“You might be religious if…”~Jim Taylor

You may be religious if:

- you go to church because if you don’t you feel God will be disappointed in you
- you go to church because if you don’t you will feel guilty
- you try to do things to make God happy with you
- you think God only speaks through a book
- you are afraid to take communion because of some hidden sin and you are worried God might kill you if you do
- you think you get some kind of points with God when you do good things
- you believe those in “the ministry” are somehow more holy than anyone else
- you think you have to say certain words just a certain way to get God to hear you
- you believe God hears you when you curse but you are not sure He hears you when you pray
- you believe some buildings are holy
- you believe God causes tornados and hurricanes to destroy places because they are wicked
- you think God only speaks in King James english
- you think the only holy worship songs were written in the 1700′s
- you give God 10% but don’t mind giving your waitress 17% .. if she does a good job
- you are not sure the building is really a church if it does not have a steeple
- you are pretty sure that only your group has the whole truth

“The prayers of a righteous man are powerful and effective.”~High Priest

What does a prayer of faith sound like?

Jason Maroney

Ya know, I always discounted the Lord’s Prayer as simple and even childish but it is not for the weak. It is the prayer of a disciple ready to be used by God for His purposes and to give up his personal rights and fears. “Do not be excited that demons obey you, but that your Father in heaven hears you.”

In the long run, whether you had gotten kicked in that cell or not, made no difference, physically in your life, but through it your faith was increased. People die of illness and others lose their jobs, “power prayers” are always so focused on the temporal, the here and now.

Our kingdom, not God’s kingdom. what does it matter if a man’s illness is cured but he goes on to lose his faith? Pray for what you desire, but our trials come for a reason, if being freed from them brings glory to God, then He will do so. If our faithfulness in the midst of suffering furthers His kingdom, then let it be so.

p.s. God’s providence does include Advil

You run head first into enough brick walls… actually, my wife’s brother, Ryan, recently died from cancer at 28 years old. He was a believer and he loved people in amazing ways.

We had prayed and prayed for years. Some well meaning “Christians” came in to visit him. they had his mom watch a Hagee video on how if God doesn’t heal you, it’s because you didn’t pray earnestly and with enough faith. So these women of “real faith” were there to show how it was done. They were convinced if they said “their” prayer the right way, with the right amount of faith, the genie in the bottle would bow to their commands and Ryan would be healed.
John Stevens

I have been suffering from neuro-pathic pain in my head for several months now, probably caused by an abscess that got into a nerve. The pain has been excruciating at times, but I am on medication now that seems to be slowly working the pain levels down.

I prayed for God to heal it, but he hasn’t. I’m still praying, but have also reached the “Gods will be done” place. I don’t like the pain, but I know that God is still on his throne & he is working all things for good.

My response…

John. It seems we walk a similar path. I have a cyst in my head. My head hurts like hell when I’m not on my med. The doc says the cyst is not the problem. My head still hurts…. I’m OK with that. I use it as a reminder of God’s sovereignty. As creator, He has the right to do what He likes and when He likes it. The good news is God’s unmeasurable love. What He chooses to do is good. Real good.

Jason. I figured your wisdom came from living through a lengthy suffering experience. Some of God’s richest blessings on my life have been in the midst of suffering. Was it Paul, who said to count it all as gain. I figure he had paid the price to talk…

As to the global issue of prayer, I know it to be deeply personal to me. As my walk deepens, do does my prayer. I hope one day to experience prayer in my life without ceasing. Likely, most of the day will be living life in thoughtful thankful recognition of God’s love.

It is my hope I never am required to pray with such intensity that I sweat drops of blood. But who knows what the future holds. We are to be obedient and God promises that the prayers of a righteous man are powerful and effective. I can bank on that and do…

“Prayer works, sometimes…”~priest

I really am interested in powerful prayer.  I have always loved to pray. Sometimes with results that were obvious, sometime not.  My dad died with callouses on his knees and my mother continues to read my fb and pray for me and others. I am blessed.

It seems God’s impression on me is to work on my prayer life.  Work as in becoming more effective.  It is not my desire to do more of what doesn’t work. I’d much prefer to do what does work.

As an example: I was jailed for a couple days. Long story. I was innocent, but God thought the experience would be worthwhile. You can read about it at http://37stories.wordpress.com/?s=maverick

As a mafia looking guy leaned over me while I laid on the jail cell floor, he pulled back his foot with expectation of kicking me.  I prayed, “God this is really going to hurt.  I’d much prefer you chilled him out on the bench across the cell.”  The guy put his foot down as a cell mate was yelling, “Respecto El Priesto” or something like that.

He walked across the room, curled up on the bench and proceeded to shiver uncontrollably. That was an immediate and direct answer to prayer.

I desire to prayer with power and effect…

So… tell me more…  What has been your experience in prayer?

El Priesto

Torch This!

I have a lot of favorite stories in the Word. One of them is about the time Elijah took on the 400 prophets of baal. A contest was setup between baal and God. Altars were built to God and baal. Wood was piled up on the baal altar. The sacrificed animals were place atop the wood pile. The prophets proceeded to pray and yell out to baal to consume the sacrifice with fire. They cut themselves until there was blood all over. But baal never showed.

THEN! Elijah built his altar with 12 stones representing the tribes of Israel. He told the prophets to pile up some wood and pour water on it. They get pouring. I imagine Elijah kept laughing… They put the sacrificed animal on top and Elijah prayed. The Word says, “Immediately the fire of Godfell and burned up the offering, the wood, the stones, the dirt, and even the water in the trench.”

WAHOO! Can you imagine?! This was no campfire. This was a fire so intense it burned up everything it touched, including the stones and dirt! Man that was some intense fire. Don’t you know Elijah had to dancing at this spectacle. Likely, BIGGER and BETTER than he could imagine. Don’t you know the prophets of Baal got a really sick feeling in their stomachs…

The story finishes with…

“All the people saw it happen and fell on their faces in awed worship, exclaiming, ” Godis the true God! Godis the true God!” Elijah told them, “Grab the Baal prophets! Don’t let one get away!” They grabbed them. Elijah had them taken down to the Brook Kishon and they massacred the lot.”

There is a price to pay when going up against an angry God. I am convinced even with the new deal of grace, this is still a price to pay.

For more GodSpots – 37stories Enjoy!

The thumbprint of Jesus….

Paula Chambers

Archie, many years ago my daughter was driving pass my brother’s
house. She noticed he was in his yard doing yard work. (he lives at
the beginning of a curve) So she took her mind off driving and looking
toward him she waved. When she turned her mind back to her driving,
she ran off the road. She jerked the wheel…and from there all hell
broke loose before my brother’s eyes.

He dropped his weed eater…and could only yell…”Oh God, Oh God!” as
he watched her truck flip over and over again. It slid in the center
of the road side ways gas was pouring out of the tank. He ran to her
but couldn’t get her out.

A woman from the church upon hearing this in the ER rebuked him but as
for this mother…I cried and thanked him. I assured him, God
understood and filled in the blanks. Do you know people asked Who died
in the truck because it was completely totaled. As for my
daughter…she had one bruise on her cheek…it looked like a
thumbprint. Praise Jesus!!!!!!!

For more GodSpots – 37stories Enjoy!

“Have you ever been healed and had it stick?”~priest

Recently I posted this question on Facebook.

Has anyone ever been healed and had the healing stick? I mean personally. I have 3,000+ friends…. have you ever been healed and stayed healed? Share with the world…

These were the responses:

Catherine Graves
In December, I was healed from cronic back pain. I am still pain free. My pastor friend prayed for my back, but I asked for prayer for a headache. It was such a nice prayer, I didn’t tell him. A couple of weeks later, I realized that my back didn’t hurt.

Robert Gibson
Thinking….I did have a massive hip pain that went instantly when my friends gathered around me and prayed…. I was unable to walk before, I was in so much pain…..

Jim Taylor
5 years ago my wife’s thyroid was healed. She had been on thyroid medication for 17 years. When the doctor examined her he said, “I don’t know what’s happened but your thyroid is perfect.” .. and it still is.4 years ago I believe it was she was healed of diabetes. She is still healed.This is a little thing for the Creator… but Oh! How we thank Him!!!

Sarah Rook
I have tonnes of stories. My mum was diagnosed with a brain tumor that NO ONE has ever survived…it’s been ten years this year and she’s still alive and kicking. It also brought seizures on because it damaged part of the brain…she hasn’t had a seizure in years and has been off her medication for 2yrs.

A good friend broke her back about 15yrs ago, she couldn’t even lift her arms above chest height, some days couldn’t even move…she was totally healed 2yrs ago…never had pain since and you can’t stop her now!!!

I’ve mentioned before about my son…obviously i’m seeing slow healing in my son…his sight was classed as legally blind (about 95% blind)…now he can see 95% – even thou the specialists said it couldn’t be ‘medically fixed’…his seizures have been so severe in the past he nearly died two years ago (but in a coma, lungs collapsed..the works)…today he barly has any. The list goes on. Healings are all around! Just gotta ask.

Tim Contreras
When I was 4 years old I had all the symptoms of polio, including dragging my foot. My mother prayed for me and the next day I was out running again! The healing power from God is always there; the only way I know how to tap into that power is faith.

Darrel Auvenshine
Archie…several years ago I was so sick that I finally went to the doctor, who diagnosed me with pneumonia. he wanted me in the hospital, but with no insurance i chose not to go..so went home to try taking heavy advil etc….a friend called and prayed for me over the phone and immediately I was healed. Got up out of the bed as though I was never sick….

Al Quietwhiteguyintheback Newberry
My dad has a growth that the oncologist was absolutely certain was a lymphoma, based on his extensive experience with lymphoma and the look and texture of the growth. When the biopsy came back it was negative. And still is. He still has the growth, which they cannot remove due to its location so close to blood vessels, but we have a feeling the doctor was right and God changed the composition of the growth. We’ll never know.

Laurie Piel
yes. From the time I was 27 until I was 34, I had MS, which made life quite difficult at times… The night I gave birth to my 2nd daughter, there were complications and I was in great pain. I broke down, cried like I hadn’t cried in many years, and cried out to God to help me, take away the pain….things began to happen quickly after that, and I ended up having an emergency C-section. As a bonus, though – I have never had symptoms of MS from that night to this day. God did more than I had expected, that night. He is still healing me to this day, from all my wounds…

There’s more to my story; during the week following my daughter’s birth, the air was crisp, comfortable and clear (in late July!), colors were brighter, the light was nearly golden…and I had a nearly palpable sense of peace and well-being…along with the distinct impression that “everything was going to be okay”; words which echoed in my mind often. It puzzled me because I had just had my healthy, perfect baby daughter and everything already WAS okay….until she was 5 days old and began to run a fever of 102, over the weekend. It took the insurance docs 2 days to decide to send her to the children’s hospital, and when they finally did, her fever broke during the short trip from the urgent care center to the hospital.

That sense of everything’s-going-to-be-okay never left me until she was in fact okay, after a short hospital stay. The doctors never did figure out what caused that mysterious fever, but the peace and comfort that I know came from God, that repeated assurance that everything was going to be okay, was what I held onto during those few days. The same daughter caught spinal meningitis at 7 weeks, and again, I had it on good authority that everything was going to be okay. And it was.

“I prayed the believer’s prayer at 6 years of age, but then what?”~priest

In today’s world there is a cure for everything or at least most things. When I was six years of age, I realized I needed Christ in my life and I prayed asking Jesus into my heart. Over the years, I have never forgotten the day and time I was once lost and then found. Yet even in the consciousness of what Jesus had done for me, it was not always what influenced my life the most.  Sadly, there were times as I grew old where there was little conscious awareness of Christ’s involvement in my life.

From a believer’s perspective, I have pondered the meanings of parables in the Word. The parable of seed falling on different types of soil with weeds, rocks, etc. has always confused me a bit relative to my belief that when one is saved, one is always saved. The problem was apparent as I heard an individual pray the believer’s prayer and then live like hell. This created a major conflict for me. I still don’t have all the answers and if you think you do, you are probably wrong. That is just the way it is, believing in a God without limitations (although some will even argue that point).

Something I have come to believe is that when one prays the believer’s prayer, it sets the stage for an important thing to happen. Although the stage is set, the outcome is not guaranteed as it is predicated on the condition of the heart. The knowledge of knowing who Jesus is, understanding what He did on the cross and rising again, then believing by faith must be empowered by the Holy Spirit for the head knowledge to become heart knowledge. If the knowledge and belief never makes it to your heart, I don’t think you can count on spending eternity with Jesus Christ.

I know the thought of praying the believer’s prayer and not being saved will really stick in some people’s throat who are much smarter in theology than I. The thought of people living a life with fire insurance and expectations of going to heaven happens to really stick in my throat. In the letters of John, He says there are those that profess belief but don’t live the life of Christ. He calls these people liars. He emphasizes that one must believe and live a life in the likeness of Christ or they are not believers.

Furthermore, in James we are told that believer’s are identified by the fruit they produce. The fruit produced will be of similar variety of the fruit produced by Christ in His lifetime. Once again, it is not just praying a prayer, but the prayer is authenticated by the fruit we produce which is in living a life in the image of Christ. It is in fact evidenced by our exchanging our life for the life of Christ.

If you have read this far and still disagree, let me try an explanation with a simple illustration. When you son hits your daughter, you tell him to say he is sorry to his sister. Right. When your son says he is sorry, he may be rebelliously thinking…..

“I may be saying I am sorry on the outside, but on the inside I am ready to smack that silly grin off your face.”~little johnny

It seems, just saying the believer’s prayer is not enough…. If you prayed the believer’s prayer and your life does not reflect the life of Christ, I’d seriously consider how confident you really are in your eternal relationship with Christ.

~just sayin’ and prayin’

For more GodSpots – 37stories Enjoy!

“David passionately loved God and he prospered in God’s blessings. So might we.”~priest

King David lived his life dressed for battle. It was a life to kill or be killed. It was as if God had called him uniquely to bloody his hands in combat such that God’s chosen people would prosper. The idea that God would bless David by the killing of others, is hard to reconcile against the backdrop of God’s incredible love.

I think the difficulty in understanding the God of the Old Testament, is we take OT actions and apply them to a New Testament world. We don’t live in the Old Testament. Our life is given to us in the grace of God’s love found in the New Testament. The God of the OT must be understood in light of the times He operated in. It was a time before Jesus was sacrificed and God brought judgement and justice in real time. “Real time” judgement is a scary thought. Fear of God was legitimate.

Times have changed. I much prefer living life under God’s plan of grace and mercy. Judgement for my sin was made and placed on Jesus at the cross. It sorrows me that my sin put Jesus there to pay the ultimate price. But through the sorrow can be found joy, that I am allowed to live my life without fear of “real time” judgement. Judgement has been made. The price has been paid. I am blessed to prosper today with a full awareness of the love God the Father has for His children.

That is not to say I will not suffer, because the evil ones are active in this world. But it is to say in the midst of good times and bad, God will continue to bless His children. God will continue to be God and I will continue to be one of His children. I am confident God is pleased to bless His children.

Can your desire to live, be what is killing you?

“The bulldog-ant of Australia if it is cut in two, a battle begins between the head and the tail. The head seizes the tail in its teeth, and the tail defends itself bravely by stinging the head: the battle may last for half an hour, until they die or are dragged away by other ants.”~Wiki

I first heard about the bulldog-ant on National Public Radio.  I was fascinated with the distinctiveness of this creature.  I am sure those in Australia will testify to the impact of an ant with such a furious desire to live.  It made me think about myself and others.  Do we as humans have such a strong desire to live as the bulldog-ant?  I think mostly so.

I was commenting about this ant on facebook and a friend asked the question if this desire for survival is typified in the local church over some divisive issue.  I think it is a point well worth making.  Churches tend to get set in their ways and there are some people inclined to change while others will die before change can occur.

In the meantime, the activity between the two factions resemble this ant quite elegantly.  The body splits.  The head bites its’ backside and the stinger stings the head.  Death is the predictable result….

All this happens in the name of God.  Where did we as children of the Father go wrong in our passions?  There is but one answer.  We took our eyes off the one that died for us, such that we might have life.  Jesus.

Father.  Forgive us for our self-centered natures…

“The Last Christian”by David Gregory

Guest Post by Ikki Soma

Have you heard the quote, truth is stranger than fiction? Well, recently I read The Last Christian by David Gregory. It is a fictional book, but what it depicts could eventually be TRUE in America (so perhaps in this book, fiction is truer than truth). It is a page turning thriller in which a Christian missionary emerges from the remote jungles of Papua New Guinea in the year 2088 and finds that Christianity has all but disappeared from America. The church buildings in America have now become like the nearly empty church buildings in Europe today.

All the recent stats and projections seem to indicate that what is written in The Last Christian WILL eventually come to pass in America. Currently, about 20% of Americans are a part of a local church. By the year 2020, it is projected that less than 15% of Americans will be part of a local church (over 85% of the over 300 million Americans will be unchurched). Today, America is the third LARGEST mission field in the world (behind India and China). My wife and I know most of the neighbors on our street (about 20 families/homes) and only two families are a regular part of a local church (the Collin’s and the Barrick’s). So even on our typical Bible belt street, less than 15% are a part of a local church. It is estimated that only 1 in 10 Christian college students are a part of a local church. And 70% of people raised in the local church as children and youth will fall away as young adults (some come back, most don’t).

So here are the five trends outlined in The Last Christian that lead to the disappearance of Christianity in America:

(1) Scientific trends that promoted a materialistic worldview – Rather than confront the theory of evolution intelligently, Christians continued to exercise blind faith. The Intelligent Design proponents did not garner respect from the scientific community (too little too late) and thus their cries fell on deaf ears (and it seemed like they were pushing a religious agenda, rather than pushing a scientific agenda).

(2) The rejection of the evangelical culture war by the larger society as secularism’s grip on society tightened – This came mostly through Christians desire to influence the culture through politics (like the Moral Majority). Rather than putting their effort into making disciples of Jesus Christ, Christians put their efforts into swaying people towards their political agendas.

(3) The backlash against religion in general due to Islamic fundamentalism – After 9/11 Americans became more and more suspicious of anyone who claimed allegiance to a specific faith. Christians were seen as fundamentalists and extremists.

(4) The rejection of the notion of absolute truth and morality as postmodernism became entrenched in the culture – The Bible claim to be truth and God to be true became increasingly unpopular. People who held to absolute truth were viewed as ignorant and narrow minded (how can anyone with half a brain believe in absolute truth?). Christians were not able to articulate their beliefs (or did not believe in absolute truth themselves).

(5) The church’s lack of distinctiveness relative to the culture around it, thus diminishing its potential appeal – This last trend seems to be so true. Christians were not distinct from the non-Christians around them (so there was no appeal to become a Christian). And that’s what the stats seem to show (divorce, having abortions, cheating on taxes, values, how we spend our money, etc). If Christian claim to have the Holy Spirit living inside of them and to be born-again, then why aren’t Christians more distinct from their “dead” neighbors?

thoughts?