I love to express what I feel called to say. Writing helps me to open up my heart and do that. I hope that what I write helps you in some way. I hope it makes you think, encourages you, or inspires you. If it challenges you or if you disagree, I hope you know that I respect your right to have a different point of view.
The rainbow is an invitation into a divine romance. It is the promise of a beautiful future and the offer of a heart-to-heart relationship with the living God. The next time you see a rainbow let it move your heart with the glorious splendor of God, to the point that you fully surrender your all to His will.
Embrace the Christian faith. Lay down your personal desires so that you are free to adore, follow, and obey the risen Jesus.
Who will set aside Ego and pride And humbly say today, “The Holy Spirit says,” And who will say, “Lord have your way,”?
When I see a rainbow On the screen of the sky Its glorious splendor Makes my hope rise high Far beyond self-focus And proud humanity.
Jesus told His disciples, “You will be my witnesses,” And gave us the task Of testifying to The things that we Have seen and heard Christ say and do Within us, Even if we’re just a few.
I wrote this blog post on my wedding anniversary, so it is really my testimony to two amazing romances. 54 years ago, God let me meet the risen Jesus and gave me an ongoing divine romance with Him. 34 years ago today, God let me marry Ernie and gave me a beautiful romance with her that continues to this day!
I express my gratitude for being alive by trying to be kind to everyone I meet. I have discovered that heartfelt politeness is powerful.
If you will without suspicion begin to be welcoming to strangers by showing them warmheartedness, courtesy, and a sincere smile, you will almost always receive a friendly response from them. You will touch the part of them that’s hungry for heart-to-heart human connection.
The next time you see a stranger make it your mission to express simple heart-felt kindness and observe the response you get. The stranger will feel better and will light up with warm facial expressions (and you will too). I experience that kind of response almost every time I express goodwill to a stranger. (There are exceptions where my kind approach is ignored or rebuffed but they are rare.)
I learned this by selling books door-to-door for three summers when I was in college. The first week of each summer I was given a week of training in positive thinking and sincere friendliness. Then I was sent to a strange city to knock on doors. I was amazed to see that my warm cheerfulness would usually (but not always) soften the heart of the person who answered the door, and we would have an uplifting encounter even if they didn’t by my books (or even take the time to look at them). I would leave them with an encouraging word and with gratitude for their time and then head to the next house.
Training your heart to be hospitable is lifechanging for you and for the people you encounter. Every person matters. If you will treat people like they do, they will usually respond positively to you. Don’t just take my word for it. Try it today and see for yourself.
Be like a potato. Keep sprouting and growing your eyes no matter where life puts you. Always be on the lookout for creative ways to turn your problems into potato salad, French fries, hash browns, potato soup, chips, home fries, loaded potato skins, tater tots, and scalloped potatoes. When life bakes or roasts you, don’t be bitter, be better (like a baked or roasted potato). When life crushes you let it make you as delightful as delicious mashed potatoes.
When tears come Try not to be Quick to clean them up And wipe them away. The drops that ooze From your eyes And leave tracks On your cheeks Are a sign That shows that Your heart is alive.
The Russia Ukraine War, the ongoing slaughter of thousands of innocent men, women, and children in Gaza, or any of the many other wars and threats of war around the globe could easily trigger Word War Three and lead to the killings of hundreds of millions of people and make life unbearable for any survivors. Nuclear war is a horrific but real possibility.
I love people from every nationality, ethnic, and racial grouping–from every political persuasion, from every religion, from every sexual description–regardless of whether or not I approve of their views, beliefs, or lifestyle. Hateful attitudes, threats, violence, and war break my heart. They are kindling for a fire that can easily devour our planet. I am greatly concerned that we turn away from the worldwide inferno that we are stirring up before it is too late.
Peace isn’t a luxury. It’s essential that we change the worldwide contemporary narrative from blame, name calling, and accusing people of hatred just because they disagree with our beliefs and behaviors. There are many issues on which people will never agree, but we can begin to disagree with kindness and compassion, to speak the truth in love and humility, to listen to one another, and to treat each other with respect even when we disagree or disapprove.
Perhaps the biggest danger for a worldwide nuclear inferno is the Russian Ukraine war. Here’s my peace proposal to end it before it is too late:
1) Ukraine officially cedes to Russia, Crimea and most of the territory in Ukraine that Russia has controlled the past two years.
2) Russia agrees that its new territory will be a demilitarized zone with no heavy military arms (except for 100 lightly armed Russian troops to serve as a trigger if Ukraine should ever try to take it back).
3) Ukraine receives NATO defense rights but is not allowed to be an official member. NATO will put no more than 100 lightly armed troops in Ukraine. They will be stationed in Eastern Ukraine to serve as a trigger if Russia ever attacks Ukraine again. Ukraine troops will not be allowed to train with NATO or be stationed in any NATO country.
4) Russia agrees that if it breaks the agreement by increasing its troops beyond the limit in former Ukrainian territory, Ukraine has the right to immediately become a full member of NATO with full membership benefits and responsibilities.
5) Ukraine agrees that if it or breaks the agreement, it immediately loses its protection rights from NATO.
6) NATO agrees to the plan and agrees that if it should put more than 100 lightly armed troops in Ukraine that Russia has a right to see that as an act of war and respond accordingly.
We all can’t make peace in Ukraine, but we can all do this:
When the foundations are being destroyed, comfortable, sentimental, and powerless Christianity offers no help. It’s time to reach beyond routine religion and take refuge in the risen Lord. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Prepare the way of the Lord in your heart. Stir up the gift that is in you. Be led from within by God’s Spirit. Courageously follow and obey the voice of Jesus, the living Word. Let Christ in you be your hope of glory.
What the world needs now is people who will open their heart to wise, Spirit-prompted spontaneity. We all need mentors and teachers like that. While the world is trash talking, Christ-followers need to be transformation talking and spontaneously sharing how the living Jesus became real to them and transformed their life.
My goal is to live my life by spontaneously following and obeying the Holy Spirit’s promptings. The spontaneous overflow of Christ in you, turns Christianity into the most powerful and amazing lifestyle on earth. Go with Christ’s inner flow! Spirit-led spontaneity is incredible. Listen to the risen Jesus, do what He says, and you’ll be amazed! Christianity without Spirit-prompted spontaneity gets locked into routine.
Some of the impulses, impressions, and inclinations that happen within you are directly from the Holy Spirit. If you will learn to recognize them and begin to obey them, then you’ll start to regularly experience the supernatural reality of the living God. You can’t follow and obey the inner impressions, impulses, and inclinations of God’s Spirit if you’re unwilling to notice them.
According to the Bible, it’s essential that Christians learn to recognize and follow Spirit-prompted impulses and inclinations. “Those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God.” (Romans 8:14.) To be led by God’s Spirit requires spontaneity. Spontaneous behavior doesn’t follow a program or plan. It occurs as a result of an inner prompting that comes without planning or external stimulation.
The fear of God’s spontaneity causes Christians to focus on routine religion. Christianity has become so planned and programmed that it has lost the spontaneity of the Holy Spirit who freely moves like the wind. It’s extremely rare for God’s Spirit to be allowed to interrupt the predetermined order of a church service. Predictable Christianity has abandoned the spontaneity of God’s Spirit.
The time and place for Spirit-led spontaneity is any time and any place the Holy Spirit tells you to say or do something. However, there’s no room for Christ’s spontaneity in a church service that’s carefully planned and rigorously controlled.
Routine religion has no sails to catch and freely flow with the wind of God’s Spirit, so it puts along with the trolling motor of patterns and procedures. When the freedom to spontaneously hear and obey the living Jesus is shut down, the Holy Spirit is quenched.
The most amazing encounters I have ever had with Christ are Spirit-prompted, unplanned and unprogrammed. The more I directly listen to and obey the risen Jesus, the more I’m aware of His presence and power working in and through me.
Spirit-led spontaneity requires the boldness to bend beyond the box of routine religion. Assessment, appraisal, and analysis of the Bible without the spontaneity of the Spirit’s leading can produce a biblical theology but not a Christ-empowered lifestyle that overflows with the fruit of God’s Spirit.
Christianity without Christaneity (Jesus-prompted spontaneity) is stuck in the rut of routine religion. Let’s go beyond that! Be Christaneous! Prepare the way of the Lord. Make room for Spirit-led spontaneity in your life! Listen to and obey Christ in you and let things happen supernaturally.
"Christ in you, The hope of glory." It's time to let Jesus do What He wants to In and through you So people can see The working Of His glory And experience The reality Of His story.
Christians need to start To learn the art Of obeying The prompting Of God's Spirit.
People who are Led by God's Spirit Produce the fruit Of the Spirit. If you aren't Growing the fruit You're out of God's loop. (Galatians 5:22-23.)
1) Ukraine officially cedes to Russia, Crimea and most of the territory in Ukraine that Russia has controlled the past two years.
2) Russia agrees that its new territory will be a demilitarized zone with no heavy military arms (except for 100 lightly armed Russian troops to serve as a trigger if Ukraine should ever try to take it back).
3) Ukraine receives NATO defense rights but is not allowed to be an official member. NATO will put no more than 100 lightly armed troops in Ukraine. They will be stationed in Eastern Ukraine to serve as a trigger if Russia ever attacks Ukraine again. Ukraine troops will not be allowed to train with NATO or be stationed in any NATO country.
4) Russia agrees that if it breaks the agreement by increasing its troops beyond the limit in former Ukrainian territory, Ukraine has the right to immediately become a full member of NATO with full membership benefits and responsibilities.
5) Ukraine agrees that if it or breaks the agreement, it immediately loses its protection rights from NATO.
6) NATO agrees to the plan and agrees that if it should put more than 100 lightly armed troops in Ukraine that Russia has a right to see that as an act of war and respond accordingly.
Photo by u0421u0435u0440u0433u0435u0439 u0412u0435u043bu043eu0432 on Pexels.comPhoto by Peter Muscutt on Pexels.com
This happened to me. “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” My stoney heart was removed and I God replaced it with a tender, compassionate heart. I was born again.
In the Bible Paul commits people who he has told about Jesus “to God and to the word of His grace” — to the message (story, testimony) about God’s undeserved favor. Every true Christ-follower has a word about how they encountered and were transformed by God’s grace.
Speaking about Christ-followers the Bible says that God “has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love.” Jesus calls that being “born again.” If you have been born again, how did it happen to you? Was it a gradual process or did it happen suddenly? When you describe how you were born again, that’s called your testimony. (See Revelation 12:11.)
The Bible talks about a mystery that it calls “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” If Jesus Christ is living inside of you, what difference does He make in your life? What was your life like before Jesus came to live within you? When and how did Jesus begin to reside in you? What is your life like now that Christ is living in you? Testify. Tell people all about it.
If Christ is in you, telling people about how that happened is powerful. It’s the word (story) of God’s grace working in you and the Bible says that it overcomes the devil and his accusations against you. Leave your comfort zone and begin to tell your salvation testimony every chance you get.
I can’t be quiet about what God has done and is doing in my life because some people accuse me of judging them just because I testify about what He shows me. Don’t let people’s criticism and accusations stop you either! When they accuse you of hate, show them humility and compassion by speaking the truth in love.
If you have never experienced God’s heart transplant and been born again, you are missing out on the greatest experience of my life! Here’s my testimony.
I have the daily habit of trying to see and hear beyond soundbites. In today’s culture of anything goes lifestyles and religions, that’s not an easy thing to do.
The Bible warns us: “Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them. So be on your guard!” One way that is being done is through Bible soundbites. Here’s an example:
This is the ignored and forgotten part of a sentence in the Bible. “. . . but God has revealed it to us by the Spirit.” The first part says: “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no heart has imagined, what God has prepared for those who love Him . . .” The first part without the second part is an incomplete soundbite that is often quoted alone. That misleads people into believing that their experience of God is limited to what their eyes can see and what their ears can hear, but the truth is that God is trying to supernaturally reveal Himself to people all the time, yet we rarely open the invisible eyes and ears of our heart. When the eyes and the ears of our heart are shut down, our seeing and hearing are limited to the physical world, and we can’t see and hear the glory of the Lord. Where are the Christ-followers who will warn people “day and night with their tears?”
The Holy Spirit wants to show you things that eye can’t see, and ear can hear. Learn to look and listen with your heart. The best glasses and the best hearing aids are a humble heart that’s hungering and thirsting to experience more and more of Jesus.
Knowing God involves more than the human eye can see or the ear can hear. It requires insight that only God can reveal to people. Unless you literally perceive the actual presence of God, He will seem like only a theory in your mind. If you aren’t allowing God to constantly work in your heart, Bible knowledge will do you little good. Sound doctrine and teaching require more than religious head knowledge!
To settle for less than continually interacting with “Christ in you the hope of glory,” is to miss the whole point of Christianity. If instead of becoming institutionalized Christians would let the risen Jesus continually revitalize them from within, their faith would be ever on fire!
Unless you see and hear directly from God, with the invisible eyes and ears of your heart, you will never know what it means to be led by the Spirit. You won’t know what it is to have the Holy Spirit warn you.
True Christianity is a Spirit-led lifestyle. (See Romans 8:14.) The only credentials that a Christ-follower needs are the name of Jesus and a lifestyle of being led by His Spirit.
Learn to look and listen With the eyes and ears Of your heart And God’s Spirit will start To show you more than You can ask or think.
By the free gift Of God’s grace People are invited To taste and see That the Lord is good, And to be led By His Spirit Into a lifestyle Of joyous surrender To His presence And His will.
Witnessing about what’s good and hopeful makes a life of peace and joy more sustainable. It increases my hope. To witness is to experience something. To be a witness is to tell what you’ve experienced. If you have experienced hope and encouragement, be a witness. Share it with others.
Unless you witness to it, people won’t know the many things that God is doing and has done in and around you. Go tell someone!
If you have witnessed God do anything, tell somebody! Without witnesses people will think that God isn’t doing much. A Christ-follower should be a witness, always pointing out the living Jesus, not a promoter pointing to self-acclaim. When few people are willing to personally witness to what the risen Jesus is doing, people begin to think that He’s not doing much.
Still, staying silent about what the risen Jesus is doing in and through them has become a way of life for far too many Christians. Perhaps they have hardened their heart and are no longer noticing Christ’s presence.
The power of a firsthand testimony about how Jesus is working in someone’s heart is immense. Don’t hide it! Humbly telling people how God is working in and around you can open up a conversation that might very well change their life.
If you’ve encountered Jesus, tell somebody. Jesus told His followers: “You shall be My witnesses.” If Jesus has done anything in your life, take the witness stand and testify about it.
Witnesses use words not to preach but to testify. Silence shuts down their witness. Speak up about what Jesus has done in you.
The way to witness about how Jesus is working in you is to speak from your heart with humility and honesty. Try it!Work on your willingness to listen directly to the risen Jesus so you can hear Him better and witness to what He tells you.
Effective Spirit-led witness to Christ is based on humility. “God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Christ’s Spirit-led witnesses bring a reality check. They testify (tell and show us) that there is more to life than we are seeing. They help us see what we’re missing so that we can taste and see greater peace and joy than we can imagine.
For Christ-followers the witness stand is everywhere they go. Will you take the stand for Christ?Your words that witness to the reality of the living Jesus may be the only witness that someone hears about Him.
It’s time for Christians To fully realize That we need To verbalize And put into words What Jesus is doing In and around us. It hard to know What motivates A wordless witness. Let people know That anything good They see in you Comes from Jesus Not from self-effort.
I witness Jesus Working in, through And around me Every day, So I can’t be silent. I have to say, The risen Jesus Is the Way To a sustainable life Of peace and joy.
The purpose of the pleasure of sex isn’t self-gratification. It’s much greater than that. The pleasure of sex is designed to assure the reproduction of humanity and to connect a man and a woman heart-to-heart so they can build a beautiful life-long relationship of light and love, thus enriching each other, their children, and their community.
These words from ancient history are powerful: “O taste and see.” People can tell us about an amazingly delicious food but until we taste and see for ourselves, their words are only hearsay. That’s the problem with modern Christianity. It tries to tell people about the glorious experience of following Jesus by using weak weekly religious talks alone when what people need are profound experiences with the risen present Jesus. “O taste and see that the Lord is good!”
Alexander the Great said: “I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.” Christians are called to be sheep led by the Lion of the Tribe of Judah — the risen Jesus! If Christians will come together to follow and obey the living Jesus instead of religious programs, they will change the world!
Jesus said, “My sheep hear My voice.” Churches should train Christ’s sheep to share what they hear God’s Spirit saying. Jesus went on to say, “And they follow Me.” Follow the risen Jesus, not routine religion. Sheep who ignore the Shepherd eventually get eaten by wolves.
When Christ’s sheep are kept silent and set in rows to hear a weekly religious speech they are sheared of the humble heart-to-heart sharing of Spirit-led community. When Christ’s sheep gather, let them all be free to speak as the Spirit prompts them.
Christianity isn’t about personalities and celebrities. Keep your eyes on Jesus alone! Talk about Jesus, not about a preacher. If the risen Jesus isn’t the center of attention in a church service, it’s way out of focus. I’ve always wondered why the name on a church sign is the name of a preacher instead of the name of Jesus.
Christians who like to talk up a preacher are missing the point. A preacher is a mere messenger who is supposed to focus people’s attention on the risen Jesus. Sheep who ignore the true Shepherd eventually get eaten by wolves.
None the less, for some reason churches and Christian conferences usually leave Jesus off the program. I don’t think I have ever seen this on a program: “Lord and Savior: Jesus Christ.”Churches need to stop counting sheep and begin to count on and rely on the presence of the living resurrected Jesus.
If the preacher doesn’t show up for church people get upset. If Jesus doesn’t show up people often don’t even notice. When you’re thinking about the church you attend who do you think of first, Jesus or the pastor?
Free Gas for Your Think Tank -- Short Reflections, Lasting Encouragement 