Hi Gang,

I heard about this really cool website! It’s called echo prayer. Basically, you can give echo your prayer requests and it will email you to remind you to pray for those requests whenever you choose. This is awesome. I’m having echo remind me to pray for you at least 4 times a day.

If you spend most of your day in front of your computer and want a great way to keep in touch with God and remember to pray, this is an awesome tool.

=)
arlen

With Tax day approaching fast, I thought this would be appropriate….

This weekend’s message will focus on resolving conflict by clarifying and clearing the air.

In Matthew 18, Matthew describes a 3 step process to clarify a situation and resolve a conflict. The first step is to clarify the situation one-on-one.
The second step is to take a witness and talk through the situation.
The third step is to bring it before the church and attempt a resolution.
The final step is church discipline. “if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him like a pagan or tax collector.” Matthew 18:17 (Emphasis mine)

It’s in this final step that God revealed to me an insight about this passage.

Matthew (the writer) was a tax collector, admonishing the church to treat someone who refuses to listen to correction as one would treat a tax collector. He would know what it was like to be treated like a tax collector. We always joke that he was the IRS auditor of his day, generally thought of as someone who worked for the enemy and stole money from innocent people. Can you imagine how people would have treated him?

But the emphasis on this passage and all other passages regarding church discipline is that the discipline is instituted to bring a person to repentance and restore fellowship.

I wonder if a little bit of Matthew’s autobiography is coming through here? Once he was a
tax collector and treated with contempt by everyone. Then he met Jesus and was called to be one of his disciples. How that call of grace must have changed his life. Now he encourages a process to be used in church discipline. And if it is necessary, a break in fellowship must be made in a corrective and redemptive process. But in the back of his mind, he must be thinking about that grace that was once showed him and how grace and restoration must be the hallmark of church discipline.

Just a thought.

Jesus did and said many things to offend the religious leaders of his day. But in Matthew 17:24-27 Jesus makes a case for him being exempt from paying the Temple Tax, but his next sentence is, “But so that we may not offend them…” pay the tax.
How are we to follow Jesus in this regard? Do we offend people by what we say and do or should we avoid offending them even when we know we are right?
The answer has to deal with the content of the offense. In the passage today, Jesus doesn’t do anything on purpose to offend the religious leaders. That’s a model to follow. On the other hand, Jesus taught truths that offended them and he had no problem doing so. We can follow that too.
Sometimes the truth contained in God’s word offends people. But we are called to proclaim it boldly, not arrogantly. And sometimes what we do to help and bless people offends them too. The bottom line there is that we must obey God rather than men. We seek God’s highest glory and if that offends some people…. oops, sorry.

Hi gang, because you’re my faithful blog readers, you’re getting the info first…

One of these days we’ll do a series on the Book of Ecclesiastes with the theme of Meaning in life.

Here’s the premise:
We all seek and crave meaning in life.
Sometimes we look in the wrong places and ask the wrong questions.
Here’s an example about experience or pleasure:

I believe that’s not the point of seeing or hearing. But if we have the wrong perspective, we ask the wrong questions and then…
We get the wrong answers.

Instead, meaning must come from beyond us… it must come from God.

Just a deep thought for today.

Last night in our Bible study, we finished a study on the Book of Revelation. And if you’ve ever read the book of Revelation (and had someone explain the symbolism or read study notes) you know that the future is filled with judgement and evil and all kinds of bad stuff. And even though the world gets worse before it gets better, God is always in control. And ultimately God wins.
But here’s the awesome phrase the sums up the entire book of Revelation… Worship God!
Through the midst of judgement and tribulation, worship God because we know the end. We have a vision and picture of what life will be like when God returns his complete rule to the earth. Read Revelation 21 & 22 and get that picture in your sight.

=)

When we read the Bible, we understand that the entire Bible is God’s word. But not every part of the Bible is as applicable to us as 21st century readers. One example of this is the Old Testament Law. As we read the Bible, there are so many laws and not all of them seem applicable to modern life. It would be easy to get lost in the law so to speak.
As I read Deut. 24, two phrases were repeated over and over (not just in that chapter, but in the entire book). These phrases help me in appying the Law to my life. Here they are…
1. “You shall put away the evil from you.”
Sometimes God gave Israel laws to seperate them from other cultures because he asked them to be holy. We would do well to live a life of purity in business, relationships, sex, etc.
2. “Remember that you… and the Lord your God…”
As God blesses us, it can be easy to forget where we came from. We were once all sinners seperated from God. The good news is the Lord saved us and began to change our lives. Let’s never forget that.
If we keep the forest in mind, we won’t get lost among the trees or the law.