Jesus unplugged?

Posted on December 15, 2021 by Steve Simms

Christianity was never meant to be unplugged from the presence and power of the living, resurrected Jesus Christ. A relationship with Jesus will go cold and formal if it isn’t continually revitalized. Is Jesus unplugged in your life?

When their heart grows cold, too many Christians wear an invisible sign that says, “Do not resuscitate.” If your lifestyle doesn’t show people that you love and obey Jesus, you won’t be able to convince them by your words.

If you have a relationship with Jesus, re-energize it daily by listening to and obeying Him. Let the living Jesus continually energize you so that His spiritual sparks fly and ignite you to new levels of excitement about Him.

Reading the Bible daily, with an open heart, continually helps me plug into the living Jesus and re-energizes my relationship with Him. Frequently praying in tongues does, too.

Many people excitedly anticipate Christmas Day. I excitedly anticipate what I get to see the living Jesus do every day.

If you fix your eyes
On the living Jesus,
He will continually
Revitalize
You.

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Get beyond the Babe . . .

Posted on December 14, 2021 by Steve Simms

They say Christmas is Christ’s birthday, but the living Jesus is rarely included in the festivities. It’s such an odd birthday celebration. It tends to either ignore Jesus or portray Him as a helpless infant. (To frequently portray a famous person as a baby doesn’t seem like a compliment.)

Advent?
God sent
Jesus,
Not to be
An annual event,
But a daily reality.

If Jesus isn’t
Actively living in me,
Advent is just
Empty liturgy.

Jesus’ intent
Wasn’t to start
Annual celebrations
Of Advent,
But to change hearts.

The “baby Jesus”
Who is the focus
Of Advent
Is the same Jesus
Who calls us to repent.

I always found religious candles and formal talks about Advent to be boring, but the living Jesus continually sets my heart ablaze! Get beyond the babe. Activate the living, resurrected Jesus in your heart!

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Feelings aren’t supposed to be mandates

Posted on December 13, 2021 by Steve Simms

If what’s on your mind
Is weighing you down,
Try putting it down
And drop the frown.

What you set your mind on eventually becomes your mindset and will set up like concrete. Set your mind right. Good or bad, the thoughts you let people plant in your head will grow deep roots and spread.

It’s hard to “get over it,” if you don’t know what “it” is that’s causing you pain. Be honest with yourself.

Unhappiness is like a hole in the ground. You can sit in it or find a way to climb out. The less self-aware I am, the happier I seem to be.

Feelings aren’t mandatory. Their inner tyranny can be resisted and overcome, instead of being surrendered to.

You’re the one who has to fight for your inner freedom. No one else can do that for you.

Some desires and emotions need to be shut down. Some need to be cultivated. Wisdom knows the difference.

Sincere kindness is beautiful. I love watching how it connects people heart-to-heart. Spread some beauty today. If someone says something you disagree with, instead of responding, compliment them. Say: “I can tell you’re a thinker.”

Good and evil contend within human beings, trying to win our attention and capture our behavior. Self-defense is needed most when we’re tormented within by thoughts and emotions, but that’s when many people give up.

Some people feel like they’re supposed to supply the world with insults, negativity, and profanity. Their words are best ignored. When people cuss, they announce that they have nothing logical to say.

As I read the Bible, I find it describing the inner struggles that I face and directing me to recovery, inner peace, and joy. Many reject the Bible because they don’t like some of what it says. I trust it because of the parts that deeply stir my heart.

Let the living Jesus
Be your inner guide
And lead you
From the inside.

You have to be alive to read,
But you can be dead
And still be read
When you’re gone.

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Verbal battles of the will or compassionate connections of the heart?

Posted on December 12, 2021 by Steve Simms

Our culture produces too many verbal battles of the will and too few compassionate connections of the heart. Unkindness won’t convince people that your opinion is right, but it might convince them that you’re rude.

Perhaps there are better ways to persuade people than with angry politics or physical violence. The Jewish people wanted a political or military solution to Roman tyranny. Jesus offered the kingdom of God based on peaceful and spiritual heart connection.

To try to get people to agree with you, you can: 1) Bully them; 2) Kindly persuade them, or 3) Live your life so well they want to learn more about what you believe.

I’m tired of all the public conflict and verbal abuse. In a true meritocracy, just being human would merit respect. Here’s what I want to see taught in school and demonstrated in society: Honesty, hope, humility, kindness, forgiveness, peace of mind, awe, gratitude, and creativity.

Gratitude is like granite. Let’s build with grateful granite instead of tearing down with disdainful rudeness.

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All desires and feelings aren’t fit to be followed.

Posted on December 10, 2021 by Steve Simms

If you don’t like the automatic thoughts that have been gradually programmed into your brain, begin a process of reprogramming. Your brain and emotions are watching you and following your example.

Too often we walk right past a better future and neglect to step into it. If we continually medicate and sugar-coat emotional pain, we neglect to learn practical ways to heal from it.

You can’t just “snap out” of years of harmful thinking. You have to climb out of the pit you’ve dug.

It’s irrational to fill your brain with junk and then expect good things to come out of it. All desires and feelings aren’t fit to be followed.

Always be fleeing
From thoughts and behaviors
That disturb your moral wellbeing.

To be whole
We need to learn
To resist and refute thoughts
That terrorize our soul.

Hearing profanity
Sounds to me
Like pools of insanity
And meaningless crudeness.

Profanity is pitiful programming for your mind and emotions. Find positive words to plant in yourself and others.

A meritocracy would have no favors, no gifts, no mercy, no forgiveness, no inheritance, no lottery, no second chances. In a meritocracy, no one does better than they deserve.

Christianity isn’t a meritocracy. By humbly turning away from our wrongful thoughts and behaviors we can receive undeserved forgiveness and healing through Christ.

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Talking about race with words that rhyme with woke

Posted on December 9, 2021 by Steve Simms

I awoke this morning thinking about words that rhyme with woke. Then I wrote some sentences that use those rhymes and some that don’t:

Categorizing people by race is a cloak that hides who they really are.

Let’s revoke the false idea that skin color defines a person.

When we listen to the voices that spoke in our history, let’s not censor the ones we don’t like.

Historians who only told the favorable parts of American history misspoke.

When we’re fully woke
To logical thinking
Racism will croak
Because it’s irrational.

The hoax of race has had a chokehold on America far too long.

When we ignore or justify the injustice in our history, we create a smokescreen that hides much truth.

Regardless of the outward color, if you crack an egg, the white isn’t more important than the yolk. Let’s break the yoke of race!

If we soak up a broader view of American history, we’ll begin to see things differently.

It’s not being woke to tell the truth about James K. Polk and other US Presidents who forcibly enslaved innocent human beings.

When we take a rational approach towards race, it disappears. The very concept of dividing people into races is irrational.

When people strongly believe a lie, any fact that contradicts it is seen as a threat.

If the telling of certain parts of American history provoke us to anger, we’re being irrational.

Researching history for facts isn’t political but leaving out the parts of history that challenge your position is.

People like to justify American slavery by saying other nations enslaved people, but not American freedom by saying other nations have had freedom.

A person who is unawake to injustice has left the truth.

Search for: Off the RACE Track book.

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Jesus talk & a cross walk go together

Posted on December 8, 2021 by Steve Simms

Since few people openly talk about their experiences with the living Jesus, such experiences are falsely considered rare and unusual. They’re much more common than people believe.

When awareness of the living Jesus overrides self-awareness, the joy of the Lord gushes forth! Choosing darkness diminishes our awareness of God’s glory. Grace talk without the living Jesus is empty words.

Grace isn’t a free pass. It’s God’s unearned power that changes people from within and empowers them to live with godly character and behavior. It gives us supernatural strength to walk the way of the cross. Grace doesn’t replace the need for a Christ-led lifestyle.

Grace is the free gift of being taught, led, and empowered directly by the living Jesus. Have your received it?

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There’s no me in my anatomy

Posted on December 8, 2021 by Steve Simms

There’s more to me
Than physiology.
My eyes display images,
But I see.

My brain processes data,
But I think.

My ears recognize sounds,
But I hear.

My nerves
Send notifications
Of pain
And contact,
But I hurt
And I feel.

My eyes, brain,
Ears, and nerves
Aren’t conscious,
But I am.

My sensory organs work automatically and don’t know what they’re telling me, but I know. My body sends much information to my brain, but I choose what to do with all that information. My body automatically keeps itself alive, but I decide where it goes and what to do with it

My mouth and tongue move, but I speak. My fingers and thumb tighten, but I grip. My legs alternate bending, but I walk. My fingers touch keys on a screen, but I write.

All matter is made of tiny, empty balls of energy, squeezed together into things, but a person isn’t a thing. My anatomy has no me. My body parts are what, not who, but I’m who, not what.

Conception, gestation, and birth can’t explain where the me in my body came from. A human body is material and measurable, but the life in the body is immaterial and immeasurable.

Materialism is a myth. What we call reality is really just electrons orbiting mostly empty space.

If humans kept as close accounting on thoughts as we do on money, we’d be better off. If we knew what we think we know, we’d all be wiser than we are.

Stress management and anger management both depend on thought-feeling-desire management Chase away thoughts and feelings that try to ruin your day.

The effect
Of neglect
is huge.

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Wellbeing, well-thinking, & well-doing

Posted on December 8, 2021 by Steve Simms

If we’re being driven by our thoughts, desires, and emotions, we’ve given up our self-control. If we resist negative mood swings, it’s harder for our emotions to push us around.

Life is full of both reasons for sadness and reasons for joy. Which reasons do you search for?

Our mindset sets the tone for our life. The more we set our mind on hope, the better our life will look to us. Both emotional and mental wellbeing require well-doing and well-thinking.

We have the ability to embrace or to resist individual thoughts, but too often we’re indifferent to that life-changing power. Try not to be unaware of what you’re talking and thinking yourself into.

Even when life outwardly seems to be going right, what’s wrong inside of us continues to need an inner cure. We can be embittered by life, or we can be empowered by it, but not both at the same moment.

It’s hard for other people to fix us from the outside because the ability to control our thoughts and behaviors resides inside us. If we’re not the choreographer of the thoughts that dance thru our brain, we’ve turned our mind over to chaos.

Walking in the light and courageously letting others see the inner burdens that we’re carrying, can somehow makes us feel lighter. Light is healing.

When negative, destructive, and/or tormenting feelings are fed and allowed to grow large, they cause much misery. Death by human hands saddens me. Suicide, violence, and abortion, all shout that we humans fail to treasure the gift of life.

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Unofficial thoughts that reach beyond the superficial

Posted on December 7, 2021 by Steve Simms

This is unofficial,
But between artificial
And superficial,
Life today is fickle.

As humans, if we won’t be completely honest, we won’t be completely rational. Either way we engage in some degree of deception by twisting and/or hiding the truth.

Why consider Jesus? Because He speaks inside those who ask and listen with their heart. Jesus isn’t an ancient myth, but the contemporary answer to the meaning of life.

Your assumptions about the supernatural could be wrong. Talk to Jesus and see if He answers. When your heart feels empty, the hollow echoing sound, might be Jesus knocking to fill it up.

The unseen Jesus,
Right here, right now,
Sees and listens,
Hears and answers.

It costs nothing
But a few moments
To ask Jesus a question
And see if He answers.

I can’t prove my consciousness but I follow it throughout the day. The same with Jesus.

To order your life according to the kingdom of God is to avoid disorder. Instead of serving and obeying your thoughts, feelings, and desires, make them serve you and submit to your control.

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