The promise of persecution for Christ-followers

Posted on December 18, 2020 by Steve Simms

If you find Christianity boring, you’re not connecting with the living Jesus! “Behold the Lamb of God.” Dare to see more of the risen Jesus than you have before. Believing what you’ve been taught about Jesus, doesn’t mean you know and have experienced Him personally.

To hear about the life of Jesus is inspiring. To daily live it is supernatural. In the Gospels, Jesus calls His followers to self-denial, not to self-defense. 

Christ-followers are promised persecution. Biblical Christianity is persecuted by religion (and by atheistic countries) because it presents Jesus as alive, present, and active in today’s world. Jesus said that it’s a blessing to be persecuted for following Him. However, Christians are never told to be persecutors. Insecure people persecute others. Secure people embrace them.

Jesus created an interactive, spiritual community, that gradually morphed into tens of thousands of independent religious organizations. They are called churches.

Kindness isn’t optional for a Christian. “The Lord’s servant . . . must be kind to everyone.” –2 Timothy 2:24. We can choose not to insult people. We can choose to be kind. Dare we?

Light words, weighty with wisdom, shine hope into pondering hearts. Seek to see with Christ’s sight. Life’s so much brighter in His light! To repent is to shift your gears of perception and begin to see from God’s viewpoint. The wonders of the world start in your own backyard.

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Put Christ back in “ianity”

Posted on December 15, 2020 by Steve Simms

Churchianity’s been around for centuries. Now we have politicsianity. Let’s put Christ back in ianity. Christianity without love for all people, is counterfeit.

To keep the rust off of my trust in God, I have to put the living Jesus first! Love sees things differently than hate. Let the living Jesus give you eyes of love.

When human hopes totter, 
The sky seems to be falling, 
Yet "Christ in you," 
The insider Jesus,
Remains "the hope of glory."

Too many Christians are Christ-informed rather than Christ-formed. It’s much more important to be Spirit-led than to be preacher-fed. Romans 8:14. Religious structure, teaching, and organization, often pushes aside the living Jesus. The failure to perceive the living Jesus at work, motivates Christians to exert their own will.

Christianity is a way of life, not a Sunday morning religious session or a political persuasion. True Christianity is based on the perception of Jesus, not on our feelings and opinions.

Everything that happens works for my good. Trusting that Bible truth makes me happy. Grace enables repentance, God’s forgiveness, freedom from guilt, & surrender to Jesus.

Jesus spoke against hierarchy. He didn’t approve of a ranked ordering of people. Because the kingdom of God is invisible to physical eyes, it’s hard to resist giving our heart to a human government. The name I want on banners is Jesus!

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Smiles to go before I sleep

Posted on December 15, 2020 by Steve Simms

I have smiles to go before I sleep.
And smiles to go before I sleep.

Negative emotions are often based on misperceptions. See better, feel better. Let the inner whisper of hopeful dreams grow into a loud cheer of encouragement.

Open hearts open hearts. Closed hearts cause hearts to run for cover. A handful of words that light the heart can ignite hope and delight.

Perception likes to tinker with reality and sometimes even dismiss it completely. Bias hardens the heart and entangles the mind, all the while telling us that we’re truth seekers.

Sometimes things don’t make sense to us because we’re using emotion instead of logic. Feelings often attack and hijack our thinking and then distract us from fact. Perception can be twisted and distorted, but reality always stays the same. Anger, hate, and panic aren’t helpful feelings.

When people disagree, they usually have much more in common than in dispute. Still, it’s easy to get lost in your own point of view and be alienated from aspects of truth. When anger is substituted for logic, understand, and kindness, hate begins to take over.

What you see (or perceive) is what you think is there, but it may be an illusion. It’s usually easier to believe whatever you like than to believe what’s right. Illusion-confusion & conspiracy-supremacy are major problems.

To coerce by force creates pain and oppression. To listen and understand brings healing. When people think things are worse than they really are, they blame, accuse, and panic.

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Sync perception with the One who sees clearly

Posted on December 14, 2020 by Steve Simms

An emotionally involved eye sees events differently than a mere passerby. Much God-given insight passes thru our mind and intuition unnoticed. Truth is found beyond our identity, our opinions, our feelings, our race, our nation.

Nothing that humans say is completely true. We’re all deceived to some degree. Valuing your opinion more than facts is called deception. 

Pride quickly rejects uncomfortable truth. Humility fact checks it before deciding its veracity.

Lies are out of sync with reality. Liars need to return to the real world.

Dishonesty covers-up and spins facts to try to make lies sound like truth. To crowd source your thinking and loop with one political group, is a good way to be deceived. People with a weak argument resort to accusations, distortions, and insults.

My perception is so limited and fragile that I feel a continual need to rely on Jesus. Christ in me calls me to be honest, even when I don’t want to be.

The One I rally around is the living, resurrected Jesus Christ! He has no need for human political power. You can’t hear the living Jesus if you wont listen to His voice. The main reason people don’t hear Jesus speaking to them is that they don’t want to. There’s a good reason for that. If you listen to the living Jesus He may say things you don’t want (but need) to hear.

Christian lingo has little power if your lifestyle’s out of sync with the risen Jesus. The call of Christianity is to continually synchronize with the living Jesus. When Christ-followers are in step with Jesus, they’ll be in sync with each other.

Christianity without love is counterfeit. Christians are called to love people, not to insult, accuse, & abuse them. Christians behaving badly, misrepresent Christ and cause people to reject the faith.

Disobedience to God is self-deception, the belief that our way is better than His way. Rebellion against God leads to dangerous falls, but surrender to the living Jesus will lift you like an inner geyser.

If you admit the truth, your conscience tries to hold you to it. That’s why denial’s in style. What matters isn’t if people agree with you, but how closely your opinions align with reality.

How we perceive a situation and how it actually is, frequently don’t match. To relieve our pain we sometimes deceive ourselves about what we perceive.

Perception is just a mental picture we take of something. It’s not the actual thing. Imagination that isn’t based on honest observation can lead to false accusation. Our opinion is a little water in our hand, yet truth involves oceans.

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The living Jesus is a showstopper!

Posted on December 11, 2020 by Steve Simms

An incredible experience makes you want to tell people about it. Jesus gives me joy and incredible experiences! If the living Jesus has done something in your life, “shout it from the housetops.” Christians will be tense if they only talk about Jesus in the past tense.

The living Jesus should be the primary focus of Christians and get more of their attention than anybody else. Too often Jesus is presented as a nice story or a moral lesson, instead of encountered as present Reality.

Jesus First! That’s how it works. If anybody or anything else is on the throne, true Christianity’s gone. It’s dangerous to allow the ministry of a preacher to distract you from the present day ministry of the living Jesus.

Revival is when Christians stop the religious show and begin to let the reality of the living Jesus show thru their daily lives. When the living Jesus enters a church service, He’s a showstopper!

To limit preaching to a minister in church (or on TV) is to twist the Bible. (Many religious TV shows and webpages mention the name of a preacher more than Jesus.) Christians are called to proclaim Jesus, not just to hear talks about Him. Gathering to hear a weekly talk is no substitute for scattering to walk in obedience to the living Jesus. There’s no need to replace the living Jesus with a sermon, a preacher, or a program.

The Bible says to preach the Good News of Jesus. All Christians need to preach and demonstrate the reality of the risen Jesus. If you have nothing to say about the living Jesus, perhaps you’ve not experienced Him. If you feel compelled to talk about something more than Jesus, maybe you love it more.

Too often we get off the subject. Use your words to point to the living Jesus, not to put people down. Biblically, preaching isn’t about putting people down, but proclaiming Good News! Without Jesus-encounters of the direct kind, church is just ceremonial.

If you’ve experienced the presence and joy of the living Jesus, don’t keep it secret! The Good News of the living Jesus is infinitely too wonderful to be silent about.

A name on a tall building isn’t above every other name, but the name of Jesus is! Anything or anybody that Christians put above Jesus is a modern day idol.

Pastors want people to stay put and listen, but Jesus wandered as led by the Spirit and sent His followers out to preach. Jesus told His disciples, “Go into all the world and preach,” not, “Go to church.”

Separation between church and the living Jesus, causes us to rely on hierarchy and human performances. Christianity’s not about improving human nature, but about letting the risen Jesus daily live in and through you. There’s no copilot in Christianity. Jesus is the Pilot and His followers submit to Him.

Judea had systemic racism against the Samaritans, but Jesus broke the racial rules. The living Jesus isn’t tame. He can still turn over tables.

Try making the living Jesus the prime focus of your life. Learn to stream Him daily!

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Fractions, factions, & half-truths

Posted on December 9, 2020 by Steve Simms

Half-truths chop reality into fractions and divide people into hostile factions. When people won’t humbly meet around truth, they arrogantly fight over error. Character will humbly embrace truth with grace, not replace it to save face.

What you think is happening isn’t necessarily what’s really happening. Facts face reality. Lies renounce it. Accusations without facts, ignore it. We can discover truth, report it, twist it, or deny it. But we can’t create truth.

Try to hear truth beyond what the herd has heard. Moove beyond group think. We’re surrounded by extraordinary things that we blindly consider common. Blessed are the meek. The meek bend to truth and don’t try to make truth bend to them.

Our perception isn’t precise, even when it pretends to be. We need God’s perspective. If you won’t think outside your comfort zone, you will be perpetually stuck there. Illusions of reality aren’t real, no matter how they make you feel.

If you’re trying to please people, you’re playing to an imaginary audience. They’re mostly ignoring you.

The Bible teaches that none of us know the whole truth. “We know in part.”

Truth seekers view reality
With honesty
And don’t just see
What they want to see.

If you don’t weed your mind
From time to time,
It will overgrow
With undergrowth.

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The right (respite) to be kind

Posted on December 9, 2020 by Steve Simms

The first step to inner peace is to take a respite from your anxiety and anger. Then exercise your right to be kind.

It’s good to take a respite from our own opinions and attend to the voice of conscience. If we listen to it, it will help us be kinder.

To believe that society has no preconceived notions about people is unconscious bias. Unconscious bias is tricky. It secretly twists how we see things and distorts reality.

Take a respite
From words that rile.
Rest a bit
And smile awhile.

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Selective seeing (choose well)

Posted on December 7, 2020 by Steve Simms

Selective seeing creates many conflicts. Searching together for truth heals divisions. Viewing life from many angles, expands your awareness of reality.

Seeing something that proves you wrong, hurts. Pride often selects not to see it.

Perspective changes perception. Love looks at people from the angle of compassion. There are many likeable things about everybody. It’s fun to find what’s likable. Everyday notice something beautiful about people. When you negatively label people you tell your heart how to feel about them. Be kind!

People who won’t respect every person as an equal, fellow human, are deceived. There’s unperceived beauty and goodness to to be appreciated in any person. Find it.

Our perception is subject to deception. No one has perfect reception of truth. Our opinions are like pages from a printer low on ink–distorted to various degrees. A weak conscience causes a life of shambles.

There’s more than one way to spin a chat. Beware of people who twist people’s words.

Society’s full of illusion confusion. Seek truth above opinions, desires, and feelings. If you let your moods manipulate your perception of life, you’ll be deceived. (It’s easier to believe lies that make us feel better instead of truth that hurts.) If you see people as monsters, you’re probably projecting your own sin nature onto them.

Reject the idea that your feelings have been hurt and your anger will vanish. Sometimes the most difficult place to find truth is in your own thinking and emotions

Political power (no matter who holds it) has the tendency to distort the truth.

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In pursuit of the living Jesus . . .

Posted on December 7, 2020 by Steve Simms

To pursue Jesus, you have to look in your heart. That’s where He wants to meet you. Type the name J-E-S-U-S into the search engine of your heart and press enter.

Experiencing Jesus as present and living, is much more powerful than thinking of Him as distant and long ago. He gestures with the wind and communicates thru your conscience. Spiritual growth requires the willingness to see truth that changes your perspective.

The more I pursue the living Jesus, the more I want to know and obey Him better. I’ve discovered that if I let the living Jesus straighten out the question marks in my life, He will turn them into exclamation points!!! I love to let the presence of the living Jesus seep into the deepest parts of my heart and then steep my soul in Him.

The Bible teaches us to pursue obedience to Jesus as our first priority and to learn to flow daily in His will. See Matthew 6:33. When it’s in your heart is to pursue the living Jesus, Bible reading becomes a great pleasure.

If we say we are Christians, but act contrary to the fruit of the Spirit, our behavior isn’t coming from God. Fruit inspectors will not be easily deceived.

Guilt motivates us to hide the truth. God’s forgiveness empowers us to be honest!

3 places to meet the living Jesus
The living Jesus in church:
https://amzn.to/3mT3F22. 
The living Jesus in racial healing: 
https://amzn.to/37JRVIA. 
The living Jesus in joy: 
https://amzn.to/36O4WBS.

Advent of the living Jesus? Christ’s advent in the world, only happened one time, about 2,000 years ago. However, His advent in many people’s heart hasn’t yet happened. When there’s a genuine Christ-advent in a person’s heart, that person’s life is changed from within & the fruit of the Spirit begins to regularly flow from that individual.

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The pursuit of gladness–gratitude is the key

Posted on December 7, 2020 by Steve Simms

Humans aren’t meant to be like a stuck kaleidoscope–able to see only one view point. We need more love in the greatest race on earth — the human race!

Too often we expect in a moment, what requires a pursuit. Creating happiness internally is much less frustrating than pursuing it externally. The pursuit of gratitude is more fulfilling than the pursuit of happiness. It’s hard to find real happiness when you’re pursuing meaningless distractions. I find little happiness in the pursuit of pleasure; great gladness in the pursuit of purpose.

Many people confuse distraction with happiness. They’re not the same thing.

Gladness comes from gratitude, not from grabbing for it. Your state of mind is a reflection of how you have chosen to live and to think.

Intentionally or unintentionally, we humans often pursue self-destructive behaviors. If your pursuit is to protect your position, rather than to discover truth, you’ll be deceived.

With no purpose to pursue, you’ll feel bored and like there’s nothing satisfying to do. The pursuit of nothing, finds it. Ultimately, the greatest failure in life is to neglect the pursuit of God.

What you continually pursue will shape you into its image. Selfish pursuits lead to loneliness; selfless pursuits to joy. The pursuit of self-fulfillment is often unfulfilling; but helping others brings happiness.

You will find what you pursue. Pursue kindness, find kindness. Pursue hostility, find hostility. Pursue what matters most, not trivialities that fade away.

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