Divided

It is so disheartening to see how divided we are as Christians. We should never have to feel uncomfortable about expressing our understanding of God with a fellow believer. Have we forgotten “that we know in part?” It is difficult to talk with a non-believer about God accepting them when His children don’t even accept one another.

Three Steps

There were forms of early Christianity which spoke as if the body did not matter, but we are both body and soul. The task of Christianity is to redeem the whole person and not just a part of them. I have, at times, been so focused on becoming spiritual while I was emotionally broken. I was at the mercy of my emotional tides, and like the waves of a storm I would rise and fall with the shifting of the wind. I would allow God to work on cleaning me up but never allowed Him access as to why I was dirty. My spiritual journey has been two steps forward and one step back. My progress has always been determined by which footprint I chose to stand in. I need, we need to help ourselves, and others experience the freedom to acknowledge all three steps.

Heart, Soul and Mind

I believe, because I have seen with my own eyes, that it is impossible to be spiritually whole if we are emotionally broken.

MERCY

We approached God as  tax collectors and received mercy. The question we need to ask is after receiving God’s mercy, did we become a Pharisee with the confident of our own righteousness? Did we receive mercy only to keep it to our self or do we extend mercy to others? 
                                                                LUKE 18:9-13 (NIV)

9To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: 10"Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. 12I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.'

13"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.'

Are you victimized by your past?

John Ishee wrote in his book, From Here to Maturity that “In examining the past, a person has two alternatives. First, they can use the past as an alibi for remaining as they are or they can learn from the past instead of being victimized by it.”

Rearranged Quote "C.S. Lewis

If I am always looking down on people, I cannot know God. For if I am always looking down, then I will never see what is above me.

Edward Gibbon’s observation

“Toward the end of the Roman Empire, all religions were regarded by the people as equally true, by the philosophers as equally false, and by the politicians as equally useful.”

Paraphrasing J. Oswald Sanders

To read is to have fellowship with great minds. If it is true that we are known by the company we keep, it is no less true that our character is reflected in the books we read, for they are the outward expression of our inner hungers and aspirations.

Here is one that unfortunately, is very close to home.

For the diligent, the week has seven days; for the procrastinator, seven tomorrows.

Legalism

In recovery circles, the language used to escape their bondage is “finding the God of their understanding.”  It never occurred to me until recently, that misunderstanding God could take one chain off only to be replaced by another.