Finger pointers

I was sitting at church on Sunday listening to a really great talk and we turned up this scripture.

"Whoever isolates himself seeks his own desire;
he breaks out against all sound judgment."
Proverbs 18 v 1

This thought might not have anything to do with this verse necessarily, but it got me thinking about isolation and how we usually only look at isolation in a physical context.

Another meaning for isolation is simply "the complete separation from others".

I thought about things that could separate us emotionally from those around us and one thing that sprung to mind is the act of passing judgment on others. I feel quite strongly that when you pass judgment on someone else, you are in fact separating yourself from the rest of humanity. You are elevating yourself to an unrightful place that is unattainable to the rest of humanity.

We are called to be holy, but we are not called to judge.

"Therefore let us not judge one another anymore"
Romans 14 v 13

Let’s face it, we tend to feel strongly about our personal preferences regarding what Christians should and should not do. And, when others violate our spiritual preferences, the finger-pointing begins! Paul doesn’t seem to take sides either, instead he says, “Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord. He who eats meat, eats to the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who abstains, does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God.” Romans 14 v 5-6. So each and every one of us should be convinced that what we are doing is pleasing to God.

I have been reading a book called "To love and be loved" by Sam Keen, and he talks strongly about learning to love a person holistically and completely. In his book he talks about learning to have empathy for others and that only through empathy, comes a deep and holistic love. One can only love someone holistically if they, like an actor would study a character, take on the life of the person whom we wish to love.

We have to remove ourselves from everything we know to be true, our own pasts, our own life altering experiences and view points, all the hundreds of things that have made us who we are today with the belief and value system we have today, and accumulate information about another person. We need to metaphorically put ourselves in their shoes and walk the life they walked. See the world through their eyes. Only by doing this will we be able to open our minds up to the joys and tragedies that others have lived. Maybe then we would have a little more love...a little more patience...and be a little less judgmental of those we have been called to love...holistically.

Who?

Who should we pray to?
If we pray to God does Jesus get jealous? If we pray to Jesus does God get jealous? Do we pray to both?

Imagine going to someone's house and greeting the man of the house and not greeting his partner wife. Do you think this is how Jesus feels when we pray exclusively to God? Is Jesus just the mediator? And what does that really mean? Should we pray to both God and Jesus simultaneously? Or does Jesus rejoice when we pray to God. Should we just pray to God, through Jesus? And what does that mean exactly? Because God asks us to show him love by showing others love. Does that mean if we pray to Jesus that we are actually praying to God?

Any thoughts?

A prayer for every soul

God be with those who explore in the cause of understanding, whose search takes them far from what is familiar and comfortable and leads them into danger and terrifying loneliness. Let us try to understand their sometimes strange or difficult ways, their confronting or unusual language, the uncommon life of their emotions, for they have been affected and shaped and changed by their struggle at the frontiers of a wild darkness, just as we may be affected, shaped and changed by the insights they bring back to us. Bless them with strength and peace.
Amen.

By Leunig

The Search for Self Importance

This is a great article I found on www.relevantmagazine.com - thought I would share it :)

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I had a Samsung Black Jack for a couple of years--the cute little red one. Unfortunately, my dog chewed on it one too many times, and some of the buttons stopped working. It did not receive emails, and picture texts were 30 cents each. My husband, who adores his iPhone, kept trying to persuade me to get one as well. It just seemed like too much work to me. Finally after my Black Jack had received it's last phone call and promptly died, I decided it was time to get an iPhone. After all, it would be nice to have all of those apps, right?
Everyone kept telling me, "If you get an iPhone you will love it!" I wasn’t totally convinced, but after a week of app-ing it up and texting pictures like crazy, I admit: I love this thing.

This morning when I was walking into the office, checking my emails on the elevator, I realized why people love the iPhone. Simply put, it makes them feel important. It makes them feel needed. It makes them feel that they are a supply in demand.

Think about the first people who started to carry pocket watches. These were the wealthy gentlemen who were imperative to society like the doctor and the mayor. Their time was so precious and their schedule so important that they had to have access to the time constantly. Before pocket watches, I am sure no one was ever on time. Nothing was pressing and no appointment was set in stone. But those people who carried time with them constantly--they were needed; they were important.

Again we saw this phenomenon with automobiles. All of the sudden someone’s affairs were so important that they had to have faster, more efficient transportation in order to get to their highly exclusive and significant events. I am convinced, that new technology is addicting because it gives people this false sense of self-worth. Any history teacher or stay at home mom can suddenly be the coolest and trendiest person with the help of that new great thing. Do you remember the first family in your neighborhood that got a desktop computer? Now they were cool.

On one hand, feeling important can be good for one’s psyche. It is the fake-til-you-make-it philosophy. I feel important, so I will act important. It is amazing what a little blind confidence can do for someone. But on the other hand, self-importance seems to be something swallowing our culture whole. Everyone wants to be famous. Everyone wants to be cool, creative, artsy. Everyone wants to have a blog—oh, wait a second ...

Everyone wants to feel important. I cannot accept this phenomenon at face value; I think this goes much deeper to an incarnate need we have as humans to feel valued and adored. Every person seeks to meet this need. Amazonian tribal members, who don’t own iPhones, seek importance through the acceptance and respect of the tribe’s elders. Infants seek to know their value displayed on their parents' faces and in the tone of their voices. And twenty-somethings with tiny seedling careers, like me, we seek it through the iPhone.

While the search for self-importance, the search for self-worth, can be extremely destructive when sought through artificial means, this ardent search is unavoidable. It is one reason why we get married, why we have careers and why we have children. It is our default setting, designed by God to make us eternal seekers for what is true, lovely and pure. I think God knew that we would, in a search for worth, pour our lives into our communities, into our children, and into others. I don't think it is an accident or wrong that we do this. Some people might protest that we should not seek to find meaning through avenues aside from Christ, but I believe that when our efforts are relational and not self-seeking, we find God there. One of the greatest surprises in life is when we realize our worth in Christ, and we weren't even looking for it.

by Kate Blackwell

Thought for the day

"Rare is the person who can weigh the faults of others
without putting his thumb on the scale."
- Byron J. Langnefield

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit,
but in humility consider others better than yourselves."
Philippians 2:3

Liquid

Dear God,
Help us to allow you to be liquid in our lives.
Seep into our cracks and crevices and fill our empty spaces.
Allow us the ability to let go and let you flow.
We call on you for every little thing...
no matter how big or how small.
We invite you in.
We love you.
Abide in us.
Amen.

Let's get building!

So I heard my first 'lady-exhort' on Sunday at Mt Colah meeting in Sydney...Jenni Pogson gave a brilliant talk and I enjoyed it so much that I asked her if i could share some of her thoughts with you! I hope you find as many gems as I did :) Hurrah! :)

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Now Haggai is an interesting book, it kind of doesn’t get much attention, it’s hidden away with all the other minor prophets, and it can be sometimes hard to find any encouragement or message from those guys up the back of the Old Testament, let alone trying to pronounce their names right. I’ve always said Haggai, some people say HaggAi, but I think I’ll just stick to what I am used to.

So Haggai was a prophet at a time where the people were back from exile in Babylon and had been living in Jerusalem for some years. These people had been through a lot, they had been living in a completely different country for decades in a foreign culture, a lot of them would know no other life really. I would have taken awhile to get back on their feet, get used to their country again, establish roots and find some normality in their lives. But it had been quite a few years since they had been back, probably about 16 years in fact, and everyone was settled in, had built some very nice houses for themselves. But while they were living these nice lives, God’s house, the Temple, was still lying in ruins. The foundation had actually been laid just after they arrived back in Jerusalem, but never finished, and so it just sat there, neglected and basically in ruins for years and years.

It says in Haggai that the people kept putting it off – “The time has not yet come for the Lord’s house to be built”, they said. They were waiting for the perfect time, a time when they felt it was right to be built. They had to be ready, the conditions had to be right, before they could really make an effort to build God’s house. But God would have none of that. “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your panelled houses, while this house remains in ruins?” he says through Haggai. The people were so caught up in their own lives, so intent on making a comfortable live for themselves, on focussing on their own concerns and comforts first, that they really had no time to be thinking about God. It was them first, God second. They did not make God a priority in their lives.

Sounds familiar hey. I know it’s so easy to get caught up in our lives, to be concerned about getting our own lives in order, getting a nice house, focusing on doing well at our jobs so we can move up the ladder and do well for ourselves and our family, that God is kind of pushed to the side a little. I mean, we come to church on Sunday, but how much of a sacrifice is that? God’s not interested in playing second, third or fourth fiddle to everything else going on in our lives. He wants to be our whole lives, for us to be so consumed with passion for Him that in permeates every aspect of our every day.

And it’s so easy to think that it really has to be the right time before we can do God’s work. We have to wait for the right moment to really commit ourselves to building God’s house, to build his church, to allow ourselves to do his work here on earth, to put Him first before anything else. But while we wait for the right time, God’s house is lying in ruins. There are people in our community who need us. There are people who are so lonely that just one visit a week from a few friendly people would mean the world to them. There are people who are not able to perform tasks such as mowing their lawn or changing a light bulb, because of a disability or some sort of limitation. And there are people who have everything but feel some sort of emptiness inside and are searching for more, but don’t know where to look. The community needs us, and God needs us to build his house here in Mt Colah.

I know sometimes we’ll do a preaching effort and spend a day really trying to do good and spread the word of God. Sometimes we feel like we have “planted much, but harvested little”. That’s what the people of Haggai’s day felt. They felt they had done some pretty good stuff, but they weren’t seeing the benefits of it. It can sometimes feel like that, can’t it. We do a big preaching day and then are surprised and disappointed that no one responds. Oh well, we say, we tried. We tried to build God’s house, we spent a whole day trying to do it, but no one cared. I guess they are just not interested. Or we do something nice for someone, a good deed, and feel really good about ourselves. I don’t really think this is building God’s house. It may be laying the foundation, but then there’s no follow-up. It takes more than one day to build a house. It takes commitment and it takes care and consistency. It needs to be ongoing, we need to take an interest in people’s lives, rather than just a blitzkrieg and then nothing. If we’re going to build God’s house it takes time and it takes effort.

Haggai said to the people, “go up into the mountains and bring down timber and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and be honoured”. Going up a mountain takes effort. Going up a mountain and carrying massive trees back down, it’s not just an afternoon activity.

It all just seems like hard work doesn’t it? But it’s not about work, it’s about changing the way we live our lives to be more responsive to what God is leading us to do. It’s putting Him and His work first in our lives. And you know what? God is with us! God says to the people “I am with you”. He is behind us 100%, because it’s not our work we’re doing, it’s His! He’s got this weird way of working where he uses the weakest things you can imagine, us, to complete his will on earth.

So the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerrubabel, the governor of Judah, and Joshua the high priest, and the spirit of the whole remnant of the people, says in verse 14. And they began work on the house of the Lord Almightly, their God.

Do you sometimes feel stirred to do something? You get a sudden enthusiasm for a particular project or idea, and you get really excited, maybe after a conference, or after hearing something, and you just really want to do it! But then after a while things get in the way, and the excitement dies, and then you pretty much forget about it. It happens to me all the time. Did you ever think that maybe God is stirring us to do something? But if that’s true, what happens when we just ignore it and do nothing?

At a recent women’s conference one of the speakers was the founder of the A21 project, an organisation that seeks to end trafficking of women and children around the world and rescue them from sexual slavery. The speaker said on a recent trip to the shelter they have for these women in Greece there was a woman, originally from somewhere in Eastern Europe, who had only been saved from sexual slavery for about two days. She was understandably angry and bitter and still untrusting of the organisation that had helped rescue her. In her broken English she asked the speaker why they had come and why they were doing this work. The speaker said they were Christians and they felt they were doing God’s work in freeing women from bondage and abuse. She felt good she could explain to this woman how great God was that he could free her and others from such horrific circumstances.

Suddenly the woman burst out, “Then why didn’t you come sooner?” The speaker was taken aback, as this was not the response she was expecting. “There are thousands of women who have been in slavery for years, why are you only coming now? Why has God only heard our cries for help now?” the woman asked angrily.

The speaker paused, then said to her: “Honey, God has always heard your cry, it just took me this long to hear it”.

God always hears cries for help. He is not deaf or busy doing something else, he hears the cries from our lips and the cries from our hearts. “When he cries out to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate,” says the Lord in Exodus 22:27.

“The righteous cry out, and the LORD hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles,” David writes in Psalm 34:17.

However, the way God works in the world, the way he chooses to do his will and outwork his plan for the earth, is most extraordinary. He uses us. Us, the weak and broken people we are. He uses us to spread his message of love, justice, peace and salvation to the world. He uses the weak things of this world to shame the strong, 1 Corinthians says.

We are Christ's ambassadors, Paul says. Jesus was sent here on the earth to show us that we can become the righteousness of God.

Why does God, all throughout the Bible, urge us to “defend the cause of the weak and the fatherless” (Psalm 82:3), “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute,” (Prov 31:8), “to look after orphans and widows in their distress” (James 1:27). Why doesn’t just God do it himself? Because God works through us for his own purpose, if we allow ourselves to be his instruments. We are the answers to the millions of prayers that rise to God every day, we are the answer to the cries of help from those who are lonely, who need a friend, who need encouragement. But God will not interfere with our free will. He wants us as willing servants. He may want us to be an answer to someone’s prayer, but it is up to us whether we are willing. He may stir us to so something, but it is still up to us whether we do it.

How many answers to prayers have been delayed because we couldn’t be bothered listening to that call in our heart to reach out to someone in need? How many prayers are still waiting to be answered? We are how God defends the cause of the weak and fatherless, we are how God looks after orphans and widows in their distress. But we need to be willing participants in God’s work. The harvest is plenty but the workers are few, Jesus said. Why does God allow suffering and loneliness and injustice in the world? Because we allow it.

So next time we have an urge to call someone we haven’t spoken to in awhile, to help that elderly neighbour do some housework, to send a card, to donate money, to start a project at here at Mt Colah or your church, maybe we shouldn’t ignore it. We may just be the answer to a prayer. It may be God desperately trying to get us to help him do his work. “For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13).

We need to respond. We need to build God’s house, we need to get to work! For too long God’s house has remained a ruin while we live comfortably in ours. God is with us! He has asked us to be part of this exciting adventure we call life. If we let him God can take us on an amazing journey, where we can meet amazing people and allow God to touch lives through us, and let him touch our lives as well. We should be honoured that God lets us be a part of his plans. It’s not meant to be a chore, or work, it’s meant to be our life. So let’s live it the way God wants us to, not because that’s what God told us to do, but because our will and his will align so closely together. Let us begin work on the house of the Lord Almighty, our God.