PJ's Journal

I don't know about you, but I fall into the trap of being too critical of people sometimes. This is especially true of those who are in the ministry. Because they don't do things like I would do them, I find myself being critical and judging their motives. This is not a healthy thing to do. Listen to what Paul says about this: "It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. The latter do so in love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. But what does that matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice." Philippians 2:15-18 Who cares! The important thing is that Christ is being preached! Paul could rejoice or the successes of others whose motives might not have been pure because ...

"Now I want you to know, brothers, that what happened to me has really served to advance the Gospel. As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ." Philippians 1:12-13 I think God's Word is incredible! Here you have a man of God explaining his own circumstances that may seem grim, undesirable, and depressing to the average person, but that was not the attitude of Paul. Paul was able to look at his circumstances and see how God was using it for Kingdom purposes. He had become a testimony to the greatness of God while in prison and people were taking notice. This testimony did not come about because of the circumstances but rather in spite of the circumstances. It was because Paul made a choice based on his knowledge of who God is and what life was all about. Paul knew his purpose and did not feel entitled to some happy, easygoing life! Not only was he a testimony to the palace guards, but his...

The Philippian Church seems to be one of those churches that you would want to be in.  In Paul's letter to that church, he has nothing but good things to say and is encouraged by the faith of the people.  These are a people that cause joy to rise up in Paul!  That's the kind of church I would love to be a part of, but they certainly were not perfect.  What do you say to a church where the people seem to "get it"?  How about encouragement to keep on doing the things they have been doing!  In the first chapter of Philippians, Paul writes: "And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ." Philippians 1:9-10 What I find interesting about Paul's prayer is his connection between knowledge, insight, and love.  Today when we think of love we tend to think of how we feel about a person.  We have grown to understa...

This blog is supposed to be authentic, and it is my desire to be a transparent person about my faith journey. I have not blogged since last month for several reasons...some good and some pretty bad! I have been struggling lately! I have allowed my heart to wander away from my God for the last three weeks. I have not been seeking the Lord in the mornings because of my heart's attitude. You know, I blogged about this last month. Our heart has a natural lean away from God because of our sinful nature and the Scriptures have told us to guard our hearts. Well, I have not guarded my heart very well. I have been very selfish and disobedient! I know that I desire God to be Glorified in my life, but at times I get caught up glorifying and gratifying myself. I spent some time talking to the Lord this morning. He is a Gracious God, and is able to bring about restoration after we have allowed our hearts to stray away. Over the last three weeks, I have known all the right things to ...

One of the most difficult questions as a believer revolves around the area of forgiveness. When do I forgive? Is there anything that needs to be done first before forgiveness can be offered? These are all great questions, but I think sometimes we make them harder because we begin mixing concepts. When I take a look at the parable of the prodigal son, I see a significant truth... Love is not the same thing as forgiveness. Consider with me the reaction of the Father. Upon seeing his son returning home, he could not contain himself and ran to his son, embracing him tightly. The father had no clue at this point that the son was the least bit repentant. As far as the father knew, he could have been returning to manipulate him for more. Who knows, but what we do know is that the father responded in love before he knew the son was repentant. It was only after the son was repentant that the father restored the son, which is what forgiveness does! Forgiveness always leads to restora...

Most of the time we have a negative view of discipline, probably because we abuse that responsibility too often. We see instances when kids are disciplined because they are simply annoying their parents and the parents react. Some go over board and embitter or actually abuse their kids, and some don't do much more than a slap on the hand at best. However, we should never look at the Lord's discipline as a negative thing! Discipline always has the goal of restoration and that is God's ultimate desire. Why? Because He loves you as His own! "And have you forgotten the word of encouragement that addresses you as sons: My sons, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when He rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those He loves, and punishes everyone He accepts as a Son." Hebrews 12:5-6 Discipline is a good thing, so do not lose heart. Instead, humble yourself and learn from your mistakes. Think about it this way...If you were t...

Our walk with the Lord is certainly a journey with its setbacks! Sometimes you choose to let your guard down and pursue influences that cause your mind and heart to lean away from God. What do you do when that happens? Should you just give up? Hang your head in shame? If not, what do you do? Paul tells us in Philippians... "Not that I have obtained all this or already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Philippians 3:12-14 Paul recognized that he had not arrived at perfection! He had setbacks in his journey just like us, yet he approached his journey with truth. Recognize that your not perfect, repent of your sin, and move on! Don't wallow in your sin and sha...

What does it mean to live by the Spirit? First we recognize that the Spirit desires what is opposite of our sin nature and then we surround ourselves with influences that feed the Spirit and eliminate those that feed the sin nature. The second thing that is essential to living by the Spirit is in the area of your thoughts. Your thoughts are like a rudder of a ship...you will become as you think many times. "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind..." Romans 12:2 "Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are good, your whole body is full of light. But when they are bad, your body is full of darkness. See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness." Luke 11:34-35 How we think is crucial to living by the Spirit, because the Spirit always guides us into truth! "But when He, the Spirit of Truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth..." John 16:13 If we think we can hid...

So Paul makes the statement that if we "live by the Spirit we will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature." This statement is good news and it demands a look into what it means to live by the Spirit. This will probably take more than one post, as my goal is to throw out nuggets to be digested than to overwhelm the reader with too much at once. That being said, I would like to look at the rest of what Paul says in Gal 5:16-17... "So I say, live by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want." Gal. 5:16-17 It doesn't surprise us that the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, as a matter of fact, most of us would say, "ok, that's pretty obvious", but Paul's purpose seems to be painting a picture of conflict. ...

It is true that the natural leaning of our heart is toward rebellion, following the desires of our sin nature, but all is not doom and gloom for sure. If that were the end of the story, I would raise my hands up in defeat and scream "I give up!", but God provided us with a more powerful influence in our lives than our sin nature. Right after Paul describes the struggle he experiences with his sinful nature he goes on to ask a question in a tone of self-defeat... "Who will rescue me from this body of death?" It seems logical to ask that question because that is how we feel much of the time. We want to do right, but find ourselves doing the opposite and then we feel empty or even spiritually dead. Death means separation, which makes spiritual death separation from God. When you follow the desires of the sin nature and live outside the box, you put up a barrier between you and God. You don't feel close to God, as a matter of fact, you feel like God could ne...

So obedience is absolutely essential to our purpose in life...to glorify God! We must become people committed to obedience, being intentional about living within God's will. But that being said, we need to explore our tendency to rebel against God. Paul, as he was writing the book of Romans, explains this struggle in chapter 7: "I know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate to do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself doing it, but sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin living in me that does it" R...

For the last month, I have been thinking about and teaching about living within God's will. God's will provides boundaries for us to live and thrive within. Anytime you read God's Word and you see a command that applies to you, it is one of many boundaries that form God's will. Here is the kicker...I have been teaching that there is freedom when you live within the boundaries of God will. Conversely , if you live outside those boundaries you actually find bondage! At first glance you might think the opposite is true. You might say that living within a box (God's will) is bondage, but lets take a deeper look at it. What is the purpose of God's will? Is it to suffocate your life just so God can sit on His throne and watch you suffer? Some might think so, but no! Actually, the opposite is true. The designer of life (God) knows just how life is to be lived to its fullest from an eternal perspective. His will helps you to find the most joy and satisfacti...

Often times it seems difficult to answer the question, "What is the very best way to give God glory?" I believe that giving God glory is directly related to loving God the most! What do the Scriptures say... Simple, Jesus says in the Gospels, "If you love me, you will obey what I command!" What are God's commands? They are based on God's character and design for life. God desires people to live life the way He intended for it to be. These desires are known as His will! God has stated His will for us in His incredible Word! We know how we ought to live, because the designer gave us the blue prints! Giving God glory is not just making Him look good, it is loving Him by living life the way He designed it to be lived...obeying His commands or living within the confines of God's will. Its really simple, live within the boundaries that God has set up and you naturally will give Him glory. So what does this mean. It means that I don't have to b...

"If anyone sees his brother commit a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray and God will give him life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that does lead to death. I am not saying that he should pray about that. All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death." 1 John 5:16-17 Have you ever heard someone make a comment in the context of your conversation with them and you had to ask, "What do you mean by that? Explain yourself!" That's what I feel like right now. I would love to have a conversation with the Apostle John and ask him to explain, because I am not sure what this means. Here is my best stab at it, but honestly I don't know! Here is what I know John to have said: 1. There is a (singular) sin that leads to death 2. There is sin (plural) that does not lead to death 3. We are encouraged to pray for a fellow believer if their sin does not lead to death 4. All wrongdoing is sin He...

"This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we have asked anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us - whatever we ask - we know that we have what we asked of Him." 1 John 5:14-15 Prayer is one of those things I am trying to understand. It certainly demonstrates our dependence upon God and our helplessness without Him. Prayer is a humbling discipline in the life of a believer. To genuinely pray, one has to come to an end of himself and recognize their place before God, this however, is no easy task. We generally function as independent people who are sufficient in and of ourselves. If we want something done, we buckle down and get it done! Hard work and outside the box thinking seem to rule our lives. "We can do anything, if we put our minds to it", is what we often think, but this is not true when it comes to Kingdom living. In a Kingdom there is a King and servants. The goal of the servant is to carry out...

"I write these things to you who believe in the Name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life." 1 John 5:13 I often ask the question to folks, "Can you know that you have eternal life?", and the response I get is almost 100 percent, "No, no one can really know!" While I understand where they are coming from, I also have to disagree. What is my disagreement based upon? Well, its based on the testimony of one who walked with Jesus, seen Jesus after the resurrection, and was privileged to write about things that are yet to come which he has seen with his own eyes. Could John be crazy? Highly unlikely! We cannot think of John without thinking of the other eye witnesses of Jesus. Here is a group of men and women who turned the world upside down based on their belief that Jesus was God's promised Messiah! They were so convinced that they dedicated their very lives to spread the news of what they saw! A very high percentage ...

What does it mean to glorify God? That is a question that seems to have many different responses from incredibly smart and God-fearing men. John Piper might say that God is most glorified when we are most satisfied in Him! While I agree that God is glorified when we find our satisfaction in Him, I often think about what brings the most glory to God. I am going to throw out a concept. God is most glorified when we are most like Jesus. If there was anyone who gave glory to the Father, it was Jesus. He is the perfect example of what it means to glorify God, and it seems to make sense to me that the more like Jesus we become, the more glory we bring to the Father! What does it mean to become like Him? I don't know if I have a perfectly formulated answer for that question, but I think about it in terms that I get. I want to love the things that He loves, hate the things that He hates, be broken over the things that He is broken over, excited about the things He is excited abou...

"We accept man's testimony, but God's testimony is much greater because it is the testimony of God, which He has given about His Son. Anyone who believes in the Son of God has this testimony in his heart. Anyone who does not believe God has made Him out to be a liar, because he has not believed the testimony God has given about His Son. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life, He who does not have the Son of God does not have life." 1 John 5:9-12 I love apologetics, but the one thing that I find hard to reason with people, who want no part of Christ, about is this confirmation in my Spirit about the things of God. I know that I know that I know that Jesus is the Son of God and has given me life! I know this testimony to be real because I live with this reality in my heart! God has testified about His Son in my heart through the working of the Holy Spirit, but how do you explain this to ...

" We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." 2 Cor. 10:5 I woke up this morning around 3am with many thoughts running through my head. I have been thinking about this verse for some time now and want to write out some of what my thinking is. We are told to take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ. I often wondered what in the world that meant! It was a bit confusing to me, because I take things very literally. I often wondered how you took a thought and made it obedient. I treated my thoughts as if they had a mind of their own (no pun intended). What does it mean? I have always heard the phrase, but never within its context. Paul is warning the people about false teaching and explains to us how he and his companions deal with teachings or thoughts that do not conform to the truth. He says that they demolish arguments and every pretens...

"This is the one who came by water and blood - Jesus Christ. He did not come by water only, but by water and by blood. And it is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. For there are three that testify: the Spirit, the water and the blood; and the three are in agreement." 1 John 5:6-8 This is a very confusing passage and I honestly can not say for sure what it is, but here is what I believe the Spirit is revealing to me as I sit here and meditate on this awhile. Through out the book of 1 John, John has been addressing false doctrine about the person of Jesus. This false doctrine taught that Jesus was not actual flesh and blood, but a spirit. In their view (the material is bad and the spiritual is good), there was no way that the Son of God could come in the flesh. He had to be spiritual. I believe John is affirming that Jesus came by water (born into this world through a birth process) and He physically died and rose again in the flesh. Jesus was ...