Celebrate Your Uniqueness

Prayer For REVIVAL in America

SCRIPTURE

 For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

~Ephesians 2:10, NLT

QUOTE

I do not choose to be a common man. It is my birth-right to be uncommon.

~Dean Alfange

COMMENTARY

I have no desire to be like anyone else other than Christ and I can never be exactly like Him. He is the unique Son of God and He created and recreated me to be unique. My goal is like is not security; it is to faithfully obey Christ. I have no desire to be a ward of the State; to be humbled by dependence upon them, or to be dumbed down to the life of a slave. I am willing to take the calculated risk, to dream, to build and yes even to fail. I don’t need a government that bails me out, I need one that ensures my freedom and stays out of my personal life. Government is good so long as it is the servant but it makes a cruel and despotic master. My Master is in heaven, not Washington. I prefer the challenges and even the persecution of following Christ over the stale, lifeless, dull existence of being a dupe of the State.

EXTRA

Well they had a work night on Tuesday and although I have had nothing except long days lately, I did show up and offered my expertise. I was told to stay away from the saws. I was running a skill saw before David Wood was born. I started building forms for my Daddy when I was 16 years old. I have cut crown mold with the old square saw and a wooden box. I go up there to help and they brush me aside, same as tell me “I am not needed.” No problem, I can handle rejection and I don’t carry grudges but their day is coming. I wish I could live long enough to see this bunch of young bucks be treated like they are old and in the way. All I am saying is–what goes around comes around. I tell you something else: they best not call me to clean up their mess or lug those chairs up the steps because this old bird aint going to show up. If I can’t cut, I don’t clean. You can push a real man only so far and I have had it! I am sick and tired of being everyone’s punching bag. David Wood is a control freak, he and I had words last night after church and if he keeps messing with me, somebody is going to get hurt. Surely, he wouldn’t hit a man with bad knees.

Repentance

SCRIPTURE: When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees saying, “Go away from me, LORD, for I am a sinful man!” [Luke 5:8, NRSV]

QUOTE: The repentance for which we pine comes upon our being given a vision of the majesty, holiness and the goodness of God. —Dallas Willard

THOUGHT: Holiness is what we see in Jesus that we don’t see in ourselves or others. As long as people see Jesus as “merely, one of the guys”, they will not repent.

COMMENTARY: Peter was probably in his early are middle twenties and he had been a fisherman all his life but he had never seen anything like what happened in Luke 5; two boat loads of fish in a matter of minutes at the simple command of Christ. Peter was overwhelmed by the “otherness” of Jesus. Perhaps for the first time, Peter realized that Jesus was uniquely different; He was most definitely not just one of the guys or even a brilliant young Rabbi. Until this day, Peter thought he knew what he was doing and what was going on around him but with this one experience, everything changed. He saw the deity of Christ as clearly as the sunrise and fell immediately to the ground and begged Jesus to leave him. Peter saw that Jesus was all together different from himself and his fishing buddies. Peter sensed that Jesus was as good as he [Peter] was evil. Why would anyone as Holy as Jesus want to hang out with someone as sinful as Simon Peter? Once you see what Peter saw and feel what Peter felt, you will kneel as Peter knelt and you want need a preacher or anyone esle to tell you to do it. Eventually everyone is going to see what he saw and everyone is going to do what he did. If you think you know what you are doing [the fish are not running] and you know all that is going on around you; then you are not focused on Jesus. One glimpse of Jesus and you will feel miserably ignorant and totally unprepared to be in His presence. The good news is that He loves sinners.

EXTRA: I hated to miss the last Revival Service but due to factors beyond my control, I had little choice. I knew that Joe David and other health freaks would not forgive me if in infected the entire congregation. I have some kind of stomach virus. Started Tuesday after lunch. I thought it was because I ate too much [which I did]. I didn’t eat at all Tuesday night and made it through the service by the skin of my teeth, but the stomach ache and the head ache got worse  and as Wednesday progressed, I finally had to come home and go to bed with every intention of getting back up for church. June said we had another good service and I am thankful. I hope to get up and running sometime today. Stomach much better, head still hurting. Hope you have a great day. I hate I had to miss Tim’s sermon. All in all, we had a good Revival.

Celebrate Your Uniqueness

SCRIPTURE:  Thank You for making me wonderfully complex. [Psalm 139:14, NLT]

QUOTE: I am the best “Me” that there is ever going to be. –Amy Byford Tourney

THOUGHT: Wilson A. [Snowflake] Bentley [1865-9131] discovered that of the millions of snowflakes that fall, there are no two exactly alike.

COMMENTARY: We humans are like snowflakes in that we are unique. Every human being, even identical twins are different. The one thing that makes me stand out from all others on the face of the earth is that I am unique. God has and will never again make another Jack. God is a Creator not a Cloner. Unfortunately for me, it took 19 years for this truth to sink it but when it did, my life was changed forever. I have always wanted to know that there was something that I could excel in, something I could do better than anyone else and I have found it: as Amy says, “I can be the best me that there is ever going to be.” Her husband quoted her at Mrs. Byford’s Celebration of Life Service yesterday and I like Amy’s way of stating this liberating truth.

EXTRA: Things slow down a bit today I hope. I plan to get in some study time. I think Spence and the girls volleyball team begin Area Tournaments today. By now you have all heard that David and Ginger are having twins. I know that is old news. I may have misunderstood, maybe they said triplets or there is a possibility that there are just having one. I predict a boy, Stanley Bill Wood or actually Bill Stanley Wood sounds more presidential. I understand that John Randall and Jimmy Gerald are not sleeping very well at night. If we lived in a perfect world, the pastor would get to name all the babies, amen. I promise you one thing: if I named them, you would have no problem with the spelling.