I'M IN CONTROL! YEAH...RIGHT

 

STEP # 7 -  We humbly asked Him (God) to remove our shortcomings.

Step # 7 really flies in the face of addiction. Addiction is all about control.
Controlling others...
Controlling events...
Controlling the past as well as the future, with no thought about today.
Now here in Step # 7 we see the word "Humble."
Humble?
What does that mean......."humble"?
"I don't know if I like that word or not."
When some people think of being humble or the act of humbling themselves, they see it as a state of defeat. I have lost and now I must humble myself. I have to grovel and beg someone for something. I must be humble.
Well, that may be the way you see humble, but not me.

Humble means to agree with God who God says I am. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Humble means I have the ability to follow directions.
Humble means I can be in a crowd and..........be in a crowd. I don't have to stick out or be the center of attention. I am humble.
Being humble is at the heart of being powerless.
I no longer have to be in control, because the evidence of my life shows that I am incapable of controlling anything. I live under the self-delusion that I am in control.
Here's the tricky part.
We have become so use to calling the shots, that we will ask for God's help as long as he does it the way we want it done, on our terms.  Well......guess what? God doesn't work that way. That is why being humble is so important.

I love the story from Jeremiah18:1-6. This kind of highlights what i refer to as "The Divine Pecking Order." In other words, God is God...he's in charge....I'm not.
Let's take a look at the passage from Jeremiah.
The LORD gave another message to Jeremiah. He said, God down to the shop where clay pots and jars are made. I will speak to you while you are there. So I did as he told me and found the potter working at his wheel. But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped, so the potter squashed the jar into a lump of clay and started again.
God is the potter and, you guessed it, I'm the lump of clay.
God has plans and intentions for me, to shape me and mold me.
I don't like his plans, so I become stiff and unyielding to him.
God wants me to be a flower vase. Me? I want to be a cereal bowl.
Who wins?
No brainer. God! I must humble myself as I work the steps and allow God to remove all my shortcomings. One thing that the step doesn't tell you is that whenever God removes something.............he always puts something back better than the original. God doesn't simply leave me empty handed. The more I can see that this entire process is for my good...then I can choose to humble myself and allow God to work in me.

Again we look to Jeremiah 17.
This is what the LORD says, "Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans and turn their hearts away from the LORD." Looking to our own strength and ability to bring change to our hearts. Like I always say....."If Step # 1 states that I am the problem....the how can I also be the solution? EUREKA! I can't. Enter....HUMBLE! I turn to God and Step# 7 is on. Removal kicks in and I continue on through the Steps.

Turning our life over to God means that we are placing our hope and confidence in him instead of people. People who can disappoint us. When I look to my own ability or strength to make my recovery work, it like expecting a tree to grow and flourish in a barren desert.

Turn loose....
Humble yourself....
Let God!

God on you....
Thanks for stopping by today. I mean it!

mb

THEM THAR THOUGHT WARS

 

Galatians 5:16-17
So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions.

Have you ever had one of those days where life is a constant war that seems to be taking place inside of you?
A day where doubt, fear, uncertainty seemed to have grabbed you by the throat and all three of them are  screaming, "Listen to me!!!".
Kind of hard to move forward when such is happening.

Funny part is that your heart is telling you something contrary to what your mind is saying.
The heart is communicating truth to you.
It may come in the form of a verse that you suddenly remember....
Or something someone else may have told you in the past that helped you....
No matter which, it is as though the mine is telling you to discount what the heart says.
"Pay no heed to what your heart is saying!" So you have this struggle between mind (sinful nature/ flesh / Paul refers to it as the "OLD MAN"....and your heart. Now of course when I speak of your heart, I am not referring to the muscle that keeps life's rhythm, in your chest. I am referring to the very core of your being. The center of who you really are. The place of the spirit, intellect, emotion, and world view of life. 

Yesterday was a day where I was battered on every side by doubt. Really had no reason for such to be happening, it just was. Every time a wave of thoughts would come to knock me off my feet, I would recite a verse.  One wave would consist of  "Who do you think you're fooling...you're not really a follower of Jesus. If you were, you'd be kinder and more attentive to the needs of others." I would counter with Ephesians 4:21-23 - Throw off  your old sinful nature and your former way of life (which includes the former way of thinking), which is corrupted by lust and deception. Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. Put on your new nature, created to be like God----truly righteous and holy.

Hannah Whitall Smith, in her book The Christian's Secret To A Happy Life, writes "Our fight is to be a fight of faith, and the moment we let in doubts and fear, our fight ceases, and our rebellion begins." A rebellion that will encourage us to not listen to the Holy Spirit, but rather our sin nature. Remember what Paul wrote in Ephesians 4..."Do not give the devil a foothold." In other words, do not let him rent space in your mind. God has provided for us, through His Holy Spirit, power to deal with these wrong thoughts that seek to pull us away from following Him.

II Corinthians 10:4-5
For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every though into captivity to the obedience of Christ.
Did you catch that?
Bringing every thought (and what falls under every "every"? Why every thing, of course)
into captivity...in other words,  through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit at work in us, we have the authority AND THE POWER, to take our thoughts captive and  not allow them to roll around unopposed in our brains. Now that is some kind of good stuff. So the next time you get beat up by your old nature trying to draw you into some kind of spiritual funk....rise up and say, "NOPE! Ain't gonna happen."

God on you....
mbb

SAVE US FROM OUR PAIN

 

There seems to be two camps among the faithful.

One is about a pain-free God.

The other is about a pain-filled God.
I think maybe the real truth of the matter is found somewhere in the middle.
That there is a God who leads His children through what we have come to know as "Life".
Life happens.
It's messy.
It's fun.
It's happy and sad (sometimes at the same time).
It's hard and you want to run away.
It's satisfying and you want to live forever.
It's call life.
And in the middle of it is this voice. The voice of the Lord bidding (calling) those who would, come. Simply come to Him.
As Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote......Christ bids us to come and die. Nothing more. For in the dying we find true life. A call to simply follow Him.  Don't forget that in Psalm 23 David wrote that "God lead." Sometimes by still waters where we can find rest. Sometimes through the Valley Of The Shadow Of Death. The main thing to remember is that no matter where life is taking us, if we follow Him, He is there to lead us through whatever we may face.


Upon the shoulders of this one we call CHRIST....resides the Spirit of the Lord. He was chosen and sent here to this world to preach the gospel to the poor. Poor in material possessions and poor in spirit. He was sent and empowered to heal the brokenhearted. Those who had lost hope and wandered aimlessly at the mercy of the master of this world.


Jesus was sent to proclaim with a loud voice and with deeds and signs that let it be known beyond any doubt that God had, in fact, invaded time and space and declared war on the kingdom of darkness.


Jesus came empowered to give sight to the blind..........both those who had lost their actual ability to see and those who were taken into spiritual darkness.


He was sent to set free those who were oppressed. They may be held down by the system of this world, but nothing..........no government, no group, no ruler can ever bind and stop the spirit of God inside of a believer.


Jesus proclaimed that this was the acceptable and favorable year of the Lord.

Thank you Lord for life and I pray that I seek you out at every turn today so that I can follow your direction and live life in the manner you desire me to.
Blessed be your name,
and may you bless everyone who has stopped by Greene Street today.
In Jesus name....
Amen.

God on you..........
mb

HE IS A COMING DOWN GOD

 

First cup of coffee always get my brain a moving. Today is no different as I sit here at my computer. My thoughts turn to the reason that Jesus did all that He did while He was on earth. Motivated first by love for His Father, and second by love for humanity, His Father's creation. But what is even more impressive to me is the fact that the people were drawn to Him. There was an emptiness in the souls of those who lived at that time, and this emptiness was stirred by the Holy Spirit that was in Christ. They may not have had language for what they were experiencing, but something told them that Jesus had the answers they were searching for.

"When He was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him."...Mt.8:1

Jesus, upon completing the Sermon on the Mount, came down off of the mountain.
He left a place where the view was not bad. The wind was fresh and soothing. The crowds attentive and listening. He left that place.
He came down from the mountain to a place where sick people were. Maybe they couldn't make it up to where Jesus was. Maybe their illness prevented them from traveling. Were their needs any less than those of the multitude who had made the trek? I don't think so, and here is where I love the heart of Christ. He came down from the mountain to meet these others right where they were. He met the leper. Jesus encountered the Roman soldier, away from home in a land he probably didn't want to be in. Living among a people he did not understand, who had strange customs and ways. Yet this guardian of the Roman Empire sought out Jesus because of a servant lying ill at his home. Jesus came to these.

It is one thing to not want to follow Jesus up the mountain where he taught. It is entirely different when you can't follow. In these cases Jesus came down to them. Isn't that an incredible thought? That Jesus sought out the sick and afflicted. He searched for those who were demonized and ostracized from society. He brought healing to them. Does that mean I get to simply sit and wait for Jesus to come to me? Heavens no! We move in the strength we have. Like the leper, we too must go and meet Jesus and be completely honest in what we desire for him to do. I think sometimes I try to play games with Jesus in an effort to get him to do what I want. It's almost like a religious "twenty questions." When I should be stating the obvious....Gee! I have leprosy...what do I want? TO HE HEALED!!!!!" Believing in faith that Jesus will reach out and heal me.
Cool beans....
until tomorrow.
God on you....
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I WILL MISS YOU GAIL

 

I received the phone call Sunday afternoon. My heart dropped as the words flowed over me......"Bro. Mike...Gail is gone." How true those words were. She wasn't dead, she was gone. She had gone home to be with her Savior and with those who'd gone before her.

As I drove over to the hospital, my thoughts seem to flit from memory to memory of Miss Gail. How she took me in when I first got to Northside Baptist Church. I had spoken on several occasions filling in for the pastor, but now I would be their pastor. What started out as a temporary thing has stretched out to almost six years, and Gail was always there to help me in any way she could.

Arriving at the hospital, I found the family gathered in her room. She looked so peaceful laying there in bed, but we all knew that this was merely the shell not the life and soul of Gail Minton. Conversation turned to what she must be experiencing at the moment. Steve, her son, said, "Well, at last she can hear now." That brought a smile to everyone's faces. We knew that she and her husband Dean were now together again, and what a reunion that must have been. But the one thing that we all knew was that she was in presence of her lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

She loved her family and that love was always on display. She made no bones about how proud she was of Terry and Steve. After Gail moved to Oak Landing, I would visit her and she would tell me story after story about the antics of her two kids. Each story involved a lot of laughter, sometimes to the point she could not finish the story.

Miss Gail will be missed by family and friends. But isn't it wonderful that God has given hope to those who know Him. Hope that if one of us departs this old earth we will be in his presence. And for those of us who remain, the hope that at some point we will be reunited with our loved ones and the One who made it all possible, Jesus.

Gail Minton....I love you and I will miss you....but I will see you again. \

God on you...

Michael b.

WHO AM I?

 

Luke 12:24
Consider the ravens for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse nor barn, and God feeds them . Of how much more value are you than the birds?

Addiction causes a person to loose their sense of self worth.
The destruction that comes through using causes shame and guilt, both toxic emotions, to be heaped upon the individual.
Here in the Luke passage, Jesus is saying, "Hey guys....(Well, I don't think Jesus ever said "guys") you need to understand your position in Me.  You need to understand that the things you are worrying about are really in My Father's hands."

God is working in us greater works than what we perceive. WE find ourselves focused on meeting our natural needs...food, shelter, clothing...a job. God has said, "I'll take care of those so you can concentrate on what I'm doing to you on the inside."  What God is not saying is, "Sit back and relax and all these things you need will fall from the sky like manna." What I have found over the years is that God will sincerely lead you to provision. You have to possess it and own it.

Letting God work in my heart lets me see myself for who I am.  I no longer get my worth from this world system or those around me. I gain my worth through "Whose" I am. I belong to Jesus and as such, He reveals to me who I am. I like what the Apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 3:5-6 - "Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, A Hebrew of Hebrews. Concerning the law, a Pharisee, concerning zeal, persecuting the church, concerning the righteousness which is in the law, blameless."  In other words, Paul says, "I'm the man! I"ve got all the right credentials." No one could argue with that. But Paul goes on to say, "But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish (dung) that I may gain Christ."  Paul says that every thing the world counts as being of worth, he counts as dung /  manure....That's pretty bold talk. How could Paul make such a statement? He ran into the real, deal Jesus. Not an ideal about Jesus...............not a concept of Jesus.............not a religious theory concerning Jesus....Paul ran into Jesus, and he was changed forever.

So as you begin this journey out of the darkness of addiction into the freedom and light of recovery, know and understand that the "HIGHER POWER" you are searching for is found in Jesus Christ.

       Because of Christ's Redemption

I am a new creation of infinite worth

I am fully pleasing

I am deeply loved

I am completely forgiven

I am totally accepted

I am absolutely complete in Christ

That's who I am

Who are you?

God on you............

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LEARNING TO LIVE

 

In these days of confused situations and events that leave us with out answers, it appears that sanity has become in short supply....
There is truth that I cannot escape nor would wish to.
That no matter how hard I try...No matter how bad I want to....
I stand before God helpless without him.
Our Society and culture seek to exalt the human will and effort...
To celebrate our ability to think and reason...
to build from our dreams, monuments to our humanness....
Polished pillars of glass, concrete and steel..
medals and trophies....
building's with our names and statues of our likeness....Thinking all the while it will last forever....not so.

We burn ourselves out chasing the desires of our heart.
We try religion, only to find out how empty and ritualistic it is. Trying to convince ourselves that we are better spiritually because we have participated in a group activity. We are so in need of relationship with the one who created us. We are so in need of Jesus. We are desperately in need of His transforming POWER that strips away our "self" and replaces it with His Holy Spirit. It's all about change that comes through transformation.
Like I said, I know the frailty of life...
One moment you here...the next your gone..
I know that the eternal offer and gift of life and redemption is at the fingertips of everyone who draws breath...
It comes down to the surrender of heart and will...
The acknowledgment of a Savior and redeemer..
A confession of wrong to be made right...

I like the way the Message Bible puts this offer of new life that Jesus makes to everyone who will accept:

Matthew 11:28-30

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. In other words, learn to walk with Him daily.
Learn what it means to seek out only his will for your life, and the power to carry it out.

To move about in conscious contact with Jesus.

Sounds impossible doesn't it?

Sounds like a fairy tale, doesn't it?

Well, it's not.
It is truth.

What have you got to loose if you do this?
Maybe only your old life, old ways...and a boat load of pain that was self inflicted.

God on you...

mb