Romans 10:15

PlanetUNI Event on the 27th at Dallas Brooks Centre. It's going to be amazing! A celebration and an invitation to those who want to know more about Jesus. Come and see how un-boring He actually is. It's $5 per entry and starts at 7:30pm. There's going to be performances, praise and worship. Pastor Matt Fielder will be there to spice things up for ya! Presence of God will be there, it's going to be the best.

See u guys there!

Intimacy

To sum up, it's been a blog famine for me of late. =) So I actually haven't been reading blogs as well, let alone login to my own account and spend time posting.

However, I thought i should.

Intimacy - spending time with our Dad; chit-chatting; worshiping; listening; communing; loving; laughing; being transparent...whatever that word means to you.

How is our relationship with God going? Okay, let's put our tags as "leaders" aside for the moment. Let's not think about the amount of time we spend serving in church, practicing for worship services, or writing sermons. Let's forget about the number of people we're reaching out to.

Being a servant in the house and being a son of the House is a altogether different is it? (just learned about this at Inner Champ).

From out relationship with God, are we still entering His rest and Presence? Are we listening to what He has to show us? Does the thought of spending time with Him cause a spring to our step? See, I believe God wants us more than we can ever want Him. So much of the time we're like little brats who don't want to listen and think we know it all.

For those of us plagued by guilt, we NEED His Grace. Accept that we are not worthy (you prob don't have a prob with that), but also accept that His Grace is bigger than anything. The Cross is bigger than anything. Let's enter in everyday with that full assurance and confidence His Grace has given us. He's saying, "Come in and feast! Come in and hang out with me, the door is open! The curtain is torn; come, come! The entrance is free, it's been paid for!" See, we need to hold fast to that confidence and to be strong in the grace because the enemy will want to rob us of that. That will stop us building our relationship with God.

I constantly fight to keep my confidence in His grace. I'm not losing my relationship with God to the lies of the enemy anymore. Who's voice are we listening to?

JC.

Have No Fear

Got this from a devotional I subscribe to, I have to admit I almost don't read it at all but just thought this was really good for a lot of us. Let's declare His promises! Heaven and earth shall pass away but His Word shall remain yea? When we have no confidence in ourselves and in our situation, it's His promises than can uphold us. =) Be blessed guys.

JC.

Worried? Pray!!

So also is My Word. I send it out and it always produces fruit.

Isaiah 55:11 TLB

Are you worried today? If you are, begin these words until they take root in your heart, awaken your faith, and become your fixed attitude towards GOD! This prayer will bring results!

“Father, you told me not to fear, for you are with me. You will strengthen me, you will help me, and you will uphold me with the right hand of your righteousness. You said those who rise up against me will be confounded. (Isaiah 41:10-11) You also said that no evil would befall me neither would any plague come near my dwelling, for you have given your angels charge over me to keep me in all my ways. (Psalms 91:10-11) You declared that when I walk through the rivers of difficulty, you won’t let me drown. When I walk through the fires of oppression I will not be burned for you are the LORD my GOD. (Isaiah 42:2-3)

“You said that no weapon that is formed against me will prosper and that you will silence every tongue that rises against me in judgement because I am you servant. (Isaiah 54:17) You promised that if I ask anything according to your will, you would hear me and that I could have it. (1 John 5:14-15) You said I am blessed when I go out and blessed when I come in. (Deuteronomy 28:6) You told me to cast all my cares on you and you would take care of me.” (1 Peter 5:7)

Adapted from A Fresh Word For Today
by Bob Gass

There's More Than One Christianity?

Found this in my study Bible during my devotion yesterday morning.

There are 4 types of Christianity (3 are distortions):
Judaized Christianity (distortion)
Definition: Christians are Jews who have recognized Jesus as the promised Savior. Therefore any Gentile desiring to become a Christian must first become a Jew.
Danger: Tends to add human tradition and standards to God's law. Also subtracts from the Scriptures God's clear concern for all nations.

Legalized Christianity (distortion)
Definition: Christians are those who live by a long of "dont's". God's favor is earned by good behavior.
Danger: Tends to make God's love something to earn rather than to accept freely. Would reduce Christianity to a set of impossible rules and transform the Good News into BAD news.

Lawless Christianity (distortion)
Definition: Christians live above the law. They need no guidelines. God's Word is not as important as our personal sense of God's guidance.
Danger: Forgets that Christians are still human and fail consistently when trying to live only by what they "feel" God wants.

True Christianity
Definition: Christians are those who believe inwardly and outwardly that Jesus' death has allowed God to offer them forgiveness and eternal life as a GIFT. They have accepted that gift through faith and are seeking to live a life of obedient gratitude for what God has done for them.
Danger: Avoids the above dangers.

What type of Christian are we?

Love At a Distance

My friend Trili told me last night that she always gets her revelations in the shower, as in like enlightenment.

I totally agreed.

Today, it happened again! U know what i realized? In the shower. I realized (at least for myself) that it's actually quite hard to love people that are really close to me. Realize how easy it is to "love" and have "compassion" for the people in Africa but hate you little brother? By people close to me i actually mean people that know me inside out, people that know my faults, my past, my REAL me. Not the me everyone that I'm nice to knows, but the me when I'm sulky, when I'm moody, when I'm bad. I use to think that I'd have to go through the whole awkward stage when they'll say, "What's the matter with you? Why are you suddenly so nice to me?"

Ok for me, that's awkward.

But this is the deal. For people that I hardly know, people that I watch from the tram stop, people that aren't exactly close friends - I find it easier to "love" and be "nice" to. And i was thinking about it, about myself. Know what I realized? Of course it's easier!! OF COURSE!! It dawned upon me like a warm shower on a winter morning. ;)!

It's easy to love at a distance because we can FAKE IT.

Well, there's really no responsibility. We hardly come into contact with them, we don't really have to care for their problems. We don't have to bear their burdens, we don't have to be patient with them. We don't have to clean up their mess, we don't have to SACRIFICE anything for them. All we do is just have a nice feeling about them. That's not love! That's faking it. The Bible tells us not to love with hypocrisy. In other words, if we think we can love the people in Africa, we'd better start loving those around us.

SO RANDOM YET SO GOOD!

love (the irony),
JC.

Tongue-tied no more!

I have three nieces - Emily, Allison & Ella (they are in order =D).

This week, I received an email from my sister-in-law telling the family news of a miracle! It's just amazing. Apparently, baby Ella has been been suffering from a tongue-tie. She's about 6 months old now and is still breast feeding. Basically, there was a piece of skin underneath her tongue that restricted the movement of her tongue tip. Understandably, this has caused her and her mom difficulty during feeding. The doctor's advice was to "snip it off". After church on Sunday, my bro and sis-in-law decided to pray for her healing. It seemed after the prayer that baby Ella's feeding had improved. =). Later on in the week, my sis-in-law sought the advice of Ella's maternal and child health nurse. Okay, the nurse knew the GP who diagnosed the tongue-tie and how a tongue-tie looked like. The symptoms described by my sis-in-law also all pointed to a tongue-tie.

AMAZINGLY when the nurse picked her up, she saw NO signs of a tongue-tie! The following week after that, baby Ella seemed to be sticking her tongue out all the time, something which a baby with a tongue-tie would find hard to do! Now, that's a miracle! There's God at work right there in this present age.

For all of us pressing on for healing, restoring, provision and all that. Our God is mighty to rescue!

JC.

Pointing Up!

I've been wanting to write about this for a while. It sort of dawned upon me one day, the fact that we are like arrows. Actually, we really are aren't we?

The lifestyle we make us like arrows that point at some direction doesn't or at something doesn't it? Okay, I'm rambling on but bear with me. =). I think what we say, how we react to things, the things we do and don't do rotates our life arrow and where it points to. For example when I think of Martin Luther King, his life arrow seems to be pointing at the under-privileged blacks of America; when I think of of Mother Teresa, her life arrow seems to be pointing to God, hope and the needy in India; when I think of David Beckham, his life arrow seems to be pointing at fame, hairstyles and soccer. It's just illustration, I don't really know either one of them well enough to be making valid statements like that.

But imagine ourselves - regardless of our job, physical appearance, social status, abilities, achievements, living as walking arrows that point to a Creator. In all we do and say and act just pointing to hope that lies in Jesus! That would be awesome wouldn't it.

Are we pointing to God? Are we pointing the hopeless to the Hope? Are we pointing the sick to the Healer? Are we pointing the lost to the Purpose? Are we pointing the confused to the Way? Are we pointing the lifeless to the Life?

How obvious are our arrows? Are they tiny or are the so big you could see them from a distance? Do people have to spend a week with us to find out or just a day?

OR, are we pointing to the world? Are we pointing to ourselves? Are we pointing to other solutions?

Don't know bout you but I desperately want to be pointing up. There's enough of us pointing everywhere else already. =).