Out of the heart....

What if our thoughts during our corporate worship time together actually came out through our mouths instead of the lyrics to the songs we are supposed to be singing? Would something like this video happen.... to you?

Makes you think.

A reminder...

Psalm 100 (The Message)
 

^1-2 On your feet now—applaud God! Bring a gift of laughter,
      sing yourselves into his presence.

 ³ Know this: God is God, and God, God.
      He made us; we didn't make him.
      We're his people, his well-tended sheep.

 ⁴ Enter with the password: "Thank you!"
      Make yourselves at home, talking praise.
      Thank him. Worship him.

 ⁵ For God is sheer beauty,
      all-generous in love,
      loyal always and ever.


Verse 1-2: "Bring a gift of laughter..." 
How many times do we think that laughter could be a offering/gift to God? Have you tithed your 10% of laughter for the day? ha!
"Sing yourselves into His presence"
Sometimes you just have to start singing- you may not feel like it- but guess what- the psalms didn't ask if you wanted to- if you felt like it- because the author knew the secret: if you just do it- you'll get what you need: God's presence invading daily routine. 


Verse 3: "Know this...God is God...and God, God..."
I love this... because I can just hear it: "you betta recognize... God is God.. and God...psh...He's GOD!" Know it. Believe it. Love it. You betta respect or as I like to say sometimes: respek. Word.
"He made us...we didn't make Him" 
What a reminder- because so many times- we don't act like we believe that we are dependent on people. We act like we are self-made men/women and that God is just some big mythical airy creature that doesn't really exist (we may not every say that but we act like that is true). I love the reminder... that we don't KNOW everything- we didn't make God... He made us. So He's smarter. He knows better. He cares. Hello.


Verse 4: "Make yourselves at home..."
Wow. An invitation to make ourselves at home- where? In God. Our soul can find rest (Psalm 62) in the fact that God is sending out an invitation to abide. Wow. 


Verse 5: "all-generous in love, always loyal and ever."
God's not stingy with His love for us. HA! He's not rationing out between everybody- He's got enough. He won't run out. He's not a traitor- not going to rat you out- sell your business or your email address to telemarketers. and then He's forever. Not going anywhere.

Only 5 verses but they bring so much hope, comfort, and excitement to the routine of everyday life. 

New Music

New Music at FCC: 

Love It Leads Me- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdJpLZkIyVk
Buy it

Living Rain - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCYqC1cxXD8

Buy it!

You are Good- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVL32yQywsA

One Thirst and Hunger - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYXy3xQVGqw

Deep Cries Out to Deep- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQwkEvevXgA&feature=related

Hope's Anthem- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crPyH-68KZU

Buy it! 

This One Thing- Unreleased

I give you glory - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XO_0VLEDcOg

Liar

There's a gap in most of our lives when what we "think" in our heads and "say" with our hearts- don't match up with what we "do".

If we think that going to Church is good; say we are faithful members; yet don't attend on the regular or don't engage while we are in attendance. We're just liars. 

If we sing songs about surrender but never fully commit to giving our ways over to the Lord. again- we're just liars.

I'm thinking that this is why God told the Israelites in Amos 5:  Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. Whoa. 

If we know that worship is not about music...that our worship SHOULD NOT be dependent on our circumstances or issues- YET come into church and offer tired worship, defeated praise, and unfocused attention- we don't really believe that worship is just about who God is and what he has done for us OR that there is any power in praise/worship that would benefit us to get out from behind our emotions and our will and let God have his way with us.  So basically what we do is tell God "yeah, I know You're good and all... I know You're great...but I'm too tired...or I'm too distracted...or I'm too irritated...or I'm (whatever-fill in the blank) to really say thanks- So I hope that this half-baked "thank you" is enough for You because it's what you're getting tonight until You do something to make me feel better or give me my way"- that's what we tell an Almighty Ever-loving God- sometimes on a weekly basis. Brave.

SO NO WONDER we've got issues. because the 2 or 3 times set aside to get in God's presence (the only place where we can truly be changed- newsflash: you can't change yourself) we've hoodwinked ourselves into complacency! We've lied to ourselves so much- that what we are offering as "praise or worship" is acceptable : when it is based on our mood, our checkbook balance, our relationship status, etc; NOT based on the fact that God is good- all the time. period. We've lied to ourselves and to others because we've forgotten to be like David in Psalms 122:1...to be glad when it's time to go to God's house- David didn't just mark that off his "to-do" list. He was expecting and excited to go to God's house- and it wasn't because of the preaching or the preacher, or the music, or seeing other people there- it was because he was glad to get to bless God for all that He is and all that He has done. Can you say the same? 

Don't lie.

Restless Heart Syndrome (RHS)

You have made us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in You. - St. Augustine 

Restless Heart Syndrome (RHS): the state of longing for more of God's presence than currently experienced in everyday life.
 
Some days you just need to be reminded that You have been made for a crazy awesome purpose: to love and be loved by God.

Sometimes we fill our lives with activity after activity- friendship after friendship- busy day after busy day... that when we go awhile like that- our hearts start to have this kinda of uneasy ache that we're missing something- something's not right. and it's because our hearts LONG to be with God. Our spirit longs to fill the joy radiate from God while He's spinning and rejoicing over us like a mad man! We can't go long without that feeling- whether it's while we're in worship (and I think that our worship just makes God go crazy- it just amps Him up- when we come into church ready and willing to lay aside our circumstances, emotions, stress- and just love on Him- it does) So we're not going to be fulfilled with anything else- because our hearts will be restless until they rest in the overwhelming love and joy of God!...we start to get RHS because we aren't fulfilling our purpose: to love and be loved by God. 


Some of us lose sight of the realness and hilarious goodness of the God that we serve. We make Him out to be a domineering perfection-seeking judge rather than a compassionate ridiculously-loving father. He's so good that even when we get on His nerves- he's good to us in hopes that it will bring us back to Him (Click this: Romans 2:4) - so we get RHS because we are forgetting our purpose: to love and be loved by God- without our opinions or own own preconceived ideas about what God thinks about us. 


What's the cure for RHS? To go on the journey of finding ourselves in the light of God's radiant joy and goodness.  When our hearts are turned toward Him fully- the mundane becomes spectacular. Worship becomes more than just words. Church becomes more than just a collection of people with issues. Our lives become more than the same ol- we begin to feel renewed, revived. Our restless heart syndrome stops because we know and we seek to bring God joy- and that comes in so many different ways: it could be:
-being the best parent you can be
-making a commitment to read your Bible daily
-being nice to your siblings/children/parents
-not just going to church but GOING to church- there's a difference. 
-applying what you read (smile)
-worshiping deeper/longer/harder than you've ever worshiped before
-letting go of bitterness/anger/resentment
All of these things just set God's feet to dancing...


I still find it amusing that God dances a jig when I start worshiping.... kinda cracks me up and blows my mind- that I can set the feet of the One who set planets in motion....to dancing! ha.

Let Go.

"A refusal to let go is a refusal to live free."


I remember being a little boy playing on the swings during recess- competing with all of the other kids to see how high we could swing- and of course it wasn't enough to just swing then it was who could jump out of the swing in the coolest way. I remember the thrill of swinging through the air getting higher and higher... and then the realization the ground is hard- and if I hit it- it may break me down. So there came the tension. The silent debate whether or not to let go of the swing and hurl myself across the sky or play it safe- slow down the momentum and get off the swing like a normal (sane) individual. Panic and excitement begin to set in. Decisions.

Lately, I've been thinking about how we go about living our lives and why we never seem to live up to our potential. It always seems that there's something holding us back, and whether you'd like to admit it or not we all have stuff that just trips us up- but the stuff that WE can control- that we voluntarily keep around in our life... we sabotage ourselves because we refuse to let it go. Lately one of the scriptures that keep popping up everywhere in my life is Proverbs 4:23 "Keep your heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life." Most of the time we see the word "keep" and think of "guarding things out...keeping things in"  But if what we've got in our hearts isn't good- we shouldn't be keeping it. We should let it go. But let go of what? 

Pride.
Ego.  - we're not God's gift to earth. 
Plans. - we forget that we don't always knows what's best for us.
Hate. 
Bitterness- if you bring it up- even for reference purposes- you're probably not over it. 
Inattention. 
Failure. 
Fear. 
Hurt. 
Past successes. 
Insecurities. 
Depression. 
Cynicism. 
Skepticism. 
Unforgiveness. 
Memories. 
Words. 
It's not easy. Not at all


Back to the swingset... So the choice was mine. Stay put or let go.  I could have let the fear. the skepticism. the failure of past attempts keep me from experiencing the excitement and thrill of freedom or I could have decided to jump. So many times in our lives- we keep ourselves in the swing set- afraid of what it may look like if we decide to let go of our hate, our memories, our skepticism, those words, our hurts. We're afraid that the ground is hard- and if we hit it- it will break us down. So in reality we're 100% depending on our abilities- not God's. We're depending on faith in ourselves- not faith in God. Why? Because we have to let go? Without letting go- we don't ever get to fill the exhilaration of jumping... 

We think too much...

Something that I'm noticing about myself (and trying to change) and other people is that we constantly over-think. We overthink our worship. We overthink our giving. We overthink our church attendance. We overthink our relationship with God. We overthink ourselves to death: a spiritual, emotional, mental death. We read the books. We listen to all the podcasts. We talk with people who don't really know any more than we do. We search and search because we like to know the ins and outs, the ups and downs, the whys, the hows, etc; or am I the only one? because we think so much- we miss God because God is not concerned with our ability to figure Him out. He's not. (See Isaiah 55:8-9) We forget that.  We miss him because we're so caught up in our thoughts- in our interpretation or opinion- that we miss Him.

One of the main ways that we do this is in our opinion of ourselves and our perception on our Christian life. We beat ourselves up too much- because we think about ourselves too much- because we are self-centered and egotistical (OK? I'm talking to myself). We can point out every time in the last 24 hours that we've failed at Christianity. Every time we've thought something we shouldn't. Every time we've said too much. Every emotion that we shouldn't have felt but did anyway. We can point it out- but we can't remember the love or the embrace of God's presence from a church service or a quiet time (maybe because we don't attend or have bible studies regularly). So we walk around thinking that life was better off before salvation because we didn't have to deal with the condemnation of not living up to an unattainable standard.

Really? That's how it's gonna go down? THAT is the attitude we're going to have towards God for giving us a hope and an eternal future? So basically we're like that kid that didn't really want to go to Summer Camp but his parent's made him get on the bus: happy when we get there- but miserable the entire ride up. That's NOT what God intended when he saved us. He wanted to give us a ridiculously full life FULL of life (See John 10:10).

You see- our introspection and constant over-thinking gets us into a state of perpetual loser-ship. We get hung up on the fact that we are never good enough. We will never be good enough. There is always going to be SOMETHING to work on (my gripe just this week... ).  We forget about God's grace...His mercy...and ridiculous love- that even though we will never be good enough- He is- and that's all that matters.

If we would stop focusing on ourselves so much and focus on God- who's really the only worthy of THAT much attention... our outlook on life would be a whole lot brighter (I know mine would), our worship would be a whole lot freer; because we would realize that- yeah, we've got a lot of work to do... we're not perfect and we never will be...but we've got a God who knows that- who's OK with it- who's rooting for us to make it, who desires us for us to quit looking down but look up to where Help is, for us to stop wallowing in our inability but to find strength in His ability- and who will love us in spite of our inconsistency- and in turn He would be able to work in us and turn us into something good (See Philippians 1:6). We just have to trust him and let go and stop THINKING.... we think that we are trying to be "good" Christians by whipping ourselves into "shape" by keeping account of everything and thinking on how we could be better - but in reality it's just a twisted form of pride and arrogance: to think that we, by our own strength, can make ourselves any better; and we are missing out on the goodness of all that He is: all of the love that He has, all of the grace that He can give. Our Christian life was not supposed to be a "process" but a relationship. I'd take a relationship over a process any day- so I'll stop thinking so much... and start trusting...

What about you?