Ingrown Christianity

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Ingrown-
1) Grown abnormally into oneself.
2) Inbred; innate:
3) Insular; self-contained:
American Heritage Dictionary

I'm not sure why this thought hit me today but here are some thoughts I've had while meditating on it.

Having grown up in a conservative, secluded, easily identifiable Christian community there were some things I never gave a second thought. Entering adulthood I simply adopted the attitude of my environment and became a self-preservationist along with my peers. Honestly, the thought of affecting or being positively affected by anyone or anything beyond my own culture never entered my cranium. I did, in some small measure, attempt to befriend people outside of my world, but it was just that, otherworldly. It was as though we were speaking two different languages about two different topics at the same time. It simply didn't happen, because due to my insulation, I could hear nothing that was said outside of my own paradigm.

I want to be clear, I'm not wanting to be accusatory by this post. I would, however, like to ask each reader to look in the mirror. Have you ingrown? Have you grown abnormally into your own sub-culture? Have you become self-contained? What influences you? It is impossible to be influenced by things you don't allow access into your life. Somehow, though, I'm not as concerned just now about who we allow to influence us as who we are willing to allow ourselves to reach out to.

Do you reach 'out'? How far?

Do you reach far enough out to touch your neighbor? You know who your 'neighbor' is. Jesus taught us clearly that anyone with a need is our neighbor if we are apprised of their need. Can you allow yourself the freedom to serve your neighbor's needs? What if your neighbor is culturally quite different than you are? Each of us like to be accused of taking the Scripture literally, but be careful not to miscontext and/or miss some texts altogether in our quest for literal application. Far too many times I've heard do good to all men and especially to those of the household of faith quoted with all the emphasis on the end part rather than the beginning. Friends, we're past due on the do good to ALL men part.

Let's ask ourselves this as a measuring stick. When we entertain, to whom does the invitation extend? Sure, there's always a time for entertaining our friends, our family, our long-time acquaintances. Sure, relationships take work, and we should devote times for just that, maintaining genuine relationship with our peers. BUT......if that's the entirety of our social experience; if we never mingle socially outside of our own 'kind'; if we have never even given thought, much less effort, to socializing with people we don't understand have we not become ingrown?

I end with this, I am guilty! Not only am I guilt of being a social recluse, I rather like it. I'm comfortable in my own social circle. Nevertheless, I pray the Lord will grant each of us repentance and the ability to affect and be affected by people. Real people. People who are quite different than ourselves!
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Journal Entry

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Wickedness, wickedness is what I'm full of
Sinfulness is who I am
Ungodliness, ungodliness is what I'm bent toward

But...
Righteousness, righteousness is what I long for
Righteousness is what I need

I'm continually amazed at God's ability, rather desire, to love me in all my wickedness, ungodliness and filth. When I take an honest look at my heart I see nothing but ugliness, sinfulness and vulgarity (if you don't believe me, ask Renita); and yet He has said that I'm worth dying for! I don't get it, but I got it and I'm thankful for it!!
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Prayer Requests

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I have two specific prayer requests. This is an awkward forum to share these requests in because there are people involved in both situations who read this blog. However, I assure you that none of the specifics of either situation are personal. I simply feel the need for prayer in these two areas.

1 - Please pray with me that the ministry team with which I go to New Castle Correctional Facility will become a unified team. In the past we have experienced unity and communion together. Pray that that will return. Pray with me that we will be able to give a 'distinct sound' rather than each of us speaking in our own 'tongue'. Pray that the unity of the spirit of God, our Father, will again bind our team together.

2 - Pray that Greenville Fellowship will experience the dream that I believe our Father has for us. Pray against the spirit of competition which can so easily rise up within our hearts. Pray that our Father will grant us a united vision. Further pray that not only will we each affirm that vision, but that we will also confirm it in one another as each one works out that vision in their own individual way. Pray, with me, against the onslaught of Satan as he works tenaciously to divide and conquer!
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Hit Him Again

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Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them.

The Lord said to Satan, 'Where do you come from?'

Then Satan answered the Lord and said, 'From wandering around on the earth.'

'Have you noticed my servant Aaron?', the Lord asked Satan.

Then Satan answered the Lord, 'Does Aaron fear you arbitrarily? Have you not built a wall around him and his house and all that he has; but take away the wall of protection and take away your blessings and he will curse you to your face.'

Then the Lord said to Satan, 'Behold, all that he has is in your power............'.

So Satan departed from the presence of the Lord.
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Brian says, 'Reckon yourself dead, brother, reckon yourself dead. Those feelings can't be given thought anymore.'

It seems like every time I start to stumble the devil trips me and then kicks me while I'm down.

Ouch!
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Hmmmm........

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If a preacher is confident in the Word of God, it is easy for some to mistake it for arrogance.

-quoted from this blog
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Now This Explains It

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If you are going through a solitary way, read John 17, it will explain exactly why you are where you are - Jesus has prayed that you may be one with the Father as He is. Are you helping God to answer that prayer, or have you some other end for your life? Since you became a disciple you cannot be as independent as you used to be.
The purpose of God is not to answer our prayers, but by our prayers we come to discern the mind of God, and this is revealed in John 17. There is one prayer God must answer, and that is the prayer of Jesus - "that they may be one, even as We are One." Are we as close to Jesus Christ as that?

God is not concerned about our plans; He does not say - Do you want to go through this bereavement; this upset? He allows these things for His own purpose. The things we are going through are either making us sweeter, better, nobler men and women; or they are making us more captious and fault-finding, more insistent upon our own way. The things that happen either make us fiends, or they make us saints; it depends entirely upon the relationship we are in to God. If we say - "Thy will be done," we get the consolation of John 17, the consolation of knowing that our Father is working according to His own wisdom. When we understand what God is after we will not get mean and cynical. Jesus has prayed nothing less for us than absolute oneness with Himself as He was one with the Father. Some of us are far off it, and yet God will not leave us alone until we are one with Him, because Jesus has prayed that we may be.

-Oswald Chambers
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Renewed Prayer

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I was sitting here this morning studying for Sunday's sermon and gleaning personal challenges along the way when the CD I was listening to gave a song to the occasion. This CD is something the pastor at Poplar Grove COB gave us to borrow; it's a Church of the Brethren choir from PA. Somehow this song hit me in a new and powerful way. No doubt anyone who is GB, or closely affiliated, knows this song as #837 in the Christian Hymnary, but somehow it seemed new this morning, especially the first verse.

Lord, I am fondly, earnestly longing
Into Thy holy likeness to grow
Thirsting for more and deeper communion
Yearning Thy love more fully to know

Dead to the world would I be, O Father!
Dead unto sin, alive unto Thee
Crucify all the earthly within me
Emptied of sin and self may I be

I would be Thine, and serve Thee forever
Filled with Thy spirit, lost in Thy love
Come to my heart, Lord, come with anointing
Showers of grace send down from above

Open the wells of grace and salvation
Pour the rich streams deep into my heart
Cleanse and refine my thought and affection
Seal me and make me pure as Thou art.
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No god but GOD!

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We heard a message yesterday titled No god but GOD our of Exodus 20:2-5 I am the Lord your God, who brought out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous god...

Brian (whom many of you know, but some of you don't) preached his heart out on this matter. The message was clear, direct and timely. However, I'm afraid it was too easy to hear. I seriously doubt that anyone who listened yesterday felt like the message was erroneous. Rather, I am guessing that everyone present was able (and willing) to say 'Amen' in their heart to what they had heard. That is the problem. Too many times we hear a message of truth and respond with an affirmative response immediately, but the next day, two days, three, four, five days later we are no longer living the truth we affirmed to be true.

I'm going out on a limb and guessing that no one present yesterday was able to look into their heart and say that they had absolutely no other gods but Yahweh (to use Brian's term), but you know what people, admitting that hasn't changed anything yet. Sheer admission that my job, my family, my pastor, my status, my church, my relationships, my political position, my (God forbid) favorite sin, my desire to consume food, etc is a god to me doesn't change anything. We need to repent! If we confess our sin He is willing, and fair, to forgive us of our sin; but if we are unwilling to confess (which I feel is slightly more that just admitting it) He is under no obligation to free us from it!

Lord, I admit; I confess; I own the fact that I have had, and do have, gods in my life. I have things in my life which aren't You that I think I can't live without. Please Father, on the basis of Jesus' atonement on my behalf, forgive me of this treason and by the power of Your holy Spirit give me the ability to rid your 'temple' of those things which don't belong. Give me a true heart of worship to worship You alone ('echad). Give me a singular eye..................no god, but GOD!!

No god...................but GOD!!
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Deb said

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God will not breath life into the golden calf.

I agree; and further, our democracy will not obligate Him in any way!
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Onslaught

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I feel as though I'm under intense spiritual attack today. I'm scheduled to preach tonite at NCCF and it seems as though the enemy feels that getting me down and then kicking me while there would be a good way to interfere with God's plan. I try hard not to be a person who blames everything on 'the devil made me do it' and I know that every man is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lusts [passions, desires, attitudes, opinions, etc]. Nevertheless, my mind is not cooperating very with my heart today!

Lord, on the merit of the finished work of Jesus on my behalf, rebuke the devil from my presence today. Let me be a willing (and ready) servant tonite. Father, I pray you would prepare my heart to both receive (first) and give your Word tonite!
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Chambers on Salvation

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The Christian worker must never forget that salvation is God's thought, not man's; therefore it is an unfathomable abyss. Salvation is the great thought of God, not an experience. Experience is only a gateway by which salvation comes into our conscious life. Never preach the experience; preach the great thought of God behind. When we preach we are not proclaiming how man can be saved from hell and be made moral and pure; we are conveying good news about God.
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MAYDAY

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Why is it easier to seek counsel from men than from God, our Father? If we ignore counselling with Him on matters are we not rejecting His counsel?

Philippians 4:6-7
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