Comments on: Continue The Conversation (Week 1 of Sync)

By: Look What I Found - - livingthedash.tv

Look What I Found - - livingthedash.tv — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 04:17:33 +0000

[...] turns his Sunday message into a Monday conversation here, here, & [...]

By: brendanwitton

brendanwitton — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 20:27:45 +0000

Great quote from CS Lewis… I might use it on Sunday in my message… great post!

By: Brooke

Brooke — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 05:02:03 +0000

What a paradigm shift. Realizing that we really do want too little, as opposed to too much. In hearing you say that on Sunday, I felt a shift inside me. I keep a pretty full plate most days, but full of what? Full of noise, mindless tasks, endless emails/voicemails/im’s/texts (and of course there are blogs to keep tabs on!) But really when I think about it, there is so much space above my plate that is NOT full. This space between myself and God. There are times when it all gets to be too much and then I look up in despair and seek God’s presence in my life. Why not look up and around for Him throughout the day? Strive to flesh out this life I have today? This is what I want to teach my kids, not the hurry-scurry now I need God, now I don’t dance.

By: just sayin...

just sayin... — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 07:05:01 +0000

Amanda: I loved your post. Your words are true for me as well.

By: therealstorie

therealstorie — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 22:26:41 +0000

Pete, this is my second time to your blog. I have seen you and your wife on Tam’s blog.
I am moved by the message here. I think that there is a continual temptation to exist in a watered down state. To seek HIM first, to taste and see that HE is good requires that we come to him first and foremost, seeking and tasting. I know that I have deliberatly settled for faux, rather than waiting or perservering for the REAL. I want to be allured to HIM, to taste of Him and how good HE is so I will never be drawn away to the subtle delicacies of this world. I am encouraged however, that as I continually offer to Him my sacrafice of praise, the empty spaces, the broken pieces, He gives me the strength in my weakness. He changes me from glory to greater glory. He makes intercession for me. He does a work that only HE can do. I pray that we as the body of Christ will be so hungry and thirsty for HIM, and HIM alone, and that as we taste anything else, it will not satisfy. It will pale in comparison.

By: Bethany

Bethany — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 22:01:48 +0000

I think this series is going to be great. I brought 2 friends to church yesterday who had never been to Cross Point and when we went to eat afterwards they kept saying, “Wow. That was so good!” or “That was just what I needed.” I totally agree and look forward to what’s to come! There is something amazing when your soul is still and you are connected with God. You know, when that anxious feeling in your chest is quiet and you quit thinking about everything you “have” to do. Unfortunately, on most days I do not stop long enough to find that stillness. I rush from one thing to the next and forget that NOTHING is more important then spending quality time with God, finding that stillness, and remaining in His presence throughout the day, no matter where I may go. I hope to work on that and this series will be great inspiration.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 17:36:07 +0000

Towny said, “I think we spend way too much time trying to be good, and not nearly enough time getting to know Him. It is being in His presence that changes us. It should be knowing and loving Him that motivates us.”

This is spot on. Our spiritual transformation is bound to wanting Jesus. Wanting Jesus starts with a decision to trust which requires the breaking of all of my idols, all of those things that I look to to give me false value, false security, and a false sense of control. But we can only have this trust when we learn first that we are not trustworthy, when we recognize that all of our idols will let us down. Sometimes it takes the idols almost killing us (like in extreme cases of addiction, or a loss of a career or loved one) to reveal that what we have embraced to define us as false. Our trust in ourselves must be broken (i.e. we must confess that at root we are sinful) before we can understand how far more trustworthy Christ is.

Only in coming back frequently to the fact that I am more sinful than I dared imagine and more loved by God than I dared hope can the spiritual transformation really begin to germinate. Meditating on God’s love, compassion, grace and mercy towards ourselves (we who had made ourselves his enemies) cultivates a heart of care for others (neighbors and enemies alike) that in turn leads us to turn to the world marred by sin with the intention to mend it in Jesus name. Only then are our actions like Jesus’ and only then are they motivated by gratitude and not religious obligation (read here “pharasaical motivation” as in “my good actions or my morality is my way to power over others” which is just another idol). Our awareness of and gratitude for what Christ has done is the engine that powers the development of spiritual transformation. Discovering where our trust truly belongs liberates us from the power of sin, frees us to do real and amazing work for the Kindom as wells as pitching the “mud pie” habit almost entirely. May we all get there eventually!

Great conversation!

By: Bill Renfrew

Bill Renfrew — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 13:53:46 +0000

Amsnda,

Wow, you said it so perfectly. I’m like you; I know the quick fixes work. They have predictable outcomes.

I wish I didn’t lack the courage to trust God completely when I know He has outcomes in store for me that trump any outcome I could ever realize through quick fix.

I want him but not always. I trust him but not completely. I turn to him but not for everything. This is my life. And it’s particularly frustrating because it’s not at all rational. After all, when I find a restaurant I love it’s never a struggle to return. There’s no fear. Chances are I’ll even order the same dish because it worked so well the last time. I’ll also recommend it to my friends as a ‘sure thing’, insisting that they try the same dish that so rocked my world. I want to share the joy.

Why don’t I do the same with Christ? Why don’t I tell more people that my unsolvable problems are routinely solved through my faith in Christ?

The only answer I can come up for not returning to same reliable source of comfort, truth, strength and hope that is right there waiting for me is that there is somebody who’s working very hard to see that I don’t.

By: Pete Wilson

Pete Wilson — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 11:13:34 +0000

@ Amanda, it scares me as well. The “complete act of surrender and laying down all control” has got to be one of the toughest things about truly following Jesus. It so reminds me of Christ in the gardsn simply praying “not my will but your will”.

By: Michelle

Michelle — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 06:05:27 +0000

Wow, Amanda, that’s honest.

Search me O God and know my heart – Try me and know my anxious thoughts – See if there is any hurtful way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.