Devotion,

Why…

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Why...Why...Why

We all have many friends in our lives, some pass through for a season others stay around for longer.   I begin this blog, not with friendship in mind directly but more to ask, out of all those friends or acquaintances how many have helped us on our journey though life?   Who has impacted me and to what extent?    It always amazes me that we have friends that don’t help as well as those who do.     Who has walked through my life and is still doing so? Bringing the imprint of wisdom through their words and actions.   Who has become the finger of God working in my life?  is this not “every joint supplying”.   I opened up a meeting on Sunday with this thought “…to join my self to any one, even to be joined to a people group, a church, cannot simply mean just  attending…” Unfortunately for far to many this is so, the Christ like life degenerates to attending rather than becoming a relational joining, a felt joining, even our language can be ever so relational but do we truly feel one another?    “You are not joined with me until I feel you, we have not joined until we feel one another”.

I would suggest that Jesus showed this in his own life, constantly painting pictures of this, glimpses of joining and being felt so many times.   One story comes to mind of the woman who had bled for 12 years, she came not just to be in the crowd, but to join herself to him.   When she did so Jesus felt it, it was not just a healing we are told Jesus felt something leave him.   She was joined he felt it and I am sure she did, a story of order and government (number 12 is always seen as government, 12 tribes, 12 apostles of the lamb, 12 disciples etc.) her life came back into order after 12 years of disorder.    This was a relational touch in story form “she touched him”, actually her healing came not as she just brushed passed his prayer blanket, in her action she joined her self to him and Jesus announced “…who touched me…” I felt it flow from me.   Is this not “every joint supplying”?

Back to where I began some people touch our lives and help us to put lenses on that enable us to see a bigger picture, enabling us to get a balance back in life, others help us to see the detail of all around, others put give us lenses that assist us to appreciate people and circumstances, and there are those that even help us to see with future lenses, making sense of the past and future along with present.   Few come along and probe strategic questions on how we see, so that we can priorities and respond correctly.  Questions that may even shake us but ones that will ultimately secure our journey and the way we live that journey.

Here is my point, reading today the Psalmist viewpoint on life lived around him, through the Message translation, I read a simple yet  a powerful word,  its consequence, if dealt with incorrectly could shipwreck a life, but if dealt with correctly will enhanced and make authentic our faith journey and intimate relationship with the Christ of God.

Psalm 106:1-3 says “…Hallelujah! Thank God! And why?   Because he’s good, because his love lasts.   But who on earth can do it — declaim God’s mighty acts, broadcast all his praises?   You’re one happy man when you do what’s right, one happy woman when you form the habit of justice.

My simple word is WHY

What a great opening and a wonderful habit to get into asking WHY?   Its not any WHY being asked here, its WHY are you being God focused, WHY are you thankful focused and WHY are you both together thanking God?      Don’t just do it because of the pressure of the crowd or the church you belong to, who expect you to conform in what we call “worship” just do it.   I think God likes this question as it cuts through the dross of performance and brings us to the real essence of you, and his relationship felt with us.

The Psalm commences with Hallelujah where does that go to, what is its meaning here.     Praise starts within the heart and action, but then we read an abrupt stop, WHY?

One sure thing that this WHY exposes is, don’t just give you self to form,  or praise that is simply emotional, soul driven, gaining ego or position, the things of life that change and that are insecure, rather find the unchanging stuff.   Find a WHY that is worthwhile and a WHY that is compelling, a WHY that brings a reason and momentum an advance, that creates a sure foundation.

Praise, thanks, WHY these three may be a good combination for life’s journey a threesome, that brings a way forward.

Praise

Thanks

WHY

Three legs of an expressive disciple, a disciple that turns his /her heart to the Lord becomes one of these who God looks for!

We have a WHY to encourage us to engage further, to become personally authentic, rather than simply being a part of a group, I have to do it.    So I need to understand WHY there is even a way to ask my WHY’s.   How can I ask an empowering WHY, not just a child’s frustrated WHY, or even a rebellious WHY, but a WHY that enables me to know myself and my motivations.

This WHY is to bring an understanding of

Self

My environment

The overcoming power of testimony

An encounter of God

Why I do what I do, that enables the expression to come from an inner well.

That no religion distracts or engrosses

That no unreality destroys authenticity

That we are always aware of the inner man discovering in the wilderness the inner challenges of motive.

WHY ASK WHY?

Should I never ask, is it productive, should it be part of my life’s cycle, am I able to manage asking the question?

WHY are you doing what your doing? find the answer,  the Father will bring it.

WHY is a powerful a belonging word, it really will cause you to feel your relationships, when WHY’s are asked we will feel one another, as we bring form to our WHY’s of life and faith.

Theme Song!

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Every Colour under the sun

As we walk our faiths journey becoming more and more like the Christ of God, we find, on occasions, that the precise quality of our faith and journey are difficult to determine.   Many of our experiences are subjective and therefore difficult to pass on to others, as they pertain to my own personal walk,  we can even create a sense of lack in others if they are led to feel unable to enter into these experiences that our worlds are often filled with.

However we have many life stories and recording of experiences of men and women, who have displayed their closeness to the Father which in no doubt become a provocation on our journeys.

Our lives must have these signs and helps to those who w ear still to encourage in their walk towards God.    One of these constant experiences outlined by the saints gone by,  is to sing of mercy and to be redesigned by judgments, these to would appear to most Christians a suitable expression of their feelings.   David seems to express in a review of his life that both mercy and judgements are proper grounds for praise and thanksgiving, along with the determination given by the Holy Spirit  to praise God for them.

Psalm 101:1 has in its opening lines this declaration “My theme song is God’s love and justice…” this  started me thinking down a number of avenues, the first being, what is my theme song?     Is it of the Fathers love, the magnificent justice of a creator that has the ability to rule in my life?

A theme in my view captures a life, it sums up a whole life, it’s the overarching bias and constant experience of a life.   I wonder what theme my life has caught or is under girded with?

The phrase theme song or may be, more popularly said, a signature tune may be used to refer to a song that has become especially associated with a particular performer or dignitary; often used as they make an entrance. Examples of this association include: the President of the United States with “Hail to the Chief”; the Queen with our national anthem, a song or tune directly associated with a person.   The purpose of the music is to connect a person with some truth, aspect of their lives or their status in life then.  It  is also used to establish a mood for an event or show.   In terms of a show I it provides an audible cue that a particular show is beginning, the lyrics of the theme song provide some necessary explanation for people unfamiliar with the show or event.

So what is your theme song?    What does your life sing of?  

What song will be associated to you and used to herald your entrance.   Will it be a positive of negative theme, are we those who are looking to communicate the great love of God, or the challenge of the walk, being near to depression with  the weight of responsibility?    What theme proceeds us as we enter a room, live life, is there a running and hiding from us?  a people saying o here comes pressure?   On the other hand it could be such a theme of overwhelming joy that all want to be in your company, for the theme to rub off?    The mood we create by the theme of our inner life

Before you go away thinking well I do not create a mood, I wanted this simple opening stanza to assist us in realising how we can change the theme of our song, to create an opening and heralding an arrival that all would wish to create.    Rather than give up, consider what your inner life dwells upon.

“My theme song is God’s love and justice”  the song that I should take hold of inside and allow to be the song that precedes me, is the love of God,  being overwhelmed,  revelling in his love for me, never mind how unlovely I see me, He loves me unreservedly.   This is the beginning of the rewriting of my inner theme, allowing  the nature and theme of God’s Love and justice to be my constant thought of him.

The dealings of the Father with us as his people, display the wisdom and goodness of God.

Consider the mix of these two foundations for a theme song, love and justice, mercy and judgments.   Mercies, if unmixed, would “exalt us above measure;” and judgments, if unmixed, would sink us into despondency. A ship needs both sails and ballast, to carry it forward in safety: and so the Christian needs a diversity, in order to accomplish in them the purposes of God’s grace. God sends them to his people to

–       Form them into the divine image. So that the perfection of a Christian consists not in one grace, or even in one set of graces, but in a combination of all the graces which are suited to a redeemed soul, and calculated to advance the honour of our God.

–       Stimulate them on their way to glory.    Mercies have a tendency to fill the soul with love to God, and to make it pant for the full enjoyment of God in heaven. Judgments also operate to the same end, by weaning the soul from present things, and causing it to long for that rest which is in Christ

The saints in every age have acknowledged the goodness of God in them

Now let me ask again “What theme song do you have?”    Bathe your mind and heart in his love and mercy revel in his judgments and justice so that our theme can be as one song sung in heaven!

Go on be bold compose a Theme Song

What a WONDERFUL World

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Natural Wonder

I wonder what world  you and I awake to every day, a world that confronts you or a world that gently wows you?    I have learned over the years not to compare each persons world as we can so quickly dismiss other Peoples world though our own coloured view-point.    What seems so insignificant to you may be so large and debilitating to others,  yet in this world there are some things that flatten the field of play, so to speak, and we can all empathise, the birth of a child, the loss of a loved one, the securing of some future event,  having the supply of food on your table.

My aim is to encourage you to consider the world you awake to today, perhaps an exciting event begins todays adventure or perhaps an unsettled issue hung over from last night, or even the concern on how  we will get through the next day and survive it.   So many worlds we awake to each morning.   What is the world before you? how is it rolling out in front of you?    A small decision, a huge event, a life changing or even a threatening day “……..this is my day……..”
Stop now and have a look at your world, the people who occupy it with all the movement of life, the events that create the terrain before you, the valleys and mountains to walk.   Stop for a moment and think what is my world like, what will I see and experience today?
The Psalmist in Psalm 98:1 (Message) says “Sing to God a brand-new song.    He’s made a world of wonders!    He rolled up his sleeves, He set things right.    The context of the song is important here, to sing a brand new song is a good thing but some times  as life is overwhelming we can not find a new song.   I am told in our travels in Africa that we should understand that “Africans sing if they are happy and sing if the are sad, so they sing at all times”  Celebration and song is a way of life there, happy or sad it’s  a song, I don’t find that in the West however perhaps it is something  we should learn.   One of the many things I love about my wife is that she carries a song within her constantly and when she looses that it changes her view and her inner ways, I see the impact of carrying an inner song in her which is wonderful and one of the many things i love in her.    OK back to the context of the song,  do you not see it here its, “he’s made  a WORLD OF WONDERS” this has to be a good way of life, realising that my life and my  song has a connection to a WORLD OF WONDERS.      With my every turn, as I open my eyes there are wonders to be seen and found, our Father has filled a world out with wonders for us to see, find and encounter so that we become those that anticipate wonders with every new day.   Perhaps “new mercies every day” have a direct relationship with realising and seeing a world of wonders as well.

Christ of the clouds

Our song Is through the medium of his wonders, I will say it again our new song has a direct relationship to the wonders we see.   May be songs are not sung when we do not account for the “…world of wonders…”.    O Lord I want to see your wonders at every hand not a narrow band but  be overwhelmed at every hand, seeing your wonders all around us, circulating our lives a “…world of wonders…”
“The wonders of our God” the old hymns sung, it is the record and impact of God with his rolled up sleeves creating wonders, these are the impact of this hymn.    Charles Wesley saw “O for  a thousand Tongues’ to declare the wonder of our God, he grasped and saw.
Oh That we might see the world of his wonders, just as Charles Wesley seeing  every aspect of God coming through  and causing us to shout with him,  with the shout of the deaf and the leap of the lame, shout wonders of our world to God.
Our world is his palette, his brush stroke as he lays down his mark throughout our world, can I be one that will see the world of wonders around me constantly.  O God I ask for a life filled by the world of wonders – then push for it son, I feel and hear  a cry inside me, for the world of wonders, your world your creative order where you are.
We are  invited as the readers to sing to the Lord a new song (cf. 33:3; 40:3; 96:1; 144:9; 149:1) because in His strength (right hand and arm are symbols of power) He has provided salvation and revealed His righteousness. God’s great salvation is possible because of His loyal love (ḥeseḏ) and faithfulness (these may be trans. “faithful, loyal love”). Remembering His covenant with His people Israel, the Lord delivered and saved them.    A WORLD OF WONDERS surrounds us waiting for us to pay attention even in the midst of life and challenges of struggles.    
LET ME EVEN GET TO THE POINT, LET ME  CHALLENGE YOU TO SEE THE WONDERS THAT AWAITS YOU IN THIS DAY, not just the miracle of healing which is magnificent in its self but wonders of life, growth, change, wonders in every way.  My cry is that we do not lose the wonders of our world for one wonder only but that we are able to encourage each one of us to be awakened to the wonders of our Father
In view of the wonders of grace and righteousness displayed in God’s salvation, the whole creation is invited to unite in praise.    My spiritual father loved the song by Louis Armstrong “What a wonderful World” and every time I hear this song sung  I think of him,  but even with out that thought I find that song moving me to appreciate the wonders of the world he has planted us in.   I am fully aware that there are human horrors taking place that many encounter each day yet in the midst of the world, shocked as we all can be of human atrocities, just t stop and wait and begin to part those things to see and look at the wonderful world that the Father has given us, he has and will enable us to see himself in our day.    I pray Lord that though the dim light sometimes of life we will see the world of wonders so that we may see our immediate world transformed through the palette of your brush strokes our lives.     That you might see the wonder of s simple life, that you might see the wonders of God at every hand throughout your day, how he involves in daily actions in and through you and those around you

Water Wonder

Open your eyes to the world of wonder!

Setting things Right

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What do you see?

Psalm 97: 6 (Message)        The heavens announce that he’ll set everything right, And everyone will see it happen—glorious!

  • Announcing heavens
  • Set right
  • Non-restricted seeing

All to do with my heavenly Father, he is glorious.

The NASB translations says it like this “…The heavens declareHis righteousnessand all the people’s have seen His glory…”

A heavens that speak to us is our wonderful gift, a declaring, an announcing heavens, lets listen to what it declares, the coming of “…Let your kingdom come…” the arrival of a King arriving to “…set everything right…”       The order, and rule, the right way up, as it is in heaven, is being declared through and by the heavens, lets listen!   Letting the eternal sound catch our inner person grooming us drawing us to look beyond the moment to see what is still to arriving in God’s economy.

“Setting everything right” is this not the same as your kingdom come, you and I have been brought into asking, praying, for what the heavens and Christ are declaring, the work of a unified voice of all creation people and heavens.   The Fathers order coming, the house of God arriving in all creation, the Kings way a highway through all of cosmos which includes my ‘little’ world.    At the school gate, in the office during classroom time, at home with the toddlers, on the road as I drive, you see it around you as you live it.    Making the far country where my abode is to be that my life is, the far country of the Kingdom of God that has arrived and is still arriving this order everything set right that is the Fathers house.

This setting in order that the Psalmist speaks of is not to be a hidden thing or in a removed place secluded small with drawn place but a place where the seeing is non-restrictive a place that “…everyone will see it happen…”

“And every one will see it happen-glorious” or “And all the people’s, have seen His glory” can this be the glory that is Christ given that is in the process of being reveled, the same that Paul writes to the Ephesus church about in the book of Ephesians that the church is to be “…the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places…” (Eph 3:10) followed by “…to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen…” (Eph 3:21).   The reveling of the church, the called out ones that are the carriers of Gods glory that will fill the earth “…as the waters cover the sea…”?

The called out people of God are the display of His Glory, we are introduced and believe in Christ that is a gift giver to the church, in John 17 we note that he gives to the church two things, one being His Word and the other, wait for it this is mind bending, see now he has given, past tense, to the church……His glory.     Not something to be hunted for or chased after but lived in light of, now read these two scriptures before you stamp all over me:

John 17: 5 “Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was…”

V 22 “…The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one;”

The glory to make an open display of in the whole fabric of creation – every one will see it happen-glorious.

One of our Western challenges, or where ever there is the hold of consumerism in the culture we live in, that has subtle impact upon all of us in relation to our desire for God our chase of the Holy Spirit which I believe we need to be careful and wise with.   If we do not we will find our journey towards maturity and desire for the Father being put off course.

Firstly let me say, of course the people of God are to deepen their intimacy with the Father realizing that he has made the way possible and it is not us that creates the possibility or means but its his grace that has done it all.   Every blockage has been removed, every meandering pathway has been straightened, every chasm has been crossed by the Father.  In essence there is no reason but for our own self that we cannot be deeply intimate with the Father.    The work has been “…finished…” it is open to us to first enjoy and be one with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The onward chase or search for God must not come from our way of society, from our cultural paradigm.    The society we live in places demands on us daily see it or not its there.   A demand from leadership at the top of every organization, we are expected to increase our results against our expanding changing forms of evaluation, just look at our schooling system let alone the business world.   It’s the promise of unlimited progress with the need of continuous improvement (Japanese concept – kaizen).    Most of our world is competitive, we like to win and beat the competition.    We must not bring this into the world of the Father.

Our world holds up individual liberties as a high goal along with the pursuit of happiness and consumer mentality but this way of life has produced a cycle that has been so below our radar.    In the retail world we see first “customer satisfaction”  as being a high goal and so it should, but here is the subtlety, in order to bring satisfaction we have first have to produce dissatisfaction with where we are, what we are, along with what we have gained.   Paul tells us that had learned to be content with little/nothing and much, I would suggest that contentment was not based on what was still to come but on what has been given and what is available now.

We see our commitments at point of purchase only lasting until the next unit is developed and made available, when the next model or style or fashion comes on the market dissatisfaction moves in.   This has a way of pushing its way into our relationship and pursuit of God which me must become fully aware of, other wise we are wanting more due to societies ability to subtly produce discontentment’s and we want more.

Of course we are to be intimate and enjoy God, for he has made a way.   It’s an overflow and growing of our love that manifests in our desire to be continuously conscious of the Christ and the Father as there is never a moment where he is not present in his fullness.  Which should have an effect on how we live NOW.   Not because I need more as what I have is not enough due to consumer dissatisfaction

Be careful that my cry for more flows from my love and not from this invasion of the society we live in that has a subtle way of producing discontent with a promise of contentment “when I”, “if I”

The psalmist here brings an encouragement to join the declaration throughout the fabric of creation “set things right” we are to declare “Your Kingdom Come” make this place the setting of your environment o Lord as we bring your Kingdom in daily life we declare we show the heavens the glory of the Lord.

The heavens and the called out people of God  announce he will set all things right,  a unified voice, purpose and work come about in setting things right with an invading Kingdom that is arriving at every hand

Announcing heavens

Set right

Non-restricted seeing

Where is your home?

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Settlement Life

As another journey looms near following an 8-week placement in Africa there comes with it all the necessary packing arrangements, packing the house away so its ready for the next people to arrive, the travel details are now starting to come, needing attention “I hope now can I get an upgrade once again?”    O yes who can I ask to collect us?     While considering these details we are looking back on what we have seen, what we have learned about God, his will and ourselves along with what we have been allowed to put our hands with while being in Africa, thoughts and considerations rush through my mind.

One question we have often been asked as we live life whilst trying to keep obedient to the mind and will of God for our lives.   We trust that every step, action, involvement, every major decision such as a home in Cape Town has a direction of God that we are trying to be obedient to,  so that our lives actually live in worship to him – obedience which is worship our “sacrifice of worship”.

Back to the question “where is your home, Cape Town, Coventry, UK, South Africa?”    My reply is often spoken firstly with a smile “where the heart is followed then by my body and I trust my body is with my heart”.     Yet where is home for each of us? what makes our home?  is it the environment or even the place where I was born and grew up or just where family and people are.   I think we would find differences of definition and places for many on where  your home is.

Try this never mind what age you are having left your parents house to get married or move to university and never return, or even moved out for work, whether you left recently or years ago, do you still “go home” to visit mum and dad? Yet following your visit do you then “go home” again?    I wonder what we do to language with “going home” does the context give us an indication of where home is?  So where is your home?     Having my parents both now passed on did my language change?   or did it change when my mother finally sold our family home several years ago, did home disappear then?

Home, what is your home?  Where is your home?  Are we always traveling towards home, I wonder?

Home opens up a whole view in my mind on dwelling and being at rest and “at home” a place where there is a security, a place of retreat where you find peace and stillness, however I know for some it may not be like this.    My heart and prayer cries on God for those who cannot find this, a place to call home what ever the home looks like and where ever it is placed in this world.

I Know this as well its a place where you have built characteristics into where we call hoe mot find that stillness that pace of being able to retreat to safety and solace where love might be found it does not just happen fully but we have to invest to see it and experience it.

I was reading Psalm 91 that commenced this thought pattern in me Verse 1 & 9 of the Psalm it says “You who sit down in the High God’s presence, spend the night in Shaddai’s shadow…Yes, because God’s your refuge, the High God your very own home…” we are presented with God the Father being our “…very own home…” I respond to that, I make him my abode.   He becomes the place where I kick off my shoes and put my feet up, put on my PJs’ early when no one else will call, where I can just  be me, chilled out.    Perhaps for some this is too easy-going language while relating to the a dwelling place of God the abode of God, the in him,  then the pace I find my rest, security, peace to be off guard.

The Psalm sounds more familiar for us in a traditional translation here its is again “…He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High Will abide in the shadow of the Almighty…For you have made the Lord, my refuge, Even the Most High, your dwelling place…”

Still the question remains where is your home, dwelling place and what is the environment you have in this home, my encouragement to you is to find and make your home in Him, find a way to be in him as  a constant living way of life,  not as a holiday, or as a visitor or a need for council, but t make home in him as a consistent living way never to depart.   He will not remove it from you, he made it possible, so why do we not occupy his possibility.

We are encouraged in the scripture to take on a pilgrim attitude to this world looking for a place; Abraham called it a city, where the foundation and maker is the Father.   As we bring the dimensions of his Kingdom or bring the Fathers home to the cosmos and we are actively involved in transforming this world we have the merging of Heaven and Earth and  he becomes our home.    Pilgrim towards our ultimate goal and his intention making Him our home.    We are living an ever emergent life from him being our home, with discovery and revelation, more and more of his Kingdom, the taste of the age to come is with us as we enjoy him as our home.

SO WHERE is home? … WHY is that home? … WHAT makes it home? … WHO is at your home?

GOD YOUR VERY OWN HOME!