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dc 05/09/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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written by Ken Mitten
Colossians 1:16-17
"For by him all things were created:
things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether
thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created
by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things
hold together."
Why should I pray? This is a
question that has been popping up again and again for me. Simple
question right? Easy answer?
If you do a search online or
elsewhere or even just take a quick glance at the
bookshelves of a Christian bookstore there appears to be a lot
written about being taught how to pray. The truth
is some of us are unwilling or afraid to pray (again not
because we don't know how) but because we are afraid of what He
might ask us to do if we pray earnestly to Him. I can hear
some of the puffed-up responses to this already: Afraid to
pray? That's ridiculous! Why would anyone ever be afraid to pray.
I am not afraid to pray.
Fair enough. For the
rest of you...... are you asking Him the following
questions when you are struggling:
Where would you have
me go?
What would you have me
do?
How will you/can you
use me?
Are you able to admit in front of
Him that you are struggling?
I will struggle with what
direction I should go/how I can
impact change in my life for long periods of time and walk away
(somehow) amazed that I am spinning my wheels
in the mud. This is not amazing. This should be
expected. Expected because when I truly examine these
wheel-spinning times I have to honestly admit that I am not
truly seeking Him. I am not praying about this
struggle. Sometimes we have to get stuck over and over
again so we can truly feel and understand the difference that
seeking the Creator makes in our lives.
He is before all things,
and in him all things hold together.
K
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dc 05/08/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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John Faulconbridge responded to
yesterday's encouragement in the following way:
Ken,
Along with your comments
about following through when we tell someone that we are going to
pray for them I'm reminded of the references to Christ saying
"When you pray" rather than "If you pray." He
(Christ, not Farrar) was being both instructive by
offering guidance on the things to pray for and how to approach the
throne and directive by telling the disciples (and us) that we
needed to pray, that we needed to follow His example, that if He
needed to be in close communication with the Father that we must
also. I used to feel like I was copping out if all I
could do was pray but the more I learn, the more I realize that
prayer is an essential part of God's plan on how things get done
and may even be more important than "doing" in some
instances.
just my
$.02.
We really can minimize the power
of prayer at times. Minimize the necessity of it.
I have often decided as John eloquently points out above that
prayer was not enough in certain instances. That
more was needed. As John says, I felt that I needed to be
"doing" something. This is not to say that we should pray and then
sit still waiting for something to happen. We can ask God for
answers. We can certainly ask God what He would have us do. We can
bring our frustration, our want to help, our helplessness in not
knowing how to make an impact directly to the Lord.
The Lord does expect us to pray to
Him. When we pray to Him NOT
if we pray to Him.....
K
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dc 05/07/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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written by Ken Mitten
As for me, I look to the Lord for
help. I wait confidently for God to save me, and my God will
certainly hear me.
MICAH 7:7
I mentioned yesterday that Steve
Farrar identified two types of leaders at his conference this
weekend: authentic and synthetic. He used Saul and
David as examples of these two types of leaders. Saul
looked regal, likely a very
tall man, but he unfortunately was ultimately about
appearances. David was a teeny-weeny but rose to the challenge
of fighting and defeating Goliath while Saul stood by.
Where this division between
authentic and synthetic leaders is ringing most true for me is in
the arena of prayer. Prayer is food, water, shelter,
air. Prayer is necessary. Prayer is not an "option" to be
merely considered in the Christian life. Time in the Word and
prayer are essential. I am struck by how often I have said to
another man, " I will pray for you." or someone has said to me, "
We are praying." I need not doubt that if a man tells me he is
praying for me that he truly is. That said, we should not take
prayer lightly. If I say that I will pray for __________ than I
should do just that. Better to not offer prayer if I cannot or will
not follow through. Authenticity.
Sometimes this lack of follow
through is attributed to lack of time. Time got
away from me and I simply forgot to pray for
___________. To combat that, try this. If you are
moved to tell a man that you will be praying for him, why not ask
him then and there if you can pray together. This can happen face
to face or on the phone. I have a friend who shocked me the first
time he offered to pray with me right after we had spoken for a
while about things that were troubling both of us, things that
needed to be lifted in prayer. It brought us closer at that moment
and built trust between us. I did not have to wonder whether or not
he was indeed lifting me to the Lord because he did it
right in front of me/ we did it together. His offer
of prayer prodded me to do the same with him and others. Do not
ignore the tug of the Spirit to pray for another man. People are
not placed on your heart randomly/for no reason. I truly believe
that.
We should be looking to the Lord
for help every day. This is not a sign of weakness but one of
obedience and wisdom. We need Him in all things at all times.
Prayer is our lifeline but does not have to happen only when we are
feeling desperate. Do you pray every day? Do you talk to
Him daily? Are you inviting Him in every day?
K
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dc 05/06/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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written by Ken Mitten
1 The LORD is my shepherd, I
shall not be in want. 2
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet
waters, 3 he restores my
soul. He guides me in paths of righteousness
for his name's sake. 4 Even though I
walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will
fear no evil,
for you are with me; your
rod and your staff, they comfort me. 5 You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my
enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.
6 Surely goodness and
love will follow me
all the days of my
life, and I will dwell in the house of the
LORD forever.
PSALM 23
NIV
Christian men's author Steve
Farrar was in town this past weekend and spoke at Ellendale Baptist
Church. He spent a good amount of time analyzing the 23rd psalm. He
began this analysis by referring to it as "dangerous scripture".
Dangerous because most know it so well (have it memorized or
nearly) that its meaning is often missed. This echoed
later in his assessment that there are more synthetic versus
authentic leaders in the church today. He was referring to
all Christian men, who he was quick to point out
are all leaders whether they are in traditional
church leadership or not, whether they are willing or able to lead
or not.
Farrar shared that mankind is
referred to as "sheep" many, many times in the Bible. He offered a
numerical count but I do not remember it specifically. It was a
significant number. He offered that he had researched sheep and
through his "research" determined three things about
them. Sheep are: Stupid, Defenseless and Dirty.
Warms your heart doesn't it? Sheep do
not learn from their mistakes unless they are cared for by an
attentive shepherd.
Ever make the same mistake
two, three, four times in
your life? Ever wonder why? Farrar argues that it is because we are
stupid. This is not a self-defeating statement or
an excuse for bad behavior/for being stuck. Here I
am again. I have made the same mistake again. I am
stupid. Instead it truly drives home how lost we
remain if we rely on ourselves instead of the Lord.
K
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dc 05/05/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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written by Nate Pruitt
Genesis 2:19 "So God formed from the dirt of the ground all the
animals of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them
to the Man to see what he would name them. Whatever the Man called
each living creature, that was its
name."
Creativity is such an amazing gift. Each of us has at least some
way we can be creative, and this is intentional by God. Here God
allows Adam to name every living thing. God isn't just forcing His
views on Adam, He's encouraging Adam to express himself and (when
done right) that will glorify God. Creativity has been a consuming
thought for me lately, because it seems the generation before me is
slowing in creativity, and the generation behind me (for example
the teens I am helping lead) have almost lost the ability
altogether. These are negative aspects of our tightly packaged,
time consumed lifestyles. The truth is that this is a clear and
dangerous hindrance to our ability to worship God. He loves to see
the gifts He has given us be turned back to His glory. I've found
it curious, but for some reason I have never heard Genesis 1:26-27
taught as a passage on how man was also made to be creative.
"Then God said, "Let us make people in our
image, to be like ourselves. They will be masters over all life;
the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the livestock,
wild animals, and small animals." So God created people in his own
image; God patterned them after himself; male and female he created
them."
From this passage any minister I've heard use it
immediately leaves the chapter to go find characteristics of the
image of God that he/she can relate to man. There's nothing wrong
with that, but it does seem to miss a certain obvious thing- God,
at this point in the Bible, has only one characteristic- Creator.
Not only that, but the direction Adam is given is not absolute, but
open, so that Adam can name the animals as he is inspired, there
was probably even freedom given him as to how he tended the garden.
This was no prison, it was paradise. I'm sure most of us would
view paradise as a place where we have some freedom, and freedom
means we can be creative, and being creative means that regardless
of what we bring to God (and everyone who reads this will have
distinctly different gifts, thoughts and passions) it can be a
fitting offering if we have a heart of service and worship before
God. My encouragement, then, is that we all seek out the time where
we can be creative, be intentional about finding rest, maybe come
home and allow your mind to relax, rather than just filling it with
the creativity killing fumes of packaged entertainment on the tube.
If we allow our gifts to grow, and let them grow with a purpose of
praising God, then our joy will increase and maybe, just maybe,
someone will look at us and think- "That's the image of love I've
been looking for," because we will be aspiring to live in the image
of the Creator.
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dc 05/01/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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written by Ken Mitten
Even fools are thought to be wise
when they keep silent; when they keep their mouths shut, they seem
intelligent.
PROVERBS 17:28
As a licensed clinical social
worker I often counsel people in distress. This has and
does occur in group settings and one-on-one both formally and
informally. The one thing that is often stressed in social work
training is the importance of listening. Silence is uncomfortable
for most and depending on how we are wired we often do anything we
can to fill in the semi-tractor trailer voids with blather in
counseling settings and elsewhere. This is human nature. It is also
"fool" behavior or maybe I should put it like this: it gets us
there rather quickly.
This translates to every day life
of course. If/when you are approached by a brother and he confides
in you/shares something he is struggling with do you immediately
convert to Commando Dr. Phil mode and provide advice/similar
experiences from your own life? Whether you know it or not this
response may insure that this man will never confide in you
again.....which may be what you want. Silence is still responding.
There is a term used in therapy circles called active
listening. It is as it sounds.
There is really no technique to be
taught here but there are some questions you can ask
yourself:
Am I letting this man tell his
story (even if it is making me uncomfortable)?
If I am rushing in to
fix the problem have I stopped to determine
whether or not he has even asked me for help? This of course
applies to our wives as well.
Be careful of the flipside here as
well. If you are being silent because you are hoping (dare I say
it...praying) that the conversation will stop, this will
inevitably find its way out of you, even non-verbally. As always,
transparency goes a long way. Scripture that describes the behavior
of fools can put us in the space of believing that "fools" are
someone other than us. People who are foolish (not you my
friend...) act like this. Make no
mistake, we are human and all have our
fool moments, some more often than
others.
K
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dc 04/30/08 |
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Daily Courage Devotional
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written by Ken Mitten
Do you know where your fights and
arguments come from? They come from the selfish desires that war
within you.
JAMES 4:1 NCV
Just to piggyback a bit from
yesterday.... There will of course be times when you are passionate
about something and will fight to right a wrong or protect a loved
one. Often if we feel we have been attacked or have been attacked
men launch into attack mode. We may begin to
believe that we must defend our honor or intelligence or
loyalty, to name a few things that just popped to mind. When we
come from that coiled up space of defending ourselves the enemy
smells the blood in the water and pounces, whispering in our
ears:
"He has no right to talk to
you that way. Blow his doors off!"
" She is your wife not your
mother. Don't let her disrespect you like that! She needs to
understand that this will not fly!"
" Show them who is in control!
You are!"
When is fighting
justified?
I just completed a study of the
book of Nehemiah. There are at least three instances over the
course of the re-building of the wall where Nehemiah shows
righteous indignation at the behavior of those who are oppressing
others and/or disobeying God's Law. In the final chapter of the
book we are told that he has returned to Babylon for an
undisclosed amount of time after twelve years in Jerusalem. When he
returns to Jerusalem he discovers that many have broken the
solemn promise they made regarding offerings, keeping the Sabbath
holy and marrying women who were not Jewish. He locks the city
walls stopping the flow of goods on the Sabbath day as well as
flying into a rage:
"I rebuked them and called
curses down on them. I beat some of the men and pulled out their
hair. I made them take an oath in God's name and said: "You are
not to give your daughters in marriage to their sons, nor are you
to take their daughters in marriage for your sons or for
yourselves. Was it not because of marriages like these that
Solomon king of Israel sinned? Among the many nations there was no
king like him. He was loved by his God, and God made him king over
all Israel, but even he was led into sin by foreign women. Must we
hear now that you too are doing all this terrible wickedness and
are being unfaithful to our God by marrying foreign women?"
(NEH 13:25-27 NIV)
The reference to not marrying
foreign women needs to be understood in context. Distractions and
pride sidetracked even King Solomon and led men away from
God.
K
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