Archive for the ‘devotion’ Category
Duncan’s Booklist
Posted by raj | Filed under citypowerhouse, devotion
Hey guys, just wanted to post the book list Duncan Corby (Key Lecturer @College) he mentioned while he spoke his message on “Thinking” at City powerhouse last week. He encouraged us to ask the hard questions concerning the bible, to think and work through it, and be prepared for the challenge. Remember you may not agree with everything in the books below, but let is challenge how and what you think.
- “How to Read the Bible for All its Worth” - Gordon Fee & Douglas Stuart
- “Simply Christian” - Tom Wright
- “Mere Christianity” - CS Lewis
- “Knowledge of the Holy” - A.W Tozer
- “The Practice of the Presence of God” - Brother Lawrence
- “The Chosen” - Chaim Potok
- “The End of Poverty” - Jeffrey Sachs
Passion
Posted by thomas | Filed under devotion, hillspowerhouse
PASSION
Passion is one of those words that brings with it heaps of connotations. When I say passion several ideas come to mind, fanatic fans, a young couple in love, a person fiddling with his hobby, the athlete practising for hours in the rain and the preacher sweating and spitting behind the pulpit.
What is passion though? Can you measure it by volume, time or anything else? Often we think of passion as the person in front of church that during the sermon says “amen” the loudest, during praise and worship jumps the highest or attends the most amounts of services.
Passion though in its purest form of definition comes from the Latin word that is translated “suffering” or “pain”, which is why the last hours of Jesus are described as “the passion of Christ”. Why is passion, as we know it, linked with suffering though?
“What will you go through?”
I believe passion is, “what you are willing to go through, to get to that which you are passionate about.” Passion is not about how loud you get or how high you jump. Those can be side effect of your passion but at the end of the day, passion is a deep resolve in one’s heart. It’s a person sold out for a cause and who is willing to go through anything. Or if we are to use the definition of the word, it’s a determination that no amount of temporary pain or suffering will stop me from pursuing and getting to the object of my passion.
Look at the example of Jesus in Hebrews 12:2-3 (NIV)
“2 Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith,
who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame,
and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men,
so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
Jesus was willing to endure such pain and suffering for the joy set before Him; for the passion before Him. This is why the cross shows our true value and is the perfect description of God’s love for humanity. So my first question when it comes to passion is “what will you go through?” If there is a limit to what you are willing to go through, there is a limit to your passion. Note: please don’t fall in the trap here and think suffering is only being taken hostage in some jungle where you are threatened with death if you don’t deny Jesus. Often it is harder to go through a mundane week at uni or work than the extreme situations, where everything is a high-pressure situation. I speak out of experience here.
“Then what?”
The second question I have for you is, what will happen once you catch, what you are passionate about? Then what?
So many people chase fame, fortune, relationships, a paycheck, a car, a ministry opportunity or something else but have you ever thought about life after the chase? Then what? So you get job, then what? So she finally gives in and starts to go out with you or even marry you, then what? The question, you must ask yourself, is what you’re pursuing above anything else, able to sustain you??? If the object of your passion can’t sustain you, you are wasting your time. All you have become is a man dancing around a golden calf.
Return the Passion
Can I urge you, make Jesus your number one passion! How do you get passionate about Him? You return the passion. He is so in love with you and He is so passionate about you! We love Him because He first loved us. If your passion has grown cold, then start your pursuit at the passion to have a passion for Him. He is found in the pursuit of Him. The beautiful thing is that when you seek Him, He is able to sustain you. You seek Him first and all the smaller passions in life will come as they take their rightful place in the greater plan God has for your life.
Bless you,
Thomas
Your Secret Space
Posted by thomas | Filed under devotion, hillspowerhouse
Several months ago some of our friends bought a 2-bedroom townhouse. It was really nice. After living there for a while, they noticed something odd. It seemed like there was a wall out of place. They looked around and all the signs pointed to a “space” behind the wall, over the garage, that they couldn’t access. They visited their neighbours to “spy” out their “space” and sure enough they had a third bedroom. So one day we went over to their place and crawled through their roof and saw that all chords and aircon tubes were running to this “space”. We cut a hole in the wall and found this fully functional room, which only needed a door to be used properly!!
I loved it, it was so C.S. Lewis.
Our lives can be like this. God calls us to devotion and He calls that place of devotion “the secret place”. It’s a place of intimacy and communion.
Before we have a life of devotion, we know there is something missing in our lives. We see this empty “space” that we know should be something. We look in our neighbour’s lives and see a functional and life-giving devotion. You have a fully functional room and all you need is an access point.
This Wednesday we have our very first Encounter Night. It’s a night, where we take extra time to worship, pray for people, prophecy over each other. We will still be having the Word preached by our youth pastor, Chrishan.
The secret place of devotion is a personal thing but sometimes we need each other to break through to that place, before we take it home and make it intimate.
Can I encourage you to be there this Wednesday and come expectant to have an encounter with Jesus? He SO desires to meet with you and see you live a life of breakthrough for His name’s sake.
Bless you as you continue chasing after Him,
Thomas & Kat
God is bigger than a blog
Posted by thomas | Filed under citypowerhouse, devotion, hillspowerhouse
I write this blog with the risk of sounding repetitive from my previous blog but I think this bears repetition. When our daughter Sienna was born, so many people wanted me to send them a picture of her. I didn’t immediately grant them their request though. A few people thought the delay was because something might have gone wrong during the labour and we wanted to wait a bit before we sent a picture, maybe something needed to be healed up on her face. This was not the problem. The problem was not one of blemish, on the contrary. Sienna was beautiful from the moment she was born, and herein laid the “problem”. I sat and stared into her big beautiful eyes and then down to my phone, as I scrolled through it, looking for the picture that would sum her up. They were all good but none were perfect. One made her look massive (not that she is thin, she has some meat on her. Our nickname for her “Chunky Love” isn’t for nothing). Another made her look angry. One made her look worried and another made her look tired. It took me almost a whole day to send a photo out because nothing matched the reality I saw. The reality and beauty of our daughter could not be captured in one picture, it was impossible.
This is the same problem I have with our “Wiki” culture, where we are constantly looking for one source that will sum up, what we look up. As a young adults pastor, I have noticed a trend among young people to be very inquisitive and curious about life. This analytical mindset send people out searching for these “sources” that will tell them, what they want to know. The “challenge” we have with God, is that God is bigger than a blog.
I see people handing out CD’s, books, and “url”’s and web addresses for blogs and sites that explain what they believe or that gives a description of Jesus. Are you kidding me? Since when could the Creator of heaven and Earth be contained in a blog? Since when could Jesus, who created Earth as His footstool, man with His hands and Is Word made flesh, be contained to 800 words on a website? God is bigger than our CD’s, books and even sermons.
Does that mean we shouldn’t be listening and reading about God? No. Resources are a blessing that have helped Christians since the letters of Peter, Paul, Luke and the other disciples were passed around in the Early Church. Resources are a blessing but the problem occurs, when we are more fascinated with a blog than our God. The problem occurs when the books, speakers, CD’s and all the rest of it, distract us from the One source of all things, Jesus Christ. Too much analysing will sooner or later cause us to do a spiritual autopsy on God.
All our writing and singing and speaking and preaching should point everyone to Jesus. We must decrease and He must increase. This doesn’t mean decreasing our voice or platform but making sure that He is always the focal point of everything we do. Our Saviour Jesus is beautiful beyond description, so it is only fitting that there are so many expressions of Him and about Him; but let us realize that reality will ALWAYS far outweigh the description of it.
Let’s never fall so in love with the picture that we forget the person.
In all our sermons, podcasts and blogs, let’s remember they have nothing on the real person of Jesus Christ. Let’s never be so good at talking about Jesus that we forget to just be with Jesus.
What do you think? Have you ever found yourself distracted?
- Thomas
Sienna Grace Hansen
Posted by thomas | Filed under devotion, hillspowerhouse
So yesterday my wife gave birth to our first born. Sienna Grace Hansen was born after 21 hours of labour. I’m so proud of both my girls.
Sitting here today though, I cannot help but just stare at my daughter. She is like a lava lamp. She is soooooo beautiful! (A lava lamp isn’t really beautiful - that analogy was in reference to the mesmerising effect)
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