Depression

Lost in darkness
Logic is not to be found in your thoughts
Wisdom flees from your actions
Impurity shrouds your eyes
Unable to move freely for the shackles of lies are clasped tightly round your feet
A dark veil hangs draped over your face
Others see that the light has gone from you eyes
People flee from you as if you were a plague
However still one remains
A man with true love in his eyes
A man with truth reaching out from his words
A man with comfort in his hands
A man with peace abiding in his presence
A man that can restore all that is lost
This man stands before you as your friend
Will you curse him or will you welcome him

Holiness

Holiness has been the call of God’s people since before Abraham, and since before Abraham God's people have struggled to be holy. God has always spoken to the ones he has chosen and told them to live separate. To be consecrated to His plan, and since before Abraham we have never really truly been set apart. The word holiness means to be consecrated or sanctified. In Romans 12 and 1 Peter 1 it is also used to distinguish what God’s people should look like as opposed to what the world looks like. Romans gives us the charge to not conform our lives to the pattern of this world. Another definition for holiness is to be set apart or be separate. It means there is an obvious life style difference. In 1 Peter it says to “prepare our minds for action” it goes on to instruct us to be, “self-controlled.” These are powerful instructions, ones that demand an intentional life change, not a mere good intentions. Romans says that,” we are not to conform to the evil desires we had when we lived in ignorance.” This is another instruction that takes work. We are to have our minds renewed, which means a complete reboot of our software. I believe that the modern church is in a world of hurt in this area. We are so afraid of legalism that we have forsaken God’s wishes for His people to be holy. Many of us have conformed to the desires we had. Now I am not saying that the Christian church is a free for all with sin, but you would be hard pressed to find much difference in the life style of some, common, Sunday morning church attendees and their, “unsaved” co-workers. Allow me to give to examples, and I will add that I am incriminated myself while I do so. Our culture is a very powerful thing. I will mention to of the most powerful idols that we have on this planet, sports, and music. I am sure that you have heard the expression, “music makes the world go round.” If that is true we are in trouble. Take a moment and evaluate what you have in your ipod. If you were to break down with a percent, what would be greater? The amount of music with a Godly topic or music without a Godly topic? For most people the majority is not Godly, I would even bet that many, “Christians,” have some pretty vile stuff on their ipod. We say things like, “there is just no good Christian music out there,” or , “It’s the edit version.” That one always gets me, because basically what that means is that they bleep the cuss words while talking about sex, drugs, and alcohol. Two things with this, first of all, if music really is powerful enough to make the world go round and the majority of what you are putting in your mind is not Godly, even if it’s not bad, then can you really ever expect to have the mind of Christ, how will your mind ever be renewed. We have the powerful force of music and are using it to fill our minds with ungodly things. Take a moment and evaluate what level of Godliness you intentionally put in you mind on a daily basis. Is it an hour’s worth? Half hour? I would venture to say that few of us put an hours worth of Godliness a day into our minds. So if we sleep for 8 hours that means in a day we are allowing our minds to be filled with 15 hours of junk and 1 hour of Godliness and then expecting to be everything God has called us to be. These seem like unrealistic expectations, wouldn’t you say? Secondly, think about who the devil is. While in heaven he was the worship leader, and now, as the prince of this world music is incredibly powerful. True we are never to fear the devil but my fear is that we have underestimated his plans and abilities. He has taken the gift he has and put it in the forefront of almost every environment that we walk into on a daily basis. He has created all levels of it. He has mellow levels that are not as noticeable, and deeply demonic levels that are obvious. No matter how you look at it music can be strongly demonic. Next, are sports. If we had modern day golden calves this would be it. Think about it, most true sports fans have spent way more money on going to games, clothes, and memorabilia then the would ever give to a church or ministry. On game day across America we have millions of people that flock to stadiums to yell, scream, and cheer for other humans to win a game. Some even dress up like absolute idiots. We spend more time overly praising our teams than we do truthfully and spiritually worshiping God. Many men that are addicted to sports spend more time surfing ESPN.com, while their wives feel disconnected, than they do learning about their spiritual growth. If you are getting angry that I am tearing apart sports and saying that I am so over board and a legalist, I challenge you to evaluate the amount of time you have spent this week following sports verses the amount of time you have spent building your relationship with God. This is the tough one for me because I am coming to some hard truths about myself. I have always been a huge sports fan. But anything that masters us is wrong. I used these two examples because of there incredible power and our ability to write them off as, “not big deals.” But to truly live a holy life means that the smallest areas matter. To be holy as He is holy means to live for him in the smallest areas of life. Lastly, I want to state that this is not a matter of salvation. In 1 Peter 1-12 it basically says that we are saved by grace and that salvation is free. This theme is woven throughout the New Testament. Time and time again it is stated that we are saved by the power of the cross and now our own works. Then in verse 13 it says, “therefore, prepare your minds for action…” He is saying that since you have received your salvation for free live a life that is passionately after God’s heart. Please remember this, a life style that is set apart for holiness is not to be a burden or legalistic. It is not to purchase salvation or receive the promise of heaven. A life style set apart for God should come out of a response to the understanding of His love. When we truly understand what He has done for us then we will desire to live fully for Him. I agree that legalism is wrong. I prefer to look at it like this, it’s the difference between obligation and desire. God does not obligate us to live right, His hope is that we will desire His will for our lives.

Surfs up

WOW now we see why surfing is so cool. We had a great time today surfing, riding bikes, and long boarding on San Diego beach. Thank you San Diego Master's Commission and Cheap Rentals. You guys are awesome! We will be posting pictures.

All Over The World

Well we have two teams literally across the world from eachother. The team in Ireland is doing amazing. God is moving and has been showing up daily. They are definetly being worked though. Most days are about 12-18 hours long. The other team is in San Diego at UCSD this week and we head to Vegas on Saturday and then to the LA Dreamcenter on the following Saturday. In the mix of all that we are going surfing in San Diego. Man ministry is fun! We will be with Brian Orme on the campus tomorrow and are excited about what God is going to supernaturally to do through our group. Be praying because life is crazy right now but we know God is good and is going before us.

The Prize

Setting my mind on things above. I just read an amazing chapter in “The Discipline’s Of A Godly Man.” It was about perseverance. It talked about having our eyes set on Christ just as a runner watches the finish line. The bible talks again and again about thinking about things that are Godly. We are to set our hope on the grace to be given us when Jesus Christ is revealed. I think about Peter in the water, and how if He had just kept His eyes stuck on Jesus He wouldn’t even have noticed the waves and the storm. In that moment Jesus wanted Peter to experience the supernatural, but for that to happen Peter’s focus needed to remain on the face of Jesus. The same is true for us. Our culture is full of distractions and things that capture the attention of our hearts and minds. Many times we are like children, still drinking milk, our attention span to God and His presence only lasts for a few days, couple weeks, or a month and then something comes along that again draws our attention away from his presence. We look at our troubles, or possibly the good things that capture us, money, love, etc., and forget about the amazing things that God was speaking and doing through us. We turn stuff and people into gods. It’s the same thing that the Israelites did throughout the bible. When ever the faced problems they doubted God’s power, even though He had brought water from a rock, parted large bodies of water to evade attackers, and oh yeah delivered them from 400 years of slavery in a truly miraculous way. In quite opposite circumstances they had very similar responses. When ever the land and country was prospering they turned to pleasure and false gods. They began to have sex and marry out side of their belief system. They threw drunken parties with orgies and worshiped other gods, giving them credit for their blessings. It seems that throughout history God has kind of gotten ripped off. Rather than our minds being on Christ they are mostly on everything but Him. The thing that we must all see and understand is that the only time that Peter successfully walked on water was when His gaze was locked on the face of Jesus. He was only able to navigate the storm when Jesus was all He would allow Himself to see, and boy was it brief. The same will be for us; we will seek Him and FIND HIM when we seek Him with all of our hearts. This is a very hard thing to do in our culture. Picture being in a room with 200 people that are all talking directly too you and you have to push through the crowed to speak to Jesus. Now if at any time you stop and talk with somebody in the room you are able to drown out the other voices so that they become one constant sound and isolate the words of the person you are speaking with. You can see Jesus and in reality He looks very different than every one else in the room. He is very identifiable. The struggle is getting to Him without engaging with anyone else. Now all of these other people have name tags on. They are; depression, worry, money, sex, fame, etc. Some of them are even good when used in the right measure. The problem that most of us have however is we lack the self-control to keep our eyes on Christ and experience good things at the same time. Rather than being mastered by nothing many of us are mastered by what ever person engages us in the moment. Since the enemy knows this he tells all 200 people exactly what to say to get our attention and before we know it we are 18, 25, 30, 40 years old and have spent our lives in a conversation with someone that has prevented us from truly living. We have spoken with Jesus from time to time but never for and extended period of time and so now we become callused and hurt that Jesus wasn’t who the bible said He is. But that is exactly who He is we just need to learn the practice of putting the focus of our heart on Him.

Love: For real

I read a quote by Mother Teresa the other day that said, " When you know how much God is in love with you then you can only live your life radiating that love". Oh to know the height, depth and width of his love for me. Not just a flowery, delicate love, but a roaring waterfall-love; a blazing inferno love! It cannot be grasped by even the strongest of hands. It cannot be contained by the greatest of walls. It can not be comprehended by the wisest of scholars. Yet he lavishes this raging love upon the weakest of vessels; me. And I wonder why I don't love more. I wonder why I feel, at times, like I have nothing to give. If only I knew how much God was in love with me--then all I could do is love; all I could see would be love; and all I could be is love.