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Need Encouragement?
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WHY?
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why r things so hard around the world? some people would rather hurt other people. does people care if they r hurt or angry? please tell me what your opinions are.
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Alexandria 10/26/2010 21:14 |
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Davidwayne Lackey
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10/26/2010 22:19 |
Alexandria, This is probably the hardest question I have ever asked myself. It is usually when I'm sad or depressed when it pops up in my mind. At those times I can only see all the bad there is and all the hardships caused by it. The Lord in His grace lets me chew on it for a while until I can't stand it anymore and just want to cry. Then my eyes are opened to all the good things there are and I feel like a heal for complaining and judging unjustly the World and all the people that The Lord has made. Then the old lessons that I had temporarily forgotten come back to mind and my complaints along with the associated depression disappears.
One of those lessons is we live in a fallen World. A World that God saw in it's entirety before the World was made. God saw the necessity for all the bad along with the good for His purpose for us in the end. We have an awesome job to do with great responsibilities that requires us to be purified like fine gold is with the refining fire. The bad in this World is a part of the refining fire. The fire that keeps us humble because without it we become spoiled and bad ourselves as history teaches time and again.
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Helga
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10/26/2010 22:43 |
Life on earth is full of challenges. Psalm 139 describes how God knows everything of us. To know Him and to serve him is what gives me purpose. I often do not succeed but I strive to do it. If people do not accept Jesus as their Lord, who do they serve? Hurt people hurt other people. The devil roams around to use someone to accomplish his wicked ideas. People are drawn into believing that they themselves can do everything but Jesus said, Christ in me, the hope of glory. People are angry and frustrated because they are not willing to be led by the Holy Spirit.
Read the post of Davidwayne Lackey, The Purpose of Living by Alistar Begg.
Alex God is every day with you and he is leading you to become a strong Christian and we become stronger when we overcome the daily obstacles. Jesus is the way and He himself endured hardship and is always there to help you and guide you. Each one of us are busy fighting a battle, so let us all just lift our eyes to Jesus and say: Lord have mercy on us and Lord guide, comfort and encourage each of us today.
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Calico
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11/04/2010 19:44 |
Hey Alex,
I have been thinking about this, and have wanted to write to you a piece that I have read before. It's a bit long, and maybe packed full of a lot of things to consider, but I believe you're a smart girl and can wrapper your brain around it. :-)
You asked "why r things so hard around the world? some people would rather hurt other people. does people care if they r hurt or angry? please tell me what your opinions are."
Ok, heregoes:
TWO BASIC FORMS OF EVIL IN RELATIONS TO OTHERS
So when we come to deal with spiritual formation of our social dimension, we have to start from woundedness. It is hard to imagine anyone in this world who has not been deeply injured in his or her relationships with others. The exact nature of the poison of sin in our social dimension is fairly easy to describe, though extremely hard to deal with. It has two forms. They are so closely related that they are really two forms of the same thing: of a lovelessness, lack of proper regard and care for others. These two forms are ASSAULT or attack and WITHDRAWAL or "distancing." They are so much a part of ordinary human existence that most people think they are just "reality," and never imagine that we could live without them.
If spiritual formation in Christ is to succeed, the power of these two forms of evil in our own life - within ourselves - absolutely MUST be broken. So far as it is possible, they must be eliminated as indwelling realities, as postures we take toward others. They also must be successfully disarmed as they come toward us. And they must be eliminated in our social environment - especially in the fellowships of Christ's followers - so far as that is possible. Perhaps we must be reconciled to the fact that they cannot be entirely eliminated from our world, or even from our fellowships of Christian believers, until a new epoch dawns, but we can eliminate them from our own being. We CAN live without them.
UNDERSTANDING ASSAULT AND WITHDRAWAL
We assault others when we act against what is good for them, even with their consent. It is not only when we harm them or cause them pain against the conscious will. Hence, seduction is assault, as is participation in or even compliance with the social structures that institutionalize wrongdoing and evil. The more explicit and well-known forms of assault are dealt with in the last six of the Ten Commandments - murder, adultery, theft, and so on. These are deepened in their meaning by the teachings of Jesus, especially in his Sermons on the Mount and on the Plain (Matthew 5 - 7; Luke 6) and in the teachings of Paul in such passages as Colossians chapters 3-5 and 1 Corinthians 13.
We withdraw from someone when we regard their well-being and goodness as matters of indifference to us, or perhaps go so far as to despise them. We "don't care."
Both assault and withdrawal primarily involve our relations to those close to us, those affected by what we do and who we are in the natural course of our living. Clearly that means members of our family or household, those who live intimately with us - our "nigh boors" - those with whom we work or play, and those with whom we share common goods, our community. In the modern world it is hard to draw a boundary to the latter because of significant worldwide connections for everyone, though in practice some distinctions MUST be made because of our finitude. We cannot effectively extend care or received it from very many people.
Now we always "distance" ourselves from those we assault, and withdrawal - including threats or suggestions thereof - is nearly always a way of assaulting those we withdraw from. So we should think of the distinction between assault and withdrawal as only a matter of emphasis, useful for the understanding of how lovelessness works.
"Renovation Of The Heart" by Dallas Willard, pgs 181, 182
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Anyway, that is just some things to think on. See if that can match up with what you've been pondering! :-)
Hugs!
Tom
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Alexandria
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11/04/2010 20:45 |
wow that kinda answer half of my questions. thanks tom for that. Hugs!
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Calico
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11/05/2010 15:30 |
Cool, Alex,
If that only answers half of them, maybe this will answer more of them! Well, maybe... :-)
The entire 10th chapter of that book would be an amazing thing for you to read some day. There are, of course, the nine chapters in front of that one. ;-) But the 10th chapter is like "the outcome" of the nine that come before it. Love is the key, as exemplified by Jesus, and empowered by His Spirit, "...for God is love." (1 John 4:8b). Though there is a lot to read in the following, the final words of the 10th chapter of "Renovation Of The Heart" are these:
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MAIN ELEMENTS IN SPIRITUAL FORMATION OF OUR SOCIAL DIMENSION
What will this look like an ordinary human relations? This is what must be explained and abundantly exemplified in the context of the retentive local gathering. It must all start from there, though it will be IMMEDIATELY applied to conjugal relationships and the families are rising out of them. Above all it must be seen in the family relationships of those who lead and teach. Here are four major elements in the new world of redeemed relationships.
RECEIVING GOD'S VISION OF OUR WHOLENESS IN HIM
The FIRST main element in the transformed social dimension is for individuals to come to see themselves as WHOLE, as God himself sees them. Such a vision sets them beyond the wounds and limitations they have received in their past relationships to others. It is this vision of oneself from God's point of view that makes it possible to regard oneself as blessed, no matter what has happened. "We are dead," Paul tells us, and "our life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then we will appear with him, glorious" (Colossians 3:3-4,PAR). We have stepped into a new life where the primary relationship is with Christ and we are assured of a glorious existence forever.
God has a plan for each of us in the work he is doing during our lifetime, and no one can prevent this from being fulfilled if we place our hope entirely in him. The part we play in his plans now will extend to the role he has set before us for eternity. Our life in him is whole and it is blessed, NO MATTER WHAT HAS OR HAS NOT BEEN DONE TO US, NO MATTER HOW SHAMEFULLY OUR HUMAN CIRCLES OF SUFFICIENCY HAVE BEEN VIOLATED.
It is God's sufficiency to us that secures everything else. Paul again said, "Our sufficiency is of God" (2 Corinthians 3:5; 9:8, PAR). It is the God-given vision of us as whole in him that draws all the poisons from our relationships to others and enables us to go forward with sincere forgiveness and blessing toward them. Only in this way can we stand free from the wounds of the past and from those who have assaulted or forsaken us.
DEFENSIVENESS GONE
The SECOND element in the spiritually transformed social dimension is abandonment of all defensiveness. This of course would occur only in a social context where Christ dwells - that is, among his special people. But it is natural it would occur in the absence of attack and withdrawal, wherever that may be, or where we have an impregnable defense against it.
This abandonment of defensiveness includes a willingness to be known in our most intimate relationships for who we really are. It would include abandonment of all practices of self-justification, evasiveness, and deceit, as well as manipulation. That is not to say we should impose all the facts about ourselves upon those close to us, much less on others at large. Of course we should. But it does mean that we do not hide and we do not follow strategies for "looking good."
Jesus' teachings about not performing for public approval, about letting our "yes" be a "yes" and nothing more, and about not being a hypocrite - having a face that differs from our reality - all find application here (Matthew 5-6).
GENUINE LOVE PREDOMINATES IN OUR GATHERINGS
And then all pretense would vanish from our lives. That would be the THIRD element in the spiritually transformed social dimension of the self. Love between Christians then would, as Paul says to the Romans, "be genuine." And that is the central factor in the beautiful picture of what the local gatherings of disciples into "churches" should look like, given by Paul in Romans 12:1-21. Christ's apprentices would be carrying out their particular work in the group life with the grace and power that is not from themselves, but from God (versus 3-8), and each one would be exhibiting the following qualities (versus 9-21):
1. Letting love be completely real
2. Abhorring what is evil
3. Clinging to what is good
4. Being devoted to one another in a family-like love ("philostorgoi" in the Greek)
5. Outdoing one another in giving honor
6. Serving the Lord with ardent spirit and all diligence
7. Rejoicing in hope
8. Being patient in troubles
9. Being devoted constantly to prayer
10. Contributing to the needs of the saints
11. Pursuing (running after) hospitality
12. Blessing persecutors and not cursing them
13. Being joyful with those who are rejoicing and being sorrowful with those in sorrow
14. Living in harmony with each other
15. Not being haughty, but fitting in with the "lowly" in human terms
16. Not seeing yourself as wise
17. Never repaying evil for evil
18. Having due regard for what everyone takes to be right
19. Being at peace with everyone, so far as it depends on you
20. Never taking revenge, but leaving that to whatever God may decide
21. Providing for needy enemies
22. Not being overwhelmed by evil, but overwhelming evil with good
This is the most adequate biblical description of what the details of a spiritually transformed social dimension look like. We should pause to contemplate it. Just think for a moment what it would be like to be part of a group of disciples in which this list was conscious, shared INTENTION, and where it was actually lived out, even if with some imperfection. You can see, I think, how it would totally transform the marriage relation and the home and family. Its effect on the community would be incalculable, as it in fact has been wherever realized throughout the history of Christ's people on earth.
The abandonment of all defensiveness and its many strategies would clearly be achieved in such a group. There would no longer be any need for them. In their place would be receptiveness and blessing for all, even enemies. Certainly, to achieve this in our social dimension we must have heard and accepted the gospel of grace, of Jesus' defenseless death on the cross on our behalf, and of his acceptance of us into his life beyond death and beyond the worst that could be done to him or to us. We must stand safe and solid in his kingdom.
The FOURTH element is an opening up of our broader social dimension to redemption. Not having the burden of defending and securing ourselves, and now acting from the resources of our new "light from above," we can devote our lives to the service of others. This is the positive moment in the redemption of the social side of the self. It is not just a matter of not attacking or withdrawing. That redemption will naturally and rightly be chiefly focused in blessing upon those closest to us, beginning with our family members and moving out from there, proportional to our degree of life involvement with others.
The social world is set before us as an infinite task, which can only be carried out in the power of God. We accept that. Just as we cannot be the husband or wife or parent God intends except in the power of God, so for our life as a whole year it we do not even know how to pray as we ought, Paul tells us (Romans 8:26). What then, shall we not pray? By no means, for "the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words" (verse 26). And the Spirit of God will enter into all of our social connections if we invite him, wait on him, and proceed as best we can. We have the promise of Jesus to those who live by his "living water." That water "shall become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life" (John 4:14), and "'from his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water'" (John 7:38, compare Isaiah 58:11).
Spiritual formation in Christ obviously requires that we increasingly be happily reconciled to living in and by THE DIRECT UPHOLDING OF THE HAND OF GOD. This is clearly what the entire biblical view of life calls for, and especially what Jesus himself lived and presented as the truth. Only from within this Gospel outlook on life can we begin to approach the godly reformation of the self in its social world. But from within that outlook we can cease from assault and withdrawal and can extend ourselves in blessing to all whose lives we touch.
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Pretty amazing stuff. I am daily asking Jesus to help me to do just this sort of thing, Alex. I'll let God have the final word here:
"Beloved, let us love one another, for love is (springs) from God; and he who loves [his fellowmen] is begotten (born) of God and is coming [progressively] to know and understand God [to perceive and recognize and get a better and clearer knowledge of Him]. He who does not love has not become acquainted with God [does not and never did know Him], for God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest (displayed) where we are concerned: in that God sent His Son, the only begotten or unique [Son], into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation (the atoning sacrifice) for our sins. Beloved, if God loved us so [very much], we also ought to love one another. No man has at any time [yet] seen God. But if we love one another, God abides (lives and remains) in us and His love (that love which is essentially His) is brought to completion (to its full maturity, runs its full course, is perfected) in us! By this we come to know (perceive, recognize, and understand) that we abide (live and remain) in Him and He in us: because He has given (imparted) to us of His [Holy] Spirit."
- 1 John 4:7 - 13, from The Amplified Bible
Hugs again, Alex! :-)
Tom
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Alexandria
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11/21/2010 19:29 |
hugs tom and i thought alot about it it makes senses. a little bit but i will continue thinking about it. :)
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Calico
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11/21/2010 20:01 |
Ooooooh hugs, you! :-)
I know that was a lot to post. Thank you for reading it, and thinking alot about it. I know you've got it in you to think-on things, and I am glad you did!
Praying with you, l'l sis!
Tom
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