#FaithPix (16 July 2019)

So here is the deal...
Let's post 1 positive and encouraging faith based picture and/or Bible Verse each day for 5 days.
Let’s spread the 'good news' around a digital world…

Share your #FaithPix along with me and let's see what God does with it...
July 16th - July 20th 2019.

Something to not just think about but do...

*Please don't share stuff to condemn or purposely upset others. Let's share what will build others up. Let's share what will bring someone else hope. Let's share about who we really believe God to be*

#FaithPix

In the vain of wanting to change things up a little this week with my Blog, plus do something that might help others...I am launching #FaithPix.
Even if it only helps one person in their moment of needing some hope, that is ok with me!

Right now my digital world is either filled with advertisements for many things I either don't want or can't afford.
It is filled with people hating others over their political leanings.
It is filled with people sharing how offended they are.
Let's change that a little for 5 days!

So here is the deal...
Let's post 1 positive and encouraging faith based picture and/or Bible Verse each day for 5 days.
Let’s spread the 'good news' around a digital world…

Share your #FaithPix along with me and let's see what God does with it...
July 16th - July 20th 2019.

Something to not just think about but do...

*Please don't share stuff to condemn or purposely upset others. Let's share what will build others up. Let's share what will bring someone else hope. Let's share about who we really believe God to be*

Trying to Breath?

Have you ever had that sensation where you were out of breath?
If you have you will know it is not the most pleasant!

I remember having croup as a young kid, waking up in a panic struggling to breath, finding it nearly impossible to call out to my mum for help.
I remember getting 'winded' playing sport, lying on the ground struggling to get another breath of air in. Like my body had forgotten how to breath on its own.
In the last few years I learned I have the occasional sleep apnea, where I stopped breathing properly, walking up panicked gasping for air.

I have been thinking today about this for a very specific and different reason.
As someone doing all I can to follow Jesus, I need to breath.
And I am not just talking about the natural breath we take for granted that will naturally flow in and out. I am referring to the very Spirit of God in my life.

God's Word speaks clearly that the Spirit of God is like a wind.
Both the Old and New Testaments speak in those terms with the ruwach and pneuma to describe the Spirit of God.
The Holy Spirit is to your walk with Christ like the very air your breath. Without air your struggle to survive and I would say it is the same with the Spirit of God. It is hard to follow Jesus, impossible to see His power in and through us, without the abiding breath of God.
Just as God breathed life into Adam on the day he first came alive, God wants to breath upon you by His Spirit so that you in turn come alive.

Can I encourage you this week to ask the breath of God to fill you each and every moment of each and every day?
Ask Him in the morning before you rise.
Ask Him in the evening before you retire.
You don't have to continue to struggle to breath any longer!

Something to think about...

Opinionators

All around the world we have 'opinionators'.
They are maybe a precursor to the fictional terminators of the movie franchise fame?
Without robot and AI enhanced skills, they show the same dogged determination to attack what they are programmed to attack.

The most important thing to an opinionator is their opinion.
And you better watch out if your opinion doesn't match their opinion!
Their strategy for dealing with an opinion or philosophical position different to them is simple...
Don't like someones idea. Attack.
Don't agree with someones faith. Attack.
Can't relate to someone else's values. Attack.

Everyone can have an opinion.
But having an opinion doesn’t make you any more right about an issue or a subject.
Opinions are not always fact.
Opinions can change at any time if something else convinces it otherwise.

Listen, opinions and the dealing with them is as old as humanity itself.
Every generation has had issues pertaining to differences of opinion.
I don't want to focus on it today, but the dam that held the extreme reactions at bay for a number of generations has been removed. Manners, respect, decorum are nearly extinct in many quarters, so the flood has arrived.
So what can you and I do to operate the best in a world of rampant opinionators?

Jesus asked his friend, his disciples a strange question one day.
"Who do people say I am?"
Essentially he was eliciting a response to all the opinions swelling around about Him at the time for a very pointed reason.
One by one they fire off their answers back to Jesus.
"Some say John the Baptist".
"Others say Elijah". 
"And still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets".
If you have read this before, did you notice they all referred to Jesus as a dead guy?
They said He was like any number of dead people. Weird!
It is just my opinion, but I can't help wonder whether they knew something was special about Jesus but didn't want to acknowledge it fully? All they felt comfortable doing was forming opinions on Him based on the history they understand around a bunch of dead guys.

Jesus then does something truly important and key to this issue. He turns to Peter, looks him right in the eye and directs His question on a truly personal level.
“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”
Peter is being most pointedly asked by Jesus to say who he thinks Jesus is. To forget about the opinionators and their biased thoughts on who He is.

Today I want to encourage you to put some blinkers on as it were to the world of raging and swirling opinions. They have become a polluted ocean. A cesspit of anger. Devoid of hope.
If you want to know Jesus, want to understand the Kingdom, get connected to the source of it all.
What you think and understand on a personal level is what God is most interested in.
Build your own relationship with God.
Do you own research.
Go back to the source of life and I believe you grow far beyond opinion.

Something to think about...

Please sow only in the way you want to reap.

I can certainly vouch for scripture and the principles we are encouraged to espouse there-in.
Give it long enough and you begin to see them play out in our personal lives, private lives, corporate and Church lives.

You have probably heard this saying...
You reap what you sow.
Online dictionaries explain it simply like this:
You eventually have to face up to the consequences of your actions.

Galatians 6:7 NIV says "...a man reaps what he sows."
Other translations help show just how simple this principle actually is.
"For what you plant will always be the very thing you harvest." TPT
"Whatever a man sows, this and this only is what he will reap." AMP

Some years before becoming the Pastor I am today, I worked for a business that was made up of many agencies. Essentially we had the 'rights' to sell and support various brands of engineering equipment from many reputable overseas businesses.
After many years of faithfully serving the owners I learned just how they came to have this business. My boss used to work as the General Manager of a very similar enterprise. He essentially set us his new business by stealing the agencies away for himself. That in turn attracted some of the staff he used to manage and there you have it - a ready made business for himself.

That point of telling this is not to have a go at my old employer but to show the true power of scripture. He ultimately reaped the harvest he sowed many years before.
Not long after I left the company one by one he lost these prized agencies to others.
I understand this caused upset and disappointment. He would have felt ripped off.
In light of what I began with, I believe scripture proved itself in the course of time.

I guess this simple thought is both an encouragement and reminder.
First that God's Word is exactly as it promises. It is sharper than any two edged sword. It gets into lives and situations. It always comes true because the creator of it backs it up.
Secondly it is a warning to consider how we build, how we deal with others, how we act in this world. As a follower of Christ I am looking for a harvest of righteousness so I need to sow that very thing to get it.

When I see others sowing in a way that is not righteous to get what they want, it makes me honestly very nervous for them.
Sowing discord will eventually reap you discord.
Sowing in jealousy will eventually reap you a jealousy harvest.
Trying to build your life, your business, your ministry or your Church in a way that is not right will eventually reap a pretty uncomfortable harvest. It might take a while but eventually we each reap was what sown in the past.

Check out what it says next in Galatians for a moment...
"...the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. 9Let us not grow weary or become discouraged in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap, if we do not give in." Galatians 6:8-9 AMP

Something to think about...