My time with Jesus at the park (Part 3)

Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed are those who take refuge in Him.

Let’s look at your feelings in light of real experiences.

Alright.

Did you constantly feel as intensely about Mark as you imagine?

No.  Not all the time.

How much of the time?

I don’t know…when we were really connecting and understanding each other it was intense…

But this wasn’t all of the time?

No.  I’m sure if it was I would have married him instead of Samuel, right?

Exactly.  So why are your feelings so intense about Mark when you remember him, or imagine a future with him?

I believe it’s because I focus only on when we connected deeply.  I don’t focus on the fights, or all of the pain we caused each other by being immature or selfish, or just plain not right for each other. 

Do you remember Richard?

Yes, I do.

Do you remember how you didn’t find him very physically attractive at first?

 

Yeah!  I actually do!  I decided to focus only on what was physically attractive about him, and to especially emphasize his personality, which was awesome!

And by doing that, he actually became physically attractive to you, and his personality became intensely attractive. 

That’s what I was doing with Mark.

And what you aren’t doing with Samuel…or Me.

But there’s nothing negative about You!  There’s nothing I have to emphasize or look past in our relationship.

No there isn’t.  So why doesn’t it feel as intense when you think about Me, or when you’re with Me?

Because I don’t focus all of my attention on you.

What would happen if you did?  Would it arouse you physically so that your face is red? 

Maybe, but not for the same reasons.  but i’m seeing that arousal is not the same as…love…or deep connection even.

What do you have with Samuel that you can never have with Mark?

Ten years of faithful friendship…of committed marriage…of seeing each other at our best and worst.

You’re leaving something out.

I know.  I’m leaving out how intense it is when we make love.

Why is it so intense?

Ten years of being one.

Ten years of oneness with each other and with Me.

My feelings for you, and for Samuel, are intense, but in a different way.

How so?

They are intense like the sun is intense…constant, alive, energizing, comforting…at times too hot to handle, but most of the time comfortably unnoticeable.

They're real.

Very real.

 

My time with Jesus at the park (Part 2)

“Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?  Mark 8:34-37

It was summer time, so the sun was still out, though going down. Jesus sat across from me at a picnic table.

I looked down at the table, avoiding eye contact, foolishly hoping the red in my face went unnoticed by Him.  He sat quietly.  His presence, His silence took, the red out of my face, and brought my eyes to His.  Then it all came out.

“Sometimes I don’t know if I really love you or my husband.”

“Why don’t you know?”

“I don’t know, it’s just that I sometimes imagine being with my first boyfriend.  I imagine what it would be like if we were married, and my feelings are so strong when I imagine us together.  I was very connected to him, emotionally and physically, as you know of course.  He was my first true love, the first man I gave my body to.”

“Do you regret marrying Samuel?”

“I don’t know.  My feelings are so strong when I imagine Mark that I don’t know if I think Samuel is the best man I could ever be with.  But there’s something else I’m feeling.”

“What else?”

“Sometimes I think I have stronger feelings for Mark than I do you.  When I’m with you, it doesn’t feel as intense as when I imagine Mark.”

“Think about this.  Imagine that your thoughts and feelings for Mark are completely and utterly real.  That if you were with Mark, it would be exactly as you imagined, even better.  Would you leave Samuel to be with Mark?”

“No, I wouldn’t.”

“Why wouldn’t you?”

“I do love Samuel.  He is a wonderful husband. He’s my bestfriend.”

“What about Me?  Would you leave Me for Mark?”

“Never.  I love you more than anything and anyone in this world or any world.”

“Then what do you make of these intense feelings for Mark?”

“I don’t know Lord.  You do….please tell me what they mean, if they mean anything.”

To Men (and Women who want Men) Part 3

If you are a man, God is for you, so who can be against you? 
He wants to see Christ formed in you. 
He loves you. 
He likes you.

So often you receive little to no encouragement, only corrections and admonitions. 
Receive honor and encouragement from me in the Name of our Lord and Brother.

To my sisters who read, we love you.  Your honor, and the look of admiration in your eyes, is like heaven on earth.  We seek to be genuinely your glory.  In Jesus' name, pray for us as we pray for you.

God is for us.  Both men and women.

To the men who read, if you haven't done so, start now to control your words. 
In this way you put aside childish speaking, thinking and reasoning.
I know as a father of 7 that children have little to no self control, expressed in their constant chatter. 
They are learning and growing, practicing words, gaining vocabularies.  Yet they talk, talk, talk, talk, talk!

As men, our words should be measured by truth and love. 
This isn't an issue of being introverted or extroverted, talkative or quiet. 
It's an issue of self-control, so that the talkative are not too talkative, and the quiet are not too quiet.

How do we know when we talk too much or too little?

Love and truth.

We should not say more than we know, as it is written of Christ,

"He speaks what He knows and testifies what He has seen and heard."

Every word should be motivated by love, as it is written,
"Speak the truth in love."

With love as our motivation, and truth as our limitation, we will not say too much or too little.
We will be perfect men, able to control our whole body.
You are God's image and likeness and glory.

May you be encouraged, and may you encourage.
Amen.

The Presence of God (Part 3)

May I sit with you?

Please do.

The way he said it was unnervingly welcomingly, like he knew everything about her and nothing about her.  It was inviting and comforting, yet completely exciting the way new relationships are.

I usually come here every Friday, but I had an engagement yesterday, so I couldn’t make it.  Saturdays at this time are still very quiet, but I like Fridays better.

I come every Saturday for the same reasons.  I like to hear my thoughts and God’s.

He just said it.  As if everyone did the same thing.

What are God’s thoughts like?

They are like the feeling you have when you realize something that has puzzled you for a long time.  You know how you try to figure something out and you just can’t, so you give up?  Then, when you’ve long forgotten the problem you have a revelation?  You know you didn’t come up with the answer, but it feels like you’ve known it all along?  God’s thoughts feel something like that, but not completely.  The revelation I’m talking about describes it, but there is something sharper and subtler.  It feels like Someone greater than and other than you is showing you something.  Do you know what I mean?

Actually, I do.  I felt like that just this morning!

He smiled.  Her heart felt warmed and stimulated by The Smile behind his smile…

The Presence of God (Part 2)

“I’ve never felt this way before,” she thought.

It was like entering a dream with clarity.  He made time and space seem like friends of the endless horizon.

He seemed to live with God….

One day Staci went to her favorite coffee shop, at a time when she KNEW she’d be the only one there!  Just her, coffee, jazz, and her lap top!  (She hoped there would be coffee shops in heaven!)

Now to her favorite section:  A booth in the back for the especially introverted.  

But someone was already there!  Yet she didn’t mind, and this is why.

As she approached “her booth,” she felt…something…or someone…the closer she got.  The man sitting there was reading, but there was much more to him than that.  He seemed to be “listening.”  Like when you're in a grocery store and a woman seems to be talking to herself, but she has one of those phones in her ear that you can’t see.  Someone was talking to him like that.  He had an invisible spiritual ear phone.

So she stopped about 20 paces from her booth.  She felt like going any further would be an interruption of a very intimate conversation.  Inappropriate.  But she didn’t feel unwelcome by the reading man or the one who spoke to him.  She was actually drawn to both, but she couldn’t explain why.  She felt peace, excitement, fear, love, and something else she couldn’t explain. 

The book and inner voice clearly absorbed all of the man’s attention.  He didn’t notice her at all, but she didn’t feel ignored or neglected.  Instead connected to him, the truth he beheld, and the voice he loved.  Though she revered the time and space in the booth, she now wanted something she never thought she would ever want:  To share her booth!  She no longer wanted it to be “hers,” but theirs:  his, hers, and His.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A MAN AND A WOMAN

A man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man.  1 Corinthians 11:7

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. 

Ephesians 5:31-32

Did Jesus teach us to pray to God our Mother who is in heaven?

Is Jesus the first begotten daughter of God?

Could Isaiah prophesy that a man would be a virgin and conceive a daughter, naming her Immanuel, Goddess is with us?

Is Jesus the bride and the church His bridegroom?

Is the church the head of Christ, and does Christ submit to the church?

These questions show the distinction between a man and a woman--A distinction which is a mystery of God’s glory, in which we all know the reality, though we cannot put it in words.

It is the difference between hugging our father and hugging our mother.

It is the difference between the sensitivity of our father and the sensitivity of our mother.

It is the difference between the strength of our father and the strength of our mother.

We know these when we experience them, but we can not explain them. 

They are mysteries: 

The mystery of masculinity and femininity—of God’s glory and the glory of God’s glory.

These are not interchangeable.   

To be equal is not to be identical.   

My children know that they cannot exchange me with their mother.  They have only one father.  And he is a man.    

They know the difference.   

It is obvious.   

They feel no need to defend it or argue it or even think about it.   

Sometimes when my baby cries, he wants me to hold him.  At other times, when he cries, he wants his mother. 

Why? 

My baby knows the mystery--the difference between masculinity and femininity is a reality to my baby.

The difference between a man and woman is the mystery of God’s glory.

The True Definition of ATTRACTION

The Lord said to Samuel, “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king.”

When they arrived, Samuel saw Eliab and thought, “Surely the Lord’s anointed stands here before the Lord.”  But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:1, 6-7

Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

Proverbs 31:30

What is the true definition of attraction? 

What truly makes a man or woman attractive? 

What is the real standard of attraction, and who is the real judge?

God.  The Creator and Maker of man and woman.   

He alone knows the definition of true attraction.   

And this is His true definition attraction: The Honor of God.

Men and women who supremely honor God are attractive to Him.  He speaks highly of them, or praises them.  He looks from the inside out, to the depth of a man or woman’s being.  

God looks at the heart.   

If He finds a heart that is dedicated to Him supremely and exclusively, then He finds what He defines as true beauty, as the word of God says:

“He who honors me, I will honor; but He who despises me will be lightly esteemed.”

Think of it like this.

When a baby looks at you and smiles, it makes you feel good, or beautiful, or likable, because babies are beautiful.  To be beautiful to one who is beautiful makes you feel beautiful.

It’s the same with men and women.  If you’re a man, and a very attractive woman finds you attractive, then you MUST really be ATTRACTIVE!  If you’re a woman, and the man of your dreams says you’re the woman of HIS DREAMS, then you MUST be a dream woman! 

This is even more so with God, who IS beauty!   

If God honors you, then you are truly honorable.   

If God praises you, then you are truly praiseworthy.   

HE IS THE STANDARD OF TRUE ATTRACTION.   

HE IS THE JUDGE TRUE ATTRACTION.

We all want to know how we are seen or perceived.  This is why we are captivated by cameras.  The camera simply shows us what’s there, good or bad.  So we see ourselves from the outside, as everyone else sees us.  We hope we look or come across a certain way on camera, because what you see is what you get.

God is the ultimate “Camera.”  He sees us through and through, inside and out.  If we want to be truly attractive, we should make it our goal to be attractive to Him.  If God is drawn to us, then we can know we are desirable in the truest sense of the word.  And we are the true definition of attraction.

The beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil

“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” The Apostle Paul

This is a command.  Don’t do this.  Do this.

Don’t be overcome.  Overcome.

Win.

Triumph.

Conquer.

Refuse to let evil defeat you.  Instead defeat evil.

How?

With good.

Good overcomes evil.

Good is better than evil.

More beautiful, desirable, powerful, reasonable.

Light exposes what’s hidden in the dark, eradicating darkness by simply being itself.

The same is true of good and evil. 

Take a Christ-like husband as an example.

A Christ-like husband is more attractive, beautiful, and powerful than an adulterer. 

He loves truly and permanently.  He becomes more like God everyday.  God is The Eternal Beautiful Powerful Desirable.  He cannot be boring because He is Eternal Life.  Every husband that imitates God will become more attractive everyday to his Christ-like wife.  Physically, he will please his wife because he loves her and has given himself to her alone.  He will please her mind because he becomes more interesting as the years pass, becoming more like God, and thus becoming new with each stage of life.  Spiritually his presence becomes more powerful with age.  He becomes more secure in his identity and destiny.

But the adulterer is the opposite of everything the Christ-like husband is.  He only loves himself and uses the adulteress for his own pleasure.  He is neither committed to God nor his wife.  He hides in hotels and in secret times and places.  He hides because he should.  He is ashamed of his dishonesty, and he should be.  He has no beauty or glory, because he rejects God's glory.  He refuses to be what God made him to be.

So everything that is truly attractive or desirable is made by God, and is as God made it to be.   

Evil is only a hidden perversion of something good.   

Satan seeks to make evil attractive, and himself attractive as the evil one.  But the mere presence of good exposes this lie.   

Good, by simply being itself, exposes and eradicates evil.

Clicke here for part 2....

Being needed

The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”  Genesis 2:18  NIV

Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God. 
1 Corinthians 11:11-12

I've always wanted to feel needed.
Desired.
Craved.

Like someone really wanted, needed, and desired to be with me, so much so that my absence made a very real difference.  Like this person couldn't or wouldn't live without me.  

In America, we're often encouraged not to feel this way.  Be independent.  Be complete and whole on your own.  In fact, two should come into a relationship with NO NEED FOR EACH OTHER AT ALL!  They should have such "high self-esteem" and independence that the other person, whether friend or spouse, is just a nice addition to someone's life.  But not by any means necessary or significant! 

At least this applies to relationships with any kind of depth or commitment.  Girls can hang out all night long, laughing and giggling and patting each other on the butt.  Boys can go out drinking.  This group of girls and boys can completely ignore each other, until...they can't!  One in the group usually gives in.  One usually caves in and admits what God said from the beginning.

He admits that it is really not good for him to be alone.  She admits that she is not independent of a man.  That she does NEED a man!

Need.

Loneliness is considered weakness.  We either should be very content in our own company, or in shallow company.  Yet the shallow company betrays the truth:  We need relationships to feel alive.

"A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity."  Proverbs 17:17

It is not wrong to need to be needed.  God Himself saw that Adam needed Eve.  And by definition, Eve needed Adam.  She would not have come into existence without God taking one of Adam's ribs. 

The first man and first woman mutually needed each other. 

Adam had GOD. 

Why would God say it was not good for him to be alone then?  The answer shows the foolishness of people saying we should be content with God alone.  God Himself disagrees with this.  Of course, no one can be God to us.  But I reverently say that God "couldn't be" to Adam what He made Eve to be:  a creature equal to Adam, like Adam.  Adam was like God, but God was not like Adam. 

Eve's significance came from this very thing:  She was the ONLY ONE who could be Adam's complimentary companion.  And Adam was the ONLY ONE from whom Eve could come into existence. 

All of my life I've searched for the one I needed, and the one who needed me. 
I found her.  She found me.  We need each other mutually. 
Without her, on earth, I am alone and lonely.  This is the blessing of family.

For those who are not yet married and who want to be, God understands and honors the fact that you feel lonely.  He is the very first person to honor this aloneness.  He will meet this need and bring you someone who needs you.

What MEN really WANT from WOMEN (Part 3)

We've seen daughters look at their fathers with awe.  We've seen the same with little sisters and big brothers.  And we've seen women who are deeply in love.  This admiration is what men want from women, as it is written:

This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. Ephesians 5:32-33

Remember earlier about creation and Creator?  Man and woman, husband and wife are their picture!  Here, the husband and wife are encouraged to see the mystery; and the wife is encouraged to respect her husband as the church should respect Christ.  The word "respect" expresses deep awe, reverence, and admiration.

"But what if I don't genuinely admire my husband," says a discouraged woman?

At work, I overheard a woman saying something like this,

"I told him that if we are going to be in a relationship, he better not cheat on me, and he better not hit me!"

She said it like some women do when they are trying to show that they "don't take no mess from no man!"  I thought about this.  Why would a woman NEED to tell a man not to cheat on her or hit her?  What woman wants to be with a man where this is not a GIVEN?  How often does she have to "remind" him of this? In other words, if she did NOT tell him this, does she believe that he WOULD cheat on her and hit her?  

How could she admire a man that she has to tell this?

So, for the woman who feels like she no longer admires her husband, I say this:
Remember who he represents, and admire him for that.  We do this all the time (or we should.)  There are officers or those in authority that we don't genuinely respect, but we respect their position enough to at least be courteous to them.  The same is true in this situation.  If you love and admire Christ, then for His sake, respect your husband as a representative of Christ.  Furthermore, there must be SOMETHING you admire about your husband, even if it's just the MEMORY of admirability!  You wouldn't have EVER gotten with him if you didn't admire him in the beginning.  Whatever he was then, somewhere inside, he is that now.

For those women who are not yet married, who are engaged or are looking for a man to marry, know that your fiancee, or your yet unknown future husband, wants you as a best friend with whom he can be free, and that he wants you to admire him.  The beautiful thing is, as of now, you have a choice of who you are going to be with.  So choose wisely according to these three things.

Find someone whom you feel you can be best friends for life, someone with whom you are free to be, and whom you admire physically, soulically, and spiritually.  Admire the strength and beauty of his body, the depth of his mind, the strength of his will, the passion of his emotions. Admire his faith and love and obedience to God.  Admire his God given purpose and presence.

As a man, be a best friend and companion.  In your eyes let this woman see the father of her children.  Let her see your vulnerability, and in this let her feel free.  Live such an admirable life that the awe in her eyes never ceases when she looks at you and thinks about you.

Men and women are a reflection of the love story between Creator and creation. 
Don't listen to Oprah or Cosmopolitan.  
Don't listen to men and women who don't listen to the Creator of all creation.

What men really want from women is what the Creator wants from all of creation.  
Let us be what God made us to be, now and for all eternity, for God's honor and glory.
Amen.
 

What MEN really WANT from WOMEN (Part 1)

Cosmopolitan fails to really know men.
Oprah Winfrey fails to really understand men.
Women fail to really comprehend men.

Who can know men better than their one Creator and Maker?  Who can know men better than men who listen to God?  Who can know men better than women who listen to God and mature men?  Therefore it is wise to listen to God, The Origin of men, not Cosmopolitan, not Oprah, not women.

Men want three things from women:
1.  A Complimentary Companion (A best friend)
2.  Vulnerability (To be free to just be)
3.  Admiration (the look in their eyes when women are in love with men)

This is true of every man and all men, because of their purpose in God's creation: to be God's image and likeness and reflection, to be exactly like His Son.  God made men like Him in sharing God's desire for His own creation.  God desires the three things that men desire, and thus He made man like Himself.  Notice I use the word "desire" instead of need in relation to God, who has no need.  Men need these things from women, and women have their own complimentary needs from men, both being members of creation.  But God is needless, Self existent and Self sufficient.  Men and women are neither, and thus they need each other.  So in men we see a reflection of God's relation to creation.  Listen to God's very own perspective concerning men:

 The Lord God said, 

“It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

Genesis 2:18

These are God's words, not the man's, nor the woman's, for she is not yet a member of creation.  Among the animals, the man is alone, which shows us the man is not an animal.  And with God alone man is still alone, according to God Himself.  The man isn't on God's level; he is not God's equal.  Man is like God, but God is not like man. So in all of creation man has no companion...until God in his goodness made the woman!

The man needed someone to be with and share his all of his life with, a friend like no other, not a mother, a sister, or a brother.  He needed someone like him, though not exactly like him, someone who complimented him and who was an equal to him.  He needed this physically, soulically, and spiritually, as we will see when we explore vulnerability.  

(Click here to continue with me.)