Remembering

Sometimes we need to revisit the past to

get our bearings on where we have come from, so

we can keep moving forward.

To reset our compass, so to speak, so that

our attention can be refocused on God.

Today's posting is from December 12, 2012

It has been 30 years since Keith Green's death.

Thirty years is a lot of memories....
A lot of life experiences....
A lot happens in 30 years.
Events and memories pile up and push things away that use to be important.
Things that we need to remember daily in order to push ahead.
After I got home last night, I went to the track at the high school to get in my daily "Walk". As always, I took my trusty mp3 player, freshly loaded with new messages and teachings. But on this night, I took something old and powerful....I took a teaching that Keith Green had done at Last Days Ministry entitled What's Wrong With The Gospel?

it wasn't a very good recording, in fact, it seems as though they may have recorded the teaching on a portable cassette recorder. What caught my attention was the voice of Keith. There was a simple passion in the sound of his voice that totally cried out..."You know...I LOVE JESUS!" That thought resonated deep in my spirit. the longer I listened to Keith teaching, the more it felt like coming home. Getting back to the roots of my first love. Remembering what it was like in the early days of my salvation...how goofy I was....how much I just wanted to hang out with others who loved this Jesus....
Thirty years had done some damage to that view of life.
Hard times....
Bad times....
I still believed in Christ...
Why I'd even gone into full time ministry but even that had drawn near to becoming a job and not "THE " call.
Keith's voice...
Keith's teaching made me realize just how much I did love Jesus.
This love translated into a love for His word....
A love that wants to tell others about Him.....
A love that wants to worship Him.....
A love that is willing to do whatever is asked of me...
Go where ever I am called to go.....
And to love who ever God places in front of me.....

You see, I'd turned into the church at Ephesus that we read about in Revelation 2:
I know your works, your labor, your patience.
And that you cannot bear those who are evil.
And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars. And you have persevered and have patience, and have labored for My name's sake, and have not become weary.
Nevertheless I have this against you.....
That you have left your first love.....
My day's had turned into duties and tasks....not love.
I said I loved those around me.....
And there were still glimpses and glimmers of this love...
But it did not burn white hot like it use to ....

Now you have to understand...I'm not talking about a feeling...
I'm talking about an attitude and a belief....
I'm talking about a choice....
A choice to love...not because I have to...but because I want to.....
It colors and affects everything I say or do.
It moves me to reach out to others with the good news that addiction no longer has to hold you in its grip.
The love and power of Jesus Christ can break any bondage that sin/addiction has wrapped you in.

As I walked that track last night, with Keith's voice in my ear, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I knew that God was drawing me back to my roots...back to the place where I had lost my love.
I drove away from the high school with a new sense of purpose....
And a love for Christ, my first love.

God is good!

God on you.....
mb