Ephesians 4:15
But, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head, Christ.
It has been a tremendous Christmas! One more to add to the old memory bank, so I can pull it out later and ruminate on it. Family and food....laughter and love in abundant portions. Got to see my nephew, Ryan, and his girlfriend, Lynn. Ryan lives in California so we don't get to see him very often. The only thing missing this year was my daughter in law, Heather, who is home in Ohio with her day who is in the hospital. Please keep her, her dad, and the entire Gozdan family in you prayers. It is a hard time for them, but my daughter in law has a faith and the assurance that God is in control.
SO what now....
Christmas has come and gone. Well, in my case, I usually start taking stock of how this past year has done. Did I grow in Christ...I mean really grow and mature. What was the one thing that seemed to be the focus of what He was doing in my life? In my case...it was His working on my selfishness and discovering that I needed to go back and revisit what it means to be humble.
You see, I really believe that as long as we draw breath on this side of heaven, we will always be a work in progress. We will always be under the gaze of the Holy Spirit. He will sift us and reveal the truth about our hearts and the motives behind not just what we do, but why we do them. Such is why I love the verse from Ephesians........we, as the community or body of Christ, are called to grow up. But we do this by speaking truth (in love) to each other. Now, I'm not talking about the meddling police running around getting up in each others business. It should be natural to speak truth....truth can be an encouragement to recognize a strength we have. Or truth can be an awareness of an area we need to work on. either way, if we hear the truth and then turn to God to show us what we need to do to change, it is a win-win situation.
What we do on Saturday night has a purpose. I know that the church has a mandate to share this message of Christ to others. I know that if salvation is accepted by whoever hears the message, they can live in the assurance that when it is their time to die, they will be absent from the body, but present with the Lord. Or, in other words, once they die, they will be in heaven.
But what about now...?
What about this side of eternity?
Well, my goal is the help them learn how to live. How to function under the guidance of God's Holy Spirit who has taken up residence inside them.
My goal for 2015, as a church or community of believers, is to birth healthy people. To help them become healthy spiritually, mentally, emotionally, physically.
I want us to be a people who have fallen in love with God. Psalm 42:1-2: As the deer pants for the water brooks so pants my soul for you, O God----my soul thirsts for God...for the living God. Just as water quenches our natural thirst, the presence of God will quench that spiritual thirst. It was this kind of thirst that we felt in our rejection of God when we were out there living in darkness. Because of our rejection of God (not wanting anything to do with Him) we sought to quench our thirst in the things of this world....the drugs, alcohol, sex, money, power and greed..and the list goes on and on. We withhold nothing from our thirst in an effort to quench the emptiness and futility we were feeling. Only in Christ will that thirst finally be laid to rest.
This Saturday night, I will be taking a look at where VRC is headed in the coming year. No, I'm not a psychic ...nor do I have a blue print....but Jesus did call us to learn how to read the signs of the times. In other words, know where we stand in His Kingdom, and what is it we have been called to do.
See you tomorrow night...
VRC / 7 p.m.
God on you....
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