In many ways humans are receptacles. You might say we are containers. A receptacle is defined as one that receives and contains something. One type of receptacle is an electrical receptacle, which receives power from a source, and releases the electricity when a device is plugged into it. It is a container for power, if you will. A properly working receptacle will have what is needed when the opportunity presents itself. An audio jack will dispense sound when the connection is made. A lamp will come on when it is plugged in. Have you ever gone to plug in a light only to find that the receptacle was not working? That’s fun. I’m not sure there is anything more useless than an electrical outlet that doesn’t have power. Really… what else can you do with it? Think about all of the things you cannot operate with a dead receptacle. I would imagine that God is just as frustrated when Christians don’t have the power we should. Beyond that, I think the world is a little disappointed when we don’t contain what we should contain. They should be able to plug into us and find light. We are after all the light of the world. We aren’t the source of the light. Jesus is that Light. But we are receptacles, containing the power of God. An electrical outlet doesn’t have just a trace of electricity. A working receptacle is full of electricity according to its rating, and can provide it as long as the power continues running to it. We don’t just have a trace of the power of God. He has designed us to produce as much as we need in a dark world as long as we are properly connected to Him. Today people will try to plug into you for love, joy, peace, courage, faith, and other things they don’t have, but expect to be alive in you. As a believer, you are God’s outlet in this world. Don’t be a dead disappointment. Be alive. Be filled with God’s power for anyone who plugs into you today. The apostle Paul put it this way, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for all endurance and patience, with joy giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the saints’ inheritance in the light. He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son He loves.” (Colossians 1:11-13) The apostle Peter also expressed this idea in a letter, “God’s divine power has given us everything required for life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness.” (2 Peter 1:3) That power isn’t just for the nice things everyone wants to hear. The prophet Micah declared, “As for me, however, I am filled with power by the Spirit of the Lord, with justice and courage, to proclaim to Jacob his rebellion and to Israel his sin.” (Micah 3:8) Find more of David's work at Heart Of Ministry. There is a good chance someone will walk over you today. It could be that they just don’t see you there. Perhaps they do and don’t like you. What’s worse is that on some of those occasions you actually get walked on. That is no fun. Not much to say there. Getting walked on is about the worst feeling. It is disrespectful, devaluing, and generally humiliating. You can count on it, most of the time if someone walks on you they are trying to move up and they just don’t care how they do it. The bad thing is, you don’t get to determine if you get walked on. That is entirely out of your control. While you can’t determine whether or not someone walks on you, you are totally in control of how you respond. For most people, the first response when they realize another person’s foot is on their head is to grab it and flip them right into the surrounding mud. The idea is, “If you are going to step on me, you are going to trip over me.” After all, they’ve earned it, right? But the better response to being stepped on, is to be a stepping stone. Stepping stones are there to be walked on. They are there to keep people on the right path, and keep them from the mud or water. Stepping stones aren’t appreciated unless they are not there. They don’t get any recognition. Often times they just become so much a part of their surroundings that they are barely noticed. But they are also beautiful in a way. They show the better way. No one was ever thankful that they tripped over a jagged rock. In fact, they often curse the rock that caused them to stumble. No… people likely won’t thank you for letting them step on you. But they will be thankful when they get to their destination. The only difference between a stepping stone and a stumbling block is basically how helpful they are in getting the traveler across treacherous terrain. That is not determined by the one walking, but by the one being walked upon. And in the end, your humble status is recognized by the One who was unfairly walked upon by everyone. I will admit that Jesus was a rock of offense to those who would not value His sacrifice. And honestly, there are some people who are so uncoordinated that they will slip on the smoothest of stepping stones and plant their face in the mud. That is on them. What is on you is to be a help and not a hindrance to another person’s walk. Personally, I know that some of the people I walked on helped me become the person I am today, and I am thankful. The apostle Paul, who had walked on people before his conversion, and was walked on by many people after he became a Christian leader put it this way, “Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Try to do what is honorable in everyone’s eyes. If possible, on your part, live at peace with everyone. Friends, do not avenge yourselves; instead, leave room for His wrath. For it is written: ‘Vengeance belongs to Me; I will repay,’ says the Lord. But If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him something to drink. For in so doing you will be heaping fiery coals on his head. Do not be conquered by evil, but conquer evil with good.” (Romans 12:17-21) Check out David's other work at Heart Of Ministry. If you’re like most people, you struggle with hearing God’s voice… mostly because He doesn’t usually speak audibly. This makes Him mysterious, but it doesn’t mean He is aloof, or silent. It just means He doesn’t go around shouting us down all the time, and as fallen humans, we need to be more focused and learn His voice. When you are trying to carry on an important conversation with someone you love, you don’t want to have to compete with the big game, or Facebook, or a project. You want the other person’s undivided attention. How frustrating is it to get to the end of a conversation and find the other party didn’t hear a word you said? They left. They may have been physically present, but they checked out of the conversation. All of the above are issues that God has to deal with (X 7.5 Billion) as well. He couldn’t be more communicative. But we couldn’t be more distracted. That distraction keeps us from hearing Him clearly. We then blame Him for not being clear. But He couldn’t be more clear. It really is messed up. Then when something rocks our world, we become focused and cry out to God for help. All of a sudden He becomes important enough for us to lay down our other ‘necessary’ pursuits. But by this time we have drifted from God. We think He is missing in inaction. We feel like He is hiding from us, playing some cruel cosmic game of ‘hide and seek’. We are languishing spiritually, emotionally, relationally, physically, financially, and God is hiding behind some solar system somewhere laughing His head off. Then we get mad because He promised to be there for us, but is now nowhere to be found at our most critical moment. Sure, He told us that if we seek Him we would find Him. But we didn’t know He was going to find such a good hiding spot. You have it backwards. God isn’t lost. He isn’t even hiding. He hasn’t gone away. You have. You have hidden from Him. You have become lost. You have gone away. Now you are having to find Him. It is amazing how far a boat can drift when no one is paying attention. If you can’t hear from God, you need to be quiet so you can hear His voice. Shouting at God does not make it easier to hear Him. You need to listen to hear Him. And as you hear Him, you can move closer to Him. No… God isn’t playing ‘hide and seek’ with you. Your Father is playing ‘seek and find’ with you. The promise is not that God will follow you into your sin, but that when you seek for Him, you will find Him… but only when you desire Him, or are desperate enough to truly seek for Him. During a time where God’s people had wandered away, He put them in a place far from Him so they would have to desperately search for Him. He hadn’t moved. He had moved them. They were far from God. But through His prophet Jeremiah, He said, “You will call to Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you.” (Jeremiah 29:12-14) The nearer you are to God the clearer He is to you. Check out David's other work at Heart Of Ministry. You’d think that each person has enough going on in their own life to not have to get knee deep in the lives of others. In fact, they don’t have to. They choose to. Drama abounds with those who can’t keep their nose out of the business of others. You know who I’m talking about. I’ll bet you hear gossip today from someone who has far too much interest in the life of their neighbor, co-worker, or family member. It is sad, but more importantly it is harmful. Growing up we were told that we need to mind our own business, and "if you can’t say something nice… don’t say anything at all." Nosiness and gossip seem to go hand in hand. There are various reasons some people spend too much time fishing in another person’s pond. They may be jealous because their neighbor seems to have more of a life than they do. Maybe they need to have info that they can use to hurt or discredit the other person. Maybe they actually feel like they should be helping other people get their stuff together. Perhaps it is easier to deal with other people’s issues than it is their own. Whatever the reason, or excuse for our meddling, the fact remains that we weren’t designed to carry our stuff and everyone else’s at the same time. Instead of being a busybody, be busy about your own body. If you hear something troubling about someone else, pray for them. Don’t dwell on it. Don’t talk about it. Don’t use them as a ‘prayer request’ for the sole purpose of running them down to others. If certain bad information comes to your attention, be grateful that you aren’t the one in it, but truly be a help to them. They don’t need more trouble in the form of a person taking pot shots at them. People who are in trouble need a true friend. How do you want others to respond to you in your problems? Yeah… that’s what I thought. One wise man wrote, “A city is built up by the blessing of the upright, but it is torn down by the mouth of the wicked. Whoever shows contempt for his neighbor lacks sense, but a man with understanding keeps silent. A gossip goes around revealing a secret, but a trustworthy person keeps a confidence.” (Proverbs 11:11-13) And apparently the excess drama that can develop in the female gender is not a new thing as Paul challenged the young women of the church against it saying, “they also learn to be idle, going from house to house; they are not only idle, but are also gossips and busybodies, saying things they shouldn’t say. Therefore, I want younger women to marry, have children, manage their households, and give the adversary no opportunity to accuse us.” (2 Timothy 5:13-14) Today, keep your nose out of other people's junk. Put your heart there, but keep your nose out. Check out David's other work at Heart of Ministry. One of the strangest things we do as humans is the act of forgiving other people. It is also one of the more powerful things we do. Forgiveness can be a confusing thing, but mostly it is empowering. Chances are, you will have to choose to forgive someone for something today. What is forgiveness? Webster says that to ‘forgive’ is to “give up resentment of or claim to requital (compensation),” Basically to forgive is to let go of a debt someone owes you, and the associated feelings that come with the debt. We have a sense of justice. God put that in us. It is powerful, and actually helps to keep the world in order. When someone does something wrong to you, they should repay you. God has laws, and we have laws to enforce justice. Making things right is what we do, right? Well, yes. Forcing someone to pay for a broken window is a way of being fair to the owner of the window, and a way of making sure people don’t go around breaking windows all the time. When you forgive, you aren’t saying that the window was never broken, or that it has no value, or that it is alright to break windows. You are simply saying that you are not going to let a broken window define your life, or the life of the person who broke the window. When you forgive you are saying that it is more important to move forward with broken windows than with broken lives. When I was a child my brother would sometimes do things to me that were wrong. I didn’t like it at all. That was my toy car. He shouldn’t have taken it. And he certainly shouldn’t have wrecked it. I was initially upset. My mom would step in and enforce justice, telling him to apologize to me. He would say, “I’m sorry.” Usually I would immediately say, “Don’t worry about it.” I could see the judgment hanging over his head. The car was messed up. I was messed up. And now my brother was messed up. I couldn’t fix the car. But I could fix me, and I could open a door to fix my brother. By saying, “Don’t worry about it,” I was telling him that I valued him more than the car, and even my right to receive payment for the Hot Wheels. I wouldn’t let that brokenness control me, and I wouldn’t let it define our relationship. And I also knew that I would want forgiveness when I hurt him. Frankly, that is easy to do with a $1.00 toy… but not when you are a child. The principle is true at any age, and with any hurt. The only thing harder that offering forgiveness is holding onto unforgiveness. If you are a Christian, you have already been forgiven of more than you will ever have to forgive in someone else. Those who forgive well, live well. Today, when you forgive, you are not saying that justice doesn’t matter. You are saying that your peace matters more than justice. You are saying that people matter more than your right to payback. You are saying that evil will not control your destiny, because your ability to love is stronger than another’s ability to destroy. The apostle Paul, a man who was forgiven much by people he hurt greatly wrote this, “Therefore, God’s chosen ones, holy and loved, put on heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, accepting one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a complaint against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you must also forgive. Above all, put on love—the perfect bond of unity.” (Colossians 3:12-14) Forgiveness won't necessarily change your relationship with the other person. Remember, forgiveness is a bridge between where you are and where peace is. Check out David's other work at Heart of Ministry. |
AuthorMy name is David, and I want to know God more, and help other people find Him. Archives
March 2019
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