Reject Good Conscience, Suffer A Shipwreck

 Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.
Pr 4:23

And why is everything you do so important?

...everything that does not come from faith is sin.
Rom 14:23


And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
Heb 11:6

To the person who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
Eccl 2:26

OK, so it's good to please God. Where do I start if everything is meaningless?'

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. ¹² Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. ¹³ You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
Jer 29:11-13 

How do I seek God with all my heart?

They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.
Rom 2:15

Wow, this is almost the Wikipedia definition of conscience! and the conection between heart and conscience?

The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.
1 Tim 1:5

Timothy, my son, I am giving you this command in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by recalling them you may fight the battle well, ¹⁹ holding on to faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and so have suffered shipwreck with regard to the faith.
1 Tim 1:18-19

Btw, the command here is to stop people in the church from teaching false doctrine.(1 Tim 1:3-4)

Guard your heart, your actions come from it. 
If your actions don't come from faith, you're missing the point of God's grace.
But you need faith to please God,
and then he gives you cool stuff like wisdom and stuff.
So there's a reward for God-seekers, but it takes your whole heart.
That's when you need to listen to your conscience.
You know your conscience is a valid guide if it produces love in you. 
But you need to fight to keep your heart pure, conscience food and faith strong, because life can get difficult.

So - guard your heart - find God.
Reject good conscience and suffer a spiritual shipwreck.

Shipwrecks are not fun. In fact, people would rather throw a prophet overboard than suffer a shipwreck. Not fun. Ask Jonah (Jonah 1:1-17)

• Do your actions come from faith that God rewards you for seeking Him?
• Does your conscience lead you to understand and love people more deeply?
• What does your conscience lead you to?
• What - or whom - would you throw overboard to avoid a spiritual shipwreck?

Have You Met The God Of Abraham? Part 1

 Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

Ex 3:6

I confess that most of the time when I read about Abraham's life and walk with God, I don't see it as anything special. Weird, yes, but not special. But thinking a little deeper, I realized he didn't have a book to read about God, like I do. God didn't introduce himself as "God of Abraham", because he was talking to the man himself. (I am the God of you? Not likely.) In fact, the Bible never accounts for God introducing Himself to Abram at all. Their first recorded interaction is a mission to an unknown.

So as they started out, God was not Abram's God. This is just my two cent, but I believe He became the God of Abraham. (After He changed the man's name). I will tell you why I see it so.

God tells Abram to move to another country - he goes. (Gen 12: 1, 4)
Whenever God promises something to him, he builds an altar and worships. (Gen 12:7-8, 13:3-4, 13:14-18)
And then after a debate of struggling faith, Abraham decides to believe God, and God counts it as righteousness... (Gen 15:6)

I find it amazing that this man had such clarity without reading the Bible, or any other books, for that matter; that he knew that it is safe to put his doubts before the Almighty. I read it (The Book) and I wish I had this clarity. I wish I could just know that it is God talking to me, and believe without wavering.

Now, by the time Moses first encounters The Lord, he already knows something about Him. Also, God is already God of Abraham. Maybe Moses was a little more difficult to talk to, and that's why he needs a formal introduction AND a burning bush. I guess he knows enough to cover his face.

By the time I met God, He was already God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, God of Moses, David, Elijah, Elisha, and Daniel (and everybody else listed in Heb 11), not to mention the Father of the Son of God. And yet, even after knowing all of these stories, I need a formal introduction, Bible, a stack of other books that talk about the Bible, a struggling experience of fighting against God, a bunch of incredible spiritual people in my life --- and I still sometimes need a burning bush to come out of my hiding place when I mess up.

I had to ask myself: What am I missing? Why is this relationship with God so difficult? Why do I lose sight of His reality?
I realized that these people were unique. They can only inspire me to get to know God personally, like they did. But they can't teach me how to have a relationship with God. If anything, from their lives I can learn about the greatness and depth of God's love, and take it from there. I want to see how God loves me. How His love manifests in my life. I want to see how it changes me and how it makes me feel and respond.
I want to meet God on my own. I want to live my life according to Him, praising him along the way. And then maybe, somebody will see the God of Silvija, and recognize His love, and will want to experience it themselves. I want to know what it feels like to have the scary kind of faith that only God can start in us. But then I also want a new, better job, more time, a good camera, and sometimes ice cream. Some of those things can cloud the view of what is really important in life.

Here is what Paul wanted.

I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, ¹¹ and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.
¹² Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. ¹³ Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, ¹⁴ I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

Phlp 3:10-14 

What do you really want?

What do you want to know about God?

How will you ask Him about that?

OMG!!! J divorces I !!!

The biggest love story of all time.

I'm not talking about Romeo and Juliet - come on, they were teenagers who never tried the reality of a relationship.
No, not Brad and Angelina either. They're still together. I think.
I'm talking about J and I. J is totally, completely, head-over-heels in love with I, does anything and everything for her. I honestly loves J, but has the attention span of 3 minutes and is always getting in trouble. J keeps finding -sometimes miraculous - ways to get her out of trouble. I is grateful, aaaaaaaaand then she messes up again. Big time. And J comes to her rescue, again. After all the trouble they have been through, you know that whatever I does, J will always be there for her. THEY are the real deal.

Then, today, reading J's blog, it becomes apparent that this incredible, immesurable, burning love has met a limit after all. J divorced I, and I can't believe it. We know she's cheated on him before, so what's the deal? It's right there, in J's blog, and it feels like this shlould be old news, but it only hits when it hits home.

Confused? So was I !!! Haha.

So what would Jesus do in this situation? He would explain the parable, of course.
J is our Lord, Jehova. I is not me in his case (although as we will see later it might as well be), it is Israel. 
Jehova chose the nation of Israel to be his bride. Israel couldn't really commit long-term, and they (she) kept going against the marriage agreement, seeking other gods. The Lord always took them back. So we know it was always a tough relationship, with sabbaticals in the desert and cold shoulder sessions, but a divorce? That God of unconditional love would divorce His beloved?
He did. By the way, J's Blog is of course the Bible. And I know you want to know just where in this holy Blog says that The Almighty would ever do such a thing. I'll tell you in a second.

First, I would like to say that the I from the story might as well be me. Somewhere along the way, I slipped into the "unconditional love trap". Confess, be forgiven. Regret, be forgiven. Apologize, be forgiven. How about really repent, like in my heart, making the kind of adjustment that would start on the inside, making its way out and manifest in different behavior? How about forgive and be forgiven? It's so easy to harbor anger at your lazy colleagues... (Why do I have to do their job?!). It's so easy to get swayed by worry when I have a negative balance on my bank account... Feeling justified... I have a note above my desk that says "When you worry you pray to yourself" - talk about idolatry...

It's easy to just quickly move on and in the name of avoiding wallowing in guilt and sorrow. But although God loves all people - so much he gave his only son for us (Jn 3:16), it seems that his love has ...limits? conditions?

Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.

Mt 7:21

Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

Mr 16:16

Surely, he loves everyone. But that doesn't mean he'll just go soft on people who don't acknowledge Jesus, when believing in him is exactly what saves us.

So yes, I know how amazing God is (or at least in part, but enough to know what is good for me), I have agreed to commit my life to him, and yet in daily life I forget what this commitment means for specific situations. I worry. I wallow in self-righteous anger. I know I will confess and God will forgive. In this sense, J is the Lord, Jehova, and I is me. It almost becomes a way of life where J's love is taken for granted. (Although it hurts me when I's (my) love is taken for granted.)

Now I'm ready to give away the passage.

This is what the Lord says:

“Where is your mother’s certificate of divorce
    with which I sent her away?
Or to which of my creditors
    did I sell you?
Because of your sins you were sold;
    because of your transgressions your mother was sent away.

Is 50:1

But if J's love for I has limits... OMG! It means that His love for me has limits?!?!

Ok, I panicked when I read this passage. I don't know about you, but suddenly my sin was much clearer to me. Also, some creative ways of repentance (Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom rang in my head).

Then, studying a little deeper, reading also other translations, I understood that it was my sins that separated me from my Love, because they were making the relationship impossible. My commitment was weak, not His. When I get myself together, and long for Him again, he will bring me out of the desert and speak softly to me. I love it already. This is what he says:

Israel, I will make you my wife forever.
    I will be honest and faithful to you.
    I will show you my love and compassion. 
I will be true to you, my wife.
    Then you will know the Lord.

Hos 2:19-20 (GW)

You know, know the Lord. I don't know about you, but something about this wedding arrangement makes sounds really exciteing, and I want to reconsider my own faithfulness. Not out of fear of divorce, but out of fear of losing sight of His love again. Love that's better than any man's, any parent's, any sister's any friend's. If I stick with Him, I will know the Lord. =)

• ____________ (<< insert your name), will you marry Jehova, the Lord of hosts, in honesty and faithfulness, so he can show you his love and compassion?
• Even if that means following His plan for yor life? Forever?
• And make him more important than marrying a human being?
• Is this idea exciting? Why?

Have You Met Abraham? Part 1

In my home country, when a person turns 50, we say that they have "met Abraham" or are "celebrating Abraham". It is supposed to stand for the wisdom that we accumulate with time. I find that funny for two reasons; one, because in the Bible, Abraham stands for faith rather than for wisdom; and, people who use this expression don't know that. The other reason why I find this expression funny is because Abraham was neither faithful nor wise at 50 years of age. In my opinion. Have I written about him yet? Very interesting character.

But his journey is a long one. And he has the patience to do it. 

Did you ever stop to think that Abraham was still Abram when God told him to move out and start traveling, and 75 years old? It was on this trip that he first introduced his beautiful wife Sarai as his sister. 

And I can already hear the critics shouting "He didn't lie, they WERE related!" But hear my point.

The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

² “I will make you into a great nation,
    and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
    and you will be a blessing.^[a]
3 I will bless those who bless you,
    and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
    will be blessed through you.”^[b]

⁴ So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran. ⁵ He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

Gen 12:1-5

I admit, I also wanted to show that at the age 50 nothing special happened to Abraham... But it is never too late for an adventure.

75th birthday comes with a surprise: you're moving but I will tell you later where. And, I will bless your family (that you don't have yet as a 75 years old man). 

I can't imagine many people who would be happy with this situation. But he did it. 

¹¹ As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, “I know what a beautiful woman you are. ¹² When the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will let you live. ¹³ Say you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake and my life will be spared because of you.”

Gen 12:11-13

OK, so their marriage was a little dysfunctional. According to the rest of chapter 12 Sarai plays along, the pharaoh actually takes the 65 years old beauty to be his wife (!!!) and realizes something had gone wrong when the plague starts. They are asked to leave, of course.. It may be that this is where they picked up Hagar, the woman who would be Sarai's maid, and later the mother of a great nation. 

All the while, God is encouraging Abram, repeating and proving that he will have a child. But there is no child.

Ten years later, Sarai gives up on hoping to have children and Abram has another surprise waiting on him for his birthday. He is 85 years old and Sarah wants him to sleep with the maid, Hagar, and conceive a child. Surely enough, for his 86th birthday Abram receives a son by Hagar! Surely, he thinks, this is the son that God had in mind! Sarai is beating herself up for suggesting this strange alliance to her husband, because now the maid has grown conceited, she thinks back to the point when she took her on staff... 

So life goes on for another 13 years. The boy is growing, and so is his mother's pride. And Abraham's and Sarah's desperation. 

Then one day God speaks to Abram again, changes his name and gives him more specific instructions.

¹⁵ God also said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you are no longer to call her Sarai; her name will be Sarah. ¹⁶ I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her.”
¹⁷ Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, “Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?” ¹⁸ And Abraham said to God, “If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!”
¹⁹ Then God said, “Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him. ²⁰ And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him; I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation. ²¹ But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you by this time next year.” ²² When he had finished speaking with Abraham, God went up from him.

Gen 17:15-22

And by his next birthday, Sarah delivers a baby boy. 

I don't know about you, but I don't want to imagine a 90-year-old pregnant lady. I also don't like the dynamics in their marriage - it seems they both had commitment issues.
But Isaac's father responded to God's instructions. I had over 6 months to prepare to move to another country, and it still took me a year to recover. How suddenly do you want to move when you retire? Maybe to a place where you don't know anyone? To a mission field where a church is yet to be planted? He did it. He packed up and took off, praising God all the way. Every time God spoke to him, he worshiped. And when he lost hope, he believed.

about 2500 years later, it is written of him:

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”

Rom 4:18

I have been trying to worship God in the moments when things don't go my way. It's difficult. But try it, something great happens to your heart. I don't want to wait until I'm 75, or even 50, to have faith. The last time I was at an "Abraham celebration", I was the child of the birthday girl. This last weekend, I was a friend. Time goes quickly, and we don't live as long as people used to back in the days. I don't want that "meeting Abraham" means being 50. I want it to mean that I have the true faith that God likes, now.

How is your faith evident in your life?
Have you ever decided to believe when you had no more hope?
What would happen if you took a hopeless situation in your life and decided to have faith in God's promises?

God bless you,

Silvija P., Düsseldorf