Life Lessons from Barbacue Sauce

3 weeks ago I got a job at Damon's Bar and Grille. It was a blessing, because I had been looking for a job for about 3 months. Correy works at Damon's, and ended up getting Link a job there. One day, Link and I had to run an errand to Correy at work, and the Kitchen Manager happened to be in. Correy asked him if he needed a dishwasher, and he said yes. So, on the spot, I got a job as a dishwasher.

I was pretty excited. So, have been working the weekend shifts for the past few weeks. Work pertains of me standing in one spot for multiple hours, scrubbing lots of barbecue sauce off of dishes, pans, plates, trays, and the like. Damon's also specializes in their "Famous Onion Loaf". Because of this, I often come home reeking of onions and barbecue sauce.

Yesterday, about 2 hours into my battle with the barbecue sauce, God taught me something. Usually when I work, I either let my mind drift to Alpha Centuri and back, or sing worship songs. Yesterday, my mind had been drifting for about 2 hours. I realized that the subject matter of my mind as it drifts usually pertains to my future. I think about all these things that I think will make my life better. Usually my thoughts go like this. 'So, 1 year from now if _________ happens, then that will lead to ________, which will help me achieve ________, which will then make me happy.' The things in the blank lines differ, but it all comes back to the same thing. I am not content with what I have. I am not rejoicing in the things God has given me. I am not loving Jesus today.

For most of my life, I have thought I will be happy when ________ happens. It has been all about the next experience. It has been all about the next adventure. In my mind, I have been seeing through the things God has blessed me with. Some of those things are...my brothers in Christ that I live with, being mentored by Don and Travis, my family, my friends back home, all the stuff that I have that I don't really need in my closet in Ohio and in Massachusetts... etc. CS Lewis said it well.

"You cannot go on seeing through things for ever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. . . . If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To see through all things is the same as not to see.”

I have not appreciated the things that God has given to me to enjoy. I have been so focused on "the next thing" that I have been thereby seeing through the things God has placed all around me. My inability to be satisfied with the things God has given me now has blinded me of the joy in treasuring those very gifts. I think a new adventure will bring me joy. And then when I am on that adventure, I am not satisfied. All I can thing about is the next adventure, which I think will bring me joy. And then it doesn't produce again, so I think about the next adventure. The cycle endlessly repeats itself.

That is the reason I have such a hard time committing to being in one place for an extended amount of time. Thankfully, by the grace of God, He is changing that.

So yesterday, God hit me with a verse. Timothy 6:7-10 says

"But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs."

and then it goes on to say in verse 11

"But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness"

I believe Godly contentment is one of the most valuable lessons we can learn in life. To be content in every situation, whether in riches or in rags. Only through the love of Christ is this possible. If we fix our eyes on Jesus, and set our minds on the things that are unseen and eternal instead of the temporary, then God will fill us will all joy, peace, and contentment as we trust in Him.

"But you, man of God, flee from all this. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love endurance, and gentleness."

"For Godliness with contentment is great gain"

God had to use barbecue sauce in New Philadelphia, Ohio to get that to penetrate my heart. Sometimes the messy things in life teach you the most. I wonder if it will be onions today? I will find out.


JN

Truth

The question was posed yesterday "What is truth?".

So, I ask you. What is truth? Take a few minutes and think about it.


Yesterday, we were watching a video series called The Truth Project. The video showed clips of normal Americans giving their answer to the question "what is truth?". There were a variety of answers. Here are a few

"Truth is honesty"

"Truth is whatever we make it to be"

"There is no such thing as absolute truth"


(And one of my favorites, that I disagree with, but I still enjoy listening to the answer.)

(me paraphrasing)
"Picture the human race standing in a cathedral. (A really big cathedral). Upon the ceiling there are glass window pains with light shining through them. Near the alter all the light comes together to form one really bright light. But when we look up at the windows, we see all different kinds of rays of light, all shining to the center. Truth is the collection of all of those rays of light. We may look at truth through the lens of Christianity. We may look at truth through the lens of Agnosticism. We one look through truth through the lens of science. But ultimately, all truth is relative to us and we are free to believe what ever truth we want to believe."

The interesting thing is that most of the people that were asked looked like they were trying to figure out what their definition of truth was as they were talking. That kind of baffled me, because, at least for me, what I believe is true is the most important think about how I live my life and how I look at the world. I know there are many people who are going to read this blog and disagree with my view of Truth, that Jesus Christ is The Truth (John 14:6) and He is the Son of the living God (John 1:1-18, Philippians 2:,5-11) and that is fine. But I would think that if what we believe about truth defines how we live and how we look at the world, we probably should know how to articulate it if we were asked.

Here is why I enjoy thinking about this answer about the cathedral.

If you did not know, that answer is from the position of Universalism. In simple terms, a universalist will believe that there is a little bit of truth from every religion and when you combine all of them, then you will find truth (or some of it is truth and not all of it. Both positions are valid in that church). If you want to read more about Universalism, just follow the wikipedia link or google it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universalism. What is interesting about this answer, is, that it is probably the most common answer we see in America today. The idea that truth is relative, is a very popular idea today. Many people will not associate themselves with the Universalist Church, but still believes a lot of their doctrines without realizing it.

So, my point in all of this, is this. If truth is relative to us, then how do we know it is truth? If one person says "Christianity is truth", and another says "Buddhism is truth", and yet another says "The flying spaghetti monster is truth", and all three of those agree each position they hold is valid, how can we know which is true? Are they all true?

Truth must be objective in order for there to be truth. Another question... If one hold's two positions of truth, for example, say someone believes the idea that God just created the world and stepped back from interacting with Creation but also likes the Mormon idea that every man will rule their own planet with over 50 wives (don't quote me on the number of wives), and chooses to believe both, then how can he believe both? How can he believe more than one truth?

I love what this 13 year old kid said on the in an interview. "There has to be a fixed truth for the universe to function properly"
I agree. Take morality for example... If truth is relative, what if one believes that murder is good and apart of culutre, like many tribes do in Papua New Guinnea, and then another person believes murder is evil? Then each person has a right to believe whatever they believe because their interpretation of truth is truth for them. So the guy that thinks murder is good can go kill as many people as he wants because he lives by his view of truth. It doesn't matter that the other man thinks murder is evil, because murder is 'good' for the one man and evil for the other. There is no absolute moral law that defines what is good and what is evil. That is the inevitable outcome of everyone believing truth is relative to themselves.

So, here are a few question to think about.

If you are a follower of Jesus:

Can you explain what you believe is Truth?

Does your belief of truth affect how you live? And if so, to what degree?

Jesus says in Luke 9:23 "If any man would come after me he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me."

Is that your response for believing Jesus as truth, denying yourself, taking up your cross and following Him?

If not, why?



If you are not a follower of Jesus:

What do you believe is truth?

Does it affect your every day life? to what degree?

Are you satisfied with your life in regards to your belief of truth?



Thank you for bearing with me on this blog. I know it was longer and a little deeper than the past ones. But I feel like this is a discussion that needs to happen. If anyone has any questions, or would like to dialogue further, shoot me a message on facebook or an email at cjoshuanims@gmail.com


If you want to probe this issue further, I reccommend reading Mere Christianity, by C.S Lewis. If you really want to try and tackle it, read The Reason For God, by Timothy Keller.



Thanks for reading and hearing my thoughts. Feedback is always appreciated, even if you disagree with me. :)



Loving Jesus,

JN

Let Your Kingdom Come

This past weekend I was in Texas. Yeah... Texas. That's what I said. I still can't believe I was there. I went with a group of 13 college age adults from Wayne and Holmes County. We drove through 4 states (Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Texas). I had never been to any of these states, so my eyes were fixed out the window for a good part of the trip. We left on Thursday morning at 7, and then drove for the next 23 hours... not getting into Waco, Texas until 7 the following day. (There is a time change). The reason we went to the Lone Star State was for a missions conference called World Mandate. The mission for the conference was pretty simple... Let Your Kingdom Come.

I have never been so filled with joy, then I was the last 3 days. Gathered with 4000 of my brothers and sisters in Christ, we jubilantly declared that His Kingdom Will Come. There were hundreds of stories of faith that were told, mostly by a man named Jim Yost, who has lived in Papua New Guinnea for the last 30 years of his life living out the gospel and proclaiming the name of Jesus Christ.

I was reminded of the goodness of God, and how in His love, he has set me free and taken of the chains that have held me down for so long. For a lot of my life I have believed the lies of Satan. Satan often tells me I am a loser and I am not worth anything. He tells me that no one likes me and no one wants to be around me. For the last 8 years of my life, I have struggled with self identity and self worth. I would walk into a room and be so afraid of what people think of me. Jesus Christ released me from that this weekend. He told me my name. He told me that I am Joshua and I am a Son of the Most High God.

God deeply cares about humanity and desperately wants to give us life... so much, that He did. He sent Jesus. In Hebrews, it says Jesus is the exact representation of of God. Essentially that means that if God were to become human... (which he did) Jesus is what God would look like, (And Jesus is what God looks like in human form, because Jesus is God).

This weekend I was reminded of the simple truth that we all have learned in sunday school... that Jesus loves me.
He loves me. Me.

As I sit on this comfy couch at New Grounds Cafe in Sugarcreek, I can not help but rejoice that Jesus loves me.




More to come from my memories of Texas


Be Encouraged that you are loved by the King


JN