I'm Definitely Going to Maybe Do That!

     In January of 2011 I took on the New Years Resolution of losing weight. The scale was scaring me, as was a future of declining health. But my resolutions had never made a difference before. So I began exercising regularly and eating less, and I eventually dropped 50lbs that have been gone for a couple years now.    

    Americans commonly place losing weight and getting healthier among their New Years goals, leading fitness centers and gyms to prepare for a flood of new members.

     However, the numbers show that half of those new memberships will fall below "core" criteria of going at least twice a week. And 2/3 of all memberships in the U.S. will go completely untouched. As a result, the U.S. wastes $12 BILLION a year to unfulfilled gym time. Maybe you should read that last line again...

    So why are resolutions so hard to keep? Because they're just words and have no teeth. It reminds me of my Granny AND James 2:14,

"What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save Him?"

     Claiming a faith in Christ with no actions is meaningless. We do not work in order to gain Heaven, but because we've been given Heaven through Jesus. True faith isn't a resolution, but a REVOLUTION moving us from words to actions!

     So let me challenge you this year to skip the resolutions and move onto Revolutions! Revolutions are marked by actions and bring results, while resolutions waste paper and sticky notes, and are quickly forgotten. This year accept Revolution in your life...

• Like studying the Bible daily (it's on your doggone phone people!). 
• Skip some Facebook time to pray to your Heavenly Father! 
• And if it's weight you want to lose, stop eating ice cream while sitting on the couch watching "The Biggest Loser" and get active!

You Can't Handle the Trial!

     It happened again! Just yesterday I had an opportunity to witness to someone who shared the old adage with me, "God never gives us more than we can handle."      

    This idea comes from a very loose recounting of 1 Corinthians 10:13. It just so happens that I recently memorized this verse with our men's accountability group at church:

"No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you to be tempted beyond your ability. But with the temptation, he will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it." 

     Three times the word temptation is used in that passage and the message is this: God always gives us a way out when temptation comes. Every time you chose sin, was a time you could have chosen victory. 

     So God never lets us be TEMPTED beyond our ability, but He certainly allows us to be TRIED beyond our ability. In fact scripture makes us keenly aware that we are given more than we can handle:

• Noah was tasked with the responsibility of preserving life on earth with a coming doomsday. 
• Gideon was charged to defeat a formidable enemy with only 300 unarmed men. 
• James 1:2-4 says to rejoice in trials as God uses them to perfect us

In each of these circumstances, God is the one doing the work. Not Noah. Not Gideon. And not you. 

God DOES give us more than we can handle, so we'll recognize it's not more than HE can handle. 

                                           You can't handle the trial!

     The Christian life is all about giving up control. Even in response to 1 Corinthians 10:13 and temptation, the only way we can even spot the escape is because we are in Christ and submit ourselves to the leading of the Holy Spirit. But moments of trial are moments to remind us who our faith and reliance must remain upon, namely Jesus.  

Your Memories: Reloaded

     So what did you give up on? For me it was gymnastics during my elementary school days. The idea of walking on my hands and doing flips sounded rad (80's slang is still the best). But after the first few practices, I realized gymnastics was work! I just wanted to know it and do it.

     Well thanks to scientists at MIT, you may have this very opportunity. After years of research into "memory surgery", scientists were able to implant a false memory into a mouse, making him familiar with a place he had never been before. So like Neo in The Matrix, perhaps one day you could simply have the knowledge of Fung Ku downloaded straight into your noggin.

     The real-life application being considered by these researchers is to treat people dealing with a painful past. Instead of working them through their issues, patients could have the memory removed or replaced by something less traumatic. While on its face this seems a noble goal, is ignorance truly the path to healing?

                       "Oh, make it a happy memory!" -Agent K

     Acts 3:19-20 says "repent...and turn back...that times of REFRESHING may come from the presence of the Lord." The pain that comes from this life of sin can be hard to deal with, but times of refreshing come not by our forgetfulness, but by God's forgiveness. Every experience becomes a part of who you are, and we know that God can work all things for good to those who love Him and follow Him (Romans 8:28)

     Are you dealing with the pain of your past? Memory surgery isn't the answer. Repentance brings refreshing directly from the presence of the Lord. He comes near to us as we draw near to Him through confession. So repent and turn back, knowing that God can always do something new with you!

Presents Aren't the Problem

     Have you ever been asked an impossible question? My parents did exactly that to my siblings and I in December of my sophomore year...

Mom: "Don't you think it would be great to donate all our Christmas gift money to needy families?" 

Us:".................................................."

If we said no, we were terrible people. If we said yes, there would be no presents. Quite the dilemna (I don't care what spellcheck says. I'm telling you that I learned that word with an "n" as a child). 

     Social media is showing us many families making the choice to skip presents this Christmas, either to punish their ungrateful children, or to put the attention back onto Jesus. In either case, I think the presents are getting a bad wrap! (That pun just happened)

     The reason kids are ungrateful and Jesus' nativity sometimes gets bumped for the elf on the shelf is because we are failing to teach what true giving is.
                           
         "For God so loved....He GAVE His only Son" (John 3:16)

     Giving is a wonderful expression of love and putting other first. It's not always done perfectly, but why not try? As my children continue to grow, they are also growing into givers. They begin to look at gifts for siblings birthdays and have even become looser with their money when it comes to impacting missions through their giving. Are they perfect in this? No, but they're growing through these opportunities.

     So I could teach my kids that an absence of presents brings the greater presence of God, but that's not the reality. The greatest motivation to greater action is a changed heart. Let us work to change the hearts of our children all year long in how we bless them by our giving, whether during a birthday or just surprising them with a Sonic stop. Show your kids they are being blessed because God has given to you and through you. 

     For 15-year-old Heath, there wasn't much of a lesson learned. We donated the money and received so many presents from sympathetic family members that no real suffering occurred. And as for the families we helped, that was pretty much a one shot deal. So let's not make lessons on giving an occasional emphasis, but part of our families on a regular basis. And most importantly, let's remind them of Jesus and his great gift of forgiveness and eternal life!

Stop Saying That!

    Star Trek is better than Star Wars. Diet Mountain Dew isn't even close. Found On Road Dead is an accurate acrostic for Ford. These are a few of the things I have become fully convinced of. But the big one for today is this: people need to stop saying that sin is God's will.

    I bring this up in light of an interview on the Today show with Janay Rice, the wife of former Baltimore Raven Ray Rice. Their now infamous elevator incident in February has brought up important discussions on domestic violence. However, Janay added a new wrinkle when she told Matt Lauer that "God chose me and Ray" to go through this in order to bring this conversation to the forefront. Perhaps without realizing it, she is endorsing sin as part of God's plan for our lives.

    Discussions of God's will do not have to be limited to theologians and pastors, but they should be limited to Scripture. To make the claim that God's plan involved sin takes us down a dangerous road. Undoubtedly, God's plan often involves pain and trials that are designed to strengthen our faith (James 1:2-4), but I cannot find a strong argument for sin and godliness to be in cahoots.

       Prepare yourself for a shock....the Bible says God hates sin.

    Psalm 5:4 says God does not "delight in evil" nor does any dwell within Him. Isaiah 59:2 informs us that our sin blocks our access to God through prayer and petition. Bunches of:others confirm this throughout Scripture.

    If God directed Ray to knock his wife unconscious in that elevator, He also would have been leading this husband to violate the command of 1 Peter 3:7 to "live in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel." While I will never pretend to have my head wrapped around the sovereignty of God, I can say God's sovereign will is for us to be separated from the sin Jesus died to save us from. Let us never convince ourselves that sin is a part of God's plan.

Heaven? Yes! Angels? Absolutely! Demons? Not so much...

Catholic priests are the ghostbusters of the theological world. For years, these vanquishers of dark forces have been shown in movies and even Youtube clips as fighting demonic powers on a regular basis through a mixture of holy weapons and just the right prayer.

Spiritual warfare is something my Baptist brethren talk about, but rarely in any meaningful terms. I have heard the stories of people experiencing demons, but I admit that I cannot pin any significant experience in my 14 years of ministry of going toe-to-toe with a demon (unless I can count a few run-ins with youth parents back in the day). So if I lack a demonic Wrestlemania moment, does that mean they're not real?

This comes up because my brother called me a few nights ago and asked what I thought of demons, and specifically if I thought they were real. Short answer: they sound scary, and they're totally real. He went on to tell me of his friend, John, who believed he was being harassed by a demon. John doesn't go to church and called a couple of pastors in his town asking them what he should do. In each instance, the pastor simply didn't believe John's story and took it no further.

So I called John and asked him to tell me his story. Let's put it this way...YIKES! The hairs on my neck are still at attention recalling how John explained this entity's ability to take a visible shape while bringing him feelings of dread and even depression. He was now worried that this "entity" (I told him demon was the correct term) would attempt to possess him and he was highly fearful.

After telling John that I believed him, I asked about his relationship to God. He admitted to having none, though he had been exploring more about God. Long story short, I shared with John the Good News of Jesus and he repented of his sins over the phone and placed his trust in Jesus. Then we had a crash course in Holy Spirit theology and that according to 1 Corinthians 6:19, no one can ever possess Him now that He has become a temple of the Holy Spirit. John hung up the phone sounding much more confident about the future. John is reading the Bible and reports no visits since his salvation.

What is the takeaway? First of all, there were pastors who had an unbeliever call them for hope and they offered NONE. We have the hope of salvation and purpose in Jesus. We must not remain silent!

Secondly, if the Bible warns us of something, we better doggone take it seriously! Jesus spent many days defeating demons who were bringing hopelessness and harm to people all over Israel (Matthew 8:16, Luke 11:20, Bunches:of others). If the Bible says it, we should believe it!