October 22, 2011

As I journaled yesterday God has been bringing different things into my life yet they all point to the same things. If that makes sense. In my Masters Face2Face week we spoke quite a bit about transformation, go figure, and when I got home in the mail was an issue of EFCA Today, a publication put out by the E-Free Church of America. On the cover it says, "Pondering Spiritual Transformation", hmmmm... I've been pondering spiritual transformation quite a bit.

I want to highlight a few things in the articles that stuck out to me, and then I'll link to the full page of articles on their website.

"At the heart of spiritual leadership is discernment - the capacity to recognize and respond to the presence and the activity of God both personally and in community."
"The practice of community discernment, like any other Christian discipline, is a means of creating space for God's activity in our lives."
"The Lord seems content to work in people's lives in terms of decades, and in the church at large in terms of centuries. So, we need slow and steady perseverance to get there."
"Sometimes victory is just resolutely facing forward even if you can't seem to move."

Here is the link to the website: http://www.efcatoday.org/

October 21, 2011

God has been speaking to me quite a bit lately, or maybe God is always trying to speak to me and I have been paying better attention. This post is going to ramble, so be prepared...

One of the things that God has encouraged me with is the following devotional that my mom sent to me. The God aspect of this devotional is two fold 1. The date is October 15, which is the same day that Dave Williams one of my Masters Professors talked about the life of Elijah. and 2. I have felt very much like Elijah lately. Here is the devotional.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

Discouragement

And he said, "I have been very zealous for the LORD God of hosts; because the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. I alone am left; and they seek to take my life." (1 Kings 19:14)
Kingdom work can be challenging! You can give everything you have to God’s service and come away exhausted. This is what happened to Elijah. God had just used Elijah to call down fire from heaven in a spectacular display of divine power. But Elijah’s exhilaration was soon replaced by strenuous work followed by death threats, causing him to flee for his life. Now he was alone, exhausted, and discouraged.
Again, God came to Elijah. This time, He came not in fire or in a loud, spectacular way, but in a still, small voice. God’s servant was tired, and God brought him comfort. Elijah’s focus had shifted from God to God’s enemies. He had allowed his circumstances to overwhelm him, leaving him disoriented to God and feeling alone. So God encouraged him. God provided Elisha for him as a helper, friend, and companion.
God removed Elijah from the activity for a time, so that he could rest and spend time with God. When the nation next saw Elijah, he was rejuvenated and refocused on God and His assignment.
If you are overwhelmed by kingdom work so that your focus is no longer on God but on all that there is to do, let Him comfort you. Listen to His gentle voice. He will encourage you and provide exactly what you need to prepare you for what comes next. If He needs to remove you from your work for a time, He will. He may place a friend or co-laborer beside you to help carry the load. God knows exactly how to encourage you. Let Him do so.

Well, that was one of the ways that God has been speaking... Seeing as it is late, I will post another one tomorrow.

October 12, 2011

I have completed my second full day of Face 2 Face classes at Camp Quaker Ridge. These intensive classes are packed into a week, 8-5 everyday. These past two days have been incredibly full. I feel like it will take time even when I get home to unpack everything that has come out already, let alone in the next five days.
There have been many many ways that I have seen Christ since arriving here, too long to write out right now.

I know that this time is life changing and will continue to impact my life long after this week is over. It is interesting to know that something is life changing, yet at the same time not really knowing what it will look like on down the line.

I feel like God is giving me fresh perspective in life, and also a renewed sense of passion for what He is doing not only in my life, but in ministry as well. I have been longing for both of these for quite a while, and I didn't really know how to go about getting them, but they are happening now and I am excited to see where it leads.

October 7, 2011

I talked to my mom on the phone today. She prayed over me, and there was one statement that she prayed that stood out to me. She asked God that Audrey and I would see Him in unexpected places. I'm not totally sure why God made that stand out to me, but I have been thinking about it all day.
One unexpected place that God showed up was yesterday. I was just headed out the door to meet with fellow Pastor Mark Ramspurger for our weekly get together to talk about ministry, life, you name it. I look forward to this time every week. It is so good for me. Well, it was snowing and I realized that both of our dogs were missing. They had somehow gotten out of the house and were now who knows where in town.
I found Maya after about 25 minutes of driving around, but Mountie was nowhere to be found. This is highly unusual because when he has gotten out before he sticks pretty close around the house. I gave up looking for him after an hour and continued about my day until noon.
This time Audrey went out with me looking for him. I was getting pretty nervous and thought he got hit or something. We drove around for thirty minutes, until finally Audrey prayed that we would find him, and I pulled up to an intersection and said, "When I found Maya, I just stopped and looked around for a little while." I put the truck in park and we sat there for maybe 30 seconds when all of a sudden Audrey yells, "There he is!"
He was barely sticking his head out from behind a house that was situated on a hill. There would have been no way that we would have found him unless we stopped.
Anyway, I believe that God showed up there; unexpectedly. I am echoing my mom's prayer today.

September 27, 2011

"Soul Training" Exercise: Lectio Divina

1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Always trusts
Always perseveres

Love always perseveres. Love always perseveres. Love always perseveres. Love always perseveres.

God brought a few things to my mind as I prayed and thought over these words. The first one is that God's love for us always perseveres. There is nothing as Paul said that can separate us from the love of God through Christ Jesus. The fact that "always" is the word used makes it kind of hard to wrap my head around. Always is 100 percent. It's not 90 percent, or like the claims of anti-bacterial soaps 99.9 percent, it is 100 percent all the time, never taking a break, never quitting, never almost making it, it is guaranteed 100 percent, always.

God's love always perseveres; it is both humbling to know that God loves me and His love for me will always be there even when I screw up, and at the same time completely freeing and open knowing that God's love for me isn't dependent upon what I do. I don't have to earn it.

The next thing that came into my head concerning this phrase is that of married love. That when Audrey and I took our vows on November 26th, 2005 that phrase love always perseveres took it's roots in our marriage. The ups and downs of life together, the hardships that come our way, the things that love has already persevered through and the things that it will have to persevere through. It brings joy to know that because of God's always persevering love for Audrey and I, that our love for each other can always persevere through anything thrown our way in life.

September 26, 2011 #2

One of the interesting things that I found in Invitation To A Journey was how integral our personality types are to our spiritual growth and transformation. That we need to be aware of what our preferred method of worship/devotions/disciplines are in order that we can nurture the other side to be whole. So I found this personality test online. It appears that I am a ISTJ. I am going to have to do some more thinking and praying about how to apply all of this to my own life. But it is a good starting point to jump off from.


Your Type is
                               ISTJ

Introverted	Sensing	Thinking	Judging
Strength of the preferences %
44	62	50	56

Qualitative analysis of your type formula
 You are:

• moderately expressed introvert
• distinctively expressed sensing personality
• moderately expressed thinking personality
• moderately expressed judging personality

September 26, 2011

 This post struck me this morning as I read it. I've just finished writing my response paper to Mulholland's book, "Invitation To A Journey", and in his book he writes, "We live in an instant-gratification culture... If we do not receive the desired results almost instantly, we become impatient and frustrated." This post from Pete Wilson speaks directly to this idea that spiritual transformation is a life long process, much like physical growth. One of the best lines from this post is, "You can't microwave spiritual formation."

I have really been enjoying how God has been weaving similar acts and truths about spiritual transformation from many different areas in my life. I feel like so many things that I read, or situations that I find myself in, or conversations that I'm having center around spiritual transformation and/or leadership. It has been very encouraging to me to be able to see God working through my Masters course work and my everyday life. They are becoming more and more one and less and less school and life. 

Re-posted blog from Pete Wilson

Impatience Is An Enemy To Spiritual Growth

I think all too often in Christian circles we view spiritual transformation as something that should always be charted up and to the right. While I wish this was true, the reality is it isn’t, is it?
I love to study the life of the apostle Peter. I’ve got way too much in common with that dude.

Matt 16: ¹⁵“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” ¹⁶Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” ¹⁷Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. ¹⁸And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it

What a huge spiritual victory for Peter. You’ve been there.
You walked away from a certain temptation.
You loved someone you thought was unlovable.
You forgave someone you thought was unforgivable.
You had a moment of incredible generosity.
But just a few verses later we read…

²¹From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.
²²Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”
²³Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”

Listen, I don’t care where you are on your spiritual journey, when Jesus calls you “Satan” it’s a major set back. No matter how you look at it that’s a bad day.
Peter is a great reminder to me that this journey of having Christ formed in me is not an overnight deal. You can’t microwave spiritual formation.
And yet “impatience” which might be the most accepted sin in our culture today drives us to constantly want to speed up the process.
Can I encourage you today to slow down. Don’t beat yourself up if you’ve met recent spiritual failure or you just feel stuck. There are seasons to this spiritual growth process.
Today’s a new day full of new opportunities to connect to God’s grace in new ways.
Have you ever felt like Peter, up and down in your spiritual growth?