Blog – Page 6

Don’t Tell Me That

Updated: January 17, 2017

Recently I overheard someone say something like this, “you know when you falsely praise someone to boost their self esteem…”

I about wanted to puke when I heard this. Falsely praising someone? Why on earth would someone want to do that?

I suppose the meaning behind propping someone up is to make them feel better about themselves, but what if what you are telling them is a lie?

Proverbs 28:23 He who rebukes a man will afterward find more favor Than he who flatters with the tongue.

Proverbs 29:5 A man who flatters his neighbor Is spreading a net for his steps.

Let’s call false praise exactly what it is: flattery. The Bible warns us multiple times about flattery! Much of the Psalms and throughout Proverbs and even the new testament tells us to beware of flattery, lying lips, etc!

If we think about what we are doing when we tell someone that isn’t exactly true, it’s setting the person up for failure in a big way. A few years ago there was a show on the WB called Superstar USA. This show spoofed a much more well known show, and evidently tricked several contestants into believing they were great singers, when in fact they were looking for the worst singers in America. They lied to the contestants, the audience so they would cheer them on, and to most of America. The woman who won, had no idea that she was considered the worst singer in America until she won and received money to pursue a recording deal, which she never made. Would you if you were told you were wonderful but it turned out to be a lie?

I cannot help but think if some of these severely untrained singers who were contestants on the show were told by family members who loved them dearly and didn’t want them to experience hurt or pain of any kind that they were the most wonderful singers and were as good or not better than some famous singers.

If you tell someone they are really good or great at something, when they are not, or do not have a talent for it, you are setting a trap for them to walk right into.

Sure, this example is in the extreme, or is it? We live in a culture in America where we want to tell people things without hurting their feelings, where there’s no room for growth, just be good at something and it will be enough. Or is it?

Being a songwriter and singer, it has been excruciating to find people who sincerely want to tell you the truth.

For every one person who will tell you that you need to improve in your art in order for it to be viable, there are literally thousands and thousands who will tell you that you are ready now. That it doesn’t matter, write what you feel, sing how you sing, art is all subjective anyway, market yourself and you will find your audience.

If we told our teachers, hey, teach what you feel is right, 3+3 could be 73 or 12, it doesn’t matter if it’s right, it’s all subjective anyway, you’ll find your students, we’d have a nation full of students who knew everything and absolutely nothing.

The arts are a discipline as much as writing, math, science, and social studies. Someone may have a natural talent towards being really good at that thing, but it takes time and learning to craft and hone that skill. Art is a discipline full of skills and tools that people learn to create something that makes sense.

Early on, I had someone tell me my songwriting was great and then I went to make an album which was a blast, and I started submitting my recorded music and I found that what I had been told wasn’t true. My songwriting was good, but it wasn’t good enough. It was a great start, but it wasn’t where it needed to be in order to record. I learned the hard way. I had people who told me what I wanted to hear, instead of someone taking the time and saying, hey, you still need to improve on this.

I’ve learned to hold certain people’s opinions in check, because there is no guarantee that the person I’ve asked for their opinion has my best interests at heart. I give honest feedback because I want honest feedback. My opinions may be harsh, may seem to be nitpicky at times, because I want the best for the people who are asking, and sometimes I give without someone asking, but I’ve been working on not giving out so much of what I’ve learned to people who don’t want it.

Since then, I’ve been my own worst critic. I ask my husband to be harsh and not hold back any criticism, because I want to grow, I want to be good, I want to write great things for the kingdom of God and I want what I create to matter in people’s lives. That means a lot of the time, I create, I share with people I trust to tell me an honest opinion and if it still needs work, I go back and work on it, or start a new project and work on it until I find that the project has either served it’s purpose, or get it ready to share with others. Now my husband knows my heart and has experience in music and art on a professional level, and when he’s honest, I take it to heart. I do have problems accepting when he truly likes a song I’ve written, because I crave the criticism. I want to work on it.

So when I heard the idea of ‘falsely praising’ someone, it literally made me want to gag. This is what I’ve spent my entire career as an artist trying to avoid and to hear someone state that they knowingly do this to people, just really made me a little angry.

On the flip side of this coin, I am aware of the art teacher that told some student to never draw or paint again. There are several famous singers who have great careers who were told they couldn’t sing by their teachers. Or the science teacher that discouraged girls from participating and learning science. Talent is not born. I used to think it was, but I believe that natural aptitude towards a discipline is a God given ability that with learning skills and technique a person can develop into a person who is great at that ability. This is what we call ‘shows promise’ and ‘talent.’ However, if a person spends a great deal of time honing a skill, because they are interested in it, even the less naturally inclined can become quite good and possibly great at any skill.

If someone shows interest, encourage the interest, but be realistic with where they are at in their development. If someone is a budding songwriter, and they need help with lyric writing, point them in the direction of Jason Blume. If they’ve been at writing for a while, point them in the direction of Pat Pattison. If they are interested in pottery, have them take a class at a local studio, don’t just buy them a wheel for the house. If they are interested in science, encourage learning about whatever scientific discipline by taking a class at a local university or community college. But by no means should someone tell another person, YES GO FORTH AND MAKE MUSIC YOU ARE FANTASTIC AND AMAZING AND THE BEST I’VE EVER HEARD! Unless it’s truth. We do not need a legion of Florence Foster Jenkins. However, if someone loves singing, encourage the singing, even if they are bad at it, but let them know in a kind way that there is nothing wrong with singing to make your heart happy, just that singing on a stage might possibly not be a destination for them.

The idea is that there is always more to learn. No one person can be the best wherever they are, there is always room for improvement.

If we follow what Proverbs says, then we should be ready with a fair assessment instead of flattery. Encourage with fair assessment, criticize fairly over inflating egos. But if it’s flattery or false praise you want to give, Don’t Tell Me That.

Failing Beautifully

by RAC

Updated: November 22, 2016

How to Fail Beautifully (Part 3 of Failure)

Once you accept that failure is part of our existence, perfection (in the sense that one is trying to be without sin or not to sin any further by your own strength), is no longer a goal. Being mature, obtaining maturity in spiritual matters is the goal, not perfection and then failing is no longer a fear.

How does one become spiritually mature in Christ?

I recently had a chat with a friend who joked that something I said wasn’t very Christian. I laughed, but I then began to think on it. In that moment, I failed to be the example that Christ wants me to be. My reaction should have been in that moment, then I need to spend more time with Jesus, instead of laughing it off.

I didn’t feel condemned, I didn’t feel ashamed that I wasn’t perfectly showing Christ, at one time I would have and then continued to do the same thing over and over magnifying my guilt, but instead I acknowledged my failure and understood the remedy for my failure.

Why is it so simple, but so difficult to do?

Because while we are young in our faith, we still assume that it is by our own strength that we overcome obstacles. We assume that by following the law, and being perfect in the law, we become blameless before God. That our own actions, in essence our own righteousness is what frees us from sin and ultimately failure. But, we know that our own righteousness is faulty, that anything we do to overcome our faults and failures, is as if we washed ourselves with the same rag over and over without being able to clean the rag. If you’ve ever washed something and used the same rag to clean, it gets so dirty that eventually all you are doing with it is pushing around dirt from one spot to another, our own righteousness is as filthy rags.

If we are saved, having believed by faith in the salvation through Jesus, then we do not need to do the works of the law. Through the law, we are dead, because we are consistently faced with our failure and no possible redemption, forced to examine our flaws. Yet through salvation by faith in Christ, we are free from condemnation, and we live by grace. We are able to fail beautifully.

Read Galatians 2:11-21

Failing beautifully is not willfully running around and carrying on like a heathen and saying “I’m saved! Don’t judge me!”

Giving yourself permission to fail is accepting the work, that your relationship with Jesus is doing in you.

By faith, entering into the relationship with Christ is what gets you saved.

By faith, we are justified before God through Jesus Christ, so that you can go chat with God at any given point.

By faith, we spend time in conversation with God, examining His character, sitting before His feet, listening to what the Holy Spirit has to say to us.

By faith, we read our Bible, meditate on the word.

Faith is not hoping we are saved, or hoping that we go to heaven.

Faith is believing that God wants to have a relationship with you and made a way through Jesus Christ.

It’s simple, but can be exceedingly difficult for some.

Believing is not easy, but it is simple. It’s making a conscious decision to wholeheartedly believe. For some it is easier than others, for others it is difficult to believe and have faith. We must have patience with those who struggle in their faith and walk with God.

This past weekend, I attended a Christian music concert. Thousands of people gathered at this event, there were speakers, performers, people from charities with booths that had information about what they were about, and people attending. 10 acts performed, several speakers talked in between acts getting on and off stage, and it was loud.

On the way into the event, one of the people in our grouped joked that the ‘Christian protesters’ might be out there. These are typical street ‘evangelists,’ they have bullhorns, large signs, and they mock and tell people they are going to hell as they walk towards their destination. We crossed the street, in no way intending to avoid these people with signs. As we passed a few, I felt moved to turn aside and chat with one of the people yelling at us that the event was pagan and woe to those who entered.

I began the conversation with scripture John 3:17 “For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.” Telling people they are condemned is not helping the lost, they already know this.

He agreed and then said that his purpose was to Christians attending the event, and that they were sinning by attending the event, and to save them from going to hell, because sinners go to hell.

I asked him if he knew that our flesh was unredeemable and even the apostle Paul spoke on this subject in Romans 7:13-25, he agreed and asked if I had studied it, which I, replied in the affirmative.

He then asked me about what then if we are crucified with Christ, not completing the passage, how this all plays into not sinning. In that moment I responded that it is not I that does any good work. For it is not my righteousness that justifies me, but through Jesus Christ. I even went further to say that if I do any good work, I cannot take credit for it, because it’s Christ within me that does it and not anything I’ve done.

I was shortly then pulled away by the group I was with to get into line for the concert, and our conversation ended.

I prayed that this man I had chatted with would enter into a deeper relationship with Christ, that he would understand that salvation is not by our doing good, but rather through faith in Jesus Christ.

I also re-read Galatians 2:11-21, reaffirming that salvation is through faith and not by the works of the law.

I was also grieved knowing that if a brother sins against us, we are to talk to them privately and confront them and restore them gently to correction in their relationship with Christ.

I will note that although I engaged this fellow believer in conversation, in the past my emotions would have taken hold and it would have been a yelling match on my end, for I am passionate about the word of God and what it says. This conversation was an aside and done in a conversational manner, and I actually found myself caring for this man and how he was approaching brothers and sisters in Christ, rather than just being right on what the word of God says.

This is approaching maturity, being patient, kind, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, love and joy.

Failing transfers into beauty when we exemplify these behaviors.

In years past, I thought I was doing good when I tried so hard in my flesh and strived to be good and do better, when all I needed to do was accept that I was failing and go enter into prayer and conversation with God. I needed to stop trying to be good and allow the goodness of God to flow from out of my relationship with God.

Scriptures to read and think on: Galatians 2:11-21, Romans 7:13-25, John 3:16-20, Galatians 5:22-25

How Can I Allow Myself to Fail IF I’m Supposed to Be Perfect?

by RAC

Updated: October 11, 2016

Matthew 5:48 “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

It’s so easy to fall into a trap of thinking that we need to be “perfect.”

We socially think of being “perfect” in a few ways:

1. Physically perfect

This is something we are bombarded with on a daily basis, especially if we pay attention to any sort of entertainment. The physical beauty. The perfect face, ideal skin tone, the perfectly sculpted abs, etc. There are creams, clothes, gadgets, and all sorts of videos and programs for you to purchase to make yourself ‘perfect.’ (For fun, read 1 Timothy 4, pay attention to verses 7 and 8.)

2. Socially perfect

This comes in as being ‘cool.’ Always having the right thing to say at the right time to the right people. Being the life of the party, the guy or girl who is always invited, never has a moment of being left out. To be desired by friends and to be popular, to be so ‘cool,’ that everyone wants to be you, because you are socially ‘perfect.’ (We are not to desire the favor of man, but of God, in so doing we win both Proverbs 3:3-4)

3. Intellectually perfect

This is all about being smarter than Einstein. To pursue knowledge and exercising the brain to the point where your intelligence is superior, to achieving perfection in smarts. Knowledge is a great thing to have, learning is important, (Proverbs 1:22, 10:14), but lording it over others is childish.

4. Spiritually perfect

This last one is perceived two ways. One, that we are ‘perfect’, we don’t sin, we never make a mistake, never offend, and make sure that we are Godly by doing ‘good works.’ In doing we are ‘perfect.’ This is typically how the church sees being ‘perfect.’ That an outward appearance of being good, doing good, abhorring anything that appears to be evil, not hanging out with the wrong crowd, etc. The second is being perfect as God is perfect.

The misconception comes from us understanding the word ‘perfect.’

First, we quote the scripture out of context. Meaning, we throw it around because it sounds good without quoting or understanding the 47 verses before it. (Matthew 5:1-47)

Perfect in Matthew 5:48 is the Greek word: τέλειος – Teleios (tel’-i-os) which is defined as perfect, (a) complete in all its parts, (b) full grown, of full age, (c) specially of the completeness of Christian character.

Further, the word has a meaning of ‘consummated goal’ and ‘mature.’ The root of the word, Tel, means reaching the end. *

*Strong’s Concordance 5046

If you read the entire chapter of Matthew 5, you get a sense and weight of what it means to be spiritually mature.

A spiritually mature person will mourn, be meek, be merciful, be pure in heart, be peacemakers, hunger and thirst for righteousness, poor in spirit, be persecuted, rejoice in persecution, will not hide their faith before others, not call others fools, or be angry with others, settle disagreements out of court, not lustfully look at men and women, will consider others before themselves, will keep their word, love their enemies, bless those who persecute them, love those who hate them, greet people who are not part of your tribe or inner circle, etc. There’s 47 verses that go into good detail about what maturity looks like, or spiritual perfection.

This is a long list for anyone to read and realize that they’ve already failed in at least one of these areas, if not daily.

It’s impossible to be ‘perfect’ in the way that we understand it as society dictates.

It’s also readily realized that no one is ‘perfect’ spiritually, however, we are drawn to be mature in spirit as God is mature.

Reading today: Matthew Chapter 5:1-48

How to Fail Like a Champ!

by RAC

Updated: October 10, 2016

It’s OK to fail.

Failing is a part of life. Everyone makes mistakes, does things they regret, and does horrible horrible things. Everyone.

Some people are better at hiding it than others.

What I want to give you today is permission to fail, and the ability to learn and move on past the failure.

Let’s start with Moses, you know, guy who parted waters, said ‘let my people go,’ wandered around in a desert for 40 years with an entire city of people? Yeah, that guy.

We don’t often think of Moses as a failure, but he was an utter complete failure. He started out his journey to freeing the people of Israel with one of the worst possible cases of failure, murder. Exodus 2:11-15

Moses was an outsider to his own people. He had grown up in Egyptian society, but still felt a strong connection to the people of Israel. In Exodus 2:11-15 we see that Moses not only felt that the Egyptians were treating his people terribly, he also felt that he could do something to ease the suffering of the Israelites because of his position. Moses’ way was to kill the Egyptian that was beating this Hebrew. Unfortunately, the Israelites didn’t feel that Moses was a ruler or a judge and possibly even really one of them, because Moses had been raised by Egyptian royalty. Since murder wasn’t really looked as a good thing, Pharoah tried to have Moses killed, but Moses fled into a different country.

Talk about major failure.

Here’s a guy who feels serious injustice is happening and tries to do it on his own terms.

That’s when epic failure happens.

How many times do we feel something we’re supposed to do or try and when we do it fails on an epic scale?

I mean, hopefully it’s not murdering people, but then again, you might be in that position.

You might even feel like Moses did, after running from Egypt.

See, later on, God approaches Moses and tells him to go and tell Pharoah to let God’s people go, that God himself will deliver and rescue them from the Egyptians, Moses just needs to deliver the message. Exodus 3:1-21

Moses protests and gives all kinds of excuses, (Exodus 4:1-17) ‘they won’t believe me’, ‘I don’t speak well’, and then asks God to send someone else. Each time God gives an answer and provision for Moses, including allowing him to have someone else speak for him.

It is possible that the thing that was really bugging Moses, was the people who were after him for his previous sin. The murder of the Egyptian.

It isn’t until after Moses agrees to go that God says in Exodus 4:19, “Go back to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you are dead.”

If we allow our failures, or even the possibility of failing to paralyze us, we create a stagnation in faith for God to work. It wasn’t Moses who parted the waters, who delivered the Israelites from Egypt, who fed them in the wilderness, God did all that. Moses just delivered messages. Sometimes, we think we have to do all the impossible work, when all we need to do is be obedient to what God is telling us to do.

God is willing to work with us despite our mistakes, failures and shortcomings. The Bible is filled with people who failed miserably, but God was able to work around and past those things. Moses, David, Peter, Thomas, Paul, Elijah, etc. Read the gospels for people who failed and then continued to fail even after following Jesus, even after His resurrection. Failure does not exclude us from fulfilling a life that we’re meant to live.

Moses didn’t have to convince the Hebrews, God did.

Moses didn’t have to convince Pharoah, God did.

Moses just delivered the messages.

All of the difficult stuff wasn’t on Moses to do, he just had to show up and be faithful and let God do the hard work.

What is it that God is telling us to do?

Is it to submit applications to places that are hiring?

Is it to be faithful in plugging away at a project you’ve been working on?

Is it just showing up and being willing to lend a hand?

Is it saying hello to that person you see everyday?

What is it that God is nudging you to do?

Reading: Exodus (the entire book) and Acts

How to Pray Prayers that Work

by RAC

Updated: October 3, 2016

Prayer is an important part of our lives as Christians, or it should be if we are not in practice of prayer. It can be difficult as a Christian if we don’t know how to pray, that we get frustrated when we don’t see our prayers get answered, or they aren’t answered the way we want them to be answered.

Many Christians I have come across spend more time in petitioning God for things and outcomes of situations rather than sitting and listening to what the Holy Spirit has to say. If you’re constantly talking and asking without spending any time listening, how will you ever receive an answer?

This connection with God is through our Creator’s spirit to ours. The first place we learn how to listen is through prayer. Jesus gave us a template to prayer and communication with God. (Matthew 6:9-13)

The first step, when we pray, is to celebrate and honor God through praise and worship.

“Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name”

By praising the name of God, celebrating who He is and who He claims to be, we are making sure that we are identifying the one true God and not calling upon some false deity.

“Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven”

In this next line, I feel is where we as Christians tend to fall short of communicating with God. In a group of Christians, when they begin to pray, they usually get that first part right, by acknowledging God and the access to our Creator through Jesus, but immediately afterwards, we start asking for things for ourselves, rather than for the kingdom of God to reign upon here on earth.

Here is where we tend to ask, instead of listening. We ask for things that we think are what God wants instead of what the will of God is. Is it here that we ask to be glorified, or for God to be glorified? Are we asking or are we listening?

Have you ever had a friend where you spend the entire time listening to their lives, their troubles, their ideas, but when it comes for your turn to speak or share, they pick up their phone, have somewhere to go, or some other response? Are we that friend to God? Do we share with God our lives and woes, but when it comes to listening to his heart, are we too busy? We tend to ask for our daily bread before we listen to the heart of God.

“Give us this day our daily bread”

This is not a request or even a demand on our part, this is a call for us to listen. Where do you know to go to get what you need, (daily bread), if you don’t listen? Have you ever had a conversation with someone where you’ve given them directions, told them how to do something, but they won’t keep their mouth shut long enough to hear what you’re saying, and consequently they get lost or can’t find where you told them to find it? That’s who we are, when we don’t listen. We are that foolish person who thinks they know everything, but won’t pay attention long enough to learn even directions of how to get to the store or search for something.

“and forgive us our debts”

There is a conversation that I continually have with other Christians about sin. Once you are saved, the sin nature, that which propelled us towards death and separated us from God is now destroyed. We have been given a new nature, a rebirth of our spirit, in which we are now born of God, however, your flesh, that which is unredeemable, is still steeped in the pattern of this world and trained to continue in sin. Although we have been redeemed, we fight continually with our flesh. (Romans 7:15-20) It is by the grace of God and the sacrifice of Christ that we are able to have a clean conscience, and the things that we do good are not of our own doing, but Christ within us that does them, this new nature that is indwelling in us. However, our flesh does get in the way. If all Christians were now completely without sin, we wouldn’t have the divisions in the Church, backbiting, fighting, and problems that are apparent. We are to ask the forgiveness of God for our debts.* (*This word has been translated as sins, transgressions, etc. The greek word is opheilema, which translates to a debt, offense or sin.)

By asking for forgiveness, we acknowledge that it is not our righteousness that makes us right with God, but our Creator’s righteousness that covers us. In doing this, we humble ourselves, reminding us who we were before God’s grace and the power of the redeeming quality of Christ’s sacrifice for us.

“as we forgive our debtors.”

If God is great enough to forgive our sin, and we now have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit within us, it is imperative that we forgive those who offend us, those who sin against us, those who we feel owe us something. Our Creator forgave us for something we could never repay, for something that had been done thousand of years to us, before we were ever being born. If God is indwelling in us, we are to forgive those who have held us captive, stolen from us, and persecute us, for we were at one time against God with our sin nature and yet He forgave us. If we do not forgive, it interferes with our ability to hear the voice of God. When you harbor unforgiveness towards a person or people, it consumes you, occupies your thoughts, infiltrates your actions, and causes unrest within yourself. It is difficult to be still, when you are angry and worked up over sins against yourself or others.

“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil:”

Most of how Jesus taught his disciples to pray, is based on the principle of active listening to the voice of God. Our Creator is not the giant candy dispenser in the sky, doling out cars, piles of cash, and miraculous deliveries out of terrible situations to utopias! No! He is the author of peace that passes understanding, the savior of our souls, the bridge between death to life. If you are serious about your salvation, and you truly believe that you have that bridge of communication, cross that bridge and begin listening to His voice.

“For thine is the power and the glory forever and ever, amen”

No matter how much good we do in His name, we can never take responsibility for the good done. Any thing that is done that brings good to people and glory, is done because of Christ through us, not because of us. Without Jesus, our righteousness is as filthy rags, any good we do is worthless. If we allow ourselves to take on God’s righteousness and then claim it as our own, we deny the power of Christ within us. We then say that we only need Christ when we are weak. In all truth, we are at all times weak when it comes to the power of the resurrection within us, for it is not us, it is Christ within us that allows us to do anything of good for His kingdom. It is our responsibility, when we pray, to acknowledge where glory and honor is due, and that is with God alone.

When we pray this way, allowing our prayers to be in God’s will instead of dictating what we feel we need or desire onto God, we end up more satisfied, for who knows better what we need than God? He knows what we want before we even speak it, but even more so, God ultimately knows what we need before we ask. (Psalm 139)

Let’s make our hearts align with the will of God as we pray. If we don’t know what His will is, then let us pray for His will to be done and lay our desires at His feet, and if it’s what God wants for us, then let it be up to Him how it should come about.