I used to do the whole CHRISTmas thing sincerely, yet blindly, until it
dawned on my bright head that we really do not have any solid proof that
Jesus was born exactly on the 25th of December.
Nevertheless, I
still appreciate this season because of the beautiful spirit of giving. I
wish it is not just limited to Christmas.
The real reason for the season, as I see (a purely personal view), is Love and not a religious agenda.
One can, however, pretend that this is about Christ, and it is
absolutely fine, but pushing that idea on someone who does not believe in
Jesus is not Christ-like. Christ was never a bully.
With that as the backdrop, I wish you a very merry Christmas and happy holidays (or work days, depending your work schedule!).
In this post, I said about being the conduits of unconditional love.
But how do we love unconditionally?
It is easy for me to love my nice elderly neighbor or my best friend. But the rubber meets the road when the object of our love is someone who hurt us or others. How do we love this person?
The easiest way is to not equate the so-called "offender" which his actions.
But in most cases, we cannot love a person unconditionally, if we trust in our strength alone. If you have any doubts, try loving Hitler, or someone who hurt you.
Unconditional love is not something that we can manufacture. It is the fruit of the Spirit that manifests as we remain in Christ Jesus.
There will be a fight initially in our mind, especially if we are usually prone to be driven by the dictates of the ego, which is not in alignment with the Spirit, Who is housed in our spirit. But the more we cease from our striving and emotionally rest in Him, acknowledging our inability to bear His fruit, the more we will see His rivers of living water saturating us and flow through us.
The fruit of the Spirit then will no longer be Christian-speak for us, but a living reality, which will not be dependent on others or the circumstances, no matter how grave or bright the situation is.
Ego is the part of our mind that keeps us
wanting which in turn produces pride, sadness, anger, worry, insecurity
and judgementalism towards others. The source of any negativity can be
traced to the ego. It literally is a heartless taskmaster that drains one’s emotional energy.
For the ego, the answer is always “out there”. We subscribe to its edicts in hopes that it will fill the void in us that we so desperately want to be filled. “Follow my prescribed path, for then, will you receive that which you seek for”,
says the ego. But to our chagrin, we discover that the happiness or the
freedom promised by the ego is nothing but an unreachable mirage.
The simple fact of the matter is that, the ego is a bully
and bullies are epic weaklings within their core. It thrives on
imprisoning the heart, but it does so by not realizing the fact that the heart has the power to rewrite the mind.
Freedom begins
when we realize that the heart is infinitely more powerful than the
mind. Authentic emotional freedom has nothing to do with anything that
comes from without. Nothing and not one human being can grant us
freedom. Freedom is experienced from within.
One way to experience that freedom is by loving unconditionally.
Love is a power source that transforms our mind. It is similar to the
water gushing out of a hose. Before the water hits the plant, it
saturates the hose from within. When we meditate and speak negativity,
no matter how justified we think we are with our assertions or how
factual we think the thought is, the negativity soils our mind and binds
us. But when we proactively and unconditionally love, it saturates us
first and sets us free, free to be ourselves and to be effective
conduits of Love.
The "world" that we so love to judge, condemn and criticize is not moved by our knowledge of the scriptures or the lack of it, whether we follow or reject a particular doctrine, whether we pray in tongues or flow in the gifts of the Spirit, or not, if we are churched, unchurched or home-churched, whether we fast or feast, whether we follow certain rituals or not, whether we give or not; if we cannot love unconditionally, then we are nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.
But who said we don't love?
Sure, we do love the birds of the same feather. We love those who speak in fluent Christianese, we love those who dress, look, act and think like us. But that would be conditional love. In other words, our love is towards the standards that we expect to see in others - it is not towards the actual person, which leads to the natural conclusion, that there is zero love in conditional love.
If we were to die tomorrow morning, what would we be known for? That we were self-important, hate-filled, judgmental, Bible-thumping bigots?
Or will be known as vessels of unconditional love, because that is exactly how Jesus loved us and Who he is. The only groups of people who upset Jesus, were the religious ones, not "the world".
Well, who cares how we are known for?
That may partly be true, considering the fact that no one can make everyone happy. The goal here is not to be more 'likable'. The bottom line is, God is Love, and as his ambassadors, may we be known as conduits of that Love. If not, what "the world" sees is just another empty label.
Few scriptures to meditate:
"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." - John 3:16 NKJV
"For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved." - John 3:17 NKJV
"But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." - Romans 5:8 NKJV
"...love is the fulfillment of the law." - Romans 13:10 NKJV
The Bible is an ocean that
cannot be limited by one interpretation. When we think we have the
handle on the truth, what's usually happening is that we are merely
backing one interpretation of the truth.
The Christian world
is littered with interpretations. The last I checked, there are close to
40,000 Christian denominations. 40,000 groups saying, "I'm right". And
each one of them base their positions from the same manuscript.
Interpretations are often mistaken for the truth. Yes, there may be
nuggets of truth in them, but, in my view, it can never be the complete
picture. God will never be contained in our favorite doctrinal bowl. We won't see the full spectrum until we cross over.
Most of us love cars. When we see a Ferrari, our reaction is instant. We drool. We do not have to work up an emotion or need two upbeat songs to get to the joy frequency.
But when it comes to worshiping the King of kings, we need two songs just to get warmed up. And then the Worship Leader has to cajole us to raise our hands or praise Him.
Why is this so?
Simply because we haven't seen who Jesus is. Yes, we are familiar with all the Bible stories and the formulas to work the Kingdom principles. We are thorough with the doctrines and have memorized a ton of scriptures. We know a lot about Him, but barely know Him.
But the more we meditate on Him, the more we get a revelation of Him, no one will have to coax us into praising Him. The reaction will be natural. True worship is natural, and not a legalistic requirement. We worship Him, not because He is insecure, but simply because it will be a natural reaction as we behold Him. And it won't necessarily be limited to a "worship session" or while listening to a "worship music".
I briefly experimented with the idea of open comments. That is, I do not verify the comments before approving them. I may not necessarily agree with a wide variety of Christian interpretations out there, but that does not mean that I cannot have an open discourse.
The only thing that the experiment showed me was that it was a magnet for Anonymous comments. First of all, I do not understand why someone has to to hide behind the Anonymous mask, considering the fact that I am not posting about matters on national security here. Regardless, I ignored and allowed it. As long as the content was relevant to the posts, it did not matter. But what I do not have, is the time or the inclination for plain judgmental negativity.
Case in point. This is the comment that I received from an Anonymous poster for the post on Steve Jobs:
"“I wanted my kids to know me. I wasn’t always there for them, and I wanted them to know why…” Steve Jobs
I am sad for Jobs’ children.
And
I am equally sad for a nation who praises and glorifies a man simply
because he achieved much in the world of business and technology.
That’s a polite way to say it, I suppose. Maybe it would be more
accurate, or at least more pointed, to say it this way: I am saddened
that we worship a man simply because he gave us phones with touch
screens.*
How I wish our society honored those men who love their families with a love that is second only to their love for God."
Farewell, Steve. Thanks for the inspiration. You were an icon!
Steve Jobs: 1955 - 2011
This is
a prepared text of the Commencement address delivered by Steve Jobs,
CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, on June 12, 2005.
I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of
the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college.
Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college
graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's
it. No big deal. Just three stories.
The first story is about connecting the dots.
I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then
stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really
quit. So why did I drop out?
It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young,
unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for
adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college
graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a
lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the
last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a
waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an
unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My
biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated
from college and that my father had never graduated from high school.
She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few
months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to
college.
And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a
college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my
working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition.
After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I
wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me
figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had
saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it
would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking
back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped
out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me,
and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.
It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the
floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to
buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday
night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved
it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and
intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one
example:
Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy
instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every
label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had
dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to
take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif
and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between
different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great.
It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science
can't capture, and I found it fascinating.
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life.
But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh
computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac.
It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never
dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never
had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since
Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would
have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in
on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the
wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to
connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was
very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.
Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only
connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will
somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your
gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me
down, and it has made all the difference in my life.
My second story is about love and loss.
I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I
started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and
in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a
$2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our
finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned
30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you
started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very
talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things
went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and
eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors
sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had
been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.
I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had
let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped
the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and
Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very
public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley.
But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did.
The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been
rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.
I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple
was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness
of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner
again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most
creative periods of my life.
During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another
company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would
become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer
animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most
successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of
events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we
developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And
Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.
I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been
fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the
patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick.
Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going
was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And
that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is
going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly
satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to
do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep
looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know
when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better
and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it.
Don't settle.
My third story is about death.
When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live
each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be
right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33
years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If
today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about
to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days
in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've
ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because
almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of
embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of
death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are
going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you
have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not
to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30
in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't
even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost
certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect
to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go
home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to
die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd
have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to
make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as
possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a
biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach
and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few
cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told
me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors
started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of
pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and
I'm fine now.
This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the
closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can
now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a
useful but purely intellectual concept:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want
to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share.
No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death
is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change
agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new
is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the
old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite
true.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life.
Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other
people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out
your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow
your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want
to become. Everything else is secondary.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog,
which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a
fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he
brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's,
before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made
with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like
Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was
idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog,
and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It
was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final
issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you
might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath
it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell
message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have
always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I
wish that for you.
What exactly is wrong with judging someone? Why is this very negative activity frowned upon, when we know that the person we judge "deserves" our tongue or thought lashing?
Judging and condemning others is bad, not because it is impolite or because Jesus exploded at this venomous negativity.
When the faithful religious crowd was about to stone a woman, Jesus said, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”
Once it finally hits us, that all of us needs His Grace, then our reaction would automatically be, "how can I judge someone?".
The 2012 US Presidential Election is around the corner and all of us have our reasons on why we think one party is better than the other party.
Regardless of our preferences, the most ignorant thing that we could do is gather information and form our conclusions based on hate-filled chain emails or chatter from clearly biased sources. FOX leans to the right just like MSNBC leans to the left.
Politifact.com, a Pulitzer Prize winning site, dissects the statements made by our good politicians. Here is a link on how they work.
Several weeks ago, I downloaded Jeff Goins' The Writer's Manifesto.
If you are a writer or seriously curious about this beautiful art form, do check it out. It's short, moving and written straight from the heart. It may have been written to the writers or the potential writers, but the heart of this message applies to any creative expression.
I also subscribe to and regularly read Jeff's blog. It's a great blog to those who are passionate about writing, or to those like me, who are discovering this powerful medium of expression.
Couple of weeks ago, we saw the effects of Hurricane Irene that hit the East Coast of the United States. Some have died and others have lost their homes due to flooding. And as always, some believe that God sent the storm because He was upset with the the East Coast.
Here are some reasons why that belief does not hold any water:
2. Christ demonstrated his love for us by dying for us while we were sinners. Now all of a sudden He is upset?
3. Contrary to the popular assumption, God is not "angry" in this dispensation of Grace. In fact, "God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son ..." to be tortured and crucified for us. That's how much He is in love with the world(not just the Christians).
4. The sin issue has been taken care of on the Cross, once and for all. Love won't be insulted, but if it can, I would assume it would be insulting to God, when we say that God sends natural calamities due of sin; because in other words, what we are implying is, that Jesus' sacrifice was not enough to take care of the sin problem. Please allow this thought to sink in.
5. Lastly, the point that inspired the title of this post. If God is the author of storms, Jesus was defying His Father's will when He calmed the storm. But we know that Jesus was not being disobedient because He only did what His Father did.
Sure, it might take a storm (literally or metaphorically)
or two to free ourselves from our undying dependence on the self and trust God wholeheartedly, but the implicit belief that God is the author of every storm,
is baseless under the new covenant.
Only in America can you be pro-death penalty, pro-war, pro-unmanned drone bombs, pro-nuclear weapons, pro-guns, pro-torture, pro-land mines, and still call yourself ‘pro-life’.
- John Fugelsang
Enough said.
Editing to add another perspective:
“And only in the mind of a progressive liberal can you be
anti-death penalty, anti-war, anti-unmanned drone bomb, anti-nuclear
weapons, anti-guns, anti-land mines (all in the name of loving your
fellow human being) and still think it’s your right to be able to murder
an unborn child.” - talkstraight.tumblr.com
February 03, 2012: Editing to add:
I
can be mindless at times. I posted the second quote without thinking
that some readers (or someone they know) may have had to go through
an abortion, which I know is not a black and white scenario. I deeply
apologize if the quotation caused anyone pain.
I am for preserving the life of the mother and the child, just like I
am against nations invading other sovereign nations, but when the woman
is a victim of rape or incest and/or if there are potential health risks
involved (which, by the way, is merely 7% of the total abortions taking place, as
per one statistics I just read), in my opinion, the government should stay out
of her choice to go with the decision she feels comfortable with.
Christianity is often viewed as a big buffet table with a variety of doctrinal dishes people pick and choose from. And Grace is often seen as one of those dishes, when in fact, it is the oxygen, with which the new creation in Christ lives. Without Grace, there is no new birth and the life, in Him. We are saved by grace through faith alone, not because we are fluent in Christianese and are trying(good luck with that) to keep the Law.
Just like we won't set limits on our intake of oxygen, we cannot pick and choose grace at our convenience. The Law cannot save us, it only condemns us, leaving us guilty and hopeless.
The more we renew our minds with the knowledge of His grace, the more saturated will we be in that truth. We may get some talking points from two books and three sermons on Grace, but Grace is not just a topic. It is not a commandment. It is our life source. Our entire life is depended on Grace. Even though some of us thinks that we are qualified to receive His righteousness, the truth is Grace is what qualifies us to receive it.
Grace is not a spiritual concept. It is not an 'it' among the bunch of 'its' that we love to debate. It is a Person, named Jesus Christ.
It is easy to get on the ever-pessimistic tribulation or the suffering bandwagon by just focusing on that portion of what Jesus was saying. But contrary to the popular assumption, that is not a stand-alone statement. He goes on to say, "... but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." (John 16:33 NKJV)
How can we "be of good cheer" when we go through tribulation? It is because the Overcomer lives in us.
The cup is not just half full, it is full - full of Him!
We can either focus on Him or on the tribulation. What or Who we focus on will be magnified in our lives. Common sense suggests that we choose to focus on Him, than on the upheavals either affecting or surrounding us.
Religious freedom has its obvious benefits. But in the long run, it contributes to the creation of institutionalism in various flavors as we see in countries that are open to religious freedom.
The unadulterated Gospel of Jesus Christ thrives in countries where there is absolutely no religious freedom. Christians there are not killed because of doctrinal differences. They are tortured and killed for their unwavering trust in the Name of Jesus.
It was His Name that put the early disciples in trouble. It was by that Name that they were conduits of countless miracles. It was by that Name that they turned the world upside down - all amidst the fierce opposition and persecution(for a detailed picture, read the Acts of the Apostles). To them it was all about Him.
Wherever that Name is oppressed, His Gospel (not churchianity) thrives. Perhaps we should pray that the religious freedom that we enjoy be taken away?
"Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof." - King Solomon
Our words have creative power. And yet, we often times release them without second thoughts.
Jesus said, "Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks."
The easiest way to find out what is in our our heart is listen to our words for a few minutes. It is easy to speak Christianese when all is going well. But when pressure hits, our words reveal what we are truly made up of.
A tube of toothpaste cannot release pineapple jam when applied pressure.
If we can decree death to a situation, we can also speak life over the situation. Speaking life over the situation is not necessarily based on our senses. "Peace, be still" does not make any sense to the natural mind in the midst of a fierce tempest, which is why it is decreed purely by faith.
In other words, we are merely making a choice (the same choice that we made to decree the negative things) to speak what God says about a particular situation.
An illustration "The economy is going down the drains and I am going to part of it."
That the economy is going down the drain may be a fact. But an Ambassador of Christ does not have to take part in it.
Based on the Phil 4:19, she or he can say, "The economy might be going down the drain, but my God supplies all of my needs according to His riches (not according to a particular economy) in glory by Christ Jesus."
Chew
The more we meditate on that scripture, the more it settles in our soul - which is our mind, will and emotions. What is the significance of settling it in our soul? Because as a man thinks in his heart, so is he. Our exterior is the reflection of our inner man. Paul says that we are to think on whatever that is true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous and things that are praiseworthy.
But how can we ruminate over a scripture when a ton of negative thoughts are competing to take up our mind's space?
Words
In comes the power of the spoken word. Ever noticed that our words stops the flow of thoughts? So we speak or decree truths that is aligned to the reality of who we are in Christ Jesus. Christ has redeemed us from every curse, so no economic calamities or sickness have the legal right to dominate and enslave us.
Visuals Words birth visuals or imaginations. When I say 'dog', you have the visual of a dog in your mind's eye in a split second. Imaginations are one of the most powerful tools that one could constructively use. Without knowing, most of us have been consistently using that tool destructively.
The word "recession" begets a visual. The more we meditate on that visual, out of the abundance of our meditation, comes the creative words, "I'm going to be affected". And for sure, it does. Just ask Job(see Job 3:25).
OR we can use our God-given power to choose to meditate and speak the God-given abundance and His promises over our lives.
The modern man who prides himself on being "self made" comes to the point where the trust in all his five senses fail, where he has no other options to bank on.
To him, Jesus says, "The things which are impossible with men are possible with God."
This, obviously is not a new revelation. We all know that.
Jesus also says, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes."
It is easy for us to believe the first scripture. We can leave all the responsibility to God and sing "Que Sera, Sera, Whatever Will Be, Will Be". It is also easy to blame God, when bad things happen to us.
However, with the second scripture, we are given a responsible choice. The choice to trust Him and believe His promises over the circumstances that does not line up with our new-creation reality in Him.
The concept of double-portion anointing is so OT. We are not int he Old Testament now. We may not realize the fullest extent of Who we are carrying, but the reality is, we are the temples of the Holy Spirit and He does not come in bits and pieces. He abides in us 24/7 whether we feel Him or not.
Read and meditate about our new-creation reality in the Paul's letters. We see that God's fullness is contained in Christ and that He dwells in us. We have the complete portion abiding in us. We merely have to renew our minds to that knowledge.
"... the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you..." - 1 John 2:17
They say the story of the mountain climber who was desperate to conquer a particular mountain. After years of preparation, he started his climb on a fine weekend.
But by the time he got around to climb, it was already getting very late. Instead of camping, he continued with the climb. It got real dark very soon. Visibility was zero. Clouds enveloped the moon and the stars and the temperature was getting colder by the minute.
As he was climbing a ridge at about 100 meters from the top, the unthinkable happened! He slipped and fell. Falling rapidly, he could see nothing but darkness. Terror invaded his mind, as the gravity sucked him down at a terrifying speed. This really was the end, or so he thought.
Suddenly he felt a jolt that almost tore him in half. Yes, like any good mountain climber, he had staked himself to a long rope tied to his waist. He was now hanging in midair with nothing but pitch blackness and the frigid weather around him.
He had no choice but to shout, "Help me God, HELP!"
He suddenly heard a deep voice from the heavens, "What do you want me to do?"
"Save Me!"
"Do you really think I can help you?"
"Of course, my God!"
"Then cut the rope that is holding you up."
There was a moment of silence. And the man proceeded to clutch the rope that was holding him even tighter.
Next day, the rescue team reported that they found a frozen mountain climber with his hands clutched real tight to the rope...
and he was merely five feet off the ground.
- Author Unknown
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Trust is a major ingredient in our walk with God. And it does not necessarily stem from our five senses. But at the same time, it is not a blind walk either. Our action will be in response to His words. Peter walked on water by trusting Jesus' words and when his eyes was focused on Jesus. But he began to sink when he trusted his senses.
"The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away" - one of the most sacred cows that has ever emerged from the institutional Christianity. When bad things happens to one's life, we are quick to point our fingers to God, based on these words by Job.
Where we miss the boat is the fact that Job was making this comment without realizing who really was the taker here. The book of Job Chapter 1 clearly shows us who the thief was. Job obviously could not read his book. He was living it.
"Ah, but God allowed it", says the follow-up response.
I beg to differ.
I do not have the slightest clue of why bad things happen to folks when it does not make any sense and my job here is not to speculate on that. But in Job's case, it was Job who allowed it.
"As a man thinks in his heart, so is he".
What happened to him was the fruit of what he dominantly meditated on. Listen to his words in Job 3:25, "For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me."
We do the same thing today. We are constantly surrounded by the negative news, and expect the sky to fall on our heads. And it does, when we give into that fear.
Faith and fear comes through one channel - by hearing. Faith comes by hearing the word of God. And let's not forget that, the word of God is not just the written text. It is the person of Jesus!
Fear comes by hearing the news media incessantly or anything that does not line up the knowledge and the reality of who we are in Christ Jesus. I'm not suggesting that we should turn the TV off and go live in a cave. I may not be able to stop the birds from flying over my head, but I certainly have the freedom to not let it build a nest on my head; unless of course, I want to believe that God allowed the bird to build the nest on my head!
The issue here is not about a doctrinal debate. This is not another theological discussion. This affects real lives. I personally have heard about the story of a man, who was dying of cancer, proudly saying that the cancer was from God and that he would not mind if God afflicted him with more severe diseases. He did not have to believe that lie when the stripes that Jesus bore on his back took care of his disease.
It is tempting to try to intellectually figure it all out and box what I want to believe about Him. But this business of believing and trusting the Person of Jesus is not based on what I necessarily perceive with my senses. It goes beyond the sense realm.
The truth is inspired by the Holy Spirit, and not by dissecting a stack of Scriptures with my head. Unless we walk by faith and not by sight, we may know plenty about Jesus, but fail to know Him, the resurrected Jesus who said, "I am with you always". This faith is not the product of our making. It is the gift of God. All we need to have is the desire to know the One who will never leave us nor forsake us.
Most of us know plenty about President Obama from Wikipedia or from the news media. But only Michelle Obama knows him intimately. Her knowledge is not based on the facts about Obama. She has a personal bond with him.
When Jesus said, "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified through it." (Jn 11:4), He was not glorifying the sickness as it is sometimes perceived. There is no glory in a dead Lazarus. It was the resurrection of Lazarus that glorified Him.
Wife: I love you hun, but you do know that I've set apart Sundays for you, don't you?
Husband: Sundays are great, but why do we have to limit our communication to just Sundays? Do you know how much I long to connect with you daily?
Wife: What do you mean? Do you not know that I wake up every day, early in the morning and read about you and talk to you?
Husband: Duh, how can I forget the time when you are having that non-stop monologue with me?
I am glad you know all the data about me, but reading about me is totally different from actually spending time with me. Do you have a clue of how much I long for a personal connection?
I was not kidding when I said I love you. You, my beloved, are constantly on my mind.
When I try to reach you, you think you have to dedicate a certain time for me. While that is not necessarily a bad thing, I look forward to your responses to my text messages that I send you throughout the day. But you seem to have this notion that mere texts won't count. Mere texts? My dearest, don't you know that there is nothing "mere" about the thoughts we have for each other? It's the little things that matters. What is little to you, means the world to me!
By the way, I find it funny when you speak to me so formally in Elizabethan English. But I always hear you speak very normally with your friends. What's up with that?!
And why does your face become all serious when you talk to me?
Seriously, it pains me when you try to become someone else around me. My heart sinks when you try to connect with me.
You do not have to try. Just be yourself. I love you for who you are. I will continue to love you unconditionally, even if you choose not to communicate with me at all, because my love towards you was never based on your response or performance. Also, I am least bothered about how well your communications skills are.
When we go through the valley of the shadow of death, we do not often feel Him. As a result, we may have the urge to conclude that he has abandoned us.
But still, we like the confirmation of our senses. And I don't think it is too much to ask for. Joy cannot be theorized.
So how do we go about experiencing Him in the middle of the worst storms?
This is where believing His words with a child-like faith come into play. We have to make the decision to take "I am with you always" at face value.
Believing has nothing to do with feelings. It is a choice that we make. We might not feel a thing initially, but as we take the baby steps with him each day, we get to taste and see that He is good.
Tasting is not a theoretical concept.
I do not taste baklavaby faith. I love that pastry and I long for more. My taste buds can never get enough of it. But if I were new to that pastry, I would have to choose to taste it. But now that I know (not just know about) how baklava tastes, there is no going back. It's too good.
There was a phase in my teen life when I tried to be an atheist. I read plenty of books on atheism and I thought I was one. But deep down, I could not agree fully with the notion that there is no God, which is why I say that I tried to be one.
Wasn't it common sense to become an atheist or at least be an agnostic? Angels, demons, virgin birth, resurrection? For sure, it must all be part of a big religious hoax, designed to control the mass.
Or is it?
Either way, I still could not commit to the concept of there is no God.
Why could I not believe in atheism? Perhaps it was due to the fact that I had received Jesus Christ to my heart at a younger age?
It is possible. But I am not sure.
Fast forward to the present. Right now, I believe that it takes an immense amount of faith to declare that there is no God. I can see why people are allergic to religion (I know I am). And I see how the biblical stories may be perceived as fairy tales and mythologies.
But to come to the conclusion that this universe and everything that contains it popped just out of the blue... I just do not have enough faith to believe that blindly, because my next questions would be, where did the blue come from and how did the very first cell come into existence? "It just happened" violates the basic scientific principle of cause and effect. Nothing just happens. I think it's an insult to the intellect to even consider that reasoning.
Even Charles Darwin was skeptical about his theory.
His words: "To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible degree."
But then, what do I know? I might be a close-minded religious nut job incapable of thinking for himself.
Most of us know that verse by heart. It's from the prayer that Jesus taught the disciples to pray (see Matthew 6:9-13).
"Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven."
But often times, we do not see the power that is contained within that statement.
If we did, we would not accept the ills that we see in our lives or around us.
The media screams "economic Armageddon" and we accept that. The newscaster declares the "flu season" and we prepare for the season. Likewise, we mindlessly nod our heads to a plethora of things that is alien to our new life in Him and His Kingdom.
Religion hurts. I am not theorizing here. Here is a real-life example.
I am part of the prison ministry team of the church organization that I attend and I have the privilege to connect with inmates in person and through letters.
Couple of weeks ago when I was at a particular correctional facility sharing the good news of the love of Christ Jesus, I met a man who came from a very churchy background. He said was raised in a church, used to be a drummer at the church and that most of his immediate family were pastors for multiple generations. But when he made some wrong choices in life, they disconnected him from their lives. Yes.
The man was deeply hurt. His questions were along these lines: how could his family, the supposed servants of a loving God be this nasty to him? Is God like this too?
Welcome to religion. This is a classic example of what religion does to a person. It condemns, hurts and alienates people from God's love. Religion mouths the name of Jesus, but its only god is the organization that it serves.
The truth is, those hurtful actions by his family members are alien to Jesus. Listen to Jesus' words, "For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved." (John 3:17). Read the Gospels closely; the only crowd that Jesus chastised was the religious crowd, not because He hated them, but because they were dependent on their self-efforts to be in right standing with God.
Condemnation is not from God, because the price for the sin of the human race was paid for by Jesus Christ, once and for all. As Paul said, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." (Rom 8:1).
It's the goodness of the Lord that leads a person to repentance (Gr: metanoia - which simply means a 'change of mind'). Jesus did not die for us when we had all our acts in order. He demonstrated his love towards us by dying for us while we were sinners (see Rom 8:5). Period.
So we see that God's love is unconditional towards every human being (not just the Christians. see John 3:16). And if we are His ambassadors, is not it fair to assume that we are to represent our King?
When I first heard about the concept of universal salvation, I was elated. Who in their right minds would really want to see anyone burn in the lake of fire? I’ve never understood the Christian who relishes the thought of someone burning in the lake of fire. Often times, the person who gleefully and viciously condemns someone to hell does so from a posture of self-righteousness. He thinks he has somehow earned the credentials to be in right standing with God and as a result, he now reserves the right to judge and condemn everyone who does not agree with what he thinks is right. Based on Ephesians 2:8-9, we know that no one earns the passage to Heaven. But that is not the focus of my post.
Back to universal salvation. Even though I loved the concept of automatic salvation, I had a lot of questions. I simply cannot agree with a view based on its popularity or because it’s the new fad. Initially I ignored the questions thinking that it must be the religion that is holding me back from receiving the new revelation and that what I felt had to be right. But this is a topic that cannot be taken lightly or can be viewed as another "doctrine". This topic affects people’s destinies. In the end, if the universalists are right, all is well! But there is still a huge chance where the well-meaning universalist position may not line up with God's plan and I could not pretend to ignore that. So I asked the Lord to shed light on this matter. The clearest answer and the confirmation of what I believed (even though it is not what I would love to believe, if I had a say in the matter) came in the form of a book titled Erasing Hell, by Francis Chan and Preston Sprinkle. The book dissects and explores the core scriptures that the universalists use to base their positions on. The author does not do a lot of interpretation for the reader. His views are based on clear scriptures from where we can form our conclusions inspired by the Holy Spirit. If you are curious about the topic of universal reconciliation and hell, I recommend this book. It is a short read, but to the point.
It was a very sobering read for me as well. This book stripped me off of my need to portray God solely in the light of how I thought everyone wanted to see Him. The Christian religion may need a new PR agency, but in my view, I don't think the Creator of the universe is a weakling who needs our defense so that He can reach many people. He is The Truth and Truth is capable to stand on His own. It was very small and ignorant of me to think that I had to promote and encase God in a package of my choice, even though the package was biblical. This does not mean I am joining the 'turn or burn' bandwagon. There is a middle ground between the extremes of 'turn or burn' camp and the 'feel-numb' camp, where the apostle Paul and the other writers of the New Testament stood unabashedly.
