Posts

Mystery Reunions in the Age of Social Media

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Pencil and paper.  Telephone with a cord. Typewriter. Face to Face. We met. In simplier days when you only met, if a person stood before you. In the flesh, eye to eye. So much can be seen. Windows to the heart.  Nothing obvious hidden. No image or mask to hide behind. No avatar. No miniture picture.  You had eyes, a face, hair, skin, clothes. You stood or sat.  When you spoke, I could hear you. When I spoke, you knew. Crisis abound. Chaos comsumed. Fragile, trust, hope was possible. You once said you saw an aura.  No auras can be felt in technology.  We were real, in a place, in a time, in this spinning world in God's massive universe.  I could be certain, of what I saw, heard and felt.  Physical presence equalled basic reality.  No one physically masked. No veil hung.  No immitations. False Identies. Fake impressions. Our fears were overcome with faith and courage.  We took the risk, equally. Bio, and materially present. How hard it can be to hang on waiting for another puzzle pie

Prayer - Spiritual Communication

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Most people struggle with prayer, myself included. Prayer takes many aspects working together at the same time: faith and surrender and humility. Humility considers the fact that we are sinners and need to check to see if we need to get anything right before we enter into God's presence. Do we need forgiveness? Do we need to forgive? With Childlike faith, in spirit and truth Through Spirit and Truth A key Bible verse for prayer is John 4:24: "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." Many times people become unable to worship God in prayer because they only possess a head knowledge of God and try to approach Him in their mind alone. Prayer is not something we do physically or mentally or even by ourselves.  The Basics: Humans are physical bodies that have their soul (mind, will and emotions) and their spirit.  Faith is believing God. It is birthed and developed by hearing God's Word, which is complete everlasting Truth. (D

Answering “Yes” to God’s Request - Doing His Will

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What is God’s will for my life?  I want to be who HE wants me to be. I want to DO what HE wants me to do. We often say and think these things but do our actions measure up? Until we learn to live our life the way God wants, we will be frustrated. Consider the three points in following God’s will for your life. Listening to God A person cannot do God’s personal will for her life if she is not asking God what it is and then listening for HIS answer.    Have you noticed that what we want and think we need is not the direction God has picked for us. Or His answer could be the deepest desire of our heart yet we still have doubts.  Rarely, if ever, have I experienced a time that God will not answer a question I ask. Even if the answer is wait or you decide. I still get an answer.  If I still my mind and focus on God, listening for his voice, I hear Him. It may even be one word but it is the answer.    Excuses  Over the past few year, I have been tryin

Reconciliation after Forgiveness in a Relationship

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We frequently hear about forgiveness, but never much about reconciliation. What does that look like? How do two people rebuild a relationship? 2 Corinthians 5:17-19   New King James Version (NKJV) says:    17  Therefore, if anyone  is  in Christ,  he is  a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.  18  Now all things  are  of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,  19  that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. God shows us. He first reconciled himself to us. He poured out his love on us when we did not deserve it; we had not earned it, but he still forgave us. Then he desired to build a relationship, but he waited for us to turn to him. Note that God did not impute our trespasses; he released us from our sins against him and approached the relationship anew.

The Miracle of Discovering Your Ministry

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God, What do you want me to do? How do I fit? Are you like me? Do you want to serve God but cannot figure out your ministry? Have you tried to do many things but it falls apart? Are do you offer to serve in areas and never get called? Do you feel overlooked and underused? I have for most of my thirty years of my Christian walk. I know what I my talents are, and I even know my spiritual gifts. Still, I have a hard time discovering my specific ministry. It has been frustrating and depressing. I know whose I am and I have studied His Word. God draws me in and points out so many truths. I feel bursting, overflowing.... yet, in many ways I feel rejected by people... and dare I say even the church. I feel like serving in church is like being in a pinball machine. You step out to serve as the lever gets pulled back, the spring tightens and then in an instant you are launched into the activity. Only once you start moving you are constantly bumping into things and people. Some mo

What No One Ever Tells You About False Religions and False Teachers

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We have so many different kinds of religions, faiths, beliefs, and even within each of the major faiths there are so many variations. In this post I am not talking about the major religions of the world; I am not talking about the ones that most would attend on a regular Sunday or Saturday. But, I am writing about false religions like Scientology and so many other smaller organizations like these are based off of very similar beliefs. The major thing no one (especially the leader or organization itself) will never tell you is the leader often has a family background in the Christian faith. Many times their parents or grandparents were pastors or missionaries. Therefore, they frequently know the teachings of the Bible, and even use them, intermingling Biblical principles with their own but never quoting the Scripture or giving the source of the teaching. It is very crafty. Ask questions about leaders. Find out their spiritual background. Biblical principles are truth. They work

Pausing in the Summer - Being Silent

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Last year was my first year since homeschooling my children to teach full-time in public schools. Teaching is all consuming. But I want God to be all-consuming in my life. It took about a two weeks after teaching for my neck and back muscles to stop cramping from being tense. Being “on” for students and administration can be exhausting -- that is what my last, long post was about -- the full-time exhaustion I felt. Now that I have had time to breathe, I am open to God to show me what he wants me to do next. I am placing my life in His hands and giving Him control. When life (and responsibilities of work) start eating up my time, I struggle to find time for God. I wonder-- Do all people who work outside of the home full-time have this same problem? And I am so behind with housework. I have so much to clean, so much to go through, and so much to through or give away. Yet, God tugs on my heart, so... I opened the Bible this morning to Zephaniah 1:7 and read “Be silent in the