for short term or even large gain. You could say, it’s one of my core values.
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But I have to confess, I have sometimes sold out. Seeking for love and belonging in places that never satisfied, holding back from fear, overcome by doubt… I have tried to gain “the world.” This isn’t a woe is me, wallowing in regret kind of post. I’m just being honest. I am happy to report that over time, as I have grown more into myself, I sell out less and less.

Have you ever sold out? Have you ever attempted to gain the world – whatever that means to you – only discover you were losing yourself in the process? How did you correct your course? Have you found yourself selling out less? What’s made the difference in your life?

Fundamental Content Problem

26 Thursday Jan 2017

Posted by in Inspiration, Observations, Spirituality

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Recently, Ty Gibson, a pretty awesome guy I follow on Twitter (@tyfgibson or check out Digma) tweeted a sermon. Besides me thinking that tweeting a sermon is brilliant, his message was profound, transformational, a paradigm shift. So I asked him for permission to share it here so your mind can also be blown.

Sermon by Ty Gibson

I’ma preach a Twitter sermon this morning y’all. Opening prayer: Lord, wake us up to YOUR agenda. In the name of Jesus, Amen!

Scripture reading: Jesus said, “the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness ABOUT ME.”

And Paul tells us precisely what the Spirit’s mission is: “GOD’S LOVE has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”

Praying for the Spirit in “latter rain” power while fostering a dysfunctional spiritual environment is an exercise in “pagan” futility.

We have a fundamental content problem—not a power problem, a program problem, or a logistics problem. The WHAT must precede the HOW.

Will it ever occur to us that maybe God isn’t sending the Spirit upon us because we simply aren’t saying to the world what He wants said?

God won’t add supernatural power to the church until the gospel of His healing love defines our message & pervades our fellowship. Ouch!

We need to align ourselves with God’s agenda of non-condemning love (John 3:16-17) if we want God to take our voice viral.

So let’s pray for humility & repentance for making the church a place of controversy, argument, politics, personal agendas, and division.

Let’s pray God liberates us from our deeply embedded theological pride, legalistic coldness, lack of love, and missional narrowness.

And then, when it is evident that our message is Christ and Christ and Christ in all His unparalleled beauty…

…and when, in the light of His love for us, it is evident that we love one another more than our opinions, positions, & power plays…

…then, and only then, will the Holy Spirit descend upon us with latter rain power & the whole world will be lightened with God’s glory.

Closing Prayer: God, forgive us for expecting You to empower our agenda. May we humbly align ourselves with Yours. In Jesus’ name, Amen!