Men yelled, women sobbed, two babies on board were screaming..... http://www.holyfodder.com

Guest Post by Bonnie: I apologize in advance for the length of this... you have asked me to tell you what happened last Friday night and it took me a day or two to process it, and write it down. I pray when you read this you will fall to your knees and thank God, as I do every time I think back to what he did. My puny words fail to accurately describe how I feel about Him...  I will just tell you what happened as best I can.

 

I have a chain that was given to me in Israel by God through a shopkeeper that has on it my promise from the Lord: “When you go to the left or the right, your ears will hear a voice saying ‘This is the way’, walk in it.” (Is 30:21) I never take it off. It is my proof that I am where He wants me,  that He sends me where He needs me to go.

 

Friday I was getting ready for the day in the office at the HEA mission center, after which I would take a bus to go about 5-6 hours away to Coatzacoalcos, the city where I grew up and my parents ministered, in another state.  As I was blow-drying my hair I heard in my spirit“Take off the chain, don’t wear it tonight.”

 Even as I reached up to take it off I wondered why and the voice came again “Leave the chain, take my promise.” 

 

Later as I slipped on sandals there was that voice in my mind, again “You will need more than that. Thick socks. Tennis shoes.”

 

I could have wondered, but for some reason, I didn’t. The entire day I was following instructions from Him and I finished my work and prepared to leave. Once on the bus at 6:30 in the evening I reached for my throat where  I usually wear my chain and thought again, “Leave the chain, take my promise.”

I sat in the seat to the right of the bus driver, immediately by the door. After an hour or so it was dark and I began to listen to Francis Chan’s sermon ‘Crazy Love”.  I rested and closed my eyes as I listened, about 9 pm the bus was silent as everyone seemed to doze and I heard Francis Chan say:   "If I really believe that God values treasures others,  wouldn’t my life be about giving away all I have and even DYING so they can hear His message? Do I believe Romans 8 that God Himself lives inside of me and I am DIFFERENT from the people on the earth? That I must be radically different because this is HIS reputation, and I have this supernatural being in me... would I even be afraid of dying, if I truly believed this, so that others would know Him and spend eternity with Him?.... "

 

That's when I heard the Lord say “My child, It’s time. And I am with you.”

 

I sat up quickly and pulled out my earpieces, looked out the window. The night exploded into lights and I heard “Pop! Pop Pop!”;  realized our bus was being shot at. Heard the glass of the bus door shatter,  felt the shards as they covered us. Felt the swerve of the bus as the driver tried to control it, turned to the lady next to me and woke her up and said "We are being held up but God is with us. Spread the word.” Women screaming, the men climbing on board yelling “This is a hold-up, we will not kill you if you do as we say.” It was an explosion of sound and assault: Their faces covered by scarves, tearing at our jewelry, watches, grabbing our purses, thrusting their hands down our blouses to search for money, guns waving, dragging the bus driver out of his seat, driving the bus into the the bush, past trees, down down into a ravine and up up up about two kilometers into tall grass and trees. Men yelled, women sobbed, two babies on board were screaming.

 

All the while, inside of me: peace. A knowing that He is there. "This is what you meant all day, Jesus. That I am not lost somewhere, you know where I am and I am safely in the palm of your precious hand."

 

The bus careened to  stop. As I searched for my wallet to give them my money and they tore off my earrings and screamed and poked to see if I had more , I heard Him say, very distinctly “Say yes, say yes, say yes. I will tell you when it is time to say no. I am with you now and I will be with you then.”

 

The bus finally came to a stop. As the men were going through the bus they dumped out backpacks to fill them with whatever they wanted of value, cell phones, money, jewelry, cameras. Pretty soon a big guy with a black bandanna around his face who seemed to be the ringleader told all the men to get up and go out and all the male passengers  followed them out. I couldn’t see what was happening outside, I heard one man grunt in pain, I assume they hit him when he didn’t do what they said quickly enough, I heard a shot and I prayed it was a warning and no one got shot. Eventually they told all the women to get up and leave the bus.  We stood in front of the bus, in the lights, we saw the male passengers  on the side of the bus, hands on the bus, spread eagled. They pushed us down into the dirt, made us lie down, faces in the dirt, hands at our necks. They frisked us and as they did that the girl next to me began to throw up. “Calm down," I said, “Don’t draw attention to yourself ."

"I’m pregnant," she moaned, "I can’t stop as long as I am lying on my stomach.”

 

I raised my head and told the two men with the guns on us. “She’s pregnant. Will you let us get up and hold our hands behind our head? She could choke.” After  much swearing from the men, they allowed all the women to get up as long as we held our hands on the back of our neck.

Feels better.

We can breathe.

The moon was amazing.

We were glowing in the moonlight.

 

“Time to speak," He said.

They ran over to the male passengers. Someone had tried to run, they made them undress from the waist down to keep them from running. You could hear them kicking the man who tried to run.  Women were sobbing.

 

“Time to speak.“

 

"Do you see the moon? It is amazing! ' I said to the women, " We didn’t know we would be here tonight but He knew and He prepared this place for us, and gave us this amazing light.”

 

"He is up there, looking down on us." One of the women said.

 

"No, that’s the best part, He is right here. In some of us and walking through and around us.” We had our hands on he backs of our neck,  guns pointed at us, I began to pray out loud. For His protection, for the the protection of His blood over each and every person there. Over and over again I prayed for His peace, peace that only He can give, and His blood around us, protecting us. Someone started singing down the line, a Catholic song, most joined in. Someone said Hail Mary's....

 

"Pray for the men."

(Gulp. Really, Lord? )

 

"Do you believe me? Pray for those who persecute you."

 

I looked at the now three men in front of us holding guns on us and I began to pray for them, out loud.  I prayed that God would have mercy on them, no matter what they did this night. As I prayed I l began to love  them and I knew it was Jesus loving them through me. I prayed "It was never supposed to be like this, God, you wanted us to have a relationship with you, but we sinned... and the bond was broken. And you  sent your son Jesus, to die for our sins, mine and theirs, to pay the price...." I went all the way through to "You have a plan for these men, and this is not it. Even at this moment you love them and you are making sure I say it so that they hear it, that you are knocking on the door of their heart and all they have to do is say "yes," to you and they will be forgiven and be set free of this life of sin....." Once I was done praying this way for the 1st man, I did the same for the 2nd man, "Father I ask for the man with the blue shirt, I ask for mercy and blessings for him and his family. You want him to know you love him and you have a plan for his life. That it was never supposed to be this way...." When I got to to the third he got mad and yelled "Don't pray for me!" and he got back on the bus to help the others as they ransacked everything. I kept praying, three times, in prayer, the entire plan of salvation was laid out...and everyone heard. The male passengers still standing on the side of the bus with their arms on the bus ... the men guarding them, and the ones guarding us.

 

The man in the gray bandanna that had told me not to pray came back off the bus, and screamed at me " I told you to stop!" and I did.

 

Then he pointed his gun at the women and said "Undress, all of you. Everything off."

 

"It's time to say 'No'.  I am with you." I heard Him say.

 

I took about a half step forward and said, " We aren't going to do that. We have cooperated fully in everything you asked, we have given you everything we have, but won't undress."

 

He screamed at us "Take off your clothes!" I heard sobbing behind me. Pleading.

 

I said, "No, we aren't going to do that."

 

He grabbed my hair on the right side of my head and pulled, and put his gun under my chin and screamed "Get undressed or I will kill this woman."

 

Someone behind me began to pray out loud.

 

I said "No, don't. God says we don't have to do that. Don't do it." Calmly. Firmly. (those of you who know me well know how amazing THAT is! Supernatural grace.)

 

He let go of my hair and he was holding the gun with both hands, pushing it under my jaw line and he was furious. He was a couple of inches shorter than I am and I had my head way back and I was looking in his eyes. Sweat pouring down his face into the bandanna, he screamed "I will kill you right now!"

 

"My life doesn't belong to you, it is God's, and only He can take it. God told me to say no and that He would take care of me."

 

The man was screaming something and I heard the whisper "Watch me."

I remember a chill running through my body.

I remember thinking: This is it.

I will either see the hand of God in a miracle, or in seconds I will be looking into the precious face of my Jesus.

 

As I write this, this is the only part of the story that makes me weep. I knew I was a second away from being face to face with Jesus. In spite of all the evil all around, that moment was unbearably precious.

 

He glared at me and I heard the gun click and push hard against my jaw. And nothing else.

 

His fury seemed to turn to terror. He pulled down the bandanna off his face and examined the gun, over and over again to see why there had been no shot. While he was doing that, the big  man in the black scarf had heard what was going on and he stormed off the bus roaring like a bull. "No seas cochino!" He yelled. "Don't be a pig! I told you to check the women, I didn't tell you to undress anyone and I never said you could kill anyone!" He pushed him away and backhanded him and the man fell back and as he did, a shot rang out, hitting no one.

 

It was as if a line had been drawn by the Holy Spirit, past which they could not cross.

 

I told the men, "You can check us but don't get funny. We have given you everything we have, there's no need to insult us any further." They nodded and checked the pockets but never touched us as they had been trying to do earlier. When it was time to check me none of them would, so I turned my pockets inside out so they could see they were empty. The big man said to me, "You can get on the bus now." I told him I would be last, after all the women. I asked him to please return all the clothes to the male passengers on the side of the bus, he nodded and went to tell someone to do that. We got on the bus and they told us to wait 10 minutes before backing out down the mountain. The bus driver waited a 1/2 hour and it took us about 1/2 hour to back out. At one point it was so steep and dark that we most of us (those that could) got out to lessen the weight of the bus.

 

As we did, the women were telling their husbands that God had saved them from having to take off their clothes and perhaps being raped, that God had spared my life, that the gun hadn't worked. "Did you know we prayed for mercy for them? I heard them ask. "Did you know God has a plan for our lives and even for theirs? Tell them about God's plan,' They told me.

 

When we got on the bus I prayed with many of them to accept Jesus, and  together we prayed for each of the 7 men that had attacked us.

 

When I calmly relayed what happened to the police a couple of hours later they said " I believe you are in shock." Later, when I told part of the family over the phone, I was calm and clear and I thought "Maybe I am in shock. Four days later I know the truth: I am walking in grace. When He gives you grace, you don't need courage because there is no fear. I'm in grace, and I am in awe of a God who cares about  such details as my Israel necklace, reminds me of His promises, walks with me, talks to me and stops bullets when He decides.

 

I lost my iPad, iPhone, iPod, all the money I had with me, digital camera, etc...

in the place of this 'stuff'  I have a new awe of God. Words fail me to describe the sweetness of His presence and the far-reaching consequences of His grace. For two years I have said I live and walk in a miracle and today I know I am a miracle. 

 

I must also admit I have a new longing: the one to see Him face to face as I briefly thought I would the other night. I know that one day I will. In the meantime, He has called us all to be His light in the darkness  we are the element of change in this world. We walk in His promise that we will walk in the world but not be of the world, and the we will be protected from the evil one:

 

John 17:15-19, in Jesus' prayer for us: 

 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.  They are not of the world, even as I am not of it.  Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.  As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.  For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.

 

I pray as you read this you are touched with the awe and wonder I have been living in since that night: God SHOWS UP. He STILL shows up. He has an amazing plan and even though He djoesn't have to, He still uses humans to accomplish them. I am in awe of this privilege!  

 

Thank you for your love and your support, and for making it this far in a long email.... How can I NOT proclaim His wonders???

 

Fully His and in absolute awe of what He's doing.....

 

~Bonnie~
El Señor cumplirá en mí su propósito. Tu gran amor, Señor, perdura para siempre; ¡no abandones la obra de tus manos! 
Salmo 138:8

The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me; your love, O LORD, endures forever— do not abandon the works of your hands.
Psalm 138:8

www.KingdomTales-bonnie.blogspot.com

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream

I'd Rather Rain Fire From Heaven...

In life's journey, I have tried to become more Christ-like.  It is what children of God are called to do.  Sometimes I succeed.  Sometimes I fail.  God in His grace encourages me to keep pressing forward in the adventure to become more like Him.

God provides His Word as a means to determine what it means to become more Christ-like.  It gives instruction on what He likes and what He doesn't like.  It gives examples of how He acts and reacts in different situations.  This provides insight into our own lives and suggest how we should behave.

A struggle I have had over the years is a desire to rain fire down on the adversary or to pray for God's love and blessings on the adversary.  I look at God's prophet who challenged the hundreds of prophets of baal and fire rained down on his adversary at the end of the day.  But then I remember when Jesus' disciples asked if they should call fire down from heaven and Jesus rebuked them.  It has left me confused on how I should pray.

Recently I had a strong desire to call fire down from heaven, but something inside seemed to say I should be praying for love to come down from heaven.  I have to admit, I didn't want to pray love on my adversary.  They didn't deserve it and I felt good to call down fire in judgement.  I thought I had Biblical precedence to back me up.  Admittedly, I understand now how wrong I was.

My confusion has cleared.  It seems calling fire down satisfies the flesh and does nothing for the heart.  It requires judgement on my part and I am not fit to judge.  In stead of becoming more Christ-like, I have tried to become God.  This is obviously dumb at best and disastrous likely.

There is a freshness and new life found when God reveals and we obey.  I've drawn a simple conclusion.  My responsible is to love.  As one of my facebook friends (Allison) has said, there is not us and them.  There is only us.  I am to pray love on us.  

It is in that love, God is glorified and we are blessed.  It is in that love, we are able and promised to live fruitful lives having all our needs met.  God even promises that all things work together for the good of those that love the Lord.  It is all wrapped up in this concept of limitless love.

When love is prayed on your adversary, an amazing thing happens.  I believe God sets boundaries around you personally, much like God puts boundaries around Job.  God allowed satan to do his worst, but with boundaries.  It is within these boundaries that God promises His grace is sufficient and it becomes real in your life.

I have personally experienced God's protective boundaries or hedges and actually seen them in action.  I have read and heard amazing testimony of others where beyond reason, boundaries were set and the evil ones were not allowed to cross.  

When the final chapter is written, God may call fire down from heaven.  He created all and He has authority to judge and execute as He sees fit.   We are to love.

It all starts with love and it ends with love.  May God be Gloried in it all.

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream

Wonderful God Spot... what exists beyond....

When pastor Todd Burpo and his wife, Sonja, asked their 4-year-old son Colton a simple question, they never expected his extraordinary response: Colton recounted an experience that reinforced their faith forever. Read an excerpt.

PROLOGUE

Angels at Arby’s

The Fourth of July holiday calls up memories of patriotic parades, the savory scents of smoky barbecue, sweet corn, and night skies bursting with showers of light. But for my family, the July Fourth weekend of 2003 was a big deal for other reasons.

My wife, Sonja, and I had planned to take the kids to visit Sonja’s brother, Steve, and his family in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. It would be our first chance to meet our nephew, Bennett, born two months earlier. Plus, our kids, Cassie and Colton, had never been to the falls before. (Yes, there really is a Sioux Falls in Sioux Falls.) But the biggest deal of all was this: this trip would be the first time we’d left our hometown of Imperial, Nebraska, since a family trip to Greeley, Colorado, in March had turned into the worst nightmare of our lives.

To put it bluntly, the last time we had taken a family trip, one of our children almost died. Call us crazy, but we were a little apprehensive this time, almost to the point of not wanting to go. Now, as a pastor, I’m not a believer in superstition. Still, some weird, unsettled part of me felt that if we just hunkered down close to home, we’d be safe. Finally, though, reason —and the lure of meeting little Bennett, whom Steve had told us was the world’s cutest baby — won out. So we packed up a weekend’s worth of paraphernalia in our blue Ford Expedition and got our family ready to head north.

Sonja and I decided the best plan would be to get most of the driving done at night. That way, even though Colton would be strapped into his car seat against his four-year-old, I’m-a-big-kid will, at least he’d sleep for most of the trip. So it was a little after 8 p.m. when I backed the Expedition out of our driveway, steered past Crossroads Wesleyan Church, my pastorate, and hit Highway 61. 

The night spread clear and bright across the plains, a half moon white against a velvet sky. Imperial is a small farming town tucked just inside the western border of Nebraska. With only two thousand souls and zero traffic lights, it’s the kind of town with more churches than banks, where farmers stream straight off the fields into the family-owned café at lunchtime, wearing Wolverine work boots, John Deere ball caps, and a pair of pliers for fence-mending hanging off their hips. So Cassie, age six, and Colton were excited to be on the road to the “big city” of Sioux Falls to meet their newborn cousin.

The kids chattered for ninety miles to the city of North Platte, with Colton fighting action-figure superhero battles and saving the world several times on the way. It wasn’t quite 10 p.m. when we pulled into the town of about twenty-four thousand, whose greatest claim to fame is that it was the hometown of the famous Wild West showman, Buffalo Bill Cody. North Platte would be about the last civilized stop — or at least the last open stop — we’d pass that night as we headed northeast across vast stretches of cornfields empty of everything but deer, pheasant, and an occasional farmhouse. We had planned in advance to stop there to top off both the gas tank and our bellies.

After a fill-up at a Sinclair gas station, we pulled out onto Jeffers Street, and I noticed we were passing through the traffic light where, if we turned left, we’d wind up at the Great Plains Regional Medical Center. That was where we’d spent fifteen nightmarish days in March, much of it on our knees, praying for God to spare Colton’s life. God did, but Sonja and I joke that the experience shaved years off our own lives.

Sometimes laughter is the only way to process tough times, so as we passed the turnoff, I decided to rib Colton a little.

Our preschooler giggled in the dark. “No, Daddy, don’t send me! Send Cassie ... Cassie can go to the hospital!”“Hey, Colton, if we turn here, we can go back to the hospital,” I said. “Do you wanna go back to the hospital?”

Sitting next to him, his sister laughed. “Nuh-uh! I don’t wanna go either!”

In the passenger seat, Sonja turned so that she could see our son, whose car seat was parked behind mine. I pictured his blond crew cut and his sky-blue eyes shining in the dark.

“Do you remember the hospital, Colton?” Sonja said.

“Yes, Mommy, I remember,” he said. “That’s where the angels sang to me.”

Inside the Expedition, time froze. Sonja and I looked at each other, passing a silent message: Did he just say what I think he said?

Sonja leaned over and whispered, “Has he talked to you about angels before?”

I shook my head. “You?”

She shook her head.

I spotted an Arby’s, pulled into the parking lot, and switched off the engine. White light from a street lamp filtered into the Expedition. Twisting in my seat, I peered back at Colton. In that moment, I was struck by his smallness, his little boyness. He was really just a little guy who still spoke with an endearing (and sometimes embarrassing) call-it-like-you-see-it innocence. If you’re a parent, you know what I mean: the age where a kid might point to a pregnant woman and ask (very loudly), “Daddy, why is that lady so fat?” Colton was in that narrow window of life where he hadn’t yet learned either tact or guile.

All these thoughts flashed through my mind as I tried to figure how to respond to my four-year-old’s simple proclamation that angels had sung to him. Finally, I plunged in: “Colton, you said that angels sang to you while you were at the hospital?”

He nodded his head vigorously.

“What did they sing to you?”

Colton turned his eyes up and to the right, the attitude of remembering. “Well, they sang ‘Jesus Loves Me’ and ‘Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho,’” he said earnestly. “I asked them to sing ‘We Will, We Will Rock You,’ but they wouldn’t sing that.”

As Cassie giggled softly, I noticed that Colton’s answer had been quick and matter-of-fact, without a hint of hesitation.

Sonja and I exchanged glances again. What’s going on? Did he have a dream in the hospital?

And one more unspoken question: What do we say now?

A natural question popped into my head: “Colton, what did the angels look like?”

He chuckled at what seemed to be a memory. “Well, one of them looked like Grandpa Dennis, but it wasn’t him, ’cause Grandpa Dennis has glasses.”

Then he grew serious. “Dad, Jesus had the angels sing to me because I was so scared. They made me feel better.”

Jesus?

I glanced at Sonja again and saw that her mouth had dropped open. I turned back to Colton. “You mean Jesus was there?”

My little boy nodded as though reporting nothing more remarkable than seeing a ladybug in the front yard. “Yeah, Jesus was there.”

“Well, where was Jesus?”

Colton looked me right in the eye. “I was sitting in Jesus’ lap.”

If there are Stop buttons on conversations, that was one of them right there. Astonished into speechlessness, Sonja and I looked at each other and passed another silent telegram: Okay, we really need to talk about this.

We all piled out of the Expedition and trooped into Arby’s, emerging a few minutes later with a bag of grub. In between, Sonja and I exchanged whispers.

“Do you think he really saw angels?”

“And Jesus?!”

“I don’t know.”

“Was it a dream?” “I don’t know — he seems so sure.”

Back in the SUV, Sonja passed out roast beef sandwiches and potato cakes, and I ventured another question.

“Colton, where were you when you saw Jesus?”

He looked at me as if to say, Didn’t we just talk about this?

“At the hospital. You know, when Dr. O’Holleran was working on me.”

“Well, Dr. O’Holleran worked on you a couple of times, remember?” I said. Colton had both an emergency appendectomy and then an abdominal clean-out in the hospital, and later we had taken Colton to have some keloid scarring removed, but that was at Dr. O’Holleran’s office. “Are you sure it was at the hospital?”

Colton nodded. “Yeah, at the hospital. When I was with Jesus, you were praying, and Mommy was talking on the phone.”

What?

That definitely meant he was talking about the hospital. But how in the world did he know where we had been?

“But you were in the operating room, Colton,” I said. “How could you know what we were doing?”

“’Cause I could see you,” Colton said matter-of-factly. “I went up out of my body and I was looking down and I could see the doctor working on my body. And I saw you and Mommy. You were in a little room by yourself, praying; and Mommy was in a different room, and she was praying and talking on the phone.”

Colton’s words rocked me to my core. Sonja’s eyes were wider than ever, but she said nothing, just stared at me and absently bit into her sandwich.

That was all the information I could handle at that point. I started the engine, steered the Expedition back onto the street, and pointed us toward South Dakota. As I hit I-80, pasturelands unrolled on either side, dotted here and there with duck ponds that glinted in the moonlight. By then, it was very late, and soon everyone else was snoozing as planned.

As the road hummed underneath me, I marveled at the things I had just heard. Our little boy had said some pretty incredible stuff — and he had backed it up with credible information, things there was no way he could have known. We had not told him what we were doing while he was in surgery, under anesthesia, apparently unconscious.

Over and over, I kept asking myself, How could he have known? But by the time we rolled across the South Dakota state line, I had another question: Could this be real?

From "Heaven Is for Real" by Todd Burpo with Lynn Vincent. Copyright © 2010. Reprinted by permission of Thomas Nelson.

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God Spots: http://37stories.wordpress.com

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream

Forgive me if i stumble, but it might be a fall worth taking...

Do you ever wonder about the depth of your Spirit experience?  I do all the time.  I wonder why God does this or why God does that.  I wonder if there is something more I might do to effect a stronger change on the world via the power of God.  I know I can’t do anything, but I believe Jesus abides in me and I in Him.   It is with that belief I wonder why I am so impotent when it comes to things of the faith….

It seems much of the miraculous things of the faith are not reachable from where one currently exists.  The “unreachables” seem to require change of heart and many times a change of location.  There are components of our inner being and physical world that hinder our ability to gain wisdom, knowledge and understanding.  It is true we look through glass that filters or hinders our ability to appreciate and incorporate the deeper things of our faith into the life we live.

Much of my life I have had an “off and on” desire for the deeper the things of the faith.  There were times when my Spirit was sensitized and I asked for deeper things.  Mostly, I didn’t receive them and wondered if what I was experiencing in my church life was all there is.  I heard stories of God working in miraculous ways in odd parts of the world, but it didn’t match up with my life.  I didn’t know why and I really didn’t work too hard at understanding because life chasing the American dream held plenty of challenges of its own.

The Word says that God will supply all your needs.  I suspect 9 out of 10 Christians will quickly respond with “God will not supply according to your wants.”  It is safe to say this and experience it, but here is a revelation. It seems to me desiring deeper things of the faith will not be provided as a “want”, but likely only as a “need”.  This thought or revelation becomes quickly problematic. 

If we desire the deeper things of the faith and they will only be supplied as a result of God’s determination of the need, we may find ourselves in highly uncomfortable situations.  These situations or events in our life create the “need” which then activates God’s promise of supply in the need, not the want.  It is in the need we begin experiencing the deeper things of the faith.

Confidence in life seems to come mostly from our gage of success in maintaining an ever increasing burden defined by the American way of life.  Our society and communities in which we live pressure us to conform to some standard of living the community has determined to be the norm.  We are not to get too far past the community or lag too far behind the community’s standards or expectations.  I wonder how much of this want “to fit” into the community or society in which we live, negatively impacts God’s desire or ability “to fit” into our life?

There was a monk of old who lived a life of service to his fellow man.  In the midst of living he developed a powerful pain in his side.  Eventually, the pain in his side would kill him.  As he lay in bed with this unbearable pain, he asked a fellow monk to roll him over on to the side where the pain would be the strongest.  It was in this unbearable pain, he found himself closest to Jesus. 

It seems suffering in the midst of unbearable pain is where each of us has opportunity to experience the reality of Jesus in our lives.  I say, “Opportunity” because choice and action is required in the suffering.  One has to choose Jesus as the supplier of need which may require a conscious decision to “roll over embracing the pain of suffering”. 

This choice is evidenced by a Spiritual realignment of your face into the light of Jesus.  Approaching Jesus requires a physical turning from the darkness of the world and allowing the light of Jesus to illuminate your life.  It is in the light of Jesus, God is obligated to honor His promise that His grace is sufficient to meet all your needs.  One finds self lacking in “want” and having all “needs” met.  This is truly a miracle of events that can only be orchestrated by God.  God is Gloried with your focus on Jesus.

I know many will read this and think it all sounds good on paper, but not experience any difference in living life.  Chasing the American dream will continue.  Impotence in your Spirit walk will be the norm and you will die wondering if that was all there is…  BUT it doesn’t have to be that way. 

You can choose to experience the deeper things of the faith.  It begins with desire and quickly followed with need.  The desire is a big step of faith, but the need can be the killer of desire.  “Job-like” suffering instantly creates need.  It is in your very real need, you have opportunity to take baby steps in faith that draw you into a more intimate fellowship through Jesus and with the Father. 

It is in this scenario, one finds self experiencing the abiding of Jesus in self and self in Jesus.  Life begins to be experienced through a wholly different perspective.  The lens through which we view the things of the world begins to bring focus on Jesus.  It is in experiencing an abiding presence of Jesus (He in you and you in He) we discover a new life in God’s Kingdom. 

The Word says pray, “His Kingdom come, His will be done on earth as it is in heaven”.  It is this Kingdom, I believe God desires His children to operate in and out of.  It from this place in my Spirit walk, I am not influenced by man’s teaching as I am not conscious of having been taught these principles.  I believe them to be true as revealed by God and influenced by an ever increasing appetite for His Word.

So forgive me if I stumble here in explanation, but this is the way it seems I am currently experiencing God.

 We live in a physical world on earth that is defined by physical parameters.  It is in this world I chose to live most of my life choosing little influence from God on how I chose to chase the American Dream and experience life on my terms.  I know many of you in your honesty will admit you are living life on “your terms” and doing a pretty good job of it.  After all it is the American Dream.

Living life in the experience of an abiding Jesus, you in Him and He in you inside the Kingdom is contrary to the life you know.   As I am a baby in my Kingdom life, I cautiously share a simplistic picture of how life in the Kingdom appears to work. 

It seems there is a physical world all encompassing in the existence of mankind. This physical world is created and owned by a loving God and is a subset of God’s existence and influence on the universe.  For some reason, God turned the world over to satan’s influence and then created man to live in it.  The beauty of man’s existence is God allowing His presence to redefine man’s life on earth as influenced by satan.  I hope God makes sense out of this for you, because this is where the meat is.

Through Jesus’ death on the cross and our acceptance in a belief He died for each of us, Jesus promises to abide in us and we choose to abide in Him.  I wonder at this point, if Jesus is obligated to abide in us or if He chooses to abide periodically as a result of our choices influenced by our heart’s condition.  I believe the Spirit never leaves, but I am not so sure Jesus is obligated to hang around in the midst of sin.

As Jesus abides, we find ourselves in the experience of living in God’s Kingdom as some sort of reality that engulfs us but is not all inclusive of the physical world.  It is like a subset surrounding each of us with Jesus and us in the midst of the Kingdom.  It is from the midst of life in the Kingdom, miracles are evidenced in our lives and in the physical world outside God’s Kingdom as we know it and in satan’s world.

It is as if we living in the Kingdom of God have the opportunity to ask God to reach outside His Kingdom we are experiencing and influence events in satan’s realm.  God’s intervention is in the realm of miraculous and I believe He is thrilled to allow us to participate in the miraculous and bring all Glory back to Him. 

The idea of God allowing us to operate in His good will and pleasure to influence things, people and events outside His Kingdom brings sense to the question of why God does or does not do things.  I believe it in not God being neglectful.  It is His children being neglectful.  We do not ask out of the resources of abiding in His Kingdom.

Imagine if His children were all operating from a platform on earth, experienced as His Kingdom and His will on earth was done as it is in heaven.  There would be an ever increasing grandness to His Kingdom on earth.  This grandness could eventually encompass all of the physical world and be defined by the Kingdom of God totally defeating and expunging the kingdom of satan.

This leads me back to my current experience in Christ.  I desire to live out life in God’s Kingdom, influencing the lives of others outside the Kingdom.  It is in this desire, I find myself daily redirecting my face toward Jesus and into His light.  It is in this desire, I find myself embracing the suffering of Christ.

I have not arrived, but for the first time I am able to better understand my destination and the importance of living out my Christian walk in His Kingdom.  It is from this perspective miracles happen, bringing Glory to the Father and His Kingdom continues to grow on earth as it is in heaven.   

I pray I have shared truth and if there is error, I thank God for His forgiveness.  I wish I had ears to hear and someone had the words to share these ideas earlier in my life.   Maybe it will be a help for you in your walk.  May you experience the richest and deepest of God’s love.

God bless,

archie

 

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream

Much like Earthquakes are inevitable in Japan... a Tsunami is inevitable in our Life.

I have been following the tragic episodes surrounding the largest earthquake ever to hit Japan and the 4th largest in world history.  The effects of the disaster have been catastrophic as seen through the camera's eye. As bad as the scenes are displayed, i am sure the emotional suffering placed on the people of Japan far exceeds any physical loss.  

Life is like that.  We as humans are made like that.  We live our live with hopes and dreams which never include disaster.  We do the best we can to achieve our dreams and inevitably  disaster strikes.  We did not plan for it.  We are not equipped for it.  It just happens no matter how hard we try to avoid it.  Even as God does not choose to love one person any more than He chooses to love another, disaster strikes all with an equal passion of hate.

Some will say disaster is just a freak of nature. I disagree.  God did not design a defective universe.  He did not design a world with built in fault lines that inevitably will create disaster.  I don't believe you will find defects in God's blue print of the universe.  There is perfection in God's plan.  The defect has to come from the forces of evil.  There is no other reasonable explanation.  

This logic applies to the life we live.  We dream positive dreams because God is a positive God.  He places wonderful positive life fulfilling dreams in your heart and in your mind because He loves us and wants us to enjoy the abundant life He has designed for each of us.  I believe His plan is a perfected plan, with no defects.  

Sadly the forces of evil have other ideas for our future and actively work to create defect in God's plan.  Only by the grace of God do we survive the hate owned by the forces of evil.

As you look at the devastation being experienced in Japan, consider the heart of each of the people in the midst of this catastrophe.  Pray for God's grace on them.  His grace is sufficient.  

Even as you pray for the heart of the people of Japan, consider your own life.  Consider the catastrophe you have experienced or are currently experiencing.  Despite living life the best way you knew how, you are suffering.  I am with you.  The suffering is not from God.  God's plan is perfect and He desires it to be perfected in you.  God's plan is full of love.  In the midst of your suffering, embrace God's love.  Stand firm in it.  

Be confident God sees your suffering and did not work it into His plan for you.  He hates it.  He desires you to live a full life wrapped, comforted and provided for by His extravagant love.  So in the midst of struggle, pray continually.  Trust God for His love and press on.  

Just as earthquakes bring tsunami, the waves will die down and life can be restored by the grace of God in the midst of His love.

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream

Uh.... Problem?

Guest Post by

 Mike Daniel on Friday, March 11, 2011 at 5:20pm

I have a problem.

 

My problem is that in my talks with church staff, in pastor coaching sessions, with groups of men or couples or singles at retreats, or when filling pulpits or leading church conferences I am beginning most of my messages with the words, "I have a problem."

 

Now, while I do find that funny, I don't write it to be funny. My problem really is that I begin most of my messages stating that I have - and in fact do have - a problem.

 

The problem is this: my audience almost never wants what they think or say they want. The church staff who say they want leadership really wants consolation for poor leadership. The men's retreat leaders asking me to share something new and fresh so they can experience a revitalization within their ministry want to only be taught what they already know - and may lynch a speaker they disagree with! Yet, what one already knows is almost never inspiring.

 

New insight which might lead to new perspective and revitalization requires someone admitting or at least being willing to admit that they have missed something previously - either by error of omission (truth missed) or commission (lies believed) - and if we are honest, usually the latter.

 

The world wants to be both inspired with newness and affirmed in our "oldness". People want new or even corrected direction without actually being redirected. It's almost as if we all desire MORE of our own thinking hoping it will make a difference in our experience, instead of desiring DIFFERENT thinking than what we already know.

 

We all want to be MORE right, but never wrong..."Correct AND agree with me so I'm even better at what I'm already about that nevertheless isn't working for me."

 

What is the solution?

 

Jesus Christ.

 

By Him you ARE right. Because of His Life, our Life isn't in our error, but instead our Life is found in His blamelessness. What I'd like to defend so often OF me is NOT me - it's the flesh IN me.

 

You see, once I recognize that I have flesh IN me but that it is NOT me, then I can admit my flesh patterns without them reflecting badly OF me. And I can only be okay seeing the flesh in me that's not me when I know the REAL me.

 

(Read the last two sentences two more times.)

 

Now - you will know the real you by knowing Christ.

 

When Peter identified who Christ was, Christ revealed who Peter was.

 

When the two disciples on the road to Emmaus identified who Christ was, they were changed - their fears, hope, perspective, needs, and behavior all changed based on knowing who He was more clearly.

 

The apostle Paul came to the end of himself on a dirt highway to Damascus that led him face-to-face with God unrecognizable and he said, "Who are you, Lord?" the answer to which changed not only him, but every generation since.

 

When we know Him, we know ourselves. But herein lies two immediate problems:

 

1. He is unknowable. Infinite God; finite me. No man can identify God in Christ to any other man.

 

2. He won't compete against me for centrality in my Life. When you want to bring about your desire for a circumstance, he'll let you try to create, try to be your own source for your needs, try to make circumstance and relationships what you desire, and try to manipulate him and others for your sense of identity and emotional needs, but that's what it looks like for us to pursue ourselves, not Him. He's not needing to prove Himself to anyone; God knows who He is. But do we know in the midst of circumstance and neediness that He is God?

 

So, that brings us out of a foggy forrest into a sunny meadow - a clearing of what it must mean to come to know Him...

 

When you come to the end of your self-determination, your independence, your hope in yourself, and your need to self-justify - at that precise moment - you can change your pursuit from you for you, or even God for you, to God for God. We can come to a place of wanting to know Him because of who He is, not what we want from Him. This - trusting Him for my needs enough to not be about my needs - is the opportunity for revelation.

 

And then Jesus Christ through His Spirit must can you revelation of Jesus Christ.

 

His is a revelation of Jesus, by Jesus that transforms us in the likeness of Jesus: our thinking, our feelings, and our behavior become His thoughts, His heart, and His will.

 

So Paul said, "I want to know Christ," forsaking all else that he would otherwise count as gain for that pursuit alone. In other words, what really would be benefit to him, he reconciles as a deficit to himself so that he might pursue Christ alone.

 

So, today, as you pay bills, and finish projects, and change diapers, and prepare meals, and read reports, and fight traffic, and check movie times, and chat with friends, and walk the corridors of your workplace, and ten thousand other things, ponder this: the Creator of the Universe wants to speak to you words unknowable, reveal Truth unsearchable, and free you to live as you're made to live in ways unimaginable as you are willing and available - okay with whatever He'll reveal and eager for Him alone - for every circumstance and activity to be useful to Him in revealing Himself so that you might live as an experience of who you really are in Him.

 

That every day might be participating with Him whom you are still discovering... Every challenge an opportunity to depend upon Him more deeply... Every venue a chance to experience His Life, His Joy, His strength, His sufficiency as you trust Him enough with what you need to be about Him instead of about what you need. ...that you might abide in Him who is our Life, know Him more by that abiding, and grow in intimacy with Him as you know Him more.

 

Problem solved.

 

 

 

ridiculously graced...

-mike.

 

Mike Daniel

www.StoneLife.org

Phone: 210-646-GRACE (4722)

--
God Spots: http://37stories.wordpress.com

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream

How fast do you run from a homeless person?

I drove to my Starbucks office to work on websites this morning.  It was a bit brisk, but sunny and bright.  I parked and looking off in a distance I spotted a homeless man.  It is pretty safe to label a person as homeless if he is laying on the concrete under a bridge, in a drainage culvert and visibly shivering from a few hundred yards away.  I pondered going down to see him, but i thought i didn't have any money so the trip would be fruitless.

I went into Starbucks, got me a nice hot coffee and orange cranberry scone on my Starbucks gift card.  It made me smile, put me in a good mood and for a few hours i was quite productive at work.  I was working on a website to help a nonprofit business succeed.  They had been quoted a couple thousand dollars for the job.  I said i could do it for a couple hundred and here i am... close to being done and broke.

Now i have been accused of writing about adventure in life in a prideful way, because it may seem like it is all about me.  But you know, it isn't all about me.  It is all about Jesus.  I want to share what Jesus abiding in me is choosing to do for other people.  I want you to know His abiding, also.  Possibly though my experiences, you will be encouraged to let Jesus abide in you and assist you in working out your faith.

That was my disclaimer in telling you i was broke, because it impacts the homeless man and i hope it impacts you. 

I packed up my laptop and headed to the car.  Can you imagine, hours later, the same homeless man is sitting in the same culvert, under the same bridge.  He is curled up rocking with a large beer bottle to keep him company.  Then the though hits me.  I have an emergency $10 in my wallet, along with the phone number to my bail bondsman.. That's another story, all about me and meant for you... i am smiling...

I climbed down the hill and into the drainage culvert.  I passively walked toward the underside of the bridge, because it looked like he was thinking about running.   As i got closer, i unfolded the ten dollars and knew he would stick around.  When i reached him, i gave him the money with no expectations but hoping he would get something to eat.  It was the money that bought me the privilege to sit down across from Robert and tell him about a God that loved him.

One thing i have discovered.  There is no wrong way to say Jesus abides in you and wants to show His love for you.  It doesn't take scripture, although there is power in the Word of God.  Robert just needed to know God loved him... God did not require him to quit drinking or smoking to get close.  God wants to love him today, just like he is.  Dirty.  Shivering.  Huddled under a bridge in a drainage culvert.  

The whole meeting took less than 5 minutes... i shook Robert's hand and we exchanged hugs... as i drove away, i wondered how God would choose to pay the rent this month.

So some will say, this story is all about me.  I am hoping you see past that thought and consider it may be all about you.

God bless and enjoy the day.

archie

Posted via email from Archie's Life Stream