i remember an old sermon of pastor garys called TEAR IT OUT!! it was based on matthew 5:29

"IF YOUR RIGHT EYE OFFENDS YOU TEAR IT OUT!!!!" it doesnt literally mean to gouge out an eye what its say is if you see something and its causing you to stumble and fall DONT LOOK AT IT!!! the whole gist of this verse is about the flesh nature the sin nature where self will ALWAYS runs riot! DONT FEED IT!!!! a while back i was beginning to have a major problem with my fourlegged brat waking up during the night wanting to be fed and snuggled. once i gave into him the first time he expected it the next night. and the next. and the next. before i knew it i was having a major problem on my hands. one day i woke up and realized SORRY BUDDY TIME TO TOW THE LINE HERE!!! needless to say he started pitching major shirley temple fits..complete with gnashing his teeth against the bars of the cage and flinging his whole body against its walls. what was i to expect. id been indulging him and petting him for several months tthen all of a sudden i stopped??!!! well thats the way it is with my sin nature. if i quit feeding my spirit man and start feeding my bratty sin nature..same thing. its not only cunning and far stronger than i ever will be its also NOT PICKY!! its not choosy about what portal of entry you choose to let it set up camp, how you feed it. it just wants to be fed petted and indulged. its not a sin to be tempted. if it was then Jesus sure sinned in the wilderness where He was tempted

where would i go?

one of the most crucial things ive come to understand..and to do otherwise i may as well take the entire book of Acts and throw it out.....over the past 2+ years.....in my walk with God is how imperative it is get involved with a local Word based church. is everything going to run smoothly
once i do this? of course not. if im looking for a church of perfect people who do everything perfectly all i have to do is look in the BIBLE to see that thats not going to happen. looking at the lives of king david who ran the gammit of every sin you could name, samson who was about as close to a textbook case of a narcissist as you could get, abraham who tried to pimp out his own wife to save his own hide, even joseph who provoked the wrath of his brothers to a large degree by being a smart-alecky kid who didnt know when to keep his mouth shut...uhmmm NO my finding a body of believers who do everything nice and wonderful..i dont think thats going to happen.. all these examples are given to show that God doesnt use perfect people..just forgiven ones. fellowshipping with people i may not always like.. i need to remember that i may not always be THEIR cup of tea. in AA theres a saying that applies most definitely to any body os Spirit filled believers PRINCIPLES OVER PERSONALITIES. i have to LOVE others even if i dont LIKE THEM all the time. that IS His greatest commandment. and its not an option. and it doesnt just apply to those who love and like ME.

its by learning to live out this very basic principle amongst others in close quarters with other believers on a regular basis that is largely responsible as to whether or not im going to develop spiritually in a healthy mature way. we have a product we want to sell to the world THE GOSPEL. the local church is like a laboratory where we take that product and show the world how well it works. can i take offense when people complain about me? of course i can? can i take offense and go to another church? of course i can. but im going to run into the same thing there. wherever i go there i am and im the lowest common denominator in everything. in the AA big book theres a chapter called 'a vision for you" its all about THIS IS WHAT MY LIFE CAN BE LIKE IF I GET AND STAY SOBER. THIS IS ALSO WHAT MY LIFE WILL BE LIKE IF I DRINK. I KNOW WHAT MY LIFE CAN BE LIKE IF I CONTUNUE FELLOWSHIPPING WITH THE SAINTS. I ALSO KNOW WHAT WIL HAPPEN IF I WALK AWAY. of course its easier to walk away from any situation when offended instead of looking to see where im the lowest common denominator but theres no growth.

to not get and stay grounded in a local church like i said is like taking the book of Acts and rip it out. once i do that as when i do that with any part of the Word i may as well throw out the whole Word while im at it because none of it is going to make sense anymore. The Word of God is full of his PROMISES. its also full of the NOT SO NICE promises of what happens when you turn your back on Him. theyre not promises. theyre more like GUARANTEES. if i quit going to church then ive already walked away from Him. especialy when its rooted in offense. thats an act rooted in pride and rebellion. and pride and rebellion are the equivalent to witchcraft. im taking MY will back thinking i can do a better job at running my life than He can. and He wont stop me if i want to leave. to do this is like asking for a refund on my misery. IF I GO MY WAY AND SIN AGAIN A MUCH WORSE THING WILL HAPPEN TO ME. if i dont have a system of checks and balances
all i have to go on is my own itching ears. its like taking a class without an instructor. the manual wil stop making any sort of sense.

IRON SHARPENS IRON. i remember in the past when i didnt think i needed to be in church and thought i was getting all these revelations of His Word that were special and unique. they were all squirelly. WEIRD revelations. people looked at me doing the blonde head tilt like HUH??????
none of us hear from God perfectly but when what i was getting wasnt even in the ballpark...we have a problem here. to have that black and white tile foundation thats solid and based on His Word i have to have as part of it checks and balances people i trust that i can talk to pray with to make sure that what im hearing IS from Him and not coming from the realm of my own addictive thinking.

being in AA ive seen from happens when people relapse. theres a pattern that almost always happens in chronological order.
1. they quit calling their sponsor
2.they quit going to meetings.
3. RETURN OF OLD BEHAVIORS.
4.then they pick up a drink. picking up a drink isnt the relapse. its the LAST STAGE of the relapse.

THIS IS THE SAME PRINCIPLE OF WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF I QUIT GOING TO CHURCH!!
1 i lose touch with fellow believers ive established a network with
2 i quit going to church
3 i quit spending time with Him and His word
4 my old character will come back.
IVE ALREADY WALKED AWAY I JUST DONT KNOW IT YET!!!

COMING FULL CIRCLE. NOTHING IN GODS WORLD IS PRIVATE

in the past two years, ive seen many of my prayers which were put out there years ago concerning my sister finally starting to take fruit.seeds were indeed planted but i know now that the time had not yet come for them to blossom. the answer as to why finally and very suddenly came to me this past wednesday as anna had us share during home fellowship over at lynns teatimonies of how God has answered prayers involving our families. i remembered what pastor gary said som weeks back SIN AFFECTS EVERYONE AROUND YOU....EVEN WHEN ITS DONE IN PRIVATE. something happens in the spiritual realm concerning those around you when your own heart isnt right with God even if they dont see what youre doing. its like the seed that gets dropped and the birds eat it. the reason why years ago my sister didnt recieve what i was saying was for the very same reason that virtually everyone in my church shunned me though i was far too reprobate to see it at the time. i still hadnt lost enough to come out of that denial. THE CHILDREN OF UNRIGHTEOUSNESS ARE OFTEN SMARTER CONCERNING THEIR OWN THAN WE ARE. it was like YOU CANT HUSTLE A HUSTLER HONEY. deep in my heart i knew i wasnt being "mistreated"...they simply were onto me. they knew a liar when they saw one. however likewith my sister they may not even realize why they dont hear you..theres simply something in the spiritual realm thats "off" and they can feel it.
my life islike a gateway into the lives of others and what i do can either be a witness or cause others to stumble even when they dont see what im doing. its no coincidence that a nations leaders are like gateways into the lives of the people of their country. i remember hearing bob yandian talking about what clinton was doing in his private life and how at that time the country was rife with sexual sin. there isno such a thing as victimless crime and sin that doesnt affect tothers. period

IN THE WORLD BUT NOT OF IT vs OF THE WORLD BUT NOT IN IT

as i have been studying the Gospels and saw how frequently Jesus butted heads with the pharisees whose deviousness and underhandedness......... plus the sly cattiness not so different from what one would find in your hen circle, do-goody charity type of women..which seems to be a mindset in ALL people whose place their sense of significance in their own goodness and others no goodness...a couple of things came back to my remembrance. i remember what pastor gary was talking about how its impossible to change the world when youre the same substance as the world. i also remember listening to an excerpt from an aussie lady preacher by the name of christine caine when she pointed out tre difference between BEING IN THE WORLD but not OF IT and BEING OF THE WORLD but not IN IT. i saw how they were constantly trying to trap Jesus. for example any fool who knew anything about OT law could take one look at the situation of the woman caught in the act of adultery and be able to tell that the pharisees had set her up simply as a way of trying to catch Jesus contradicting the law..even though He made it very clear he came NOT to destroy the law but to fulfill it. why do i think it was a trick bag?
because in the OT both the man and the woman caught in the act of adultery was subject to being stoned. plus look at when barrabas and Jesus was presented by pilate before the masses.
it was the pharisees and scribes who whipped the people into a frenzy to hav Him crucified. during His trial they out and out lied in their testimony against HIm repeatedly. after His resurrection they bribed the soldiers to lie and say His disciples came and stole His body even though moving that stone with a hundred men was impossible and when Jesus spoke when He taught in the synagogues He SPOKE AS ONE WITH AUTHORITY and NOT AS THE PHARISEES. even thought Jesus WAS God He STILL was speaking from the point of His HUMANITY to say WIHTOUT GOD WE ARE NOTHING!!!!!

the mindset of these men went far beyond the evidence of their hypocritical natures..in that even thought they turned their nose up at the common folk even the soldiers whom they spit on to do their dirty work for them. the very core of the duplicity in their characters was that they confused being SEPARATIST with HOLINESS!!!! they thought that by COMING OUT OF THE WORLD it somehow made them BETTER THAN THE WORLD. so they shunned the world around them forgetting about what all the types and shadows really meant which pointed to the one who came for the very world they rejected. the problem was that all the pettiness all the cattiness all the dishonesty and manipulation which is so integral in our fallen natures they took right along with them. all the backbiting the gossip NOTHING HAD CHANGED.!!!!! and they say that women in your sorority type of setting are catty backbiting blackballing and vicious???!!!! OH PLEASE!!!! rather than remaining IN THE WORLD and being salt and light IN THE WORLD they came OUT OF THE WORLD but kept all its nastiness!!! of course no one saw any real authority in them. they were all about giving themselves attaboys AND SNUBBING THE WORLD AROUND THEM but God wasnt tin the midst of any of it.

i see now why Jesus so went after them while displaying the love and mercy of God to the tax collectors the prostitutes. true these werent people that society would exactly look up to but you knewwhere you stood with them. but THESE MEN?? you couldnt trust as far as you could throw them the most dangerous lie is when we lie to ourselves. but i also have to remember as blind as these men were He also loved them and died for them too

zaccheus

id been meaning to get around to blogging this for a couple of weeks now so here goes. i remember a couple of sundays ago when pastor gary was talking about zaccheus, the chief tax collector whom nobody liked and was so short that he had to climb up the tree to see Jesus. as i was listening to pastor gary speak, god really opened up my heart as to how there was nothing that Jesus spoke of and nobody that He encountered that we dont come across today i saw hoe Jesus looked beyond the outside and ministered to the inside man behind the outer actions.
a couple of things really stood out...the fact that zaccheus WAS so short and that he was in a position to rob his people. i see someone who all his life was probably what we would call today a geek...smarter than the average bear, sort of an oddball, probably someone who got made fun of, the kid whom the neighborhood bullies probably took his lunch money, got beat up on more than one occasion. but he was smart. go figure they didnt pick dummies to be auditors and tax collectors. we see this alot today..kids who have a miserable childhood because people just dont like them very much who later in life get put in positions of power and authority that give them a chance to get their own back, where everything they do when they rob step on and fleece other is like saying HOW DO YOU LIKE ME NOW!!! im pretty sure if you try to establish a sense of loyalty to zaccheus"s people his response to you would have been LOYALTY??? TO MY
PEOPLE?? WHY??WHAT DID MY OWN PEOPLE EVER DO FOR ME?? i think he thought that by being in a position of power wealth and authority would somehow banish that frightened kid who just was trying to get thru another day without being hungry because his lunch money got stolen without getting beat up without being called a nerd and a geek too afraid to tell anyone knowing it would made it worse for him. that finally being able to get even with his tormentors would silence that deep need just to be loved accepted for who he was to have friends. but it never did. that frightened little boy was who was climbing up that tree to see Jesus because he knew that deep emptiness inside of him hadnt been and never would be filled by any of that. thats all of us who are lost..that frightened kid who never ever healed. some of us were able to let Him in behind the mask because we saw He WAS the one who COULD heal us.
many of us however never do.

zaccheus being willing to give half his goods to the poor and restore manyfold what he had stolen came from that place that matthew 6:14-15 talks about..in order to recieve forgiveness from God he first had to be willing to forgive those who had wronged him. and forgive himself

stewards of the earth

the issue of the environment has taken on ridiculous heigths. i think much of it is a byproduct of how secular humanism has violently rejected God and attempts to place stock in their own sense of "goodness" WE DONT NEED GOD TO BE GOOD!!!!! the problem with this is whenever Jeus ISNT the center of all this is that our focus tends to become distorted and on the wrong things. of course as believers we should love and cherish this glorious creation that God gave us and when we hear those who say that its irrevelant that one day well have a new earth and heaven it just gives us as a whole a bad name.we are also to occupy until He comes and to be good and faithful stewards over what He has given us NOW. ONE DAY THE EARTH WILL CLAP ITS HANDS THE SEA WILL CLAP ITS HANDS THE OCEANS WILL ROAR AND IF WE DONT PRAISE HIM THE STONES THEMSELVES WILL CRY OUT!!! and of course i value animal life..anyone who has endured my babbling on about my fourlegged bratty samson
knows how big an animal lover i am. however i have a huge problem when we see the very same people who are pro-life over the rights of a sea turtle or a tiki bird being pro-choice over the rights of an unborn child. ive actually heard of women willing to have an abortion so they can be free of the responsibilities of parenthood thus being able to pursue their career of protecting the environment....their priorities are way out of whack. and i remember some years back an episode of LAW AND ORDER which always rips cases out of the headlines about a famous case involving GREENPEACE a radical environmentalist group who actually condones acts of terrorism to promote their cause to preserve the environment. they set a building on fire and it turned out many people perished in the flames. the mastermind of the acts response was chilling... IN A WAR THERE ARE ALWAYS CASUALTIES. his cause was more important that the lives of his fellow man. this is what always happens in any situation where we preserve our own twisted sense of righteousness after turning our back on God........we leave a door open to the demonic. there is a definite satanic force behind the section of the environmentalist movment that is anti-God. its called THE SPIRIT OF THE ANTICHRIST!!! people are Gods most valuable commodity and we are the ones who in Jesus name makes satan shake in fear.
get rid of people and he gets rid of a huge chunk of the competition because he know they were created with gifts and calling that could destroy his kingdom. whenever we arent God centered we always think WERE in control not seeing that its SATAN whose existance we deny controlling us. so its little wonder that the very same people who often lobby for peace and justice are often the most violent people youll ever want to meet. whats more violent than ripping a baby out of its mothers womb before its time? attacking a whaling ship endangering the lives of human being to protect a whale? MATTHEW 6:23-24 "IF THE EYE BE SINGLE THEN THE WHOLE BODY IS FULL OF LIGHT. IF THE LIGHT BE EVIL THEN THE WHOLE BODY IS DARK...AND IF THE LIGHT INSIDE OF YOU BE DARKNESS HOW GREAT IS THAT DARKNESS!!! " these things are what happens when people become so decieved that they actually have their priorities out of order and think that they are serving the greater good!!!!!

the root of the carnal nature is ALL ABOUT ME!!! WHAT ABOUT WHAT I WANT??? DONT I HAVE A SAY IN ANY OF THIS???? IIIIIIIIIIIIIIMEMEMEMEMEMEMEMEMME like a never ending litany. this is the weapon that satan most often uses to enslave and entrap us with traps he sets for us. and its very self deceptive. when we allow others to penetrate that shield of faith and push our buttons we immediately rise to the defense or even offense and our carnal nature will always tell us that were in control were getting one up on our opponents YOURE NOT TELLING ME WHAT I CAN AND CANNOT DO!!!!!!! a common lie satan will tell us is that somehow ..as insane and twisted the thinking behind this is......two wrong equal a right, forgetting that what OTHERS are doing isnt the issue. the issue isnt what others are and arent doing....WHAT DOES GOD HAVE TO SAY ABOUT IT??? WHAT WOULD JESUS DO IN THIS SITUATIION????!!!!!!! pastor gary hit on a crucial truth two weeks ago when he defined humility...it isnt being a doormat.....its holding off on the self-proclaimed right to do what we want to do and acting on it because there is a higher agenda at stake. humility is not only remaining teacheable but its also picking your battles. there is a time to yield and a time to draw the line. if its just all about proving im right and exercising the right to do what I
want then it means its time to let it go. however when it directly goes against what GOD says then its time to draw the line but there is a way of doing it. i was getting so caught up in my right to do what i wanted that i was forgetting to live by what His Words said. it was all about IM IN CONTROL YOURE NOT GOING TO CONTROL ME!!!! i didnt see that in my vain efforts to exercise control over my life that all i was doing in the eyes of God AND others was sabotaging myself. i was looking at WHAT ARE THEY DOING and not seeing GOD ISNT PLEASED WITH THIS. a doubleminded man is unstable in all his ways......by behaving one way in the presence of my fellowbelievers and my coworkers and then acting dramatically different on nighst i was out in an effort to defy those who told me i couldnt do what i wanted
only succeeded in painting a picture of me as unstable and someone not to be trusted. that duplicity of character scares people and when they see you on facebook or wherever posting all things about God and then when youre around them behaving totally the opposite theyre going to look at you as kind of nuts. pastor gary nailed it when he said whatever we put over God we WILL become enslaved by. alot of things we become enslaved by often happens because we leave a side door open to it thru bitterness and unforgiveness much of my unforgiveness was due to the fact that i saw in some of the people closest to me that their first priority was being out for themselves and as much as they may have loved me they clearly loved themselves more and they made decisions concerning me because they were looking out for and protecting themselves. well there are several parts to this. the first and this plays a crucial element in forgiving others......one is looking at MY PART IN IT- i am ALWAYS the lowest common denominator in everything that happens in my life. people tend not to talk about you unless you give them reason to talk about you and what they saw was someone clearly going back to their old ways. they also tend not to protect themselves from you when they dont see you as someone they need to protect themselves from. i was only looking at life thru the eyes of my own carnal nature and seeing those whom i couldnt trust because they didnt have my best interests in mind
and failing to see that they were doing what they were doing because they didnt trust me either.
the second was seeing that in taking my eyes off of GOD and fixating on what I wanted what was and what was not fair to me and seeing everything from a carnal perspective was i lost sight of the big picture. i strained at a gnat and swalllowed and almost choked on the camel.
HUMILITY ISNT LETTING OTHERS WALK ALL OVER YOU. ITS LOOKING AT THE BIG PICTURE AND SAVES ITS ENERGY FOR THE PRIMARY THINGS. the carnal nature focuses on defending things that God isnt happy with and forgets what His will for our lives is.