New Name Blog

By Jeremy Glaze

If you are unfamiliar with the story of the prodigal son, I strongly suggest that you read Luke 15: 11-32.  In my opinion it is one of the most important parables that Jesus told.  There is so much in this passage, but I am only going to touch on one verse here.  The parable is about a wealthy father and his two sons.  One of the sons ask the father for his share of the estate, then leaves the family the to go live on his own out in the world.  This son ends up blowing all his money on living wildly.  And after he was broke, a severe famine struck the country and he had absolutely nothing.  He was hungry.  He ended up with a job feeding pigs, but he was not even allowed to eat the food that he was feeding to the pigs.  He finally had enough and decided to go back to his family.  He prepared a short speech for his dad asking him to take him back as a servant, and he headed home.

I imagine that this was a long journey home.  I picture doing stupid things as a teenager and having to go home and tell my parents what I did and how I let them down.  Those were always long rides home.  Or when I had to call them to come get me, awaiting their arrival was the most painful part of the whole process.  And to think that this particular son left home and blew his whole inheritance from his father on hookers and who knows whatever else.  That would be a tough ride home.  I can see him preparing what he would say as he journeyed home.  ”Dad, I’m sorry, I have let you down, I don’t deserve to be in the family, just let me be a servant.”

But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him.  He ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him (Luke 15:20).

Wow.  Just think about that.  While the son was still a long way off, his father saw him. The son did not have to walk up and knock on the door.  He did not have to ask the father to let him back in.  While he was still a long way off, his father saw him.  What does that say about the father?  It says to me that the father was looking for him, he was waiting on him to come home.  I do not know how long he was away from home, but due to the fact that he had enough time to blow all of his inheritance, I am thinking he was gone for awhile.  And I bet his dad spent several days watching the road that lead up to the house.  Just waiting for his son to come home.  And when he saw the little figure walking up in the distance, before he could even make out who it was was, I bet a smile came over his face and tears flooded his eyes.  I can almost hear him saying with excitement in his voice, “there he is!!”

He ran to his son. As soon as he saw his son, he ran to meet him.  He did not wait for his son to come to him, he ran to his son.  He threw his arms around him and kissed him.  Considering the son was broke, starving, and had been working in a pig pin, I can almost guarantee he was nasty.  And he most likely stunk something awful.  And his father hugged him and kissed him.  He did not wait for his son to come inside and clean up, He ran to where his son was at and hugged and kissed him as he was.  Through the filth.

You see, most all of us have ran away from God before.  I have done this.  I have left and spent all my money and time on the awful things of this world.  And notice how we do not come back to God while everything is still ok.  We wait until we are broke, hungry, nasty, and in a pig pin before we realize we need to come back home.  And the second that God sees us realize this, He comes running toward us.  He… runs… to us.  That is amazing to me.  And He does not wait until we get right with ourselves or get right with God.  He doesn’t wait until we start doing the right things.  He wraps His arms around us right there where we are at and kisses our nasty face.  When we stink, filthy with sin, He holds us and kisses us.

This goes against all logic.  This goes against all human nature.   But this is Grace.  This is Love.

It’s Amazing Grace, Amazing Love.

Jeremy Glaze

New Name Blog

By Jason Glaze

Last week I found myself in a discussion about what motivates people to move in God’s direction.  As the discussion unfolded we began to unpack the damage that religion has done over the years by using unhealthy methods to try and reach people.  One method that seems to be normal in some circles of the church is fear.  Why is fear a normal method of motivation?  Because it “appears” to work, but because of the damage it causes in the long run we really should take a step back and reevaluate things.

By simply observing human nature it is safe to say that if someone is afraid enough they can be motivated to do almost anything, and this is the reason that many people that I know decided to enter into a relationship with God.  The problem with this is that years later they are still afraid of Him.  I’m not saying that they are afraid of Him on a daily basis, but because fear is their point of origin that is what they often turn back to in order to describe why they feel like they are disconnected from God.  They fear His judgement, anger, disappointment, etc.

I don’t know about you but I’m not going to run to someone that I’m afraid of, as a matter of fact I’m going to run in the other direction.  Unfortunately that is what so many people are doing in their spiritual life, they are running from God. 

What if we really knew that God loves us and that His perfect love drives away all fear?  (1 John 4:18)  If you need to, go back in your memory to the time when you were introduced to Jesus and realize that even though fear was being screamed from the pulpit, love was being whispered from God.

Jason Glaze

New Name Blog

By Eric Abney

In addition to working at New Name I have the privilege of working part-time at a great retail company called R.E.I.  It stands for Recreational Equipment Incorporated.  I have the opportunity to meet all kinds of wonderful people who are doing the most exciting and daring things.  Some may be getting ready to go on a trip to South Africa, New Zealand, or even to Stone Mountain right here in Atlanta.  Regardless they are always excited about getting ready to embark on their adventure.  Many times families will come in ready to purchase bicycles and cycling equipment for family adventures around their subdivisions and homes.  Once a family was in the store and they had the cutest little girl with them, but she was weeping almost uncontrollably.  The family had made it across the store from the cycling department which was in the front of the store back to footwear which was in the rear.  That’s where I was ready to help people.  I overheard the family talking to each other.  Through sobs the little girl expressed how she really wanted a particular bike that we had across the store.  She was very upset. Her mother held her close and tried her best to comfort her.  Then her father came close and said these words, “Honey, it’s going to be okay.  We haven’t forgotten that you need a bike.”

Jesus said that if the flowers of the field are covered with morning dew and have what they need doesn’t our heavenly father love us even 
more still? (Matthew 6:28-31)

He does, but every now and again we forget who God is and all those 
perfect fathering aspects that He possesses.  In those times we think 
that what we need must have been forgotten by God or even worse we feel forgotten.

Rest assured that just as that father in R.E.I. said to his little 
one, so your heavenly Father says to you, “I haven’t forgotten what 
you need.”

Be Challenged and Live Adventurously,

-Eric

New Name Blog

By Jeremy Glaze

Our Father which art in heaven,  Hallowed be thy name.  Thy kingdom come.  Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread.  And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil:  For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever.  Amen. (Matthew 6: 9-13)

I came to a disturbing realization concerning this passage a couple of weeks ago.  I have read or recited this prayer hundreds of times in my life time.  I remember reciting this prayer with a group at several public events.  While in school, I said this prayer with my baseball and football team before every game.  We have this prayer in a frame hanging on our wall at home.  So a few weeks ago I thought to myself, out of all the times I have said this prayer, “how many times did I mean it?”  The answer I came up with…ZERO.  Jesus said these words to give us an example on how to pray, and I just realized I have never used this example that came straight from Jesus.  Honestly, I did not even know what “Hallowed” meant until about three weeks ago.  I know, its sad.

So I decided that I would  whole heartedly pray this prayer.  When I did, I was astonished.  This is a powerful prayer.  It covers everything that I could possibly need in my life.  I broke down each line of this prayer into my own wording so it would actually be me talking to God.

-Our Father, which art in Heaven:   -Daddy, perfect God in a perfect place.
-Hallowed be thy name:   -You are Holy, You are Sacred to me.
-Thy kingdom come:   -Bring Heaven here in my life.  Let Heaven crash into earth and change the world.
-Thy will be done in earth as it is in Heaven:   -Make my life yours.  What You want it to be.  Not my own will, but Your will God.  Show me the way.
-Give us this day our daily bread:   -Give me what I need, not what I want, just what I need.
-And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors:   -Forgive me for all my sins, all my shortcomings, and I will forgive the ones who have done me wrong.  (Notice here that it does not say “help us to forgive our debtors:, it says “AS we forgive our debtors”.  We are not asking for help to forgive, we are committing to forgive).
-Lead us not unto temptation:   -I want to be all about You, I do not want to be involved with anything else.
-But deliver us from evil:   -take away anything in my life that hinders me from You.
-For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever:    -It’s all about You, It’s all about You, It’s all about You Jesus.
-Amen:   -Amen

Jeremy Glaze

New Name Blog

By Jason Glaze

Have you ever noticed that impatience seems to be a character flaw that almost everyone in the world struggles with?  If I told you that being impatient has never been one of my issues I would have to follow that up by saying that self-delusion has been.  However, I can honestly say that God has brought me a long way in this area.  I never thought I would have come as far as I have which gives me great hope for the future.

I’m not saying this about myself in a boastful way.  I’m saying this because I talk to so many people who seem to have this belief that impatience is so much a part of who they are that they think it can never get better.  We often talk about being impatient like it’s some kind of incurable disease.  When we believe that about ourselves we end up acting it out like a self-fulfilled prophecy and we begin to passively accept the destruction that impatience brings along with it.

Here is what really helped me out when it comes to being patient.  A couple of years ago God began to show me that I had the strong tendency to get so focused on a goal that I ignored the process of the journey as I headed toward that goal.  I was so focused on the destination that the journey felt like an inconvenience that I would rather just skip, and even though I knew in reality that I couldn’t skip the journey I had the mentality that I must merely tolerate it.  God then began to show me that from His point of view the journey was the whole point.

It’s in the journey that change happens.  It’s where I grow and mature.  The journey is where I have the opportunity to experience God as He walks with me and He loves me way too much to hurry me through it.  God began to reveal to me that what I thought the destination would bring was actually found in the middle on the journey.

I’m thankful for this new perspective and this new found truth, and even though I haven’t fully arrived yet, for me the journey is no longer merely tolerated, but highly anticipated.

Jason Glaze

New Name Blog

By Jeremy Glaze
He must increase, but I must decrease (John 3:30)

As we attempt to follow Christ, I believe a struggle that the vast majority of us encounter is surrendering to the fact that it is not about us.  Human nature mixed with what we learn from society gives us the instinct to put ourselves first.  And with that we get the phrase “Looking out for number 1″  (which is a great idea once we realize who number 1 is).  When an important decision arises, it is so easy for our first thought to be “how will this affect me?” or “what will benefit me the most?”.  This is a dangerous way to live life.

When I think of bad decisions that I have made (which probably outweigh the good ones), almost everyone one of them was made with no one else in mind but myself.  Think about what causes us to lie.  What causes someone to cheat or steal?  Think about what caused you to do something that emotionally hurt someone you loved.  It was that we were putting ourselves first.  We were thinking things like “this will make me feel good”, “this will keep the blame off of me”, “this will get me what I want”.

But when Christ increases and I decrease, everything is different.  When I realize the it is all about Him and not about me, my decision making process becomes a lot better.  I do not lie, cheat, say hurtful things etc…  and I make better decisions 100% of the time when He is number 1 in my mind.

So when someone betrays us and deeply hurts us, we could think about ourselves.  We could seek revenge and hold them responsible.  We could let their betrayal control our thoughts and actions.  Or we could realize that it is not about us, it is about the One greater.  We could forgive this person and release any control that it had over us.  We could show the one who betrayed us a glimpse of the Gospel and set both of us free.

We can avoid the bad parts of town and the poor neighborhoods because that is where a lot of violence happens.  It is not safe, plus we don’t want to be bothered by beggars.  Or we could realize that it is not about us and these are the unreached places that need the Gospel the most.  We could actually believe that Jesus has me and you in mind to take the good news to the poor.

When we receive our paycheck, we could think about ourselves and the long hours we worked for this.  We could take any extra money and go blow it because we think we deserve it.  Or we could realize that is not about us and help some one else in need.  We could find someone who really means it when they pray “give us this day, our daily bread”, and God can use us to answer their prayer.

When we put ourselves first, it is impossible to allow God to live through us.  It is impossible to be a light in the world.  I have regretted thousands of decisions I have made, but I have never regretted a decision I made when I made it all about Him.  That is one thing that is so cool about God.  Anytime we do things for Him, even if it is suffering for Him, He will bring us more joy than we can imagine.  It all works together.

New Name Blog

By Eric Abney

Don Henley said that he was trying to get to the heart of the matter.  He thought it was about forgiveness even if she didn’t love him anymore.  We all remember the great classic rock music that we would sing to the top of our lungs on our way to work in the morning.  What is interesting about this line in this song is that there is a lot of truth attached to it.

Jesus was at the last supper with twelve guys he had just spent three years with.  They were eating and having camaraderie among themselves when Jesus took some bread, gave thanks, and told them to eat it.  The bread represented his body that would be broken for them.  Then he took the cup and told his disciples that the wine that was in the cup represented his blood and would be a new covenant.  His blood would be “poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:28).  This word forgiveness is the greek word: Aphesis, which literally translates “to release from bondage or imprisonment, to forgive or pardon of sins (letting them go as if they had never been committed), remission of the penalty.”
Forgiveness does something.  It does something more for the one doing the forgiving than it does the one who is being forgiven.  When we have unforgiveness kept in our hearts we most often believe that we are holding the unforgiven person captive.  In reality we are chained to a prison that we have created for ourselves through unforgiveness.  As time passes the walls of this prison get higher, built by our own anger, sadness, and depression, our own hurt.

We cry out for rescue but the very thing that will bring these walls of pain down is the one thing that we will not let go of.  That one thing is forgiveness.

There comes a moment that the opportunity arises for us to give the gift of forgiveness and release the person from any debt they owe to us.  In that moment ,when we choose to embrace it, the very nature of God the Father flows through us and we become forgivers.  In these times emotions run high, warm tears flow down the sides of our cheeks and it feels ever so cleansing.  In that moment the impenetrable walls of depression and sadness come tumbling down, chains of anger and revenge become loose and we are . . . FREE!

This freedom is not free it costs something.  It costs the debts of those who owe us and we must surrender those debts to the flames of forgiveness and let them burn.  The pain is real and it hurts, but the freedom is that much more a reality and true.

The translation of the word forgiveness in Matthew 26:28 is strong and seems to even make the words of Don Henley’s song command something more that just lyrical pleasure.  It instructs us to look closer to the “heart of the matter” and see that true life can be had now and this true life can be lived with freedom.



Be Challenged and Live Adventurously,

New Name Blog

By Jason Glaze
We see our Jesus nailed to the tree of our shame, receiving into His
perfect body our past, present, and future sins.  We hear Him crying
the forsaken cry that was ours to cry.  We know that He felt the pain
and aloneness that was meant for us to feel.  This moment of the cross
was a moment that changed the course of spiritual history, but it was not our first moment with God.

We come to realize that God has given us our new name by our new
birth.  He has called us from the death of binding sin into the freedom of life in Him.  We are enlightened to the truth that He has crucified our old identity and has given us our new identity by the
righteousness of His life.  We hear Him say that new life means we are in Him and He is in us.  This is a precious, powerful moment but it is not our first moment with God.

We envision the moment when we are fully with God, the moment after we take our last breath to freely breathe for the first time, the moment when the dark glass is made clear and we see Him, ourselves, and others in the fullness of a perfect reality.  What an amazing moment this will be but it is not our first moment with God.

Our first moment with God happened before moments even existed.  Before God divinely formed the heavens and earth He formed us in His heart.  He saw us, knew us, and deeply loved us.

As I close my eyes and listen with my heart I can hear my Father’s sweet voice speaking my name.  Before my Father said, “Let there be light.”  He said, “Let Jason be mine.”

Rest in the truth that God has always known you and has always loved you.  There was never a moment in eternity’s past that He did not love you and there will never be a moment in eternity’s future that He will stop loving you.

New Name Blog

By Eric Abney
You remember the first time your parents let you drive the car.  I was
14 and we had to take the garbage to the dump.  It was about a mile and a half from the house and Dad let me drive.  I was scared and I ran off the road one time too.  It was very exciting and we did make it back to the house safely and in one piece.  I remember times when we would be doing things at the house and the truck would be parked in the road of the subdivision, Dad would toss me the keys and say, “Pull the truck in”.  Wow!  What excitement would rush through my body.  It wasn’t an everyday occasion to drive at 14 so I always took him up on the opportunity.

In those moments I felt like Dad was saying something more than just, “here are the keys”.  I felt like he was saying, “I trust you.  You have what it takes.”  There are times in our lives when God in essence throws us the keys to the truck.  It is in those moments that we feel as though God Himself is saying, “I believe in you.  I trust you.  You have what it takes.”  I have done quite a bit of communicating in my life, but I can remember the first time I stood up in front of my youth group and spoke in front of them.  I was scared to death, but I could feel God saying, “You got what it takes. You can do it.”  And I did.  It probably wasn’t the greatest thing they had ever heard, but God was proud and I think those words were some of His favorite things He’s ever heard me say.

God desires to father us and His fathering is perfect and is everything we need.  He has been fathering you and He has whispered things to you.  Don’t drive by those things.  Park it there and enjoy what God is saying to you.  He means it and He wants you to know that, “You have what it takes.”  Think about how God might be throwing you the keys to the truck.

Be Challenged and Live adventurously,

-Eric

New Name Blog

By Jeremy Glaze

Another year has come and gone.  And like all the years before, this one seemed to fly by way too fast.  2009 was a great year for me and my family.  But more specifically, this Christmas has been an amazing one.  I am excited to approach a brand new year, but I hate to see this Holiday Season come to an end.  Christmas is the season of giving, and this year, that seemed more prevalent than ever.

One of my favorite things that we got to do this season was spend some time in the 4th Ward projects in Atlanta.  This is a section of the city that is strickened with poverty, drugs, violence, prostitution, etc…  Before we set out to walk in these project homes, we gathered outside in front of the Dream Center house to pray and sing.  One of the several things that happened that day that I will never forget is when we sang God of This City.  I have heard this song several times before, but I rarely paid much attention to it until then.  This time it hit me hard.  It finally clicked.  We were standing by the street in the projects on a cold December morning singing God of This City at the top of our lungs.  We were not singing just another song.  It was as if we were proclaiming this city. Or better yet, reclaiming this city.  From there we split into small groups and carried large trash bags full of toys into the apartment buildings.  We knocked on each door in the building to hand out toys to the children and pray with the families.  I do not know if I have ever been more inspired.  I was just volunteering one Saturday.  There were people here that did this every weekend.  There is a staff that does this every day.  This made me reevaluate the way I attempt to follow God.

It was great to do various things to give back this Christmas, but I started to wonder why this is my focus just during the Holiday season.

So I have come up with a challenge for myself and I will offer the same challenge to you.  As we come upon a brand new year, let’s make this the “year of giving” instead of waiting for the “season of giving”.  I am not just talking about giving financially.  The economy stinks so most of us do not have the funds we would like to have to give.  But we have all the time in the world to give.  If we do not think we have the time, we need to make the time.  Let’s change our priorities.

Secondly, I believe every social conscience person would say they would like to change the world if they could.  Well, I believe we can.  But we need to start in our community, our city.  If you stop to look, I will bet that God is drastically moving somewhere in the city you live in.  Find it, and become apart of it.

In Matthew 5, Jesus tells us, “You are the light of the world.  A city on a hill cannot be hidden”. Yes, YOU!  You are the light of the world.  He goes on to say “Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven“.  (Matthew 5: 14 & 16).

Let’s shine.  Let’s take back our city.

God is moving, join the movement.

Greater things have yet to come,
Greater things are still to be done in this city.
(God of This City by Chris Tomlin)
 

Jeremy Glaze

New Name Blog

By Jason Glaze

So last night my family and I were sitting in the living room by a fire watching one of our favorite Christmas movies, How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  About half way through the movie my oldest son Reed who is nine years old speaks up and says, “Even if the Grinch steals all the presents, Christmas in still going to come.  Nobody can stop Christmas from coming.”  Now you have to know Reed to understand that if he says anything it means that he has thought about it for a while.  When he made the statement there was strength in his little voice, and I got that proud feeling that comes over a parent when their child says something that reflects the health of their child’s heart.

After I stopped smiling, the truth of what Reed said started to really settle in my heart.  I began to feel incredibly thankful that in my family life Christmas is constant and reliable.  Christmas is so engraved in our hearts that no matter how much our culture changes, it will always be.  Sure, commercialism has had it’s influence on the season and our minds are sometimes shifted away from the real meaning of Christmas, but I believe that there will always be those moments like our family had last night.  Moments of peace, moments of truth.  Moments of understanding that no matter how bad life gets, the bad can never totally drive away the good.  Moments of seeing the Prince of Peace being brought into this world as a baby and beginning the segment of His journey here on earth, Matt. 1:21 NASB “She will bear a son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.”

No matter what comes my way.  No matter if the Grinch breaks into my house and loots everything that I call mine, Mary had a son, and I will call Him Jesus, because He has saved me from my sins.  Nothing can change that. It is real and it is constant.  God has written His story into my heart with an eternal engraving utensil, and on days like today the layers of my heart are peeled back, and my Father is reading it to me like a bed time story.  His Son was born unto me in the city of David.  I am His, He is mine, and nothing or nobody can change that.

Thank you Reed, your Daddy loves you!

Merry Christmas!

Jason Glaze

New Name Blog

By Eric Abney

We all remember the late Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video.  It involved great dance moves, incredible cinematography, and of course, zombies.  I can remember the incredible dancing as Michael would sing, “Cause this is thriller, thriller night.  You’re fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight”.  At one point in the video singing stops and the zombies appear and as the music is playing there is an amazing choreography of dance moves.

I think zombies are interesting creatures.  They are by definition “walking dead people” which only leads one to believe that they must have been “alive real people” at one time or another.  This word zombie comes from the West Indies and has to do with voodoo.  It is said that the dead people are “reanimated”.

If we are honest I’ll bet that we are at times living our own lives as “walking dead people”.  I dare say that most people don’t lead their lives, they accept their lives.  We are traveling through life letting things happen to us instead of making things happen for us.

“Making things happen for us” sounds kind of arrogant, but let me explain.  I’m not talking about getting out there and shaking the bushes and doing something to help me get the things I want.  I’m talking about getting out there and finding something that will assist someone else in their dreams and in their desires.  What if we ceased to live lives that are self absorbed and we looked beyond ourselves to find a story that is bigger than us to be a part of.

There is an initial step in this that involves Christ and what He brings to us when it comes to being alive.  Paul gives an explanation of our lives when the life of Christ begins to present itself in our lives.  This is what Paul says in Romans 8:10-11 the Message translation: It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he’ll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself?  When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life.  With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s!

Ultimately our goal would be to live a life that is fully alive and Christ offers that through His Spirit.  This word “Spirit” that is used is originally a greek word “Pneuma” which means “the vital principle by which the body is animated”.  Christ’s life living in us is not there to “reanimate” us like zombies, but to be the source of animation that we live from.  When our minds can wrap around this idea that we don’t have to live like walking dead people anymore, and when we step out to do something for someone that is beyond ourselves it is accompanied by the powerful, extravagant, healing life of Christ flowing from inside of us.  That has meaning and has got to feel good.

Be Challenged and Live Adventurously,

-Eric

New Name Blog

By Jason Glaze

Have you ever noticed how easy it is to compare ourselves with other people?  Sometimes it can almost seem like an involuntary action, like breathing.  We notice someone’s looks, gifts, talents, successes, or possessions and automatically measure ourselves by them.  This is especially easy to do when it comes to our spiritual life.  It’s easy to place a super Christian up on a pedestal and use him or her as a standard of how well we are doing spiritually.

The danger of comparing ourselves with others is that it sets off a wicked cycle of emotions.  We immediately become discontented with who we are, where we are, or what we have.  We all know that having goals and desiring to grow and change is a good thing, but I believe the crucial step to growth is accepting ourselves just as we are and not as we think we should or could be.

Soon after discontentment comes envy.  We begin to covet what someone else has or what they can do and try to figure out what we need to do to become like them.  We abandon our authentic selves and lose connection with who we are as individuals.  We end up with families, businesses, and churches full of cookie-cutter people with no sense of the importance of embracing our individuality.  We learn the right lingo and do the right things to be like the person we envy.

We then begin to notice a feeling of despair.  Despair comes because we end up tired of the performance treadmill.  We have done all we know to do.  We say the right things, believe the right things, and do the right things to become more like the person we have compared ourselves with and still in our heart we know that something is missing. 

Anger is usually the next emotion we notice developing.  We become angry because anger and expectations go hand in hand.  We don’t know what to do with the anger so we stuff it.  We can’t express it because being angry doesn’t fit the cookie-cutter image we are trying so hard to portray.  The deeper we stuff our anger the deeper into depression we fall.

We quickly get tired of our hearts playing ping pong with our emotions so we end up finding someone to compare ourselves with that is worse off than we are so we can feel better about ourselves.  We then wonder how we have become so judgmental.

Sounds fun doesn’t it?  No wonder Paul says this in 2 Corinthians 10:12 “We do not dare classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves.  When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise.” NIV

Jason Glaze

New Name Blog

By Eric Abney

When the time had fully come God sent His Son.
Galations 4:4 makes this statement in speaking of Christ and because of this we celebrate Christmas.  I find it interesting that God had to wait.  There was a time that God was waiting and it had to fully come before the miracle of God being clothed in man-flesh could become a reality.

In our Bibles there is one page that separates the old testament from the new, but that one page represents 400 years that God was silent.
He didn’t say anything.  There were no prophets, no one to speak on God’s behalf, because He wasn’t saying anything.

Although God was silent He must have still been working, and at last it was time for God to introduce Himself to the world.  And He did after He had waited 400 years.

We wait for things too.  Children patiently wait for Christmas morning so that their presents can be opened.  Adults wait to see if life is going to add up the way that we want it to add up.

What are you waiting on?  Are you frustrated?  Are you becoming impatient thinking that you aren’t going to get the fulfillment of God’s promise?  What does this Christmas season bring to you?  If it is anxiety and uneasiness?

Relax.

It took 400 years for things to line up for the Almighty.  Chances are it won’t take that long for you.  So let me encourage you in something, do your best to enjoy the conflict of waiting.  When you receive the thing you’ve waited on you appreciate it all the more because you had to wait for it.  It’s not easy.  Hear that loud and clear.  It’s not easy.  But it’s a lot more satisfying.

Be Challenged and Live Adventurously,

-Eric

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