Circumstances Don’t Dictate Our Faith

September 20th, 2012

This morning when we were listening to the story of Esau approaching Jacob’s family with 400 men, I stopped the audio to ask the kids how they would feel. Esau had previously said that he would murder his brother Jacob for stealing his birthright and blessing through trickery and lying. Jacob knew that he was going to be killed, and he was scared half out of his mind.

“What would you have done to appease your brother’s fury and try to protect your family from being killed?” I asked this after they heard that Jacob had given a huge present of lots of animals to his brother.

“Give him presents” was the answer that seemed appropriate because Jacob had sinfully tricked Esau out of his father’s blessing, and Jacob had received double the inheritance that Esau had, because the right of the firstborn back then was to get a double portion of the inheritance. (To do the math, since there were two kids, the money was divided into three parts; the firstborn got 2/3rds, and the second son was supposed to get 1/3. If you had 8 kids, you divided the inheritance money into 9 parts, giving the firstborn a double portion.) Anyway, since Jacob had swindled riches away from his brother, it was only right for him to make up for his sin through money. Money back then (wealth) was counted through livestock and land. So Jacob was giving large amounts of livestock to his brother to appease his anger.

“But wait, Mom!” shouted my oldest son. “God told Jacob that he would prosper in the land back home. So there was no way that Esau would kill his brother. If he had trusted God, he would not have been scared.”

I paused. My son was right.

Circumstances are not reality. God’s Word is reality. If we can truly grasp this, we would never have fear, because God has promised that all our circumstances will work out for our good. I was shocked that my son had such deep spiritual perception.

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Shadow Puppets Behind a Sheet

September 19th, 2012

shadow-puppetsI tied a rope to two trees and hung up a white bed sheet. The sun shone through the sheet, so the kids started doing pantomime and shadow puppets with their fingers. This was a completely unexpected activity, since I hung up the sheet for the kids to do a painting. (You can see what they painted here.)

You can also do shadow puppets on a white wall while projecting a bright light toward the wall in a dark room. Slide projectors without a slide in them work especially well. The children combine their fingers into different shapes to make animals and objects. You can even play a game of charades by silently acting out a shadow puppet and trying to get the other people to guess what object you are making. Shadow puppets are great fun!

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Confidence vs. Self-Esteem

September 17th, 2012

God commands us to have confidence over and over in Scripture. We are to be bold and courageous (Joshua 1:9), we are to walk boldly to the throne of God to receive help in time of need (Hebrews 4:16), and we are to reach out to the lost (Matthew 28: 19-20), which requires boldness. To have confidence is not sin. We derive our confidence from God.

Self-esteem is not the same as confidence. Self-esteem is thinking more highly of yourself than you ought to think (Philippians 2:3). But humility and confidence are not opposites. People who are greatly used by God are BOTH humble and confident. They know who they are in Christ, and they boldly follow God and lead others closer to Christ.

When God commands us to walk boldly to His throne to receive help in time of need, He wants to grant us confidence so that we possess that confidence, and that confidence is OURS. The confidence that I have in Christ is MINE. It belongs to me because God gave it to me.

So many Christians (like this Beth Moore Basher) say that we’re not allowed to have confidence, because it’s God’s. Oh, really? Just because it came from God doesn’t mean it’s not given.

Most women think they are pieces of dirt. And because we think of ourselves as garbage, believing lies from the enemy, we accomplish nothing for Christ. Instead of splitting hairs about the word “confidence,” I would much rather tell a woman that she is dearly loved by Christ, who gave up His life for her. God created her for a purpose, and she needs to ask God what her gifts, talents, and life purpose is. After salvation, when God is in the process of transforming her, she becomes more and more beautiful. You can see it in her face. She becomes more and more like Christ.

And as she becomes like Christ, she can stand on the Word of God and not believe the lies from the enemy that are crippling. She then has deep confidence in God, and it’s HERS. The confidence belongs to HER, and it shines out of her face.

It’s not a sin to be confident. To be used by God full blast in your life, you must be bold as a lion. Yes, it comes from Christ, but it’s GIVEN to us. That confidence permeates every aspect of our lives, and we are used maximally for His kingdom.

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Rebuttal to a Beth Moore Basher

September 16th, 2012

rebuttal-to-a-beth-moore-basherI listened to 16 minutes of this man‘s venom towards Beth Moore. I was going to listen to the whole one-hour show, to see if anything he had to say had validity. But the condescending, contemptuous way he referred to his fellow believer in Christ was sin. If he is sinning, he is not walking by the Spirit. If he is not walking by the Spirit, nothing he has to say is worthwhile, especially if he’s trying to make a spiritual point.

I have no idea if I agree or disagree with the theology of Beth Moore, but no two people on this earth will agree about everything. That doesn’t mean she’s Satan. She’s not. Last January I took her study on the book of James, and it was excellent. I grew spiritually. I saw nothing that was theologically incorrect, and my father is a seminary professor with a doctorate in theology from Dallas Theological Seminary. I’ve had a solid foundation of Scriptural training in the Christian schools that I attended as a missionary kid, and I’ve spent thousands of hours in the Word of God. None of this is boasting. I live with my face smashed in the dust because God is everything and I am nothing. What I’m saying is that Beth Moore wasn’t off in her theology in her study of the book of James, which is the only one I’ve done so far.

The radio show host began by bashing the person who introduced Beth Moore. He paused the man half-sentence and twisted his words. The man (who introduced her) said that his confidence came from God, but the radio show host said that he had his confidence in himself. If the radio show host can’t even hear a clear sentence, his pompous, puffed-up heart has plugged ears from the get-go.

Then he starts reading long reams of Scripture without telling us why. He says that we can’t memorize a Scripture verse without in essence memorizing the whole chapter. This is ludicrous. And, by the way, it’s ironic, because Beth Moore memorized the entire book of James and encouraged each of us women to do the same during the one Bible study I took. Sheez.

He also bashes her as a preacher. For heaven’s sake, she teaches WOMEN. No man can be offended by a woman who teaches women, no matter what you believe is Scriptural. This radio show host was prideful, smug, and critical of someone who has a deep spiritual walk with God and is having a powerful impact on women across the nation, causing the women to repent of sin and draw closer to God. I’m going to pray that this man repents of HIS sin.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Okay, I’ve listened up to the 36-minute mark, which is all that I could stand. He mentions confidence as sin. (Beth Moore said, and I quote, “confidence in God.” She never said her confidence came from outside of God, but that she was discouraged and felt incapacitated for the work that God had called her to do.) I will address this in Part 2: Confidence vs. Self-Esteem.

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