THE TROUBLE WITH TIFFS

If I have a tiff with my wife I have trouble either praying or looking to the Scriptures.  When the heavy feelings or depression are upon me I just do not feel the praying or that reading will have value or effect.  Its hard to think, “I need to do this by faith”.  My prayers, I feel, would be insulting to the Lord being prayed from such a dry or angry or faithless personality.  I can not think of where to read in the Bible that would have application.

Perhaps I should start reading somewhere – anywhere:  Psalm of the day, Proverbs, a Gospel.  Maybe I would find the lord talking to me there.  Or maybe the Spirit would lead me somewhere else.  Perhaps then the prayers and answers would come.

WAIT FOR VENGEANCE

Psalm 21 speaks of the king trusting in the Lord and of God's vengeance upon his enemies.  As I was coming back from Jacksonville on a business trip a while ago (1998) I came upon a very severe traffic jam.  The two lanes of traffic were at a crawl.  At various times some people would cheat and come down the right-hand breakdown lane.  I thought, “here are these rude people taking advantage of the rest of us who are trying to be polite to each other and keep order and the law.  These have no concern but for themselves.  They will never receive punishment for their wrong doing that I will see.  I wonder if God even cares to take vengeance on such little things when much worse are happening.”

But when we got to the bridge over Lake Mary the police were pulling these over to the side and giving them tickets.  Yes, these were receiving the vengeance due to them.  Yes, God does care about such things.  Yes, it is worth while to have faith in God, that he will do what he says he will do.  Yes, it is worth while doing the right thing.

IN THE SPIRIT??

(Eph 5:18) “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit and watching there unto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints”

What does it mean to pray “in the Spirit”? Does it mean to pray in tongues? Does it mean to “keep silence” before the Lord – to be listening for what the Spirit might be saying? Does it somehow mean to be sensitive to inward impressions that may be lingering just inside your conscious awareness? (Or are these just from your own “subconscious” speaking?) Do we cover over or chase away communication from the Spirit by attributing too much to the “subconscious” or by fearing too much the evil spirits?

ANGER SNARES

(Prov 20) The anger of a king is as the roaring of a lion, he that aggravates him gets a snare to his soul.

This shows it is not good to make your superiors angry. I suppose some people purposefully do things to make their Superior angry, but it only gets them trouble and does no good. It may be the desire to make an authority angry or agitated is a flaw in the personality of him that wishes to to it.

Another snare is associating with angry and furious people.

The desire for situations of anger is a trap - - possibly a habit or deception that is very hard to break. A snare is something that traps you and keeps you. Snares are difficult to get out of. (Lord, please help me to avoid snares like anger.)

Knowing you are in a snare can help you get out; not knowing you are in a snare can leave you trapped forever.

MAKING THE PROMISE TRUE

Psalm 105 speaks of remembering and rejoicing in what the Lord has done.  It speaks of the progress of the children of Israel to the promised land.  He gave the promise to Abraham, Issac and Jacob.  He preserved them in the places where they were.  He sent Joseph before them to prepare a place in Egypt  He developed them into a great number.  He delivered them from slavery.  He brought them to the promised land. 

Can we look at big, broad pictures like this and see comparisons in our own or our families lives?

 -- Giving of promise
 -- Protection from outsiders, adverse situations
 -- Development
 -- Delivery from bondage.
 -- Occupying the promised land

Here a generalized version:

 -- Start of a thing (giving promise to Abraham).
 -- The initial delicate stage (protection in Canaan).
 -- Development of the thing (growth in Egypt).
 -- Moving of the thing toward its purpose (delivery from slavery).
 -- Delivery of the thing into its purpose (bring to promised land).

CONSIDER YOUR PATH

“A wicked man hardeneth his face; but as for the upright, he directeth his way.” (Proverbs 21:29)

A wicked man decides he is going to do a thing, and once decided, proceeds through to the end without respect to how the situation may have changed or be different than how he planned.  He pays no attention to the effects of his action on others.  You don't have to be wicked to be this way, you can just be dumb.

The upright directs his way.  Once he decides on a thing he proceeds but keeps aware of how the situation develops  and changes his course (or stops) if it becomes necessary.

TO FIGHT FOR WISDOM

(Proverbs 21:11)  “When the scorner is punished the simple is made wise:  and when the wise is instructed he receiveth knowledge.”

A scorner is someone who speaks words of disgust against something or someone else.  He disapproves, he belittles.  This is not a healthful situation and it is a good thing to correct it.  The scorner needs to be publicly told his words are damaging and not helpful.  Apparently when this happens the simple see the damaging words for what they are:  destructive, unhelpful words.  When they make this perception – that scorning is a damaging activity – they become wiser than they were.  Once someone has perceived this they have increased in wisdom.

Two things happen when you publicly stand against scorning:  A bad activity is stopped, and people are instructed toward wisdom.

DRUMS AROUND THE FIRE

(From a 1998 Journal entry:)

First the thought, and then how I arrived at it:

We would criticize the native American for using drums to achieve some sort of spiritual contact during his religious ceremonies yet we Christians do the vary same things during ours.  Whether during services we use jumpy charismatic tunes or they are old hymns, we hope to achieve a state of worship for the Lord.

How I got here:

I was thinking of a native American who believed in the “Great Spirit” before the time when the Europeans began to emigrate to this hemisphere.  I have wondered if such a person, having never had contact with a Christian, and therefore could not properly state the Gospel, yet believing in the Creator of all things, could not be a “pagan believer”?  He would be a person whose heart was sincere and earnest for God.  I wonder if having a true desire to know the one true God, to be willing to forsake all for, and to suffer for the truth, has the equivalence before God to confessing Jesus with the mouth?  Could the verses in Romans, the ones that speak of the physically uncircumcised acting as if they were circumcised, figuratively apply to such a person?  Again, I am speaking of people who have never had any exposure to God as the sort of revelation the Jews and Europeans had through the Scriptures.  If there were many like him in his tribe, could not the drums about the council fire be the same as our worship music?

Could the name of “Great Spirit” be to this person as “Jehovah” or “Christ” is to us?  You would have to know his intended purpose for his calls to the “Great Spirit” and the intended purpose for the music.  More fundamentally, you would have to know what he thinks the “Great Spirit” can do, what he can not do, what he did, what his requirements of us are.  What is mankind's place in the world, in the after life and what is man's place before him?  What if his understanding does not line up exactly with our understanding of God?  Without the Bible how would he get that understanding?

But in the 21st century, with the spread of the Gospel over the globe, there are very few of such people to be found upon the earth.

LISTENING TO MUSIC

Back when I was a boy I remember hearing, every once and a great while, Latin music on the radio. I would hear the breaks when just the percussion instruments would play. To me it was a thrilling sound. Back then there were no records or tapes or CDs to buy - - you could only hear the music once, while it was playing. When it was done you had to wait until the next time something like it was played, perhaps months later. Back then the sound quality was poor. I don't remember that we listened to the radio all that much at our house yet I remember rhythmic syncopated music exciting me.

Now I can select from a wide variety of all types of music. If I have a recording I can play it over and over. By repetition I can learn it so well so as to know all the parts of it. I can know instantly if anything is different from another recording even if the voicing and arrangements are all the same. Now music performance is at our fingertips - - we may have it whenever we want: from a recording or from the radio or T.V. We are bound no longer to performance by live musicians, or to performing it for our own selves.

Why is it, then, that I don't listen more at home. I rarely ever do. Playing music distracts me from other things. With me it's one, or the other.

CHATTERBOXING

Once on the way into work I was having an imaginary conversation with someone. These people I “talk with” are usually people with some influence or importance in some area. I thought, “Why do I do this?” Am I wishing for some favor from them; do I want to gain their attention? Then I thought, “Here I am imagining a conversation with an imaginary person, who is not real, yet I do not pray to the Lord, who is real.”

Would it be a good thing for me to have these “conversations” with God instead? If I did this would it have a value to God? Would I be a chatter-box endlessly whining on about my problems and ideas and never leaving a space for God to respond?

WATCH FOR CURVES

In his word God tells us how he expects us to think and act via men like Moses, Paul, Peter, Mathew, John, etc.  This is how we can know what truth is.  As shown in 1 Tim 1 we are supposed to “teach no other doctrine”.  I take this to mean that we are not to modify the intended meaning of the Scripture.  There may be cases where we are teaching about a subject and use Scripture to support our teaching, but we should not use our teaching to modify the meaning.

When we wish to describe a topic we have many tools to use, and Scripture is one of them.  It is perfectly allowable to use Scripture this way.  Scripture is a tool of truth; we use it to give a foundation to a truth we want to communicate.  But we need to use the proper tool for the proper  job.  We do not use a chisel to turn a screw tighter, and we do not use a screw driver to trim a piece of wood.  We do not use truth to tell a lie.

Men are good at “weasel wording”, they can turn aside from the original intended meaning toward something different.  They start along the proper path and start walking along the edge of that path.  Sometimes they will take a little side path that parallels the original and hop back into the true path.  Perhaps they continue staying on the parallel path.  Then the path that was parallel may slowly start to veer, ever so slightly, to the left or right.  Perhaps the path they are following bends further astray until one day it is not going to the same destination at all.

Watch your compass to make sure you are taking the true path.

SERVING THE STICKS

God washed the disciples' feet and said “As you have seen me do, so should you do to one another.”  This is not unusual, God has always acted in service to us.  He gave us the run of his creation for our use and provision.  He required little from us other than to take care of it and of each other.  He overlooked many insulting and grievous transgressions we did as we were using it.

What do we do?  We create too:  we take sticks of wood and construct a house.  Then we become concerned over the house - - it becomes our protection; it is our peace-giver; it is our thing of beauty; it is our future; it is our life-giver.

When this happens the house is not serving us, we are serving the house.  We have come to worship the house.  Through his provision and forbearance God serves us.  We were never God, yet we turn ourselves to serve a pile of sticks which we  sawed from God's trees.

EXTENDED BRAINS

It's fascinating to think about how human-devised devices can work as extensions of our brains. Our brain registers and interprets sound, which we receive through our sense organs, the ears. So the brain becomes extended through the ear. The ear itself can be extended when we listen to a phone call. The phone extends our ear to the person at the other end, perhaps miles away. All our senses can be extended as Norman Doidge explains Marshall McLuhan's insight to us:

" . . .the communications media both extend our range and implode into us. His [McLuhan's] first law of media is that all the media are extensions of aspects of man. Writing extends memory, when we use a paper and pen to record our thoughts; the car extends the foot, clothing the skin. Electronic media are extensions of our nervous systems: the telegraph, radio, and telephone extend the range of the human ear, the television camera extends the eye and sight, the computer extends the processing capacities of our central nervous system. He argued that the process of extending our nervous system also alters it."

The Brain that Changes Itself, Norman Doidge, MD, Penguin Books, copyright 2007.

THE BEST POSITIONING

(2 Timothy 1:3) Paul served God “...from [his] forefathers...”  The tradition of serving God came to him from his family.  His father served God, his Grandfather served God, his nation served God.  Paul grew up in a family that served God.  (v5) Timothy also had a line of faith starting with his Grandmother Lois.

God has a plan for us, a calling according to his own purpose which may, or may not, coincide with our works.  God has had a plan for us which was in place before we ever started to plot out our own lives.  It was in place “... before the world began.”  Paul was called to be a preacher, apostle, and teacher (of the Gentiles) (v11).  Timothy had “... that good thing ...” (v3).

I believe God's plan for each of us in general in nature.  He wants all of us to live according to his instructions.  But he positions individuals with certain specific intellectual and skill tendencies and leaves the development of them to each of us, as he did with Paul and Timothy.  The more we try to be sensitive toward God, the more likely we will not disturb the positioning God has made for us.  The more self-centered and worldly we are, the more likely we are to make the position less effective, or perhaps destroy the positioning altogether.

How do we know what God's plan is for us personally?
- Word of God (Bible)
- Circumstances
- Observation
- Opportunities
- Other people as in:
    – Family
    – Friends
    – Books
    – Seminars
    – Test instruments

THE DOCTRINE OF DOCTRINE

Doctrine is principle or body of principles. A doctrine is a systematic attempt by men to describe what the Word of God says about a certain topic. There are elements within the Word of God that can be taken and used as building blocks for doctrines. Some doctrines can use one or more elements of other doctrines. Each doctrine is represented by a window through which we look at a portion of the Word of God. Each window looks at a different area; some windows cover only one area while other windows overlap each other.

Doctrines, taken individually, can not represent all of what the Word says to us. It may be that many doctrines linked together can approximate much of what the Word says.

Doctrines can be wrong, either partially or wholly. Sometimes doctrines take what God said simply and make it so complex that men go wrong or become discouraged. Conversely, some doctrines take a complex communication from God and so simplify that it looses it's intended meaning.

The Word is always larger than the efforts of man to classify or explain it. Given the limitations of our flesh, God has told us (mankind) more than we can comprehend, understand, or explain.

Similarly, no single man can comprehend fully all the knowledge wrapped up in a microchip. It took thousands of men hundreds of years to discover electricity and the technology to harness it to produce power and to manipulate knowledge. There are geniuses, but no one man can comprehend it all.

So don't feel bad about not knowing everything; you can't; no man can.

THE DOLLAR-EIGHTY SERMON

Is faith a matter of the mind only, or is there some feeling mixed in with it?  The Charismatics look for the feeling – the experience.  The Baptists look for the teaching.  When the Bible says “we walk by faith, not by sight” does that mean we set aside the feeling and recall from our minds what God said and walk that way?  What feeling could there possibly be that would be reason or justification enough to go against God's word?

If sermons can be rated as to worth, say from $0 to $3.00 dollars, X preaches a $2.00 sermon.  What does it mean when he preaches a $1.80 sermon and we have to add to it $0.20 from our own store so that it can be a somewhat balanced sermon?  Where do we get the other dollar?  What about when this happens Sunday after Sunday?  What about the people who don't have anything to add because they do not actually read the Bible.  If they read, they read books about what is said in the Bible.  What do they do?

GROWING THE UNDERSTANDING

When I first came to know the Lord, I accepted Jesus as my savior, but I has a problem with thinking of him as God.  Much later (after accepting Jesus as God) I had a problem with accepting the Holy Spirit as God.  Later (after recognizing the Holy Spirit as God) I struggled with the Trinity being “persons” rather than “offices”.  The growth of the concept came from doctrine taught over the years.

AVOIDING (THE WRONG WAY)

2 Timothy 3, vs 1-7 speaks very well of the current day people who are in the church but are really wicked. It seems to me the list can apply as well to lofty Legalists as the flamboyant Charismatics. The aberrant Charismatics* are more open and easy to see than those who have the “form of godliness, but deny the power thereof”.

We avoid them by:
- - Continuing in things learned and assured (proved).
- - Learn things that come from good sources
- - Life long learning from the Scripture..

This we get through:
- - Doctrine, systematic way of teaching, thinking. First we must know the basic truth.
- - Reproof, “you are wrong, stop, repent”. We must stop the wrong activity.
- - Correction, “you are going off course, this is what you must do to correct”. We must show where and how we are getting off course.
- - Instruction in righteousness, describing and demonstrating what are the right actions and thoughts. We must show what is the right way to do things..

Parents play a first, primary and major role in accomplishing this..

*Not the good ones, but the aberrant ones.

FINDING AND KEEPING THE WAY

God has many ways to teach us. We should read the Bible as our primary source but we also should seek instruction from other godly people.  We should attempt to achieve a right understanding in line with God's principles.  Thereby we can become a means of changing ourselves and others who want to be Godly.  Then we can be a source for our children.

Yet we have to be aware of wrong thinkers, those whose thinking does not match the moral principles taught in the Bible.  Then we can identify and avoid, and perhaps fight, false teaching.  It may be we could help such to change to a godly way.  But if they won't change we should avoid them and take steps to protect the innocent if necessary.

LANGUAGE FRUSTRATION

OVERUSED WORDS:

“Like” when used as a verbal pause as in “uh”, “err”, or other unnecessary noises people make when communicating.

“Not a problem” when you mean “you are welcome”.

“I love . . .” when you really mean you “like” or “admire” or “appreciate”. You would actually love (have a strong emotional attachment for) your spouse, children, country, etc. You do not “love” the way a room is decorated.

“Absolutely” Very few things are absolute.

“So” when it's used at the beginning of response: “So, the answer to that is . . . “, “So, when he went . . .”.

“Actually” Actually, there is very little need to use this word except to emphasize a contrast, which actually is rare.

"Utilize" I don't see why this word exists. It's enough to say I "use" something, I made "use" of something. For example: "I waste my time utilizing Facebook." I "use" Facebook; I don't "utilize" Facebook. Utilizing that word does not make you appear smarter.