Miserable Ordinances Of Princes

"..... miserable man, if he cannot often say and sing to himself those lines of Pindar,

"To love the slender cypress, and to leave the Cretan pastures lying near Ida. I have but little land, where I grow strong, and have nothing to do with sorrow or faction,"

or the ordinances of princes,

or public duties in political emergencies,

or state functions hard to get off."

- Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. First Century Greek Philosopher.

St. Patrick’s Breastplate

St. Patrick’s Breastplate

This is a powerful prayer of Protection, also known as The Deer's Cry. It is attributed to

Saint Patrick of Ireland. 

The story goes that Saint Patrick sang this after an ambush had been laid against him, to

prevent him from going to a certain community to spread the gospel. It is said the man lying in

ambush did not see Saint Patrick and his monks as they passed by, but rather wild deer with a

fawn following them (thus the name the Deer's Cry). 

That Gaelic phrase might mean, however, a

mist of concealment.

The prayer calls for Christ's protection using a lorica (shield or breastplate), from which it

derives its name, "St. Patrick's Breastplate". This is based on Ephesians 6:10-20 ("God's shield to

protect us ... from snares of devils"). This prayer recognizes the spiritual battle between good and

evil and thus the importance of praying for protection on a daily basis.

I arise today
through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
believing in the threeness,
and confessing the oneness,
of our Creator of creation.
I rise today
in the power of Christ's birth and baptism,
in the power of his crucifixion and burial,
in the power of his rising and ascending,
in the power of his descending and his judging....
I rise today
in heaven's might,
in sun's brightness,
in moon's radiance,
in fire's glory,
in lightning's quickness,
in wind's swiftness,
in sea's depth,
in earth's stability,
in rock's fixity.
I rise today
with the power of God to pilot me, with
God's strength to sustain me,
God's wisdom to guide me,
God's eye to look ahead for me,
God's ear to hear me,
God's word to speak for me,
God's hand to protect me, ...
God's shield to defend me,
And God's host to deliver me,
from the snares of devils,
from evil temptations,
from nature's failings,
from all who wish to harm me,
far or near, alone and in a crowd.
Around me I gather today all these powers
against every cruel and merciless force
that would attack my body and soul....

In 1889 this poem was adapted into a hymn entitled I Bind Unto Myself Today. There are

many versions of this on You Tube, but here is one version that you can use for your meditation

and worship today - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH4ToVxtn9A.

If you want to add your own thoughts to this to be shared with the c

The "Too Much" Kinda CHURCH

Years ago, I sat in a staff meeting at a church I was serving; the purpose of the meeting was to talk about how we could attract more people to join the church. At one point someone counted the requirements for church membership that were already in place and made the startling discovery that somewhere between five and nine time commitments per week were required of those who wanted to become church members!

Outwardly I tried to be supportive of the purpose for the meeting, but on the inside I was screaming, 'Who would want to sign up for this?' I was already becoming aware of CFS (Christian fatigue syndrome) in my own life and couldn't imagine willingly inflicting it on someone else.

The clarity that dawned In in this moment caused me to start being a little more honest about what my own Christian Life had been reduced to. While I was trying harder and doing more, there was a yawning emptiness beneath it all that no amount of activity, Christian or otherwise could fill. It made no difference at all that I had been a Christian all my conscious life, that I had been in vocational Christian Ministry since early adulthood or that I was busy responding to what appeared to be God given opportunities to become involved in many worthy causes. The more I refuse to acknowledge the longing for more, the deeper and wider the emptiness became until it threatened to swallow me up.......

Life in and around the Christian Community does little to help us attend to our longings, to believe that deep within there is something essential that needs to be listened to, or to offer much hope that our deepest longings could take us somewhere good. At times the deeper longing of our heart are dismissed as mere idealism. The emphasis on human depravity in many religious circles makes it hard to know if there is anything innis that can be trusted.....

Our longing for healing and transformation is met with self-help messages that leave us briefly inspired and yet burdened by the pressure of trying to fix ourselves with some new technique or skill. Our longing for a way of life that works is most often met with an invitation to more activity, which unfortunately plays right into our compulsions and the drivenness of Western culture."

- Ruth Haley Barton -

Sacred Rhythms

How Big Fire?

"How brightly

burns the flame of desire

for a love affair with God, other people,

the world?

- Elizabeth Dreyer -

Bad Situations - Require Rogues

"And Stratonicus asked his host at Seriphus,

for what offence exile

was the appointed punishment,

and being told that

they punished rogues by exile, said,

"Why then are not you a rogue,

to escape from this hole of a place?""

- Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. First Century Greek Philosopher.

A Snall Mark But Wanting The Whole World.

"Philip, who when he was

thrown in wrestling, and turned round,

and noticed the mark his

body made in the dust, said,

"O Hercules, what a little part of the earth I have by nature, though I desire all the world!""

- Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. First Century Greek Philosopher.

How To Avoid Politics

"Alcmæon, when fleeing from the Furies, so the poets tell us, dwelt in a place recently formed by the silting of the Achelous; but I think he chose that little spot to dwell in ease and quiet, merely to avoid political disturbances and factions..."

- Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. First Century Greek Philosopher.

Ecstatic Experiences

"Ecstatic experiences, though they be tantalizing, do not constitute

the warp and woof of Christian

spirituality."

- Les Hardin -

The Spirituality of Paul

Being A Fraud

"Being a fraud - a sense of being not what they (we) pretend to be 

but rather precisely what they (we) pretend not to be."

David G. Benner

Our Slow Rejection As Follows

How Opposition To Your Change Is Expressed in Three Stages

Stage 1: Reasoning

"You are wrong for changing and here the reasons why."

Stage 2: Isolating

"Change back and we will accept you again."

Stage 3: Threatening

"If you don't change back, these are the consequences" (which are then listed).

Baptism Is A Meeting Place!

"By lazy theologians Christian Baptism is made out to be some work of man. So they dismiss it, delay it, deny it.

We are robbing Baptism for what it is. Baptism is God's invitation to the place and time of God's work. Baptism is an invitation by God to the place where you recieve His promised gifts. Not because of what you have done, rather, because of what He said He will do there if you come to Him.

Baptism is a meeting place.

Come meet Him!"

(Acts 2:38-39, Romans 6:1-8)

A Witness Or Lawyer?

"Spirituality speaking,

there is a huge difference between being a witness, than a lawyer."

- Ryan Couch -

Manipulating Institutions Instead of Healing Our Souls

".... it's far easier to deal with the exterior world. It is easier to spend your life manipulating an institution than dealing with your own soul.

We make institutions sound complicated and heard and regress, but they are Simplicity itself compared to our inner Labyrinths"

- Parker Palmer -

Demon Helper! INTERNET

"Don't let comments on the internet decide.

It's like calling demons for help."

- Joe Rogan

To Know God?

The price is a self-emptying which goes on simply, almost imperceptibly, day by day."

- Ruth Burrows. Carmelite Nun

What Does Suffering Signify?

"Suffering is no sign of being in the wrong place."

-Ruth Burrows-

Carmelite Nun

Jesus Sanctifies Sight, Sound, and Touch

"Yet, Jesus belongs to earth.

His resurrection has Sanctified this world of sight and sound and lovely touch."

- Ruth Burrows. Carmelite Nun.

I've Lived

"My life has been sorrowful but it has been life. I have lived. Life has not passed me by."

- Ruth Burrows. Carmelite Nun.

Living Their Dream - But Not Mine

 "The vast majority of us go to our graves without knowing who we are. We on consciously live someone else's life, or at least someone else's expectations for us. This does violence to ourselves, our relationship with God, and ultimately to others."

- Peter Scazzero. Emotionally Healthy  Spirituality

Struggling With The Paraphernalia Of God!

That phrase... "paraphernalia of God"

Wow!

"For many years I was to struggle with a subtle problem which now I can describe as that between God and the paraphernalia of God, if he will pardon me for using the expression. There seemed no relation between God and all that had been presented to me in teaching at school or what was being offered to me in religious life....... There was nothing to impart real richness."

- Ruth Burrows. Carmelite Nun. "Before The Living God"

The Mountain gods Are Dead!

"...... Sarkon, the world hater....

He had decided to become the herald of the mountain gods, though all the mountain gods

were dead."

- Calvin Miller. The Song. (The Singer Trilogy)

More Dead Than Alive

Terra is a spinning Vault,

A mass of Dusty Graves,

The Tomb yard of her Dreamers,

The the Mausoleum of her Brave...

Across her continents it reads:

"HERE LIES HUMANITY!"

- The Song. Calvin Miller -

(The Singer Trilogy)

Broken Church- 70-80% Of OUR Kids Never Return.

We are full of it.... we are full of hot air, bologna, theology, hyper-spirituality, and the fact is that we aren't doing anything other than congratulating ourselves on the profundity of our revelations.

Between 70 and 80 percent of evangelicals in America, by the time they are twenty-one, will leave the faith and never return. Did you hear that? We are not even reaching our own children.

It's like we have a broken down car and we're trying to sell it to the world, saying, buy our product.

Our product stinks. We have nothing to sell but our Bible opinions. And how is the world responding to our bible opinions?
But we're going to keep doing it because we've got the "Bible."
But we're not delivering on the life, the love, the power, the truth, the Incarnate....(sigh!) ..... we are not delivering on Jesus as a general rule."
Seventy to eighty percent of our own children should be a terrifying statistic. It should cause us to sit back and say,

"Dear God how many hours, how much money is being poured into this thing called Christianity, and my own children aren't even serving the lord?"
This is broken Saints. It's broken! It's broken, broken, broken! But we're going to have an evangelism outreach, we are going to pass out... [pamplets or flyers]
Oh my!
- Stephen Crosby!

Read this Book as it gets to the real issue below the surface that we never talk about in church.

This insight in how our history, our past, our emotions, and our emotional responses and mechanisms affects us today,  is simply extraordinary.

I found the book to be the typical  slick marketing and packaging  to make a "Program" to sell to churches. So the writing is the usual dumbed own style of language and writing of typical evangelical  programs,

but in no way is this books HELP and INSIGHT shallow.  

He hits  subjects not talked about. 

It is VERY well written.

Every leader should read this book. 

 

The Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, Peter Scazzero 

When Being Right Trumps Being Christlike

Dallas Willard was once asked, “Why are Christians so mean?”

His answer was up to the task. He said that Christians are mean in proportion to when they value being “right” over being “like Christ.”

You Can't Fix a Sin We Can't Identify

" The failure to name sin, to be able even to identify the Subject of sin, shows itself in the characteristic failures of theology. If we cannot name the systemic distortion we cannot effectively resist it. "

- Paul Axton

A Prayer For Fellowship

Father, to whom have you assigned me,

At this season in my life,

For their benifit and mine?

Suggested prayer for fellowship

- Stephen Crosby -

Meetings Have No Power

"Make life and love demand a meeting. Don't expect a meeting to produce life and love.

A meeting is just the dance hall for the potential of relationship.

We can have more kingdom, more fellowship, more relationship than we could ever handle.

But you know why we don't do it? Because it's slow and it's costly.

It's just easier to go to a meeting where I have LOW investment, and someone is going to preach to me."

- Stephen Crosby -

Dont Question Me Authority

"If as a Pastor or Minister, if you have to ask for honor and authority, it proves you don't have it, and you're not worthy of it. Those who are always talking about honor and authority have something wrong. Because, listen carefully, where love abounds, honor and authority are as natural as breathing."

- Stephen Crosby. Church refugee survival guide. Videos.

The Luxuary Of Self-Analysis

"........ a man of his generation and class had neither time nor opportunity for being sensitive and still less for the luxury of self-analysis. I am sure he was a painful mystery to himself. To all appearances he was a strong man, very much head of the family. As a child I felt relief safe when Daddy was around and terrified when he was a wood of the host. In my early childhood he was the embodiment of safety. The rude awakening did not come until the outbreak of War when I realized that he was, now, powerless to protect us."

- Ruth Burrows

Is Some Wanting of God Still In Your Heart?

".... And that the whole meaning of our existence and the one consuming desire of the heart of God is that we should let ourselves be loved, many spiritual persons would smile at my naïveté.

They are likely to murmer: 'But we know all that; we can read that in any spiritual book.. does she think she is telling us something new?' All I can say is that, although I too have known this in Theory, it is only now that it is integrated into my life. What is more looking at my dear friends, living for God, wanting only him, I see in fact that something is yet wanting to them...... 

They feel they are spiritual failures because this has not happened to them and that has not happen ed to them; they feel they have missed out on something because their experience carries none of the features which treatises on prayer and the contemplative life seem to demand as signs of a truly authentic spiritual life. They know they are loved by God and are pleasing to him and yet there is an indefinable anxiety.....

It seems to me that God is asking one thing more and only one thing more, and this, precisely, is what they are refusing to give. It is, in fact, the deepest self-denial and so different from the ways in which they are seeking to do things for God and, as it were, trying to wrest God's good pleasure from his reluctant heart. This refusal seems to me to spring from lack of insight and understanding, certainly not from lack of goodwill. I see these dear people, self giving, generous to a degree, full of life for God and yet still anxious, still hesitant before the last step which will release them from themselves and bury them in God. I see them turning, with a sense of failure, to new ideas on prayer which might perhaps "work better" though this is certainly not the term they would use...... 

I long them that there is no need for this, that here and now, in their present "unsatisfactory" state, in their "failure", God is giving himself to them, that this state of poverty is precisely what he wants and his way into them. 

- Ruth Burrows (she is a Carmelite Nun)

Ability To Say "No!" Expose Relationships

You can tell if you are

in a healthy, adult,

and functional human relationship

buy how people respond

when you tell them "No!""

- Stephen Crosby -

Deconstruction Of Religious Mindsets

"We are full of bible knowledge, we are all spiritually activated, but, we are humanly and relationally dysfunctional. We don't know how to be human beings well together. We need to be skillful humans, not just walking bible encyclopedias, with "organic" church insight.... They don't need your insight, they need your love, patience, endurance, your long-suffering....

Part of this deconstruction out of religious mindsets isn't to change our meeting formats. It's to be anew type of human being. A human being that actually pays attention. Who actually cares. Who actually listens.

- Stephen Crosby

As Question Instead Of Persuad Uninterested

"Saints, please listen to me. If you are still in persuasion mode, you still haven't learned anything yet.

What was Jesus's modality? "What do you want me to do for you?" We have not learned how to dignify another human being where they are "AT" ......

Jesus would dignify another person with an inquiry."

- Stephen Crosby

Slow Socalist Communists

“Your children’s children will live under communism. You Americans are so gullible. No, you won’t accept Communism outright, but we’ll keep feeding you small doses of Socialism until you will finally wake up and find that you already have Communism. We won’t have to fight you. We’ll so weaken your economy, until you fall like overripe fruit into our hands.”

—Nikita Khrushchev

We Want the Fast Road To Growth God.

“Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something
unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress
that it is made by passing through
some stages of instability—
and that it may take a very long time."

- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

The Small Things Are Divine

"Not to be constrained

by the greatest thing,

but to be contained

in the smallest thing,

is divine."

- Anonymous Inscription in a 1640 Flemish Jesuit volume commemorating the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Jesuits.

God is Active Everywhere! Ignatius of Lyloia

This line from a poem by the Jesuit Gerard Manley Hopkins captures a central theme of Ignatian spirituality: its insistence that God is at work everywhere—in work, relationships, culture, the arts, the intellectual life, creation itself. As Ignatius put it, all the things in the world are presented to us “so that we can know God more easily and make a return of love more readily.”

Ignatian spirituality places great emphasis on discerning God’s presence in the everyday activities of ordinary life. It sees God as an active God, always at work, inviting us to an ever-deeper walk.

When Debat Fails Use Totalarianism

"Plotted to kill him (Paul).

Enemies of the Gospel cannot defeat it by free and open debate, so they often resort to force, falsehood, murder, and governmental suppression."

- ESV Study Bible

Study note on Acts 19:23

Are You the Best State Soldier?

Does Jesus Christ 

and His Gospel call us to be the best military solider,

or the worst?

- Paul Axton -

Liberal Gospel

He perfectly characterized liberal Christianity as that in which

“A God without wrath

brought men without sin

into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross.”

- Richard Niebuhr The Kingdom of God in America (1937)

More Than Rule Keeping - Image Bearers

In the story Tthe Bible is telling, humans were created for a purpose, ..... and the purpose was not simply "to keep the rules,"..... as you might suppose from innumerable books, sermons, hymns, and prayers. 

Humans were made to be "IMAGE-BEARERS," to reflect the praises of creation back to the Creator and to reflect the Creator's wise and loving stewardship into the world."

- N. T. Wright. The Day The Revolution Began 

Re-Branding Sin

"There was a time when the people who worried about "sin" were impertinent wrongdoers. Today, the wrongdoers aren't worried any more. The people banging on about "sin" are those who think it's someone else's problem.....

Some in the churches, fearful of moral anarchy, have tried to cling to the old rules. Others have switched attention to newer, more fashionable issues, still thumping the pulpit, but now warning against fossil fuels rather than fornication. The older "sins" have been replaced by newer ones; the fierce energy of earlier moralisms has been transferred now to issues like ecology, feminism, and international debt. Others again have thrown over the whole idea, so that self-righteousness - the idea that "our way of life" is superior to "theirs" - is the only sin left."

- N. T. Wright. The Day The Revolution Began.

Regreting Our God Talk?

"Good souls many will one day be horrified at the things they now believe of God."

- George McDonald

Regreting Our God Talk?

"Many good souls will one day be horrified at the things they now believe of God."

- George McDonald

It Is Ordaine That We Should Know One Another

"And I think that life itself, and the way we come into the world, is so ordained by the deity that we should know one another.

For everyone comes into this great universe obscure and unknown casually and by degrees, but when he mixes with his fellows and grows to maturity he shines forth, and becomes well-known instead of obscure, and conspicuous instead of unknown."

- Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals.

1st Century Greek Philosopher

UnRuffled Lives Die

"For Sophocles' words,

"Brightly shines brass in use,

but when unused

It groweth dull in time, and mars the house,"

.... are also appropriate to the character of a man, which gets rusty and senile by not mixing in affairs but living in obscurity. For mute inglorious ease, and a sedentary life devoted to leisure, not only injure the body but also the soul: and as hidden waters overshadowed and stagnant get foul because they have no outlet, so the innate powers of unruffled lives, that neither imbibe nor pass on anything, even if they had any useful element in them once, seem to be effete and wasted."

- Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals

Terror Begets Terror

"Those who would gain power through terror, rule through terror."

- Pierre Elliot Trudeau -

FLQ Terrorist Crisis in Quebec.

200 bombings, 7 murders, 2 kidnappings

Buddhism Has desire

"Buddhism often says humanity needs to eliminate human desire. When in fact that pursuit is the human minds total fixation on the human desire to eliminate desire."

- Paul Axton -

Pride is no cure.

'Pride is the human cure for shame which is no cure at all, because pride comes before shame in the wisdom literature."

- Paul Axton

Thank God For Our Infancy

"I acknowledge Thee, Lord of heaven and earth, and praise Thee for my first rudiments of being, and my infancy, whereof I remember nothing..."

- Augustine -

The Confessions of St. Augustine