dW 09.27.07

scripture

Genesis 2:21-22, 25

So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, He took one of the man's ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib He had taken out of the man, and He brought her to the man… The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

thought

It is ultimately fear that limits the closeness of our relationships. What if they knew my past? What if they knew my struggles? What if I was honest about my feelings? We wear so many layers of superficiality that no one really knows who we are. They only see who we want them to see. But if we strip off these layers then we could experience true relational intimacy. Wouldn’t it be an amazing feeling to know that you can go to someone and be fully yourself, flaws and all, and yet still be fully accepted?

quote

Fear makes strangers of people who would be friends.

dW 09.26.07

scripture

 

Luke 9:62
Jesus replied, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God."

 

thought

 

An Old Testament story echoes here in Jesus’ words. Remember when Lot and his family left Sodom before it was destroyed? They were told not to look back. Lot’s wife did not listen because her heart was still in Sodom, and when she turned back she became a pillar of salt. Pay attention, following God is serious business. Following God is serious business.

 

quote

 

It is a poor sermon that gives no offense; that neither makes the hearer displeased with himself nor with the preacher.
George Whitefield

dW 09.21.07

scripture

 

Matthew 23:25-28

"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.”

 

"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.”

 

thought

 

Is Jesus really talking to the Pharisees? The Pharisees by practice were those most concern with the law and keeping themselves pure. However, Jesus points would that although they look beautiful on the outside their insides are unclean. Don’t we do the same thing? We paint the barn to make it look pleasing on the outside but inside we are storing manure. We should ask God to clean the inside first then from its cleanness the outside will reflect it.

 

scripture

 

Luke 11:34-36

Your eye is the lamp of your body; when your eye is sound and fulfilling its office, your whole body is full of light; but when it is not sound and is not fulfilling its office, your body is full of darkness. Be careful, therefore, that the light that is in you is not darkness. If then your entire body is illuminated, having no part dark, it will be wholly bright, as when a lamp with its bright rays gives you light.

dW 09.20.07

scripture

 

John 14:21

“Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him."

 

quote

 

But however long you may have continued in rebellion, and how ever black and long the catalog of your sins, yet if you will now turn to God by a sincere repentance, and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you shall not be cast out… No one was ever saved because his sins were small; no one was ever rejected on account of the greatness of his sins. Where sin abounded, grace shall much more abound.
Archibald Alexander

dW 09.17.07

scripture

Romans 3:10-18

As it is written:

"There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one."

"Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit."

"The poison of vipers is on their lips."

"Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness."
"Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know."
"There is no fear of God before their eyes."

thought

Talking with my neighbor I found out that he goes to church when he feels he needs it. Everything is gravy as long as he is helping people. He said that he wasn’t out killing people so he felt he was pleasing God. I wonder how many people are basing God’s favor on their perceived goodness. I could run as fast as I think I need to but just because I think that I am fast won’t get me onto the track team. We have to judge ourselves by the standard that we are going to be held against. We need to use the bible to show them God’s standard. Only then can they see that their goodness is a filthy rags before God and that we are justified by the blood of The Lamb.

comic

http://www.savagechickens.com/blog/2007/09/where-am-i.html

dW 09.15.07

Yes, I know it is Saturday. Consider it make up for the days I did not send anything out this past week. J Plus I liked this so much I had to pass it on. My good friend Kieran sent this to me. I put it in the normal dW format but did not alter its contents in any way.

 

Blessings, Kyle

 

----

 

scripture

 

Jeremiah 8:8-9 "How can you say, 'We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us'? But behold, the lying pen of the scribes has made it into a lie.  The wise men shall be put to shame; they shall be dismayed and taken; behold, they have rejected the word of the LORD, so what wisdom is in them?"

James 1:22  

But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

background

 

The Jews to whom Jeremiah was prophesying were great hearers of the word.  They went to the temple, and then went about their life.  They had a Sabbath life that, in their eyes, enables them to do whatever they wanted with their secular life.

thoughts

That double-mindedness makes God furious.  It denies His truth and robs His glory.  It makes His people ineffective and unattractive.  An independent life cloaked by a Sunday-service Christianity is a mockery of God and a drain on the world (a wise man once told me, "Everyone has two choices in life; you can be a fountain or a drain.").

May we today, strive to be doers of the word; to be fountains of His active love and grace to the world around us.

Blessed beyond measure, Kieran

dW 09.14.07

scripture

 

Isaiah 30:21

Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it."  

 

quote

 

A person who wishes to begin a good life should be like a man who draws a circle.  Let him get the center in the right place and keep it so and the circumference will be good.  Let a man first learn to fix his heart on God and then his good deeds will have virtue, but if a man's heart is unsteady, even the great things he does will be of small advantage. 

Johannes Eckhart

 

This Day’s Thoughts – Thursday

dW 09.10.07

scripture

 

Mark 5:30-32

At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?" "You see the people crowding against you," his disciples answered, "and yet you can ask, 'Who touched me?'" But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it.

 

background

 

A synagogue ruler, named Jairus, comes to Jesus and asks him to come heal his daughter who is deathly ill. While in route to this man’s house there’s a crowd that presses in on them because they want to see Jesus. In the midst of the crowd a woman reaches out and touches Jesus’ cloak. She touches his cloak because she believed that in doing so she would be healed.

 

thought

 

Jesus paused on his way to heal this man’s daughter. He was about serious business. This was life or death. But he stopped. He did not see this woman as a distraction but met her need right there. Do we miss out on God’s work because we are too busy going about our own? Are the things that we see as distractions really the good deeds that God has predestined for us to do?

dW 09.06.07

scripture

 

Matthew 9:10-13 Amplified Version

And as Jesus reclined at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and [especially wicked] sinners came and sat (reclined) with Him and His disciples. And when the Pharisees saw this, they said to His disciples, Why does your Master eat with tax collectors and those [preeminently] sinful? But when Jesus heard it, He replied, Those who are strong and well (healthy) have no need of a physician, but those who are weak and sick.

 

something i was taught in class

 

In Jewish teachings if you walked in the shadow of an unclean person, then it made you unclean for a day and if you touched an unclean person then you were unclean for a week. This was their theology.

 

Paradigm-shift: When Jesus touched the unclean, he not only remained clean, he also made them clean!

 

scripture

 

Luke 7:36-50 New International Version

Now one of the Pharisees [Simon] invited Jesus to have dinner with him, so he went to the Pharisee's house and reclined at the table. When a woman who had lived a sinful life in that town learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee's house, she brought an alabaster jar of perfume, and as she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner."

 

Jesus answered him, "Simon, I have something to tell you." "Tell me, teacher," he said. "Two men owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon replied, "I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled." "You have judged correctly," Jesus said.

 

Then he turned toward the woman and said to Simon, "Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven little loves little."

 

Then Jesus said to her, "Your sins are forgiven." The other guests began to say among themselves, "Who is this who even forgives sins?" Jesus said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace."

dW 09.05.07

scripture

 

Romans 1:25
They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

 

quote

 

The probability of life originating by accident is comparable to the probability of the complete dictionary resulting from an explosion in a printing factory.

Edwin Conklin

 

testimony

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