"By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked." I John 2:5-6
How do we know that we are in Jesus? If we walk the same as He walked. How do we walk in the same way? By abiding in Him. John 15: 1-5 says "I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing."
How do you abide? As the branch of a fruit tree gets its nurishment from the trunk of the tree, so must we get our nurishment from Jesus. The branch sucks the juice it needs for life from the tree itself. We must do the same with our Savior. Drink deep from God's Word. Get your life from it. As you do that, you will walk as Jesus did and you will be known as one that abides in Christ.
I need thee every hour, most gracious Lord;
No tender voice like thine can peace afford.
I need thee every hour; stay thou nearby;
Temptations lose their power when thou art nigh.
I need thee every hour, in joy or pain;
Come quickly and abide, or life is vain.
I need thee every hour; teach me thy will;
And thy rich promises in me fulfill.
I need thee, O I need thee; every hour I need thee;
O bless me now, my Savior, I come to thee.
Annie Hawks
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Friday, October 19, 2007
History of Communication Cont. w/ Application
Last time we started looking at the history of communication. We first looked at how verbal communication came about and without dwelling on that, began to look at how written communication came to be. We will continue in that story.
Characters:
Oog: the guy that got it all started
Aag: Oog's wife
Uug: Oog's brother in law
Junior: Oog's son
Recap of the story so far:
Oog sent Jr. over to Uug's cave to tell Uug something. It got all mixed up and now the whole town thinks that the Red Coats are coming.
The men of the town stood there, shoulder to shoulder waiting for the Red Coats to make their appearance. (The Red Coats were a bunch of marauding barbarians who wore polar bear skin coats dyed with raspberry juice. They were a fearsome lot those Red Coats.) The only man not there to defend the town was Oog. Soon, Uug noticed that Oog was not there so he sent his teenage son Uugo to Oog's cave to alert him to the grave situation that the town of Cavesville was in. When Uugo filled Oog in on the details Oog was shocked! He grabbed his club and headed down to the town post-haste. When Oog got to Uug, Oog immediatly began questioning Uug about what was going on. Uug said, "I was working in my cave when Junior came running in and said that the Red Coats were coming." Oogs mouth dropped wide open. He said, "I sent Junior over to ask you if you wanted to come for supper and if you could bring some bread with you if you came!" They immedialty went to search for Junior. After questioning him at some length, they figured the situation out and sent all the townsmen back to their caves. While talking about the days events over dinner that night, they decided that something had to be done to prevent something like that from happening again. There must be a way to accuratly transfer messages from one place to another. Aag said, "What if you were to make a different mark with some raspberry juice for each sound we have. Then by putting the sound together you would form words and therefore my stringing words together you would have a message!" Oog slapped his hands on his thighs. "I am so glad I thought of that!" he said. "The intelligence of the male mind is astounding!" Uug, Junior, and Uugo concurred. Aag did not and the men didn't get any dessert that night. But from that conversation grew the alphabet and from there simple messages and finally books.
The problem of sending messages to people when you didn't have a runner soon reared its ugly head. Different tribes of cavemen had different solutions. Some polished up metal plates and used sunlight to flash sunlight back and forth. Some whistled or used long wooden horns to call to each other across valleys. Some of the more destructive tribes, of which this writer is a member, preferred the smoke signal approach but they often had altercations with the EPA. "Honestly Sir, the reason I had to send a message to my pen pal in India. That is why I had to burn Yellowstone National Park. That is the only way my pen pal could get the message!"
From those rather primordial beginnings grew the postal system, telegraph, telephone, radio, cell phone, email, instant messaging, etc. And with each of those technological advances, we became more and more addicted to communication. And we have to have more and more options. We can't just have a cell phone now. It has to have text messaging, call waiting, voicemail, and email access. We can't just have email, we have to have several email accounts, Yahoo, Google, and half a dozen other forms of instant messaging. We have our Scholar360 account, blogspot, FaceBook, and MySpace. And if we don't have instant access to at least a score of ways to communicate at any time night or day anywhere in the world, we can't function. What has society come to? We spend so much time communicating with others that we often don't take time to sit and think and still less time to communicate with God. Jesus often got away from it all and spent time in the wilderness and mountains and on the lake. Sometimes it was with his closest friends. Often it was just him and his Father. Alone. For an evening. Or a whole night. Or early in the morning. When was the last time you got alone for a long period of time and just sat and watched the tadpoles swim? You can get a lot of thinking and praying done while doing that. When was the last time you were quiet and let the Spirit search you? I'm probably stepping on some toes now but don't worry....I'm yelling louder at myself than I am at you!
Characters:
Oog: the guy that got it all started
Aag: Oog's wife
Uug: Oog's brother in law
Junior: Oog's son
Recap of the story so far:
Oog sent Jr. over to Uug's cave to tell Uug something. It got all mixed up and now the whole town thinks that the Red Coats are coming.
The men of the town stood there, shoulder to shoulder waiting for the Red Coats to make their appearance. (The Red Coats were a bunch of marauding barbarians who wore polar bear skin coats dyed with raspberry juice. They were a fearsome lot those Red Coats.) The only man not there to defend the town was Oog. Soon, Uug noticed that Oog was not there so he sent his teenage son Uugo to Oog's cave to alert him to the grave situation that the town of Cavesville was in. When Uugo filled Oog in on the details Oog was shocked! He grabbed his club and headed down to the town post-haste. When Oog got to Uug, Oog immediatly began questioning Uug about what was going on. Uug said, "I was working in my cave when Junior came running in and said that the Red Coats were coming." Oogs mouth dropped wide open. He said, "I sent Junior over to ask you if you wanted to come for supper and if you could bring some bread with you if you came!" They immedialty went to search for Junior. After questioning him at some length, they figured the situation out and sent all the townsmen back to their caves. While talking about the days events over dinner that night, they decided that something had to be done to prevent something like that from happening again. There must be a way to accuratly transfer messages from one place to another. Aag said, "What if you were to make a different mark with some raspberry juice for each sound we have. Then by putting the sound together you would form words and therefore my stringing words together you would have a message!" Oog slapped his hands on his thighs. "I am so glad I thought of that!" he said. "The intelligence of the male mind is astounding!" Uug, Junior, and Uugo concurred. Aag did not and the men didn't get any dessert that night. But from that conversation grew the alphabet and from there simple messages and finally books.
The problem of sending messages to people when you didn't have a runner soon reared its ugly head. Different tribes of cavemen had different solutions. Some polished up metal plates and used sunlight to flash sunlight back and forth. Some whistled or used long wooden horns to call to each other across valleys. Some of the more destructive tribes, of which this writer is a member, preferred the smoke signal approach but they often had altercations with the EPA. "Honestly Sir, the reason I had to send a message to my pen pal in India. That is why I had to burn Yellowstone National Park. That is the only way my pen pal could get the message!"
From those rather primordial beginnings grew the postal system, telegraph, telephone, radio, cell phone, email, instant messaging, etc. And with each of those technological advances, we became more and more addicted to communication. And we have to have more and more options. We can't just have a cell phone now. It has to have text messaging, call waiting, voicemail, and email access. We can't just have email, we have to have several email accounts, Yahoo, Google, and half a dozen other forms of instant messaging. We have our Scholar360 account, blogspot, FaceBook, and MySpace. And if we don't have instant access to at least a score of ways to communicate at any time night or day anywhere in the world, we can't function. What has society come to? We spend so much time communicating with others that we often don't take time to sit and think and still less time to communicate with God. Jesus often got away from it all and spent time in the wilderness and mountains and on the lake. Sometimes it was with his closest friends. Often it was just him and his Father. Alone. For an evening. Or a whole night. Or early in the morning. When was the last time you got alone for a long period of time and just sat and watched the tadpoles swim? You can get a lot of thinking and praying done while doing that. When was the last time you were quiet and let the Spirit search you? I'm probably stepping on some toes now but don't worry....I'm yelling louder at myself than I am at you!
Saturday, October 13, 2007
History of Communication
Verbal communication. It started out one of two ways.
Theory one: Oog the caveman was putting up a partition in his cave. His family was growing and he was partitioning off the playroom to make two rooms. While moving a large rock, he dropped it on his foot and the cries of agony and rage went down in history as the first verbal communication that we, as homo sapiens, had.
Theory two: same time, same place. Only this time Oog's wife Aag was watching. When she saw him drop the rock on his foot, she whispered "Oops." From that rather inauspicious beginning, grew the languages we speak today.
One day Oog wanted to tell his brother-in-law Uug something. But, Uug was in his cave and Oog couldn't leave what he was doing to talk to Uug. So Oog sent his son Junior. Now Junior was a good lad but like most boys his age, a little forgetful. To complicate matters even further, Uug was hard of hearing. When Junior left, he knew that he was supposed to ask Uncle Uug if he was going come over for supper and if he was, to bring some bread and pot roast. "And," Oog added, "come home right away."
So Junior left the cave and went next door to Uncle Uug's house. When he got there, he realized that he had forgotten exactly what he was supposed to ask. He thought it had something to do with bread though. So he asked Uncle Uug, "Do you have any bread or toast and are you coming?" and having said that, turned around and left. After all, his dad told him to come right home. Uug was horrified. The Red Coats! And they were coming!! He ran out into center court and sounded the alarm. "The Red Coats are coming!" he shouted. Everybody came running with their clubs. They lined up shoulder to shoulder, ready to defend their wives and children. they waited....and waited....and waited......and waited...........................................................................
to be continued
Theory one: Oog the caveman was putting up a partition in his cave. His family was growing and he was partitioning off the playroom to make two rooms. While moving a large rock, he dropped it on his foot and the cries of agony and rage went down in history as the first verbal communication that we, as homo sapiens, had.
Theory two: same time, same place. Only this time Oog's wife Aag was watching. When she saw him drop the rock on his foot, she whispered "Oops." From that rather inauspicious beginning, grew the languages we speak today.
One day Oog wanted to tell his brother-in-law Uug something. But, Uug was in his cave and Oog couldn't leave what he was doing to talk to Uug. So Oog sent his son Junior. Now Junior was a good lad but like most boys his age, a little forgetful. To complicate matters even further, Uug was hard of hearing. When Junior left, he knew that he was supposed to ask Uncle Uug if he was going come over for supper and if he was, to bring some bread and pot roast. "And," Oog added, "come home right away."
So Junior left the cave and went next door to Uncle Uug's house. When he got there, he realized that he had forgotten exactly what he was supposed to ask. He thought it had something to do with bread though. So he asked Uncle Uug, "Do you have any bread or toast and are you coming?" and having said that, turned around and left. After all, his dad told him to come right home. Uug was horrified. The Red Coats! And they were coming!! He ran out into center court and sounded the alarm. "The Red Coats are coming!" he shouted. Everybody came running with their clubs. They lined up shoulder to shoulder, ready to defend their wives and children. they waited....and waited....and waited......and waited...........................................................................
to be continued
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
A Voice of one Crying
A Voice of one crying. Why that for a title? It comes from the book of John, chapter 2 verse 23. When John the Baptist is asked who he is and what he is doing, he responds with "Iam the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias." That is one of my three life verses and one that I hope reflect my mission in life and philosophy of ministry.
Now, why did I create this blog? Why did I, a computer/technology...uh disliker...I almost said hater but that would be too strong of a word...create a blog? Two reasons and they have no real "spiritual" purpose. A friend of mine has a blog and I wanted to respond to a post of his but couldn't until I was also a blogger.
Secondly, I work some very late nights/all nighters/and early mornings. I need something to do when I'm sick of studying!
So that is why I'm here. Basically my reasons are totally pragmatic. But I may actually make a difference in someones life or it may serve to just keep me out of trouble. And if it does either of those, then good. I'm happy.
Now, why did I create this blog? Why did I, a computer/technology...uh disliker...I almost said hater but that would be too strong of a word...create a blog? Two reasons and they have no real "spiritual" purpose. A friend of mine has a blog and I wanted to respond to a post of his but couldn't until I was also a blogger.
Secondly, I work some very late nights/all nighters/and early mornings. I need something to do when I'm sick of studying!
So that is why I'm here. Basically my reasons are totally pragmatic. But I may actually make a difference in someones life or it may serve to just keep me out of trouble. And if it does either of those, then good. I'm happy.
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