Steve Simms's Blog, page 170

Better skin?

The skin
You’re in,
Even with
Less melanin,
Is no better
Than the skin
Others are in.

To look down on, or ignore people because of the color of their skin is a major flaw in the content of our character. Judging people by the color of their skin and using that as an excuse to devalue them, was and always will be evil.

To see skin-color-based slavery as a minor flaw in a nation’s history, but present-day mask mandates as tyranny is a major misconception. There was and is nothing trivial about melanin devaluation.

Learn more about the skin you’re in. Let’s get over the skin-hierarchy thing.

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Sunshine breakthrough

Everyday, try to be the sunshine breaking through the clouds in someone’s inner storm.

Lavish kindness can banish anguish and make it vanish.

If you let other people pick out the attitudes you wear, you’ll never learn to dress yourself with your own perspectives.

You can’t save time, but you can enjoy it’s daily light before it flows out the end of the funnel.

Since the past is history it can’t be changed, but we still have a say in the history we’re making today.

The way to create a chaotic, combative, and confused culture is to communicate to everybody that they can have their own way.

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“The church,” “the Spirit,” “the blessings”

When there are thousands of disagreeing, independent denominations and churches, the phrase “the church” makes no sense.

Anything that distracts our focus from the risen Jesus, quenches the Holy Spirit. Distraction hinders the Spirit’s action.

I’m unworthy of every blessing God sends my way, yet He continually showers me with them.

Go ahead and quickly give up, anytime you’re in conflict with God.

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These tiny shorts are thoughts that matter

Attitude matters.

If you want to lift up your attitude, uplift someone else.

Encourage more often.

Compliment people.

Encouragement leads to achievement. Discouragement doesn’t.

Repentance is a self-tune-up that makes your life run better.

To choose to lose your integrity is unwise.

Guilt is a choice. You choose the behaviors that cause it.

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Fresh perceptions for stale thinking

Sometimes it’s helpful to re-point our point of view.

To be less than happy, but not unhappy enough to take corrective action is to be stuck in emotional mediocracy.

Good intentions are no excuse for bad actions. Intention matters. Why do you do, say, and think what you do?

To improve your friend retention, make it your intention, to share your views with kindness.

Our brain is tangible and physical, but our consciousness isn’t. We can’t prove it exists, but when we’re awake we’re aware of it.

Arguing with people whose intention is to prove you wrong creates many unnecessary, negative emotions.

For me God is like consciousness. I can’t scientifically prove He exists, but when I’m awake, I’m aware of Him.

To camouflage your intentions is to engage in deception.

Biblical inclusion: “There is none righteous;” “All have sinned;” “All we like sheep have gone astray.”

To begrudge someone’s blessings is to belittle your own blessings.

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How to enjoy your interior life

To enjoy your interior life embrace accurate, helpful thoughts and reject inaccurate, harmful ones. The interior life is a flowing collage of consciousness, concepts, thoughts, emotions, ideas, desires, reasoning, conscience, etc.

“It’s my life.” If you want your life to be truly yours, you must take control of your inner world.

Psychology tries to understand the inner life through intellectual analysis and research done on groups of people. Perhaps a more effective way to understand the inner life is through observing your own interior experiences and conducting your own experiments of your own inner world.

There is much about you that’s not observable from the outside. That’s your interior life. When your inner intention doesn’t match your external behavior, that’s called hypocrisy.

People can do the same thing for different reasons. Their exterior life looks the same, but their interior life’s very different.

A chaotic interior life ignores and drowns out God’s “still, small voice.” We can strive to daily align our interior life with God or choose live it in rebellion against Him. An unmanaged interior life stays overgrown with weeds and is unwelcoming to God’s spiritual seeds. You can’t align your interior life with God without humble, honest introspection and the willingness to admit where you’re off track

Genuine connection with the living Jesus occurs in the interior life, not in the exterior — “Christ in you,” not Christ around you. Jesus wants to be present and interactive inside you, not just for you to worship Him as if He is far away. If you don’t want an intimate, interior life with Jesus now, then you probably won’t enjoy being stuck with Him forever.

Interior life is often chaotic and conflicted, but ongoing, surrender to the living Jesus trains us to calm the inner storms. If Jesus isn’t continually changing and improving your interior life (your thoughts, desires, and emotions), check your connection. “Christ in you” will grow or diminish, depending on how you tend your inner garden. If you won’t hear and surrender to Jesus’ voice in your heart, hearing about Him from a preacher does little good.

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We need a humble eye, not humble pie

A humble eye learns to see things the way God sees them, not the way we see them. It sees life and all it’s amenities as undeserved gifts.

Humility has nothing to boast about. It doesn’t pretend to outsmart reality. Humility realizes and admits that our desires, feelings, and opinions may be completely off track.

Humility is the willingness to learn and to accept the truth, even when you don’t like it. It is to be open to correction and immune to rejection. To embrace humility is to be more concerned about conspiracy and deception in your own heart than in the world around you.

Humility is freedom from self-focus. It isn’t distracted with a desire for recognition, approval, or applause. Humility is the willingness to do small things that seem insignificant and to do them well.

Humility is the courage to be honest. Pride likes to hide behind lies.

Humility lets God set the rules, seeks to live by them, and openly admits any failures to do so. It believes that God loves us, not because we are lovable, but because He is loving and merciful. If you won’t learn from “Christ in you,” you surely won’t learn from a sermon.

The way
To pray
Is to say
Humble words
From the heart.

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It takes courage to think about humility

Humility is what it is. It doesn’t try to impress other people. The phrase “humble beginnings” implies humility is something to be left behind, but to abandon humility is to surrender to ego.

Humility requires being honest about your faults, and mistakes. It requires the courage to openly admit when you’re wrong and the willingness to be looked down on by other people. Humility requires the loss of self-focus.

The feeling of awe is humbling. Our human nature is only willing to experience it briefly and infrequently.

Humility is open to learn. It is open to correction. Ego believes it already has things figured out.

Humility seeks to see things as they really are, not as it wants them to be. It recognizes and openly acknowledges personal weakness, flaws, and mistakes. When ego rises, humility sets like the sun.

True self-awareness causes great humility. As Paul of Tarsus said: “O wretched man that I am.”

Humility is to consider yourself as no better than anyone else. It feels no need to have other people’s applause, appreciation, or approval. It freely abandons self-focus.

Humility overflows with appreciation, gratitude, and thanksgiving. It realizes that even its merits are flawed and need mercy. Humility never boasts.

Humility produces inner peace and freedom from anxiety. It says no to ego.

The use of logic requires humility. We have to admit that there are laws, principles, and circumstances that we can’t control.

Life begins and ends with humility. It’s a gift that we’ve done nothing to deserve. Human pride is but an illusion.

To truly have a relationship with God requires that we check our pride at the door. Christian discipleship requires humility. Ego will never fully obey God.

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You’ve got ’em (thoughts from God)

Thoughts from God aren’t hidden from you. When you don’t notice them, it’s because you’re hiding from them. If you begin to notice and focus on thoughts from God, you’ll begin to experience amazing new perspectives on life. Thoughts from God, when pondered with a tender, open heart, bear loud witness to His reality!

Humans aren’t deaf to thoughts from God, but we do tend to use selective hearing to avoid them. If you don’t want to notice thoughts from God, they’ll pass through your mind unnoticed.

God is trying to teach us by dropping thoughts into our mind, giving us flashes of inspiration, and awakening our conscience. Thoughts from God are often called “conscience” because they direct us toward good and away from bad. Will we respond to or reject God’s efforts to guide us?

Our culture believes the lie that says that people who are skeptical about God are smarter than those who believe in Him. Because pride sees thoughts from God as hindering its plans and freedom, it overlooks them. When we are living in disobedience to God, thoughts from Him are seen as unwelcome intruders. When we’re unwilling to obey God, thoughts from Him are an inconvenience.

Every human experiences thoughts from God. A prophet notices, ponders, obeys, and proclaims them. Church is a vaccine too many Christians blindly accept without question–taking sermons as truth while ignoring thoughts from God.

To admit that a thought that comes to you is from God, makes you responsible for how you respond to it. It’s easier to deny it. Many people seek noise, distraction, and activity because they help them ignore thoughts from God.

Unbelief causes people to deny or ignore the thoughts that come to their mind directly from God. People who ignore thoughts from God often think that people who focus on thoughts from God are crazy.

Thoughts from God don’t contradict what He has revealed in the Bible. However, theology, thoughts about God, should never be used as an excuse to ignore thoughts that come directly from God to your mind.

If churches trained people to notice and obey thoughts from God, Christians wouldn’t be dependent on Sunday sermons anymore. Most Christians seem to trust sermons by mere men, more than they trust the thoughts that God directly sends to their mind.

Having a strong desire to do something doesn’t make it morally right. That’s one reason we need to pay attention to thoughts from God. To claim to be a Christian without having the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22) flowing thru you is to be a branch cut off of the vine.

Secondary Christianity sees obeying Jesus as a low priority. Biblical Christianity’s focus is continually on obeying Jesus. If you don’t realize that Christ is in you, there’s a good chance He isn’t. When God deposits His thoughts in your mind, don’t ignore them.

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Thoughts from God (are common)

God is able to put thoughts in your mind. Ideas about God aren’t enough. Learn to recognize the thoughts that He sends you.

Thoughts that nudge you toward goodness, kindness, peace, and patience aren’t from yourself. They’re thoughts from God. Thoughts of gratitude and appreciation don’t originate with you. They come directly from God.

Thoughts from God are like the beauty of nature. They flood our mind, but we get so focused on self we neglect to notice them. Thoughts from God continually pass through the human brain unnoticed, not because they’re rare, but because they’re common.

Christianity teaches people thoughts about God, but too often it trains them to ignore the thoughts from God that flow through their mind. Be Spirit-led. Ask God to give you a thought. Then wait for His gift to appear. Aha!

Jesus is called “Emmanuel,” which means, “God with us.” He’s not watching us from a distance. You can hear His thoughts in you. If churches trained people to notice and obey thoughts from God, Christians wouldn’t be dependent on Sunday sermons anymore.

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