I know quite a few of my brothers and sisters who have read The Shack and loved it. Those of you whom I have spoken with know of my feelings of its liberal and flexible portrayal of the Trinity. I would suggest to read this review from The Resurgence and look at the book again with a more critical eye…
http://theresurgence.com/the_shack_book_review
You all know I love ya.
Gabe
A Letter to the Youth and Young Adult Leaders…
Dearest friends,
I wanted to let you know how encouraged I am to your choice to step out and volunteer your heart and time for a generation that is, what I believe, touching God’s heart with their cries for a God, Teacher, Spiritual Leader that will give them the answers to their purpose and destiny. The culture of this world is offering false hope and a wide path that leads away from the God we love and serve and the young adults and youth are falling for the promises of a culture that cannot provide what the Great Creator God can offer.
The Lord has appointed His leaders to come and preach the message of Jesus to this generation and to lead us in reaching out to a culture in love and acceptance. They will lead us to the Father to draw from the everlasting streams of living water. This is a huge call that a lover of God would not take lightly. I want to encourage you as leaders to keep your respective ministry leaders in your prayers. God wants all the heavens and earth to know where his heart is focused. If God has fixed His gaze upon the youth and young adults, I believe the enemy has as well. This will indeed bring about attacks from the enemy to make strategic plans of attack and that puts the youth and young adult pastors as the choice of focus of these attacks.
I want to encourage you to be intentionally prayerful for your pastors. Praying for more revelation of Jesus in their lives, praying for clarity of understanding, vocalizing and living the message that God has imparted, praying for the Father to provide the pastors with quality time to spend with their families and to bless those moments together, pray for the pastors to lead you in a godly way and be an example of God’s leadership, pray for their relationships with parents and schools. The list can go on and on and I would encourage you to ask the Lord for creative ways to pray for the pastors and each other.
Just as the Lord has opened His heart to us on the Cross, He is calling us to reciprocate that action and make ourselves vulnerable to Him and to pick up our crosses daily and pray for the very reality of heaven to manifest in the in the lives of the youth and young adult of Whatcom County. As you pray for your leaders I will be praying the same for you. Let us be united in purpose through the power of the Holy Spirit and cry out to God the praise He so rightly deserves.
Your brother in the Lord,
Gabe Gallegos
Names…
Beloved,
I am essentially writing this as an overview for the guys in my small group, but I decided to go public with what we are discussing because I have found it to be incredibly important and uplifting to me. I have a desire to see this present generation fall in love with their true God and friend and embark on the journey of life in the relationship that was intended. I would love for the testimony of Jesus to be revealed to this generation in such a tangible and illuminating way. You have a slight idea of where my heart is, so here we go. Just a reminder, this is a follow up to my small group. So there may be some references to conversation that happened in group. Please keep that in mind.
The Glory of the Name/ The Name of Glory
Let’s go back to the time of reflection of the passages we read (Isaiah 6:1-6, Acts 9:1-19a and Rev 1:1-20) and picture those scenes in our minds. We have Isaiah who came before the Lord and cried out ‘I am undone (ruined, lost, depending on the translation you are reading)’, Saul, now Paul, who got knocked off his horse and blinded and John the Revelator who fell ‘as though dead’. Three very different reactions to the same God, but a very important ingredient for this recipe is God and his glory.
Our next step was to Exodus 33:18 to Moses asking God to show him his glory. The Lord then has an interesting response to that request. He explained that he will have all his goodness pass before him and proclaim his name to Moses (he was of course hidden in the rock, God placed his hand on him to protect Moses and Moses only got to see the back of God or Moses would die, crazy!). This awesome thing God did and what happened? Moses face shown with the glory of God and had to have his face covered up because it was too much for people. How cool is that!?! This brings us to the fourth encounter with God’s glory that we discussed. It was the same glory that knocked Paul of his horse, Isaiah cry in repentance and John to fall in such a lifeless way. Interesting…
The glory of God has been described as the sum total of all the characteristics and attributes of God that allow God to be God. Also, the weight of the combined attributes of God. That to me is incredible. It was that very glory that linked those four stories together. So Moses says ‘show me your glory’ and God responds with proclaiming His name. We can only conclude that God’s glory is expressed in His name. As we learn about the names of God, we are encountering the very glory that knocked a madman off his high horse and redeemed him. We are encountering a glory that can transform us also. So as we open our hearts to the scriptures, we are going to have the Lord proclaim His name to us through the Word and transform us and the radiance of His glory to rest on us.
If there is one thing I have learned is that a lot of the young adults and young professionals are on a quest to find their identity and esteem that quest, a lot. I, personally, believe that the identity of God and who people are in God to be the most important things. By learning about the names of glory we learn about whom God is and how we live out His name and how He provides us with security through His name.
In my narrow view
Protect me and transform me
Show me your glory
First and foremost, RELAX!!! This isn’t a post telling you to throw away your non-Christian music or scrapbooks, tear your football jersey or books, or even hang up your Star Trek uniforms and hang your light saber up for good. Although, since I don’t get scrapbooking or the draw to Star Trek like my good friend _ustin _choonover (I was careful to hide the identity of my friend as not to draw any undesirable attention to him), I’m going to say these are idolatry and need to be taken to the Lord immediately. I kid.
The day started off very well. I had an opportunity to sleep in until 8am. This may not seem like a big deal to you, but we can talk about small victories some other time. This is about idolatry. So, I picked up my bible first thing in the morning (small victory) and started to read. As I was reading, the Lord brought to my attention a passage that I had to look into a little bit more. This particular passage is in Romans…
Romans 1:18-23 (ESV)
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.
21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools,
23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
This passage is about ungodly and unrighteous people. Sinners. Well, Christians are sinners too. We may have a relationship with the triune God, thanks to Jesus, but we are sinners that are affected by sin daily. A lot like the people that are mentioned in the verse. I understand that we recognize what God has done for us, worship Him and have given up our days of praying to engraved statues of birds, animals and Beverly Hills 90210, but we are not exempt from the sin of idolatry. Idolatry may not be able to rob you of your relationship with God, but it can steal some of the affection you have for Him and displace it somewhere else. This particular sin has an opportunity to rob of us time with God, rob us of other things such as clarity, drive, passion, purity, friendships, boyfriends or girlfriends. The list goes on. If we are not exempt, then what does this look like to the Christian? These are the questions we can’t be scared to ask ourselves.
Idolatry is anything that you would worship or esteem over God. I would imagine that the fruit of this particular sin would be similar to that of the unbeliever, yet distinctly different. Suppression of truth, blindness to godly reality, lack of respect and selfishness, hardened hearts would all manifest in ugliness, even in the Christian. Have you ever been in a friendship where there was some discord between the two of you? Was that rift caused from disappointment or missed expectations? Have you avoided people because they are different than you? Have you not spent time with people because they don’t appear as smart as you? Do you make time for Top Chef more than you pray to God? Are you more focused on Seahawk stats during football season, than the condition of your friends’ relationships with God? I have had to answer yes to these questions. I have wrestled with my ignoring there to be a problem in a lot of situations. I have personally , refused to see my place in helping to fix these things all the while disrespecting brothers and sisters in the Lord and being too stubborn to do make any steps forward. This is my history. What I do to them, I do to God.
This is about priorities and being good stewards of the gifts and blessings God gives us. Like knowledge, understanding, friendships, boyfriends, time, girlfriends, ability to sing, wisdom, Seahawks, etc. So what is truly important is to have a self check. Be prayerful to God and approach Him with a humble heart and ask Him to reveal anything that may be taking precedence over Him. Since you are approaching Him with a humble heart (He opposed the proud), He is approaching you with grace. If you are found with fault, be penitent and vulnerable to Him because He is trustworthy. Realize this is a process that may take some time and don’t be discouraged if things aren’t magically fixed. Killing idols is the beginning, keeping them dead is part of the process of change we go through. So be blessed because He who loves you, loves you greatly and deeply.
See aforementioned title and thank you for stopping by. I have no idea as to what this blog will be composed of or contained within its borders, but I hope it is something for you. Thank you.
Gabe
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