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| Extreme Makeover |
| Wednesday, August 12, 2009 |
Tired of how you look? Hate that crooked nose? The beady eyes? Hate that you can't afford plastic surgery? Frustrated that, for the most part, you'll look like this until you die?
Well, for starters, God made you how you look, so it shouldn't matter how you fit in. "But God gives [you] a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body." (1 Cor 15:38-39) And don't forget that everything God makes is GOOD!
But even if God didn't make you handsome or beautiful by your own standards, He doesn't care about that anyway -- and neither should you. Your outer man is corrupted and decaying, and God's far more concerned about giving the inner you a complete makeover. For now you're just living in a temporary shell, warts and all. Your body is just the luggage that gets you from birth to death.
I used to think that when God raises you from the dead you'll look exactly the same, and so we should show great respect to it, even at death. But that doesn't seem to be the case. The Bible clearly teaches that "flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of heaven" (1 Corinthians 15:50), and that the body is "sown a natural body and raised a spiritual body; there is a natural body and there is a spiritual body" (15:44) What God raises from the dead will look very little like what you're walking around in now.
So why worry so much about what you can't take with you? God's makeover will be extreme. When He raises you from the dead -- or transforms you if you're alive when He returns -- you will look quite different. Proof of this is when Jesus rose from the dead. Mary Magdalene stared right at Him and didn't recognize Him. She thought He might be the gardener. When He walked with some disciples along the road to Emmaus they had no clue who He was. Why? Because His raised body was not the same as what He had been born with. It was quite different.
This will happen to you too. At death you'll get the surgery you always wanted. Your whole body will decay back into dust, and God will raise it up as a new creation....a spiritual body of some sort. "And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man." (1 Cor 15:49)
I'm guessing that if you're not happy with your body now, you'll be very happy with it then! Meanwhile, put a little more effort into making-over the inner you instead of the the outer you that's going to rot and disappear.
Labels: deception, humlity, vanity |
posted by Alan Harstone @ 10:50 AM   |
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| BETRAYAL: Learning To Love Our Enemies |
| Tuesday, August 11, 2009 |
 You may be reading this post today with the sharp edge of betrayal fresh in your mind. Perhaps your spouse has been cheating on you, or one of your kids has just been arrested for drug possession, or that person you confided in went and blabbed everything all over town. And the anger in you is starting to swell; there are days when you simply lose control.
Jesus can sympathize with you. But when we face these situations we must look at how Jesus handled Judas Iscariot, and take our cues and strength from Him.
Before He selected Judas to be His disciple Jesus had spent a whole night in prayer speaking with His Father in heaven. We can assume that God spoke very clearly to Him about whom He should choose, and I believe that the Father made it clear to Jesus that Judas would be His betrayer. But He was still to teach him, love him, and treat him as a brother.
I can't imagine how hard it would be to be told that you must select and love the person who would eventually turn you over to terrorists to be tortured and killed. But this exactly what Jesus did. Never, at any time, did He let on to the other disciples what He knew about Judas. They were stunned to meet him at the edge of the Garden that dreadful night.
This reminds us of what God not only expects, but enables us to do with our enemies. Jesus said, "Love your enemies and do good to them", not as a wonderful ideal but straight out of His personal experience with Judas. For three years He practiced love, compassion, forgiveness, and patience with Judas....all the while knowing that in end Judas would not repent, and would still carry out his betrayal.
This is our calling too! Whether it's with a difficult spouse, a wayward child, an ornery boss, or an unfaithful friend God calls us to love them, forgive them, and do good to them in spite of what they have done, or may still yet do, to us.
May God give you the grace, strength, and peace to accomplish His purposes in your life....especially with those who continue to hurt you.
Labels: hate, love |
| posted by Alan Harstone @ 10:25 PM |
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| Praying For Our Kids! |
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With so many temptations and pressures that our kids face today it is imperative that we as parents and grandparents pray every day for our kids. But what should we pray?
Jesus answers that question in John 17.
"I have revealed You to the ones You gave me; for I have passed on to them the message You gave me. All who are mine belong to You, and You have given them to me; protect them by the power of Your name so that they will be united just as we are."
Of course, He was speaking of His disciples, but can't we speak the exact same way about our kids? The principle is identical: we are responsible for passing His love and truth on to all the little ones He has entrusted to us.
And then Jesus gets into the heart of what we must pray:"I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should KEEP THEM FROM THE EVIL ONE. SANCTIFY THEM BY YOUR TRUTH." (17:15,17)
This must be our prayer too: "Father, as much as I would like to protect my kids from the evil one, there is only so much I can do. You are their Father.....protect them from the evil one. Watch over them constantly. Lead them not into temptation. And Father, sanctify them by Your truth, for Your Word is true."Praying this way for our kids is a humble recognition that we can't be there for them all the time -- but God can. And it's also a recognition that in order to keep their minds and spirits clean we must bathe them every day in the Word of God.
I have to confess that when my children were growing up I washed my hair more often than I washed my kids' minds with the Word of God. It was so easy to get distracted from that important time of family devotions, and it's a mistake that I wish I could go back and undo.
If I want my kids to make healthy choices and remain innocent and untouched by the evil one, I need to diligently pray for the Father's protection and consistently model and teach God's Holy Word for their sanctification. They simply cannot be sanctified when I get lazy about teaching them His Word....especially when they become teenagers.
Moms, Dads....be diligent in your prayer for your kids! And be just as diligent in protecting and cherishing those quiet family times when you gather your kids together each day to sanctify their hearts and minds with God's Word.
Labels: faith, family |
| posted by Alan Harstone @ 11:10 AM |
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| Real Hope For Beating Sin! |
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In my 20-year ministry as a pastor I have met more defeated Christians than I wish I ever had to see. They know what pardon is; they know what it is to come to the Fountain; they know that they can come to Jesus in times of difficulty; and they know that they can return to Him with all their guilt and get forgiven; but if you were to describe the pattern of their lives in regard to sin and their desire to live righteously, they would tell you that for the most part they've been on the losing side. They can identify quite well with God's warning to Cain: "sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it." (Genesis 4:7) They're very familiar with the desire of sin, but not so familiar with the ability to master it.
The Apostle Paul talks about this battle in Romans 7: "For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do." (Romans 7:14-19) This is the testimony of the defeated Christian! "Wretched man that I am. Who will deliver me from this body of death?"
You see, Paul recognizes that your struggle with sin has to do with your flesh -- your body. "So it is no longer I who do it, but sin which dwells in me....I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind (which delights in God's Law - vs. 22), making me a captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members." (Romans 7:23) So then his question is, how can I get free from this losing battle? Who can deliver me from this body of death?
The answer is found in the little phrase "IN CHRIST", but first let me introduce you to verse 25: "So then, I MYSELF serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin." This is the mistake that many of us make: I MYSELF love God's Law inwardly, and I MYSELF try to live for Christ out of that love. It's a losing battle.
Jesus said: "Without Me you can do nothing" (John 15). We must be IN CHRIST if we're ever going to win this battle. So what do I mean by that?
Let me illustrate: SIN makes us like a lead pipe in water -- it's constantly dragging us down. But when we receive Christ as Lord and Saviour we have a new desire in our hearts to love and follow Him. So we want to get that lead pipe up above the water. But the mistake we make is tying an I MYSELF cork to the lead pipe, so that I MYSELF not only wants to please the Lord, but I MYSELF tries to make this lead pipe float. The result is that I bob around -- sometimes up, sometimes down, depending on the currents and depth of the water that my life is in.
This is where SO MANY CHRISTIANS are living today! Their desire is heavenward; their will is on the right side, but they lack the adequate power to overcome; sin is ultimately stronger than the strength of thier will. And so they encounter failure, fruitless struggle, painful effort, continuous conflict and defeat.
Is that where you are today? Let me give you hope with God's simple solution: IN CHRIST. We must be IN CHRIST, not only positionally, but also practically in our day to day battles.
Let's suppose for a minute that you take your lead pipe and knock the cork off; then stick it squarely into the middle of a life-belt and throw it back into the water. What will happen? It will float! It will not sink, come hell or highwater. Why? Because there is a superior law at work. The buoyancy of the belt is STRONGER than the law of gravity which the lead pipe is subject to.
This is our only way to win! We have to let go of the I MYSELF strategy, and place ourselves squarely, every day, IN CHRIST for the waves ahead. "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." (Romans 8:2) So long as we abide in the life-belt of Jesus Christ, we will not sink. But take that lead pipe out of the life-belt, and it will quickly find the garbage at the bottom once again.
James said it best in his epistle: "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Resist the devil....." (James 4:7) Flee from his demonic laws and sink yourself into the safety of Christ's "law of the Spirit of Life". Make a habit of putting yourself IN CHRIST every day, just like you do when you get out of bed in the morning and put yourself in a set of clothes to cover the shame of your nakedness.
IN CHRIST there is victory, but we must place ourselves IN HIM every day. We must clothe ourselves with Jesus each and every day, for only the law of the Spirit of life is greater than the law of sin and death!
I MYSELF is a losing battle!!!!
Labels: abundance, sin, victory |
| posted by Alan Harstone @ 10:27 AM |
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| About Me |
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Name: Alan Harstone
Home: Saskatoon, SK, Canada
About Me: Senior Pastor
Saskatoon Evangelical Free Church
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