What Is Your Superpower?

The Church strongly adheres to spiritual gifts for a time. Then, the emphasis seems to fade and people do whatever they want. The idea just doesn't seem to stick even though it is biblical. The fallen nature of people reverts to the belief that everyone should be able to do everything. That isn't true even though there is already someone reading this saying, "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me." Anyone who takes a serious look at Philippians 4:13 will realize that all things are refering to the things God has called them to.

Each believer has been given at least one spirtual gift. No believer has been given all the spiritual gifts. The believer should listen to the Lord and do what the Lord says to do. The Lord will not require anyone to do something that can't be done without Him. He works through the spiritual gifts to accomplish His will.

Sometimes people feel guilty when they refuse to accept a position of service at the church. Many will accept the position but never show up for the service. Others, feel as if they are not being good Christians by their refusal to work in a certain area. Still others accept the position, do the work reluctantly and look forward to the moment they no longer have to serve. It shouldn't be that way.

The spiritual gifts were given to the church so that the church would have unity. Let's face it, God could do everything He needs to do without us. He requires us to do His will so that we will grow spiritually and have fellowship with Him. There is a greater fellowship when His children have unity with each other. Thus, we depend upon each other and work together. The members of the church working together for the purpose of giving God glory produces unity.

But that means we must need each other. No member has all of the gifts so that the members need each other to do God's will. So, God has given specific gifts to different people to accomplish His will, bring them to unity and felllowship with them. So, every believer should be functioning in the area of  his/her giftedness and no believer should be trying to function outside of his/her giftedness.

God does not call people to do things outside of their giftedness. He calls His Church to do great things  and equips the Church to do whatever He is calling her to do. Each new member should be a confirmation or an indication of God's will. He is gathering those whom He has gifted to do what He has or will call the church to do.

This gift or gifts which have been given are to be used in conjunction with the leading of the Spirit. They are given and governed by the Spirit. Thus, the person who lords a gift over someone is not truly employing the spiritual gift. He or she is acting under the flesh. Some people are very good at imitating a spiritual gift with the flesh.

So, one gifted in teaching who is also a natural orator may teach heresy by the flesh and confuse others who know the person has the spiritual gift of teaching. The person listening should know what the scriptures say and realize that God does not contradict Himself. Those listening should always ask for spiritual discernment for any "new" teaching.

This is true for any of the spiritual gifts. The person who has the gift of serving others may act in the flesh in his/her service. Thus, the service is used to gain an advantage over others. Those who serve in the spirit will always be thankful for the service. Those who serve in the flesh do so to satisfy the flesh.

Knowing your own spiritual gift does not exempt anyone from service. In other words, the one who has the gift of prophecy is not exempt from mercy because he doesn't have the gift of mercy. The one with the gift of leadership is not exempt from giving because he lacks the gift of giving.

The gifts provide spiritual results for those who are operating under the Spirit with their spiritual gifts. The prophet speaks for the Lord with a special power. The teacher gives the reasons and details of the teaching as one who has walked with the Lord. The person with mercy sees the need to be merciful when others would rather wask their hands over the matter.

In short, we have been given special spiritual gifts to see our Lord personally and corporately. We see Him as He works in us and as He works in His body, the church.

Are you serving God with your spiritual gift? It is His power working in you. It is your superpower.

1 Corinthians 12:1-11 (NIV) ¹ Now about spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant. ² You know that when you were pagans, somehow or other you were influenced and led astray to mute idols. ³ Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit. ⁴ There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. ⁵ There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. ⁶ There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men. ⁷ Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. ⁸ To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, ⁹ to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, ¹⁰ to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. ¹¹ All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.

Tale of Two People

There are two people who live within me. One knows what the Lord has said and believes. The other doubts and worries. One humbles himself and obeys the Lord. The other does things he knows he shouldn't do. One is at peace. The other is ful of anxieties.

I naturally walk as one of these people. The other requires the Lord to walk with me.

I know that God is the Almighty. There is nothing that is beyond His abilities. There is nothing that is beyond His concern. His love for me is everlasting and He loves no one more than He loves me. I know that He will give me direction for today. I know that I exist in His grace for today and must depend on His grace for tomorrow when tomorrow arrives. I know obedience to Him honors Him and is best for me. I know that I have been created for His glory and He desires to have fellowship with me. I know that He has plans for good things in my life. I know that He is sovereign. He is aware and involved in everything that happens. I know He has forgiven me of all my wrongdoings. I know His mercy is fantastic. I know I can trust Him.

Yet, today, if I fail to pay attention to what I know, I can act as if none of these things are true. I can worry that my life will be meaningless. I can believe I am a failure. I will see myself as a fool who believes in Someone who does not care for me. I can blame myself. I can lose my trust. I can be full of worries, anxieties and fears.

Will I be the person who knows God or will I act like one who doesn't? This is the question I have before myself every day.

Yesterday, I rode my bicycle to the church building. I was almost hit by three cars. Twice it was my fault because I was trying to get past people before the lights. The third time it was because the person was completely distracted. He was talking on a cell phone, looking left and turning right at a stop sign. I was crossing the intersection on the sidewalk. I hit my brakes hard because he never looked.

I believe this man knows how to drive and is probably a safe driver most of the time. The problem was in his distraction. I thought of this as an example of the two people who live within me. I am a different person when I pay attention. I am different when I take time in the morning to remember who I am and who God is. I am different when I pay attention to what I know of God and how He acts. I am different when I am paying attention.

Who will I be today? That depends on whether I am paying attention.

Psalm 42:11 (ESV) ¹¹ Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.

What Are You Expecting?

Everyone has faith though that faith may not reflect the type of faith Jesus told us to have. For example, some people have faith that there is nothing to Christianity. They believe the followers are deluded fools whose hope might as well be put in the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus. Their faith will not allow them to see the working of the Lord around them. Everything can be explained by those who choose to believe there is no god.

Faith fashions our expectations. Natural explanations are readily available to those who seek them. The Hebrew people escaping through the sea can be explained with a strong wind. The crossing of the Jordan on dry ground came because a landslide dammed the river. People were healed just as they are healed by placibos. Walking on water meant Jesus knew where the rocks were.

But these expectations also often form the results too. Jesus told His followers that they must believe before they will see God act.

Matthew 17:20 (NIV) ²⁰ He replied, "Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.

A father comes to Jesus and asks that a demon be removed. He asks Jesus to do something if He can.

Mark 9:23 (NIV) ²³ "'If you can'?" said Jesus. "Everything is possible for him who believes."

Belief is tied to expectation and expectation to results. The lack of belief resulted in the lack of miracles in His home town.

Mark 6:5 (NIV) ⁵ He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them.

While I am not one who says that the lack of faith is the reason for every unanswered prayer, I have to admit that there is merit in faith bringing miracles.

So, I have to ask myself what I expect. It is not just a matter of what I believe God has the capacity to do. I believe that He can at all times do what people consider impossible. That must be true if I am honest in any request I make. But faith of Jesus is more than this. It actually believes He will rather than merely He can.

How can I have this faith? God is not a cosmic Santa Claus who grants my every wish. He does not merely grant it because I have told Him that He must because I have used the "faith" card to trump Him. No, He remains sovereign.

I must, therefore, know Him so well that I know His will. I may receive that will from a word from Him. I, then, can expect that He will grant my request because He has said this is His will.

1 John 5:14-15 (NIV) ¹⁴ This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. ¹⁵ And if we know that he hears us--whatever we ask--we know that we have what we asked of him.

The problem we most often have is that we have neither taken the time to ask or if we have, we do not consider what His will is. Thus, we are either silent or selfish. Neither will see God respond.

James 4:2-3 (NIV) ² You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. ³ When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

But we can ask and we can expect if we walk with Him to know His will and pray that His will be done.

So, what do you expect? Are you asking for God to act in miraculous ways to do something which will save souls? Are you asking Him to revitalize your church into the army that it was intended to be? Are you asking God to provide, heal, protect, open wombs and raise the dead? Are you asking Him for wisdom, forgiveness and the restoration of the joy of salvation?

Or do you have the same faith as the unbeliever? They don't expect anything will happen today.

Do Pharisees Know They Are Pharisees?

We live in a very divisive world. People are divided into categories so that others can manipulate them. The poor are told to despise the rich. The blacks are supposed to hate the whites. The young are to be suspicious of the old. The northerners must question the purity of the southerners. Each of these can be turned vice-versa.

Groups are subdivided within their distinction. Thus, a conservative may not be conservative enough. Or, a liberal may not be liberal enough. The effort to find purity within your own personal ilk results in Pharisees being born. Don't think that theological circles are devoid of these divisions which seek to create an elite group.

Discernment of the measure of elitism becomes the self appointed responsibility of some. They tell who is of worth and who has no worth. They determine safe and dangerous associations. They tell who can be trusted and who can't.

Demonization is the accusation of the Pharisee. The Pharisee declares that all that do not act exactly as they act are agents of the devil. They often speak of a "slippery slope" or make statements like, "A little leaven leavens the whole loaf." They see these as warnings against others who have deviated fromt he pure path.

Thus, their interpretations of the Bible are as always right as those of those of others are always wrong. Those who do not believe as they teach heresy. They warn their followers to stay clear of those who are not as "pure." They tell them that they will never be able to advance to bigger churches (and make bigger money) if they don't keep themselves on the approved path. They will never be famous and never get on the big conference speaker circuit.

So, they continue to tow the party line. They continue to use division to manipulate the followers and they continue to demonize those who are not pure.

Jesus said to the Pharisees of His day: But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves. Matthew 23: 13-15) (ESV)

Jesus said that we would be identified as His disciples by the love we have for each other. How can those who despise, gossip and slander others think they are the better followers of Jesus because of their self determined better doctrine?

Do Pharisees know they are Pharisees?

What If You Are Wrong?

Each of us puts all that we know together to form our own world view. We establish our beliefs from this world view. From it we understand that the order of things. These things develop into what is right and wrong from the basest of things like eating because we are hungry to the telling the truth because it is the best policy. Maybe this is why the world is so confusing to us.

Some people tell us that we don't eat because we are hungry. Others are telling us that we are not truthful even though we might say that it is the best policy. They "scientifically" prove their theories and we don't know what to believe anymore. So, we start telling people that we are eating because our mothers' didn't burp us enough and we are telling lies but really want to tell the truth. This is all very confusing.

Many people decide to reject what the theories of others who challenge their world view. They become so adamant about it that they will not listen to anyone who presents a different world view. Thus, they defend their political party and deny that any of those in the party have flawed morals because their party is the only one with the right morals. They believe that considering the validity of an argument which does not agree with their own world view will make their concept of reality fall apart.

Many people try to live in different world views at the same time. Instead of rejecting a deviant theory, they embrace it. They are Democrat/Republican/Libertarian/Green Peace/Peta members of the NRA. They claim to be "living in the moment." This, I can't deny.

So, for some people it seems dangerous to consider if they are wrong and others never admit they are wrong. The latter simply goes with the flow. They can go to a Christian church one week and praise Jesus and to a Muslim mosque the next to pray to Allah. They make no sense to anyone who has lasting convictions.

This is all Zen if you are in that latter group. You are nodding your head in agreement with me and have decided to speak to the Buddhist Monk down the street about it all.

But what about those who do have lasting convictions that their world views are right? Can they step aside for a moment and consider a view that does not fit in with their established views?

Now, some pictures of reality do not have a lasting effect. Whether or not you believe you should be a vegetarian or ride your bicycle to work will not have a personal eternal affect. It may significantly determine what you do each day while on this earth but it will not change your eternity. What you consider to be true in your faith will have an ethernal affect. It is very important that each of us comes to a solid understanding of what we believe in this area. Each of us should listen to each other but not all of us can or should change our own world view of faith. We have to consider whether or not we are right. Knowing what we believe is right is a matter of faith.

So, we have to ask where we are gathering our information to determine what is right. Is it coming from the popular view of our communities? Is it coming from our own reasoning? Doesn't it have to come from some place more eternal to be something that determines the eternal?

I, personally, believe we must challenge and confirm what we claim to believe. I have found that the more my faith is challenged, the more it is also confirmed. I have found that people who are willing to challenge their world views will have those views confirmed or refuted. In other words, truth will win out if you will be honest in your search.

The Bible says, "A fool says in his heart there is no God." The foolishness does not come from challenging the existence of God. The foolishness comes when there is no challenge and the "fool" is born because he is so absolutely sure in the non-existence of God. It is foolish to say someone doesn't exist merely because you have not met him. It does not matter how self assured I am in my belief. I must keep looking if I am to be assured in the non-existence of God

The path to ultimate and eternal destruction is found in what seems to be true. Searching reveals what is true. I cannot simply seem to know what is true.

So, what if you are wrong in your unbelief? What if you haven't allowed for an honest search for God? What if you have only accepted what others have told you? What if you have simply stopped searching too early?

Destruction answers the what if.

So, keep looking, keep seeking, keep asking. I am sure that you will find the truth as long as you keep challenging what you seem to know.

Proverbs 14:12 (NIV) ¹² There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.

Would You Go with Jesus Today?

Imagine that you have always been blind and everyone you have ever known is blind. Some people talk about sight but they are considered irrational. Most people say that they will not believe it unless they can feel, taste, smell or hear it. Of course, sight doesn't fall into any of these categories. It must not exist.

Now, imagine a Man comes to your town claiming that He can see. He tells you that you will be able to see too if you will just get close enough to Him. So, you listen to Him. You get close enough to Him and you start to get glimpses of things. Your eyes begin to function. You are filled with joy for you had been blind and now can see.

Now comes the tough part. You can see better when you are close to Him. Your vision fades when He is absent. You can either choose to be blind like the rest of your friends or you can choose to see and walk with Him. He says to you, "Come with Me and I will enable you to help others see." The implication is that you either go with Him and help others or stay where you are with the blind.

Would you go? Would you stop what you were going to do with your life and walk with Him receiving your sight and giving sight to others? I wonder how you could refuse.

I read the story of Peter, Andrew, James and John leaving their fishing businesses to follow Jesus this morning. His promise was to make them those who would fish for men. They left their old life behind to be with Jesus. They understood how blind they would be if they didn't go with Him. How could they refuse?

Matthew 4:18-22 (NIV) ¹⁸ As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. ¹⁹ "Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men." ²⁰ At once they left their nets and followed him. ²¹ Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets. Jesus called them, ²² and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.

What Fellowship Can Light Have with Darkness?

"I am in the world but I am not of the world."

These words have been said many times yet still need repeating. I am in this world. I am to bring the presence of Christ to this world. I am to live in a way that brings light to the world.

But I am not permanently bound to this world. It is not my "forever" home. It is a temporary place in which I should not attempt to make permanent. I get myself in trouble every time I do.

It is important that I do these things. It is important that I realize the value of bringing people to Christ. It is important that I live a life pleasing to Him. I do so because of the relationship I have with Him. It isn't just a desire to get to heaven. Making this world more than it should be will hinder my relationship with my Lord.

Thus, it is important that I do not make partnerships with those who do not know the Lord. Yes, I work with those who do not know the Lord. Yes, I do business with those who do not know the Lord. But, no--emphatically NO!-- I do not bind myself to them. Binding myself will make me a part of what they are doing.

Each of us has to sign contracts for services we have. We have a contract with our cell phone companies, our cable providers and our home security systems. These are common agreements that loosely bind us to these companies. The  relationship we have with them should be severed when we find them acting illegally or unethically. We are giving our tacit approval when we continue to do business with them while others are hurt. Light and darkness cannot share the exact same space.

Therefore, we should not make direct partnerships with unbelievers either. These are those with whom we must do daily business. We do not marry those who are not believers because our partnership cannot bring fellowship. It causes us to participate in a world this is not our permanent home. It brings us pain because "until death do us part" means a whole lot more when our spouses are not believers.

I used to think that I was an island all to myself. I thout  that my actions are merely my actions but I do not believe that anymore. I am connected to other believers so much that my actions affect the actions of the whole group. I am connected to my wife. My actions affect her all the time. My walk with the Lord especially affects her. Hers does the same for me. We have the same Lord, the same home and the same destination.

I am more than simply glad that my wife is a believer. I don't know how I would have coped with life without her infusing light when I drew toward darkness. I don't know how I would have tackled life's struggles without her encouragement of faith. What would she have had to tell me if she had no faith? How could she really helped if all her encouragement came from the wisdom of this world?

Many people reading this blog may have an unbelieving spouse. This blog is not intended to put them down nor to point out why they shouldn't have married the person they married. It is intended to encourage those with believing spouses to thank God for their spouses. It is intended to urge those with unbelieving spouses to pray for their salvation. It is intended to warn those who are unmarried to wait for a believing spouse.

2 Corinthians 6:14 (NIV) ¹⁴ Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?