Something I read today....

[GrowingPains]

Originally Posted by mizpeh

From The Grace Awakening by Charles Swindoll pag 20-21

"Most people I know look forward to payday. You do, too, right? For a week, or perhaps a two week period, you give time and effort to your job. When payday arrives, you receive a hard-earned, well-deserved paycheck. I have never met anyone who bows and scrapes before his boss, saying, "Thank you. Oh, thank you for this wonderful undeserved gift. How can I possibly thank you enough for my paycheck?" If we did, he would probably faint. Certainly, he would think, What is wrong with this guy? Why? Because your paycheck is not a gift. You've earned it. You deserve it. Cash it! Spend it! Save it! Invest it! Give it! After all, you had it coming. In the workplace, where wages are negotiated and agree upon, there is no such thing as grace.We earn what we receive; we work for it. The wage "is not reckoned as a favor but as what is due".

But with God the economy is altogether different. There is no wage relationship with God. Spiritually speaking, you and I haven't earned anything but death. Like it or not, we are absolutely bankrupt, without eternal hope, without spiritual merit; we have nothing in ourselves that gives us favor in the eyes of our holy and righteous heavenly Father. So there's nothing we can earn that would cause Him to raise his eyebrows and say, " Um, now maybe you deserve eternal life with me." No way. In fact, the individual whose track record is morally pure has no better chance at earning God's favor than the individual who has made a wreck and waste of his life and is currently living in unrestrained disobedience. Every one who hopes to be eternally justified must come to God the same way: on the basis of grace; it is a gift. And that gift comes to us absolutely free. Any other view of salvation is heresy, plain and simple."

We certainly never "earn" it, but we put ourselves in position by being seen through Christ. My good works aren't a matter of getting saved, they are a byproduct of being saved.

[GrowingPains]

Originally Posted by mizpeh

From Joyce Meyer's The Battlefield of the Mind, a devotional #84

Good stuff right there!

[GrowingPains]

Originally Posted by mizpeh

Why I Don’t Have a Television and Rarely Go to Movies by John Piper (a nonapostolic)




......There are, perhaps, a few extraordinary men who can watch action-packed, suspenseful, sexually explicit films and come away more godly. But there are not many. And I am certainly not one of them.

I have a high tolerance for violence, high tolerance for bad language, and zero tolerance for nudity. There is a reason for these differences. The violence is make-believe. They don’t really mean those bad words. But that lady is really naked, and I am really watching. And somewhere she has a brokenhearted father.

I’ll put it bluntly. The only nude female body a guy should ever lay his eyes on is his wife’s. The few exceptions include doctors, morticians, and fathers changing diapers. “I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?” (Job 31:1). What the eyes see really matters. “Everyone who looks at a woman to desire her has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). Better to gouge your eye than go to hell (verse 29).

Brothers, that is serious. Really serious. Jesus is violent about this. What we do with our eyes can ........ us. One reason is that it is virtually impossible to transition from being entertained by nudity to an act of “beholding the glory of the Lord.” But this means the entire Christian life is threatened by the deadening effects of sexual titillation.

All Christ-exalting transformation comes from “beholding the glory of Christ.” “Beholding the glory of the Lord, [we] are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18). Whatever dulls the eyes of our mind from seeing Christ powerfully and purely is destroying us. There is not one man in a thousand whose spiritual eyes are more readily moved by the beauty of Christ because he has just seen a bare breast with his buddies........To Read the Rest go to : http://ow.ly/fRb4

Add Michael L Brown to this list in his book Go And Sin No More. Non-apostolics who don't like tv. The difference is, they encourage the saints in this, and don't make it a litmus for fellowship.

[mizpeh]

Is there truly an application of the blood of Christ upon the heart?

As wonderful as the blood-shedding for our redemption is the blood-sprinkling for our cleansing. Here is indeed another of the spiritual mysteries of the New Covenant, which lose their power when understood in human wisdom, without the ministration of the Spirit of life. When Scripture speaks of “having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience,” of “the blood of Christ cleansing our conscience,” of our singing here on earth (Rev. i. 5), “To Him that washed us from our sins in His blood,” it brings this mighty, quickening blood of the Lamb into direct contact with our hearts. It gives the assurance that that blood, in its infinite worth, in its Divine sin-cleansing power, can keep us clean in our walk in the sight and the light of God. It is as this blood of the New Covenant is known, and trusted, and waited for, and received from God, in the Spirit’s mighty operation in the heart, that we shall begin to believe that the blessed promise of a New Covenant life and walk can be fulfilled.

From Two Covenants by Andrew Murray

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/murray/covenants/Page_80.html

[mizpeh]

Resisting Temptation

From The Imitation of Christ by Kempis

The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are.

Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks.

Someone has said very aptly: “Resist the beginnings; remedies come too late, when by long delay the evil has gained strength.” First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in 18 resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/kempis/imitation.ONE.13.html

[mizpeh]

Bearing with the Faults of Others


UNTIL God ordains otherwise, a man ought to bear patiently whatever he cannot correct in himself and in others. Consider it better thus—perhaps to try your patience and to test you, for without such patience and trial your merits are of little account. Nevertheless, under such difficulties you should pray that God will consent to help you bear them calmly.

If, after being admonished once or twice, a person does not amend, do not argue with him but commit the whole matter to God that His will and honor may be furthered in all His servants, for God knows well how to turn evil to good. Try to bear patiently with the defects and infirmities of others, whatever they may be, because you also have many a fault which others must endure.

If you cannot make yourself what you would wish to be, how can you bend others to your will? We want them to be perfect, yet we do not correct our own faults. We wish them to be severely corrected, yet we will not correct ourselves. Their great liberty displeases us, yet we would not be denied what we ask. We would have them bound by laws, yet we will allow ourselves to be restrained in nothing. Hence, it is clear how seldom we think of others as we do of ourselves.

If all were perfect, what should we have to suffer from others for God’s sake? But God has so ordained, that we may learn to bear with one another’s burdens, for there is no man without fault, no man without burden, no man sufficient to himself nor wise enough. Hence we must support one another, console one another, mutually help, counsel, and advise, for the measure of every man’s virtue is best revealed in time of adversity—adversity that does not weaken a man but rather shows what he is.

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/kempis/imitation.ONE.16.html

[mizpeh]

A. W. Tozer wrote a little book on the attributes of God entitled, The Knowledge of the Holy. The very first line of the first chapter reads, "What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us." That is an amazing statement. I remember when I first read this book, as a freshman in college, how deeply moved I was by it and how much I benefited from it. I have never been the same since; this book had such an impact on my life. I have ever since believed, even more strongly over the years, that what A. W. Tozer says here is true. What comes into our minds, that is, our minds, our hearts, our souls, when we think about God is the most important thing about us because it shapes everything else. God has made us so that we instinctively, naturally become like whatever it is we esteem most highly. Whatever it is that we value, cherish, prize, love, adore, we gradually, instinctively move in that direction. Of course, if this is a false god, an idol, so we become like that idol; we take on those characteristics and qualities. How important it is for Christian people to know God as He is, and in knowing Him to find Him, and Him alone, as worthy of their highest esteem and so become like him. Really, one of the greatest and most important truths I have ever learned in my life, I learned from A. W. Tozer, that we become like what we love. May we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and then become like Him increasingly. The greatest need in the church, I believe, in every generation and certainly in our generation now, is the need to know God as He is. May God help us to accept his revelation, discard misconceptions of God that are prevalent in our culture, accept God for who He has told us He is and love Him as He is. Bruce Ware

http://www.biblicaltraining.org/lecture/th103-2 Click on "transcript" or listen to the lecture.

BTW, The Knowledge of the Holy By Tozer is a wonderful book. It's online. http://www.heavendwellers.com/hdt_kn...f_the_holy.htm

[mizpeh]

From Jason Dulle's blog:

......And like Greg noted, self-deception is even greater at the group-level. I have found this to be true in my own life. There are certain teachings common to my religious organization that are not well-evidenced, but they are believed tenaciously by its members. People are afraid to question these teachings because the group accepts them as being true (and why question the group), and questioning/abandoning those teachings could impact their continued involvement with the group. I have seen people become emotionally disturbed when presented with evidence against these teachings. They often ignore the evidence contrary to their belief—going on as if they never heard it—so that their involvement with the group will not be negatively impacted.

I have even seen people go to great lengths to defend ideas and doctrines that no reasonable person would defend if they were not part of a group of people who believed and practiced such things. Humans have the tendency to want to justify the beliefs of the group they belong to. I have done so myself, and truth-be-told, I am probably doing this in certain areas even now. That’s the thing with self-deception: not only do we deceive ourselves in regards to specific issues, but we deceive ourselves into thinking that we are not deceiving ourselves when we do so. Lord, expose us to our own self-deception so we can see the truth more clearly! http://theosophical.wordpress.com/20...elf-deception/

I wonder what he could be referring to?

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by mizpeh

From Jason Dulle's blog:


I wonder what he could be referring to?

Flat Earth, maybe?

[*AQuietPlace*]

Originally Posted by mizpeh

From Jason Dulle's blog:


I wonder what he could be referring to?

That was a great blog post. So true.