Passion 2011: part 3

the heart.

we can easily water down the greatest commandment: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, & strength..." and we can also skim over the fact of "delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart" (Matt 22:37; Ps 37: 4). beth moore merged these two verses together during her breakout session at passion. it was a convicting message of knowing the desires of our hearts, but also the heart of that very desire.

psalm 37 was where we would spent most of our time studying what our desire, delight, and heart is. to give a little structure, beth broke it down as follows:

1. nothing dictacts our lives like our desires
2. beneath the desire of our heart is the heart of our desire
3. delighting in God makes our truest desires inevitable
4. nothing external can steal our right to delight
5. to make room for delight, we have to commit
6. patiently waiting for desire to turn into delight is not passive

she elaborated on each one which gave greater depth to knowing the desire deep within. she defined desire as "sustained longing unaffected by mood or circumstances". God knows the depth of who we are and what we really want. it's not just the desire of wanting something, but it's the heart and sole purpose that really matters. and at times we believe that the circumstances around us can take away our joy for things, but it's actually what is going on inside of us that can steal it.

i have realized that the relationship between the mind and heart are vitally important. we can know something, but the question is...are you letting yourself believe that very thing you know?

Passion 2011: part 2

the power of the mind

beth moore begin our first morning session at passion with tackling one of the most critical areas...our minds. she embarked on a challenging subject, but one that is relative to all. one issue that we all, if we were honest, deal with in one way or another. i have been in a rut lately on "wondering what i am supposed to do with my life right now" and i have allowed myself to settle for the answer of "i don't know. i am just waiting on God to tell me". that may be true in some ways to wait, but honestly for me, it was a cop-out because i was spiritualizing my excuse for not going after something.

beth took us through Romans 12:1-8 and focused on verse 2 which says,

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God -- this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you be able to test and approve what God's will -- his good, pleasing and perfect will." (v2)

she pointed out to us that it takes the renewing of your mind to know God's will. and whatever He calls us to do, we are never fully capable to do it. that's why we need Him. He is the one who will accomplish all things. we are just the vessel He will use to do that. we have to believe that. it's not about us. but ALL about HIM!

the mind is full of brilliance and of darkness...we can know what we are doing and why we are doing it. whether it's honoring God, or not at all. that's why we must take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ (2 Cor 10:3-5). there is a reason why we do certain things and we make excuses for "not knowing why", but we can know the thoughts we think. and we should be fixated on HIM...not on the world. we must get to a point in our day. in our lives. to think beyond the obvious. to ponder upon. to treasure Christ. (Luke 2:18-19) 

and as paul was in his chains for the sake of Christ, he continued to have a renewed mind as he said, "..i consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake i have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him...I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings..." (phil 3:8-10)

that is where i am today. i desire to know Christ more. to fixate my mind on Him and Him alone. it's a daily choice to make, but in the end only He will remain. everything else will fade. 

beth left us with this..

you wont impact your generation unless you have a renewed mind and are focused.

 God will blow our mind if we just give it to Him!