Weekend thoughts

It is amazing how my mind works sometimes. I was in the car on the way to church on Sunday going over my lesson for Sunday and was really feeling guilty for some of the personal battles I am fighting and how at times I just can't seem to get over them. I started to think that they are just areas of weakness that am just going to find a way to deal with. As I was having a bit of a pity party, a thought came to mind, that I am convinced was God.

"I created you with weaknesses because those are the areas of your life where I can be made strong."

What an amazing thought.  God crafted me in such a way that I have areas of life in which God can make himself real to us. WOW. He is so amazingly awesome.

Slow fade

For the first time in my life, I started on the journey to read the Bible straight through from cover to cover. It is amazing to me some of the lessons I have learned during the journey. In my study of the book of Judges, one major thing stood out to me, how many times the phrase, "and the Israelites did as they fit in their eyes." occurs in the book of Judges. When the focus of our life is what is good to us, we get it wrong every time.

But even more than that, the book of Judges shows me that path to "the Israelites did as they saw fit in their eyes" is the slowest of fades, it does not happen overnight. It a series of decisions to let our guard down, each time getting a little lower, until we wake up one morning like Samson and realize that we don't even realize the Spirit of the Lord has left us. What an awful realization that must have been.

When you let the demands of work and family or other commitments, many of which are good and beneficial, pull you to the point you skip personal time with God. When this starts to happen, it is a very dangerous path and before long you will wake up like Samson.

My prayer is that no one would wake up with this realization.

Simplicity of the Message

As I think back over the last few years of my life, teaching students mathematics has been a big part of it. As I have taught various concepts in the world of Geometry, Algebra, or Probability, as you may have guessed, I have a student or two utter the phrase, "I don't get it." In fact I have probably heard that phrase more often then I care to admit. Most of these instances, students just did not understand the way I explained it or there was a mistake in their mathematics, so I would adjust the way I explained it and help them correct their mistakes and the light bulb would come on and they would "get it".

The most frustrating times for me as a teacher are the "You making this harder than it has to be" moments. This is when students would try to make a complex theory out of a simple formula.

All too often we treat the message of Christ much the same way. We make it so hard by adding conditions to come to God. Whether it is giving up a habit or knowing more about the Bible or going to church more, we feel have to do certain things before will let us come to Him. 2 Corinthians 5:18-21 says it with such simplicity:

¹⁸All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. ²¹God made him who had no sin to be sin^a]"> for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Sometimes when we read the Bible, much like my math students, we over complicate its message. We search for hidden meanings and find some deep spiritual meaning to it instead of reading what was intended. The message of Christ is simple. Christ came so that through the Cross, in our imperfection and weakness, we can be in right standing with God. God desires relationship with us. So as you go about your day, let the simplicity of the message resonate in you.

I know its been a while for me to add some insightful words today. Things have been really busy lately. School has started. This means that I am spending fifteen hours a week in class at ISU. This means that my free time is severely diminished.

A quote that I came across the other day that I has been on my mind.

"God is too good to be unkind
God is too wise to be confused
Whenever you can't trace his hand
You can always trust his heart"

This goes to the very core of who God is and how we have to let him work in our lives. There are times when we have to trust him. It is hard when things don't look promising in our eyes. But sometimes we just have to remember that God is always at work preparing us for the next step.

Is it really hard to believe...

that God answers our prayers?

Last night, I crawled into bed about 12:30 AM or so after watching the men's gymnastics from Beijing and doing some late night laundry. I was trying to get comfortable, but not having any success. For about the last week, I have been soar from an attempted dive for a volleyball during our concert in the park. I don't know what happened, but it has been bugging me ever since. So thinking about how annoying this little injury. While laying there, I thought why don't I pray for a healing. He created the universe and he has raised the dead, surely this isn't too big for Him. So I prayed in confidence that he was going to heal it. But upon finishing my prayer, I found myself surprised that it didn't hurt.

Mark 11:24 says "Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." It shouldn't come as a surprise that prayer gets answered. But how often do we pray and really have the faith to believe that it will be answered? God wants to answer us when we pray. It is who he is; we just have to trust that he will come through.

The Wheels on the Van

This week I had the opportunity to go to Magic Waters in Rockford with the youth. It was the first time I had been there in about ten years. It was a blast. It is a weird sensation, though, when an intertube squeezes your bottom when going down a slide.

In the van on the way home, something was said that really made think. As we passed a FedEx truck she asked if we see the arrow? Do you see it?





See it. It is in between the bottom space of the E and the left side of the X. I don't know if it is intentional or not, but it's there. I had never seen it before, but now every time I see a FedEx truck the arrow is all I see. It is all about perspective. Our perspective is what forms our attitudes and opinions of the way things are. Our perspectives are so easily changed.

It makes me so glad that God's perspective of us never changes. The fact the he always looks at us, his children, with love and mercy regardless of all of the sinful, selfish, and sometimes even stupid things we do. He always carries and leads us through whatever trouble we get ourselves into.

What's a blog?

This is the first blog I have ever written. I really don't know what someone is supposed to write about in a blog. Someone told me that the ideal blog has a great deal of humor with an inspirational twist. My inspirational twist is gone for today, so I hope humor will do.

Things that you go Grrrrr:

1. Slow drivers- I know I need patience, but I am not a doctor.
2. The Brett Farve situation- enough already
3. The Yankees and the Red Sox- they seem to play everyday and its annoying
4. Spam email- will it ever stop
5. Bloggers- Doesn't that make me grrr at myself?