Includes...
The other day I was helping my daughter learn to roller skate. About an hour before this I had been praying and asking God about a few area of life where I was not seeing much progress. I was working at them but not seeing much results.
Then through teaching my daughter to roller skate I received the answer I was looking for.
When she first started on the skates every attempt to move forward would actually make her go backwards. She would try to skate but panic because she didn't want to fall, and when her wheels would contact the ground they were spinning backwards. She was putting out a lot of effort but the skates were going the wrong way.
She kept working at it and figured out how to make the skates go forward but she would do so by keeping her skates on the ground the whole time. She would sort of shuffle them. This would move her forward but at a very slow pace, and it was a lot of effort. When she was in this stage she kept asking if she was getting it, and my response was...
In the spring it's time for seeds to grow. One of the themes of the parables of Jesus is that our hearts are like soil. God has promised to roll away our hearts of stone and give us new hearts. Then he planted his seed in our hearts. Our rocky soil turned into good soil that can grow the seed and produce a harvest, but we do have a role to play in taking care of the soil by keeping an eye on our thoughts and what we visualize in our minds. Negative thoughts and images are like weeds that need to be pulled.
This seed is planted in our hearts but it produces fruit through our lips.
God planted a seed in our hearts and the imagination is where we create the environment that grows the seed and produces fruit in our lives.
The imagination is the key to our maturation.
A great practice is to be on the lookout for any images in our minds that attempt to steal our peace and/or joy. We can develop the habit of casting these down and meditating on something else.
Something I have found helpful if imaginations start stirring is to take communion. I imagine God pouring his wrath on the body of Jesus so that we have the cup of his blessing. I begin to stir this image in my mind instead and it has a powerful effect on reprogramming the emotions.
Jesus said that if we abide in him we will produce much fruit, and it will last.
The other day I was reading in 1 Chronicles 23 about how David set up God's temple. He had the Levites. who were the workers in the temple standing thanking and praising God every morning and evening, on the Sabbaths( weekly), on the New Moons( the start of the month), and on the feast days(the yearly holidays).
This short passage combines two very powerful principles... gratitude and rhythm.
Gratitude is one of the greatest expressions of faith, and one of the things God wants most from us.
The temple in the Old Testament had a rhythm of morning and evening, weekly, monthly, and the yearly cycle.
Our bodies are the temple now, and we can stand thanking and praising him on this rhythm.
When these two principles are combined it is very powerful.
In the Old Testament Passover was so important that God gave the people a second chance to celebrate it a month later, just in case they missed it. Today it has been a month since Passover, which was the night Jesus instituted communion. If you haven't taken communion in a while it would be good to do so.
Here is the training from my book 7 Dates with Jesus on Passover.
Click Here for the Video ( 38 Minutes)
Click Here for the Audio
Here is a summary of Passover
Passover is a reminder that Jesus has set us free and translated us out of the kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of light.
The traditional Passover meal includes...
The word Pass...
Years ago I came across the story of a college track coach who would do an interesting experiment with his sprinters every year. At the start of the year he would tell them that they were going to run and that their times would rank them on the team.
All of the sprinters would take off and run as fast as they could, and their times were recorded. Then he would tell them to run a cool down sprint, and to focus on running relaxed and smooth. They would all run again and beat their first time.
Then he would have them run again and focus on being even more relaxed and they would all beat their times again.
It is counterintuitive but our bodies always perform better when they are relaxed.
When we are mentally relaxed answers come faster and our productivity increases.
Basketball coach John Wooden used to always tell his players to be quick but don't hurry.
When we rest God works.
It is important to make our meals look good, taste good, and smell good. One of the best ways to avoid boredom with nutrition and to make meals more exciting is to use a variety of herbs, spices, and sauces.
There have been studies done where people were dropped in the middle of nowhere and asked to navigate their way out. If the people lacked a reference point then they tended to walk in circles because they make biased decisions favoring one side. They think they are walking straight, but they keep making small biased adjustments that cause them to walk in circles. To keep our lives from spinning in circles we need a true north, which is meant to be God’s standard.
God's standards are meant to be the things above that we set our minds upon to help us navigate our lives.
Down Below is the May 2020 Letter: The Things Above
Click Here for the Audio
Click Here for the PDF
A few years ago a good friend of mine was leading a Bible study. He said " the Bible tells us to set our minds on the things above or the things of heaven, but can anybody tell me what these things are, because I want to know."
Out of about 15-20 guys nobody had an answer for this question. This seemed like an important question to answer so I started seeking God for an answer and he began to teach me.
To set our minds on the things above is to set our minds on his standards for our lives, which are different than the worlds standards.
For a couple of years I have been working on narrowing this down to a set of questions we can ask ourselves to know if we are on track.
Here are some questions to be thinking about.
The Emotional Standard is Joy: How was my level of joy today?
Life Standard: God forgives and is giving us grace. Did I walk in forgiveness and give other people grace?
Purpose: God has a unique plan for each of us. Did I seek hard after this plan today?
Health: O...
Recently I have come to the conclusion that joy is one of the best indicators for how we are doing emotionally.
Emotions are the translator between our spirits and physical body. They let us know what we are truly believing in our hearts.
If we are lacking joy it could be that we are focused on the wrong things. When we set our minds on the things above, the things of heaven, we will have joy.
Yesterday I was listening to our pastor talk about how the Apostle Paul wrote about being joyful in Philippians, even though he was in prison at the time. Even in terrible circumstances he still had joy.
One of the best ways to stir up our joy is by taking control of the imagination. The imagination is the short cut to reprogramming our emotions. If imaginations arise that steal our joy we must learn to cast them down and stir in images that generate joy instead. This is a practice.
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