A God honoring media diet
- 27 Dec
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Psalm 19:13
With so much media competing for our attention, is it any wonder that it is sometimes difficult to stay focused. But as enticing and exciting as it all may be in the big scheme of things, the value that it brings to our life is disproportionate to the benefit we get. In other words... considering how much time we can spend surfing internet links, trolling social media or gorging on video, TV and movie entertainment, are we actually getting a good return for that time we have invested? I'm sure sometimes the answer is yes, but more often we gain nothing, or what we do gain is fleeting and temporary.
Are there some entirely wholesome things that we would do well to feed as much as possible on? The most obvious thing is God’s Word, the Bible.
The more we can meditate on His Word and apply scripture, we obey God when He says “Meditate on it day and night.”
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What does it mean to follow Jesus?
- 14 Dec
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. Romans 12:1-2
What does it mean to follow Jesus? Jesus said that if you want to follow me, you need to die to yourself. He also said, no servant should expect to be greater than his master. We shouldn’t expect as Christians that somehow we will escape trials and tribulations. In fact, the aim of a Christian should not be the pursuit of comfort, but rather the pursuit of things that honor God which often involves things that make us decidedly out of our comfort zones.
Jesus said trials and tribulations would come but He did also say that He had overcome the world. We see that in Jesus’ live and His death and resurrection. Every day we can make choices to put aside our desires, our agenda and preferences in favor of others. Every day we can choose to die to ourselves and, in one of those great ironies of life, be victorious.
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Asking yourself hard questions
- 30 Nov
It’s ok to take a critical look at yourself. By critical, I mean examining with a fine-tooth comb as opposed to just getting down on oneself. If you start thinking you are stupid or dumb because of your actions, that is not helpful.
I recall meeting with a young man for the purpose of mentoring several years ago. During the first time we met, as we were talking about some of the things we might do as part of the mentoring process, one of the things I asked him was to list some of his weaknesses. There was silence and then he told me he could not think of any weakness. It concerned me greatly that he was not able to identify any weakness in himself as young Christian man who wanted to be discipled.
I suppose that it was possible that he had never been asked to think about that. I knew him quite well and knew his heart. He had a strong desire to follow God and do what God wanted him to do. As with all of us, there were blind spots.
