Month: February 2019

Ezekiel’s vision of dried bones rising to life to build an army demonstrates the power that God has over the universe. Literally nothing is impossible, even to remake history.

Our hope lies in this faith in God’s supreme and unlimited power.

Our lives are like a pile of dried bones, lacking the everlasting water of Christ. Once we have Christ in us, our bodies and minds become new. They are still dry and brittle compared to the new bodies we will get at the end of time, but they are alive and raised fro (spiritual) death.

Ask and you shall receive.

Mark K

The Mission – Bring your most hopeless situations and issues to God. Believe God for the impossible. Live and move in the power of the impossible.

This, to me, is the great commission. To act like we are children of God so that others might see how god has filled our lives and transformed us.

Because we are Christians, and often under attack, our behavior is important because the entire faith may be judged through you. It may not be fair but it does identify individual responsibility.

Through our actions the Holy Spirit will lead people to us who will ask, and we will tell…

Mark K

1 Timothy 4:8

“for bodily exercise is profitable for a little; but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life which now is, and of that which is to come.”

‭‭1 Timothy‬ ‭4:8‬ ‭ASV‬‬

https://www.bible.com/12/1ti.4.8.asv

I don’t think I have encountered a part of the Bible that specifically addressed exercise!

In this same section Timothy addresses that some people will fall away from the faith, not marry, and stop eating meat. (Which God has created for us to eat).

This is interesting advice about the will of God in these matters. He does want us to take care of our bodies, but he reiterates that this is not as important as godliness.

Mark K

“God is with us”

Think of this a moment. The God and creator of the universe is sitting next to you right now. Interested in you and waiting for you to accept his leadership. He already knows what is going to happen so he waits.

We don’t know what is going to happen though. Our decisions, all the thousands of decisions we make every day, are in front of us.

But we have the supreme guide right next to us! If only we would hear his voice. If we quiet our own voice we can hear the words and commands of God inside of us.

I pray that I can move myself out of the way of your will. To hear your voice in the the whole day. Let me not fill my own ears with my own noise.

Mark K

Oh how I long for the faith of a mustard seed. I have some mountains I would like to make be!

So, how much faith is there in a mustard seed? The seed has no thought or distractions, it simply is. Was this the mindset of us before the fall? As connected to the reality and presence of God as we might be to the chair we are sitting on?

There would be no difference between my perceptions and thoughts. All would be real. Doubt would not exist. To have this faith is to empty oneself to be like the mustard seed.

Faith is something that is added into us but we have to get the other stuff out of that space that defines reality for us. The barriers for faith are not the restrictions of the gift from God, but our resistance to letting go of the faiths we already have.

This said we are also going to gifted a measure of faith. Just like all our other gifts. Our measure of faith is all we need but it may seem less or more than others. This is the mastery of God’s work in us. To give us what we need, to ensure the inner battle and the quest to be the very example of faith he desires.

Mark K

Seasons are opportunities. The seasons I speak of are not the ones that mark the passage of the year but the opportunities that come before us in our lives to do the good thing. The season can happen at any time and we must always be ready to harvest the fruit.

Each day is a new set of things that will “season” in front of us. The opportunities to be kind and considerate or to help abound. We should take the time make these opportunities a chance to show God’s light shining through us. While we may reap benefits from doing good works, our motivation is to give glory to God.

We are thankful that God gives us the opportunity to glorify him through our choices. But we must be vigilant as they may pass us by.

Mark K

I try to nurture an inner dialogue all day. An ongoing conversation with myself and God. Yes, a conversation with myself and a conversation with God.

I check on myself, check to see my mood, my reactions to things, mistakes and triumphs. In a word, I supervise myself.

This does not result in pit downs or low self-esteem. I’m checking myself against my faulty inner compass.

Then I have to calibrate the compass.

That is where the dialogue with God comes it. That perspective is always “True North” and always points me to where my thoughts and decisions should go. I guess this is prayer.

This prayer, however, is decidedly informal. I conversation, a nudge in the right direction, or even a scream in my ear. For all it’s silence, those are deafening!

The effect of connecting with God is immediate. My mood lifts. I feel “at home” and safe. That I’m on the right track. Such a gift this is, and accessible immediately at all times of the day and in all places.

I’m grateful for this.

Mark K

We pray for God to show us his ways and to teach us his statutes. They are written on our hearts butGod’s teaching is by example.

As we pray for this teaching God surrounds us with examples and with opportunities to act. We read his textbook, He gives examples, and he assesses our performance, like all good teachers!

But the testing might be challenging, it it were not, we would not need the teaching! (And we always need the teaching in God’s statutes!)

So we pray to be led into challenging situations so we can bring glory to God through our actions. We are given the opportunity to be Christians, not just in word but in action.

Mark K.

It is vain to think that we have any power of consequence in our lives. What strength we do have comes directly from God. He strengthens us, removes the barriers, and shuffles the very stars to suit his plan.

Drawing on that power, through obedience, we cannot fail in any true sense. We float along the stream of God’s plan. Our real needs are met and he will even favor the ones that follow him. Even, at times, in this world.

Fortune is ally to the brave. Yet fortune is simply the consequence of being a part of God’s plan. In His ordered universe there is no “chance”. Nothing is random, even if it appears to be. Always, pattern emerge from the chaos consider only your own life and you can know this as truth.

This must set us as humble. When the almighty creator of the universe guides our very steps, how lowly, grateful, and humble we must feel. Despite the fruits of our knowledge, there is still so much we don’t understand.

Long after science has solved many of the mysteries of the universe, without faith we remain ignorant of our most important answers to our most important questions:

Who are we, and why are we here.

Mark K

Today I read the story of Esau who, when famished after a hunting expedition, sold his birthright to his brother Jacob in exchange for some stew.

Is this not the lesson of addictive sin! We are selling our birthright as the children are f God to satisfy a hunger. Just like food, the satisfaction comes into us and then leaves and we are empty again.

The food and water the God promises us if we obey him do not leave us. We will never hunger or thirst again. But so little can tempt us from this everlasting sustenance.

This is the power of the darkness inside of us and the cleverness of the deceiver. “Surely, you will not die!” he says to Eve.

But we do die. We now are expected to know the difference between good and evil and this had burdened us ever since. This is the result of the fall in the garden. Prior to that, our innocence was in our ignorance. Now we are “wise” and must decide for ourselves.

Mark K.