Transformed Mind

1 John 1:5-2:10 5 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6  If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. 1 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world. 3 And by this we know that we have come to...

13 That very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, 14 and they were talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15 While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. 16 But their eyes were kept from recognizing him.   Let me stop right there. What was wrong with their eyes? They didn’t recognize him? Seriously? These were two of Jesus’ disciples. Theologians have many explanations, but as I was thinking about it I thought, “How many times do I tune out that which is right in front of me?” I’m particularly good at filtering out crying babies, which is pretty handy on flights. Or maybe think back to your school days where your mind drifts into a long day dream and you completely miss the entire content of the class. Deeper though, think about a time when there’s been suffering in your life, in that gut-wrenching place of grief, disillusionment, and darkn...

  Valentines Day & Ash Wednesday (Feb 14), an interesting combo of holydays this year. Valentines Day of course we think of love and romance, a time to express emotions, hand out little cards, boxes of chocolates, and for some reason a fat baby with wings and a bow and arrow. Love in scripture goes deeper than some of the superficiality we get on the commercialized day of Valentine, for it proclaims, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent, a time of self denial, fasting, prayer, and the giving of oneself to contemplate God’s ultimate act of love that culminates on Good Friday. It’s a time to think of our own mortality. During the imposition of ashes whereby a person makes the sign of the cross on the recipients forehead you may hear the words, “All are from dust, and to dust all return.” It’s a sobering thought. And working in a hospital I really think about this quite a bit, deat...

"You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life." - John 5:39-40  Book of Kells image Jesus here is talking to the Pharisees, the religious folk of his time and isn't too happy with their arrogant blindness. It's the equivalent of being a PhD in political science, writing articles for professional journals about current political affairs, pouring into students the knowledge you've obtained and then one day a living US president walks in and you have no idea who they are. He says, "Don't you know who I am I'm the one you've been writing articles about, those economic policies were my doing, everything that's right with this country has my fingerprints on it. My staff have been pushing my agenda for years to get things done." And nothing, you're clueless. You actually think this guy is pulling your chain ...

1 The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?  2 When evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh, my adversaries and foes, it is they who stumble and fall.  3 Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I will be confident.  4 One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple.   David knew conflict/adversity since a boy. At the taunts of Goliath the Philistine he courageously said, "let no man's heart fail because of him, your servant will go and fight with this Philistine." And from that day on he was a fierce man of battle, brutal hand to hand combat where your opponents blood was ever in your presence, think Game of Thrones or Braveheart, it was as intimate as one could get in the taking...

"For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers." - Galatians 1:11-14    Pretty amazing stuff. Paul didn't have to confer with others about the gospel, he met Jesus on the road to Damascus. He experienced truth incarnate, the word of God made flesh, and forever changed. How about you, what's your story of transformation if any? Paul here before being blindsided by the risen Jesus thought he was on the right track in life. He tried to literally destroy the church. Just look at Acts where Stephen is stoned to death... "Then they cast him out ...

Listen to full sermon here (Scroll down to …from Restless to Fulfilled)  http://journeyqueens.com/podcasts/overwhelmed/ So here we now come, to the meat of Paul’s prayer, and what does he pray for, he prays, “that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.” Just like Jesus didn’t come to make bad people good, but to make dead people alive, because in all seriousness we are all dead in our sin without Jesus’ redemptive work on the cross, so like that, he did not come from heaven to make our external circumstances; jobs, relationships, health, perfect, but to change us from the inside out, to completely gut our inner being, to utterly destroy that selfish ‘meism.’ I don’t need a better job, more stuff, a better wife, husband, girlfriend, boyfriend, or the like; I need a new me. I need God, according to his vast, immeasurable, unend...

As Paul writes this letter to the church in Ephesus, things are not going well in that metropolis of trade and shipping. The church there is experiencing fear AND hostility. Culturally, Ephesus was a strong city that had many marks of a bustling metropolis of the ancient world. Its harbor provided shipping and trading opportunities and its former claim to fame, the Temple of Artemis, still provided opportunity for local artisans to profit by making idols, little silver and wood statues. Paul’s teaching about Jesus though turned people from and against idol worship and therefore deprived these artisans from their source of income. In the Book of Acts one of these artisans, Demetrius, states,  Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth. And you see and hear that not only in Ephesus but in all of Asia this Paul has persuaded and turned away a great many people, saying that gods made with hands are not gods. So things are bleak as persecution persists against the ...

“Everywhere things are troubling and uneasy - wars and rumours of war: perhaps not the final hour but certainly times most evil. Nevertheless, the Apostle again and again bids us "Rejoice." Nature herself bids us to do so, the very face of the earth being now renewed, after its own manner, at the start of Spring. I believe the men of this age think too much about the state of nations and the situation of the world…We are not kings, we are not senators. Let us beware lest, while we torture ourselves in vain about the state of Europe, we neglect either Verona or Oxford. In the poor man who knocks at my door, in my ailing mother, in the young man who seeks my advice, the Lord Himself is present: therefore let us wash His feet." This was a quote from famed author of The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, Mere Christianity, and of course the Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis. Though in this quote he was reflecting about the state of the world in 1947, Lewis had also fough...

1 Kings 13  (Read First!) Introduction How easily do those we see as leaders, experts, and colleagues deceive us? How many of you remember back in 2011 when Harold Camping predicted the end of the world and many of his followers and others sold all of their possessions actually thinking the end was coming. Or how many of you have heard that God will not give you more than you can handle? The thing is, intentions and sincerity do not necessitate or require truth. Both the above examples were and are false. We are to live by God’s word and His truth alone. But I’ll come back to that. Let’s delve into this story… Original Meaning So in this passage we have a king named Jeroboam and a couple of prophets. To give you a little background Jeroboam was a servant of King Solomon who oversaw the forced labor that built the Temple and other buildings in Jerusalem. What happened prior to this passage was that Solomon had greatly sinned by whoring after his wives’, yes wives, as in more t...

Everywhere things are troubling and uneasy - wars and rumours of war: perhaps not the final hour but certainly times most evil. Nevertheless, the Apostle again and again bids us "Rejoice." Nature herself bids us to do so, the very face of the earth being now renewed, after its own manner, at the start of Spring. I believe the men of this age (and among them you Father, and myself) think too much about the state of nations and the situation of the world. . . .We are not kings, we are not senators. Let us beware lest, while we torture ourselves in vain about the state of Europe, we neglect either Verona or Oxford. In the poor man who knocks at my door, in my ailing mother, in the young man who seeks my advice, the Lord Himself is present: therefore let us wash His feet. – C.S. Lewis The world is continuing to spin into chaos, which is fine because God is sovereign. Take what’s in front of you and do your best with it. It’s the small things in life that make the greatest imp...