What are you afraid of?
Recently I went on a tour of an abandoned sanatorium consisting of five buildings. The old site is one of my favorites and I was excited to get to finally go inside. My cousin and I were the only people there and the guide left us to tour the other four buildings on our own and only stayed with us through the first one, which of course everyone says is haunted. Several times the woman stopped and asked us if we were troubled by spirits, because we are about to enter areas that were known to have heavy Spirit activity. My cousin and I informed her that we were Christians so they didn’t bother us, she kind of rolled her eyes at that. She let us go up into a super condemned area of the building, and challenged us to see if we would go all the way to the end of the ‘Haunted Hall,’ my cousin and I looked at each other and grinned of course we would go to the haunted floor with the haunted hall, sounds like fun. We joked with each other a little bit about the ghosts, went to the end of the hall, we’re slightly terrified at the thought of falling through the floorboards, and then returned totally fine. The scariest part was when we got back home and I showed the photos to my father, who has worked in construction for a lot of years, he informed us that the ankle-deep fluffy stuff we were walking through was falling asbestos from the ceiling. As we toured around more there was one-room known for its activity, where people had left a bowl of garlic that had apparently been there for several years. All of this made me think, what are you really afraid of? Isn’t it vampires that garlic keeps away? As Christians we know that evil spirits do exist, and by no means should we take them lightly, but we also need to remember that God gave us Authority in these situations. I don’t know if ghosts actually bother hunting people, I know that coming from a family of pastors that my grandparents and my parents have seen evil spirits be driven out of people, and I am very sure that if there were evil spirits around us they didn’t bother us solely because we are Christians and they knew to avoid placew Jesus is present. Admittedly, I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get to rebuke any ghosts in the name of Jesus. The fact of the matter is that people give over to these beliefs and then they let these beliefs control them. People say would you stay in a haunted building for $100,000? And I’m like, absolutely, because as Christians there is no reason for us to fear ghosts or spirits. To be honest, with how run-down parts of the buildings were, and the fact that we very easily could have run into some kind of large animal, I did get a little jumpy on that thought, especially when we found a random staircase hidden under another staircase that led down into a basement that had seemingly been untouched for a very long time, because even the owner had admitted to not going into those buildings in several years. But my point was, it’s fun to let yourself be afraid in a silly way, where you’re joking about things that go bump in the night; however we shouldn’t give too much thought or power to these things, because you don’t want to let any opening where the devil could poke through. If I’m being fully truthful there are a lot of children’s ghost stories that when you read them as a Christian you can tell that these aren’t ghosts, or something silly to laugh at but that these are encounters with evil spirits that are real and you should not give that room in your life, and certainly should not let your children be giving room to such things in their minds, which are easily influenced. If you’re wondering why we decided to explore an abandoned sanatorium when we have no interest or fear of ghosts, we did it because the old buildings have an incredible history that lends to our province, and that history makes the building’s interesting. The thing I love the most is that youth for Christ had taken these buildings over at one time, and though Ghost Hunters had broken in and graffitied things on the walls to make it seem like the building was cursed, there were still banners up with scripture verses, there were still Bibles and devotionals in the rooms, pieces of the love of Christ fill those buildings, so I doubt they’re haunted, because what ghost wants to deal with all of that😉
Category: The Bible
Fear
Fear
Today I want to discuss fear. Why? Because today I was afraid. What I hate is that I had just listened to an amazing sermon on being happy and still my fear took me over. What happened next, I was condescending and rude to the person I was afraid for. I was not at risk of anything but they were and I care about them a lot, so I reacted to my fear for them and have felt sick about it all day. I needed to trust that Jesus had it covered, but instead I rose up and was unkind while trying to protect the person I care about. Love shows itself in many different forms, aggression and anger sometimes being those forms, which actually doesn’t make a lot of sense. When you are afraid you react, and that reaction can cause bad things to occur. What are causes of fear?
Being human.
We know that God has things covered and yet fear grabs us and destroys our rational thinking. Some say of you fear you aren’t a true Christian because it means you don’t trust God. I disagree. Fear can hit us even when we are trusting God because we are still human, yes we should take our fear to God but we should also know that He isn’t angry at us for being afraid. David criticized his own soul for it’s fear and told it to have courage in God, but the fear was still there. Fear is not a sin, how we respond to that fear can be. But God understands, He isn’t angry that you are afraid, He simply wants you to give your fear to Him and to trust Him.
Gift giver
We as people always want to give back. We want to give back to our neighbors, our co-workers, our family, our friends. So of course we want to give back to God. But we can’t. We can repay a cup of coffee with a cup of coffee, or having our grass mowed by baking some cookies or so on… but how do we give back to God?
In giving fully of ourselves. But is that enough? It is to God.
But say In full measurement of the ‘equal gift calculator’ do they add up to the same? No.
Think of it like this.
Your dad buys you a new CD. You’re eight years old and super excited and want to give him something in return, so you run to your room and grab your second favorite Super Star doll and give it to him as a present, what is a grown man going to do with that doll? From anyone else he would probably tell you politely that he doesn’t want it and you should keep it, but you are his child and thus are special, so what does he do? He takes it to work, puts it on his desk and when people ask about it he says with a smile, “my daughter gave it to me”.
We want to give back to God because He gives us so much, we have nothing to give Him that He wants except our hearts, but we still dish out things that we think will make God happy, even though it’s like a little girl giving her dad a doll, God still smiles seeing us trying so hard to give to Him. Our gift will never equal His, it can’t, but the giving we try to do makes Him smile because He loves us.
God values YOU
One person does not define you.
Five people don’t define you.
People don’t define you, God does.
Jesus defines who you are, He directs who you are.
Look at your life through the eyes of the man on the cross, the man walking out of the tomb, God sitting on His throne. If He was willing to die for you, the you who you are right now, then what person has earned the right to try and judge you? If God loves you enough to give up everything for you, then isn’t that enough to show you your value? Because you do have value! You right now reading this, God wants you to know that you have value and are valued by Him.
People don’t define you, God does.
Somehow
Jesus is the God of somehow.
Somehow the disease vanished, somehow the pain is gone, somehow they got the job, somehow they survived it, somehow it was all okay.
Jesus is the God of the amazing and unexplainable, the things that happen that don’t make sense- the impossible. When the doctor says, “I don’t know how, but the colitis is gone” -that’s God. When the police say, “there is no reason they should have survived that accident” -that’s God. When the addict says, “I don’t know how but I managed to turn away from my addiction”- that’s God.
God is the God of the unexplained.
He doesn’t prevent suffering all the time, sometimes He let’s us go through something that we need Him to help us through or rescue us from so that we acknowledge His wonders. You may say, “what about when God doesn’t heal or rescue?” That is a painful but fair question, sometimes God’s miracle is simply being sustained through suffering or trial. I know that for some that isn’t good enough, but when you have God the burden is lifted. That doesn’t mean that it is gone, that means that it is raised so that you can keep walking. Someday, somehow God will end the pain, and when He does you will probably say, “somehow, I’m still okay.”
Somehow she kept her faith.
Somehow she persevered.
Somehow she held on to Jesus so tight that she feared at times her hands would give up, but she kept on and saw her redemption.
I know many of you are in the pain moments right now and I would like to take a minute to pray for your somehow moment.
Dear Jesus we ask in your name that you will touch every person who is in pain right now oh, that you will touch them and heal them from there pain and suffering whether it is physical and emotional, psychological, whether it is an outside suffering that is plaguing them or an internal suffering. In their families or in their bodies or in their daily lives. Jesus whatever the painful is help please we ask, and give these people who you love their somehow moments, their moment of ‘somehow I made it through’, ‘somehow I was delivered’, ‘somehow it’s all okay’ because somehow you always manage to work things out for our good even if we can’t see it from where we stand now, we ask these things in your name of Jesus, Amen.
Beyond your cage
Reach beyond your cages and praise God!
Today my beautiful mom was worshiping God behind a covid safe screen in our church this morning and it made me realize that God is reaching down behind many walls and cages, He’s reaching for us. There are people in prisons, in underground churches, in basements, in flood and fire areas, in churches that are restrained by the government, in their own homes- afraid to go out. In hospitals, In sick beds, in care homes. Whatever your cage is. If your cage is literal or figurative. God is reaching down behind your walls and your cages to grab your up reached hands, up reached hearts and to lift you out of your cage. Sometimes Jesus enters in and if you look around you can see Jesus in your cage with you.
Your cage is not God’s cage.
God is working even when you can’t see past the bars. My dad’s old school mate Billy Richards said that faith is a muscle, you need to use it to make it strong. You can either let your cage defeat you, or you can let it grow you and your faith. Believe that Jesus can save you, He has already saved you, trusting His will can hurt- but it is always the right path to take.
No matter your cage, remember that Jesus loves you, and you have the savior with you.
Jesus, we know that you can save us from our cage, no matter what it is, we use our Faith in you and know that you are with us even in our cages- amen.
Read Paul’s letters from prison and see how God can work beyond the bars of your cages❤
Gain through giving?
I once heard it said, that the reason we give so much up in our lives for other people is because they are what we leave behind when we are gone, through them our lives continue. It sounds a little strange until you think about it. When I mention a ‘but God’ moment, it’s my poppa speaking through me, when I struggle and find myself putting scripture in my shoes so all day I am standing on the word of God, that’s my nana. Those who are gone leave their legacy in us, and if they hadn’t taken the time and effort to teach me, serve me and be with me I might not have the strength that their words gave me. Nana is gone to Heaven but she still lives and guides and teaches through all the people she put effort into. We live in a ‘serve yourself first and then you will have the strength to serve others’ theory in this world, even evangelist speakers have said this once in awhile, and not that serving yourself is wrong, but if the only one you serve is yourself then that is wrong. Jesus didn’t say ‘love yourself, that is the greatest commandment,’ He said ‘love the Lord your God, and your neighbour as yourself.’ If all we ever do is serve us we miss out on the true Joy of serving others and through serving others serving God. Our joy comes from fellowship with Christ, you cannot serve yourself only and have fellowship with others. This sounds really discouraging I know, but I’m not saying drop everything and give up all your time for others, I mean we should actively aim and strive to be servants. If you want to spend a day sitting on the couch watching TV that’s fine, but if while sitting on that couch somebody calls you in need and you refuse to go because you’re busy taking care of yourself isn’t that wrong? As in all things there’s a balance, you can’t only serve others because you’ll hit burnout, but you can’t only serve yourself because that’s not how Christians Act. It always comes back to the old adage, what would Jesus do? Would he say no cuz he was too busy taking care of himself? Or would He go to help those in need? I guess that’s a dumb question, considering the answer is so obvious.
Heaven’s angels
Today there is an angel with a dog bite on his hand, yesterday there was an angel with oil on his clothes, the day before there was an angel with too much heat as he stood guard today there is an angel watching over my heart. Every day there is an angel set upon us by God to watch over our actions as we do our part each day. Everyone has an angel the angels are gifts given to protect us by God, they never let us fall. There have been times when my angel has been dirty and worn because I know that that’s been my day and that he followed me through it. Those thorns in our skin as we worked in the yard and as weariness clowded our eyes God sends His angels to watch over us, and though they are not to be worshipped we should never forget the gift that they are. There have been days when there were angels who had been hit by another car as they pushed mine out of the way and kept me safe from the driver behind the deviating wheel. There’ve been times when my angel watches over those I love. There are days when I’m sure the angels have had enough but God is there watching over us each day, He sent his angels to guard us that’s what the Bible says.
Drowning in God
There are times when my Faith makes me feel like I could walk out to Jesus on the waves without a doubt, and there are times when my fear makes me not want to even get into the boat. We are all afraid in part of going deeper into God. We like to have control of our lives just like we like to have control of the TV remote, when we go deeper into God we start giving up control. Stormie Omartan said ‘we let God into one room of our hearts and tell Him to stay there, but soon He starts knocking on the door to another part of our hearts, then another, then another until He fills our whole hearts. We hate losing control so we shove God in a corner and say we are Christians because we have Jesus, but that’s not what God wants, in fact that behavior is probably to blame for so many people claiming to be Christians but not acting like it. You can’t act like Jesus until He holds your whole heart. We have to trust God and be guided by our Faith so that we can fall so deep in God that we see nothing but Him.
Hate is easy, love… that’s the hard part
Hate is easy, love is hard.
Charlie Brown was asked why it is that people didn’t mind you asking them why they didn’t like you but why they did mind if you asked them why they did like you? He replied that it was because the latter was a harder question to answer.
Disliking someone is easy, it takes no effort. I once heard a movie character say that she was now free to hate, unburdened by the ties That Force us to love she felt the freedom of being allowed to hate. It’s a terrible sentiment, and yet it almost makes sense. As Christians we are demanded to love, it’s not a suggestion, it’s not a request, it’s a rule. Jesus said ‘and the greatest of these is love,’ and spoke on love being the sign of your Faith over ten times in the Bible, He also speaks against hating others several times, it is not a request.
Why does God demand it? Because it’s a sign of Him, He is love. Why does He repeat this demand over and over? Because it’s hard to follow. There are so many people that would be so easy to hate, having to love them may even cause you to feel ill or in pain. There are really awful people out there. Think of Corrie Tenboom speaking to the crowd and having that German soldier from the prison camp she was in come up to her and ask for forgiveness, what nerve! He had no right to do that after all she had gone through, right? No. He had the same right to ask for forgiveness that we all do because of Jesus. Because God forgave us we must forgive eachother. Love forces us to forgive the unforgivable, to help those who have hurt us, that’s why love is so hard. If we do not love we are not Christian, love is a sacrifice for Christ, and sometimes loving one another is our way of bearing our cross up to the Place of the Skull. Love is pain. Hate doesn’t hurt in the moment,-though it may hurt in the long run- but love hurts often, that’s why it’s a sacrifice, that’s why so many give up on it, and it’s what separates us from the rest of the world. It’s easy to love your friends, but what kind of crazy person loves their enemies? The kind who is crazy about Jesus and knows they have to love to serve Him.
Carried in the cross 