For my birthday last week, I shared a handful of the things I've learned about life. (Thank you to my readers for all the nice comments and tweets.) More important, this week, are just a few of the things I've learned about God, in roughly the order He revealed them to me.
Jesus is living God, to be worshiped for Who He is.
The more you look closely at nature, the more certain you are there's a Creator.
If you reach out for God when you're really scared, He reaches back.
You can only believe what other people tell you about God if it's backed up by what God says about Himself.
You cannot know God apart from truth. Pure truth has a quality that facts alone can never touch.
Hell is horrific and I belong there. Jesus loves me and He died so I can stay with Him instead.
You can't have all of God until you give Him all of you.
When God's Spirit moves in, sin needs to move out.
God can play a fierce game of Hide & Seek, but He loves to be found.
God is God, and He must be met on His terms, not ours.
When you seek God first, you receive blessings you'd given up on.
My best ideas are garbage unless they're part of God's plan.
God never intended for any of us to go it alone. We really do need one another.
God cares passionately about what we think of His Son.
God has a tender spot for the people who love His Son.
God's not particularly interested in making us comfortable.
Be very careful about what you pray for. God has an outrageous sense of humor.
Always pray for others what you'd want them to pray for you.
God repays good for good generously and bad for bad mercifully.
When we think we're waiting for God to move, He's probably waiting for us to move.
Don't ask God for new instructions until you've followed the last ones He gave.
God does not change and His feet do not move. But prayer can move the arm of God, the face of God, and the heart of God.
God has great compassion for the sorrowful heart turned toward Him.
God has little tolerance for whining when He's been so good to us.
Sometimes, God is only waiting for us to ask.
God can and does speak to those who know His voice.
God has no condemnation for His children, only discipline.
When we think we can't endure another moment of pain, God knows how far to stretch us.
If you seek blessings before seeking Blessor, you're sure to be disappointed.
God is seriously in love with His people.
God is too great to ever be understood by mortals.
God loves us too much to let us understand too little of Him.
We won't get tired of an eternity with God.
No matter what else or who else you think you need, God really is enough.
God never gives up on those in whom He's taken up residence.
Thus says the LORD:
"Heaven is My throne, and earth is My footstool.
Where is the house that you will build Me?
And where is the place of My rest?
For all those things My hand has made,
And all those things exist,"
Says the LORD.
"But this one will I regard:
The one who is afflicted and of a smitten spirit,
And who trembles at My word."
~ Isaiah 66:1-2
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
What I've Learned, the First Fifty Years
I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
~ Galatians 2:20 (NKJV)
Today I complete fifty years of drawing breath. I don't feel fifty years old unless I look back at all I've lived through or look forward to all I wait for, so I simply try to live in the present—to "seize the day" while remembering to plan for the future and see the past as no more than my schooling in life.
Here is a handful of some random things I've learned in my first fifty years.
The more I learn, the more I realize how ignorant I am of all there is to know, and the less I want to say.
The less you speak, the more likely people are to listen to what you have to say.
Strive for excellence and leave perfection to God.
Kindness is more important than efficiency.
Unkindness is never justified, however necessary or difficult the truth.
Force, even painful force, is necessary to authority and most effective with absence of anger or malice.
Neither debtor nor the one owed a debt is truly free. Forgiveness means living free of debts.
A good physician facilitates cures, but healing comes only from God.
(Likewise …) Any one of us can be an agent of rescue, but deliverance comes only from God.
There's no better place to be than the center of God's will.
Comfort can sometimes be purchased, but peace is a gift of God.
Joy is the product of expressed gratitude.
Money is a problem if you have too little or too much. If you have adequate food and clothing, you don't have too little.
Jesus died to save sinners, of whom I am chief, and there is no cause to look down on anyone.
The most important thing I will do today is express my great love for God in my love of neighbor.
Love doesn't eliminate sin, but it does cover a multitude of sins, and that's enough for mortals.
The Lord's Prayer covers everything. Pray it often and slowly.
There' s nothing in this world truly new—
That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
~ Ecclesiastes 1:9 (NKJV)
God makes all things new (Revelation 21:5), every day—
This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.
Through the LORD's mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
~ Lamentations 3:21-23 (NKJV)
Finally:
God is good. ALL. THE. TIME.
Gracious Father, if I have found favor in Your sight, please grant to me:
humility without defeat,
joy without pride,
peace without complacency,
faith without presumption,
hope without expectation,
passion without impatience,
and love without constraint,
for Your glory alone.
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
~ Galatians 2:20 (NKJV)
Today I complete fifty years of drawing breath. I don't feel fifty years old unless I look back at all I've lived through or look forward to all I wait for, so I simply try to live in the present—to "seize the day" while remembering to plan for the future and see the past as no more than my schooling in life.
Here is a handful of some random things I've learned in my first fifty years.
The more I learn, the more I realize how ignorant I am of all there is to know, and the less I want to say.
The less you speak, the more likely people are to listen to what you have to say.
Strive for excellence and leave perfection to God.
Kindness is more important than efficiency.
Unkindness is never justified, however necessary or difficult the truth.
Force, even painful force, is necessary to authority and most effective with absence of anger or malice.
Neither debtor nor the one owed a debt is truly free. Forgiveness means living free of debts.
A good physician facilitates cures, but healing comes only from God.
(Likewise …) Any one of us can be an agent of rescue, but deliverance comes only from God.
There's no better place to be than the center of God's will.
Comfort can sometimes be purchased, but peace is a gift of God.
Joy is the product of expressed gratitude.
Money is a problem if you have too little or too much. If you have adequate food and clothing, you don't have too little.
Jesus died to save sinners, of whom I am chief, and there is no cause to look down on anyone.
The most important thing I will do today is express my great love for God in my love of neighbor.
Love doesn't eliminate sin, but it does cover a multitude of sins, and that's enough for mortals.
The Lord's Prayer covers everything. Pray it often and slowly.
There' s nothing in this world truly new—
That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
~ Ecclesiastes 1:9 (NKJV)
God makes all things new (Revelation 21:5), every day—
This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.
Through the LORD's mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
~ Lamentations 3:21-23 (NKJV)
Finally:
God is good. ALL. THE. TIME.
Gracious Father, if I have found favor in Your sight, please grant to me:
humility without defeat,
joy without pride,
peace without complacency,
faith without presumption,
hope without expectation,
passion without impatience,
and love without constraint,
for Your glory alone.
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
Monday, November 26, 2012
Third Thanksgiving Payback: Purpose
The turkey has been eaten or frozen for later. The mammoth sales are over. The game's glow of victory or shadow of defeat has faded.
The Thanksgiving weekend has ended.
Let us hear the end of the whole matter:
Fear God, and keep His commands,
For this is the whole of man.
~ Ecclesiastes 12:13
"Fear God, and keep His commands" might accurately sum up human purpose. But it comes at the end of Ecclesiastes, Solomon's long lament about the "whole" of life as "meaningless," "vanity," "pointless," or "useless" (depending on your Bible's translation). How do we reconcile the wisdom of Solomon simultaneously viewing the whole of life as meaningless and the whole of man as "Fear God, and keep His commands"?
And further, from these, my son, be warned;
The making of many books has no end,
And much study is a weariness of the flesh.
~ Ecclesiastes 12:13
King Solomon possessed greater luxury, peace, and wisdom than all before or since. Yet he wearied himself searching for his "whole" in many women, much study, and a multitude of writings. He rightly concluded that the whole of man is found in fear of God and obedience to Him, but evidently found no satisfaction in the conclusion.
Solomon's descent came not in the loss of any blessing, but in failure to be content. His father David lived much of his life in exile and want, enduring hostility and war, yet he expressed continual gratitude to God through it all. Solomon's two psalms, volumes of proverbs, and Ecclesiastes elegy fail to speak of gratitude at all despite his enormity of blessings and peace.
Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work."
~ John 4:34 (NKJV)
Jesus knew His purpose and it was food to Him, body and soul. Gethsemane revealed that although human will and purpose are quite distinct, they find harmony in acceptance of God's will as blessing. We see in Scripture that Jesus, God the Son, always gave thanks to God the Father for His food, including the food of God's will, for He gave thanks for the covenant cup (Matthew 26.27-28)—a cup made available only because Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, also accepted the cup of God's wrath (Isaiah 51:17, Matthew 26:39,42).
This grace was given me: to proclaim goodness … the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make visible to everyone our share of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things … according to the eternal purpose which God accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.
~ Ephesians 3:8-11
In the giving of thanks, we make invisible God visible. We have highest purpose.
The Thanksgiving weekend may be over. The giving of thanks has no end.
Gracious Father, reveal to us Your will and our purpose. Lord Jesus, thank You for Your glorious example. Holy Spirit, empower us to live up to all we are to be, to our Father's delight.
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
The Thanksgiving weekend has ended.
Let us hear the end of the whole matter:
Fear God, and keep His commands,
For this is the whole of man.
~ Ecclesiastes 12:13
"Fear God, and keep His commands" might accurately sum up human purpose. But it comes at the end of Ecclesiastes, Solomon's long lament about the "whole" of life as "meaningless," "vanity," "pointless," or "useless" (depending on your Bible's translation). How do we reconcile the wisdom of Solomon simultaneously viewing the whole of life as meaningless and the whole of man as "Fear God, and keep His commands"?
And further, from these, my son, be warned;
The making of many books has no end,
And much study is a weariness of the flesh.
~ Ecclesiastes 12:13
King Solomon possessed greater luxury, peace, and wisdom than all before or since. Yet he wearied himself searching for his "whole" in many women, much study, and a multitude of writings. He rightly concluded that the whole of man is found in fear of God and obedience to Him, but evidently found no satisfaction in the conclusion.
Solomon's descent came not in the loss of any blessing, but in failure to be content. His father David lived much of his life in exile and want, enduring hostility and war, yet he expressed continual gratitude to God through it all. Solomon's two psalms, volumes of proverbs, and Ecclesiastes elegy fail to speak of gratitude at all despite his enormity of blessings and peace.
Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work."
~ John 4:34 (NKJV)
Jesus knew His purpose and it was food to Him, body and soul. Gethsemane revealed that although human will and purpose are quite distinct, they find harmony in acceptance of God's will as blessing. We see in Scripture that Jesus, God the Son, always gave thanks to God the Father for His food, including the food of God's will, for He gave thanks for the covenant cup (Matthew 26.27-28)—a cup made available only because Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, also accepted the cup of God's wrath (Isaiah 51:17, Matthew 26:39,42).
This grace was given me: to proclaim goodness … the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make visible to everyone our share of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things … according to the eternal purpose which God accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.
~ Ephesians 3:8-11
In the giving of thanks, we make invisible God visible. We have highest purpose.
The Thanksgiving weekend may be over. The giving of thanks has no end.
Gracious Father, reveal to us Your will and our purpose. Lord Jesus, thank You for Your glorious example. Holy Spirit, empower us to live up to all we are to be, to our Father's delight.
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
Monday, November 19, 2012
Second Thanksgiving Payback: Protection
Most humans think that our greatest source of suffering and our number one enemy is named Death. We fear its process if not its outcome. We avoid discussion of it, as if to disallow it in conversation is to relegate it into nonexistence. We fight it at any cost.
But I assert that Death is merely a portal, and our number one enemy is named Sin. Whether or not Suffering travels with Death, Suffering never leaves the company of Sin. Suffering and Sin both, like cancer, grow wherever they find a foothold. Sin assaults soul, hurts neighbor, weakens every community in which we have a part, and affronts God. The Suffering which enters with Sin can be neither measured or called back.
You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask bad, that you may expend it on your desires.
~ James 4:2-3
… lust … covet … desire … Here is where sin originates.
"Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses."
~ Luke 12:15 (NKJV)
Here too is the difference between the hungry third-world child, happy to play in the dirt with his companions, sticks, and rocks, and the round first-world child who cannot content himself in a house filled with luxuries.
"And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
~ Matthew 19:24 (NKJV)
And here is the difference between two men of equal means—one who looks upon what he has, and one upon what he has not, whether material wealth, health, or relationship.
"Wealth consists not in the abundance of our possessions, but in the fewness of our wants."
~ Unknown
In the practice of thankfulness, gratefully focused upon all we have, we become increasingly oblivious to the desires which invite sin and lead to suffering.
For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.… O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
~ Romans 7:19, 24-25 (NKJV)
If Sin is greatest enemy, giving thanks to God is perhaps the most effective protection we can employ against the tyrant.
Next time: Third Thanksgiving Payback – Purpose
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
But I assert that Death is merely a portal, and our number one enemy is named Sin. Whether or not Suffering travels with Death, Suffering never leaves the company of Sin. Suffering and Sin both, like cancer, grow wherever they find a foothold. Sin assaults soul, hurts neighbor, weakens every community in which we have a part, and affronts God. The Suffering which enters with Sin can be neither measured or called back.
You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask bad, that you may expend it on your desires.
~ James 4:2-3
… lust … covet … desire … Here is where sin originates.
"Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses."
~ Luke 12:15 (NKJV)
Here too is the difference between the hungry third-world child, happy to play in the dirt with his companions, sticks, and rocks, and the round first-world child who cannot content himself in a house filled with luxuries.
"And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
~ Matthew 19:24 (NKJV)
And here is the difference between two men of equal means—one who looks upon what he has, and one upon what he has not, whether material wealth, health, or relationship.
"Wealth consists not in the abundance of our possessions, but in the fewness of our wants."
~ Unknown
In the practice of thankfulness, gratefully focused upon all we have, we become increasingly oblivious to the desires which invite sin and lead to suffering.
For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.… O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
~ Romans 7:19, 24-25 (NKJV)
If Sin is greatest enemy, giving thanks to God is perhaps the most effective protection we can employ against the tyrant.
Next time: Third Thanksgiving Payback – Purpose
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
First Thanksgiving Payback: Peace
For many people, next week will be four days off of work for gorging on food, football, and frenzied shopping.
For others, the celebration of giving thanks is an opportunity to indulge in blessings remembered and to renew thanksgiving as a way of life.
As a way of life, thanksgiving offers paybacks exponentially higher than 5% cash back on a credit card. Whatever else we do in pursuit of health in body and mind, heart and soul, the exercise of giving thanks returns a plethora of rewards for a person's well being, and peace is first on the list.
Peace with Life
"A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves." So said Henry Ward Beecher, and so I have observed to be true, foremost of myself. When I believe I should have more than I do—more wealth, more health, more esteem—I am not at peace with life. But when I see myself as a worm who is unworthy to live in a free country amid plenty, or as a sinner undeserving of God's mercy grace and forgiveness, I am then utterly amazed that my Creator has blessed me as He has. In such a condition, I am at peace with life and know contentment in the midst of trial.
Peace with People
The same humble spirit necessary to heartfelt gratitude enables peace with even the most contentious scoundrels. God's Word directs, "If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men." (Romans 12:18, NKJV) If some scoundrel will not be at peace with me, I will yet be at peace with him (wherever possible), ready to see the opportunity to return thanks to him (whenever possible), channeling to him the abundant grace poured out upon me (however possible). And, perchance, he (or she) will come to know peace with me in the process.
Peace with God
Truth be told, this is hardly different than peace with life. For God is Giver of life and all its complements. No circumstance of life arrives absent the permission of Almighty God. I would believe that my complaint about circumstance benignly evaporates, the thin air into which it was breathed dissipating its substance. Yet is complaint not a plaintiff's testimony against God's goodness, carried into the world and heavenly realms alike, summoning the Lord as Defendant and declaring my opposition to His sovereignty? On the other hand, the plea to receive strength and wisdom for a test is to invite His grace. And to offer testimony of thanks is to proclaim God wise and good and righteous and loving, declaring myself at peace with Him.
Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever.
Let the redeemed of the LORD say so.
~ Psalm 107:1-2 (NKJV)
Next time: Second Thanksgiving Payback – Protection
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
For others, the celebration of giving thanks is an opportunity to indulge in blessings remembered and to renew thanksgiving as a way of life.
As a way of life, thanksgiving offers paybacks exponentially higher than 5% cash back on a credit card. Whatever else we do in pursuit of health in body and mind, heart and soul, the exercise of giving thanks returns a plethora of rewards for a person's well being, and peace is first on the list.
Peace with Life
"A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves." So said Henry Ward Beecher, and so I have observed to be true, foremost of myself. When I believe I should have more than I do—more wealth, more health, more esteem—I am not at peace with life. But when I see myself as a worm who is unworthy to live in a free country amid plenty, or as a sinner undeserving of God's mercy grace and forgiveness, I am then utterly amazed that my Creator has blessed me as He has. In such a condition, I am at peace with life and know contentment in the midst of trial.
Peace with People
The same humble spirit necessary to heartfelt gratitude enables peace with even the most contentious scoundrels. God's Word directs, "If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men." (Romans 12:18, NKJV) If some scoundrel will not be at peace with me, I will yet be at peace with him (wherever possible), ready to see the opportunity to return thanks to him (whenever possible), channeling to him the abundant grace poured out upon me (however possible). And, perchance, he (or she) will come to know peace with me in the process.
Peace with God
Truth be told, this is hardly different than peace with life. For God is Giver of life and all its complements. No circumstance of life arrives absent the permission of Almighty God. I would believe that my complaint about circumstance benignly evaporates, the thin air into which it was breathed dissipating its substance. Yet is complaint not a plaintiff's testimony against God's goodness, carried into the world and heavenly realms alike, summoning the Lord as Defendant and declaring my opposition to His sovereignty? On the other hand, the plea to receive strength and wisdom for a test is to invite His grace. And to offer testimony of thanks is to proclaim God wise and good and righteous and loving, declaring myself at peace with Him.
Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever.
Let the redeemed of the LORD say so.
~ Psalm 107:1-2 (NKJV)
Next time: Second Thanksgiving Payback – Protection
Comments are welcome (including respectful disagreement) and will receive a reply.
You may also contact author via Twitter – @anne4JC
or e-mail – use @gmail.com *after* buildingHisbody
Copyright 2012, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.
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