Over the past few weeks, we have seen a flurry of activity in order to prepare for this new time here at Owl Hollow. Many people have been active in making preparations for the Rayburn’s move to our congregation, and there have been some serious man hours that have gone into revitalizing much of our buildings. First I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to this effort and worked to make our facilities warm and inviting.
The think about revitalization is that you have to let go of the old to embrace the new. We painted my office this last week because it really needed it. The wall were marked and dirty where hands had be run over them over time, and the gray-green paint was beginning to show signs of age in this space that I call my office. Frankly, it was kind of a depressing place, and was not conducive to getting much work done. After cleaning out the room, painting the walls, and reorganizing the area the office feels like a place where I can get much more accomplished.
Our lives are much like this. We feel weighed down and somewhat depressed because things seem bleak and we see the need for renewal. Here are a few steps for renewal and renovation in our life:
CLEAN IT OUT (II Cor. 7:10)- We have to be willing to take everything in our life and set it aside only to bring back the things that are needed. We should realize that we should only bring those things back into our life that are good (I Thess. 5:21), and get rid of the things that are not. Otherwise, our repentance cannot lead to a state of salvation.
CLEAN IT UP: (Rom 6:4)- Putting on Christ is more than a paint job, it is a complete rebuilding of who we are. Christ takes us down to the frame and even rebuilds who we are with himself as the foundation (I Cor. 3:11), and but we have to be willing to participate in this process.
CLEANLY ORGAINZE IT: (Colossians 3:12-17) When we clean out the bad in our life we make ample room for the good to come in and take its place. We are told to put on compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, forgiveness, love, and the peace of Christ. Life becomes easier to handle when we use these concepts to organize our life and how we deal with others.
When we look at revitalizing our life, it means that we have to make some significant changes. We have to be willing to sacrifice wealth (Matt. 19: 16-24), family (Matt. 10:37), friends (Luke 21:16), and even our very life (Matt. 16:25, Mark 8: 35, Luke 9:24, 17:33). We have to make the effort and admission that our lives are junky and we are ready to clean them up before Christ’s blood can have any effect on us as followers. Take time this week and ask yourself if you need to revitalize your life….
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
The Problem with Hypocrisy
One of the biggest complaints against Christians today is that many lead a life that is hypocritical in nature, and for the most part these allegations can be somewhat true. This is not to say that we are never allowed to make mistakes, but hypocrisy calls out a larger problem that plagues the Church. Hypocrites are leaders of double lives. That is the problem that those in the world have with those who are supposedly followers of Jesus; they pretend to be one thing while truly being another.
The worst part of hypocrisy is that those who participate in it are so delusional that they are unable to recognize that they are living this double life. Jesus had a serious problem with those who led a double life. In Luke 6, Jesus makes the point that one can not help those around them until they are aware of their own situation and condition that is often worse than the person that they are trying to help. Hypocrisy tricks us into believing that our problems are insignificant and do not affect us. In effect, we cannot see the forest for the trees. Jesus said it this way, “How do you expect to get the splinter out of your brother’s eye when you have a log in your own (Luke 6:42)?”
Hypocrisy hinders us from being effective in this life. It’s easy to slip in and out of church going unnoticed and being uninvolved because we are afraid of being to closely knit with a church family. It makes it all the easier for us to live how we want without the repercussions of guilt for leading a double life. Jesus demands that we pick a side. We cannot continue to claim to be a follower of Jesus, but live a life that is measured by the world’s standards. If we have put on Christ, we have to live a life that is according to God’s standards. When we become Christians, we are not our own anymore. That means that we cannot live life as we please, because we have sacrificed ourselves over to Him.
Hypocrisy is crippling the Church today because so many “Christians” claim to be one thing while living in the complete opposite of what they claim to be. Imagine if a charity asked you to join and help them to feed starving children around the world, but you saw that they were doing nothing to feed those children and in many cases were actually starving them intentionally. Would you want to take part in that organization? I wouldn’t! That’s how the world perceives the Church when it is filled with those who lead a double life. IF THE CHURCH IS TO GROW, WE MUST BECOME COMPLETELY DEDICATED TO CHRIST! That is what will set us apart from the rest of Christianity, and will show those in the community around us that we are children of God. It begins when we start to live that way!
The worst part of hypocrisy is that those who participate in it are so delusional that they are unable to recognize that they are living this double life. Jesus had a serious problem with those who led a double life. In Luke 6, Jesus makes the point that one can not help those around them until they are aware of their own situation and condition that is often worse than the person that they are trying to help. Hypocrisy tricks us into believing that our problems are insignificant and do not affect us. In effect, we cannot see the forest for the trees. Jesus said it this way, “How do you expect to get the splinter out of your brother’s eye when you have a log in your own (Luke 6:42)?”
Hypocrisy hinders us from being effective in this life. It’s easy to slip in and out of church going unnoticed and being uninvolved because we are afraid of being to closely knit with a church family. It makes it all the easier for us to live how we want without the repercussions of guilt for leading a double life. Jesus demands that we pick a side. We cannot continue to claim to be a follower of Jesus, but live a life that is measured by the world’s standards. If we have put on Christ, we have to live a life that is according to God’s standards. When we become Christians, we are not our own anymore. That means that we cannot live life as we please, because we have sacrificed ourselves over to Him.
Hypocrisy is crippling the Church today because so many “Christians” claim to be one thing while living in the complete opposite of what they claim to be. Imagine if a charity asked you to join and help them to feed starving children around the world, but you saw that they were doing nothing to feed those children and in many cases were actually starving them intentionally. Would you want to take part in that organization? I wouldn’t! That’s how the world perceives the Church when it is filled with those who lead a double life. IF THE CHURCH IS TO GROW, WE MUST BECOME COMPLETELY DEDICATED TO CHRIST! That is what will set us apart from the rest of Christianity, and will show those in the community around us that we are children of God. It begins when we start to live that way!
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Dangers of Looking Back
In a time for our congregation to have so much to look forward to, there is a temptation for us to look back on the past and make a comparison. The problem with looking to the past is that we tend to romanticize it, and make it out to be so much better than it actually was. This creates a problem of comparison in which the present will never live up to the glorified past. This is especially true when we look to face hard times and situations that make us greatly uncomfortable.
Think about the Israelites when they had just come out of Egyptian captivity (Exodus 14). They were in the wilderness just beginning their journey when the Egyptians realized they had let go of their entire workforce, and they were determined to get them back. The Israelites had see great wonders and miracles from God, but when the armies of Egypt were seen in the distance they quickly glamorized their life in Egypt. They begin to remember their fair masters, filled bellies, and thought it would be better to serve Egypt than to die in the wilderness. In that moment looking back, all the Israelites could see was that slavery looked better than death. They had forgotten what God had done to bring them to that point because all they could see was the unknown.
We tend to do the same thing when placed into a situation where there is a variable of the unknown. It makes us panic and look back to our past to comfort ourselves in a diluted romanticized view of what actually was. So how do we fight this? Moses gave the children of Israel the answer, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord which he will work for you today (Ex. 14:13).” We have to have a full faith in God that he will lead us forward with an established future that will protect us and provide us each with the opportunity to serve him in the best way possible.
Think about the Israelites when they had just come out of Egyptian captivity (Exodus 14). They were in the wilderness just beginning their journey when the Egyptians realized they had let go of their entire workforce, and they were determined to get them back. The Israelites had see great wonders and miracles from God, but when the armies of Egypt were seen in the distance they quickly glamorized their life in Egypt. They begin to remember their fair masters, filled bellies, and thought it would be better to serve Egypt than to die in the wilderness. In that moment looking back, all the Israelites could see was that slavery looked better than death. They had forgotten what God had done to bring them to that point because all they could see was the unknown.
We tend to do the same thing when placed into a situation where there is a variable of the unknown. It makes us panic and look back to our past to comfort ourselves in a diluted romanticized view of what actually was. So how do we fight this? Moses gave the children of Israel the answer, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord which he will work for you today (Ex. 14:13).” We have to have a full faith in God that he will lead us forward with an established future that will protect us and provide us each with the opportunity to serve him in the best way possible.
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