Salt Spill... Overflow

I can't believe I'm writing in here again, so soon anyway.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the lost...

oh how I love them.. So much.

I think every time I stop and ponder about all the masses of people who will burn in hell because they never decided to truly take the gospel and story of Jesus seriously, it makes my heart break... the more I think about it the more grief and pain and even fear I feel rise up in me...

But grief, pain, and ESPECIALLY fear will not save people from Hell...

Love and ONLY love will do it. 

true.

real.

unconditional.

Jesus Christ.

crazy.

limitless.

love.

and that's it...

I am currently working as a fitness consultant @ TNT family fitness, a gym in Port Saint Lucie FL where I have met only 2 other people who call themselves Christians...

The rest, broken... battered... & bruised.

No REAL joy, just temporary happiness.

No REAL life, just here on earth.

No REAL love, just what mistakenly have experienced it to be.

No REAL God, just the wooden/plastic/famous idols that will one day burn.

MY HEART IS WRENCHED....

To me, I see christianity as a once starving man who has finally found where the harvest of food is... it is our job to tell the others who are dying of that same hunger we once suffered...

I go to work day in and day out, seeing these people every day trying to temporarily satisfy & fill a gaping hole inside of them the size of eternity... 

I read in a book somewhere, "it's not what you say that changes people, its the love you give..."

Tonight I talked to this beautiful young woman who wasn't more than 19 or 20 

years old.. She had already been cheated on in a past relationship more than 17 times.. and she kept saying she didn't know what she had done to go through all of it but that God was now giving her a piece of heaven because of the hell that she had gone through before...

My heart breaks because THEY DO NOT KNOW HIM!

Oh, that they WOULD KNOW HIM... If they could understand HE IS ALIVE!!

That's the most reoccurring thought right now for me...

So I have been loving them, I have been working alongside them, rubbing elbows and hoping that maybe... just maybe, their time would come and I would be able to see God do a miracle in someone's heart.

Think of it like Jesus said in Mark in verses 26-29

"Then Jesus said, 'God's kingdom is like seed thrown on a field by a man who then goes to bed and forgets about it. The seed sprouts and grows—he has no idea how it happens. The earth does it all without his help: first a green stem of grass, then a bud, then the ripened grain. When the grain is fully formed, he reaps—harvest time!'"

So when it comes down to it... We can plant the seed, and even water it.. but it is GOD that brings the growth.. and it always will be, because.. well, we are HIS children.. and 

so are they.

[I corinthians 1:17]

One day though... every tongue will confess, and every knee will bow at the name of Jesus... when they know and understand what he did... and even the ones that don't will be faced with the truth. 

May the overflow of our love impact people, may they experience the fragrance of who Jesus Christ is through you and I... After all, we are his hands and his feet.

Salt Spill... Brokenness

Have you ever felt so broken that the tears just wouldn't stop... Or how about so broken that they finally did stop because you cried until there was none left...

Sometimes there is a reason and sometimes there just isn't... The burden of this world is so heavy and sometimes instead of casting our worries to the Lord, we take them upon ourselves.. Things happen, people die, hearts are broken, and the same old roaring lion seeking who he can devour...

Lately the Lord has definitely been taking me through the high waters David talks about in Psalm 69...

1 Save me, O God,
for the floodwaters are up to my neck.
2 Deeper and deeper I sink into the mire;
I can’t find a foothold.
I am in deep water,
and the floods overwhelm me.
3 I am exhausted from crying for help;
my throat is parched.
My eyes are swollen with weeping,
waiting for my God to help me.

Here I am in a similar situation crying out as David did, Christians EXPERIENCE this and it's okay because THE LORD loves us UNFAILINGLY... We cannot forget this! REMEMBER! REMEMBER THE TRUTH! We must be CONSISTENT and call upon Him..

13 But I keep praying to you, Lord,
hoping this time you will show me favor.
In your unfailing love, O God,
answer my prayer with your sure salvation.
14 Rescue me from the mud;
don’t let me sink any deeper!
Save me from those who hate me,
and pull me from these deep waters.
15 Don’t let the floods overwhelm me,
or the deep waters swallow me,
or the pit of death devour me.

The enemy sits, plotting, and waiting for our hope to fail us so that he can use these "trials of many kinds" to do three things.. Kill, steal, and destroy us...

29 I am suffering and in pain.
Rescue me, O God, by your saving power.

30 Then I will praise God’s name with singing,
and I will honor him with thanksgiving.
31 For this will please the Lord more than sacrificing cattle,
more than presenting a bull with its horns and hooves.
32 The humble will see their God at work and be glad.
Let all who seek God’s help be encouraged.
33 For the Lord hears the cries of the needy;
he does not despise his imprisoned people.

34 Praise him, O heaven and earth,
the seas and all that move in them.
35 For God will save Jerusalem[d]
and rebuild the towns of Judah.
His people will live there
and settle in their own land.
36 The descendants of those who obey him will inherit the land,
and those who love him will live there in safety.

THIS MY FRIENDS IS WHAT SETS US APART-- Our PRAISE!

I have not chosen to be thankful in the past for my tears, but in moving ahead I will choose to be, I will fight, and I will no longer allow the enemy to batter me to pieces triumphing over me as if what Jesus did on the cross never happened...

WE ARE MORE THAN CONQUERERS!

God will never plant the seed of his life upon the soil of a hard, unbroken spirit. He will only plant that seed where
the conviction of His Spirit
has brought brokenness,
where the soil has been watered
with the tears of repentance
as well as the tears of joy.

Alan Redpath
(1907-1989)

He is preparing you and I to do a MIRACLE IN AND THROUGH US...
The enemy is waiting at the door to use these hard times as an opportunity for us to give up, sin, and allow ourselves to be defeated...


Heart-rending
is divinely wrought
and solemnly felt.

Charles H. Spurgeon
(1834-1892)

J. C. Philpot wrote that "There is much presumption, pride, hypocrisy, deceit, delusion, formality, superstition and self-righteousness to be purged out of the heart of God's child."

I know this is true in me.. Brokenness is inevitable if we are to call ourselves Christians... but TAKE HEART

"The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit." (Psalm 34:18)

"The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise." (Psalm 51:17)

PRAISE THE LORD.
Praise Him, unceasingly, even in your pain...
He's not done with me, and he is not done with you either.. He who started a work in us is faithful to complete it... We are being made more and more into his image and because of the trials.. our faith WILL persevere...
Don't be afraid to let the tears fall.. The world sees it as weak but the word of God says He holds each one in a bottle... [Psalm 56:8]