The Problem…

In some ways it’s the height of comical irony that a culture such as ours so steeped in the worship and reverence of love could have it so wrong…

but it does.

It’s often confused with sex, perhaps as a result of the perception that it’s somehow inherently explained by the misleading commonly used expression

“make love”.

Sadly, many settle for the red-headed step-child of love “attention” primarily because we don’t really know the difference. Children, both young and old, act out in bad behaviors that are really just cries for help or for “love”.

It’s sometimes described as a feeling, but that’s kind of like saying Gods creation is God and then worshiping “it” instead of Him. We’re told that love is a choice, which is true, but how does that help us to make loving choices? We’re inundated with a constant flow of dis-functional concepts and examples from every possible source! Through the song lyrics that brainwash us daily all the way back to the fairytale stories that were read to us as children.

I feel very comfortable in saying that all of the most screwed up things that you and I have done in our lives are directly related to our misunderstanding of God and of love, and our search for both.

Almost invariably, mans search for love and his quest for the understanding of it are motivated only by his selfish desires to marshal it’s great power for his own purposes. Man has become a master at peddling illusions and perpetrating lies on his fellow man in order to get what he wants. One is seen as being successful in this life by demonstrating an ability to manipulate others and more importantly to convince themselves that it’s love that they’re offering. None of which would be possible apart from the basic ignorance about the true nature of love that’s so prevalent. We’re like blind people feeling around in the dark who are stung, bitten and burned as a result of working through a process of elimination hoping to find the real thing.

As unfortunate as ignorance is,there’s still cause for hope in that ignorance can be dealt with through simple knowledge. Whats most unfortunate are those of us who have allowed fear to take hold of our spirits. In acting out of fear we acknowledge our own personal insufficiency by believing that we are the source of our limited provision. We’ve been taught to look out for number one which is of course ourselves because if we don’t who will? certainly not a benevolent God, afterall, everyone knows that God helps those who help themselves right?. But in truth, God helps or comes to save those who absolutely cannot help or save themselves!

And that’s exactly the work I believe God is wanting to use His church to accomplish!

God Is Love!

As His representatives and ambassadors, disciples and followers, evangelist’s and ministers, church members and children, shouldn’t we have, based on our personal relationship with Jesus, a much greater familiarity with love than those who don’t or who aren’t any of those things?

Love is the answer!

Perhaps we as the church have forgotten that. We live in the midst of a world full of people who are crying out for answers, are we prepared to give them? Shouldn’t we be the ones teaching the world about love?  This world is a vineyard ripe for harvest, and the only real preparation necessary for us as Christians is to truly receive that love and those answers first ourselves! How can we say that we know the Lord, or that we’ve accepted Christ as our Savior, and then stand idly by in the presence of so much need in our own assigned area’s of mission field earth?

We’ve been given the perfect example of what love is in Christ.

I don’t think there’s any way that I personally could ever be thankful enough for what He did for me. If I really mean that, then what does it mean?

We need more than a “revival” what we need is a revolution! A love revolution…

And since love is an action word, a “verb”, that means we need to shift our focus away from merely talking about it week in and week out to one of making some thoughtful plans to implement it in some way scratch that, every way possible! I’m not talking about some token “feel good” project that doesn’t require much from us. What I’m suggesting here is that we work in earnest the great harvest that’s been prepared before us! Just as Christ held nothing back on our behalf, How can we do any less?

We can make the most of the opportunity before us by bringing everything we have to bear on this Kingdom battle for the souls of those around us who our Heavenly Father dearly loves!

Or we can listen to fear…

It’s a choice each of us has to make,there is no way to “abstain”

We can either choose to live in love or be imprisoned by fear.

We can choose to serve the One True God and His Kingdom…

Or be a slave to the one who opposed Him and who is also our enemy.

Is that a problem?

Advertisement

Our Path,Our Purpose,and Gods Provision

At the core of my belief system is the idea that if we will do what we’re supposed to do in life our needs will be met, paramount among which is to be loved. That can be a tricky thing to know exactly what it is we’re supposed to be doing, to say the least. It also takes courage and trust to actually do that thing once you figure out what it is. So important is this concept to me that I named my blog “Seeking The Kingdom” to place an emphasis on how simple I feel that life can actually be.

Allow me to bring this down to a personal level… My current financial situation is not good, I’ve been out of work for over a year. (stay tuned blog fans, this has recently changed) I’ve tried a lot of different things during that time to make money but for one reason or another nothing has worked. I have clearly made some bad choices in that time but I’ve also had some bad breaks. What I have done successfully during that time is to do what I was compelled to do, to tell people the great news that God loves us all, that he wants to heal us, to provide for us, and to spend eternity with us in a perfect place he’s prepared for us. So far, I’ve never missed a meal, still have a roof over my head, a car to drive and gas to put in it! I’ve been imprisoned, and impoverished, and I can honestly tell you I’ve never been happier.

Recently I’ve written some things about the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin. I’d like to clear up any misunderstandings if possible by first of all saying that in no way do I believe that a woman shouldn’t work outside the home. This is an issue that is also very close to me right now given my aforementioned circumstances. It’s an issue that me and my wife have struggled with recently. My wife home schools our seven year old daughter, she does all of the housework, attempts to cook and a host of other things in our home. What changed my mind as to her seeking employment outside the home is the basic premise that I started with…what my wife does here is SO much more important than the money that she could make at a job. Being here and doing what she’s doing IS what she’s supposed to be doing! If the choices that we’ve made together are selfish and self serving then I wouldn’t expect to see Gods provision in them…Our daughter is the most precious gift that God ever entrusted us with, I’d much rather lose everything I have than to give my consent to compromising that most sacred of stewardship’s. My problem with Palin is that she holds herself up as an example to young women of being able to “have it all” while the pregnancy of her teenage daughter is somehow seen as an acceptable trade-off for her career…And, she wants to be considered a Christian, well okay, I’ve made my share of bad choices in life and I’ll readily admit to them, I’ve turned from as many of them as I can,I use them as “cautionary tales” to anyone who will or who needs to listen. Sarah Palin is my sister in Christ and I love her, I’m pretty sure I believe in most of the same things that she does. But here we go again, instead of taking the opportunity to use her publicity to caution women about balancing family and work which in my opinion would really be a wonderful thing for her to do…I see her as sweeping it under the rug and once again making winning this election and her career the priority. That seems pretty self serving to me even though she would claim to be a public servant, which is fine, I know who I serve…