Archive for Men

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Wednesday, November 11th, 2009

Hopefully you sensed my passion for recovery in the first post.  This will be a short one because I want to share with you how God works in my life.

I have been forming this series of posts for about a month now and God has been bringing new insights and confirmations every day (even on bad days).

Today I received my Daily Eldredge email and it gave insight into addiction:

Whatever the object of our addiction is, it attaches itself to our intense desire for eternal and intimate communion with God and each other in the midst of Paradise—the desire that Jesus himself placed in us before the beginning of the world. Nothing less than this kind of unfallen communion will ever satisfy our desire or allow it to drink freely without imprisoning it and us. Once we allow our heart to drink water from these less-than-eternal wells with the goal of finding the life we were made for, it overpowers our will, and becomes, as Jonathan Edwards said, “like a viper, hissing and spitting at God” and us if we try to restrain it. . . “Addiction is the most powerful psychic enemy of humanity’s desire for God,” says Gerald May in Addiction and Grace, which is no doubt why it is one of our adversary’s favorite ways to imprison us. Once taken captive, trying to free ourselves through willpower is futile. Only God’s Spirit himself can free us or even bring us to our senses.  (The Sacred Romance , 133–34.  John Eldredge)

This is where we will be going in our path to freedom . . . God.

If you want to include this resource in your daily walk just go to RansomedHeart.com, make a profile and sign up for the Daily Readings.

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God Likes You More When You Get Up Early

Friday, February 22nd, 2008

OK, look, I was brought up Southern Baptist. Sunday School, “Training Union,” “WMU” (that’s the Women’s Missionary Union” for the uninitialized). Royal Ambassadors for the boys, Girls in Action and The granddaddy of them all– The Brotherhood. The MEN of the church. They had work days once every couple of years when the maintenance of the church building got to be so much that they didn’t want to pay a contractor. And then there was the quarterly Prayer Breakfast (evidently the earlier you get up and the runnier the eggs the more seriously God takes you). That’s pretty much it work and eat but not very often. On the subject I’ve overheard ministers say they just don’t get a good response from men. They don’t show up with any regularity. Typically they show up to set up tables and chairs and then grab a coffee and talk while the women prepare for the Wednesday night pot luck. The men show up because the women need things off the high shelves. Why?

I am at the very beginning of my journey into a ministry specific to men. I want to get away from the attitudes of duty and dogma I’ve grown up with. Why did I– Why have men disconnected from God. What can be done to engage them in service and ministry? What is the role of today’s man in the church? Believing that men were created as men for a reason how do we invite and unleash that purpose? I’ll have some ideas as I research and talk to other men but where do you think it should start?

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Categories : Purpose
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