It is now onto 1 Corinthians chapter 1 where I found my first challenging thought of this book while in the Boundary Waters. Most of these verses I have read many times and even spent times thinking about them multiple times but am going to share mot of my thoughts for the first time.
1 Cor. 1:25
For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.
The foolishness of God? First and foremost I don’t ever see it possible that God could be foolish in anyway, shape or form. So to me this is kind of mute or maybe just needed for my understanding here. Cause really in no way can I see God being foolish no matter how hard I think on this. When I think of those thoughts and then think of the fact that even to that point He is still wiser than I am or even the smartest man out there. It makes me realize that I need to stop trying to figure out why and what and all the in betweens in the bible. Some things that were done or happened I may never understand and I have to be ok with that. I think of times when I am talking with some of the smartest people I know and how there are things they say or may even be trying to explain to me that will just fly right over my head without even a chance of me understanding it. Now I turn and think of God being much wiser than even that person and it sheds a little light on the whole complete and ultimate wisdom of God.
Now I think of His strength. In the boundary waters the last couple years we have seen some pretty strong winds and interesting storms, but nothing really bad. It is just a different thought process when you are out in the middle of no where. To hear trees falling from the wind and finding out that there are were multiple fires started out there all around where you were staying and it didn’t even seem like all that powerful of a storm really makes me think of His ultimate power. If those storms didn’t seem like much but yet we have down trees and fires burning all around, what could He really do if He put His mind to it? Well, create Heaven and Earth. Not a very deep thought I know this but you think of the Old Testament also and just wiping entire nations out and much, much more. I feel I have not even seen a glimpse into His true almighty power.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Friday, September 26, 2008
BWCA_2
Some more thoughts of the boundary waters.
Romans 15: 11
So I have reason to be enthusiastic about all Christ Jesus has done through me in my service to God.
My train of thoughts were a little different here. Enthusiasm, joy and or passion is some thing that I think can rub off on others. A joy of something, say a joy for serving the Lord, for serving others, for seeing people grow and for seeing lives changed or transformed are some examples that came to my mind.
In the picture above you see this enthusiasm in these boys during a teaching illustration. This was something that was amazing to see through there face through everything that they did. Such an enthusiasm for life no matter what they are doing, weather it is running a race, gathering wood, hauling blocks or most importantly worshiping our Lord and Savior.
The questions that then pursued were how do I actually spread enthusiasm that I have for something? How do I spread a passion a joy I find in an experience or in something that I have seen in someone else. Also how do I get that enthusiasm that those boys have in that picture? An enthusiasm in all things and one that radiates through everything I do. This is the enthusiasm that I long for in Christ at all times. So how do I ensure in myself that this joy overflows in my life that others know that there is something different about who I am as I do in those boys.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Processing in the BWCA_1
I am going to break this down a little different this time and just share the questions that I pondered and asked myself on this.
Rom. 10:14
“But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him? And how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them?”
Who am I to hold back my experiences? Hold back what the Lord has taught me as I have been walking through life. I definitely haven’t been perfect in life that is fo rsure and if others can learn from my mistakes or by me sharing what I have learned who am I to hold it back. I may never know what they Lord may use in my life or the lives of others. As an analytical this verse hits home. Job 36:26a Look, God is greater than we (I) can understand. Even though I may want to know and understand I need to accept that I may not ever fully understand His ways. In my reading this morning it talked about being ok with saying “I don’t know” then focusing on what you do know. I often apply this at work so I should learn to apply it more in my walk with the Lord. He has definitely taught me a lot and I still have a ton to learn.
Rom. 10:15
And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent? That is why the Scriptures say, “How beautiful are the feet of messengers who bring good news!”
Senders are very important as no missionary or person doing outreach can go without being sent by someone? I definitely learned this in the past years with being more involved in missions. They wouldn’t have been possible without out loving support of prayer. Seeing the amazing work through prayer first hand is a great experience. Feet…… huh beautiful? Most people think of feet as dirty but here they are beautiful, but could you even see myself kissing the feet of someone I know. Say my pastor or a mission team member before they go. I know I couldn’t but after seeing someone talk about the feet as in the word here it definitely is an amazing and humbling experience to see them kneel down and kiss the feet of four people in the room in the middle of the evening. To think how humble and greatful others are. Where do I stand here and that is a tough question…….
Rom. 10:14
“But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him? And how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them?”
Who am I to hold back my experiences? Hold back what the Lord has taught me as I have been walking through life. I definitely haven’t been perfect in life that is fo rsure and if others can learn from my mistakes or by me sharing what I have learned who am I to hold it back. I may never know what they Lord may use in my life or the lives of others. As an analytical this verse hits home. Job 36:26a Look, God is greater than we (I) can understand. Even though I may want to know and understand I need to accept that I may not ever fully understand His ways. In my reading this morning it talked about being ok with saying “I don’t know” then focusing on what you do know. I often apply this at work so I should learn to apply it more in my walk with the Lord. He has definitely taught me a lot and I still have a ton to learn.
Rom. 10:15
And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent? That is why the Scriptures say, “How beautiful are the feet of messengers who bring good news!”
Senders are very important as no missionary or person doing outreach can go without being sent by someone? I definitely learned this in the past years with being more involved in missions. They wouldn’t have been possible without out loving support of prayer. Seeing the amazing work through prayer first hand is a great experience. Feet…… huh beautiful? Most people think of feet as dirty but here they are beautiful, but could you even see myself kissing the feet of someone I know. Say my pastor or a mission team member before they go. I know I couldn’t but after seeing someone talk about the feet as in the word here it definitely is an amazing and humbling experience to see them kneel down and kiss the feet of four people in the room in the middle of the evening. To think how humble and greatful others are. Where do I stand here and that is a tough question…….
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Psalm 46 and the BWCA
So I know everyone knows and frequently is pointed to verse 10a of this Psalm. “Be still, and know that I am God”, but I am going to say that I am really at fault of actually doing this at most times in my life. It has been something I have been working on and something I strived to do on this trip to the BWCA. It is amazing what the Lord will teach me when I actually do this.
Now I did just that and I have to say that it was completely amazing to see how blessed we were on this trip. In the midst of his wonderful creation we were completely blessed with weather, safety of travel and the surroundings of animals inhabiting the area with us.
A deeper look into Ps. 46 led me to an amazement of how much it truly applies to our trip. One instance would be to look at verse 8. “Come and see the works of the LORD, the desolations he has brought on the earth.” Here we are in a completely amazing place in Minnesota that has been totally destroyed by fires over the years. As you look around you can see the complete and utter power of fire. Now I don’t know if these were caused by lighting or a human, but last year while we were in the BWCA there were multiple fires around where we were staying all started by lighting. So this is what came to my mind at the time. Amongst this though there was the complete power, strength and freedom of a Bald eagle if you look closely.
While there I was reading and journaling through Romans and 1. Cor. it is amazing to look back at my journal and see what verses stuck out to me those days and the impact they had on me. Journaling though I may initially have not wanted to do it has proved itself invaluable over the past couple years in my walk with the Lord.
I have decided that over the next few entrees I will share some of these verses and my thoughts on this trip in these blogs and use this as an intro to that.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
A fish
First off I was going to write about this on Friday night but decided to just relax do my bible study and read my magazines that I was behind on. In doing this I came to a little paragraph an Article called “Leading by Social Network”. Now it went into a bunch of ways next generation leaders are doing ministry. What happened was crazy, I went to this site only to find the topic for the day, to be exactly what I was going to write about. You will see an exert from this below. Check it out. Also church could pertained to this in Christians being the light of the world.
One night a few weeks ago I ended up having a random conversation with some random people at Granite City while have a quick dinner. While sitting there watching a tennis match on TV I some how got a conversation going with this girl about Christ and that I was a Christian. What I thought was a going to be a good conversation quickly turned not so good. As what was stated as Christians are those people with the Fish on the back of their cars who drive crazy and cut you off and won’t let you in. Next thing I know the bartender joins in also ( I was sitting at the bar eating my dinner as I usually do when I run in by myself). Now, not really a good thing as I am becoming pinned here. Well, I manage to turn it away from that and lead them to an understanding that not all Christians are like that and that we all make mistakes and in fact that is why I don’t even have a fish on the back of my car. Side track, this leads me to think this is funny from the site above.
“. Can your kids revoke your fish if you drive like a maniac? If you cut someone off or swear at someone in the church parking lot, can they say, "Pull over mom, I'm gonna need to put that fish in the glove compartment for a few days."”
It is so true as a Christian I feel that I can be really hypocritical at times as no one sees me get mad or annoyed or the things I say, want to say, or even think about that person that just cut me off or is driving really slow or even flies by me going way over the speed limit. This verse strikes me and makes me think about when I speed or am driving. Rom. 2:15 They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right. 16 And this is the message I proclaim—that the day is coming when God, through Christ Jesus, will judge everyone’s secret life.
This story also goes with church this weekend in Matt. 5: 14 “You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden. 15 No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.
How I act is exactly what others see and like my pastor says this weekend when I am careless the light goes out (or gets covered up) and the world gets a little bit darker.
Back to the story though, I don’t ever know what happened to that girl or the bartender but by the end of the night I think I had finally convinced at least the girl to give Church and Christ a try and she sounded if she would visit Willow Creek in Chicago where she was from as there was one fairly close.
All in all this really made me think about the impact I can have for Christ without evening knowing it just by my actions.
One night a few weeks ago I ended up having a random conversation with some random people at Granite City while have a quick dinner. While sitting there watching a tennis match on TV I some how got a conversation going with this girl about Christ and that I was a Christian. What I thought was a going to be a good conversation quickly turned not so good. As what was stated as Christians are those people with the Fish on the back of their cars who drive crazy and cut you off and won’t let you in. Next thing I know the bartender joins in also ( I was sitting at the bar eating my dinner as I usually do when I run in by myself). Now, not really a good thing as I am becoming pinned here. Well, I manage to turn it away from that and lead them to an understanding that not all Christians are like that and that we all make mistakes and in fact that is why I don’t even have a fish on the back of my car. Side track, this leads me to think this is funny from the site above.
“. Can your kids revoke your fish if you drive like a maniac? If you cut someone off or swear at someone in the church parking lot, can they say, "Pull over mom, I'm gonna need to put that fish in the glove compartment for a few days."”
It is so true as a Christian I feel that I can be really hypocritical at times as no one sees me get mad or annoyed or the things I say, want to say, or even think about that person that just cut me off or is driving really slow or even flies by me going way over the speed limit. This verse strikes me and makes me think about when I speed or am driving. Rom. 2:15 They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right. 16 And this is the message I proclaim—that the day is coming when God, through Christ Jesus, will judge everyone’s secret life.
This story also goes with church this weekend in Matt. 5: 14 “You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden. 15 No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.
How I act is exactly what others see and like my pastor says this weekend when I am careless the light goes out (or gets covered up) and the world gets a little bit darker.
Back to the story though, I don’t ever know what happened to that girl or the bartender but by the end of the night I think I had finally convinced at least the girl to give Church and Christ a try and she sounded if she would visit Willow Creek in Chicago where she was from as there was one fairly close.
All in all this really made me think about the impact I can have for Christ without evening knowing it just by my actions.
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Inflation
Ok so how many people have complained about inflation over the past year? I know I myself have on Chipolte Burritos and Gasoline to name a few. Now Chipolte ok was only 10 cents but Gas that has jumped a dollar or more depending on they day seeing it was $2.50 a year ago Labor Day. Now that is a lot, but is this real a lot. I have heard about corn, rice and some other grains going up and even hay. I received a letter in the mail from an Organization that buys rice in 2000lbs. bags. They have seen the price jump from $340 a bag to $700 thus the cost of the meals they make have jumped from 15cents a meal to 17 cents. Now multiple that by the millions of meals they make. I think you get the idea. This led me to contact a friend and ask him about the price of corn. He has seen the price of corn in the last two years go from $2 a bushel to as high as $7 a bushel to where it currently sits at about $5.74. Now here is a quote from him, but I am not going to use his name for privacy sake “Because of the government ethanol mandate, global demand and a weak dollar corn prices have gotten higher than ever in the last two years.”
So my thought was this is kind of affecting me but I knew more because of past experiences and trips. See the boy in this picture? Well, he also has a type of inflation in his life. It is his stomach. Now I doubt this is because he ate to much like I did in the Boundary Waters this past weekend. No it is probably the start of Malnutrition. I met with a couple very smart people the last day or so to probe and find more information on a problem I already knew existed in a country I care about greatly. Well, this is what I found out. Corn in the Borana region of Ethiopia where I have visited both in 2007 and 2008 and where this boy is from, usually ranges from 50-150 Burr (their currency about 9Burr to 1 US dollar) depending on the drought and production and such. This guy has lived there for years and said this is the norm. I take him as a creditable source for this information. When he left Ethiopia this year corn was at 600 Burr. Now granted I don’t know the units of how much for this but I don’t care as of now. I thought about this, my gas that I complain about going from $2.50 a gallon to $10.00 a gallon or maybe even $15.00 a gallon that is 6 times as the corn in Borana is. Now this gas problem for me is an inconvenience if it got worse and would probably change some of my living habits to riding the bus, carpooling and other extra curricular activities would go away, but for the Borana people group and others like them it is a life or death sort of problem as they can’t afford to eat three meals a day maybe not even two some maybe four a week who knows.
So my thought was this is kind of affecting me but I knew more because of past experiences and trips. See the boy in this picture? Well, he also has a type of inflation in his life. It is his stomach. Now I doubt this is because he ate to much like I did in the Boundary Waters this past weekend. No it is probably the start of Malnutrition. I met with a couple very smart people the last day or so to probe and find more information on a problem I already knew existed in a country I care about greatly. Well, this is what I found out. Corn in the Borana region of Ethiopia where I have visited both in 2007 and 2008 and where this boy is from, usually ranges from 50-150 Burr (their currency about 9Burr to 1 US dollar) depending on the drought and production and such. This guy has lived there for years and said this is the norm. I take him as a creditable source for this information. When he left Ethiopia this year corn was at 600 Burr. Now granted I don’t know the units of how much for this but I don’t care as of now. I thought about this, my gas that I complain about going from $2.50 a gallon to $10.00 a gallon or maybe even $15.00 a gallon that is 6 times as the corn in Borana is. Now this gas problem for me is an inconvenience if it got worse and would probably change some of my living habits to riding the bus, carpooling and other extra curricular activities would go away, but for the Borana people group and others like them it is a life or death sort of problem as they can’t afford to eat three meals a day maybe not even two some maybe four a week who knows. So I asked more questions and probed farther. Like how do to support this region to prevent this and reach kids the kids for Christ? The options and answers are out there we just need to find them. Other areas of the world have problems also and you can see some on my links on the right of the page of projects and ways to help. I particularly have a passion and a heart for the Borana because I visited there and have friends there and maybe many of you do also or would like to hear more. Just contact me and let me know and I will go deeper into what I have learned. I am extremely blessed to live and be given what I have to this point in my life.
Here is some information and articles I have read as of late.
This is a new one. Check out some of the articles really made me think.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Faith
1Cor 13:2b if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing.Could you imagine having enough faith to move those mountains. There have been times that I have thought my faith was strong only to have my world shaken a little to make me go searching and even doubt at times. This is an amazing growth and learning experience even though it surely isn’t fun. In the end it is all that much more worth it when I look back. Lee Strobel says “ I knew that my fundamental trust in Jesus would be stronger, surer, more confident, more steadfast because it had been refined through the purifying fire of doubt.” Now think of this. How powerful fire truly is and yet how dangerous it can be if it gets out of control. Lee Strobel also says in the next page of The Case for Faith “If doubt and faith can co-exist, then this means people don’t have to fully resolve each and every obstacle between them and God in order to have an authentic faith.”
I find great comfort in knowing that I don’t need to know all the answers but that I just need to have faith in Him and Him alone. Now this also is not always easy so I don't want you to think this is just like a simple walk in the park.
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