Idle Idol Worship

Do you ever think about the people you "idolized" before you came to Christ? Do you remember why it is that you did consider yourself a fan of those people?

I was music crazy for a long time. My favorite performers were the same as anyone growing up when I did: most Motown artists, especially The Jackson 5, and then, of course, Michael; my rock/pop faves were INXS, Prince, Earth, Wind and Fire; and I had my collections of James Taylor.

When I did stop focusing on music for the sake of entertaining my emotions or living and loving vicariously through the medium, I still thought about the entertainers.

Can you remember being a "teeny bopper" and deciding that you just had to somehow, someday meet your favorite singer? I do. I recall plotting on how I'd somehow get backstage at a concert and get to finally see one of my idols up close. It was different with Michael Jackson. I wasn't just going to meet him; we were going to be married and I had the wedding all planned out.

Now that I am past all those things of my physical and spiritual youth, I have to shake my head when I think back on it. Those entertainers - complete strangers to me, basically - had a huge impact on my life. I tried to emulate them in dress and attitude. I looked up to them in a way. I would have loved to have been included in their lives. I was a true fan - or fanatic.

If those strangers that I only knew via their songs and performances (and published gossip) impacted my life when I was part of the world, why am I not returning the favor now that I am saved?

I always wonder if Christians ever happen to meet one of their former idols and, if they do, do they share the Gospel with them.

It makes me very sad to think that people who amass millions of "fans" who love and adore them, often end up alone and sad and in despair.

• Michael Hutchence - singer for INXS who lived a full and fast life with lots of fans and lots of lovers. Died alone in a hotel room, hung from the door with a belt. 
• Marvin Gaye - Iconically famous and talented. Depressed and out of control at the end of his life.
• Amy Winehouse - talented and fragile, and alone at the end of her life.
• Steve Clarke - Guitarist with Def Leppard, died alcoholic and, apparently, helpless and hopeless.
• Whitney Houston - her story and that of her daughter's is still so new and tragic I don't have to say anything.

The list goes on and on. 

These are people who proved that having everything and anything that the world can give is never enough to fulfill the soul.

How many fans did these people have? How many people all over the world claimed to "love" them? How many autographs did they sign? How many fans were lucky enough to get a photograph snapped with them? Hundreds or thousands?

Couldn't one person who got close enough to get a photo or autograph just mention God's love?

I don't know about the religious upbringing of the others, but Gaye and Houston were raised in church and heard the Gospel. But maybe someone could have reminded them of God's love just one more time.

Maybe none of it would have made a difference, but it would be nice to know that someone tried.

Maybe the next time you are on a social networking site and see one of your former idols you can share a Bible verse with them.

Peace

--Free

Walking the Talk (is serious exercise!)

"Be careful what you pray for."

If that's not a saying, it should be!

I'm hot-tempered. It's the main thing I had to ask God for help with. You know, after the whole,"Please save my soul" favor.

It's a wonder that God isn't just so sick and tired of me by now. But then, He is God. Thank God!

Recently I prayed a prayer that got answered with a quickness I wasn't prepared for. My prayer went something like this: "Please, Lord, help me to be more thoughtful with my words and actions. Help me to reign in my temper. Let me live my life as a testament to the changes You have made and are making in me."

Then I had to repent a whole bunch of stuff because I had spent the previous night carousing around the backyard fire pit with a bunch of friends and family. Oh, how we laughed and talked. And cursed and gossiped and discussed things that we really should not have been discussing...

Yeah.

So, my prayer was sent up and apparently given Priority rating because, before I knew what hit me, I got the chance to hear God's answer.

As usual, I'm hard of hearing when it comes to God's voice. Like the kid who can hear the ice-cream truck from 6 blocks away, but can't hear the sound of his mother's last nerve snapping when he disobeys for the millionth time.

Let's just say that I got myself into a verbal situation with someone and I could have remembered my prayer and reigned in my temper. I could have.

That would have been beautiful. By holding my temper and responding to the other person with a kind and thoughtful response, I would have been a testament to the work that God is doing in my life. It would have been easier on me and a more powerful reaction than the one I actually had. Which was to get hurt and irritated and respond from a position of pride and negativity.

God is infinitely patient with me, but I am sure, as they say, this is what my guardian angel must have looked like:

                                                            

Oh boy. So, yeah.

I asked God for something and He gave me the perfect opportunity to receive His answer. And I blew it. What could have been so easy, I made triple hard.

I walked around for probably two hours, just livid, about the whole conversation. I replayed the other person's words in my head, considered every nuance of their attitude, and just ripped them apart in my mind.

Then

I stopped.


I stopped listening to myself, my pride, my past, my feelings and emotions. I stopped hearing myself long enough to hear God again. I heard God's love for me, and His patience. And I realized how unloving I was being.

Now I have to repent for my hard head and hard heart. And I still have to let God work on what I prayed.

The most ironic part of all this is that the verbal altercation I was involved in had to do with, of all things...

(I really hate to admit this)

...how we who say that we are Christians actually live out our Christianity in our daily lives.

I'm still in the crawling stages

(I will wait while you finish shaking your head at my complete and utter folly.)

I can just imagine the glee that Satan got out of this. I can also imagine his disappointment when I stopped running on my own steam and gave myself back over to He who lives within me.

Anyway, this is one of those times that I need to walk the talk.

I say I am a Christian, so I have to learn to love and live and forgive and repent, just as Christ commands me to.

I have to walk the talk and, boy, is this going to be some serious exercise.

Peace
--Free

In Specific Praise

As always, our service at church this week was awesome. I especially appreciated one part because of something the pastor said after a worship song about praising God. He pointed out that when we praise someone – a child, for instance – we don’t just tell them, “I praise you.” We tell them why we are praising them. He then invited the congregation to share some of the specific reasons they have for praising God. There were some really beautiful shares by members and, listening to the examples where God had done incredible things in people’s lives, something occurred to me. Not only is God a good, wonderful and loving Father, but He is such a personal God. For each of us, He does and gives what we each need. Nothing He does for us is generic.

I was so moved by one sister’s story of ways that God had moved in her circumstances that I was too awed to even share my own testimony, but I will share the gist of it here now.

Of course, I am thankful to God for being patient with me, for putting up with my constant mistakes, and, most of all, gifting me with His salvation and love. That's what He has for all of us. And, for some of us, he will supply a specific need at a specific time. For me personally, though,  He actually allowed me to lose things.

It took losing  my house, health, job, relationships, companions, finances, and pride before I reached a point of either walking away from God or walking into His presence. Prior to all that, I believed in God, but I didn’t acknowledge needing Him. When I did acknowledge my need, it wasn’t because I wanted everything back that I’d lost; I just felt so empty that I realized the things I’d lost had never fulfilled me.

God truly has been so good to me. I am not only learning to depend on Him for my daily needs, but I live from moment to moment in trust that He will supply what I need. I needed God before I knew that I did, but I’m so glad that I do know now.

I've mentioned here before the various ways I toyed with "religion" and how I grew to accept Jesus as my Savior. It took me a long time to understand that "religion" is just a word that can be used any and every way we humans want to use it, but a relationship with Jesus is personal and real. I grew up with "religion" and it never was enough.

A book I read recently says this: “When they seek comfort, He makes Himself known to them.” That right there could be my entire testimony. That's my specific praise.

Peace
--Free

The Wonder of This World. The Wonder of Choice.

The past couple of weeks have been rough. I've been dealing with the extreme fatigue again and it was so very depressing. A bright spot was when I was doing my Bible study and one thought kept coming to me about God's awesome power: What an amazing world we live in and what amazing creatures we are.

I don't believe that I'm being arrogant or stubborn when I say that I truly cannot understand how anyone can not believe in God.

Louie Armstrong may or may not have felt the way that I do, but his song expresses my wonder:

1. (What a) Wonderful World

   Song by Louis Armstrong
2. I see trees of green, red roses, too,
   I see them bloom, for me and you
   And I think to myself
   What a wonderful world.

   I see skies of blue, and clouds of white,
   The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
   And I think to myself
   What a wonderful world.

   The colors of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky,
   Are also on the faces of people going by.
   I see friends shaking hands, sayin', "How do you do?"
   They're really sayin', "I love you."

   I hear babies cryin'. I watch them grow.
   They'll learn much more than I'll ever know
   And I think to myself
   What a wonderful world

   Yes, I think to myself
   What a wonderful world

Truly so.

source

Part of my current Bible study is on the difference in the words used for "creating" and "making" something. Only God can create (make something new, created from nothing), while humans are capable of making things (from something that is already created).

There has to be a wanting to disbelieve on the part of anyone who refuses to look at at least that one fact when they question the existence of God.

Not only did God create, but He did so with such perfection and order.

We humans are not only amazing specimens, but there is such meticulous and complex order to what we are.

The reason I started doing this Bible Study was just to get more into the Word. The more I do get into reading and really looking deeply at the Scriptures, the more awed I am.

That there are people who refuse to acknowledge the God of the Bible is further (unnecessary) proof to me of His existence. After all, man is only capable of rebelling because God gave us free will.

In all our human intelligence and accomplishments we forget something when we talk about being "randomly" just here: Our bodies, brains, and souls were not randomly created. If we came out of all the chaos that is, Who brought order to that chaos?

If man is greater than God, then let man create something using anything but what already exists. It doesn't have to be anything special - just come up with a color made not using colors that exist.

It takes so much more faith to believe in randomness than it does to believe in order and purpose.

A popular saying used to go like this: "Happiness is a choice". That is true, but most people who wore those t-shirts and displayed the posters were being flip and now-minded.

There are more eternal truths that a lot of people don't think about (or even want to think about). I doubt that I'll ever see many t-shirts or posters proclaiming those more important truths:

• Unbelief is a choice. 
• Unrepentant Sin is a choice. 
• Repentance is a choice. 

Those are important because, unfortunately, living forever as we are is not a choice. All of us are going to see the end of this life and not enough of us are considering what that is going to mean for each one of us.

We can choose to be arrogant. lazy, careless, stubborn or defiant. All those "paths" lead straight to Hell. Or we can be humble and submit to God, asking for forgiveness through the blood of Jesus. That's the only way to peaceful eternity. It takes nothing to be humble except to stop being full of pride.

I'm praying for those who still don't acknowledge God's existence. I'm praying to those who believe in His existence but don't acknowledge Him and His eternal authority. But all I can do is pray. 

My mother used to say to me "I can take you to church, but I can't take you to Heaven. We all are going to walk into eternity on our own."

Peace

--Free