by MIMADMIN | May 7, 2015 | Articles, Testimonies
Several years ago, I moved my young family from Colorado Springs to Salida. I had taken a new position with a company that wanted to establish an outpost there, along the upper Arkansas River valley. My wife and I finally found a home we felt was affordable, just outside of town and we put it under contract. The process went smoothly and in a few weeks, we were closing in on our new place and packing to move. I had started with the new company while living in the Springs and things were going well. We had a plan and it looked, for all intents and purposes, that GOD was directing us to make the move. We shuttled our belongings to a storage facility in our new town and took up residence in a dingy little motel that agreed to let us rent a room for a few weeks, just until we closed on our new place. It was cramped and less than ideal, but the four of us endured it. We avoided any major conflict, opting to walk across the highway to a small city park and “get some air,” rather than arguing with one another. I must admit, the last three weeks of our six week stay entailed many park visits. Then came the day that I received a phone call from the headquarters of my new employer, back in New England. I had crossed swords with the secretary of the owner of the company, in defending one of my support staff from an unprovoked attack. When the smoke cleared, the woman at the home office had...
by MIMADMIN | May 7, 2015 | Articles, Testimonies
A good friend of mine shared a story with me that has stuck with me ever since. He lived many years under the influence of alcohol, and indicated that even as a non-believer, he had a conversation with God every day. It was a simple conversation, but a profound one nonetheless. It went like this: each day, God would quietly ask him in the depths of his heart “Today, John?” To which he would reply solemnly, “No God, not today…” This conversation continued for years as this man’s life self-destructed around him. God, ever faithful, kept asking the question, and he kept answering in the same manner until the one day when God took him down to rock bottom and asked the question “Today, John?” And John answered “Yes, God, today.” Twenty seven years of sobriety later, my friend looks back on that time and reflects on two thoughts. The first is what a waste of precious life that yielded nothing but heartache, pain, despair, and damage to him and those around him that he loved. He drank fully of the deceptions the world offered up to him and received nothing of value in return. The second thought is how thankful he is that God kept asking him the question. At any time, God might have said “Fine, I will no longer ask – you are on your own.” As I reflect on what I’m going to tell my accountability partners on our next call a week from now, my friend’s two thoughts hit home for me. I have committed to certain things and have routinely reported to my...
by MIMADMIN | May 7, 2015 | Articles
Hebrews 13:17 Obey those who rule over you, and be submissive, for they watch out for your souls, as those who must give account. Let them do so with joy and not with grief, for that would be unprofitable for you. If you are like me, the older I get, the more I fatigue. Fatigue in turn wreaks havoc on my spiritual discipline and my ability to run the race well. Paul states that he disciplined his body and brought it into subjection lest when he had preached the Gospel to others he should become disqualified (1 Cor 9:27). The last thing in this world I want for myself is to be disqualified in this race for eternity. I know this race is a battle against my flesh (Gal 5:16-17) and against principalities and powers (Eph 6:12), a race in which my very life is at stake. This sobering thought has led me to contemplate my predicament with fatigue. As I have done this, the idea of accountability to other men has become increasingly logical and even vital in my life. Obviously, we will all be held accountable to Christ in the end equation (2 Cor 5:9-10). But, at times, this accounting seems distant and surreal, especially when you are getting battered in the crucible of life. Being accountable to other men is more immediate and can be just as powerful. Most of the time we tend to think of accountability in the “do not’s” of the Bible. For instance, many men use accountability groups to help them with their sexual purity, “do not look at a women to lust...
by MIMADMIN | May 7, 2015 | Articles
“At my first defense no one took my part; all deserted me. May it not be charged against them! But the Lord stood by me and gave me strength to proclaim the message fully, that all the Gentiles might hear it.” II Timothy 4:16 – 17 Imagine yourself in a dark, musty cell, awaiting death. You have time to sit at a poorly lit table and pen a few words to your friend. What would you say? What would be your chief concern? In this letter we have a glimpse of what was uppermost in Paul’s mind; the prison is inconsequential while the message is all-important. He charges Timothy to be faithful in the sight of God. Such a charge is quite predictable; you would expect Paul to admonish his son in the faith to finish the race of life well. What is exceptional is the fact that Paul makes this charge against the backdrop of one disappointment after another. “You are aware that all who are in Asia turned away from me, and among them Phygelus and Hermogenes.”(1) “Hymenaeus and Philetus have swerved from the truth by holding that the resurrection is past already. They are upsetting the faith of some.”(2) “As Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of corrupt mind and counterfeit faith.”(3) ”Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica.”(4) “Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm.”(5) “At my first defense no one took my part; all deserted me.”(6) Can you imagine a missionary sending agency sending out a person with this kind of record? Paul charged his friend with the need to remain faithful, for results do...
by MIMADMIN | May 7, 2015 | Articles
“And the children of Israel …asked of the Egyptians jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment. And the LORD gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they let them have what they asked. And they despoiled the Egyptians.” Exodus 12:35-36 Man’s will yields to the will of God – whether man wants it to or not. God can move man’s will, like that of a robot, to accomplish His purpose. While God inflicted plague after plague on Egypt, the Bible reminds us, “…the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart.”[1] When it was time for Israel to depart Egypt on the Exodus, God laid it on the hearts of the Egyptians to surrender their wealth to these former slaves. It does not require sanctified imagination to conclude that this act of generosity was not naturally motivated by goodness of these pagan hearts. God holds man responsible for submitting his will to Him, and God judges man when he stubbornly refuses to yield. Although these two appear contradictory, both are true. On the one hand, God will have His way, with or without your cooperation. At the same time, God grants you the freedom to bend your will to His, or rebel and reap the consequences. As His obedient servant, purpose in your heart to keep your will in complete surrender to His will. [1] Exodus...
by MIMADMIN | May 7, 2015 | Articles
“None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written, ‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him,’” 1 Corinthians 2:8-9 Paul gives two illustrations of reason’s inadequacy. First, if the rulers and intellectual giants during the days of Jesus Christ understood who He is, they would never have crucified Him. The best that the world had to offer, when meeting Jesus, was that He should be destroyed. Just as human reason did not stop these people from killing the Savior, so it cannot help you find God. Paul’s second illustration of reason’s inadequacy is seen in your ability to understand the future. Your reason cannot give you a clear picture of heaven. All you can know about it is what God has revealed. You only know the ways of God to the degree that He reveals them to you. Even after you have come to know Christ as your Lord and Savior, reason can take you no further than revelation. Develop convictions from your understanding of revelation, but take them no further; do not make absolute what the Bible does not make absolute. For example, a great deal of what many Christians believe about heaven is what they want heaven to be like rather than what Scripture promises. Be content to live within biblical limits, believing no more and no...
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