Success and Failure Blog

If left to our own devices, we would fail miserably, every time. Yes we may think that we are successful: a fat bank account, a house, cars, good social life, but these are all empty rewards. They will fade eventually. Sadly they will also serve as a distraction from what our Father in heaven would have us do. At first, we may see these things as blessings, especially if we have been down for sometime, and have prayed earnestly for God to intervene in our lives, and rightly so, they are. The new job, a car, a home, even a small windfall that helps to catch up your debts.

Eventually the want for more will begin to consume us as we enter the race to keep up with the Joneses. We become dissatisfied with what we have striving for more to build our mountains of wealth and gain. We forget where these gifts come from and perhaps begin to pride yourself on your gains. Subsequently, you forget about thanking He from whom all this comes from, and you begin to see yourself as the creator of your fortune. You credit your skills, talents, and intelligence, and rightly so, they have helped a great deal. But don’t forget where you obtained those attributes. God is our Father, because He is our Maker, and he alone is the credit for all of our possessions. He will allow you all the freedom you want, but be prepared, He will pull the rug out from under you, and you may lose all, like Job. He is only trying to get your attention though. Not to hurt you, but to show you how fragile these material things can be.

God loves us, and He doesn’t want us to suffer, but He will allow you some heartache, if you have strayed too far. Just read about the people of Jerusalem in the Old Testament, and they were His chosen.

Jeremiah 29:11-”I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope, and a future.”

These words mean so much, “I know the plans I have for you..”  He knows what will become of your life. He knows when you will succeed, He knows when you will fail. Can you say that of yourself? We all make plans, long term, short term. But these are only hopes and dreams. We don’t know what will happen tomorrow, much less next week. Only God, who is omniscient, knows from day to day. He knows because it’s His plan.

Isaiah 14:24 - ”The Lord [has] sworn ”Surely as I have thought, so it will be, and as I have spoke so it will stand,”

Indeed we are given free will, but really that is a misnomer. We are free to live as we see fit according to our lives and lifestyle, but isn’t “as we see fit” being disobedient to Him? We are not living as He would like, according to His will for our lives. He wants us to listen to Him, to ask of Him, to connect with Him and in turn, He will provide for us:

Matt 7:11 – “if you being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in Heaven, give good things to them that ask?

All He asks of you is an obedient relationship with Him.

God bless you all.

Become the man God intended you to be with the excellent book by Dr Tony Evans that addresses some of the pitfalls Christian men face today

Praise God for answered prayers. Here is a testimony from the Lord (and a great lesson) – It’s all about Faith and Obedience = Blessings. I pray this edifies the Body -

(more…)

Boy, do I over complicate things. Keep It Simple Servant! Faith and obedience, it’s really that simple.

Obedience is an action – Moses, strike the Nile with your rod. Raise your rod Moses. Strike the rock with your rod Moses. March around Jericho 7 times and shout. Lepers, go show the priest you are healed. Pick up your mat and walk. Keep it simple servant – Have faith and choose God, hear His word, then take an action in obedience. Simple enough, right? It only gets complicated after my ideas start to get involved. I end up trying to figure things out myself (Proverbs 3:5-8). When I do this, I have walked right into the war zone, Spirit vs Flesh -

(more…)

A quick lesson on how to continue to be joyful even in the midst of your greatest trials…

HEBREWS 12

Hebrews 12:3 “For consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.”

This verse says it all to me.  Consider Him [Jesus]….. lest I be weary [worn and dull of mind] and faint [grow weak in my Faith].
In other words,  I need to keep my mind on Jesus ALL THROUGH THE DAY so that my Faith will be strong to accomplish what needs to be done.  What needs to be done?  I need to live for Christ and through obedience to Him [action Faith] do the work the Father has chosen me to do.  I will know when the time comes what that is in it’s totality.  In the meantime, obedience is the job.  The key I’m seeing with this verse is this:  Keep your mind on Him.

Chapter 12 of Hebrews starts with the word (KJV)  Wherefore.… that means that the verses leading up to it have led us to a point being made .. and so we need to know what led us up to this point:
Leading up is Heb 11 and a message about people of Faith and their accomplishments.. vs 33-40 in particular, is talking about the early Christian’s who where martyred for their Faith, mostly in the Roman Coliseum.  They were fed to lions, spitted on stakes and set afire, sawn in two, boiled alive in oil, and a hundred other obscenities.   These people, when they where being tortured in the Coliseum sang and Praised God in their martyrdom to the effect that Nero (Emperor of Rome) would plug his ears and cry out “Why are these Christians so eager to die?”

The early Christians were eager to follow Jesus.  They KNEW that with Jesus was the place to be!  I’m not talking suicidal…I’m talking of a total lack of fear of death.  Jesus had just given us power over the fear of death, remember?  These people lived such fear free lives that they went to the Coliseum singing and praising God!  Even some of the soldiers quit their posts and ran to take the place of those being martyred because these people had ‘something’ that others had never seen before.  Jesus!

Listen to this truth and reflect on it —within 30 yrs of this, the most powerful nation that had ever existed in the known world, fell.  It disintegrated  – imploded- because of the Christian Faith.  Oh how we have fallen away!  Today, we are scared to even mention His name in places!

This then all leads into Hebrews 12 and now we need to pay attention, for the point leads us to what we need to do:

1 Wherefore seeing [by the preceding verses] we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, 2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, [of bearing any sin] and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Paul is telling me to remember those that have gone before and how their walk with Jesus was.  To lay aside everything I am going through at present and to focus on Jesus.  By doing so, even during these afflictions [persecutions] my Faith will enable me to persevere with patience the trials before me.

How could Jesus, knowing and aware that the torture, brutality, and cruelty of the cross was directly before Him, possibly walk toward it in Joy?  did you ever wonder about that?
Joy?  ???

Jesus had joy because He kept His mind on the Father.  He had Joy because He knew He was doing what the Father wanted Him to do .  The assignment did not matter – obedience was the issue.  The fact that it was going to kill Him and cause him untold pain and undeserved horror and shame-did not steal His Joy!  He did not endure the trek to the cross with a sulky self-pitying attitude.  His mind was fixed on the prize He was to attain over his victory and he was flooded with joy because of it.  Even in the midst of His worst earthly moments, He had joy.

That sure takes away any excuse I have for my next pity party!  This teaches me that JOY is under our control. It is an emotion and so subject to our control.  Your emotions follow upon your actions.  Actions follow your thoughts.  You can stir yourself up to feel any emotion you desire to have. What are you focusing your mind on?  What emotions are your thoughts creating for you?

How then can we possibly allow ourselves to be depressed, discouraged, sad, etc…?  We can stir ourselves up through remembering what Jesus did and by doing the same.  He stayed focused on the joy of serving His Father.

This is an incredible teaching.

Some tremendous messages in these verses.  There are some hard things coming in the near future.  I for one, and keeping my mind on Jesus. Otherwise, I will be too weak to endure my own race.