I'm enthusiastic about life.
That means that I am grateful for those things that got me to this point.
I didn't used to be this enthusiastic. This is the most excited I've been to be alive since I was a little kid.
I was very ill and the Lord apparently saw fit to see that I was healed, against medical predictions that I would be totally disabled for the rest of my life.
Here's one thing I am thankful for, a working brain. I don't take that for granted because I had one, lost it, then the Lord restored it better than when it was new. Like I told my pastor; "Father, I can't tell you how great it is to not be crazy unless you've been crazy yourself." Spiritual growth, emotional maturity and self-control, peace of mind and heart, these things all go hand in hand.
Once you taste the kingdom, you start to get better at finding more of the kingdom. Then whoose, like an avalanche. At least theoretically I've read.
As far as I'm concerned, the Catholic Church has been my foundation for my whole life. I have been alternately hurt and then helped by her, but such is the case as she is operated on this earth by humans. For years I didn't know more than the "crust" of the pie -- that is where the rubber hits the road -- the sheep come into the pasture of God's house and are fed.
If I read my Bible right, what I'll call the kingdom of peace and joy, can be accessed here on earth. It requires direct involvement from God, to literally rewrite your heart and mind so that they start to operate in a heavenly realm and not just a physical realm.
It's like a joke you can't quite get or a sneeze that's always coming but never here. You can study all you want, but until the Lord exposes you to a point of view that you can't reconcile with any possible thoughts you've ever had, which is when surrender becomes the best ploy, (it always is but sometimes we have to be convinced) and you wait until God has you prepared to take the leap of of the ship -- to test whether you can walk on water. Of course, I mean this all in the symbolic sense and is intended to convey my thoughts about how the spirit world operates.
So once you get the joke or sneeze the sneeze, a lot of tension finally subsides, even if only for a few minutes. You've always known what the joke meant, but you never knew why others found it funny and you just found it immature. But then, all of a sudden you get the joke, and laugh clear from the heart.
I invite you to gaze upon the Lord's word to ponder what things could be like 10 years from now, or 10 weeks, or maybe 10 minutes. Once you quit judging whether you're on a time schedule for spiritual growth, the Lord has flexibility to take you along at a rate controlled by him, without your own ideas about how it should be done getting in the way
Who here is not aware that all is possible with the Lord? If you know that, then why can't he grant you healing peace that is unconditional and permanent as early as this afternoon? How about next Friday? How about we just get in line and He will tell us if we get to take cuts?
Oh, yeah, the Word. Here's what I want to share:
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Matt 13
10 The disciples approached him and said, "Why do you speak to them in parables?"
11 He said to them in reply, "Because knowledge of the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven has been granted to you, but to them it has not been granted.
12 To anyone who has, more will be given and he will grow rich; from anyone who has not, even what he has will be taken away.
13 This is why I speak to them in parables, because 'they look but do not see and hear but do not listen or understand.'
14 Isaiah's prophecy is fulfilled in them, which says: 'You shall indeed hear but not understand you shall indeed look but never see.
15 Gross is the heart of this people, they will hardly hear with their ears, they have closed their eyes, lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and be converted, and I heal them.'
16 "But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear.
17 Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.
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Exercises suggestion from SD: read
job 37-40 and consider your ability to understand things -- especially if you are a technical person.
Exercise idea from me:
Exercise your imagination to put yourself in places you want to be, whether you believe they are attainable or not. For example, you might think, "what would it be like if I were in this same exact worldly situation and then suddenly had complete peace? What would i do and say?" (Refer to the movie Office Space for one movie's take on that)
I used to like play
"The Wall" by Kansas before I went to a test, while I was in college. Talking about all this makes me think of its lyrics.
The straight answer to your question is "yes" I have a zeal for life and all that is in it. The Catholic Church is something I'm eternally grateful for, but so are flowers and birds and mosquitoes.
Alan
Zeal for the faith
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