Author: watchstandpray

225 – Higher Appeal

When life gives you a hard time, appeal higher. On the school playground, kindly obey. Make the rude teacher’s day better by making the principal proud.

By preparing your appeal to higher authorities, you free your mental energies to act with charity toward those closer to you. Live to serve the king and forget the offenses of your immediate supervisors. Even an ill mannered cop is easier to deal with if you imagine yourself on TV “out-kinding” him. You might already be on camera anyway and if you either act super-kindly or super-unruly, you might end up on TV anyway. So, smile for the crowd and forget the foe in front of you. Besides, with a wider lens and sugar with a cherry on top, your foe could become your friend anyway.

The higher appeal will serve you well in the long run. A landlord, employer, magistrate, sheriff, trade partner, and anyone with powers to dangle over your head may try twisting your arm and lord their strength over you. It’s sad, but normal. Don’t get bent out of shape about it. And, if you play the long game—the end game—you may court friends and authorities much more powerful than they could contend with. But, you only find those higher appeals through wider and longer lenses.

One of the highest appeals is to public opinion. No organization’s or nation’s president is ever bigger than the organization or nation. The people at large are always the highest appeal to make.

Then, there is the supreme appeal to God. But, in a sense, God Himself appeals to the people. He does not impose His good rules on us. It’s up to each of us to welcome Him. Even God appeals to the public, on some level. But, His appeal to the public is so strong and convincing, whenever we find a good idea, we celebrate it. Sometimes we even give God credit for good ideas, even though they all belong to Him.

So, make the higher appeal to God by appealing to the public how He does. Don’t ask the public to teach you right from wrong; appeal to the public. There is a difference.

224 – Leading as Followers of Jesus

You cannot lead others until you first lead yourself. And, you cannot lead yourself until you first understand who leads you. And, you cannot understand any leadership until you understand the Leader of All Things.

You may believe in God, but you will encounter other people who have not figured out Who leads the created universe. All ideas about leadership—all problem-solving, heart-to-heart talks must begin with exploring this question: Where does leadership begin?

The order must be proper. Moving on to later questions of leadership are pointless and you do your friends no service to address the advanced questions of leadership without finishing the basics. The only successful leader must be a godly leader, otherwise his leadership will have severe limits.

Look at leaders who have not thoroughly answered questions about God and you will see corresponding shortcomings in their leadership results. Always look at leadership from the perspective of godliness, whether in your own growth or in those you work with. The mid-to-high level leadership tactics are generally godless children attempting a rebellion. But the higher, “expert” methods of leadership always pursue questions and answers about godliness.

Christians from the Sunday morning culture are often anemic where leadership is concerned, unless they have significantly augmented their Christianity with Bible study and mentoring that Sunday morning has no control over. Christians who have known a “least common denominator” Bible teaching devoid of the basics have not had the opportunity to grow into advanced levels of the Bible’s teaching. Basic Christianity understands that leadership begins with godliness, but eventually we learn more about godliness from the advanced methods of “soft power” that Jesus taught.

Whatever your challenge is in leadership, first remember that it is a challenge in “godliness” and second meditate on how Jesus’s ingenious leadership methods out-smarted King Herod and even overthrew Roman Caesars, centuries after his death.

The depth and brilliance of Jesus’s leadership is inexhaustible. Focus your research there. As you study history to learn its repetition, always go back and see Jesus working with leadership principles in ways even more masterful than the greatest Machiavellians could comprehend. Search themes of “servant leadership” and “overdone-submission”—leadership principles inseparably intertwined with godliness.

223 – Levels of Sins

There are no different levels of sin. People throughout society frequently bring up questions about specific sins, “What about this sin?” or, “What about people living this lifestyle who say they love God?” The Cross of Jesus Christ redeems us from all sin. It does not condemn us for sin. It does not pick and choose its favorite sins like we tend to. The Cross delivers us from all sin.

The presumption of the Biblical-moral worldview where sin is concerned is “equal need for redemption”. Whether something is or is not sinful or immoral, the Bible’s final message is not that we are condemned, but forgivable. Immorality is presumed to be self-condemning.

Fleeting passions and dishonesty do not quench the soul’s thirst for fulfillment. They are ungratifying—all of them equally. To even consider certain sins as being above or below, more or less severe, than other other sins is a sin itself since it falls short of the Bible’s view that the Cross offers us redemption from things that harm us and leave us empty and dry.

People who live in continued immorality or dishonesty, yet say they love God, actually and only love their misunderstanding of God. To some extent, they have contrived their own moral code and invented their own version of a god who prefers that moral code.

Whatever we need delivered from is not our choice. Few people choose their addictions in advance. Both morals and help to obey them must both come from above. If we determine our own morals, then we are our own greatest power to fulfill them. But, when we bend the knee to an all-powerful God Most High—Who alone can determine a moral code—then we can walk in a power greater than ourselves.

We can only come to God on God’s terms. You life will skyrocket when you let God determine your morals and help you back on your feet when you fail to measure up. Someone who persists in any sin, dishonesty or immorality, yet claims to love God, may very well love God, but still has room to love God much, much more. By definition, that includes every one of us.

222 – Time Reserves

Bear in mind your time. You only have so much, as with space, money, know-how, skill, network, reputation, and all the rest. But here’s one of the big secrets: Time’s biggest conflict is pride.

How much time does your pride cost you? How many hours have you spent waiting for someone to finish a sentence so you could make your point?—and it didn’t matter! Maybe you worked too long to make the frosting just perfect, only to have it melt in the sun at the picnic. Counting tissues that all got thrown away anyway or even scheduling the wrong date for your flight—little things need to be kept littler than bigger things. Next time pride tries to take a bite out of your time, remember that you have bigger fish to fry.

And really, a flight on the wrong date shouldn’t be that big of a deal, even if you fly once a decade. Learn to explore, keep a prayer cloud around you to supply angels who help you with the unexpected—and get used to it. Keep a book with you or a cheap, tiny notebook computer so you can take your work with you while you wait. If you can psych yourself up to overlook bad timing with airline flights, you’ll be much better at letting microscopic priorities slip through the cracks when they should.

Rolling with the unexpected and not caring about the little things really go hand in hand. God sends chaos into our lives so we can practice “getting air” and fish-tailing in the snow. Safe, competent drivers are comfortably in control of the unexpected, so they neither hunger for the thrill nor fear it. They just don’t care, and neither should you.

When someone wants to niggle over a few miscounted coins, just accept the loss and move on. Your main priorities should be bigger. If the busy clerk short changes you, show love to everyone in line and forgive. Their day will be better and they won’t even know why; so will yours.

Quibbling gobbles up our time reserves. So, reserve your time. Learn to love taking losses that buy new time to discover hidden treasure.

221 – Constant Prayer

Prayer is meant to have a constant presence with every human. Your body is the wick, prayer is the flame, and the oil comes from good, daily deeds, Bible study, and responsible choices. The flame may grow more and less intense, but it should never go our. Your spirit should be in a constant state of prayer—even while you sleep if possible. Even in your dreams, you should maintain an awareness that God is near with His love as you love Him back.

When prayer is a constant thing, it will form a kind of “cloud” around you. Circumstances that would normally harm others won’t harm you. Doors will open up which everyone else thought to be impenetrable walls. The quiet “nudging” from the Lord will hint at which roads you should take, often times avoiding disaster or delay that you may learn you avoided. You may even have small thoughts leading to your own discover of home cures for small illnesses, if for no other reason than for God to verify that you hear Him somewhat accurately. This “cloud” doesn’t make you ignorant of the world, it allows you to go everywhere in the world without the normal harms.

A life of prayer will also lead you into higher waters and deeper hardships, but it will be with you through it as you grow to understand the hardship of others—hardship one half of society might never understand about the other half. But, you will understand that hardship because your prayer cloud led you into the hardship that taught you.

Many governments across the world have unfair laws that cannot even be obeyed by their own people. These governments feel sad for not being able to govern effectively. Even mid-ranking Nazis often turned a blind eye to Jews and American soldiers. Remember America’s underground railroad. Prayer will also navigate you through those times, without fear, without giving up on all legal compliance, and without facing trouble.

Learning to navigate from inside your cloud of prayer is a skill. You make mistakes, but keep going and learn how the trust, work, and His direction all work in concert. Constant prayer supplies wings to soar.

220 – Deliverance and Power in Meekness and Weakness

The human heart must be in touch with God’s sovereign supremacy. He has all power and He is the highest authority. We can easily agree to this as an abstract concept, but this truth must settle deep into our experiential understanding.

If your heart does not believe that God is sovereign then you will not behave as if He is your most powerful help; by definition, such behavior is “ungodly”.

Our souls require us to have such experiences where we perform our due diligence, where we study and prepare as much as we ought expect ourselves to, yet the task remains too great for us to accomplish on our own. In these circumstances, when our strength is not enough, when we maintain our “godly” perspective that God Most High is alone Most High, then He will use the strangest and smallest of methods to overcome the impossible. Only God can orchestrate these circumstances, which is part of Him being supreme.

If we could initiate or invent circumstances where God is the greatest then either we do not deserve credit for those circumstances or God is not supreme in them. God must be the greatest in our lives, only on God’s terms, only in God’s time, only in God’s way.

When God called Gideon, the least of his family, the least of his tribe, He addressed Gideon as “mighty warrior”. Israel’s problem was idol worship, specifically idols that used human sacrifices. They had trusted in false gods and were literally killing each other in worship of those idols. The Midianites invaded. Human sacrifices and Satan worship did not deliver them from evil. But, Israel’s true enemy was their own behavioral theology.

They knew about Moses’s Law, but their behavior proved that they did not believe God was their sovereign deliverer. So, God wanted Gideon’s army to be small so they would once again behaviorally believe God is Almighty.

The small, seemingly weak things are vital to God’s victory via our lives. God achieves victory through things that seem counterintuitive—things we never would even consider might work out. Satan and his worshipers always want the biggest and greatest, never suspecting the tools the Almighty will use.

Judges 7, Psalm 127:1, Zechariah 4:6, Matthew 5:5, 2 Corinthians 12:9-10, Philipians 4:13

219 – Rules Aren’t for Their Own Sake

Rules enforced without injury are just an excuse to boss other people around. God made rules for justice and justice is not moot. Rules were made to govern people, to help us all enjoy better lives. Once rules impede on a better life without bringing much more and better vibrancy, those rules become unjust.

Legally, courts often require “standing” in order to press charges. A “concerned citizen” can be a witness as a “bystander”, but only if there is a victim with a measurable “injury”. This is an argument against enforcing “J-walking” when no traffic is present, but that opens a long debate on whether any civil law, including traffic laws, should be enforced unless a crime has been committed against a specific person. But, in God’s sense of justice, J-walking is only “wrong” if it interferes with traffic because true justice is only, always, ever about doing what is right by other people.

Enforcing rules that don’t affect you—putting yourself as the self-appointed cop over people who aren’t bothering you—to stop others from doing something that isn’t hurting anybody isn’t “justice”; it’s “bossing”. Even if someone might be committing a crime, inform the police and let them handle it; don’t pursue and don’t try to enforce. As a witness to a murder, you might keep a loose tail to help police track the killer, but not always—and only if you know what you’re doing.

Witnessing a crime doesn’t deputize anyone. Sadly, many people anoint themselves judge, jury, and executioner. That is no life to live. Never let yourself be the busy-body sticking his nose where it don’t belong.

God gets a bad wrap when “morals” are misrepresented as an excuse for busy-bodies to meddle in other people’s lives. Busy-bodies only boss others because they want a distraction from their own lack of good results.

Justice begins with minding one’s own life, by prospering at home and in one’s own business, then involving others to bless and protect them. Give your justice to the world by being just and fair to your own priorities—by completing your goals as an inspiration to others. And, if you encounter a busy-body, say as much.