What Cause Should We Support?

There are a lot of things in this world that are “wrong”. And a lot of people that have problems which “need to be solved”. If we as individuals chase after each one that we think are worthy of our time and attention then we will do little more than wear ourselves out and help them little (if at all). God is a whole lot smarter than us. If we can learn to listen to that quiet voice that comes from Him, we can direct our individual efforts where they can make the most difference.

God knows much more than we do; what the most important things are. If there is the one that ‘God’ is leading you to be a part of, then do it with all of the effort and strength that He is able to give you. He deservedly gets the credit for everything that has been corrected and/or what He has given us the strength and inspiration to correct. And we deservedly get the credit for everything that we’ve messed up.

How Can There Be A God If

I think mothers and fathers look at the pain that their children go through a little differently. I think, in general, mothers would do anything so that their children would not have to experience pain. Father’s on the other hand, with varying philosophies, believe that certain amounts of pain and hardships are good for their children and prepare their children for future hardships that they might have to endure in life.

Consider for a moment the many scriptures that speak of our faith being refined the same way that fine metals are refined (through intense heat) … 1 Peter 1:6-9 is one of them. Intense heat is ‘not’ comfortable! :-) Now consider a God whose long term objective is ‘not’ our comfort in this world (though He does often comfort us), but rather a goal of the eternal salvation of our souls.

If we allow the tragedies in life to turn our hearts toward God then what we call tragedies have not been wasted. Look to the long term objectives and promises … 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Citizenship

If we are defined by one thing then we have focus, if we define ourselves by more than one thing then we do so with the detriment of being divided regarding some decision that we must make either now or in the future. We try to condone our self serving natures (me too) by self imposing a tier-system of one thing being more important than another.

I think about the examples we see in the New Testament scriptures. I have never read any disciple in scripture taking pride in their country or their citizenship. There were ones that admitted their worldly citizenship (for instance Paul as a Roman citizen) but only when it allowed an opportunity for God’s will of sharing the gospel with the Roman officials).

As for myself I am only a U.S. citizen according to the paperwork of the U.S. and the governmental rules of this world. In my heart and mind however I can borrow the words of a favorite praise and worship song; “This world is not my home, I’m just passing through” … Galatians 3:28

YOU Help the Poor !

The greatest benefit of serving those that are in need is that it will bring you toward a greater opportunity for a relationship with God.

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James 1:27, Acts 9:36, Acts 10.

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Notice how God not only ’says’ that “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and .. is …to look after orphans and widows in their distress”; but he also shows us in other scriptures how ‘He’ has reached out to those who have reached out to those who are in need.

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Also consider Matthew 10:42 and Mark 9:41.

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In mind of those last two, notice that it does ‘NOT’ say “anyone who gives money to an organization and has that organization give a cup of water in my name” … Instead it speaks to the individual doing it.

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When was the last time that ‘you’ gave to those that needed food and/or clothing. Jesus gave us an example to follow. His command is that ‘you’ follow that example. So, either you need to follow it or stop dirtying His name by not following it but still calling yourself a Christian. … ME TOO!

The greatest benefit of serving those that are in need is that it will bring you toward a greater opportunity for a relationship with God.

James 1:27, Acts 9:36, Acts 10.

Notice how God not only ’says’ that “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and .. is …to look after orphans and widows in their distress”; but he also shows us in other scriptures how ‘He’ has reached out to those who have reached out to those who are in need.

Also consider Matthew 10:42 and Mark 9:41.

In mind of those last two, notice that it does ‘NOT’ say “anyone who gives money to an organization and has that organization give a cup of water in my name” … Instead it speaks to the individual doing it.

When was the last time that ‘you’ gave to those that needed food and/or clothing. Jesus gave us an example to follow. His command is that ‘you’ follow that example. So, either you need to follow it or stop dirtying His name by not following it but still calling yourself a Christian. … ME TOO!

Windows One thru Twenty-Nine Please

I was very “pressed upon” and tired yesterday, but today I feel surprisingly well. Don’t get me wrong; my feet still hurt, my toe on my right foot feel like it’s bruised, and I’d happily take on about three more hours of sleep if I didn’t have so many other things that I believe I should attend to. Yes yesterday was quite a day.

Got there a little after ten AM. First I went to window one and was told by someone in line that I should go to window three to complete my “previously approved” 12(a) visa. At window three I was told that I needed to have my tourists visa extended by one month. But before I go to window twelve I needed to make two copies of several of my documents. Ok at window twelve I was told I needed to go to window fourteen, who politely explained to me that I needed to go back to window three to get something called an “Agenda”.

Back at window three and he showed me that the document which I already possessed was signed by the director and so I didn’t need an Agenda. Knowing about beurocracy at it’s best I requested that he write a very short note that I could give to the guy at window fourteen so Mr. Window Fourteen wouldn’t think that I simply didn’t know what I was talking about. Mr. Three didn’t seem to want to give this to me however. So after I did my best three to four minutes of unsucceful persuasion I finally just got his name (MacDave) and accepted another printed document that was different than what I had but wasn’t what Mr. Fourteen was asking for.

After taking this to Mr. Fourteen he looked at what I got from Mr. Three with an expression of “This isn’t what I asked for”. After a few seconds of that he seemed to come up with a way that he could make this do and gave me some paperwork to fill out. After filling out the paperwork I went back to Mr. Fourteen who promptly sent me to window sixteen to pay for my one month visa extention. This was about P3,100 (but I don’t have the receipt in front of me right now). Going back to Mr. Fourteen with the receipt I was told I can pick up my passport and visa later at 1:30pm (a bit more than an hour and a forty five minutes). So I walked to Manila SM to run some other errands.

1:33pm I went to window sixteen to pick up my visa. Now back to Mr. Three and was given another form to fill out and the task of getting two copies of a handful of other documents. Now back at window three who tells me to go to window six to pay (another P5,300) and then back to window three. Mr. Three then tells me at 3:45pm that I can pick up my passport and this new visa at window one. Ahrighty another hour and a half to do something, back to SM Manila (which is a brisk ten minute walk by the way).

Three forty-five PM; your friendly neighborhood “Hey Joe” (as they call all Americans) makes his way back to window one and waits there for ten minutes for his turn. After getting to window one I am told to wait while the clerk goes to the back and gets something that has nothing to do with me and then comes back. My visa (and various paper work) is on the top but I am asked for P8 and the task of making two more copies of several documents and then to come back to window one. After waiting in a short line for the copier (pleasant surprise) I come back to window one and am told that I am not done yet (what?!?).

Ok, now at window number twenty four where I am give another document to fill out and the task of going to the other side of the building to get two copies of seven different documents. I come back to window twenty four a few minutes later and am told that I missed one. So I go back to the copier and come back to window twenty-four with what I think is everything however Mrs. Twenty-Four says that I have the wrong copy of the visa page of my passport. Now back to the copier to get this corrected and then back to Mrs. Twenty-Four.

Everything is completed so I take a finger print card to a make-shift finger print station behind me where I wait for five minutes before going back to Mrs. Twenty-Four who points at two chatty women sitting down about six feet from the station. I just thought they were there just like me, neither one of them said “How may I help you” when I was standing right beside the finger print station for five minutes.

After the finger printing is done I go back to Mrs. Twenty-Four and she tell me that I should go to Window twenty-six to pay an additional fee. Oh no!; when I started this fiasco I had printed out a page from the Phil Immigration website that said my total fees would be P5100. So like a good little Boy Scout I thought I would double that amount just so I could be prepared. Well that wasn’t quite enough and at this point I was P700 short; where would I get this money?

With a smile Mrs. Twenty-Four said “oh no, you’ll just have to come back tomorrow. We will be open at 9am.”. Well I smiled back politely and said “ok well I’ll just come back tomorrow then”. But that’s not what I was thinking. I was trying to figure out how I could get out of this situation without having to make the nearly two hour trip back to Marikina only to do this again tomorrow.

I thought of the lawyer that helped us with this process in the beginning. So I went up to the forth floor to his office and talked the matter over with him. After I was somewhat convinced that I wasn’t being treated unduly in this matter, I remembered that I had P1000 in my BPI account. So I went down to Mrs. Twenty-Four and asked if there was a BPI ATM near by and if I had the time to go to it. “It’s just over there but you’ll need to hurry; it’s 4:30pm already.”.

Ok so I hurry about fifty meters to the ATM and then hurry back; pesos in hand. Mrs. Twenty-Four reorganizes my paperwork and sends me to window twenty-six to pay P2991. The middle age woman at window twenty-six was about the most disinterested and slow employee I’ve ever come across. I waited there patiently for a very full five minutes before she ever got to me. She simply sorted and organized the other work that she had there, not once making eye contact with me. My paperwork simply hung there over the edge of her side of the window (I wanted to make sure that she knew I was there). And once every ninety seconds (about) I would shift my paperwork in front of her. Again with absolutely no eye contact I had no idea that she even knew I was there.

Paid the P2991 and then was told to proceed to window twenty-nine where I would have a picture taken for my new iCard and my contact and identifying information was inputted into a computer. The only piece that was incorrect was my age. It said 39 (I’m only 38) but it had my birth date correct of course but the age was still wrong. The explaination?; “The computer calculates age based on year”. They apparently had no way to correct this. And finally, about seven hours after I got there, I was given a telephone number to call to find out the status of my iCard tomorrow. But no one knew (I asked three of the people involved) whether the card would be ready when I called or whether it would take two days, three days, one week or three weeks .

Am I unhappy about this situation? Well no, was just tired and felt that my patience was quite tried. But as the old saying goes, “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger”; or the scripture says “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

There area lot of details to this story (like the cost of everything) that I have left out. I spent nearly P12,000 yesterday and hopefully I’ll collect the receipts from upstairs and add those details another time as I think it will be useful for others in in the same situation.

Sin is Fun !

I wish I could write a whole book on this subject but I just don’t have the talent/time. The talent that I have for writing is more suited for short entries into a blog (which I do) but not for the content of an entire book. To do so would require that I live like a hermit completely uninterrupted for three to five years. And since I have a family and I am not independently wealthy, the likelihood of that happening is very small. I’ve only heard one speaker dare to say “Sin is Fun” (a few years ago). As I searched across the internet it seems that the religious right only wants to talk about how sin is ‘not’ fun and all of that “wages of sin is death” stuff which has nothing to do with whether or not sin is actually fun.

I mean, how can anyone deny it? When I was “out there” doing whatever I wanted, I did enjoy it. How could I not; I was out there doing whatever I wanted with little or no restraint. Sex, women, alcohol, drugs, stealing, lying, pursuing a career that gave me a certain level of respect or power, “getting over” on someone who I considered less intellectually capable than I was; etc. I wouldn’t have done any of these things if I had not thought they were not fun. “By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time.” … Heb 11:24-25

But I can attest to how short lived this fun is. When I had finished have a night out with a woman, I had to go to work the next day. When I had a few drinks or smoke a little weed with friends at the bar or a one of their houses, the effect of the alcohol or marijuana eventually wore off. When I was young enough to be surrounded by friends who were impressed with my stealing, eventually the thrill and the bragging rights were over. And after I had climbed a few rung up the ladder of power, I eventually realized that even ‘my’ loose definition of morals and ethics were starting to become strained, and that wasn’t any fun.

Yes, the wages of sin is death; something much greater than death in this world. And the fun of doing things that are contrary to what God wants us to do (sin) is certainly temporary; not normally more than just a few hours; or a few days (if you don’t count the hours of gaps between “the fun”. I’d be lying to you if I didn’t say that my heart sometimes longs for the things that I once did several years ago. But then I don’t give much attention to my heart “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” … Jeremiah 17:11

What I do give regard to is something that doesn’t sound too sane for those that don’t believe in God and the Spirit of God that Jesus Christ said that he would send. I give regard to a “separate voice” (which is more like a separate thought really). But none-the-less I have truly come to understand that it is actually something completely different than I am because I have dared to follow it’s “voice”. And although there aren’t hundreds of times that I can tell you amazing stories, there are enough amazing stories for me to go ‘wow’ “I can’t ignore that there is something more hear than I can just simply see, hear, touch, and taste.

It’s because of this faith that God has given me that I can not deny Christ. I can not ever deny what I have personally experienced. I don’t need a bible to tell me that it is true, and I don’t need a pastor to tell me what I know for myself.

The Law is Spiritual. But I am Unspiritual

Pray that I will continue to keep in mind ‘today’ the great love that Jesus Christ gave so that I might daily be free from the law of sin and death. And that all of our brothers and sisters around the world will struggle relentlessly in the understanding of that great love. I pray that we will all be awake and ready. Fully aware that one of the schemes of the enemy is to rock us asleep while singing the great lullabies that will get us thinking about our jobs, our families, our friends, and our responsibilities. Satan doesn’t needs us to think about something vividly evil in order for him to be happy; as long as we don’t think about God in this moment, then the devil is happy.

“We know that the Law is spiritual; but I am a creature of the flesh [carnal, unspiritual], having been sold into slavery under [the control of] sin. For I do not understand my own actions [I am baffled, bewildered]. I do not practice or accomplish what I wish, but I do the very thing that I loathe [which my moral instinct condemns].

Now if I do what is contrary to my desire, [that means that] I acknowledge and agree that the Law is good (morally excellent) and that I take sides with it. However, it is no longer I who do the deed, but the sin [principle] which is at home in me and has possession of me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot perform it. [I have the intention and urge to do what is right, but no power to carry it out.]

For I fail to practice the good deeds I desire to do, but the evil deeds that I do not desire to do are what I am [ever] doing. Now if I do what I do not desire to do, it is no longer I doing it [it is not myself that acts], but the sin [principle] which dwells within me. So I find it to be a law (“rules of right and wrong” acting in my being) that when I want to do what is right and good, evil is ever present with me and I am subject to its insistent demands.

For I endorse and delight in the Law of God in my inmost self [with my new nature]. [Ps. 1:2.] But I discern in my bodily members [in the appetites and wills of the flesh] a different law (rule of action) at war against the law of my mind (my reason) and making me a prisoner to the law of sin that dwells in my bodily organs [in the appetites and wills of the flesh]. O unhappy and pitiable and wretched man that I am! Who will release and deliver me from [the shackles of] this body of death? O thank God! [He will!] through Jesus Christ (the Anointed One) our Lord! So then indeed I, of myself with the mind and heart, serve the Law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin. … at Romans 7:14-25 AMP

Choosing God’s Best revisited

Once upon a time I wrote a post about “Choosing God’s Best” and said that I would like to write more about that later. … Well, I never got around to writing that ‘more’ that I was referring to, but I am glad that you were able to write in your blog about it.

I do have a comment about the “High Standards” that you refer to however. I find that there are many people, influenced by the world’s view on things, who have created this criteria for a person they are looking for and that criteria gets in the way of God’s choosing ‘for’ us.

Allow God to be the ‘full’ match maker. Drop the “check-list” and simply tell God make it clear for you whether He wants you to be single or to be married. In that total surrender to His will you will find that He ‘is’ able to make it clear to you and you don’t have to have any criteria other than Him.

Consider in Gen 24 how Abraham allowed God to choose a wife ‘for’ his son. His son  Isaac didn’t pick his own wife, and Isaac’s wife wasn’t even picked by his father. How’s that for not having standards. The only “standards” that you might see from this story is the criteria set by Abraham of ‘not’ getting Issac a wife “from the daughters of the Canaanites”.

I think that had to do, if memory is serving me correctly, with a command God had given about the influence that a woman might have in serving the god of other peoples. But notice the criteria that he set had nothing to do with social status or outward appearance.

The reason I mention this, and I do realize I don’t know you and I am making an assumption here, is that in the American culture that I am from, the use of the phrase “I have high standards” doesn’t usually apply to the idea that someone is looking for a man/woman who has a similar faith. Instead it usually applies to looks, age, social standing, financial stability, or whether or not someone has a vehicle.

Worldy man’s perspective; “God wouldn’t want me to be with a woman that I’m not attracted to would He?”.

Worldy woman’s perspective; “God wouldn’t want me to be with a man that couldn’t provide a good life for me and our family would He?”.

Both perspectives are skewed and twisted (custom designed ideological dementia from the father of lies himself). But I’ll leave any further ideas that I have about this for another time.

Disney Channel Christianity

It’s good to see that God has given you a faith. I don’t yet know what kind of faith it is because I don’t know you.

However since God has given me faith in 2003 I have taken seriously the charge; “See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.” … Heb 3:12-13

And as such I challenge every brother and sister in Christ to not accept the mamby pamby, Leave it to Beaver, Walton’s Mountain, Disney Channel christianity that seems to proliferate wildly like some fiendishly inspired disease.

A false Christianity that simply carries over from the “American Dream” that fed the imaginations of millions now repackaged as a form of Christianity pulled loosely from scripture promising health, big houses, “good” jobs, and advanced schooling at a “good” college for all of your children.

“Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you stood your ground in a great contest in the face of suffering. Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated. You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.

Pursuing God?

Trying so hard to avoid boredom.

I thought I was pursuing God because I “went to church” most Sundays, and occasionally on Wednesdays. However when I reflect back on life I consider all of the places I’ve been & everything I’ve experienced. I realize that I’ve spent 40 to 50 hrs/wk pursuing a career, 28 hrs/wk glued to the television &10 hrs a week sitting behind a computer.

I’ve spent more time trying to entertain myself than sharing the wonder of life that God has given me. I’ve been to Disney Land, Niagara Falls, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and Egypt. I’ve went to all the greatest places in the world but I didn’t spend five minutes a week sharing with someone the wonders God has done in my life. Not even 1% of my time sharing that Jesus Christ gave his life so I could be reunited in a relationship with God. … If my life’s time was a tithe I could not stand before God and say that I really appreciated what He’s done for me.

“I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you will have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ.” … Philemon verse:6