Thursday, November 25, 2010

Thank you for...

Today is Thanksgiving. So, I just wanted to write God a thank you note. Here it is!

Thank you for:
Amazing family and friends
Breathtaking weather and beautiful days over the past month (rain included)
Christmas expectations!!!
Days off from school and work to enjoy
Excellent times in Your word, both in church and out
Fantastic moving experiences
Grace and peace and mercy for all of the stuff I do wrong
Hilarious conversations
Insomnia
Jesus!!
Knowledge of Your word in confusing days
Laughter (lots of it)
Massive amounts of coffee
Never feeling alone even when no one's around (also ninjas)
Obvious statements
Pleasant morning sunrises
Quests to find chocolate late at night
Radically changed attitude towards Cuesta
Samples at Trader Joe's and Costco
Typical Sundays
Unfailing love on Your part
Vacations
Wacky inside jokes that make no sense to anyone but you and the other person and last way too long for       their own good
X... I don't know how to play the xylophone... but apparently they're cool?
Your character
Z... You know what, I really like zebras. I saw one tackle a cheetah or some big cat on the Discovery channel and it was really awesome.

So clearly there are sooooo many other things to thank God for on a daily basis, and the book of Psalms is chock full of amazing examples, but for now I'm going to sleep. God bless all of those people who had to work tonight, I hope it went quickly and painlessly!

Friday, November 19, 2010

Challenge!

So I've been memorizing a verse every day for a few days, and it's a lot easier than it was when I was in Awanas (I was a Sparky then!). It's only been a couple days, but so far I've got James 1:19-20 ("So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath, for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God"), John 14:27 ("Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give. Let not your heart be troubled; neither let it be afraid."), of course I have Psalm 37:3-4 from a while ago ("Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the Lord and feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in His way and He will give you the desires of your heart."), and Philippians 4:8 ("Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy - meditate on these things"). I'm working on getting a whole chunk in, and I'm thinking about Matthew 6:25-34 (the section about not worrying and just trusting God). You would be surprised at how much it affects your day. Every time I feel myself getting frustrated, I can reference James, and if I start stressing about troubles in the future, out comes John and the Psalm. It's a great way to start off the day too, because instead of just skimming a few chapters, I can concentrate on what God is saying and actually get some meat.

So for all of my readers (all... like I have a hundred or something :p) I want you to try to memorize some verses over the next week. They don't have to be long, but I would go for memorizing verses that have impacted you - it makes it so much easier when it has a personal connection. Philippians 4:8 is one that impacted my life in a huge way because it was that verse that really made me establish my relationship with God. And you should tell me which ones you've memorized! I want to see how God's word is affecting you, it's so amazing to hear how God is working in personal ways.

God bless!

Friday, November 5, 2010

Fear of God

Yesterday I came across Psalm 76, which is one of my new favorites:


(The Majesty of God in Judgement) In Judah God is known; His name is great in Israel. In Salem also is His tabernacle, and His dwelling place in Zion. There He broke the arrows of the bow, the shield and sword of battle. You are more glorious and excellent than the mountains of prey. The stouthearted were plundered; they have sunk into their sleep; and none of the mighty men have found the use of their hands. At Your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both the chariot and horse were cast into a dead sleep. You, Yourself, are to be feared; and who may stand in Your presence when once You are angry? You caused judgement to be heard from heaven; the earth feared and was still, when God arose to judgement, to deliver all the oppressed of the earth. Surely the wrath of man shall praise You; with the remainder of wrath You shall gird Yourself. Make vows to the Lord your God, and pay them; let all who are around Him bring presents to Him who ought to be feared. He shall cut off the spirit of princes; He is awesome to the kings of the earth.


I was reading through it and was struck by how revered God is in the author's eyes. I've been noticing in the past year or two that as a society we have ultimately committed the "unpardonable sin" ("Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man , it will be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come." - Matthew 12:32). Instead of giving God the respect that is due to Him, I see a trend of belittling Him, putting Him in the realm of humanity and dragging His name through the mud. There is a severe lack of reverence and ultimately fear of our Creator in the world today, and it's especially prevalent in the American culture.

Where has the fear of the Lord gone? How do we get it back? What is the fear of the Lord? I'm still trying to figure out the last two, because I've noticed that I'm one of those people who looks at God as my benefactor, best friend, and doting Father, but who's left out the part where Mt Sinai was moved by His very presence (Ps 68), or when God broke the Leviathon's heads and fed them to His people (Ps 74), or when He parted an entire body of water for the Israelites, or when He would strike even His high priest dead if the man had sin in His heart. The God who did all of that (and sooooo much more) deserves more than our fleeting love and temporary devotion. The God who delivered His chosen people from the Egyptians, who appeared to Moses and wrestled with Jacob, who flooded the earth and who rained fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorra should be feared. This fear isn't the kind where we start screaming in terror; this fear that we should feel for God is more of a deep, deep reverence mixed with the understanding that God is supreme, absolutely holy, and has the ability to wipe us off the face of the earth for our sins. 

I get that things have changed, since we are able to rely on the gift of salvation offered when Jesus died for us, but the unfortunate side effect since then is that we become complacent in the fact that our sins are forgiven. We can basically make little booboos and nothing will happen, unless we continue in the sin and it grows big enough to separate us from God. There will always be consequences and God has made that abundantly clear in my life at least, but after the consequence, we're back under the "Jesus umbrella" and we feel untouchable. We have lost the reverence and fear and respect for our Lord in today's society, and it breaks my heart that out of the whole world, it seems that Christians are the ones who spread the loss of respect. I am absolutely guilty of this. I have no idea how to put the genuine fear of God into my heart because I've spent so much time  using humor and the band-aid of God's grace to define my relationship with Him. There are definitely times where I've felt that fear and respect, but it isn't there all the time.

I'm going through the Old Testament right now and one thing I've noticed is that the Israelites experienced the best place in their lives when they respected and feared God, but once they lost that element of respect, their focus turned to themselves and things went downhill. I can't help but feel that the world is on this downhill spiral, where we all think that God is our best buddy who wants us to have whatever feels good and who accepts our sins in the name of love. We don't even know that we're missing out on the different facets of God's character because we're so busy promoting God's "love" to people who are trapped in sin instead of actually loving them enough to give them the lifeline they need. We don't have the proper fear of God in our lives. I rarely refer to Him as my Mighty King, or the God of Jacob, and I rarely remember just how awesome His power is and just how mighty He is. My prayer is that He'll give me reason to remember and experience how powerful He is, and that He'll give me the ability to fear and respect Him more than I do now.

God bless.