Too Good to Be True – Hospitality, Friendship, and
living for Christ
Purity 499 08/17/2021 Purity 499 Podcast
Good morning
Today’s photo of a late day commuter’s sun that seems to have been
devoured by a sky creature of my imagination, whose silhouette is defined by
the framing trees, I think of it as the “Halfmoon Sky Hog” with gaping mouth, comes
to us from yours truly as I decided to drive in a different direction yesterday
after work and take advantage of a friend’s hospitality.
After emerging past the “Ides of August” this past weekend, I was
overcome by a sense that the times “they are a changing” and in contemplating the
weeks ahead I realized that the Summer of ’21 is slip, sliding away. I have a busy schedule with work, meetings,
ministry, gatherings, and church and at times it doesn’t seem like I have a
moment’s rest but trust me that is a good thing. I consider myself truly
blessed by the activities in my life and the relationships that I enjoy as part
of it all.
As we walk through life we must meet our responsibilities and make time
for the things we want to do by scheduling the time for it. I have become somewhat skilled at scheduling
my time for everything but as I reviewed my upcoming days I realized I had something
to do for most of the days in the next week after work but yesterday evening
was a rare “night off”, okay to be honest I had a few things to take care but determined
that they wouldn’t take up a lot of time and could be done before I went to
bed.
So early yesterday, with the upcoming schedule in mind, and the
dwindling days of summer as a clear and present reality, I recalled a friend’s
kind invitation to use their swimming pool without reservations.
I don’t know about you but sometimes when people make an offer of
hospitality you almost immediately dismiss it because:
1.
You don’t know if they really mean it.
2.
You don’t know if their invitation will obligate you in some
way
3.
You feel to accept their invitation is to admit to some lack
in your life
4.
You fear the rules and regulations that may be involved
5.
You fear that accepting will somehow push the friendship
beyond the “comfort zone” and will somehow result it conflict and a loss of
relationship when the bounds of the friendship are pushed beyond their limits.
But nothing ventured nothing gained, right? We can’t receive if we don’t ask. Right? And honestly,
sometimes we have to “call people’s bluff” and see if they are for “real”. As we all know, sometimes people say things
and don’t mean them, but we will never know if they are authentic if we don’t decide
to take advantage of what they offer.
And I love what happens in us when we get moved to do something. Suddenly, all this resistance comes in: “Oh, maybe they were just saying that…” “Are
you really going to ask to go to their house and go swimming on a Monday, on a weeknight?...
by yourself?... what are you nuts?”
This little internal dialog of anxiety is what keeps us from our
freedom. So in our interactions with one
another there is some potential for growth between friends on both sides.
They make the offer of hospitality, making themselves vulnerable. Have you ever invited a bunch of people that
you thought of as friends to party and have no one show up? When we offer our friendship and hospitality
we run the risk of feeling the hurt of rejection. Do we want to be vulnerable by allowing people
into our homes? Do we want to give
them the power to possibly judge us and reject us?
On our part, the invitation to accept their hospitality puts the “ball
of friendship” in our courts so to speak.
Will we accept? Are we friends or just acquaintances? Do we want to make
ourselves vulnerable by going into their home?
So yesterday, out of the blue on a Monday morning, I texted my friend
with my thoughts and inquired if I could take advantage of the offer of their
pool. In retrospect, I didn’t really ask
how they were and actually texted “I was thinking of your pool”. Real nice, right? OH and how are you. Yeah
I never asked that…. It’s amazing I have friends at all.
Amazingly, they said the offer was good and they advised how I could
access their property and enjoy their swimming pool without disturbance.
Oh yes, another wrinkle for the faint of heart. “You mean, they weren’t even going to be
there?!”
Apparently not. Talk about upping
the ante, right?
And this speaks all my single friends. We need to boldly go on our own
into this world. If we are going to be waiting for a companion to live our
lives, we should be prepared to spend a lot of time at home alone. And here’s the deal, if we are comfortable
home alone, why not take the show on the road?
There is a whole world outside to enjoy and we need to challenge our
fears and go out into it even if it means we will be rolling solo.
As single people, we also need to be vulnerable and make ourselves
available to others for friendship.
Recently, I was at a gathering where someone new to the area actually asked
for prayer to find friends. We prayed for that person and hopefully our prayers
were answered because at the next gathering they were not in attendance.
And that brings up another thing, are we praying for something that God
is putting right before us? This person
was praying for friends in a group, in which they could have possibly found those
friends! Like I said, I hope they found them in prayer, because through their
absence they may have decided that “these people” weren’t “friend material” or they
weren’t comfortable with themselves.
Somewhere in scripture it says that if we want friends, we need to be
friendly… If we don’t make ourselves
vulnerable and reach out to others we will never find friends.
Oh I understand the risks of rejection, but oh well, thankfully through
my faith I know that I am accepted for who I am in Christ, and I have decided to take the risk to reach
out to those who seem friendly. I have nothing to prove to anyone and only seek
to enjoy their company and encourage them.
So, I took the risk of being “presumptuous” and was rewarded with a
transformed Monday as I was welcomed to use my friend’s pool to enjoy the
water, the weather, and the solitude.
So keep walking and talking with God. He will give you the confidence to
walk through life boldly and to take risks to make yourself vulnerable to
others. When we make and accept
invitations, we open the door to our hearts and while it can be a scary
proposition to do so, the rewards of personal growth and experiencing new
things and the love of others is more than worth it.
This morning’s meditation
verse is:
Philippians
1:21 (NKJV)
21 For to me, to live is
Christ, and to die is gain.
As
always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from
prominent Christian counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with
their walk.
Today we continue with Dr. Neil Anderson’s Victory
Over the Darkness, beginning Chapter 12.
As always, I share this information for educational purposes
and encourage all to purchase Dr. Anderson’s books for your own private study
and to support his work. If you need this title you can find it online at several
sites for less than $15.00:
Chapter
12
Dealing
with Rejection in Your Relationships
Ruby had experienced more rejection in her 40 years of
life than anyone I have ever heard about. She was rejected by her unmarried
mother before she was born, miraculously surviving an abortion six months into
her mother's pregnancy. Ruby's mother then abandoned her to her father, who in
turn gave her to his mother. Ruby's grandmother was involved in a bizarre
mixture of religious and occultic practices. So Ruby was raised in an
atmosphere of seances and other weird, demonic experiences.
Ruby married at 14 to escape her
grandmother's home. By the time she was 21 she had five children, all of whom
were convinced by their father that Ruby was no good. Eventually her husband
and five children all deserted her. Feeling totally rejected, Ruby
unsuccessfully attempted suicide several times. She received Christ during this
time, but those who knew her were afraid she would take her own life.
"Don't commit suicide," they encouraged her. "Hang on; life will
get better." Yet voices inside her head still taunted Ruby, and an eerie,
dark spiritual presence infested her home.
In this condition Ruby came to a
weeklong conference I was conducting at her church. On Wednesday night I spoke
about forgiveness, encouraging people to list the names of people they needed
to forgive. In the middle of the session, Ruby left the room with what appeared
to be an asthma attack. In reality it was a spiritual attack.
The next afternoon one of the pastors
and I met privately with Ruby to counsel and pray with her. When we began to
talk about forgiveness, Ruby brought out the list of names she had
compiled—four pages of people who had hurt her and rejected her through the
years! No wonder Satan was having a field day in her life. Virtually everyone
else had turned her away.
We led her through the steps to
forgiveness, and she walked out of the office free in Christ. She realized for
the first time that God loves her and will never reject her. She went home
thrilled and excited. The evil voices in her head were gone.
Most of us haven't suffered the
pervasive rejection Ruby experienced. Everyone knows, however, what it feels
like to be criticized and rejected, even by the very people in our lives we
want to please. We were born and raised in a worldly environment that chooses
favorites and rejects seconds. Because nobody can be the best at everything, we
all were ignored, overlooked, or rejected at times by parents, teachers, coaches,
and friends.
Furthermore, because we were born in
sin, God also rejected us until we were accepted by Him in Christ at salvation
(see Romans 15:7).
Since then, we have been the target of Satan, the accuser of the brethren (see Rev. 12:10), who
never ceases to lie to us about how worthless we are to God and others. In this
life we all have to live with the pain and pressure of rejection.
Victory Over the Darkness: Realizing the Power of Your Identity in Christ.
---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------
God bless
you all!
Join our “Victory
over the Darkness” or “The Bondage Breaker” series of Discipleship Classes via
the mt4christ247 podcast!
at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts,
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Email me
at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be
encouraged.
Encouragement for the Path of Christian
Discipleship
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