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Grace, Oversight and Direction Spell G-O-D

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I am sharing another excerpt from the book, “Signs of Hope: Ways to Survive in an Unfriendly World. ” It talks about the grace of God, and how we sometimes ignore it and feel we are doing fine on our own. Dr. Phil might ask, “How is that working for you?

The book, “Signs of Hope: Ways to Survive in an Unfriendly World,” is on sale on this site. In the bookstores it is $19.99, but here it is only $15.99, and the shipping has been cut in half. A total savings of over $6.00.

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Chapter 34

 

Grace, Oversight and Direction

Spell G-O-D

 

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Ephesians 2:8–10

 

As I have grown in my Christian faith, I have seen some disturbing trends in Christianity. One that particularly disturbs me is that we have so many what I call “Sunday Christians.” Oh sure, they’re in church on Sunday—they even may teach a Sunday school class or usher or be the preacher—but on Monday they go back to telling their raciest jokes, padding their expense accounts, cutting corners in business deals and doing things that would make even the average pagan blush.

They attend church on Sunday and then disgrace themselves—and their Savior—the rest of the week. Saying someone is a Christian just because he goes to church is the same as saying you’re a hamburger just because you eat hamburgers! (Yes, this is a bumper sticker that I used earlier. You are very sharp!)

 

I read a book called “What’s So Amazing About Grace?” by Philip Yancey.1 He is a wonderful writer who doesn’t pull any punches and goes directly to the heart of the matter on any subject. He talks about people who avoid grace.

Grace is one of the most important things God has provided for us. He showed His own tremendous grace by sending His only Son down to earth to die for us.

But people avoid grace because grace brings about change. It causes them to live righteous lives. It causes them to love their neighbor. It causes them to give their hearts away to God. It causes them to give up their sinful desires for power and lust. And, frankly, some people don’t want that kind of change in their lives because it totally rearranges their lives.

We see these people in our churches. They have an outer face of love and grace, but on the inside they are greedy and selfish, and wonder what they can do to help themselves look more important. They come because it is the proper thing to do, and it makes them look good in their community.

Experiencing true grace is seen in the account of the prodigal son. He knew he was wrong. He knew that he had wasted all his inheritance. He was ashamed of everything he had done. The only thing that saved him was his father’s grace. He realized he needed to go back to his father and ask for forgiveness, hoping (no, knowing) his father would extend grace.

The truly gracious person was the father. Instead of turning his back on his wayward son (which he had every right to do), he ran toward his son with tears in his eyes, embraced his son and welcomed him home. He even had the best calf in his herd slaughtered to celebrate the occasion.

However, the brother of the prodigal son hated him because of the disgrace he had caused the family. He was livid that the father accepted him back without punishing him. His hatred and envy were not very far below the surface of what probably looked wholesome and loving.

Think of the prodigal son’s father as our God and how He will accept us back no matter what wrong we have done. His grace is every day. He loves us seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day—not just on Sundays.

Not only does God extend His grace to us in providing salvation and welcoming us into His family, there are two other things He wants to do for us—the last two things in the acrostic at the beginning of this chapter: He wants to provide oversight and direction in our lives. Those are things we must give Him permission to do for us.

We can accept His salvation and then decide we’ll simply go on with life, using our own intuition and “smarts” in plotting the course of our lives. But that’s not very smart. He has a so much wiser plan for our lives. It’s in our best interest to turn that part of our lives over to Him as well.

 

God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.

2 Corinthians 9:8

 

Further Adventures

If you were given grades for your commitment to going to church, helping others, or loving God, what would those grades be?  (I love giving out grades since I once was a teacher.) Would you get an “F” for going to church? Have you decided there is no way that going to church can make a difference in your life? Do you think that you can grow spiritually on your own? What about helping others? What grade would you receive for giving to the poor, or helping a homeless family?

Now for the most important grade that will help you pass your requirements to go to heaven: How much do love and serve God? Are you a non-believer? Are you an occasional churchgoer who believes in God but doesn’t seek to grow? Are you a dedicated Christian who seeks more knowledge about God and tries to help others to do the same?

Think on this: Study up on the real meaning of life by reading the Bible. Learn how to be compassionate to others in their time of need. Place God first in your life, and be in fellowship with others who have also put God first in their lives. Then you’ll be in line for the final BA (Bible of Advancement) degree that will advance you into heaven.

 

Something to Ponder

Isn’t it funny that when we show grace enough to help others shine, we begin to shine ourselves?

 

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Are you a Just a Church Goer, or an Actual Spiritual Member?

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The book “Signs of Hope: Ways to Survive in an Unfriendly World, ” is on sale now at the bookstore on this site. In the stores it is $19.99, but here it is only $15.99, and the shipping is cut in half as well. A total savings of over $6.00. Just click on the “Bookstore,” tab at the top of this page to take a look.

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Today’s excerpt is asks the question, ” Are you just a church goer, or are you you an actual spiritual member?” Many people come to church just to let others see they are going. They may not even bring a Bible. The spiritual members come to worship and praise.

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Chapter 30

 

God Doesn’t Want Shares of Your Life;

He Wants Controlling Interest

 

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

Romans 8:28

 

I’m sure there are people in your church who make you wonder why they’re even there. They’re critical about everything—the music, the organist’s clothes, the length and wording of the prayers, the color of the rug, on and on ad nauseam. They gossip about others or sit through the service without listening to the sermon.

In The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren talks about these types of people. He says there are two types of people who go to church: the church attendees and the church members.1

The churchgoers come just to be able to say they go to church in order to impress their clients or neighbors—or as a promise to their mother. Often the churchgoers don’t even bring a Bible with them. Instead, they study the church bulletin the whole time, whisper to the person next to them or make out next week’s to-do list. They come only to show others they are going to church—and then they leave. You could ask them right afterward what the sermon was about, and they wouldn’t be able to tell you. They come in order to meet up and go out to lunch with someone from the church after the service is over.

“It is not what you show on Sunday that counts. It is what you show on Monday!”

The other type of church people are the spiritual members. They are members of the body of Christ. They are the ones who come humbly to church to truly worship God. They have their Bibles. They listen carefully to the sermon, taking notes to learn from it. They also are the ones who reach out to the “churchgoers,” to try to help them learn the true joy of learning about God.

When the church attendees come before God on judgment day, God will not ask them if they went to church. (He already knows everything you do.) He will ask them what they have done to deserve to be a part of His kingdom. What close encounters did they have with God? Did they totally worship Him not only on Sundays, but on Mondays also? They will try to convince God that they were very loyal, but He will say, “I do not know you; be gone!”

True members of a church reach out to those in need. They spend hours praying. They get into small groups to study the Bible. They help in the church by being an usher, singing in the choir, greeting at the door, etc. They also worship with the whole body when they are done serving. The members of a church are all part of one body, and we need to help the weaker parts of the body realize that if we lose even one finger from our body, we will suffer. We need the whole body being strong together.

I want to make sure you understand. I am not talking about a person who joins a church by having his or her name added to the membership list. I mean a member of the body of Christ.

I learned from one of the members of my Bible Study Fellowship group that a pastor of a church he knew had borrowed some money from one of the members and then never paid it back. The pastor tried to avoid the church member every Sunday so he wouldn’t have to talk to him about the money he owed the other member.

This member—even though he’s the pastor—isn’t a healthy functioning body member. Instead, he is one of the weaker parts of the body that needs help. Just joining a church “on paper” doesn’t make you a part of the body. All believers are part of the universal (transcending time and place) body of Christ and hopefully also healthy functioning members of a local body of believers called a “church.” It is too easy to “join a church” and then live off the title without ever being a part of the body of Christ.

We each need to decide if we’re going to be a church attendee/churchgoer/“pew sitter” or a true member of the body. If we are a part of the body of Christ, we will want to be in fellowship with other believers in a local church where we can be consistent in our worship of God and service to others. 

Each of us can become a prayer warrior, or be part of a Bible study group. We can help people find their seats or greet people at the door. Or we can just come humbly before God to worship each Sunday. After all, it is called a worship service.

Then we need to take God with us on Monday. Each day we can thank Him for His love. And we can look at others who might be simply “church attendees” and help them to grow into healthy functioning members.

It is often very difficult to approach the church attendees because they seem to resent anyone who challenges them. We need to convey to them that we love them enough to want them to take further steps in their live, to become a stronger part of the body. That may anger them at first, but they may thank us later when they become an integral part of the body and love God more than they ever dreamed possible.

 

For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Ephesians 2:10

 

Further Adventures

Take a “home inventory” of your own family. Are they all “members,” or is there one who is only a church attendee? If all families worked on having all their family becoming church members, there would be no need to have other church members try to help you. Even your children can be strong parts of the body of Christ by being examples to the other children in church. They can also get involved by being counselors at youth camps, singing in the youth choir, or helping in a Sunday school class.

 

Something to Ponder

Isn’t it funny that if you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything?

Remember: Never, ever, give up!

 

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A Small Stumble May Lead to a Big Fall

I have a busy week coming up by Monday. I will going “Door to door,” visiting all the bookstores in Salem, Oregon. I am diving head first into my marketing for the book, “Signs of Hope: Ways to Survive in an Unfriendly World.”

I did the research, and there are twelve bookstores in Salem. Lots of “Mom and Pop” level bookstores, and one Borders bookstore. My goals to to have a least one of my book, “Signs of Hope: Ways to Survive in an Unfriendly World,” on the shelf of each of these stores.

You have a chance to own the book before it hits the shelves in about 2o days. You can go to www.winepresspub.com right now and save 27% of what the retail price will be when it comes out.

When you get to the site, click on the bookstore at the top, and then when you are there, put in “Signs of Hope,” in the search area. That should get you right to my page. You will see that you will only be paying $14.59 instead of the retail price of $19.99.

When the book comes out you will get the book sent to you that day.

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What follows is an actual excerpt from the book, “Signs of Hope: Ways to Survive in an Unfriendly World.”

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Chapter 52

A Small Stumble May Lead to a Big Fall

Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

1 Peter 5:8–9

Lydia Moeller was at her recital and ready to play for the audience. The girl before her finished and Lydia walked onto the platform. She sat down and began to play “The Enchanted Stream” by Christopher Goldston. She started out playing a beautiful tune, but about halfway through she stumbled when she forgot her notes. She stopped, tried to start, and stopped again. You could she the emotions building, and tears were coming down her face. Then a wonderful thing happened. She regrouped and played the song without error. So, yes, she stumbled, but she didn’t fall. She kept her balance and finished the race. I said to her afterwards that I was very impressed with her. Not that she stumbled, but that she finished the race.

Do you stumble and fall because you have worries and problems that overtake you? Well, you are not alone my friend. This is an all too common occurrence in our lives.

We let enemies like divorce, abuse, overweight, low self-esteem, depression, fear of failure and bills that are not paid to cause us to stumble, and wonder, Where is God?

Satan loves this kind of doubt. He can plant many thoughts in our heads to cause us to fall even further. Some of these worries may be small by themselves, but put enough of them together and they become as large as Mt. Everest.

That broken-down car isn’t such a horrible thing, but you have already missed some work because of it, and your boss said you are not to miss any more work. The illness that attacked your daughter isn’t life-threatening, but you have no insurance to pay for the doctor’s visit. You want to put that glass of whiskey down, but you can’t.

Each of these issues may be small to some people, but for you it is like taking on Sir Lancelot and his sword with a wet noodle, or trying to swim ten miles and not knowing how to swim.

Some of the most successful people in the Bible have stumbled many times, and still are loved by God.

Abraham lied—not once but twice—to save his skin, but God gave him all the land he could see and promised that he would be the father of a nation.

Moses killed a man, and doubted God many times, but he led the nation of Israel out of Egypt.

Rahab was a prostitute, but her heart was open to God, and she protected three spies for Joshua. God in turn spared her life.

David committed adultery and had a man killed to cover up the first sin. (And both of these sins are biggies in our book.) Yet, God called him “a man after his own heart.”

Jonah tried to run away from what God commanded him to do and was swallowed by a whale. He later followed God’s command to preach to all the people in Nineveh.

Peter denied knowing Jesus three times, but became one of the prominent leaders in the early church.

Each one of us has stumbled many times. We have the choice to lie there flat on our face when we stumble, or we can get back up and continue our walk with God. The longer we lie there, though, the harder it can be to get back up and into the race again.

We wonder sometimes why God would love us. The good news is that He loves us just the way we are. But He doesn’t want us to stay that way. He didn’t want all those people in the Bible to remain they way they were. However, He accepted them the way they were, and transformed them into spiritual leaders.

How can we change? By taking our focus off our failures, fear and worries and turning them over to God.

The mind is like a stream running through our brain and the stream has been polluted. It will tear us down and eventually affect everything if we let it. When we stop the flow of “sewage” (unwholesome input, negative thinking) to the brain, it will take awhile for the creek to clear. We can’t clean up all the sewage at once, but we need to take the first steps.

Before he became the king of Israel, David was so down and desperate that he had to live in a cave to get away from his pursuer—the king himself. It was there that he realized that all he had to do was to cry out to God, asking Him to protect him and bring him back to where God really wanted him to be.

I myself was so down from my stumbling that I seriously considered suicide. I cried out to God to rescue me, and He did.

We need to not focus on our times of stumbling and need to focus on God instead. Our weeks need to include reading the Bible, praying to God for guidance, going to church to be with other Christians, being part of a Bible study, and reading Christian books (like mine, of course!) We need to take time to be with other Christians.

We can’t afford to dwell on the negative. Instead, we need to seek out the positive. If we have failed in the past (and we all have in one degree or another), we are not doomed to live in the past. God desires that we live for today—and the future.

Others may have turned their backs on us because of our stumbling and seeming inability to “get it together.” But they’re only seeing the outside. Remember that God looks at the heart (1 Sam. 16:7).

Maybe you haven’t stumbled, but you think people look down on you because you don’t have as many of this world’s possessions as they have—or maybe you have more than they do. Or maybe you feel you don’t measure up in other ways—too overweight, too this, too that, or not enough this or enough that.

Remember, please, that God doesn’t care about any of those issues. He is looking at your heart. He is looking for you to follow Him and do great things for Him.

Satan uses our stumbling to tell us we might as well give up. “You won’t succeed no matter how much you try,” he whispers. You want to stop smoking, but you can’t. You want to finish that project your wife has been screaming for you to finish, but you don’t have the desire. You can fill in the blanks because you know what your issues are.

Please don’t give up. Never give up! Find friends you can turn to at times like this. Share your fears and let them be your protectors, coaches and encouragers. A true friend wants only the best for you, will listen and not criticize, and is a person you can feel safe with. A true friend may have to say some hard things to you, but his intention is that you become the best person you can be.

I have friends like that here on earth, but I also have one more—Jesus Himself. He meets all the criteria listed above for a true friend. I am never alone—He is always just a prayer away.

We don’t have to try to make more money—or lose 50 pounds, or climb the ladder at work—to feel worthy in His sight. Our willingness to simply turn all our troubles over to God and let Him love us is the “proof” of our worth. Success in this life can be measured by how much we love God and desire to serve Him.

So you’re not in line to be named as the next Pope. You’ve done some things you’re not proud of? You gave up too early on a dream? Do you feel like Custer and you’re on your last stand? Do bad things keep resurfacing like a cork in a lake?

Well,  join the “Been there and done that” club. Here’s a news flash: Churches are filled with the down-and-out. They may look like the “up-and-in” crowd, but they need someone who’s “been there and done that” to come alongside them for encouragement and fellowship. You may be the one person in your entire church who can honestly say to that person, “I know how you feel.”

I have a hearing problem. I have to wear hearing aids in both ears. I have learned to use selective hearing. (Don’t tell my wife!) I take off my hearing aids when I want a quiet time. I go somewhere that noise cannot find me, where I can really concentrate on reading the Bible or praying.

However, I’ve found there are two types of thoughts I can always hear, and I get to choose which side of the “argument” I’ll listen to:

  1. 1. Yes you can … No you can’t.
  2. 2. God will help you … There is no God.
  3. 3. You have self-worth … You are worthless.

All of us can choose to use selective hearing too. We can turn a deaf ear to those stumbling days and the years of doubts. We can walk the straight path toward the future and listen only to God.

I don’t seem to hear Satan as much anymore—because of the ear-plug effect. I can choose to plug the ears to my thoughts and not allow negative thoughts to penetrate, but open my mind’s ears wide to uplifting, soothing thoughts.

All of us have ears; we just haven’t learned to use them properly. We can turn the volume down on people who want to degrade us and turn up the volume on those who come alongside to help us.

When we’re standing knee deep in a river and dying of thirst from feeling depressed, dejected and beaten down, we can wade ashore and quench our thirst on the love of God. God responds to our sighs, our tears, our fears—even our stumbling and falling—as a prayer to Him.

Each of us is a child of God—made in His image. Don’t you think that since He went as far as to make us in His own image that He will do everything He can to love and do what is best for each one of us? Of course He will.

Stop stumbling and start walking with God.

Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.

James 1:12

Further Adventures

We all fail sometimes. It may be small thing like forgetting where the car keys are. It may be you lost the important papers you boss told you to take are off. It may be a broken marriage. It may even be your own job that you have lost. It is what you do after each of these happens that shows what we are made of. I can’t tell you how many times I have lost my keys. I have had to have Charlotte bail me out often by getting the keys for me, but I am still driving. I didn’t give driving up because I feared I would lose the keys again. I have lost important papers. I had this book all one and was getting ready to go back through and ad some Further Adventures to it like the one you are reading now. I completely finished it one time. But somehow I lost the whole file. I think I must of sent it to a friend and asked them to proof read it and forgot who I sent it to. I haven’t found it to this very day. So this is my second attempt at writing this Further Adventure. I vaguely remember the other one I wrote for this chapter, and I like this one much more. Could it be that it was God that “lost” that file for me?

The point to all of this is that you stumble and you fall. I did. You need to get back up; dust yourself off and start up again. I will get all the Future Adventures done the second time, and now I am convinced that they will be better than the first time I wrote them.

Something to Ponder

Isn’t it funny that we seek happiness from the outside, but true happiness is found on the inside?