Posts by: Aruced

Spiritually Homeless

I am appreciative of what God has been doing in my life, and I love every thing He has been changing in me, but lately, I have not been active on Walking Christian nor have I been active on my Youtube channel. My friends, I cannot begin to fathom where my life is heading into because I’m hindered and broken so much even though I have been holding on to Jesus.

Everyday, my relationship with my parents weakens and I always thought that being with God and following His Word is going to help me bridge the gap we always had for many years. I thought going to school was going to make them smile at me for once. I thought the new pastor of the church they are going to will help them improve their relationship with God. Now, I realize there’s no point into all of this. I am stressed, and I am already on the brink of discontinuing school. Even though, 2013 is the last year I have for school, I feel as if my time in college has been useless. I have been extremely lonely, and I’ve been denying my depression. I want time alone with God, but living in the house I am sleeping in is no longer considered to be my home. All these years, I should have known that God has already shown me that my connection with my family has been destroyed.

I feel homeless. Spiritually.

I cannot post anything on Walking Christian because I am such a horrible example of what Christian Living should be. I feel that I lost my credibility ever since I fell into this hole that has been created. My life has turned upside down since the beginning of 2012, and I have been contemplating suicide.

I don’t know what to do at all. I was looking forward to continuing Aruced and the Christian Gaming Community in Walking Christian, but the Lord has been saying no to me on everything now, and He wants me to do something that I doubt myself in.

My friends, my brothers, sisters, and spiritual family: This is the last post I will write. Until then, good bye everyone. Sorry that I have let a l0t of you down. I need time to think for myself.

A Lack of Godly Attributes: Love

You may have heard or read 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 and already started to see it as the true definition of love. A pastor, priest, or a teacher either used this verse in a wedding or in a classroom. You may have encountered this verse using a google search for love topics because you wanted to know what does the Word of God have to say about this particular word, not that it’s actually a bad thing to do. What I really wanted to do was display this verse in a new perspective.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 is not just the definition of love. It’s a verse to show what we lack as individuals, especially for any believer.

I want you to look at this verse very closely.

 

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 

Let’s replace the word, Love, into first person perspective. For example: I am patient, I am kind.

If we do use the verse in this way, we can already ask ourselves what are we lacking.

Paul wrote this, and he did not just throw this passage in his letter to the Corinthians just to define love. I believe that he could have wrote this in this specific order. Why did it start off with patience, and kindness? Why did he include envy, pride, or selfishness? I hope that this post can be lined up with the Word, and also reveal as to why this verse is so crucial to living as believers.

 

Patience and kindness

The first thing I thought of was patience was one of the first things we lack in when we were infants. Impatience creates worrisome thoughts, inflexibility, and also tantrums. Lacking impatience can adjust individuals to an attitude of cruelty. Having such an attitude can hurt others around us without having to stop and think. Patience teaches us to be harmless to ourselves and kindness teaches us to be harmless to others. If we are living impatiently and cruel to others, it leads into the next problems we also have.

Envy, Boasting, and Pride

Three of these words do belong in the same sentence. Being envious to people shows how we are unsatisfied with ourselves, and how much appreciation we don’t give to God. God gifts us with many blessings, and being envious is a contradiction to that. Boasting also comes from being envious. We don’t have to have the same things the other person has. We can simply ignore the other person and say that you don’t need the things the other person has, even if he was willing to give his things to you. Boasting about ourselves can build up intense levels of not needing anything, including help which leads to pride. Pride puts us in a position and making ourselves a status that we live by, in terms of man-made institutions, instead of being proud of being in God’s family. If we have pride in the things we make of for ourselves, we also push away God, not needing of His gifts, His mercy, and His loving grace.

Dishonor, Selfishness, Anger, and Blame (Wrongs)

If we do continue to prideful, we also learn to dishonor others. When we encounter others and they seek help, or anything related to helping them, we either send them away with comments such as, “Stop being lazy, and help yourself.” If we try to ask the same person or others who we have dishonored, would it be safe to say that’s really selfish of us to do that to them? How about when they reject our requests? We become frustrated with them and become angry. What about if they do accept to help us, but they did not help us in the way we want them to? Sure, it may be less frustrating, but it can lead us to anger. We start to blame them when we are supposed to be in the wrong. It’s so easy to blame others for our mistakes, and our lives, yet we put ourselves in the wrong when we call ourselves Christians while we live in a lifestyle that doesn’t align with the truth.

Rejoicing in the Truth, not in Evil

If we cannot stop to see the contradictions we have exhibited to others, we tend to believe that we are being right, doing good, sin does not exist in ourselves, or walking on a blameless path. Truly, we are lying to ourselves if we believe such things. We will end up like the ones before in the kingdom who were sent to an eternal prison, created by God, for living in the darkness that God wants us to leave behind.

Protection, Trust, Hope, and Preservation

When we delight in evil, we are not protected against anything we have just gone over, and against the forces of evil. When friends, family, or anyone do not live up the standards we create for others, and ourselves we start to lose trust in them. When God does not answer our prayers, we lose trust in God. We also start to lose hope in our Father, ourselves, and then for the future that God has in store for us, which then leads us to no longer striving to preserve God and His Word, His gifts, His church, and His Love for us through Jesus Christ.

 

I believe this topic is so important because it really shows how much we truly needed God’s Word to help us with our flawed lives. All these things that we tend to corrupt with our sins makes us stray from God. If Jesus had not come down, if Paul didn’t write this wonderful passage of what True Love, we are all condemned for eternal banishment, burning in our own fire, and the worst of all punishments, separation from God. I believe it really had to be in this order because if we do not start to learn patience, we will be impatient to learning all the other things that Love exhibits. Therefore, this is why this is one of the most important verses to learn about, and it’s not just a one time read through. I recently found this out when I was speaking to two students with this verse and immediately, the Spirit helped me see more of this verse’s treasures. Humbly, I’m glad to seek the truths of God’s love and the means for all of us so that I may share with all of you who are growing in the Faith.

 

See Video for Michael’s Personal Application

Deep into the Greatest Commandment

A Topic in Christian Living and Reflection

Connecting and getting to know God, our Father, gives such a great amount of joy in a daily Christian life. Serving Him rewards us with comfort and great desire for Him. Although, we can point out so many things about glorifying Him, even God says it’s not enough. One might point to a fact that human beings cannot glorify God like Jesus can, but the real argument I want to clear up on is, “If serving, glorifying, praising, worshipping God is not enough, what must we also do while we live in flesh?”

If we have a relationship with God, should we also have a relationship with others as well?

The answer is yes, and I have several passages from the Word of God we can all look to.

One of the Pharisees in his time asked our Lord a question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” (Matthew 22:36)

Jesus replied with three answers in Matthew 22:37-40.

1)    Love the Lord with all of your heart, your soul, and your mind. (37)

2)    Love your neighbor as much as yourself. (39)

3)    All the Law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.

Why did Jesus say these things, first of all?

From what I was taught from several ministries, the Pharisees, Jewish leaders, and the people around Jesus, first of all, did not have an authentic relationship with God.

Jesus called God his Father. In John 5:16-18 shows that the Jewish leaders wanted to kill Jesus for calling God his very own father because he was making himself equal with God. The case was actually about showing the position they were in. The people only called God THE Father, instead of calling God THEIR Father. Jesus previously spoke to a Samaritan woman about true worshippers of God. True worshippers of God worship in Spirit and in truth. (John 4:21-24)

This supports answer one from the main question. We must worship God with Spirit and in truth. The Spirit is our heart, and our soul. The truth is our mind that aligns with the Word of God.

Going back into John 5, there was a pool called Bethesda where so many of the sick and disabled lay. There was one specific man who has been disabled for 38 years. He was then cured by Jesus and was told to pick up his mat and walk. This was happening on a Sabbath, and the Jewish leaders saw this man carrying his mat. I’m not sure if they knew before that he was disabled, but the first thing that caught them is his mat instead of his past condition. Before the healing occurred, the man said this after Jesus asked him if he wanted to get well.

“I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.” (John 5:7)

This caught my attention about the relationships that people were having with others around that time. Before I get into this part, carrying your mat on a Sabbath day was viewed as working on the Lord’s Day, referencing back to the 4th Commandment of His Law to only rest on the Sabbath. Carrying your mat was actually a man made Jewish Law that has nothing to do with work. Jesus telling the paralytic to carry his mat and walk during a Sabbath Day was done intentionally to get their attention so he can tell the leaders of his relationship with God by the way. John 5:41 and 43 is remarkable:

1)    I do not accept glory from human beings.

2)    I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me; but if someone else comes in his own name, you will accept him.

This supports answer two of my main question. We are like them, and maybe usually, we pick and choose others, tending to leave others behind who don’t seem ‘worthy’. Jesus commanded to love others as much as we love ourselves, not love only the ones we are acceptable in society.

When Jesus said that the Law and the prophets hold on to these two commandments, he was stating it as a fact, not an suggestion, opinion, or interpretation. I will be using Hosea as an example: Hosea is a prophet who was commanded by God to love his unfaithful wife Gomer. Unfaithful as in she was a prostitute. God was giving one of the greatest examples about what true love is through Hosea’s harsh life. The gist of the Prophet Hosea is found in chapter 3 verse 1.

“Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another man and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes,” the Lord said to Hosea.

This passage shows that prophet Hosea was holding on to God, and also to Gomer. He loved God with all of his heart, his soul, and his mind. He loved Gomer, even though she was not like Hosea, or anybody that Hosea would find acceptable, tolerable, etc. He held on to these two commandments, thus proving Jesus right. This passage really hit me so much, and because of Hosea’s gospel, I was saved through those words, seeing God’s love for me, for you, and for all of us. This supports not just answer three, but all 3 answers of the main question, and hits it home.

Now, that we understand that, how about we look into our relationship with God, and many others in our life? We are going to emphasize the relationships with others more actually. The reason is that our relationships with others can be extremely difficult for all of us, and I’m not just talking about our relationships with our family, or our own friends. I want to use the teaching that Jesus gave to the Samaritan woman which is “Spirit and in truth.” I learned this great lesson from a great teacher by differentiating these two things.

1)    Worshipping God only in Spirit is considered idolatry. (Samaritan example)

2)    Worshipping God only in truth is considered hypocrisy. (Pharisee example)

3)    Worshipping God in Spirit and in truth is a must. (John 4:24)

I wanted to go deeper with that example, except that we will not worship others because it is not good to do so anyway. This is an amazing discovery by going deeper into this teaching of Jesus. I realized that by taking this lesson from our Lord, I wondered about my relationship with others recently.

I loved my friends and family without having to know much about them. I use to defend them, care for them, and even give to them by only by a little knowledge of their life. I was giving them praise, blindly because they just seemed to be so good in life. Wouldn’t that be considered idolizing your own friends? Did I just make them into heroes, or even gods?

I had friends who I knew most of their life. Some may consider them that I was their best friend because I knew so much about them. Yet, even though, with all the knowledge I have about them, I also had no compassion towards them, and still, they were considered my ‘friends’. Didn’t I just tell you that I was being hypocritical? Was I lying to them the whole time?

Without those two things, our relationships with others are futile because it shows that we are not truly reflecting in God’s standards for our daily living, and also, not following the greatest commandment given to us.

Obsession vs. Reflection

A Topic in Love and Relationships

 

Remember the first time you came across a person and develop sudden interests in them? You probably became friends after or it took some time to get to that point. Ever thought of them so much that you couldn’t stop your heart from beating too fast, or kept your eyes away from them? Somehow, your friends have come to an interest about your life in love. Some may support it; others could not. Did you come across a comment that told you were obsessed? How about such phrases from others? For example: “You’re a creep!” but inside, you either knew that for a fact, or it was something you knew that most people would never understand. The world we live in today easily mistakes those feelings and thoughts for obsession.

Most people who use the word “obsessed” do not truly know what the word exactly means. In the dictionary, the meaning tells that obsession is domination of the person’s thoughts through persistence in idea, images, etc. That’s the correct term in a general sense, but what are the things from obsession we can distinguish by using the term in dating and relationships? Let’s slowly brainstorm the things we came across and learned. Characteristics of obsession can be the person’s mind is constantly thinking of that other person. Now, it’s okay to think about that person, but to be constantly thinking of that person in a twenty-four hour day and more than one-fourths of it have been spent on that thought can lead to such an area that can be very dangerous to health, and more importantly, faith. Such strong thoughts can lead to areas we should not tread on. It can lead to praising the thought, and can lead to praising the person, or worshipping. That would be called idolization, which is much worse than obsession.

Reflection is a term that most people ignore. Reflection is not in a sense where you look in the mirror and you see yourself. This is more of a spiritual way of using reflection in this discussion, especially in dating and relationships. Reflection is mirroring the characteristics of a certain object, or abstract images. In this sense, the reflection I want to go over is reflecting upon the characteristics of Christ.

What does Christ have that we really want to mirror? Philippians 2:1-8 has a great list of examples of who Christ is. Starting from verse 5, Paul, the author of Philippians, tells us a great command to be like our Lord and Savior before giving us his beautiful attributes.

1)    Christ did not make himself equal to his Father, even though he is God as well.

2)     He also took the nature of a servant instead of being a king on earth to be praised highly.

3)    He was also obedient to death, carrying out the will of God, and still, had no desire on earth to be glorified like God, the Father.

 

If we go back to verse 1, Paul tells us a loving command to become sensitive, compassionate, being like-minded, being one in Spirit and of one mind with our friends, family, and even with the one we care for and love. Reflect on these traits. Meditate on these verses.

Personally, there’s a special person in my life who I am not conversing with at the moment because of some troubles we had together, but I was hurt when we had to be away from each other. It’s been more than a month and I wanted to move on but God confronted me that I have been reflecting on wrong characteristics, such as moving on too quickly. If I had done so, I would’ve done the opposite that Christ has done for us. I would be not sensitive to others, not concerned, uncompassionate, and being separate from God. Because of that conviction, I will reflect on those characteristics towards her. At the same time, you could also be walking into an area where you can have thoughts of the other, even in worries, we can stumble by being too thoughtful of the other person, or dwelling in the past and not having faith in Christ that he will lift these burdens away from us. We will be making our thoughts direct our lives when it should be God, our loving Father, to pull us out of the troubles we have caused. I began to think about what was wrong in my friendship with her and I realized that I was obsessed with the thought of her, filling the spot of being my spouse so that I can no longer feel lonely. I do wish that I could go back and fix that mistake, and I do know that most people really do as well, but without those convictions, I wouldn’t see my need to be just like Christ. So I learned to accept the fact that she and I are not communing because my character will not reflect Jesus, but reflect on wickedness and selfishness. I am glad that God has given me chances everyday to turn away from such things and instead, striving towards to be more like Christ in such a loving way.

Whenever you feel discouraged about the other person on how they think of you, ask yourself this question: Are you reflecting on the traits of Christ? Or are you being obsessive of the thoughts you create in your life about that person?

The best answer we all hope for is the person is seeing Christ is the center of your life, and they want to grow in the relationship with Christ as well.

If that answer is that you are not reflecting on those traits, but the other is willing to be interested in Christ, then ask yourself if it is right to pursue this person?

The worst answer we would have is the person is seeing Christ in you, and wants you to not love him.

What about the person who has Christ but they aren’t interested in you? Pray for wisdom, and encouragement in an area you have in need of help in.

Remember: We’re still in human flesh, and we won’t achieve all of Christ’s characteristics but striving for his perfection to govern our lives is what He most desires.

 

 

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