Blogging at Bedtime Part II

I had to throw my two cents in about the fight over Kirk Phifer, henceforth ever to be known as ULM (Ultimate Ladies' Man). See below for more on this topic. Aside from that, I actually had some deep thoughts and quandries for the blogworld.

Tonight in Deeper (AKA Dive Hometeam), we discussed the "blip" on the radar screen of eternity that is our life. We talked about how to cultivate an eternal perspective while still living daily life with all its troubles. I think the deep and thoughtful members of our little group came up with some wonderful thoughts. At the end, our fearless leader, Chip (AKA The Gambler), read some questions about Heaven, which we did not have time to discuss and proceeded to assign us homework to answer them. Since this is not for a grade, I'd like a little help with my homework...so I'm going to extend this assignment to all you bloggers, commentators and lurkers (even though the last group won't answer because they only lurk).

So, here are the questions:

• How different do you think Heaven will be from Earth?
• Will there be cars, buildings, relationships, technology?
• What about nature? Plants, animals, oceans, mountains?
• What Scriptures do we have that back up or inform us about Heaven?

Can't wait to hear what y'all come up with!

The Ladies' Man
Some of my girl friends have been fighting over my good friend Kirk. I am wondering if I should choose sides, discourage the fight or jump in and try to win the man myself. I'm thinking it might have to be the latter. After all, Kirk is, by all reports, the ultimate ladies' man. Hmmm... Check out the fight and tell me what you think.

Lackadaisical'>http://1cor1558.blogspot.com/2006/03/bring-it-on.html#links">Lackadaisical

http://flaminlarry.blogspot.com/2006/03/girl-fight.html

http://fairygodseester.blogspot.com/

http://fairygodseester.blogspot.com/2006/03/kirk-phifer-smooth-operator.html

Dive Class at Hunt Retreat

Thanks to Brian Wilson's birthday, we took advantage of the opportunity for some cake and ice cream. Yummy!

Lee, Jonathan and Chip

Blogging at bedtime

Ok, so I got online to check my e-mail and found a comment had been posted to my entry with the picture of my cousin's baby. I had not realized how much I had hoped for more comments on my blogs, especially those soul searching and gut checking ones...geez, another thing to affect my sense of self-worth! Regardless, the comment led me to the blog of the commentator, Jessica, which in turn led me to other blogs...you know how it goes, and suddenly I look up and it's past my bedtime! Ugh! I need some sleep...yet I had to post another blog just for the sake of posting. I noticed in my lurking, reading and occasional commenting, that many posts are simple "here's what happened to me today" posts and really don't have to be deep and meaningful. I'm still learning, folks. All that to say, here's my first "meaningless" post. If you don't like it, that's ok because I'm not expecting comments on this one. In fact, I've decided that just like the outcome of sporting events, I must choose not to base my sense of self-worth on whether or not people read and comment on my blog entries. That's a topic for a future post, though, and I'm simply too tired after the Dive retreat to go there. Goodnight, blogworld.

My cousins' baby, Bruce, is so adorable! Check out their blog to see more pics.

http://www.tbsatwood.blogspot.com

The Relinquished Life

*I'm starting to sense a pattern in what the Lord is trying to hammer home with me in the last few days and weeks. Here is the devotional that "just happened to be" lying open on the desk at a friend's house this week.

"I am crucified with Christ." Gal. 2:20
No one is ever united with Jesus Christ until he is willing to relinquish not sin only, but his whole way of looking at things. To be born from above of the Spirit of God means that we must let go before we lay hold, and in the first stages it is the relinquishing of all pretence. What Our Lord wants us to present to Him is not goodness, nor honesty, nor endeavour, but real solid sin; that is all He can take from us. And what does He give in exchange for our sin? Real solid righteousness. But we must reliquish all pretence of being anything, all claim of being worthy of God's consideration.
Then the Spirit of God will show us what further there is to relinquish. There will have to be the reliquinshing of my claim to my right to myself in every phase. Am I willing to reliquish my hold on all I possess, my hold on my affections, and on everything, and to be identified with the death of Jesus Christ?
There is always a sharp painful disillusionment to go through before we do relinquish. When a man really sees himself as the Lord sees him, it is not the abominable sins of the flesh that shock him, but the awful nature of the pride of his own heart against Jesus Christ. When he sees himself in the light of the Lord, the shame and the horror and the desperate conviction come home. If you are up against the question of relinquishing, go through the crisis, relinquish all, and God will make you fit for all that He requires of you.

by Oswald Chambers
From: My Utmost For His Highest
March 8th

Lord, Surrender is a scary thing. Sacrifice does not come easy. Please help us to be like Abraham, who knew that giving up Isaac was the only way to live in obedience to you and was so confident in your goodness and provision that he knew you were going to either raise him from the dead or perform some sort of miracle to make things right. May we anticipate the miracles our obedience will allow you to perform in our surrendered lives and may we wholeheartedly welcome opportunities for sacrifice that demonstrate your power, provision and goodness. Amen.

Do you want to get well?

This is an excerpt from the FCA devotional I read for today. It seems to go along well with my last post and like my friend Erin Bayles and her Joyce Meyer desktop devotional calendar, it goes along perfectly with what I have been dealing with in my life lately.

Why would Jesus ask a man who had been paralyzed for 38 years if he wants to get well? You would think it would be a no-brainer. But Jesus wants to know if the man has faith that He can make him well and if he has the will or desire to get well. Also, Jesus often deals in the spiritual realm, rather than merely the physical, so it wasn't just about his body being healed, but his soul as well.

When it comes to spiritual matters this is often the way it is in life; people just really don't want to get well. We say we want to, but we make excuses just like the paralyzed man (John 5:7) about why we are still in the same condition. Until we truly want to get well, and until we realize that Jesus is the only One who can heal us, we will continue life in our sickness.

God wants a relationship with you today. Do you want Him? Really?

Resisting God

Why do we fight and struggle against the very One who made us and the only One who really and truly wants our best? Why do we resist His working in our lives? I think deep down it is a power struggle. We want control of our own lives, our own destinies. It's been said that "surrender is the highest act of the will." We have no greater battle in life than the battle with self. We resist God because in our human, finite minds, we think we know better for us than He does. We think we can do a better job running our lives than He can. We think we can get what we want on our own and we fear if we surrender we will have to wait or settle for something other than our hearts' desire. What we fail to realize is that God's best for us is so much better than what our hearts can even imagine. So, we go on holding on to our dreams and desires instead of letting God take them, and not shatter them, but mold them to fit His will for us. Not all desires are bad. Desire is not the sin. The sin comes when rather than surrendering that desire to God, we seek to fulfill it ourselves. What we end up with is a cheap imitation of what we really wanted and a broken heart about the fact that it fails to satisfy. Resisting God's best for us will never bring about the joy and fulfillment that can be ours by surrendering to His will. The bottom line is that lack of surrender is sin. Sin will steal your joy.
While we are talking about sin, this is another area where we resist God's working in our lives. We have the Scriptures and they are clear about what sin is and what actions in our lives qualify as sin. So, why do we continue to succomb to sin? I think the answer is fear. We are afraid that we must change on our own and we know from experience that we will fail in the attempt. What we don't realize is that getting rid of sin in our lives is God's job. He wants to give us clean hands and pure hearts, but we simply don't let Him. No one can forgive and transform a life but God. Surrendering our wills to Him allows him to do that. We think repentance is a long process where we have to continually battle our sin and fall on our faces over and over in the effort to change our behaviors. Repent simply means to turn around. There's not even any forward progress in the motion. It is just a spin, a 180. All we have to do is turn our hearts to God and set our sins at His feet. Let Him have them. He will fix us Himself. Every person who has tried to help himself has failed. Every person who has thrown up his hands and said "I can't do it myself" has found the joy and peace of God stepping in and saying, "Finally. Let me do it for you."
We resist God because we don't trust God. We don't trust God because we don't really know God. We don't really know God because we don't take the time to get to know Him. So, the key to learning the art of surrender is getting to know God. Invest in your relationship with God. Give Him the opportunity to prove His love for you and His power over your sin. At the end of the day, He will do a much better job of running your life than you could.

Weak or Strong?

I know there are verses in the Bible about being strong (Deut. 31:6; I Kings 2:2; Joshua 1:6, 7, 9) and there are verses about being weak and allowing God to be strong through us (II Corinthians 12:9-10). Sometimes I feel like I have no strength when I'm supposed to be strong and when I am supposed to be letting God work though my weakness, that's when I think I'm strong enough to handle things myself. I have so much going on in my life and I try to handle everything. I try to make decisions based on knowledge or previous experience rather than letting God have my struggles and work them out for me. I want to do it myself, like a little child just learning to get dressed or make a sandwich. I don't want help, but I have my pants on backwards and there's jelly all over the counter. On the other hand, there are times when I know I have to be strong. I know God has given me a challenge and He intends for me to meet it head on. But what do I do? I cower in fear and take the easy way out. I don't face my fears. Then again, isn't this weakness something God wants to be strong in also? He's not going to give me a challenge that He won't be there to uphold me through. I know deep down that rather than just telling us to be bold and corageous, God has empowered us to be so. I may face some really tough things in life. In fact, Christ told us we would have troubles in this world, but we are to take heart because He has already overcome the world. I don't have to have all the answers and I don't have to be the strongest person in the world. I just have to lean on and trust my Savior who loved me enough to die for me. I have to give Him my struggles and my fears and let Him make things work together for my good. I know these things. Why don't I live like I believe them?