July 31, 2003
Wait
So as long as everyone keeps bringing up Christie anyway I figured it was about time to just do a post on it...
A huge lesson that I have learned in the last week and a half is how greatful I am that I waited as long as I did to talk to her. Not only was it definitely smart to consider the counsel of those who have influence in my life but also simply because now I could never evalutate her as I did.
I spent the summer praying for her from across this little pond that sits between my apartment and hers and that was a really good distance. From there I could look over her life and character and see the good and the bad, I could watch her work out her relationships with other guys and girls, and I could test my own thoughts and intentions while they were unmuddied.
Through the last week and a half we have grown closer. We have talked more and spent more time together alone then we really ever had. This has been a very good thing because it has allowed us to know each other in a new way.
This also has done something interesting to the whole evaluation process. Her character and life are a lot harder to look at objectively and evaluate from six inches away. I just can't get as wide a view. I need to depend on the things that I saw in her over the last 15 months and trust that God is continuing in them.
One thing that I can do, though, is lead her more closely. I can call her more strongely to be pursuing God and I can challenger her to be the women that he has created her to be. And that is a wonderful thing and I love doing it. (Hopefully she loves getting it as much.)
So you can pray that God would lead our relationship and he would develop it at his speed. That God would lead us both into following him more closely through this, and that we would both dream and pray about how far he can take us together.
Posted by paul at 01:25 PM | Comments (4)
July 28, 2003
Complicated
I have always considered myself to be a rather complicated person. With many varied layers and lots of depth I have always been beyond anyone else's comprehension much less my own. I was thinking tonight that maybe I am not all that complicated after all. I mean yeah sure you'll never be able to fully predict what I will say or do, and there is no way that you could chart all of my experiences or the things that I have learned over the last 23 years. But really my life comes down to several simple motivations. Areas and questions that when the rest of my actions and intentions are played against they come out in categories.
Now I am not entirely sure if everything fits into the categories bellow, because this is a new idea for me. So bear with me as I fathom the depths:
1. I desire to know God.
This is an inate desire to know the one that created me and worship him for all that he has done for me.
2. I desire to make God known
This is a desire to share the gift of relationship that I have been given.
3. I desire to enjoy God.
In that is the desire to enjoy his creation
and part of his creation would be other people.
And that is about it. Even eating and sleeping fall into the category of enjoying his creation. It has all become clear.
But now that I look at it...
Each of those things are in themselves increadibly complicated and deep. I guess I'll have to spend another 23 years figuring out how to do them. At least 23 years...
Posted by paul at 11:34 PM | Comments (10)
July 26, 2003
The Seashell Pt 2
I think that having significance is closely linked to being respected. If you have a great deal of significance people will respect you and treat you accordingly. Obviously so it is with the converse in that if you are respected as a person then you will be attributed with significance.
So then where is the origin of respect and significance?
I can give things significance because significance has been given to me. There is only one that has significance on his own. He in himself is significant and needs no other verification. There are a couple of important lessons that can be drawn out of this:
1. Your value and significance should be drawn mostly from a single source. Other people can try and put you down or make you feel insignificant but in reality they have no power other then to talk at you. You can let them build you up and give you respect but you cannot base your value on the significance given to you by humans. The eternal giver of significance is never changing and always faithful in telling us that we are valuable to him and therefore ultimately significant.
2. As we have been given value we need to give it to others. When we tell someone else that we believe in them and what they are doing, we trust them with our possessions, or we simply say: “I love you” with genuineness then we can give them a tangible boost (If they accept it.) This is a duty we have to each other before God. Let’s pass on the significance and respect to those around us…
(P.S. When originally thinking of this I was thinking of #2 and the relationships around me.)
Posted by paul at 01:06 PM | Comments (2)
July 25, 2003
The Sea Shell
I was walking along the beach here in Florida the other day and I saw a not so unusual sight, a shell half buried in the sand. Reaching down I picked it up and washed it clean in the surf rubbing the dirt and sand from its surface. It was, I guess, a beautiful thing if you like shells but really not extravagant. It was simple and small sitting there in the middle of my palm a light creamy white color with purple flecks out near the edge blended with a darker cream. The front edge had been damaged slightly from the force and consistency of the waves. It was unique, there were others similar but this one was totally its own and yet laying there in the sand it had no value. It was simply the cast off exterior to a dead crustacean.
But when I lifted that shell from the sand something about it changed. Its size, shape and color did not change. It did not sprout wings, begin to speak, or even draw breath and live. But now that little seashell was different then any other on the beach. I gave that seashell significance when I made it my own. Within that action I gave it the value that I have by making it my possession. I made this seemingly ordinary shell significant only because it was mine. I took it not in spite of its blemishes but because of them. I washed it and made it clean. You could say that I gave it my name, accepted it, and changed its place in the world.
That seashell had done nothing to deserve my attention or my gift. But I chose it over all others to make my own. I made that shell something when I picked it up. I made it mine.
Posted by paul at 11:23 AM | Comments (6)
July 24, 2003
The Adventure Begins
So every now and again you will have to put up with a bit of my poetry. I realize that you very well will not enjoy it but well its my website and I can do what I want. Please don't cease your visits to this site on account of them. :) I am not even a budding Shakespeare in any sense, all I wish to do is express my thoughts and feelings. I have been doing this for awhile mostly for my own mental health and amusement.
But anyway this is from the fireworks that I saw last night at Universal Studios...
Screaming through the sky as acrobats
twisting turning blowing fire and spark
cris crossing in a delicate dance these fireworks
and so my heart follows them in their gleeful rush
The music swells and sweeps away my stare
as breath rushes in and out
frantic to escape this war torn battlefield of the mind
but now peace is the King
That which is patience and kind pulls and goads me
and my heart like a new babe tests out its lungs
my body moves through water
and yet my mind cannot keep pace
your reality stuns me
as nothing ever berfore
I close my eyes and can still feel you
and for that treasure I will sing
Posted by paul at 09:02 AM | Comments (6)
July 23, 2003
Random Thoughts
So its sunny down here in Florida today, and the world is bright. I am off to Universal Studios Islands of Adventure and am looking forward to a day full of surprises!! ;)
So here is what you can do:
Share your earliest happy memory.
One of my earliest happy memories was sitting on the front porch of our red duplex in Ames, Ia and my mom cutting my hair. She promised me grapes or m&m's or something if I sat still. I remember the hair tickling my ears and the sun through the trees. There was a big english sheep dog nextdoor that bit my sister at sometime during our 3-4 years there. But it was a happy time, before the cares of the world had come crashing in.
During highschool I actually wrote a poem about this experience. My teacher really like it and read it to the class. So there you are, my early memory.
Posted by paul at 09:18 AM | Comments (4)
July 18, 2003
Point of Salvation
I have heard a lot of debate lately about a person’s point of salvation. Since last summer and then continuing on this summer I have heard over and over again how we don’t need to be able to point to a specific moment when we accepted Christ. I don’t know if you have ever been in a conversation about this but it gets tangled in God’s sovereignty, man’s free will, and that whole Romans 10:9-10 pray this prayer business.
I think that this whole issue springs from a reaction that Christians have had to those of us who attempt to pin someone down and tell them that if they do not have a specific “point of salvation” where they were broken, repentant and prayed a specific prayer then they really are not saved. So the animated response to this direct and often punishing theory is to swing wide and tell young believers that they don’t need a specific moment of redemption. A definite danger here is to shy away from even telling people that they need to pray the prayer mentioned in Romans, or at least follow the guidelines and standards that it sets forth for belief.
It is impossible for me to believe that to God there is not a moment of salvation. Even to those who claim to be saved through a process or length of time or maybe grew up in a faithfilled home and have “always believed” have a time when they passed from death into life. If they died somewhere in that process where would they go? For those who say that they prayed a prayer when they were a kid but did not follow God until their high school years then the question is: Did the process of refinement by the holy Spirit start with that prayer? Or did it start when you got into a community of faith in high school were encouraged in your walk and actually started living your life for Christ?
Now an obvious solution to whether someone is actually saved is that only God really knows. We can only look at the fruit of a person’s life.
I am not suggesting that we hound people in an attempt to see if they are saved. I am not suggesting that we lay back in inaction letting people bumble their way until they hopefully find salvation. Lets just make sure that our response is to find the balance in the issue, to lead people to the bible and teach them it’s words about salvation and a right relationship with God, lets (in relationship and love) watch their life and “spur them on to love and good deeds”.
What do you think? I want a balanced opinion on this. Rip me apart! I want to know the truth even it I have to change my opinion. :)
Posted by paul at 11:10 AM | Comments (6)
July 16, 2003
Philippians
Did someone say Philippians? Man I love Philippians!!! It probably is my favorite book out of any book religeous or otherwise.
Teaching about humility, love, and again running that ol' race but without selfish ambition. I believe that it draws this beautiful line between selfish ambtion and righteous ambition. Jesus did not condem the "Sons of Thunder" for there ambtion to be the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven, instead he told them how to go about it.
So jump in and read about those fun Christians in Philippi. Ah so many good nuggets of wisdom and really so little time! I should study it again. :)
Posted by paul at 10:18 PM
July 15, 2003
Running the Race
Hebrews 12: 1 - 3 (NLT)
1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily hinders our progress. And let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us. 2 We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish. He was willing to die a shameful death on the cross because of the joy he knew would be his afterward. Now he is seated in the place of highest honor beside God's throne in heaven. 3 Think about all he endured when sinful people did such terrible things to him, so that you don't become weary and give up.
I want to run the race the rest of my life.
Recently in my life I have been thinking and dreaming (I guess you could say it is a developing passion) about running the race to win and finishing it. So many get bogged down with snags along the way. My desire is to look back after 50 years and to see those years filled with hard running after the prize. I want to like Paul have my life poured out like a drink offering. But how do I accomplish this when so many others have failed. I think that this verse can give us some great (but difficult to apply over the long haul) steps.
1. Throw off everything that hinders especially sin. If we are proactive in getting rid of the things in our lives that keep us from God we can obviously increase our speed. If we can eliminate the sin then we are even more free to accomplish the things God has for us.
2. How? By fixing our eyes on Jesus. Knowing where our focus should be. If we focus on trying to eliminate the sin and other distractions we trick ourselves into slowing down and not running. Not to say that we should ignore area’s in our lives that we need to work on but if our primary focus is the health of our relationship then we are able to continue in our journey.
3. Consider what Christ went through. Again that takes your eyes off of your own mournful situation. It gives the correct perspective and allows you to look towards the finish line and not just mope around waiting for things to get better before you take action.
Posted by paul at 03:32 PM
July 14, 2003
Great Day!
Blessed by your name when the sun is shining down on me and when the world is all as it should be!
Today I am celebrating Gods goodness in blessing me with life, joy and peace.
There is joy in the Lord!
Posted by paul at 11:57 AM
July 11, 2003
Judas - A redeptive thought
This comes from the recent events that I have been apart of:
Q: Did Judas have to die? Was he destined to hang himself? Did God need him to give up his life for the crime that he committed? And if he had not killed himself would he have just as much a claim to the grace of God that Peter did?
A: Through a brief study through scripture on the character of Judas and the prophecy surrounding his betrayal I am unable to find anything telling of his death. Peter refers back to Ps 109:6-20 when discussing the need for a replacement but there was nothing else.
In reference to the comparison to Peter it is important to notice that Christ committed to praying for Peter which he did not do for Judas.
He did however mention Judas in his prayer as the "one doomed for destruction"(NIV). But Gods grace can cover over any sin right? And how was Judas' betrayal that much worse then Peter's?
According to Billy Williams both Judas and Peter wept bitterly after their respective betrayals but I was unable to substantiate that claim.
According to John Gill Judas was entirely evil and never believed in the first place and so therefore got what he deserved.
Another thought for discussion is that Jesus appeared to the twelve after his resurrection. Did he appear to Judas? Am I “baking your noodle” yet? :)
That’s all I have for now…
(This was brought on from a comment by John Freeman about Judas and his chance to go on after failure.)
Posted by paul at 02:12 PM
July 10, 2003
So this is a blog
Like many people are recently doing I am also entering the weblog world. This is a place for me to post my thoughts and to recieve feedback from those who would contribute to this and add their own thoughts in compliment or contridiction of mine for both are welcome. I look forward to many a day full of interesting and amusing dialog... but for now chow...
Posted by paul at 11:37 AM