Lent day 5

Today I was reading in Psalms 32 about confession and it brought some old memories to my mind that I hadn’t thought about in a while.

N.T. Wright talked about how “confession is facing up to what’s wrong.”

I remember one summer during college, I was home from school and was really feeling convicted about some things that were going on in my life. I don’t remember what they were. But I do remember feeling like they were welling up inside of me.

Then one night I had a long prayer session where I laid all of these things out before the Lord.

I remember distinctly that as I confessed each sin it felt like I was throwing up. I remember it felt like I was releasing demons from inside of my body. That I was now free of these things that had haunted me for so long.

I’m not saying that I haven’t sinned since then or that those sins stayed out of my life. As I said I can’t even remember what they were to tell you if they are truly gone from my life.

But I know that in that moment I felt new and clean.

Lately I’ve wondered about the whole point of confession. It says in the Bible that God knows the things that we do. That He knows the sins even before we know that we are sinning. So, than why should I confess those things to Him if He already knows them?

My pastor was talking about this in church and he said that there is nothing that you can say to God that He doesn’t already know. But that isn’t the point of confession. Confession is for our own hearts. It is for our souls.

When we do not confess our sins, we hold them inside and let them eat at us. We need to bring them up before God and let Him work on our hearts and mind to repair the damage we have done to them.

Lent day 4

Today my devotional was in Matthew 4 again and this time focusing even more on the temptation part. I think I really needed to hear some of this today and so I thought I would share it with you.

N.T. Wright talked about how temptation starts of as just a little bit off-limits and then it leads us one step further away from where we know we should be.

You don’t start off by killing a man, but by disliking him. Then hating him. Then thinking of ways to hurt him. Then acting out on the fantasy.

You don’t start off by having sex outside your marriage. You start by lusting over those around you. Then by flirting. Then spending more time with them.

He also said that temptation is the perversion of something good for not good reasons. Bread is a good thing, but if Jesus had given in and made the stones into bread for just Himself and to prove that He was who He said he was would have been a sin.

I pray that God would give me the wisdom to hear and know when the voices in my head are from the tempter and the strength of character to say no to the temptations in my life.

Lent day 3

As I was looking for things to give up this Lenten season, I thought of fasting from a meal or something specific. But I realized that I’ve never really been good a fasting from things. I get cranky and then find all kinds of excuses to get around it.

This is probably something I should work on. But I’m not doing that this season.

I decided to add a couple of things into my life that I also needed to be doing.

I started doing a devotional by N.T. Wright and reading the book Prayer by Timothy Keller.

I’m not saying this to brag. That’s another thing that I tend to find annoying during Lent, that every feels the need to tell everyone what they are giving up.

I’m just telling you the things that I’ve been going through and where I’ll be getting my ideas.

So, today I was reading Matthew 4.about the temptation of Jesus, and I realized how much I’ve struggled with fasting and temptation in general.

I realized that’s why I’ve never wanted to give things up for lent. I’ve always found ways to justify giving in to the temptation of eating when I said I would fast or doing the thing that I said I wouldn’t.

I know that this may not be a big encouraging post. I don’t really have anything else to say though. No nice bow to wrap this thing up with. Just wanted to be honest about the things that I struggle with that I feel God speaking to me about.

Lent day 2

For a while I’ve struggled with my prayer life.

I’ve always felt that I needed to pray more, but have found it hard to know what to pray or how to pray.

I felt that I would say the wrong thing, or pray for the wrong thing and then God wouldn’t listen to me and the whole thing would be pointless.

So, for a long time I’ve been paralyzed about prayer and therefore haven’t prayed at all.

I knew that this was also not good, so I’d feel guilty about it and it becomes a downward spiral.

In a series on prayer my pastor was talking about how we can’t pray anything that God doesn’t already know.

God knows what we need and even if we pray for the wrong thing or in the “wrong” way, He is there and He is listening.

Just as when one of my kids asks me for something, I long to be able to give them anything they ask for.

Not that I’ll get everything I ask for in prayer. God knows the things that I need and the things that I want.

As in the example of my kids, I know what they need and I know what they want.

Just because they ask for a toy or ice cream or something else doesn’t mean they are going to get it.

But I, as their father, look at the things they need and want and give them the things that I deem to be in their best interest.

So, God, in His infinite wisdom will give us the things that we pray about that He deems in our best interest.

Lent day 1

I’ve started doing a devotional for Lent and I thought I would try to write thoughts that come to me while I’m reading and studying.

This thought really isn’t my own. But it was brought back to my mind while I was reading Matthew 1 and 2 today.

I had always been somewhat confused and annoyed by all of the genealogy list that are in the Bible. Most of the time I would actually skip over most of them or just speed through them thinking nothing about them or why they might be there.

But this last Sunday in a membership class for my church our pastor talked about the lists and that maybe they were there to show us the kind of people who God can use.

When you look at Joseph’s family line, and therefore Jesus’, you find a whole lot of people who messed up a lot.

Yet God still chose to use them for His plans.

He chose to work through screw-ups, adulterers, killers, and many other sinners.

In fact if you think about it, every person that God worked through, and is still working through today, was and is a sinner.

We have all messed up in our lives.

We have all sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God.

But none of that means that God can’t and won’t use us, if we are willing to be used by Him for His glory.

My latest excuse

I realized tonight, that my work has become my latest excuse for why I’m not doing the things that I want to do with my life.

I always say that I want to do this or that or that I have all these ideas for things to do.

But I have always found an excuse not to.

When I was writing and playing music all the time, I used the fact I didn’t know what I was doing to try to do anything with it, or that I was working too much and didn’t have the time or energy to really do anything with it.

Then I became a stay at home dad. I told myself that I would have time to write and try to record some things on my own. But than I used taking care of my son coupled with the fact that he didn’t like it very much when I would play my guitar or sing, to excuse that fact that I wasn’t doing the things I set out and feel called to do.

Now I have a job again, and I can tell you that I’ve been pretty close to just giving up this whole dreaming thing and just try to figure out the best way to make it through the rest of my life.

But there is still this nagging thing inside of me that says I was meant to be doing something else.

I think it’s why I’ve never felt content or happy in the things I’ve done in my life for very long.

I know that those aren’t the things I supposed to be doing.

A few Sundays ago, I was playing in church that night and was practicing the music for the service. Then I found myself playing my guitar and singing for probably two hours. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a day that I felt so fulfilled and happy. Then worshiping God by helping to lead worship was the perfect end to a great day.

I need to find a way to make myself take the time to do the things that bring me joy, while still doing the things that help bring home the money.

Big project

So, the other day I had an idea for a project that would involve my writing music and Bible study. But it also would be a huge project that would take me a few years to complete.

Every once in a while ideas come to me like this and I generally get excited about it at first and than lose all interest and move onto something else.

But this idea has kinda been stuck in my head now for a few days and while it seems extremely daunting, I think I really want to give it a try.

I’m not sure what my next step will be in this project, but I’m hoping that I’ll be able to see it through.