Brother
A discouraged, depressed and desperate woman with no children, no hope and no future was addressed in a passage of scripture from Isaiah 54:1-4. In the midst of her despair and pain, the prophet said “Get up in faith! Start moving into the destiny you can only see in faith! Get ready, here it comes!” The prophet said she must INCREASE HER CAPACITY for a miracle!
What is your capacity? God is not concerned with how large our bank account is, the size of our church, or the number of letters after our names from our education—He wants us to have a LARGE IMPACT in culture!
IMPACT IS ABOUT ‘CAPACITY’...
“Begin to sing!” the Lord tells us today from this ancient text—“You’re about to give birth, and you’ll have more children than anyone else! Enlarge your place!”
FAITH sings about the coming blessings of God! Faith believes. Faith has HOPE. Faith enlarges its space—shows evidence of expectation! Faith listens to the Word! Faith expects God to act. “Expectation is the atmosphere for miracles.”
God changed Abram, “the father of many,” to Abraham, “the father of nations”—even though he was not yet the father of “many” or “any”! God said, “Abraham, your prosperity is on the way, now start to call yourself by that name!”—Every time Abraham said his name he spoke faith over his life, though he had not seen it yet!
ARE YOU DARING AND RADICAL ENOUGH TO CALL YOURSELF WHAT YOU SEE YOUR DESTINY AS? “WORLDCHANGER”—“HISTORYMAKER”—“A MAN OF IMPACT”
Jesus told the disciples go to Jerusalem and do not leave “until you have the Promise.” They were to be ‘filled’ with power from the Holy Spirit...Filled—not immersed, covered, shrouded with—FILLED!
SOLOMON asked for wisdom...GOD GAVE HIM WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGEAND LARGENESS OF HEART—God said in essence, “Solomon, to do what I need you to do, you must get larger, bigger...”
Being “filled” is directly related to our capacity...OUR CAPACITY MUST INCREASE TO FULFILL OUR DESTINY.
LARGER PEOPLE...LARGER IMPACT!
Two ways stretch the size of our capacity:
INTIMACY—Time with the Father: practicing His presence, prayer, Word, time with the brethren, worship, meditation on the Word.
ADVERSITY—James said, ‘Count it all joy’ when we encounter problems (James 1) because he knew the result of adversity would increase strength, largeness of heart, capacity in the inner man.
We cannot allow little voices of doubt, nagging defeat from the past, inferiority (measuring ourselves by others), comments from unbelievers or anything else stop us. God said it would not be by our own strength and human spirit, but that it would be “NOT BY MIGHT, NOR BY POWER—BUT, BY MY SPIRIT SAYS THE LORD!” (Zech 4)
Stretching is not easy, but it doesn’t break us. We become malleable and easily molded into Christlikeness through our intimacy with him. We are shaped and our characters are formed as we step out of our prayer closet and overcome adversity.
Let’s not resist being stretched—let’s get large as men who are sent into the world to make IMPACT!
INCREASED CAPACITY, INCREASED IMPACT!
Grace/peace
Paul L. Cole
PresidentCMN Worldwide
Friday, February 29, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
A Relationship with Jesus? (Part 1)
THE PHRASE
I was at a restaurant having lunch a few weeks back with a few of my co-workers when one of them, a feisty devout Catholic, asked the rest of us charismatic crazies what our stance was on the salvation issue. You know the topic. You’ve probably been suckered into the same conversation at some time – “do you believe in once-saved-always-saved?” (I can hear the moans and groans as I type) I’ve wised up recently to stay away from this conversation when it’s possible. Too often these talks wind-up in hurt feelings, damaged relationships, and most regrettably – a splintered gospel.
As I sat quietly and let my Protestant brethren tackle the answer, I prayed to myself and simply listened to the debate. At some point someone told our Catholic co-worker that “Christianity isn’t about religion, it’s about a personal relationship with Jesus Christ”. A personal relationship with Jesus Christ? My full-gospel buddies in the Lord, I ask you – how many times have we either heard or uttered that sentence? Why do we believe that these words alone will lead others into understanding our earthly and eternal purpose? I believe that at one time this statement held significant meaning, but without extremely careful follow-up conversation, it’s simply a bastardized phrase that no longer holds the power that we thought it once did. Yet still, without thought, we say it and say it and hope that someone will hear it and suddenly find themselves in hot-pursuit of a “relationship” with our Lord.
Please don’t misunderstand me, I commend my co-worker for what she was trying to convey. I’m not knocking her for saying it. In fact, I probably used the same phrase in talking to someone else the day before. But for the first time, on this particular day, I heard how little this phrase helps someone, saved or unsaved, understand what kind of life we have been called to in Christ.
Although I completely agree that we have been called to a personal relationship with Jesus, there is an even bigger chunk of this very truth that the American church has been surgically removing from the equation – the type of relationship it is we have been called to with Jesus. We have been called to a relationship of submission to Christ. It is the removal of this key component of the gospel that has caused an epidemic of powerless Christianity.
As passionate followers of Jesus, we want nothing more than to see others desire to seek after God with the same level of reckless abandon that He has worked into our hearts through our experiences with Him. We search for the right things to say to get them on the "fast-track" to the same Jesus we know. We want to be able to explain to our loved-ones with a witty one-liner approach what being a Christian is all about. The truth is there are no one-liners that we can come up with that will magically illustrate what it means to live a God-pleasing life. But because we want everyone to feel good about the decision to follow Christ, we use these words and unknowingly hide the gospel of submission behind the fluff of friendship with the Almighty.
So we say things like, “Don’t worry about religion. Religion is bad! It’s about having a close and personal relationship with Jesus!” Then we follow-up with , “You just have to ask Jesus to live in your heart, and pray to Him every now and then and try to read your Bible when you get a chance, and love Him and know that He loves you…that’s it!” The biggest problem with this vague approach to truth is that it creates a life aware of Jesus, not a life hidden in Him. It produces the gospel of cheap grace, not a gospel of complete self-denial.
I’m not against one-liners for the sake of causing conversation or interest in Christianity. In fact, there’s a really great book that I know of that is filled with just over 30,000 effective “ice-breakers”. It’s called the Holy Bible and I highly recommend it to everyone. And just to prove that I completely support a quick way to sum-up what it is you believe as a Christian; what it all boils down to, I’ll give you the one verse that I believe works best for striking-up conversation and stirring-up intrigue while vividly illustrating what it means to live a God-pleasing life:
“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20 (NIV)
I was at a restaurant having lunch a few weeks back with a few of my co-workers when one of them, a feisty devout Catholic, asked the rest of us charismatic crazies what our stance was on the salvation issue. You know the topic. You’ve probably been suckered into the same conversation at some time – “do you believe in once-saved-always-saved?” (I can hear the moans and groans as I type) I’ve wised up recently to stay away from this conversation when it’s possible. Too often these talks wind-up in hurt feelings, damaged relationships, and most regrettably – a splintered gospel.
As I sat quietly and let my Protestant brethren tackle the answer, I prayed to myself and simply listened to the debate. At some point someone told our Catholic co-worker that “Christianity isn’t about religion, it’s about a personal relationship with Jesus Christ”. A personal relationship with Jesus Christ? My full-gospel buddies in the Lord, I ask you – how many times have we either heard or uttered that sentence? Why do we believe that these words alone will lead others into understanding our earthly and eternal purpose? I believe that at one time this statement held significant meaning, but without extremely careful follow-up conversation, it’s simply a bastardized phrase that no longer holds the power that we thought it once did. Yet still, without thought, we say it and say it and hope that someone will hear it and suddenly find themselves in hot-pursuit of a “relationship” with our Lord.
Please don’t misunderstand me, I commend my co-worker for what she was trying to convey. I’m not knocking her for saying it. In fact, I probably used the same phrase in talking to someone else the day before. But for the first time, on this particular day, I heard how little this phrase helps someone, saved or unsaved, understand what kind of life we have been called to in Christ.
Although I completely agree that we have been called to a personal relationship with Jesus, there is an even bigger chunk of this very truth that the American church has been surgically removing from the equation – the type of relationship it is we have been called to with Jesus. We have been called to a relationship of submission to Christ. It is the removal of this key component of the gospel that has caused an epidemic of powerless Christianity.
As passionate followers of Jesus, we want nothing more than to see others desire to seek after God with the same level of reckless abandon that He has worked into our hearts through our experiences with Him. We search for the right things to say to get them on the "fast-track" to the same Jesus we know. We want to be able to explain to our loved-ones with a witty one-liner approach what being a Christian is all about. The truth is there are no one-liners that we can come up with that will magically illustrate what it means to live a God-pleasing life. But because we want everyone to feel good about the decision to follow Christ, we use these words and unknowingly hide the gospel of submission behind the fluff of friendship with the Almighty.
So we say things like, “Don’t worry about religion. Religion is bad! It’s about having a close and personal relationship with Jesus!” Then we follow-up with , “You just have to ask Jesus to live in your heart, and pray to Him every now and then and try to read your Bible when you get a chance, and love Him and know that He loves you…that’s it!” The biggest problem with this vague approach to truth is that it creates a life aware of Jesus, not a life hidden in Him. It produces the gospel of cheap grace, not a gospel of complete self-denial.
I’m not against one-liners for the sake of causing conversation or interest in Christianity. In fact, there’s a really great book that I know of that is filled with just over 30,000 effective “ice-breakers”. It’s called the Holy Bible and I highly recommend it to everyone. And just to prove that I completely support a quick way to sum-up what it is you believe as a Christian; what it all boils down to, I’ll give you the one verse that I believe works best for striking-up conversation and stirring-up intrigue while vividly illustrating what it means to live a God-pleasing life:
“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20 (NIV)
Monday, February 18, 2008
CMN Newsletter 2-13-08
I am going to post these as I get them. If you are a Christian man and are not currently receiving these newsletters, let me encourage you to visit CMN Worldwide’s website and sign up! I recently had the privilege of attending CMN’s 30th anniversary event – Lion’s Roar ’07 in Dallas, TX. What an honor to be associated with greatness for God in the form of the global Christian men’s movement. Paul Cole is running full-sprint with the vision his father, Dr. Edwin Louis Cole, had for all men around the world. The men of our church are in continual prayer for Paul and all he is doing for the sake of the Kingdom. We love you Paul. Keep doin' work!
The newsletter circulates via electronic-mail to men all over the world. There were only a few pictures featured on the newsletter. I was excited when I realized that there, sandwiched between a photo of Robert Barriger (leader of the largest church in South America) and Paul Cole (President of CMN Worldwide) was a shot of me and my good friend, Andrew, getting-down in some hard-core prayer at the Lion's Roar '07 conference. Awesomness...
-av
Brother -
Confusion breeds mediocrity...our culture is confused on the definition of manhood. That one issue is deeply and negatively affecting all areas of culture.
Today I’m in Peru...at Robert Barriger’s massive conference “Corazon” (which means ‘heart’). We are meeting with dozens of leaders from the nations of South and Central America—we are in an amazing season of exponential growth!
Pastor Jimmy Cornejo told me this story...of the first 20 men they commissioned in Ecuador just 4 years ago, 12 have launched churches—7 are strong, active leaders in his church in Cuenca...awesome!
These are the reports we are hearing every day from all over the world...Uganda, Indonesia, Germany, Ukraine, New Zealand...
Pastors are leading the charge to take their nations...discipling men, building the church...changing culture!
WE ARE CHALLENGING/CONFRONTING THE CONFUSION OF THE CULTURE!
You and I know that to set culture on the right course, we must impress the men of this generation with the message that “Manhood and Christlikeness are Synonymous.
When men don’t know where they are headed, they slow down...when men don’t know the essence of manhood, they back off—living lives safely secure in mediocrity...
Mediocre manhood is the dragging riptide of our culture...Mediocre men are immature men—irresponsible, unteachable, painfully selfish.
The demasculination of our churches has led to a feminization of the discipling process that does not attract strong men...To keep up ‘numbers’ we end up training pastors to cater to the mediocrity of men...intimidated by strong men and not wanting to ‘rock the boat’...
Let’s do more than rock the boat! Let’s blow up the boat!
Mediocrity enslaves men in the sin of substitution.
Mediocre men want:
authority without accountability
position without the price
power without the process
the applause of men rather than the presence of God
In 1 Kings 14 the enemy stole the gold shields from the temple—symbolic of God’s authority, presence and power...
Unbelieving, confused Israelites replaced the gold with brass shields...symbolic of the strength of man...THE SIN OF SUBSTITUTION...
Our church culture and culture in general is in a state of confusion. We substitute:
humanity for divinity
works for faith
talent for anointing
respectability for righteousness
tolerance for love
Fathers substitute toys for time.
Husbands substitute money for affection.
Pastors substitute personality for character.
We must rescue men from the morass of mediocrity, clearing the cobwebs of confusion...bold in our message, strong in our presentation, sure in our faith.
Let’s lead a men’s movement of powerful, humble servant leaders.
The world needs your confident faith...the world needs your message.
The world needs your Jesus!
We can change the world!
Let’s do it—one man at a time!
Paul L. Cole
President
CMN Worldwide
The newsletter circulates via electronic-mail to men all over the world. There were only a few pictures featured on the newsletter. I was excited when I realized that there, sandwiched between a photo of Robert Barriger (leader of the largest church in South America) and Paul Cole (President of CMN Worldwide) was a shot of me and my good friend, Andrew, getting-down in some hard-core prayer at the Lion's Roar '07 conference. Awesomness...
-av
Brother -
Confusion breeds mediocrity...our culture is confused on the definition of manhood. That one issue is deeply and negatively affecting all areas of culture.
Today I’m in Peru...at Robert Barriger’s massive conference “Corazon” (which means ‘heart’). We are meeting with dozens of leaders from the nations of South and Central America—we are in an amazing season of exponential growth!
Pastor Jimmy Cornejo told me this story...of the first 20 men they commissioned in Ecuador just 4 years ago, 12 have launched churches—7 are strong, active leaders in his church in Cuenca...awesome!
These are the reports we are hearing every day from all over the world...Uganda, Indonesia, Germany, Ukraine, New Zealand...
Pastors are leading the charge to take their nations...discipling men, building the church...changing culture!
WE ARE CHALLENGING/CONFRONTING THE CONFUSION OF THE CULTURE!
You and I know that to set culture on the right course, we must impress the men of this generation with the message that “Manhood and Christlikeness are Synonymous.
When men don’t know where they are headed, they slow down...when men don’t know the essence of manhood, they back off—living lives safely secure in mediocrity...
Mediocre manhood is the dragging riptide of our culture...Mediocre men are immature men—irresponsible, unteachable, painfully selfish.
The demasculination of our churches has led to a feminization of the discipling process that does not attract strong men...To keep up ‘numbers’ we end up training pastors to cater to the mediocrity of men...intimidated by strong men and not wanting to ‘rock the boat’...
Let’s do more than rock the boat! Let’s blow up the boat!
Mediocrity enslaves men in the sin of substitution.
Mediocre men want:
authority without accountability
position without the price
power without the process
the applause of men rather than the presence of God
In 1 Kings 14 the enemy stole the gold shields from the temple—symbolic of God’s authority, presence and power...
Unbelieving, confused Israelites replaced the gold with brass shields...symbolic of the strength of man...THE SIN OF SUBSTITUTION...
Our church culture and culture in general is in a state of confusion. We substitute:
humanity for divinity
works for faith
talent for anointing
respectability for righteousness
tolerance for love
Fathers substitute toys for time.
Husbands substitute money for affection.
Pastors substitute personality for character.
We must rescue men from the morass of mediocrity, clearing the cobwebs of confusion...bold in our message, strong in our presentation, sure in our faith.
Let’s lead a men’s movement of powerful, humble servant leaders.
The world needs your confident faith...the world needs your message.
The world needs your Jesus!
We can change the world!
Let’s do it—one man at a time!
Paul L. Cole
President
CMN Worldwide
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Mission Impossible
"Did Jesus choose to die for our atonement, or was he commanded by God to die for us?" This question came up recently as I had coffee with two of my co-workers. I knew what I believed to be true but was unsure of how to answer. I promised them I would get back to them on the matter soon. Later that night, after seeking the Lord in prayer and seeking His wisdom in the Word, I wrote this:
If you Google search enough you’ll find arguments for both sides. I personally feel that reading too deeply into the meaning of what is sometimes obvious scripture can wind-up being more of a hindrance to a believer’s walk with Christ than a release of revelation. What we seek to prove through humanistic rationalization usually becomes a basis for argument rather than an understanding of truth. My rule of thumb for reading scripture is to take my understanding from spiritual discernment first and literal understanding second. I once heard a pastor say, “On the day of judgment, I would rather be guilty of taking God’s Word too literally than not literally enough!”
These are the words of Christ himself:
"I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me — just as the Father knows me and I know the Father — and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life — only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father." (John 10:14-18, NIV)
If you are familiar with the movie or old-school TV show Mission Impossible, you undoubtedly know the secret agent, Ethan Hunt…coolest character name of all time. Ethan Hunt is not a secret agent by order, he is an elite government agent who is willing and capable of doing the toughest and most dangerous jobs for the sake of national security or offensive-strike against terrorist organizations. His missions are presented to him as “…if you choose to accept”. He is not obligated to accept the mission. It’s not a command from his authority to risk his life. He accepts the mission only after having heard the objectives, directives, and possible risks. If he agrees, then off he goes - parachuting from a high-altitude plane into the jungles of some far-away country hoping to successfully complete his mission and make it back alive.
Like Ethan Hunt, Jesus Christ also accepted a seemingly impossible mission – reconcile all of humanity back into perfect fellowship with God the Father. Jesus’ mission was presented to Him as “…if you choose to accept”. The word says, “no one takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord”. Jesus understood the objectives, directives, and risks involved. He knew that at the end of this mission, he would have to suffer horrific torture and experience the violent sting of death. Knowing these details, he still accepted the mission.
No mission this big can be improvised, and so it required directives, lest the mission be compromised. The “command” Jesus received from his Father were the careful instructions on how He would need to live and when and how He would need to die in order to successfully complete the mission.
While on his missions, Ethan Hunt would usually need access cards to special rooms and pass codes to hack enemy intelligence, so these were granted to him by his commanding authority. Likewise, God granted Christ the authority to both give up His life and more importantly, take it back up.
So with all the pieces in place , Christ entered the world as a baby, lived a God-pleasing life, and died a criminal’s death. Praise be to God that death on a cross was not the final objective. We know that on the third day after Christ’s death, he rose again! Jesus’ resurrection has freed us from death and now we can live eternally in fellowship with God and with the One who chose to accept a mission that for anyone else, would have been impossible.
If you Google search enough you’ll find arguments for both sides. I personally feel that reading too deeply into the meaning of what is sometimes obvious scripture can wind-up being more of a hindrance to a believer’s walk with Christ than a release of revelation. What we seek to prove through humanistic rationalization usually becomes a basis for argument rather than an understanding of truth. My rule of thumb for reading scripture is to take my understanding from spiritual discernment first and literal understanding second. I once heard a pastor say, “On the day of judgment, I would rather be guilty of taking God’s Word too literally than not literally enough!”
These are the words of Christ himself:
"I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me — just as the Father knows me and I know the Father — and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life — only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father." (John 10:14-18, NIV)
If you are familiar with the movie or old-school TV show Mission Impossible, you undoubtedly know the secret agent, Ethan Hunt…coolest character name of all time. Ethan Hunt is not a secret agent by order, he is an elite government agent who is willing and capable of doing the toughest and most dangerous jobs for the sake of national security or offensive-strike against terrorist organizations. His missions are presented to him as “…if you choose to accept”. He is not obligated to accept the mission. It’s not a command from his authority to risk his life. He accepts the mission only after having heard the objectives, directives, and possible risks. If he agrees, then off he goes - parachuting from a high-altitude plane into the jungles of some far-away country hoping to successfully complete his mission and make it back alive.
Like Ethan Hunt, Jesus Christ also accepted a seemingly impossible mission – reconcile all of humanity back into perfect fellowship with God the Father. Jesus’ mission was presented to Him as “…if you choose to accept”. The word says, “no one takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord”. Jesus understood the objectives, directives, and risks involved. He knew that at the end of this mission, he would have to suffer horrific torture and experience the violent sting of death. Knowing these details, he still accepted the mission.
No mission this big can be improvised, and so it required directives, lest the mission be compromised. The “command” Jesus received from his Father were the careful instructions on how He would need to live and when and how He would need to die in order to successfully complete the mission.
While on his missions, Ethan Hunt would usually need access cards to special rooms and pass codes to hack enemy intelligence, so these were granted to him by his commanding authority. Likewise, God granted Christ the authority to both give up His life and more importantly, take it back up.
So with all the pieces in place , Christ entered the world as a baby, lived a God-pleasing life, and died a criminal’s death. Praise be to God that death on a cross was not the final objective. We know that on the third day after Christ’s death, he rose again! Jesus’ resurrection has freed us from death and now we can live eternally in fellowship with God and with the One who chose to accept a mission that for anyone else, would have been impossible.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
God Bless Evolution!
Recently, actor Matthew McConaughey, of such movies as Sahara and We are Marshall, announced on his website his excitement over learning that he and his girlfriend, Camila Alves, are expecting a child. He wrote the following:
"We are stoked and wowed by this miracle of creation and this gift from God, and so excited for the adventure that will come in raising this child, being mother and a father, and shepherding him or her through this life.”
“Wish us the best, keep us in your prayers, and God bless evolution. Thanks for being fans of me and my work and now this new and miraculous chapter in my life, as me and Camila and our child do our best to just keep living.”
No matter your creed, race, or religion; A-list celebrity or indigenous tribesman - there is no denying the miracle of birth. I don’t know who or what Matthew McConaughey confesses to be “God” in his life, but he is undoubtedly experiencing the same joy that the only true Living God felt the moment He created you and me. I believe that the joy of new life is one given to us by God and is right up there with the joys that we should be experiencing daily knowing that Christ lives through us despite our sinful past and that our spouses live with us despite our present imperfections!
We should all be “stoked and wowed” by the every-day adventure of raising a family. There is no greater calling in life! As family men, we have all been called to be the shepherds of our homes. We are the ministers, pastors, and head-priests to our wives and children. As parents, we have been called to lead our families into a better understanding of God. As believers, we have been commissioned to make disciples of nations. But how do we know if we are properly equipped to tackle the awesome adventure of family ministry or ministry to the unsaved? Theologian, Matthew McConaughey eludes to the answer – evolution!
One definition of evolution is, a gradual process in which something changes into a different and usually more complex or better form. As a Christian, I must confess – I believe in evolution. I’m not talking about Darwin’s theory of evolution or natural selection. I’m talking about the need for professing Christians to change and become something more than we are today so that we can truly live and ensure an even better tomorrow for our families and for those whom we love and influence. I’m talking about a God-directed spiritual evolution. It’s an evolution that begins with a flesh-driven sinner and matures to a Spirit-filled believer. We become a different, more complex and better form only when we have disappeared and Christ is revealed through us.
Romans 12:2 reads: “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” (NIV)
If we are not experiencing a continual transformation in the way that we walk, talk, act, and think, odds are that we are not allowing the spiritual evolution that God designed for us, through the completed work of the Cross, to take place in our lives. My pastor coined this process as “progressive realization”. Progressive realization is the Holy Spirit impressing His righteousness upon our hearts by allowing us to see the areas of our lives that we have yet to surrender and submit to His will. We must be obedient to the call of not just changing, but exchanging our will for His. As Christ-led leaders, we need to be setting the example through our lifestyle. It is, after all, through example that we assume the kind of leadership that Christ has directed us to - servant leadership. Our families and loved ones will only respond to the need for change when we first acknowledge and respond to the need for change within ourselves.
It’s through the evidence of change in our lives that others will understand God’s perfect will and perfect love for their lives. We must break out of the pattern that this world sets and adopt the pattern that Christ lived and has laid out in the Word. It’s time to recongize the need for the continual exchange of our will for His. It’s time to become something better; not just for ourselves but for the lost, weary, and broken. It’s time to become Christ to the world around us. God bless evolution!
"We are stoked and wowed by this miracle of creation and this gift from God, and so excited for the adventure that will come in raising this child, being mother and a father, and shepherding him or her through this life.”
“Wish us the best, keep us in your prayers, and God bless evolution. Thanks for being fans of me and my work and now this new and miraculous chapter in my life, as me and Camila and our child do our best to just keep living.”
No matter your creed, race, or religion; A-list celebrity or indigenous tribesman - there is no denying the miracle of birth. I don’t know who or what Matthew McConaughey confesses to be “God” in his life, but he is undoubtedly experiencing the same joy that the only true Living God felt the moment He created you and me. I believe that the joy of new life is one given to us by God and is right up there with the joys that we should be experiencing daily knowing that Christ lives through us despite our sinful past and that our spouses live with us despite our present imperfections!
We should all be “stoked and wowed” by the every-day adventure of raising a family. There is no greater calling in life! As family men, we have all been called to be the shepherds of our homes. We are the ministers, pastors, and head-priests to our wives and children. As parents, we have been called to lead our families into a better understanding of God. As believers, we have been commissioned to make disciples of nations. But how do we know if we are properly equipped to tackle the awesome adventure of family ministry or ministry to the unsaved? Theologian, Matthew McConaughey eludes to the answer – evolution!
One definition of evolution is, a gradual process in which something changes into a different and usually more complex or better form. As a Christian, I must confess – I believe in evolution. I’m not talking about Darwin’s theory of evolution or natural selection. I’m talking about the need for professing Christians to change and become something more than we are today so that we can truly live and ensure an even better tomorrow for our families and for those whom we love and influence. I’m talking about a God-directed spiritual evolution. It’s an evolution that begins with a flesh-driven sinner and matures to a Spirit-filled believer. We become a different, more complex and better form only when we have disappeared and Christ is revealed through us.
Romans 12:2 reads: “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” (NIV)
If we are not experiencing a continual transformation in the way that we walk, talk, act, and think, odds are that we are not allowing the spiritual evolution that God designed for us, through the completed work of the Cross, to take place in our lives. My pastor coined this process as “progressive realization”. Progressive realization is the Holy Spirit impressing His righteousness upon our hearts by allowing us to see the areas of our lives that we have yet to surrender and submit to His will. We must be obedient to the call of not just changing, but exchanging our will for His. As Christ-led leaders, we need to be setting the example through our lifestyle. It is, after all, through example that we assume the kind of leadership that Christ has directed us to - servant leadership. Our families and loved ones will only respond to the need for change when we first acknowledge and respond to the need for change within ourselves.
It’s through the evidence of change in our lives that others will understand God’s perfect will and perfect love for their lives. We must break out of the pattern that this world sets and adopt the pattern that Christ lived and has laid out in the Word. It’s time to recongize the need for the continual exchange of our will for His. It’s time to become something better; not just for ourselves but for the lost, weary, and broken. It’s time to become Christ to the world around us. God bless evolution!
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Of Rats and Men
This is the essay that started me back on the path to writing. I was in prayer when the image of a rat eating poison came to my mind. Through obedience to the Holy Spirit, I got up from my knees and sat down at my computer to type this out:
Am I the only one fascinated with how rat poison works? I find it quite interesting. Rats instinctively will eat just a tiny portion of their chosen meal and wait to see if it makes them sick, if they don’t feel sick within moments of the sampling, they proceed with the feast. So the rat, in need of nourishment, wanders into a home and finds the poison, hoping it will satisfy his ever-existing hunger. Even to a desperate scavenger, the deadly pellet can’t be the most appetizing thing he has ever laid his beady eyes on, but it’s something…and in his search to fill his belly, it’s certainly better than nothing! He tastes it, and when he does not immediately feel the adverse effects, he assumes it can’t be bad for him and continues to eat what will more than likely end up being his last meal. After the poison is devoured, he licks his nasty little rat fingers and moves along in his life’s journey of satisfying his unquenchable appetite. Little does he know that in just a few minutes of eating this particular dinner, an unseen chemical reaction will begin to take place at his very core.
The chief chemical used in most modern raticides is warfarin. This chemical works by clotting the blood, restricting blood flow and as a result causes the rodent to experience extreme thirst. In his new pursuit of quenching his thirst, the rat leaves the comforts of the human’s home in search of water to drink, thinking that the water will make his ill feeling go away. The harsh reality is, at this point, there is not enough water in the world that can save the rat’s life. The rat will die because his choice of food for the day, which seemed to be the answer for that hunger that lived in him, only lead him to thirst for another dead-end solution for his need to survive.
As Christians, we have been called to more than just survive. We have a much greater calling on our life than to just find our next temporary fix. We were not created to go from hunger-to-hunger or thirst-to-thirst. We were created to live from “glory-to-glory”. Yet time and time again, we see Christians in hot-pursuit of all the ‘stuff’ in this world that readily offers a solution to those hungers that live inside of us. We want to nibble at the subtle offerings of this life and see if it makes us sick right away. And when we don’t see or feel the effects right away, we assume it can’t be bad and eventually find ourselves immersed in a lifestyle that was never intended for us.
Matthew 6:33 says, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you.” Our purpose in life is two-fold: to seek after that which pleases our Father in Heaven through a pursuit of eternal significance (the Kingdom of God), and strive for the character of God in every area of our lives, thus fulfilling our earthly purpose (His righteousness). Then all the other things that are needed in this life…and yes, even those things which we desire (the stuff) will be added to us, according to His will for our lives. Too often, as Christians, we find ourselves part of the “rat race” and find that we’re running harder and faster than ever before in pursuit of the things of this life. God has created us with a wonderful desire to want more out of life. This was in hopes that we would one day discover that this driving force, in us all, was placed there so that we would come to know Him more. But so many Christians have mistaken this divinely appointed desire for something else. It’s an error of mere degrees, in which we don’t put our trust in God, but rather in the blessings of God.
When our focus is on the blessings of God and not God himself, we find ourselves headlong in the sin of idolatry. When we plant the seed of idolatry in our core, we also gain a thirst to water that seed by continuing the pursuit of things rather than the pursuit of God. Before we even know what happened, we become like the unbelieving world; running full-speed, aimlessly through life trying to satisfy the unquenchable thirst for bigger houses, better paying jobs, and nicer cars. We wind up another contestant in the always tiring, never-ending “rat-race”. We completely lose sight of God Himself being the answer to all of our hungers and thirsts in life; the simple truth of Matthew 6:33. Psalms 107:8-9 says it this way, “Let them give thanks to the Lord for His unfailing love and His wonderful deeds for men, for He satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.” God longs to satisfy our needs. He takes pleasure in doing so. When we make Him the focus of our Christian walk, He cares for us in ways we can not fathom. He is the source for all we’ll ever need.
When we chose to follow after Christ, and trust God with our sin-dead lives, we turned our back on that old life of fending for ourselves. We are now in fellowship with the Almighty who owns everything in the universe and gives freely to those who live to know Him. God has invited us to feast at His table and enjoy the best of all He has to give. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry and he who believes in me will never be thirsty” (John 6:35). A rat’s life is no life for a Christian. We have no business blindly taste-testing the things of this world. When we do so, we put God’s will for our lives on the line. And if we’re too careless, we could risk our very lives. All we’ll ever need, in this life and the next, is found in Him. Christians, it’s time to put our faith and trust for provision back on the Lord. Once we have done that, we can get back to our true purpose in life – seeking His eternal Kingdom and pursuing His ever-blessed righteousness.
Am I the only one fascinated with how rat poison works? I find it quite interesting. Rats instinctively will eat just a tiny portion of their chosen meal and wait to see if it makes them sick, if they don’t feel sick within moments of the sampling, they proceed with the feast. So the rat, in need of nourishment, wanders into a home and finds the poison, hoping it will satisfy his ever-existing hunger. Even to a desperate scavenger, the deadly pellet can’t be the most appetizing thing he has ever laid his beady eyes on, but it’s something…and in his search to fill his belly, it’s certainly better than nothing! He tastes it, and when he does not immediately feel the adverse effects, he assumes it can’t be bad for him and continues to eat what will more than likely end up being his last meal. After the poison is devoured, he licks his nasty little rat fingers and moves along in his life’s journey of satisfying his unquenchable appetite. Little does he know that in just a few minutes of eating this particular dinner, an unseen chemical reaction will begin to take place at his very core.
The chief chemical used in most modern raticides is warfarin. This chemical works by clotting the blood, restricting blood flow and as a result causes the rodent to experience extreme thirst. In his new pursuit of quenching his thirst, the rat leaves the comforts of the human’s home in search of water to drink, thinking that the water will make his ill feeling go away. The harsh reality is, at this point, there is not enough water in the world that can save the rat’s life. The rat will die because his choice of food for the day, which seemed to be the answer for that hunger that lived in him, only lead him to thirst for another dead-end solution for his need to survive.
As Christians, we have been called to more than just survive. We have a much greater calling on our life than to just find our next temporary fix. We were not created to go from hunger-to-hunger or thirst-to-thirst. We were created to live from “glory-to-glory”. Yet time and time again, we see Christians in hot-pursuit of all the ‘stuff’ in this world that readily offers a solution to those hungers that live inside of us. We want to nibble at the subtle offerings of this life and see if it makes us sick right away. And when we don’t see or feel the effects right away, we assume it can’t be bad and eventually find ourselves immersed in a lifestyle that was never intended for us.
Matthew 6:33 says, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you.” Our purpose in life is two-fold: to seek after that which pleases our Father in Heaven through a pursuit of eternal significance (the Kingdom of God), and strive for the character of God in every area of our lives, thus fulfilling our earthly purpose (His righteousness). Then all the other things that are needed in this life…and yes, even those things which we desire (the stuff) will be added to us, according to His will for our lives. Too often, as Christians, we find ourselves part of the “rat race” and find that we’re running harder and faster than ever before in pursuit of the things of this life. God has created us with a wonderful desire to want more out of life. This was in hopes that we would one day discover that this driving force, in us all, was placed there so that we would come to know Him more. But so many Christians have mistaken this divinely appointed desire for something else. It’s an error of mere degrees, in which we don’t put our trust in God, but rather in the blessings of God.
When our focus is on the blessings of God and not God himself, we find ourselves headlong in the sin of idolatry. When we plant the seed of idolatry in our core, we also gain a thirst to water that seed by continuing the pursuit of things rather than the pursuit of God. Before we even know what happened, we become like the unbelieving world; running full-speed, aimlessly through life trying to satisfy the unquenchable thirst for bigger houses, better paying jobs, and nicer cars. We wind up another contestant in the always tiring, never-ending “rat-race”. We completely lose sight of God Himself being the answer to all of our hungers and thirsts in life; the simple truth of Matthew 6:33. Psalms 107:8-9 says it this way, “Let them give thanks to the Lord for His unfailing love and His wonderful deeds for men, for He satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.” God longs to satisfy our needs. He takes pleasure in doing so. When we make Him the focus of our Christian walk, He cares for us in ways we can not fathom. He is the source for all we’ll ever need.
When we chose to follow after Christ, and trust God with our sin-dead lives, we turned our back on that old life of fending for ourselves. We are now in fellowship with the Almighty who owns everything in the universe and gives freely to those who live to know Him. God has invited us to feast at His table and enjoy the best of all He has to give. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry and he who believes in me will never be thirsty” (John 6:35). A rat’s life is no life for a Christian. We have no business blindly taste-testing the things of this world. When we do so, we put God’s will for our lives on the line. And if we’re too careless, we could risk our very lives. All we’ll ever need, in this life and the next, is found in Him. Christians, it’s time to put our faith and trust for provision back on the Lord. Once we have done that, we can get back to our true purpose in life – seeking His eternal Kingdom and pursuing His ever-blessed righteousness.
Sunday, February 3, 2008
"LET'S GET IT ON!"
First, let me thank you for visiting this blog. My prayer is that anyone who reads these pages will be inspired to seek out for themselves who God is, what He demands from us, and all that He desires for us. Secondly, this blog belongs to Christ. I have merely been given the task to maintain this little corner of the blogosphere for Him. It is truly an honor and a privilege. Thirdly, I’d like to thank my pastor and friend since the days of He-Man action figures, Steve Trevino, for encouraging me to write consistently and playing a role in the decision to start this thing…I really needed to stop blogging his blog (see – any ridiculously long “comment” on Steve’s blog). I love you man. I’m glad that we have not only begun to rebuild a friendship but also established a relation of discipleship. I’m proud to call you my pastor and spiritual leader.
Most guys know that the term “tap-out” comes from the wonderful world of combat sports or what is more popularly known these days as mixed martial arts. Tapping-out is simply a term for when a fighter taps the mat with a hand to signify to their opponent and/or referee that they have chosen to yield to the opponent during a match, resulting in an immediate loss of the match. A tap-out is usually the only choice a fighter might have if he has been caught by a submission move, or a move in combat sports that limits movement or the ability to breathe and almost always causes an extreme amount of pain or discomfort and in some cases broken bones and torn muscles.
As I watched a UFC highlight show one night, I was prompted by the Spirit…and Big John McCarthy…to a deeper truth behind the reality of the submission move. As Christians, we have all been called to a relationship of complete submission to God’s will for our lives. There are those Chritians who don’t have an understanding of this yet and those who do. For those Christians that do understand the importance of submission to Christ, there are two more categories – those who have tapped-out and begun the process of progressively realizing God’s will for their lives and those who are still lying flat on their backs, experiencing pain and discomfort because of their unwillingness to embrace the completed work of the Cross. Realizing God’s will for our life and being fully committed and completely submitted to it is the key to unlocking everything we will ever need to walk a purposeful Christian life.
This blog is more than just letters and words floating in the vastness of the information super highway. It’s more than just a means for me to get God-inspired thought onto a forum. This is your chance to share what God is doing in your life through the decision to live in complete submission to Him. I encourage you to leave comments and in doing so, sharing in the ministry of this blog. Feel free to email me directly should you ever have any concerns or questions - abelsfault05@hotmail.com.
God bless you guys.
So having said all that, in the words of the great BJM, “LET’S GET IT ON!”
Most guys know that the term “tap-out” comes from the wonderful world of combat sports or what is more popularly known these days as mixed martial arts. Tapping-out is simply a term for when a fighter taps the mat with a hand to signify to their opponent and/or referee that they have chosen to yield to the opponent during a match, resulting in an immediate loss of the match. A tap-out is usually the only choice a fighter might have if he has been caught by a submission move, or a move in combat sports that limits movement or the ability to breathe and almost always causes an extreme amount of pain or discomfort and in some cases broken bones and torn muscles.
As I watched a UFC highlight show one night, I was prompted by the Spirit…and Big John McCarthy…to a deeper truth behind the reality of the submission move. As Christians, we have all been called to a relationship of complete submission to God’s will for our lives. There are those Chritians who don’t have an understanding of this yet and those who do. For those Christians that do understand the importance of submission to Christ, there are two more categories – those who have tapped-out and begun the process of progressively realizing God’s will for their lives and those who are still lying flat on their backs, experiencing pain and discomfort because of their unwillingness to embrace the completed work of the Cross. Realizing God’s will for our life and being fully committed and completely submitted to it is the key to unlocking everything we will ever need to walk a purposeful Christian life.
This blog is more than just letters and words floating in the vastness of the information super highway. It’s more than just a means for me to get God-inspired thought onto a forum. This is your chance to share what God is doing in your life through the decision to live in complete submission to Him. I encourage you to leave comments and in doing so, sharing in the ministry of this blog. Feel free to email me directly should you ever have any concerns or questions - abelsfault05@hotmail.com.
God bless you guys.
So having said all that, in the words of the great BJM, “LET’S GET IT ON!”
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