The Prelude...

I am going to be starting a study here shortly, on the Charismatic movement. It is not my intention to rip to shreds the beliefs of others; only to point out what I believe and why. Recently I have had several people ask me questions what I believe concerning the Charismatic movement, and honestly I have not been able to answer some of them. Hopefully this will be a learning experience for my readers, as I know it will be for me.
~Jim

The One Step to God's Will

As I was writing my last post, 'God's Will Anyone?' I came across some interesting verses and I figured I share them with you. These verses are for those of you who want to know God's will. (I'm using the ESV translation)

1 Thess. 4:3
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;

So according to this verse God's will is our sanctification. According to the dictionary 'to sanctify' is 'to set apart to a sacred purpose or to religious use.' Well, how do we go about being sanctified?

Rom. 12:1-2
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

According to this, we are to be transformed by renewing our minds. And with our renewed minds, we will then be able to discern what the will of God is. And for the record, renewing your mind is not an easy, and, it's a never-ending process. As long as we are on the earth, our minds are going to need renewal. And without the Holy Spirit, it would be impossible.

So to summarize, be set apart (holy) by renewing your mind, and God's will is going to be clear.

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God's Will Anyone?

I know that finding God's will is a very important issue for many Christians. I know that I have spent a lot of time in prayer asking God to reveal His will for my life. And I know that I've spent a lot of time wondering why God hasn't said, "Matt, this is what I want you to do." Now I know that it would be nice if God did that, but that's not how it works.

A few months ago I was planning on getting an apartment with some friends. My parents were moving and I felt it was time to move out. I spent a lot of time in prayer, but I must confess, my prayers were more, "God, please let this work" than, "God, is this Your will." And in the end it didn't work out. And I at first I was very disappointed, but as I look back, I am so thankful that God closed that door. I can't remember if it was the same day, or the next day, but God opened another door. I was given the opportunity to be a summer missionary in Texas working with Gospel Ministries to Children. I prayed about it, and I really felt God's call to go down. I had no idea what God wanted me to do after the summer program was over, but I came down anyway. And I believe wholeheartedly that it was God's will for me to come down here.

This is a roundabout way of saying it, but my point is. God's will is not a secret. If you are submersing yourself in God's word, and pursuing Him, God's will is going to follow that. God's will isn't going to suddenly appear to someone who's sitting on his couch praying for God's will to drop out of the sky on him.

So what I have to say to you is, are you seeking God's will? If the answer to that is no, then that's a whole different issue that I'm not going to cover in this entry. But if the answer is yes, than I would ask, when is the last time that you did something in your church besides warm a pew on Sunday?

Getting back in the groove

I've been swamped with computers to fix, not that I'm complaining. I really enjoy fixing them. Within 10 days, I've done everything from Win XP (pro, home, and media addition), Win Vista (home), Mac OSX (wasn't the Macs fault. It was the printer), Linux (Gnome). Two of them were Acres, one was a unibody that I don't even remember the brand, two Dells, Apple, and two home made deals. Printers, power cords, faulty wifi, virus infestations, missing drivers, web-cams, Burners... all kinds of problems. One thing that has stuck out the most out of all of them, was.. you guessed it. Windows Vista. It almost seems like Vista thinks you don't ever know what your doing, or it always needs your permission to do something even though you just told it to do it.

I will give it one thing. It looks pretty. I wish Windows 7 would have kept the same look.

Speaking of computers, I also installed Linux Mint. Its pretty spiffy. Gotta be one of my favorites out of the box now.

Tomorrow I'll hopefully go to the Washington County Fair. Its the first day tomorrow and I need to hit the Demolition Derby. I'll probly have some good posts to come complete with pictures.

Great Gizzards

I've always wandered why Great Minds doesn't have millions of people flocking to read each new post that comes out, after all, where else are you going to read the thoughts of such great minded people? Well, I have finally found the answer. The reason is.. because though we are brilliant dudes, we randomly go months without posting anything.

SO! Its time to change that. Stay tuned for more posts, more insight, more fun, more frequently.

On Hope:

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language defines hope in three ways: hope as a transitive verb, hope as an intransitive verb, and hope as a noun. As a transitive verb, to hope for is to wish for. As an intransitive verb, to hope for is to expect. As a noun, hope is a trust or confidence, or it is a person or object. “Success is our hope” or “[He is] our teams only hope for victory.”

In Psalm 39, David writes: “(5) Behold, You have made my days as handbreadths, And my lifetime as nothing in Your sight; Surely every man at his best is a mere breath. (6) Surely every man walks about as a phantom [as an image]; Surely they make an uproar for nothing; He amasses riches and does not know who will gather them. (7) And now, Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in You.” In verse 7 David asks “for what do I wait?” What am I waiting for? There is the idea of expectation. In verses 5 and 6 David points out the brevity of life. Now he asks this question, which can accurately be read: And now, Lord, for what do I hope? “My hope is in You.”

Psalm 71 says: “(1) In You, O Lord, I have taken refuge; Let me never be ashamed. (2) In Your righteousness deliver me and rescue me; Incline Your ear to me and save me. (3) Be to me a rock of habitation to which I may continually come; You have given commandment to save me, for You are my rock and my fortress. (4) Rescue me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked, out of the grasp of the wrongdoer and ruthless man, (5) for You are my hope; You are my confidence from my youth.”

~Jim