Following Jesus Son of God …

Here is a link.  If you are not using Firefox, you are missing something in your web experience.  You don’t have to uninstall Internet Explorer or any other browser you may be using.  I use at least three web browsers regularly:  Firefox, Opera and I still use IE sometimes.

Firefox web browser | Faster, more secure, & customizable

Powered by ScribeFire.

marked by erratic changeableness in affections or attachments; “fickle friends”; “a flirt’s volatile affections”

erratic:   liable to sudden unpredictable change; “erratic behavior”; “fickle weather”; “mercurial twists of temperament”

What have you done for me lately?  Have you ever let that attitude from someone else directed toward you discourage you?  I have.  I’m thinking – How was it that just a few days ago I was so wonderful and now I am loathed?

I think one insight we can gain from this is a gauge as to how we truly relate to God and to people.  If God is giving me what I want, if he is “blessing me” and doing “miracles” in my life, then he is wonderful.

But if God isn’t making my plan happen then forget about it!

The Apostle Paul dealt with his share of fickle people.

Acts 28:2-6 GW  The people who lived on the island were unusually kind to us. They made a fire and welcomed all of us around it because of the rain and the cold.  (3)  Paul gathered a bundle of brushwood and put it on the fire. The heat forced a poisonous snake out of the brushwood. The snake bit Paul’s hand and wouldn’t let go.  (4)  When the people who lived on the island saw the snake hanging from his hand, they said to each other, “This man must be a murderer! He may have escaped from the sea, but justice won’t let him live.”  (5)  Paul shook the snake into the fire and wasn’t harmed.  (6)  The people were waiting for him to swell up or suddenly drop dead. But after they had waited a long time and saw nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god.

From evil man getting his just punishment to being a god.

Just because a snake bit him.

Can you hear Paul:  “Sheesh.  What the heck is with you people?  I’m neither an evil murderer nor a god.”

Anyway, this is nothing new, and I have written about it before, but I guess my thought is that I need to be more prepared for the “fickle factor” so I am not so surprised so I can still relate to people as God intends.

That’s when I am sometimes at my worst, when I am surprised, when I haven’t had time to really submit something to God and bow before him, breathe in his truth and assurance.

Ahh. . .resting right now in the sovereignty of my Creator.

So I need to forge ahead and not expect too much from people who are sometimes as failure prone as I am.

(Ephesians 4:32 NKJV) And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you.

This is the abstract truth. Paul gives us God’s idea for how we treat each other.

Kind. Tenderhearted. Forgiving just as God in Christ forgave us.

So when you tweak this, dummy, what have you got?

C’mon now. Okay, so sometimes I’m the dummy too. When I tweak God’s truth as I bring it from the abstract to the concrete, “What have I got left?”

I’ve just got my own gut feeling, my emotions, my opinions. And how far is that going to get me in eternity?

When we refuse to forgive as God forgives, we neither have nor understand God’s truth. And we think we can bail here and bail there because overall we have a solid basis for living.

Baloney. You are only kidding yourself.

Said all this out loud, didn’t I?

Just trying to make a point, friend. When we change God’s truth as we bring it into the reality of our lives, then we have blown out “this little light of mine” no matter how many times we sing the song. We have “hidden it under the bushel” of our petty thoughts, hurt feelings and opinions.

I recently was listening to the lectures of a creation scientist who shared this wry comment from a Chinese paleontologist.

In China, we can’t criticize the government, but we can criticize Darwin.

But in the U.S., you can criticize the government, but you can’t criticize Darwin.

• marked by erratic changeableness in affections or attachments; “fickle friends”; “a flirt’s volatile affections”
• erratic: liable to sudden unpredictable change; “erratic behavior”; “fickle weather”; “mercurial twists of temperament”; “a quicksilver character, cool and willful at one moment, utterly fragile the next”

The “hot” team in the playoffs, the “hot” candidate in the primaries, the “hot” investment.

We are a fickle people. From sportscasters to newscasters to the woman in the next cubicle, we change our minds and behavior at a moment’s notice.

The Minnesota Vikings were the “hot” team this year that no one would want to face in the playoffs. Didn’t have to worry about that because they lost their last two games and didn’t make the playoffs. Obama made Hilary cry because of his unexpected win in Iowa and we wondered how she would recover. Well, she won the next primary.

Why are we so easily swayed?

Why so fickle?

Even as Christians, why are we so changeable and erratic?

Because we are looking for a way that is not God’s way. If we are following the Way (John 14.6), Jesus Christ, if we are seeking the things above and keeping our minds on the things above, then every little ripple in the water here below would not send us into a panic.

How many of us filled our cars up with gas on the way home from work on “911”?

What good was that going to do? But everyone one was doing it, so we don’t want to be left out.

But God doesn’t leave us out. . .ever.

Hebrews 13:5-6 MSG Don’t be obsessed with getting more material things. Be relaxed with what you have. Since God assured us, “I’ll never let you down, never walk off and leave you,” (6) we can boldly quote, God is there, ready to help; I’m fearless no matter what. Who or what can get to me?

If we are following the way, we will know that.

If we are just knowing religious stuff, we’ll just be another guppy when the next fear factor strikes.

The “Game Version” of Pilgrim’s Progress: The ultimate game is life.

No avatar. No character in a Second Life virtual universe. You are it. You have been given a soul and a body. You have been placed on “the Board” in a particular place at a particular time.

GOAL: Stay true to your purpose in this life and present yourself with honor to the King of heaven in the next. Get “saved” and “save” as many other characters in your area of “the Board” as possible.

OBSTACLES: Powerful, unseen enemies. Self-deception and misdirection within due to our faulty psychological and spiritual makeup.

WEAPONS: A powerful, unseen Spirit within you. Words of instruction from the Creator of “the Board.”

GAME SCENARIO: You have been strategically placed in time and space by the creator and administrator of “the Board.” Each participant has the ability to win the game by taking the same path of the Way, following the King’s Son from this life to the next. Through the Son we have a way to not only escape, but to enjoy victory over all who would oppose us.

May the Administrator bless your journey!

(Acts 20:24 ESV)  But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.

As I read this the other morning I thought, “I know exactly what Paul was thinking.”

Paul had gotten to the point in his life where one thing really mattered and everything else needed to fit under that perspective.  Above all else he wanted to finish the task that Jesus Christ had given him on this earth.

I’m sure other things mattered to him, but this was the one that he was determined not to miss.

And I guess that whatever I am doing I don’t want to miss that either.  For all the things I enjoy, and all the responsibilities I have, and all the good things that I can do.

I want to finish my course well, honoring Jesus Christ, fulfilling the service he gave to me specifically.

That’s what I think about that.

(Exodus 5:21 MSG) The foremen said to them, “May GOD see what you’ve done and judge you–you’ve made us stink before Pharaoh and his servants! You’ve put a weapon in his hand that’s going to kill us!”

Talk about stepping in it. Moses came to help and this is what he heard from the people he was supposed to lead out of the land and rescue.

Moses was in the land of Midian, minding his own business, married and had a son, got along with his father-in-law. Things were alright now after barely escaping from Egypt with his life.

And then one day as he was minding his own business, God interrupted the journey. . .maybe you know the story, burning bush and all. God tells Moses he needs to go back to Egypt and rescue his people.

One of the problems is that Moses had tried the hero thing before and it almost got him killed. He’s amazed with the burning bush but not so amazed that he is yet willing to go back to Egypt.

Maybe you are not familiar with the background. Moses was an Israelite raised by Pharoah’s daughter. He tried to help his people several years previous and ended up killing a man and fleeing for his life.

His story is  found beginning in Exodus 2 in the Old Testament.

Have you ever tried to help someone or a group of people and ended up “stinking” in their sight?

Sometimes this is how God’s plan works.

You are doing well, submit to God’s call, follow him and make everyone mad at you.  Moses probably thought “Here we go again!”  But this time he may have to run for his life from his own people, the people he was trying to save.

Following God means “stepping in it” and keeping going in spite of your failures.  Moses was not the great “up, up and away” hero we have made him out to be in our Sunday School stories, but he was a very real person and a tremendous man of faith.

And I can relate to Moses, the man of faith, but I cannot connect with Moses, Sunday School super-hero.

Are you feeling me on this?  🙂

Chris Rice, Live By Faith Lyrics

Powered by ScribeFire.