The Subtle Appeal

“No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.” 1 Corinthians 10:13

If I had a fire burning in my lap without me trying to put it out, people around me would think I’m out of my mind. However, if no one knew the fire was burning in my lap there thoughts wouldn’t matter.

Is there a fire burning in your lap that no one else can see? Proverbs 6:27 says, “Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned?” Why am I talking about fire, burning and whether people know it and can see it? Although Facebook (FB) can be used as a blessing for God’s glory, it also can be used as a tool of Satan for your destruction.

Let’s be frank! Many of us on FB have connected with people that we haven’t seen in years and even decades. We are meeting new people everyday, experiencing life, sharing pictures (typically the best ones so that we can look our best), information and engaging in conversations that range from how many children we have to what you are doing at the moment. It’s a phenomenal means of socialization and networking.

For the most part, the FB social network is public. But FB also has a few built in allowances for “privacy” that allow for more one-on-one interactions, which are fine. But these allowances if not honestly dealt with could, can and will lead to emotional, mental and physical attachments with the wrong people that may destroy you. I know you are saying to yourself, “What, he’s trippin?” “Why does he hate on FB?” Listen to me, I’m one of FB’s biggest fans with over 400 plus friends but I’m also not naïve to the depravity of man. Man’s heart is wicked, depraved, rebellious and desirous to please itself. Man’s heart combined with Satan’s schemes is a lethal combination. You see, Satan could care less about me and thus desires to use my sinfulness and whoever else would participate to hinder God’s work in my heart and family.

Now, before you write me off as “over the top” let me make sure that you hear me correctly. Using the chat feature, INBOX and whatever other means out there to communicate privately with people isn’t wrong. However, don’t sleep on Satan’s ability to awaken in you a subtle appeal for someone of the opposite sex that isn’t YOUR spouse.

Please feel free to answer a few questions for yourself: Who are you spending the most time chatting with? How often do you chat with them? What do you talk about? Where is your spouse when you are chatting? Could your spouse read your chats and not be offended? What about your inbox? Who is in your inbox? Who are you hoping would send you a message? Whose page are you constantly going to in order to see what they are doing?

Let me help you out! You don’t have to have sex with someone to be out of bounds, committing adultery and in an emotional affair. Affairs happen subtly. It is a subtle appeal that grips your emotions and then controls your desires, body and actions. Everyone who has ever had an affair would tell you that it started out so innocent but ended in disaster.

FB has a wonderful “public face” but I’m wondering how many people are behind the scenes creeping, hiding, lusting, freaking, caught, devastated and now assessing the collateral damage from a lot of bad decisions.

If you are huffing and puffing through this, you may be already knee deep in an emotional affair because you perceive that I’m throwing “cold water” on your flow. If so, good! If you are convicted like me then begin setting boundaries within FB and honoring your spouse and the friends you know and love. I’m not a legalistic; you set your own boundaries but do take heed…

To the single brothers, make sure you aren’t engaging with someone else’s wife too frequent and too intimately. If her husband can’t read what you are saying to her without getting offended then you are out of bounds. I know many of you are back in touch with a few sisters from the past but maybe now they are married. Let them BE! The past was the past and it’s time for you to move on… Don’t try to take a sister “back down memory lane” to test her loyalties to the past in lieu of her present marital commitments. This is sinful, manipulative and the carnal side of you lusting after her.

Join me on FB making some new commitments, setting some wise boundaries and being honest with yourself as you seek to honor God with this amazing tool that he has given us to steward. Have the type of fun that would honor our King. Peace.

His Instructions Matter

“And the Lord commanded the man, saying, ‘You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.’” (Genesis 2:17)

After God created everything, He put Adam in the Garden of Eden to “serve” and “maintain” the garden. Man’s first responsibilities given from the mouth of God was to thrive where God put him by serving and maintaining the garden.

So here it is men, serve and maintain where God has placed you. Alright! So what does this have to do with pride?

When we trace back the steps of pride in the human race we must carefully explore the first few chapters of Genesis. In Genesis 3, Satan tempted Adam and Eve to disobey God’s original command given in Genesis 2:17. Satan’s primary tactics are always to cause us to devalue, minimize, doubt and ignore the value of what God has to say. Adam knew the truth but didn’t value the truth enough to defend his wife against the lies of the enemy.

What can we learn? We can learn something here as it relates to the sin of pride. Ignoring the first command that God gave Adam led to the downfall of the human race (Romans 3:23). God gave Adam specific instructions that would have helped and guided him in obeying his Creator and stewarding his responsibilities but what did Adam do? Adam failed to value what God said to him.

I think one of the important steps in our victory over pride is taking heed to what God says to us through His Word.

As a man, when you were growing up, did anyone engrain within you that God’s Word mattered? I think personally as men, we grow up full of pride because we are all sinners but also because no one says, “God’s instructions matter.” So what do we do? We become instructors of ourselves and live based on our own desires instead of according to what God says.

Our first step towards humility is valuing everything that God says to us in His Word. If you own a copy of the Scriptures, I encourage you to read them. Don’t be afraid of them because they are meant to help, guide and protect you. Listen to me, pride says, “I don’t need what God has to say… I only need myself.” Humility says, “I desperately need everything God says to me in His Word.”

Over the next few days, dive into the Scriptures and demonstrate your need for HIM. Ask God, “Lord, help me live today, dependent on you and everything you have to say to me through your Word.”

The Dreaded Stiff Arm

During this year’s football season, I was astonished at the striking resemblance in play between Walter Payton and Adrian Peterson, running back for the Minnesota Vikings. Recently, I caught a few highlights on ESPN as the sports media made comparisons between the two of them. One clip showed Payton, a.k.a. “Sweetness” running the ball with an oncoming defender approaching him. Running full speed, Walter Payton would almost came to a standstill, juked to the left, rotated his hips, then juked to the right and headed for the sidelines. After evasively avoiding his opponent, it would appear that he was headed for a touchdown until an eager, aggressive and winded cornerback or safety caught up to him, attempting to thrust Payton out of bounds. However, unbeknownst to him, he would experience a HARD stiff arm to the helmet from Payton that would appear to have broken his neck. Once the defender realized that his chances of tackling him was over, Payton held the ball out to the side and high stepped freely on his toes into the end zone.

Every time I witnessed a Payton stiff arm, I only grimaced at what it would have felt like. Personally, I have received stiff arms not by Walter Payton but by Jesus Christ. I’ll never experience a Payton stiff arm but over my lifetime I have experienced distance from God. How so? The Bible says in James 4:6, “But He (Jesus) gives more grace. Therefore it says, God opposes (stiff arms) the proud but gives grace to the humble.” There have been times in my life when I have lived prideful and independent of God in order to please myself. I see pride in my life and guess what? God sees pride in your life. As a matter of fact, God sees it and hates it (Proverbs 6:17; Psalm 101:5). To be biblically honest, pride disgusts God. Why? Because pride is at the root of all sin and God hates sin.

But listen to some great news, in spite of our pride, God loves us passionately but hates when we take the initiative to exalt ourselves as god instead of finding our sufficiency in Him. Charles Bridges (Theologian) says, “Pride lifts up one’s heart against God and ‘contends for supremacy’ with Him.” Jonathan Edwards (18th Century theologian) calls pride “the worst viper that is in the heart” and “the greatest disturber of the soul’s peace and sweet communion with Christ. The proud person seeks to glorify himself and not God thus depriving God of what He is only worthy to receive.”

When do we see pride in our lives? We see pride in our lives when we arrogantly think that our success has everything to do with us, deliberately seek the applause of men, live like we have life figured out, and resist help from others because we proudly feel that “I” can do it better than everyone else, etc. Think about your life right now, “How does pride show up in your life?” Let me warn you as men, this is OUR “kryptonite” and our downfall (Proverbs 16:8, 29:23). The Bible teaches us that pride always precedes destruction and an arrogant spirit before a fall.

So what can we do? Should we all walk around sheepishly, with no sense of worth, speaking a little above a whisper to show everyone around us that we aren’t prideful? Not at all! The answer for our prideful hearts is in Scripture. In James 4:6, James says, “that God gives grace to the humble.” In other words, God stiff arms the proud but GIVES His grace (undeserved kindness) to those that humble themselves. You may ask, "How do we humble ourselves?" Repent often, turning our focus from ourselves “as the almighty great one” to Jesus Christ, our greatest picture of “true greatness.”

Listen to me, when the world presses on you to be “great in your own eyes” or you convince yourself that you need to be “the man” in order for the people around you to be impressed with you, repent often, recognizing that you are nothing apart from the goodness and grace of God. You see, Jesus, although God, humbled himself, came to the earth as a lowly human servant, lived a sinless life and died on a cursed cross so that we could be forgiven for our sins and not have to experience the wrath of God (Philippians 2:5-11). We are called to follow Jesus (God), who humbled himself being made low but yet was exalted by the Father (God).

Brothers, I’m in the journey with you! Let’s follow hard after Jesus, allowing Him to show us our pride that wanes deep in our hearts as well as the grace that He is given as well. My prayer for you over the next couple weeks is that you will come to grips with your pride and realize your desperate need for Jesus Christ. We’ll engage around this topic for the next few weeks. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

In the meantime be praying, “Lord, help me live each day completely dependent and trusting in you for everything I need and not myself.” Praying for you!

Putting Feet on MLK's Dream

I'm so thrilled to see people remembering MLK by making a difference today. Hearing the speech's, echoing the monologues, watching the Civil Rights footage all are wonderful but let's allow his legacy to catapult us into action today. Here's a friend of mine that has taken a personal interest in understanding the struggle and triumphs of African Americans. Check out this article and give him some feedback. How's MLK's legacy challenging you to change today? Let me know.

Prosperity Gospel Uncovered

We live in an age of the "super-sized" whereby we are under the delusional thought that the bigger is always better (i.e., bigger homes, portions of food, bank accounts, shopping centers, names, followings,etc.) The church has followed suit by even espousing to a theology called "Prosperity Theology" in order to fit well into the age of the "super-sized." Recently one of the key proponents of the health and wealth gospel, rendered a statement on his website.

I can't believe that Creflo Dollar thinks that a "man-made theology" can justify him living extravagantly off of members of the church (a non-profit institution). It's also amazing to see that he and others attempt to build a "theology" around a few verses like Deuteronomy 8:18. If one takes that verse out of context, it could build a theology of prosperity but in actuality Moses was warning the people not to forget the Lord for all he has done and for what he will do in the future. When self-exaltation, greed and pride are at the heart of our pursuits, we can leverage the Scriptures to say anything we want.

Many others like Joel Osteen (although he's a positive dude), Kenneth Copeland, Joyce Meyers, Juanita Bynum, Paula White, Paul Crouch (TBN), Brian Houston, TD Jakes, Jesse Duplantis and Eddie Long espouse to the same teachings under the theological umbrella of "prosperity." All of these people teach doctrine that temporarily lifts people's spirits but is grossly in error. My heart breaks over what is happening to Christianity in America because of false teachers. How can a gospel of humility, sacrifice, grace and meekness lead to a gospel of excessive luxury, unimaginable wealth and greed - It's called bad theology intersecting with a depraved heart. I know plenty of God-fearing, Jesus living people who aren't riding Bentley's but nonetheless, love Jesus.

Please here my heart. I am writing this entry not to condemn them as people but to bring truth to those who are being deceived by their teachings. Join with me by praying for them and those who listen to them, attend their churches and buy into their ideologies. I'd love to hear your take on this tragedy in America.

Happy New Year!

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year!

Welcome God-Man, Family & Friends

Christmas is the best holiday season of the year. It's a time that brings family together, people take time off work, friends connect, and love is shared through gifts and Jesus, the Savior of the world is celebrated. Christmas rocks!

The more I have learned about what Jesus did for me, the more jazzed about Christmas I become. He is the God-man. His virgin birth sealed the deal and welcomed redemption to the world as the one prophesied - fully human and fully God. No man could redeem us from our sin so God sent his only Son to pay the ransom so that we could be set free. That is phenomenal news! We don't have to pay a sin debt with our lives; Jesus paid it in full. He is the sinless, sufficient and the Savior of the world. Unlike other years during this season, I've been captured by the hard fact that my salvation is so complete in Him. I know Christmas has impacted you as well? Let me know what Christmas means to you and enjoy yourself with family and friends.