Steve Simms's Blog, page 130

God’s holy fire (Mt Carmel to Emmaus to you)

Our watered-down hearts
Need to be set ablaze
By the living words
Of the risen Jesus
So that they
Burn within us
Like they did
In the brothers
On the road
To Emmaus,
Red-hot,
Not luke-warm.
Be like Elijah.
Ask God for heart-fire
And let it make you
A living sacrifice–
A spreader of
God’s glory
Everywhere you go.
Fall prostrate and cry,
“The Lord–He is God!”
Jesus, the one
Who answered
The Emmaus brothers
By words on fire,
Will do the same
For you!

When the members of the body of Christ have been trained to meet as passive spectators not much happens. We need God’s fire.

For the spiritual
Adventure of your life
Step beyond
The rigid religious forms
That shut down spontaneity.
Then dip yourself
Into Jesus’ serendipity.

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Christ-followers are called to glory today, not just in Heaven

True glory is the presence of God. God’s splendor, majesty, might, brightness, awesomeness, perfection, and holiness so infinitely transcend human comprehension and belief that when we glimpse them (even faintly), we stand undone in amazement and call it His glory.

Hearts that are tender, meek, and poor in spirit can sense God’s glory everywhere. “The heavens declare the glory of God.” “Christ in you” is “the hope of glory.” Life was never intended to be lived unaware of and apart from God’s glory. However, “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”

The death of Jesus ripped the veil in the temple. When people turn to the risen Lord His blood tears the veil in our heart so that we can behold the Lamb of God. Then we can grow daily in our awareness and experience of God’s glorious presence as we learn to be directly and inwardly led by the Spirit.”

The ministry of the Spirit” is even more glorious than the glory that was on Moses’ face after He encountered the presence of God. The glory on Moses faded, yet even that fading glory was too much for unredeemed people to behold, so the Israelites demanded that Moses cover his face with a veil. That veil still remains in fallen human hearts but is taken away when we turn to the Lord. Then begins the calling to and the anointing for the lifetime journey and process of salvation and sanctification–being continually transformed from within (not reformed by rules or human effort) into the image of God from glory to glory.

The living resurrected Jesus is “the way” (“the narrow path”) to that journey. To surrender your will to Him and to actively follow and obey Him daily is the key to being “led by the Spirit” and to living in the “surpassing glory” of “the ministry of the Spirit.” Take “the keys of the kingdom” and unlock your heart and life to be enthralled by and possessed by the glory of God and the absolute Lordship of Jesus Christ.

Modern Christianity has an abundance of exalted experts at giving religious explanations but far too few exhilarating examples of Spirit-led discipleship. Christ in a programmed sanctuary service can seem pretty stuffy, but Christ in real life interaction is powerfully transformative.

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Religious transaction vs. heart-interaction with God

Christianity as
Heart-expression
Is different than
Christianity as
An organization.

Transactional religion is mind-based analysis built on human logic and reasoning. It tends to be cold, calculated, and contained. Analytical theology (the study of God and His revelation in the past–scholasticism) is transactional. (Our study, or sermon-hearing, is exchanged for the idea that we understand God.)

Transcendent faith is living, heart-felt interaction with the risen Jesus. It is passionate, life-changing, and ongoing. Direct, personal revelation from God is transcendent. It goes infinitely beyond mere human perception into experiencing God and being changed “from glory to glory.”

St. Thomas Acquinas was the leading proponent of scholasticism in the medieval period of church history and shaped much of Roman Catholic theology. He spent most of his life attempting to explain everything theologically in a massive book he called Summa Theologica. Towards the end of his life, Acquinas went on a retreat in a monastery. When he emerged, he said something like (the quotes vary): “All I have written seems like straw compared to what has now been revealed to me.”

There’s a famine of Spirit-led, heart-healing, holiness-empowering Christianity in the land. Much that’s called Christianity has become self-focused, pleasure-seeking, and sin-excusing. Modern Christianity has an abundance of exalted experts at giving religious explanations but far too few exhilarating examples of discipleship. Transactional religion has replaced transcendent faith.

Revelation matters! Transcendence transcends transactional theology and makes it “like straw.” Open our eyes, Lord!

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The Reformation was incomplete. Transformation needed!

Reformation changes “form” (behavior, structure, appearance, and/or organization). Transformation goes beyond “form” to presence (“with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord”). It changes the heart–the inner essence.

500 years ago, the Reformation made some changes in the “form” of how church was led by human leaders, but it didn’t go beyond form and transform church into the Spirit-controlled body of Christ with the living Jesus as the Head, the Senior Pastor (“that Great Shepherd of the sheep”). The Greek word used in the New Testament to describe Spirit-directed gatherings of the body of Christ is “ekklesia” (which was the name of the participatory town meeting in Greek cities). Reformation reshapes church a bit. Transformation makes it Spirit-led ekklesia again.

Let Christian worship follow the presence of the risen Jesus, not a program. Because Jesus speaks directly to each member of His body, He needs no chain of command. Let no person or thing distract a gathering of the body of Christ from His presence and glory.

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Be fresh / be original! (This’ll help.)

Be a creative writer–an original. You can do so much more than just quote, repeat, or borrow other people’s ideas.

Try to say
Something positive
Today
That’s never been said
In the very same way.

I like quotes,
But not simply
Quoting.
I use quotes
As springboards
To inspire me
To write
Original statements.

I like to
Take a platitude,
Change the words,
And try to launch it
To a new altitude.

Here’s a creative writing exercise:
Find a fresh, creative way
To say,
“Reinvent the wheel:“

“Rock the rollers,”“Create a new kind of tire.”“Engineer another device for a car to roll on.”“Redesign the way a vehicle moves.”“Come up with a sequel for the wheel.”“Redesign a car so that it walks on legs.”“Reengineer a car to bounce on springs.”“Make a car that glides on air.”
(Now it’s your turn to come up with something.)[image error]Pexels.com" data-medium-file="https://stevesimms.files.wordpress.co..." data-large-file="https://stevesimms.files.wordpress.co..." src="https://stevesimms.files.wordpress.co..." alt="" class="wp-image-32506" />Photo by Tim Mossholder on Pexels.com

Christianity unapplied is Christianity denied

Christianity
Applied
Is to let
The risen
Jesus
Reside
Inside
And be
Your inner
Guide.

Anything
That tells
Or compels
You to quench
The Holy Spirit
Is contrary
To God.

If you never overflow with heart-felt expressions of faith in and love for Jesus, there may be a kink in your spiritual hose. Spirit-prompted expressions of love for Jesus that flow from the heart reveal glimpses of God’s glory. Christ-followers need to gather to hear and obey the Holy Spirit’s promptings, not to hinder the Spirit.

Trying to circumvent God doesn’t vent your heart. It makes it stale and prevents your conscience from leading you to fresh air.

You can’t be led by God’s Spirit if you ignore, hinder, or circumvent His inner promptings. Anytime you dim Christ’s inner light you move closer to darkness. Every time you circumvent your conscience, you jump over a guardrail. Anything that hinders you from being the person God wants you to be is sin.

Put your trust and attention on Christ working in you, not on preachers and singers. Church is too often seen as Christianity express–a one-stop, quick fix for your spiritual needs and/or religious obligations.

Christ came to make me His temple, turning over my tables and powerfully working in me. I try to make room for Him and not to block His way.

Until Christ in you
Is allowed to shine
His glorious inner light,
You’ll only see
With human sight.

A pure heart
Is transparent.
It’s nature
Is apparent.

Compassionate sensitivity (life’s ignored superpower)

It takes inner strength to maintain a sensitive heart. The weak attempt to protect their heart by hardening it. Compassionate sensitivity is life’s ignored superpower! Heart-felt caring works miracles!

When life seems heartless, refuse to let it make you heartless. If you refuse to see yourself as a victim, you’ll have the strength not to harden your heart.

To be compassionately sensitive is to be in touch with the caring part of your heart. Any society that trains people to shut down their compassionate sensitivity becomes cold and hard. Maybe we can’t fix people’s problems, but we can care enough to listen to their pain.

The willingness to feel intensely isn’t a sign of weakness. It’s the courage to open your heart to compassion. If you can’t care about and have compassion for people who see things differently than you do, your heart is too hard.

Desensitized people like to tell people, “You’re too sensitive.” If you’re not sensitive to your conscience, you’ll get into (and cause) much more trouble than you need to.

Compassionate sensitivity is slow to take offense because it’s acutely aware that people who hurt people are driven by pain. Being quick to take offense isn’t sensitivity. It’s pride.

There’s nothing brave about refusing to care about other people. Christianity, without a sensitized heart, tends to focus on religious formulas rather than on being attuned to the living Jesus.

When people are sensitized
To God’s Spirit,
They become inwardly wise,
Connected heart-to-heart,
And de-institutionalized.

My father on his 85th birthday. He had the superpower of compassionate sensitivity.

Jesus “led captivity captive”

Gravity’s invisible force keeps my feet on the ground. Jesus’ invisible force lifts me up with hope and encouragement. He captivates me with His glory!

The Holy Spirit is teaching me that the goal of His teaching me isn’t to impart information but to propagate His radical transformation in me by creating in me an ever-growing hunger and thirst for righteousness and the willingness to surrender to and obey His will by letting Him live unhindered in and through me every moment of every day. I long to learn to fully and continually let go and let Jesus!

God has had me spending time reading and pondering 2 Corinthians 3. He’s been teaching me that the “hope of glory” isn’t just “the hope of all the glorious things to come,” but also the hope of glory now, in this life, today. Yes, in this very moment. In 2 Corinthians 3, Paul describes the glory that was on Moses’ face and then says that the ministry of the Spirit is even more glorious. He calls it “the surpassing glory” and says that we are now experiencing “ever increasing glory.” Christ-followers aren’t supposed to just hope to cope in this life. We’ve been supernaturally empowered to live each day with the expectation that we will encounter, actualize, and actuate God’s glory all day long!

Beware of preachers who seldom mention Jesus in their sermons or who present Him as mere theology instead of as living reality. They can lead you into spiritual captivity.

Freedom is the ability to resist and to overcome destructive desires. Captivity is being controlled and dominated by them.

When any desire is allowed to override rationality, conscience, and self-control it opens the door to demonic captivity. Blame and bitterness are the chains of emotional captivity.

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Cultivate a great desire for inner peace

Good or bad,
The habits
You cultivate
Create
Your life.

If you don’t cultivate
Your inner environment
It will deviate
Into chaos.

To cultivate
Peace of mind,
Regulate
Your thoughts
To align
With God’s design.

If you won’t cultivate your mind and heart, ugly weeds will overgrow your inner landscape. A garden of humility, when neglected, is quickly overgrown by the weeds of pride. When weeds fill your heart it’s a sign of your apathy and neglect.

Good plants need to be intentionally cultivated in your heart. Bad ones will grow naturally. You can learn to cultivate and maintain an inner positive environment no matter how negative things appear around you.

When you cultivate the treasures within you, the treasures around you lose much of their appeal. Never cultivate hate. Nip it in the bud. If you don’t want something in your life, don’t cultivate it.

The best way to teach is to cultivate someone’s desire to learn. True education isn’t a memory filled with facts. It’s a mind trained with wisdom and a heart filled with wonder.

Any nation
That cultivates hate
Creates a fate
Of much violence.

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Be a faith adventurer

Faith adventurers are Christ-following disciples who go beyond the rope that marks the boundary of shallow religious boxes and begin to flow on the depths with the risen Jesus. They let go of the bottom and trust the buoyancy of Jesus’ living water to keep them afloat.

When life is getting over your head, the living Head of the body of Christ can always keep your head above water even when you can’t touch the bottom. You don’t need to constantly cling to the rope that marks the end of the shallow water. Trust in His buoyancy, the upward overflow of His inner geysers of living water, to carry you safely in the refreshing thrill of His deep-water-will for you. Let go and let Jesus. Cling to the risen Jesus as your lifesaver ring and ride His current wherever He wants to take you.

There’s so much more than self in the depth of my inner scenery. The living Jesus fills the landscape inside me.

Church is too often the lid that prevents the Holy Spirit from overflowing, but the body of Christ should be the fountain of the Spirit’s flowing. Churches dissect the body of Christ cutting it into a multitude of independent religious organizations.

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