Comments on: Mark 9:38-50 http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/ reading the bible as a community Thu, 20 Nov 2008 10:24:16 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.5 by: Wend http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/#comment-2327 Tue, 05 Feb 2008 22:35:59 +0000 http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/#comment-2327 Refining fires are not intended to gently warm; they purge. That doesn\'t make it easier at the time, it just offers the chance to develop your faith that a God bigger and wiser is in control. Sometimes faith is the final straw to cling on to (however fragile). Sometimes God lets you know why fires come; sometimes He doesn\'t. Sometimes you get to use the experience to help others; sometimes you don\'t. God will have His way, and He delights in bringing us closer to Him. Sometimes, only when we feel really broken do we allow Him free reign to rebuild us as He wants and the fire is to burn away the unnecessary stuff we cling on to rather than clinging on to Him. Beth, you sound so brave x Refining fires are not intended to gently warm; they purge.

That doesn\’t make it easier at the time, it just offers the chance to develop your faith that a God bigger and wiser is in control. Sometimes faith is the final straw to cling on to (however fragile). Sometimes God lets you know why fires come; sometimes He doesn\’t. Sometimes you get to use the experience to help others; sometimes you don\’t.

God will have His way, and He delights in bringing us closer to Him. Sometimes, only when we feel really broken do we allow Him free reign to rebuild us as He wants and the fire is to burn away the unnecessary stuff we cling on to rather than clinging on to Him.

Beth, you sound so brave x

]]> by: Torn http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/#comment-2322 Tue, 05 Feb 2008 14:39:01 +0000 http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/#comment-2322 So even if an elder pastor who seems to have lost his compassion for his people, who seems to be all about himself, and who has preached so long it just seems to very automatic - we must still love and respect him because while we feel his motives may not be in the right place, he still seems to reach people threw his very dynamic sermons? And because his love for Christ is not in question? So even if an elder pastor who seems to have lost his compassion for his people, who seems to be all about himself, and who has preached so long it just seems to very automatic - we must still love and respect him because while we feel his motives may not be in the right place, he still seems to reach people threw his very dynamic sermons? And because his love for Christ is not in question?

]]> by: Beth http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/#comment-2316 Tue, 05 Feb 2008 12:46:19 +0000 http://dream.uk.net/wpblog/2008/02/05/mark-938-50/#comment-2316 I\'m broken. My body and my brain can\'t do everything that I want them to do anymore. They may heal themselves in time, but I may never be able to manage all the things that I used to do. I will probably never be the person I once was. Yet that\'s not necessarily a bad thing. I\'m being changed by this experience, and I hope it\'s for the better. If God uses this to refine me then that\'s okay by me. And if God would rather have me broken than unrefined, then my brokeness won\'t be the end of the story. I\'m valuable, as I am. Here and now. In fact, I\'m better than I was in my unbroken state. God takes the rational, sane, logical attitudes of our human society and turns them upside down (again). The question is, how do we turn things \'God\'s way up\'? I\’m broken. My body and my brain can\’t do everything that I want them to do anymore.

They may heal themselves in time, but I may never be able to manage all the things that I used to do.

I will probably never be the person I once was.

Yet that\’s not necessarily a bad thing. I\’m being changed by this experience, and I hope it\’s for the better. If God uses this to refine me then that\’s okay by me. And if God would rather have me broken than unrefined, then my brokeness won\’t be the end of the story. I\’m valuable, as I am. Here and now. In fact, I\’m better than I was in my unbroken state.

God takes the rational, sane, logical attitudes of our human society and turns them upside down (again). The question is, how do we turn things \’God\’s way up\’?

]]>