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Disc Error

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“Bad master disc!” This announcement in the window of my CD multi-duplicator sent a shiver down my back. After spending an hour of recording time, mixing down the track, and finalizing the master, I wasn’t fully prepared to swallow the tragic news that all my hard work might be wasted. I spent the next hour and a half doing what I could to reclaim and recover the material that was on the master disc.

A “bad master disc” contains material that is damaged, and it was only after I re-vamped, revised, and re-structured another disc with untainted material that I was able to begin duplicating CDs once again. I breathed a sigh of relief as the duplicator ejected usable copies of the material I had worked so hard to produce.

I’ve reflected on this experience more than once, and I always seem to gravitate back to the same thought: Our spiritual lives can often mirror this idea of possessing “good” or “bad” master discs…largely due to the type of experiences that we have accumulated over a lifetime. The way that we think, feel, act and react speaks volumes about how we view and relate to God on a personal level.

When I treat others harshly and respond to them without consideration and kindness, there’s a good chance that I see God as a dictatorial, angry, and unkind Being; One Who spends much of His time waiting for me to step out of line. If I constantly feel guilty about past mistakes that I’ve made (even after I’ve asked for forgiveness), it’s quite possible that I don’t understand what Jesus came to accomplish while He was here on planet earth.

The spiritual ideals that I ascribe to do make a difference, and they often manifest themselves by what resides on my spiritual “master disc.”

Michael Temple writes from North Dakota.

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

Deconstructing Life

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Several years ago I watched images of horrendous loss for the people of Japan. Rivers of cars, airplanes, boats, houses, possessions all washed away or into mammoth piles. And for each survivor, and for those watching around the world, we have been reminded of what is truly important in life. People search for people. Those living need water, food, shelter, clothing, and medical care. The rest is all flotsam, irrelevant for survival, or replaceable.

Just a few days before this world event, fires had consumed hundreds of acres of land in my state. People were interviewed as they prepared to abandon there homes to go to safer areas. Small children clutched a few belongings. Pets were packed into cars along with suitcases. Everything else could be reduced to ashes within minutes.

I am reminded of a culinary term that has surfaced in the past few years. De-constructing a recipe. What used to be a mix of ingredients in a casserole, sauce, etc., is now clearly identifiable or re-combined as separate entities on the plate. So, it seems that another country has been de-constructed by the forces of nature and human invention.

What do we discover when forces outside of our human control, re-shape our lives? A new normal will exist in Japan and elsewhere. As I work with individuals, couples and families, I realize they too have been de-constructed by life events. That reality can be traumatic, yet great good can still prevail. Under the rubble, people find the character qualities that reside in themselves and their family or neighbors. They also often re-learn about what is really important for their lives.

Jesus Christ appeared on earth’s stage like a spiritual earthquake — a tsunami to wash away all the religious clutter that had trapped people’s hearts and lives. He reduced relationships with God and people down to simple elements such as Bread, Water, Light, a Gate, a Shepherd, a Vine, a Father. “My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you” (John 15:12, NIV).

Questions for personal journaling or group discussion:

1. If you had five minutes to evacuate your home, what would you take?

2. What part of your life is in need of “de-constructing”? What simple elements need to remain?

Karen Spruill writes from Orlando, Florida.

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

Don’t Be Stupid

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My sister has this friend who married a guy who was great at teaching the Bible. He was very pious and they married fast. They also separated fast. It turns out teaching the Bible was how this guy covered his deep fears, mean temper and habit of absolute control. It turns out that just because somebody looks shiny and nice, doesn’t mean they are! Hello? Sound familiar?

The fact is, you can love Jesus and still be stupid!

Unfortunately I find that many Christians who like Jesus—even love Him, sing to Him and go to big nice churches to pray to Him—do so without getting into His teachings and wisdom. This can be devastating to all involved; first for the Jesus-toting simpleton; and then for the world of skeptics looking on.

Jesus teaches that love is kind, practical, deep and should be tested. Jesus teaches that we should be careful and honest and be sure to count the cost of things first. You’d think with all He’s taught we’d see less romantic casualties among Jesus’ followers… but no. Often when confronted by someone infatuated I find the same ignorance everywhere. So how long have you known her? And her friends? And her family? And her history? These are the kinds of questions that can save a young groom an ocean liner’s worth of heartache. They are questions of a most basic nature. And if you’ve accepted Jesus and believe all those blessings He promised are going to be forthcoming, these are questions you’d better have good thorough answers for.

Our ignorance on the relational teachings of Jesus reminds me of a joke I read a few years ago. It turns out this girl is crossing a street when a voice says, Jump on the curb! Doing so, she nearly misses being run over. This happens a few times before the girl looks up into the sky and asks whom it is that is speaking to her. I’m your guardian angel, says the voice, to which the girl asks—well where on earth were you on my wedding day?

What a perfect example of ignorance. Unlike a car that is suddenly screeching around the corner out of nowhere, getting married is not something that hits us because we left the curb at the wrong time. Promising to hunker down with another faulty and fallible human for all time is huge, and there’s a really good chance our guardian angels couldn’t get a word in edgewise. (Just try talking anyone out of marriage in marriage counseling.) We cannot point to anyone but ourselves when having chosen a mate, things explode all over. Last time I checked, there are directives on how to do this all through the Bible. Think about it… who bought the dress and rented the church?

And maybe this is why I sometimes think that Christianity as a religion has really gone shallow on the teachings of Jesus. Why else would there be as many poor marriage choices within the church as without? Why else would an older Christian lady marry an online prince and loose her life savings, or even worse, be so gullible as to believe that because the guy could pray so nice, he must be that answer to prayer?

This really hit home to me back in 1993. Remember the story of those young Christian girls who chose to become David Koresh’ third and fourth wives? I actually knew where they were from. I knew people they’d gone to church with. And when I read those cover stories, I couldn’t imagine what they had been thinking. Jesus is nothing like David Koresh, and holing up in Waco, Texas, wasn’t anything like the kind of life Jesus taught was ours.

So yeah, I think that sadly, it is possible to be into Jesus to some degree and grow up around Christianity and still make really poor choices. Why? First, because the evidence is overwhelming—it happens a lot. And second, because liking someone—even loving someone—doesn’t mean you’ll be wise like them, Jesus included. Wisdom, as the good book of Proverbs states so clearly (over and over ad nauseam) is for those who seek it. Stupid can be accidental, wisdom; never.

Clar Sproul writes from the Pacific Northwest.

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

A Future Without Me

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I did it. I did it? I DID IT?! I DID IT!!!! I just passed the oral defense of my dissertation proposal! I can’t believe it! If you’re not familiar with the process (which I wasn’t until a few years ago), here’s how it works. A doctoral student, (in this case, me), learns everything possible there is to learn about a subject, comes up with questions about the topic that, up until now, have remained unanswered, and then the doctoral student comes up with a project that will answer one or more of those questions. Make sense? (Yeah, I don’t get it either)

You can only imagine the things that were going through my head as I embarked on a journey that I didn’t quite understand. These thoughts included, but are not limited to:

  1. How is it possible that I made it to this point in the program without having learned anything?
  2. Is it possible that I’ve gotten dumber?!
  3. What would REALLY happen if I packed up my car and me and my puppy ran away forever?
  4. Who do I think I am?! I’m not smart enough to do this!

I don’t know if you can tell, but the underlying all of those thoughts is my worst enemy, anxiety. I can safely say that I’ve spent the better part of the last month afraid. Like hiding under the covers afraid. I prayed and asked others to pray for me, but my fear seemed to consume me most of the time.

Until one day, earlier this week when I found a devotional book that I had long been ignoring: Jesus Calling, by Sarah Young. I opened it up and on that very day, the topic was anxiety. The very first sentence blew me away (meant to be read as if Jesus were speaking): “Anxiety is a result of envisioning a future without me.”

I know that Jesus wanted me to find that devotional on that particular day to read that particular sentence. That experience is nothing short of a miracle for me. I wish I could say, I never felt afraid again, but I did. But each time anxiety came over me, I’d remember to think of Jesus being at my side, carrying me through whatever situation was scaring me. I thank God for speaking to me so clearly!

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in you.” (Psalm 56:3, NLT).

Note: In writing this, I want to make sure that I’m very clear about the nature of anxiety. For some people, it’s a very real, debilitating disorder that can’t be cured by reading a random sentence in a long lost devotional book. If you are one of those people, please seek out help. Jesus made therapists too, you know.

Jael Amador writes from New York, New York

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

Jonah People

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My three-year-old grandson enjoys watching cartoon videos and I often treat him to one when he stays with me for a day. I usually watch one with him for the first time but I sit nearby when he begs for repeats on a later date. The repetition provides him with a way to learn songs within the videos and I hear him singing snippets later.

A few weeks ago we watched a Christian cartoon version of the Jonah and the Whale story from the Old Testament. Now he’s singing the songs and asking me such questions as, “What’s a prophet?” or “Why did God say —?” So we reviewed the story as we ate lunch and I starting thinking that people–God’s and others– haven’t changed much since Jonah’s time.

The Jonah story is still a fascinating book in the Bible about a reluctant missionary inside a large fish, an important evil city, and the God who cared about all of them. (In Genesis 10:9-12 Nimrod, the warrior, built such pagan cities as Babylon and Ninevah.) Jonah probably hated Ninevah; maybe he even lost some family members to that place. When Jonah ran away from God’s mission to deliver a message of warning to Ninevah, he spent three, dark, miserable days inside a stinky fish stomach, crying out to God in distress. Then God told the fish to spit out the prophet.

What a great place for introspection, yet Jonah was still talking smack about those pagans “who forfeit grace” (Jonah 2:8, 9, NIV). God gave Jonah a second chance to deliver his message to Ninevah. They responded with humility and God had “compassion” upon the people and did not allow them to be destroyed.

But Jonah was angry that he served such a “gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love” (Jonah 4:2). Jonah pouted and declared he would rather die than live. Still expecting hellfire, Jonah sat down to see what would happen to Ninevah. God went so far as to provide a vine to give Jonah shade, then a worm chewed the vine. When Jonah got sunburned he whined, “It would be better for me to die.” God questioned Jonah’s right to be angry about the loss of shade, and Jonah admitted, “I am angry enough to die.” God confronted Jonah: “You are so concerned about the loss of a vine that you had nothing to do with. Yet Ninevah has more than 120,000 people, and their cattle. Shouldn’t I be concerned about them?”

For generations people have refused to resign the concept of an angry, vengeful God who delivers eternal justice on their terms. They often label others as heretics and unbelievers if they can’t accept a gracious inclusive God. Many times they have exterminated those with whom they disagree, believing they represent God. And they pout, and clutch their vindictiveness as something sacred. Even as God blesses them and provides second chances.

God loved Ninevah and Jonah. Later the same God came to earth as a man, full of grace and compassion for the wounded and ignorant. As he died at the hands of his own people Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34, NIV).

Questions for personal journaling or group discussion:

1. Have you ever been angry enough to want to die? What do you think about that particular issue now?

2. How do you imagine the outcome for evil people? Does that picture match your idea of God, if you believe in him?

Karen Spruill writes from Orlando, Florida

The post Jonah People 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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