Last night I got together with a few brothers for a meal and a time to think about our spiritual lives. It was a valuable, rich evening which I truly appreciated; and it wasn't all thinking-stuff, we had a practical time of practicing prophecy and anointing our host's flat, but an interesting issue did come out of it that I'll relate in a moment. On the way to work this morning a brother was talking about how shocking it would be if we all spoke out what we were thinking all the time! We concluded that we'd soon learn to control our thoughts, which begs the question - why don't we? The brother commented that the problem was that thoughts exist in our private world where no one else can see them (except the Spirit of God), in other words they exist in the darkness. We don't have to control our thoughts because no one else can see them. It reminded me of the scripture:
The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
Matthew 6:22
In other words what you focus on effects your how good or bad your conscience is. We can be full of darkness (and how great that darkness) because while on the outside we pretend to be good, inside we are truly rotten and wicked, not really focussing on Jesus or giving ourselves to him.
When I had been with the brothers I'd spoken about Jesus' story of the slave who did nothing with the talent given to him by his master (Matthew 25). The slave was an intimate member of his master's company, if he were a modern Christian he would have gone evangelising when his brothers evangelised, he would have prayed for people to be healed if that was the activity of the day, he might be moved to cast out demons, but when asked to do the specific work of personally investing his energy for the profit of his master he failed because he practiced disobedience in his heart. The slave was punished.
How about us?
Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'
Matthew 7:21
It is vitally important that we give ourselves to knowing Jesus with all that we are or he will say that he never knew us. We simply cannot allow the darkness to rule within. Interestingly all that Jesus says before his words on focussing on the darkness is about what we do in secret, and how it must all be given to God. It's too easy for the hypocrite in each of us to do whatever everyone else is doing and think that we are doing good. It's all about what we do when no one else is looking. We've got to get our religion right.True faith produces a life full of actions, not a head full of facts.
Anon
Photos by carf and bitmapr of flickr.com
this has often been something that I fear that on the day I meet God he will turn his face from me
ReplyDeleteI so wish that I had the courage to speak out what was held in the privacy of my own though pattern
because often a thuoght in darkness leads to an action in secrecy adn leading to hidden sin and then a blockage and a wall from God
I so wish we could move beyond being stiff up lipped british people that we are
we need to grasp the counter Kingdom freedom culture
yhanks agin bro as thought provoking and convicting as ever
blessing
if you are going to use my images from flickr, the right thing to do is to have the image link back to the flickr page that contains the image. what you're doing here not kosher... especially the copying of the image into your own account... with not even any publically visible attribution (except if you look at the page source).
ReplyDeleteplease, do the right thing. and if you cannot, please do not use my images.
thanks.
bitmapr, I can see that it is your picture ok simply by placing my mouse over the picture.I've also visited your flickr site and think your black and white piccies are brill.
ReplyDelete; ) The TJ
bitmapr, gulp, you're right. I do try to acknowledge all photos through the alt tag but the site doesn't lend itself to captioning photos. I'm going away for a few days but when I get back I'll look into seeing how I can link through to you, and other photographers.
ReplyDeleteThanks for putting your stuff on the commons lisense.
Thanks for often championing the light. We do have to keep pushing and pulling one another out into it; better to judge ourselves here than to be judged by Him there. 'Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner'.
ReplyDeletetschaka,
ReplyDeletethe flickr TOS *requires* you to link back to the original image on flickr:
to quote:
Remember! Flickr Terms of Service specify that if you post a Flickr photo on an external website, the photo must link back to its photo page.
cheers.
[A seperate point to what bitmapr is requiring, but if you want images to display a caption correctly in Mozilla, use the title option (within the a tag rather than the img tag) instead of the alt option.]
ReplyDeleteScary when you think of getting to grips with the hidden things. I guess, like you say, that's where it really counts. Takes bravery to keep such things truly in the light, but it's gotta be done. Nice one.