Amazing God


There are a lot of things that are amazing about God to me. One thing that really blows my mind is prayer. God listens to the prayer of human beings. The Creator bends His ear to creatures. We get to talk to Him. We can talk to Him about making it rain. We can ask Him to help us on a test. We can petition Him about helping us to get a better job. There is no limit of what we can talk about with our God. He listens and He cares.

Another truly amazing thing about prayer is that God listens to millions of people all at one time. He listens to me and a 11 year old boy in South Dakota named Billy at the same time. He can hear and talk with all of us intimately and simultaneously. I have trouble listening to just one person at at a time, just ask my wife. He is the Incredible God.

His extraordinary love and ability gives us the privilege of talking with Him in prayer at any time and any place. Take time and pray to our amazing God today.

Grace,
Chris

Envy the Assassin

Envy like pride and anger desires to take you down. The jealous heart is developed by comparing ourselves to others. We want their possessions, power, positions and prosperity. It hurts to come to grips with the fact that we lack. We discover we are not all that we think we should be or have what we think we should have.

Jealousy and envy can break down the support system of our life (Proverbs 14:30). When the Apostle Paul writes to the Romans, he says that we should rejoice with those who rejoice. (Romans 12:15) Rejoicing with others who have what we want is a lifeguard for us. It keeps us from being in bondage to resentment and discontentment.

Who can you congratulate today to guard your life from jealousy?

Anger the Assassin

Anger has taken men and women down throughout history. It is a fact of life because we live in a broken and sinful world. The Bible assumes that you and I will get angry. (The Apostle Paul says, "In your anger do not sin,". Ephesians 4:26)

What you do when you get angry is important. You and I will make a decision when we get angry. Will we choose to sin or to be holy? Today if we find ourselves angry, let's be careful. Sin is crouching at the door ready to pounce if we don't control our anger.

Pride the Assassin

Pride is an assassin. It seeks to build us up so that it can take us down. Everything that goes up must come down, right? The tricky thing about pride is that we can be blind to it. Pride is easy to see in others, but often very difficult to see in ourselves.

God has given us a bodyguard against pride, arrogance and vanity. Humility acts as protector of our soul. It causes us to see ourselves rightly, not just lowly. This why God tells us in James 4:10 to humble ourselves.

Be on guard today with humility.

Steven Johnson's Tweet

You probably seen the Buffalo Bills Steven Johnson tweet after dropping the game winning touchdown pass against the Pittsburgh Steelers. If not, here it is....
"I PRAISE YOU 24/7!!!!!! AND THIS HOW YOU DO ME!!!!! YOU EXPECT ME TO LEARN FROM THIS??? HOW???!!! ILL NEVER FORGET THIS!! EVER!!! THX THO..."
If God tweeted, what would He tweet back????
It might sound like this...
"I GRACE YOU 24/7!!!!! AND THIS HOW YOU DO ME!!!! I DO EXPECT YOU TO LEARN FROM THIS!!! BECAUSE!!! IVE FORGIVEN EVEN THIS!!! EVER!!! YOU'RE WELCOME THO..."
Maybe that's God's response.

Too Much

I am often overwhelmed by the amount of stuff I need to pray for and it tempts me not to pray.

If you are like me you have a prayer list that is a mile long. Just the sheer volume of it is discouraging. Time and energy seem to evaporate. But I know that I must overcome the temptation to bypass praying by praying. This is why prayer is a discipline of the faith.

A Battle

#3 - There is always someone or something that will try to keep me from praying. I have discovered that my flesh, this world and Satanic forces are working to keep me from praying. The activity of prayer has to be one of the greatest battlefields in the mind of the believer.

Prayer is essential to God's work that's why I think it is opposed so greatly.

Regrets

One of the things I have learned about prayer is that I have never regretted the time I have spent praying, but I do regret the times I have not prayed. When I look back over my life I know that I should have prayed more.

I never have prayed and thought well that was a big waste of time. It is just good and right to pray.

May we all pray more...

30 in 30

I have been sharing the 30 things I have learned about pray in 30 years with GracePointe at Wednesday night Bible Study. So, I will share them with all (or both) of my blog followers.

Lesson #1 - Study the prayers of the Bible to learn how to pray.

The best way to learn to pray is to look at how people prayed in the Bible. I have gained a great education in prayer by studying how Nehemiah, Moses, Daniel and Jesus prayed.

Confession of Prayer

3 Things I Confess I Need to Do More

1. Pray more.
2. Pray more for others.
3. Pray more with others.
   

Confession needs to lead to action.

Angry?

This past Sunday I spoke from Proverbs 29:11 which says, "The fool gives fool vent to his anger, but the wise man keeps himself under control." Solomon observes that both the wise man and the fool get angry. But the way the handle their anger is different. The impulsive fool is controlled by his anger. The wise guy controls his anger.

Passion is good. But passion out of control is dangerous. Moses was passionate for justice, but his strength became his weakness. It is recorded in three episodes of his life where his anger got the best of him. He killed an Egyptian taskmaster. He broke the Ten Commandments. He struck the rock twice when he was only to speak to the rock to bring out water for the people. His anger cost him years of service, respect and the opportunity to enter Canaan.

The wise man considers the cost before his temper is lost.

Great Advice

A mentor of mine once told me, "Work on your heart everything else is cosmetic." I found this to be wonderful advice for living.

Follow and Following

I started "tweeting" on twitter last week. It's weird in that you are trying to get people to follow you. You also start following other people. We actually follow and are followed at the same time. That's kinda strange.

Jesus would have called us to follow Him. But He would not be following us.

O T Character

I was thinking about which Old Testament character would be cool to hang out with for a day. It's a more difficult choice than I had originally anticipated it would be. I think I would choose King Solomon. He fascinates me. I mean how cool would it be to hang out with a guy who was the wisest man to ever live. He knew something about just about everything so you could talk with him about anything.

I think I would ask him...

• Why all the women?
• What was it like having King David as a father?
• What's more difficult to handle success or failure?

Someone from History

Yesterday, I posted on who I would love to hang out with for a day that is famous right now in our world. Today, I am thinking about one person in history that I would love to chill with for 24 hours. I have a lot of people that come to mind. So, I am going to limit the boundaries who I can pick to spend a day with to someone who is historical, but not found in the Bible. I will get to the Bible guys tomorrow.

I think I would like to spend a day with Robert E. Lee. I read a biography on him last year and was amazed at this guy. I think he was a fascinating person. I would love to talk to him about politics and his faith in Jesus. I would like to know how difficult it was for him to fight against the Union. It must have been an incredible burden to be a General that sent young men into battle knowing that many of them would die. That kind of burden for any man must be terribly difficult to handle.

What about you? What non-biblical historical figure would you like to get to know in person? And why?

One other thing about yesterdays blog on spending time with Mark Richt. I have not been feeling to well and slept much of the day. I have some kind chest and sinus respitory infection. I went to sleep and actually dreamed about hanging out with Mark Richt. It was kinda strange, but cool. I guess later tonight I will be standing on some battlefield with R. E. Lee, at least in my dreams.

What Famous Person of Today?

If you were given the honor of spending a day with one famous person that is still alive who would you choose?

I was thinking about this question on the way to work this morning. I had a bunch of people to cross my mind, but I think I would choose to spend a day with Mark Richt, the head football coach of the Georgia Bulldogs. I would think he would have some great stories to tell about football as head coach and as a player. I would love to hear about what he's learned about leadership over the years. Most of all, I would love hearing about how he integrates his faith in Jesus with life and coaching. He seems like he be a laid back cat that would be good just to chill with over dinner.

Who would you choose and why? I would love to hear from you.

Completing the Work

It's been quite some time since I last blogged. I am sure both of my followers have been discouraged. But it is a new year so I need to get on the ball here and do some thought sharing.

Life is about glorifying God. If I am going to glorify Him then what must I do. I found this clue last week in John 17:4 where Jesus said these words in His prayer, "I have brought you (Father God) glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do.".

So, one observation is that if I am to glorify God on earth then I will complete the work He has given me to do. I will do the job He has set before me.

Professor Splash at Catalyst

The Catalyst Conference was great this year. I have been to all 10 years and believe that this year was the best. It is here that I saw one of the most insane acts that I have ever personally witnessed. Professor Splash who owns the world record for diving from 35 feet into a kiddie pool with one foot of water was there and did one of his dives. It was crazy. Here is the video from my friend Matt Mitchell who was standing behind me...You can also find Prof Splash at http://www.professorsplash.com/

A Recommendation

The best recommendation I can give to anyone anywhere for anything is that they follow Jesus Christ. That about sums it up for me.

Somebody

Most of us at some point in our week have thoughts about what “ought to” be done. What was the last thing that came to your mind that you really felt ought to be done? Was it some injustice that needed to be made right? Was it some ministry that needed to be started? Was it some person who needed a hand? Was it some task that would improve your community?

Chances are that everyone of us will have a moment today or tomorrow where we will think that somebody should do something about this or that. It is that “ought to” moment that I believe that God uses to prick us towards action. The challenge I want to leave you with today is when you sense that somebody should do something about an injustice, a need or a ministry that you will consider that the reason you have had an “ought to” moment is not for just personal observation only. It may be that God has put it on your heart to be the somebody to do something about it.