Freedom Guns and Jesus

“The Church has not taught us properly, but much of what she has taught us is proper.” – Christian

Definitions of PROPER (1-3 not applicable)

I sat through a re-run of the sermon that prompted me to write the Inheritance post a while back.  It was interesting though, this time my pastor told a story of a man who was radically saved from addictions and wild living, got straightened out, fell back into sin, and then was offered a chance to come clean again, to which he replied, “I don’t know if I want to do that”.  A week later he died, and another believer commented to the pastor, “The Lord showed me that he took ____ to save him”.  The pastor’s comment was, “I don’t know what you do with that in your theology!?”

Isn’t it clear?  If the flesh (being that person’s soul in that lifetime) sometimes cannot be restored, his soul will still be saved! How do I know?  Because the blood of my Jesus paid it all, the Word says so.

Remember (take the verse in context) that this is referring to a believer, lest one should misconstrue this to mean that all souls go to heaven.

Notice that the lifestyle does not call into question the sinners’ salvation, as so many Christians often do.  I am listing below several verses that show that believers fall and can in fact be “destroyed”… but don’t think that just because the enemy wins a few battles that salvation is lost. Because I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow–not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.

Conclusion:

Live a holy life out of love for your Creator, gratefulness to your Redeemer, and respect for the Counselor. Not for fear of destruction, judgment, or ex-communication.  Don’t call sin OK.  Sin is sin.  The Bible still tells us to let no unwholesome talk come out of our mouths, that beer is not for kings, and that we shouldn’t cause others to sin.  Yes, we need to rid the church of those in intentional disobedience, deceit and those who pridefully refuse to repent, but for Pete’s sake (remember Peter, the guy who said he’d never disown Christ and wept bitterly at the rooster’s crow?) can we focus on the good that we can do instead of the bad that we do-do (get it… doodoo).

I have included the verses below to show that this post is not an argument to keep on sinning, nor an excuse for sin.  In fact, to keep on sinning you would certainly cause others to sin as a natural consequence.  When the Bible says something three times, we should look at it carefully:

Now I ask, what’s “better” about being drowned?  Come on now!  Again, if you think it through, the destruction of our life here on Earth can not be “better” unless our soul is saved in the end!

What happens when a trusted person is found out to be unfaithful? I guess that depends on your perspective.  Normally, betrayal leaves us angry, hurt, bitter, and less likely to trust again.

I have children.  I expect them to be children.  I’m not shocked when they lie, cheat or disobey– they are children, and that’s what children do.  Of course the action needs to be corrected, discipline (consequences) applied, and then there is a loving restoration of the relationship, where trust is earned back over time.

Adult humans sin.  Surprised?  You shouldn’t be.  When a trusted adult is caught in unfaithfulness, sinful activity, or some other butt-headed behavior, you have a choice on how you react.  A wise man once said, “be the rock that the wave breaks upon”.  I have seen people fall apart, remain angry and hurt and worse, due to the sin of another adult.  It seems to me that if this is the case, that too much trust was placed in the individual who did the hurting.

Codependency (or co-dependence, co-narcissism or inverted narcissism) is a tendency to behave in overly passive or excessively care-taking ways that negatively impact one’s relationships and quality of life.

We need to be careful not to depend on another human to fill needs that God himself should be filling.

How long does it take to repent? This is a heart-action that cannot be judged.

How long does it take to forgive? Does it depend on how bad the hurt is?

Every sin was paid for through and at the time of the passion of Christ.

When my daughter “sins”, our relationship is not broken.  She is still my daughter, I am simply waiting for her apology, in other words, for  her to repent.  Then the love and forgiveness that was ALREADY THERE (before the action) immediately begins to restore trust.  Lessons have been learned, and there will be more trials in the future, if we continue to have a relationship.

Don’t waste time being hurt by the actions of another.  Their process carries enough shame and guilt to out-weigh your pain.  If you gave them the best years of your life, they already owe you.  When you give them the power to cause you additional pain, you join in their process in an unhealthy way, and you have your own process to attend to.  If you’re angry, its probably because you didn’t see it coming.  If you missed the signs along the way, then most likely, you’re really angry at yourself for being so blind and vulnerable.

Two nights ago, I deleted my Angry Birds in Rio app from my Droid…. Well, it was actually 5 am.

I spent much of the next sleepy day wondering what made that game so addicting, and why I would keep on trying to get to the next level.

I also spent two hours in a park, meditating with my eyes closed, seeing images of things falling, crashing… just one more monkey…

(hang on, I’ll get there in a minute)  A few weeks ago, I watched a documentary on dreams.  It seems that after running a maze for several days, a rat will actually run the maze during the REM phase of his sleep (I’m serious, they actually wired this little rat’s brain and mapped it out on a visual computer screen!)  It seems that during the sleep I missed while playing Angry Birds in Rio, I should have been trying to work out the events of my life, learning how to do it better the following day, a form of virtual life experience if you will.  I beat the system–I learned more from Angry Birds.

Anger:  A very motivating force.  What else will get you to try, try again to lob little kamikaze birds into rocks, bricks, boards, metal cages and vicious vampire monkeys?  There are always way too many birds to free or monkeys to kill, and you have to keep getting better at it to get to the next level.

Strategy:  You only have a small number of birds to use as bombs, bullets, etc. (how sick is that?)  Throw in obstacles–some moving, all falling, some that will rearrange to make a stronger barrier; so it is mentally stimulating to figure out exactly where the bird has to hit the pile of stuff to cause one of three events:

(Motivation:) …Free a bird (a truly noble cause), damage as much stuff as you can to drive your score up, or kill a monkey.  If you think about it, it appeals to  good (promote freedom), neutral (raise the score), and evil (KILL those damn monkeys) desires in our psyche.

The Slippery Slope:  I find it interesting that the first level was all about freeing trapped little innocent birds.  The second level was about killing vampire monkeys.  I didn’t play long enough to find out what was next for fear of having to bust through a moral barrier (not to mention the need for sleep.)

There is no such thing as a mindless game (, activity, relationship, career, etc.).  When we are not smart enough to keep from getting sucked into activities like Angry Birds (or Facebook), we need to consider who or what we are using as ammunition, what is our true motivation, and whether the reward is worthy of  what we will need to sacrifice or compromise to attain it.

Wow.  I am in the toughest spiritual/physical season of my entire adult life.

I’ve been trying for 20 minutes to start this post, and I just can’t yet.  There are too many variables.

I will say, for the two of you who follow this blog, that my reason for not writing is not that nothing’s happening.

I developed this blog as a journal, a place to post my firmly held-beliefs.  Well, all bets have been off the last few months as things firmly held have fallen into the refiner’s fire and they’re not done cooking yet.

I’m not comfortable with where I am.  I am in process.  It’s hard.  It goes against so much of who I thought I was or should be by now.

For now, it’s awesome to know that my God is on the throne, and my wife is by my side.  Everything else ……

I’m finally starting to see deeper into the Word.  I was reading Matthew 27 this morning, where Judas, full of remorse tries to return the money to the chief priests and elders who arrested Jesus.  They would not take it directly, so Judas threw the 30 pieces of silver into the temple and went to hang himself.  They then picked it up, and being bound by their religion, said “‘It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money.’  So they decided to use the money to buy the potters field as a burial place for foreigners”, thus fulfilling what was written in Zechariah 11:12-13.

What I noticed about the scripture 11:12-13 is that it has three consecutive numbers, so I read what came before and after the scripture:

Here’s what I found:

 ¹⁰ Then I took my staff called Favor and broke it, revoking the covenant I had made with all the nations. ¹¹ It was revoked on that day, and so the oppressed of the flock who were watching me knew it was the word of the LORD.

 ¹² I told them, “If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.” So they paid me thirty pieces of silver.

 ¹³ And the LORD said to me, “Throw it to the potter”—the handsome price at which they valued me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them to the potter at the house of the LORD.

 ¹⁴ Then I broke my second staff called Union, breaking the family bond between Judah and Israel.

Here’s what I learned:

1.   The action of the religious leaders that day as they rejected the Son, coincided with God’s plan for a New Covenant.  The old covenant was legally broken with the action of the betrayal, purchase, rejection of the “blood money” and ultimately, the purchase of the potters field, which was then called the “field of blood” which was used as a “burial place for foreigners”.

2. Choice and rejection pave the way for grace.  God always gave the Jews a choice, and they have almost always rejected Him.  God’s favor was turned away from His chosen people many times throughout the old testament, (He even put his favor on Babylon for a time to carry out the punishment for that rejection).

3. Under the New Covenant, the blood of Christ provided for foreigners – gentiles.  Remember when Christ told the woman at the table that he came for the children of Israel?  The rejection of Christ and the money exchange to break the covenant is part of the pre-ordained opening of the gospel to non-Jews.  The purchase of the place to bury foreigners is the prophetic act that demonstrates that the Blood was for people of all nations.

4.  Union was broken.  From this point on, many Jews would follow Christ, and many would remain religious pharasees who would continue to reject the new covenant.

I’ve been taking more time to pray in the mornings, and since I have been gifted with a prayer language that I cannot understand, it makes it easier to pray for extended periods of time, but also a bit–well, frustrating that I often have no idea what I’m praying for.   I lend my toungue to the Holy Spirit for His purposes in the Earth.

So I was about 50 minutes in the other day, and I asked God to allow me to understand what it was I was praying.  Immediately, my prayer language changed (it was a much lighter sound with lots of Ls and As) and I got a picture in my mind of Angels being released from heaven, kind of like one of those huge flocks of birds that take off during migration.  They were headed to go to war over some Middle East strongholds.

How did I know this?  Immediately following that, I got a memory of when I was sitting in the desert 19 years ago.  I was a Marine, on listening post out in front of my platoon which was an advance party going to prepare the next positon for 3 Mar Div HQ Batallion.  The ground was hard, I was only half dug-in, meaning my fighting hole was only about 3 feet deep.  We were a small force of about 30 men, and my commander had taken my rifle, and replaced it with a 9mm pistol and a radio.  As LP, I was the furthest out front, and responsible for calling in anything unusual.  As a radio man, I had to learn the codes and language of a radio operator.

Sometime in the middle of the night, I heard the sound of a lot of tanks approaching.  I called it back to HQ, and they did some quick intel and called in Marine Air Force to obliterate somewhere around 300 Iraqi tanks that were headed to a town called (I can’t spell it) khafchi.

So I started to compare the events of that physical experience to where I am today.  With my finances and business, I am definitely only half “dug in”. With my prayer language, I have learned some new code, with my faith experiences, many would call me “way out there”.  I am listening.  My mission is to stop the destruction of a rampaging yet under-equipped enemy, and I am an outside force willing to fight for foreigners who are oppressed.

I find it interesting that I am now, 19 year later, living out spiritually the physical events I have lived out as a young Marine.

Semper Fi.

Did you ever consider how much of our experiences are prophetic?  Foreshadowing, for you non-christian intellectual types.

A few nights ago, I was working in the office at 12:30 am.  I heard ungodly screaming coming from my master bedroom, and my first thought was, “wow, that sounds demonic!”  It was just a couple of cats.

A black cat had entered our home and got into our bedroom before our resident kitty, Isaac realized his presence and sounded the alarm.  It was an awful way for my wife to wake up! I go flying down the hall, flip on the light, the black cat tries to scurry out past me when the light came on so I pinned it to the floor with my left hand.  I was more than a little forceful and trying not to get scratched, the cat was more than a little forceful as it was fighting to breathe, and after a towel being placed over the cat, a firm grasp and delivery downstairs and a long toss out the front door, our home was put back to it’s normal peaceful state.

What bothered me about the situation is that I actually considered just holding the cat’s throat shut until it expired, and then tossing it into my garbage can.  I was so outraged about the intrusion into my home, waking up my family, my own (minor) loss of blood.  That cat had caused prior infections for my poor declawed kitty in the past, and killing it seemed a convenient solution to future problems.  Fortunately for the cat, it was able to walk away.  After my wife’s comments about how sweet that kitty is when it’s not on our property, I was glad I didn’t take vengeance into my own hands.

OK, so what’s the prophetic peice?  Sin enters our environment often when we are most vulnerable, groggy, our defenses are down and we are usually the most unprepared when temptation or circumstances invade our space.  I think you can agree that a black cat at midnight mayrepresent sin in this analogy.  Our response, if we are not exercising self-control with a sound mind, may be a little extreme–or a lot extreme.  We are responsible to take action and toss out the invader, but it is not a proper or acceptable response to allow anger and rage (even righteous indignation) to cause our behavior to slip even further into a different type of sin.  Unfortunately, this is what Christians often do.

Thank you, black kitty, for the life-lesson.  I am praying for your recovery as my scratches heal.

I was praying this morning, confessing a familiar sin, considering how the guilt of repeated failure in a given area leaves me feeling anxious and -well, claustrophobic.   Really?  Are the two related?  I have on occasion dealt with a sudden onslaught of claustrophobia; the last time was when I saw the news online about the rescued mine workers and thought about being trapped underground and then having to get into that tiny basket.  I have been praying for the root of that fear to be revealed and I think I may have run across it today.

Remember that I have been praying to (as a prince of the Kingdom) be raised up and walk above the systems of this world that are controlled by evil?  Those systems include health, finances, emotions, legal realms, and religion.  Well, I was dealing with the guilt associated with failure, and slipped into the part of my prayer where I tell Jesus that I really don’t mean to cheapen his sacrifice on the cross (his shed blood) by my repeated sin, and then it hits me…. that’s total religious garbage.  That mindset is like a Jewish Hedge Law designed to keep weak men from sinning or using grace as an excuse to keep sinning. 

The truth is that what Jesus did on the cross (yes, was for us and our sin, but) is so far above our actions, that there is nothing we can do to cheapen that grace.  It is the rock that our sinful waves break on, that we can eventually climb up on top of to get out of the sea of repetitive waves of sin and guilt.

So, as so many of the world’s systems are inter-working, there have been things woven into religion that actually keep us bound.  Here’s the connector:  Some of us Christian entrepreneurs have had greatness prophesied over us and truly believe that we will break through and become successful…. after we become who we need to become to be successful.   In comes temptation and sin to beat us down, and some have bought into the lie that our blessing is conditional on our ability to overcome sin.  Well in a way, that may be sort of true, as our actions have consequences, but the notion that we cannot ever be successful until we have overcome sin is utterly ridiculous.  It is that very guilt reasoning that makes it so EASY for the enemy to hit us with temptation and watch us mentally, emotionally and spiritually roll back down to the bottom of the hill in defeat, not expecting any blessing, and therefore not achieving it.

I declare that the blood of Jesus is more than adequate and in full effect in my life.  I am no longer a slave to sin or the guilt associated with it.  Life is a long war with many battles.  The Kingdom wins in the end, and losing an occasional battle is inevitable as long as we stay in the fight.  To get demoralized at the loss of a single small battle shows serious lack of faith in the commander, who orders our steps onto every battlefield.

If you’re still looking for a logical link back to claustrophobia, I’m sorry, this is how things of the heart are often revealed and why so few get free.  Looking for the root of the issues requires looking at seemingly unrelated events and issues.  And somehow for me, guilt is the root of this fear that manifests as claustrophobia.

When Galatians 5:19-20 (“that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”) comes out in a sermon, it is often used to “separate the sheep from the goats” and cause one believer to declare that other belivers will not be saved.

Is it possible that “salvation” is different from “inheriting the Kingdom“?  Strongs helps because most instances of the greek word include a true inheriting what is yours by right, something of value that you take ownership of, but there is also the concept of “being a partaker of” or to paraphrase, “to experience”.

In the spirit of not being able to reconcile seeming contradictory scripture, preachers often say “the Bible says this, and the Bible says that, and I’m just preaching the Bible!” .  Exposure to scripture is great, but so is searching out the deeper hidden truth that will bridge the gap, remove the conflict between scriptures, and lend a logical explanation to non-christians who arm themselves with defenses about christians being hipocrytical, judgemental and gullible (accepting too much on faith). 

So I asked the Lord to give me scripture to help me understand this concept of inheritance vs. salvation.  Here’s what I got:

1. The Prodogal Son:  It’s in Luke 15, if you want to look it up. Concepts:  The son blew his inheritance by turning to the pleasures of the world, but he never stopped being a son.  He was part of the family, and returned with full acceptance, but the father said to the faithful son, “all that I have is yours”.  In essence, he was saying, “Stop complaining about your brother, whom I have accepted back.  His inheritance is gone, but we will still have him here in our family, in relationship, and allow him to enjoy the benefits of membership, without ownership.”

2. Joseph, after he was sold into slavery, worked out his salvation.  His faithfulness to God in all his crazy situations EARNED him great authority or inheritance in Egypt, when God’s chosen people (Joseph’s family) who did not earn squat, but in fact had tried to harm Joseph, only got to enjoy membership and provision, not authority.  They were rescued from destruction even after thier evil actions toward Joseph: that’s a picure of grace!

3.  All the verses in the Bible like this one: “And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according to his work.” (Rev. 22:12, and many others) clearly give a concept of higher reward for those who faithfully “work out ther salvation…”.  How can you have levels of reward if the Kingdom is like an on/off switch, saved or unsaved.

4. Luke 23:43 where the [undisputed] criminal defends Jesus to the accusing other criminal, Jesus says those famous words.  “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”  Did Jesus lie?  Didn’t that man have a bad lifestyle?  Did he even repent before he died?  He simply identified with Christ.  Jesus did not say, “surely, you will inherit the Kingdom”.  The gift of salvation through the shed blood of Christ and a heart turned toward him was sufficient for entry INTO the Kingdom, and I believe it still is today.

More and more, as we learn how big the Universe is, I hear believers talking about God giving us authority over his creation, judging angels, ruling in the new Millennium, etc.  I don’t have all that figured out, but here’s what I do believe:

1.  The blood of Jesus is rich and generous, and the gift of salvation is based on HIS action grace to our choice.

2. Inheritance of the Kingdom at any level should be motivation enough to leave any lifestyle of sin, or justification of it.

3. I would never say anthing to cause people to question their salvation, other than getting them to say the prayer again if they never remember doing it.  The enemy will use judgement based arguments to cause believers to give up the fight, if he can convince a christian that some sin will keep him out of the Kingdom.

4. God alone is qualified to judge the heart.

I learned how to tie my shoes last week.

No Joke.

I have this pair of leather shoes with rawhide laces, and they’d always come untied unless I’d tie a double knot.

I’ve been proud of myself for my entire life for being able to tie my shoes so fast.  I have always done it the normal way.  In fact, I used to look at the people who made a loop on both sides and then tied them with a  a square knot as sort of dumb, or slow.  Probably because it takes so long to do it that way, and I clearly knew a better way.  I think that I once found out that the slow way took longer to untie as well, and had written it off as useless years ago.

So here I am at 41 years old, and for the last 9 months I’ve been tying my rawhide laces the normal way, and then doubling it, and frankly, it just looks goofy for an adult business man to walk around with clearly double-tied laces–this big old knot of rawhide on some fairly expensive shoes.

For some strange reason, I have hit the season of re-evaluating EVERYTHING in my life, and I am glad to admit that I just learned to tie my shoes the slow way, the way that looks and functions much better.  I no longer look like the goofy computer geek with one untied shoe or two double-tied shoes.

Truth is, there are different times to tie your shoes different ways.  If you only have one way, you’re missing out.