Sleepless in Chicago... and then IN, KY,TN, and FL, until I arrive!

Yipe. Very sleep deprived and rambly.

I should be driving, I'll try to be brief- 5 minutes.

Brief list of updates:

1. I went to Northern Ireland this summer, and Lord willing, hope to live there after I graduate in 2012.

2. I'm going to be a Sophomore nursing student at PCC.

3. I'm still in need of a Saviour, and Jesus has become more real to me than ever this past year since December at Christmas conference. I could give countless examples of sin and how He's used things, my life I live as a forgiven failure, trusting in Jesus for the forgiveness of my sin. And I oftentimes fail at remembering I'm forgiven. "I'm more sinful than I can ever imagine, and more forgiven than I'll ever dream." - Tim Keller.

4. I don't know what's ahead at PCC this year, but God has changed my heart towards it, and I'm looking forward to living day by day, being kept by an All-Powerful God.

5. I'm extremely thankful to God for the people He has placed in my life, I could name names, but I'd rather have you guess if I was talking about you or not. I was.

and here goes.

This year at school, I'm going to daily focus on God's will for my life as stated in 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 "Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."
1. Rejoice Always
2. Pray without ceasing
3. Give thanks in all circumstances

I'm incapable, but the Holy Spirit lives in me, and He IS capable. I will never not need Jesus. When I think of what my life would be like if those three things were true, it amazes me. So rather than focusing on schoolwork, I'm going to focus on these three things and get more out of doing more schoolwork than I would have.

I hope to grow in my knowledge and love for Jesus and people, and have that be contagious, by God's grace, through His strength, and for His glory. (and my joy and peace as Samuel rightly says)

Something that I'm going to take with me from my talk with Emma today is honesty. Admitting my sinfulness and my need for Jesus in a humble way- because He already knows everything anyway. I'm not going to surprise Him with my sinful heart, motives, or my need for Him, or my looking to myself and most other options before I consider going to Him.

Ephesians 3:20 "Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Rejoicing in Hope,
-Scotty

I'll also say this. I just spent 20 minutes "editing" this so that people would think better of me. "They'll think, "He's too proud, he always...,he never..., hypocrite, foolish, etc" and such was just going through my head. I seek people's love more than Jesus' oftentimes. Scotty, stop focusing on yourself. Focus on Jesus, and others. JOY- Jesus, Others, scottY/YEOOOOO. Usually it's easier for me to see others' sin, especially the fear of man. I used to think this meant thinking less of myself, or false humility stuff, but it means thinking of myself less often. Lord, save me from myself.

Friendship

In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity; I want other lights than my own to show all his facets. Now that Charles [a good friend to Lewis and Tolkien] is dead, I shall never again see Ronald’s [Tolkien] reaction to a specifically Charles joke. For from having more of Ronald, having him “to myself” now that Charles is away, I have less of Ronald… In this, Friendship exhibits a glorious “nearness by resemblance” to heaven itself where the very multitude of the blessed (which no man can number) increases the fruition which each of us has of God. For every soul, seeing Him in her own way, doubtless communicates that unique vision to all the rest. (from CS Lewis’ essay entitled “Friendship.”)

I read this in Tim Keller's The Prodigal God. Spending time with friends and friends last night was amazing. It's funny, even animals can bring out things in people that wouldn't be as clear without them. My one regret last night was not coming together in prayer. At all. I love praying with friends. I love hearing hearts talk to our Heavenly Father. I don't like praying aloud because I'm so aware of the people in the room, perhaps almost always more aware of them than God, whom I'm trying to talk to. I was afraid of "ruining" my friend's time, and taking responsibility for that. I'm afraid of the "goody-goody" accuzation, possibly most. But I think prayer helps to set hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. I've been more hesitant to jump the gun on things that I think are good ideas, but I think it was the Holy Spirit putting that idea on my heart last night, not just me own. I'm thankful that I don't gain or lose points-there are no points for my failures, or successes as far as I know, or in a way that I could understand. I think I did rob myself and many others of joy that could have been had last night, by not doing what I ought to have done.

Prayer is one way to see God through different perspectives, like in C.S. Lewis's friendship essay. Playing fun games and chillin' is another way to see that, and I think prayer helps me get my heart right as I play Apples to Apples and eat delicious pizza. OR listen to music. I have to be careful to see the Grace in other's lives, and not just sin. I tend to see grace, and point out sin that would make the grace more evident. Which isn't helpful without that explaination at all. If Paul can say

I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in Him in all speech and all knowledge-- even as teh testimony about Christ was confirmed among you-- so that you are not lackign in any spiritual gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. - 1 Corinthians 1:4-9

I am fearful that everybody else is doing better spiritually than I am, and so don't want to bring up anything, because I'll feel ashamed. But aren't I supposed to walk in the light? Now I have guys to talk to about deep struggles. There are some girls who I can share things with that I wouldn't just share with everybody, but I think there are things that I should be sharing with during random parties for - my daily struggle to love Jesus as my treasure. By God's grace I'm going to work on this, but I'm still going to try to do it in a wiser way, which usually means I need to close my mouth more often, and listen more, while keeping in mind things above.

I just read in Spiritual Depression by David Martyn Lloyd-Jones this morning that he loves the Disciples, because they mess up again and again, and he can relate to that. I am amening that. I'm noticing a quite similarity with the Israelites too as I read the old testament.

Fighting for joy in Jesus,
Scotty

when we "mulch it"

Illustrations and analogies are helpful for me in both understanding and remembering things. I don't really care that all analogies break down, because that's not the point of them. Matt Reagan gave an illustration of the Christian life.

How to eat sunflower seeds. (from the back of my patriot's choice sunflower seeds)
"Pop one in your mouth, crack the shell with your teeth, eat the kernel inside and spit out the shell. Got it?...Now, be a Pro! Pop a handful of seeds in your mouth and store in one cheek, transfer a seed over to the other side with your tongue, crack open, eat the kernel and spit out the shell. Repeat until your mouth is empty."

"To try really hard is NOT Christianity. It's every other religion, but not Christianity."
We say, try harder. We should say, "let it go." Quit trying. It's an endless battle, that has been won. But I need to learn to accept that.

I blew it.
He did it.
Accept it.

Matt Reagan was talking about how hard it is for him to eat seeds (a specific time, pretty sure in general though). He starts out fine, but he'll get distracted and eventually and inevitably "mulch it", not separate the seed from the shell, but chomp the whole thing at once, if you've ever eaten sunflower seeds, you know what he's talking about. Once you have the debris from that one, it's hard to continue with the rest. The point is not whether we mulch it or not. Jesus already did it perfectly! (yes, I think in this illustration, it is eating sunflower seeds perfectly... oh well).

My self-righteousness is always creeping, and constantly with me. It will be for the rest of my life, and is a sin that I will constantly need to confess and then repent for the rest of my life! Daunting? honestly, yeah. BUT it shouldn't be. When I commit a sin, I nearly? always commit another sin of self-righteousness. Probably always, to varying degrees. Did Jesus die for all my sin? past? present? future? yes! yes!! Well, this is a life-long learning process. Now what do I do with that? Sin that grace may abound? May it never be!


I don't know if this is true, but I think it probably is. I'll never be more or less sinful than I am right now. I thank God that I haven't committed some sins that bear with them consequences, like murder and drugs and rape and things, BUT I have the wickedness in me to do those things. Tim Keller also mentioned in his sermon this illustration: In Silence of the Lambs, the book, not the movie.
Officer Starling asks Hannibal Lector, "What must have happened to you to make you such a twisted person?"
"Why nothing happened to me, Officer Starling. I happened. You can't reduce me to a set of influences. Why, you've given up good and evil for behaviorism, Officer Starling. You've got everybody in moral dignity pants, nothing is ever anybody's fault. Look at me, Officer Starling. Can you stand to say I'm evil?" He nails her. He knows he makes her wonder- Am I like that? She doesn't want to admit she's not basically good.

The more we grow as Christians, the more we should realize our sinfulness. You ask Hitler if he was a bad man? He'd probably have said no. Ask the same question to Abraham Lincoln, and he probably would have responded "yes". Also, along with that, the more we grow as Christians, the more we see God's Glory. Andrew Knight gave this "Pac-man diagram" and it was so helpful for me. The point is that as we grow as Christians, we see God more clearly, and ourselves more clearly. He's greater and we're worse than we can ever imagine. That means that Jesus needs to become bigger in our lives. Paul didn't think he was good at the end of his life. He called himself the "chief of sinners". He understood his sinful inner being. And he understood how short he fell of the perfection demanded of him. And he understood that Jesus did it for him.





An accepted failure,
-Scotty

Mr. Walsh sent me a sermon by Tim Keller titled: "War Between Your Selves" on Romans 7 that is full of truth, and my last post was a song from the musical version of Jekyll Hyde.

"So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin

Romans 7:21-25

"All of a life is a battle between two selves. But there's a different war before when you meet Christ, and after you meet Christ. The war before you meet Christ you cannot win; the war after you meet Christ you cannot lose... you're going to be in one of them"

"In the 10th commandment, you get a definition of sin. You see what all the other commandments are getting at: coveting."

Covetousness: not just wanting something. To inordinately want something. It's wanting anything more than God. Saying that there's something besides God, His love, and His salvation that I've got to have as a requirement for being happy. That's coveting and the essence of sin. It's the essence of what's wrong with the world, with you with me.

Coveting is not wanting it, but HAVING to have it. Paul coveted morality when he was Saul.

Religiousness is covetousness, and bringing us away from Jesus, not closer.

Tim Keller has the ability to put profound things simply, without losing their force, it's really incredible.

Dependent upon Christ,
-Scotty