All the More - Purity 866
Purity 866 10/19/2022 Purity 866 Podcast
Good morning,
Today’s photo of the shadows of trees stretching over
the plains that lead to the autumn decorated hump of Willard Mountain in the
distance under a blue sky with a cloud formation that in my imagination looks
like Godzilla reaching out towards us comes from yours truly as I stopped long enough
to capture this scene as I drove back up Watie Road on my way back to
Riverhouse on Sunday. I took this photo
to capture those autumn colors on the mountain and was going to crop out the
rest to highlight that feature but now that I see all that is going on in this photo
I decided to leave it as is.
Well, it’s Wednesday again and I share today's photo
because of that hump of Willard mountain adequately represents the midpoint of
another work week but I love that this photo has shown me that sometimes
there's more than meets the eye, that sometimes we think we know what we're
looking for only to discover that God has so much more for us.
Last night I facilitated the freedom in Christ
course again and shared with the participants a photo of myself from 2017 where
I was tabling for the recovery ministry I was doing at the time and it showed
me smiling and wearing a Celebrate Freedom T-shirt and what must have been at
least an additional 30 pounds of me.
The photo had come up in my Facebook memories from
five years ago and when I saw it II was shocked and marveled over how I had
freedom over alcohol and drugs in 2017 and was obviously motivated and happy with my
freedom enough to go out and table for my frecministry but I recall all the
things I didn't know that I needed freedom from that I hadn't achieved yet.
When I saw the photo I had laughed at it and said wow I really needed more freedom,
you know? There was more freedom to be had and I didn’t even know it.
I shared it with these participants last night to
demonstrate that our freedom and our walk with Christ is a progressive thing.
That the freedom that they may experience through the freedom in Christ course
can be significant but that doesn't mean that the freedom they achieve is the
only freedom that they can have. I shared the photo to encourage them that
after they finished the course they should continue with the life of Christian
discipleship to discover all the things that the Lord has for them.
In 2017, I had many things that I was in bondage to
that I didn't quite realize at the time but that the Lord made me aware of and
gave me the power to overcome in the years that followed. But I never would
have known this freedom and victory that I have today if I had just stayed
content to stay in recovery ministry and claim that victory and only speak about that.
If I had stayed complacent and stopped walking with the Lord and stopped
examining my life I would have not known the great freedom and victory that I
have today. And as I walk with the Lord today in 2022 I know that there's other
things that I I can work on that I can overcome.
As I've said in the past, after I realized that the
Lord was willing to do the impossible in my life I asked “What's next Lord?” as
I've continued to walk in the spirit I realized that there are no limits to
what the Lord can do and I stopped trying to figure out what was the next thing
a long time ago and just continue to do what I do day-to-day and remain open
for the Lord to lead me in whatever direction he chooses.
Now just to be clear here I don't get an audible
word from the Lord. Although sometimes the promptings in my spirit sure sounds
like God, I can't claim that everything I “felt I was to do” was the Lord’s
direct commands to me.
The truth is that walking in the Spirit can be a
process of trial and error because allthough we have the Spirit of God living
in us, we also have ideas and dreams of our own that we have carried with us
from our Pre-Christ existence or that the world and society values that
influence us and we may think that we can discern God’s will perfectly only to
discover that things don’t work out like we thought they would, that the things
we decide to “do for the Lord” may not have been divinely inspired because they
weren’t successful.
But our failures are part of this path of Christian
Discipleship, so rather than worrying about whether or not the “callings” we
get are divinely inspired or not, I would advise others to “give it a try, and
see what happens” rather than not doing something and be left always wondering “what
if”. When we step out in faith and try
new things or take on challenges that we struggle with, the Lord can use the
process to make us grow into the people He wants us to be: people who live by
faith in the power of The Holy Spirit rather than people who have it all figured
out and only do what is safe.
Right now there are lies that we are believing,
still, that we need to stop believing. Like
“I don’t have faith like ____” or “Overcoming X isn’t the same as overcoming Y”
or The Lord blessed them with freedom and victory but He hasn’t blessed me” or “You have to eat” or “I only eat the food I like” or “I only do
the things I like and that make me happy”
Now, if any of those statements ring a bell or confound
you or even anger you, we might have found an area where there is more freedom
to be had.
I know a person who is constantly making “I can’t”
or “I don’t” statements that are subtly defining their lives. I can’t really go into detail about what this
person is all about but I if I wanted I could give you a very long list of all
the things they:
Don’t do
Can’t do
Don’t Like
Won’t do
Won’t Try
In my perception of this person, I just see a whole
lot of resistance and I don’t see any joy.
I see someone who looks to other people or circumstances to make them
happy and surprisingly as much as that seems to be the only thing that occupies
their minds: what pleases them, some how they are continually in a state of
discontent. And once you think of
applying a solution to “their problem” that has worked in the past, they shoot
it down as “something they don’t want today” or “don’t feel like” today. And instead of telling us, what will satisfy
them, they hem and haw, expecting others to figure out, somehow magically, what
will make them happy, what they “feel like” today.
This person, and people like them, are slaves to
their circumstantial happiness because they are in bondage to their preferences
and the resistance they put up to new things and their utter failure to take
personal responsibility for themselves.
But there is great news here! There is lots of
freedom to be won here! If they were so inclined, the Lord could lead them to
cast fears and anxiety, the Lord could shift their focus off of themselves to
consider Him and others, and the Lord could reveal to them that life is not all
about pleasing ourselves.
So what do you do with somebody like this?
You try to encourage them to seek the Lord and to
examine their lives according to what He says is true and to be open minded to
consider all the things that He would lead them into. And you pray for them.
People like this are blinded by the lies of this
world and trapped in a perspective that considers only themselves. They have
mirror vision – where they only see themselves – and they rarely let anyone
else into their frame.
I think we all suffer from this to some extent, so
none of us gets off this hook. But the
remedy to this self-centered ideation is to consider the Big Picture that the
Lord reveals to us and to realize that what the Lord has for us is more than our
personal preferences and likes. The Lord has much more than we could ever imagine,
but we won’t know it unless we pursue His truth and His presence.
So that’s why I say, keep walking and talking with
God, because He will tell you what you need to know and He will invite you to
follow Him where you should go.
We currently don’t know all the lies we are believing.
We don’t know all that we can be “free from” or all that we can be “free to”
but if we keep seeking the Lord and His will for our lives, one day we will be
able to look back and marvel over how far we have come and how much the Lord
has given us. So keep going and see and experience, all “the more” that the
Lord has in store for you.
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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible
Promise Book for Men”.
This morning’s meditation verses are
Romans 15:5-7 (NLT2)
5 May God, who gives this
patience and encouragement, help you live in complete harmony with each other,
as is fitting for followers of Christ Jesus.
6 Then all of you can join
together with one voice, giving praise and glory to God, the Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ.
7 Therefore, accept each
other just as Christ has accepted you so that God will be given glory.
Today’s Bible verses encourages us who follow the Lord into the
complete harmony that followers of Jesus Christ can know when we join together
to give Him praise and glory and accept each other as Christ has accepted each
of us.
One of the biggest challenges of the Christian Walk is being
discerning with what the Lord has revealed to us and how we are to interact
with others now that we “know the TRUTH”.
Because we are in Christ, we are sensitive to the Lord’s will for
our lives to be sanctified and to repent of sin and worldliness. But while we can have this conviction in our
lives, other Christians or our friends and family may not have received the
same message and in order to maintain harmony and unity in the body of Christ,
we may have to learn to use that conviction to transform us and be accepting of
our brothers and sisters in Christ who don’t seem to be there just yet, and we
have to be even more careful with God’s Truth with our unsaved loved ones.
I haven’t been discerning and in my zeal to share the gospel I
have said some pretty harsh things that were true but somehow didn’t lead
people to Christ or a deeper relationship with God. It turns out I am not the Holy Spirit and I
have learned that His job is not my job and, while I will speak the truth in
love when I feel His leading, I have learned to get out of His way.
When we gather as a church, I am not to judge my brother by their
supposed sins and offer unsolicited advice on how they can be grow. As today’s verse says, we are to come
together and accept one another in peace as Christ has accepted us and should
concern ourselves with giving God praise and glory. That’s what the corporate gathering is for
to praise the Lord and to encourage one another to keep in the faith.
So, accept others, warts and all, encourage them to follow the Lord,
and let The Holy Spirit do His work but be ready in case He calls you into
service to help someone in their walk.
___________________________________________
As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I
always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to
assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.
Today we continue sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s
“Discipleship”, also known as “The Cost of Discipleship”
As always, I share this information for educational
purposes and encourage all to purchase Bonhoeffer’s books for your own
private study and to support his work. This resource is available on
many websites for less than $20.00.
Chapter Six
The
Sermon on the Mount
Matthew
5
On
the “Extraordinary”
of Christian Life
The Visible Church-Community
The other
possibility, of course, is that salt loses its taste, that it stops being salt.
It ceases to be effective. Then it really is no longer good for anything except
to be thrown away. That is the special distinction of salt. Everything has to
be salted. But salt that has lost its taste can never again be salty.
Everything, even the most spoiled stuff, can be saved by salt. Only salt which
has lost its saltiness is hopelessly spoiled. That is the other reality of
salt. That is the threatening judgment which hangs over the disciples’
community. The earth is supposed to be saved by the community. But the
community that has stopped being what it is will be hopelessly lost. The call
of Jesus Christ means being salt of the earth or being destroyed. It means
following Christ or—the call itself will destroy the one called. There is no
second opportunity to be saved. There cannot be such a salvation.
Jesus’ call promises
the community of disciples not only the invisible efficacy of salt, but the
visible shine of light. “You are the
light”—again, not: “you should be the light”! The call itself has made them
light. It cannot be any other way. They are a light which is seen. If it were
different, then the call would not be revealed in them. What an impossible,
senseless goal it would be for Jesus’ disciples, for these disciples, to want to become
the light of the world! They have already been made into light by the call, in
discipleship. Again, not “you have
the light,” but “you are it!” The light is not something given to you as for
example your preaching, but you yourselves are it. He who speaks directly of
himself by saying, “I am the Light,” says directly to his disciples, “You are
the light in your whole lives, as long as you remain faithful to the call.
Because you are the light, you can stay hidden no longer, even if you wanted
to. Light shines, and the city on the hill cannot be hidden.”[58] It
simply cannot. It is visible far into the countryside, no matter whether it is
a strong city, a guarded fortress, or a crumbling ruin. This city on the
hill—what Israelite would not be reminded of Jerusalem, the city built on
high!—is the community of disciples. With all this, the followers of Jesus are
no longer faced with a decision. The only decision possible for them has
already been made. Now they have to be what they are, or they are not following
Jesus. The followers are the visible community of faith; their discipleship is
a visible act which separates them from the world—or it is not discipleship.
And discipleship is as visible as light in the night, as a mountain in the
flatland.
To flee into
invisibility is to deny the call. Any community of Jesus which wants to be
invisible is no longer a community that follows him. “No one after lighting a
lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand”—there is that other
possibility, that the light will be shaded intentionally, that it is
extinguished under the basket, that the call is denied. The bushel basket,
under which the visible community hides its light, can be fear of human beings
just as much as it can be intentional conformity with the world for some
arbitrary purposes, whether it be missionary purposes or whether it arises from
misguided love for people! But it may also be—and that is even more dangerous—a
so-called Reformation theology, which even dares to call itself theologia
crucis [theology of the cross] and whose signature is that it prefers a
“humble” invisibility in the form of total conformity to the world over
“Pharisaic” visibility.[62] In that case the identifying mark of the
community ceases to be an extraordinary visibility. Instead, it is identified
by its fitness to function within the justitia civilis. Here the criterion for
Christianity is considered to be that the light should not shine. But Jesus says, “Let your light shine before the
Gentiles.” In any case, it is the light of Jesus’ call which is shining. But
what sort of a light is it in which those followers of Jesus, those disciples
of the Beatitudes, are to shine? What sort of light should come from that
place, to which only the disciples have a claim? What do the invisibility and
hiddenness of Jesus’ cross, under which the disciples stand, have in common
with the light which is to shine? Shouldn’t it follow from the hiddenness of
the cross that the disciples should likewise be hidden, and not stand in the
light? It is an evil sophistry which uses the cross of Jesus to derive from it
the church’s call to conformation to the world. Does not a simple listener
recognize quite clearly that precisely at the cross something extraordinary has
become visible? Or is that all nothing but justitia civilis? Is the cross
conformation to the world? To the shock of everyone else, is the cross not
something which became outrageously visible in the complete darkness? Is it not
visible enough that Christ is rejected and must suffer, that his life ends
outside the city gates on the hill of shame? Is that invisibility?
The good works of the
disciples should be seen in this
light. “Not you, but your good works should be seen,” says Jesus. What are
these good works which can be seen in this light? They can be no other works
than those Jesus himself created in the disciples when he called them, when he
made them the light of the world under his cross—poverty, being strangers,
meekness, peacemaking, and finally being persecuted and rejected, and in all of
them the one work: bearing the cross of Jesus Christ. The cross is that strange
light which shines there, by which alone all these good works of the disciples
can be seen. Nowhere does it say that God becomes visible, but that the “good
works” will be seen, and that the people will praise God for these works. The
cross becomes visible, and the works of the cross become visible. The want and
renunciation of the blessed become visible. But human beings can never be
praised for the cross and for such a faith-community, only God can be praised.
If the good works were all sorts of human virtues, then the disciples, not the
Father, would be praised for them. As it is, there is nothing to praise in the
disciple who bears the cross, or in the faith-community whose light so shines,
which stands visibly on the mountain—only the Father in heaven can be praised
for their “good works.” That is why they see
the cross and the community of the cross, and have faith in God. There, then,
shines the light of the resurrection.[1]
---------------------------more
tomorrow------------------------
Join our
“Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in
Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!
at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can
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These
teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTxjSNstREpuGWuL0bF3U7w/featured
Email me
at mt4christ247@gmail.com to
receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.
My wife,
TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask,
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and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)
Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship
[1]
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship,
ed. Martin Kuske et al., trans. Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, vol. 4,
Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003), 112–114.
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