A Long Three Weeks

These past few weeks have been very sparatic in posting. Mainly because I am starting my new job at North Point Community Church. I have also been been having just a crazy personal life lately...

Something I have learned is that I cannot take things for granted. Much of my personal life has been bombarded with God taking. Its an interesting period of life. God is always known as the God who performs miracles, often leaves people speechless in his presence, and a being that knows all while being the end all. He is seldom ever the one first looked at when something is taken away... Things like property, business, and even life.

Please hear me people. Take the things you have and understand that you are on borrowed time. Do everything to the max. Put your heart into everything. You could lose it at any time. Love all of you and be looking for more consistant updates.

Redefine :: Part II

An Introduction

From a long break I have emerged to continue this blogging series. I just recently came back from Florida where I spent the weekend with Lauren's grandparents and mother. It was one of the greatest weekends I had ever had. I got to do my favorite thing in the whole world. I got to do absolutely nothing. It was an unbelieveable feeling. Anywho... Patience...

Going throught the abstract nouns that are found in the passasage at the end of the "Love Chapter" and the "Fruits of the Spirit" located in Galations, I found a word that stood out to me. Patience. Lauren tells me sometimes that its one of my ticks that I have trouble with. When I am ready to do something... I am ready. I even have very specific body language that shows I am done with what ever I was doing and ready to go on to the next action of life. Sometimes this bothers the heck out of her. I admit it. Patience is a tough thing to learn, but even harder if we look at the whole definition.

Suffering Capacity

A true test of patience is not waiting quietly and eagerly for an event to happen. Often I think that patience is confused with reverance. There is much more to patience than obidence. It is looking at a situation and deciding that what God desires for you is better. I always wondered how Jesus portrayed patience. It wasn't until I read this definition. Patience is saying "Your will be done." Patience is saying to yourself that God is better. A true test of patience is exemplified in Psalm 63:3: "Because your love is better than life, my lips will praise you."

Patience is not merely a virtue it is a capacity. It has volume and weight. It isn't something that can be found on the page of the massive book your grandmother gave you when you were a kid. It is something that can only be given in its full definition by the Spirit of God with in you. My patience is going to be tested this summer. My family is going to be going through some major life changes. We will come closer to Christ through more than just trust, but a patience that believes that God is better than anything in this world. Because of this we should praise him with our lips, tounge, actions, words, and lives.

Finals... Eww

I promise there will be more to this discussion... I have finished finals. I am not working on getting some rest and relaxation. Look for a post sometime tomorrow. Peace

Redefine :: Part 1

An Introduction

Hope. I have been musing on the meaning of this word a lot. e tend to hope in a lot of things. We hope that we graduate. We hope that the love of our life will find us in college. We hope our parents get back together. We hope our mothers disease can be healed. We put hope into a lot things trivial and eternal.

But was is real hope? In Colossians Paul calls the mystery of Christ in us (Which by the transitive property we are then part of the mystery) the hope of Glory. How can we be the "hope" of glory?

I was in a conversation with Lauren the other night about the idea of hope. I put forth the idea that hope cannot be disconnected from expectancy. Lauren gave her rebuttle by saying that in situations where the odds are against your favor you tend to hope, but you do not expect the inprobable outcome. I argued that expectancy is the foundation of hope. With much deliboration, we decided to consult our dear friend Apple Dictionary. I will admit. I had an advantage because I had been thinking on this a while and had recently visited this specific entry, but we did find that in fact expectancy is the foundation of the word. Also, after further research (BibleGateway) we found that it is the only noun I will be discussing in these entries that have a future connotation.

I think we have lost the definition of hope. We say that we hope that something we happen, but we often jsut mean desire. But even then have we lost the true meaning of desire. Do we not expect our desires to be fullfilled? I believe we pray too much in disbelief. We don't think God is as big as he is. We fail to hope. We fail to be a mystery. We fail to be the hope of glory that we are. We are a hope to the world. We represent an expectant glory, but we seldom live like it.

I challenge you to join with me. Pray expectantly that what is to be in heaven it be done on Earth. Hope in the fact God is infinite. Be expectant in your thoughts. Hope in you desires. Hope in the faith you believe in. If we have hope we will be more urgent in our purpose. We will understand what it means to expect Glory.

Redefine :: Hope

This is a conversation not a sermon. Please leave your thoughts...

Redefine :: An Adventure Through Language

I was hanging out with Lauren tonight enoying the company of some friends for 24. Afterwards we hung out with her sister AJ and talked church/seminary for a while. When Aj left Lauren and I got into an interesting dicussion about our words. I am not sure how we got on to the topic but we started to tlak about it and we found ourselves deep in the pit of language. Why do we use the words that we do. Could Satan infect our language?

I have been compiling a list of sins that I believe that we do not pay as much attention to in our lives because they are not the four most discussed ones: Alcohol Abuse, Lust, Homosexuality, Drugs. Sins like idolatry, greed, and selfishness (to name a few) are often overlooked and not widly talked about. Our failure to acknowledge the truth of the language God has given us might be another one that we have stumbled upon...

This brings me to a first that I know of... A series of meditations on our daily language. Over the next few days or weeks I am going to be personally debunking the abstract nouns found in Galations 5:22-23 and 1 Corinthians 13:13. I am not saying anything I write is correct. These are my personal thoughts. A spontaneous commentary with the hope of interaction with anyone who dares to venture with me.

Join with me... Redefine