Something that had been sort of bothering me, well maybe bothering me isn't the right word, something that has been ... confusing me, is that God is the love of our life. How does this fit with a wife? To make someone your wife you have to love them with all your heart, they are the other half of your soul, they complete you. How are you supposed to love God more than that?
In Genesis 2:
24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.
Become one flesh... become one flesh. One person. I'd heard this before and thought oh yeah, that means that they are inseparable. I don't think that's what God intends here. You are two halves of an incomplete whole. God puts you back together to make a whole being who He wants to have a relationship with. He can have a relationship with you independently to be sure, but when you join with another, you become one in His eyes and He is now in a relationship with You (both of you). God is now the other end of this relationship. He wants You (both of you again) to be in Love with Him, just like you couldn't live without your other half, You (both) can't live without Him.
As You (both) grow closer to Him, You (both) begin to become one with Him, to become one in His spirit. You love God more than Yourself to be sure, but you still can't live without all of you, and all of you is now two people. You become one flesh with your wife, and then You (both) become one spirit with God.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
The War
Jesus died and rose again and that ended the war. There is no more battle for sin or evil, Jesus' death has ended all that. Satan is no longer a real threat, it's been dealt with, we can just sit back let Jesus deal with everything. As long as we go to church and try to do good, we are good Christians. Is this truth? Is this the life God is asking from us? I think not.
I've heard it said that satan's best trick was to convince the world he didn't exist, that may be so, but Christians know he exists. The best trick that satan ever pulled was even more cunning that that. It was to convince God's warriors that there was nothing to fight, that he was not a threat, that it was merely people choosing evil that causes the world's heartaches. Who causes that evil though? There is a war going on, and that war is all around us and we are the one's God calls to fight, we are God's front line and He is our Commander. Don't get me wrong, we can't do anything on our power, but Christ has given us Power in His spirit, that we can use to fight, and we are called to fight:
Mark 16:17
And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues;
2 Corinthians 10
4The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. 6And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete.
Ephesians 6
12For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.
"After you have done everything"... God is not saying, "hey wait around for me and i will fix everything", he is saying, "go and fight!" He is calling us to be his warriors, his right hand men, assaulting the very gates of hell. Satan doesn't want us fighting against him, so he convinces us this isn't the case, there isn't anything to fight, so we go around our lives completely unaware of the larger struggle going on.
This isn't a part time job. You don't go around casting out demons on the weekend and then worry about your regular life on the weekdays. This reminds me of a scene in 300. Leonidas has just marched off to make war on Xerxes, and the arcadians come to join up. Leonidas asks various arcadian volunteers what their profession is, one says potter, one says blacksmith, etc. Leonidas then asks what the spartans profession was, to which they replied "Hooah" which loosely translates to some form of death-bringing.
These two groups provide us with an excellent view of two types of Christians. The arcadians are people who have been led to believe there is no war, or if there is it's only minor battles here and there. They have a real life and fight on the side. The spartans however, understand that only by completely devoting themselves to readying themselves for war will they be victorious. They are warriors and have a real life on the side. This is what God calls us to be. We are warriors for His Kingdom first and foremost and this life is a trivial thing. It's an illusion. It's not real.
"The truth is you were born into bondage, into a prison you can't taste, smell or touch, a prison for your mind. and as long at the Matrix exists the human race will never be free."
~ Morpheus (The Matrix)
Another movie example, the human race is imprisoned, and most of them don't even know it. There are other humans who know the truth, the truth that their oppressors would have kept hidden from the rest of the population. This small group of humans fight to free other humans, and to fight the real evil going on. Sound familiar? As soon as neo (which is his real name, given to Him when he is freed) wakes up from being released from sin.. *cough* i mean the matrix, morpheus says to him "welcome to the real world" - welcome Neo, to what is really going on, welcome to the war.
Welcome Christian brother or sister, welcome to the real world, welcome to the war.
I've heard it said that satan's best trick was to convince the world he didn't exist, that may be so, but Christians know he exists. The best trick that satan ever pulled was even more cunning that that. It was to convince God's warriors that there was nothing to fight, that he was not a threat, that it was merely people choosing evil that causes the world's heartaches. Who causes that evil though? There is a war going on, and that war is all around us and we are the one's God calls to fight, we are God's front line and He is our Commander. Don't get me wrong, we can't do anything on our power, but Christ has given us Power in His spirit, that we can use to fight, and we are called to fight:
Mark 16:17
And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues;
2 Corinthians 10
4The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. 6And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete.
Ephesians 6
12For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.
"After you have done everything"... God is not saying, "hey wait around for me and i will fix everything", he is saying, "go and fight!" He is calling us to be his warriors, his right hand men, assaulting the very gates of hell. Satan doesn't want us fighting against him, so he convinces us this isn't the case, there isn't anything to fight, so we go around our lives completely unaware of the larger struggle going on.
This isn't a part time job. You don't go around casting out demons on the weekend and then worry about your regular life on the weekdays. This reminds me of a scene in 300. Leonidas has just marched off to make war on Xerxes, and the arcadians come to join up. Leonidas asks various arcadian volunteers what their profession is, one says potter, one says blacksmith, etc. Leonidas then asks what the spartans profession was, to which they replied "Hooah" which loosely translates to some form of death-bringing.
These two groups provide us with an excellent view of two types of Christians. The arcadians are people who have been led to believe there is no war, or if there is it's only minor battles here and there. They have a real life and fight on the side. The spartans however, understand that only by completely devoting themselves to readying themselves for war will they be victorious. They are warriors and have a real life on the side. This is what God calls us to be. We are warriors for His Kingdom first and foremost and this life is a trivial thing. It's an illusion. It's not real.
"The truth is you were born into bondage, into a prison you can't taste, smell or touch, a prison for your mind. and as long at the Matrix exists the human race will never be free."
~ Morpheus (The Matrix)
Another movie example, the human race is imprisoned, and most of them don't even know it. There are other humans who know the truth, the truth that their oppressors would have kept hidden from the rest of the population. This small group of humans fight to free other humans, and to fight the real evil going on. Sound familiar? As soon as neo (which is his real name, given to Him when he is freed) wakes up from being released from sin.. *cough* i mean the matrix, morpheus says to him "welcome to the real world" - welcome Neo, to what is really going on, welcome to the war.
Welcome Christian brother or sister, welcome to the real world, welcome to the war.
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Intimacy
There is no doubt that God has been teaching me a lot over the last month. He has been teaching me some incredible stuff, some really deep stuff, and stuff that has revolutionized my world. I felt everything was connected though, that all these lessons were leading to a bigger lesson that He was slowly unfolding, and something that would forever change me.
Ever since I was first interested in girls I have been looking to settle down, that may seem odd, but I have always been extremely family oriented, and everything that I have done in my life has been to support my dream of being a husband and a father. I have never felt complete, and it has always been a belief of mine that I will not be complete until i find my 'better half'. Nothing in this world could bother me, not famine, disease, or poverty. As long as I had God, my wife, and enough food to barely survive I would be content. I could do anything as long as i had God and my wife. There is only one thing in this world that I have ever truly cared about, and that is finding the one person who completes me, and also the one thing that I have kept with me for as long as i can remember, and the one thing that I have not given over to God.
I began to wonder why this was, why it was so hard for me to give this over to God, and i realized that it was intimacy. I needed intimacy, I could live my entire life and deal with anything that would come along as long as I had intimacy, and i thought that could only be found in my wife. What i failed to realize was that the purest form of intimacy, the most incredible and powerful and full form of intimacy we could ever want is not found on this earth.
In the garden was the truest form of intimacy, complete and open communion with God, with nothing to get in the way of our oneness with Him. This is what we were made for, this is what our heart so longs for, and what we lost when we sinned and were forced out of God's presence. In the old testament God had his people create the Tabernacle which means 'dwelling place', but the hebrew word for it is 'Mishkan' which means 'to dwell in the presence of God.' God was giving his people a way to get back their intimacy with Him that He so desperately missed in some small part, but even then he could only be with them in a small space. It wasn't until He sent his Son to eradicate sin's effect that He could fully dwell with us again and regain the intimacy we both desire so much.
God created us for intimacy, and as such we have a desire that can only be fully satisfied by Him, but He does give us something in this life that can give us an inkling of what He has created us for and it can be found in genesis starting with chapter 1:
27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
God creates man AND women in his image, meaning the true image of God is displayed in both of us so that in genesis 2:
24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.
We become one flesh and unite the two halves of God's image, and share an intimacy that is so intense and so powerful it could only have come from God. This is, however, only a fraction of the true intimacy we were created for, this is merely a whisper, a fleeting glance at the true unity of spirit that we were created for and we long for. We must be careful that we do not try to fill our need for intimacy with only this. It is not enough to simply have this intimacy with your other half, you are missing the truer part, the real part, the part God made you for, and that is for the real intimacy that we lost in the garden and that we have again in communion with His spirit. You will never be satisfied with anything this life has to offer because what you truly seek cannot be found here.
Sex is so powerful and so attractive because it is the closest thing we have on earth to what our souls long for, but it is still a far cry from what we need. Satan knows this, and he knows what God truly desires, and he hates God. So he does whatever he needs to do to lure us away from our one hope at fulfillment by promising to give us the intimacy we so desire, but in a much easier way than what God offers. It works. We somehow believe that our need for intimacy can only be filled by something in this world, by our wife, by sex, but that will never be enough. The true intimacy our souls long for can only be found in one place, and that is the place we were created for. You need no other love, nothing else this world has to offer. This world is full of lies - an assault on your heart by the one who wants nothing more than to break God's heart by leading His soul-mates away from Him.
Ever since I was first interested in girls I have been looking to settle down, that may seem odd, but I have always been extremely family oriented, and everything that I have done in my life has been to support my dream of being a husband and a father. I have never felt complete, and it has always been a belief of mine that I will not be complete until i find my 'better half'. Nothing in this world could bother me, not famine, disease, or poverty. As long as I had God, my wife, and enough food to barely survive I would be content. I could do anything as long as i had God and my wife. There is only one thing in this world that I have ever truly cared about, and that is finding the one person who completes me, and also the one thing that I have kept with me for as long as i can remember, and the one thing that I have not given over to God.
I began to wonder why this was, why it was so hard for me to give this over to God, and i realized that it was intimacy. I needed intimacy, I could live my entire life and deal with anything that would come along as long as I had intimacy, and i thought that could only be found in my wife. What i failed to realize was that the purest form of intimacy, the most incredible and powerful and full form of intimacy we could ever want is not found on this earth.
In the garden was the truest form of intimacy, complete and open communion with God, with nothing to get in the way of our oneness with Him. This is what we were made for, this is what our heart so longs for, and what we lost when we sinned and were forced out of God's presence. In the old testament God had his people create the Tabernacle which means 'dwelling place', but the hebrew word for it is 'Mishkan' which means 'to dwell in the presence of God.' God was giving his people a way to get back their intimacy with Him that He so desperately missed in some small part, but even then he could only be with them in a small space. It wasn't until He sent his Son to eradicate sin's effect that He could fully dwell with us again and regain the intimacy we both desire so much.
God created us for intimacy, and as such we have a desire that can only be fully satisfied by Him, but He does give us something in this life that can give us an inkling of what He has created us for and it can be found in genesis starting with chapter 1:
27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
God creates man AND women in his image, meaning the true image of God is displayed in both of us so that in genesis 2:
24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.
We become one flesh and unite the two halves of God's image, and share an intimacy that is so intense and so powerful it could only have come from God. This is, however, only a fraction of the true intimacy we were created for, this is merely a whisper, a fleeting glance at the true unity of spirit that we were created for and we long for. We must be careful that we do not try to fill our need for intimacy with only this. It is not enough to simply have this intimacy with your other half, you are missing the truer part, the real part, the part God made you for, and that is for the real intimacy that we lost in the garden and that we have again in communion with His spirit. You will never be satisfied with anything this life has to offer because what you truly seek cannot be found here.
Sex is so powerful and so attractive because it is the closest thing we have on earth to what our souls long for, but it is still a far cry from what we need. Satan knows this, and he knows what God truly desires, and he hates God. So he does whatever he needs to do to lure us away from our one hope at fulfillment by promising to give us the intimacy we so desire, but in a much easier way than what God offers. It works. We somehow believe that our need for intimacy can only be filled by something in this world, by our wife, by sex, but that will never be enough. The true intimacy our souls long for can only be found in one place, and that is the place we were created for. You need no other love, nothing else this world has to offer. This world is full of lies - an assault on your heart by the one who wants nothing more than to break God's heart by leading His soul-mates away from Him.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Spiritual Warfare
Ephesians 6:12
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
There is more going on in our lives than is immediately obvious. There is another layer of warfare going on below the surface that most people are unaware of. This is the battle for our heart that is fought between the forces of heaven and the forces of hell everyday. Satan hates God, and will do anything to get at Him, and the only way he can do that is to destroy us, who have been made in His image. So Satan lures us away from God to hurt Him. He does this by tempting us to sin, and then flooding us with every evil desire as soon as we give Him an in.
The good news is that we are sons of Christ. We share in the body of Christ, and as such are given the same power over demons that He had.
Matthew 26:53 "Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?"
We have this same power, we have the power to send 72,000 angels rushing at the devils attacks, all we have to do is call on them. They are waiting in heaven for the signal. We don't have to put up with the crap satan tries to throw at us, we can call in an air strike and kick him right in his face. The devil fears the Power we have in Christ, through the blood that he shed for us on the cross:
Acts 19
"13Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed. They would say, "In the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out." 14Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. 15(One day) the evil spirit answered them, "Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?" 16Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding."
We are in that same list as Jesus and Paul, we have that same Power. The demon who overpowered 7 men would run away screaming like a little girl from us.
Romans 8
"31What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?"
Just remember the next time someone does something crappy to you, it does you no good to get angry at them. We all know whose fault it really is, so send 72,000 angels knocking at his door ;)
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
There is more going on in our lives than is immediately obvious. There is another layer of warfare going on below the surface that most people are unaware of. This is the battle for our heart that is fought between the forces of heaven and the forces of hell everyday. Satan hates God, and will do anything to get at Him, and the only way he can do that is to destroy us, who have been made in His image. So Satan lures us away from God to hurt Him. He does this by tempting us to sin, and then flooding us with every evil desire as soon as we give Him an in.
The good news is that we are sons of Christ. We share in the body of Christ, and as such are given the same power over demons that He had.
Matthew 26:53 "Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?"
We have this same power, we have the power to send 72,000 angels rushing at the devils attacks, all we have to do is call on them. They are waiting in heaven for the signal. We don't have to put up with the crap satan tries to throw at us, we can call in an air strike and kick him right in his face. The devil fears the Power we have in Christ, through the blood that he shed for us on the cross:
Acts 19
"13Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed. They would say, "In the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out." 14Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. 15(One day) the evil spirit answered them, "Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?" 16Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding."
We are in that same list as Jesus and Paul, we have that same Power. The demon who overpowered 7 men would run away screaming like a little girl from us.
Romans 8
"31What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?"
Just remember the next time someone does something crappy to you, it does you no good to get angry at them. We all know whose fault it really is, so send 72,000 angels knocking at his door ;)
Spiritual Leadership
Eve sinned first right? That was the impression I was always under. God said don't eat the apple. Satan told Eve, wow that sure is a tasty apple and it will make your brains big, even bigger than God's. So she ate, and then made Adam eat. She sinned first, right? Well, i've come to find out that, no.. no she didn't. Look at this excerpt from Genesis 2:
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
18 The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."
Look at the order of this... God tells Adam not to eat from the tree.. and THEN he creates Eve. God is making it Adam's responsibility to make sure this new creation does not do what He told Adam not to do. What!?
Then read in chapter 3:
"6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it."
Adam was standing right there the whole time! What a jerk, God told him NOT to eat from this tree, and gave Him the responsibility to keep Eve from it as well. All he had to do was say, "Hey baby, i don't think we should be doing this." But no, he had to be a spineless loser and just sit there with his mouth closed. Isn't this the sin we (as men) have been cursed with for the rest of human history? We are to the be the spiritual leaders in the relationship, but it has always been our downfall not to stand up for what we should, and not to protect the loves of our lives from sin as God led Adam to do in the garden.
Christ is to be the head of the church just as a man is to be the head of the family. Whatever you may think on how the breakdown of power should be in a relationship for decisions, it's very clear in the bible that men are supposed to be the spiritual leaders, and as such we fail women horribly. It is our job to lead us toward God, and our job to stand up for what is right in the relationship and our job to keep us from sin, and we suck at it.
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
18 The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."
Look at the order of this... God tells Adam not to eat from the tree.. and THEN he creates Eve. God is making it Adam's responsibility to make sure this new creation does not do what He told Adam not to do. What!?
Then read in chapter 3:
"6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it."
Adam was standing right there the whole time! What a jerk, God told him NOT to eat from this tree, and gave Him the responsibility to keep Eve from it as well. All he had to do was say, "Hey baby, i don't think we should be doing this." But no, he had to be a spineless loser and just sit there with his mouth closed. Isn't this the sin we (as men) have been cursed with for the rest of human history? We are to the be the spiritual leaders in the relationship, but it has always been our downfall not to stand up for what we should, and not to protect the loves of our lives from sin as God led Adam to do in the garden.
Christ is to be the head of the church just as a man is to be the head of the family. Whatever you may think on how the breakdown of power should be in a relationship for decisions, it's very clear in the bible that men are supposed to be the spiritual leaders, and as such we fail women horribly. It is our job to lead us toward God, and our job to stand up for what is right in the relationship and our job to keep us from sin, and we suck at it.
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