Guest Post: Being Led By the Presence of God

Guest Post: Being Led By the Presence of God.

Jesus is a means to an End….

Man I hope I don’t get in trouble for this one…..please hear me out before you judge me.

 

For most of my Christian life up until recently, I have to admit, I’ve considered getting saved to be the paramount thing in life and making it to heaven the paramount thing for the afterlife.  But as I am growing I am seeing more and more that accepting Jesus as our savior and dedicating our lives to him is just the beginning of a world of opportunities and to be frank, obligations.

Let me be clear. Jesus was never intended to be the goal for the Christian life. He was sent to redeem us so that we could be in right relationship with God and therefore do as He did when he was here and DESTROY THE WOKS OF THE DEVIL!!!. We were not supposed to accept Christ as Savior and then stop, as if we have arrived.  We were supposed to accept him and then move on to do the Greater Works.

Even Jesus knew he was a means to an end.  He said so himself.  If you disagree, then listen to him instead of me:

Jesus said to him, “I am the WAY, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” John 14:6

• What is a WAY? A way is defined as a thoroughfare for travel or transportation from place to place. Not a place, but a path to a place.

I am the DOOR. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. John 10:9

• A DOOR, when was the last time you approached a door and stopped as if you had made it? No, you went through the door to get to what or where you needed to be.
• Then he says you can go in and out and find pasture. Pasture in the Bible usually represents what we need to sustain a spiritual life. Jesus says he is the door through which we can go in and out to obtain what we need to sustain our spirit man for the work we have to do.

¹² Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.” John 8:12

• Light is what we need to see where we are going.  If you are just going to lay or stand there and do nothing why do you need light.
• Jesus also says follow me. If you have arrived once you accept Him, then why would he want you to follow Him?

These are just a few examples, from Jesus himself.

I am not saying that Jesus is not of the utmost im[importance in our lives, I’m just saying even he didn’t want us to stop at him. He wanted us to go through Him in order to do the Greater Works God has in store for us.

In a play on the words of Heavy D & The Boyz… NOW THAT YOU’VE FOUND JESUS, WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO THROUGH HIM?????

 

GROW UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As Christians we have to grow up. No seriously, we HAVE TO!!! I restate the necessity in my opening sentence because the term “Grow Up” can seem cliche sometimes, or it could be looked at as stating the obvious but I want the urgency in that to ring out.  We really don’t have a choice in the matter, it is imperative that we mature in God or else……

Our Pastor taught on growing up in the things of God last night.  He came with the intent of teaching a totally different message, but the Holy Spirit led him down a path of fatherhood and he taught our church family a great message on growing up and it’s results or it’s potential for our church.

The main scriptures he used were found in Hebrews 5:12-14

¹² For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. ¹³ For everyone who partakes only of milk isunskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. ¹⁴ But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is,those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

and Hebrews 6:1-3

6 Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, ² of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. ³ And this we will do if God permits.

These are both somewhat familiar scriptural that tell us that we as Christians need to move past being babies and move on into adulthood.  That we need to move past the milk, or the easy and pleasant things of Christianity to the meat, or the more elevated doctrines of of our Faith which can often cause us to have to put ourselves aside in order to fulfill.

But this post was inspired by what I read in the verses that followed.  The writer of Hebrews goes on to warn us in chapter 6:4-8 to talk about what I believe happens as a result of a lack of growth over time, and that is a falling away from which there is a possibility of no return.  Here it is in Hebrews 6:4-8

⁴ For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, ⁵ and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, ⁶ if they fall away,^[a] to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame.

⁷ For the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it, and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated, receives blessing from God; ⁸ but if it bears thorns and briers, it is rejected and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned.

You see in verse four he makes a jump from lack of growth to falling away.  You see, anything that is not growing in either fully mature or dead.  Since we are talking about a lack of growth to maturity then we must follow the path of reasoning of death.  We don’t want to be spiritually dead so we must grow.  Unlike in the world, for the Christian growth is the actual sign of maturity or perfection.  We should always be growing in Christ. We should be growing from Glory to Glory. He goes on to close it out by making an analogy of us to the earth and stating that if we take in the rain (Water or Word of God) and bring forth thorns and briers in stead of good fruit we will be burned or destroyed or end up in hell in other words.

Therein lies the urgency of my post.  In our modern day Christianity we seem to be moving further away from responsible Christianity. We hear more and more about the Grace of God and less and less about our responsibility to God.  We are save by Grace without a doubt, but we are saved unto GOOD WORKS!!! If we do not mature as Christians we will never get to the point that those good works will flow from us naturally and if we don’t produce those useful fruits but instead waste the Grace and bring forth thorns and briers we will be unfruitful and therefor cut down and burned.

This is the meat and not the milk…This is the harder to swallow and digest side of our walk….This is the part of Christianity that we have to grow up into…..Children walk around with no responsibility for their actions, but grownups have to be responsible for what they do.

What else was done by Christ on the Cross????

I know the pot title sounds crazy to some. But I was reading the Bible this morning and my meditation scripture for today is 2 Corinthians 4:18, but in the verses preceding that Paul is talking bout the difference between the Jews or the unsaved who didnt have Christ and us who do. He mentioned them having a veil over their faces when they read the Law and us not having that veil and therefore being able to be changed by the Word in a way they can’t.

That got me to thinking that the reason we don’t have the Veil any longer is because of what Christ did on the Cross for us.

Then I thought of how much we associate the work of Christ on the Cross so much with our sins being forgiven that we oftentimes neglect all the other things he accomplished there. So i jotted down a short list of the other benefits or accomplishments that i could think of  and put them here:

1. Gave us open door access to God
2. Removed the veil from our understanding
3. Closed the gap between us and God
4. Removed the power of death
5. Healing made available
6. Obtained the ability for us to have peace
7. Destroyed the barriers between us as people

Can you think of any others???? If so please share them in the comments below…….

 

Praying or Worrying…Which am I doing more of?

So it’s on to the next set of meditation scriptures. Not that I have mastered Ephesisans 4:29, but I have been doing much better in regards to negative and critical speaking. So let’s move on to the next one.

⁶ Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; ⁷ and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.⁸ Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these thi

ngs. Philippians 4:6-8

I have to admit, that as much as a faith man as I confess to be, here lately as I have encountered trouble and issues at a higher rate than ever before I have found in myself a tendency to worry. This has really been bothering me, because worry is rooted in fear and unbelief and these are both sinful not Godly characteristics. I have found myself thinking on the issues that I am facing more than thinking on the solutions God has already provided, and this is disturbing.

When i turned to this scripture in my Bible this morning it was highlighted in yellow and underlined in black ink and in the margin I had written in big capital letters with exclamation points, “DON’T WORRY, JUST PRAY”.  But as I sighted in my last post, Word Meditation and Application,  we have to do more then read and highlight the Word of God we have to actually DO the Word.

So today I start on a new journey, or should I say I start over again in my efforts to replace my anxiety with my confession of Faith. I start to take the lies the enemy is always telling us, and instead of meditating on them meditating on the promises God has made us.

This is not easy, I mean look at verse 8, and all we are commanded to think on. How much easier is it to do the opposite. How much easier is it to think on things that are ignoble, and things that horrible instead of lovely and profane instead of pure. These negative things are always before us, between the news, our bills, our friends, the Grammys, BET, and MTV, and all the reality shows we pump into our system. It’s no wonder our thoughts are so polluted which results in our Faith being so weak.

I must start today to replace my worries with prayer, litterlay every time a worry crosses our mind we should cast down that lie from the enemy and offer a prayer to God in it’s place, and thank God for the answer to the problem, because he has already provided it. Then we replace the negative thoughts or meditations with thoughts or meditations on God’s word. The battle we are fighting is in our minds, and if we don’t win it there we won’t win it. We won’t see the Glory of God manifest in our personal lives or in the lives of others through us, if we don’t change the way we think.

Once again, feel free to join me, I would love the company… Let me know what you think….Is this possible???????

Guest Post by Pastor Perry Noble: You Cannot Go To The Next Level If…

You Cannot Go To The Next Level If… February 9, 2012

One of the things I always hear in regards to leadership is that we should always desire to “go to the next level!”  However, there are several things that will hold us back from doing this.  Reality is that you and I cannot go to the next level if…

• You absolutely are in love with the way things are
• You are increasingly obsessed with the people who hate and criticize you the most.  (Here are 7 difference between a coach and a critic, PART ONE& PART TWO & PART THREE)
• You are not hungry for wisdom. (Proverbs 4:5-7)
• You are not willing to make uncomfortable decisions. (Galatians 1:10)
• You are a people pleaser. (Proverbs 29:25)
• You are not willing to accept responsibility for where you are right now.  (The person who always has to blame is always lame!)
• You are not willing to speak the truth in love. (Ephesians 4:25)
• You are using people rather than valuing them.
• You are more in love with comfort than carrying your cross. (Luke 9:23)
• You never allow yourself to be exposed to new ideas and methods. (Isaiah 42:9, Isaiah 43:19, Isaiah 48:6)
• You take shortcuts (see Exodus 13:17-18)
• You expect people to read your mind and then hold them accountable for things you never actually said but rather just assumed they knew.  (Great leaders will leave you if you do this.)
• You do not hold people accountable to what they have said they will do.
• You are always looking for a fight instead of a solution. (II timothy 2:23)
• You are not begging God to reveal more of Himself to you.

Word Meditation and Application

So I have been following Rick Warren’s 40 Days in The Word campaign from a distance since it started. Recently on his blog he has been focusing on Bible study methods and more specifically, application of the Word of God.

 

After reading several of the blogs I was convicted by how often I read the Bible but how seldom I actually look for a way to apply the scriptures. So I decided to do more than feel bad about it, but to actually start doing something about it.

 

So as of today I am beginning my Scripture Meditation and Application Plan.  We know that in James 1:22-25 we are admonished to be doers of the word, but have you ever noticed that it says that the way we will be blessed in what we do is by doing the Word that we read.  I think it’s key here to realize that James tells us that when we see something in the Word, we should see where we are different from the standard the Word is setting and then walk away trying to meet that standard, then the blessing comes.

 

Well in order to walk around all day and actually practice or apply what we read, we have to be constantly aware of what we are applying, and thats where the meditation part comes in.  Unlike most of pop culture thinks, meditation for the Christian is not sitting somewhere with your legs crossed humming nonsense.  When  we meditate on God’s word we think about it over and over and repeat the actual Word we are meditating over and over. We try to visualize ourselves in the Word and what it would have been like for us.  So as we go through our day instead of letting our minds aimlessly wander, we think about the scripture we are meditating on. This is how you make sure you are mindful to practice or apply what you read, by keeping it in the forefront of your mind all day.

 

Today was my first day and I started with a bold scripture, that I have had to seriously focus on to make sure I stuck to it. In all honesty, I slipped once or twice, but I repented and got back on task.  My scripture for today was Ephesians 4:29:

Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.

Now, it’s not that I am an overly negative person, I definitely don’t use profanity, I am not by any means a mean person either.  All that being said, I still sometimes slip up and speak words of doubt, or i can be critical in a way that may not be perceived as constructive. Lately, I have noticed that I can get caught in conversations where I am talking about a person that is not present in a manner that I wouldn’t talk if they were there.  Nothing I have done has been necessarily sinful, but it wasn’t all Godly and it definitely wasn’t edifying and it didn’t minister Grace to the people that heard me.

 

I want to give God my best, point blank.  And the only way to give God our best is to give him our lives lived in pursuit of embodying His Word on the Earth.

 

If you want to join me feel free to dialogue with me here on what you are doing each day and what scripture you are using.