Munich, part one

After a few days in Munich, I have enjoyed the many varying dynamics of another culture. The city has great public transportation--we have been taking the ubahn and Sbahn everywhere. It's true what they say--beer is like water here, the drink of choice at dinner time. The best beer I've tried was the Paulimer, weisbeir at a pub in the Marienplatz, or main square.
New years eve was crazy-- in the city center the people were lighting off their own fireworks, downing bottles of alcohol, then smashing them on the cobblestone... And singing... Random white stripes songs.
Holidays and Sundays, the city shuts down. Sunday we found a starbucks that was open, and another coffee shop in the main square. Otherwise, even grocery stores are closed.
I really enjoy the pace here--maybe it's just because I'm on vacation here instead of living here, but everyone seems to take time at dinner, talking, eating, sipping... I see few people with their nose in a screen. Wifi is hard to come by! I enjoy the freedom from the information overload that is apart of American culture.
I'm waiting at the train stationto head to Füssen. We are going to see the castles today. Tomorrow we will head to Salzburg.
Jet lag finally died for me I think. After a remedy from Whole Foods, and an overload of caffiene in the mornings, I think my body is finally rewired to this time zone.
I continually see the beauty of God's provision and protection and authority. He is intimately at work across the globe... Jesus is Lord over Munich, Minneapolis, everywhere he is good and sovereign.

George Mueller on Prayer

"While I was staying at Nailsworth, it pleased the Lord to teach me a truth, irrespective of human instrumentality, as far as I know, the benefit of which I have not lost though now... more than forty years have since passed away.

"The point is this: I saw more clearly than ever, that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was, to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not, how much I might serve the Lord, how I might glorify the Lord; but how I might get my soul into a happy state, and how my inner man might be nourished. For I might seek to set the truth before the unconverted, I might seek to benefit believers, I might seek to relieve the distressed, I might in other ways seek to behave myself as it becomes a child of God in this world; and yet, not being happy in the Lord, and not being nourished and strengthened in my inner man day by day, all this might not be attended to in a right spirit.

"Before this time my practice had been, at least ten years previously, as an habitual thing, to give myself to prayer, after having dressed in the morning. Now I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God and to meditation on it, that thus my heart might be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed; and that thus, whilst meditating, my heart might be brought into experimental, communion with the Lord. I began therefore, to meditate on the New Testament, from the beginning, early in the morning.

"The first thing I did, after having asked in a few words the Lord’s blessing upon His precious Word, was to begin to meditate on the Word of God; searching, as it were, into every verse, to get blessing out of it; not for the sake of the public ministry of the Word; not for the sake of preaching on what I had meditated upon; but for the sake of obtaining food for my own soul. The result I have found to be almost invariably this, that after a very few minutes my soul has been led to confession, or to thanksgiving, or to intercession, or to supplication; so that though I did not, as it were, give myself to prayer, but to meditation, yet it turned almost immediately more or less into prayer. When thus I have been for awhile making confession, or intercession, or supplication, or have given thanks, I go on to the next words or verse, turning all, as I go on, into prayer for myself or others, as the Word may lead to it; but still continually keeping before me, that food for my own soul is the object of my meditation. The result of this is, that there is always a good deal of confession, thanksgiving, supplication, or intercession mingled with my meditation, and that my inner man almost invariably is even sensibly nourished and strengthened and that by breakfast time, with rare exceptions, I am in a peaceful if not happy state of heart. Thus also the Lord is pleased to communicate unto me that which, very soon after, I have found to become food for other believers, though it was not for the sake of the public ministry of the Word that I gave myself to meditation, but for the profit of my own inner man.

"The difference between my former practice and my present one is this. Formerly, when I rose, I began to pray as soon as possible, and generally spent all my time till breakfast in prayer, or almost all the time. At all events I almost invariably began with prayer. . .But what was the result? I often spent a quarter of an hour, or half an hour, or even an hour on my knees, before being conscious to myself of having derived comfort, encouragement, humbling of soul, etc.; and often after having suffered much from wandering of mind for the first ten minutes, or a quarter of an hour, or even half an hour, I only then began really to pray.

I scarcely ever suffer now in this way. For my heart being nourished by the truth, being brought into experimental fellowship with God, I speak to my Father, and to my Friend (vile though I am, and unworthy of it) about the things that He has brought before me in His precious Word.

It often now astonishes me that I did not sooner see this. In no book did I ever read about it. No public ministry ever brought the matter before me. No private intercourse with a brother stirred me up to this matter. And yet now, since God has taught me this point, it is as plain to me as anything, that the first thing the child of God has to do morning by morning is to obtain food for his inner man.

As the outward man is not fit for work for any length of time, except we take food, and as this is one of the first things we do in the morning, so it should be with the inner man. We should take food for that, as every one must allow. What is the food for the inner man: not prayer, but the Word of God, so that it not only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what we read, pondering over it, and applying it to our hearts. . .

I dwell so particularly on this point because of the immense spiritual profit and refreshment I am conscious of having derived from it myself, and I affectionately and solemnly beseech all my fellow-believers to ponder this matter. By the blessing of God I ascribe to this mode the help and strength I have had from God to pass in peace through deeper trials in various ways than I had ever had before; and after having now above forty years tried this way, I can most fully, in the fear of God, commend it. How different when the soul is refreshed and made happy early in the morning, from what it is when, without spiritual preparation, the service, the trials and the temptations of the day come upon one."

Enjoy Food and Clothing, Don't Obsess

I write this to remind myself...

"Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? ³¹ Therefore do not be anxious, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' ³² For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. ³³But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." — Matthew 6:25-33

Thoughtfulness about the world is a heathenish sin, and unbecoming Christians. The Gentiles seek these things, because they know not better things; they are eager for this world, because they are strangers to a better; they seek these things with care and anxiety, because they are without God in the world, and understand not his providence. They fear and worship their idols, but know not how to trust them for deliverance and supply, and, therefore, are themselves full of care; but it is a shame for Christians, who build upon nobler principles. — Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible: New Modern Edition, Electronic Database. Copyright 1991 by Hendrickson Publishers, Inc.

SEEK CHRIST, THE BREAD OF LIFE, AND BE SATISFIED.
"Taste and see that the Lord is good."

Dear Astronomy,

So get this: Astronomy is a 3 credit gen ed... and I've put ALMOST more time into homework and preparation for tests than I did for my Arabic classes. It's a bit out of control.

What I do appreciate about the class is the learning curve. I have not learned this much "new information" so systematically for some time. Planets, moons, their cycles and phases, our sun, our solar system, the galaxies... orbits, revolution, and rotation... this class is info overload!

An interesting thing Dr. Trapp said in class the other day is that Astronomers can see approximately 5% of the universe. When we asked him how they knew it was "5%" if they can't see the entirety of it in order to know what fraction they see... he had a pretty decent answer which I can't really remember.

So when I read this today, I was humbled--to say the least:

"Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, or with
the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens? Who has held the
dust of the earth in a basket, or weighed the mountains on the
scales and the hills in a balance?" -- Isaiah 40:12

God is more majestic than I know Him to be. My sin is so often a result of not viewing Him rightly. Jesus is what my soul craves, and the only one capable of fully satisfying these cravings for pleasure and joy!

May I see myself in light of God's vastness and be humbled. May I then see the greater glory of the slaughtered Lamb--Jesus Christ--and be spurred to live to make this glory known and magnified.

Imperfection: Part واحد

واحد means "one". Part I.

Tim Keller once said, "Christianity is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints."

This is a fair comment on the "sickness" and "disease" I so clearly perceive in myself every day. A peculiar hospital it is... for indeed, Christ has made me well! "For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified" Hebrews 10:14

Yet my sickness is ever with me. If holiness is to be pursued and grown in, why is it that my sin is ever-more apparent to me?

What is more, He has declared me to be a Saint. So what does Keller mean? Why not display the saints for one to admire? Because the saint-hood of anyone is not their doing. The glory is not in sainthood, but in the One who exchanged His holiness, perfection, and spotlessness for our depravity which enables us to do nothing but sin.

This is the glory that reigns and will be at center-stage for eternity: the glory of the grace of the Lamb who was slain.

Two reasons we don't need this museum:

1. Saints still sin
2. The glory of sainthood is merely a reflection of Christ's glorious grace

The reason Jesus doesn't need a museum:

• Museums are for dead people; Jesus is alive.

You can see the way I change

A new swag, new walk, new focus...
It's all Christ--not me--no boastin.



Romans 12:2 "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind."

Don't waste your life

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Jesus said, whoever drinks the water that I give him will never thirst again.