Daily writing prompt

What’s the coolest thing you’ve ever found (and kept)?

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The strangest thing I’ve ever found (and kept) was my heart strangely warmed. The same thing happened to a guy named John Wesley in 1738. This is what he wrote in his journal:

“In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death. I began to pray with all my might for those who had in a more especial manner despitefully used me and persecuted me. I then testified openly to all there what I now first felt in my heart.”

One evening in 1970 I went very unwillingly to a Spirit-led Christian gathering at the University of Tennessee Martin, where people were describing the change which God had worked in their heart through faith in Christ. I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation. I then testified openly to all there about the presence and reality of the risen Jesus who I was now feeling in my heart. I’ve kept that awareness of the living Jesus and His presence in me ever since that day.

It’s time to abandon half-hearted Christianity! Let’s replace it with hearts that are strangely warmed and kept continually on fire for Jesus, day and night.

Christian minds have been poisoned by “cozy quiet time Christianity.” It’s time to move beyond “the domesticated church of corrupted Christendom” and to boldly proclaim and demonstrate the presence, power, love, and kingdom of the living Jesus in the same way the first century Christ-followers did. (The quotes in this paragraph are from Seedbed Wake-Up Call.)

Poisoned minds persistently prefer their own perspective and resist the antidote of truth and love. To purse God’s righteousness and His kingdom we must abandon all hope in our own righteousness (and/or the righteousness of our nation) and instead humbly embrace His perspective: “There is none righteous, no not one.” That involves a lifetime of deep repentance and radical surrender to Christ’s presence, Christ’s will and Christ’s perspective.