Live In The Tension

It's "both and," people, not "either or"!

HT: Christine Caine

Bigger Than We Can Imagine

From Beth Moore at CT Magazine: When A Big God Escapes Us:

I was the second-youngest child in a family that took up the better part of an entire pew at our Baptist church. My maternal grandmother lived with us, which meant that every Sunday I heard three generations of my own flesh and blood sing from The Broadman Hymnal. We lived in a college town in the green hills of Arkansas, whose denominations in those days were as distinct as the seasons.

Everyone I knew headed somewhere to church on Sunday morning. Whether we were people of faith was not the question. We were people of church. Still, true faith could be found down the heel-scuffed halls of my church.

All who filled the pews had secrets. Though my family’s could have qualified for daytime television, I know now that no one there was what he or she seemed. We all needed Jesus worse than we pretended. We all had wounds that Sunday mornings had not mended. We needed a Savior willing to stuff himself into the crowded car with us after church and venture behind the dark drapes of our homes. Some of us needed a wonder-worker who could wring honest-to-God miracles out of a house doused in madness, a proper Savior for improper people.

The order of our service usually mirrored that of the previous Sunday. After all, people like order, and my people liked bulletins. We liked to know in advance what hymns we’d sing, who’d bring the special music, and whether we were baptizing anyone that day. We could usually tell the latter by the curtain over the baptistery. (If it was open, somebody was going under.)

The church bulletin also served as a checklist through which one could work toward the goal: the benediction. At our church, it always came in the form of a song, and sometimes we would join hands. The lyrics of 18th-century Baptist John Fawcett seemed to sum it up well: “Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love. The fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above.”

The routine didn’t preclude the riches. Sacred songs were sung, the Bible was read and revered, a sermon was preached, an invitation was offered—and joy teemed over the takers.

I was 9 when I walked the aisle to profess my faith in Christ. I understood the basics of my decision: that I was a sinner and needed saving if I wanted to go to heaven. I could summarize many sermons I heard as a child with one thundering question: Do you want to go to hell? No, I did not. I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to go to heaven, either, but it clearly would beat hell.

Those who came forward remained at the front after the service so the other churchgoers could shake their hands until their shoulders nearly popped out of their sockets. The more the people congratulated me, the more I realized something profound had happened—something big people thought was big. And I cried like a baby, hiding my blotchy wet face with my left hand while shaking an assembly line of hands with my right hand. Jesus had come to my church that day and, in the routine, I had not managed to escape him....

There is so much more in this article - a stirring Bible lesson and the pathos of hunger for God's presence. Read it all at the link.

Satisfied?

Some straight talk from Beth More:  Is Christ Alone Enough for You?

Knowing God's truth is an absolute necessity in our journey to freedom, but so is our truthfulness. Psalm 51:6 says God desires "truth in the inner parts" (NIV). God's truth and our truthfulness are both needed in order to gain complete freedom in Christ.

I mention the importance of honesty because I may be about to get more honest than some of you can stand. I ask you to consider what I have to say: Many Christians are not satisfied with Jesus.Before you call me a heretic, let me set the record straight: Jesus is absolutely satisfying. In fact, He is the only means by which any mortal creature can find true satisfaction.

However, I believe a person can receive Christ as Savior, serve Him for decades and meet Him face to face in glory without ever experiencing satisfaction in Him.

Rather than waste our effort on worthless things, God wants us to find satisfaction in Him. When we look to other sources, we are guilty of idolatry....

Read it all at the link.

I Believe

I''ve always loved this faith confession from Beth Moore's book Believing God. It's worth repeating daily.

"Confessions of a Beth Moore Convert"

Any Beth Moore fans out there?

At CT's "Her.meneutics" blog, Karen Spears Zacharias has published her Confessions of a Beth Moore Convert, subtitled "Why the Bible teacher with the big Texan hair may just be our female Billy Graham."

Her studies present the Scriptures in a straightforward fashion. She often concedes that there are different ways of considering the matter. "There is a big difference between a head full of knowledge and the word of God literally abiding in us," she warns. She’s funny but never demeaning (which can’t be said for many these days). "Everyday temptation and intentional demonic seduction are as different as a snowball and an avalanche." Anyone who has experienced the two, and survived, knows the truth and wry humor of that statement. Moore's workbooks have the same general theme in that they repeatedly point people to the Jesus who can and will, given the chance, completely transform their lives. I'd go as far to say she is the female Billy Graham, unabashedly falling on her face in prayer in front of the masses.

I have enjoyed some of Moore's books and videos (although her speaking style is not my cup of tea), but I can't agree with the "next Billy Graham" comment. There won't be a next Billy Graham, because he was and is a unique gift of God for one season in history. However, Beth Moore and her Living Proof Ministries have a lot of fans and have helped many to get into the Word more deeply. This article should please her fans and rankle her detractors (but maybe change a few minds).