Category Archives: SPIRITUAL INTEREST

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Another Minister in the Headlines: Failure of a Church Leader

blog stopFailure in the Church

On social media, a minister shared a link to an online  article about a rising star, a person of influence, a minister of the gospel, who is now on the hot-seat. This is due to his ungodly and disrespectful behavior, behavior unfitting for any minister of the faith. He is immensely popular and has a multitude of followers. Because of his misbehavior, deceitfulness, and other self-glorying actions, some Christian organizations are pulling his books, and he is being removed from upcoming speaking engagements. I have followed some of his missteps over the past few months.

We have been here before, in recent years and also a couple of decades ago, when television evangelists and preachers have been exposed for walking a walk that doesn’t match the talk. It is a shameful business. I am sure these ministers didn’t start out that way. But the success and popularity got their eyes off Christ. This one is a big story and has been months in coming. However, it doesn’t make me want to add my voice to the condemning mantra, which many delight in doing. Rather, it makes me want to go to him and say, don’t you realize what you’re doing? This is man-serving not God-pleasing. This is bringing shame to the name of Christ.  As fellow-believers we react to such things. Our reputations are also affected albeit distantly. The unbelieving take notice. My first thoughts were sad and judgmental but also wondering and desirous of a spiritual cleansing for this minister of the gospel.

Quickly the thoughts collected and spewed in my head: You reap what you sow. You’re leading out of your flesh not out of the spirit.  Pride comes before a fall. Pride begets arrogance. Stardom turns some leaders toward demagoguery. They become infatuated with their own selves and the reach of their influence (and ministry). They dominate the people they lead. It becomes cult-like.  God will prune them and their ministry, or he may remove them from the action. God humbles the proud, and He means it for their good. I conducted a web search. There are many injured as a result of this pastor’s ministry. These people believe they have been sold out, their reputations compromised, because they didn’t follow the mold or agree with the leadership in some way. There is a warning here for anyone in leadership.

I have noticed this same pattern over the years. Independent thinkers who question the leadership, not on the same track as the minister for whatever reason, get waylaid or removed with some spiritually-sounding explanation given as the justification. Is that God’s way? I don’t think so. I also read an article by an unbelieving person who went to great lengths to condemn this minister by citing quote after quote, writing an in-depth blog that slammed this minister. The blogger found great fault with both the message and the messenger. It was putrid. Some of it was against biblical stances which are contrary to political correct ideology, but the rest was, apparently, deserved. The sad thing is, there was lots of fuel available, actions unworthy of a minister of God. Some blame rests in growing a ministry that has lost its first love and also its balance. 

It is a difficult position for a church to be in. Ministers ordained and serving have an anointing from God. To expose them when they are in error, is something that must be done in God’s way and with confidence that this isn’t a preference or a  reaction but biblical. In scripture, the goal of confrontation is always to restore the person to God and godly behavior. It is not to shame, degrade, or to designate them as an outcast. It is a call to holiness.

Christian leaders who silence the people (those Christians who hold them accountable), who lead with an iron fist, who take power and authority and then abuse it, these leaders have quit looking in the mirror of God. They think they are the gifted person, the one who matters. In truth, they are a tool, a special one who God is using to proclaim his message to the world in which they live and to grow His kingdom. God tends to shout if from the rooftops when they continue living a lie, act as a hypocrite, and/or are unrepentant. They are held responsible to God for their actions.

I thought of how we are all fallen people. We all have a propensity to glorify self and we tend to believe we are in the right. We all need Jesus to set us on the right course, to change-up what needs changing up in our spiritual lives. Today I added my comment. “It is a sad commentary. But, for the grace of God…”

But, for the grace of God there go I. Although it is a sad commentary, this is not the end of his story. This minister will either become broken and experience the insights which come with brokenness, or he will continue on and on unless God stops him, and he will continue to bring shame to the name of God. There are too many reports for me to not believe that some of this is true. If there is repentance and godly sorrow, God will cause a rebirth in this minister’s ministry that will have a different sort of impact.  God sees the contrite heart. That is what is needed here among some other things. We must pray and believe for God’s intervention in this man’s life.

I feel hopeful for him, that God will cause a watershed moment in his life, and he will know the grace of forgiveness, and the joy of restoration at the feet of Jesus, that he will die to self and live unto Christ. A death and resurrection experience is what is needed here.

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The Life Ever After: The Truth of Heaven

0605002048Our view of heaven is too limited. There isn’t all that much information, I know.  Yet I believe heavenly life with the Savior is going to be amazing beyond prediction. That’s because He is amazing.

My thoughts are on heaven today. I am preparing a lesson about heaven for children. I don’t believe heaven is on the radar with most people. Can’t even say it’s on my radar all that much. It’s too out there, in another life. The present life seems a bit too frantic to even contemplate heaven during the daily busyness of living. But is it?

We’ve all heard the arguments. Why would anyone want to go to heaven ? Why would anyone not want to go to heaven?

What do you think heaven is really like? It’s a good question is it not? We have a scattering of ideas that come from passages sprinkled throughout the scriptures. People have written big books on heaven. I’m wading through Randy’s Alcorn’s study on heaven. A good read and convincing. Yet there isn’t all that much concrete information. There’s some conjecture. But, what is heaven really like?

What can we expect? Why would someone look forward to being there? In my lesson, I will talk about what is not in heaven: suffering, pain, sickness, evil, and so forth.  I will talk about what is in heaven: tree of life, book of life, celestial beings, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, homes, gold and jewels, people who have gone on before us, and so forth. Yet, it still can sound sort of tedious or boring. Is heaven boring?

The more I come to love my Savior and Father God, and to experience the Spirit’s life in me, the more I know that it is impossible to be bored in heaven. Life starts to get interesting once God is in control. Imagine the music. Wondrous harmonies. I think there will even be humor in heaven. Not boring in the least, contrary to what others may think who’ve not experienced God. Heaven could not be boring with Christ living there.

One reason heaven is so wonderful is that we will see with our eyes what we have by faith believed in our hearts.

There is another reason that Heaven will be the most amazing place ever. It has all to do with Son-ship. In heaven we will be family connected to the Source of all things living. This relatedness to the Triune God will put into our lives full acceptance and love. I have this feeling that everything will be brighter, more intense than in this shadowland we call earth. Once we are no longer mortal but have become immortal, we will rejuvenate and become ALL that we have ever wanted to be. There won’t be the endless striving and disappointments of the earthly journey. I am certain we will be more incredibly ALIVE, more radically FULL, more fully COMPLETE than we can even imagine.

Can you imagine that? What it will be like when our faith becomes sight, when we see our blessed Lord, the scars in His hands, the wounds in His feet, and we know Him in His heavenly presence. Wow!

I have long felt that the earth, in its groaning and suffering with its struggle under sin’s curse, is like something bound in a closed system. At times there are glimpses into the heavenly realm. For the past few years I have been seeking God with an intense fervor. I want to know God. At times I experience a joy and fullness that is overwhelmingly beautiful.

One time it happened while I was singing in church with the worship team. There was such spontaneous joy inside of me that I could barely contain myself. I felt like shouting and jumping up and down. It felt as if beams of light were radiating out from me. My smile was so big that I probably looked foolish. This happened to me during a time of personal crisis in my life, when I was drawing deep from God’s well.  I wonder if that will be the way of rejoicing and worshiping in heaven? I sure hope so.

Heaven will be a “safe house,” a home that is welcoming, serene, loving and radiant. I love it that Jesus says, “In my father’s house are many rooms. I go to prepare a place for you.” We are “family” in Jesus’ “Father’s house.”

Another time, I was writing at the computer after spending a long while in prayer and meditation. It was in the morning. I was looking out the kitchen window. The clouds were glorious and I was watching them change shapes. For a moment, just a moment, I saw varied colors transfusing the sky in indescribable colors, rich and bright. Then they were gone. I wondered at it. Was it a glimpse into the heavenlies of God? It was as if I saw through a veil into a place of grandeur.

There are many reasons to anticipate heaven Just to walk with Jesus will be a miracle of peace and joy. The difficulties of the earthly realm will fade away into oblivion. Past hurts will lose their hold on us. People who have wronged us will be fully forgiven and enjoyed in renewed relationship.

Jesus says, ” I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me.”  Jesus is the way, the Gatekeeper, we must pass to get there.

The Bible is the road map that tells us the directions to heaven.
Jesus Christ is the Way to get to heaven. He is the Truth and the Life.
There is no other way. No shortcuts or bribes or good deeds are enough.
A person cannot pay their way into heaven. …Not to worry. It is a free gift called salvation.
We are saved by Christ’s redeeming love through His shed blood on the cross.

Heaven is a by-product of a life hidden in Christ.