I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!
Interests:"Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. Expertise: Occupation:Operations Industry:Nonprofit
What a year. I have been absolutely blessed beyond my personal hopes, and yet I have been dashed to what are the lowest realms that I ever could believe one woman's heart could handle.
Jesus is my portion, and brought me to this place, because He is not done with me. The volumes unsaid here are filled with actual intrigue and unbelievable encounter of His mercy and faithfulness, forgiveness and His supply. He did not wait until I was perfect, not did He wait until I was in "good shape." I am available to Him. I can barely journal this, and won't go into it here. It all boils down to not being about me anyway.
The thing that struck me hard today are two things. One I always told my children as they were growing up, and that is the fact that nowhere in the Bible do you see a generation of "teenagers." I am ashamed of the Christian so called culture and the self seeking ways and perpetual adolescents of this generation that a great price was paid for. Although it was paid for them, it was never just about them, you know?
The second is the loss of innocence. The worst of it is when it is by choice and not persecution. As an unsaved woman working and partying in a reprobate world, I saw some pretty bad stuff and walked in lower than low crowds. I had friends that would lead me, or just because of the nature of my job I saw things people just weren't meant to see. It is a fallen world and it is sick. But, when you purposely turn your face and walk away from the King of Glory calling good evil and evil good....well, it breaks me. My heart literally hurts.
I was with a crew up at our new property and got along well with the "20's" group I was with for week. A real bawdy bunch. I teased them because a lot of the "music" they were rocking to was mixed with loads of music from my era! What they listened to, what they talked about was no different than what our "20's" Christian kids talk about and watch. However, so much of what both groups do, what both groups see, what both groups CHOOSE to allow into their lives is perverted and anti-Christ. As in not pleasing to God. I still am ready to break into tears. Funny thing is, the pagan young adults were approachable and pliable yet as opposed to the brats we have raised in our church! (You know it is not a blanket statement, but much too real.)
Bottom line is this. Out of a book I was reading by Ted Dekker, he spelled out something that is the catalyst for this post. From the book "Saint" comes the following."Once born into childlike faith, brimming with belief, typical people begin to lose their faith. Society mocks them. Their friends smirk. They come to change the world, but over time, the world changes them. Soon they forget who they were; they forget the faith they once had. Then one day someone tells them the truth, but they don't want to go back, because they're comfortable in their new skin. Being a stranger in this world is never easy."
Some wells are meant to be redug. Jesus is coming.
The cat. His family has gone away for a few days. He misses them sorely. He has been "talking" a lot more, and calling out when the eldest takes the dogs out. From deep down in his little furry body comes this hollow and sad wail...it sounds like "wow wow" in a bucket. I was praying and I feel this little furry appendage bat the bottom of my foot. When that got no response, he sat on the back of my legs. I was walking to the kitchen, and I feel "bat bat" on the back of my legs.
Yesterday, I took the dogs out and the goofy cat was waiting at the back dog for me. Yep, he's missing his pack of cats.
I know we are not to walk to the left or the right. Trust leads me down a safe path, but the portion I am learning is the narrowing of the road.
It feels like the scope of things is tightening up. The taste of the things I used to do has lost all appeal for me. I do not want to cling to this life, because I think of things eternal and my heart does a little leap. But I do not want to walk out of this life never having known the completion of the race.
Oh, I know my King is moving, and I suggest that if you are a follower of Christ, keep your eyes on Buffalo. Significant grisly things have happened here lately, allowed I might add, to prosper right under the nose of the church. Jesus said that the wheat would grow with the tares. The mercy of the living God to reach down and use the destruction in a geographical area for His glory will be seen here. I know of what is coming, and it is His glory.
Along with that, the things of this world WILL grow strangely dim in our eyes, or we will be sorely affected soon.
This is a tough season for me, much that I see I can't do anything about in the natural. Oh, I could be vocal but it would serve no real purpose. Warnings mean nothing. The heaviness in my heart is for those that know, and know that they know, but gleefully reject His ways. It's like a hammer on my skull; I could not feel worse. Foolish vanity. Children's games. Everything, I mean everything, except for His ways.
His name is not Buddha, Joel Olsteen or John Calvin. There is only one Jesus. He accepts no other.
However, His ways are not our ways. His encouragement is to trust in Him (as in only Him) and obey. His joy is our strength, and we must draw from that.
My pedigree is shifty, related to captains on the Rhine
River, landowners in Germany,
a concert violinist in the Old World reputed to be a
scoundrel with the ladies, and the lowly Buffalo
City beat cop. The latter was a man
that gained a purple heart by saving the life of a little girl from an
unforgiving monolith of a chrome bumper that graced the behemoth autos of an
era long gone. But I never knew that until I was much older. I knew him as
papa, and he always had time for me. I loved him, and because of the time he
gave me, I knew my grampa loved me too.
My past is unlovely, raised in a religious society, my head
filled with church facts and laws choking me with death; being obedient because I was told to be. The stars of the church easily sailed into fulfilling those
roles of never forgetting their chapel veils, knowing their 12 stations, their
10 points and their sacraments. The appearance of holiness and the cloaking of
piety, the added titles of doctorates and degrees, the membership of hollow church
society leaves a hole that will not be filled by more of the same. To keep
applying the plaster on the wall to cover the yawn of emptiness is futile,
because you will face death and truth. The lemming like rush to go farther and garner
more to add to my human frailty leaves me disgusted, as we touché with longer
words and feed the ego of pride that swells to encompass it. Yes, I am
unlovely.
My human nature is faulty, a dreamer from birth pounded by
people of haughty prestige laughing at my lowly state. I will probably never
master another language, nor have my name known as the corporate lawyer that I
was never designed to be anyway.
My choices have been self serving and have entertained evil
in my heart. My mouth is too quick to speak, and my ears have to sometimes back
up to hear what was spoken, if I can recapture the moment. I am totally
imperfect and am amazed that I am not who I think I am just about the time when
I think I have a handle on it!
My life was reduced to turning my head from the party scene
and bar crowds that were my friends as long as the beer flowed and the door was
open. There was always a reason to gather, and not necessarily bad in their own
right. I found their friendships sincere
but filled with more of the same, for what answer did they have for all of the
hypocrisy of life? The lofty titles of my professional friends that had the "right
look" made me sick, but I found my friends of the night had the same disease,
just in their fashion. Then I learned of the group where the two actually
blended, and it was so disgusting and empty that there seemed to be no relief
for the insanity. Walking from the east of my upbringing to the west of the
wildest adventures I could claim short of death did not patch the plaster of
the ever widening hole in my heart. But if you lived fast enough and did
enough, you could keep ahead of thinking about it....until you stopped or
rested. The stirring would not stop.
My answer came to me only in those moments that I was forced
into being alone, when my own circumstances backed me into a trap. The trap to
me was being alone, without the party atmosphere I was so adept at conjuring
up. The trap was driving a truck, alone for hours, down the highway. I needed
the money, I used the latest skill I picked up, but I was trapped. Alone. Away
from the familiar, but not afraid, for I welcomed the next adventure. My
foolish heart led me ever away, to never question my invincibility. I was alone
for hours. The absolute silent times in a tiny cab of a tractor trailer with
just the hum of the huge tires was the cage that something unexpected happen.
My song came from nowhere, as the melody of my heart began
to move through my lips, calling out to a God who was waiting for me all that
time. What a foolish daughter I had been, for here the Master of my free will,
my life, had his prey captured, and in the endless stretch with no radio except
for the occasional chatter on the cb. My King used my bondage and lonely
wasteland condition to open my heart to a new song. I sensed something,
someone, who was very real and was with me.
My hindsight is rich now, because I can look over my
shoulder, and thank Him for that time when His faithfulness waited for the
moment I could hear.
Oh, yes, my dearly beloved friend, I do know what I believe,
because I know WHO I believe. The rest is History.
http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"> name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"> name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 10"> name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 10">
I am.
My pedigree is shifty, related to captains on the Rhine
River, landowners in Germany,
a concert violinist in the Old World reputed to be a
scoundrel with the ladies, and the lowly Buffalo
City beat cop. The latter was a man
that gained a purple heart by saving the life of a little girl from an
unforgiving monolith of a chrome bumper that graced the behemoth autos of an
era long gone. But I never knew that until I was much older. I knew him as
papa, and he always had time for me. I loved him, and because of the time he
gave me, I knew my grampa loved me too.
My past is unlovely, raised in a religious society, my head
filled with church facts and lawschoking me with death; being obedient because I was told to be. The stars of the church easily sailed into fulfilling those
roles of never forgetting their chapel veils, knowing their 12 stations, their
10 points and their sacraments. The appearance of holiness and the cloaking of
piety, the added titles of doctorates and degrees, the membership of hollow church
society leaves a hole that will not be filled by more of the same. To keep
applying the plaster on the wall to cover the yawn of emptiness is futile,
because you will face death and truth. The lemming like rush to go farther and garner
more to add to my human frailty leaves me disgusted, as we touché with longer
words and feed the ego of pride that swells to encompass it. Yes, I am
unlovely.
My human nature is faulty, a dreamer from birth pounded by
people of haughty prestige laughing at my lowly state. I will probably never
master another language, nor have my name known as the corporate lawyer that I
was never designed to be anyway.
My choices have been self serving and have entertained evil
in my heart. My mouth is too quick to speak, and my ears have to sometimes back
up to hear what was spoken, if I can recapture the moment. I am totally
imperfect and am amazed that I am not who I think I am just about the time when
I think I have a handle on it!
My life was reduced to turning my head from the party scene
and bar crowds that were my friends as long as the beer flowed and the door was
open. There was always a reason to gather, and not necessarily bad in their own
right. I found their friendships sincere
but filled with more of the same, for what answer did they have for all of the
hypocrisy of life? The lofty titles of my professional friends had the right
look made me sick, but I found my friends of the night had the same disease,
just in their fashion. Then I learned of the group where the two actually
blended, and it was so disgusting and empty that there seemed to be no relief
for the insanity. Walking from the east of my upbringing to the west of the
wildest adventures I could claim short of death did not patch the plaster of
the ever widening hole in my heart. But if you lived fast enough and did
enough, you could keep ahead of thinking about it....until you stopped or
rested. The stirring would not stop.
My answer came to me only in those moments that I was forced
into being alone, when my own circumstances backed me into a trap. The trap to
me was being alone, without the party atmosphere I was so adept at conjuring
up. The trap was driving a truck, alone for hours, down the highway. I needed
the money, I used the latest skill I picked up, but I was trapped. Alone. Away
from the familiar, but not afraid, for I welcomed the next adventure. My
foolish heart led me ever away, to never question my invincibility. I was alone
for hours. The absolute silent times in a tiny cab of a tractor trailer with
just the hum of the huge tires was the cage that something unexpected happen.
My song came from nowhere, as the melody of my heart began
to move through my lips, calling out to a God who was waiting for me all that
time. What a foolish daughter I had been, for here the Master of my free will,
my life, had his prey captured, and in the endless stretch with no radio except
for the occasional chatter on the cb. My King used my bondage and lonely
wasteland condition to open my heart to a new song. I sensed something,
someone, who was very real and was with me.
My hindsight is rich now, because I can look over my
shoulder, and thank Him for that time when His faithfulness waited for the
moment I could hear.
Oh, yes, my dearly beloved friend, I do know what I believe,
because I know WHO I believe. The rest is History.
Premium
