Tag: rejected

Heart Broken, Not Offended over News of Intolerance

This is nothing new, yet deep sadness comes when Christians, who are forced in this culture to tolerate so much, witness closed doors to groups who want to share the Good News to those who will hear.

True believers, believers in the God of the Bible, aren’t offended by this news, we’re heart-broken.

God’s greatest gift to the entirety of mankind is His gift to choose.

How sad, that people are afraid of a different opinion than the god of the culture. What if the God of the Bible is the true and living God?

Should we only be tolerant of the god of the intellect and modern world and not check out the Word of the Ancient of Days? We study hard for many tests in life, should we not consider reading God’s Testimonies for understanding instead of “hear-say” about them?

Who’s close-minded? Do we want to be found deceived in the end?

Shouldn’t people be exposed to both views? God allows choice, should we not as well?

When I was young, I went my stubborn way, making god into what I believed he should be. A distant God. While I went on to discover me.

But the “me” I was discovering had a story much like Humpty Dumpty who had a great fall. Broken in pieces, hurting, unable to put myself together on my own, I felt desperate and afraid with no where to turn.

But God was watching over me. And now my true search for God began.

Friends in high school, who I believe were part of Young Life, (also part of the Key club at our school), gave me a Bible.

It didn’t mean much to me then, but God knew, there would be a perfect time when I needed to know God.

At that time, my life depended on it.

I opened the Bible given to me years before and found the name of Jesus mentioned everywhere. Curiosity and deep hunger had me reading the Bible like a new best-seller, (which it is by the way, only, not new).

My heart was finally open to receive Jesus as God, Lord and Savior of my life.

He created everything with His Word. He’s provided His-story. He’s patient and kind. God is love. He doesn’t insist on His own way.

He’s the giver of life, breath, love. He’s Creator God.

And, He gives choice to each man to believe. He allows, He lets . . . man to choose Him or reject.

Why be afraid to let other voices be heard?

What if the Word of God is what it says it is, the truth: Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth John 17:17.

This news report of no surprise to God. It’s written:

“He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him” John 1:10,11.

Younglife and many Christian organizations want the overwhelmed, restless, and guilt-ridden world to know the Good News, the God of the Bible.

Yes, God is love, but He is also Holy. God is just.

We’ve all sinned. Meaning, we’re all separated from God. The mystery is revealed in the pages.

That’s why He sent Jesus. His perfect blood shed on the cross is the atoning sacrifice. The “at one” with God sacrifice.

Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God John 1:12,13.

I received Jesus. I’m not perfect, but He made me new then, believing on Him for salvation, and each day He graciously accepts me, because I’m washed, cleansed, believing Him as my Savior and Lord.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new 2 Corinthians 5:17.

Why be afraid to have Young Life on the campus? When the God of the Bible is the most liberating and freeing God ever:

Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,  that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation 2 Corinthians 5:18,19.

God was in Christ reconciling the lost and broken world to Himself. God alone can put us back together again.

To keep people from choice, is a huge crime to Jesus. Do people want to be found guilty for causing others to stumble:

Jesus said to his disciples: “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come.  It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.  So watch yourselves John 17:1-3.

Do we want to be a people closed to invite Groups that believe in the God of the Bible because it might speak against a cultural idea?

I wasn’t open when I received my Bible to hear its Word, but God knew there would be a day.

And He patiently allowed me to go my merry way, until I was open to hear. I’m thankful for the boldness that came from kids from a Young Life group. In the end, the Lord used them to be a part of putting my broken pieces together.

I’m thankful for Young Life. And I’m broken-hearted that there might be a broken soul that now is unable to be touched by the Good News that Young Life brings.

Are you still in question who Younglife actually is and what their message actually is:

 Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God.  For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him 2 Corinthians 5:20-21.

Young Life will continue. Young Life remains. Believers in Christ pray and we watch God move, whether the world will open their doors or not. God touches hearts that seek after Him.

God’s love never fails 1Corinthians 13.

Who knows agony of spirit?

Who knows agony of spirit?
For some it comes in an instant. Sudden loss and trauma roll in like thick clouds. They don’t move, the thick darkness. It simply stays around.
For some there is heaviness of feeling, being abandoned and alone. Being rejected and forsaken, and Confusion makes a home.
“My God, My God. Why have You forsaken Me.” (1) These are the words of Jesus, the Lord.
“Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, The Creator of the ends of the earth, Neither faints nor is weary.
His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, And to those who have no might He increases strength.
Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall,
But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.” (2)
This is the word of God. Oh, how it reads like a poem.
The enemy of God wants to destroy faith in His name. The enemy, and our flesh destroy, But God remains the same. He is the same, yesterday, today and forever . . . (3)
Who is like God? He was. He is. He is to come.
“In the beginning God,  . . . and darkness was on the face of the deep . . . and the Spirit of God was hovering over the  . . . waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.” (4)
Who knows agony of spirit? We all do.
But Jesus does most.
Beyond the depth of our darkness, He has walked. We cry out, “Jesus.”
He understands.
This is the will of God. That we turn to seek Him.
Hear Him.
Follow Him. Know Him.
There is no One like God.
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him, should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world,
but in order that the world might be saved through Him. (5)
“Let there be light.”
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear …” these are the words that we must hold on to, as Jesus endured hours on the cross. “But of power and of love …” there is hope. God will restore – His word is alive even now, in each of us, ever more.
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.” (6)
God restores and gives us, “sound mind.”
 Right now.
Step by step, and hour after hour.
Does He know we are in agony of Spirit? Oh, yes. He knows.
He is with us.
“Jesus.” we call.
A new creation, a resurrection from the dead, this is what He gives. We wait. We trust.
His name is Faithful.
His name is True.
His eyes remained on the Father, and that is what we  . . . will choose to do.
“God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble.”
Could it be? Could it actually be? That this present darkness we are in, will be a comfort for someone else, some day, some when? When we can hold their hand and listen, and cry with them too, and say, “Oh yes. Jesus knows exactly what you are feeling. He knows, through and through.”
And somehow, in a way mysterious, where pain and beauty meet, we are drawn to the Savior, like never before, again and again, we worship Him, complete.
 
(1) Mark 15:34
(2) Isaiah 40:28-31.
(3) Hebrews 13:8, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.”
(4) Gen. 1:1-3.
(5)  John 3:16,17
(6) 2 Tim. 1:7.
(7) Psalm 46:1