Steve Simms's Blog, page 144

Is a church benediction a traitor to true worship?

We need benediction-free worship–interaction with Jesus that never ends. Church benedictions seem to put the brakes on God by saying, “The spiritual part’s over, now get on with your life.”

If you worship the glorious God who never ends, it’s misleading to declare a benediction that’s says the time for worship’s over. Church benedictions are a fancy way to say, “The end.” They aren’t true. “We are now done with worship.” Never! Worship is an ongoing lifestyle.

Perhaps the benediction is a tool to protect our addiction to avoiding God. It helps us draw near to God with our words but keep our heart away from His ongoing control.

How a benediction is often perceived: “Church is over now so you can ignore God until next Sunday.” It can be a polite way to close the door on God.

The truth is that Christian spirituality has no closure–no on and off button. If it’s not ongoing it’s substandard. It’s based on continual dependency on Jesus, not on closure.

Religious control or religious chaos are not the only choices for Christianity. Spirit-directed meetings that train people to live an ongoing, Spirit-led lifestyle are the forgotten option.

And now for the benediction . . . (I’m not giving one. Instead, stay focused on the living Jesus both day and night.)

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God’s free elevator ride

I believe that God’s salvation is like an elevator ride from the basement to the top floor of a huge skyscraper. Jesus is my elevator. I got in Christ years ago. I’m abiding in Christ now and if I don’t step out of Christ on the wrong floor, I’ll arrive in the future at God’s penthouse on top of the building.

Grace opens the door for me to have a relationship with God. Faith is how I walk out that relationship every day.

Faith abandoned isn’t faith. It’s unbelief. Don’t stop before the top!

Christian community matters. Jesus builds His community thru Spirit-led interaction when Christ-followers gather to hear and obey His voice. By gathering as Jesus’ town meeting and all being led by the Spirit as we serve and encourage one another, we strengthen our faith and help each other stay close to the risen Jesus.

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“My Lord & my God!” Whew!

“My Lord and my God!” Like Jesus’ disciple Thomas, reason can’t resolve my doubts, but encounter can. The more I open my heart to experience the risen Jesus, the more I’m astounded, undone, and overwhelmed by Him. I don’t understand the theology of it all, but I bask in Christ as He lives in me and fills me with the hope of glory.

Another Thomas, Thomas of Aquinas who lived in the 1200s, spent his life trying to rationally explain God. He is known as one of the greatest theologians in church history. Late in life he went to a monastery and had an amazing encounter with the living God. Afterwards he is quoted as saying, “All that I have written seems to me so much straw after the things that have been revealed to me.”

Biblical Christianity requires much more than theology. It requires direct revelation from God. Like Jesus told Peter: “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.” If you want to know who Jesus is, open your heart to Him. One peep of His voice. One glimpse of His glory can change your life forever. Listen to and behold the Lamb of God!

Live by God’s Spirit, not by your own desires. When Christians live in God’s Spirit, they’re united. When they don’t, they aren’t. When the body of Christ gathers under the direct Headship and direction of the risen Jesus, it becomes His town meeting (ekklesia).

Intellect has no answers for evil

Human intellect has no solution for the problem of evil.

Truth to inspire:
Having a desire
Doesn’t require
That what you want
Transpire.

I continually resist and fight to reject society’s brain washing. Instead, I ask God to bathe my mind with His hope and compassion.

When people surrender to wrongful desires and emotions, they try to hide their shame by grasping for rationalizations and excuses. If people worked hard resisting their negative desires and emotions instead of resisting their conscience, they’d be far better off. Because of Jesus, you no longer have to be controlled by your desires and feelings. Instead, you can be led by God’s Spirit.

If you think you’ve got God figured out, your thinking isn’t adding up! To talk to God but refuse to listen to Him is human pride demonstrating unfairness.

To overcome fear
Shift your life
Into God’s gear
So you can hear
And obey His voice.

If you find life
To be a bore
Or a chore,
Let Jesus
Restore
Your joy.

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An overlooked Christian challenge

One of Christianity’s greatest challenges is to let the resurrected Jesus’ literally demonstrate His supremacy when His body gathers! “He is the Head of the body, the church (in Greek “ekklesia”–the participatory town meeting in ancient Greek city-states) . . . so that in everything He might have the supremacy.”

When Christ-followers gather to actively surrender to Jesus’ supremacy, He will actually take the reins and begin to reign in their midst as they all listen to His inner voice and then as each person says and does whatever Jesus prompts them to. It’s amazingly encouraging to let Jesus take the literal headship of and directly control a gathering of His body.

When I see Jesus in action, demonstrating the reality of His presence by directly leading and manifesting through ordinary people, my eyes light up with awe as my awareness of the risen Jesus’ grows in my vision. Whenever that happens, it’s the ekklesia (church) that Jesus is building.

By connecting heart-to-heart with the living Jesus and seeking to maintain that vital connection throughout each day, my awareness of His presence grows. By continually opening my heart to other people and seeing my interactions with them as Christ-connections that I need to literally allow Him to lead by obeying His inner promptings, I behold the living Jesus working on them and/or in them and I get a taste of His glory!

Here’s the challenge of ekklesia: Listen inside your heart and follow the risen Guide together with other believers. Love abandons self-focus.

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Good streaming can silence your mind’s screaming

Since Jesus is the truth, dishonesty and deception distance us from Him and distort His voice within us. Stream truth and flow with light. To live fully in the light we need to continually, humbly, and courageously be “speaking the truth in love,” streaming truth both within ourselves and to others.

Without the conviction (light) of God’s Spirit, darkness falsely tries to convince me that I see. Deception from the dominion of darkness diminishes my vision and sometimes I mistakenly think I’m right when I’m wrong. Admitting my own sinfulness and my ongoing need to be rescued from darkness, I’m learning search for and stream God’s inner light–the living, resurrected Jesus Christ.

When darkness
Is screaming
In your head
There’s bad
Supernatural streaming
Going on.

When you’re streaming
The presence of Jesus
Your face will be beaming
With His light.

In Christ’s body
All members
Need to be
Directly led
By Jesus
The Head.

To keep supernatural music
In my soul,
I stream
Jesus’ voice
And He makes me whole.

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Golfers, skiers, and life

When you swing
On a tee,
Or step on a slope
To ski,
Or try to live free,
If you don't
Choose to focus
You'll fail.

In golf, skying, and life, you can’t control the hazards, but you can call the shots. You can increase and develop your skills for living.

On a golf course and in life, peaceful swings are more potent than panicked swings. Instead of letting life’s downward pull defeat you, be like a skier & let it propel you on a joyous ride.

Life pays the green fee, but you have to swing the club. Life pays for the lift ticket, but you have steer down the slope.

Church is like the ski lodge or the club house. Its purpose should be to empower people to hit the slopes and play the course.

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The beatitudinal cycle of prayer

I woke up with this thought on my mind today: “For relief beyond belief: Instead of forcing yourself to believe–receive and perceive the presence of Jesus.” I think that’s the key to heart-felt prayer. It freely flows from the risen Jesus living inside us. “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” It streams from Jesus’ love manifesting in and through us.

The Beatitudes shine light on the blessedness of that kind of prayer. Effectual, fervent prayer begins with such poverty of spirit that we mourn and become meek (pliable to the leading of the Spirit). Then we hunger and thirst for righteousness so much that we continually cry out to the living God for His presence and power, emptying our heart of all bitterness and unforgiveness. We continually let God’s presence fill and purify our heart as we make peace with Him and with others. When we’re opposed, we let that opposition bring us back to poverty of spirit and we repeat the beatitudinal cycle.

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Salvation isn’t a business transaction–it’s a heart dance

Once when I was praying, these words came to my heart: “The worst condition a person can be in is to think they’re saved (and a Christ-follower) when they’re not.” Someone has said, “The Gospel is actually knowing God. ” It’s not just knowing about Him.  If I think I’m saved when, I’m not, I’ll settle into a false sense of religious security based on my knowledge about Jesus and unintentionally substitute my knowledge about Him for a humble, submitted growing relationship with Him.

The more I get to personally know the living Jesus, the more I realize that my knowledge about Him is rather sketchy. The more I love Him and surrender to His will, the less need I feel to try to figure out all the theological details about Him. Instead, I prefer to bask in His presence and get lost in His splendor and wonder!

I continually invite the Holy Spirit to lead me so that I can know, experience, surrender to, and obey the risen Jesus better. I continually experience this beatitude: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness . . .” Although I have an M.Div. degree and have spent all my adult life daily reading the Bible and more Christian books than I can count, my informational knowledge about God is minimal, but my heart continually dances with joy in His presence.

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Freedom! True deliverance doesn’t require dueling banjos

Your inner imagery influences your perception of your life. Embrace hopeful inner images. Resist and reject harmful ones.

The more honest you are, the closer you are to freedom. The more you lie, the more you’re trapped in bondage. It’s amazing how much mental, emotional, chemical, and spiritual bondage there is in “the land of the free.”

There’s a powerful alternative to being controlled by your desires. It’s being led by the presence and power of God’s Spirit. Jesus taught His followers to pray, “deliver us from evil.” Christians need to demonstrate freedom from evil thoughts and desires.

Christians should be both an example and an agent of deliverance. We should be living free from bondage to wrongful desire and setting others free. If you want to be free from self-imposed bondage, let your heart connect with and surrender to the living Jesus! When Christians settle for bondage, they deny the delivering power of the risen Jesus. Are you denying the Lord?

Jesus came, lived, died, and rose to set His followers free from bondage to self and to dominating desires. Deliverance from controlling desires comes from heart connection with the risen Jesus. Bondage to desire comes from self-focus. If Jesus has set you free, why are you still hanging out inside a prison cell?

When I say,
“Jesus deliver me,”
He hands me
The key
And says,
“Go and be
Set free!”

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