I've been on vacation these past few days, and what I chose to do on my vacation was to make my way through a wonderful teaching series by James MacDonald. I'll link the video series at the bottom of this post. (For those of you who receive this blog through email, you'll have to go to the actual blog to see the link. Why it renders blank through email, I do not know.)
The series addresses the core of who we are by zeroing in on our thought life, our thought patterns, why we think the way we think, and how to eradicate debilitating, destructive patterns out of our life.
I found listening to ten hours of sermons delightful. I know. I am odd. But in part, James is easy to listen to, and I like his dry humor ..... even as God excises "stinkin thinkin" out of my own mind.
That is the point of listening, you know.... to EXCISE elements OUT of your life. It isn't so that reason will give allowance for them to stay a bit longer.
My great-grandfather and my grandfather, who lived beside one another and whose lands bumped up to one another, were farmers....not for profession... but for provision. As a result, they tended the fields EVERY morning and EVERY evening. In between, they worked their jobs.
As a result, they always had this tremendous abundance of various foods. (The peaches were always my favorite!)
I recently had a conversation with a dear soul. During spring, they had planted a few plants, built a fence to keep rabbits and the like away, and left them to grow. Over the course of the summer, the weeds simply overtook the plants. When we were talking, they said, "Well, I weeded them about three times, but the weeds...." Yes, the weeds.
Needless to say, nothing came from those plants.
The elements in our lives are like those plants. Sporadic weeding is simply not sufficient IF we actually desire fruit. Be it relationships or elements of personal disciple, to produce fruit DEMANDS DAILY weeding; DAILY DISCIPLINE.
If my grandparents had taken the course of least resistance and taken to the field only sporadically or when they FELT like it, you and I both know little to nothing would have come out of those fields.
Feelings. Oh, talk about a cans of worms. If I could count all the conversations with beloved people who are chained to their feelings, I know the number would be profoundly vast.
Educating my children, I taught them two paramount cornerstones-of-the-mind, if you will:
1) LEAD your emotions.... do NOT be lead by them.
2) Learn to say NO to yourself.
Oh that everyone had someone who would drive just these two points home, deep into the mind, soul, and spirit!
I want to encourage you to do two things in the coming days:
1) START and COMPLETE the video series by James MacDonald. You binge watch Netflix or the like! So, I KNOW you can take the time to SOW into YOUR life this truly life-altering series.
2) START really monitoring what you do, when you do, and how you do LIFE.
Take your life OFF auto-pilot. Begin with small steps. It might be dedicating structure to when you rise in the morning and when you go to sleep at night.
We, as Christians, just love to talk about the liberty found in God, but too often, I find too many apply that liberty to destructive patterns. That was never God's intent. Remember I Corinthians 10:23: "I have the right to do anything, but not everything is beneficial. I have the right to do anything, but not everything is constructive." Some of you would do a lot of good by dedicating that verse to memory and meditating on it before rolling out of bed in the morning!
It was interesting listening to the individual who planted the plants in the spring. They began to explain why it had turned out the way it had. Quietly, I heard the Lord say, "This is what I will hear when My people come before Me at the Time of Account." There was no condemnation in His tone, but sadness. Indescribable sadness.
I don't want to stand before Him and be so flustered that all I have to offer is excuses and "rational reasons" why I didn't produce well, why I did not steward well.
I know it is hard to rip the blinders off and truly assess one's habits, one's life, one's fruit - if there be any, but hear me, dear ones..... to delay is absolute folly! For the "Time of Account" is nearing....if not through Jesus' return.... certainly through death!
Time here is brief to say the least!
What are you doing with your time?
This brings me to an amusing true story, but it does drive home the point.
A father had had his fill of his high-school son complaining that he simply didn't have the time needed to do all his school work. So, the wise father looked at his son and explained, "Son, everyone has 24 hours in a day. I work between 7 and 8 of those hours, sleep 8 of those hours, and have 8 hours free. What I want you do to is think of your school as your work, and record the MINUTES... not the hours... but the minutes you actually work on your school. Do not record the minutes you pick up your phone to look at whatever or the minutes your mind takes you to a various website to check on some interest. ONLY record the minutes you actually apply to your work."
Again - oh that EVERYONE would have someone give them such wise instruction.
How easy it is to "blow our time" ...and then turn right around and complain we simply don't have enough of time to work our field!
God is a God of order, and what I have found in my nearly 50 years of living is that in following His lead in that line of order brings forth well-springs of provision internally of love, peace, joy, etc.
I don't have to give myself pep-talks of self-worth because I have, with diligence and mindfulness, sown seeds of care and stewardship concerning this life He died to give me.
My ACTIONS, my personal stewardship, DECLARE my gratitude and my understanding concerning what HE had to do on my behalf. I CANNOT do any less than my best FOR HIM!
Let your life do likewise, dear ones! No matter your starting point, let there be a starting point!
Learn to say "NO" to yourself; which as we all know, "self" until regenerated (dare I say executed) on down the path of Godliness is carnal and corrupt and leads to death. Don't go that direction. I implore you; don't! Choose life.... by your actions; choose life!
Godspeed, dear ones; Godspeed!
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Here is the first video of ten in the series.. Most sincerely, may God have His way with you as you dedicate this time between you and Him......
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