tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71862117897364793682024-03-05T21:48:10.046-08:00A Hope for This WorldAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.comBlogger215125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-54956987320205298292012-11-27T03:32:00.001-08:002012-11-27T03:32:59.898-08:00Ye Who Are Weary, Come Home<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.333333969116211px;">By Rick Marschall</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.333333969116211px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.333333969116211px;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<b>SWARTZ CREEK MI </b><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>I have become aware of the condition of a friend who is experiencing some trials lately. None of the experiences are, perhaps, unusual in themselves, but their almost simultaneous visitations could test anyone's spirit. He is trying, not to make sense of these sorts of life-happenings -- because everything makes sense or nothing makes sense, and "time and chance happen to all men," as Proverbs says -- but to cope, simply to cope. Have you ever been there?</div>
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In less than a calendar year his special-needs niece died; his nine-day-old granddaughter died; his wife, after multiple long-term illnesses, is to choose between dialysis and hospice; and his sister, who lost her home in Hurricane Sandy, is losing a battle with HIV that was long held at bay. My friend says he keeps fighting the seduction to moan about his own condition, his own emotions and reactions to these matters.</div>
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But he knows -- that is, he too infrequently remembers -- that it is not about him. It is about these loved ones. And about God. Usually, when nothing makes sense to us, and God seems to be somewhere in the story, it means that God is EVERYWHERE in the story. The man's wife, for instance, has been cited by many, many people through the decades as an inspiration: encouraging people to faith and endurance. And his sister, after years of rebellion, has come to know Jesus, drawing closer to God.</div>
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Why do we find it so hard to see the silver linings to the dark clouds? Why are we always surprised at the grace that infuses every "crisis"? Why do we forget that the sun shines, not only after the storm clouds pass -- but all the time, even when the storm clouds temporarily are overhead and, to our eyes, blot the sun from view?</div>
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Just like the natural tendency to be sad when a loved one dies, such emotions are a brand of selfishness. Any reactions we can summon should be channeled to the loved ones in their difficulties, and to God on their behalf.</div>
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We cannot believe that God is in control only when the course of events magically follows our own scripts. God wants us, more than anything else, to trust in Him. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Faith is not summoning patience until God does what we want. Faith is, sometimes, to stop obsessing about our understanding everything.</div>
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And faith is humility. Yield to His commands, trust in His love, accept His plan. My sister, newly a friend of God, is blessed not just by the power and balm of the act of praying, but of praying on her knees, specifically. There is a language of prayer, in some gifted circumstances; and, surely, there is also an attitude of prayer.</div>
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And sometimes, my friend has discovered anew, there is the biblical concept of the "sacrifice of praise" -- when you don't feel like praying, and even less feel like praising, is when to do it. Loudly and confidently, or softly and tenderly, do it.</div>
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If you never have clicked on a music video after one of these messages, please do watch this one, the completion of this message. The classic hymn "Softly and Tenderly" was written a century a quarter ago by Will L. Thompson on similar reflections, and among its verses, "Time is now fleeting, the moments are passing, Passing from you and from me; Shadows are gathering, deathbeds are coming, Coming for you and for me." But followed by: "Oh, for the wonderful love He has promised, Promised for you and for me! Though we have sinned, He has mercy and pardon, Pardon for you and for me." And the promise in the chorus: "Come home, come home,You who are weary, come home; Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, Calling, O sinner, come home!" Sung by RoseAngela Merritt of NewSpring Church, Anderson, S.C.</div>
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Click: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=l3TmIn7PGds#MondayMinistry_11-25-12" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">Softly and Tenderly</a></div>
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<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=l3TmIn7PGds#MondayMinistry_11-25-12" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch_<wbr></wbr>popup?v=l3TmIn7PGds#<wbr></wbr>MondayMinistry_11-25-12</a></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-7757566156185342832012-09-13T03:50:00.000-07:002012-09-13T03:50:11.880-07:00TobyMac has the number one album in the United States<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">By Ginny McCabe</span><br />
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<b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=NASHVILLE,%20TN" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">NASHVILLE, TN </a></u></b><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>TobyMac’s new studio project, "Eye On It" debuted at No. 1 on the <span style="font-style: italic;">Billboard </span>Top 200 this past week. It is the first time in 15 years and only the third time ever that a Christian album has topped the charts.</div>
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“It’s my honor to write songs and even a further privilege that people choose to listen and make them part of their lives,” said TobyMac in a press release, upon hearing about the No. 1 debut. “My hope has always been that these songs would somehow remind people that though we are flawed God offers us love, hope and refuge.”</div>
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"Eye On It," led by the No. 1 single “Me Without You,” is being recognized by many as Toby’s strongest set of pop songs to date. In support of the album, TobyMac will launch a fall “Eye On It Tour” and follow that up with a “Hits Deep Tour,” which will continue throughout the holiday season.</div>
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On Nov. 1, 1997, LeAnn Rimes ranked No. 1 on the <span style="font-style: italic;">Billboard </span>Top 200 with "You Light Up My Life - Inspirational Songs," which spent three weeks on the chart as No. 1. Prior to that, only one Christian project achieved this noteworthy status. Bob Carlisle’s “Butterfly Kisses/Shades of Grace" hit number one earlier in the summer of 1997. In 2011 and 2012, other Christian artists that have come in at the No. 2 spot, include Casting Crowns, Red and David Crowder Band.</div>
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As for TobyMac, he has claimed a spot on the chart nine times and he has been in the Top 10 three times. DC talk, the trio made up of TobyMac, Michael Tait and Kevin Max, also had five more albums on the top of the charts, including "Supernatural" in 1998, which came in at No. 4.</div>
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For more information about TobyMac, "Eye On It" and the upcoming tour dates, visit <a href="http://www.tobymac.com/" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">www.TobyMac.com</a>. Also, check out his Youtube channel at <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/tobyMmusic" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">www.youtube.com/user/<wbr></wbr>tobyMmusic</a>, where Toby talks about the story behind the hit single “Me Without You.” and the bestselling track “Forgiveness,” featuring Lecrae, and more.</div>
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/8qGa5rIOB28" width="560"></iframe>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0Nashville, TN, USA36.1666667 -86.783333335.7564632 -87.4150473 36.5768702 -86.1516193tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-62168141478389634052012-07-09T04:34:00.002-07:002012-07-09T04:34:43.335-07:00This Upside-Down World<span style="font-family: Arial;">By Rick Marschall</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.springhillsodfarm.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/springhill-sod-farm_bozeman-grass-field.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://www.springhillsodfarm.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/springhill-sod-farm_bozeman-grass-field.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #193305; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold;">Springhill Sod Farm, </span>
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<b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=SWARTZ%20CREEK%20MI" target="_blank">SWARTZ CREEK MI </a></u></b><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>The world’s easiest job just might be Foreman of a Sod Farm. All day long, nothing but calling out, “Green side up!” Here are some thoughts that connect “keeping things rightside up” and the saying, “the grass is always greener”... with a bit more wisdom, trust us, than that lame joke. Our culture, in fact, is acting on upside-down values these days.</div>
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"The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.” The lesson implicit in this aphorism, that we should be satisfied with what we have, ignores the possibilities that you are standing in an awfully barren patch, or that the other grass IS greener, or perhaps that a life represented by greener pastures is not just our desire but a necessity.</div>
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Human beings have a problem with sorting out desires and necessities. It is always worthwhile, for instance, to pray for discernment so that we might ask God for what we need, not what we want. Spiritual maturity is when we know He will answer along those lines anyway: but we must keep our priorities straight. We should look less to the pastures over the fence and over the horizon, and more to the One who nurtures those pastures.</div>
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Our culture (what the Book of Common Prayer calls “the world, the flesh, and the devil”) continually distorts this understanding. The tendencies of our natures to be dissatisfied with what we have, combined with the spirit of the age that tells us that human devices ultimately will be sufficient to satisfy every human yearning, add up to an upside-down world. Upside-down values, upside-down actions, upside-down results.</div>
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The world’s literature is filled with tales of men who try to recapture a lost or misspent youth, and, contrarily, youths who aspire to manhood before the wisdom that comes with experience -– the literal meaning of premature. Closer to home, I turn to something I have observed about American society. I rely less on charts and graphs when I think about certain things, trusting instead to random half-hours at shopping malls. I have lost count of the number of teenage girls I have seen who, evidently, cannot wait to be women: excessive make-up; clothes and undergarments that (they apparently believe) make them look 30 years older; smoking and rough language; making babies like Mom did. I notice in equal numbers women who need to fool the world, or themselves, that they are still 30 years younger: tattoos; clothes designed for teens; and, again, cosmetics and clothes that are more camouflage than fashion. Upside down.</div>
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It extends to more serious realms (not that I don’t think that corruptions of age, gender, and role models are not serious). Ours has become a culture where the blessings of science and medicine run on simultaneous tracks -– more miraculous techniques of delivering premature babies and rescuing at-risk lives... and devising more efficient means to euthanize babies and “mercy kill” the sick, the elderly, and the “inconvenient,” conspiring in laboratories and courtrooms. Upside down.</div>
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Politicians say one thing and do another. Upside down. Many of society’s role models would have us think that bodies are indestructible and souls are fragile and off-limits; upside-down advice, because Americans abuse and overburden our bodies to an alarming degree; and even preachers don’t always act like they know our souls can handle all manner of tough love. </div>
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And they should, to stay healthy.</div>
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Competition is good for people. One way we can test this is by observing that self-destructive elements in America have transformed it into a dirty word. Yet there is a fine line -– the fence separating the greener grass, if you will -– between the healthy impulses of ambition, and mere dissatisfaction or cynical pessimism. If we wallow in hypocrisy, we are a heartbeat away from fatal defeatism as a culture.</div>
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... these are all secular observations, very secular. Upside-down values are guaranteed in a secular culture, because secularism by nature does not have an Anchor. Does America yearn for better things, or are we into a cycle where we will reflexively keep hating what we have, and what we are?</div>
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By returning to God and to biblical principles, we can be free of the lies of the world, the flesh, and the devil; we can find self-respect in ways other than upside- down role reversals dictated by TV shows and commercials; we can be patient and confident, not impatient and full of doubts.</div>
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Boys act like men and men act like boys? Girls act like women and women act like girls? Scientists act like killers and killers act like scientists? Here’s another one: Every day, everywhere, people act like God. Does God act like us?</div>
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Well, we should be grateful that God does not act like us. But one time, in one unique way, He did. He chose a nexus-point in history to become man, and to dwell amongst us. Of the many reasons for this, chief of these to provide a means for our salvation, God wanted assure us in case we ever forget (!) that He knows our sorrows, He shared our pain, He understands temptation, He is not offended by failure and He appreciates repentance, He can forgive sin, He wants to live within us so that we can have a better “self” to self-respect.</div>
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He tells us that the color of the grass over the fence does not matter. After all, there will always be other fences and distant pastures. What matters is His promise that All things will be made new. Consider the words of that promise singly, separately, in any combination: All. Things. Will. Be. Made. New.</div>
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Meditate on the words of this promise, and the upside-down will pass away, whether green or slightly greener. Whatever. Things are rightside-up in God’s world, the Kingdom Come.</div>
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We have context this week that inspires, supports, and illustrates the message. Beautiful thoughts and images from the anointed Beanscot Channel on YouTube; and a tender but powerful song by the gifted singer-songwriter J. J. Heller. “All Things Are Made New.”</div>
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Click: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=UkWCG7N1AcI#MondayMusic_7-9-12">Kingdom Come</a> </div>
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( <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=UkWCG7N1AcI#MondayMusic_7-9-12">http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=UkWCG7N1AcI#MondayMusic_7-9-12</a> )</div>
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<tr><td bgcolor="F0F0FF">Rick Marschall is the author of 65 books and hundreds of magazine articles in many fields, from popular culture (Bostonia Magazine called him “perhaps America’s foremost authority on popular culture”) to history and criticism; country music, television history, biography and children’s books. He is a former political cartoonist, editor of Marvel Comics, and writer for Disney comics. For 10 years he has been active in the Christian field, writing devotionals; co-author of The Secret Revealed with Dr Jim Garlow. His biography of Johann Sebastian Bach for the “Christian Encounters” series (Thomas Nelson) was released in April, 2011. His history of cartoon Advertising, Drawing Power, will be published in July 2011 by the Marschall Books imprint of fantagraphics Books. In October his major biography of Theodore Roosevelt, BULLY!, will be publ;ished by Regnery History of Washington DC. He is currently working on a One-Year CDevotional for Tyndale House; and edits the the reissue of Harper's Weekly -- the Civil War Years for NOVOink e-books. Rick is a former Director of Product Development for Youth Specialties. He is recipient of the 2008 “Christian Writer of the Year” award from the Greater Philadelphia Writer’s Conference, and produces a weekly e-mail devotional, “Monday Morning Music Ministry.” His e-mail address is: <a href="mailto:rickmarschall@gmail.com">RickMarschall@gmail.com.</a></td><td bgcolor="F0F0FF"><img align="right" border="0" height="150" src="http://www.assistnews.net/WRITERSPICS/Marschall%20photo.JPG" /></td></tr>
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<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-69778302153800816972012-07-09T04:24:00.003-07:002012-07-09T04:24:59.852-07:00A Matter of Faith<span style="font-family: Arial;">Celebrating Evidence of God</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">By Carol Round</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=CLAIREMORE,%20OKLAHOMA" target="_blank">CLAIREMORE, OKLAHOMA</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span><span style="font-style: italic;">“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters</span>” — Genesis 1:1-2 (NIV).</div>
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On July 4th, America celebrated its freedoms with fireworks and picnics. On the outskirts of Geneva, Switzerland, scientists at the world’s biggest atom smasher celebrated that day too. They believe their discovery of a new subatomic particle called the Higgs Boson, or “God particle,” is one more step in proving their Big Bang theories.</div>
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Since I didn’t understand this scientific discovery, I had to “Google” this news item. The Higgs Bosom is supposed to be the particle that imparts mass to matter, meaning that without first interacting with this particle, nothing would have mass. They believe this particle actually holds the universe together. According to one physics professor, “It's helping us understand the big universal question, which is what are we made out of.”</div>
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While scientists admit that the discovery won’t have an instant impact on everyday life, they see great potential for the future. Another physics professor said, “This is not going to be able to give us a solution for the energy problem or climate warming or the other, the immediate, pressing problems that face us. It is, however, a piece of the puzzle that we need … to understand the world.”</div>
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Understanding our world begins with humans trying to find the answers to some very complicated questions, such as, “Why do we exist?” and “How was the universe created?”</div>
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As a faith-filled believer in a God who created our beautiful universe and everything in it, including man, I was not impressed with this discovery. Of course, I don’t have a scientific mind.</div>
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While I am not making light of their beliefs, I know in my spirit that God does exist. Once you’ve had an encounter with “The Living God,” who will continue to pursue you until you say, “Yes,” you are never the same. I’ve discovered that once you have a relationship with God, not only do you see Him, but you feel Him, hear Him and know, without a doubt that He exists. Hebrews 11:1 tells us that faith is “<span style="font-style: italic;">the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot yet see</span>.”</div>
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I recall an incident that happened more than 30 years ago. As I was taking an early morning walk with my oldest son, he stared at the colorful sunrise and said, “Mama, God sure got up early this morning.” When I asked Casey how he knew, he replied in child-like faith, “Because He’s been busy painting the sky.”</div>
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We don’t need an atom smasher to uncover evidence of His existence. All we need to do is look at everything He created. How could a Big Bang create such diversity in life forms, including people, animals, plant life and more? The next time you see evidence of His existence, try celebrating.</div>
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Are you as close to God as you want to be? Please check out my new book, “Journaling with Jesus: How to Draw Closer to God,” available at <a href="http://www.journalingwithjesus.com/">www.journalingwithjesus.com</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/">www.amazon.com</a> or at your local bookstore.</div>
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<br />Carol Round turned her passion for writing into a full-time career after retiring in 2005 from a northeastern Oklahoma public school system. Her passion, however, is using her writing to inspire others. “A Matter of Faith,” her self-syndicated column, is currently running in 12 Oklahoma newspapers. Two collections of her columns are also available in book form and are available through her blog, www.carolaround.com. Ms. Round’s latest book, “Journaling with Jesus: How to draw closer to God,” was just released and can be purchased at<a href="http://www.amazon.com/">www.amazon.com</a> or at <a href="http://www.journalingwithjesus.com/">www.journalingwithjesus.com</a>. Readers may contact her at<a href="mailto:carolaround@yahoo.com">carolaround@yahoo.com</a>.<br /><br />
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-67239219803114868232012-07-05T03:48:00.000-07:002012-07-05T03:48:26.416-07:00Is the Christian Faith Supposed to be “Blind”?<span style="font-family: Arial;">By J. Warner Wallace, Cold Case Detective</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=MISSION%20VIEJO,%20CA" target="_blank">MISSION VIEJO, CA</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>Sometimes Christians have a mistaken definition of “faith”. </div>
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Because faith is sometimes described as believing in things that cannot be seen, Christians often think of faith as an act of believing in things that have no evidential basis. In essence, some Christians believe that “true faith” is believing in something in spite of the evidence or believing in something when there is no evidence to support the belief in the first place!</div>
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But this is not the Biblical definition of faith. While it is true that God is a Spirit and cannot be seen, it is not true that there is no evidence to support the existence of the unseen God. While we may not see anyone throw a rock in a pond, we may indeed see the ripples that the rock created on the surface of the water and come to the belief that someone threw a rock into the pond on the basis of this evidence. In a similar way, there are many good reasons to believe that God exists, and the Biblical model of true faith involves examining the evidence for God's existence. Let's examine the Biblical model of evidential faith:</div>
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Christians Are Called to Use Their Minds</span></div>
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God tells us that we are to love Him with more than our heart. We are to have a relationship that is emotional and intellectual (Matthew 22:37-38).</div>
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Christians Are Called to Understand the Value of Evidence</span></div>
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God has given us a number of good evidential reasons to believe that He exists and that Jesus is who He says He is. We are not called to have blind faith, but to have a well-reasoned, evidential faith (Acts 1:2-3, Acts 17:2-3, Acts 17:30-31).</div>
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Christians Are Called to Examine Their Beliefs</span></div>
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God wants us to know what we believe and why we believe it. We're not called to numbly trust everything that might be taught in our world today, even if some Christian teacher is the source! We're expected to be critical, skeptical and thoughtful (Acts 17:10-11, 1 Thessalonians 5:19-21, 1 John 4:1).</div>
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Christians Are Called to be Convinced of What They Believe</span></div>
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God wants us to be certain and base our certainty on evidence that can be articulated to others who may have doubts (Romans 14:5, 2 Timothy 1:8-12, 2 Timothy 3:14).</div>
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Christians Are Called to be “Case Makers”</span></div>
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Once we have examined the evidence and have come to the conclusion that Christianity is true, we are called to be ready to make a strong defense for what we believe (1 Peter 3:15).</div>
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The Christian life is a rational and reasonable life that is rooted and grounded in the evidence of the Resurrection and the truth of the Bible. Christians are saved by placing their trust in Jesus, but Christians become a powerful force in their world when they commit themselves to being “case makers” for what they believe. Christians can be “case makers” precisely because the Christian faith is an evidential faith. When we, as Christians, argue for the truth of the Christian Worldview, we are not sharing an opinion.</div>
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There either is a God, or there is not. Jesus is that God, or He is not. Salvation comes through Christ alone (as Jesus Himself maintained), or it does not. This is not a matter of opinion, personal preference or wishful thinking. The Christian faith is grounded in evidence that can be assessed and evaluated. The Christian faith is an evidential faith.</div>
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<br />J. Warner Wallace is a detective (currently working cold case homicides), a missions leader and a church planter. He earned a Master’s Degree in Architecture (UCLA) and a Master's Degree in Theology from Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. J Warner is the director of Please Convince Me Ministries and hosts the <a href="http://www.pleaseconvinceme.com/">www.PleaseConvinceMe.com</a> website, blog and podcast. He can be contacted by e-mail at: <a href="mailto:jim@pleaseconvinceme.com">jim@pleaseconvinceme.com</a><br /> </div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-84089208630392148362012-07-02T02:40:00.001-07:002012-07-02T02:40:28.671-07:00The "Unforgivable" Sin - YouTube<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5RP6mQK4N8&feature=player_embedded#!">The "Unforgivable" Sin - YouTube</a>:<br />
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Think about it!<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/G5RP6mQK4N8" width="560"></iframe>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-68972781215866850252012-07-01T18:21:00.001-07:002012-07-01T18:21:10.035-07:00Micah Bournes - When America Dies<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/3ctXPDwLlwk?fs=1" width="480"></iframe>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-73857343526213096842012-06-23T04:33:00.001-07:002012-06-23T04:33:03.848-07:00Healing, forgiveness, and reconciliation when a brother sins against you<br />
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By Mark Ellis<img alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-1799" height="205" src="http://blog.godreports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/forgiveness-300x205.jpg" style="display: inline; float: right; height: auto; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 7px; max-width: 100%;" title="forgiveness" width="300" /></div>
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In one of the earliest teachings Jesus gave to the church, he taught about a process to find healing and reconciliation when a brother or sister sins against you.</div>
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In the Book of Matthew, chapter 18, Jesus said:</div>
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”If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over.</div>
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“But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’<strong style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> </strong>If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.”</div>
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Here Jesus gave some instructions about how to deal with a fellow believer who sins against us. Jesus did not say if your brother irritates or offends you in a minor way, that you confront them in this manner.</div>
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Pastor Ray Stedman noted that there is another word in the Christian life that covers irritations coming from difficult people: that word is forbearance. We are called to bear with one another. We put up with difficult people, the grace-growers around us, often without saying anything. Sometimes they drive us to our knees – if not almost crazy.</div>
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If the offense rises to the level of sin, you must take the initiative to go to the person privately, just the two of you. Don’t wait for the person to come to you. Often, they will never take the initiative. They may be blissfully unaware they’ve even hurt you.</div>
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One of our former senior pastors, Steve Krantz, warned in a sermon about “triangle-ing.” Triangle-ing is when you go to somebody else first, instead of directly to the person who sinned against you.</div>
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This is our human tendency, to go to somebody else and say, “Whoa, do you know what so and so did to me?” Then we unload the dump truck in their lap. Then it gets passes around.</div>
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Triangle-ing can quickly turn into gossip, which leads to dysfunctional families and dysfunctional churches. If we start telling other people, that in itself is a sin.</div>
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None of us likes confronting someone else about a sin matter. Your attitude when you go is all-important. You should go in a spirit of gentleness, speaking the truth in love, with compassion, sympathy and mercy.</div>
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You should not be self-righteous, harsh, or condemning. If the person listens and accepts what you’ve said and stops their sin, there is nothing more you need to do. You’ve won your brother or sister.</div>
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If the person won’t listen and rejects what you’ve said, then you take one or two others with you. Our model for this process is God Himself. He goes after his sinning children to bring them back. And he uses the church as a means to do that.</div>
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If the person still refuses to listen, tell it to the church. In my experience this is extremely rare that it would get to this level, and usually this is reserved for a church leader who has had a significant moral failure.</div>
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But these are the instructions of Jesus himself. At the last stage of this process, if the person refuses to listen to the church, Jesus says to treat them like a pagan or a tax collector.</div>
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In our church, we would probably treat a pagan or tax collector pretty well. But in that day they were not treated well; they were treated like outcasts. So I believe Jesus wants the church to protect its holiness and keep the sin from spreading. To accomplish that, the person was removed from fellowship.</div>
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Again, this would be extremely rare today in any church. But even if we give up dealing with a person caught up in habitual sin, even if our human efforts fail, God can take over the process, and that is what usually happens.</div>
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God has his ways of getting the person’s attention, and that can be very painful for that individual.</div>
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I went through a Matthew 18 process many years ago as an elder who had to confront a pastor that I loved and admired. I put this man on a pedestal, which I should not have done. When he had a moral failure, it almost destroyed my young faith. It was one of the most painful times of my life.</div>
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This man finally broke down and admitted what he had down, with great emotion, in front of a group of elders meeting in his home. After that, he went around the room and asked each of us to forgive him.</div>
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And that was really difficult for me to do. In fact, I couldn’t do it at that moment. I was too deeply hurt, my wounds were too raw. But I came to realize much later the importance of forgiveness, that it often involves a decision rather than a feeling.</div>
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If I waited until I felt like forgiving him that would have been a long, long time.</div>
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Just as loving your spouse if a decision, not necessarily a feeling (our feelings go up and down) forgiveness involves a very important decision at a time when we may not have any inclination within ourselves to forgive.</div>
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There are times when I really don’t want to forgive someone else. But Jesus’ parable at the end of chapter 18 has become very important to me in understanding why I should forgive. In this parable, Jesus responded to a question that came from Peter.</div>
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Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?”</div>
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Jesus answered,”I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.<strong style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> </strong>”Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents (equivalent to more than $10 million) was brought to him.</div>
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Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.</div>
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”The servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.</div>
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”But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii (equivalent to about $20). He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.”</div>
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His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.’</div>
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”But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened.</div>
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Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger, his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.</div>
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”This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart.”</div>
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In this parable, Jesus holds up a mirror so we can see ourselves. The great king represents God, who has forgiven us all our sins, an enormous debt. The amount he forgave was way beyond our capacity to repay.</div>
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At a staggering cost to himself, the king forgave this huge debt. What was the huge cost to God? The death of his only begotten son, Jesus, to pay for your sins.</div>
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But this man, who should have been grateful because he was forgiven so much, refuses to forgive someone who owes him the equivalent of about $20 dollars.</div>
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The rabbis had a rule at the time of Jesus that you should only forgive someone three times for the same offense. Peter thought he was being generous when he asked if we should forgive someone seven times.</div>
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But Jesus says, no, don’t forgive seven times, forgive seven times seventy times. His point to Peter is that we shouldn’t even bother to count. He said there should be no limit on the times we forgive our brother or sister in Christ.</div>
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In human terms, this seems completely unfair. I might say I try to forgive someone, but often I don’t forget and it feels awkward around that person. I say that I bury the hatchet, but I leave the handle showing so I can grab it whenever I need it.</div>
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Do I really have to forgive? It goes against everything I’m feeling. I want justice! Justice! I want them to pay.</div>
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It seems unreasonable until I think about how many times God has forgiven me. How many times have I gone to God and confessed the same darn sin? I can’t count that high. What if God said there was a limit of three times or even 7 times to forgive me for that? What if God had a three strikes rule?</div>
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There is no limit on how many times you can come before God and ask for forgiveness. Aren’t you thankful for that? He never counts the times we come before his throne of grace. He freely forgives us and washes us clean.</div>
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God not only forgives our sins, he forgets our sins. The Scripture says that as far as the east is from the west, that is how far God has removed our transgressions from us.</div>
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Why should I forgive those who hurt me? First, God has forgiven me so much. He cancelled all my debts; he wiped the slate clean. If he has forgiven $10 million of my debt, how can I withhold the forgiveness of $20 in debt from somebody else?</div>
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Why should I forgive those who hurt me? If you notice the end of the parable, the unmerciful servant is thrown into prison, to be tortured by his jailers. Unforgiveness is like a torturous prison.</div>
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By not forgiving that person, you end up hurting yourself even more, as the resentment and bitterness eat away at your heart. You can even make yourself sick due to this self-torture.</div>
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Why should I forgive? Because I need forgiveness every day myself.</div>
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When I forgive that person who wounded me, I don’t let them off the hook. I simply take them off my hook, and place them on God’s hook. I relinquish my right to get even and give all those rights over to God. He has a better arsenal than I do.</div>
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There is a day coming when God will settle the score completely on all sin and injustice in the world.</div>
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But there won’t be healing in the world until there is healing in our hearts. It begins right here. Because of the grace God has shown each one of us, we can begin to extend grace to each other.</div>
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<span style="background-color: white;">Because of the grace God has shown you and me, you can be an instrument in his process of healing, one heart at a time.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #f0f0ff; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Mark Ellis is a senior correspondent for ASSIST News Service and the founder of</span><a href="http://www.godreports.com/" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">www.Godreports.com</a><span style="background-color: #f0f0ff; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">. He is available to speak to groups about the plight of the church in restricted countries, to share stories and testimonies from the mission field, and to preach the gospel.</span><br style="color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><a href="mailto:mark@Godreports.com" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">mark@Godreports.com</a>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-87735945930204458862012-06-22T03:38:00.000-07:002012-06-22T03:38:34.035-07:00Seven questions in light of heaven<br />
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By Mark Ellis<img alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-1739" height="300" src="http://blog.godreports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Alcorn-heaven-bookcover-202x300.jpg" style="display: inline; float: right; height: auto; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 7px; max-width: 100%;" title="Alcorn heaven bookcover" width="202" /></div>
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Many believers entertain vague, incomplete, or even faulty views about heaven, a condition that may rob them of fullness and joy during their relatively brief lives on this side of eternity.</div>
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Author Randy Alcorn, in his outstanding book, “Heaven” (Tyndale House), seeks to rectify this problem in an exhaustive treatment that answers almost every question the most imaginative minds could conjure about our lives to come.</div>
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The stark reality is that about 250,000 people worldwide die every day and go to either heaven or hell, as Alcorn notes.</div>
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As we pass through the doorway of death, like a ship disappearing over the horizon headed for a better land, Christians enter into an “intermediate” heavenly state, which is temporary, according to Alcorn’s understanding of Scripture.</div>
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This represents the transitional period between our lives on Earth and our future resurrection to life on the New Earth. But Christians often miss the crucial distinction between this temporary place and our true eternal home.</div>
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“When we tell our children ‘Grandma’s now in Heaven,’ we’re referring to the intermediate Heaven,” Alcorn notes. “The intermediate Heaven is not our final destination. Though it will be a wonderful place, the intermediate Heaven is not the place we are made for – the place God promises to refashion for us to live forever.”</div>
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In the intermediate Heaven, we’ll await the time of Christ’s return to the earth, our bodily resurrection, the final judgment, and the creation of the new heavens and the New Earth, Alcorn notes. “If we fail to grasp this truth, we will fail to grasp the biblical doctrine of Heaven.”</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;"><span style="color: navy; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Randy Alcorn</span></b>
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Alcorn devotes most of his book to exploring the beauty, greatness, and grandeur of our lives on the New Earth. “God’s children are destined for life as resurrected beings on a resurrected Earth,” he notes. “We must not lose sight of our true destination. If we do, we’ll be confused and disoriented in our thinking about where, and in what form, we will spend eternity.”</div>
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“Just as we die, the earth will be destroyed; and just as we will be raised, the earth will be renewed,” Alcorn notes.</div>
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A New Heaven and a New Earth will be merged together. “The future Heaven will be in the human realm, on Earth,” he writes. “The dwelling place of God will be the dwelling place of humanity, in a resurrected universe.”</div>
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As the Apostle John foresaw in the Book of Revelation, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them.”</div>
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In the vastness of the universe, it is sometimes hard to grasp God’s exclusive plan for planet Earth. “Earth is unique,” Alcorn notes. “It’s the one planet – perhaps among billions – where God chose to act out the unfolding drama of redemption and reveal the wonders of his grace. It’s on the New Earth, the capital planet of the new universe, that he will establish an eternal kingdom.”</div>
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In the light of the many facts presented in Alcorn’s book about Heaven, he asks every Christian to ponder these all-important questions:</div>
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<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily reflect on my own morality?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily realize there are only two destinations – Heaven or Hell – and that I and every person I know will go to one or the other?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily remind myself that this world is not my home and that everything in it will burn, leaving behind only what’s eternal?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily recognize that my choices and actions have a direct influence on the world to come?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily realize that my life is being examined by God, the Audience of One?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily recognize that the only appraisal of my life that will ultimately matter is his?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Do I daily reflect on the fact that my ultimate home will be the New Earth, where I will see God and serve him as a resurrected being in a resurrected human society, where I will overflow with joy and delight nearer to God by studying him and his creation, and where I will exercise, to God’s glory, dominion over his creation?</li>
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Alcorn relates the story that after Columbus discovered the New World, Spain struck coins with the Latin slogan “Plus Ultra.” It meant “More Beyond.” This was a horizon-expanding message, encouraging the people to believe there was more beyond their shores.</div>
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Likewise, every Christian should have their imaginations set aflame with anticipation of the wonders of the New Heaven and the New Earth. In God’s new universe there will always be more beyond…</div>
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<span style="background-color: #f0f0ff; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Mark Ellis is a senior correspondent for ASSIST News Service and the founder of</span><a href="http://www.godreports.com/" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">www.Godreports.com</a><span style="background-color: #f0f0ff; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">. He is available to speak to groups about the plight of the church in restricted countries, to share stories and testimonies from the mission field, and to preach the gospel.</span><br style="color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /><a href="mailto:mark@Godreports.com" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; line-height: normal; text-align: -webkit-auto;">mark@Godreports.com</a>
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<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-2755714205387741102012-06-11T09:50:00.000-07:002012-06-11T09:53:20.646-07:00Enabled Not Disabled<span style="font-family: Arial;">Oscar Pistorius: ‘The Fastest thing on no legs’</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">By Nico Bougas</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=SOUTH%20AFRICA" target="_blank">SOUTH AFRICA</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>Oscar Pistorius is an inspiration and one of the world’s great sporting icons who was voted in Time Magazine's top 100 People of Influence.</div>
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This 25-year old South African, described as “the fastest thing on no legs”, is a real-life champion, and no fictional figure.<br />
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He was born with missing fibulae in both his legs due to a congenital condition. Before his first birthday, his legs were amputated below the knee.</div>
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At school he excelled in rugby and water polo, but a knee injury terminated his rugby career.</div>
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He was introduced to athletics while undergoing rehabilitation.</div>
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Oscar’s first major competition was the 2004 Summer Paralympics in Athens. He came third overall in the T44 100 m event, which included single amputees.</div>
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According to <a href="http://www.google.co.za/">www.google.co.za</a>, he qualified for the final after falling in the preliminary round for the 200 m, but Oscar has a different version of the truth. “I did not fall. There were several false starts and the starter didn’t give us enough time to pause on the set position before starting the race so when he fired, I presumed that he had false started again.”</div>
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But there was nothing accidental about the final. Pistorius went on to win it in a world record time of 21.97 seconds, beating single amputee American runners Marion Shirley and Brian Frasuee.</div>
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Oscar runs on carbon-fiber and steel blades attached to his knees. They were especially developed and are called Cheetahs.</div>
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Recently, Pistorius finished a 100 m race in a magnificent time of 10.91 seconds.</div>
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By the way, Oscar does not perceive himself as disabled. “I don’t see myself as disabled. I just don’t have lower legs.”</div>
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In 2007, Pistorius took part in his first international competitions for able-bodied athletes. However, his artificial lower legs, while enabling him to compete, have generated claims that he has an unfair advantage over able-bodied athletes. The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) amended its competition rules to ban the use of “any technical device that incorporates springs, wheels or any other element that provides a user with an advantage over another athlete not using such a device”. The federation claimed that the amendment was not specifically aimed at Pistorius. After monitoring his track performances and carrying out tests, scientists took the view that Pistorius enjoyed considerable advantages over athletes without prosthetic limbs. On the strength of these findings, on 14 January 2008 the IAAF ruled him ineligible for competitions conducted under its rules, including the 2008 Summer Olympics. This decision was reversed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport on 16 May 2008, the Court ruling overall there was no evidence that Pistorius had any net advantage over able-bodied athletes.</div>
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Pistorius is annoyed about allegations that his so-called bionic legs give him an edge over other runners. “I train as hard if not harder than many athletes. I diet, sleep and base my life around athletics and it is a shame as too when either spectators or critics try and base my success on my apparent bionic body or my prosthetic feet.”</div>
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The 25-year old athlete is extremely popular internationally. In March 2007, journalists of a German magazine, Der Spiegel, spent two days in South Africa to do an extensive article on Pistorius. There are plans to write a biography on him.</div>
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But he keeps his feet firmly on the ground, and he knows who the source of his strength is.<br />
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“God is the most important person in the world to me. If I’m on the right patch spiritually, it helps with everything else.”</div>
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He grew up in a Christian home, and accepted Christ as His savior “more or less before I could remember.”</div>
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Asked why he needs Christ in his life, he says: “Because He is the reason for my success and the one that takes me from strength to strength.</div>
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“Christ makes all the difference. He aids me in my struggles and makes my glories that much greater.”</div>
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To other athletes, Pistorius has this advice: “Believe in yourself. In the final seconds before a race, I tell myself: I wouldn’t be here unless I qualified, and I know I can do this.”</div>
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Nico Bougas is the International Development Director for Hellenic Ministries.He has a master's degree in communications from Wheaton Graduate School and M. Div and D. Min degrees from Trinity Theological Seminary. He is the author of five books. He previously worked for Youth for Christ in South Africa and was Editor of In Magazine and Christian Living TODAY and currently serves as Consulting Editor for JOY Magazine and is an Associate of Sports Outreach Africa. For further, information contact: <a href="mailto:nico@bougas.info">nico@bougas.info</a><br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0South Africa-30.559482 22.937506-37.553973 12.830084 -23.564991 33.044928tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-43477003920556749102012-06-08T05:06:00.001-07:002012-06-08T05:06:33.120-07:00The Old Man Is Gone and a New Man Appears<span style="font-family: Arial;">The Holy Ghost brings salvation and new-found freedom in Christ Jesus</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">By Grelan Muse Sr., founder of Inside The Pew</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=BATON%20ROUGE,%20LA" target="_blank">BATON ROUGE, LA</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>Going to church on Sunday as a kid was always interesting. My family and I used to attend an old wooden church which sat on the hill in Amite, Louisiana. We did not have central air to keep us cool, only a box fan. Service got going at 11 a.m. and the time we shared with the Lord and in fellowship with each other was priceless. The only heat that went on at our church was the fire the congregation showed for the Lord.</div>
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The old saints would rejoice and all we had was one big drum and a few tambourines to work with. We clapped our hands and sang praises to the Lord such as “Payday is Coming After While” and “It’s Gonna Rain.” Then, the spirit of God encompassed us. The young people had to get up and testify as well. We were so happy to do so and tell how good God had been to us that week. I could feel the power moving all around me and others in the room.</div>
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As a teenager, I didn't understand everything that was going on, but I knew it was the anointing that destroyed the yoke, and, at that time, the anointing had broken down the strong holds of the enemy. We were so enthralled with the spirit the physical conditions of the church were no longer a concern.</div>
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Now I can appreciate what was happening within my congregation. The Bible says we all were born into sin. The experience of falling in love with Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost and being born again in the spirit separates us from sin. Once we allow the Holy Spirit to enter our minds and heart, we can live the life Jesus lived. At this point we are free, and we graciously allow the Holy Ghost to come into our lives. This is why you see adults and teenagers crying like babies because there is no more sin in their lives; they are new creatures in Jesus Christ. We are babes in God's sight (1 Corinthians 3:1, KJV).</div>
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My experience reminds me of the story in Acts 2:1-4 when the Holy Spirit comes at Pentecost: “<span style="font-style: italic;">And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance</span>” (KJV).</div>
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The old man is gone, and a new man is here. The scripture shows the importance of letting the new spirit come in. I can see God working even as I write this column. I encourage those who have allowed the eternal flame to fizzle out to rekindle it. I pray the Holy Ghost will move in your life once again and bring you closer to the One who loves dearly loves you.</div>
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<br /><br /><br /><br />Grelan Muse Sr. is founder of Inside The Pew and Emanuel and The Mainline Ministries. Email responses to this column to <a href="http://pewnews@aol.com/">pewnews@aol.com</a>. Follow Pastor Muse on Twitter @gremuse. <br /><br /><br /><br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0Baton Rouge, LA, USA30.4582829 -91.140319630.3487844 -91.2982481 30.5677814 -90.9823911tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-1172670709980978932012-02-15T02:46:00.000-08:002012-02-15T02:46:13.432-08:00Does the L-Word Belong in Business?<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/bradleyjmoore" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Bradley J. Moore</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/2830559891_72ac79fbee_b[1].jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">So I was standing in line at Starbucks, doing my usual coffee routine, and I saw one of the baristas, Carla, in the background taking orders for the drive-through. She’s talking on one of those hands-free headphone things, so I can only hear her side of the conversation:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“Is that you Barbara? How’s it going?”<br />
…………………</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“Awesome!”<br />
………………….</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“OK… Is that decaf? The usual?”<br />
………………..</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“Yeah, I know. That must have been great.”<br />
…………………..</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“All right hon, that’s $4.50.″</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The car drives up to the window, and I watch her conducting the transaction. As I walk over to the counter for milk, I hear Carla’s parting comment to the customer:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“Ok, see you soon. I love ya!”</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">What?</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">You could practically hear the dubbed-in record scratch as I did an audible double-take.<em> Did she really just tell that customer that she loves her?</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">This blatant profession of love in the midst of public enterprise made me cringe—and melt, all at once. Part of me, the Jesus-Spirit-Christian part, wanted to wave palm branches in her general direction for establishing a new pinnacle of customer service. (Take that, <a href="http://consumerist.com/2011/01/survey-zappos-amazon-give-best-customer-service.html" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Zappos</a>!) But the buttoned-up business manager in me was tapping his foot, questioning the appropriateness of that exchange.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">At first glance, there would typically be no call for expressing love while achieving your management objectives. Business is about process and profits, after all. And market share and competition. There’s nothing sentimental about it.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Plus, one generally attempts to portray some level of professionalism at work in order to maintain a commanding presence, or to earn the respect of colleagues. A measure of guardedness comes with the territory, especially for those in management positions (think Facebook vs. <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">LinkedIn</a>).</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">However, there’s no denying that our organizations are made up of people, not machines. All that equipment and technology—well, they don’t just work spontaneously of their own accord. It's the human beings who are running things, and at their core, people just want to be loved.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Martin Luther King once said, “Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">There is a lesson here for leaders.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">We are all too familiar with the concept of power in business—the drive and resolve to get things done. None of us would be successful in our careers without some of that. But for too many, that’s where the discussion ends.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Plenty of research keeps cropping up showing that people at work are much more productive when they also feel cared for. Even loneliness, the perception of isolation or estrangement from others, has been <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/jobs/building-a-bridge-to-a-lonely-colleague-workstation.html" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">shown to reduce an employee’s overall productivity</a>, both in individual and group tasks. And it doesn’t take a PhD from Harvard to understand why. When you don’t fit in it makes you depressed, moody, negative.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Author <a href="http://www.bkconnection.com/ProdDetails.asp?ID=9781605093048" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Adam Kahane</a> suggests that love, expressed as compassion and solidarity, is completely appropriate in business. But leaders must strive for a balance, he says. A system that follows only power will sacrifice its people, while a system that follows only the impulses of love will lose its competitiveness.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">That's all well and good, but here's my takeaway: isn't love the ultimate link between our spiritual life and our work? Not Valentine’s Day love, but the every-day kind of love that says you care about the well-being of others. The kind that gives the best of yourself at work, in a compassionate and caring way. I suppose this is what Paul is talking about in <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Corinthians+13&version=NIV" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">I Corinthians 13</a>, and it is more or less the main thing Jesus wants us to do.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">When you strip out all the formalities and jargon of doing business, at the end of the day we are all just needy human beings trying to get stuff done. And I’m thinking, wouldn’t that really lift everyone’s spirits at work, if we tried to love each other?</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Image by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/overworked/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Joshua Miller</a>. Used with <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">permission. </a>Sourced via<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/overworked/2830559891/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"> Flickr</a>. Post by <a href="http://shrinkingthecamel.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Bradley J. Moore</a>.</em></div><ul class="taglist" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; list-style-type: none; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 10px;"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /></ul>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-18698908779211930442012-02-13T04:28:00.000-08:002012-02-13T04:28:48.543-08:00Just A Minute<span style="font-family: Arial;">A Compelling New Book from Wess Stafford</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">By Janey DeMeo</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<div style="font-family: Arial;"><b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=VISTA,%20CA" target="_blank">VISTA, CA</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>Ever feel overwhelmed by the dilemma of the world’s hurting children? Whether from neglect, poverty, sickness…the statistics on child suffering are daunting. It’s tempting to look the other way and do nothing, mostly because we feel inadequate to do anything useful. But anyone can help a child. All it takes is a minute.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"></div><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="3"><tbody>
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<div style="font-family: Arial;">In his latest book, <span style="font-style: italic;">Just A Minute </span>(Moody Publishers, Jan. 1, 2012), Compassion International CEO, Wess Stafford, shows how one minute can count in big ways to a little person.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Just A Minute</span> is a compilation of true stories and testimonies of people—ordinary people, celebrities and historical figures—whose lives were impacted for good or bad by someone who took “just a minute” to build them up or tear them down through words, action or attitude. The author also showcases the immeasurable reward experienced by those who pour encouragement, godly direction, affection, inspiration, hope . . . into the heart of a child.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Stafford compels us not to underestimate our influence but to weigh the power of our words, hugs, body language, financial support (sponsoring a child or children’s ministry), our kindness or even our harshness. Children are impressionable. They absorb everything around them and, more notably, everything that’s directed at them.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Anyone can help mold a child’s future. But Christians, especially, are both equipped and called to imprint God’s love in children’s hearts. </div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">Just A Minute </span>promotes Compassion International but with a little creativity, similar organizations helping children could also use it in their fundraisers or awareness campaigns. The book is worth the read and some of the stories take just a minute to read. A minute well spent.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Note: This article first appeared in The San Diego Christian Perspectives Examiner (<a href="http://www.examiner.com/christian-perspectives-in-san-diego/just-a-minute-review">www.examiner.com/christian-perspectives-in-san-diego/just-a-minute-review</a>)</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
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</tbody></table>Janey DeMeo is founder and president of Orphans First, a non-profit organization providing food, shelter, education and Christian teaching to underprivileged children in several countries. Janey and her husband, Louis, were missionaries in France for 22 years and have resided in Southern California for eight years where they now have a house church in San Clemente. Janey is also an author.<br />
Her websites, Twitter and Blog are:<br />
<a href="http://www.orphansfirst.org/">www.orphansfirst.org</a><br />
<a href="http://www.janeydemeo.com/">www.JaneyDeMeo.com</a><br />
<a href="http://www.twitter.com/JaneyDeMeo">www.twitter.com/JaneyDeMeo</a><br />
<a href="http://janey-demeo.blogspot.com/">http://janey-demeo.blogspot.com</a><br />
<hr style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">** You may republish this story with proper attribution.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0San Diego, CA, USA32.7153292 -117.1572550999999932.4256327 -117.34425859999999 33.0050257 -116.97025159999998tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-44260300291743940882012-02-13T04:20:00.000-08:002012-02-13T04:20:52.041-08:00All Things To All People<span style="font-family: Arial;">By Rick Marschall</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.marklansdown.com/pinbacks/images/pogo-foggy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.marklansdown.com/pinbacks/images/pogo-foggy.jpg" /></a></div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=SWARTZ%20CREEK%20MI" target="_blank">SWARTZ CREEK MI </a></u></b><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>A political season can get people thinking about promises – promises for the future (by candidates we like) and the potential of broken promises (by those whom we don’t). When I was a kid I wrote a fan letter to Walt Kelly, the cartoonist of “Pogo,” who sent a drawing of Albert the Alligator’s platform as a political advisor: “I promise you voters to not promise anything. And if I do make a promise, I promise not to keep it.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">It would be refreshing, really. But the problem with promises is not politics or politicians -– it’s human nature; which, I promise you, will never change on its own.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Truth is something we all must confront, and deal with. Even Pontius Pilate, yielding to public pressure, desperately trying by symbolism to wash his hands of the guilty act of condemning an innocent man to die, looked at Jesus, probably knowing better than the mob did Whom he addressed, and asked, “What is Truth?” People don’t ask such questions of criminals or strangers or even politicians, of Pilate’s day or our own day.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">One aspect of human nature is that when we are confronted with Truth, it frequently is our tendency not to change ourselves or our habits, but to bend truth, explain it away, weaken it, even deny it. Heretics through the history of Christianity, “relativists” in philosophy, and leaders of the Emergent movement on the fringes of today’s religion, all have tacked adjectives to the word “truth.” They give us relational truth, conditional truth, relative truth... everything except the firmly rejected Absolute Truth. Which the Bible teaches. And what God IS. And what Jesus embodied -– “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">I have noticed that a lot of Christians can be timid about the truth, and frequently they justify it by not wanting to offend non-believers. Some even think that being too bold with the truth about God -– maybe at first, anyway -– might alienate prospective Christians. “Meet them at the their level,” because, after all, doesn’t God say He loves us just as we are? ... and pretty soon, the well-meaning Christian is the enabler of sin and a rebellious lifestyle, instead of speaking the truth.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">If someone were to approach you on the street, and say, “Sic enim dilexit Deus mundum ut Filium suum unigenitum daret ut omnis qui credit in eum non pereat sed habeat vitam aeternam,” chance are you would not know what the person said. I wouldn’t. How about if someone in the supermarket called to you, “Denn so hat Gott die Welt geliebt, daß er seinen eingeborenen Sohn gab, damit jeder, der an ihn glaubt, nicht verloren gehe, sondern ewiges Leben habe!” it probably would not be much different. Are they asking a question, telling a joke, or cursing at you? Then you get a phone call: “Car Dieu a tant aimé le monde qu'il a donné son Fils unique, afin que quiconque croit en lui ne périsse point, mais qu'il ait la vie éternelle.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Well, these are the Latin, German, and French translations of John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.” If you went to Sunday School, if you watch football games on TV, you know the verse. Do you know it in Latin?</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">It makes no difference whether you understand it or not: it is still true.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">And there’s a lesson for how you and I should relate to non-believers. Some Christian counselors dismiss bad behavior, for fear of offending those who need help. Some youth workers try to dress and talk and act like adolescents, subconsciously (maybe quite deliberately) thinking that they have found a way to reach kids that is better than sharing God’s truth. We speak the truth, and the Holy Spirit takes over when the seed is planted -– part of the job description.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Most of us live on smaller stages, but we should remember that when St Paul explained that he was willing to be “all things to all people,” he didn’t mean compromising his faith; he meant that, unlike haughty priests, he knew it was necessary to meet everyone where they were, literally. He “spoke Greek to Greeks,” and showed up in front of pagan temples -– not join in their rituals but to share Jesus with people who would never otherwise hear such words.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Likewise, Jesus Himself. He had fellowship with Mary Magdalene, and the woman at the well, not to have sex but to discuss their sins. Not even to condemn, but to forgive. But He did not “accept” them “where they were” in terms of accepting their transgressions. Just the opposite. Jesus was, and is, quick and hard with the Truth. “Sin no more.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">If we do less -– whether confronting our own sins; or the sometimes excruciating obligation to share the gospel with others; or in debating integrity in national debates -– if we do less, we fail not by slight degree, but miserably.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">For then we brand ourselves with as “half-truthers,” which is tradition’s polite term for liars. All things to all people? Unless you define it as Paul did… far better to be one thing to the One God, if truth be told.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
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</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Truth does not vary according to the audience or the culture or the times. That is the definition of truth. Like a rock. Not just as a last refuge but a first affection, we should cling to the Rock of Ages. Here some Homecoming singers at the Cove, Billy Graham’s conference center, gathered to sing the classic hymn. Sitting next to Gloria Gaither that day, under a portrait of Billy Graham, was Billy’s late wife Ruth.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Click: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=AGSlJGXDirE#MondayMinistry_2-13-12">All Things To All People</a></div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
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<tr><td bgcolor="F0F0FF">Rick Marschall is the author of 65 books and hundreds of magazine articles in many fields, from popular culture (Bostonia Magazine called him “perhaps America’s foremost authority on popular culture”) to history and criticism; country music, television history, biography and children’s books. He is a former political cartoonist, editor of Marvel Comics, and writer for Disney comics. For 10 years he has been active in the Christian field, writing devotionals; co-author of The Secret Revealed with Dr Jim Garlow. His biography of Johann Sebastian Bach for the “Christian Encounters” series (Thomas Nelson) was released in April, 2011. His history of cartoon Advertising, Drawing Power, will be published in July 2011 by the Marschall Books imprint of fantagraphics Books. In October his major biography of Theodore Roosevelt, BULLY!, will be publ;ished by Regnery History of Washington DC. He is currently working on a One-Year CDevotional for Tyndale House; and edits the the reissue of Harper's Weekly -- the Civil War Years for NOVOink e-books. Rick is a former Director of Product Development for Youth Specialties. He is recipient of the 2008 “Christian Writer of the Year” award from the Greater Philadelphia Writer’s Conference, and produces a weekly e-mail devotional, “Monday Morning Music Ministry.” His e-mail address is: <a href="mailto:rickmarschall@gmail.com">RickMarschall@gmail.com.</a></td><td bgcolor="F0F0FF"><img align="right" border="0" height="150" src="http://www.assistnews.net/WRITERSPICS/Marschall%20photo.JPG" /></td></tr>
</tbody></table><hr style="font-family: Arial;" /><span style="font-family: Arial;">** You may republish this story with proper attribution.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-40303279459935512702012-02-12T03:09:00.000-08:002012-02-12T03:10:51.922-08:00Beware of Vows in Election Campaigns<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://media.washtimes.com/media/community/photos/blog/entries/2012/01/04/2012_lowa_Romney_Paul_Santorum_120103_s640x427.jpg?73b8e21685896c3f2859310aaa5adb253919b641" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://media.washtimes.com/media/community/photos/blog/entries/2012/01/04/2012_lowa_Romney_Paul_Santorum_120103_s640x427.jpg?73b8e21685896c3f2859310aaa5adb253919b641" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo: Associated Press</td></tr>
</tbody></table>The 2012 Republican Primary campaigns have been as ruthless as ever in their negative attacks against each other and as wreckless as ever in the promises made by candidates.<br />
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Just this morning I saw two headlines that read "Romney Vows to be Pro-life President if Elected," and "Rick Santorum Assures Conservatives He Won't Move to The Center." We know the definition of insanity, yet every four years we listen and respond to the promises made and then suffer through four years of disappointment from promises broken. We fall for the same old lies expecting a different result.<br />
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We Christians, I think, are especially easy prey for political wolves in sheep's clothing because we really want to believe that things will get better. After all, doesn't love hope all things? As Christians, and as the Church, we have a responsibility, though, to cast our vote in a way that honors God and His Kingdom. We cannot base our decision to support any candidate on what that candidate tells us about himself or about his opponent. We can base our decision on the "fruit" of their lives and careers.<br />
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<div style="text-align: left;">To the Christian, a vow is a solemn oath that must be honored at all cost. But to a politician, it is simply the means to an and -- a way to get your vote. We don't take the vows we make lightly. After all, as Bronislaw Malinowski said, "You utter a vow or forge a signature and you may find yourself bound for life to a monastery, a woman or a prison." But a politician has no such conviction and can see no further than the election. He only sees the end and will use any means to get there. Heed the words of Richard Brinsley Sheridan: "He who vows the most are the least sincere," and you will be less likely to find yourself repeating the words of Thomas Otway: "let us embrace, and from this moment vow an eternal misery together."</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
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</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-30321413806490542272012-02-07T02:31:00.000-08:002012-02-07T02:31:12.441-08:00Kierkegaard: A Parable of a King and a Maiden<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilp05XMYluCvUIADCWaaBxwygrKSwhFjl-LdOXxsBLCZJtTK4tFywbaOHLg3qUjhlRanC8X3EqpdE4Lxe6J9zBOCctloyIPH5L_2PTmAWY5EjmWG8ZsR9-QJONoO7rwKJLjibgvWxUOrqh/s1600/image_11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilp05XMYluCvUIADCWaaBxwygrKSwhFjl-LdOXxsBLCZJtTK4tFywbaOHLg3qUjhlRanC8X3EqpdE4Lxe6J9zBOCctloyIPH5L_2PTmAWY5EjmWG8ZsR9-QJONoO7rwKJLjibgvWxUOrqh/s320/image_11.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="background-color: #f3eddd; color: #505050; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: left;">Suppose there was a king who loved a humble maiden. The king was like no other king. No one dared breathe a word against him, for he had the strength to crush all opponents. And yet this mighty king was melted by love for a humble maiden. How could he declare his love for her? In an odd sort of way, his kingliness tied his hands. If he brought her to the palace and crowned her head with jewels and clothed her body in royal robes, she would surely not resist-no one dared resist him. But would she love him?<br />
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She would say she loved him, of course, but would she truly? Or would she live with him in fear, nursing a private grief for the life she had left behind? Would she be happy at his side? How could he know? If he rode to her forest cottage in his royal carriage, with an armed escort waving bright banners, that too would overwhelm her. He did not want a cringing subject. He wanted a lover, an equal. He wanted her to forget that he was a king and she a humble maiden and to let shared love cross the gulf between them. For it is only in love that the unequal can be made equal. (as quoted in <i>Disappointment with God</i>)<br />
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The king clothes himself as a beggar and renounces his throne in order to win her hand. The Incarnation, the life and the death of Jesus, answers once and for all the question, "What is God's heart toward me?" This is why Paul says in Romans 5, "Look here, at the Cross. Here is the demonstration of God's heart. At the point of our deepest betrayal, when we had run our farthest from him and gotten so lost in the woods we could never find our way home, God came and died to rescue us."</div><br style="background-color: #f3eddd; color: #505050; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: left;" /><br />
<span style="background-color: #f3eddd; color: #505050; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: left;">(</span><a href="http://ransomedheart.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=5bc0b0c292a333cd8cca4ece1&id=42d91be73f&e=a5a99a5def" style="background-color: #f3eddd; color: coral; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: left;" target="_blank"><i>The Sacred Romance </i></a><span style="background-color: #f3eddd; color: #505050; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: left;">, 80-81, by John Eldredge)</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-58140333170809605392011-12-28T04:49:00.000-08:002011-12-28T04:49:35.356-08:00Laughing Baby YouTube Phenom Reduces Stress<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.christiannewswire.com/images/1325036572.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.christiannewswire.com/images/1325036572.jpg" /></a></div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">BERRIEN SPRINGS, Mich., Dec. 27, 2011 /</span><a href="http://www.christiannewswire.com/" style="background-color: white; color: #ca0505; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px; text-decoration: none;">Christian Newswire</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">/ -- Laughter is an excellent stress reducer, says Skip MacCarty, D.Min, grandfather of Baby Micah whose YouTube clip of him laughing hysterically as his dad rips up a job rejection letter has amassed over 33 million hits since it went online in February. On Thursday, December 29, Micah and parents will be on NBC's Today Show again for the third time since March.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">Micah's "Grandpa Skip," a Fellow of the American Institute of Stress and retired minister, has been teaching stress management for over 20 years. He says that laughter is one of the best medicines for stress relief. Researchers call it "internal jogging" because it gives the internal organs a good workout. It also lowers stress hormones and combats disease. So it's no surprise to MacCarty that many people who viewed the 2-minute "Baby Laughing Hysterically at Ripping Paper" YouTube clip have commented that it calmed them and lowered their stress and anxiety.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">MacCarty and his daughter, Pamela Coburn-Litvak (who holds a Ph.D. on the effects of stress on the brain) have co-authored the faith-based Stress: Beyond Coping seminar and e-learning course accessible at </span><a href="http://stressbeyondcoping.com/" style="background-color: white; color: #ca0505; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px; text-decoration: none;">stressbeyondcoping.com</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">. They are offering a 24-hour FREE access to one of the four modules of the e-learning course coinciding with the December 29 appearance of Baby Micah on the Today Show. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">"Baby Micah has brought our whole family hours of joy with his contagious laughter," says MacCarty. "What you see on the YouTube clip(s) (there are now several new ones added) is just what this little guy is really like. He's a contagious laughing machine who enjoys life to the fullest, with a few whimpers sprinkled in to remind us that he's human."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif, serif; font-size: 13px;">Research on humor as a therapeutic modality was sparked by Dr. Norman Cousins' book, Anatomy of an Illness, in which he described his diagnosis of a rare disease for which doctors said there was no cure. He attributed his surprising recovery largely to his self-treatment with lots of humor, including watching comedies and reading joke books. Later he joined the UCLA medical school as Adjunct Professor of Medical Humanities where he helped establish the Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology for the study of the brain's contribution to the healing process.</span> <br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/RP4abiHdQpc" width="560"></iframe>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-10851003239346579412011-12-27T11:18:00.000-08:002011-12-27T11:18:01.378-08:00The Personal Ponzi Scheme<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/lauraboggess" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Laura J. Boggess</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/ponzi%20post.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“I’ve decided that life is a Ponzi scheme.”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I give my friend a quizzical look.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“Do you know what that is?”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“Yeah, sure, sort of. Isn’t that what <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Madoff" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Bernie Madoff </a>got in all that trouble for?”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">She nods her head rapidly.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"> “<em>Yes,”</em> she says. <em>“It’s smoke and mirrors--like, convincing others that you have this great thing to buy into…”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I’m still puzzled but I’m listening. Wasn’t this what Bernard Madoff had done? Bilked hundreds out of millions by convincing them to invest in his fraudulent scheme?</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I sit up straighter.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">My friend is getting her MBA, so she is always enlightening me—stretching my world bigger. The way her mind works amazes me. While we dine in my small office at work, she has educated me as to how<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312425074/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=thehighcallio-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0312425074" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">the world is flat</a>, given me insights about the international business world, and helped me understand the virtues of certain marketing strategies.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">But a Ponzi scheme?</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I listen to my friend expound on her theory.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">She explains that she has stumbled on a new source of self-confidence.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The Ponzi scheme.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“<em>Most people get their Ponzi schemes from their parents. As they’re growing up, they’re told they’re wonderful, or special…you know? They get this unconditional love that they build their world on and…and they totally buy into, right? So they grow up feeling good about themselves…”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I am on the edge of my seat. And then she says this:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“And since I was raised by crazy people, I didn’t get my Ponzi scheme.”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">My eyes widen.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“I didn’t either!”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">We talk more about developing our Ponzi schemes—how to use this concept to build our self-esteem.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I love it. It makes sense. Sort of a self-investment. Building myself up.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">That’s good, right?</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I am so impressed with our new theory that I tell my husband about it when I get home.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“Isn’t that neat? I mean, if I buy into the scheme that I am a self-confident, all together woman, and act accordingly—then…I am. I just have to buy into it and then others do too.”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Before I am finished, he is shaking his head.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>What?</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>I don’t want to have to pretend to be something I’m not</em>, he explains calmly. <em>I’m sick of all the Ponzi schemes. I’m sick of all the falseness in the world. I don’t want to invest in anything but the Truth.</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Can you say ‘deflated’?</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Still, not willing to let go, I looked up <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Ponzi scheme on Wikipedia</a> and this is what I found:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>”A <strong>Ponzi scheme</strong> is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to investors from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors rather than from any actual profit earned. The Ponzi scheme usually offers returns that other investments cannot guarantee in order to entice new investors, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent. The perpetuation of the returns that a Ponzi scheme advertises and pays requires an ever-increasing flow of money from investors in order to keep the scheme going.”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Reading just a bit further, these words jumped out at me:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“The system <strong>is destined to collapse</strong> (emphasis mine) because the earnings, if any, are less than the payments. Usually, the scheme is interrupted by legal authorities before it collapses because a Ponzi scheme is suspected or because the promoter is selling unregistered securities. As more investors become involved, the likelihood of the scheme coming to the attention of authorities increases.”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Destined to collapse.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Hmm.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">It’s not looking so good for the personal Ponzi scheme.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Sadly, I relay my husband’s words to my friend at work the next day.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“He just says it’s not based on the truth…”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">She tilts her head to one side, eyes sparkling with mischief.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>“But what is truth?”</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">And then it’s my turn.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">***</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><strong>Announcement:</strong> If you want to understand how success happens, I mean <strong><em>really </em></strong>understand...join us for our new book club beginning Monday, January 9th. We'll be reading David Brooks' fascinating bestseller, <em><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/140006760X/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=thehighcallio-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=140006760X" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">The Social Animal: The Hidden sources of Love, Character, and Achievement</a>. </em>Written in the context of story, Brooks looks at the multilayered science of decision-making and redefines what society sees as success. Won't you join us? We'll be discussing the introduction and the first three chapters. The paperback edition of the book will be released on January 3, 2012.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Image by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/ecstaticist/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Evan Leeson</a>. Used <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">with permission</a>. Sourced via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/ecstaticist/4547800868/sizes/l/in/photostream/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Flickr</a>. Post by <a href="http://lauraboggess.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Laura J. Boggess</a>.</em></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-3901364921629604042011-12-15T05:02:00.000-08:002011-12-15T05:02:14.853-08:00A Very Mary Christmas<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/jennifer-dukes-lee" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Jennifer Dukes Lee</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/postimage-pregnant.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Feet dangling in patent-leather, I sat on the polished pew while the Christmas pageant director assigned parts. I held my breath, waiting as she called names. I dreaded this moment, for I knew I’d be instructed to serve as a sheep or cow. Each year, she would assure us that those lowing, humble barn-dwellers were "important" pieces of the story.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I didn't buy it. I wanted to be Mary.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">As I grew older, I was upgraded from beast to human. In this more esteemed role, I had the opportunity to deliver real lines, beyond the scripted moo-ing. We didn’t have enough boys in church to fill all the male roles, so I regularly stood in as a king or a shepherd, wearing an itchy gunny sack. One year, I did get to wear white wings, proclaiming into the church microphone: "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people!"</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">But even as an angel of the Lord Most High, I secretly pined to be tapped as Mary, Mother of God. This was every Sunday School girl's dream. Each year, the highly favored one would ride down the red-carpeted aisle on a cardboard donkey. She wore a flowing gown, which the director ceremoniously retrieved from the church’s costume vault only once a year. Mary never had lines to memorize. Her only job was to look good.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Each year, Mary seemed to glow, outshining even the glittery star overhead. She radiated in that magical moment when, at the end of the play, everyone in the pews would rise up, gripping candles, to sing “Silent Night” in a circle.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I watched Mary as I mouthed the words. She sat center-stage by the wooden communion rail, while gazing upon the babe in arms. Some years, we had a real-live baby as our Jesus. Mostly, though, we used a doll from the nursery toy-bin. We wrapped it in swaddling clothes—threadbare dishtowels from the church-basement kitchen.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Often, a pretty blonde was christened as Mary. Even at a young age, I knew this was historically inaccurate. But no one seemed to mind in our town, where Swedish descendants bore names like Larson and Anderson. Mary usually matched our toy-box Jesus—a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl doll with magic marker drawn on the back of her head.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Then, behold, in 1982, the heavens opened, and I witnessed my very own Christmas miracle: I was called forth from the pew.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“Jennifer?” she asked. “Would you be willing to serve as our Mary this year?”</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I nodded a shy yes, but on the inside, I belted out the <em>Magnificat</em>.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I remember it still, draping a white cloth around my brunette head, then walking down the aisle of my dimly-lit church. I remember cradling the baby in swaddling dishtowels, and hearing everyone laugh when one of the wee kings in a cardboard crown shouted out: “Hi, Mom!” A shepherd stretched out on the step for a long winter’s rest. Beside me, the cattle were lowing and adjusting brown-felt ears. And behind me, I sensed a great company of the heavenly host—all dressed in holey bed sheets. Or maybe they were holy.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Then came the moment for the final number, the hallowed singing of “Silent Night.” A great hush fell over the room, as the congregants rose to their feet and lit candles by passing a flame around the circle.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The pianist began, then all began to sing:</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Round ‘yon virgin, Mother and child</em><br />
<em>Holy infant so tender and mild</em></div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">And that’s when it happened. At the front of a tiny Iowa church—where I sat in a sheet-covered folding chair—Mary’s story was becoming my own. I looked at the cradled babe, with bits of hay snared in blonde locks. I was beginning to realize, right then, who the real star of this Christmas show was.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I turned my head a bit, bowing my chin lower as voices swelled higher. I hoped no one would notice a single tear sliding down my cheek. I—the holder of the Christ-child—was discovering what those words in the story meant, about a young girl treasuring up all these things, and pondering them in her heart.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Image by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/bies/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Bianca de Blok</a>. Used with <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">permission</a>. Sourced via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/60012221@N00/107729240/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Flickr</a>. Post by <a href="http://gettingdownwithjesus.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Jennifer Dukes Lee</a>.</em></div><ul class="taglist" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; list-style-type: none; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 10px;"></ul>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-7900607875071545932011-12-12T09:29:00.000-08:002011-12-12T09:29:30.703-08:00Two Pies Lighter<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/julia-spicher-kasdorf" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Julia Spicher K...</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/pecan%20post%20image.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Early on Thanksgiving morning, I drove down an eerily silent College Avenue in State College, Pennsylvania, to deliver a couple of pies to the community kitchen in my church basement. The town felt strangely somber. Streets were empty, students and many of the faculty members—more than half the borough’s population—gone. Anyone who had an excuse to get out was relieved to do so. Nevertheless, an NBC news van sat perched at the edge of campus like a vulture, as if even on that still morning a savory bit of news might break.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">As a Penn State faculty member who has never set foot in Beaver Stadium or watched a football game of any sort on television, I’ll just say that I came to this place for another reason. But football money has funded a substantial portion of our library’s holdings. It has endowed two professorships, one in my own department. And thanks to the influx of cash that football season brings to the region each fall, it has made Centre County a better place to live.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">In other words, across the university and Happy Valley, we’re all aware that we will be sharing the consequences of these crimes and cover-ups for a very long time. </div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">What can a person do when the actions of a powerful one or few ruin things for so many? All I could think to do that morning was what I did the year before on Thanksgiving morning: rise early, make coffee, roll out crusts and whisk fillings, slide the pumpkin and pecan pies into the oven, and then drive them over to Saint Andrew’s. </div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Like my students who were eager to identify with Penn State when its stock was up, I must consider the price of collective success and my own willingness to buy into it. Now, those students worry that the brand has gone bad. That fast, a university’s winning reputation has been wrecked by willful evasions and strange manipulations and images of hooligans rioting in our streets.</div><h3 style="color: #3f3f3f; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 15px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Pressing On</h3><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I think of my father’s chagrin after working for more than 30 years for a major corporation that in the late 1990s turned out to be rotten at the top. His retirement a few years too early was embittered by a sense of betrayal at the hands of a company that had once made him proud. I think of those associated with church organizations publicly shamed by corrupt or irresponsible leaders, or the happy-looking families undone by foolish moves.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">It is easy for me to tell my students to use their words and their heads when they would prefer to take to the streets. Those are the English professor’s stock sentiments. But what shall I do with my own disappointment and disgust? </div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The answer came without much thought on Thanksgiving morning: the pies, the drive over to St. Andrew’s. In dark times, we fall back on those practices that a lifetime of practice has taught us. When words fail or fail to come, meaning and comfort spring from the most ordinary, elemental means: our work, small observances. This is the quiet spirit of Advent.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I will stick around when the TV vans have gone away, just as my father worked on for several years while his company painfully stuttered to a halt. I will continue to teach these kids who will have some difficult questions to answer in job interviews for a few years.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Driving back to my home in Bellefonte—a town of 6,000 where the preliminary hearings for Jerry Sandusky will be staged this Tuesday morning—I felt a rush of gratitude for sunlight on the forested ridgeline, my car two pies lighter. My heart felt lighter, too, with the satisfaction that comes from making something, from giving a gift that will vanish before the sun goes down, from doing one tiny thing I can respect.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Image by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/chadmiller/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Chad Miller</a>. Used with <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">permission</a>. </em><em>Sourced via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/chadmiller/308729422/in/photostream/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Flickr</a>. Post written by Julia Spicher Kasdorf, author of <a href="http://chrysostomsociety.org/2011/08/poetry-in-america/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Poetry in America</a>.</em></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-73050809372046862372011-12-09T09:24:00.000-08:002011-12-09T09:24:55.592-08:00What Churches Can Learn from the YMCA<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/mtuckey" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Matt Tuckey</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/Work-Stub-03_3.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The YMCA isn't a church, but it sure knows something about bringing people together.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">At the Y, I sometimes see people running alone on the treadmills. They stare straight ahead, eyes fixed on the TV monitors scrolling the news of the day. The only sound they hear is the one pulsing into their ears via buds. Eventually, they step off the treadmill, checking the pace and distance the cold machine has calculated for them. Satisfied, they move along.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">It occurs to me that this is sometimes how we function in our churches, as well. We show up, get all we can for ourselves, and then move along. But just as there’s another, more fulfilling side to community at the Y, so Christ offers more than that in the Church.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Read the rest of this article at <a href="http://www.inpart.org/dept/vibes/community" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">In Part Magazine</a>.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Image by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/seier/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">SEIER+SEIER</a>. Used with <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">permission</a>. Sourced via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/94852245@N00/2654032126/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Flickr</a>. Post by featured by Senior Editor Marcus Goodyear. Matt Tuckey is a member of The High Calling and blogs at <a href="http://carlislefamilyymca.blogspot.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Carlisle Family YMCA</a>.</em></div><a href="http://www.inpart.org/dept/vibes/community" style="color: #d16f1a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;" target="_blank">Read the full blog entry</a><a href="" id="commenting" name="commenting" style="color: #d16f1a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;"></a><div style="clear: both; color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"></div><div class="article-sep-bar" style="background-color: #e8e8e8; clear: both; color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; height: 1px; margin-bottom: 4px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 18px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; width: 520px;"><img alt="" height="1" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/all/modules/custom/articles/images/clear.gif" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-style: none; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-top-width: 0px; border-width: initial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" width="1" /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0Carlisle, PA, USA40.2025 -77.19540.183139 -77.2324895 40.221861000000004 -77.157510499999987tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-57782277788957170532011-12-09T05:35:00.000-08:002011-12-09T05:35:18.851-08:00Is it safe for you to die?<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;">By Bill Ellis</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://theworshipplace.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/1sr-Candle-2011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://theworshipplace.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/1sr-Candle-2011.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=SCOTT%20DEPOT,%20WV" target="_blank">SCOTT DEPOT, WV</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>It was the first Sunday in Advent. I expected the normal “introduction to Christmas” sermon. That, however, is not exactly the preaching style of Dr. Melissa Pratt, in my opinion, one of America’s finest young preachers and pastors. Her exposition of the Word of God is filled with new and invigorating approaches to truth.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"></div><div style="font-family: Arial;"></div><div style="font-family: Arial;">The sermon began with a summary of Ecclesiastes 7:1-3 that was concluded with this statement: “A wise person thinks a lot about death. Happy Advent. Merry Christmas.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">But what about the wise men, shepherds, camels and angelic choirs? What about Christmas trees and Santa Claus? Where is the church’s annual Christmas drama and cantata?</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">The sermon continued, “The truth is, the Christmas season has everything to do with death because it not only has what we experience in this life and how we live it, but what happens after we die that Jesus came to deal with.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">God, being rich in mercy, sent Jesus to die on the cross to pay the price for all our sins. Were it not for His birth, life, death, and resurrection, we would all be doomed to an eternal destiny of unbearable suffering and separation from the presence of God.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">The question has been running through my mind each day, “How safe is it for me to die?” Death is not a possible “if”, but a definite “when” and an issue we will all deal with very soon. Even at my relative young age, it seems that every year and age of my life has come and gone so quickly. Everything is on a rapid speed except eternity. John Newton helped us understand its duration with these words: “When we’ve been there ten thousand years . . . we’ve no less days . . . than when we’d first begun.” Eternity never subtracts from itself.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">There are two eternal profiles carefully described in Luke 16:19-31 in the frightening and yet blessed story of the rich man and a beggar named Lazarus. This story is filled with warning and its graphic depiction of a great chasm that takes away all hope of transferring from Hell to Heaven -- once there always there. It is the story of eternal separation, punishment, judgment, fire and regret.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Jesus is the answer to all the fears about death and judgment and the problems and suffering created by sin. Read about His coming in chapters one of Matthew, Luke and John. Mark starts in chapter one with “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God (Mark 1:1). </div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">When I read in Mark’s account, I often think about the night at The White House, when a select group of invited guests heard Alec McCowen, famous English actor, quote this exciting book in its entirety with his dramatic memory in the historic East Room. The delicious dinner with President and Mrs. Carter did not overshadow the book of Mark.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">American leader, Benjamin Franklin spoke of his day and ours: “How many observe Christ’s birthday! How few, his precepts. O! Tis easier to keep holidays than commandments.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">E. B. White, iconic teacher of those who attempt to write said, “To perceive Christmas through its wrapping becomes more difficult with every year.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“An angel of the Lord appeared to Him (Joseph) . . . saying, . . . ‘And she shall bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins’ ” (Matthew 1:20-21). That was the beginning of Christmas . . . the birth of the Savior, born to save all who will believe in Him.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Do not throw Him out with all the trimmings, trappings, purchases, debt, gifts and papers of our modern Christmas celebrations. Merry Christmas to you and your family from me and my family.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"></div><div style="font-family: Arial;">-30-</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"></div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
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<tr><td bgcolor="F0F0FF">Bill Ellis is a syndicated columnist, and convention and conference speaker on every continent. He is the writer of more than 2,000 newspaper and magazine columns, articles and contributions to books. He is also a widely known motivational speaker and pulpit guest who utilizes enjoyment of life and just plain fun and laughter while speaking to high school, university and professional sports teams as well as to business and professional groups of all kinds. His keen understanding of human problems makes him a favorite speaker for youth, parent, and senior adult meetings. He is accompanied by Kitty, his wife, favorite singer, editor and publisher.<br />
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For information on becoming a subscriber to the Ellis Column for your newspaper or magazine, you may contact him at: BILL ELLIS, P.O.Box 345, Scott Depot, WV 25560 or by calling: 304-757-6089.</td><td bgcolor="F0F0FF"><img align="right" border="0" height="150" src="http://www.assistnews.net/WRITERSPICS/Bill%20Ellis.jpg" /></td></tr>
</tbody></table><hr style="font-family: Arial;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;">** You may republish this story with proper attribution.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-9429424462294035162011-12-09T05:25:00.000-08:002011-12-09T05:25:30.788-08:00Winter Window: Explaining a Spiritual Experience<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;">By Brian Nixon</span><br style="font-family: Arial;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;">Special to ASSIST News Service</span><br />
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<div style="font-family: Arial;"><b><u><a href="http://www.assistnews.net/google_map.asp?place=ALBUQUERQUE,%20NEW%20MEXICO" target="_blank">ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO</a></u></b> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>(ANS) </b>-- </span>Recently I had a coworker share with me a beautiful spiritual experience that had occurred in his life. Apparently, he has been seeking the Lord with great fervency, asking for more and more fruit to come from his walk with Christ. Before he knew it he was in tears, overwhelmed by a sense of love and joy surrounding him. He felt as though God had engulfed him with His presence.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
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<tr><td><img align="right" alt="" border="1" height="245" src="http://www.assistnews.net/images11/fireplace.jpg" width="235" /></td></tr>
<tr><td><div align="center"><b><span style="color: navy; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">New Mexico fireplace and room</span></b></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table>My co-worker came to me with two simple questions:<br />
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</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">What happened to me? And what do I do now?</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">I shared with him a couple of my own experiences of pondering God’s goodness and His creation.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">But his questions gave me to pause.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">What do these deep and personal experiences mean in our lives? I thought.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">I considered for a moment, looking out the window at the recent snows on the Sandia Mountains in Albuquerque, New Mexico.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Then it struck me, a mental picture of a possible explanation of how and why God uses epiphany-like experiences in our lives.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“Think of it this way,” I responded. “You are God’s child; He is your heavenly Father. Imagine yourself in a room with your Father. It’s warm and comfortable. But outside a recent snow has fallen, with new adventures calling for you to witness and apprehend: snow angels to make, snowmen to create, sleds to ride, and skis to sail.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“For you—the child—the reality that lies beyond these walls, doors, and windows is another world: one that creates excitement and fervency to experience.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
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<tr><td><img align="left" alt="" border="1" height="314" src="http://www.assistnews.net/images11/alexandervolkovwindow.jpg" width="221" /></td></tr>
<tr><td><div align="center"><b><span style="color: navy; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Winter Window<br />
by Alexander Volkov</span></b></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table>“However, there’s a problem. You’re too small. You can’t see out the window or unlock the door to begin this new adventure.<br />
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</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“Watching you the whole time is your Father. He watches as you try to look out the window on tiptoes. He chuckles as you reach and reach and try to unlatch the door. He notices as you became frustrated.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“And He sees you as you look to Him, begging to experience the new world outside.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“‘Please, Daddy, let me see outside!’ you exclaim.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“With this, your Father smiles. He gently walks over to you, picking you up to see the new, wondrous world the snow has created outside.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“And with each snowflake that falls, He points out great and marvelous things. You can’t believe your eyes or ears!”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">I looked at my coworker and said this may be what God does when we experience deep, spiritual events in our lives.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Our Father picks us up and gives us a glimpse of the joy, love, and profound nature of His world to come—of a life lived in His constant presence.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"></div><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="3"><tbody>
<tr><td><img align="right" alt="" border="1" height="297" src="http://www.assistnews.net/images11/boylookingout.jpg" width="235" /></td></tr>
<tr><td><div align="center"><b><span style="color: navy; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Boy looking out the window</span></b></div></td></tr>
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<div style="font-family: Arial;">We are like the child seeking to see the snow and to experience its wonder. However, as Christians, we’re not seeking snow. We’re seeking God, knocking on His door, calling His name. And God responds by lifting us up to show us His world; the promised world to come, where His kingdom will be established forever.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">My coworker said, “I like that.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">I said, “So do I.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“But,” he continued, “What do I do now that I’ve been lifted up to see God’s new world?”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">Once again, I paused.</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">“Well, my friend,” I responded. “You keep asking, you keep knocking, you keep seeking. Then, when your day has come, He will unlock the door and let you experience the adventure forever. You will no longer need to look through a window, for that which you have sought will forever be your reality. You will be home.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial;">I pray the Lord will lift you up as you continue to pursue Him. Knock, seek, and ask this coming year! There’s an adventure awaiting you!</div><hr style="font-family: Arial;" /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="font-family: Arial;"><tbody>
<tr><td bgcolor="F0F0FF">Brian Nixon is a writer, musician, minister, and family man. You may contact him at<a href="http://www.briannixon.com/">www.briannixon.com</a></td><td bgcolor="F0F0FF"><img align="right" border="0" height="150" src="http://www.assistnews.net/WRITERSPICS/web%20nixon.jpg" /></td></tr>
</tbody></table><hr style="font-family: Arial;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;">** You may republish this story with proper attribution.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0Albuquerque, NM, USA35.0844909 -106.651136734.9488469 -106.85645319999999 35.2201349 -106.4458202tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-39628606053818974062011-12-08T05:41:00.000-08:002011-12-08T05:41:45.402-08:00When Love Is an Action<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/lauraboggess" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Laura Boggess</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/birds%20post.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I have watched how they go these past weeks. Soaring and diving, turning and landing—a migration ballet. I stand in the middle of the street with my neck arched upward for dizzying moments. When they swoop overhead, the world turns and I am lifted to heights, longing for wings. The way they plunge and domino through the sky makes my tummy drop—I am flying with them, my heart lifted by their communal dance. They move as one.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The birds are heading south and the beauty of it breaks my heart.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">They call me a shepherd at my church. I have a flock that I tend. It’s a way for our leadership to stay abreast of individual needs—divide the congregation into smaller groups and assign elders to watch over them. As shepherd, I am supposed to check in with my flock regularly. Make sure they are doing okay.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">We have had troubles. We have brushed up against each other and bruised tender flesh in the jostling. Sheep do—they bleat wildly when alarmed, bumble about in fear. We lose sight of our Shepherd.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Sunday night we meet in the sanctuary. There are some good words and some prayers and then we all flood out into the narthex to dress up our church for Christmas. The Hanging of the Greens, we call it. Old and young are here—the same faces we always see when something needs doing…the same faces we’ve argued with and picked at and found fault with.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">We are told to love one another. The word in its original Greek is an action word—a verb. It’s a doing thing. So we do.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I’ve often wondered—as I lift my eyes to the sky, feel my breath leave my body as the birds move in unison across the sun—how do they do that? What drive inside pulls them forward, what cue from the next allows them to turn so gracefully as one—no hesitation, no clumsy choppy movements? I know it is written on their hearts—this greater purpose that allows for such harmony, such grace.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I hand an ornament to gnarled fingers, the same fingers that have lashed out at me and those I love in the past…and I lean in closer. Those fingers touch mine and we smile.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">So many times, our fellowship is like the sheep—mindless, aimless, losing sight of our Shepherd. But Sunday night, we spread our wings. We moved as one, pulled by something greater—something we do not understand. When love in an action—we turn with those subtle cues, follow the rhythm of our hearts—this is when we take wing.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">This is when we fly.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7186211789736479368.post-67706914545052783722011-12-08T05:25:00.000-08:002011-12-08T05:25:27.635-08:00Struggling to Serve<div class="author" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 16px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">by <a href="http://www.thehighcalling.org/users/mderusha" style="color: #d16f1a; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="View user profile.">Michelle DeRusha</a></div><img class="main-image" src="http://www.thehighcalling.org/sites/default/files/postimage-stoplight.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; color: #515151; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 18px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">About a year ago my husband and I signed up our family of four to deliver <a href="http://www.mowaa.org/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Meals on Wheels</a> once every six weeks to elderly residents around town. It seemed like the perfect family volunteer opportunity.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">What we didn’t anticipate was the mutiny.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Our sons, Noah and Rowan, resisted this family activity from the start. Rowan got carsick and complained of headaches and nausea as we crisscrossed town. Eventually I got smart and handed half of a chewable Dramamine tablet to him before we left the house. But while the pill dispelled the queasiness, it left him groggy and did nothing to improve his attitude.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Meanwhile, Noah couldn’t tolerate the smell of the cooked food that wafted from the warming bins stashed in the back of the mini-van. Broccoli days were the worst. To combat the pungent odor we rolled the windows all the way down, even in mid-February, and blasted the heat while Noah sat hunched, knees to chest, his T-shirt pulled up to the bridge of his nose.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">One Saturday my husband suggested that Noah smear Vicks VapoRub under his nose. The heavy menthol scent masked the stench of the food, and that, combined with the frigid air circulating throughout the van, was enough to keep Noah from gagging.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Despite our heroic comfort measures, though, the boys still complained relentlessly. “Why do we do this?” whined Rowan. “I hate it! It’s <em>so</em> boring, and it takes <em>so</em> long.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“We choose to suffer a little to help those who suffer a lot,” I lectured one day from the driver’s seat, turning up the volume of the “Jesus CD,” as my kids call it, in an effort to drown out their complaints with Christian music.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">“This is not suffering a <em>little</em>,” said Noah, in a muffled voice from the backseat. “This is suffering <em>a lot</em>.”</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">I glanced in the rearview mirror, prepared to launch another lecture about the importance of serving, when I caught sight of my ten-year-old. His brown eyes swam with tears as he held the VapoRub container clamped around his nose like a feed bag.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">That was the day we quit Meals on Wheels.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Later that night I struggled to compose an email to Rhoda, the program coordinator. It seemed over-the-top to mention the gagging and the VapoRub and the tears, so I finally explained that delivering Meals on Wheels simply didn’t work well for our family. It was the truth, but it felt more like a declaration of failure.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Rhoda’s gracious response should have freed me: "I absolutely understand…You need to do what’s right for your family." Yet, as I closed the laptop, a dull ache lingered deep in my gut.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.5; padding-bottom: 12px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em>Image by <a href="http://www.joshliba.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Josh Liba</a>. Used with <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">permission</a>. Sourced via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/26121794@N07/3783269078/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Flickr.</a> Post by <a href="http://www.michellederusha.com/" style="color: #d16f1a; font-size: 12px; font-weight: bold; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Michelle DeRusha</a>.</em></div><ul class="taglist" style="color: #515151; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; list-style-type: none; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 10px;"></ul>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12437071072878781423noreply@blogger.com0