On the old blog, one of the most popular posts was one where I showed an ad that I saw on facebook and how interesting that was. Well, it’s time to do it again. I was on facebook and saw this on the side of my profile:

Has anyone else seen this ad? I can understand all of the singles ads that flood facebook, but geek dating? What on my profile would make whatever decides which ads go where say, “Ooh yeah, Dustin’s single so he needs some dating ads, but what kind… hmm. College dating? No. Christian dating? No. Oh yes! Geek dating! That’s the one!”?

Has anyone else found this ad? What did you think of it?

Dustin

One of the most popular verses when talking about worship is Romans 12 where it 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.

Now, nowhere in this verse does it say to offer our good days, or offer the times when we feel like it as a sacrifice and that that would be our form of worship. It says to offer our bodies as a sacrifice, and then that would be our form of worship. Body can be interpreted as merely the physical body that each of us have, but it can also be interpreted as the whole, our lives.

I think that often we tend to justify not doing something for God by saying, “I don’t feel like it.” (I know I’m guilty of this). We think that because there’s no “mountain top” feeling going into something, that we don’t necessarily need to do it. But if we think that this is okay, why did Paul write to offer our bodies as a sacrifice and that that would be our form of worship?

Would true worship be showing up when the feeling isn’t necessarily there? Would it be participating in what God is doing out of true love, discipline, and obedience rather than out of a feeling or emotion? I’ve heard it said, and I agree, that love isn’t a feeling, it’s a choice (or something to that effect). And I think that we often forget that. A relationship with Christ is like any other relationship, if you try to operate off of feelings and emotions, the relationship will be short lived. But just as Christ chose and is constantly choosing to love us despite all of the junk in our lives, so should we choose to love and be obedient to Christ, operating not on feeling or emotion, but out of love, faith, and obedience.

I’m writing this post out of some experiences of mine that have happened as of late where I flat out didn’t want to do something that God was calling me to do. I wanted to leave or skip what I was responsible for and just move on to the next part of the night. I’ve heard several talks, and chances are if anyone has ever been on a retreat you’ve heard it too, about showing up and continuing this walk with Christ after the feeling from the retreat/concert/sermon/worship set is gone. I believe the same principal applies when going into something. I think God purposely chooses to not fill us with that emotion/anticipation of a moment to teach us to trust that He is still God. I think he does this to show that He is the God of everyday, not just the God of the big extravagant church events. This is a lesson that I’ve been learning a lot over the last two months and it’s been hard for me. I’ve had discussions with a couple of people where I just say that I don’t want to do this. But after we’ve prayed and brought this to God, God provided and told me to continue on.

This post feels kind of scattered and not well written, but I can live with that. Basically, worshiping God when the mountaintop feeling isn’t there is just as important, if not, more important, as worshiping God in those mountaintop experiences like retreats and worship events.

Love isn’t a feeling. It’s a choice.

Dustin

This semester I wrote a research paper in inner healing and deliverance. While I was writing this, I had several people ask if they could read it once it’s finished and I thought that this would be a good place to post some excerpts from the paper and see what you think about it. (Am I trying to get more blog traffic? Maybe, but this is how I’m gonna do it.) This paper was written based on what I’ve read, what I know, and what I’ve seen and experienced in my own life.

This first excerpt talks about our need for healing and how that goes back to the beginning; it goes all the way back to Genesis.

If one is to look at the subject of inner healing, one must first go back to the very beginning and observe a key matter: what is the need for it? In the Christian faith, Jesus Christ is the only Son of God and He was sent to save and restore the world. Francis MacNutt (2006), a Catholic Priest and pioneer in the revival of inner healing ministries who has written several books on the subject of inner healing, asserts in his book The Healing Reawakening: Reclaiming our Lost Inheritance that, “We will remain forever in the dark if we do not understand why God sent His son to be Savior of the world. Why did Jesus come among us in the flesh? He came because we had lost our inheritance and he intended to restore it” (p.27). This is a key statement in looking at inner healing because if someone doesn’t know that inner healing is needed, how then will healing take place?

The need for healing starts in the very beginning. Going to the Bible, it is easy for a person to see that humankind had committed a great travesty and was in need of reconciliation both to God and to them. According to the Bible, in the story of Adam and Eve, God created them in His image to live, work, and take care of the Garden of Eden. They could eat from any tree in the Garden, but they were forbidden to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This didn’t last long though as both Adam and Eve both ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They committed the first sin, and the consequences were severe both for them and for everyone who was to come after them. In Genesis 3, it says:
To the woman he said,
“I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing;
with pain you will give birth to children.
Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you.”
To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.” (Genesis 3:16-19, New International Version)
The incident of Adam and Eve’s sin was a tragic time because humankind had officially committed what is known as “the fall” and the result was that we could no longer be in the direct presence of God, as well what God laid out in the passage. In this sin that Adam and Eve committed, we had lost what God had originally intended for humans and thus we had lost what God had intended to give to everyone. Francis MacNutt (2006) goes on to state in The Healing Reawakening that our inheritance was lost when, “the human race sinned and fell from fellowship with its Creator” (p. 28). For Christians, this may have the darkest time in history, for it was the day that humans fell from a real relationship with God.

It was not going to stay like that forever though, the Bible tells us that God had a plan to reconcile the world to him and erase the work that sin had done in the world. The plan was for God to send his son, Jesus Christ, to bear the burden and pay the price of sin for the entire world. When Jesus came in human form, he spent three years of his time on earth ministering and teaching those around him. And in his teaching and ministering, healing was a large part of what he did. In fact, Jesus’ ministry could be summed up with three points or three main goals. He proclaimed that the Kingdom of God was near, he fought to take back what had been claimed by the kingdom of Satan, and he came to heal the sick; He came to heal them physically, spiritually, and emotionally. In another one of his books, Healing, Francis MacNutt (2006) says that, “The time of the Messiah [Jesus] would be a time of healing, of liberation, and of salvation” (p.41). In other words, the time of Jesus would consist of people being healed, people being set free, and people being saved.

I think I’ll make this a weekly series and post some more excerpts over the next few weeks. Hopefully this will stir up some really good discussion about God-stuff.

Dustin

The title says it all. Here are a few pictures I got off of the DVD that was recorded Sunday night. Enjoy.

Again, I just want to say that this was an incredible night and I was completely blessed to be leading worship with such an awesome group of guys and worshiping with the awesome young people that were there.

God did amazing stuff and I hope that what went on there carries over to how we live our lives outside of events like this.

Dustin

Thanks to Amber who took these pictures. These are a couple pictures from the incredible youth event held tonight called Unite where the young people in Eagle River and Chugiak gathered together to join as one in all out worship of our God. I was fortunate enough to lead worship for this event and I’m speechless. It was cool to see the young people of The Church sing and worship like that. It truly an anointed night.

It was an amazing night that and time of worship, we even had an encore! I have never had that happen to me before! God is so good, and it was incredible to watch these young people encounter God tonight.

It was incredible

Dustin

Last night at Kairos, God worked some amazingly cool stuff. Not only was Sarah’s message spot on and very relevant to me, but afterwards was an extended worship time followed by prayer; this was where God really started to do cool stuff.

I spent most of the hour of worship wrestling with God and trying to haggle and bargain my way out of dealing with some stuff in that time, but I knew that I was supposed to receive prayer. So the music stopped and we regrouped and began to pray for each other. I knew I was the first one who needed prayer, so I reluctantly said that I was the one who was supposed to be prayed for. I didn’t want to say why I was the one who needed prayer so I said for them to ask God what they’re supposed to pray about and maybe I’d avoid having to deal with this stuff. But in prayer one of the people received something from God that couldn’t be ignored and I knew that this had to be dealt with.

The time that followed was full of healing for my spirit and I’m thankful that God chose to deal with it last night, despite me not wanting to. God blows my mind in so many ways in times like this. No matter how much we try to do things on our own, we desperately need God’s guidance to really do what needs to be done both in our lives and in others. And when God offers his guidance, we need to be obedient and willing to accept it. Last night would have been nothing if those praying for me wouldn’t have shared what God was telling and showing them. God continually blows my mind and I wouldn’t trade what happened last night for anything else.

Even though I originally didn’t want to deal with it!

Dustin