Christ

“I Love You Too!”

/ Chris / 4 Comments

The other night as I sat with friends and family in the Miller living room, it suddenly felt like Jesus silently walked in, sat beside me, and whispered “I love you!” In disbelief at first, I ignored it. “I love you!” he seemed to repeat. It seemed like He wanted me to respond. So I did. “I love you too!” I thought awkwardly.

This is relationship. I had real interaction with Jesus Christ, the Creator and Sustainer of life! I think that this type of interaction really happens many times, but I usually doubt it and dismiss it as simply emotion. I will always cherish this brief interaction with Jesus, and look for more. It amazes me how loving and good God really is. Even in His wrath, He is still loving and good.

Yesterday morning, as I sat in on a chapel service, the speaker showed a YouTube clip about persecution in Indonesia. In the clip, Muslims were slaughtering other Muslims who had converted to Christianity. Although it was only six minutes long, I kept thinking to myself “Just make it stop already! Just make it stop!” I thought the clip would never end, but I knew I had to watch as much of it as I could stomach. I had to see. This brutality is the price these people have to pay in order to follow Christ. And then I thought about how this is what Jesus had to pay to set us free! Not only was He mocked and ridiculed, but He was beaten and bruised, and His flesh was torn apart. He suffered immense pain, agony and separation from the Father [God] so that we could be forgiven of sin and unified with the Father.

And I realized how pathetic my love for Him is. Could I honestly bear His name, while having half my scalp chopped off? I’m not sure I could, save by His incredible grace.

I desperately desire deeper love for Christ. I long for stronger faith so that I can stand firm on the Rock, Jesus Christ. I want to trust Jesus, rather than doubt Him or His love. I want to be convinced of God’s goodness. By realizing my security in Christ and knowing that He is completely good and loving, I can endure the pain He may call me to.

Someone once said something like: “to the degree that we suppress pain, we also suppress joy.” I desperately want to be surrendered to this concept: that to experience great joy, I must also allow myself to experience great pain.

I think in many ways I have tried to suppress my pain. I have tried to be strong. But I think there is something beautiful about just letting yourself hurt and allowing yourself to be weak. The picture that I get is a big and strong middle-aged man kneeling before a gravestone bawling and letting his pain out by gasps and screams.

Many times we get knocked down and we can’t get back up. We need a helper, a savior, a healer. Jesus Christ is that Healer.

I do not know if I have responded well to the pain and hard things in my life, but I want to do better. I want to allow myself to hurt: to grieve loss, struggle with change and allow Christ to bring healing when it is time.

I don’t like pain—I run from it. I pursue happiness just like everyone else. But there is health in bleeding; there is relief in flowing tears. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” Finally, I am beginning to understand this verse. Jesus is saying, “Allow yourself to hurt, because I will comfort you!” And we will hurt, but we can’t “bottle” it up, or we’ll burst.

Keep battling on. Keep hurting. Keep healing. Keep relating. Keep living. The end is in sight, just a few more years. God is faithful, by His strength we can do this!

Poured Out Like Wine

Hugo McCord

Would you be poured out like wine
upon the altar for Me?
Would you be broken like bread
to feed the hungry?
Would you be so one with Me
that you would do just as I will?
Would you be light and life
and love My Word fulfilled?

Yes, I’ll be poured out like wine
upon the altar for You
Yes, I’ll be broken like bread
to feed the hungry
Yes, I’ll be so one with You
that I would do just as You will
Yes, I’ll be light and life
and love Your Word fulfilled

Where He Leads Me

Ernest W. Blandy

I can hear my Savior calling,
I can hear my Savior calling,
I can hear my Savior calling,
Take thy cross and follow, follow Me.

Where He leads me I will follow,
I’ll go with Him, with Him, all the way.

I’ll go with Him through the garden,
I’ll go with Him through the garden,
I’ll go with Him through the garden,
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

Where He leads me I will follow,
I’ll go with Him, with Him, all the way.

I’ll go with Him through the judgment,
I’ll go with Him through the judgment,
I’ll go with Him through the judgment,
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

Where He leads me I will follow,
I’ll go with Him, with Him, all the way.

He will give me grace and glory,
He will give me grace and glory,
He will give me grace and glory,
And go with me, with me all the way.

Where He leads me I will follow,
I’ll go with Him, with Him, all the way.

C.D.

In the Despair — a Poem of Hope

/ Chris / 2 Comments

I believe that all men

At a point in their life

Do arrive to a state

Of despair.

 –

“Oh my God,” cried the king,

“Where are you in this world?”

We do fear that the Lord

Is not fair.

 –

But despite our small thoughts

Our Lord God who redeems,

Keeps us in, close to Him

And His care.

 –

We can

Surely

Know He

Will not

Falter

On His

Promise.

 –

In the times of confusion

Trust in God’s substitution.

 –

On the cross in the East

God did die for our release.

 –

There is trouble

There is pain;

But in all

Can be gain.

 –

Even when

God seems far,

Don’t despair

For you are

On a journey

That is good,

And will make you

More strong than wood.

 –

So look up to the sky,

And whisper to God:

“I will trust you

I will serve you.”

Even if you feel

Under a curse,

Know that Christ

Loved you first.

 –

There is a hope

Midst the sorrow.

I will wait

For tomorrow.

C.D.

What Makes Me Angry Infuriates Me

/ Chris / 2 Comments

I am angry. I am angry at the fact that thousands of people die every day and enter into an eternal state of complete separation from God. From God who is the source of all that is good. I am angry at the fact that slavery is still very much alive in our country and that my city is in the center of it all. I am angry that sin and immorality are rampant in the world. That people—even children!—all over the world are without clean water and humane living conditions.

That makes me angry, but what really infuriates me is that so many Christians are doing nothing about it. It infuriates me that the only thing many Christians think about is themselves. It infuriates me that many guys cannot reach beyond their own weaknesses. It infuriates me that many Christians are so self-conscious that they are not willing to abandon all to follow and obey Jesus. It infuriates me that Christian men tear families and churches apart because of their pitiful beliefs. It infuriates me that personal convictions have become a bigger issue than the Gospel. It infuriates me that godly people throw themselves into useless head-butting discussions on social networks knowing that their arguments will not change anybody. It infuriates me that Christians care more about their rights then they do about the souls of their fellow humans. It infuriates me that people are content with their shallow lives. It infuriates me that many people think rightly, but actually do very little.

It infuriates me that I see much of this attitude in myself.

So many Christians are chasing the wind. So many men think their only job on earth is to provide for their families and be comfortable, and so many young people are obsessed with their next date or party: all they think about is themselves. I wish I could ask them if they are really content with the shallowness of their lives? Don’t they want to make a difference in the world? To utterly spend their lives for Christ? Or is their selfish flesh and peer pressure so great that it keeps them from having any meaningful life at all?

It is easy to look at shallow people and judge them, but what about those who are religiously shallow? Do young people simply walk away from God? Or could it be that personal convictions and doctrines become too important and regulated that they strangle any life out of church? Are the particular beliefs people hold dear so important that they are willing to sacrifice the souls of young people, and the souls of those who have never even heard the Gospel?

I hope not.

The only thing that matters in life is that we have a relationship with Jesus Christ. Any conviction, any social work, any significant choice should be born out of that relationship. Jesus is the holy, perfect, just, loving King of the Universe. We are sinners completely lead astray and deserving of Hell. If we want a relationship with the perfect King, we, the very imperfect humans, must play by His rules. Let’s read the Bible and obey it! Let’s not try to reason it all out, legislate it, add to or subtract from it, just obey it. Let’s remember that Jesus is holy and perfect, but vehemently loves you and continually forgives you when you repent. Let’s remember that our purpose as Christians is to proclaim the Gospel. To do anything “Biblically” yet forsake the Gospel is worthless, but to proclaim the Gospel and forsake the Bible is like trying to run a business without money.

Let’s focus on Jesus. Just love and obey Him.

C.D.

What Would Jesus Do?

/ Chris / Leave a comment

Wow, imagine this, Christopher Witmer is actually updating his WordPress! SURPRISE! Life has been good and God has been good, as always. That is the interesting thing about life, it can be either negative or positive, but when God is walking alongside, one can usually look back and say it was good.

I just recently ate my first full Chick-Fil-A meal on August 1st. (I wonder how many people remember the date of the first time they ate at a fast food restaurant . . .) I and the group I was with did it mainly to show support for the organization and its employees in light of the attacks they have come under from many who support gay rights.

I am intrigued by the modern discussion of homosexuality and the stark difference between the two worldviews. Unfortunately, both sides of the argument can sometimes come through very hostile to each other. As a Christian, I hope that I am known as a safe and accepting person to be around, even though I believe homosexuality is a sin, just as I believe adultery, period, is a sin (adultery including: sex before or outside of marriage, lust, et cetera). Many times the very thing these people are longing for is love and acceptance and the only place they can find that is in a perverted way of relating to each other. I find this very sad because what they truly long for is Jesus and His powerful love, but many Christians have turned them into a spiritual and political enemy, which is not giving them the love they need and desire.

We all want love. Love is an amazingly powerful force. When a person feels loved, he has a sense of worth and dignity; and he  can begin to see from the lovers point of view, and will listen to what the one showing the love has to say. God is not a heavy-handed old man sitting in a booth upstairs just waiting for us to make mistakes so He can call us out and punish us. Rather, He is compassionate and extremely long-suffering. He loves us with an everlasting love. Not a cheesy love, no, but a love that will change one’s life. It changed and is still changing–transforming–my life.

I wonder if maybe the reason it is so hard for Christians to demonstrate love is because we often do not fully realize the extent to which God loves us! How can one give what one does not have? The reality is that He loves us so much that He died to live inside of us! – Do not resist it! – But He is a holy and jealous God and we are completely sinful–there is no way for us to have fellowship with God and receive His love and blessing: except through Jesus Christ, glory hallelujah! God sent His own son, Jesus, to make a way for us to be connected to the Father who loves us.

Realize, Christian, that there is nothing that can separate you from God’s love, yet there is nothing “lovable” about you, and yet He loves you passionately. It’s called grace. It’s called amazing. Now live it. Show some love to your homosexual neighbor–it will probably change their life. . .and yours.

C. D.

“Those Guys”—Happen to be God’s Kids

/ Chris / Leave a comment

As I caught the rebound of my basketball, a whiff of tobacco came my way from the picnic tables. I looked over and saw that it was those guys. Yeah, the stereotypical 16-year-old cigarette smokin’ guys–you know the kind.

But what about those guys. Doesn’t God love them too? How can I reject these guys because of their lifestyle, when no one has ever showed them a different one? I have a good family. They probably have multiple bad families.

Jesus is standing in Heaven, telling His people, “LOOK! I have children down there! Can’t you see them? I died for these kids! They’re lost and all alone. They’re lives are broken! DO something!”

Can we just stand back and say, “Hey, I serve a powerful God. If He wants these guys to change, He’ll make it happen.” The problem is, He is making it happen. If you are a Christian and you see “the least of these”, He is making it happen. If we ignore “the least of these”, we are ignoring Christ.

I am no longer content to just look on and criticize with clean and unscathed hands. I have clean hands now, but they better be dirty when I stand before Jesus–who’s hand’s were pierced for these kids.

C.D.

He Did it For You

/ Chris / Leave a comment

I wonder how often I have read the gospels, and more specifically the Crucifixion story, and merely stored it up in the old brain as simple information?

I think this is a common mistake. It seems hard to transfer the severity of the situation from mere facts and apologetics to an actual belief and conviction of the heart. From a story, to a way of life.

But it just struck me–or maybe I should say He struck me.

As Jesus was dying on the cross, it was not that He just thought: “I am doing this for the world.” But as they drove those nails into his wrists, He was thinking, “That one is for Christopher.” He did it for me.

And He wasn’t just thinking of me, He was thinking of everybody! He was thinking of my neighbor, the President, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, even the dude I passed on the street and the homeless guy under the bridge.

People, this is phenomenal! As the Creator of the universe was “dying” at the hands of His creation, He was thinking of His creation. He was thinking of US!

Imagine it. Basically, when we sin (whatever it may be, no matter how big), we are re-driving the nails through His wrist, we are killing Him all over again. And He says, “That was for you.”

If that isn’t love…

C.D.

This Is What I Call–Fail

/ Chris / 3 Comments

Is this really what we have come to? As I scroll down Facebook lane, the only meaning I see, now, is that it is the weekend…and weekend means party. The only thing I see during the week is longing for the weekend. Then we party, and then on Monday the course starts all over again. Are we this shallow? Are people really satisfied with this, this fakeness?

Am I really that weird to long for something deeper?

ALL WE HAVE TO LOOK FORWARD TO IS THE LATEST TOP, BOX OFFICE MOVIE!

I think I finally get it…I finally begin to see the devil’s trick.

Are we really going to accept defeat? Are we going to let Satan laugh and claim victory over our lame lives? WHY IS THERE NO MORE PASSION?

It breaks my heart that this is what we call, great. Success.

You wanna know what I call great? I call people like Bruce Olson (Aka, Bruchko), who went to South America to be a missionary when he was NINETEEN! I call the five heroes of 1956–who were speared to death for their passion–great.

I call people being saved by Jesus, success!

The devil would love to see us, especially young people, just partying our way through life. Satan’s whole scheme is to suck the very life out of us. And you can see it. He wants us to spend time on Facebook, rather than reading the Bible; he’d rather have us watch the latest, violence filled, immorality endorsing, time-wasting movie, over spending time with people.

Don’t tell me it doesn’t affect us!

We are the product, I am the product.

If our lives are this shallow, we must be doing SOMETHING wrong.

So what do you say, shall we accept this defeat? Shall I sleep in until lunchtime tomorrow? Shall I eat pop-corn and drink soda, and just say “Such is life”?! Please tell me this is not the way it must be. Please tell me there is something deeper. If all my security, my life, my all, depends upon the next party, then there is truly no meaning in life.

It DOESN’T have to be this way!

But it starts with us, with me, with YOU! Pull yourself out of the muck, and call yourself a man! Life doesn’t need to consist of such shallow wandering.

When I get through life, what will I look back on? Will I look back on a life of trying to desperately grasp what I could have easily held on to while growing up? Satan would love to see us go through life and accomplish nothing.

So, is the weekend all I have to look forward to? I think not.

C.D.

The Cross

“May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ…” The cross is where true purpose lies.

Satan would love to see us go through life and accomplish nothing.

To Die Is Gain

/ Chris / Leave a comment

“For to me to live is Christ, to die is gain.”

NKJV “For to me, living means living for Christ, and dying is even better.” – Philippians 1:21 (NLT)

I wonder how many times I have said that. And if I have, did I really mean it? Would I really find it a gain to die? I know in my heart that it is, but when it came down to it–would I really rather die–for Christ, mind you–then to live? (I would not want to die for anything but Christ..which might include dying to save another.)

And do I really live as Christ? I really have to compare myself to this verse sometimes. I have great admiration for Paul. Because, half the time, I think I end up living as myself, and to die is loss.

I have been reading out of the Martyrs Mirror (also titled Bloody Theater), about how each of the apostles, and people shortly after Jesus’s crucifixion, were persecuted, and eventually martyred. (And these stories are only a fraction of the book, there are hundreds of stories–or at least it seems so. It is about as thick as two and a half Bibles.)

Anyways, it has really challenged me.

These men were devoted to the faith. At least three of the apostles crucified, one of which was Peter who requested to be crucified upside down because he did not deem himself worthy to die like Christ. (His crucifiers were happy to oblige him of course, because it would increase the pain.)

And Andrew, Peters brother, was crucified in a different fashion than Jesus or Peter. (See picture below.) But he was not nailed to the cross, but rather, tied to it, and he hung there for three days instructing the people around him.

(See pictures below for third apostle crucified.)

And of course we all know what happened to Paul, and it is no less significant than any of the others–he was beheaded. James the greater was martyred in the same fashion.

Mark, or John, also John Mark, was “dragged out of the congregation, through the streets  and out of the city; so that his flesh everywhere adhered to the stones, and his blood was poured out upon the earth, until he, with the last words of our Saviour, committed his spirit into the hand of the Lord, and expired.” Martyrs Mirror, page 78.

Christians in general were not martyred by any less cruel ways. Many had pitch and such substances poured on them, then tied to stacks and used as torches! And that is only one way in which Nero persecuted them.

James the Lesser was thrown off the top of a building and then stoned. And as he was being stoned (for the fall had only broken his legs) he prayed the words of Jesus as he was dying. “Lord, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Hearing this a priest called out for the stoning to stop saying, “What do ye? the Just is praying for us. leave off the stoning!” But someone took a club and hit James over the head with it, killing him. (See page 75 of the Martyrs Mirror.)

And of course, Stephen was stoned to death, which is also no little way to die.

Luke the evangelist, and physician, was hung by the neck on a tree.

(And there are still hundreds of later martyrs and other apostles whom I have not the time to write of. Plus more that were never recorded.)

All these men, died for He who first died. They followed His footsteps to the very end. Some not only followed His footsteps, but spoke His words.

Even today there are persecuted men and women. And yet I sit here in comfy America.

“..to live is Christ, to die is gain.”

C.D.