The Fraility Of The Human Condition.

We are evil by nature.God said in Genesis that when He looks at the heart of man He sees that our thoughts are continuously wicked. We have a spiritual heart condition. For every spiritual condition there is a physical parallel and expression.
We experience spiritual death the day we are born. Physically we are dying everyday we live. Death in human society is two folds. spiritual death and physical death. Spiritually we are separated from God and the Bible calls us spiritually dead. We spend tremendous amounts of resources protecting our bodies from death because our bodies are temples of Gods Spirit.
Similar or greater efforts should be made to protect our spiritual life because our spirit goes back to God.
Our brains have been conditioned to listen to our hearts.mind).It answers to the desires of our bodily appetites.(hunger, thirst, passions etc. This is the mind that we give the Holy Spirit permission to reconstruct or renew when we accept Jesus as Lord over our lives.
During this process of transformation our worldviews (the way we see view the world and formulate opinions) begin to change systematically. Similar to every construction project it is a process and not an event. We become saved from the wrath of God into the Body and Corporation of Jesus Christ. We are baptized into the Name, Body of believers, and Authority of Jesus. We are presented to God the Father dressed, covered , and cloaked in the Righteousness , or right standing of Jesus and not our own least anyone should have an inclination to boast.
We are saved and made righteous positionally but in experience we are working towards righteousness . We are being transformed into Gods original intent. The Image of God.

Before the fall we knew we were spirit beings mastering the human experience. We have lost our identity and we think we are here to master a spiritual experience. Being baptized with the Holy Spirit, we begin to yield our thoughts and activity to the appetite of God and not out own. We live our lives between the tension of our fleshly needs and the discipline of the Holy Spirit. At this point of our lives we have to consciously begin to starve the appetites of our fleshly wants or needs, and feed the Spiritual nature so it can dominate the flesh. We still sin . We still commit acts of transgression because we are born in sin and that sin nature is still alive pointing us and reminding us of our need for the passion of Christ. We are transgressors because we are sinners . We are not sinners because we commit transgressions. Yes as Christians we sin!but we don't practice sin. We are convicted by the Holy Spirit when we sin and we are compelled to repent. It's the sin and repentance cycle.

As adults we don't stumble and fall like a toddler because we have matured . Likewise we must grow into Christian maturity. Paul in his writings said 'be ye perfect for I am perfect .' Christian perfection is a call to maturity and not flawlessness. As new born babies we long for milk but as adult we Begin to crave for solid foods. We also put away childish things and behaviours and Begin to adopt and experience things as Adults.
We are in a constant war . It becomes the dualism of decision, the conflict of the Word of God and our existential struggle. This war is waged in our minds. The struggle between our human will and Gods perfect will for our lives. The Spirit of God versus our human will . Who will we yield to? Who will we feed and make stronger? Here is what Paul has to say:

Rom 7:18-23 know I am rotten through and through so far as my old sinful nature is concerned. No matter which way I turn I can't make myself do right. I want to but I can't. 19 When I want to do good, I don't; and when I try not to do wrong, I do it anyway. 20 Now if I am doing what I don't want to, it is plain where the trouble is: sin still has me in its evil grasp.
21 It seems to be a fact of life that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. 22 I love to do God's will so far as my new nature is concerned; 23 but there is something else deep within me, in my lower nature, that is at war with my mind and wins the fight and makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. In my mind I want to be God's willing servant, but instead I find myself still enslaved to sin.
So you see how it is: my new life tells me to do right, but the old nature that is still inside me loves to sin. Oh, what a terrible predicament I'm in! Who will free me from my slavery to this deadly lower nature? Thank God! It has been done by Jesus Christ our Lord. He has set me free.

As we approach this new year 2010 a year of new beginning most of us have made a resolution to be better Christians. I urge you all to remember this message. you are save by grace and not your own efforts. Do not try to win God's favor through works. do not beat yourself up if you transgress. Repent and move on don't stay down.

Love and Trust God. If we love Him we will sow Spiritual seeds that will yield Spiritual fruits. If we sow in the flesh we will yield fleshly fruits that will lead to our destruction. We are in a love and trust relationship and not a performance and reward relationship. God bless you all and remember Christ is in us in the Whirlwind of the storm.

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The goodness of God

The book of Genesis begins with " In the beginning God" It did not seek to explain the creation of God or the pre-existence of God, this is because this God of the Bible is a God that has to be revealed and discovered by those and to those who diligently seek him.

Every society and culture of this universe has come to believe that there is a Greater being. Paul talks about this with the pagans of his time hence he said "I see you have many gods even an altar to the unknown God" and he went on to testify about Christ. Romans chapter one tells us that the things that are seen, the created things testify to that fact that there is an unseen Entity that created all things. Paul moved on to say that God has placed eternity in the hearts of men. God has placed in our hearts the laws of what philosophers call the laws of Absolutes. That is the eternal knowledge of right from wrong, Good from bad. Atheists cannot accept this law and C.S Lewis address this issue in his book "men without Chests.

We were never taught the laws of fairness, or the distinction between good or bad. That was in us since we were born. God has to put it in us. To disagree on the absolute laws of morality we deny the reality of God.

Most people have come to believe in a malevolent god. A god who sits with a big stick waiting to punish us when we do wrong. when This god or gods get angry they punish us with natural disasters . In order them keep them happy we must offer sacrifices or good works to appease them or him.
Some cultures offer pigs, goats and some Christians offer good works. The ultimate sacrifice to appease god is human blood. that's why some circles sacrifice or kill children because of the innocent blood required to appease the gods. Innocent blood is the ultimate price. in Jewish circles they used to offer a young lamb. Abraham understood this that's why he didn't find it strange when God asked him to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. He didn't understand God was providing him insight to the future of how he was going to redeem mankind. (Abraham was a type of the Father God offering Isaac a type of the Son Jesus for the remission of sin)God was showing Abraham how He was going to redeem the world.

This malevolent God is not only expressed in pagan circles, but rather it is in the Christian Church. shocked? look around, look in the mirror. we are all saved by grace but we walk around trying to maintain our salvation through works. Its not by works of righteousness but by Gods grace alone. We try to pray, read our bible and if we don't we feel guilty or afraid that God is going to get us. Without God we wont know how to pray or do anything good. When bad things happen to us we think its because we are not praying hard enough. We get the Job syndrome. "Though He slay me yet will I praise him".The question was it God slaying Job or was it the devil? The God of Christian scriptures is not malevolent. The God we are called to express in culture is not malevolent.

God only allows us to suffer the consequences of our actions or sometimes He allows evil to run its course. This is its kingdom. This is the mark of the beast revealed in revelation. 666 that's the symbol or number of man that symbolic language of the thinking of man and his kingdom that's why it was in the head. It was in the hands as well to show that the evil work of mans hand will dominate this world.

The God of the Bible is a Benevolent God. God is Good. His total reality is Good. His entire make up is Good. He has no inclination to evil. Evil is any condition where the presence of God doesn't dominate. God is light. He is the light of the world in Him there is no darkness. God shines His light into the darkness of our hearts and His light penetrate us and we become transformed in his spiritual image. Genesis tells us the earth was dark and void.That was the condition of our hearts before we were saved. It moves on to say God said 'let there be light'. and that is the same Word He speaks into our life as we accept him into our lives. The theology of Redemption started in creation. Genesis was God redeeming the world to himself. the Greeks in the bible sought knowledge the Hebrews sought light. Paul puts it this way that God has called us into his marvelous Light that we might Know him and the fullness of his Grace. He included everyone. The existentialist lives for the present the Utopians lives for the future and the traditionalist lives for the past but only CHRIST has and can infuse all of History with meaning through his goodness. That's why he can say for as often as you do this do it in remembrance of me.

God is Good He Loves us . loves us enough to redeem us. It was Gods love that Compels us to get saved. some scholars calls it the Hound of heaven chasing us. God searches us at our lowest point like the woman with the lost coin. God so loved Adam and human Kind that He kicked him out of heaven in order to save him. If Adam was left in that fallen state in heaven he would have eaten from the tree of life and mankind would have stay in sin forever. Jesus wouldn't be able to come in human flesh and die on the cross because man would live forever. It was Gods love that compelled Him to curse the ground in his anger because if he has cursed Adam where would we be? Gods love for the human race is beyond words. He loves us more that we love ourselves. David penned it this way " what is man that you are mindful of him? even when I walk through the valley of the shadows of death You are there with your rod to correct me and your staff to guide me .His goodness and mercy comforts me. it is out of our love for him that we pray to him to commune with him to love him to relish him with curiosity and to be in his presence . its is not out of religious legalism. we praise Him and give Him adulation because we are loving Him back .He is the lover of my soul, He is my Ethiopian woman in songs of Solomon. I walk up and down the city streets looking for my lover if u see Him let him know I am looking for Him. Read the songs of Solomon and see how he describes his lover and the passion he experiences as he communes with Him. Lets love Him with all our hearts. Jesus reveals the character and power of God. Goodness is the Essenes
and character of God .

God is good. If we want to know Good then we have to know God and the truth of His Character. Character is the inherent group of attributes that determines the
moral, ethical, actions and reaction of God or the person being evaluated.
We have to be careful not to evaluate God with humanistic standards and
expectation. God is good all the time, regardless of what the
challenges are in our life . Don't ever misjudge the goodness of God
based on the flaws and poor decisions exercised by our depravity as humans.

God's goodness is expressed in His Holiness and His love.
His holiness is separated from all that is evil. He cannot be
identified with evil which is a condition that rejects God's sovereign authority.
It is because of that Goodness that He is able to love us sacrificially.
Love is the ability to give.God is entirely good his love allows him
to seek us that is evil sacrificially. With love and kindness has called us.

God sends us agent of His love. To reach out to a lost and dying generation. To
extend his love and redemptive power regardless of our sinful nature and act.
He is using us as an expressive agent of his love and kindness. A
response to their cries of their prayers .
God loves the sinners and transgressors redemptively
The goodness of God is clearly revealed in the redemptive nature of God.





by Kairos Expressions.

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Ways that God speaks.

Our greatest asset in life is our ability to hear and discern the voice of God. Some ways that God has spoken throughout History are listed below.
God knows who we are, He designed us so He knows the most effective way to communicate to us.


1.God speaks through his Word. Gods Word (The Bible is infallible).
We have to step out on His Word . Trusting on His Word is also working on developing His character in us. Our words have shaped our destiny as Gods Word shaped the universe and everything therein.
We speak and act on Gods Words to express our faith . My father used to say faith in motion sets God in motion.
God speaks through His word. The bible is the rule and not the exception it's our rule of conduct.
1. He also speaks in a audible voice . The exception and not the rule. He spoke to Moses in an audible voice . He first gets our attention then He speaks. When He speaks we have to test it by the Word to authenticate the Word.
He spoke to kings, and prophets and He spoke to the masses

2. He spoke through angels also know as messengers. That is not the rule. We have to test the Word of the angels by the words in the bible .

3. He speaks through dreams. God speaks to us in pictures during our sleeping hours. Not all dreams have spiritual significance.
What your mind cannot resolve when you awake your mind tends to resolve when you are asleep.

4. Visions.
Gods speak to us through visuals pictures and visions.

5. Spirit to spirit.
His spirit speaks to our human spirit

6. Prophets
God speaks to us through prophets .
Exhortation , correction . Not fortune telling, Or forth telling . Beware of false prophets . They have to be consistent with the Word. The Word comes from a different realm we don't make it happen . It's also for edification .

8. Godly counsel .
Spiritually mature people that can speak into your life and give you words of wisdom

9 Spiritual gifts.
He speaks to us through our gifting and talents, through our passions .

10 . New desires.
God fills our hearts with desires that guide and guard our hearts against things that are outside Gods will.

Hearing the voice of God "Akouo" the Greek meaning to hear. To know. Knowing God so well that it produce an offspring. To hear . We can hear the sound but we don't understand. My sheep hears my voice " akouo" knowing him intimately. His attitude and character that produces offspring . Abraham knew Sarah "akouo" and produced a son . Knowing her intimately to produce an offspring.

The men with Saul heard the sound but saw no one." Akouo" they heard the sound. Acts 22 vs 7 they heard the sound but no understanding.

We hear the voice of God but lack understanding. We hear him . He is always speaking but we have to train ourselves to discern his voice amidst the noise and haste. There are too much noise too many voices.

Psalm 19. God speaks all day without a sound . Yet His message is being sent out.

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The call of God

Mud cloth Artist. Posted by Valerie K. 4/29/09

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It was a dry and sunny day; I stood in the compound of the Fulani’s tribes men in Kingtom village on my way to Prince of Wales secondary school. I was eleven years old. I was dressed in my white poplin shirt and khaki shorts white sneakers partially covered with dust from the unpaved road I had traveled. It was about eleven o’clock am, the sun was ascending to its prime, and I almost stood on my shadow.

The smell of fresh bread being baked in a traditional wood oven was in the air and a couple of men were getting their baskets ready to prepare for their delivery to the local Fulani shops. The cries of little children were in the air as they crawled on the earthen floor as if to signal to their semi-clothed mothers that they were hungry. You can hear the topless young girls about my age pounding rice to make flour in their mortar and pestle in a synchronized musical rhythm. The women were moving around the shacks with a sense of urgency attempting to prepare a meal for the family.

A blackened pot supported by three stones was on a fire fueled by some pieces of wood. The water was boiling as the insects buzzed around aimlessly. A dog was laying down not too far under the mango tree gazing into space as if it were standing guard over the pot and waiting to pounce on any item of food that would be dropped on the floor. Occasionally it would attempt to catch the flies walking on the sores in its ear.

The tapping noise of two pieces of wood clapping caught my attention. I turned around and looked. There he was, a weaver sitting on the ground in front of a wooden, hand made tapestry machine powered by the pedaling of his feet. His hands were moving the threads at his will and every gesture was significant to the threads and the grand design. Without a script or a picture, he wove the threads. The intricate patterns locked in his mind came alive as he nudged his hands, nods his head, dropping sweat from his brow and pedaling with his feet. The grand design was unfolding. I greatly admired his creativity. I watched him work silently, he was oblivious to the crowd of school children that now stood around him guessing what the complete design would be.

He had a plan for every color of thread in his hands, only he knows but he will not utter a word. The mid day call for prayer from the nearby mosque rang in the air. He immediately stopped to prepared himself for his ceremonial washing, I walked away at that moment declaring to myself that the show was over as I walked away and was imitating the actions of his hands as I approached my father’s house.

It has been twenty two years later, I see and hear the voice of the Grand Weaver of Universe stopping by to tell that African boy that He has a plan for his life and that He (GOD) alone carries the threads of my life. The Grand Weaver is holding the threads of my life, and if I would only respond in obedience to his nudge as He, moves the shuttle at His will.

God is holding the threads of my life and fashioning and extraordinary pattern. My life continues to vacillate on the shaft of his machine because of the dignity that God has invested in me. My humanity gives me my essential worth, and who I am as an individual gives me God’s prerogative of reflective splendor. My THEOPHANY matters, my SPIRITUALITY matters, my DISAPPOINTMENT matters, my D.N.A matters and my HUMANITY matters.
During those years my desire was to live with my father in his house and now as a young man living in America my pursuit and yearning is for my Heavenly Father. The appetite for a Father and a Fathers approval is ever present in my life. I have to restrain myself from expecting that approval and love from the great men in my life like my bosses. That might be the reason why I serve them well in pursuit of purpose and meaning in my life.


I have grown to understand that my relationship with my Heavenly Father matters and my eternal Destiny is to be conformed into the image of my Him Father and to live in His House.This revelation has allowed me to review the Bibles account of Adam’s family and empathize instead of casting the blame on Adam, Eve and Cain.

Cain lacked acceptance approval. He also had a lack of personal identity with no sense of belonging. His father had experience rejection from God. Adam communicated that rejection to his son either through words gestures or in spirit. Did Adam hide in and emotional cave after being thrown out of Eden as most men do when the experience rejection of feel as thought they missed the mark? Did Cain become angry and bitter because of his inability to understand the magnitude and effects of this sin nature which his generation is confronted with?

When God removed his presence and character from Cain, he lived his life in a state of independence from Adam and his Heavenly father. Cain built a city that was outside the presence of God the Father. The Bible describes his descendants as being a talented and gifted group of people but the character and presence of God was absent from their lives. They fell short of Gods moral standard. Cain lives aimless without an eternal purpose because he missed and lacked presence of the Moral law giver.


Cain and his offspring cannot live morally because they did not know the moral law giver. They developed philosophies but could not master it because they did not know the Father of philosophy. They tried to develop character but lacked the Character of the Master. They excelled in their talent but talent alone cannot be sustained independently from God.Talent It needs character and integrity to support it. Cain and his offspring lacked the character of their Heavenly Father which is the mandate and requirement for humanity.


Excepts from my I.C.B paper.Inspired by Dr. Ravis Zacharis and Dr. A.R Bernard.

HOPE

The Bible introduces us to an ideal creation for God by God. It was the specific environment for humans to flourish in their fullness. Adam was created in the perfect Image of God. Adam had the attributes and character of God that allowed him to commune one with the Father. Adam was given 1 law. The ideal condition created for Adam lasted through one chapter in the Bible. The rest of the book became dominated with violence and decay and human depravity.
Even with these atrocities, God was and is currently at work in the fallen condition lovingly executing His redemptive plan for mankind. What is it about man that compels God to love man enough to redeem him?

Religious practices through out the course of human history has kept God confined in box with limitations set by our finite levels of thinking and understanding. The God of the Bible is working everyday even on the Sabbath to redeem mankind. Sometimes God works openly and sometimes behind the scenes. The most imperatively and marvelous work is done behind the curtains when the stage is closed and when the lights are out as we sit down in solitude confronting ourselves as the Holy Spirit convicts us. It is at this time the need for change in the deep dark closets of our lives is revealed. The hound of Heaven sets on our Trail. The results are always magnificent. We become transformed daily. His work is in motion. He is at work in a fabulous way. He changes us to reflect him through the image of his Son. We are set on the path of Christ revealed in culture. Christo Kia Cosmos.

Abel’s death was a traumatic impact to human history. That was the first time nature was exposed to a dead human. Adam for the first time experienced death in his own house. He saw and experienced first hand the weight and scope of his sin. The heaviness that Christ felt as he approached the cross was also felt here by Adam. The first time blood was shed. The first of many to die. The first human funeral. The first smell of human death. The first experience of human decay. The first time human’s decomposition was experience. The first time flies tasted and hovered over a dead human being. The first death. The first physical separation of mother and son. This to me is a type of Mary and Abel a type of Christ.
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One seldom considers the emotional guilt of Eve as a woman and Adam as a man to bring such tragedy to their home and human condition. How did Adam and Eve live with themselves daily knowing that their decisions resulted in the death of their son through the hands of another? How did Adam deal with the rejection from God? Can we imagine the guilt that Adam lived with? Did that guilt send him to an emotional cave where he did not speak to his family? What about Cain? How did he deal with his own issues? Did he blame Adam? Was it rejection from his father that ignited his anger towards his brother? As a couple how did they go through life and intimacy after the loss of their two sons to even conceive the idea of having another son.

Seth was the compensation for their suffering. Seth was the first seed of hope in human history. 'God has given me another son". That was Eves hope. The pain of loosing two sons was rewarded with a Seth. Here we see hope emerging from hopelessness.

A hopeless world, hopeless human condition has now being introduced to the concept of hope. We are now a people of Hope. The Hope of redemption, the Hope of salvation. The hope of optimism. The optimistic assurance that is God given is sealed; it is not subjected to the frailty of human condition. Eve’s optimism was foundational and based on Gods word.

Our hope, is now being Experienced through our relationship with Christ.

Picture from freefoto.com

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What is worship?

Worship is the concept that quantifies the sole purpose of human existence.
God created us for His purpose and his glory. The word worship describes a posture of laying face down on the floor with humility. It is both an activity and an attitude . Arch Bishop William Temple describe worship as the submission or laying down of all of our being, to the authority and sovereignty of God. He moved on to say that it's the quickening of our flesh and it's imagination and all that we do has to be in adoration to Him and His Lordship found in the person of Jesus Christ. Our daily activities should be an act of worship. The Glory of God which is His Presence and Character must be present in the simplest of tasks that we engage in. The transformation of Christ's engagement in our lives being demonstrated is our act of worship. Worship is not only that segment of our church services where the choir sings and the lights are dimmed, and our emotions are touched but rather a continuation and over flow of expressing Christ in culture. That is the Christian mandate expressed in Genesis and Mathew .

Picture by Freefoto.com

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