The completion of my 24 hr fast.....and there was much rejoicing. lol
I had not fasted in 4 years. 4 years! No wonder that was so hard.
I'm glad it's over. But I think God taught me a lot in the suffering.
For one life is so much more simple when you don't have to worry about what to eat next.
I have always hated eating, for the most part. lol I have always seen it as such a hindrance to doing what I want to do, cause I guess I'm always on the move, always doing something. I don't like being forced by my body to slow down and eat. lol and perhaps I don't like being dependent on anything, even food. hm....how odd.
As Ecclesiastes says, there is a time for everything under heaven....and I would add a time to eat and a time to not eat. Both we can learn from. Fasting teaches us self-control, the most enviable fruit of the spirit and the hardest to attain I believe.
Self-control, think about that. Do any of us really have self-control? A quote I love regarding the philosophy of teaching is, "If you don't have control you become controlling." So so wise!
And so many of us do not know how to control ourselves so we try to control others. I know I have been guilty of this on many occasions. But why on earth do we think that in trying to control others it will fix ourselves? lol This thinking is so odd, so backwards, such a lie from Satan.
Thus Jesus has the analogy of the plank in our own eye.....
Mt. 7 says, "How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye."
Can I just say how much I love biblegateway.com! Cause if it weren't for that website finding these verses and typing them out would be so much harder. lol. But as it is I just type in three words from a verse I remember and bam, there it is! Any verse you want to look up man, biblegateway.com. It's truly, truly amazing! God is good :)
We had an excellent exercise at Mariners this weekend! Another shout out, I love Mariners! Been going there for 12 years now since I was 16 and it is a phenomenal church! If any of you are church hopping, hop no longer lol! Come to Mariners in Irvine and you will have almost found the perfect church. (services are at 5 sat. and 9 and 11 sundays lol) No church is perfect but I must say, they are pretty close.
Ok back on topic lol. So Jesus is pointing out the hypocrisy of Christians. At Mariners this weekend they had a tent where you could walk through and write things on the walls in chalk, very artistic and very cool. The first wall asked the question, "How do people see the church?" The word "hypocritical" and "judgemental" were written about 10 times by various people, lol, so I wrote stupid, not fun and dorky. Which is true right? "Stupid" is actually biblical because Paul said the gospel would seem like "foolishness" to those who are perishing. But may God give them eyes to see! "Not fun" is because, well the church can take the fun out of everything sadly. There are two sides the pendulum can swing in how we handle life, licence or legalism. Since the world is very much on the licence side, "Hey man whatever makes you happy man do it," the church is very much on the legalistic side. Jesus was actually completely in the middle but only he is perfect, and we can never attain to that perfection, so we as humans tend to go to one extreme or the other. May God heal us of this!
The legalistic side is what Jesus is referring to in these verses in Mt. 7. The Pharisees of his day were very, very annoying people, to say the least. I, for one, think they were just jealous of all Jesus was doing and that's why they kept picking on him. Poor Jesus :( lol
They were threatened by his power, cause they wanted to be number one, they wanted everyone to look to them as the voice from God, and "who is this poor, unattractive person from Nazareth over stepping our game man?" lol. That's what they were thinking. Seriously. The Bible does say that Jesus was actually not attractive, interesting huh. :) And he did come from a poor family. He was a carpenter so he worked with his hands, manual labor.
So Jesus calls them out on their pride. He says basically, "You all act like you love God and you want to follow all he says, but you judge others and have no love in your heart for your fellow man!" He actually calls them a "brood of vipers" on one occasion. lol He really, really did not like them. He said of them, and this is one of my fav verses, "These people honor me with their lips, yet their hearts are far from me." Jesus looks at the heart, not outward appearances and shows and masks. He does not care what we look like on the outside at all if our heart is black.
So if any of you reading this do not like Christians, neither did Jesus! Funny huh. There are many modern day Pharisees walking around in our American churches. But DON'T let their flaws keep you from believing in the one true God! People are people. We are fickle, mean, unintelligent sometimes and usually incredibly selfish. Do not let how Christians live dictate your view of God.
Sadly I saw that a lot when I was at Biola. I went to Biola for my B.A., a private Christian college in LA. I was so saddened by the incongruities of what these people said and how they acted. Modern day Pharisees.
However we all can be hypocrites every day. Every time we think we are better then someone else. Every time we compare ourselves. Every time we judge someone, for, oh my goodness, drinking a glass of wine. Jesus turned water into wine! That was his very first miracle! So why do we freak out about alcohol? And then there is dancing. Did David not dance unashamedly and "undignified" he called it before God? He loved to dance before the Lord! So why do we shun dancing? God gave us dancing as a gift to enjoy life! To express our joy when we are happy!
What other taboos are in the church where we have the plank in our own eye? I am sure you can think of many....
The point is, before we judge anyone else we need to look at ourselves. Sometimes the most judgemental people are those filled with the most sin themselves. "We hate in others what we hate in ourselves." Therefore, when we see someone else's sin it may hold up a mirror to our true selves and the realization of that is what we despise. It is not the other person's actions, it is the darkness in our own hearts that we hate. The fact that we are capable of so much evil and capable of causing other people so much pain, this is what we actually hate, in ourselves. I know how much I hate it in myself. But God saves us and transforms our mind little by little, day by day, if we ask him to. :) So ask him.
Satan lies to us and tells us the problem is with other people, when really it is with ourselves.
Look in the mirror this week and ask God to show you who you really are, your true colors.
As David said,
"Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
24 See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting."
May we allow God to search us and know us intimately and to allow us to intimately know ourselves. For we all hide from ourselves. Sometimes other people can see things in us that we ourselves do not see. Sometimes we are so incredibly blind to our own pride until someone else points it out to us.
I know I did not see my pride as much until my late husband pointed it out to me, lol, on several occasions. :) Thus, "As iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another." We are to correct and rebuke each other when we see sin in each other. It is for our own good. It would not be loving to allow someone to remain in their sin, because sin is like a cancer.
If someone you loved had a disease and you might be able to help cure them wouldn't you tell them? Sin is a disease and we can help cure each other. "Confess your sins to one another and pray for each other."
Like a tree being pruned, God prunes us. And it hurts sometimes, definitely. But it WILL result in a beautiful soul full of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness and self-control. Let him prune you.
Pray that God will mold you this week into what he knows you can be, your full potential! It is a dangerous prayer, but it is worth it. :)
Lyrics to a fav song....
"Take me, mold me, use me Lord fill me. I give my life to the potter's hands.
Call me, guide me, lead me, walk beside me. I give my life to the potter's hands."
Become like soft clay in his hands so that he can mold you :) Amen!
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