Anger

May 5th, 2014

I am so angry tonight. I feel like I want to get in a fight. The frustration of work and personal life has created the perfect storm for me. I am completely enraged.

Why? Good reasons… kind of… not really. Nothing that matters eternally. Why is my perspective so short?

I’ve snapped at both my kids and my wife this evening. Thankfully the only thing I’ve punched is a wall. So what is going on? I’m sinful. I haven’t gotten things going my way at all today, and I let that kill my joy and contentment. Thus I’ve sinned.

My statement for the year, which Craig encouraged us to seek the Lord for is, “My happiness does not depend on getting what I want”. Well, I’ve completely failed at keeping that in mind today.

Heavenly Father, please forgive me for my selfish outlook on life. Please teach me the truth behind my joy. Please forgive me for being so angry with the world this evening. In Jesus name, amen.

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Ridiculing for my own pleasure

April 25th, 2014

I like to think that I’m funny. And I really like it when my wife laughs at my jokes. Tonight a couple of my comments at home took a sarcastic, mocking turn for the worse. Although it was in private, and I’m confident no one else will ever hear the words I spoke, I’m still convicted that it was sinful for two reasons. First, because what I say comes from the overflow of my heart. Thus I must be holding evil in my heart at some level to ridicule the person as I did. Also because this person is a child of God. If I overheard someone making fun of one of my children, I would definitely be upset. How angry God must be at me for making fun of His child!

Heavenly Father, please forgive me. I am wicked and deceitful. Please forgive me for saying ridiculing things towards one of your children tonight. Please enable me by the power of Your Spirit to overcome the temptation to speak evil. Please clean me from the inside out. In Jesus name, amen.

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Talking about my kids

April 22nd, 2014

It’s fun to get together with other parents that have small children and talk about your kids. There’s so many adorable things to share and listen to. But I’ve fallen into a trap. More than once, I’ve gone too far and have been too loose with my tongue. Tonight I was joking, but made a reference about the lack of intelligence of one of my children. This was in front of other parents, my kids, and their kids. First of all, it was not honoring or respectful. I’ve dedicated my child to the Lord so in my mind He is the Lord’s child as well. This is a huge sin to make fun of a child of the King. Secondarily, I don’t know how much he could understand at one year old, but if I let this carry on, one day he will understand. As the proverb says, death and life are in the power of the tongue… (18:21). I want to impart life via my words to my children not death.

Heavenly Father, please forgive me for dishonoring your child and your gift. Please place a deep conviction on my heart of my sin and remind me to guard my tongue when speaking about others. In Jesus holy name, amen.

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Gluttony

April 21st, 2014

Whenever I’m home and not busy (like today), I suffer from terrible want. My taste buds and stomach rule my thoughts. My urge is to drive to Braums right now and buy a chocolate malt. Is that a sin? No, not in itself, but in the overwhelming desire that rules my thoughts and actions. I scour through all the pantry just to see what chocolate I can find to stuff in my mouth. This appetite reveals something about my heart. I’m not satisfied or content, and I’m always looking to feed my fleshly desires. My heart’s strong desire should be for my loving, living Lord.

Will I go get chocolate ice cream? I don’t know, maybe. But I definitely won’t be going anywhere until I struggle through this with God and get my heart in the right place.

Holy Spirit, please fill and consume me. Change the desires of my heart from earthly temporary pleasures to the eternal lasting pleasure to be found in You. Please forgive me for dishonoring you by settling for lesser pleasures. In Jesus name, amen.

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Impatience and a lack of love

April 19th, 2014

My children drove me crazy this morning. For the last hour we were together, I was harsh and short with them. I repeatedly raised my voice at little provocation.

Galatians 5:22 reminds me, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”

I had none of that this morning. Why? I’ve learned a lot about myself recently through the book “Strength Finders” by Tom Rath. By taking the online test associated with the book, I learned that Positivity is my greatest strength. I love that; thank you Jesus! I enjoy using my positivity to uplift and encourage. I enjoy using it to infuse situations with energy and excitement. But like every strength, it has a down-side. There is the sinful distortion of every strength into an associated weakness. What do I believe my sinful bent is?

Rath says this to people with the Positivity strength, “Avoid negative people. They will bring you down.” And here is what he suggest for those that work or live with positive people, “Cynics quickly sap this person’s energy. Don’t expect him to enjoy cheering up negative people. He will do better when asked to energize basically positive people who are simply in need of a spark.”

Rath hit the nail on the head. I had never thought about it much, but I always hated being around whiny people. Complaining is my pet peeve. I show little (if any) sympathy for people that throw pity parties.

Why did my children annoy me so much this morning? Well, they woke up extra early and were very whiny (as 1 and 3 year olds often are). It took very little before my self-preserving sin started jumping all over them. Instead of choosing to call upon the Lord for strength, I took aim to shoot down all the negativity around me. I showed no regard for my children’s best interest, but only in preserving my joy and peace.

Heavenly Father, have mercy on me. Thank you for your good gifts that I do not deserve. Please forgive me for lashing out at others. Help me die to myself and love others as you have modeled for me. Fill me with your Spirit and restore to me the joy of my salvation. In Jesus name, amen.

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No love for the lost, or cowardice?

April 18th, 2014

My conscience has been plagued the last few days by a lunch encounter I had with a stranger this week. To make a long story short, he jumped into conversation with me and my co-workers with some IT questions. The first of my sins was to be put off that he interrupted my rather fun lunch with some technical questions which I didn’t want to answer. The sin of selfishness wanted what was easy and fun for me rather than to submit myself as a servant to this stranger (parable of the Good Samaritan?). Also to laugh at his ignorance (if only in my mind) because he asked a seemingly silly question furthered my sin. Pride reared its ugly head, and I internally classified (judged?) the individual. After I played my best avoidance card and allowed one of my co-workers to answer his question, we had a reprieve from conversation. I was fairly certain this was a non-believer, and I felt moved (convicted?) to extend the conversation by inviting him to church. I opened my wallet to look for an invite card (always an easy way out), but when I didn’t find one, I settled. I made an effort to call out to the young man as he was leaving, but he didn’t hear me and I let it be. I even had another chance again as we were leaving the restaurant and saw him in the parking lot, but again I chickened out.

In short order, I had committed the sins of selfishness, pride, and rejected the Spirit’s prompting. The fruit of the Spirit were not on display in me because I know that love would have reacted exactly opposite to how I did in every way.

Lord Jesus, please forgive me. If not for your grace, I would be outside of your family. I repent of these sins, and I ask with faith that you would overcome them in my life by the power of your Holy Spirit. Amen.

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God’s Kingdom & Republican?

February 11th, 2013

By Brad Belyeu

 

I was going to start this blog post with a prayer. But that was only until I recovered from the delusion that I could write some super-spiritual awesome prayer that would miraculously make everyone reading this blog post agree with me. God has done a work in my heart and transformation in my mind about how I view many things in the past several years. So it’s out of love that I want to share this with my friends and family. I hope it doesn’t offend anyone, but if it does it’s probably only because something came across via text much more seriously than I intended it to. Feel free to contact me to clear anything up.  I want to start out by explaining that I hold fully to Reformed Christian theology and am a registered Republican. I share that information to let you know that I’m not condemning those views, but pointing out how I think they could be better.

 

Social Justice

If we want the Republican party to be a party of Christian morals, there is one aspect we are sorely deficient in and that is social justice. This is something I feel that God has impressed on my heart a lot lately. For some reason, I was able to conveniently read my Bible for years and look right over many of these passages. The “left” or Democrats are known much more for their taking care of the poor than the “right”. This is the greatest shortcoming of the Republican party in my opinion summarized by the scripture: “Love your neighbor as yourself”. If we want to be a free nation based on Christian principles, we should look at how God instituted His government in the Old Testament. Nothing can say this better than the Word of God itself.

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/lev.19.10.esv  God requiring His people to leave “handouts” for the poor

https://www.bible.com/bible/111/lev.25.8-12.esv  God mandating redistribution of wealth / forgiveness of debt

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/act.2.45.esv  New Testament example of sharing all wealth

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/deu.15.7-11.esv  Biblical mandate for lending to the poor without expecting repayment

A bunch of other verses regarding giving to the poor

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/isa.58.6-12.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/1jo.3.17-18.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/mat.25.31-46.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/pro.14.31.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/luk.11.39-42.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/mal.3.5.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/pro.19.17.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/isa.1.17.esv

https://www.bible.com/bible/59/zec.7.9-10.esv

There are many, many more verses regarding God’s heart for the poor.

 

Our President

The next issue I’d like to approach is our disrespect and dishonor for our President. I’ve been as guilty as the next person about this. Listening to and reading jokes (even if they’re funny) that ridicule and make fun of him is not Biblical nor is it the way Christians should act. As one who holds completely to God’s sovereignty and the authority of Scripture I believe that God Himself has appointed Barack Obama as our President even though I didn’t vote for him. Just take a look at Romans 13 (https://www.bible.com/bible/59/rom.13.1-7.esv) which explicitly tells us “For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” That puts it as simply as possible. God instituted our authority whoever it may be. Instead of making fun of those whom God has instituted we should respect them and pray for them which leads me to 1 Timothy (https://www.bible.com/bible/59/1ti.2.1-3.esv). We should be spending our time praying for “kings and all who are in high positions” instead of ridiculing or complaining against them. On this scriptural command, I must confess that I often forget to pray for those in high positions, but let’s encourage and remind each other to do this.

 

Taxes/Money/Giving

Next I’d like to approach the topic of taxes. I totally agree that our tax system is in dire need of reform along with our government’s spending. Not to mention how inefficiently the government spends our money! Those are valid concerns, but not spiritual in nature. They are different topic than what I intend to discuss. I’ve heard many complaints this year about paying taxes due to the rollback of tax cuts. I was self-employed for a couple years and have definitely cursed tax season before. I hear some people saying our tax system isn’t fair, but I can’t help feeling that there is something amiss in our hearts. If we who have plenty are complaining that we don’t have more, we’re missing the point. We should be focused more on being thankful for the blessings of God (WHICH WE DON’T DESERVE!) and how much we can give, rather than complaining that we don’t have more. That mindset can effect the poorest or the richest soul on the planet. It’s more about our state of mind than our state of affairs. (https://www.bible.com/bible/59/php.2.14-15.esv  https://www.bible.com/bible/59/mat.22.20-21.esv)

Further food for thought on money comes from 2 of my favorite Calvinist pastors, John Piper & David Platt.

http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/sermons/money-currency-for-christian-hedonism

http://www.radicalthebook.com/movement.html

 

Theological Arrogance

Most importantly, I’d like to discuss Reformed arrogance in regards to ridiculing other Christians beliefs. I’ve also ashamedly fallen guilty to this one. This isn’t unique to those with a reformed view, but it seems more prevalent. If another ministry, led by someone who doesn’t believe exactly like we do, is working for the Kingdom, who are we to judge? (https://www.bible.com/bible/59/rom.14.4.esv) Even if someone has had all the mysteries and knowledge of the entire Word of God revealed to them, but they don’t display love – THEY ARE NOTHING – OUCH! (https://www.bible.com/bible/59/1co.13.2.esv) The amazing thing to me is that those of us who truly hold to a reformed view have the least reason for spiritual arrogance, right? We know that we are “totally depraved” and that we can know nothing of God without His grace overcoming our sinful nature. All knowledge of Him is a gift of His grace. How can we be arrogant about something we received as a gift??? Therefore, we should strive to use our gifts to teach His body and not ridicule those who may not have the same gifts of knowledge, but have other gifts (evangelism for example).

 

Guns

I almost didn’t include this topic, but I decided to throw it in while I’m stirring the hornet’s nest. It’s very much opinion and much less based on Biblical passages like the points above. And I’d like it to be known that I am for the right to bear arms. I believe it can prevent crime and is a foundational right for our country’s citizens. I own a gun, and enjoy going to the gun range on occasion. My problem is more with how Christians are reacting to proposed gun control. As a good Calvinist, with complete faith in God’s sovereignty I trust in the Lord to keep me and my family safe. Anyone who trusts in a gun for safety in my opinion, is trusting in something much weaker and much less than the Almighty. In addition to faith and trust, there’s the matter of how I would react to someone breaking into my home and robbing me. I hope I would react more like the movie “Les Miserables” in how the priest reacted to his invader, rather than taking someone’s  life in defense of my earthly possessions. On one hand, you are promoting the Kingdom of God, on the other you are protecting your worldly possessions. That being said, I would not condemn anyone who owns a gun and would use it to defend their home from invasion. Just wanted to make sure that’s clear. I just believe we need to have more faith in God’s protection than our own strength.

 

In conclusion

I know that many of my friends and family don’t share my view points on the above topics. I’m willing to receive any constructive criticism and Biblical views you may want to post as feedback either via email or the comments on this blog. Let’s just make sure all our discussion is covered with love for one another in Christ.

 

 

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Recipe Theology

May 13th, 2009

I’m currently reading through “The Silence of Adam” by Dr. Larry Crab, Don Hudson, and Al Andrews witha  group of guys from church. The chapter for discussion this week is #3, ‘Recipe Theology’. He tells a story at the beginning of the chapter with the punchline being a man saying “I don’t know what to do.” He then proceeds to write about how men like recipes for solving problems and how we typically clump into 2 groups: experts and followers (which I think is often a good thing). He goes on to say that men are uncomfortable with situations where they don’t know what to do which I think is generally true. I feel that the author is making an over-generalization though and I wish he wouldn’t stereotype as much as he does in this book. The author then proceeds to write about this line of thinking calling it ‘Recipe Theology’, where men give each other bullet points for living and solving life’s problems. I really like what he has to say about the Bible not being a cookbook. I despise it when someone takes what works for them and press it on others as the way they need to do it. The author then proceeds to write about the ‘big picture’ and mentions that when we are just trying to solve life’s problems we aren’t viewing the big picture of life. He then approaches the topic of a ‘sphere of mystery’ and urges men to leave their comfort zones and to go there. The author calls upon the readers courage to do what he normally wouldn’t. The author concludes the chapter by calling men to a ‘transcendent theology’ by leaving their ‘sphere of management’ to enter the ‘sphere of mystery’. The chapter was hard to track with at times, but overall I liked what he had to say. My only issue being with some of the sweeping generalizations he made.

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