shattering images

something that i've been thinking about for a while is how we see God:

we have the beautiful image of jesus carrying our sin on the cross, that's pretty wicked, i mean, we suck, and so God takes our suckiness on to His own shoulders. He died for all of us. sweet! there's our freedom.

we have cute baby jesus sleeping in a donkeys food trough awwww...so silent...not really actually

then we have the burning bush...powerful - and other old testament images of a powerful God leading us...

these are all nice, good ways to remember God, but most of those are past images of God. ways that God HAS shown up. we need to shift our sight to right now.

brother yun, a great preacher, and minister for God said in his newest book "most churches see God in the past, and in the future, but never see Him as a present figure in our lives" that was a paraphrase because i'm too lazy to pick up the book and write it out. 

thats so true.

quick trivia question, in the old testament what distinguished our God from the pagan gods?

don't think too hard about it, it's really easy, their gods were inanimate statues. 

our God was known as "the great I AM" or my favourite "the living God".

our God is ALIVE, he didn't end at the cross, rather He began a new movement when He came back. "the great mystery of the ages has now been revealed - Christ in you the hope of glory".

remember the past images of God, how they show His love, but now remember that He Is in our lives right now. that when you were saved Holy Spirit came in to your life to help you live a new life without sin. 

He's right here right now, ready to perform signs and miracles. 

"I tell you anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do greater things than these, because I am going to my Father."

seriously!

we forget that our God is the living God, that He isn't far off. He's living in us, and ready to do signs and miracles, and forgive us. we can have joy right now! we can be forgiven right now! He can heal us right now! we have this bad perception that we're evil, wretched, bored and helpless until He comes. but He can take all those away right now. 

He's moving right now.

all of you

think about this, how does God fit in to your life?

if you thought "well sometimes i think about him through the day" or even if you considered Him fitting in to your life, i think you need to reconsider some things.

please, don't take offense, stop reading if it bothers you to hear that.

these aren't thoughts, or reflections, these are things i've personally experienced in my own life. 

things i've realized after living for a while.

He's never going to fit in to your life.

the bible tells us He's an all consuming fire.

jesus also compares our lives as jesus followers to buying a new pair of jeans, ripping them, and using them as a patch for our old jeans.

yes, that might be fashionable these days, but it's impractical. 

when you are given a new pair of jeans, why would you wreck them by adding them to an old pair.

we are given a new life, why do we try and fit it to the old life?

why hold on to sin, bad stuff, why hold on to grief and sadness? 

you can have a new life. 

jesus is a new vintage, you don't add new wine to a bunch of old wine, you take an empty barrel and pour it in to that barrel. 

we need to empty ourselves of our old life and let His new life flood in to us.

romans 12 (BEAUTIFUL chapter of the bible!) says this:

"do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world [as we did in our old life], but be transformed by the renewing of your mind" 

the brackets were mine, do you get it? 

renew means to make new, i don't know if you've ever tried to make something new, but it doesn't work. i can't make my jeans new without a time machine. 

renewing our mind means starting over, throwing everything away, emptying ourselves, and receiving a completely new life.

He wants you to be new, and to live new. He's not asking you to fit Him in, but rather to let all of you be made new by receiving all of Him.

my challenge is this: if you're holding on to pain, if you're still reflecting your old life and trying to follow Him, or if you're not following Him at all then empty yourselves completely, let all you're preconceived notions, and thoughts fall away and let yourselves be made new.

that's what he's asking. in jesus' name be made new.