(these are not my words. this post was gathered from the book "The Life You've Always Wanted." By John Ortberg. I picked it up for the first time today, and this is what I got: God's perfect timing of incredible truths.... things one has probably heard before, but reminders are never harmful but helpful, and needed).
There is an immense difference between training to do something and trying to do something. Spiritual transformation is not a matter of trying harder, but training wisely.
- arrange your life around activities that enable you to live in the fruit of the spirit.
(Thinking about this. . . I find much truth in the statement. If people were to grow a garden, they would be personally exercising their spirit to be patient. Each day as they cultivate the garden they would be bearing the fruit of patience, and maturing their inner man).
- humility and patience are objects acquired from the disciplines. Patience is not the discipline, it is the reward.
- disciplined people can do the right thing, at the right time, in the right way, for the right reason.
- our season of life is not a barrier to spiritual growth.
Before a woman becomes committed to being a wife and mother, she has the time to give to God in prayer and silence, "quiet time." Reading the bible and praying are accounted for spirituality. But when a woman becomes a mother, her time alone feels as an oxymoron. However, we are failed to be taught that, (in this specific analogy)... perhaps caring for children, offered daily with expressions of gratitude and prayers for help and patient acceptance of trials, might become a kind of school for transformation into powerful servanthood beyond anything a mother has ever known. And somehow having "quiet time" counted toward spiritual devotion, and caring for children did not.
We need the freedom to discover how God wants us to grow, for His design will not look quite the same for everyone. And whatever season it is- it is no barrier to having Christ formed in us. Not in the least. Life counts - all of it.
Now The Dee Dah Day!
Joy is the serious business of heaven - c.s. lewis
Most of life is spent in transit: trying to get somewhere, waiting to begin, standing in line....no? Driving someplace, trying to get a task completed, worrying about something bad, or being angry about something that did not happen. These are all moments when one is not likely to be fully present, not to be aware of the voice and purpose of God. It is being impatient. It is almost, literally, killing time. And that is just another way of saying I'm killing myself.
Joy is at the heart of God's plan for human beings. The reason for this is worth pondering awhile: Joy is at the heart of God himself. We will never understand the significance of joy in human life until we understand its importance to God. I suspect that most of us seriously underestimate God's capacity for joy.
Jesus came as the Joy-bringer. The joy we see in the happiest child is but a fraction of the joy that resides in the heart of God.
When you think of the people that have survived cancer, and when they get the news that they are going to live and not die.... just imagine that moment, and hearing those words that they feared the chance of not hearing at all. In those types of moments, the reality that life is a gift is not intellectual, it is experienced. *We don't earn it, can't control it, can't take a moment of it for granted. Every tick of the clock is a gift from God. Every day is a DEE DAH DAY!
"This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength."
- Joy is strength. Its absence will create weakness. Joy must be taken seriously - (as strange as that sounds)..
- The discipline of celebration.
Celebration generally involves activities that bring pleasure- gathering with people we love, eating and drinking, singing and dancing. Spiritual celebration means doing them while reflecting on the wonderful God who has given us such wonderful gifts. *Our word hoilday comes from the practice of "holy days." (Nehemiah). *We often think of discipline as abstinence from pleasurable things, but Nehemiah commanded the people to set aside a time to revel in them as a discipline for personal transformation. *True celebration is the inverse of hedonism. When we celebrate, we exercise the ability to see and feel goodness in the simplest gifts of God. We are able to take delight today in something we wouldn't have even noticed yesterday. Therefore the capacity of joy can only increase.
True joy, as it turns out, comes only to those who have devoted their lives to something greater than personal happiness. This is most visible in extraordinary lives, in saints and martyrs. But it is no less try for ordinary people like us. Our test of authentic joy is it's compatibility with pain. Joy in this world is always joy 'in spite of ' something. It is defiant nevertheless...set at full stop against bitterness and resentment.
- if we don't rejoice today, we will not rejoice at all. If we wait until conditions are perfect, we will still be waiting when we die. If we are going to rejoice, it must be in this day. This is the day that the Lord has made.
- This is the DEE DAH DAY!
It is important to surround and identify yourself with joy-carriers: life-enhancing, joy-producing people. For depression is generally as prevalent inside the church as outside. And depression has replaced anxiety, the common cold of emotional life. We need to start declaring "Weeks of Jubilee."
This leads to the path of an unhurried life: the practice of "slowing."
Has anyone mastered that besides the Creator of it, our God? Help, Lord!!!!! (that's the next chapter).
I must say, "today has been a Dee Dah Day!" indian.paintbrush
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