Blessed are the Meek

A friend of mine once questioned how one could traverse the heights and depths and, in recounting, do any of it justice. Neither he nor I have found the answer, but I know I will have some stories to tell. Stories that couldn't be made up, stories that proclaim the glory of God and at least hint to the stupidity and frailty of man. Stories of the beauty of the Church. These stories are of a good and faithful God. The last few weeks have brought me through a trek of my journey that I won't forget.

One of the biggest lessons of the past couple weeks brought me to a place of the heart of God that I've never been before. A "simple truth" that I hadn't known became my lifeboat in a storm. (Do you remember that time when Jesus and his disciples were crossing over the sea, the storm came, and JC was sleeping? Oh man! What a story! Anyway...) I was spending some time journaling about 2 weeks ago like I hadn't done in a long time. I should back up and say that one of my very favorite passages of scripture is the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5, the beatitudes. Every once in awhile an "old" concept pops back up on the radar, and sometimes something new comes. The latter is what happened that night. I was journaling through some things and it hit me.

"Blessed are the meek...", verse 5 says. I've heard meekness described as an inward disposition of the heart that accepts God's dealings with me as good and right. Here's what I wrote, "I think I"m learning to trust His heart more in this - maybe that's the meekness Jesus talked about in the sermon on the mount. Perhaps it's not just accepting God's dealing with me as good and right but really trusting him and his heart" towards me. Have you thought about that lately? Have you considered that through the circumstances - whatever they may be, and whether or not they will change - you can trust his heart? And, you can trust his heart toward you.

So, where does that leave me? Grateful to be a part of the body of Christ and part of an organization that supports the growth of that body. It leaves me with a greater understanding of how Christ lived out through the local church really is the hope of the world. It leaves me amazed at the goodness of my God.

The Cross is Proof...

Sometimes life doesn't work out. That doesn't change the fact that the same God who put the stars into place and knows their names is still God. He is great.

I'm listening to a podcast now and Louie Giglio is talking about just that. As he spoke on Isaiah 40, he said "...and if [God's] holding the whole cosmos together, you can be sure he's holding you together." He goes on in talking about the Hebrew word translated wait in "those who wait upon the Lord." Its not a passive, we're-just-going-to-sit-here wait, "it is enduring through circumstances, no matter what we see around us, with a confident resolve that God is at work in our lives, that he is at work in the circumstances..."

"The cross is proof..." What do you think he goes on to say?
- that God loves us? that God cares about us? Yes those things are true; God does love and care about us.

But here's the statement he made - it struck a chord in me, especially today...

"The cross is proof that God doesn't always change the circumstances.
but it's also proof to us that God always has a purpose in the circumstances. And he's always at work in the circumstances ,whatever they are and he can triumph in those circumstances... He had a purpose in every hour of that cross. ...God was accomplishing something amazing in and through it all."

If you don't like it...

Dr. Diehl was here for our 50th anniversary celebration (of the church of the Nazarene in Germany). He preached Sunday morning. The words of his sermon have played back many times - in my mind and from my own mouth and the mouths of those around me. This is something I can get on board with.

If you don't like it, change it! If you can't change it, give it to Jesus.