When I think about needs of others I have witnessed, I am often overwhelmed. I try not to be aware of needs, but then I don’t know how to respond. Often I think about how I live like a queen in comparison to many people, especially those in other countries. When I have visited other countries I usually quickly adapt to ways of life that are simplier, but when I am living here, I don’t how I am to respond, other than in thanks. I try to live simply, but it doesn’t compare to how others live in places such as mud huts and without electricity or running water.

There is a different sort of bubble that I find when I return after having been on outreach (I have only been on a few outreaches, but they have left great impact on my mind and heart.) It is like all that I have experienced becomes surreal, and I am stuck back in a rut of living for myself. I have found that I try to do everything myself, and don’t like to ask for help. I know that is prideful, and I think many people in the US have this attitude. We keep up masks and walls and don’t get involved with many others lives, and it is often hard to take off those masks and walls because it is taboo in our culture. If we ask for help, often we feel as though we are burdening others and many don’t seem to want to help, so we keep up the walls and masks. While on outreach there are always things planned to do to help others, and it makes it easy to reach out and care and be involved. Also there is usually instruction on HOW to help. When I come home from outreach I haven’t found a place to plug into where things are planned and when I meet someone in need there aren’t instructions. I also think a part of my lack of helping others is that I am also in need of healing, and when I strike out to help others without instructions and someone I can go to with questions, I come to a place where I feel I am not able to help anymore because I begin to feel I have issues that haven’t been resolved. I often pray and ask the Holy Spirit to help me know how to help others and myself as well, but it is like there is a bubble created from the walls and masks I have learned to don that I have found difficult to break through on my own. I also know that this is something God has been working on in me.

Question # 7: Job’s response to his suffering stands out to me as the response God is looking for: “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” (Job 1:21 ESV) When people say “God is so good” when they receive a blessing, it sounds like God is not good when bad things happen. As Job learned, suffering is a mystery that only God understands. If we really believe God is good, then we must believe that even in our suffering God is working things out for our good (Rom. 8:28). If we cannot see God’s goodness in our suffering, perhaps that reveals the deepest motives of our heart–that we may be using God instead of loving him.

2) The church I am attending is losing their building. Through many sets of unfortunate circumstances, we can no longer afford our mortgage. Ever since we found out, our pastor has been focused on “getting us out from behind our 4 walls.” We are starting small groups for the first time, and we will be doing community services a minimum of quarterly as part of our small group time. Before we lost our building, we were drowning out the pain by choruses of praise music. I think losing the building will be the best thing to ever happen to our church.

3) As a returned prodigal, I will tell you “I get it now.” There is no “get out of hell free” card. And there are so many people who are going to find this out “too late.” I do believe that the Gospel requires more than just believing the right things, and I am learning so much about where I have my own holes in the gospel.

4) I don’t want to ignore the pain in this world. I am called into the world. However, I do find that my problem is that I submerge myself TOO much into this world, and that causes problems. I have many friends through my professional circles that are homosexual, and this is very difficult to deal with, particularly when they are in a professional relationship with you. I wish I could skip the parts of the Bible that make people feel “excluded,” and homosexuality is a biggie for making people feel excluded.

5) I went through a spell when my marriage was breaking up. We pulled it together with the help of a very good Christian counselor. I never thought that any good would come of it. Four years later, I can count a minimum of four couples that we have been able to offer love, support, and HOPE for the future.

6) I am withholding my entire self. My mind gets distracted, I get too busy with my job, which is very important to me, and I am working very hard in relying in Him instead of my understanding of the world as I do these abuse investigations. Without His wisdom, I am just another part of this world’s problems.

7) Romans 8:28 “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” I had a professor who wrote a book about surviving cancer, titled, “All Things Work for Good.” I loved Professor Sinclair, and I clung to this verse when my mother came down with cancer, and through my own trials. Professor Sinclair is home with Jesus now, and I still miss him dearly, even though it’s been more than 10 years.

BELIEF, BELIEVE, BELIEVERS
pisteuo NT:4100, “to believe,” also “to be persuaded of,” and hence, “to place confidence in, to trust,” signifies, in this sense of the word, reliance upon, not mere credence.
(from Vine’s Expository Dictionary of Biblical Words, Copyright © 1985, Thomas Nelson Publishers.)
Being a follower of Jesus means to surrender everything to Him. That would and should determine everything we do and say, but we rarely live in that place.
There could certainly be holes in my understanding of the gospel. I need to keep reading it and asking God to reveal His truth.

Both situations changed me because I had to depend on God for everything . . . and He has met my every need, and then some! He gave me a heart of compassion to help other women who are suffering abuse. God has been working in my heart to teach me many lessons about myself–one of which is how to love and be loved. Another big change is actively waiting on God to direct my steps instead of running ahead of Him and praying for Him to bless my efforts. Through the pain and suffering has come great joy that can’t be beaten down or stolen, and all the humiliating and destitute situations have given me a greater understanding and concern for others.

2) I think, at least here in America, that a lot of the screams of poverty and injustice are drowned out by the continual praise music of the Church. After awhile, Worship music can seem to be bland, because at times it almost seems fake.

3) The bingo card gospel is not much of a gospel at all. It’s a simple transaction that says you once prayed for God’s forgiveness and dedicated your life to Christ. I think the Gospel Jesus proclaims is one that requires total surrender, more than just what you believe, but what your doing with it. Like James said, a faith without works is a dead faith. I’m sure there’s holes in my own Gospel, I don’t claim to have all the answers, but I do know God loves each and everyone of us and he wants us to love one another.

4) Yeah, well surrendering your own desires and pursuing God’s. Sacrificing yourself for the sake of others, loving others as yourself, do unto others as you would have them do unto you. These are things I’d like to ignore, but their truth. And the Truth will set you free.

5) I can remember when I broke up with my girlfriend I felt pretty low. I know what your thinking, well you brought that onto yourself, but the reason I broke up with her is because we we’re going down a road that I know God would not approve of. And although I loved her very much, it was kind of like I had to make a choice, My desires or a relationship with God. I’m not trying to compare this to anybody else’s suffering, cause I know others suffer more than I can even begin to realize, but this was one of those times when my heart was truly broken. And if it hadn’t of been for a really great friend, I don’t know what I would have done, my best friend came and met me that night and we talked for about 2 or 3 hours…Thank God for great friends!

6) I’d say time is a big one, I seem to get caught up in what I want to do that I often forget to spend time with God. I pray, but I don’t have those times where I just get still and listen.

7) Well I think one that comes to mind is John 3:16…Jesus had to suffer so that we could have life.

I’d like to add something else to this. What I always go back to is that we need to be abiding in Him. We need to keep Him at the center and forefront of our lives. It is through this abiding and the infilling of His Spirit that He is able to mould our hearts to conform with His. It’s through this that He leads us. It is through this that we will come to love the things that He loves, and through that love we will act. Otherwise it seems like we’re going through the motions and trying to do the right things, but they may not be the right things He’s calling us to.

I’m going to read the other responses one day soon.

Blessings to all,
Tess

No wonder people aren’t attracted to this kind of gospel. If I didn’t already know and love Jesus, it would be hard to convince me to accept the gospel being presented in many churches. And after half a century or more of being saturated in a dry, sterile theology, my head is full . . . but my heart is starving.

And yes, I believe there is much more than just believing the right thing. True faith and repentance is not a cerebral exercise–it’s an awakening of the heart that provokes action and obedience from a motivation of love, not duty.

Yes, there is definitely a hole in my interpretation of the gospel–most definitely in the way I was taught in the past, but even now as I encounter God’s mercy and reckless love it reveals how much I still have to learn, how much I need to grow, how much I need to learn how to love, and how much my need for His “good news” is just as great as that of the world’s vilest sinner.