2008

Well it finally came, a few more hours will see 2008 come to a close. I'm not a 'new years' person, never been into the resolution thing myself. Dec 31st has always just been another day on the calendar, rolling into the next. This time round something is different. Since November I have felt a stirring, deep within, of the need to 'clean' parts of me up! To settle, to stand against, to let go and to pack it all in my little (well big actually) 'God' box and keep soildering on. Not escaping from using and learning the experience of 2008 and prior but not bringing it all forward with me... the whole leaning on God and not my own understanding thing. Not sure if that makes complete sense but hey it does to me! So moving forward in the search really all comes down to my devotional reading from last night which reads:

"We are weak, but you are strong" 1 Corinthians 4:10
- We need help - and alot of it. (skip skip skip) You are weak unless you find your strength in God, and the sooner you face that fact, the better.

Amen to that!!

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it aka My thought for today...

Letting go of pride, an idol, sin etc is so hard because it initially means just that - giving up, disconnecting, loosing something - something earthly that we are programmed to believe we just can't survive without...the ironic consequence of taking that step of faith will infact prompt a whole new world of opportunities that we would otherwise never have had.

I will never leave you nor forsake you - Hebrews 13:5

Colossians

So I am searching...and something inside prompts me to go read Colossians (Holy Bible) so before work this morning I read the entire book...Is only 4 chapters but when I put it like that sounds soooooo much more :)

2:20-23 really stand out to me "Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch! These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence"

I have been contemplating this on and off all day and as the ink I remember on those pages begins to etch itself on my heart and mind I am slightly overcome.

"Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules"

I decide this is sparking enough intrigue that it is time to do a Bible study on this book...which I planned to search around on the net in the first instace AFTER I finish playing on facebook.

So we all know facebook right? In the news feed this girl I went to school with comments on some random shot...long story short...well really only 4 clicks later I arrive on a churchs website. This church is round the corner from where I grew up and next click I am NOT suprised in the least that their last few podcasts are on the Book of Colossians.

I love my God. So many things go wrong, so much pain and uncertainty in this world and so much picking up and starting again. But so many things go right. And the right is in that corny saying "it's the little things". It's the little things like taking a tiny step towards whatever God puts on your heart and who knows what years of tiny steps will look like from now. It's the smallest things like reading a part of the Bible when feeling prompted and seeing the consequence flow on. The small things, I believe they mean the biggest and I know I'm not alone.

Press on to the goal...

what more can anyone do?

The Beauty of Boundaries

So my church is doing a series of preaching on boundaries and I'm learning alot...and when I say 'alot' I mean the kind of 'alot' where this will most likely come out all wrong and take twice as long to decipher as it streams from my disorderly intellect and into reality. It's been a bit of a wake up call and I'm slowly seeing that through the theory of boundaries I can have more control over certain parts of my life than I have been having...if I commit to being a willing participant for said greater good that is!

This is all based on a verse in Psalm 16 that says "the boundaries have fallen for me in plesant places". When I first heard that I did not for the life of me understand it. A month ago if you had of asked me to give a thought on what boundaries mean to me I would have said words to the effect of "well, you know, you put boundaries up and they limit you and make you miss out on opportunities and so they are not so good" and not a thought further.

Well yeah boundaries limit you BUT that can actually be a good thing!! My Pastor gave the most brilliant description (from a source I can't remember) that "In the beginning..." the universe was in chaos before God put the boundaries in of land, sky, sea etc. That everything was in utter chaos because nothing was in its rightful place. An answer to pray and I can see ever so clearly, whether I am aware of boundaires or not, that the few 'little pieces of chaos' in my life (you know the ones which just go round and round and if you do something it doesnt stop and if you do nothing it goes even faster) are the precise areas which have absolutely NO boundaries...funny that :)

For the first time i'm consciously considering the boundaries in my life...and I'm left with a sense of ownership that works out perfectly in theory (as most of life does) but is rather a struggle in reality. Attempting to put boundaries in place where they have not lived before is not such an easy task!

But wait there is more...atm the 'more' is stuck sandwiched somewhere in that disordely intellect...Part 2 - coming soon

Life is difficult by Unknown

Life is difficult, this is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It it is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult-once we truly understand and accept it- then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters.

Jesus in the Clouds - and abit of a reflection

Saturday September 22 2007, over a year ago now...







Today on my morning walk I was chatting with God - No I was chatting AT God - getting some things off my chest and not expecting a reply in return - nothing too specific - just the standard "Lord, how on earth am I going to make it through this life?" "Please lead me to where you want me because my spiritual compass is broke and I have no idea where I am going" and "Where are you and why can't I feel you like I used to?" type stuff.

As I was coming around the cliffs on Lurline Bay heading toward Maroubra Beach I looked up at the sunrise and saw Jesus! The clouds were thick and the sun was shinning through kinda making him glow - I couldn't have missed Him if I tried - still I did try to turn Him into something else like that game you play with finding objects etc in the clouds - I thought don't be stupid, that can't be Jesus - Yup It was definately Jesus, on the Cross - with only one arm mind you but still it was Him!!

The message I felt burning in my heart that moment as I looked up at the sky was:

EVERYTHING IS ABOUT ME - MAKE EVERYTHING ABOUT ME

Not that this was something I didn't already know but hey I struggle with doubt and fear and need a good kick up the butt just as much as the next Christian.

I looked down and walked afew steps as I tried to grasp what this ment - making EVERYTHING in my life about Jesus - or more so putting Jesus in front of everything.

When I looked back up Jesus was gone and standing in his place was an Angel - LOL - no really LOL - Again I tried to turn this angel into something else but oh no it was definately an angel.


So my lesson for the morning has appeared to be:

1. Acknowledge that EVERYTHING in life is about Jesus, the Cross and what God has offered us through Him. Whether we choose to follow or even believe this is completly irrelevant. Life always has and always will be about this.

2. I am to make every part of my life about Jesus - getting rid of all the negative and replacing it with Him. No matter how small these things may be I am starting to realise just the smallest bit of crap in my life can multiply and rage out of control before I know it.

3. If I, continually & constantly, strive to put Jesus in front of everything I won't feel the need to ask frantic and irrational questions like the one's I did this morning because I have been given an angel to keep watch over me??? - That's really hard for me to grasp as I'm not too big on angels - I mean I believe in them and all but they are not something I have ever really consiously thought about.

4. My angel is quite robust and looks like an African-American Gospal Singer.




Now to present day, almost 15 months later...

I was told to make EVERYTHING about Jesus. Sounded simple enough but I barely understood what that ment at that point.

I was searching then, in an almost innocent, child like manner..."God, where are you??" I don't know if I'd be game enough to ask that in such a way again, as I have learnt that when you ask of God, He takes you seriously. When you seek God with an honest and open heart He will show you who and where He is and how relevant He wants to be in your life. I honestly believe He will take you as far as you allow your faith to stretch.

But let's be honest. The stretching of faith, this will more than likely require some moulding/scoulpting/bending/breaking, call it what you will. It will mean, possibly painfully, stepping outside of what you think you know, to fully view Him and His purpose. It will mean allowing more of God in and getting more of you out. It may mean, that God will allow you, because He loves you and you are His, to scrape the absolute bottom of the barrel, breaking you into a million pieces so that He can reconstrust you and there becomes no other option than total and complete reliance upon Him.