aSacredRebel

Complete Joy!

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another. (John 15:9-17, NRSV)

If you love me you will keep my commandments…

Interesting…

You see Jesus never said, “In order for you to earn my love you have to follow my commandments.”

He told us, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments, and those are love God and love your neighbor as yourself.”

You see God chose you to be His hands and feet to go and share His love with all of the world. He gave us His commands so that we could love ona another!

And the reason we are to love, so that we may have His joy, and because of that our joy may be complete!

If we can follow His commands and love God and each other, then there will be complete joy!

And I do not know anybody who doesn’t want complete joy!

change

Change This picture is a postcard I got a while ago while I was pastor at a previous congregation I served. It was an advertisement for a book from Spark House. I was not interested in the book, but I was interested enough in the saying to keep the card on my bulletin board.

Change is something we try to avoid, because change is hard even if it is good change. It is hard to do things different, to not do it the same old way.

But the problem with that sometimes leads us to hope things will be different even when we do the same things! Albert Einstein is attributed with saying, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.” If we always do things the way we have, nothing will ever change, no matter how hard we wish it would!

I say all of this, because there are changes happening. Some of them you will notice, and others may go without even causing a ripple. Some of them will affect some of you greatly, and others of you may or may not even see a difference. But if it affects one of us, it affects us all!

And my hope is the changes will affect us all. I hope and pray that we will learn how to talk with each other about our faith. Thus helping us to better understand our faith and better be able to share it in the world around us. I hope and pray we will all be disciples of Jesus, helping each other grow in our faith and deeper in relationship with Jesus.

You see we are all learners and teachers. We are helpers and leaders. We are all a part of the body of Christ and we need each other!

So if something has changed and you need to talk about it, my door is open, please come and have a chat! All of us are in this together and we need everyone to be a part of God’s mission so that we can change the world!

Because the change God has for the world is better than any change it will get from the vending machine!

seek the Lord

Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it. For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress; instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle; and it shall be to the LORD for a memorial, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off. (Isaiah 55:6-13, NRSV)

Forsake the things that do not lead you to the Lord!

If you leave behind the things that separate you from God, He will accept your repentance and be found to you in a way which you may not have known before!

He will pardon you sins and see not your iniquity.

But that is the thing, what separates you from God? You need to leave that behind and seek after Him, for His ways are not our ways, and what is right for us in our relationship with God may or may not be the right thing for someone else.

We need to identify what it is that keeps us from God and leave it behind, and allow God to take its place in our life, so we will know His ways, and the over abundance of blessings He has for us!

So seek the Lord and allow Him to show you His ways!

Refreshing

In this way God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, that his Messiah would suffer. Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah appointed for you, that is, Jesus, who must remain in heaven until the time of universal restoration that God announced long ago through his holy prophets. Moses said, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you from your own people a prophet like me. You must listen to whatever he tells you. And it will be that everyone who does not listen to that prophet will be utterly rooted out of the people.’ And all the prophets, as many as have spoken, from Samuel and those after him, also predicted these days. You are the descendants of the prophets and of the covenant that God gave to your ancestors, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your descendants all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’ When God raised up his servant, he sent him first to you, to bless you by turning each of you from your wicked ways.” (Acts 3:18-26, NRSV)

Have you ever really needed a drink?

Needed water so bad, that when it crossed your lips it was the best tasting substance that had ever entered your mouth?

Luke is reminding the community here in Acts, when we turn around and seek the Lord, that He will be present in our lives and will bring about times of refreshing simply ny being in His presence!

Jesus’ presence is the drink of water when we are parched! It is the presence in our lives that makes our lives!

So turn around and see Him waiting to give you the refreshing life you have always wanted!

Return

Return, O Israel, to the LORD your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity. Take words with you and return to the LORD; say to him, “Take away all guilt; accept that which is good, and we will offer the fruit of our lips. Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses; we will say no more, ‘Our God,’ to the work of our hands. In you the orphan finds mercy.” I will heal their disloyalty; I will love them freely, for my anger has turned from them. I will be like the dew to Israel; he shall blossom like the lily, he shall strike root like the forests of Lebanon. His shoots shall spread out; his beauty shall be like the olive tree, and his fragrance like that of Lebanon. They shall again live beneath my shadow, they shall flourish as a garden; they shall blossom like the vine, their fragrance shall be like the wine of Lebanon. O Ephraim, what have I to do with idols? It is I who answer and look after you. I am like an evergreen cypress; your faithfulness comes from me. (Hosea 14:1-8, NRSV)

Does it feel like everything is falling apart?

Is it feeling like the harder you try to go a step forward you fall three steps back?

Like you can’t make any progress, and no matter what you do it never seems to work?

Maybe you are like Israel in our reading…

You have stumbled in your iniquity…

Return to the Lord!

He is waiting right behind you for you to turn around and throw yourself into His arms, and take the salvation He is giving you!

Nothing but God can save you, and all you need to do is return to the Lord!

He is waiting to walk with you through the darkness, to pick up the pieces, and put the blessings He has for you where they need to be in your life!

Change of heart

When he entered the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him as he was teaching, and said, “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?” Jesus said to them, “I will also ask you one question; if you tell me the answer, then I will also tell you by what authority I do these things. Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?” And they argued with one another, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say to us, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ But if we say, ‘Of human origin,’ we are afraid of the crowd; for all regard John as a prophet.” So they answered Jesus, “We do not know.” And he said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things. “What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ He answered, ‘I will not’; but later he changed his mind and went. The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir’; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him; and even after you saw it, you did not change your minds and believe him. (Matthew 21:23-32, NRSV)

Have you ever made sure you say the right thing?

Have you ever made sure you do the right thing?

Is it about saying the right thing?

You see the second son told the father what he wanted to hear. The father wanted to hear that the son was going to do what he was asking him to do. And when the second son said the right thing, was that what was needed?

Well no, because he only told his father he was going and then didn’t do it…

Is it about doing the right thing?

Well the first son told the father that he wasn’t going to go, but later he changed his mind and did what he said he wouldn’t. Is that what was needed? It’s not about doing what we think is right either…

It is not about saying the right thing or doing the right thing…

Because the right thing for the situation maybe the thing we think is wrong, and the right thing to say maybe the furthest thing from our mind…

It is about the place of your heart, and where your heart lies.

You see it is about changing our hearts to follow after God and do what He is leading us to. Not doing something because we think it is the right thing to do, or will get us points, but doing it because it is what God is leading us to do and that is truly what our heart wants to do.

So allow God to change you heart, so where he leads you, you will follow!

You provide!

You visit the earth and water it, you greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water; you provide the people with grain, for so you have prepared it. You water its furrows abundantly, settling its ridges, softening it with showers, and blessing its growth. You crown the year with your bounty; your wagon tracks overflow with richness. The pastures of the wilderness overflow, the hills gird themselves with joy, the meadows clothe themselves with flocks, the valleys deck themselves with grain, they shout and sing together for joy. (Psalm 65:9-13, NRSV)

Have you ever really stopped to think and list out all of the blessings you have in your life?

We complain about the heat and the snow and the rain… But without them, would anything really grow?

We have so many things in our lives to be thankful for, that we sometimes forget that they are blessings…

When the rain changes our plans of a picnic, we look down upon it, but without it, the garden would not grow and the food we are eating would not be there…

God so loves us that His blessings flow onto us daily…

He prepared this place for you, and you for this place. So see your life as God sees it, a blessing to you and to others!

grace upon grace

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. John testified to him and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’” From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known. (John 1:14-18, NRSV)

The Word of God became flesh and dwelt among us…

And from His fullness we have all received grace upon grace!

Because He came we have all received grace from Him.

Not those who deserve it….

Not those who earn it…

But all have received beacuse of His fullness. We all have access to the greatest gift anyone could possibly receive, and to receive it over and over again, because of His fullness and His love for us!

counsel who

O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! “For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” “Or who has given a gift to him, to receive a gift in return?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen. (Romans 11:33-36, NRSV)

Everything that we have has come from one place…

Everything that is around us came from that same place…

Everything that is now or ever was or ever will be came from that same place also…

Who are we to seek to counsel God in anything?

He wants us to follow Him, not offer Him advice. He has created all things, and has given us every good thing we have, and has walked with us through every dark valley we have trodden, so trust Him, and expect nothing from Him, but know that you will always be richly blessed by Him!

destined for adoption

Destined for Adoption Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, just as he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love. He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace that he lavished on us. (Ephesians 1:3-8, NRSV)

How many of us have ever felt like we don’t belong?

We have been picked last, or made to feel like an outsider…

Most of us if we are honest with ourselves have been there.

We have been left out and not a part of the in crowd…

But here God has destined us for adoption!

God wants you. When no one else does God still wants you to be His child.

Not because of who you are or aren’t or because of anything you have done, didn’t do, or will do, but simply because it his His good pleasure!

He loves you and wants to bless you.

And because of that we have redemption through Jesus Christ and get to be children of God!