Triumph

Our only true triumphs are God's triumphs over us. His defeats of us are our only true victories [ALFORD]

HORSEPOWER

HORSE-POWA!

My heart is racing!

“Honour and enjoy your Creator while you're still young, before the years take their toll and your vigour wanes”

Eccles. 12:1

Here’s a prospect: the years are going to take their toll, gravity will win, and you are going to get old and wrinkly and weak sooner than you think! Nice, hey? Can you imagine putting your faith in something that will disappear, like your smooth skin (Pr 31:30 “beauty is fleeting”), or your big muscles (Psalm 147:10 “He's not impressed with horsepower; the size of our muscles means little to him.”)

So, how do we honour God and enjoy Jesus with our youthful vigour of “horsepower” and “muscles”?

Like this: “Young men, in the same way be submissive to those who are older. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble." (1 Peter 5:5)

The “Team strip”, the gear, that we pull on to make our “power-play” as young people has never gone out of fashion. We’ve always had to pull on that jersey of humility from God’s wardrobe, and use our amped-out-of-the-box, adrenalin-loaded energy to vigorously serve and to submit! Yup, that’s the mark of enduring power in a young person’s life. The next verse says, “So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and in his good time he will honour you.” (1 Peter 5:6) If you want to win the game, then play by the rules:

In God’s School, you honour Him, He’ll honour you all the days of your life, even when you’re a “old boy” or an “old girl”! (because you will be!)

The Power of Purity

MANPOWER

The Power of Purity

Psalm 119:9 “How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your Word.”

I was heading out for a surf the other morning, and I just couldn’t believe my eyes. The beach was strewn with rubbish as far as the eye could see! A veritable waterline-in-the-sand of garbage! The surf was operating, but the contrast was staggering. I stood stunned, suspended somewhere between a desire to go’n play in the beautiful waves, and a deep paralysing concern for the filth on the beach. I was disturbed.

I paddled out next to the pier, and as I was approaching backline, this fisherman hooked something huge, and began to haul with all his might. (It’s always exciting to watch a “big fish” fight, and get landed!) But, don’t you know it, he had hooked a huge, waterlogged blanket! He was disappointed; the crowd was disappointed; and I was disappointed that that kind of stuff was washing up on our beach.

Not far up from where I was surfing, is a river outlet, and clearly, some people upstream continue to dump all their junk into the river.

It got me thinking about what we allow to “stream” into our world. How the garbage we dump into our souls is going to wash up somewhere. And boy, it’s disappointing. We think we’re “big fish”, but we’ve got about as much fight left in us as a wet blanket! Our children are suspended between a desire to play with daddy, and a deep concern for why he seems to be foaming at the mouth! Jude 1:13 describes disguised dudes like this as, “wild ocean waves leaving nothing on the beach but the foam of their shame; Lost stars in outer space on their way to the black hole.”

But, somewhere in all of this shameful, lost mess, God the Holy Spirit, in His loving mercy, will not “let us off the hook”. He wants us to get “hooked up” with the right guys, so that He can pull the garbage out of us, and clean up our act, before we get all washed up!

Talking about “Gatekeepers of Purity” in our “MANHUNT” is hardly “bait on a hook” for a guy – I know that. It sound more like someone is trying to rain on your party. But I’m not here for your vote - I’m trying to find men who have enough fight left in them to draw line in the sand, and be rescued, before they leave us all “gutted”!

Are you hooked on Jesus yet?

Resting is Humility

Jesus said in Matthew 11:28-30 "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. [29] Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. [30] For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

REST is an expression of humility. Humility is directly proportional to aligning ourselves with the rhythms of rest. We are as humble as we are free from stress and pressure.

Pride, on the other hand, is directly proportional to the "I'm busy" syndrome. Building our identity on how hard we work, as opposed to how well we love, is the evidence of pride. The more stress and pressure that we are under, the less we are under Christ's humble yolk.

Eccles. 4:6 "One hand full of rest is better than two fists full of labor and striving after wind."

Live better.

POWER PARADOX

POWER-PARADOX

Can you think of POWER aside from MONEY? Just pause on that for a moment...POWER aside from MONEY...?

It would seem in this present age that nothing significant can be done without money, wouldn’t you say? Be honest now! (Eccl 10:19 says, “...money is the answer to everything.”) All that really means is that money is a good substitute for the real thing! And with money comes all the other powers: popularity, prominence, profile, influence and control. Ooh, we like those! Scripture says that in these closing days, Christians will “have a form of godliness but deny its power. Have nothing to do with them.” (2 Tim. 3:5) Money’s a great substitute for real power, it really is, but we’re told to make a wide berth around the “Prosperity Plague”. There’s nothing quite like the real thing: Check out these penniless dudes from the book of Acts: “But Peter said, "I don't have any money for you. But I'll give you what I have. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, get up and walk!" [7] Then Peter took the lame man by the right hand and helped him up. And as he did, the man's feet and anklebones were healed and strengthened.” (Acts 3:6-7) Power without money? I think so.

So here’s a thought: What if God chose to put His power exactly where we think it doesn’t belong? (Is 55:8)

What do you mean?

What if God clapped His hands in delight over all of our weaknesses and frailties, and said, “Now there’s a person I can really invest God-power into.”?

“You must be joking. That’s silly. Surely God needs me to “get my act together”, to “get all my ducks in a row”... (OOPS, sorry, that’s a negative confession – I’m not a duck! Cancel that!) But really, surely God will use me because, well... “... I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. [12] 'I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get, I don’t play in mud puddles, I soar like an eagle...and blah...blah...blah...' (See Luke 18:11-12) Mmmm...

That seems like a perfect landing place for celebrity status in Jesus, doesn’t it? But, friends, it’s not the place of God-POWER! Our brow-beaten brother Paul discovered the amazing power-paradox in 2 Cor. 12:9-10, where he writes, “And (Jesus) has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for POWER IS PERFECTED IN WEAKNESS." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my WEAKNESSES, so that the POWER of Christ may dwell in me. [10] Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am WEAK, then I am (“POWERFUL” YLT). (NASB-U)

In the economy of grace, we are only POWER-FULL when we are WEAK! Perfect POWER makes a soft-landing. Go ahead, and try’n package that for resale in this “control-freak” world!