Sometimes God works THROUGH us, but He is Always Working IN us

Any ministry any of us ever does is always being compared against what others do.  We compare numbers constantly.  It is what somewhere in our Western world we have determined is the gauge to call someone “successful” or “fruitful.”
     In 1 Kings 17 we are introduced to Elijah.  Now I get excited when I think of Elijah.  I have over and over again read the stories of all the great things God did through him.  What a successful, fruitful prophet he was.  And again my mind imposes on it all the same standard for gauging his ministry (and mine).  But recently God pointed out something I never saw.

Between Two Worlds - (Suffering and Joy)

I'm stuck in it.  You are stuck in it.  And for the time being, there is no way out of it.  We are ever in this grave reality that at times lessens, though at other times increases.  And it is not about to go anywhere, anytime soon.  That is because time is the great obstacle to this entire conundrum in which we find ourselves caught.  

Thank You ISIS

For those of us who claim to "know the Bible" to be regularly reading the Bible, we are in a very difficult reality.  We read a book written by men, under the inspiration of God's Spirit, which then through the human personalities contains the very Word(s) of God.  We place our lives, the current living out of these realities, and our eternal destinies in this Word of God.  And yet at times there is a massive breakdown in understanding just what some of these authors, even whose experiences were what God chose to report to us, are still today (some 3500-2000 years later) applicable to us.  It is to this I say: Thank you ISIS.

The Glory of Christ in a World of Lesser glories

Rarely do we anticipate the profound.  Rarely do we know where to find it, rather it finds us.  Indeed, if we knew where it was to look we wouldn't be so consumed by matters so small, which is really what we continually find ourselves preoccupied with.  But there is a grander purpose for which we have been designed, of which we above all creation have the bandwidth and capacity for, namely the GLORY OF CHRIST.  I wasn't anticipating this years ago, but I was awakened to something profound and life-changing.  Let me explain.