Emptying Of Self

What does it mean to be empty of oneself? There are books and books about overcoming greed, pride, ego, and the like.
Getting over the "evil" of "self," is a simple act. It's called love.

When the social stereotypes of Christians come to mind, the world thinks of either Ned Flanders, or else a hypocrite that forces their beliefs on others, condemning sinners and portraying themselves as self-righteous.

After some recent experiences, i've realized why the world thinks we're all self-righteous bigots. Because many are, and because those are the ones they have contact with; the ones telling them, personally, "You're going to Hell!" The one bad apple spoils the bunch.
Sin does condemn. There's no denying that. But the thing we are to do, instead of beating them with religious rhetoric, is to break the religion of it and fall into the personal love that Jesus displayed (and embodied). Sin condemns, Christ does not. Christ builds, sin destroys, simple as that. To be like Christ, we must encourage, welcome, and above all, love sinners.

We should not encourage anyone to sin--grace is grace, and just because God makes a greater display of grace with a worse sinner, we should not all strive to be the worst sinner and, therefore, the greatest display of grace. We should strive to be the older brother in the parable of the Prodigal Son, when God says "Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours." We should strive to be the one that needs no grace, but has it nonetheless. We should encourage by being examples of a life with a purpose, hope, and love. We should encourage by being Christ-like, and it wasn't the lowly that He rebuked in the Gospels; religious people and demons. All others, adulterers, thieves, tax collectors, and anyone that would call on Him, He received at the price of their "self."

If we're to welcome someone, we have to make the first move. We have to be accommodating. We have to meet people where they are and work with them in their situations. To the Romans, we must become Romans. To the sinner, we must become a person with a sinful past. We must acknowledge the need they have for a Savior by first acknowledging to them that we need a Savior ourselves, and that we were sinful as well, but have reconciliation through Christ, that very Savior we need.

And what good is anything without love?
None.
If we have religious or selfish motivation for spreading the Gospel, we have gained nothing because we failed to do it out of love. If we prophesy, even, and not out of love, its benefit is null.
We are unable to do anything worthwhile for ourselves if we do it for ourselves. Only when we bless others out of love can it be counted as a blessing to us, because we are otherwise a resounding gong or clanging cymbal. To love is to put others first--to humble yourself. And when you humble yourself, you will be exalted.
The heart is a tricky piece of equipment; difficult to convince, and even moreso to understand the motives of. But one way to overcome this issue is by seeking Christ first. Seek above all things the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. When He becomes your motivation, you don't have to understand your heart because it will not be the same thing as it was before. God will put a new heart in you, and put His Spirit within you. Only that can alter the motivation of the heart to a loving motivation.
When we abandon any hope of our own righteousness and cast it away like dirty garments, searching instead for God's righteousness; only then can we become righteous. Not because of our own righteousness, but because of Christ's. When we set ourselves as the tax collector in the parable in Luke 18, beating our chests, knowing ourselves to be unworthy to even look up to Heaven, crying out "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!" we are acknowledging that we are unworthy and that our only hope rests in mercy, which is, by definition, undeserved.

When we become nothing, we gain everything. That may not be material things that perish and rot away. I'm talking of eternal things, things that are permanent and will outlast the sun itself.
A Christian is not self-righteous. A Christian is a sinner, forgiven by grace, righteous not in his/her own eyes, humble, and striving to embody love as Christ did.

That's what it means to be empty of oneself.

All Things Work Together for Good . . .

Romans 8:28.
Many of us have it memorized without knowing what verse of what chapter of what book it's in.
"Furthermore, we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called in accordance with His purpose;"

That's the CJB translation. That verse doesn't apply to everyone, obviously. "Those who love God and are called in accordance with His purpose."

This verse is speaking specifically to the "called" to God. Some have a natural tendency towards faith, and what a blessing that must be.

But let's look at the two promises in this.

"We know that God causes everything to work together for the good . . ."

That is only one statement, but two things are actually being promised here.

First, we have things working out for the good of God's people. This seems a joyous promise -and oh, how it is!- but we must look at what good is when it comes to humanity. Good is the fruit of the Spirit. Good is loving, good is humility, good is being gentle, good is having hope, good is . . . Good is such matters.

Now look at some other verses for the second promise of this.

Romans 5:3-5;

"But not only that, let us also boast in our troubles; because we know that trouble produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope; and this hope does not let us down, because God’s love for us has already been poured out in our hearts through the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) who has been given to us."

2 Corinthians 12:7;

"Therefore, to keep me from becoming overly proud, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger from the Adversary to pound away at me, so that I wouldn’t grow conceited."

1 Corinthians 13:4-7;

"Love is patient and kind, not jealous, not boastful,

not proud, rude or selfish, not easily angered,
and it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not gloat over other people’s sins
but takes its delight in the truth.
Love always bears up, always trusts,
always hopes, always endures."

Now, look at those verses. These are how we gain hope, humility, and love (for many years, I did not know that 1 Corinthians 13 was a poem), respectively.

1) Hope; through tribulation, trouble, suffering, pain, misery . . . Despair! The very antonym of hope is the means by which we achieve it. We must suffer to gain hope.

We must suffer to achieve this good--and not by our own means, but by the Holy Spirit. Not only are we to accept our trials, but we're to delight in them because they will be used by God for our good.

2) Humility; through a thorn in the flesh, through a messenger of Satan himself. It was likely a constant reminder of his past (it could be anything, but i perceive it to be a memory, possibly of a Christian he'd killed "in the name of God." But that's just my imagination). It was this very thing, this demon, this tormentor, this thing "pound[ing] away" at him that kept him humble.

Humility achieved through, again, suffering. God used this suffering for good.

3) Love; we often think of this passage as being all kind and sweet and soft and mellow . . . But it should be applied to us.

Someone getting on your nerves and not leaving you alone? Be patient (or, literally, long-suffering; suffer endlessly through what you're being put through; that is love).
Return evil with kindness. Don't be jealous that someone who has wronged you is being promoted over you--be happy for them. Don't boast that you have this certain skill, or you have achieved something great. Don't build yourself up in the eyes of others, but elevate them. If someone insults you, hold your tongue; don't be rude, but rather, again, kind.
So on and so forth.

This isn't so easy when it's seen as an application for your own life. Are you living in love?
Do you forgive completely, keeping no record of wrongs (not seven times, but seventy times seven; that's how often we're to forgive a person in a single day--losing track of their sins against us probably around the fourth or fifth)? Do you always bear up, though you have little encouragement to offer? Are you always trusting, to the point of naivete? Do you always have a hopeful perspective to a situation, confident that God is in control, even to the loss of a loved one? Do you persevere, enduring to the end, despite being in a sea where the end is a horizon that is retreating at the exact same pace in which you pursue it?

That is what good is. It's self-sacrifice. It's loss of self for the benefit of others. Our love is good, because it is selfless.

Now, let's look again at Romans 8:28; "Furthermore, we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called in accordance with His purpose;"

See the second promise in this? God is promising we will be tested, we will be stressed, we will suffer, we will know despair and pain and torment.

But the first promise, the obvious one, says that He will work it together for our good, if we wait it out. If we trust. If we hope. If we endure.

Are You A Child Of God?

I'm going to start off rather bluntly.
I am a sinner. I can't call myself a child of God. As hard as i try, i just can't.

I won't put the verses here, because i want to encourage you to open your own Bible and read it for yourself, not to have me spoon-feed you a select few verses and give you my interpretation of them. Read them, read them in context, and come to your own conclusions. Meditate on them.

Firstly, i do ask you to turn to 1 John chapter 3. I'm not going to give specific verses; please at least skim the chapter for yourself before continuing. Draw your own conclusions, your own convictions, your own personal revelations. Whatever you get from it, go ahead and get. What i'm putting is merely how it affects my life. I beg you to find out how it affects yours.

In fact, to make it even easier for you, here's a link to the ESV translation of that chapter on BibleGateway. You don't even have to grab your Bible. You don't even have to search for the chapter. There it is. Just click it.

Matthew 7 says that many who proclaim His name will be turned away for He never knew them.

What i get from 1 John 3 is this: if a person knows God, they follow Him. If they don't follow Him, if they keep sinning, they have not seen or known God.
It gets pretty harsh. It goes on to say that we're either children of God, or we're children of the devil. It says that whoever doesn't practice righteousness is not born of God . . . They're a child of the devil.

Here's why i said i can't call myself a child of God: i have issues with anger, resentment, unforgiveness, bitterness, impatience, and . . . Well, the list goes on. At the pinnacle of this pile of manure within me is hate.

There. I said it. I harbor hate within me. I don't want to, but it's made a home. It's like that friend who lives on your couch; you really want them to leave, but you can't quite kick 'em out, right? That's me and hate. I don't want it staying here, but i don't have the heart to sever it.
Now, you may be saying to yourself that i'm not that bad of a guy, and that i'm being too critical of myself. But no. Let me explain (despite what i said, i am quoting a verse, and will again by the end of this entry; if you want to know which verse, you'll have to read through the chapter yourself in order to find it--that way you'll read it in context, i hope).
"By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother."
So here i am, admitting there are those whom i don't love (Christians, even) yet . . . Yet the Bible clearly says that if i don't love my brother, i am not of God . . . I'm a child of the devil.

I think this proves i'm not afraid to admit my failures and faults, and apply Biblical standards to myself, even ones that may crush me.

We're not to just say that we love, but to actually show it. We're supposed to act on our love for others, we're supposed to show compassion, even if none is shown to us. We're supposed to build up those who would tear us down. We're supposed to actually love, and to love in honesty. In truth.

We're supposed to take action based on love. In a moment, without hesitation, we could make a witty and hurtful comment to someone who's said something hurtful to us. That's precisely when we're supposed to, without hesitation, show them kindness and patience.

We know we're to love one another. In 1 Corinthians 13, it says several examples of what love is (the antonym of many of the things i just said i have issues with), and says, out of faith, hope, and love, that love is the greatest of the three. As long as the three abide, love is the greatest to possess.

But how serious is it to not only be without hate, but to actually love? Well . . . There is the whole "children of the devil" thing. But also, if you don't love, what is left? Nothing? If we don't love, we feel nothing. It's apathy. It's lukewarm. We make our home with death if we do not love. In fact, we're to love to the point of laying down our lives for our brethren in Christ.
Would you put yourself in front of a moving vehicle in order to get someone else out of the way of it? Are you willing to climb onto train tracks to lift another off while knowing you couldn't escape calamity yourself, only spare them?
If the answer is a complacent one, you've taken too long. They've already been hit by the car/bus/train.
If someone knows to do good and doesn't do it, they've sinned, right? You know that saving them is the right thing to do. Anything less than right is wrong.
Again i ask, would you put yourself in the way of danger for someone else, knowing that there's no way for you to escape death yourself?
Now i inquire, are you still a child of God?

I'm not saying this to hurt anyone, but to encourage.
Be filled with love, and be filled with God. I adjure you to love! Love so that you may know God! Love so that you may see God! Love so that you may not walk in the path of sinners, so that you may be a child of God!
Whatever the circumstances, show love, care, concern, compassion, patience . . . Always love.

(here's the other quote i said would be put in):

"By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him; for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God; and whatever we ask we receive from him, because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him. And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us. Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God, and God in him. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit whom he has given us."
After reading this chapter a few times and pressuring myself by it, the closing verses are a much needed sigh of relief. It doesn't excuse my wrongs, but i am trying.
I might not be getting better about it, but i am trying, and i know that God is greater than my heart; i know God knows what is in my heart. I know God knows i don't want this to be a part of me. I know God is helping me along. I know God believes in me, and will help me to love wholly if i ask Him to.
God knows i can love. I know i can love.
And i thank Him that He's not given up on me.

I am Crucified

(most of my quotations are from the ESV translation)

"We know that our old self as crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin."
Romans 6:6

"I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."
Galatians 2:20

"And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires."
Galatians 5:24

"But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world."
Galatians 6:14

So, Galatians pretty much covers this topic; we must 'die' to the world.
I've heard that a lot in my life, but it never really stuck out to me until i found myself saying "How i was" and "How i used to be." When i said that, what flashed through my mind was a paraphrase of Romans 6:6; the old man has died, and a new one has risen.

But what happens? So, you might have a different lifestyle after you get saved. But what truly happens is not just a change in lifestyle. It's a change of life.

To die, everything that we are is severed. It ceases to be, and we're left an empty shell--the spirit has flown.

To die to the world means to leave all the ways you lived behind. Not just the big sins like thievery and violence, but all sins. It's not the 'big' sins that keep people out of Heaven, it's the little ones, because sin is sin. A murderer and a person who steals a pack of gum might be seen different in humanity's eyes, and rightly so. But the spiritual effects are equal--utterly damning.
Everything about us has died; our way of thinking, our way of talking, our way of looking at people and things, our desires, our mannerisms. Everything about us dies and becomes no more; it is crucified and buried as Christ was.
From there, we are given a new life; we are born again. A new person, a new heart, a renewed mind, a new spirit, new desires, new hopes, new dreams, new life. Everything that was is dead and gone. We have a new identification (truly so, as God has a name for us each; my name is not necessarily Josh Isaacs to God. No, He has a name for me that i don't know yet).

And as we die to the world because we are crucified with Christ, so also does the world and its ways die to us.

"How i was" might not be the correct way of putting it . . . Rather, "the person that used to inhabit this body," might be slightly more accurate.

Of what use is my faith if i don't love? If i love, i will share my faith out of compassion. If i don't share it, i don't love; if i don't love, i gain nothing. Faith is nothing if not shared.

How do we achieve holiness? Short answer: We don't. Having Jesus in our heart achieves it for us.

Seek God, Work For Love

Love won't pay the bills, nor will it put food on the table, but it will satisfy the soul.
What good is it to gain the whole world but lose your soul? Work first for love, for if we have riches yet no love, we have nothing.
Seek, above all things, the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and your needs will be met/supplied (or are we so vain as to believe that His grace is not sufficient for us?).

Seek the kingdom of God, seek His righteousness, and you will not know need.
Work for love, and you will not toil in vain.
In these two things, the body is nourished and the soul fulfilled.

What good is it to listen if we don't hear?
What good is it to talk if we say nothing?
What good is it to observe if we learn nothing?

Who are you?

Who i am is me; no one tells me who i am. Not my parents, not my pastor, not my friends, not strangers; who i am is between me and God.

What about you? Who defines you?
Are you a mere convergence of your parents' DNA (or are you following blind obedience to them)?
Are you a sheep who sees pastors (men) as infallible?
Do those you spend time with have the right to choose who you are?
Do the unbiased opinions of strangers hold more water than the biases of those you keep company with?
Or are you an independent person, finding out who you are in God?

Parents can teach, pastors can advise, friends can support, strangers can offer glimpses, but nobody decides who you are except you.
I'm not condoning disobedience. I'm merely stating that nobody knows what use you are to God except for God Himself. No mortal can fathom.
No preacher/spiritual adviser can tell you who you are or what you're here for, or where you're to go. They can offer support and advice, but much more is overstepping their boundaries. Parents can set up rules, but what we do in private or outside their watch is purely up to us. Friends can help us through difficult times, but they can't build us.
People try to make us into themselves, or guide us into being what they want us to be. But nobody knows your heart except you and God; why should anyone else have any say in who you are?
Only God can build us, and only if we let Him. We can find ourselves, but who are we if we don't have God . . . What have we found? A shell. Have Christ in your heart, and you will be found.

So who are you?
Do you follow people who are just as out of place in this world as you?
Or are you independent, unique, unalterable by the things in the world you live in, shaped only by your craving for meaning (read: craving for God)?

What is Love?

What is love?
More than a feeling, more than a chemical reaction, more than a craving, what is it that makes love what it is?
Anger is a feeling. There are books written about it, but not enough to fill a dozen libraries.
Grief is an emotion, too. Again, it has books written about it, but scarcely does one spend their life in search of it.
Sadness is one of the more popular emotions, but it’s not fantasized about endlessly.
Why is love set apart? Why do we seek it, sometimes our entire lives? Why does it fill our hearts and minds so that we fill countless books with tales of it? Why do we feel joy for those that experience it? How is it that it affects us by proxy so much that we can be brought to tears of happiness at imaginary scenarios involving it?

Love is a meaning. It is life.
When we seek love, we seek meaning.
When we fill pages with love, we fill them with life.

We must learn to love things with meaning, with truth, with meaning, or else our love means nothing and our pages are filled with a pointless life, and our search is never complete. We die hollow, empty, and alone.
Your love must be true.
Love truth. Delight in truth. Love wisdom. Seek wisdom. Pray for discernment. Trust in God, for God is love.

Everything that has a shell is hiding something--the beauty, the life; it's within.
It's dangerous to break out of that shell; it could damage you, and severely . . . But you'll not grow out of it if you don't.
Isn't life itself a risk? What is love without risk? What is life without love? 1 Corinthians 13 says we gain nothing if we don't have love.
Go, live, risk . . . And above all else, love!

Speak your mind . . .

Where i work, we have scripture verses posted on some of the walls. On our business cards, hats, ads, etc., there is one verse that is mentioned above all others: Matthew 6:33.
"But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." (ESV)
It's an awesome verse, but it, in and of itself, does little to explain what, exactly, will be added to us. "All these things" is referencing prior verses.
Now, i've been working there since i was 12; nine years past. That verse has been drove into my mind so much that i could quote it in my sleep, and in all that time i've not considered it heavily on many occasions. A few days ago i was sort of meditating on it, though.

“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all."

Those are the verses leading up to 6:33 (25-32, to be exact).
It addresses necessities of life. Don't worry about them, have faith in God, and seek His kingdom above all other things, and He will supply you with your needs.

It also addresses worth. In this, we see how God supplies for and clothes with splendor all things, even the birds and flowers; they have worth to Him--how much more His own children must!
This, at the time, didn't relate much to me, as i have more than i could need, and i don't suffer from a lack of self-worth (self-respect is another story). I told a friend of mine about how those verses struck me when paired with the following one, though, and how impressive i thought the overall message was.
It didn't occur to me that someone else might've needed to hear that . . . And at the time it didn't serve much purpose to either of us, but mere hours later, a scenario came up involving the same friend and a discouraging situation.
It was interesting, because we had talked earlier that same day about how it might seem that others see us as worthless, but God promises through these verses that He holds us with worth above things He holds with worth, and sees us as His children, and that He will supply for His children since He is our Father.
That may have been chance, but i honestly don't think so. I'm not saying it was necessarily 'ordained', or that God was speaking through me, just that He was able to utilize His own words by having placed reminders around me of that set of verses for the last decade.

My reason for putting all of this is to encourage you not to disregard what might somehow help someone else. Just because a thought that passes through your mind doesn't affect you doesn't mean it should be disregarded. Your thoughts, though they might not completely pertain to yourself, should not be ignored; someone else may need to hear what you have to say.
Think positive, then speak your mind.

We all have multiple choices. Everything comes down to choices. But sometimes it comes down to two general choices:
1) the smooth, easy, direct path, or
2) the hard road, the one that leaves us hurt more often than not, the one that tests us and breaks us, but in our breaking down we are being built up. It's the road that teaches us how to appreciate what we have, keeps us focused enough to not want the things we don't, and it leaves us feeling fulfilled and accomplished because anyone can travel from point A to point B, but it's only the determined that take the road less traveled.

When such a choice is yours, do you take the easy, bland path, or the rough, fulfilling one?

If you're going to number your reasons to be sad, at least try to number your heartbeats and breaths--each one was a gift and a reason to rejoice.

Mouths and ears don't work at the same time. So many times i cry out for God's will to be made known, yet i won't be quiet long enough to hear Him speak.