outline

To live is to suffer. But to survive, well, that's to find the meaning in the suffering.

Saturday - June 14, 2003

But God's own descent
Into flesh was meant
As a demonstration...
Spirit enters flesh and for all it's worth
Charges into earth in birth after birth
Ever fresh and fresh
- Robert Frost

The Jesus I Never Knew, Philip Yancey wrote:

Jesus knew what he was getting into by coming to this planet; his death had been decreed from the beginning.

During that wrinkle in time known as the Incarnation, God experienced what it is like to be a human being. In the thirty-three years on earth God's Son learned about poverty and about family squabbles and social rejection and verbal abuse and betrayal. He learned, too, about pain. What it feels like to have an accuser leave the red imprint of his fingers on your face. What it feels like to have a whip studded with metal lashed across your back. What it feels like to have a crude iron spike pounded through muscle, tendon, and bone. On earth, God's Son "learned" all that.

God's character did not permit the option of simply declaring about this defective planet, "It doesn't matter." God's Son had to encounter evil personally in a way that perfect deity had never before encountered evil. He had to forgive sin by taking on our sin. He had to defeat death by dying. He had to learn sympathy for human beings by becoming one. The author of Hebrews reports that Jesus became a "sympathetic" advocate for us. There is only one way to learn sympathy, as signified by the Greek roots of the word, syn pathos, "to feel or suffer with." Because of the Incarnation, Hebrews implies, God hears our prayers in a new way, having lived here and having prayed as a weak and vulnerable human being.

In one of his last statements before dying, Jesus prayed, "Father, forgive them" - all of them, the Roman soldiers, the religious leaders, his disciples who had fled in darkness, you, me, who have denied him in so many ways - "forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." Only by becoming a human being could the Son of God truly say with understanding, "They do not know what they are doing." He had lived among us. Now, he understood.

Monday - June 9, 2003

"The test of observance of Christ's teachings is our consciousness of our failure to attain an ideal perfection. The degree to which we draw near this perfection cannot be seen; all we can see is the extent of our deviation." - Leo Tolstoy

The Jesus I Never Knew, Philip Yancey wrote:

The Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect."

Has anyone ever lived a life as perfect as God's? Has anyone ever followed the Golden Rule? How can we even respond to such impossible ideals?

There is only one way for any of us to resolve the tension between the high ideals of the gospel and the grim reality of ourselves: to accept that we will never measure up, but that we do no have to. We are judged by the righteousness of the Christ who lives within, not our own.

Jesus did not proclaim the Sermon on the Mount so that we would furrow our brows in despair over our failure to achieve perfection. He gave it to impart to us God's Ideal toward which we should never stop striving, but also to show that none of us will ever reach that Ideal. It forces us to recognize the great distance between God and us, and any attempt to reduce that distance by somehow moderating its demands misses the point altogether.

The Sermon on the Mount proves that before God we all stand on level ground: murderers and temper-throwers, adulterers and lusters, thieves and coveters. We are all desperate, and that is in fact the only state appropriate to a human being who wants to know God. Having fallen from the absolute Ideal, we have nowhere to land but in the safety net of absolute grace.

----------

Lord, I am not perfect by a longshot, I confess to you daily
But I work harder everyday, and I hope that you hear me
In my heart I mean well, but if you'll help me to grow
Then what I have in my heart, will begin to show

Thursday - June 5, 2003

I can only imagine
What it will be like
when I walk by your side
I can only imagine
What my eyes will see
when your face is before me
I can only imagine

Surrounded by your glory
what will my heart feel?
will I dance for you Jesus?
or in awe of you be still?
Will I stand in your presence?
To my knees will I fall?
Will I sing halleujah?
Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine

I can only imagine
when that day comes
when I find myself standing in the sun
I can only imagine
when all I will do
is forever, forever worship you
I can only imagine.

Surrounded by your glory
what will my heart feel?
will I dance for you Jesus?
or in awe of you be still?
Will I stand in your presence?
To my knees will I fall?
Will I sing halleujah?
Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine.

	Sunday - June 1, 2003
Don't let society create you, live out of your heart. ---------- Do not conform yourselves to the standards of this world, but let God transform you inwardly by a complete change of your mind. Then you will be able to know the will of God. - Romans 12:2

Saturday - May 31, 2003

Character is both developed and revealed by tests, and all of life is a test.

----------

But when envoys were sent by the rulers of Babylon to ask him about the miraculous sign that had occurred in the land, God left Hezekiah to test him and to know everything that was in his heart.
- 2 Chronicles 32:31

Hezekiah had enjoyed a close fellowship with God, but at a crucial point in his life God left him alone to test his character, to reveal a weakness, and to prepare him for more responsibility.

----------

No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.
- 1 Corinthians 10:13

----------

Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
- James 1:12

Friday - May 30, 2003

I know that my Saviour lives
and at the end he will stand on this earth
My flesh maybe destroyed
but from this body I will see God
Yes, I will see him for myself
and I long for that moment

----------

The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis wrote:

Again, we are afraid that heaven is a bribe, and that if we make it our goal we shall no long be disinterested. It is not so. Heaven offers nothing that a mercenary soul can desire. It is safe to tell the pure in heart that they shall see God, for only the pure in heart want to. There are rewards that do not sully motives. A man's love for a woman is not mercenary because he wants to marry her, nor his love for poetry mercenary because he wants to read it, nor his love of exercise less disinterested because he wants to run and leap and walk. Love, by definition, seeks to enjoy its object.

Tuesday - May 27, 2003

The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren wrote:

Your most profound and intimate experiences of worship will likely be in your darkest days - when your heart is broken, when you feel abandoned, when you're out of options, when the pain is great - and you turn to God alone. It is during suffering that we learn to pray our most authentic, heartfelt, honest-to-God prayers. When we're in pain, we don't have the energy for superficial prayers.

We learn things about God in suffering that we can't learn any other way.

DMX Convo...

Monday - May 19, 2003

Made me a leader before I was ready to lead
Took away my hunger, but didn't give me greed
Made me successful, when I just wanted to be heard
Give me the light, cause all I need is the word
Give me a life, that I'm responsible for
I'll give him what's right, cause I'm responsible for him
And into the night, I'm gonna be there with him
Facing a fight, I be right there with him
Ready for Heaven, cause I done been through the Hell
And since I was seven, I've had a story to tell
See God is great, and that's why I'm still livin
He gave to me, so I'm goin keep on givin'
The bravery of a man's mind is slavery
Is makin me the man I was made to be
I hate to see when cats know but don't spit it
Right is wrong, when it's on you goin get it

	Sunday - May 18, 2003
The true worth of a man is not measured by what he does for himself But what he does for someone else And if you help another, without concern for water or gold What you give you shall receive ten fold ---------- Complacency will ruin your life.

DMX Convo...	Monday - April 21, 2003
Lord, I am not perfect by a longshot, I confess to you daily But I work harder everyday, and I hope that you hear me In my heart I mean well, but if you'll help me to grow Then what I have in my heart, will begin to show And when I get goin, I'm not lookin back for NOTHIN Cause I will know where I'm headed, cause I'm so tired of the sufferin

Turning Point...	Sunday - April 20, 2003
I stepped into a world of rapid-fire choices where it seemed I had no ultimate control - a world where time moved painfully fast on occasion and excruciating slow on others. I guess at that moment, I started to view life differently. "And when your time comes, and it will come, remember not to be afraid to fulfill your purpose."

DMX Convo...

Friday - April 11, 2003

You gave me the light and let me bask in your glory
So it was only right that when you ask for this story
I put it together to do our dogs some good
Our dogs being, brothers and sisters in the hood
Plenty of times you sent help my way, but I hid
And I remember once you held me close, but I slid
There was something that I just had to see
That you wanted me to see, so I can be what you wanted me to be
And I think I've seen it, I can feel the change
Matter of fact I know I've seen it, I can feel the change
And it's strange almost got me beating down your door
But I have never known a love like this before
It's a wonderful feeling to get away from the pain
And up under the ceiling I get away from the rain
And the strain that I feel when I'm here is gone
I know real so I wipe away the tears with a song
And I almost lost faith when you took my man Monty, Paso and Jay's brother Dan
And I fear that what I'm saying wont be heard until I'm gone
But it's all good cause I really didn't expect to live long
So if it takes for me to suffer, for my brother to see the light
GIVE ME PAIN TILL I DIE, but please Lord treat him right