Category: True Joy

Lent day 1
Christianity · CS Lewis · dreams do come true · encouragement · Jesus · lent · Love · power of God · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

Lent day 1

carriedinthecross2 Comments

Be not cast down

“But do not be cast down.” Said Aslan, “evil will come of that evil, but I will see that the worst of it falls upon myself.” -The Magician’s nephew.
I don’t really need to say it. Maybe all that needs to be done is to change one word here:
Jesus
“But do not be cast down.” Said Aslan, “evil will come of that evil, but I will see that the worst of it falls upon myself.”

(Don’t forget that CS Lewis himself claimed Aslan as a reflection of Jesus, so every moment with the lion has a great meaning.)
Evil came. People weren’t created evil, we were created in the image of God. Yet evil was here. Long before there were any people anywhere, jealousy grew in the heart of one of God’s angels, and evil crawled it’s way into existance. Yet God saw all this coming, why didn’t He stop it? I have no idea. Some may theorize about it, but I am not so bold, I try not to touch what I don’t understand lest I confuse someone else also. But God saw this evil coming and Jesus knew He was going to bear the worst of it Himself in order to save us. The crazy part is that God would want to save us! He could just make new people, start everything from scratch, yet He already loved us. He still loves us, and it breaks His heart when we fall away, because He loves us so much that He sacrificed His most precious treasure to save us. We mean so much to Him that it’s hard to believe, yet it’s true.
As We Begin Lent let us remember why we have the freedom to Lent, a reason to Lent, and why lent begins and ends. It begins in Jerusalem, it climaxes at the cross, and it ends at an empty tomb.

The wicked lies of the devil lead to death
Christianity · Devotional · free · Jesus · Love · power of God · Prayer · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

The wicked lies of the devil lead to death

carriedinthecrossLeave a comment

The devil has been lying since the beggining. It’s one of the things he’s good at. He lies about your value, he lies about your identity, he lies about God, but he most often lies about himself. He pretends to be good, kind and loving. He pretends to be cool and exciting. He uses words like equality and acceptance, and shared power and universal unity, but he doesn’t mean it. In the end, those who follow him will never feel equal, accepted, powerful or unified. Because he is the ordinator of lowlyness, seperation, weakness and devision. He uses words from people that make it sound like if you follow his path you will be going down a good and kind route, but you aren’t. He makes God sound like He is judgemental, inconsiderate and unaccepting. So what does he do to replace God? he replicates Him, he makes a new version that is labeled with acceptance and understanding and equality, yet this false god lacks everything the original had. For starters it’s fake and God is real. Second, it has no authority, no power, it’s just there incase you need someone to pray to. Third, it has no rules, hence the accepting and understanding part. And of course it isn’t higher or greater than anyone, hence the equality part, because we as people can never be equal with the true God. And people come to this puppet god, they believe in it and worship it and call themselves Christians, thinking they have a found an easier to follow version of Jesus. Yet they have found the devil in disguise. The devil’s biggest lie is that he cares about you. He doesn’t. You will never rule in hell, you will never have authority in the devil’s realm, why? Because he wants to be the ruler, the king, he wants equality with God and that’s why he was thrown out of Heaven. You will never gain all the devil has promised you, he will only give you enough to keep you coming back, never more. God is not unaccepting. He accepts us as we are, then His love changes us. We don’t change first and then find Jesus, we can’t change without Him. Yes, He does not accept our sins -any of our sins- but He died so that we can come to him sins and all, and he will purify us and set us free from them. Yes God is intollerant to sin. He wouldn’t be God if He wasn’t, but He loves us enough to take us as we are and to help us change. God considers us everyday. He is so considerate of us that He forgives us. He knew we would sin, so He always made a way out, first with sacrifices, then with the sacrifice of His son, because of that we can now sacrifice our old selves and become new creations in Christ. All of this was possible because God was and is thinking about us.
God judges our sin. Yes. But He gave us a solution in Jesus. We sin everyday, but God looks at the heart and mind and knows when we are trying to do better and knows when we are truly sorry.
The devil is conniving with his lies and makes them easy to accept and easy to follow. God is just and righteous in His truth, sometimes that is hard to accept and hard to follow. But one way leads to hell and the other to Heaven. Don’t follow the easy path. Seek after the true God. Pray and seek His heart, then you will be truly free and accepted by the one who loves you.

Are we willing?
Christianity · Devotional · guidance · holy spirit · Jesus · power of God · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

Are we willing?

carriedinthecrossLeave a comment

Are we willing?

What does your dream, goal and ambition mean to you? When the government tells you that you can’t be a teacher, lawyer, politician, doctor, and so on, unless you accept certain sins as no longer sin what will you do? Is dream worth so much that you will buckle and bow to the death system. Death system was a term that came up when I was a kid. In books, in TV (mostly anime) it means a system unacknowledgably careening toward destruction, sort of like Chaos Theory. Back then even the secular world could see it coming and what it would bring. Now even Christ followers bow to the death system. Not the death of the planet, though much of the shows that winked at the death system did cover the death of nature, but instead we should focus on the death of our souls and the rape of our minds. Do we even know what’s wrong anymore? Or are we taking a pen and crossing out the parts of our Faith that offend us? I was reminded recently of what Christians face in countries that don’t support the Christ belief. People with high IQs and great talent have demeaning jobs, can’t attend certain schools or social events and live in shamble, because they refuse to deny even a tiny part of Jesus, they embrace Him even though they are left in the street by the world. Do we? Are we willing to take the humble road rather than deny even a speck of our Lord? So often we see “christians” praised for taking a job in a secular setting because they can, “promote their witness” there. But do they? How much of Jesus did they have to deny to get that job? What sins did they accept so that they would be accepted? The devil sits back and gestures to a goblet, “drink this, accept the darkness and I will give you everything.” Jesus takes our hand and says, “don’t! It’s a trap.” We pull away from Christ, “if I drink what he offers then he will give me a place in society where I can promote you better, it’s just a little sip, I’ll be fine.” Our bold statement dies as we drink the whole glass and join the devil. If Jesus says something is wrong then it is wrong no matter our good intentions. Are we willing to live as ditch diggers and serve Jesus by denying the devil? Or have we already taken of the death drink, and now we serve the devil under the badge that used to say ‘Christian’, but now says ‘deceived’?
We are so lost in this death system that we have forgotten what life is. Go back to Jesus. Reach for Him. Don’t let the devil deceive you. Don’t let your heart become poisoned. Give yourself to Jesus. Whatever you end up doing, no matter how valueless it feels, remember- if you are doing it for Jesus, if you are sacrificing it for Jesus, if you are suffering it for Jesus, then what your doing is right. The easy road of compromise leads to death. Not death in this world, but death of your soul. Don’t give in. Fight back. Dare to take God at His word no matter the cost.

Counting on you
Christianity · Devotional · dreams do come true · encouragement · free · guidance · Jesus · Love · power of God · Prayer · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

Counting on you

carriedinthecrossLeave a comment

Counting on you

We as Christians count on God for so much. We count on Him to be good to us, to forgive us, to love us, to heal us, to help us. But can God count on us for…well…anything?
We don’t think about God counting on us. In fact, we don’t really think that God needs us, do we? We realize that He is God and He can make His plan work no matter what we do or don’t do. But that’s not the point. God doesn’t rely on us, He doesn’t have to, but He does count on us. He counts on us to do His will, to obey His commands, to care for our fellow Christians, to show His love to the lost and broken, He may even have appointed you a position in which you can do these things. He counts on us doing our part. If we never step out our front door, if we never take the chance, if we squelch the voice of God inside of us, aren’t we letting God down. We like to dance around the circle of ‘it’s a partnership, God and I are working together,’ because it makes us think that God is helping us in fulfilling our goals and our dreams, and that is what the outer ring of the circle sometimes looks like- but what about the inner circle, the inner Sanctum if you like, that’s where God is, the place where it’s not our will but His. The place where the fire burns so hot that it hurts sometimes, the place of surrender, are any of us willing to enter that circle? Or do we prefer the edge where it’s safe?
Can God count on us?
Can God say, “I can always count on Lauren to do the right thing?” Or I can always count on Larry, or Lynne, or Tanya, or Carole, or Mark, or Matthew, or whatever your name is, fill in the blank, can God say “him or her, I can always count on”?
I hope so. I hope that we all aim to live within the fire, near the heart of God, so He can count on us.

Counting on you
Christianity · Devotional · dreams do come true · encouragement · free · guidance · Jesus · Love · power of God · Prayer · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

Counting on you

carriedinthecrossLeave a comment

Counting on you

We as Christians count on God for so much. We count on Him to be good to us, to forgive us, to love us, to heal us, to help us. But can God count on us for…well…anything?
We don’t think about God counting on us. In fact, we don’t really think that God needs us, do we? We realize that He is God and He can make His plan work no matter what we do or don’t do. But that’s not the point. God doesn’t rely on us, He doesn’t have to, but He does count on us. He counts on us to do His will, to obey His commands, to care for our fellow Christians, to show His love to the lost and broken, He may even have appointed you a position in which you can do these things. He counts on us doing our part. If we never step out our front door, if we never take the chance, if we squelch the voice of God inside of us, aren’t we letting God down. We like to dance around the circle of ‘it’s a partnership, God and I are working together,’ because it makes us think that God is helping us in fulfilling our goals and our dreams, and that is what the outer ring of the circle sometimes looks like- but what about the inner circle, the inner Sanctum if you like, that’s where God is, the place where it’s not our will but His. The place where the fire burns so hot that it hurts sometimes, the place of surrender, are any of us willing to enter that circle? Or do we prefer the edge where it’s safe?
Can God count on us?
Can God say, “I can always count on Lauren to do the right thing?” Or I can always count on Larry, or Lynne, or Tanya, or Carole, or Mark, or Matthew, or whatever your name is, fill in the blank, can God say “him or her, I can always count on”?
I hope so. I hope that we all aim to live within the fire, near the heart of God, so He can count on us.

Merry Christmas
advent · Christianity · Christmas · Devotional · encouragement · free · guidance · holy spirit · Jesus · Love · The Bible · True Joy

Merry Christmas

carriedinthecrossLeave a comment

Which is your favorite gift under the tree?
We all have that one gift. The one we have been eyeing that has our name on it. Be it big with a red bow, or small with sparkly paper, there is usually a single gift that stands out above the others. We don’t know why. It just speaks to us. Then the day comes when we open it and get to see what we have been dreaming of.
Jesus is the greatest gift from God. The only gift that came to us willingly and because He loves us. He’s not under a tree, He’s near our hearts, knocking and waiting for the door on them to be open. He’s the only gift that so many ignore and refuse to open. He’s the only gift that so many others cherish above all joys, friends, family and even life. Someday He will return and we who love Him will get to see whom we have been dreaming of. He came once to save us from our sins, that was Christmas and Easter. But He is coming again to redeem us from this world, that will be our Revelation.

Merry Christmas!

I’d rather be in Bethlehem tonight
advent · Christianity · Christmas · Devotional · Jesus · searching · True Joy

I’d rather be in Bethlehem tonight

carriedinthecross1 Comment

As Connie Scott sings, I’d rather be in Bethlehem tonight, just to be one of the shepherds, just to hear the angels sing.
I’d rather be close to the baby. Draw me closer to Him. Do we long to be closer to the King? Would we give up our presents and decorations to be in Bethlehem? To be there to see the wonder of wonders? To hear the angels and see the star? Would we want to be shepherds just so we could be amung the few who witnessed the baby in the manger? Do you long to be in Bethlehem tonight?

I’m just too young to know better
Christianity · Devotional · guidance · Jesus · power of God · Prayer · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

I’m just too young to know better

carriedinthecross1 Comment

How can a young person stay on the path of purity? By living according to your word. I seek you with all my heart; do not let me stray from your commands. I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. Praise be to you, Lord; teach me your decrees.
Psalm 119:9‭-‬12

People write off our falling away from God and sinning as a product of youth, but that isn’t right. The Bible tells us how to live, if we love God we will live according to His word no matter our age or lack there of. I know so many good strong Christ loving young people. I know even more who have fallen away from God. Why? Because we aren’t taught the Bible like we used to be. Our parents no longer require us to go with them to church. We don’t bother to pray. So, we fall away. So many youth don’t even believe in sin. But sin is real. The devil isn’t a scary bedtime cheracter, he’s a seeking enemy looking to kill your soul. Jesus isn’t just a happy go lucky smiling face on a bilboard. Sin eats away like a virus. The devil corrupts and kills and makes it look like what we are doing isn’t wrong. Jesus is the one true powerful king and God, and the only way to Heaven. Don’t let youth be your excuse. Stick to the narrow path and seek Jesus.

Are we willing?
Christianity · Devotional · guidance · holy spirit · Jesus · power of God · searching · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

Are we willing?

carriedinthecrossLeave a comment

Are we willing?

What does your dream, goal and ambition mean to you? When the government tells you that you can’t be a teacher, lawyer, politician, doctor, and so on, unless you accept certain sins as no longer sin what will you do? Is dream worth so much that you will buckle and bow to the death system. Death system was a term that came up when I was a kid. In books, in TV (mostly anime) it means a system unacknowledgably careening toward destruction, sort of like Chaos Theory. Back then even the secular world could see it coming and what it would bring. Now even Christ followers bow to the death system. Not the death of the planet, though much of the shows that winked at the death system did cover the death of nature, but instead we should focus on the death of our souls and the rape of our minds. Do we even know what’s wrong anymore? Or are we taking a pen and crossing out the parts of our Faith that offend us? I was reminded recently of what Christians face in countries that don’t support the Christ belief. People with high IQs and great talent have demeaning jobs, can’t attend certain schools or social events and live in shamble, because they refuse to deny even a tiny part of Jesus, they embrace Him even though they are left in the street by the world. Do we? Are we willing to take the humble road rather than deny even a speck of our Lord? So often we see “christians” praised for taking a job in a secular setting because they can, “promote their witness” there. But do they? How much of Jesus did they have to deny to get that job? What sins did they accept so that they would be accepted? The devil sits back and gestures to a goblet, “drink this, accept the darkness and I will give you everything.” Jesus takes our hand and says, “don’t! It’s a trap.” We pull away from Christ, “if I drink what he offers then he will give me a place in society where I can promote you better, it’s just a little sip, I’ll be fine.” Our bold statement dies as we drink the whole glass and join the devil. If Jesus says something is wrong then it is wrong no matter our good intentions. Are we willing to live as ditch diggers and serve Jesus by denying the devil? Or have we already taken of the death drink, and now we serve the devil under the badge that used to say ‘Christian’, but now says ‘deceived’?
We are so lost in this death system that we have forgotten what life is. Go back to Jesus. Reach for Him. Don’t let the devil deceive you. Don’t let your heart become poisoned. Give yourself to Jesus. Whatever you end up doing, no matter how valueless it feels, remember- if you are doing it for Jesus, if you are sacrificing it for Jesus, if you are suffering it for Jesus, then what your doing is right. The easy road of compromise leads to death. Not death in this world, but death of your soul. Don’t give in. Fight back. Dare to take God at His word no matter the cost.

Final Level!
Christianity · Devotional · dreams do come true · encouragement · free · guidance · Jesus · still fighting · The Bible · True Joy

Final Level!

carriedinthecross1 Comment

Final level

Growing in God is something we hear a lot.
“I’m just growing in God.”
“Don’t forget to grow in God.”
“Always grow in God.”
But what does grow in God mean? What visual does that statement give you? I used to picture a sapling, growing into a tree. But lately I’ve had a different visual. Video Games. Hang on, don’t run away yet. Let me explain. Recently I was reminded of my short stint as an avid gamer, and that brought to mind this simili. I had a game for a time… actually I think it’s still in my closet, anyway- this game was a progressive story arc type. You know, you have an avitar and you follow the cheracter on different quests and so on. I recall the peace of the starter village. Old fashioned cabins, cathedrals and pretty brick bridges. You could walk and never see a monster all day. But as you leveled up the game obviously grew harder. Eventually I reached a level where I had to look up the hacks to pass it. Monsters were everywhere and they didn’t die no matter how hard you attacked them. The only way to win that level was to let your character lose all his or her strength, right before your avatar was down for the count you would get a bonus strength boost, and that was the only way to win. What do I mean by all this?
When we first become Christians it’s nice to go to church, maybe bake for a potluck, perhaps you will even read your Bible once in a blue moon. It’s nice and quiet with no work. But. That’s not how we are meant to stay. We are intended by God to level up. And as we level up things will get harder, because the devil wants to keep us low and weak. Say you keep going. Level after level. Praying every day, reading your Bible with conviction, volenteering at your Church and Church events, maybe even branching into missions work. With each level you grow, but with each level the monsters seem to increase. One day you find yourself in an abandoned town with monsters that refuse to die. Why? Because you are doing things right. Thay doesn’t make sense, does it? But the devil is fighting against you. Whatever that monster is. An illness, debt, a habit, or something less personal, like how the world has gone and the darkness and sin taking over. Everywhere you see the monsters. You have fought and fought and now you are on your last life. But don’t forget. As you were leveling up and growing, God was growing with you. Not that He was ever small, but maybe He was small inside you because you hadn’t let Him grow yet. Now you have been growing in God and God has been growing in you, so when your last life comes up blinking and your avatar gets fuzzy, don’t give up! Hold down the A and Y buttons and use your power boost to kill those monsters. In other words, use your trump card. Pray. Talk to God and use His power within you to win the battle and reach the final level. You are never fighting or growing alone, God is right there, you just need to reach for Him.
So go on friends. Level up. Grow with God.