Category: Jesus

I’m Coming To The Party You’re Throwing For Me!

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Psalm 40:1-I waited and waited and waited for God. At last he looked; finally he listened. 2 He lifted me out of the ditch, pulled me from deep mud. He stood me up on a solid rock to make sure I wouldn’t slip. 3 He taught me how to sing the latest God-song, a praise-song to our God. More and more people are seeing this: they enter the mystery, abandoning themselves to God. 4 Blessed are you who give yourselves over to God, turn your backs on the world’s “sure thing,” ignore what the world worships; 5 The world’s a huge stockpile of God-wonders and God-thoughts. Nothing and no one comes close to you! I start talking about you, telling what I know, and quickly run out of words. Neither numbers nor words account for you.
6 Doing something for you, bringing something to you – that’s not what you’re after. Being religious, acting pious – that’s not what you’re asking for. You’ve opened my ears so I can listen. 7 So I answered, “I’m coming. I read in your letter what you wrote about me, 8 And I’m coming to the party you’re throwing for me.” That’s when God’s Word entered my life, became part of my very being. 9 I’ve preached you to the whole congregation, I’ve kept back nothing, God – you know that. 10 I didn’t keep the news of your ways a secret, didn’t keep it to myself. I told it all, how dependable you are, how thorough. I didn’t hold back pieces of love and truth For myself alone. I told it all, let the congregation know the whole story.
11 Now God, don’t hold out on me, don’t hold back your passion. Your love and truth are all that keeps me together. 12 When troubles ganged up on me, a mob of sins past counting, I was so swamped by guilt I couldn’t see my way clear. More guilt in my heart than hair on my head, so heavy the guilt that my heart gave out. 13 Soften up, God, and intervene; hurry and get me some help, 14 So those who are trying to kidnap my soul will be embarrassed and lose face, So anyone who gets a kick out of making me miserable will be heckled and disgraced, 15 So those who pray for my ruin will be booed and jeered without mercy. 16 But all who are hunting for you – oh, let them sing and be happy. Let those who know what you’re all about tell the world you’re great and not quitting. 17 And me? I’m a mess. I’m nothing and have nothing: make something of me. You can do it; you’ve got what it takes – but God, don’t put it off. “The Message”

Street Children

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kidsweb

During the rebuilding of our church’s building after the fire, we are leasing a store front. Each day there are three boys who play in the parking lot, in the dumpsters, running down the sidewalks, annoying the other offices in our shopping center. They run into our office each time they pass by, “We came for candy and Coke”, they say. Each day that they come by, we give them candy but we don’t drink Coke often so all we have is water which is disappointing to them and they decline.

They generally wreak havoc in the office and then go on to the next office. Today though was different. I was working in what is now the sanctuary. They had found a shopping cart and they were taking turns getting in the cart and running as fast as they could go, before letting the cart go as it ran into cars, windows etc… They got in trouble so they had to let that activity go and they were running around looking for something to get into.

I leave the sanctuary to get a stapler from the office and as I was walking out of the office, I hear the drums and they boys screaming in the sanctuary. I lock up the office and run next door. The scene went like this:

“RUN SHE’S COMING!”
“HANG ON! DON’T RUN! SIT DOWN RIGHT NOW!” This is my best mom voice!
All three of the boys stop dead in their tracks and sit down.
“Now, I’m calling the police because you guys are trespassing.”
“NO! PLEASE DON’T!”
Three boys begin to look really scared.
“Too bad! You guys need to learn a lesson. You can’t just run into places and do whatever you want! There are a lot of expensive things in here and you can’t just go banging on stuff without permission. You have to learn to respect stuff and you have to learn manners.”
“NO! PLEASE DON’T! LET US WORK IT OFF! WE’RE SORRY! WE WON’T DO IT AGAIN.”
A couple of the boys begin to get teary.
“So, here’s the deal I’m willing to make. You have to promise never to do this again. You all can come and play drums and stuff but you have to ask first and you have to be supervised. If you do this again, I really will call the police. Got it?”
“Yes! Thanks! So we can play the drums if we ask permission first?”
“Yes. You can play with permission and with supervision.”
“Okay, and we’ll walk Lulu if you want.”
“No, that’s fine. I want you guys to have stuff to do but we have to have some ground rules. So let me show you how to play the instruments and what you can mess with and what you can’t touch.”
“Do you think we can be in the band?”
“When you’re in 7th grade you can.”
“They’ll let us? Are you really sure?”
“Yes, they’ll let you be in the youth band. I’m really sure. Just use your manners in the house of God.”
“Okay.”

In about 15 minutes they were trying to coordinate a song and trying to drum to a beat. The song? We Will Rock You by Queen.

I know the story of two of these boys. Their moms are stay at home moms and on drugs. The third boy lives with his grandparents but I’m unsure about where his parents are. They basically fend for themselves and no one ever comes to check on them. Ever. They eat whatever we have around the offices. They are generally unclean and unkempt and they have gutter mouths, but you know what? They are little boys. These aren’t big kids. The oldest one is a third grader. Hopefully today we struck a deal. I needed to get their attention and I needed to give them a place to go. You know something? After we made rules, they were sweet. Boys nevertheless, meaning they ran around, they yelled and they played. I wish their parents could see that with some boundaries, care, love and concern they’d have some really great future men to lead our country.

He Is Rich And Powerful

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This is the fifth installment in a series, the fourth is here.

Silvio Berlusconi Image by © George Steinmetz/Corbis www.flickr.com
Silvio Berlusconi Image by © George Steinmetz/Corbis http://www.flickr.com

The Lord owns everything and is the Almighty, He is rich and powerful. When it comes to choosing a man for your life is that a prerequisite? The world says that in the monetary sense it is, but I believe rich and powerful is not necessarily about money. I believe it’s important that a man have a passion for his work. He has a powerful sense of who he is and how to command those things that aren’t as if they were. Let me explain.

God is rich in mercy. More than money you are going to need this in a man. The man who never offers clemency, kindness or forgiveness is not for you. Imagine doing or saying something stupid and the punitive punishment of deciding he isn’t going to talk to you for several days. A man who is always out to punish is not a man in which I want to dedicate my life. Instead a man whose heart is like God’s sees the mistake and realizes it was a mistake. It’s not a weakness not to punish, in fact, punishment is easier, mercy is hard because it allows you your will and doesn’t demand it’s own.

God is rich in compassion. He hurts when you hurt. He has an innate sense of your pain and desires to help you. A man without compassion is one in which his life is too busy to see a person in pain. He is too self-absorbed to help you with your problems. I don’t really see living a life with a man who can see the pain of others and has a failure to respond. It shows me that in times of trial he won’t be much help to me.

God is rich in love. I know I don’t have to explain this one. The man who fails to see the beauty of the life within you, isn’t for you. The man who is not content will always strive for something more and that includes love.

I think you are getting the picture of a rich God. He is both rich in resources and rich in the giving of himself to help you. While in our humanity we can’t be perfect, these are basics for living a fulfilled life. Look at these things carefully because a pocketbook will not sustain you emotionally and eventually you’ll need more than the superficial.

God is powerful. He is able to do whatever he desires to do. I want you to notice something though. This power has never been abused. Powerful yes, abusive never. Power is not brute force. Power is being able and capable of doing anything he sets his mind to do.

When I was a little girl I thought my daddy was the most powerful man in the universe. What made him so to me? Back then it was his size and my little hand in his felt protected. I noticed that he was charming and could captivate a crowd. Plus, when he came home the whole house was happy. Yes! Daddy’s home. Daddy had the power to turn negative to positive. Now I see the other parts of what made me feel he was powerful. He could come home and cook dinner when my mom had to work late. He could sit on the floor and play dolls, he could learn to fly a plane and put a band-aid on. He never taught me that there were male jobs and females jobs. There were only jobs that needed capable people. Power is the ability to get things done no matter what they are and regardless of your position. No job should be beneath anyone. It’s also the ability to realize when you are not the one for the job! God is rich and powerful. Take your time to find someone like him.

Taking Back Our City

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Psalm 17:4 I’m not trying to get my way in the world’s way. I’m trying to get your way, your Word’s way. 5 I’m staying on your trail; I’m putting one foot In front of the other. I’m not giving up. 6 I call to you, God, because I’m sure of an answer. So – answer! bend your ear! listen sharp! 7 Paint grace-graffiti on the fences; take in your frightened children who Are running from the neighborhood bullies straight to you. “The Message”

Each month a small group from Oasis goes out to combat the graffiti in the city. Each month we are given pages of addresses of buildings that have been tagged. Most are gang symbols and names and they make our city look terrible. This month our task was a wall that ran two blocks. As you can see, this isn’t artwork, but merely gang symbols that are crossed out and replaced with more gang symbols. There was a lot to paint and this was only one place on a list of many.

Adrian Jurado one of our church elders owns AJ Painting, a local company, so he came out to help us.
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We have a lot of fun out there and this time was no exception. A lot of heavy topics of conversation are on our minds as we paint. This month it was the San Francisco 49ers line up (a godly team, I might add) vs the Oakland Raiders line up (there’s a little sin in each of our lives).
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Pretty soon a good deal of one of the walls is painted. We paint God’s grace-graffiti on the wall as we clean up our city and make it a place we can be proud of again.
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Thanks to our volunteers and thanks to our city who allows the privilege of service!
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Who Told You That

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miss mariana lee www.flckr.com
miss mariana lee http://www.flckr.com

On the eve of Pastor Doug’s 40th birthday he sat quietly bummed. I thought it was about age but instead he said, “I had a pastor tell me once that if you didn’t have a big church by the time you were 40, you failed and weren’t gonna have one.” I was wondering where this came from because this had never been his line of thinking. He had never felt it was about numbers. I sat beside him and in a brilliant moment of clarity and wisdom, I answered, “Who told you that, because I know that we, you and I, only receive the word of the Lord and God did not say that. What you have received was not God speaking.”

Be careful to receive only the word of the Lord. God tells you that you can. God tells you that you will. God tells you that all things are possible. So whose words do you receive? Who told you that you’d never buy a house? Who told you that your marriage would never be restored? Who told you that you couldn’t get that promotion? Because I am blogging here today to tell you that God never said that.

Remember the cartoon of the angel and the devil sitting on your shoulder and one would tell you to do good things and the other would tell you not to worry about it? Well, it may have been a cartoon but it’s real. There is a God who wants you to succeed in life and there is an enemy of your soul who tries to keep you from trying. The battle is held in your mind as to which one you are going to believe.

Then there are words spoken by people are often ingested and believed both positive and negative. Those words shape our lives when we decide that they are true about us. Those thoughts then become actions and actions shape our lives as they lead us down paths that are either right or wrong for us. What needs to happen is you have to have a sense of who you are and what your purpose is and a plan on how you will fulfill that purpose.

So the task before you is to determine which words are just idle words, in other words, words that don’t define you at all and are just merely a belief of the person speaking and which ones are words to live by. Notice that I didn’t write only accept the positive statements about you, there are some negative things that have been said that are true as well. You have to know the truth about yourself for in that truth will lie freedom. Many of the things that you are doing today and the way that you feel about yourself is not even close to being true about you! So ask yourself, who told you that? Why did you believe it? Now that you know it might not be true how you can you overcome it? What can you change today to undo the damage it caused?

Dogs Eat Vomit

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Proverbs 26:11As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.

As often is the case people like to complain about their situation but few are willing to find solution. It seems as though we’d rather return to our vomit than eat the food the King has set before us. So why do we do it? In some sort of bizarre way we find it easier than the work the solution will take.

Vomit although gross is familiar. We all know that person who refuses to try new food. They eat a steady diet of comfort, things that are safe. Doing things the same way feels like the safe way. Whatever you say about the human condition we are a creature of habit who doesn’t like change. Change is hard for us.

Complaining about our situation though is not hard for us. We are great complainers but why don’t we change? Change takes courage. Change takes coming up with a different plan and a step out into the unknown. Change is not safe.

I remember once, years ago, each week during our prayer time a man kept asking for prayer for a new job. The new job was just not coming his way and I kept asking God, why a new job wasn’t coming? I mean, we are all praying what is the deal? The following week, when it came time to pray for the specific needs of everyone, there he once again asked for prayer for a new job. I asked how many resumes and applications he’d sent out that week and where he was applying. He responded “none”. I said, then I don’t feel like praying for a new job because it’s not going to fall out of the sky. Yes, everyone gasped and thought the response was harsh but you know what? Why waste time? I mean here was a man who returned to his own vomit week after week expecting for it to taste differently and being bummed out that it was the same ‘ol meal.

Want a different result in your life? Then quit going back to the vomit and head instead in a new direction.

Smart-Mouth College

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In honor of the first day of school, here’s a little wisdom!

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Psalm 1:1 How well God must like you – you don’t hang out at Sin Saloon, you don’t slink along Dead-End Road, you don’t go to Smart-Mouth College. 2 Instead you thrill to God’s Word, you chew on Scripture day and night. 3 You’re a tree replanted in Eden, bearing fresh fruit every month, Never dropping a leaf, always in blossom.
4 You’re not at all like the wicked, who are mere windblown dust – 5 Without defense in court, unfit company for innocent people. 6 God charts the road you take. The road they take is Skid Row. -“The Message”

Prophesy and Pastors

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christian.plochack i's photostream

This was a note from Sergio:

Dear Pastor Susan, at some point in my life i was thinking about all the preachers who have shown that the Holy Spirit was in them, they prophesied, said things directly from God ect. So far so good. The Bible warns us about false people and I am aware of that. You know that there are different types of pastors out there who sometimes contradict each other and have different beliefs. So all the sudden I WONDER “Maybe it was a demon who made them do all those things (Say prophesies ect.)” I had a huge rush inside of me, thinking about what I did, I asked God for forgiveness and refused to beleive such thought, I did not declare it nor do i beleive it. And this all brings back the story of the Pharisees. My question is have i blasphemed the Holy Spirit?

Hi Sergio,

Questioning is not blaspheming. The bible says we are test every spirit to see if it is of God. This is how you know:

John 4:1 My dear friends, don’t believe everything you hear. Carefully weigh and examine what people tell you. Not everyone who talks about God comes from God. There are a lot of lying preachers loose in the world. 2 Here’s how you test for the genuine Spirit of God. Everyone who confesses openly his faith in Jesus Christ – the Son of God, who came as an actual flesh-and-blood person – comes from God and belongs to God. 3 And everyone who refuses to confess faith in Jesus has nothing in common with God. This is the spirit of antichrist that you heard was coming. Well, here it is, sooner than we thought!
4 My dear children, you come from God and belong to God. You have already won a big victory over those false teachers, for the Spirit in you is far stronger than anything in the world. 5 These people belong to the Christ-denying world. They talk the world’s language and the world eats it up. 6 But we come from God and belong to God. Anyone who knows God understands us and listens. The person who has nothing to do with God will, of course, not listen to us. This is another test for telling the Spirit of Truth from the spirit of deception.

You can tell a prophet of God by his prophesies coming to pass and not after the fact either. I have met so many people who knew something was going to happen after it happened.

Questioning or doubting the things of God happen to us all. It’s in what we do with that doubt or question that our hearts are revealed. When we are shown the truth and it answers the question we stop doubting and believe. Read here about information on blaspheming the Holy Spirit.

He Is A Provider And Protector

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This is the fourth installment on a series that began here.

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OOOOO this post gets me excited because this is where we as women miss the mark completely on the men we choose to share our lives. “I can fix him”, is the common thing I hear. But sister let me tell you that if your man isn’t working now he isn’t going to work later. As I always say, “If he’s broke, don’t fix him.” And yeah I do mean financially too, if he is working and not rich fine, but if he is living off of mommy and daddy or whoever his girlfriend is at the moment, he’s not marriage material. Period. Let’s read what the bible says about this:

Genesis 2:7 the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being

If you want a provider and protector you first have to find a man who has a relationship with his Father in heaven. How do you get closer in relationship then to have the breath of God bring you to life? This is critical ladies and I hope you are paying attention!

8 Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9 And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground–trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Notice Adam was not living in his daddy’s house. You want a man who has lived on his own while still maintaining a relationship with his family. A man has to stand on his own two feet first and know how to feed himself.

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

Before a woman can even consider a man for marriage material she has to ask him a critical question. “Are you working?” If not, do not pass go and do not collect $200. Make a decision. Either you will wait until he is working to have feelings for him or you won’t. That is up to you but I would not under any circumstances date a man who isn’t working. He isn’t ready for a relationship. Between jobs? Then he’s between getting me and not. Before you go thinking this is about money, it’s about a man who knows how to provide for himself and isn’t looking for a mommy to breastfeed him.

16 And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”

God gave the man some rules to live by. Is your man submitted to rules to live by? Character and morals are shaped on this premise. What are his rules and what does he live by? This is critical so don’t miss it. You’ll find men who are wild and out of control and we like those bad boys but we don’t marry them. I seriously hope you are reading this today because I am giving you some good advice. Does he have babies here, there and everywhere? I know he said the condom broke or the woman tricked him but it speaks to his character.
The rules of conduct of a man aren’t very important to him and if he isn’t supporting and seeing those babies then he isn’t submitted and he won’t be different for you.

Does he drink a little too much, gamble a little too much? Then expect that in your life. Is he a good man, but doesn’t believe in God? This won’t pose a problem to you if you are a follower of Christ until you have children. Once you have children, it will become extremely important to you so again, choose with the end in mind.

18 The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” 19 Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.

Notice, God didn’t say, “Now Adam, I think the time has come for you to get married.” NO! He waited for Adam to see his need for a mate. Don’t go around thinking that because your man is 28 that he wants to get married. It’s different for everyone. Don’t push for marriage just because you’ve dated for two years. Don’t give ultimatums. When your man is ready to get married and he has his life in order with the things we’ve blogged about here then he will tell you. This is the mistake I see time and time again. Pressure may make him do the thing you want but pressure will not make him stay. And quit wondering why he won’t marry you if you are sleeping together. Remember that old saying, ‘Why the buy the cow if you can get the milk for free?’ It totally applies here.

22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. 23The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” 24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

You want to avoid the mama’s boy? When he sees for himself what is required of him is when you’ll get that. Don’t shortchange what God has put in place.

EVER.

FOR ANYONE.

Your Lord, is your provider and your protector. There is nothing he wouldn’t do for you. There is no place he wouldn’t go for you. He laid down his life at your feet, for the chance and opportunity to have your love. His life is ordered just as he set up Adam’s life, for God used his own pattern. To do anything else is to live a life of uncertainty. God made our number one need as women to be loved and feel secure. The bible never once tells a woman to love her man. She does that automatically. He tells the man to love his wife and take care of her. Why? Because God does. He loves you and takes care of you. No one had to tell him to. No one had to push him to. He did it because he wanted to.

You will know when a man is ready for marriage because he will move towards it. Until then, make wise decisions with your life. Either you are willing to wait for his decision or you aren’t and you move on. Do not give yourself away to a man who is not ready. And certainly do not give your heart to a boy who doesn’t know what he wants and hasn’t earned his position in your life, no matter his age. You only have one heart so give it to someone who will nourish and protect it.

Dorcas

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The women of TLC studied a woman from the bible named Dorcas. Yes, that’s really a name and if you blink, you miss her story. But her story is powerful and just so you know, despite how her name sounds in today’s culture, it was a name of beauty in the biblical days. Her story is all of six verses but they are powerful.

Acts 9:36 In Joppa there was a disciple named Tabitha (which, when translated, is Dorcas), who was always doing good and helping the poor. 37 About that time she became sick and died, and her body was washed and placed in an upstairs room. 38 Lydda was near Joppa; so when the disciples heard that Peter was in Lydda, they sent two men to him and urged him, “Please come at once!” 39 Peter went with them, and when he arrived he was taken upstairs to the room. All the widows stood around him, crying and showing him the robes and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was still with them. 40 Peter sent them all out of the room; then he got down on his knees and prayed. Turning toward the dead woman, he said, “Tabitha, get up.” She opened her eyes, and seeing Peter she sat up. 41 He took her by the hand and helped her to her feet. Then he called the believers and the widows and presented her to them alive. 42 This became known all over Joppa, and many people believed in the Lord.

So here was Dorcas, a woman who worked in the church. Dorcas was one of the first converts as a follower of Christ. I won’t call her a Christian because in that day of the bible it was considered a put down word that the heathens gave the people who believed that Christ was who he said he was. Instead the bible calls her a disciple of Christ. She has a lot to teach us.

The very first sentence was she was always doing good and helping the poor. Always means always. This wasn’t an exaggeration. We need to know when to say NO. We need to know when we need to rest and just hang out and go put our feet in the sand of a beach. There will always be things that people need but we also need to take care of ourselves. It says she became sick. What was she doing working when she was sick? I’m not talking working through a cold or working through being tired or working through a mild headache. This woman was obviously very sick because the next thing we see is she drops dead at work. Can you imagine that? So sick that she drops dead! She needed to be home in bed or in the hospital. She needed to take care of herself.

The people in her local church sent for the apostle Peter and he prayed and God raised her up from the dead. I wonder what she thought? What a powerful way to get a second chance. We are studying about assessing the situations in our lives. What do we need to do versus what can wait? How can we pace ourselves and still accomplish our goals? How can we take care of our bodies while still taking care of others? What is too much to do and what needs to be delegated to others? As one of the TLC women appropriately said, “We are little Dorkitas.” It was hysterically funny to me but so true. Can you relate to her story? Do you see where you need to change some things in your life, places to pick it up and places to lay it down? Read her story again. It’s a small story, powerful message. What is it speaking to you about?