Desperate Joy

  Photo by cottonbro studio on pexels.com A few years back I was working at a warehouse for Dippin' Dots ice cream. I was tasked with repairing a crate for a freezer we wanted to ship. I was cutting a two-by-four with a table saw and was careless for a moment.   The spinning blade caught my left hand. Several fingers got mangled, especially my index finger. Upon seeing the damage, I immediately pulled my wrecked hand close to my body and cradled it in my other hand. I got a clean towel and wrapped it up to help control the bleeding. My boss drove me to the ER where they cleaned up my hand and wrapped it up more thoroughly. That night a surgeon tried to repair the index finger, but was not successful. I am now missing the tip of that finger. For many weeks, my left hand was wrapped and padded, and I was careful to treat it gently. The slightest bump meant anomy. Our natural instinct with any wound, even the smallest of paper cuts, is to pull that wounded part in closer...

  Image by  Holger Langmaier  from  Pixabay Those who know my story or have been reading this blog for any amount of time will know that I am an addict. My drug of choice is porn. That addiction dragged me to some dark places, and I ended up in Federal prison where I am now. We all have a hurt, a God-shaped scar on our soul. A piece of us that is hollowed out. As children we looked to our family to fill that void and heal the scar. Our caregivers usually meant well, but often their best intentions still left us wounded. It is an unfortunate reality that in most cases our parents and siblings are broken themselves and instead of pouring ointment into the gash, they poured in salt and vinegar. They loved us and wanted the best for us, but their love is still a fractured gift, it may have been genuine, but it was still tainted. For others of us, those caregivers abandoned us, or worse, tormented us further. Opening the wound even deeper. So, we looked to our frien...

  Image by  chanwit whanset  from  Pixabay "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness to him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." - 1 Corinthians 2:14 There is a war going on in our hearts and minds between the natural man and the spiritual man. This battle is also described as being between the flesh and the spirit. For those of us who are in Christ there is an old nature and a new nature, and they are in constant conflict. What the Bible is saying here is that we need spiritual discernment to reject the old, fleshly, natural part of our selves and to embrace our new, spiritual, holy nature. We live in a physical, natural reality that we perceive with our five senses, but we also live in a spiritual reality. We often miss out on the spiritual reality because we lack spiritual discernment.   We allow those fleshly, temporal things to distract us from our relationship with God an...

  Image by  Ronald Sandino  from  Pixabay I grew up in a very strict, rigid, conservative Christian home. We had lots of rules. Many TV shows we did not watch, no rated "R" movies, no rock or popular music. Even modern Christian music was off limits. We had high standards for dress and behavior, and, of course, no smoking and drinking. Most churches have standards of some form or another, and many churches still hold to these kinds of strict standards. These rules may be useful at times. As young Christians many times we struggle to understand what righteousness and holiness are all about. How do we live a holy life? What does it mean to be righteous? Living a Christ-like life can be kind of vague, ephemeral, or mystical, and we can't quite wrap our minds around it. The Bible tells us to walk in the Spirit, but that seems even more vague and mystical than being like Christ. At least in following Christ's example we have the Gospels to look at. What ends up ha...

  Photo by JÉSHOOTS "For everyone that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil."   - Hebrews 5:13-14 Small plastic bowls and containers are difficult to come by in prison, so I will look for containers I can reuse or repurpose. In the commissary here they sell small tubs of sliced jalapenos and when I have used up all the jalapenos, I will pour out the vinegar and jalapeno juice and wash the bowl out to reuse for other things. The problem is that when I pour out the jalapeno juice, the flavor and the aroma of the jalapenos lingers in the plastic. This essence of jalapeno will then infuse whatever I put in the bowl, and often leave my whole locker smelling of jalapenos. Eventually this essence of jalapeno washes or wears out, and the container is much more useful. We live in the world with its ...

  Photo by Benyamin Bohlouli on Unsplash More than 700 years before Christ was born, Ahaz was king of Judah. The Prophet Isaiah delivered a difficult message to him, because of Judah's great sin and rebellion against God, they would be taken captive by the Assyrians and the land would be left desolate. But Isaiah also had a message of hope. Under Divine inspiration he told Ahaz to ask God for a sign. Ahaz refused, and here is how Isaiah responded (Isaiah 7:14-16), "Therefore, the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings." This is one of the most clear and profound prophesies about the birth of Jesus Christ. Even though Ahaz was looking forward to some terrible days...

  Joseph Accused by Potiphar's Wife, 1655 Rembrandt van Rijn, Dutch, 1606 - 1669 Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington Many times, we find ourselves in situations where the right thing seems all too clear, only to find out later that what we thought was right turned out to be wrong. We live in a world that is continually telling us that was is good is actually evil and what is evil is actually good. If we are not careful to develop and practice godly discernment, we will end up on the path of destruction. Samson was a good(bad) example of a man who lacked discernment and as a result ended up destroying himself, we looked at his story in the previous post. He could not see beyond Delilah's beauty and charm to see the evil that lurked just below the surface. Diametrically opposite him we find Joseph. Joseph, even as a young man, demonstrated uncanny discernment. He had a clear sense of purpose and direction that he derived from his connection with God. He knew what...

  So Delilah asked Samson, ‘Please tell me what makes you so strong and what it would take to tie you up securely.’Samson replied, ‘If I were tied up with seven new bowstrings, I would become as weak as anyone else.’  Source: FreeBibleImages.org , Samson's Hair Before there were kings in the nation of Israel, judges were religious and political leaders who organized the scattered tribes of Israel to fight their enemies. One such judge was Samson. Samson is well known for his Holy Spirit-empowered physical strength and ability in battle. He single-handedly killed hundreds of enemy Philistines and at one point pulled out the gates of a city and carried them away. There are not too many people that the Bible says were filled with the Holy Spirit like Samson was. He was uniquely gifted and used by God. He is honored in the "Hall of Faith" in Hebrews 11, alongside many other people of great faith. But Samson had a problem. As much as he was able to defeat nearly every Ph...

  In 2 Kings 6 in the Bible, we find the king of Syria waging war against the nation of Israel. When the Syrians would plan an attack, the Hebrew prophet Elisha would tell the king of Israel where and when they were going to attack, and they were able to outflank the Syrians in every battle. The king of Syria would attempt sneak attack after sneak attack, and every time Elisha would spoil his plans.  The king of Syria started to think that he had a spy in his court. One of his advisors told him that it was not a spy, but Elisha was telling the king of Israel "the words that thou speakest in thy bedchamber."  They discovered that Elisha was in the town of Dothan, and the king of Syria sent a mighty army there. Here is what Scripture says:   "...When the servant of the man of God was risen early, and gone forth, behold, a host compassed the city both with horses and chariot. And his servant said unto [Elisha], Alas, my master! how shall we do? And he answered, Fear not...

  Image by  Artur Pawlak  from  Pixabay When I was teenager, I had a Pug/Pekinese mix dog named Chad. He was hyper and ugly, in a rather adorable way. His favorite game was to pull on pieces of rope with knots tied in the end. I had a good time swinging him around with those. One night he was laying in bed with me, and he was drooling a lot, so I kicked him off the bed onto the floor. The next morning, he was unusually lethargic and had left a large puddle of drool on the carpet. I tossed him in the back yard and as I was going about my routine, I looked in the back yard and Chad was rocking back and forth, pushing his head in and out of some bushes. I pointed this out to my parents, and they decided to take him to the vet. Turns out, Chad had gotten into some "snail bait"(poison) my parents had in the back yard for the vegetable garden. Chad thought it tasted good and had his fill. The vet pumped his stomach and fortunately he survived to pull on the rope anot...