Stars
“Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe.” (Philippians 2:14,15)
That is definitely one of the coolest verses in Paul’s letters. How many of us are guilty of what Paul was telling the Philippians? Do we spend a lot of time arguing about things on which are faith doesn’t depend, for instance, arguing with a christian friend who thinks that the days must have been longer when God created the world or something like that. It’s irrelevant to what Jesus has in store for us. We can’t change the past and definitely a past that long ago.
As Paul writes, let’s concentrate on being God’s children in a crooked and depraved generation. It is impossible for you, me or any other human on the planet to be blameless and pure, no matter how hard we try. Jesus did it though. He was like a sheep in a pigsty and stayed clean, it’s amazing and wonderful, a miracle in itself. His spirit is here, everywhere and he is working in or on your heart, depending on whether you’ve opened the door of your innermost self or not…
Jesus doesn’t want a bunch of puppets that hide behind a wall of religion or/and tradition to keep themselves “blameless and pure“. The sad thing is they actually believe it does keep them clean. Jesus was a “dirty” saviour, in a manner of speaking, he spent time and loved the people that we “blameless and pure” reject because they might dirty us. He didn’t mind getting “dirty”, he didn’t approve or accept the negative lifestyles that a lot of people led, but he still loved them and wanted them to follow him. Most of them did, in fact, there were more “dirty” people that accepted him as Lord and Saviour than “clean ones. Ain’t it sad?
Now about shining like stars in the universe, that’s the real awesome part about this verse. The thing about most stars is that you can basically see the same star in almost all parts of the earth, they don’t move as far as I know, although the earth does. Stars are fixed and anchored in one spot, their a pillar, a fixed point of reference. The Bible is this. Jesus is this. Are we this? No. Not by ourselves, no no no, we’re missing one little (OK, BIG) thing. Jesus! Jesus is our star, our light, salt, path, lamp and other things that get mentioned in the Bible. But together, oh wow, we are right there with him, shining, giving flavour, being a guide! Ever heard of “Me+Jesus=1″? That’s what this is, except, you and I are the “reflectors”. Jesus’ light and shining bounces off us and hopefully we absorb some of it too. Jesus is the big star, the fire that burns in the lighthouse that gets reflected off the reflectors, the sun that gets it’s light reflected in the moon. Following along? It’s a great, awesome and wonderful, for lack of better word in the English language, concept. You can’t just grasp it just like that. You have to learn it. Learn to reflect. Learn to love and get “dirty” to help and get close to the people who are “spiritually sick”, the ones who need the doctor. The people in your church have the doctor, not that you shouldn’t love them or anything, but it’s the sick ones that need more attention. God will use you and me to reach those he has made and loves, no matter how much sin they are carrying.
Let’s be Jesus!
Youth leadership…Are you ready?
OK, just to clarify were I’m going on this topic, I have to tell you where I heard it. Yesterday, Friday, I attended a Youth Leadership conference in the city of Caaguazu. Today I attended a Youth conference. The speaker at both events was Dr. Jeffrey de Leon (PhD) from Miami and he definitely has a most interesting way of portraying how a Youth ministry can be better “managed” nowadays. Here’s what I have learned:
First of all, let’s dispense with the title of “Youth Ministry” if it keeps the youth from feeling welcome. It’s may not seem important to us, but to someone that turns around at the word “ministry”, it can be quite important.
Let’s get rid of the whole idea of having OUR church that includes OUR christian principles, language and mannerisms. Let’s be what Jesus intended us to be, a BODY! The churches make up the body of Christ, as do it’s members. What do we do when someone in church sins? Do we send them home and tell them to give up their membership? That would be like taking a knife and cutting off your finger because it was hurting and swollen. That’s stupid. Rather let’s help heal the wound, the person that has sinned, that has brought shame to himself. Let’s act like the body we are. If the finger hurts, you can feel it. Being sensitive to the hurts and needs within the body is something every church needs to learn.
OK, now back to youth. Give them leading responsibilities. Jesus gave responsibilities to his immature followers. Take Judas, Jesus trusted him as a treasurer. If that 15-year old is interested in leading worship, let him lead worship. If someone appears to have good entertaining skills with her choreography, let her do it. Giving the youth responsibilities, giving them the power to lead, will help them mature and grow a LOT more than if the Youth leaders go nuts coming up with ideas try to entertain them. With time it will become less awkward and more and more people will get involved and if the Lord is behind it, as well as the prayers of the prayer warriors then “If God is for us, who can be against us?”
There is alot of goodness within all of us, that’s what Hollywood keeps telling us. We just have to let it out. And all that rubbish about looking within yourself to find answers, it won’t help. Your the one who’s confused…
OK, so why all the emphasis on teaching Youth to lead? You tell me how all the big wars would have been faught without them, and the revolutions and different movements… Hitler trained Youth to fight, it was mostly young people that made the ruccus in the states in the 60’s, most of the army’s of the world are made up of a great percentage of people under 20.
Now to the point of preaching. Why do we have the leaders on a stage behind a pulpit preaching “at” the congregation? How many sermons can you name right now, by name, that you have heard this year? Jesus didn’t put himself on a stand, he washed his disciples feet and taught them on a whole lot more personal level that can ever be accomplished from behind a pulpit. I’m not condemning the pulpit or anything, just think about it… Let’s not let the titles of “Pastor”, “Deacon”, “Reverend” and others come between the teachers and the students. Again, let’s look at what the ultimate teacher did when he was on this earth as a human being.
Let’s get past the idea that the pulpit is a “medium”. TV, the Internet, movies and radio are “mediums”, the pulpit just ain’t. You know why? I quote “The medium has become the message”. TV isn’t just a bunch of shows, it’s a message, it doesn’t just transmit the thoughts of the writers and producers, the thing in itself is a message. The pulpit isn’t a medium because it doesn’t transmit the message, we are just hiding behind it. This is kinda hard to wrap you mind around and I don’t fully understand it myself. I’m not condemning and of the things mentioned, as almost anything, they can be used for good and bad.
Our faith doesn’t validate the Bible. I don’t know were some of us have gotten the idea, but it doesn’t. Just because I believe that it’s true doesn’t make it true. Jesus’ resurection does though. That in itself encompases the whole bible, it validates it, because of all the prophesies and things that were fullfilled through Jesus, especially the resurection. An example of this concept is that the Bible is like a lion, we don’t need to defend it, it’ll defent itself.
How many times do we condemn things saying they come from Satan? Some music styles, tattoos, piercings, movies, TV, Internet, some books… They do not belong to the devil, he never owned them. Let’s stop giving to him what does not belong to him. Those are all human ways of expresing themselves. Not Satans way.
Young people are having a hard time deciding what is good and bad. Some don’t even know the difference. As leaders, we are responsible to give them the tools they need to find out (to differentiate) for themselves what is right and wrong. This applies to so many things, from music to lifestyles.
Did you know that the definition of “tolerance” has changed over the years? It used to mean “to bear”. That meant, I could sit beside a homosexual and tolerate him, meaning bearing but not accepting his choice. Today, tolerance means to accept the beliefs, lyfestyle, etc. Jesus wasn’t tolerant by any of the above definitions. He didn’t “bear” or “accept” the lifestyles of the “sinners” he met. He told the woman that had commited adultery to “go and sin no more”.
Let’s get to know the auther behind the Bible. It wasn’t Paul, Moses, John or any of the writer. They were the writers, but not the authers, same as with this Blog. God is the auther, he is behind the Bible. Let’s not just read the Bible, let’s read “between the lines” to get to know Jesus.
Think about it…
Explain!!!!
Please, someone, explain to me how a 17-year old girl can be so confused?! She’s a preacher kid, she attends church, youth events, teaches Sunday school, is part of a worship team. Now explain, why is she so confused?!
Now, what makes me think that she’s confused… I just went to her house today, without calling before hand, which is normal in our community. It’s a Sunday afternoon, it’s cold, nothing is going on and I’m bored. I arrive, park and knock on the door. I happen to know her parents aren’t home. A friend with a really uninviting look on his face answers. The house is dark inside with sensual music blaring from a stereo system. I can barely see one or two people sitting on the couch. The guy says: “This is a private party”. I say, “yeah right”. “It is.”
I went straight home, praying.
Now explain to me what is going on in my friends mind? Her parents are gone and she invites a bunch of people to her house, with the lights off, loud music and thank God I didn’t get to see anything more. I don´t want to assume the worst, but… knowing some of the people I saw there…
I feel like crying. I have prayed for these youth for so long. By myself and together with other friends. Why does this happen?!!!!
I´ll tell you with one word. Evil. Not just that, its misinformation, miseducation or some other mis-something that I’m missing. What I’m saying is it isn’t entirely the kids fault, it mostly, but not all. I’m not blaming on the parents either, well maybe a bit, but not all that much. I guess nobody can just put the blame on someone else, every person is responsible for their own actions.
Now what am I going to do about this? Half the people at that private party go to my school or are even in my class. Im going to be praying really hard. Please do the same. I’ll already talked to a mature friend and we agreed that prayer was the best weapon. God’ll do the rest.
(Update). It’s funny how a few weeks later this seems like it was nothing. I’ve prayed a lot and I think I’m seeing some changes in some of the Youth here. I explicitly prayed that they would feel extremely empty inside. That’s how some of them appear to be, empty, without purpose and without true happiness. Now I’m starting to pray that God may use me to help them in whatever way he has planned.
Healing Rain
“Once upon a time there was a magical place where it never rained. The end.” (Film: Holes).
That’s literally how it’s feeling here in Paraguay, but not just the rain that falls from the clouds, also the rain that falls from heaven. Although it’s not true by a long shot that it never rains, sometimes it feels like it, especially when you put a lot of effort into something, like spreading the word of God, and it seams like the rain ain’t coming.
I’ve got news for you. The rain is coming. Real soon. And you and I better be ready, let’s get enough of those seeds sown so that a real big crop come up, eh?
I love that song by Michael W. Smith that talks about “healing rain“, that rain I told you was coming, that’s the healing rain that also happens to make things grow.
It has actually rained in places in Paraguay this year, at the Hillsong concert it rained, spiritually. It was the most awesome worship experience. Just as they were sing some of their last songs it stared raining. Literally. From the clouds, but basically just over the stage. That’s when I thought of Michael’s song “healing rain” and if I had known the words, I woulda sung it, but I just prayed instead, that this would bring a new era of healing in Paraguay. That’s why I said it’s going to rain. Hard.
Let’s just make sure we make the most of it. Let’s ask God if he can take away our doubt and replace it with courage, enough to make us go to the people we are most afraid of, the ones that don’t know God’s love or are struggling. It’s the getting up and going there that’s the hard part, talking will come easy enough if you totally trust God. It’s time to stand up to your friends when they’re telling green jokes or swearing, it’s time to let Jesus live not only in us, but through us. Are you ready for that?
I’ve praying right now while writing this you, the reader, may be touched and encouraged by this post to be the light God meant you to be. It doesn’t matter where you live, where you grew up or what your family is like. It’s about Jesus and what he wants for you, believe me, what he want is good. However hard it may be.
To many times I and many others have postponed that phone-call we know that we should make to you-know-who, to many times we have perfect opportunity’s to share about Jesus and don’t, to many time we could encourage someone or tell them that Jesus loves them. STOP IT! me too. It is time to ask for courage, kindness and love. To ask for the salt that gives our lives an enriched taste to others. To be Jesus in away that makes us cry for joy when you and I see the results.
Be Jesus.
Favorite Quotes
Kind words are short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.
- Mother Teresa
Where there is no vision a people perish
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
Always tell the truth and then you don’t have to remember anything.
- Mark Twain
Private victories precede public victories
– Stephen R. Covey
Don’t try to find Truth by looking within yourself;
you’re the one who’s confused.
- Frank Peretti
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.
- Mother Teresa
Wise people learn by others’ mistakes, fools by their own.
- Henry George Bohn
Preach Christ. And if you must, use words.
- St. Francis of Assisi
God would prefer we have an occasional limp than a perpetual strut.
And if it takes a thorn for him to make his point,
he loves us enough not to pluck it out.
- Max Lucado
Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important.
- C.S. Lewis
It is no use walking anywhere to preach unless our walking is our preaching.
- St. Francis of Assisi
“It has been my observation that people are just
about as happy as they make up their minds to be.”
- Abraham Lincoln
I know God won’t give me anything I can’t handle; I just wish He didn’t trust me so much.
- Mother Teresa
Consumerism
We live in an era of consumerism.
I don’t just mean the buying, borrowing to buy, stealing to buy, trading to buy, to consum, to have more, to fill that empty place inside. No. I mean the consumerism we experience within a “christian” community, in church, at Youth groups and bible studies and meetings, festivals and concerts. These things are actually all good, if they do what is biblical and God pleasing. But how many time do we just listen and not give it another thought.
For example, sitting it church beside me on Sunday are tons of people that go to all or most of the events I mentioned above, yet they don’t bear the fruit Jesus told us we would recognize them by (Matthew 7:15-1), although he was talking about the false prophets, it applies basically to anyone that calls themselves Christians. These are the consumerists that “buy”, as in listen, yet don’t “need” it. Not that they don’t need it, just that they don’t apply it to their lives. Bear with me in this, just trying to compare the spiritual consumerist to the material one.
The question is, can we blame these people for that? Doesn’t it happen to everyone sometimes? How to we solve this problem?
Making the preacher or speaker say that “you should apply this to your life” isn’t going to help. Now, what would happen, if churches and youth groups would get more practical? Sometimes it’s like taking a Chemistry class in theory, but you really don’t quite grasp it until your actually mixing the stuff in test tubes. Our leaders and people like me that want to get more practical need to get creative at a whole new level. Getting more practical doesn’t mean having more worship services and having more sharing time, it means doing things for people in the community and being a light wherever we go. Now, not nearly all the people in church would be exited about going to old Missus Agis to help her with gardening and cleaning and painting her house. But if the people that are exited and feel challenged to get more practical, the negativists will see their enthusiasm and might just come along and get their lives changed in some way. It’s amazing when you find out that even though Missus Agis doesn’t come to church because of her arthritis, she still prays everyday for a lot of people she has met over the years.
Let’s be open to change, open to let God use us as tools, to better his kingdom. Why do so many “Christians” resist being fully used by God? Their putting up a barrier between themselves and God that is going to do more damage to themselves than the Creator. Why be afraid of the Creator, the King, the ultimate Father and brother?
I’ll cite an experience that I had with a girl in our community. I was talking to her about joining a prayer group a bunch of people had started (whole ‘nother story) and asked, not for the first time, why she didn’t want to come. She’s recently baptized, a mature Christian to some point, yet she admitted to having a fear that she might get a “high” or something and be depressed afterwards because it ended. I’m not sure where she got this idea, but the Mennonite background seems to encourage it. “Let’s not get to close to Jesus, or we might end up feeling down afterwards, because we can’t always feel good, blablabla”. What’s up with the so little faith that we put in Jesus to help us always, through the time when we feel close to him and when we don’t? Feelings are tricky anyways, but God gave them to us and we can’t just ignore them, just like we can’t ignore pain or a runny nose. We can try to master the, but we’ll probably never succeed. So what can we do?! Turn the over to Jesus. That’s what he’s there for, he love you no matter what, and handing over another part of what he has created back to him will please him a lot more than just sitting at home and going to events and consuming and not really living a “close” relationship with him.
At this point I’m really starting to feel like this is a sermon or something. Hope it’s a good one and that whoever has taken time to read the whole thing will feel challenged by it’s content. Please don’t just be a consumerist. Ask God to guide you and lead you in absolutely “everything”. If there is one little thing that you want to manage your self, you probably won’t feel good when you mess up.
God can actually do something for you, especially when those barriers are broken to bits as small as dust and thrown into the ocean… You will know what I mean.
Evolution, God, and some random thoughts…
Isn’t it really funny how evolutionists feel so attacked when a creationist (meaning someone that believes in a divine creator) tries to explain why they believe what they believe? It’s not always the case, as with all things when mentioning them in general, but you get the idea.
I read a couple of article/interview/debate style blogs the other day with a lot of arguing, most of it coming from the evolutionist. The point was whether it was positive to teach the creationist “theory” along with the evolutionist one. Most people complained and objected to this.
Don’t you think this, in a small way proves that the fear of God has not been eradicated as much as we think within “modern society’s”. The fact that some of the evolution supporters put so much effort into eliminating and getting rid of anything to do with God proves that they are scared that there is one. They acknowledge it.
For example, when the communists in the Soviet Union wanted to promote marxism and other communist ideas, they taught evolution in schools and made a lot of “loud” believers disappear. The communists were shocked when some of the people they tortured for months and years wouldn’t give up their Faith and repeatedly witnessed miracles in relation to the people they were trying to “break”. Those miracles and the stoic Faith of the Christians made many people re-think their beliefs, seriously wondering if there actually is a God. (Due to a comment received, it appears that this is in part false, because they only started teaching evolution in the 1960’s. Lenin was very anti-darwinism)
Really there is no point in voicing these opinions on a Blog, especially since the topic is so controversial. But I just felt like writing and maybe somebody who is doubting either that there is a God, whether he created the universe or not or that it just BOOM! was there and took a bunch of million years…
