You wanna get messed up?
Read this whole article and listen to the argument she makes.
Oh God, circumcise our hearts by the Gospel and let us carry your revelation and reconciliation back into the Body of Christ.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Tonight I got to hold a 7-week old baby boy and it was quite exciting. If you really think about it, babies live lives of complete contemplation for a great long while before they are actually useful for anything. Studying the intricacies for the human face, the ceiling, their own fingers, the reaction of mommy and daddy give when I make this noise.....etc. And if you sense some envy on my part towards them, you'd be right.
But when I got home I was struck with a thought by the Spirit. The Lord father must have such a time watching we, his babies, learn and develop. Yes, from the very beginnings of faith and the adoption process into His family as sons. As we begin to start and stumble. As we follow cookie trails that lead to His lap. Finding precious presents where and when we least expect them. Receiving His discipline, and being thankful for it even if it takes years. Rebelling and running away and finding out we could never truly escape His kingdom and the powerful love that forever changed our heart into something much brighter, something more like His own.
Perfect father, come and hold us now.
"Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery."
Hebrews 2:14-15
But when I got home I was struck with a thought by the Spirit. The Lord father must have such a time watching we, his babies, learn and develop. Yes, from the very beginnings of faith and the adoption process into His family as sons. As we begin to start and stumble. As we follow cookie trails that lead to His lap. Finding precious presents where and when we least expect them. Receiving His discipline, and being thankful for it even if it takes years. Rebelling and running away and finding out we could never truly escape His kingdom and the powerful love that forever changed our heart into something much brighter, something more like His own.
Perfect father, come and hold us now.
"Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery."
Hebrews 2:14-15
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
micro-blog:
Just watched A Beautiful Mind for the first time all the way through and it really knocked me off my feet. Well done, sir!
Gotta get up at 3:45am and take Jourdan to the airport so he can fly back to Detroit and get his wife and kids so he can bring them here. So I am late to bed and its only 8:45pm.
Tomorrow is work and then to Juvenile Detention. There are so many that need the Father's love, and in that love, the hope, grace, and mercy that is Christ. His word will stand forever, and as the rain waters the earth, the word of His mouth will not return void.
Just watched A Beautiful Mind for the first time all the way through and it really knocked me off my feet. Well done, sir!
Gotta get up at 3:45am and take Jourdan to the airport so he can fly back to Detroit and get his wife and kids so he can bring them here. So I am late to bed and its only 8:45pm.
Tomorrow is work and then to Juvenile Detention. There are so many that need the Father's love, and in that love, the hope, grace, and mercy that is Christ. His word will stand forever, and as the rain waters the earth, the word of His mouth will not return void.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Last night was great. Never been to a drive-in theater, but there are first times for a lot of things. Didn't see any teenagers making out but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
Today we go back to the Jefferson County Juvenile Detention center for my 3rd time this summer. Ive been working with a guy named Ricky from Odenville. He is almost 18 years old and has been in juvi nine times. Yes, nine times. What has been such a blessing and a surprise is his openness to the Word and the enthusiasm he shows toward me for the truth. But in the same stride I've heard the story of how incarcerated people's faith is so incredibly hard to recreate on the outside. Someone told me a story (maybe it was on the TV), about a guy that mad a complete change in jail for like 20 years and was ordained and became the jails honorary preacher and was just a good guy, but not long after he got out he was back in jail for a non-petty offense. There are success stories though. Bobby Fox, a brother in Christ a couple years older than me, who was so influential in my journey of faith(and still is), was serving two years in youth jail when he found the Lord and began to burn so brightly even to this day.
What is exciting is the hope that these broken vessels, these no good, mostly fatherless children will be made whole into whole men who carry the mystery of God inside. Chosen when foolish to be made wise before the Lord. Accursed before man, now blessed in the Kingdom of God. From mostly good-for-nothings dads, to now adopted by the Father in heaven who has given them an equal inheritance in His will.
Unrelated: the National Sacred Harp convention in Thursday, Friday, and Saturday in bham and I'm thinking about checking it out Saturday. Check the link if you don't know what I'm talking about and get back to me if you might want to go listen for a little while. http://www.awakemysoul.com
Today we go back to the Jefferson County Juvenile Detention center for my 3rd time this summer. Ive been working with a guy named Ricky from Odenville. He is almost 18 years old and has been in juvi nine times. Yes, nine times. What has been such a blessing and a surprise is his openness to the Word and the enthusiasm he shows toward me for the truth. But in the same stride I've heard the story of how incarcerated people's faith is so incredibly hard to recreate on the outside. Someone told me a story (maybe it was on the TV), about a guy that mad a complete change in jail for like 20 years and was ordained and became the jails honorary preacher and was just a good guy, but not long after he got out he was back in jail for a non-petty offense. There are success stories though. Bobby Fox, a brother in Christ a couple years older than me, who was so influential in my journey of faith(and still is), was serving two years in youth jail when he found the Lord and began to burn so brightly even to this day.
What is exciting is the hope that these broken vessels, these no good, mostly fatherless children will be made whole into whole men who carry the mystery of God inside. Chosen when foolish to be made wise before the Lord. Accursed before man, now blessed in the Kingdom of God. From mostly good-for-nothings dads, to now adopted by the Father in heaven who has given them an equal inheritance in His will.
Unrelated: the National Sacred Harp convention in Thursday, Friday, and Saturday in bham and I'm thinking about checking it out Saturday. Check the link if you don't know what I'm talking about and get back to me if you might want to go listen for a little while. http://www.awakemysoul.com
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Earlier today I was somewhat considering a lyric talking about reaping what you sow. It was in the context of sin and I was thinking about how my life has seen this worked out in many, many, many ways. But this in the bigger discussion I have been having internally in what it means to "sow to the flesh" or to "sow the Spirit" in which Mr. J. Rizzo says in a song "I am doing one or the other all the time". Then today I was given a tiny, yet lovely revelation:
I was doing my thing at work and there was a a wild over grown area near our ponds filled with ripe blackberry bushes. In the midst of all these I seemed to find the bushes with the biggest clusters and proceeded to have my fill of the good fruit. I thought, "What a treasure just for me!" And the Lord seemed to say,
"Eric, see how the grace in My love is so good you have reaped where you have not sown? For that matter, no one has sown these seeds into the earth and watched over their fruits carefully but Myself, for they are wild.
Yet this is just a manifestation of a greater mystery: how you reaped a measure of My grace, and My mercy today, even when you sowed your portion yesterday into the flesh. Still greater is how you were unable to sow life for yourself because you were dead in sin but I sent my Son to sow it for you with his life and you have reaped the the most precious fruit, again, where you did not and could not sow."
Is this not so good?!?
I was doing my thing at work and there was a a wild over grown area near our ponds filled with ripe blackberry bushes. In the midst of all these I seemed to find the bushes with the biggest clusters and proceeded to have my fill of the good fruit. I thought, "What a treasure just for me!" And the Lord seemed to say,
"Eric, see how the grace in My love is so good you have reaped where you have not sown? For that matter, no one has sown these seeds into the earth and watched over their fruits carefully but Myself, for they are wild.
Yet this is just a manifestation of a greater mystery: how you reaped a measure of My grace, and My mercy today, even when you sowed your portion yesterday into the flesh. Still greater is how you were unable to sow life for yourself because you were dead in sin but I sent my Son to sow it for you with his life and you have reaped the the most precious fruit, again, where you did not and could not sow."
Is this not so good?!?
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Can I quickly tell you how insurmountably thankful I am for the Body of Christ and how being apart of a community where the river from the throne is flowing and refreshing is just the greatest thing.
There is a great impostor in the world and it calls itself the church, the body of Christ Jesus, when in fact the spirit of the anti-Christ is its head with all its greed and control and faith in another gospel altogether. But when you read the scriptures and see the hope of the true church, set upon the rock of the Gospel of God, and experience the true reconciliatory and spirit-building power, it truly is unsettling in its perfection.
I still don't believe we have scratched the surface of what it really means to be THE BODY and to be as knit as closely as we need to be to endure the end, but Lord willing, I want to invest in this. Paul was so convicted of the supremacy of the local church that he said of casting out members of the church until they repented being "handed over to Satan" for "the destruction of their flesh" (1Cor5). Beloved (IHOP humor), we need this kind of conviction in our own hearts for the importance of the working of His holy church.
There is a great impostor in the world and it calls itself the church, the body of Christ Jesus, when in fact the spirit of the anti-Christ is its head with all its greed and control and faith in another gospel altogether. But when you read the scriptures and see the hope of the true church, set upon the rock of the Gospel of God, and experience the true reconciliatory and spirit-building power, it truly is unsettling in its perfection.
I still don't believe we have scratched the surface of what it really means to be THE BODY and to be as knit as closely as we need to be to endure the end, but Lord willing, I want to invest in this. Paul was so convicted of the supremacy of the local church that he said of casting out members of the church until they repented being "handed over to Satan" for "the destruction of their flesh" (1Cor5). Beloved (IHOP humor), we need this kind of conviction in our own hearts for the importance of the working of His holy church.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)