Worth Reposting…

The following is NOT my personal post but I am simply re-posting what Perry Noble posted today on his blog. It’s clearly worth pondering and sharing. Perry is the Sr. Pastor of an incredible church called NewSpring Church with campuses throughout South Carolina. NewSpring Church is an incredible gathering place of Believers who are excited about serving Jesus and serving others with the goal of making an impact for eternity…and I might say they do it with excellence.

Thank you for the reminder Perry….

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Why Would You Not Do It? April 6, 2011

One of my life verses that is always in front of me is Hebrews 11:6…

“And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”

One of the myths that has been crippling to Christianity for years is that Jesus has called us to “play it safe”…when that is not taught OR modeled by Jesus OR His followers in the Scriptures.  (See Acts 20:24 and Galatians 2:20)

Jesus didn’t play it safe…Paul didn’t play it safe…none of the Apostles played it safe…the church in Acts 4:23-31 upon being threatened and persecuted did NOT pray for safety…they prayed for boldness!

Yet today we seem to want to play it safe…that cannot be the goal.

So what about you church leader?  Church member?  Whoever…what is that ONE THING that you KNOW the Lord is calling you to do?  You know it’s a risk…you know that in order for it to take place you are going to need divine intervention?  What is it?  Why not do it?

People have asked me before, “Pastor P, how do I know that it’s God telling me to do it and not just an idea I had?”  GREAT question…allow me to share three identifying marks that I have personally experienced.

#1 – This thing that you believe you are called to do by God will not contradict God’s Word! I believe in the power of the Holy Spirit…and I believe that He speaks as loud today as He did in the book of Acts; however, I also know according to the teachings of Scripture that the Holy Spirit will not contradict the Word of God.  So…if “that thing” that you feel called to is in direct conflict with God’s Word…then it’s not God telling you to do it.

#2 – You can’t get away from this thought…it dominates your thinking and the more you marinade on it the more you feel like you might explode. For example…I really did believe back in 1996 that Jesus was telling me I needed to start a church.  BUT…instead of running out and doing it immediately I began to read books on it (Rick Warrens books and Bill Hybels book on the subject of church planting impacted me significantly) and dove into the Scriptures to see what they taught about the subject.  AND…the more I prayed, studied and read about it…the hotter the fire inside of me became.

#3 – Godly people in your life affirm it. (SEE Proverbs 15:22)  What I have learned from personal experience is that if I do not want to share my idea with those in my life who I know really do love Jesus and love me…then…I usually know it’s not a “God idea” but rather a Perry idea.  One of the things that EVERY believer in Christ needs is godly men and women who love Jesus and love the person enough to speak the truth in love…people who value the friend more than the friendship and are willing to say what needs to be said.  ANYTIME I have ever shared a thought/idea that I really believe the Lord has placed in my heart and the people the Lord has placed in my life to love and challenge me push back…I ALWAYS take a step back and pray and think through the idea more until the Lord either gives me greater clarity OR shows me that the wise counsel of my friends is exactly what I needed to hear.

That is what works for me…so how about you?  What is that thing that you know you should do?

Life is short, hell is hot and eternity is forever!!!  The world has NEVER been impacted by Christians who spend their whole lives in a car seat and beg God to never let anything bad happen to them!

Ask HIM to set you on fire with HIS plans…and THEN GO FOR IT!

Today’s Purpose Driven Life Devotional

Friday, December 10, 2010

Obeying God Requires You Take a Risk by Tom Holladay

After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead." Matthew 2:19-20 (NIV) Today's devotional is by Tom Holladay, teaching pastor at Saddleback Church. "We may want a life of no fears in this world but that only happens in heaven." As uncomfortable as it was for Joseph to move his family to Egypt, imagine how scary it would be for him to obey God's command to come back to Israel. It was like going back into the jaws of the lion. He was going to take Mary and Jesus back to where his son's life had been in danger. But because Joseph trusted God and what he was saying, Joseph took the risk and went there because he knew that was the right place to be. The Bible says, "Even when I am afraid, I keep trusting you" (Psalm 56:3 CEV). Notice this verse says, "when I am afraid" not "if I am afraid." We may want a life of no fears in this world but that only happens in heaven. In this life, we're all going to face fears of one kind or another. We have some big fears and some little fears. We fear the future, we fear what's going to happen with our jobs, what's going to happen with our family; and we fear little things like whether we said the right thing to someone, whether that presentation went well, even fear of making a phone call. In all of these situations, you have a choice to make. Are you going to let the fear control you or are you going to take a risk of faith because you know you have a God who loves you? That risk of faith could mean going someplace you've never been before or forgiving someone you thought you couldn't forgive. It could mean leaving your job. A risk of faith could also be praying about something or deciding to trust God with a situation or a relationship you've held tight in your hand. What Christ-like risk is God telling you to take in faith?

A Great Reminder Today….

Friday, June 11, 2010

You cannot grow without a teachable attitude by Rick Warren

Practice these things. Devote your life to them so that everyone can see your progress. 1 Timothy 4:15 (GW) "There is only one way to develop the habits of Christlike character: You must practice them—and that takes time. " While you were given a brand new nature at the moment of conversion, you still have old habits, patterns, and practices that need to be removed and replaced. We are afraid to humbly face the truth about ourselves. I have already pointed out that the truth will set us free but it often makes us miserable first. The fear of what we might discover if we honestly faced our character defects keeps us living in the prison of denial. Yet, we often build our identities around our defects. We say, "It's just like me to be ..." and "It's just the way I am." The unconscious worry is that if I let go of my habit, my hurt, or my hang-up, who will I be? This fear can definitely slow down your growth. Only as God is allowed to shine the light of his truth on our faults, failures, and hang-ups can we begin to work on them. This is why you cannot grow without a humble, teachable attitude. Godly habits take time to develop. Remember that your character is the sum total of your habits. You can't claim to be kind unless you are habitually kind—you show kindness without even thinking about it. You can't claim to have integrity unless it is your habit to always be honest. A husband who is faithful to his wife most of the time is not faithful at all! Your habits define your character. There is only one way to develop the habits of Christlike character: You must practice them—and that takes time! There are no instant habits. Paul urged Timothy, "Practice these things. Devote your life to them so that everyone can see your progress." (1 Timothy 4:15, GW) If you practice something overtime, you get good at it. Repetition is the mother of character and skill. These character-building habits are often called "spiritual disciplines," and they include such things as meditation, prayer, fasting, Bible study, simplicity, stewardship, solitude, submission, service and evangelism.

Dream Big!

God builds your faith by giving you a dream by Rick Warren

"Now glory be to God, who by his mighty power at work within us is able to do far more than we would ever dare to ask or even dream of—infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, or hopes." Ephesians 3:20 (LB) "If a dream comes from God, it will be so big in your life that you can't do it on your own. If you could do it on your own, you wouldn't need faith." Faith is like a muscle: it can be strengthened. It can be weak or it can be strong, depending on how much you use it. How does God build your faith? He uses a very predictable pattern that we will look at this week; and, if you understand it, you can cooperate with him in developing greater faith. It's like when the father, seeking help from Jesus for his son, said, "Have pity on us and help us, if you possibly can!" (Mark 9:22 TEV) Jesus replied, "What do you mean, 'If I can'? . . . Anything is possible if a person believes." (Mark 9:23 NLT) The first thing God does to build your faith is give you a dream. When God wants to work in your life, he'll always gives you a dream—about yourself, about what he wants you to do, about how he's going to use your life to impact the world.  There are many examples in the Bible of this. God gave Noah the dream of building an ark. God gave Abraham the dream of being the father of a great nation. God gave Joseph the dream of being a leader that would save his people. God gave Nehemiah the dream of building the wall around Jerusalem. How do you know when a dream is from God or when it's just something you've thought up yourself? The Bible tells us that God, "by his mighty power at work within us is able to do far more than we would ever dare to ask or even dream of—infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, or hopes." (Ephesians 3:20 LB) In other words, if a dream comes from God, it will be so big in your life that you can't do it on your own. If you could do it on your own, you wouldn't need faith. And if you don't have faith you're not pleasing God, because the Bible says whatever is not of faith is sin. (Roman 14:23) God starts to build your faith by giving you a dream. He may be speaking to you now, but you just don't recognize it for what it is. That dream you have—the idea, the concept —that thing you've been thinking about doing that would be of real benefit to other people, where do you think that idea came from? God will never tell you to do something that contradicts his truth. In other words, he won't give you a dream of leaving your family and kids and moving to Hollywood to be a movie star. If you've got that dream, then you can know it is not from God. God starts with a dream as he works within your life to build faith.

“You Cannot Out Dream God”

 

Tuesday, May 18, 2010 Venturing Forth It's better to stay in the safety of the camp than venture forth on a wing and a prayer. Who knows what dangers lie ahead? This was the counsel of the ten faithless spies sent in to have a look at the Promised Land when the Jews came out of Egypt. Only two of the twelve, Joshua and Caleb, saw things differently. Their hearts were captured by a vision of what might be and they urged the people to press on. But their voices were drowned by the fears of the other ten spies and Israel wandered for another forty years. Without the anticipation of better things ahead, we will have no heart for the journey. One of the most poisonous of all Satan's whispers is simply, "Things will never change." That lie kills expectation, trapping our heart forever in the present. To keep desire alive and flourishing, we must renew our vision for what lies ahead. Things will not always be like this. Jesus has promised to "make all things new." Eye has not seen, ear has not heard all that God has in store for his lovers, which does not mean "we have no clue so don't even try to imagine," but rather, you cannot out dream God. Desire is kept alive by imagination, the antidote to resignation. We will need imagination, which is to say, we will need hope. Julia Gatta describes impatience, discouragement, and despair as the "noonday demons" most apt to beset the seasoned traveler. As the road grows long we grow weary; impatience and discouragement tempt us to forsake the way for some easier path. These shortcuts never work, and the guilt we feel for having chosen them only compounds our feelings of despair. (The Sacred Romance , 156-57)

Have you lost heart?

I want to share a quick thought from the Ransomed Heart Daily Reading for today…

January 12, 2010 In the End In the end, it doesn’t matter how well we have performed or what we have accomplished—a life without heart is not worth living. For out of this wellspring of our soul flow all true caring and all meaningful work, all real worship and all sacrifice. Our faith, hope, and love issue from this fount, as well. Because it is in our heart that we first hear the voice of God and it is in the heart that we come to know him and learn to live in his love. So you can see that to lose heart is to lose everything. And a “loss of heart” best describes most men and women in our day. It isn’t just the addictions and affairs and depression and heartaches, though, God knows, there are enough of these to cause even the best of us to lose heart. But there is the busyness, the drivenness, the fact that most of us are living merely to survive. Beneath it we feel restless, weary, and vulnerable. Indeed, the many forces driving modern life have not only assaulted the life of our heart, they have also dismantled the heart’s habitat—that geography of mystery and transcendence we knew so well as children. All of us have had that experience at one time or another, whether it be as we walked away from our teachers, our parents, a church service, or sexual intimacy; the sense that something important, perhaps the only thing important, had been explained away or tarnished and lost to us forever. Sometimes little by little, sometimes in large chunks, life has appropriated the terrain meant to sustain and nourish the wilder life of the heart, forcing it to retreat as an endangered species into smaller, more secluded, and often darker geographies for its survival. As this has happened, something has been lost, something vital. (The Sacred Romance, 3-5)

More on warfare...and how to win!

This is taken from Sylvia Gunter's book Prayer Portions.

Praise As Warfare

     Greetings from the trenches.  I am not sure what battle you are facing today, but I know you are facing one.  We are all living in the middle of a war.  One of our most powerful weapons is praise.  Praise is a warfare strategy that has been winning wars throughout the ages.
2 Chronicles 20:22
"When they began singing and praising..."  The Israelites used praise as God's appointed weapon for winning a tremendous victory.  They had not even reached the battlefront when God acted and completely destroyed their three-fold enemy.
Acts 16:25-26
Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns.  Suddenly a violent earthquake shook the foundations of the prison.  The prison doors flew open, and prisoners were set free because of praise.
Joshua 5:14, 15 and 6:2
Joshua bowed to worship, and God told him that Jericho was already in his hands.  As the Israelites marched around the city, they walked out the victory already won in worship.
Judges 7:15
Gideon bowed to worship, returned to his camp, and reported, "Arise, God has given the enemy into our hands
     It is sometimes more important to persevere in praise than to continue to petition.  Why?

Because in praise, we take our eyes off people and stop fighting on the human level.  We focus our spiritual eyes on God and see beyond ourselves and our problem to lay hold of His infinite ability,  availability, and sovereignty.  Praise stirs up our faith to stand in His almighty name.
Because God has already judged Satan, and he is a defeated foe.  Praise executes upon him and his spiritual rulers the judgments that God has already written (Psa. 149:6-9).  God has already handed down the sentence which will be put into effect by the praises of His people.
Because praise acknowledges the victory Christ already won.  Jesus is far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and every name in this age (Eph. 1:20-21).  His victory over Satan was legally accomplished at Calvary, but Satan is contesting His rule.  Christ's victory is currently credited to the church.  God is using warfare to teach His people massive, continual, aggressive, militant, offensive praise to overcome spiritual forces of wickedness.  Praise speeds victory in our prayer battles.
     Praise is adoration of God for who He is, His person, His character, His names.  It is loving God because He is God.  The Bible gives more exhortations to praise than to pray, because God is altogether lovely, holy, and completely worthy of our worship.  So, troops, let's use our valuable weapon of praise for the battles we are facing today and see how God delivers us.

From Prayer Portions, page 115-16. © 1991, 1992, 1995 Sylvia Gunter. Available at www.thefathersbusiness.com