I blogged this on the War Room blog aswell (blogroll to the right), and although they are similar, they have their differences, I recommend reading both.

Psalm 139 - How wonderfully complex he has made us!

Suddenly my mind is taken off myself. Psalm 139 is often reflected upon for personal edification, for personal knowledge of how the Lord has created you. I have long struggled with self-image, seeing myself as beautiful or accepting the Lord has made me 'good', and for years I have been directed to this Psalm for truth - yet never finding satisfaction or assurance from it, until now. Becuase it's not about ME! (yet I get that it is all at the same time). But, if we are saying that the Church is the Body of Christ, then wow - how fearfully and wonderfully you have made us - He knit us and formed us.

Or in Paul's first letter to Corinth, he says that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and that we are to glorify Christ with our bodies. Along with the above I have also struggled with putting toxins in my body, in the Lord's temple. And again directed to this verse for conviction and knowledge, but never got it fully. Sure I would live it out in faith, but it just makes so much more sense now. OUR body is a temple to the Lord. OUR bodies together is the Body of Christ, and the Body of Christ is where the Holy Spirit dwells. By poisening MY body I was poisening YOUR body, because MY body is part of the greater body, which is the Body of Christ.

In Matthew, Jesus boldly teaches that if your hand causes you to sin cut it off, or if you eye is the root of sin gauge it out. Again, I'm floored by the idea that it is no longer a personal thing, but for the WHOLE body. If there is a part of our body that is unclean or unholy we need to cut it off. Purge the Lord's temple of all that defiles.

And that's why it is so important to find your role, to know what part of the body you are. If you are not doing what you were created to do you will get weak and tired (as a whole). Figurativly, if you are the feet but are workign with your hands then you will get become weak and fall. We were not created to walk on our hands, try this for a day, not even, try this for a minute and you will soon fall, you will soon discover that walking on your hands will ruin you. Or if your 'role' is blinking, but you are operating the breathing, then it effects the eyes, which will dry out and vision becomes blurry (which will affect the legs in where to go...) Litrally, if you are created to work in helps, to be the aid of the eye, but instead of offering helps you are serving (with your hands) then the prophets vision is hindered (then the apostles direction is blurry, then the shepards could be leading the wrong flock, or the teachers teaching the wrong message....)

Im an evangelist, aparently, and for years I have not seen this and have been discouraged becuase the fruit of this is rotten. Sure I have seen numbers of people confess the name of our Lord but today only a handful of these converts continue to confess the name of Jesus. When using this to deny this 'gifting' it was shown to me that this is when the body part responsible for dischiplship, teaching and pastoring is to do what it was created to do and that I need to do what I was created for.

This is why identity, and knowing who you are in Christ becomes ever so important. If you dont know who you are, or what you are supposed to do, how then do you do it. I stopped preaching salvation and using testimony becuase since the fruit has gotten rotten I figured it wasnt my role to play, and have been wrestling for a long time trying to find out my 'identity'. And without identity you are nothing. If you dont have a passport or I.D Card you cannot prove your existence.

Know who Christ is and know who you are IN him. (In him, in his body - wow).

It's not easy though eh? It's not as simple as saying ok you are the hand, you are the heart, you are the knee...or you are the servent, you are the compassionate or you are the intersessor....you've got to figure out the nervous system, and the immune system and the pinky toe-nail.

How do you do it then???? By consulting the rest of the body!

Oh man, how wonderfully complex this all is.

We are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.
Taste (salt) and see (light) that the Lord is good.
Mouth and eyes.
I wonder if our evangelism should come from the mouth and eyes. What I mean is that sure a large part of what we clasify as evangelism is what we say (mouth-taste-salt), but I think a larger part comes from what others see. (Eyes-see-light).
I heard a great preacher the other night talk about the image of Christ and in the end encouraged us to pray that we would see Christ in others and that others would see Christ in us. And furthered his action points with approaching people and telling them where they see Christ. So, I suggest the same to you, email, call, text, visit someone and tell them where you see Christ in them.

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The knowledge of Salvation is the forgivness of sins. (Luke 1:77)

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In studying salvation...I came across Isaiah 1, and found it interesting (and assuring) that salvation is active. A lot of verses talk about us being washed and clensed by the Lord (and Im not knocking those in anyways, as we cannot DO anything to be saved, salvation can ONLY come from the LORD and by His grace and not by what we do) but in Isaiah it tells us to wash ourselves, to cease to do evil, to do good, to seek justice, to correct oppression, to bring justice to the fatherless and to please the widows case. Though your sins are like scarlet they shall be as white as snow, though they are red like crimson they shall become like wool. If you are willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the land. (Isaiah 1:16-19)

Later in Isaiah salvation is described as a hiding place and shelter.

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In the end I still have no idea what Im talking about, but I know I want to.
I'll be processing my reflections as I continue to reflect.

He is Risen. Hallelujah.

Risen...He rose from the dead, He is victorious. Death cannot even hold Him back. He is the WAY the TRUTH and the LIFE.

Life conquers death.

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I wonder if we ever under spiritualise things to avoid over spiritualising instead. I know I do. What happens when we under spiritualise things? We put the Lord on a back burner, we take glory and we take the credit, we think God isnt as big as He is, God now becomes incapable and our faith isnt given room to grow.

What happens when we over spiritulise things? I dont know. Is it such a bad thing afterall?

I am such a logical thinker and I look at reality all too deeply. But come on, Christ rose from the dead, that's not very logical according to human standards, nor does it fall into the catagory of reality - but it is still very real and it is still extremely cool.

If we are going to take on one extreme over another, I think it's safer to over spiritulise things.

Maybe I am using the wrong adjectives to express what I mean. But I think there is more danger in not recognising when the Lord moves as opposed to recognising it too much.

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Is it wrong to be a people pleaser, or to want to make people happy. I don't think it is. I mean sure there is that time Paul talks about not pleasing people as it doesn't matter, but to please God is our main objective, and I agree full on with that. But I would suggest the Lord is pleased...greatly pleased when we do something for someone else. I am often told I am a people pleaser, and I'm okay with that. If I do something like lend my car here or pick up something there or take on an extra shift at work or whatever and by doing that someone else is happy then I will continue doing it, for I think when other people are happy the Lord is happy and that is why I am here - to please the Lord.

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So we just had RAW here in Vancouver, a great time. A bunch of teens all over BC spent their March break loving the Lord and serving the poor. One night we did this Tabernacle thing, set up some stations one with incense another reflecting on Christ and another of the holy of holies. The entire time we had this Matt Redman song on repeat "Are the Prayers of the saints like sweet smelling incense"...and me in my pride and in my selfishness began to think, no they are not. More people could be praying, there could be some more intersession, louder praise, etc. I was sad thinking that we weren't praying enough or weren't praying well and I didn't even ask the Lord...and then I asked him...are our prayers like sweet smelling incense expecting Him to say no and being discouraged...but I was humbled yet again by His response. He said yes, these prayers are like sweet smelling incense and an aroma that is very pleasing. The Lord loves it when His people pray and it is always a pleasing aroma when we pray.

While at RAW we were worshipping and the worship leader asked us if we wanted more, "Who wants more, more of the Lord" he asked. Now Im not denying that statement by any means, and I agree with it fully, that we should always be wanting, needing, desperatly searching for more of the Lord. But when he asked us that I heard the Lord say, I want more of you. The Lord wants more of us. It's a two way stream...we want more of the Lord and He wants more of us. He really wants more of us. All of us.

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Two people I love dearly and are very close to me have both resently been diagnosed with medical conditions both of which are controlled by diet and what you intake. I wonder what the Lord is doing? I'm not one to over-spiritualise things but I just wonder. A few years ago a bunch of people I knew where having heart issues. One had a heart attack, another was born with a heart murmur, someone else had a bypass and a forth was having unknown complications with her heart...through this the Lord was speaking to our hearts. How our hearts need to be right and clean...etc. And then recently I kept hearing about people and strokes which are complications in the brain and wondered if the Lord is teaching us to worship him with all our minds. And now is the Lord saying we need to rely on Him and His word to fill us. To watch our intake and make sure we don't consume anything that will harm us. In one sense why not...I mean the Lords truth and instruction is to work on having a clean heart, to lean all our understanding on Him, to worship Him with our whole mind and to flee from that which will harm and to intake all that is good. Either way it is still truth and still something we should do...but does recent events have any deeper meaning?

silence.

you know that 400 years of silence before Jesus was born...i think im going to adapt that life style for a bit