Phoenix Preacher

“The reason you think you’re not hearing from God is that He’s talking to you about your character, not your plans.”

I wrote that yesterday and was asked to expand upon it a bit …so here we go.

The premise of my book was that God is always speaking…not necessarily audibly, but through the situations, circumstances, and people He places us around and in, as well as through traditionally recognized means such as Bible reading and the preaching of the Word.

What I didn’t write in the book was that those communications rarely addressed the things I was most interested in hearing about from God.

I wanted to know how to get a better job, successfully promote my book, raise a child, and improve my close relationships.

He wanted to talk about my character and my heart.

Thus, I didn’t have much interest in listening as I thought both were fine, thank you.

I still haven’t heard much on the topics I’m interested in, but I’ve learned to listen to the stories God is telling me.

God’s main interest is in our transformation into the image of His Son.

“I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

(Romans 12:1–2 ESV)

“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.”

(Romans 8:29 ESV)

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord,are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”

(2 Corinthians 3:17–18 ESV)

I believe that God is superintending all things together for our good…that good being the transformation spoken of above.

Thus, the bad job, no job, bad relationship, difficult person, good job, great relationship, stray cat, etc, are all speaking of what He’s doing in our souls, if we have ears to hear.

Still, I want to know about the other things as well…and I get really frustrated when I don’t.

I’m sure that sin is unique to me…

The answer I have come up with is this…that God is never more honored and loved than when we trust Him with the things that concern us most and walk in faith while they are revealed to us.

He knows what we need.

“And he said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on.For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing.Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds!And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?If then you are not able to do as small a thing as that, why are you anxious about the rest?Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.But if God so clothes the grass, which is alive in the field today, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith!And do not seek what you are to eat and what you are to drink, nor be worried.For all the nations of the world seek after these things, and your Father knows that you need them.Instead, seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you.

“Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

(Luke 12:22–34 ESV)

Where your heart finds its treasure is what He is most concerned about…and what He wants to discuss with you today.

He has promised to take care of everything you need when you seek His kingdom first.

Keep asking, seeking, and knocking about all that’s on your heart…but listen when He speaks to you about what is on His.

And of course..make your own application.

There is a new documentary being made on Juarez and the asylum I have written about before run by Pastor Galvan called, “Dead When I Got Here”.

These clips are from it…and the second one featuring Charles Bowden is a prophetic word in my opinion.

There’s some bad language…and a ton of truth.

What did you teach?

What did you learn?

Did you hear the Gospel?

GLORY

GOD’S GLORY-SHOWING REQUIRES GLORY-GIVING

Like the appearance of a rainbow
in the clouds on a rainy day,
so was the radiance around him.

EZEKIEL 1:28

God’s goal is his glory, but this needs careful explanation, for it is easily misunderstood. It points to a purpose not of divine egoism, as is sometimes imagined, but of divine love. Certainly, God wants to be praised for his praiseworthiness and exalted for his greatness and goodness; he wants to be appreciated for what he is. But the glory that is his goal is in fact a two-sided, two-stage relationship: it is, precisely, a conjunction of (a) revelatory acts on his part whereby he shows his glory to men and angels in free generosity, with (b) responsive adoration on their part whereby they give him glory out of gratitude for what they have seen and received. In this conjunction is realized the fellowship of love for which God’s rational creatures were and are made, and for which fallen human beings have now been redeemed. The to-and-fro of seeing glory in God and giving glory to God is the true fulfillment of human nature at its heart, and it brings supreme joy to man just as it does to God (cf. Zeph. 3:14-17).

“Glory” in the Old Testament carries associations of weight, worth, wealth, splendor, and dignity, all of which are present when God is said to have revealed his glory. God was answering Moses’ plea to be shown God’s glory when he proclaimed to Moses his name (i.e., his nature, character, and power, Exod. 33:18–34:7). With that proclamation went an awe-inspiring physical manifestation, the Shekinah, a bright shining cloud that could look like fire, white-hot (Exod. 24:17). The Shekinah was itself called the glory of God; it appeared at significant moments in the Bible story as a sign of God’s active presence (Exod. 33:22; 34:5; cf. 16:7, 10; 24:15-17; 40:34-35; Lev. 9:23-24; 1 Kings 8:10-11; Ezek. 1:28; 8:4; 9:3; 10:4; 11:22-23; Matt. 17:5; Luke 2:9; cf. Acts 1:9; 1 Thess. 4:17; Rev. 1:7). New Testament writers proclaim that the glory of God’s nature, character, power, and purpose is now open to view in the person and role of God’s incarnate Son, Jesus Christ (John 1:14-18; 2 Cor. 4:3-6; Heb. 1:1-3).

God’s glory, shown forth in the plan and work of grace whereby he saves sinners, is meant to call forth praise (Eph. 1:6, 12, 14), that is, the giving of glory to God by spoken words (cf. Rev. 4:9; 19:7). All life activities, too, must be pursued with the aim of giving God homage, honor, and pleasure, which is glory-giving on the practical level (1 Cor. 10:31).

God would not share with idols the praise for restoring his people, for idols, being unreal, contributed nothing to this work of grace (Isa. 42:8; 48:11); and God will not share the praise for salvation with its human subjects today, for we too contribute nothing more to it than our need of it. First to last, and at every stage in the process, salvation comes from the Lord, and our praise must show our awareness of that. This is why Reformation theology was so insistent on the principle, “Glory to God alone” (soli Deo gloria), and why we need to maintain that principle with equal zeal today.

J.I. Packer: Concise Theology

I do not know the moral of this story, I just know there is one.

She carried herself as she imagined someone who was young, beautiful, and wealthy would…in reality she may have had money but she would need to depend on imagination and memory for the other attributes she longed for.

The surgeons had played a cruel joke on her and she seemed to be the only one unaware of this fact.

Her skin had been stretched so tightly across her face that she looked like a cat squeezing through a screen door.

Her breasts had been enlarged and  set at such an angle as to appear to be an entrant in the Albuquerque Balloon Festival.

Her lips had been injected, then carved into a perpetual smirk that reminded me of The Joker in the Batman movies.

Her hair was yellow, though I’m sure the bottle mentioned something blonde.

She was…hideous.

The surgeon wasn’t finished though, and his knife had yet to touch her neck.

The loose folds of skin betrayed her and she kept one hand over them as much as possible…not recognizing that her hands betrayed her age as well.

She was haughty and arrogant and unknowingly pathetic and sad, fighting back against age without realizing she was dead already.

A few hours later, another set of scars approached.

All I know is that there had been a terrible fire and the surgeons couldn’t do much with what was left.

He wasn’t scarred, he was a scar.

The hair and eyebrows were gone as were the better part of his nose, lips, and fingers.

He immediately tried to set me at ease…” I don’t text much”, he joked.

He knew his appearance was disturbing, so he counted on the beauty of his soul to speak of who he truly was.

It didn’t speak…it sang…a song of life, of truth, of beauty, and of hope that flames could not touch, now or in the age to come.

I wanted to sing along.

I don’t remember how he looked as much as I remember him.

I remember how she looked.

Make your own application.

Linkathon will be later tonight so here’s some filler to get us through…

North Carolina passed a ban on gay marriage yesterday and the social networks are buzzing.

One observation stuck in my head…if Christians are so concerned with the sanctity of marriage, why aren’t we trying to outlaw divorce or at least make it more difficult?

Why are we so concerned about what one group is doing to the traditional morality of the culture when we ourselves participate freely in it’s decline?

What are we winning with these ballot measures?

Chuck Smith stuck his foot in it again according to some family advocates…

“Pastor Smith indeed recommended that Christians use contraception to control family size and went on to encourage artificial birth control because of the high cost of raising children and because they do not produce any financial benefit to the family.In addition to advocating for artificial birth control, Smith’s co-host, Don Stewart, espoused the false notion that the world is over populated and offended many Christians with strong convictions about birth control by openly mocking natural family planning methods. “Whatcha call people who use that? You call them ‘parents’ because that never seemed to work there.”

Listen for yourself here…it was kind of odd.

The other odd thing is how many Christians are opposed to birth control…I did not know that.

Thank you Bill Kinnon…thank you very much, my friend.

I’m out of time…have to go to work.

Blessings on all.