Thursday Ponderings

Over the last couple of weeks I have just been more and more challenged, broken, etc., by my loving Heavenly Father. I hope to at some point be able to break down all that God has been doing in my heart and mind and share it with others in hopes of encouraging them in their walk with the Lord. I grew up in church, and have done a lot of "right" things, but never realized just how inconsistent my walk with Him was until these past few weeks as God has stirred my heart and mind.

As all this has been going on, I came across a snippet that got my attention and caused me to look for a more complete version and I found it on You Tube. I hope as you listen to it, that it will amaze and awe you and remind you of how special you are to our Heavenly Father as it did me. Just click on the arrow to play and be blessed!

Light Overcomes Darkness

I read a statistic a while back that said 80% of Americans are Christian. Really? I would think that if that were true, then our country would be very different, don't you? In Sunday School class this past Sunday, Tom spoke about how we (Christians) are to be the salt of the earth and if the salt loses it flavor, what good is it?

Not only are we to be the salt of the earth, we are also supposed to be the light of the world. I am reading a book called Fresh Encounter by Henry T. Blackaby and Claude V. King and in their book they talk about the darkness we live in and the light we are to be. Here is what they say:

Christians should not be surprised by the spiritual darkness around us. That is all it can be. Darkness is dark. The greater problem is not with the darkness. The problem is with the light. When light shines, it dispels darkness. We face a growing spiritual darkness in our land because the light is not shining brightly.

Jesus said that His disciples are the light of the world (Matt. 5:14-16). When the light of Christ in us is dimmed by the sins and cares of the world, darkness increases. When God's people are clean vessels, the light displayed causes darkness to flee. Darkness itself cannot overcome light. Light overcomes darkness!

Did you get that??? The problem is with "the light" - the problem is us, because we are what Jesus called "the light".

How bright is my light shining? How bright is yours?

I need to do some cleaning of my vessel so my light can be seen. Do you?

I think if the above statistic is even halfway close to being right, most of us have some cleaning to do so our light can be seen.

Repentance - Do I Really Know What That Is?

As I continue on this path to personal revival, I have learned that true revival only comes about after true repentance. Now most of us think we know repentance, but as I have studied on it this past week, I discovered that there is much more to repentance than what I first thought.

I am concerned that too many of us confuse repentance with remorse. Remorse is a worldly grief, a feeling bad about our sin. Repentance is a Godly grief, and there will be outward evidence of it.

Real repentance influences behavior. Repentance is a change of mind that results in a change of behavior.

C.H. Spurgeon said: "There must be a divorce between you and your sins. Not a mere separation for a season, but a clear divorce." What a picture that is! Can I truly say that I have so effectively removed sin from my life as compared to a divorce?

I want to bring glory to God and I want to be used by Him - that's what repentance will enable me to do!

Revival - How Bad Do I Want It?

In the past few weeks, God has been stirring my heart to a deeper walk with Him, a personal revival if you will, and then the ladies group at our church decided to do a book study on Seeking Him by Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Tim Grissom. It has been an amazing study so far, though painful in many ways as God reveals sin in my life and asks me to get rid of it.

You really wouldn't think sin would be so hard to get rid of would you? I mean, just the word "sin" makes me think of something dirty or nasty, but of course, if we truly saw sin as dirty or nasty, we probably wouldn't be enticed by it, would we? Usually sin comes to us in these great little packages that look great, sound great, taste great, feel great, therefore, we are more easily snared by it.

One morning as I was thinking about all this, God reminded me of a story He told where a rich young man came to Him and asked Him what he had to do to be saved and Jesus told him that he needed to go sell all his stuff and then come back. Scripture records that the young man went away very sorrowful. Why did he go away sorrowful? He wanted a relationship with Christ, but he was sad when he realized he would have to give up his "stuff" in order to enter into that relationship with Christ. Ouch! Could this be me? Could this be many of us sitting in pews every Sunday morning?

Scripture doesn't say whether or not this young man ever returned to Christ, but it sure has got me to thinking. I want a deeper walk with God, I want to experience a personal revival, but to get there, Christ may, and almost certainly will, ask me to give up some of my "stuff". The question is will I be willing to do that or will I walk away sorrowful?

An Update

Greetings to my blogging friends!
Sorry I have been missing in action for so long. There have been many things I have longed to blog about, but every time I sat down to write, I couldn't seem to get it out. Sigh...

Anyway, here we are at the end of a month and at the dawn of a new one. I have many personal goals for the month of May and blogging a LOT more than what I have been is one of them.

I hope to be able to share with you some things God has been teaching me in hopes that they will encourage you in your walk with the Lord. God is so faithful to take us to that next level if we only let Him.

Until the next post, may God bless and keep you!