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You are here: Home / Archives for News and Feeds / Answers For Me / Dear God

Make Us Great Again

January 15, 2019 By admin

Peter and his fellow disciples wanted to script Jesus’ mission. Their goal was to have an “earthly” Messiah who would pulverize the Romans, miraculously feed people when they were hungry, and heal the sick! They wanted a flash-bang, eye-popping, miracle-working God who would make Israel great again! So you can imagine how crestfallen Peter was when Jesus started talking about His imminent death.

Jesus had refrained from talking with His followers about His death during most of His ministry because He knew they would be overwhelmed. But eventually it had to be done.

“From then on Jesus began to tell His disciples plainly that it was necessary for Him to go to Jerusalem, and that He would suffer many terrible things at the hands of the elders, the leading priests, and the teachers of religious law. He would be killed, but on the third day He would be raised from the dead. But Peter took Him aside and began to reprimand Him for saying such things. ‘Heaven forbid, Lord,’ he said. ‘This will never happen to you!’” (Matthew 16:21-22, NLT).

“Speechless with grief and amazement, the disciples listened. Christ had accepted Peter’s acknowledgment of Him as the Son of God; and now His words pointing to His suffering and death seemed incomprehensible. Peter could not keep silent. He laid hold upon His Master, as if to draw Him back from His impending doom, exclaiming, ‘Be it far from Thee, Lord: this shall not be unto Thee’” (Desire of Ages, p. 415).

How could Israel be made great again if the Messiah walked a path of humility and allowed Himself to be scorned by the religious leaders? He needed to be assertive and loudly proclaim His right to David’s throne! Jesus needed to be managed by a group of savvy PR “handlers” who could shape His image with just the right words and “media” appearances.

The strongest rebuke that Jesus ever gave was directed at one of His own followers—Peter!

“Jesus turned to Peter and said, ‘Get away from me, Satan! You are a dangerous trap to me. You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God’s’” (Matthew 16:23, NLT).

Jesus recognized that the devil was trying to use Peter to deter Him from the path He must take to be the world’s Redeemer, and He severely rebuked Peter for allowing the evil one to use him.

Spiritual greatness is not achieved through grandiose speeches, manipulative leadership techniques, or by performing supernatural wonders. Conversely, it only happens when we embrace the spirit of Jesus.

“Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though He was God, He did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, He gave up His divine privileges; He took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When He appeared in human form, He humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross” (Philippians 2:3-8, NLT).

Rich DuBose writes from Northern California.

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Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Answers for Me.

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Filed Under: Dear God, News and Feeds Tagged With: anchor points, christ, christ-jesus, humility, israel, jesus, strong leadership, took-the-humble

Highway Thoughts

January 14, 2019 By admin

“Dad, why are you pulling over?” I asked, as our blue SUV came to a stop on the side of the highway.

“The radiator’s overheated,” he replied.

I felt a knot in my stomach. We had worked too hard for this to happen. My brother Michael, a couple friends and I had been traveling for almost 18 hours straight from our college in Washington to California. Now we were driving with my dad to Leoni Meadows Camp, where 400 high school students would be arriving in a few hours for a weekend Bible retreat. Michael, Dean, Gabby and I were the band. God had given us a job to do.

Honestly, I was frustrated about the car. These sorts of things always happen when God gave us a job to do. My brother and I had made the same trek a few years earlier, and it turned out to be one of the most stressful weekends of my life. We missed our flight, took a frantic drive to another airport, had two flat tires, and a near-death experience involving a foot-long wrench whizzing by me while I stood by the side of the road. I was not ready for another one of these weekends.

We piled out of the car, and Dad checked under the hood. “Our radiator did overheat,” he confirmed. “We need water to cool it down.”

We didn’t have any with us. We needed a miracle.

We got in a circle and prayed. I hoped that God would provide, but, secretly, I didn’t see a way out of this mess.

We glanced around and noticed a little stream down the bank by the side of the road, complete with a break in the fence to provide access to it. We found an empty water jug in the trunk of the car and used it to fill the radiator with fresh, cool water, and a few minutes later Dad decided to see if the car would start. I paid attention, hopeful that this would be the miracle we had asked for.

My dad turned the key… and nothing.

I felt dejected. And slightly unsurprised. After our escapade two years ago, I kind of expected we’d be stuck here forever.

With nothing left to do except wait, we decided to run through the songs for that night. But as we started singing the last song, something inside of me felt different.

We sang the words, “Our God is greater / our God is stronger / God you are higher than any other / our God is healer / awesome in power/ our God,” but it didn’t feel like practice. I felt connected to God in a way that I hadn’t felt before. I didn’t even think about our situation, I just let the worry go. For those five minutes, it was all about God.

When we finished Dad tried the key one more time. We heard an unexpected sound – the engine starting – and suddenly I knew that I had just witnessed something amazing. Our God really is greater than whatever is working against us. He’s bigger than our secrets, our fears, and our bad attitudes. And that day I learned that he wants nothing more than to take care of us.

Heather Bradley-Robbins writes from the Pacific Northwest.

The post Highway Thoughts appeared first on Answers for Me.

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Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Answers for Me.

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Filed Under: Dear God, News and Feeds Tagged With: airport, answers for me, bible, car trouble, god's leading, leoni-meadows, road, road travel, sang-the-words, story-harvest, under-the-hood

Dying with Dignity

January 10, 2019 By admin

Dr. Death (Jack Kevorkian) made headlines in the 1980s with his beliefs about euthanasia. In a 1998 article, he admitted to helping more than 130 people to end their lives. Not everyone was appalled by Kevorkian’s thoughts about assisted suicide, though.

In the early 1990s, I was a reporter for a small-town newspaper and interviewed Derek Humphry, who founded the Hemlock Society. His book, Final Exit, provided information to dying people to aid them in dying. His society and his book also supported legislation permitting physician-assisted suicide. It was an interesting interview and a subsequent article — showing both sides of the debate.

Since 1994, three states have enacted Death with Dignity laws: Oregon, Washington, and Vermont. These laws allow mentally competent, terminally-ill adult state residents to voluntarily request and receive a prescription medication to hasten their death.

Mom and I used to talk that when her time came to die, and she was suffering with no hope for recovery, that I would assist her in dying. It was just talk and we didn’t really believe it was possible. But there is a way to legally let health-care workers know a person’s wishes when they are beyond the ability to verbalize those wishes. My mother had an Advance Health Care Directive (aka Living Will), that she had prepared long before she became terminally ill, enabling my brother to “pull the plug” when she was put on life-support — her wish, all legal.

An Advance Health Care Directive provides a clear statement of wishes about your choice to prolong your life or to withhold or withdraw treatment. “Pull the plug” sounds harsh, but we were so clear about her wishes, that we knew we were doing the compassionate act.

She also had an updated will, a durable power of attorney for finances, and had fully paid for cremation services. A pre-nuptial agreement with my step-father left no question of her wishes. We children were, of course, saddened by her passing, but we were never confused about final arrangements.

Planning for end of life — even if you believe there’s no need — is what I consider “dying with dignity.” It also makes your mourning family grateful for your foresight.

For additional information about end-of-life decisions, visit here. Also, if you’re concerned about the cost of these documents, I got mine at a reasonable cost from LegalZoom.com.

Dixie Litten Whited writes from Virginia.

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Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Answers for Me.

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Filed Under: Dear God, News and Feeds Tagged With: advance-health, answers for me, compassionate, dying with dignity, end of life, jack kevorkian, news and feeds, pull-the-plug, these-documents, wishes

Alpha and Omega

January 9, 2019 By admin

I enjoy seeing a need and starting a group or service for that. I am a pretty great starter. Yet I am coming to the end of one of my life ministries. I have facilitated a women’s support group in my city for about 12 years. Funding for my work has disappeared and the group members aren’t able to pay to attend. I remember when I first started a support group and the pastor at that location mentioned that he had been taught that ministries often run active for about five years. So this is well overdue by those standards.

In our last session one of the group members was troubled about needing to end a draining friendship with someone who refuses to change. I tried to encourage her that sometimes there are “necessary endings” for all of us–divorce, death, moves, job loss, separation from unhealthy or damaging relationships.

I have noticed some of my Facebook friends have been pruning their friend lists and dropping those who don’t contribute, don’t play nice, or don’t match their interests. When we have limited time, energy, resources and life–pruning in some way is necessary for the health of an institution or a person. Author Dr. Henry Cloud states: “To hold on to ‘hope’ when what you really have is merely a wish is to fail to grasp reality.”* He also reminds us that the past is the best predictor of future behavior as relates to relationships.

Jesus modeled and taught the necessity of endings. After he made some very plain and pointed statements, many of his early disciples walked away (John 6:66). We have no record that Jesus ran after the deserters or that he knocked on doors that evening to beg them to return. Later Jesus told his mission-driven disciples that if they weren’t welcomed in towns or homes, to “shake the dust off your feet” and leave (Matthew 10:11-14). Time came when Jesus ended his earthly mission for the next step in our salvation and redemption (Mark 16:19, 20).

The loss of a meaningful or time-consuming activity– one driven with passion and prayer, can lead to some grief or aimlessness. It can also open ways for other people to find their mission and create new services as God leads. Letting go can open up space previously occupied in our hearts.

Books, movies, series, classes, cereal boxes, bank accounts–everything ends.

In so many ways I am in the school of learning to become a gracious “ender.” I am left with mixed feelings about something that I still feel is important and not duplicated in my community. If I am honest, I feel sadness, anger, some relief, and anticipation at this ending. What

might happen next? At ending times, can I trust God to help re-shape my life and legacy, and make good use of my remaining time and talents?

Questions for personal journaling or group discussion:

1. When have you benefited from an ending?
2. What/whom might you be hanging onto that needs to end?

Karen Spruill writes from Florida.

The post Alpha and Omega appeared first on Answers for Me.

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Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Answers for Me.

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Filed Under: Dear God, News and Feeds Tagged With: city, deserters, facebook, health, jesus, life, mission, necessity, personal, seasons, shake-the-dust

Highway to My Heart

January 8, 2019 By admin

It was a beautiful, sunny day. I had the music up, the window rolled down, and was tapping my finger on the steering wheel as I cruised along the highway. The Christian radio station I was tuned in to started another praise-worship song that I liked. Suddenly, in my mind, the focus of the song flipped. My eyes welled up with tears, and I had to pull off to the side of the road …

Rewind << I was nine years old when I first stepped into the baptismal tank, along with several other students from my school. We had studied all the beliefs and doctrines of the church; but, at least for me, the knowledge had reached my head, but not really touched my heart.

Life carried on. I went on through high school, college, and began a career and a family. I wasn’t rebellious — outwardly. I was ‘good’ and was attending church regularly. My kids were in church. My wife and I volunteered with various church ministries. Yet, something (Someone) was missing.

Skip Forward >> Now, parked along the side of the highway, with tears streaming down my face, I really heard the lyrics for the first time. It was as if Jesus was singing this song directly to me!

Draw me close to you
never let me go
I’d lay it all down again
to hear you say that I’m your Friend

You are My desire
no one else will do
’cause nothing else could take your place
to feel the warmth of your embrace
Help me find the way
[to] bring me back to you

You’re all I want
You’re all I’ve ever needed
You’re all I want
Help me know you are near

He desired me! He needed me! The warmth of His embrace enveloped me …

Jesus still desires, needs, and embraces me today, and I Him!

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Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Answers for Me.

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Filed Under: Dear God, News and Feeds Tagged With: along-the-side, answers for me, christian, conviction, friend, highway, jesus, music, story-harvest, streaming-down, students

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