Failure

I HATE failure! It is my greatest fear. I don't want to get to the end of my life and look back and feel like a failure. These last two weeks I have dealt with what I consider some huge failures. I have not been able to help couples repair their marriage relationships. You see, through some struggles and yeah, failures of my own I know what it takes to build a godly and fulfilling marriage. I am not perfect and my marriage is not perfect, but God out of His grace has given my wife and I an awesome marriage.

Several years ago it was not so awesome. It was weak and could have gone toward failure or success. I had not been the husband God called me to be. God's Word tells us as husbands to love our wives. The word used for love in this context is the Greek word agape. It means an unconditional love. A love with no end, no conditions or no boundaries. I was not loving my wife like that. I was loving her very selfishly which is not really loving her at all. God's Word also tells us as husbands to give ourselves for and to our wives. I was not doing that either. I was sitting back demanding that she do that for me. I hurt and wounded my wife very badly. There came a point in our marriage where she admitted not really having any feelings for me and really wanting out.

It was at this point that God in any awesome act of grace changed both my wife and I. He changed me by showing me that my wife and son were more important than my ministry and that in fact my first ministry was to them as husband, father and spiritual leader. He showed me how to love my wife and gave me the ability to do it. He showed me how to give myself to her and put her needs ahead of my own. He changed my wife by moving her to ask Him to give her a new love for me. He did!

Now here's where I feel like a failure. I try to commuincate to couples what it takes to have a godly and fulfilling marriage and they don't seem to be listening. It takes continually working at it and humbling ourselves to do it God's way. It takes a willingness to let God unconditionally love my wife through me and for her to unconditionally respect me through Him. Ephesians 5:33 says, "However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband." Do you see the key? Husbands unconditionally loving their wives and wives unconditionally respecting their husbands.

God has shown me two truths that will allow God to turn marraiges in to fulfilling relationships. I know because God used these truths to change me.

Truth #1: Love Jesus more than you love your spouse.
God has to be first. Nothing else will work if you love anything more than Jesus.

Truth #2: Love your spouse more than you love yourself.
If you demand from your spouse more than you give that is called being selfish and it will hurt your marriage.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls by letting God give you a new realtiosnhip with your spouse in Jesus.

Joe

Real Life

In the Gospels most of the time that Jesus uses the word "life", He is using the Greek word zoe. Now I am not a Greek scholar. I am not a scholar of any kind. I however, love to study the words of the Scriptures. In studying the words of the Bible I have found that this word zoe translated life is one of my favorite words. We who speak English have one word that means all kinds of life, all levels of life, and all stages of life. In the Greek they used several words.
When Jesus says for example in John 6:35 that He is the Bread of Life, He uses zoe not bio for life. He also uses zoe in John 14:6 where He says, "I am the way and the truth and the life." If Jesus would have used bio, he would have meant that He was the Bread of biological life. If Jesus would have used bio in John 14:6 He would have meant that He was the way and the truth and the biological life. He didn't use bio, He used zoe. Zoe means life to its fullest. Zoe means living and just existing.
Jesus gives us a better picture of this in John 10:10 when He says that He can to give us life (zoe) to it fullest.
Jesus wasn't born to give us biological life. Jesus didn't live and teach and preform miracles to give us biological life. Jesus didn't die to give us biological life. Jesus didn't resurrect to give us biological life. Jesus did all of those things to give us real life, life that is full, joyous, adventoursome, and eternal. What amazes me is that you and I are so quick to settle for just a biological existence. I have come to want more than just a safe and comfortable life. I want to experience the kind of life Jesus offers us in a relationship with Him. I want to experience the kind of life Jesus lived.
Allowing God to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is experiencing life (zoe) to the fullest. It is not a life of safety, security, or comfort. It will be risky, but it will be worth all the risk. It will be a life lived giving glory to God.

Joe

Struggles

Everybody struggles. We all struggle with something, some of them are big and some are small. However, big or small they are, struggles are a struggle and they are not fun.

God has shown me that struggles are bad. It is when there is no struggle that we can really be in trouble. If I am not facing a struggle of some kind it means one of two things.

One: I am in one of those awesome mountain top spiritual experiences where out of God's mercy and grace I have rest from struggles for a time. We can't really live there because we live in a fallen world that is dominated by sin and that sin will effect us. I am very thankful for those times. They allow me to be refreshed and reenergized.

Two: I have given up and given in and am no longer in the battle. There is no struggle because I have surrendered. I have not surrendered to Jesus, but to the enemy and it seems everything is fine. It is not fine and somewhere down the road my suurender will lead to great defeat and destruction.

 I have learned that when I surrender my life to Jesus, I will face struggles. The stuggles direct me to Jesus. The struggle shows me that Jesus, my Lord and my Friend, is with me in the middle of the struggle.

Allow God in the middle of your struggle to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls. Jesus will pour the Holy Spirit into your life and also your struggle and will then display His glory to the world.

Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls
                           Joe

I would rather be in the struggle with Jesus then out of the struggle without Jesus. As you struggle call out and let Jesus be Who He wants to be to you in the middle of your struggle.

To Faith or Not To Faith

Faith is a fascinating concept to me. Why can I have strong faith about some things and absolutely no faith about other things. Another thing about faith that causes me to be fascinated is how some people who really shouldn't be peolple of faith are. Let me cite an example. I am studying through the book of Joshua. A few days ago I read chapter 2 which is one of my favorite passages in Scripture because God uses a prostitute from Jericho to accompish His purpose. And if that is not cool enough this prostitute has a huge amonut of faith.

In Joshua 2:4-6, Rhab, that's the prostitute, hides two Israelite spies and then tells the king of Jericho that they had gone. She risked her life believing that these two men represented the true God. Faith will require that we risk. Yes, at time even our very lives.

Then in Joshua 2:9 she tells the spies that she knows God has given Israel the land. Now, Rahab's family could had been occupying that land for hundreds of years. She has faith that God had already given it to Israel. Faith is trusting God will do something before He does it.

Then in Joshua 2:10 Rahab tells the spies that they, Jericho,  had heard how the Lord had dried up the Red Sea and that God had helped Israel defeat King Sihon and King Og (love that name). Rahab had not personally witnesses that or even talked to anybody who had, but what she heard that God had done, she believed. Faith is trusting God even when you have not personally witnessed something.

Then in Joshua 2:11 Rahab identifies God as the God in heaven above and on the earth below. This concept of God being a God over all (heaven and earth) is beyond anything that Rahab could have ever been taught by her culture. Her culture like all the cultures of that time saw God as over certain areas or things, but not as a God over all. It take a gracious revelation from God to help her understand, but she did. This again is a huge faith.

Finally in Joshua 2:12-13 she makes the spies swear that Israel will spare her and her family when they conquer Jericho. They agree and tell her what she has to do and in the rest chapter two we see Rahab follow God's commands that allow her and her family to be the only people in Jericho to survive.

God Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls from our lives and from His church will take a Rahab type of faith. A faith that helps us believe the Word of God without reservation, a faith that allows us to in spite of our fears to risk everything for God, a faith that will enable us to trust what we can't see and help us leap beyond our own experiences or feelings about God and trust Him as He really is.

So what I am saying is I want the kind of faith in God that a prostitute from Jericho had.

Joe

Real Faith

I have read James 2:25 many times. It says, "In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction?" I have always thought it is was cool of God to use a prostitute because then when people tell me that God can't use somebody becasue of what they did in their past I can point out to them that God used Rahab, a prostitute. It also convicts me when I make excuses to God about why I can't to certain things and He reminds me that He used Rhab, a prostitute.

That verse in James was nice, but to be honest it was just that nice. And then I was reading Joshua chapter two, the story of Rahab and Wow! God took that passage and showed me some awesome faith in this prostitute. Rhab. In verse nine, she tells the spies that she knows that God has already given the land to Israel. In verse ten she tells the spies about how she believed the accounts of God drying up the Red Sea and how God helped Israel defeat King Sihon and King Og. She did not see theseevents  are have any physical proof, but she believed. Then in verse eleven she tells them that she knows that God is God in heaven above and the earth below. In her culture gods were see as having control of areas or territories. Rahab expresses faith that God is the God of everything. Then finally she has faith that if she helps the spies that God will spare her and her family. When the spies tell her what to do to make sure that her and her famiy are spared, she does it.

So now I read James 2:25 with more awe for what God can do and who He can do it though and more respect for Rahab's faith. She had a faith which showed trust in God and lead to action with God. I believe that God wants to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls in my life, in my church, in all other believers' lives and in all God's churches. If I really believe that I should be willing to obey God to do anything He wants to move that along. 

Joe

Attacks of the Enemy

It is very interesting how our enemy Satan attacks. In this instance I mean attacks upon the church as a whole not Satan attacking us as individuals. In Acts 3 aand 4 Satan attacks the church from the outside. He brings persecution from those who are oppossed to the church. First this persecution comes upon the leadership of the church and when that is not effective, Satan brings persecution on the membership as a whole. This proved to be ineffective also. The enemy does not give up and so in Acts 4 he attacks from within. Satan uses part of the church to try and damage the whole church.

Satan has not changed his tactics. We see it today. The church is growing in places where it is being attacked from outside. In countries like China and Cuba where the government tries to control and limted what churches and Christians can do the church is growing. In American and Western Eurpoe where there is freedom to meet and evangelize the church is not growing nearly as fast and there are internal conflicts like: authority of Scripture, worship styles, and Bible translations.

I also see it on a more local and personal level. God is doing an awesomely cool work in our church. Sunday has become an amazing time to see God work in people's live and the repsonse among God's people to what He is saying and doing. It amazes me that in the very middle of God working we see Satan using people in the church to try and stop God. We have seen it in three ways.

One way is people not focusing on what God is doing, but on their on own selfish desires. This people will find a small petty thing and if it is not to thier liking try and casue a conflict over it. One of the biggest of this is worship style. In reality the worship style you use is to be pleasing not to us, but to the one you are worshiping. Our worship does not have to please us, but to please our audience of One - Jesus.

A second way we have seen internal problems is people getting angry at one another. This again is usually over very unimportant things. However, when there is disunity within the Body of Christ the Holy Spirit is grieved and hindered in His ability to work with His people.

The third way that Satan has attacked inwardly is by people attacking the spiritual leadership of the church. Spiritual leadership in the chruch should be held at very high level of accountablity . It should not be required to be perfect. When there is a concern on the part of an individual in the church about the leadership it should be in love taken to the leader face to face, not in gossip behind their back. Spiritual leadership should be repected, not followed blindly or in Biblical ignorance.  

For God to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls of His church we must focus on what God is doing and let Him do it His way and not demand that He do it our way. We must be in unity, one heart and one mind. We must support the spiritual leadership that God has placed within the church. As we do that God will do awesome things in and through His church.

Joe

The Church Part Two

When I read about the church in the New Testament the words that are used to describe the church are very revealing about what the nature of the church is. Italso shows who we as the church is to be.

The church is called the Body of Christ. A body is made up of many different parts with many different functions, but they all work together so that the body can fucation as it should. The church is made up of many different kinds of people and these people have many different fuctions. When we as the church in our differences come together under the Head and fuction as we should it is an awesome dispaly of who Jesus is.

The chrch is called the Family of God. A family is again made up of different people with again functions. A family works when in love the different people work together putting each others needs ahaed of their own. Family is about loving no matter what.

A third way the church is described is as the Bride of Christ. A woman who is a bride has to have a man willing to be the groom. The church as the bride has Jesus as our groom. For a marriage to work the bride most respect, love and honor the groom. The groom in turn must respect, love and honor the bride. Jesus respects us as His bride, He loves us and He honors us. We as the bride must also respect, love and honor Him. A bride and groom share an intimacy that is the deepest human intimacy that we can experience. Jesus desires intimacy with us, the church as His bride.

The thing all of these describes share is that they are all relational. The church then is God's people realting to Him in unity and love with great intimacy. The church is also to relate to each other with that same unity, love and intimacy.

The world will take notice and be blown away when the church is who God's Word says we are and acts as Christ' Body, Family, and Bride.
Joe

The Church Part One

What is the church? The building, the programs, the ministries? Well, the word translated church in the New Testament means a gathering of the called out ones. That indicates to me that the church is the people. Then we have to ask what people? Ninety percent of the time church is used in the New Testament it refers to the local church. So the church is those followers of Christ who week after week meet together for worship, study, and fellowship and who work together in ministry and evangelism.

When God gave me the idea of Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls part of it was to emphasize to our church that the church is not the building, but that the church was US. In reality we never go to church we are the church. The church is not a place or thing it is a who. I ran into a big obstacle a few years ago when I attempted to have a Sunday evening worship service at some place other than the "church building". I was told that if we didn't have the service at the "church building" it was not really "church". I remebering thing at that time how unbiblical and sad because in the New Testament their were no "church buildings".

Now, I am not against church buildings unless they interfere with the church doing the work that we were called to do by the Head of the church - Jesus. The bulding that a church meets in can get in the way of what God wants to do. It can do that in several ways.

One way the buidling can get in the way is if our view of what the church is has more to do with the building then with Jesus. If we see the church as the building and are not willing to get outside the four walls of that building and minister to people where they are that goes against who Jesus is and what He has commmanded us, the church to do. If we think that if it doesn't happen in the building and we can't count it on some form, it is not really church than that is hindering what Jesus' mission for His church is.

A second way that the building can get in the way is if our view of the church is a fortress mentality one. If we view the building as what protects us from all the terrible people and things out there (in the world) and are not willing to go outside or invite some kinds of people inside than it hinders what Jesus has commanded us as His church to do.

Another way that the building can get in the way is if so much of our resources are poured into the building and stops us from putting resourses into minsitering to and sharing the Gospel with lost and hurting people. God didn't tell us as the church to maintain, He told us to grow and He didn't mean to build bigger buildings. Jesus told us to grow by making disciples. If large portions of our church budgets are about building payments and building upkeep to the detriment of money going to help the poor, to share the Gospel, or missons that is not honoring to God.

So buildings are not wrong, but I do believe that God would have us to let Him Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls of His church so that the world can see the glory of the One who is the Head of the church - Jesus!

Joe

The Epic Life

We are going to see our kids today. I love being with them because I really love them. It is one of the great plasures of my life to watch my granddaughter. I loving just watching her live life. She lives life to the fullest. Everyday for her is an adventure (she has made life for her parents that way too) and nothing ever seems ordianry to her. She is one of the most passionate people I have ever been around.

So because of going to see the kids and because I have been reading a new book by John Eldredge called The Way of the Wild Heart. God has got me thinking about living an epic life. This began as I was reading the book and Eldredge makes the statement that to capture a boys heart, his focus, something has to be epic. I looked up the word epic and it means bigger than life.

As I read that definition I realized that when I was about 18 to 19 years old that is what God did in my life. He showed me that Christianity was not about just going to church and trying to be good. Christianity was about following this epic, bigger than life, God. It also answered a question that has been in my spirit for years. The question is what did my wife, Jan and I do as our son was growing up that helped him establish a real and passionate realtionship with Jesus. You see, every time I ask my son what we did that helped him know Jesus, he says you guys made it real. He tells us that we lived it out. I now understand that through our passionately seeking Jesus everyday in all things and in allowing our lives to center around Jesus not religious stuff we passed a view of God that was bigger than life, epic on to our son.

Some of the things we did to others seemed crazy and downright over the edge. But to our son they seemed big, risky, and that captured his attention and directed him to Jesus because if Jesus didn't come through on what we believed that He was telling us then we were sunk.The world and even some of the church thought we were crazy, but our son thought it was cool and though it he learned to know that God is real and epic.

I have an ordianry family, but we serve an extraordinarily epic God.    
                               Joe

Loving the Unlovable

Tuesday afternoon as I visited with one of our church family we were interrupted by a person who I have encountered many times. This person comes by frequently usually looking for some type of help. My first response was to tell the person that I was busy and to go away. But as I was about to do that God stopped me and very gentle told me to show love to this person. I have to be honest it is hard for me to love this person. Their life style is not something that I believe is of God and this person is also very demanding and not very grateful when I do help them. After I was able to help this person I began to wonder if Jesus had to deal with people like this person in His earthly ministry. Then the spiritual light bulb went off and I though of course He did. Jesus had people all the time demanding things from Him. Jesus healed, feed, and helped many people. And as I thought about it we don't have a record of many of them telling Him thank you. When Jesus feed the 4,000 and the 5,000 did any of them tell Him thank you? When He raised Lazarus from the dead did Martha and Mary tell Him thank you? Did any of the people Jesus healed tell Him thank you?

There was one episode when Jesus healed some people and most of the them didn't tell Him thank you. Jesus encountered ten lepers. They called out to Him and ask for mercy. Jesus told them to go show themselves to the priest and as they were going they all were healed. One of the men saw he was healed and came back to thank Jesus, but the other nine didn't.

As I thought about how ungrateful most of the people Jesus ministered to were, I realized that I needed to love this person who was so demanding and ungrateful because it is not about the person or me it is about obeying and honoring Jesus. If I love only the lovable people that is easy and anybody can do that. If I love the unlovable then it is not me loving them because I can't, it is about Jesus loving them through me. That glorifies God!

I realize now that this person who I struggle with loving has been brought into my life by God so I can help them but also so I can learn how to love like Jesus. The whole salvation process is not just about me going to heaven, but God molding me into the image of His Son, Jesus. God is Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls of my life through learning to love people like Jesus does, not matter who they are, what they do, how demanding they are or how ungrateful they are. I want the love of Jesus to be a character trait of my life.

Joe

One and Only Son

Today is my son's birthday. It is his 30th birthday. Just typing that makes me feel old. I have the greatest son in the world. He is a godly man who loves and serves Jesus, loves his wife and loves and cares for his daughter. When I found out that we were going to have a child, I began to pray that if the child was a boy that he would grow up to be a man after God's own heart. My son is a man after God's own heart. He is a son even at 30 who greatly honors his parents with the way he lives.

I have been thinking a lot about him and his birth over the last few days. I was reading in 1 John 4 and came to verse nine which says, "This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son as antoning sacrifice for our sin." I looked at that verse and realized that my son is my one and only son and God loved me enough to give me and you and my son His one and only Son.

There are very few people I would ever even think about giving my son up for. God gave Jesus up for me before I even knew that I had a need for salvation. So today as I celebrate and thank God for my one and only son, I will also praise Him for His one and only Son. I will spend my life serving His Son by letting Jesus Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls of my life. 

Joe

Fitting Jesus In

When Peter, Andrew, James, John, and Matthew were invited to follow Jesus did they come to Jesus to die or to fit Jesus in their schedule.

When Saul on the road to Damascus was confronted by Jesus and become known as Paul. Did this dramatic chage occur in his life so he could come and die or come and fit Jesus into his travel plans.

When I look at the men and women in the New Testament I see people surrendering their lives completely to Jesus. I see them coming to Jesus to die. They died to their plans, their desires, their dreams, and they came alived to what Jesus wanted for them. They came alive to do His will. They also came to Jesus knowing it could mean their physical deaths. It cetainly meant Stephen's death, it certainly meant James' death and eventually Paul and Peter's deaths.

I am asking myself lately why I came to Jesu?. Did I come to just go to heaven? Did I come just so I would be a better person, you know more moral and nicer? Did I come so that God would bless me with a lot of stuff? Did I come to fit Jesus into my schedule? Or did I come to die?

I am asking that question for three reasons. The first one is that I see many Christians today who being a Christians means living the American Dream Jesus style. That Christianity in America seems at times to be a matter of saying a few magic words, getting baptized and then living based on what I want to do and asking Jesus to bless it. I have become very frustrated with that brand of Christianity. I see it alot in our nation and not so much in Christians from other countries.

Second I am scared that I have moved into the kind of Christianity that is about everything, but Jesus. I at times plan ways to do what I want at the expense of doing what God wants. I really want to die to self, take up my cross daily and follow Jesus. I want that but then when God gives me an opportunity to do it I pull back because it is going to cost and I afraid that God won't provide what I think I need to do it.

Third I am tired. I tired of being up and down. I am tired of feeling angry. I am tired of feeling defeated. I am to be honest tried of being tried.

I want to have one pure and holy passion, one magnificent obsession, one glorious ambition for my life to follow hard after Jesus. I want to die to my selfish desires and come alive to God's will. I want God to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls of my life so I can come to Jesus and die.    

Joe

Running Away

Did you ever run away or feel like running away. I ran away once when I was seven. I got into a fight with a kid in the neighborhood and beat him up pretty good. He threatened to tell my parent so my buddies hid me in an old club house that we played in. I think I stayed there for a few hours got bored and hungry and went home.
Lately I have been thinkinng about running away. I would take Jan cause running away from her would be stupid and lonely. So I would take Jan and go off the grid. We would find some remote mountain cabin, stock up on food and just stay gone. Then we would not have to deal with all the stress of living in the American culture and dealing with people and see all the hurt and brokenness that surrounds us. That sounds appealing to me, but Jesus constantly reminds me that life is not about me, life is about Him.
There is an incident in John 6 that the Spirit reminded me of yesterday as I as planning our running away time table. Jesus shares with the disciples and larger group of people that He is the Bread of Life. In verses 53-54 Jesus says, "I tell you the truth unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day." Not a teaching that will have everyone running to be your follower. I love it when Jesus shares this off the wall teachings. Jesus would not be the pattern you would use to get people to come to your church.
Believe it or not after hearing this many of Jesus disciples turn away from following Him. In verse 60 one of the disciples says, "This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it." Then Jesus ask the Twelve if they will also turn away from following Him. Then in verse 68 Peter speaks. Well, who else of the Twelve would possibly speak. Peter is the kid in class who raises his hand every time the teacher ask a question whether he knows the answer or not. This time Peter was right on target. He says, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."
So why am I not going to take Jan and run away? Where would I go? Jesus has everything I need and I don't need to run away to get to Him, He is right here with me all the time. There are days that are struggles, I mean real struggles. I see broken and hurting people in my community. In my church I have brothers and sisters with cancer, money problems, parents with children in rebellion, and marriages struggling to make it. Running away will not help change them. Staying and letting Jesus use us as His instruments will.
Jesus is Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls, but it isn't always a comfortable process. It is, however,  always a glorious process.
Joe

Weddings

I am doing a wedding this afternoon. If you know me you know I am not a great fan of weddings American style. I love marriage, but the way many people go about beginning them in our culture is silly. This wedding is small and I think very well thought out. The reason I don't like many weddings is because they are focused on the wrong thing. They are focused on the couple getting married. Weddings should be focused on the One who brought the two peolpe together and who will make them one - Jesus. For the wedding to lead to a marriage that will last Jesus has to be the foundation of the marriage relationship. I don't mean just going to church I mean living a life as a couple and family that is totally surrendered to Jesus.

Annother reason I find American weddings not what they should be is that too much money is spend on the wedding. I know parents who have gone into debt to finance a wedding. Weddings shouldn't put anyone, parents or the couple themselves into debt. Nor should a wedding cause the kind of stress in people's lives that it does. I have been married for over 38 years and to be honest the wedding itself is just a memory. My everyday relationship with my wife is what is important. My loving her and she respecting me is what keeps our love for each other fresh and real and the fact that Jesus is at the center of our relationship.

The most often used picture of the relationship that God wants us His people is that of a marriage. That why in Malachi 2:16 God says that He hates divorce. Divorce destorts the picture of God's love and desire that He has for His people. It also hurts people and God loves us so much that He doesn't wants to have to experience that kind of pain.

Expensive self focused weddings don't need to happen. They are real joy killers. Weddinngs that are simple and Jesus centered can begin a marriage with a burst of pure God given joy. Let's celebrate marriage Jesus style.
Joe    

Risking Wiht God

What God did by becoming human and giving His life on the cross for us is very risky. I have been thinking a lot lately about risk. God loves me enough to risk for me. Do I love God enough to risk for Him?

Several things come to my mind when I thinking about risking for God. One is that I don't really risk for God, I risk with God. God doesn't need me to do for Him or risk for Him. I work with God because it is not me coming up with what I want to do for God. It is me seeking God, seeing where He is working and joining Him in doing it. It is the same thing with taking a risk. I don't come up with what I want to risk for God and then risk it. I seek God, see what he is telling me to do and do it, many times what God is leading me to do will be risky. It's like Elijah when he confronted the prophets of Baal and Asherah on Mount Carmel in 1 Kings 18. Did Elijah wake up one morning and say, "Oh, I think I'll go and challenge 850 false prophets to a contest to detemine whose God is the real God." No, that is not what happen. Whose idea was it that this contest on Mount Carmel come about? It was God's idea. Did Elijah risk something? Oh, yeah! But he did it in resonse to what God told him to do. He didn't risk for God, he risk with God.

Another thing I have learned about risking with God is that it leads to an intimacy with Him. When I trust God I will risk with Him. When I risk with God and He comes through, which He always does. I open myself up more and more to Him and His will. When I really open myself up nd obey the Spirit of God and God comes through it leads me to do it not once but over and over. Obeying God over and over is faithfulness. When I am faithful to God He reveals Himself to me more and more and I experience a closeness, an intiimacy with God.

Finally, I have learned that risking with God is scary, but it is also exciting and fun. I have found great joy in letting God take me out of my comfort zone. The first few steps are hard, but once I take them and see that God is there and He is not going to let me crash and burn, I experience great joy.

God is daily in the process of helping me to risk with Him and by doing that God is more and more each day Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls from my life.

Joe 

9-11

This has been a day of reflection for me. A day to mourn and fast. I believe that September 11 is a day for American Christians to call out to God and seek Him. A day for us to ask our Father to send revival. On this day our cry should be 2 Chronicles 7:14, "If my people who are called by my name with humble themselves, pray and seek my face. I will hear from heaven, forgive their sins and heal their land." Just as Israel has a day of atonement in which they fast and pray I believe that 9-11 should be ours. My prayer for us on this day is that we as God's people would humble ourselves before Him and let Him Raise the Roof and Rmove the Walls of our lives and of His church.
I having a growing desire to see God's glory reveled in us as His church, His Body. I see a church that has increasingly focused on our desires, our comforts, and our pleasures. The time is now for us as God people to surrender all ourselves so that God might be exalted above all. God had me studying Psalm 67 this week. That Psalm talks about what will happen when we as God's people seek Him and seek His blessings not for ourselves, but so God can by blessing us use us to bless the world by showing His glory to all the nations. I want to be like Isaiah who when confronted by the awesome presence of God and was asked who would go said, "Here I am send me!" May God use me and you for His glory.
Joe     

Wealth Creation

I am not an expert on the economy. I can't even balance my check book. I do know what we have been doing is not working. The defination definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. It seems to me that is what we are doing. I live in the county with one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. Our is somewhere around 20%. In my time with Jesus today I read Deuteronomy chapter 8 and in verse 18 God says, "But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today."
It is God who gives us the ability to produce wealth. It does not come from the govenment. It doesn't even come from men and women gifted in business. It comes from God when we do things God's way. Our economy will improve when we move from seeing making money as an end in itself to a means to an end - Glorifying God. We have made job creation and starting new businesses the end. Let's instead making honoring Jesus the end and cry out to Him for help and direction and see what happens. I know this makes no sense economically, but remember I am not an economic expert. I do know God and believe His Word and believe that He not us is the Creator of wealth.
Joe

Fear

I hate fear. I hate feeling fearful. And the bad part is that I have felt fearful for a lot of my life. For years I would visualize the deacons coming into my office and firing me. I am in one of those fearful places in my life right now. Many times when I have felt this way I didn't know why. This time I do know why. I am fearful that my church is going to miss God. You see, over that last 6-8 months God has been doing some really cool things within His church here in Deming and God really wants to do even more. He wants to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls. My fear is that we will not let Him. And a greater fear is that it will because I was not obedient to do all that God has told me to do as the pastor of His church. I see every day the enemy, Satan trying to disrupt and getting our focus off of Jesus and on to petty concerns and into conflicts with each other. I also see the enemy messing with the marriages and families in the church.The enmey knows that if he can get us fighting as spouses with each other or children with their parents than he can stop what God wants to do and win the victory. I know I am not alone in feeling fearful. In the the first chapter of the book Joshua God tells Joshua five times to be strong and courageous, not to be afraid. Joshua was about to lead the people of God into a land that God had promised to give them, but they would have to fight to take it. God promises them that He would be with them and give them everything they needed to take the land. They had to trust Him and fight. The reason that God tells Joshua that he can be strong and courageous is because of God not because of Joshua. So as I read that chapter again I was reminded in the midst of my fear not to panic, not to abandon the church, not to run away from God. I am to run to God. I am to trust God and in completely trusting God and not me, I am to fight. I am also to pray that my church will trust God and fight the enemy and allow God to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls.
Joe     

The Need for Forgiveness

I hope to make this blog very honest and so I will share not just my great spiritul moments but also my very bad spiritual moments.
After having been a Christian for over 45 years now that are time when I begin to think man I have this sin thing licked. I doing good and why can't all this other "sinners" get their act together. Then I will have a moment like I had Sunday and open my mouth and the stupidest things come out. It is at those times when God reminds me of three things. One I am a recovery sinner. i don't have sin licked and I can be as unspiritual and unholy as anyone. He reminds me that I still need forgiveness and not just from Him, but many times from the person I have sinned against. He also reminds me that He still loves me. I hate to be humbled, but I love the fact that God loves me enough to humble me. God disciplines those He loves. Sunday and Monday He really loved me.
Joe

Goober

Goober is my 3 year old granddaugther. No, her real name is not Goober, it is Alyssa Marie Byers, just ask her and she will tell you. I love this little girl so much. I don't just love her because she is the most awesome kid in the world, though I think she is. You don't have to think that, in fact if you have little children or grandkids you should think that they are the most awesome kids in the world. I don't even love her because she belongs to Andy and Joni who I also love. No, I love Goober because she is my granddaughter. I realized that the moment I first saw her. She had done thing to cause me to love her at that point, but I did. I love Goober in the same way, not a perfectly, as God loves me. Evey time I am around her and she comes running to me and excitedly says, "Pops" I am overwhelemed with joy. I believe that is how God feels when I call out to Him in love and say, "Abba."  
We don't have to do anything for God to loves us. He just does!
I love love Goober even when she misbehaves, I know it hard to believe a Byers' kid misbehaving, but it happens. In the same way God loves me when I disobey. He nevers gives up on me or rejects me, He just loves me and disciplines me (because He loves me).
Also spending time with Goober has help me undestand what Jesus meant when He said that you had to become like a little child to enter His Kingdom. Goober is the most honest person I have ever met. When she is happy you know it, when she is sad you know it and when she is mad you really know it. She is so open and transparent. That is what God wants to do in my life and in the lives of all of His followers, the church. He wants to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls so we can be open and honest with Him and transparent to others showing the world our Awesome Savior.

Joe

God's Car

Today has been an interesting day. Jan and I were on our way to Las Cruces when I noticed the check engine light was on. Well, being the crack car guy I am I decided to go on to Las Cruces. We ate and went to come home and the car won't start. Now, normally I would panic and get mad. Instead, I prayed and ask God to get the car started. He chose not to. I don't full understand why, because I think it would have been a perfect awesome dispaly of His power. God had another plan. We have Onstar and we called them and they got a tow truck out pretty quick and we call some friends who happen to be in Las Cruces. In the porcess of doing this I still didn't get upset or go ballistic because in the middle of this God brought a verse to my spirit, it was Psalm 50:10 which says, "For every aninal of the forrest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills." So God whispered to me the car isn't yours it mine so let me worry about it. I know that God could have kept the car from having problems. He could have gotten the car started. He chose a different plan. I know that He did that to show me that He could take of us and that I need to truely surrender everything even my car to Him. He also taught me when anything is His, He'll take care of it and I don't have to stress about it.  

With God Not For God

Growing up in the church I was constantly frustated because I was told I needed to do "for" God. And I didn't know how or what to do for God. Plus I figured if God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and always present why does He need me to do for Him? As I read and study Scripture I have yet to find anywhere it says that I or any other human being is to to do for God. Scripture tells me I am to do with God. I am to join God in what He is already doing. I don't have to come up with the plan or even how to work the plan. God has a purpose and God has a plan to fulfill that purpose. I don't have to come up with anything, I simply have to join with God and obey Him.
I thus don't have to seek God's will for my life, I need to just seek God. I seek God so that I can know Him and have a relationship with Him because if my relationship with God is not right than nothing else will work properly. But if my relationship with God is right then He will show Himself and His will to me. He will also show me where He is at work and how to join Him in that work.
I am to seek not what the culture tells me to seek. I am not to seek even what the church culture sometimes tells me to seek. I am to seek Jesus. And I have the promise of God that if I seek Him with my whole heart I will find Him and I will experience the fullness of His presence and power.
There are days when I feel so overwhelmed with all that is wrong in the world, in my nation, in my community and even in the lives of the people in my church, whom I love and hurt and suffer with as they hurt and suffer. In the midst of all of this my Abba, my Dad comes and reminds me the pressure is not on me to find a solution to problems, to the hurting. God has the solution to all of it and the solution is - Him and my job very simply is - to point people to Him.  

Real & Ordinary

There are some gifts that I have always wanted God to give me. I have always wanted to be able to play a musical instrument and sing. God has not seen fit in His will to give me those gifts. In fact over the years as I have looked at my life I am about as average and ordianry as you can get. I have no great abilities. I resented God for years because I saw so many other people with these awesome abilities and I had none. Then just about five or six years ago in the middle of one of my "poor me" parties, God spoke to me and it shocked me what He said. God told me to stop whining. He pointed out to me that He had given me two gifts. One was that I was ordianry. The fact that I was ordinary allowed me to connect with people and for them to identify with me. You see most of us are ordinary or at least that is the way we see ourselves. So when we encounter these people with their extraordinary abilities we are blown away by them and many times put them on a pedestal and not really see ourselves as being able to achieve what they have. Trust me! I am not somebody that anyone would ever put on a pedestal. I don't want to be on one because the only place you can go on a pedestal is down. I have come to enjoy the gift of being ordinary because when God uses me and others see what God has done and tell me that they could never to do what I did, I can honestly tell them that they can because if God can use me, He can use anybody because I am very ordianry.
The second gift God has given me is the ability to be real. In the early years of my ministry I tried being a traditional minister. I even tried to develop the ability to sound like a praecher, to have preacher voice. I couldn't, it sounded stupid and so I gave up. At the same time that God showed me my gift of being ordinary, He also showed me that He had given me the gift of being real.
Being real means you are who you are, you doing things not like others, but like who you are and you don't hid things well. Like you don't hid when you happy or sad or mad or discouraged. Being real sucks sometimes because you would really like to hid stuff and you can't and it gets you into trouble or it ticks people off. But being real is also a very cool gift from God because it allows Him to much more easily Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls of your life. Being real allows God to say things through you that really nice people would never say. Being real has to be tempted with a lot of love. If not, it then just becomes rudeness and that is not of God. So now God is teaching me, at time very painfullessons, on how to be real and ordinary with love.
Joe    

Its Not About Me (or You)

God woke me up this morning with two passages of scripture on my mind. One is John 14:6. Jesus says He is the Way and the Truth and the Life and that He is the only way to the Father. I have always taken that verse to apply to the fact that Jesus not Buddha or Mohammed is the only way to come to know the real God. But what about us as Christians, how does this apply to our lives now. It says that Jesus not what I think or perfer or feel comfortable about is the way not only to God but to please Him. I have for most of my Christian life serve God for I could get out of it. I wanted the church to grow so I would look good. I wanted people to like my sermons becasue it made me feel good. I also began to think that since I was serving God that He owned me something. Thus when I  prayed I expected God to give me what I prayed for because as a "good" Christian, He owned it to me. Which brings me to the other passage that God impressed on me this morning which is Hosea 13:6. It says "When I feed them, they were satisfied; when they became satisfied, they became pround; then they forgot me." That was me (and still is at times). I would get blessed by God and think it was becuse I deserved it and then when I didn't get what I wanted I would have a pity party and be mad at God. Pride tells me that I deserve all the good stuff from God and when I don't get it God is not loving me like I deserve. John 14:6 says however, that Jesus is everything and that I am to center my life around Him making Him what life is all asbout and trusting His love for me and His goodness and believing that all that He allows into my life is for my good. Even if I can't see it at the time. I want to serve God because He deserves it. I want Jesus to be the focus and priority of my life because He deserves that because He died for me (for us). God has been Raising the Roof of my life and letting me release my pride to Him so He can fill me with humilty and Removing the Walls of my life so I can humbly love others.     

Rasing the Roof and Removing the Walls

The time has come for the church in America to be honest, we have focused on ourselves and not on what God wants. It is time that we Raise the Roof (become open and honest with God) and Remove the Walls (be transparent to the world). This blog I pray will be used by Jesus to help us as His church to remove barriers from our lives and our churches so that God's Spirit can fill us and use us as His people for His glory. And that we will be a dispaly case for the awesomeness of God to be seen by a culture that needs Him because we are broken.

I would love to hear from people who desire for Jesus to not just be part of their lives, but to be their lives. Who desire to completely surrender thier lives to Him and who hunger and thirst to fully know Him.