Getting what you need, not what you want

For God there is no tomorrow, no yesterday and no last week. God lives in the NOW. He sees everything that has ever happened and everything that will happen all at once. For Him it is just a matter of bringing His perfect plan into fruition.

In the bible it says 365 times ‘Do not worry’. His word tells us ‘that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’ Romans 8:28

So what does this mean?

If you have just had your car stolen: Don’t worry, in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’

If you have just lost your job: in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’

If you are sick: in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’

If life is not going the way you want it to: in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’

Remember that the purpose of this life is to train us spiritually, NOT to be successful and comfortable in the world. ‘Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you.’ 1John 2:15

If we focus on what is truly important in life, namely learning to “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ and ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ Matthew 22:37-38 instead of trying to get more money, a bigger house, more recognition and more success in the world, we might feel like more than conquerors instead of flailing Christians.

2 Corinthians 5:7 ‘We live by faith, not by sight’. The faith that God’s plan is being played out and we are a vital part of it. The faith that the circumstances of our lives are being used to mold and shape us for a purpose, His purpose, not our desires!

Romans 9: 20 But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” ²¹  Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? ²² What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, ²³ in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory.

Learn to thank Him and praise Him even when you can’t see the blessing!! God Bless You

He’s In Control

Mathew 17 : 24-26

24After Jesus and his disciples arrived in Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma tax came to Peter and asked, “Doesn’t your teacher pay the temple tax?”

25″Yes, he does,” he replied.

When Peter came into the house, Jesus was the first to speak. “What do you think, Simon?” he asked. “From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own sons or from others?”

26″From others,” Peter answered.

“Then the sons are exempt,” Jesus said to him. 27″But so that we may not offend them, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”

For morning devotion at the school I work at there re 2 teachers assigned to each class. My partner and I take turns giving sermons and leading the 15 minutes we have with our class each morning. This morning she shared about how last week she was having a problem and without knowing it my sharing was very specific advice for her.

Even now I don’t remember the sharing I gave. Quite often I go to class with little or no idea what I am going to talk about and just talk about something I have heard or learnt in the past. But God is God and He is in control !!

Why didn’t Jesus just take a coin out of His pocket and hand it to Peter to pay the tax ? Because He wanted to make the point that He is in control of everything, nature, money, every circumstance, everything !

One of my favourite experiences as a Christian is when you have the revelation or ‘re-revelation (remember) that God is working in every aspect of your life. He knit us together in our mother’s womb, He clothes the lilies in the field (Matthew 6:27-29), He commanded the waves and wind to stop, He cures disease and HE LOVES YOU AND ME !! How wonderful that is, if He is with us, who is against us ?

Lean on Him today, trust in Him, have faith in Him. They are the key words in Christianity because that is what Christianity is all about. The fact that God is God and He has a beautiful plan. Love Him, trust Him and know that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose. Romans 8:28

GBU

“Many are invited, but few are chosen.”

In the story of Lazarus and the rich man the rich man begs to be sent back to earth to tell his 5 brothers that there is a God and if they don’t change the way they are living they will end up in hell.

27 And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house— 28 for I have five brothers —so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.’

The answer he receives is :

29 But Abraham said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.

In Matthew 22:14 we hear that “Many are invited, but few are chosen.” What does this mean ?

The revelation I am beginning to get is that everyone on earth is called. The bible is there, the word of God is there, His saints are preaching His message, the church doors are open. It is their choice to answer the call or not.

Then there are those who were chosen. God had predestined them. He touched them on the shoulder at some stage in their life and said “Hey, you are mine. I have work for you to do” I believe he did that with me. If you read my life testimony you will see a complete life transformation. Why? Did I get sick of the life I was leading and work hard to change direction? NO! I CAME FACE TO FACE WITH THE LIVING GOD AND HAVE NEVER BEEN THE SAME SINCE!!

I pray that you are one of the chosen. If you are it is only a matter of time. If you are one of the called, answer the call. It makes absolutely no difference if you are called or chosen as long as you answer the call.

Put your life on track to spend eternity in Heaven. If you need help with this email me – Geoffcollins1@yahoo.com.au

                                                           God Bless You, Gef

Creatures of Habit

Human beings are very habitual. Being habitual is an instinctive trait. Memory builds a list of experiences that bring desired outcomes and we tend to stick to those experiences to fill our needs. Stepping into a new experience can bring rushes of adrenaline, anticipation and even stress. Don’t believe me? Just think about the extra sense of excitement when you a try a new exotic food (and then there’s sky diving!)

The thing about habits is that they can be bad or good. A golfer practices their golf swing to build muscle memory. After a while, your body can repeat your golf swing with very little conscious effort and it will be remarkably similar time after time. So why aren’t all golfers of Tiger Woods caliber? The problem is in the programming. When building the muscle memory people build in mistakes that they then repeat over and over again. It’s the golf coach that analyzes the swing and instructs about where correction is needed. The golfer must then make a lot of effort to re-program their swing as it is easier to build a new habit than renovate an old one.

In life we have also built in bad habits or had them programmed into us by people as we have grown up. We can however, change our bad habits. We can replace bad habits with good ones and fine tune our habits so that they become beneficial for ourselves and others.

A lot of smokers are successful in giving up because they replace smoking with drinking water. When they have a craving they drink a glass of water or eat candy. Instead of eating to relieve stress you can retrain yourself to go for a walk or go to the gym. Instead of waking up slowly and unhappily, depressed about the fact that you have to get up early, you can train yourself to get out of bed earlier than normal, eat your breakfast and go for a walk.

“ Many things effect your life but none as much as you.”

Take a good long look at yourself. Don’t try to change everything overnight. Choose one thing about yourself or one habit you have that is negative and work on replacing it with a habit that is positive.

Quote from ‘My name is Earl’ : “ We tried replacing cigarettes with carrot sticks but we couldn’t get em to light”

Don’t let life get you down, build yourself and others up. Amen

Another Follow Up to ‘It’s Amazing What God Will Give You If You Ask’

(I suggest you read ‘It’s Amazing What God Will Give You If You Ask’ and A Follow Up to ‘It’s Amazing What God Will Give You If You Ask’ before reading this post. They’re lower down. If you don’t I hope you get something anyway. GBU)

Not only is it not about how it feels but I also know from personal experience that God works even when we think things aren’t working. My wife’s grandfather belonged to a religion called ‘Jawi Wetan’ for most of his 70 odd years. It is similar to Buddhism in ways. He and the other people from his temple would spend the whole night meditating a few nights a week. When someone got sick or moved house or had a baby, they would meditate.

In his late 70’s he got sick and received Jesus. When he recovered he would come to church with my wife and I. Two years later, he died. I am very aware that my wife’s grandmother, who still belongs to that religion, who we convinced to come into the church instead of waiting in the car when I preached, could have been the major work God was doing on Sunday.

It happened once before, we held a retreat in 2007 and one of my wife’s cousins came to play keyboard even though he was a Muslim. He came again in 2008. After the 2008 retreat, my friend Jos and I got together to evaluate things and decided that the money we spent on the retreat could have been better spent on school fees. Long story short, then we found out that Krisma (my wife’s cousin) accepted Jesus a few days after the retreat. We are now praying and getting ready for the 2010 retreat.

Just remember it is not about you J I’ll leave you with what mother Teresa said when a reported asked her “You have had success serving so many people in India and yet there are still so many people around the world you haven’t reached, do you feel like you have failed?”

“I wasn’t called to be successful, I was called to be obedient”

2 Possibilities – 1 Response

I always used the analogy that the world was like the Titanic. It was going down and our job was to grab as many people and stick them on the ‘life boat’ as possible. Then a new train of though was presented to me and I entertained the notion that perhaps Christians will eventually work their way to the top of every area of life, politics, business, education etc.

My conclusion is that it doesn’t matter !! It doesn’t matter if the result of human greed will cause the destruction of the planet and at D-day a certain number of people will be saved and the rest will not. It doesn’t matter if eventually the entire planet will be a ‘Christian utopia’ and Jesus will descend from Heaven and thank us all for preparing the earth for His arrival.

What matters is MY response is the same :

Luke 10: 27 He answered: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and love your neighbor as yourself’

I can spend the rest of my life trying my best to do those two things. Then, if the world ends tomorrow, I am safe in the knowledge that I did all I could with the time I had available. If the earth takes my lifetime to evolve into a place where all people love God and surrender their life to Jesus, I am safe in the knowledge that I did all I could to bring that about and I have a place there.

GBU

God The Conductor

I received an sms last week from the person who runs Ada Hari Esok (There’s a Tomorrow) Orphanage. It said ‘We would appreciate it if you could attend the Christmas celebration of our orphanage next week, day/date/time’. My wife and I went last night as we took some of the kids from AHE on a retreat a few years back and have had a long standing relationship with them. We were keen to catch up with Pak Stefanus and Ibu Mona (The people who run AHE) and the kids who we hadn’t seen since the fellowships we held after the retreat.

When we got to the restaurant I saw a few familiar faces and was very happy to catch up with people. There were hundreds of people there and it turns out that it was a belated Christmas celebration for the orphanage and the church that the orphanage falls under as well as the official launching of a cd the kids from the orphanage and Ibu Mona had made with the goal of helping to financially support AHE.

There was a long sermon and we were sitting at a table with people we don’t know. Both my daughters were tired. Kellie knocked over a glass of red fanta and it spread all over the table. Chloe was a bit sick and tired and miserable and I had the thought of “This is not what I thought it would be like, why are we here ? Is there an exit door close by?”

I was pondering these thoughts when I came to the conclusion that nothing happens without a reason. I said a silent prayer of thanks to God and felt better. Pak Stefanus walked over and shook my hand and said he was glad I was there. We chatted and I asked him where a mutual friend of ours, Ronny was. He said he didn’t know. He pulled out his mobile phone to check my number and punched it in as I dictated it to him. When he finished I glanced at the screen and I saw Ronny’s name come up.

A few minutes later it sunk in that Ronny was the one who was supposed to be invite, not us. At first I felt embarrassed and then I had the thought that I wanted to get out of there ASAP. But then I remembered my prayer of a few moments before. I recalled the vivid realisation that ‘Nothing happens without a reason’.

Long story short, we caught up with the kids from the retreat and they were very, very enthusiastic to see us. They asked when the next retreat would be and were so insistent that we give an answer it convinced me to go for it and prepare another one. It may have been a miscommunication but I trust that God orchestrated everything and it taught me to lean on Him and not my own understanding and trust that ALL things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purposes.

Please pray for the ‘Shine For God’ retreat. To be had at a time to be determined.

God Bless You

Does God love you ?

Does God love you ? ………………………………………………………. Yes
Does He want to be near you ? …………………………………………. Yes
Does He know that Heaven is a better place than earth ? ………..Yes
Then why are you still here ?……….  Because you still have something to do here. It may be something to do for someone else, it may be something to do within yourself, it may be both.

May God bless your journey. Amen

Work Ethic

There are 9 people in my department and their work ethic, professionalism, ability, attitude and character are all very different. Some of them do a very superficial job and spend their day watching youtube clips and movies. Others work hard yet struggle to understand concepts and updates themselves on common practice and methodology. They are honest and hardworking but find it difficult to change their old paradigm for a new one. Then there is one who has a lot of natural talent and ability, he manages his duties and things run well but he tends to dispose of his responsibilities and fill most of his day with personal stuff.
As the head of the department I need God’s wisdom so much. What is it that God WANTS ? Yes, there is the LOGOs of His word but there is also the RHEMA for want He wants to happen in the life of every individual. I am ever aware that I am blessed to be working in a Christian organisation. When conflict and difficulty arises I find strength in the Lord and His word. When a member of our team was absent and another became disgruntled by the fact that she had to cover hi load I told her that it wasn’t fair but :
1) Remember the story of the man harvesting his crop. Some workers started in the morning, some a few hours later, some a few hours after that and some just before the work day finished. When he paid them all the same the workers who had started in the morning complained.
This story has been a great comfort to me. I have often fumed because others cruise through their day and I work as hard as I can nearly all the time. BUT I realised a few years ago is that all I need to concentrate on is myself. If you do a good job, people will know and if you do a bad job, people will know. More importantly, your father in heaven knows and WE ARE CALLED TO DO OUR WORK AS THOUGH WORKING FOR THE LORD HIMSELF.
2) The parable of the talents in Matthew 25: 14-30. We will all stand face to face with Almighty God and be called to give account for what we did with the gifts He gave to us. I don’t think “ Oh, but God, they weren’t paying me enough” or “ I would have worked harder but my bosses just didn’t inspire me enough” or ANY excuse will do.
3) Finally I leave you with a quote I live my life by :

This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.” George Bernard Shaw

Or as a friend of mine once said “ I’d rather die young from exhaustion because of serving the Lord than die old from falling over in the shower “

God Bless You !!

A Sense of Joy

Most people who know me would say I am not a very happy go lucky person. I might seem to take things seriously and never be satisfied, but they don’t know the inner me. I have always been a very intrapersonal person. I think a lot. I analyse myself and the things I do. I talk to God a lot and work on my relationship with Him. I feel regret deeply and constantly ask myself if I am inline with His plans or if I could be doing better.

I have been struggling with running a new department at work. My wife and I have recently been sick. I was cleaning the fridge on the weekend and I put a hole in the freezer so we now need to spend a fortune on a new fridge. The first rain of the rainy season came a few nights ago and our newly renovated roof LEAKS!! I was up at 2:30 in the morning moving furniture and mopping up.

And yet the dominating feeling I have had during all these events is JOY !! I know ,without a doubt, that God will see me through these problems. We don’t have enough money to fix them all instantly, hopefully we can get the roof patched up before it rains again. Hopefully we can scrape together enough for a new fridge before all our groceries go rotten. Hopefully…but if not, so what ? We are still alive !! God is still awesome !! I could be dead tomorrow but if I am not I will praise His Mighty Name !!

Someone sent me a comment a few days ago mentioning his despair because his friend is dying of cancer. We are all dying, slowly or quickly, sooner or later, how great it is to fill our days with joy instead of despair. Of course, this is easy to say when you are not faced with a dying friend but there is a lot to be said for living in the positive.

If your friend recovers, you worried for nothing. If your friend doesn’t recover, you spent your last time together worrying. I think that is what Jesus meant when he said we shouldn’t worry. There’s no point. It will end when it ends. Just do all you can to use your gifts, talents and opportunities to the fullest while you have the chance.

God Bless You, spend this day KNOWING that He loves you, His ways are higher than yours and all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purposes.