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Gary's musings
  
Gary's musings
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How close can you come? Aug 18, 2008 11:35 am
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The story is told of a wealthy businessman who had posted an ad in the "help wanted" section of the newspaper. He needed a driver.

It was well known that his mansion was on top of a very steep mountain, and the road to it was narrow and steep, and the mountainside very precipitous.

The applicants began to pour in, each claiming excellent driving skills. He arranged for them to all meet on a specific date and time.

They all gathered at his mansion at the appointed time for the group interview.

One by one he began to openly interview these men. The first question he asked each was, "How close could you come to the edge of the steep road leading up here?"

"I could come within several feet," the first man replied.

Not to be outdone, the second responded,"Well sir, I could come within one foot of the edge and be completely in control."

The third applicant said, "Well, sir, I could come within inches of the edge, I have the skill for that. However, I would stay as far from the edge as possible, it's just not worth taking the risk."

"HIRED!"

How close do you think you can live to sin, without participating in it?

Do you try to see how far you can go before the Lord has to yank your chain?

Do you keep pushing the limits?

"I will only drive past the bar!"

"I will only talk to that scantily clad girl."

I will only look at that magazine, I won't buy it."

"I will only kiss that person."

"I will only BUY the drinks for my friends."

HOW CLOSE CAN YOU COME???
5 Comments
The dangers of "point" and "click" Aug 15, 2008 3:50 pm
736 Views
There are no doubt many of you who could tell stories about people who seek God like this:
they take the Bible and put it on the binding, vertical to the table and just let it flop open to any page. Then they randomly point to a verse and claim the Lord led them there.
If the verse doesn't mean anything they repeat the action.

I call that point and click.

So let me try it and see how well it works.

I let my Bible flop open to......Matt 27:5, "So Judas threw the money (blood money for betraying Jesus) into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.

Well that didn't work out to be inspirational, so let's try it again. This time my Bible flops open to....... Luke 10:37, "Jesus told him, Go and do thou likewise."

Thanks anyway, but I think I will stick with a structured method. Between God and I, at least one of us knows where I'll be reading and can better speak to me.
7 Comments
My journey in the Old Testament Aug 15, 2008 2:02 am
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About 5 weeks ago, I felt prompted to read bulks of the Bible at a time. This started out being one book per day, beginning with Genesis.

It revealed to me the mindset of those living in those parts of the world today. The emphasis on their history, their future, violence, commitment etc.

But more importantly, I saw God in a new light as well. When you process large amounts of data at one sitting, it is amazing the different perspective you see.

To be quite honest, I have had a lot of trouble with the God of the O.T. I believe in Him, and I believe the O.T., but I don't always understand Him. He seems capricious, and whimsical to me and rather severe.

Part of the problem is that in the O.T. we see God through the eyes of Israel. Here was a people who had grown up in Egypt as slaves. They were brought out of Egypt by means of devastating plagues visited upon the stubborn Pharaoh and his nation. Their life was FULL OF violence and pain and struggle and warfare. The O.T. is inspired by God; it also inescapably reflects the culture of the people to whom and through who it came.

In addition to this cultural influence, the O.T. also illustrates the fact that God's revelation of Himself is progressive.

Some of the early fragmentary glimpses of God can therefore be misleading. God may appear to be bloody and vindictive and remote. As we see more and more of God, even in the O.T. , a different picture emerges. David is an interesting case in point because Scripture calls him "a man after God's own heart." David was in many respects a bloody man. He killed many people, and he did it in the name of God. Yet notice what David said late in his life to his son Solomon:
I had it in my heart to build a house for the Name of the Lord my God. But this word of the Lord came to me, 'You have shed much blood and have fought many wars. You are not to build a house for my Name, because you have shed much blood on the earth in my sight. But you will have a son who will be a man of peace and rest.....He is the one who will build a house for My Name'" (I Chron 22: 7-10)

The true nature of God was not represented by bloodshed but by peace and rest. In fact, bloodshed was so contrary to the nature of God that the man who shed blood, even though it was necessary, could not build the house of God.

Coming as it does from a primitive people steeped in violence, the O.T. is a remarkable revelation of God as "the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness" (Ex 34:6).

Yet it remains for the N.T. to reveal God more fully to us by means of the Incarnation. In the N.T., God not only speaks to us in our darkness and confusion, but He comes to us in human flesh. Although we still inescapably see Him through the eyes of our own culture, there is now a new dimension. God has come into humanness! No matter how culture changes, I CAN UNDERSTAND HUMANNESS. GOD HAS COME IN THE FLESH!!!

As I neared the end of th O.T., I got quite anxious to begin reading the N.T. I almost felt as though I had truly entered into the mindset of the Eastern person.

Even though I may interpret the N.T. from the western viewpoint, I am coming to a fuller understanding of what my God is really like. That understanding grows daily, until one day I will see Him face to face and have a complete knowledge of Him. What a grand day that will be!!
8 Comments
speaking of the redeemed..... Aug 15, 2008 1:23 am
658 Views
I was sitting in the congregation of my church while the pastor was preaching about witnessing. During his message he quoted "let the redeemed of the Lord say so." (Ps 107:2). He paused long enough after saying those words, for me to mis-quote him out loud (which I almost did): let the redeemed of the Lord....say something

I often wonder if the reason we don't witness much is because we might have to clean up our act, knowing that if we say anything, our lives are going to be watched.
6 Comments
"Jesus needs to be committed" Aug 14, 2008 1:21 am
613 Views
That's apparently what Jesus' family thought.

Mark 20-24, "Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that He and His disciples were not even able to eat.

When His family heard about this, they went to take charge of Him, for they said, "He is out of his mind.'

And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, "He is possessed by Beelzebub! by the prince of demons He is driving out demons.'"

He truly did "make of Himself no reputation." And He did this for us.

This makes me wonder how much of what we do as Christians involves protecting our image, our reputation. Are we willing to have our reputations smeared?

Do we need to defend ourselves when lied about? when people think the worst about us? Can we trust the Lord to be our defender?
1 comment
Do you trust your grandfather? Aug 13, 2008 11:33 pm
Mood: trusting, 621 Views
Our pastor's young son has a weekly ritual he performs. Sunday, after all the services are over, he goes through through whole auditorium search the padded pews for lost change.

One such Sunday he was having lunch with his grandfather joyfully sharing his stories with his grandfather. He held up his latest find, a shiny new quarter.

His grandfather slammed his hand on the table, shocking the young boy. The grandfather then said, "You can have whatever is under my hand, if you will give me that quarter."

Suddenly this boy's excited look took on a look of deep contemplation. What, if anything, did his grandfather have under his hand.

Finally, he reluctantly handed over his recent treasure. The grandfather lifted his hand to reveal a $1 coin.

The excited look of the boy's face quickly turned into a furrowed brow, and you could almost hear the wheels turning inside his head.

He looked up at his grandfather and asked, "Can we play this again?"

How about you, are you willing to trust our Father enough to give Him your quarter?

Jesus taught this principle in the N.T.: you lose what you grasp but keep what you give away."
4 Comments
Two types of sin, can it be?????? Aug 13, 2008 2:31 am
631 Views
I remember all too vividly the struggle I had when I became a Christian.

I knew from my childhood experiences in church that my sin created a problem with God, but what do I do about it?

Follow the thinking here of me as a new Christian. I knew that if I died with sin in my heart, I wouldn't get to Heaven. "The soul that sins, shall die."

Look at I Jo 1:6, "If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, WE LIE, and do not live by the truth." And the bible says that all liars will go to hell. So in order for me to get to Heaven, I have to be sin free.

But :8 says "If we claim to be without sin, we are living in deception and the truth is not in us."
So my sin is going to send me to hell, and if I say I don't sin, then I am lying, and that alone is enough to send me there. So I can't win. If I admit to sin, I go to hell, if I say I don't sin, I lie, and still go to hell.

So I began a futile exercise of trying to confess sin every time I thought about it in my life. So all day long I would pray, "Father forgive me, Father forgive me, Father forgive me. You can imagine the bondage I was under.

then I began to study I John and saw something that freed me from a life time of bondage. When John talks about sin, in this book, he uses two different words
1. the nature of sin, and
2. the habit, or deliberate, conscious willful practice of sin.

:8 "If we claim to be without the (nature) of sin, we deceive ourselves..." We will always carry around with us, that nature of sin. We have been delivered from the penalty and power of sin, but the deliverance from the presence of sin is yet to come at the second coming.

Jump over to I Jo 3:4-5, "Everyone who (habitually practices) sin breaks the law; in fact, sin is LAWLESSNESS.....No one who lives in Him keeps on (habitually practicing) sin." You cannot knowingly practice sin, and expect to remain in Christ.

So how do we handle these to different approaches to sin.

Well, obviously the premeditated sins, must rely in I Jo 1:9, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."

God very clearly shows us our sin, we confess it, repent (which means turn around 180 degrees from it) and we are then forgiven....BUT DO NOT GO BACK TO IT, OR YOU HAVE WILLFULLY SINNED AGAIN. "IF WE SIN WILLFULLY AFTER THAT WE HAVE RECEIVED THE KNOWLEDGE OF TRUTH, THERE REMAINS NO MORE SACRIFICE FOR SIN."

Now what of the "nature of sin?" This is where 1: 7 takes effect: "But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood purifies us from all sin."

The key word here is "purifies." The tense of that verb indicates that it is an ongoing purification of the sins we commit, that we are unaware of, and if we were conscious of commiting them, it would grieve us......the nature of sin. The sins we commit simply because of our human nature.

Right now, your body is doing at least two things: it is constantly bringing you life, and at the same time, is removing the impurities from your body. If it were to ever stop doing either of those, you would die. This would refer to thenormal germs that we come in contact with every day, that often, and unknowingly infect us. It does not include the germs we deliberately infect oursleves with. Those germs must be dealt with through confession.

So the blood of Jesus is in your life right now, doing those same two things, It is ALWAYS bringing you life, and it is ALWAYS removing the impurities that the nature of sin has produced in you. If it were to ever stop doing either of those two things, you would die, spiritually.

This gives me a lot of hope and freedom.
8 Comments
USDA approved Aug 12, 2008 2:17 pm
521 Views
James 1:2-4. "Consider (regard as particularly important, in the Greek) it pure joy, my brothers, wheever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance (cheerful endurance). Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

In order for meat to be offered to the public, it must undergo testing. Only when it has passed the tests, can it receive the USDA stamp of approval.

ARE YOU USDA APPROVED??
ARE YOU KOG (Kingdom of God) approved??
7 Comments
Is God cheating???? Aug 12, 2008 1:49 am
475 Views
While I was praying today, I found myself asking God to give me strength.

I am going through the test of my life, and sometimes I feel I have gone under, and won't survive. Many many times I have felt if I just pressed "delete"..........

So, "Lord give me strength!" I pray. "I cannot make it without You."

I realized that He puts me through the test, but also gives me the strength I need to survive the test.....isn't that kind of cheating???

Then I reflected on the business management and accounting courses I have taken, and remembered that in many of them, the tests were "open book." So, if I have read THE BOOK, I will know where to find the answers. The instructor tests me, but gives me the book with the answers.

Congratulations, you got it. That's what God does with us. He gives us tests that are open-book and then gives us THE BOOK. If we have read THE BOOK we will know where to find the answers.

The answers are IN THE BOOK, and IN HIM (the Word became flesh).

"Lord, please give me the strength to endure, to be found worthy, to make you proud, don't let me fail this trial."
11 Comments
Friendship Quotes Aug 11, 2008 11:08 pm
427 Views
"The antidote for fifty enemies is one friend."
~Aristotle

"Shared joy is a double joy; shared sorrow is half a sorrow"
~Unknown

"Friendship is like money, easier made than kept."
~Samuel Butler

"Friendship is the only thing in the world concerning the usefulness of which all mankind are agreed."
~Marcus T. Cicero

"Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow; Don't walk behind me, I may not lead; Walk beside me, and just be my friend."
~Albert Camus

"A real friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out."
~ Walter Winchell

" Fate chooses our relatives, we choose our friends."
~Jacques Delille

Each of us has a hidden place
Somewhere deep within ourselves
Where we go to get away
To be alone to be ourselves
But every once in a while whether by chance or design
Someone finds a way into that secret place
That person adds perspective to our hidden realm
They quietly settle down in their own little corner
We call that person a friend
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