A prayer for this week: Asking forgiveness and thanking God

 

 

Father forgive me for I have sinned:

There were several occasions in the week when I was selfish or mean;
Or careless or uncaring or slow to reach out to those who are ill
I have given less than I could to those in need;

There were days I did not pick up my Bible
or remember to say thank you;
And when I brought all this to you for your mercy and grace
I received it.
Because you welcome sinners so that you can
love and forgive them.
 
Thank you, Lord.
I wish I was more like you.

 

 

prayer for this week

Greatest single cause of atheism

The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is
christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips
and walk out the door and deny Him by their lifestyle.
That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.
[intro track to War of Ages album Fire from the Tomb]

Popularized by the 1995 dc Talk track “What if I stumble?
Brennan Manning

How I treat a brother or sister from day to day,
how I react to the sin-scarred wino on the street,
how I respond to interruptions from people I dislike,
how I deal with normal people in their normal confusion on a normal day may be a better indication of my reverence for life
than the antiabortion sticker on the bumper of my car.
Ragamuffin GospelBrennan Manning

In a futile attempt to erase our past, we deprive the community of our healing gift.  If we conceal our wounds out of fear and shame, our inner darkness can neither be illuminated nor become a light for others.
[Abba's Child]
Brennan Manning
 
“When I get honest, I admit I am a bundle of paradoxes.
I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged,
I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good,
I feel guilty about not feeling guilty.
I am trusting and suspicious.
I am honest and I still play games.
Aristotle said I am a rational animal;
I say I am an angel with an incredible capacity for beer.
Brennan Manning

To live by grace means to acknowledge my whole life story, the light side and the dark.
In admitting my shadow side I learn who I am and what God’s grace means.
As Thomas Merton put it,
‘A saint is not someone who is good but who experiences the goodness of God.
Brennan Manning

The gospel of grace nullifies our adulation of televangelists, charismatic superstars, and local church heroes.
It obliterates the two-class citizenship theory operative in many American churches.
For grace proclaims the awesome truth that all is gift.
[The Ragamuffin Gospel]
Brennan Manning

We should be astonished at the goodness of God,
stunned that he should bother to call us by name, our mouths wide open at his love,
bewildered that at this very moment we are standing on holy ground.
Ragamuffin GospelBrennan Manning

Do you realize that in a profoundly human way – the God of Jesus loves you?
He loves you beyond worthiness and unworthiness;
beyond fidelity and infidelity.
He loves you in the morning sun and the evening rain without caution, regret, boundary or breaking point.
No matter what’s gone down – He can’t stop loving you!

 Brennan Manning

 

Brennan Manning (Photo credit: Jordon)

Last Friday at the age of 79 the author, friar and contemplative Richard Francis Xavier (Brennan) Manning gave his last breath.
He was the man who said Jesus loved the people around him and that his Father was willing to take them all up in His Kingdom if they wanted to come to Him.
In his book "The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled Beat-Up and Burnt Out"  Manning takes aim at those “so-called Christians who disfigure the face of God, mutilate the gospel of grace, and intimidate others through fear.” He finds it unthinkable that the church rejects those who are accepted by Jesus. Jesus loves those whom the Father loves. If Jesus accepts sinners then God accepts sinners – and He does. How can any of us enter the Kingdom except that God accepts us in our sinful state? (Romans 5:8)

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Related articles

Brennan Manning and the #Ragamuffin Gospel

 

• 'Ragamuffin Gospel' Author Brennan Manning Dies.
• Brennan Manning on Grace and the Importance of Telling the Whole Story
• Top 10 Brennan Manning Quotes
• On The Death Of Brennan Manning
• Brennan Manning
• My Unknown Encounter with Brennan Manning
• M is for Manning, Brennan (1934-2013)
• Brennan Manning and the #Ragamuffin Gospel
• On Richard Dawkins and How Atheism has Become a Warmongering Religion
• "The Ragamuffin Gospel" by Brennan Manning

Church is a Hospital for sinners

Rosemary Hard has seen on a church notice board

 " Church is not a museum for saints, its a hospital for sinners!"

Sinning because being a sinner

You are no sinner because you do some sins.  It is the other way round: you do sins because you are a sinner.  That is the meaning of the fact that each individual is in Adam .

Because you descend from Adam you are a man fallen in sin.   

Dutch original / Nederlands origineel > Zondigen omdat men zondaar is

Heroes and saints

Perhaps we want to be  Heroes and saints at the same time.

"The hero is the one who kindles a great light in the world,
who sets up blazing torches in the dark streets of life for men to see by.
The saint is the man who walks through the dark paths of the world,
himself a light."
- Felix Adler

"Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future."
- Author Unknown

The mark of a saint is not perfection, but consecration.
A saint is not a man without faults,
but a man who has given himself without reserve to God.
- W. T. Richardson

"In Jesus' situation we have the story of the holiest man that ever lived,
and yet it was the whores and the thieves who worshiped him,
and the religious who denounced him."
- Rebecca Manley Pippert

Sanctification is glory begun.
Glory is sanctification completed.
- F. F. Bruce

"Therefore be careful how you walk,
not as unwise men but as wise,
making the most of your time, because the days are evil.
... understand what the will of the Lord is."
Ephesians 5:15-17

In winter the world is beautiful white,
but it can be dangerous slippery.
Let me know the dangers of this seemingly beautiful world, Lord.
Let me deal with the right people
and let me be a light in dark days for many,
that I ask you, my God, in Jesus name.

Dutch version / Nederlandse versie > Helden en heiligen

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2013 update:

Billboard advertising Heroes World Tour, Changi Airport, Singapore. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Related articles

• Lessons from the Saints
• Saturday (January 19): "I did not come to call the righteous but sinners."
• The Key That Fits the Lock, Part Thirteen
• A Choice in the Matter
• Feast of the Confession of Saint Peter

God receives us on the basis of our faith

"In the sight of God all are sinners and their goodness is inadequate to justify them in His presence. There is only one standard of righteousness, holiness and justice, and that is God’s standard, and God will not at any time compromise that standard in order to accommodate the fickleness of men and women. Sin today is no less sinful than it was in the days of Noah or Eve. God has not evolved from a God who hates sin to a God who merely overlooks it. Human goodness compared with God’s standard of righteousness is stunted and impoverished. It is no good coming to God with our ‘scorecard’ which testifies that we are decent people, we pay our debts and never harm our neighbours. In the context of respectability this may be important, but in the context of salvation it is paltry. Our bit of righteousness is no passport to God’s favour. The Bible teaches that we have to repudiate our own withered morality and confess that we do not measure up to God’s standard. This is called Repentance.

Since men and women cannot be received on the basis of their natural goodness, which is inadequate and unfair, God receives them on the basis of their faith. The faith they show is counted by Him as righteousness. This is the great doctrine of justification by faith and explains why it is impossible to come to God faithless, and why those who come must believe. In order to show how the great principle operates the Apostle Paul takes the case of one man, Abraham. Abraham received certain promises from God which, at the time they were spoken, appeared, humanly speaking, to be impossible of fulfilment. But Abraham had faith in the promises in spite of adverse appearances and God counted this for righteousness:

"He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; and being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; but for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification" (Romans 4:20-25).

Paul insists that the principles which operated in the case of Abraham are true for every man who will come to God for salvation."

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Dennis Gillett
One Bible, Many Churches - Does it Matter What We Believe?

Compassion and Discipline

"But suppose the sinner persists in his way or seeks to defend it so as to be injurious to the harmony of the whole assembly. What then? The counsel and commandment of the apostles are quite clear. The line is to be drawn in order to preserve the spirit and practice of the Lord Jesus in the congregation. In this connection it is worthwhile remembering an Old Testament word which runs:

"These ... things doth the Lord hate ... a proud look ... and he that soweth discord among brethren." (Proverbs 6:16-19)

Under the rule of Christ, as in Old Testament times, the time comes when the recalcitrant person must cease to be regarded as a member of the congregation. Fellowship cannot be sustained because, in effect, it has already been severed by the persistence in error of the person concerned. This is the final resort and a source of great sorrow. The Scripture which enjoins this action reads as follows:

"Now we command you, brethren, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us ... and if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed. Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother." (2 Thessalonians 3:6-15)

"Now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat." (1 Corinthians 5:11)

"If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness; he is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself." (1 Timothy 6:3-5)"

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Brother Harry Tennant
Fellowship
The Christadelphians - What they Believe and Preach

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers.

Psalm 1:1, New International Version

Dutch version / Nederlands > Gelukkig de mens die niet de raad volgt van wie zonder God leven

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    So often sin and ungodly lifestyles are portrayed as glamorous. The way of blessing, however, is the way of God. His will is for our good, his commands spring from his mercy and protection, and his way is the path of life. We are blessed when we walk with God and do his will.

    Forgive me, Father, for believing the lies of the world and being deceived and enticed by temptations. I know that sin brings heartaches, complications, and problems. I also know that choosing the right things, standing up for truth, and living faithfully for you are sometimes very difficult. Please help my heart believe and my mind see that walking in your will brings me life. In Jesus' name I ask this. Amen.

God demonstrates his own love

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:8, New International Version

Dutch version / Nederlands > God bewees ons zijn liefde

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    Interestingly, the Bible doesn't ever just say that God loves us. Instead, it says: "God demonstrated his love..." "In this is love, not that we loved God but that God loved us and gave..." "For God so loved the world that he gave..." Love is more than emotion or intention. True love, redemptive love, God-styled love is active; it does something. For us, Jesus did also more than something; he sacrificed everything. What's more, he did it when we most needed it. He demonstrated his love when we were sinners!

    Father, thank you for loving me. I love you. I love you for what you've done. I love you for who you are. I love you for your promises. I love you for your faithfulness. Most of all, dear Father, I love you because of Jesus who showed me just how much you love me. Please empower me to show my love by serving and giving to others as Jesus did. In his name I pray. Amen.

2013 update:

Related articles

• Romans Chapter 5
• God Demonstrates His Love
• Luke 19:10 NKJV - He came for you and for me
• What Kind of God?
• "Even when we're messy?"
• God thinks of you
• I'm Going to Be a Total Girl for a Second
• DEAD MEN TALKING - Part 3
• Free Gift

Forgiveness is a blessing for the one who forgives

"Forgiveness is a blessing for the one who forgives
as well as for the one who is forgiven."
- Alice Gray

"Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance:
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners –
of whom I am the worst.
But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me,
the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display
his unlimited patience as an example for those
who would believe on him and receive eternal life."
1 Timothy 1:15-16

By Christ I am forgiven, I am thankfull for that.
Lord, let me have the power to forgive others even when they did wrong to me.

Dutch version / Nederlands > Vergiffenis is een zegen voor diegene die vergeeft