Pastor Jay //

“Men are God’s method. The church is looking for better methods; God is looking for better men.” - EM Bounds, foreward, Hudson Taylor’s Spiritual Secret

“The whole transaction of religious conversion has been made mechanical and spiritless. Faith may now be exercised without a jar to the moral life and without embarrassment to the Adamic ego. Christ may be “received” without creating any special love for Him in the soul of the receiver. The man is “saved,” but he is not hungry nor thirsty after God. In fact he is specifically taught to be satisfied and encouraged to be content with little.” – AW Tozer, The Pursuit of God p. 12-13.

I am exhausted with the superficiality of so-called Christians. It amazes me the sad lives people live - without spiritual growth - without spiritual victory. And then I look in the mirror, and realize that I am asking so little from God. I am so unwilling to make the sacrifices necessary to be the man of God that He calls me to be. My exhaustion comes from my pride instead of service. My lack of compassion comes from a selfish attitude.

God, please send a renewing of your Spirit. We ask for a fresh wind of grace upon your church.

Thank you President Bush for taking a stand for religious freedom in China. In an interview with Bob Costas on Sunday Mr. President said:

THE PRESIDENT: …[I]f you’re a religious person, you understand that once religion takes hold in a society it can’t be stopped…
COSTAS: [D]o you find Hu Jintao… receptive [to Western ideals]?
THE PRESIDENT: It’s hard to tell. I mean, it’s-all I can tell you is that it is best to be in the position where a leader will listen to you. I went to church here, and I’m sure the cynics say, well, you know, it was just a state-sponsored church. …[A]nd that’s true. On the other hand, it gave me a chance to say to the Chinese people, religion won’t hurt you, you ought to welcome religious people. And it gave me a chance to say to the government, why don’t you [recognize] the underground churches and give them a chance to flourish? *

Thank you for going to church while at the Olympics. Thank you for calling for religious freedom in China. (And, thank you for standing amidst the onslaught of Bob’s misguided questions. Maybe he should stick to sports.)

*transcribed by Family Research Council www.frc.org

Although I haven’t dredged the depths of this blog and will probably find that it is irreverent or something, I have a new fav blog: http://stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com/

This is a very sarcastic look at Christians that I happen to find pretty funny. Silly me. Here is one of my favorite posts about parking at church called “#261: Parking in visitor parking for 14 years” Enjoy. BTW, thank you to Tara at http://livesayhaiti.blogspot.com/ for introducing it to us.

Sometimes I hear or read things that contradict something that I have thought or said. I came across one such statement today:

“Christianity isn’t about do’s and don’ts.  It’s about a relationship.”  (As if the relationship were not guarded and preserved by rules.  Try telling your wife after you’ve had an affair, “Come on.  I thought our marriage was about the relationship, not all these do’s and don’ts.”) - Kevin DeYoung

I think what I have said is, “Christianity is not a religion, it is a relationship.” Still, I think the point is well taken. We need to be careful in not sacrificing the commands of the Bible in the name of relationship. If we do, we are fooling ourselves.

I was talking with one of our youth this week that has been struggling over the last year spiritually. (He speaks of this publicly and blogs about it.) One of the things that caught my attention was his perception of the peaks and valleys of spiritual life. It reminded me how high and low those peaks were for me when I was his age. Summer camp was high and feeling alone as a Christian in high school was low. Oz had something to say about this today in the Utmost devotional - posthumously, of course.

One of the worst traps a Christian worker can fall into is to become obsessed with his own exceptional moments of inspiration. When the Spirit of God gives you a time of inspiration and insight, you tend to say, “Now that I’ve experienced this moment, I will always be like this for God.” No, you will not, and God will make sure of that.

He says that if we try to hang on to and continue to live for those moments, we become a burden to God rather than helpful. This is because those special moments are gifts - gifts that we cannot choose to have at the moment of our choosing. They are encouraging and inspiring, but not for daily consumption. Moses didn’t stay on Sinai. Jesus didn’t pitch tents on the Mt of Transfiguration. John did not remain in the vision of Revelation on the Isle of Patmos. We are to be incarnational. We are to take that relationship into the world.

Father, help me to be willing to do the hard work of Christianity - even when it’s not exciting or easy.

You know I love reading Oswald Chambers. Take a look at the April, 4, 2008 devotional. Here’s a quote:

After we have the perfect relationship with God, through the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, our faith must be exercised in the realities of everyday life. We will be scattered, not into service but into the emptiness of our lives where we will see ruin and barrenness, to know what internal death to God’s blessings means. Are we prepared for this? It is certainly not of our own choosing, but God engineers our circumstances to take us there. Until we have been through that experience, our faith is sustained only by feelings and by blessings…Until Jesus Christ is truly our Lord, we each have goals of our own which we serve. Our faith is real, but it is not yet permanent. And God is never in a hurry. If we are willing to wait, we will see God pointing out that we have been interested only in His blessings, instead of in God Himself.

I am reminded again how much pruning my life needs even after 25+ years of salvation.

Good Humor: Things you never hear in church:… (more…)

“Suffering is the touchstone of saintliness, just as temptation is, and suffering wrongfully will always reveal the ruling disposition, because it takes us unawares. (from Bringing Sons unto Glory, Oswald Chambers, 1943).

When things go wrong in your life, how do you respond? We are not in heaven yet, because we need refining. We are not perfected yet, because we need perfecting. James says, “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.” (James 1:2-3) If you are facing a trial, allow it to reveal the things that are broken in your heart and lay that brokenness at the feet of Christ for Him to heal.

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.” (1 Peter 2:24; see also Isaiah 52:13-53:12)