Death, Loss and Where Will It Take Your Heart?

As I read through the Facebook postings this morning over coffee, I was amazed to see how many people were affected by The Office character Michael Scott's leaving the show. It has been talked about for months, and dreaded by many fans. Yet, what I truly find amazing in this, is the fact that the character is not a real person, but the change in the show brought about real feelings in people.

This is not a new thing for me, I've had it happen to me before, in a book that I read many years ago. I am a huge Star Wars fan (And not only in height and weight.) and years ago when there started to be new stories written in the Star Wars universe, I couldn't wait to read the latest book and would often purchase it in the hard back version because of my eagerness to see what was going to happen next.

There was a new threat posed to that universe that I learned about in the book Vector Prime written by R.A. Salvatore, they were called the Yuuzhan Vong. These characters made the Empire look like girl scouts. But the thing about this story, was that the powers that were in charge (George Lucas being one of them.) decided that to enhance the story and to show how truly bad this new threat was, they would need to kill off a major character from the original movies.

So you may understand my shock and surprise as I read in that book about Han Solo, his youngest son Anakin and Chewie working feverishly to get as many people as possible on the Millennium Falcon to save them from their planet which was being destroyed, and Chewbacca in true Wookie form, in an act of self-sacrifice staying behind on the dying planet so that Han's child wouldn't have too.

Take a look at the following passage from the book Vector Prime:

Chewie turned about and took one step toward Han and the Falcon, and then a burst of tremendous, hot wind blasted through, tossing him to the ground, toppling buildings. One pile of rubble crashed atop the Falcon - her shields groaned in protest - and sent the nose of the ship up, up.

Anakin fought her back to level, started to turn her about to find the Wookie, but saw instead,

in all her devastating glory, the last descent of Dobido, (The planet's moon which was crashing into the planet.) the arrival, to those faithful natives still praying in the ruined streets, of Tosi-karu.

They were out of time. Anakin knew it immediately. If he turned for Chewie, if he did anything other than take her straight up and out, the explosion of the crashing moon would tear the Falcon apart.

He heard his father's pleading cry to get him back to Chewie.

He pointed the Millennium Falcon skyward and punched the throttle.

Han saw.

A battered and bloody Chewie regained his footing, stood up high on one pile of rubble, and faced the descending moon with arms upraised and a defiant roar. A fitting last pose of defiance, but one that did nothing to mend the tear ripping through Han's heart.

I must admit that my heart was also torn as I read this part of the book. And truthfully this really did surprise me. I mean after all this is a fictional character from a fictional planet that doesn't even exist! How could my heart be saddened by the death of Chewbacca?

I think the answer lies in our hearts. We are relational to our core, and since that is the case that means that even the lives of characters which are not real touch our lives because of the characteristics which are real. Chewbacca's loyalty to Han Solo touches me, because I long for that type of loyalty in my life. Michael Scott's leaving Dunder Miflin to move off to be with the woman that he loves, well then our hearts cry out that we too desire that kind of love.

So, it's not really unusual for these kinds of things to happen, I guess the question is when they do happen, what is it revealing about our hearts? And that is the central thing about us all, fictional and real. Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

In Service to the King

Here in the United States, I think that we don't realize what it means to have a king. Obviously because we threw off the yoke of being under a king to become our own nation. The very idea of having a king is really a foreign concept to us. But in the Kingdom of God, we do have a King and I think it would do us all well to try and learn what it means to be a subject in a kingdom in service to a king.

Few things have captured my heart like that of knights and medieval times. I can remember from when I was a young boy swinging sticks around, slaying dragons and rescuing fair maidens. There is just something about that time period that I've always loved. As I've grown into adulthood that fondness has never left me, although I must admit that I too don't really understand what it means to serve a king.

I remember a few years ago, I was at church during a Sunday morning service. We were in the midst of worship and I felt led to go down front and fall on my knees and spend some time there with my Lord Jesus. I remember being there on my knees in prayer when these words sprang

from my lips, "My sword is Your's Lord." I wasn't just saying words, it was a very solemn time for me, one where I felt I was actually in the presence of Jesus. It was a very holy time for me, and one that I will remember forever. I think it was at that time that I really began to think of myself as Gods1stKnight. (An online screen name that I have used for many years now.)

I look at the Scripture and see a man named Ananias, who was just a servant of the King, yet it was he that Jesus used to bring Saul into the Kingdom. It wasn't one of the original apostles that did this, just a normal everyday believer. That's encouraging to me, because it shows me that God does not just use the elite...He uses whom He chooses, and that is most often those that are willing to have bowed their knees to His Lordship on a daily basis.

It's a wonderful thing to call on the Name of the Lord and get saved, but are you becoming a disciple of His? A disciple is someone who does more than just prays the sinner's prayer and then shows up at church once in a while. A disciple is someone who is constantly on the look out for opportunities to learn about the Kingdom, share the Kingdom with others and just plain and simple does what Jesus did while He was here on the Earth.

I was born again a lot longer than I have been a disciple of His. But since that day of bowing my knees to my King and offering my sword to Him, I have made every effort to follow His leading and become the best subject in His Kingdom that I can be. How about you? Are you a disciple of His, one that has offered up your sword for His cause?

Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

Grey Days and the Son

When a day starts out cold and dreary, it can, if not prepared for become a cold and dreary day in your soul if you let it. I've met many people whose outlook on life is determined by the weather around them. If the sun is shining and there are blue skies, then they will be happy and in a good mood. On the other hand, if the days tick off one after another with only grey, cloudy skies to show for it, then these same people will have a poor and sad outlook on life.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not judging these people or making light of what ails them. I do wonder however, how they function in the Kingdom. In God's Kingdom, the currency is faith, and faith is believing what God's Word says is true, even when the circumstances around us say they are not. When it comes to having a bad day because there are clouds in the sky, then I have to ask where is the faith? (That believing what God's Word says is true?)

We can have faith for many, many areas in our lives. Faith for salvation, (We must believe that God raised Jesus from the dead and confess with our mouths that He is our Lord.) faith for our finances, (It is God who meets all of our needs, wants and desires.) even faith for healing as well, (By the stripes on Jesus's back we were made whole.) These are just a few areas, but every facet of human existence on this planet should be operated in by faith. Remember, without faith, the Scripture states, that it is impossible to please God. (Hebrews 11:6)

We have faith in our every day walk too. When you sit in a chair, do you first pick it up and inspect it? Do you look to see that all of the welding, bolts and stitching have been done correctly before you sit down in it? I have never seen anyone do that, they usually just sit down. That is faith. You believe that when you sit the chair will hold your weight. You aren't scared about it, or concerned about it, you just sit down. You do that because you have faith that the chair will hold you up.

What about turning on the lights? Do you take a screwdriver to the light switch and remove the plate covering the wires to make sure that they are all connected properly? No, when you need light in a room, you flip the switch, believing that when you do so the lights will come on. That is faith too. You don't worry and fret over whether or not the lights will come on, you just know that they will.

Why is it that we can have natural faith for everyday common things, but when we bring this over into the realm of Christianity and walking with the Lord we have such a hard time having faith in His Word? I believe it is because of conditioning. We are conditioned to believe that the chair will hold our weight, or that the light switch will turn on the electricity required to light the room. Many of us have not conditioned ourselves to believe what God's Word says is true, for whatever reason. For some it is taught in their local churches that God doesn't heal anymore, in others people through their own life experiences have come to the conclusion that things won't happen for them.

What is so sad, (And not due to the weather.) is when a person accepts the fact that whatever they struggle with is their cross to bear for the Lord. That is sad because when Jesus told us to take up our cross and follow Him, He was telling us to put aside our selfish ways, He was not telling us to walk in poverty, or to take up the cross of sickness. I mean why would He have taken the beating He took? Peter says that He did that for our healing of sicknesses and infirmities. So if He did it for that reason, then why would He also tell us to take up the cross of sickness? It doesn't make sense.

God's Word is true, and we should believe every Word of it. But we have to condition ourselves to believe it, it won't just happen. We have to, as the Bible states, study to show ourselves approved, a workman needing not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of Truth. (2 Timothy 2:15) That means that in order to do that, you will have to read your Bible. Your faith will remain small if your only experience with the Word of God is what you get when you go to church. Going to church isn't what will put you over in life, (Even though it is an important part.) you will have to read and study on your own, asking the Holy Spirit to lead, guide and direct you.

As you study on your own, you will see your faith grow. And as your faith grows, you will become conditioned to believe what His Word says about you, and then you will be operating in the faith of God that pleases Him. So don't let the grey days discourage you, go to God's Word even more when those days arrive and find the truth of who you are in Christ, and what you can do in Christ, and you will see the Son shine in your heart even if the sun outside is not. Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

In One Accord...and I'm Not Talking About the Car Either

In the past several months, we have been experiencing something wonderful in my local church body. People truly living in one accord, and working together for the common good. I for one have been more excited about being at church in the past several months than I have been in years. It really feels good too, that being a part of something bigger.

Which brings me to my thought this morning, being a part of something much larger than ourselves individually. Last night, I was waiting up for some of my daughter's laundry to finish and decided that in order to help me stay awake I needed to watch something on the television. Since I have just started to re-read The Hobbit, I decided that the animated version of this story would be a good one to view, and to help me stay awake. (Which sleep did find me anyway...it seems to do that more and more these days when I'm in my recliner.)

As Gandalf recounts the story for Bilbo Baggins about the Dwarves who lived in the Lonely Mountain and how they were the finest craftsmen around, the images on the screen were that

of a whole community of Dwarves working together to create these

wonderfully handcrafted items which they sold to men and elves. When I saw all of these people working together, I actually had the thought, "They are working for the common good of all their people. They are not working for themselves."

Now leave it to me to see something of how the Body of Christ should be doing things from an animated movie made way back in the early 1970's. But as I watched those Dwarves working together, under their King's direction for the good of the whole community I was struck with the power of working for something bigger than yourself.

We are admonished in the Scriptures to not forsake the assembling together of ourselves, (Hebrews 10:24-25) and about how we are many members but make up one body (Romans 12:3-5). These things were not put in the Bible just to be filler. No they are there for our admonition, to build us up and help us to be able to walk in our daily walk with Christ better.

When we serve something larger than ourselves, and pour our lives into it, we are more fulfilled. It's just the way that we are wired. I know from my own experiences that when I'm doing something that affects the bigger scheme of things, that I in turn feel more complete. And I think, especially in America, the tendency is to be more self-serving rather than more about serving a community, so this doesn't really come naturally to us. It is something that has to be cultivated in our lives.

There is power in unity however, and I believe that as my church grows in this we will see more and more of the increasing of the Kingdom of God in our lives personally. It's in serving the greater good, that we all become greater people, and that works out good for everyone. And if you are not experiencing that in your life or church, don't bemoan the fact that you don't have this, be the catalysis for change, ask God where He wants you to start and then get after it.

Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today.

I Got Flipped Off...But I'm A Nice Guy!

The other day I was travelling from my hometown of Sapulpa, to take my son’s car to a mechanic we use in Oklahoma City. Micah’s car was in desperate need of some front end work, and when we’d drive it, it would bounce us all over the road.

As I was driving towards my destination, I found myself in the passing lane doing eighty miles per hour. (At eighty the car didn’t bounce nearly as bad.) I was boxed in on the right, front and rear by other vehicles travelling the road with me. We were this way for about five minutes, and there was absolutely nothing I could have done to get out of the passing lane except reduced my speed to fifty to try and get in the right hand lane and extricate myself out of the way of the guy riding my bumper.

Finally the traffic started to ease up and I was finally in a position to move my car to the right hand lane, when out of nowhere the guy who had been on my tail soared past me. It wasn’t until the back tires of his car were in line with my front tires that I realized he was flipping me off. Immediately something went off in my and the thought came to my mind to change lanes right then and push his car into a tail spin.

Whoa! What’s that all about? Where did that come from? I quickly realized that as not a viable option, and began to think things like, “Hey, that guy thinks I’m number one!” or “Oh look, he’s telling me his I.Q.!” I was really surprised at his reaction to me being in the passing lane and not moving over. I mean, I couldn’t, there was no way for me to. I wondered how worked up he had gotten while trying to get around me. (I truthfully wondered if he got as worked up as I have in the past when in traffic.) Had he flown off the handle and called me names too? How high was his blood pressure now?

It was about two minutes later that the traffic ahead of my new found friend began to slow again because two semi-trucks were driving neck and neck; one in the right hand lane, the other in the left. Well as luck would have it, the semi in the right hand lane was moving faster than the one in the left and I was in position to pull ahead of that other guy. So what does he do? He pulls in front of me blocking me from passing him.

I thought, okay and changed lanes moving into the passing lane again. I really am glad that guy had no heart problems because I’m pretty sure that he would have stroked out with his need to stay in front of me as he pulled back into the passing lane. He must have thought he was Mario Andretti I guess, and in the race of his lifetime.

I lost interest with him and backed off deciding I’d had enough fun for one day. I did think about this for a while as the highway passed beneath me. My greatest thought was, “You’re a pretty big man when you can drive past someone and not actually have to confront them personally.” I mean, if we’d been in a mall and a similar situation had arisen, I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have chosen to flip me off.

I’ve been accused of having bouts of road rage in the past, mainly by my wife and daughter, and there may be an element of truth in what they say. But this incident and the rage that rose up in me at first has got me to rethinking what I do and say when I’m driving in traffic now. I mean, come on I'm a nice guy and still he flipped me off. Well, there’s that…get ‘em up folks, we need to go out and whip something for the Kingdom…and I don’t mean whip out your middle finger in traffic….

Christ's Passion

As I write this it is the Tuesday before Easter. Easter is that time in Christian circles where we celebrate the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The thought occurred to me this morning that this is His "Passion Week", and that spurred another thought, "What was Christ's passion?" To which I had to answer, "Us."

In the book of Luke, chapter 19 and verse 10 it states: "For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost." When we look at this Scripture, we have to ask ourselves what is it that

was lost? And to find this, we have to go back to the time of the beginnings, the book of Genesis.

In Genesis 2 we find the creation of man, and his job description. Look at verse 15 - 17;

15) And the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to tend and guard and keep it. 16) And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden 17) but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and blessing and calamity you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.

Now we know that Adam and Eve didn't physically die once they ate the fruit. So either God lied, or He meant something else. Other more literal translations of this passage say that, "in dying, you will die." Meaning that it was not physically that they died, but spiritually they did. Their hearts within them, the real them, their spirits died that day. They

became cut off from God. This is what Jesus came to seek and to save, mankind's spirits.

Remember what Isaiah stated in chapter 53, verses 4 - 6:

⁴ Yet it was our weaknesses he carried;

it was our sorrows that weighed him down.
And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God,
a punishment for his own sins!
⁵ But he was pierced for our rebellion,
crushed for our sins.
He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed.

⁶ All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.
We have left God’s paths to follow our own.
Yet the Lord laid on him
the sins of us all.
.

The best part of the story is not shown in Isaiah, but in Matthew 28:5-7:

⁵ Then the angel spoke to the women. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I know you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified.

⁶ He isn't here! He is risen from the dead, just as he said would happen. Come, see where his body was lying.

⁷ And now, go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and he is going ahead of you to Galilee. You will see him there. Remember what I have told you.”

There can be no doubt that God loves us. He set in motion the rescue of mankind's hearts, at the very time that they became lost. Jesus definitely loves us, or else He would not have gone to the cross and taken the beating that He did. There is nothing else that either of them can do to show us that they love us, and the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God. So as we enter this week of remembrance of what Jesus has done for us, remember that His passion is you.

Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

The Passage of Time

April 6, 2011 marked the one year anniversary of the death of my youngest son. As I spoke of in an earlier blog, the passage of time is an interesting thing. The other day I was out in the yard, looking around at the beginnings of spring with the blooms of all the many trees in my yard and some perennial flowers showing off their glory. It was then that I noticed Noah's tree.

Noah's tree, is what I call this little tree because we planted it after he died. A good friend of our family, Holly Jones talked her parents into buying us this tree last year in honor of Noah, who loved to climb trees. My bride planted it where it would grow the best, which just happens to be where I can see it from my rocking chair on the porch.

The blooms on the tips of this little sapling brought me some hope that day. Hope that with the passage of time I will see more healing. You see just as this tree is little now, it will eventually grow into a much bigger one through the years. And by watching it get larger each year, that will help me to keep track of the time where my heart will hurt less than it does right now for the loss of my son.

Who would have thought that a gift of a tree would help in the healing process of grief for me? Thank you Holly Wolly Bing Bong for your thoughtfulness in giving us that tree. You are a true friend to me and my family, and we love you very much! Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

Counterfeit or Real...How Do You Tell?

I was having a discussion the other day about hearing the voice of God with a friend, and as we discussed what the Scripture said, I made the statement that if we don't read the Bible, and find out what it says, then we would really have a hard time distinguishing the voice of God.

We have an enemy, the devil, and he is always trying to trip us up in our walk with God. He constantly is assailing our thought life with his thoughts in the hope that we will pick them up and run with them. Actually that is the only way that he can win in our lives, when we take the thoughts he's thrown at us as our own, or worse that they are God's.

We have to know what the "real & true" is in order to realize a counterfeit when we see or hear it. Years ago, I learned that bank tellers are trained in how to recognize real money instead of how to recognize the fake stuff. It's in learning what the real looks like, that when a bill comes past them that is not real, it just jumps out at them. Just like the bank tellers, if we don't know what the real (God) is, then we will find ourselves falling for the fake (devil).

But how can we learn the difference? It's really simple, the Bible is God's will for mankind. We have to put our faces in the Bible daily and learn what it is that He has for us, then when those thoughts come around that speak to us something other than what we've learned what the Bible says, then we know to leave those thoughts, and cling to the ones that come from our Father.

It's really not that hard, we just have to be diligent to read God's Word the Bible daily. One thing that I have come to learn over the years, is that the Bible really will create it's own hunger, if we allow it to. So get your Bibles out everyone, and begin a Bible reading plan and watch your hunger for God's Word really take off! Then we'll be able to tell the difference between the counterfeit an the real. Get 'em up folks, let's go whip something for the Kingdom!

You Are a Leader, Act Like One!

I was in a leaders class last night at my church and my friend who lead the class was talking about "fear" and how detrimental it can be in our walk with the Lord. There was a story that came up out of the Old Testament that piqued my interest and I thought I would write about this morning. It's found in the Book of Numbers, and is the story of Moses sending the twelve spies into the promised land to see what all it held for them.

You remember the story, the twelve went into the land and saw everything there, and came back and told Moses, Aaron and all the congregation of people what it was like. They told of all the greatness of the country, of how it truly was a place that flowed with milk and honey, but in the same breath they began also to talk about how the people and the cities were. They said things like, we saw giants there, and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight and so we were to them as well.

It was at this point that Caleb interrupted and called for everyone to be quiet. He said, "Let us go up and take the land now! We can do it!" (Numbers 13:30) But the damage was done. The people had already heard the evil report and believed it. I'm sure you know the rest of the story, how it took the Children of Israel forty years walking around in the desert and waiting, until they finally were able to go into the land and possess it.

The thing that I found really interesting and the point that I'm really wanting to bring out this morning is who the twelve spies were. In Numbers 13:1-2 MSG it says, God spoke to Moses: "Send men to scout out the country of Canaan that I am giving to the People of Israel. Send one man from each ancestral tribe, each one a tried-and-true leader in the the tribe." These twelve men were not just guys pulled at random from the tribes, they were tried-and true leaders. These were men who had proven themselves to be able to lead, and they held sway over people in their tribes.

Now you may be saying, but Dave I'm not a leader, I'm just a follower. Well to that I say, that's not entirely true. Each and every one of us has a sphere of influence, a group of people that we hold sway over. It could be at work, among friends, or maybe you as a parent to your children, we all lead somewhere in this life. And with that influence, we are leading others even if only by example. It has been said that all of us have people who are watching us, to see how we respond to the circumstances of life, and that is true, we all do. It is those people that we are leading, even if they don't know it.

These stories in the Bible are given for our example of what to do, and what not to do. Those ten leaders, those tried-and-true men who were appointed to go in and spy out the land by Moses used their influence and in doing so, kept the Children of Israel out of the inheritance that was promised to them by God. What about us, are our actions causing others to not experience all that God has for them? How do we handle the situations of life? What are our actions saying to those who are watching us, those that we are leading by our own actions and words? When you look at it this way, it kind of makes you re-think your actions and what you are saying doesn't it?

So what kind of leader have you been? Have you led like the ten spies who brought back an evil report, or are you like Joshua and Caleb? This is an answer that only you and the Lord will know, I would encourage you to take some time today and ask the Father about this. And if you find, like I often have, that you are leading like the ten spies, then make a correction, change your words and see your world change too. Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

How Do You Handle Being Confronted?

I received an email this morning telling me that I had hurt someone's feelings, (The writer did say it was unintentional 0n my part.) and that I should go and make amends. My first reaction (Not always the best thing to go off of either.) was to bow up and say out loud, "Who does he think he is telling me what to do? I haven't even heard from him in over a year!"

I've walked this road with the Father long enough to know better than to dismiss what is inside my heart when these types of things arise. So I will talk with Him about this further and see where I need to go with this information. Just because this has come up, and may even be true, does not mean that it is in fact from God, but could very well be a distraction from the enemy. This is why we need to take time to discern what exactly is going on. One thing that I've always gone by is the notion of following after peace. If something brings peace to my heart, then it is from God, if it brings turmoil and confusion, then it is from the enemy.

You see, while the information that I received from this friend today may in fact be true from his point of view, (He has only heard one side of the story and is now confronting me and telling me to fix it.) I will have to judge whether or not this is something that I need to respond to, or to let go. If I've learned anything about the enemy it is this, he loves to meddle in the affairs of men. He can't do anything to men and women unless they give him permission to do so, and just as God uses people, the devil uses people as well.

That is where I've made a lot of mistakes in my past, in just flying off the handle when some confrontation comes. Instead of taking time to talk to the Father about it, I just rush off to handle it, which usually causes it turns out bad. I am learning, and as a disciple of Christ I think it is our job to continue on learning at the feet of the Master. We never truly arrive at that point in our Christian walk where we become the "super" disciple that needs no more instruction. On the contrary, we are following the Lord daily, or at least we should be, seeking Him to mold us into His image.

So how do you handle being confronted with situations? Running to your flesh, or to the Father God? I heard a man talking about emotional responses one time say, if your emotions run high, your intelligence will in turn be low. But if you can keep your emotional level low, then your intelligence will be high. I think that is why the enemy tries so hard to get us emotionally worked up all the time. He knows that if we are operating at a high emotional level, then we will make mistakes because we have circumvented our intelligence.

Let's get 'em up folks, and go whip something for the Kingdom today!

What Do You Know?

Romans 8:28 starts off by saying, "And we know...". This phrase is full of hope to me because it says that there is actually the ability to have certainty in my life even when things really don't seem to look like it.

Paul wrote this letter (The Book of Romans) to the Roman church fifty-seven years after Jesus was raised from the dead, and Paul was also finishing his third missionary journey at this point. So I'm pretty sure that what he was writing about he had lived out in personal experiences following the Lord. Remember, Paul was beaten, stoned and left for dead on numerous occasions, so we can believe that he had a little bit of knowledge about what he was writing.

While thinking about those three little words, the thought came to me, "What do you know?", which got me to thinking, there is a lot of stuff rattling around in my head at any given time, but it's the stuff that I know that actually helps me to overcome in this life. For instance, I know that Jesus loves me, but do I walk in that daily? Not if I'm whining about how hard things are, because He is the One who said, "Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you. Let Me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light." So if I find myself whining, then I'm not really operating out of what I know am I?

It's not just what you know that will put you over in this life. It's what you know, and do. In John 5:39 - 40, Jesus is talking to the Pharisees (The guys who were the "play by the rules" police) and He tells them that they are searching the Scriptures looking for eternal life, but all the Scriptures pointed to Jesus and they wouldn't believe Him. So you see, it's not just what you know, but also what you do with what you know. And for me, that is the hardest part, the doing.

One thing though that I love about God, and I try and emulate daily is that He never asks anyone to do anything that they do not have the ability to do. This tells me that I can take "what I know" and turn it into "what I do", and in so doing that I will become the disciple that He is looking for. Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom of God today!

A Clash of Two Sterotypes

Last night I had the opportunity to almost see the collision of two worlds. I was in the shopping center parking lot, sitting in my truck waiting on my bride to pick me up so we could go and enjoy a nice dinner with friends, when out of nowhere this beat up Ford pickup with really loud exhaust pipes slams on its brakes and slides sideways to avoid hitting this pimped out Blazer.

That's innocent enough, and even though the redneck guy shouldn't have been driving as fast as he was, that is typical on a Saturday night. The guy driving the Blazer just stops his vehicle and

refuses to move forward, which causes the redneck to squeal his tires a bit in response. This is when I thought the conflict would really begin. Throwing open his door, the driver of the Blazer leans out and hollers something at the guy in the pickup, and the redneck

yells back. After about thirty seconds the Blazer guy shut his door

and drove off, and the pickup driver pulled across the parking lot and parked next to his buddy's car.

So I pay attention to the two guys as they get out of their vehicles, and the guy driving the Blazer turns out to be one of those wanna be gangster types. You know, a white momma's boy all decked out in the latest hip hoppers outfit, baggy pants, shirt too big and hat cocked to the side. You know the type, the guy that if push came to shove would probably fall apart if someone actually confronted him. The guy in the pickup gets out and sure enough, sleeveless button up plaid shirt, jeans tucked into his boots and a Mohawk in desperate need of a trim.

What I witnessed last night was the epitome of stereotypes in a clash that wouldn't have been really between titans, but more like young men who had yet to grow up. Little boys in young men's bodies who would have been better off just parting ways, chalking it up to something minor instead of getting all worked up about an almost vehicle mishap.

Life really is interesting if you pay attention to it. Get 'em up folks, let's go whip something for the Kingdom of God!

Who Among Us Haven't Had This Happen?

This past week I was taken on a journey that I had not been on before. It turned out to actually be an attack from the enemy, but it was disguised in a way that I'd not seen before.

This past Wednesday was the one year anniversary of the death of my youngest son Noah, and so naturally I was a little on the melancholy side of life that day. But we made it through it, and I figured that the following day would be easier. Boy was I ever wrong about that one.

The following day, my oldest son Micah was leaving for the Philippines to do mission work. What this boils down to for me, is that I got to be up and leaving my house a little bit before 4:00 AM to take him to meet the rest of the team and then drive them to the airport. (I'm not complaining, I'd do this every day if need be.) After returning home at 6:30 AM I read my Bible, drank a little bit more coffee and then went back to bed for an hour of sleep before getting ready for work.

Once I made it to work, I was bombarded with things seeking my attention. I had several refunds, a couple of rude remarks from people in the store and really couldn't wait until lunch so that I could leave and have a few minutes to myself. Well lunch time came and I went home to eat. (Something that I do often) As I was sitting in my recliner after my meal, I fell fast asleep, and was awakened by my wife and daughter coming into the house. (About 2 hours after lunch.)

That night was quiet around the house, I spent some time on the porch reading, Cheryl in her recliner watching/snoozing during American Idol and April in her room sleeping/working on homework. We all went to bed early with little to no conversation at all.

The next morning as I was showering, I was dealing with this heaviness and melancholy in my soul again, when these two words came up from my heart; "hope deferred". Proverbs 13;12 starts with those two words and says, "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life." Those two words rolled around in my heart for most of the morning, and then about noon it hit me! I knew what the Lord was showing me.

For the past several weeks, I have been hearing a lot of bad news; one friend I have is divorcing his wife because of substance abuse and her lack of getting help, another friend's marriage is failing due to infidelity on his spouse's part, and I've got one friend who is facing a terminal illness. Couple all of that together with the anniversary of Noah's death and the remorse and guilt that were trying to pile on top of me, and you've got a recipe for disaster.

It was then that I saw how my hope was being deferred. The enemy was using these things that my friends are going through to steal/erode my hope in God and His Word. The enemy had launched an attack on me from the side, and I didn't realize it for what it was. You see, had he come directly at me, I would have seen it for the attack that it was and made my stand against him, but because it came from the side it took me a couple of days to see it.

The good news is that I now see it, and I am able to stand against the attack he has brought to me. God never promises us that we won't be attacked, He does promise however He will give us a way out of the attack (test or temptations) 1 Corinthians 10:13 The Message. Now that I know the attack for what it is, I can stand on God's Word and see my way safely out of it.

One other note here, don't say, "Well I read the Bible everyday, and I pray, so that will never happen to me." Don't bank on that. I read the Bible daily, and pray a lot, and still the enemy found a way to get me off of my game, if even for just a couple of days. There are no guarantees that you will not come under attack, on the contrary, if you are doing what God's Word says, you will more than likely have a target on your back. The enemy comes against us all, we have to stand against him and his schemes, daily.

Better days are on the horizon, I can see it! Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!

Does Time Heal All Wounds, & Should It?

It is an interesting thing that the passage of time will do to you. I was thinking of one of the riddles from J.R.R. Tolkien's book The Hobbit this morning. For those of you who haven't read the book, the first of two movies will be released next year, and there is a part of the story where Biblo and Gollum have a contest of riddles. Here it is:

This thing all things devours,

Birds, beasts, trees, flowers.

Gnaws iron, bites steel,

Grinds hard stones to meal,

Slays king, ruins town,

And beats high mountain down!

Of course, the answer is time.

But honestly, what does time do? Nothing really, other than give us an opportunity to mark the passage of it. It has been a year since my youngest son took his own life, and that passage of time has not helped to alleviate the pain and loss

that I feel. I miss his laugh, his deep voice and the way that he could make me laugh, even when he was getting in trouble for some mischief he was involved in. I miss his spirit more than anything, the way that he was so full of life and purpose, and time has not changed that one bit.

I don't think that time can ever fully erase the memories I have of my son, and even though painful, I don't want them to be erased either. Yes, I must admit that I tear up when I

remember something, or see something that reminds me of him, but that is not a bad thing at all. I am beginning to wonder if that truly is a wound meant to be healed. It seems as if it needs to be healed because of the stigma that goes along with suicide, but would we think it needed as much healing if he had died of natural causes, would we walk a different road of grief then?

The truth of the matter is that my son is with Jesus and I will see him again, and I guess that brings a level of comfort. But what about now? What about today? I truly didn't know what to expect at the one year anniversary of Noah's death, but it seems that time, while steadily moving forward, has not wiped away the pain, hurt and sadness. Crap! That's not good at all! I had hoped that the passage of time would do something more than it has.

Okay, so maybe not one of my best posts, and even a little raw as my emotions are in flux today, but that is how I am feeling, and I think if people have learned anything about me through my writings it is that I share who I am; the good, bad and the ugly...so get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom of God today!

God Loves Who You Are, Not What You Do

I experienced something last night and it got me to thinking this morning. I was out with friends, and ran into someone who I had not seen in several months. We all made the required pleasantries and then this person made a statement about working with an atheist, but that in the end he managed to get him saved. It was at that moment that I thought, "Dude, God loves who you are, not what you do."

Now don't misunderstand me, I'm not saying that we shouldn't spread the Gospel and bring people to Jesus. Because after all that is the whole point of why Jesus died on the cross, so don't stop reading here and get mad at me, go ahead and finish reading so you'll see the point that I'm actually making.

Often in life we identify more with what we do than with who we are; like Paul is an accountant, Sandy is a teacher, or Joe is shop worker. The really sad part is that "what" we do only takes about forty - sixty hours out of our week, the other 1o8 to 128 hours of that time we sleep, spend time with family and friends and enjoy the fruits of our labor.

Look at Romans 12:2 in the J.B. Phillips translation:

"Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold, but let God re-mold your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all his demands

and moves towards the goal of true maturity."

What is the goal of true maturity? To become better at your job? I don't really think that's it, I mean there may be a part of that which comes into play, but ultimately I think God is more about who we are not what we do. The problem that I have come to find (And yes, even in myself personally.) is that I got so identified with what I was doing for a living that I actually lost the sense of who I was as a person. I am David Felts, not Dave the shoe guy.

We tend to hold on to the "what" we are more than the "who" we are because it is easier to define ourselves when we can see some kind of results. I own a shoe store, so when business is good, then if I am identified with the shoe store, I am doing good. But if the store starts to do bad, then I am bad. It's a catch-22 that can lead you down a path you really don't want to be on.

Here's the thing, when everything is said and done, and I stand before Jesus and the Father God the relationships that I've developed will be the only thing that I can bring with me. Now I can make and develop relationships within my business and I actually try to do that, and that is a good thing. I just don't need my job to be my identification.

This begs the question then, if we should not identify ourselves personally with what we do, what then should we identify with? The answer comes in the form of a little booklet that I read so many years ago by Kenneth E. Hagin called "In Him". Inside this little booklet you will find all of the Scriptures that tell you who you are in Christ, and what you have and can do in Christ. It gives you the tools to renew your mind to the truth of God's Word about who you really are. And that is definitely worth looking into I believe.

So click on the link, pay the $1.50 and get this little booklet and began an in depth study of the Word to find out who you are, what you can do and what is yours in Christ, you'll be glad you did. Get 'em up folks, let's go out and whip something for the Kingdom today!