Saturday 30 August 2008 Wake up world.

Where is it? The photo, that is. No, it is not the inside of a prison. In fact, only some one who lives in Melbourne will know. And then not many. If you think you know where it is, try the comments column. Yes, write it in.
OK, now, why the topic. Look here to find out. Wake up world! This events, although a long way apart, do relate. The Bali bombings? Judgement on all the ugly tourists from the land down under plus other places. Guess what? We didn't learn a single thing from that. There are now ten times more tourist there now as there was then. And their just as drunk and ugly. 9/11 judgement on the monetary systems of the world. What did we do? Go to war with Iraq. That's not going too flash either. At least Mr Rudd is pulling our troupes out. That is a step in the right direction. Madrid train bombings? They got the message. Our drought? Wake up Australia, God is calling you to repent before it is too late. China has an earth quake. Wake up China, the Lord has His eyes on you. Now the UK is not looking to flash monetary wise. USA will be next. They have been spending way beyond their means.
OK. Lets leave the last word to Amos.

Saturday 30th August 2008 Whinge time!

But first, do you like the photo? It is part of my "My Melbourne" collection. Yes, I take the photo's myself. The photo was taken from my train. I was standing at a signal waiting to go into Flinders Street Station. I was impressed with the light reflection. How about you?
Now it is whinge time. Anybody use Face Book? Isn't it the biggest load of rubbish? I don't what we are supposed to do with it. Sure beats me. I did sign up because some friends seem to think it was a good idea. I haven't seen anything so far that leads me to believe it is anything special.
I like Psalm 128.
Our memory verse for September is 1 John 1:5. Go here to look for it.

Tuesday 27th August 2008 Gone walkabout.

Catherine Grace Mitchell will be 18 months old at 1949 hours tonight. My mate, who wasn't my mate this afternoon. Well, she was, but I don't think she like me much for a few moments this afternoon. See she decided to test the waters of disobedience. She did the same as her grandparents. They were told "Don't Touch". They did, she did. And, like them, the consequences were immediate. Her backside stung. And she cried. It wasn't as though she doesn't understand "Don't Touch", because she does. In fact she is a very well trained young lady. But, for some reason she had a baby moment. You know, a bit like senior moment, or a female thing. Call it what you want. It's when you do something but can't for the life of you explain why you did what you did. We all have those.
I am anti-abortion. I am also anti-execution. They are both legalised forms of murder. There is no excuse for either. The Victorian state government is currently updating the abortion law. I have written to my local member. He is the local labour member. And a good one at that. But I think he and I disagree on the whole abortion thing. I got one answer to my letter. I think it was a standard form letter which outlined the party policy and thinking. It did state that the members would be allowed as conscience vote. I don't now how Alistair Harkness will vote. I can only make my views known and pray. Not necessarily in that order.
Why did I mention that? Coz it in two blogs that I read. Look here and here. I did learn one interesting fact in reading those two blogs. Apparently, in that bastion of democracy, the good old US of A, when one registers to be on the electoral role one must state which party one supports? Hang on a minute. How is that democratic? As if I am going to tell some idiot which party I support. It's none of his business. But this is the good old US of A that we are talking about. Democracy American style. When is a democracy not a democracy? When you tell some idiot, who should mind his business, which party you support.
Mind you, I will give them this, they are consistent. They treat their own they way the treat the rest of the world. It's their way or the highway. If you don't agree with the USA your wrong. Don't believe me? Have a look at their foreign policy and they way they handle the rest of the world. I'll get off that soap box.
How did I get there? Oh, yes, I remember now. It was regarding single issue voting. Would I vote for a candidate based on his views on a single issue. No. I wouldn't. Take Mr Harkness for instance. Maybe he will, and maybe he wont vote for the current bill before parliament. But to me he is more than one issue. He is many. The abortion bill is just one issue. Big, yes. Passionate? Yes, am at least. I think it's murder. But it is one issue among many. What would I do. I already did. I wrote 2 emails. He is there to represent the entire electorate, not just me. How would it be if the pro-abortionist did that. It would be a bit like throwing out the baby with the bath water.
How do I vote? Well, here in the Land Down Under we have two houses of parliament. The Upper and the Lower. The Lower is the government and the upper is the house of review. Bills that have passed in the lower house are sent top the Senate, or upper house, for review and to ratify. In the House of Representatives, the lower house, I vote for who ever I think will do the best job and represent the electorate the best. Unfortunately we have a party political system here in Oz. The party with the most elected members, governs. The other is the opposition. Unfortunately, although good, it doesn't always work well. Who ever is in government thinks they are right and who ever is in opposition thinks the government is wrong even if the government is right. This is OK in the lower house, but not in the Senate. Hence, in the senate, I always, without exception vote independent. My wish is that the independents will have the balance of power in the senate and we may get sensible rational debate. Maybe! Well, one can hope. It does work. A couple of years ago a very bad bit of legislation was to go through the senate. The independents, who just happen to hold the balance of power, were able to block the legislation. One for common sense.

Sunday 17th August 2008 I really must.....

.... be very careful in future when I mention some ministries and church groups. In 2 recent posts I have mentioned a group, which shall remain nameless at this time. I mentioned this group in passing whilst making a statement about another matter. I need to be more careful.
My statement, in yesterdays post had to do with giving Christ His rightful place in our lives and credit for doing what He does in us.
I was given a couple of links to look at. Not good and not clever. The only thing I gained from the links was that some one doesn't like some one else very much and in one of the links, that ministry has a major problem, which should not be aired on the internet. Displaying one's dirty linen in public is not my idea of desirable Sunday afternoon reading. There is a Biblical way of dealing with such matters.
Enough for now.

Saturday 16th August 2008. Me, myself and I

Nope, no photo this time. Why? I am too lazy to go look for one. I thought I would just include a definition in case you wondered what it meant. To be lazy that is. I also like spell checkers. They help me with my atrocious spelling.
Revival. It's not happening. At least not that I am aware of. Actually I have eluded to it a bit in my recent posts. At least the reason why it is not happening. It's called sin. In my life and maybe yours. Well, I think yours. I can't really tell. I am too busy pulling the plank out of my eye. That's what prevents me from seeing you and if your sinning. How does God view sin? The wages of sin is death. However, before we will see any sort of revival we have to view sin the same way that God does. I can give mental assent to the statement that the wages of sin is death. It means nothing. Even Satan believes the wages of sin is death. He gloats about it. It is an entirely different matter to viewing it the same way that God does.
Lets look at stealing. Just for a minute. There are two ways of stealing. I can walk up to you and take something from you without your permission. That is the direct way. I have taken from you, without your consent, something that is rightfully yours. There is another way to steal. I can deny you something that is rightfully yours. I may, for example, promise you some money that I owe you. I don't pay up. That is stealing. I have something that is rightfully yours. Now we do this with God every day. We steal from Him the time that is rightfully His. We deny Him first place in our life and place something else first place instead. This grieves God. Yes, He is big enough to handle it. But it is still stealing. It is serious. That shalt not steal. Being denied is only one consequence of stealing. The person we stole from might become angry. They may wish you harm because of your sin. They may not harm you literally, but in their heart they may. So, you have sinned directly against them by taking something rightfully which is theirs and then indirectly by causing them to become angry and thereby sinning because they wish you harm, which is a form of murder, mental murder. OK, you haven't sinned against God? Wait. That person we stole from is a creation of God. Jesus said, as you did to the least of these, you did to Me. Oops.
See the problem. No matter what wrong we do, ultimately it is against God. It is failure to live up to His standard. You and I have to look at things the same way as God does before He can change us.
Consider this. "I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." That will be our attitude after we have seen our sin and ourselves as God sees us. That will be the after effect. That is where God wants us to be.
There is a great emphasis these days on what I must do. There is only one thing I must do. I must die and Christ must live. In me. Anything less denies God His rightful place in my life. If I say I will do this, or I did that. Who was it that said "I must decrease, He must increase"?
I was listening to the conference ministry from Sovereign Grace Ministries. They emphasised salvation by grace alone, in Christ alone, through faith alone. Absolutely in total agreement with what God says one hundred and ten percent. Theologically and doctrinally spot on. Then they stuffed in in the discussion panel by failing miserably to give God and Christ His rightful place. They stole from God His glory in giving Him credit. They went on about how much they enjoyed this person's sermon or that person's ministry. No no no no, that will never do. It is not your ministry, it is not my ministry. It is not my works. It is Christ's works that He chooses by His sovereign will to do in and through me. They have their head on back to front and unfortunately the panel discussions became a huge mutual admiration society. I wept.
We need to weep over this sin. What sin? We need to weep over the sin of claiming that we did something when we didn't. Christ did it in and through us and chose to make us a vehicle for His purposes.
I was on the revival band wagon for ages. All the time looking for revival. What I didn't see wwas that Revival must start with me.
Enough. You have a comment?

Sunday 10th August 2008 Giving Christ His rightful place.

A picture of Michele with a smiley face she made from food. She promptly ate the food.
Above that is a picture of Cathy joining in on Michele's lap-a-thon at Michele's pre-school last week. That denim dress Cathy has on originally was Michele's. Would you believe they both fit into it.
Now I guess by now you are wondering what the title has to do with those two photographs. Nothing. Not a thing. It is all to do with Sovereign Grace Ministries. I like to listen to sermons when I am driving my trains. It helps to take my mind off the silly things I see passengers and members of the public do. I mentioned SGM in my last post. I don't have a problem with SGM. We don't have them here in the land down under that I am aware of. I liked some of the preaching I heard and was unable to fault it. In fact some of the preachers I thoroughly enjoyed. John Piper I have listened to many times. I find him challenging. We need challenging in our Christian walk. You don't? Good for you. I do. John MacArthur is good. Christ has used all those men to minister to me in a deep and personal level. I thank the Lord Jesus that He has seen fit to shine His light upon me through the ministry of these and other men.
I listened to the the 2006 and 2008 conferences at SGM. There was some good ministry there. Christ was upheld. The Gospel was expounded, sometimes deeply. Sometimes Christ really probed into my innermost being. Then I got to the discussion panels. Here, sadly, I saw what I see often. Christ was not uplifted in this, that the men failed to give Christ His rightful place. There was a lot of backslapping and how good each preacher thought the other preacher was. I thought firstly it was a mutual admiration society. Hang on, wasn't that conferences about Christ, the gospel, theology and doctrine? Yes, do I hear you say? Aren't we supposed to give Him all the glory?
Don't think for one minute I am saying that SGM are alone in this. Oh, no, far from it. May God forgive me, but even I do it. Yes, there are four fingers pointing at me. But I am reminded that Christ is my all in all. I am dead. He is now living in me. He should/must receive His rightful place. If I or you are doing the doing then it is nothing. Only what Christ does will last. He may, in His infinite mercy, use you or me, as His vessel to accomplish His will. But you and I cannot claim any credit at all. God is Sovereign. He is Holy. It is His world. We are here for His purpose.
I am reminded that according to humanist thinking, the chief end of man is the happiness of man. No, no, no! That is not so. The chief end of man is to, first, glorify God, and secondly, enjoy Him. I must decrease, He must increase. My boast can only ever be in Christ and Him crucified.
OK, I will get off me soap box now! Maybe next time I will go on about salvation by works.

Sunday 3rd August 2008 Us.

That photo was taken at a friends house last month. Count it a miracle. I can count on one hand with fingers to spare, the number of photo's that have been taken of me. I agree with our Lord. I don't do photo's. I take photo's, I do not have photo's taken of me if I can help it.
Today is Sunday. We went to St Lukes today at nine fifteen this morning. Now church can be a funny thing. I will make a fool of myself now. The singing was excellent. We had 4 hymns. Did I tell you, I love hymns. I am a hymn man. I don't do crash bang wallop church music all that well. Yes, I can tolerate it in small doses with a long time between each dose. It is sometimes called 711 music. Seven words sung eleven times. Also most just have drums. Take drums out of a lot of modern songs and what have you got? Silence. I think you get the picture now.
The prayer, the church prayer that is, I found boring. Yep, that's me. It was boring. The person said a bit then we had silent time. I don't mind silent time. But I like prayer to be a bit noisy. That's me. Now my daring wife, that her with the red top on (isn't she good looking?) she thought the prayer was good and she found it deep and meaningful. I found it boring.
Then we had the sermon. That was OK. Today's topic was busyness in the modern day. And used Luke 5:1-11 for the gospel reading. Did I tell you, we all stand when the gospel is read. Now what that reading had to do with busyness I have no idea. But what Phil did say about prioritising was relevant. He waffled on a bit, ministers do that, but it was good waffle. And if you want a photo of young Phil, he is 12 months older than me, but I am young, go here and while your at it, read Phil's focus. And he is good looking. Not as good as me, but not everyone can't be that good.
So, that was this morning. This afternoon Cathy is sleeping. Michele is playing what ever 4.5 going on 45's play. Stephanie is reading and I am doing this and cooking a roast. I will be grumbled at later for creating so much dishes to be washed. Yes, we do have dish washers: Us.
What's on the soap box. Plenty. Seems folks are a bit worried about the state of the economy and interest rates, look like coming down, petrol prices, coming down, and so on. Some are in debt up to their eye balls. I was like that once. Praise the Lord, He made me pull my head in a bit.
What am I listening to? Over here at Sovereign Grace Ministries there are some really excellent things to listen to and I have a had a ball. Also I like 66/40 by Chuck Misler.
Oh and there is a bit of a thing going on about global warming. That little problem is easy solved. Plant more trees. Yep, it's that simple. Trees store carbon. Carbon dioxide is one of the triggers to global warming. Plant more trees you get more rain and less carbon in the air. That was easy.
Global poverty? Now that is a problem. Cancelling debt will help. But as long as their are despots on earth poverty is going to be an issue. And as long as thier are humans on earth there will be despots. So I guess the solution is take humans out of the world and you cure all the ills of the world.
But there is one small fly in that bottle of ointment, or a fat spanner in the works. It's God you see. It's His fault. He gave us free choice. That really didn't help much. That is what got us in this awful mess in the first place. You see, we humans wont and cant do as we are told. It's called the sin principle and you can read about it here and the solution here and here..
I think you get the picture. We are all sinners. We were born that way and we choose to continue that way. Calvinist disagree with the last part of that, but I can tell you without fear of contradiction we do wrong because we choose by our own free will to go against God and man.
Jesus has provided a way out of that. God is Holy. He can have nothing to do with sin. This is where homosexuals fall foul of God. They want God to embrace their life style choice. God can't. To do so would be for God to accept sin and go against His own nature. He can't. But, He did provide a way of escape. Repent. That is turn around and go away from your sin. Stop doing what your doing. Ask Jesus to take control of your life. Ask God top accept Jesus death on the cross as your own. That's why Jesus went to the cross. To pay the penalty for your sin and badness. Put it in your own words when you talk with God. That's what prayer is. Talking with God. Ask Him to accept what Jesus has done as being you. Ask your sins to be accounted to Jesus. Believe in Jesus. Get born again. Only God can do that. It is a work of the Holy Spirit in your life as you become dead to your old life and become alive, by an act of God, in Christ. Look at John chapter 3. Accept a man is born again he cannot see God's kingdom.
If in doubt, write to me or put an entry at in the comments section of this blog. If you want help or prayer? Put a blog comment in and I can/will prayer.