DNR ~ Diminished and Reduced…


ekg-001-an-electrocardiogram-heart-monitor-pulses-on-a-blue-grid-loop_r4m_frdh_thumbnail-full01I see depressed people. I see them everywhere. You can easily spot them by their lowered vitality; their lack of activity; that dimness in their eyes. They think that is just how life is and have settled into an existence that isn’t painful but isn’t pleasant either. They have unknowingly become diminished and reduced and need to be resuscitated!

The reason people reach this level in their thinking and let’s be honest, many, many people have, is because at the core of things, at the most elemental level they have been talked into believing things that aren’t true. It sounds simple and cheesy I know, but the things in life that appear complicated are often more simple than you think. Wrong thinking leads to wrong believing which leads to a sucky life! And to add insult to the proverbial injury, you are struggling against a force you can neither see nor discern absent spiritual insight. There is something, whether you believe it or not, that is actively working against your best interest, seeking to bring you down to some level of defeat or mediocrity or loss.

Your opponent is spiritual in nature and works within the systems of the world to bring you down to misery or frustration, to take away the life God has given you, to steal away your energy and passion for living. He does not work alone, but controls a vast network also hidden from view, hell-bent on feeding you some wrong conclusion! It’s called the systematizing of error and it’s damn effective! It’s a cause and effect where the effect did not come from the cause. It’s H2O minus an O. It’s 2 + 2 = 5. It’s an argument where the starting premise was wrong. It’s a scientific formula with an unaccounted for variation. In short, it’s a lie that needs to be challenged.

You may have noticed in your life, in those moments of clarity where you sort of “wake up” to some reality, that as soon as you begin to take steps to remedy a situation, you are besieged with challenges or distractions that take you right back to square one and back to your familiar, yet painful sleepy life! You can tell you are living mesmerized by this deceitful drug by the things that run across your mind. You ask yourself, “Is this all life is?” “Is this my lot in life to get up and go to work and come home and go to sleep?” The answer to these questions is hell-effin no! You’re just being hoodwinked, that’s all! You are being systematically talked out of things that matter. You are being fed lies, albeit minutely subtle lies, that reduce and diminish your existence.

Often, you’ll find that the things you once enjoyed have been taken away one by one without your consent. Or, something convinced you there was something wrong with those things you enjoyed and suggested you give them up. Have you noticed in today’s world, that someone is always telling us about the potential dangers of something we enjoy with suggestions that we curtail what we like to do? Don’t eat this! Don’t touch that! Watch out for those people! Be cautious! Don’t try that because it’s already been done! Pretty soon the whole world will be living on dry chicken breasts and zealously guarding against anything with a little flavor. Don’t you see it? It’s all part of a universal scheme; a system that seeks your personal liberty and enjoyment for life. And, it happened to us because we believed the lies!

The only solution to this world-wide dilemma is to get back to what is true. Stop allowing other people to define your life for you. Stop accepting the things that run across your mind as some kind of gospel. Just because you thought something, even many, many times doesn’t guarantee it is truth. In fact, those thoughts; those wrong beliefs are the source of your difficulties. You are limited by yourself and yourself alone! If you believe you will never have enough money, you will never have enough money, but that’s your sucky choice not mine! Choice – you get it? In your mind, in the secret places, you are making choices day by day. You are gathering information and making a choice. You just have to make sure that what you chose is actually true and not a lie. Anything that diminishes you, anything that reduces you, anything that boxes you in or closes you off is a LIE!

The truth will resuscitate you and bring you back to life. Your Creator is the author of life! As life’s source He will always open the doors and make a way for you! He’s not the god of religion, He is the God of life! He does not seek to take away and limit and reduce, He seeks to give and expand and offer you life more than abundant! You can break out of your rut; your depression; your less than abundant life simply by opening your heart to the truth. God already knows how much life has been sucking for you, so why not let go of everything you think you know and get back to life? You didn’t begin your life depressed and you don’t have to end it that way. Choose vitality. Choose energy. Choose life!

I don’t know about you, but I’m not signing that DNR!

Just some good thoughts…

 

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Fine Lines of Demarcation…


Drawing a line in the sand.  An old metaphor.“I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly!” exclaimed Jesus while explaining his purpose for mankind. Can you believe it? The reason God sent His son into the world was so that you and I could live a more than abundant life! God’s great promise is a life that is superabundant in every category, every facet and phase! So why do we often find ourselves living a less than abundant life? The answer can be found in the fine lines of demarcation between truth and error.

Error, in order to be believed and practiced, must follow closely alongside the genuine. If the error promoted is too far away from the truth, people will spot it and in most cases go another direction. When you travel you have to move in a certain direction to end up at the right destination. Depending upon how far you have to travel, being off just one degree will cause you to miss your location by a thousand miles. Many people miss the life they wished they could live by a thousand miles.

The truth found in God’s Word provides you with the genuine. The more you can align your life and believing with the genuine, the better results you will experience in your life. But, and its a big but, you have to be very, very, very clear on the doctrine. If you get real close but are off ever so slightly, you will miss the prize at the end. There are forces out there in the world ever working to move you away from the genuine with the goal of steal, kill and destroy. Error steals your happiness, your successes, your results. Error kills your enthusiasm for life while seeking to kill you in the process. Error destroys your accomplishments and potential rewards in the future.

The only way to be assured of the victory is to know what the Good Book says and more specifically, know what it says directly to you. For example the book of Romans, written directly to you, explains how Jesus Christ paid the full price for your sins (your missing the mark) past, present and future. He not only paid for your sins but he also paid for the consequences of those sins. Can you see your more than abundant life alive in those verses? Yet, what does the world teach you? What do the churches teach you? They tell you, you must do “good works” to earn God’s favor in your life. They become adept at condemning you and reminding you where you don’t “measure up.” Oh sure, they agree that Jesus Christ died for your sins, but in the same breath talk about sin, promote sin and laud sin! They ask if you are right with the Lord. They question if you are living your life the right way. But, how could I live my life the wrong way if Jesus Christ paid the price for everything that was ever wrong with me? Can you see the fine lines of demarcation? Can you recognize how the subtlety of wrong doctrine can cause you to spend a lifetime trying to earn something that God already freely and graciously gave to you? Can you discern how your struggle to make yourself right with God leads only to a life that is less than abundant?

Most Christians fail to utilize the power of God because they are still trying to do things that will make themselves right with God! You show me a person operating the power of God in his life and I’ll show you a person who believes who God says he is and has ceased from his own works! In order to get all of the things God says you can get, you have to persuade your mind of the things that God says are true! You have to be damn clear on the doctrine. People aren’t clear on the doctrine because they have drifted away from God’s Word and have been caught up in philosophies and tradition. I don’t blame the people for this, however… If I was taught to associate God with Him evaluating and judging my life, I wouldn’t want to read the book either. I would want nothing to do with that garbage! Yet that pervasive error is the very thing that keeps people from the only book that will actually save them!

It is religion that has done this to people. Religion, ever seeking to exercise control over man, has promoted these wrong doctrines. Religion is ever focused on what man does or doesn’t do. Religion places man at the center of things and blames him for failing to attain. Christianity is just the opposite. Christianity isn’t about what man does, but what God has done for man in Christ! Christianity, true Christianity, makes God its subject of focus. Christianity is God’s solution for a sick and dying world. Christianity is the more than abundant life promised in John 10:10…

I’m not asking you to slap your pastor or go and beat up your priest! Instead I’m asking you dig into that Word of God and see what it says about your life. Read those seven church epistles written directly to you. (Romans – Thessalonians) Stop participating in the good behavior games and learn about the freedom you have in Christ! Learn about all of the wonderful things God has already done for you and made available to you. Find out how to believe rightly and gain access to every good thing you ever wanted for your life! It’s all right there waiting for you folks, as long as you observe those fine lines of demarcation…

Just some good thoughts…