Categories
Christian Living

How Well Do You Speak English?

Calligraphy letters representing the English language we misuse through curse words

From a poster in my father’s football locker room in the 1960s:
“Using curse words proves to everyone around you that you are not intelligent enough to communicate your thoughts using the English Language.”

The words of that poster must’ve stuck with Dad, because he was not one to use foul language as an adult, at least not that I can remember. I can’t say that I always followed his conviction about language when I was younger, but as an adult, I have also used the words of that poster to guide my speech.

God tells us, “Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear…and there must be no filthiness…or coarse joking, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks” (Ephesians).

I hope to show my intelligence today as I guard my speech from unwholesome words. Hope you’ll join me!

God, Help Us To Change Our Conversations
And The Language We Use When We Speak!

No one who really wants [their life] to count for God can afford to play at Christianity. –H. A. Ironside

— brian rushing

Categories
Worship

The Resurrection of Sunday Morning… What Changed?

Well, it’s Monday. Did much change in your life because of yesterday? Maybe not.
But so very much changed some 2000 years ago on a Sunday. James Stewart sums up what occurred by Jesus’ Death & Resurrection, and how it changed everything:

“It is a glorious phrase— ‘He led captivity captive.’ The very triumphs of His foes, it means, He used for their defeat. He compelled their dark achievements to subserve His ends, not theirs.

bloody barbs of the crown of thorns that preceded the resurrection“They nailed Him to the tree, not knowing that by that very act they were bringing the world to His feet.

“They gave Him a cross, not guessing that He would make it a throne.

“They hung Him outside the gates to die, not knowing that in that very moment they were lifting up all the gates of the universe, to let the King come in.

“They thought to root out His doctrines, not understanding that they were implanting imperishably in the hearts of men the very name they intended to destroy.

“They thought they had God with His back to the wall, pinned and helpless and defeated: they did not know that it was God Himself who had tracked them down.

“He did not conquer in spite of the dark mystery of evil. He conquered through it.”

Thank You Jesus for conquering sin & death & hell & satan on the cross.
Thank You Jesus for rising from the dead to prove to us the truth of what You did.

Resurrected One – You changed everything and You are worthy of all honor & all praise & all glory!

— brian rushing

Categories
Prayer

A Powerful Prayer for Today

a relief sculpture of a person prayingR.A.Torrey: We are too busy to pray, and so we are too busy to have power. We have a great deal of activity, but we accomplish little …many services but few conversions….

I ran across this prayer during my reading and thought it was excellent. I hope you won’t just read it, but that you will pray it for yourself and for your church this morning…

“God, give us tears for our sins. Forgive us for being so shallow in prayer, …so content amid perishing neighbors, so empty of passion and earnestness in all our conversation. Restore to us the childlike joy of our salvation. …Cause us to hold to the cross with fear and trembling as our hope-filled…tree of life. Grant us nothing, absolutely nothing, the way the world views it. May Christ be all in all.
…Oh God, place [within us] passionate prayer, poverty of spirit, hunger for God, rigorous study of holy things, white-hot devotion to Jesus Christ, utter indifference to all material gain, and unremitting labor to rescue the perishing, perfect the saints, and glorify our sovereign Lord.
Humble us, O God, under Your mighty hand, and let us rise…as witnesses and partakers of the sufferings of Christ. In His awesome name. Amen.”
(from John Piper in Brothers, We are not Professionals)

What else would you add to a prayer that we should all be praying today?

— brian rushing

Categories
Worship

The Silence of Death.

No sound comes out of graves.
But on a Saturday some 2000 years ago,
that silence was deafeningly loud at the tomb of Jesus.
a carved rock tomb which signifies the silence of the tomb of Jesus
Have you ever had one of your dreams dashed…to the point that it left you speechless? I can’t imagine seeing Jesus crucified on Friday and to have all my hopes as a disciple dashed and destroyed. How could He die? What will I do now? The silence screaming back at me from my dark questions would have been deafening.

It was a dark day in history. There have been other dark days. But I love what Ravi Zacharias has to say about the dark days of history – including the dark spots that stand as blemishes on the history of Christianity:

“As discomforting as it is to admit, much of what the church has had to face by way of criticism has been deserved. Much wrong has been perpetrated in history by people supposedly acting in the name of Christ. In many parts of the world today the church has a poor name, and a look back at her track record in those settings often reveals valid reasons for that contempt. But… the deviants often get more attention than do the normal.”

“But I point you not to them or to any man; rather, I point you to the person of Jesus Christ. Look at who He is and who He claims to be.”

“Do yourself a favor and get your eyes off of the shortcomings of institutions and people and history’s dark spots. Level your scrutiny at the person of Christ, and you will see the One who wears His Father’s coat very well.”

“Pilate said of Him, “I find no fault in this man. The thief on the cross said, “We receive the due reward of our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” Jesus looked at His fiercest opponents and said, “Which of you convinces me of any sin?” That last challenge could not have been made by any other religious leader, founder, or prophet. The sinfulness of each one of them is readily visible and undeniable.”

“Jesus alone stands without moral blemish.”
“Fairy tales are merely fantastic; Jesus Christ is fantastically true.”

The silence of Saturday was deafening, but the resurrection of Sunday was on its way!
Jesus is fantastically true, and so was His resurrection!

— brian rushing

Categories
Worship

The Good God of Good Friday

scrabble tiles spelling friday, as a visual representation for Good FridayA very few of you that have been following me for the short time I’ve been posting on facebook may have noticed that I have been adding my prior facebook posts into my blog. Going back through some of my posts that I wrote for facebook before I started the email subscription and blog, I felt they would be useful to share with everyone. So when you read today’s post and wonder why I am posting about Good Friday several months after it has occurred, it is because it is a “recycled post” but one with ideas that are applicable for today. So…   What’s So Good About Good Friday?

The reason we celebrate Good Friday as a holi-day (Holy-Day) is because of Jesus – His Goodness. His goodness to leave Heaven and put on humanity; His goodness to come to earth as its Eternal King yet not to be served but to serve; His goodness to take the punishment of my sin though He was sinless.

And it isn’t just that His greatness is to be remembered only on Good Friday or on the days when I feel blessed, but God is good all the time!

Corrie ten Boom reminds us of this when she says:
“Often I have heard people say, “How good God is! We prayed that it would not rain for our church picnic, and look at the lovely weather!” Yes, God is good when He sends good weather. But God was also good when He allowed my sister, Betsie, to starve to death before my eyes in a German concentration camp.”
the inside of a concentration camp barracks
What an amazing outlook on this sin-filled, evil world where God’s goodness is evident even in the midst of our circumstances. We invited sin into His perfect world. We chose to listen to and trust Satan instead of God. And instead of blasting us into oblivion, He becomes our righteousness in the midst of this perverse earth. We still have to endure the consequences of living in a sin-soaked world. We still have to endure the consequences of our own poor choice of choosing sin. But thankfully, we can do so knowing that our God of goodness will walk with us through every difficulty.

Corrie ten Boom knew that God was good even though she and Betsie had to endure the evil of the concentration camp. What an amazing statement she made showing that she was allowing God to transform her mind, and therefore change her entire outlook on life.

God, change our outlook on life so that we better understand your greatness no matter the circumstances we find ourselves in. And Thank You for Good Friday!

(Thanks to my friend Mariah Fields for sharing this wonderful quote with me from Corrie ten Boom!)

— brian rushing