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Archive for March, 2009

Be True to Yourself

General | Posted by Rob

Mar 31 2009

Wow, now there’s a phrase you can take about 18 million different ways!

When people say this, what exactly are they asking?

If you enjoy lying—be a liar?
If you are lousy at math—don’t be an accountant?
If you can sing like a canary—join the praise and worship team?
If you are an angry person—become a cage fighter?
If you feel wrestless after 40—trade in your wife and find a younger model?

I mean, what in the world is this gobally goop?

To me it has become so over used you might as well lump it in the same category as the following:

There’s someone out there just for you—find your soul mate!
Follow your heart
Trust your instincts

I won’t even dignify the soul-mate thing. That’s so ‘Oprah’ I get a nauseous feeling every time I hear the word. Or is it two words?

Who cares?

But these others?

Follow your heart
Trust your instincts

The Bible tells us that we can’t even know our own hearts. Check here if you think I made that one up. In fact, I believe God warns against the simple-minded approach to life that just says, “follow your own heart.” Really, He does. I’ll show you…

This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who stubbornly follow their own heart and have gone after other gods to serve them and worship them, shall be like this loincloth, which is good for nothing. Jeremiah 13:10

And our ‘instincts’?

Last time I checked it was animals who lived by instinct and man was supposed to be a little better than that?

BTW, as you might have guessed, God covered this in Bible 101 as well. Check it out.

Romans 1:18-28,

¹⁸ But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness.^i]’>[i] ¹⁹ They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. ²⁰ For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.

²¹ Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused. ²² Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools. ²³ And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles.

²⁴ So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. ²⁵ They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. ²⁶ That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. ²⁷ And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved.

²⁸ Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done.

That right there is basic “living by your instincts.” It’s pretty ugly, huh?

Sounds like good ole, “Look out for number one, be true to yourself, all that matters is that I’m happy,” and a whole host of other self absorbed life philosophies are pretty much a bust as far as God is concerned.

So we shouldn’t be true to ourselves?

I didn’t say that.

Or did I?

Destructive Down-Shifting

General | Posted by Rob

Mar 30 2009

I used to have a Honda Passport. If ever there was an ill thought out vehicle, this was it. There were several things about it that made it quite clear that it was an after thought on the part of Honda rather than a well planned out SUV to compete in the market.

Things such as:

It had NO cup holders!!
It wasn’t actually a Honda at all. It was an Isuzu Rodeo!
It had NO cup holders!
You had to stop the vehicle and shift to four wheel drive and then back up to engage the hubs! My jeep Wrangler I had 7 years earlier could shift on the fly!!
The engine tapped like Sammy Davis Junior!
Did I mention the thing actually had NO cup holders?!
I actually tried every after market cup holder adaptation known to man. None of them worked.
But, perhaps worst of all was the way the shifter was laid out. It had no grooves to safely lock it into drive so it was possible to accidentally knock it into reverse—while doing 65 mph!!!!!
And it had NO cup holders!!!!

Seriously, most of these were almost comical inconveniences or troubling annoyances—all but one. The fact that this thing could accidentally be knocked into drive or reverse was enough to make even the shortest drives an exercise in Extreme sports competition! If this happen it could grind your transmission to smithereens in seconds.

It happened twice to me in the 11 years I owned the thing. In the end my transmission was hanging by a thread.

Now, that was accidental downshifting, but would you be surprised to know that there are millions who practice destructive downshifting with their lives every day?

It’s true.

Take for example the whole idea of cutting back in tough times.

A good idea—depending on what you cut.

Dropping your health club membership might be necessary to save money, however, working out makes you healthy, releases endorphins and generally makes you feel better. You should probably hold on to this one as long as you can—especially if you still go to Starbucks everyday for that extra hot white chocolate mocha that’s 650 calories of liquid death in a cup! Even if you only go 3x a week that thing is almost $4!! And that’s for the smallest size!! Three of those equals 12 dollars a week. That’s 48 dollars a month. There are a lot of health clubs you can join for less than that!

You’re scaling back—downshifting. But at what cost? I say you’re downshifting toward your own demise.

My wife is a Chiropractor and she tells me how she deals with this strange logic almost daily with people. They tell her they need to cut back on their healthcare while they talk about the latest movie they went to that weekend or while they are munching on the McDonald’s French fries they just bought!! Obviously they have money for some things. They probably do need to cut back—to downshift. But a lot of people are downshifting destructively. I guess they want to feel like they are at least doing something to alleviate the pain—to bring themselves some sort of relief. But is it?

And isn’t it crazy what we even call some of the worst things we put in out bodies?

“Comfort food.”

I guess eating an entire bag of Doritos is comforting while your at it but when you look in the mirror afterwards how would you describe that feeling?

The word ‘comforting’ doesn’t come to mind. Maybe depressing, but not comforting.

There are a million and one crazy examples with the same circular reasoning but let’s talk about something even more important. In times of stress people often claim they haven’t got time for everything—a very true observation. But when they downshift and scale back often they let go of things like Bible reading and prayer!!

But maybe keep watching their favorite shows like 24 or American Idol!!

Bad trade!

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Messing Around on God – Final

General | Posted by Rob

Mar 27 2009

Last we read, we were tracking the rebellious Israelites as they decided to obey God—but only halfway. In fact, it seemed more like about 90 percent of the way to me. But God would have none of it. He wanted their obedience to be all or nothing

A lot of people read passages like this and come to the wrong conclusion that God is too harsh.

He’s not harsh enough if you ask me.

You say, “Well nobody asked you.”

Oh contrar, you’re reading my blog aren’t you? Then let’s continue, shall we?

Let’s take a closer look at the passage in question again:

Leviticus 17:1-14,

¹ Then the Lord said to Moses, ² “Give the following instructions to Aaron and his sons and all the people of Israel. This is what the Lord has commanded.

³ “If any native Israelite sacrifices a bull^a]’>[a] or a lamb or a goat anywhere inside or outside the camp ⁴ instead of bringing it to the entrance of the Tabernacle^b]’>[b] to present it as an offering to the Lord, that person will be as guilty as a murderer.^c]’>[c] Such a person has shed blood and will be cut off from the community. ⁵ The purpose of this rule is to stop the Israelites from sacrificing animals in the open fields. It will ensure that they bring their sacrifices to the priest at the entrance of the Tabernacle, so he can present them to the Lord as peace offerings. ⁶ Then the priest will be able to splatter the blood against the Lord’s altar at the entrance of the Tabernacle, and he will burn the fat as a pleasing aroma to the Lord. ⁷ The people must no longer be unfaithful to the Lord by offering sacrifices to the goat idols.^d]’>[d] This is a permanent law for them, to be observed from generation to generation.

⁸ “Give them this command as well. If any native Israelite or foreigner living among you offers a burnt offering or a sacrifice ⁹ but does not bring it to the entrance of the Tabernacle to offer it to the Lord, that person will be cut off from the community.

There are two very important themes of this chapter:

The one acceptable place of sacrifice
The Value of the blood

Even though patriarchs like Abraham and Noah, etc offered their various sacrifices on open hilltops and so forth, from this point forward God wanted His people to focus on one particular place—the tabernacle. Henceforth forth only “blood sacrifices offered at the door of the temple of the congregation” would avail.

Apparently that was too inconvenient for some of the Israelites, so they started offering the sacrifices whenever and wherever they pleased.

Some might offer, “Hey, at least they were still interested in spiritual things. At least they were still offering sacrifices at all. Doesn’t that count for something?”

Yes, something disobedient.

And God says He is uninterested in sacrifices offered flippantly or in disobedience. Don’t even bother.

Today, places are still important to the Lord though He resides everywhere and in the hearts of His people rather than just at the Temple. But today, the Lord has the church in mind as the place where believers congregate to worship corporately. He also has a place of service (Hebrews 10:24).

What is your place of worship and what is your place of service?

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