The Path to Glory

John 14:31-32 [ESV]

31 When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. 32 If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once.

This is something that Jesus says on the night of his betrayal and arrest - NOW is the Son of Man glorified!

Really, Jesus? You’re about to be arrested, beaten to a bloody pulp, nailed to a piece of wood and left hanging to die. That's glory for you?

And Jesus' answer is yes, because the things that are most valued by humanity are despised in the sight of God. The selfish way that we would think of being glorified would be to be in perfect health with a great, prestigious job, the respect of all who know us, fame so that everyone knew us, wealth beyond imagination, leisure coming out of our ears, - that would be glory.

But Jesus is so very different for us, that he finds glory for himself in an expression of radical, self-giving love. He doesn't consider himself glorified most in some moment when everything is going as he wants it to, but when everything in this world comes apart for him. Everything but God and the will of God. When nothing was left to Jesus but his love and obedience, he considered himself glorified.

And really, the best moments of my life are like that too. I know my life to be really great when I have done something that makes a difference in someone else's life. When another person is made better or discovers greater faith as a result of my love and work in their life, that's when I feel most alive and closest to God.

Jesus' trust in God was so profound that even though no one else would be able to recognize it until after the whole work of God was done, Jesus knew that he was being glorified in his terrible cross.

So perhaps when life gets hard here, and it seems like no one in the world would ever want to trade places with me, I need to try to see things from God's perspective. Those dark nights might be our times of greatest glory.

My Too Often Unbroken Heart

Psalm 34:18 [ESV]

The Lord is near to the brokenhearted
and saves the crushed in spirit.

I think I forget this a lot. I get to thinking that God will be near to me if I am good enough, do my job well enough, think right, make sure I am in control of everything all the time, and basically prove to him that I really don't need him because I'm doing well on my own.

But I don't do well on my own. I don't like who I am on my own. When I try to be on my own, eventually, I find myself devestated. I mess something up or I get overwhelmed and over stressed, and before I know it, I am sinking to the ground and crying out, "Help me! I can't do this without You!"

And that's when I finally find peace and strength to make it through. When I stop trying to pretend that I'm not broken - when I stop trying to hide all the fractures in my heart - I find his peace all around me. When I admit that the weight of my life (and particularly of my sins) is more than my spirit can bear, I find that in those moments I see him more clearly.

What I wonder is, why is it that I so often have to get to the end of my rope before I pray? Why can I not pray when I am just a little bit broken, when I still have some peace for Him to multiply? I suppose my heart is broken in more ways than I want to admit.

What's Money For Anyway??

Luke 16: 8b-9 [ESV]

For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. 9 And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings.

This is one of Jesus strangest parables, but I think this is his point: why do I have what I have? For use in the kingdom of God. All the money I "earn" is really God's money, entrusted to me for His purposes.

Money won't last forever - it comes and it goes, but the reality is, we won't have it forever. Eventually, we will die, and there is no currency that can alter that truth.

But our use of money absolutely can alter what our experience will be like after we die. We can use money to help each other, and the help that we offer to each other deepens our care for one another. It isn't that we buy love, but that our love is expressed in how we use money. The repeated expression of love deepens love - the more we express love for someone, the more we love them. (The converse is also true - the less we express and act on love, the less we love others).

Love is what lasts into eternity - the welcome that we extend to each other and the care we provide for each other. So we use what cannot last and is doomed to fail to deepen what will last forever and is of immeasurable worth.

Everything about us must be dedicated to the kingdom and our kingdom relationships - even our use of money must be kingdom oriented.

How Well He Knows Us

Matthew 26:41 [ESV]

41 Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

He knows that I am weak. I am weak, but I don't want to be weak. Deep inside, I long to be a good man - a better man than I've ever been. But there is all this junk around that man - all these desires and drives and out of control places, most of which seem totally harmless to the world around me, but will kill me if they become the dominant drives in my life.

How do I solve this? I spend time keeping watch with Jesus over my heart - seeing it for what it really is - and I pray. Direct effort on my part to over come my brokenness just produces more brokenness. But by entering into God's presence [praying]with honest self awareness and sober self assessment [keeping watch] I have a chance to find empowerment to overcome the urge to be what I should not be.

God's Plan for Our Lives

Jeremiah 29:11

11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for wholeness and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

God has good in mind for us - not to do us harm, not to kill us or distort our lives, but to give us wholeness, fullness, life worth living, helping us to live for the sake of others and not ourselves. Life lived with God is worth having, and that has been his plan all along.

Hey Guys, Here is More what we were thinking, I think

Okay, lets give this a try. Who has a scriputre and a thought?