Words

I have a problem. Its not a bad problem but a problem none-the-less. I can't read. I mean, I can read, I learned how a long time ago, but I can't read. I can't focus on what I am reading. It doesn't matter if it is dead quiet or I am on a bus full of noise, I can't focus. Its bad too. Its not just books. I get distracted reading the labels on a can of soup or reading the bulletin at church. A magazine article is a task that takes twice as long as it should and a book might as well be a triathlon.

To make things worse, the books I am interested in trying to read, are so wordy I can't keep up. Even my sister's blogs lose me. C.S. Lewis is a bountiful feast of words (you like that don't you) I don't understand. The use of all of these BIG words blows my mind. The bible is one of the hardest ones, especially the King James version. I can read The Message version pretty well but ol' Jimmy might as well be in Hebrew.

It makes me feel dumb sometimes. I know I'm not, but I wish it was easier for me to read. Its like, for some, trying to sleep with a dripping faucet or ticking clocks. There have been times when I have read the same sentence four or five times in a row before I actually knew what it said.

I don't want to take any drugs for it, the last drugs I took were for depression and I felt like crap everyday. I just want to read and enjoy reading. I want to be able to sit down with the bible and actually soak up everything I am reading. I guess if I had to take some kind of pill I would, but I don't really want to.

I can write, however. When I sit down at my computer, I can write for days. If I have a topic I could write for a while. But to me, writing is like talking, you just need something to talk about to get you started.

Be still...........

How strong are you? Physically, mentally, emotionally, how strong are you? I used to think I was strong. Not necessarily physically strong, but I thought I was a strong person. I thought I had a strong will and mind. I thought I was strong in what I believed. I was wrong. Its easy to be strong when there is nothing pushing against you. No weight or tests, no work or hurt, nothing to contest us. But when our minds and bodies are tested, or when our hearts are tested, are we strong?

As Christians, we know from God's word, that we will be tested. Sometimes those tests are small and sometimes they will be gigantic, but regardless of the size of the test, what does God say to do? Be Still. "Be still and know that I am God." "Be still and I will fight for you." God doesn't tell us to fight by ourselves. He doesn't offer a reward for the strongest ones who fought their own battles. He simply tells us to be still and let Him be God.

That is one of the hardest thing for me to do. I want things done or fixed right now. I don't want to wait to get better, I want to be better now. I couldn't tell you how many times I have told God that I can't take it anymore. I don't know how many more times I have tried to change myself or fix my problems alone because I was tired of waiting on God.

Its funny to read the daily devotionals sometimes. The one I read today was talking about trials. It was talking about letting go and trusting that God will make all thing good in the end. Sometimes I want to take the guy (or girl) who wrote it and choke him. "Just call upon the Lord and everything will be better." This coming from a guy with a wife and kids, a great job, and no worries. He has nice suits, he is in good health and people really love him. It makes it kind of hard for the readers who are suffering from all kinds of problems to agree with him.

Then there are those people who have overcome. The people who remain faithful to God and wait on his time. Sometimes things work out for them, sometimes it never does, but they remain faithful. They were still. They let God fight for them. Their lives are a testimony to all who have struggled with addiction or loss or mental battles. Their very lives reflect the message that the guy with no problems was trying to get across. Be still, you don't have to know a certain person's background to know that what he is saying is true. He got all of his information from God through the Bible. God has suffered loss. God has seen and experienced everything you and I could ever go through. You can't tell me that every time one of God's children suffers that it doesn't break His heart, not just because we are in pain but because we won't let him help.

Be still and know...........

Angels' voices

What does an angel singing sound like? For some of you sappier people, it might be the sound of your spouse on the phone or down the hall. For others it might be the sound of a huge choir of expertly trained singers, harmonizing together. Whatever you may or may not think, I have heard it. No, I did not die for a moment and have an out of body experience or be visited in a dream, but I really felt like I was in heaven when I heard it.

Sunday night, our guitar trio (Eric Ott, Andy Smelley and myself) were given the opportunity to lead worship at my church on the same night that Christian Shmidt preached. For those who don't know, Christian is a college guy who has responded to the call to preach and at the same time, been given the task of fighting cancer. It was an honor and blessing to play that night. That night was different than any other night. We played and it went fine and Christian preached and did a really great job, but the thing that got me the most was hearing the angel sing.

I can't even remember the hymn, but I remember that voice. She wasn't loud, she wasn't extra talented, but it got my attention so, that I closed my eyes and just listened to her. It was the sweetest, most beautiful thing I have heard in a long time. She may never be more than a church choir member, but that night she was the only one in the room. I teared up just listening to her. I turned around to sneak a peak at this little girl with rosy cheeks and a big bow in her hair and I couldn't do anything but smile. She was singing to her Lord. She never missed a word, her eyes were wide open and reading the words on the screen. Listening to her sing that night was worth being there, it made me forget about anything that was on my mind at that given moment.

So I have ventured into some classic literature. Not Mark Twain or Charles Dickens, but Martin Luther. I have been reading his commentaries on the book of Galatians the last couple of days because I am interested in Grace. I don't understand grace. I mean, I know what it is and that it is the only way through Faith to be saved, but I don't understand it totally.

When we are born we are immediately sinners. We are born into a world that disregards truth and put emphasis on self. We are born into a world that seeks approval based on who we are and what we have rather than who God made us to be. See, I have struggled for a long time trying to make myself happy again. I was very happy before I was a Christian because I could do what I wanted to(within reason of law) and didn't really have to answer for it. But, when I got saved I thought I was truly going to be happy. The grass would be greener, the sky bluer, I would leap out of bed every morning ready to start a new day. That's not how it happened. Oh, it was like that at first, but shortly thereafter, it ended.

That's where my confusion came in. I was saved, why were bad things happening to me? Then the devil started picking apart my life and using old "junk" to tear me down. I started to doubt my salvation because I didn't deserve it. I prayed for forgiveness over the same old sin, over and over. This hasn't been that long ago. It still bothers me today.

My sister sent me an email a couple of days ago. The subject was"Good message." It was the pastor at The Church at Brookhills speaking on freed by grace. I have had no idea what it means to be free. I know that Christ died to set the world free from sin. I know that Christ had died for me. But I have had the hardest time letting go, and letting God take care of me. I know the bible says that He is in control of everything. But I have struggled letting Him take control.

The pastor made a reference to Luther's commentaries on Galatians, where Paul is speaking of grace. Where Paul blesses the Galatians with Grace and Peace and tells them that Christ died for them to be set free from those sins. Luther says, "How may we obtain remission of our sins? Paul answers: "The man who is named Jesus Christ and the Son of God gave himself for our sins." The heavy artillery of these words explodes papacy, works, merits, superstitions. For if our sins could be removed by our own efforts, what need was there for the Son of God to be given for them? Since Christ was given for our sins it stands to reason that they cannot be put away by our own efforts."

So by the Grace of Jesus, we are forgiven our sins upon acceptance of Him. This is something I am going to have to spend a lot of time on. For one that I will accept His forgiveness and my own, and two, that I will be truly FREE.

WHERE IT FALLS

I am trying to get in a better habbit of reading the Bible. I looked at christianity.com today, logged on and saw where I had started reading almost a year ago. The web site has the "read the bible in a year" option. I was pretty devoted for a little while, then I noticed how big of a gap there was between the time I had logged in and read.
So here I am, one year later, and trying to get started again. I was reading in Luke chapter 8. Thats the chapter where Mary magdelene follows Jesus with the 12 and Jesus gives the parable of the sown seeds. I got to thinking about which seed best represented me. Was I the seed on the side of the road that never took root at all? Was I the seed on the rocky soil who took quick but fizzled out even quicker? Was I the seed that fell in the thorns that got choked out by what I was surrounded by? We always want to be the seed in the good soil that grows strong and with good roots, but was I that one?
Its true what people say about the things you get involved in. The places you go, who you go with and what you do when you are there can and will have a lasting effect on you. I think I was the seed in the thorns. I say that because shortly after my salvation experience, trials, doubts and fears cluttered my heart and mind. I fought for a while, I prayed every day, spent my lunch hours in the prayer room at my church, but eventually I gave up. I quit praying, I almost quit believing. I questioned God and doubted God. I got mad at myself and at the devil because no matter how many doubts I had with God, I blamed everything on satan. I had given up. for a long time I just moped through life. I was not living the way I should have, I had no drive or ambition, I wanted to just quit.
I don't say all of that to get people to feel sorry for me. That time is over. I did that already, and it didn't do me any good. I say that because I know where I was. I know where I am. And I know where I want to be. Realizing that I was a seed among thorns, was the first step. Now I have to let Jesus remove the thorns. That is hard to do. Some of those thorns might be friends or hobbies, or addictions. My plans may change completely.
Somebody very important to me told me a long time ago that God had plans for my life. I have often wondered since then if those plans included me in the ministry, mission field, or if I was just supposed to be ready for whatever. I would love for God to wrap a righteous baseball bat around my head and say, "THIS IS IT". Its not the end of the world that my seeds fell in the thorns, just as long as I let Jesus work and remove the thorns.

what is beautiful?

When you say something is beautiful, what does that mean? How do you decide something is beautiful? Does it have to be a finished product, finely tuned, everything in its place? Does is have to sound just right, no missed notes, does it fit? Or are you one of the few who sees beauty in potential? Can you look at someone or something and see the beauty to come?
I went to church last night. My girlfriend's dad preached. Now he is not a "pastor" or an evangelist, you wouldn't see him on t.v or hear him on the radio, but I liked it. The simplicity of the message and delivery was where I could understand it very well. He talked about Jesus, the carpenter. He talked about how a carpenter was a very respectable job. He told us how a lot of people depended on carpenters because so much of the things they need, he provided. But the coolest thing of all was how he described the way the carpenter looks at the wood he is working with.
A tree is beautiful when it is in full bloom, when you can see all of its leaves and their color. But what about when that tree has been cut down, had all of its limbs cut off and nothing is left but the bare trunk? What about when they are piled up on a trailer on their way to the mill? We wouldn't call that beautiful, but the carpenter would. He said that the carpenter could look at a crooked piece of wood, with all of its splits and knots and see straight through to the finished product. Just by looking and handling the wood, he already knew how beautiful it was going to be.
Then he told us how we are like that wood. How Jesus can and does see straight through the impurities to the potential beauty we possess. No matter how ugly our life may be, how much junk we clutter up, how much stuff we get addicted to, he sees our beauty that He intended us to show. All we have to do is ask the carpenter to do his work and let the beauty show.