Romans

Hey everyone. Sorry I missed posting yesterday. Been trying to think through some things. I have decided that over the next few weeks, we are going to do a book study. Don't freak out! It's not going to be that hard. But I do think that often times we spend a little time on this verse and then a little time on that verse, jumping around all throughout the Bible. What I would like us to do is, over the next few weeks, we are going to go through the book of Romans. We'll take it a chapter at a time. And if it's a long chapter, we'll do it in parts. This week, we are going to start with chapter one. It is a short chapter. It will only take you five minutes to read it. But here's what I want you to do: pick out one thing that stands out to you and comment on it. Here's mine:

Romans 1:11-12

Paul talks about bringing a spiritual gift to those he comes in contact with, wanting to encourage everyone, but also wanting to encourage everyone else. This is something that I think we could do better at. Do we just go up to each other and ask, "Hey, I just want you to know that I pray God blesses you today, or this week. Is there anything I can pray for you about?" That's the kind of encouragement that I think we need to be about. We spend a lot of time together. But do we really take that time to get into each other's lives? Are we really fellowshipping with each other? Or are we just being superficial in our relationships? This is something that I want each of you to ponder.

You can feel free to comment on my thought, if you wish, but I do want to hear what stood out to YOU in this chapter.

Love y'all

Robbie

Rain

Rain... what can you say about it? We've certainly had a lot of it lately. I sit around when it's raining and think.... really? God, couldn't you just give us a nice sunny day? Couldn't we just not have to walk around and get drenched? Would it be too much to ask for a little bit of Sun?

This morning I was sulking, thinking about how much I hate the rain. Then I opened my bible randomly to Dueteronomy. I do this from time to time, when I'm not doing a book study. So, I'm grumbling about how it's pouring outside.... AGAIN! and I'm really starting to question whether or not I need to build another Ark. And then I see this: Dueteronomy 28:12.

So often we take the things of this world for granted. We dismiss the smallest of things and make big deals out of others. But more often than not, we forget that God uses ALL things for His glory. We sit around and ask God to bless us and our efforts, and in the midst of a blessing, we pass right over it. Today I was taught a valuable lesson and I was reminded of another passage of scripture. In Isaiah, God tells us that His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts.

We need to remember this. Cause if we don't, we are going to possibly miss out on something that God is doing, something that directly affects us. We may be missing out on receiving that which we have been praying for. And in the future, maybe I'm not going to be so bummed out when it rains!

Tell me your thoughts.

Love y'all.

What do you pray for?

Hey everyone, it’s Philip Organ starting our blog thought for the week. Robbie is taking care of his beautiful family who needs him today.

What do you pray for? I know it seems like a simple question, but as I ask it of myself, I noticed that I pray for my family and our situations and stressors, I say a ton of “thank you for…”, and we pray for friends and family, especially when in need. One thing I noticed is that I don’t pray for the body at the Journey as often as I need to. Paul inspired me through Ephesians 3 (v. 14-21) in his prayer for the church in Ephesus, and showed me the importance of praying power and strength into those we serve at The Journey. I do pray for this team each week that we bring a servant heart, and a spirit of love and compassion as we have the privilege of leading. Likewise I need to be praying for those who receive the offering we give, that their hearts may be softened and open to the spirit of the Living God and respond to his overwhelming love, to have courage and power and walk away changed each and every week.

As Paul closes his prayer, his thoughts are so powerful? If God is able to do so much more than we can ask, or even imagine, then my simple prayers for our church, combined with all of yours, can bring profound change in this area of middle Tennessee to the glory of our Father in heaven, both now and in future generations. I commit to each of you today, that I will pray each and every week that our gathering of believers, both guests and regulars will receive the power of the Spirit.

So again I ask, what is it you pray for, and how does this passage speak to you?

Psalm 145

This week, we're talking about Psalm 145.

This is a GREAT Psalm. There are so many "nuggets" that one can take from this Psalm. I love the imagery that David gives. Just little things like him saying, "Your awe-inspiring deeds will be on every tongue; I will proclaim your greatness!" So many times I've read that and passed right over it, never thinking about it. What David is saying here is, though everyone on earth will recognize God's greatness, he will be the one to shout it out, regardless of who else does or not. That's the way David was. He never concerned himself with what others were doing. He only focused on how he was worshiping. I'm not saying that we don't need to focus on other people. We do! Cause we're in charge of leading them. But we CANNOT worry about them until we are centered ourselves. Which goes back to last week's post and the question: How are we doing in preparing ourselves before we take that podium on sundays? I think we need to really investigate our boy, David. We could all learn a lot about worship from him. What are some other things that stand out to you in this Psalm? I'll give you one more for me. Verse 18. "The Lord is close to all who call on him, yes, to all who call on him in truth." The key words here are the last two! How many people call on the Lord when they need Him? Just about everyone. How many of them call on Him in truth? What does that even mean to you? What are your thoughts?

Attitude

We talk all the time about our attitude, and what it should be when we worship. We throw around words like, gratitude, humility, brokenness, joy, wholeheartedness.... etc. But what do those things really mean? What does the Bible say about them?

I think this is something that we NEED to investigate, if we are to call ourselves worshipers, and leaders of worship. Our church, and the Church as a whole, needs to know what it means to worship. We talk about this all the time. We say, "Well, if WE are truly worshiping, then our church will see that and be drawn to it." I believe that that is true! I truly believe that when people see God's children engaged with Him, intimately, they can't help but want that for themselves. It's because that's how we were designed. We were designed to want to worship Him. But how can they see that, if we don't understand what it means to worship Him with humility, brokenness, joy... etc.?

I found a great article that listed a bunch of scriptures that references each of these qualities. I've linked them all in this blog. I want each of you to try and look at them all. Just click the links and you'll be taken to the scriptures that reference them. They are short and to the point. But some of them are going to speak different things to each of us. So, here's your "assignment", so to speak. Pick two that you really keyed on and explain what you think. Again, we don't need a book! You don't have to try and write something profound or brilliant. By sharing what God shows you, you will be writing something profound and brilliant! (see how that works!) I'll start.

Justice: I was floored by this scripture! God says, as plainly as He possibly could, that he isn't interested in my songs or my singing, or my talent, or my offering. He even call's them, and I quote, "Noisy hymns of praise!". Why? Does God not liked to be praised through song? NO! That's not what He's saying. He says that if my heart isn't right, that if I'm not living a life that exemplifies worship all the time, then He doesn't want my songs on Sunday. It's nothing more than a peace offering for the week that I spent ignoring Him!

Purity: This Leviticus passage is weird! Let's be honest... the entire book of Leviticus is weird! It's a very hard book to read. For a lot of people, they feel like it is the "Rule Book" of the Bible. It's full of crazy things you shouldn't do! However, we must remember. The Israelites didn't have a Saviour yet. And just as Erik talked about, before Christ, they had "the Law". And when you have a bunch of "laws" to live by, they begin to leave questions about boundaries. So, what happens? You start having to justify those questions by adding more boundaries to the already existing law. This passage talks about the sacrifice being pure before God. That If you don't present a perfect animal for the sacrifice, it is not worthy and God will not acknowledge it. The beauty is... we have already had the perfect sacrifice. It was Jesus. And so, while this passage doesn't apply to us, in that, we don't sacrifice cows and goats to atone for our sins anymore, we do offer ourselves. That is our worship. We cannot come before God to worship, harboring anger, malice, pride, or any other junk in our heart. We have been given the perfect sacrifice. We MUST lay that down at the cross and ask God to purify our hearts before we worship Him. And since we are to live a life of worship.... (you can connect the dots here!) then we must do this daily. Only when we truly ask Jesus to clean our hearts and repent (which is not the same as confessing. To repent means to acknowledge our sin and turn from it. To make every effort to not return to that behavior) then we can truly worship Him.

Those are my thoughts. Tell me yours. And please, guys and gals, don't just click on two of them and then comment on those two. Please, try to look at all of them. You don't go to a restaurant and ask them to only tell you about two things on the menu! You look at everything... and then make your choice!... (I'm just saying!) Living a life of worship involves all of these things. We need to know what God says about all of them!

Love Y'all.

Honesty (John 4:23), Gratitude and Reverence (Hebrews 12:28), Faith (Hebrews 11:4), Righteousness (Malachi 3:3), In the Spirit (Phil. 3:3), Humility and brokenness (Psalms 51:15-19), Purity (Leviticus 22:18-22)

Wholeheartedness (Deut 6:4-6; 1 Chronicles 29:6-9), Joy (Phil. 4:4, 1 Chron. 15:16)
Loyalty (Hosea 6:4, 6), Justice (Amos 5:22-24), Simplicity (Exodus 20:25), Self-giving (Ephesians 5:1; Romans 12:1)

Worship In Heaven

What is worship in Heaven going to be like? We hear all the time about how God's throne room is full of worshipers, who never cease in worshiping Him. For us, that can be overwhelming to understand. And in the book of Revelation, we're actually given a small glimpse of what worship will look like in Heaven. For a lot of people, reading the book of Revelation can be confusing. Many argue that it is a lot of symbolism. I personally believe, as I hope you all do, that the word of God, the Bible, is the complete and absolute word of God, without error. If that's the case, then when John speaks of the Elders and the creatures that he saw in his vision, we must believe that there are going to be these things in Heaven, just as they are written. Can you imagine seeing these things! But here's what gets me... of all the things that God has EVER created, He tells us that we are His most prized possession. So, though we may be in awe of seeing these things, can you imagine what they think? They get to live in God's Heaven already. They've been there for all eternity. What, then, do you think they think of us, when they see us.... God's most prized creation. That should make you think about how you live your life. It should make you think about how you worship. There are these beasts, with like six wings, with a bunch of eyes on them, who do nothing but sing praise 24 hours a day, without ceasing. And as spectacular as they are, they cannot measure up to what we were created for.

So my question is this. If that's the kind of worship that is going on in Heaven right now, how are we measuring up? We have to live our lives in constant worship of Him. What are you doing to make that happen? What are the things that we can do as a team to encourage each other to be living a life worthy of the grace that we live under?

Love you all.

What Do We Worship

Romans 1:18-32 is a passage of scripture, where Paul talks about worship. Not just Praising and Singing, but living a life of worship. He asks a good question and then gives us something to really ponder, in the form of a warning that should scare us all to death. He says that God will eventually abandon those who turn from Him, worshiping idols, and leave them to pursue the evil desires in their hearts. And then He talks about some consequences of those actions.

What do you think is our job as a worship team? Is it merely to lead our church in the time of Praise and Worship that we do on sundays? Or is it more? I want everyone to honestly consider what is in our lives and takes the place of God at times. I want to hear some of your answers. And then, I want us to spend some time talking to each other, encouraging each other, praying for each other and holding each other accountable for the things that we reveal. Because make no mistake, we will be judged for the life that we live. And if we call ourselves worshipers, and leaders of worship, we will be expected to live a life that reflects it. I'll go first. For me, I put my work and my family before God sometimes. Though I do ministry for a living, it's just that. Ministry. It is not through my job that I worship God. When I take time away from Him and focus on my family (whom He blessed me with) and my job (which He so graciously allows me to have), I deny Him the worship that He deserves. There are other things in my life, I'm sure, that keep me from focusing on Him more. I'm really going to challenge myself to pray about those things and ask God to forgive me, and guide me, so that I'll put Him first in everything I say and do. Where are you on this?

Love you all.