Our Hinge in an Unhinged World

“The greatest distinction between Christianity and other religions is that the death of its founder did not mark the termination of His life and ministry. . . . . The Resurrection is the hinge on which the truth of our faith turns, and without it nothing else would really matter. . . . The dynamic joy of our faith would turn into speculation, and Christianity would be simply one of many human philosophies and religious theories.” Nothing But the Truth: Upholding the Gospel in a Doubting Age by John MacArthur




It would be interesting to get the statics on how many home grown business went down the minute the original founder passed away. I can name two in my own home town that did just that. Basically their death did mark the termination of the business as it was, as their love ones weren’t interested in making it work. Living in the hometown where the founder of Les Schwab lived and died I’ve been watching to see if the same thing happens to all his tire stores since he passed away recently.



Without the resurrected Christ the same thing would have happened to the church. There is no way we would have kept it going without our founding Father still being alive and well and active in each establishment and heart. It’s a great thing to know that the death of our founder, Jesus Christ didn’t terminate anything but bondage to sin itself. His death and resurrection were the beginning of something bigger not the end of something self-created. No, I take that back it was the end of something self-created, sin.



Indeed the resurrection is the hinge on which the truth of our faith turns. Without it nothing else really matters. It is the reason we stay together and the reason we are able to survive. It’s our life line. We need to show the world that our founder is not dead but very much alive. Alive in our lives, active in our church, present in our hearts, and displayed in our actions.



In order to convince the world we serve a risen Savior we need to believe it ourselves. Too often we live our lives as if God wasn’t there watching over us. We worship Him on Sunday and do our own thing for the rest of the week. When life hits us upside the head we react first in an ungodly manner sometimes and then we turn to God. I am speaking of myself. I’m ashamed of my reactions that get ahead of my actions. God is all I have yet I treat Him sometimes like He’s my last resort, unhinged and trying to hang on by my own strength.



Shame on me, shame on us. Let us make our Founder proud. Many of the people who work for Les Schwab have never met their Founder and never will now that he has passed away. We get to meet our Founder, each and everyone of us. May He be proud, our hinge via faith in an unhinged world.



Nina is our hostess of the week at her site http://mamaslittletreasures.com/ run on over there and read and share with group regarding the wonderful message in today’s quote. October is coming if you hadn’t noticed we will be talking about planting seeds, maintaining a garden and harvesting what we planted. Get your shovels and tools out and join in.

Right Side IN

“What we do as followers of Christ flows out of who we are in Christ.” Scott Savage Minister to Young Adults North Phoenix Baptist Church 

 

The mystery still remains when people ask the question, “Which came first the chicken or the egg?” Everyone has their own answer to that puzzle like many have different answers to, “where does what we do as followers in Christ flow from?” The only answer to that question is not a mystery it is plain and simple, it comes from who we are in Christ.

 It starts with who we are IN Christ. Like the old saying goes, garbage in, garbage out. What comes out of our mouths flows from what is in our hearts. What we do as followers of Christ flows out of who we are in Christ. It’s as simple as that. Without Christ on the inside of us it will never show up on the outside.

 It begins with inviting Christ into our lives and then making the room for Him to work, live, and operate. Christ wasn’t meant to be a couch potato living at our place doing absolutely nothing. We are the ones that make Him out to be that way by not allowing Him access to every part of our lives.

 Christ wasn’t meant to be put up on a shelf and dusted off with the family Bible whenever we need a prayer answered or a scripture found. He is designed to work from the inside out. Too often we find ourselves wearing our clothes inside out and it just doesn’t work. This weekend as I got my grandson ready for church I noticed he had his shirt on inside out. The convincing element for him to believe me was the tag hanging out in the back.

 Why isn’t it that simple to let people know they are wearing their spiritual clothes inside out? They think wearing a cross around their necks, going to church on Sunday, never committing adultery or any of the "big” sins makes them a Christian. That is a totally backward, inside out attitude on what needs to be. They are trying to dress from the outside in not the inside out.

 It can’t be said enough that Christ needs to be on the inside where He is allowed to operate. By doing that our spiritual walk is launched into something that demonstrates we have Christ living in our house and the flow begins. How we operate the spiritual home of our heart will determine what flows out in the things we do. Plain and simple we need to keep Christ active and available by the choices we make, the attitudes we display, the willingness we have to allow Him the access to the most important part of our lives, our heart, His home.

 Christ in, Christ out. It’s as simple as that. Where it gets complicated is when we try to hold back pieces of our lives for ourselves and close off access to rooms we don’t want to give up. Rooms that is full of resentment, anger, “our rights”, bad choices, and so much more. Time is now to open up that access and allow Christ on the inside and start to wear our spiritual clothes on right.

 Right side in means Christ on the INside, flowing out in all we say and do!

 

Our host today is Debbie at Heart Choices, you need to get over there to see and share with the rest of the gang on this great quote.

 

 

The Perfect Seat

“Remember this. When people choose to withdraw far from a fire, the fire continues to give warmth, but they grow cold. When people choose to withdraw far from light, the light continues to be bright in itself but they are in darkness. This is also the case when people withdraw from God.” ~Augustine~

Aren’t people amazing? They think they can play with fire and not get burnt and move away from the light and still see. As much as we would all like to have that “perfect seat” we never seem to find it. At our family park around the fire pit the chairs constantly seem to be moving. If its not the smoke getting to them, the fact that the fire is too hot or not hot enough sends people around the pit in searching for that “perfect seat.”

The same is true with light. Yesterday as I went for my mid-morning walk with a co-worker someone back at the clinic was busy. An order from the “higher up” was given that all light bulbs needed to be working. The problem with that is the fact that some people didn’t want them working. Years ago we had made peace between those who like it dark and those who like the light. Eventually all had settled into their “perfect seats.”

However, just like that within a matter of minutes the seats of choice were no longer perfect. Old arguments arose once more about headache lights and hurt eyes. In either case whether we chose to sit close to the fire the fire continues to give warmth. Whether we like the lights on or off doesn’t change the wattage of the light itself when it shines.

The same is true with God and our relationship with Him. God is there whether we choose to live closely in the warmth of His love or walk in the brightness of His light or not. We need to be the ones who are willing to adjust our chair to get that “perfect seat.” The seat found near God. The one brightly lit with the rays of His Fatherly love and care. Over the years since the beginning of time we have always viewed the perfect seat as the one right next to God. Only Jesus belongs in that seat. Our seat is the one close by. It may be tattered and torn showing tremendous sign of wear over the years but that doesn’t matter. A seat worn and torn by our struggles in life while on earth that has been trial tested and endurance proofed as we did all we could to keep it near God.

It reminds me now of the song about the old rugged cross. For Christ it was the rugged cross, it was a symbol of suffering and shame. We have our old rugged chair that is the symbol of our suffering and shame endured over time in our quest to be the children God wanted us to be. It has nothing to do with our sufferings for doing wrong and making bad choices but our suffering to remain close to God no matter what the cost.

Eventually destiny has it that we will all be called home and there awaiting us will be God, Jesus, and that “perfect seat.” Oh, it makes me cry just thinking about it. How awesome can you get! It’s awesome to know we all have that opportunity but it starts with us today and how willing we are to adjust our seat here on earth. Adjusting it to stay within the warmth of God’s loving arms and the light of His glory and grace in Jesus. Hot or cold? Light or dark? Which is it going to be?

© 2010 Karen J. Gillett @ Pencil Marks and Recipes Publishing

Christing, the completion of something whole

Christian is a great noun and a poor adjective.~ Rob Bell

As we all know a noun is something that represents a person, place, or thing. Add an “ing” to a verb like read “reading” and it can become a noun as well. An adjective on the other hand is a word that describes, identifies, modifies, and quantifies the noun or pronoun. Now that we have our English 101 class behind us lets try and decipher today’s quote.

Depending on what angle you go at this quote one can agree or disagree with it. Duh, Karen! What a novel idea. Isn’t that what it is with anything! You can either agree or disagree. I think I need another cup of coffee.

As a noun a Christian represents a person, place, or thing. The person is Christ. The place is eternity with Him, and the thing being His Holy Spirit, grace, love, and forgiveness. The better the noun the better the representation of Christ and right there is the task we have been given on earth to accomplish being imitators of Christ.

In order to be that noun of a Christian we need action in our lives and thus we need to be a verb as well. Something that is shows action as we should show action on behalf of God’s kingdom. Once we have that we can slap a “ing” on that verb and make it a noun. “Christing” would that be the word? In any case it leads us back to the noun concept.

Some could argue that the noun is Christ and we are the adjectives, the things surrounding Him that describes, identifies, modifies, and quantifies Him. In other words, the witness people can gaze upon that points them to Jesus. If you think about it we should make very good adjectives as we paint a picture of Christ that glorifies God and builds Him up as the noun instead of us.

After a couple of swallows of coffee I think I might see what Rob Bell was after. We as Christians shouldn’t be all talk but demonstrate strongly the role of Christian. We can describe, identify, modify, quantify all we want with words but do our actions speak louder than those words. Are we “Christing” as we should?

We need to figure out for ourselves which part of the sentence we want to be? The Capital Letter at the Beginning that Leads the Way for the Rest or the noun that has a specific person, place, or thing it is representing. Or the adjective that simply is there to describe the main character. Perhaps if we look closely enough at the way we are behaving we might find we are the period at the end of the sentence. The one that says “its my way or the highway, end of sentence, PERIOD.”
Opps, been there and done that and it wasn’t the best of places to be living within the attitude of it’s my way or the highway kind of life.

What a blessing it is that Jesus gives us the opportunity to be the center stage noun person people need to see. We don’t have to stay an adjective that is full of only descriptive words; we can actually be like Christ. We will never “be” Christ but we can be like Him, there’s a difference.

“Christing” we’ll call it, is where we put together the whole sentence, a noun representing Christ, a verb giving us our action, an adjective describing what Christ is like, and yes even the period at the end. The period that says this is it, period, no more. It shows Satan that the formula for our lives is complete. Thanks to God we are a complete sentence in Christ snuggled in between the Capital letter at the beginning, the time in which we came to Christ and the period at the end. The completion of something whole, our lives with God! Amen? Amen!!

© 2010 Karen J Gillett @ Pencil Marks and Recipes Publishing

Examine Your Echo

January 13, 2009 IOW

“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” Mother Teresa

What is it about an echo that kids love? Do they love to produce it or do they love to hear the after affects of it? Everywhere they go they don’t miss the opportunity to produce an echo.

One day at work as I was trying to accomplish a task a co-worker and I heard this horrible sound. It sounded like a kid was being tormented. With our curiosity caught and our work undone we went to investigate what it could be. Down the hall one door was the staircase leading to the second floor, evidently a kid who had come to the doctor’s office that day discovered if they stuck their head in the door on the second floor and yelled it made a fantastic echo. An echo that may have been entertaining to them but it sounded differently from the third floor.

The words we speak are definitely something that produces an echo with an after affect that can go on long after we speak. It doesn’t matter if the words are cruel or kind they can have a tendency to linger long after we have spoken. Because of this it should be important to us that what we say should be words of kindness.

The words we speak don’t necessarily have to be said in a staircase to get an echo, they can be said through our writings, our witness, and our every day speech. A simple kind word to a stranger in the grocery line can leave an echo in their lives that may travel farther than we could ever imagine.

If you think about it that is what “In Other Words” is all about, the echoes of other people. Simple sentences in the middle of a paragraph or speech that catches our attention that warrants repeating and the echo begins.

If you’ve ever had someone say something to you that was unkind the echo seems to stay in your head. Over and over again we hear the words like a tape recorder stuck on replay. However, when the words are ones of kindness the after affect of them produces a kindness that spills over to others. Short and sweet beats quick and cruel any day when it comes to the words we leave behind for others to hear. A little goes a long ways.

Still occupying a space in my Bible serving as a bookmarker lies the echo of a dear friend. Several months before her Lou Gehrig’s disease took her life she wrote me a kind note that will echo forever from the paper it’s written on. God’s word has that echo affect too and we need to realize that we too produce an echo. What that echo will be is up to us. Before we stick our head in the staircase of life and start shouting we need to think about what its going to sound like at the other end. Will it have the affect of Christ built in to its sound waves bouncing off the lives of those around us or is it all about us.

Perhaps the best thing we can do is stop, listen, and examine our own echo.

Copyright 2009 Karen J. Gillett @ Pencil Marks and Recipes Publishing