Currently...

1. reading

I'm not finished with it yet but wanted to to take the time to quote some profound thoughts and writings found here. Hope it's as profound to you as it is to me :)


The problem is not fundamentally hypocrisy. We're all hypocrites at some level. The problem is the air of superiority many of us carry around. We stop acknowledging imperfections in our lives. We forget where we came from and all God has done in our lives. I don't see Jesus's teaching a call to fake moral superiority. I'm a sinner following Him. I don't have it all together, and that admission is precisely what tweaks the perception of hypocrisy.

Jud Wilhite
pg. 61

We're labeled hypocritical because we are. I know i'm a hypocrite, and i'm not sorry for it. I have this thing called sin, which is like a disease -- or at least it gives me a lot of dis-ease (hehe..witty!) -- woven into the fabric of my being. I didn't ask for it; i don't want it. More often that not the sin manifests itself in the form of self-destructive behaviour. So, if i look a little inconsistent on the outside, you can only imagine what's going on in the inside.

I realized how much i was infected and how much it is affecting my attitude, my relationships, my life. So the truth is that i'm fighting. I'm fighting sin with everything i've got. Some days i fare better than others. Odds are that if you're calling me a hypocrite, then you caught me on my worst days.

I'm sorry, i'm sorry that i let you down and disappointed you. But the truth is that i'm not giving up or letting go. I've encountered a God who promises that the battle ends in victory -- life instead of death. So, call me crazy -- i am holding on to that promise. I'm also trying to uphold the standards God has set. They're pretty high, and some days i just find myself laying on the ground, staring at the ceiling. But then i feel an urge, an energy, to get up and fight once again.

Margaret Feinberg

pg. 64-65

Simply put, we must stop presenting ourselves as the message and begin presenting Jesus as the message. There will be dissapointment as long as there are imperfect people. Since all Christians are imperfect, there will always be dissapointment. So, we must stop having the message of Christ tied to our butchered efforts.

Jim White
pg. 66

Reading this, I felt as if the writers were penning down my very own thoughts and cries. The beautiful coincidence was last Sunday's sermon was driving in the point of God's faithfulness in keeping His words & promises - this truth is what keeps us going. That which makes us stand up to fight with everything we've got on something we know God has promised. Even sitting on the pew that Sunday, it drove so deep that I could feel my heart in my throat.



And finally, from Leo Tolstoy the great 19th century novelist...

Attack me, I do this myself, but attack me rather than the path I follow and which I point out to anyone who asks of me where I think it lies. If I know the way home and am walking along it drunkenly, is it any less the right way because I'm staggering from side to side.

In a personal letter

2. gearing up for a cook-out

Yes, I know Michelle blogged about it but since we're both in the same boat although she's cooking and I'm judging (muahaha!); that's what we're busy preparing for.

Interested? You know who to tell.


Last but not least....one more quote;

Just because we believe in the power of the Holy Spirit does not mean we check out our brains at the church door. We are commanded to test the spirits. Jesus wants us to love Him with our hearts and our minds.

J Lee Grady
Editor of the Christian Magazine - Charisma