GREENE STREET LETTERS: Today I Choose

Monday, September 22, 2014

Today I Choose

Deuteronomy 30:19
I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live.

Today, I choose life. With all its problems and troubles. With feelings that go up into the positive and crash to the depths of negative. I choose life. Life that has God as its source. Life that is not defined or dictated to by society or commercialism.

Today, I choose to be sober. I choose because the worst day sober is better than the best day drunk or high. I choose to be filled with God's Spirit and allow Him to control my tongue and my actions. I will not bow my knee to, nor will I partner with Meth, Crack, Weed, Alcohol or any other darkness that seeks to overpower me and control me. I choose to bow my knee to the One who created me........God.

Today, I choose God. I choose to give up my will and life to His care. To simply turn my entire being into a receiver....all my senses....my intuition....my heart...all tuned to hear what God has to say. Why? Because I am following His directives. Some are pretty simple. Don't use! Don't get drunk or high! You may say, "well everyone know that!" To which I would reply...did you notice that I never mentioned my brain or intellect in the list of being a receiver? Because we follow by faith, by what is in our heart...we don't rely totally on intellect or brain power. Proverbs 3:5-6 -- Trust in the Lord with all your HEART.....and lean not on your own UNDERSTANDING. Now He isn't saying check your noodle in at the door and become a machine. He is saying find the value of not totally relying on your own ability.

Today, I choose to forgive those who I have held hard feelings (that's a nice way of saying "a grudge") against. It matter not if I am justified in holding that grudge. I don't get to make that call. I choose to turn loose of it and move forward with my life. Chances are the person I'm holding the grudge against isn't even aware that such is happening. I'm the one who is suffering, not them.

Today, I choose to love as I Corinthians 13 defines love. I choose to love those that I don't really want to. I choose to love the outcast, the marginalized, the homeless and the oppressed. I choose to love my enemies. I choose to love those who God puts in my path. I choose to love as God loves. My Bible says that "God so loved the world". He loved mankind and His creation with a total love. Doesn't mean He excuses sin or wrong doing, but even such as that will not stop Him from loving.

I think maybe if I work on this today, it might turn out to be a good day. I choose to do so.
How about you?

God on you...
mb

No comments:

Looking At The World Through Cracked Lens

As ol' Paul wrote in his Corinthian letters.."We see in part and we know in part." Now what piece of this bit of wisdom do we not get? I wish to not run around acting and trying to be some sort of Biblical G00-Ru (I meant to spell it wrong). Or a sage of sages.

I simply want to be able to communicate some of what God has given to me. Why? Do I think what I get is better than what you may have received from Him? Nope. But I do think encouragement comes when we share our daily story of struggle and victory in an effort to encourage each other.

Thanks for letting me share.

Time to soldier on..

mbb

Our Statement of Faith

We believe that God is the eternal king. He is an infinite, unchangeable Spirit, perfect in holiness, wisdom, goodness, justice, power and love. From all eternity He exists as the One Living and True God in three persons of one substance, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit equal in power and glory. we believe that God created mankind in His image, male and female, for relationship with Himself and to govern the earth. Under the temptation of Satan, our original parents fell from grace, bringing sin, sickness and God's judgment of death to the earth. Through the fall, Satan and his demonic hosts gained access to God's good creation. Creation now experiences the consequences and effects of Adam's original sin. Human beings are born into sin, subject to God's judgment of death and captive to Satan's kingdom of darkness. We believe that Jesus, God's Son, was sent to this world, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of a virgin, Mary, fully God and fully man in one person. He is humanity as God intended us to be. Jesus was anointed as God's Messiah and empowered by the Holy Spirit, ushering in God's kingdom reign on earth, overpowering the reign of Satan by resisting temptation, preaching the good news of salvation, healing the sick, casting out demons and raising the dead. Jesus' atoning death on the cross took God's judgment for sin which we deserved as law-breakers. Jesus' resurrection and ascent back to heaven opened the door for those who received salvation to begin a relationship with God.

Little Nets Into Deep Waters

Fishing nets were designed for one purpose only. To catch fish. Nets are no good if they stay on the boat. Nets serve no purpose if they are never used. I think maybe God sees us this way. We are all created for a purpose (by the way, the creator gets to define what our purpose is). Any other use besides the one we were created for does us no good. But when the creator places His hands upon us, casting us out into those scary, dark places with deep waters, it is then we can see the reality of our purpose. He knew there would be a catch waiting for us. I think I will be the net God has called me to be.

The Twelve Steps

As a community of people in recovery, we affirm that our higher power is Jesus Christ. He did for us what we could not do for ourselves. Just as God told the children of Israel He was going to give them a promised land, He has revealed to us that He desires to give us a "Promised Life." When Israel got to the promised land, God instructed them to go and in a possess it, fight for it and claim it. In recovery, the 12 Steps are the directions given to us on how to fight, possess and claim this promised life.

Monday, September 22, 2014

Today I Choose

No comments:

THE REALITY OF THE NAME OF GOD