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"you will find it...dont settle for your common.mundane, belief system.."
Yours is the common and mundane religion Jordan. You speak the religion of self, and self-centeredness not enlightnement, not freedom, sadly only illusion.
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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Trying to make that language look nice is about as effective as pouring perfume on a pig. It ain't going to change the fact that the pig and that word wallow around in the mud and stink.
you are really trying to bring about the new worlsd order.... LOL talk about perfuming a pig? you should get a whiff of your fascist preachings...
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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Funny that is the phraseology you chose Glass given you endorse letting genocide happen. But that's another thread.
Glass and Jordan you guys are the height of sanctimonious religio-phobia. We get to the core of why you are angry with me: Christianity. Your true colors are coming out tonight. Intolerance and fear. It's okay, I once was just like you. I just wonder why you are so afraid.
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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No I come on to have fun boys. I'm free and celebrating. I share the peace within myself, it is you who come spoiling for a scuffle. See, you all take this board way too seriously, that's why you get angry. You don't see it for what it is, a diversion.
Look Jordan, I have been listening to the sme broken record from you, Glass, bdgee about religion all day. You guys hate religion. That's your gig. You're mad because we disagre, I am having fun. You use profanity, I have no need. Why? because I am at peace.
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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And see, this is your hypocricy: you say I preach the same stuff over and over, must not read the posts, but you preach the same dogma everywhere: hate Bush, hate religion. Utterly predictable.
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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Guys, you're mad because it's all out in the open. Bdgee uses racial epithets, Glass can't decide whether I'm fascist or liberal, and Jordan hates Christianity. To me this is all really funny. We got all weekend to keep this up.
See, this is exactly why we need the religious left to assert itself. To heal the racism, the political turmoil and the religio-phobia. Peace is in the heart as God gives grace.
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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"and stop reading your sermons! we arent your flock of sheep... you must be a witness"
Actually, I don't read my sermons, I memorize them. The world is my parish. And when you come to a thread I posted, you will hear about Christ. Your anger Jordan is fun to watch play out. You have a mantra like poem: there is no God! Almost like Dorothy saying "there's no place like home."
You need to come up with better material. At least something original. Gordon, Glass, bdgee and now Jordan. Funny how you all attack the same thing. I wonder why you are so afraid of faith?
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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"when did i cuss?.. and if i did? its just my way..thats all..settle down"
Bud I don't need to settle down, I'm having fun here. I am watching the atheist crew self-destruct. Jordan, let me help you with a new mantra: find God, find peace.
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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1 Kings 3:7-15 1 Thessalonians 5:12-24 Matthew 6:19-24
Underdog! I wince every time I hear the word. Especially when it is used in reference to Jesus! And yet when I hear the birth story, I can not help but see that Our Savior came to us in the humblest manner. Underdog! Laid low in a manger, nothing more than a feeding trough, this is Christ Jesus. Yet even from these humblest of origins the greatest rescue mission humanity ever experienced was launched for rich and poor, man and woman, slave and free. From out of that trough came redemption of the world- God came down to lift us up! Will you believe? To whom should we give worship? To whom do we take aim when we reach out for comfort? “Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it will bear no fruit. But if the seed falls to the ground it bears fruit a hundredfold.” With these words Jesus told his disciples what he must do in order to bring them and all who would believe eternal life. But God’s full plan was only hinted at in Jesus’ death on the cross. For God was not content to let death be the last word in God’s action to save humanity. Jesus is alive! Not just now but for all time, our savior reigns. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! May Christ rise in heart and voice once again as we stand to sing, “Christ the Lord is Risen Today.”
Arise you ransomed, redeemed people of God. The woes and cares of this world grow strangely dim, for God is our strength, the light of our lives. In the light of God’s truth we grow in Christ- turning from what we have been, becoming what we will be, revealed by God’s grace. Let us bring our praises to the Lord as we join to sing, “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee.”
I gotta tell you I’m excited this morning! I’m excited because something’s moving in this church today. I’ve been working on this service for six weeks- for two weeks I’ve been praying for this morning, praying and searching through scripture asking God to guide me, asking for God’s Holy Spirit to touch lives this morning, and in fact every morning of your lives. Asking for God to give me the strength to submit for God’s purpose for this morning! Brothers and sisters come! Now is the time to worship! Now is the time to give heart and mind, body and soul to God, to set aside all distraction and hold fast to the One who longs to receive us for all time. For as the song goes, “One day every tongue will confess, one day every knee will bow- but still the greatest treasure remains for those who gladly choose God now!” Now is the time to worship- to set our sights high, to aim high for God! Bishop T.D. Jakes was preaching to soldiers gathered in a stadium, while broadcasting to 2-3 prisons when he picked up a rocket launcher and exclaimed, “When it comes time to answer the question, ‘what do I believe in? Aim High! When it comes time to answer the question, where will I put my trust? Aim High!’” How much I agree with this admonition! Nothing could be more important in our lives! I say this because the highest aim we can have points to God and the place to set our treasure is heaven. To believe or trust anything else in all creation is to set ourselves up for disappointment and grief. So set your sights high- believe in God- set your sights on God’s kingdom. I implore you Aim High! A few weeks ago, I talked to you about revival and awakening, I want to explain that now. Revival happens when a person’s heart is touched by God. Revival touches on emotions, feelings, and motivation. Some people call revival heart religion because it is based in heart experiences. It is deeply personal and transforming. We need revival in the church today if we are to carry the good news of Jesus Christ into the world. Equally though, we need awakening, which is the reasoning side of the church, to say, “Okay I see what’s happening around us, but how do we channel this energy into the mission of the church.” As we look into the future, there are people fired with passion, burning to witness to the faith they experience in Jesus Christ. There are others, though, who are not into that dancing in the aisles, hand-waving, heart-religion crowd. That first group is on fire and they are saying, “right now let’s do!” and the second group is saying, “Let’s think this through!” How God has blessed both groups, and I am sure some of us are in one group or the other. Whether you follow God with heart or mind you are a valuable part of where this church is going. But if I may be so bold, I would remind you, God is hoping you’ll give heart and mind to God! I offer this as a challenge to you and to my self because I know we are able. Revival energizes people for the mission of the church and awakening organizes the mission of the church. Where would the church be without both? It is revival that energizes people to support the ministry of their church with their prayers, their offering, their talent and their participation, and awakening that organizes programs, designs projects and classes and sets a schedule. But it all begins with prayer. I mentioned aiming high, well, you see, the first step in aiming high is to get down on our knees before God. We can never truly and accurately aim for the kingdom of God until we are willing to get on our knees before our Holy God! If a hunter or sharpshooter wants to have the steadiest aim, they get on their knees and if we are going to have a clear vision for where this church is going. If we are going to aim high for God’s kingdom and our place in it, we have to become very serious, intentional and deliberate about our prayer life with God. Growing a life of prayer is step one of aiming high. Step one of aiming high is getting low down and humble before God in prayer! Step two of aiming high is studying the bible. As the hunter uses a scope to improve the aim- so Christians must use the bible regularly if we are to aim for God’s kingdom. The Bible is our scope, our way of peering into God’s will for us. The Bible is the scope that focuses our attention in God’s direction- it instructs us in what it means to be a Christian. We have an opportunity to draw near to God- an opportunity to catch the vision God has for our life- every time we read the bible. But it needs to be a daily experience, a daily chapter in our lives. Opening the bible provides another opportunity to worship God as we fellowship together. So step two of aiming high is developing a pattern of daily reading the bible- remember the old saying- a chapter a day keeps the pesky pastor away. Seriously though, I look forward to the day when you all take over the sermon time playing “stump the pastor” by asking me questions about the bible. That will be a great day for me because on that day I will know that in reaching for the bible, you set your sight on God. Step three in aiming high is recognizing that what we are aiming for is God. You see, people venture into a church for many different reasons. Some come because it’s where we’re supposed to be on Sunday morning. Others come because their friends attend. It’s a great place for coffee, the music’s great (sometimes), it’s peaceful, it’s friendly. Some come for reasons they can’t quite describe or understand. Church is also called other less pleasant things- a social club, a bunch of hypocrites. All of this to say we are easily distracted from God, as Solomon’s story testifies to this morning. Most people recognize that there is a social purpose, which is a great secondary purpose, but our main purpose must always be to grow closer to God and to advance God’s mission on Earth. To do this the church must first be a place of teaching people what it is to be a disciple of Christ, giving them a personal relationship with God, helping people find their role in the ministry of the church and then equipping them to fulfill that role, and finally to go repeat that cycle with people in the world. See when people view the purpose of the church as purely social, bad things happen. When the focus comes away from God- We stop seeing people as the children of God and we begin sizing them up as contributors. We begin to find areas of disagreement, and the offering is seen as some kind of church tax or membership dues. When God is not the focus, an unpleasant form of tension surrounds decisions about the direction of the church. Tension always surrounds decisions, BUT in the church when we lose our focus on God, the discussion about where things are going becomes much more personal- a social matter rather than spiritual. I pause on this because, as a church gets closer to making decisions, it is human nature to take our focus off God and focus on the issues and debates and the sides of the argument. It becomes easy to stop taking action for fear that someone will be hurt. I COMMEND THAT INTENTION. But let me offer a better way to make decisions: 1) pray, 2) read the Bible, and 3) Keep the focus on God. If we focus on God, something really helped through prayer and bible study, then the decisions we make, both in the church and the personal ones we are confronted with, become less a case of deciding between good and bad, and become a decision between good and best. And focusing on God will pull us into the future. See, focusing on God helps us to realize we are a part of a beautiful thing in this church. We are the present generation, this church was passed on to us from generations past as we will pass the church on to a future generation. We are here today because people filled with the presence of God, focused on God, journeyed to this place. They gathered here to build this place as they felt the leading of God. We are gathered because generations of this church left a part of their labor, a part of their money, a part of their heart, and a part of their life as the endowment of this building given for this and future generations. Their decisions changed the course of this street and this town because God was their focus. They knew the church had been entrusted to them, as they would one day entrust it to us. Brothers and sisters, we are confronted with the same challenge, the same invitation. The decisions that confront our church today beg us to ask the question: How can God lead us to join with the generations past to leave a spiritual inheritance for generations future? I have no doubt that God has further plans for this corner of God’s kingdom, no doubt that in God’s plan this church’s future does not end with this generation, but the question remains: what manner of church do we leave to the next generation of faithful? The answer can only be found as we aim high in everything we do, as we focus on God for all our direction. Sisters and brothers, aim high! Let us pray!
-------------------- God's peace be with you A salaam a lakum Shalom Chevarim Posts: 896 | From: Iowa | Registered: Jul 2006
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