Hope for Complementarians

You cannot come to God with bargaining and with promises. But if you will throw yourself recklessly upon God, trust His character, trust the merits of His Son, you will have the petition you have asked of him.

You can have this confidence in God, and you can have this respect for His will. Do not expect God to perform miracles or you so you can write books about them. Do not ever be caught asking God to send you toys like that to play around with.

But if you are in trouble and concerned about your situation and willing to be honest with God, you can have confidence in Him. You can go to Him in the merit of His Son, claiming His promises, and you will find the way of deliverance.

God will move heaven and earth for you if you will trust Him.

*A.W. Tozer, Faith Beyond Reason

It is certainly not enough for me to identify fear as an obstacle for women and not offer godly solutions to fear.

In I John 4:18 we find this gem. "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love."

We are given this encouragement in Hebrews 12:28 Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe;

Paul gives us this in 2Timothy 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline.

And this from Romans 8:15-18
15 For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, "Abba! Father!"
16 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,
17 and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with {Him} in order that we may also be glorified with {Him.}
18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

And the Psalms contain this balm for our souls

Psalm 16:9-11
9 Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will dwell securely.
10 For Thou wilt not abandon my soul to Sheol; neither wilt Thou allow Thy Holy One to undergo decay.
11 Thou wilt make known to me the path of life; in Thy presence is fulness of joy; in Thy right hand there are pleasures forever.

Psalm 33:18-22
18 Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear Him, On those who hope for His lovingkindness,
19 To deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine.
20 Our soul waits for the LORD; He is our help and our shield.
21 For our heart rejoices in Him, because we trust in His holy name.
22 Let Thy lovingkindness, O LORD, be upon us, according as we have hoped in Thee.

I have been injured at the hands of men, men I should have been able to trust. I have known such fear in being submitted to a man's authority that I have run in terror from men who have considered me as a suitable wife. I have sabotaged myself in that regard for years. I do not want to make it seem an easy thing for a woman to submit to any man's authority. I do want to make it seem like the right and beneficial thing to do- to be submitted to God's authority.

Being a woman submitted to God's authority does not mean that your gifts and talents are wasted or that you have less meaningful contributions to make to the Kingdom. It does allow you the opportunity to make the most of your gifts and talents by using them wisely. He is an economical God who equips His people with precisely the abilities He needs them to have in order to accomplish the tasks He places before them.

Character Flaws, Sin and Remediation

I have been thinking about my last post in which I offered to talk about how having a job has shown or magnified my character flaws. Before I do though, I want to distinguish between character flaws and sin. My character flaws predispose me to sin in certain areas more readily than in others. Indulging in my character flaws is sinful. Entertaining the idea of indulging my character flaws is sinful. They are the weaknesses in me where my flesh makes itself known by screaming, "You know you want to!!" Too often I hear Christians lamenting that they "make mistakes" or are victims of their genetic make-up and intimate that they should, therefore, be excused from culpability for being prone to certain activities. Our cultural dependence on a medical model to define our behavior has given many what they see as a plausible excuse for sin. I don't see that caveat in the Word. For Christians, the Word is always our standard. It is the standard by which all will be j

Fear Down, Hope and Peace to Go!

Last night I had the honor and privilege to present some information to the women of my church. I cannot begin to tell you how much I love and appreciate them. The seminar I did was on fear. God is clever and He had me present the information to them because I needed it. It's not that I don't want to study things for my own benefit and growth, but whenever I do a topical study to teach it, I see how badly I needed it and how much more I have to repent of than I realized. Sometimes you don't know what you don't know. That's a topic I want to return to in another post. I want to talk about the ladies for a moment. They are an incredibly loving group of women. Women who seek God and are teachable. They have gone out of their way to include me and love on me, which speaks volumes of their characters because I am not all that lovable. I am not being self-deprecating here. I am a mix of endearing and maddening qualities like anyone else. What I am telling you is

Super Church a song for the Emergent-sy

In the early 70s I was in a youth choir at my church. Our youth pastor was a musician and his way of connecting with us as a group was through the choir and music. Somehow there was an affiliation between him and The Continental Singers, New Hope and Jeremiah People. He was worked with Moishe Rosen of Jews for Jesus too, I think. Are any of these names familiar to you? Though I remember the church fondly I was a profoundly lost and troubled young woman during my years there. That and time have muddled the memories quite a bit. Today I was digging through some old paperwork and one of the books to the musical we did. It's Getting Late For the Great Planet Earth, a folk rock oratorio by Cam Floria. Yes, that's right. Cam Floria put Hal Lindsey to music. There's a lot to laugh about and some to groan about but as I was looking through the songs and remembering, I found this little ditty and I only wish I could sing it for you. Just remember that this is circa 1972 and even th

rambling rosemarie

Search This Blog