Reflections of Brengle - holiness

"I saw the humility of Jesus, and my prode; the meekness of Jesus, and my temper; the lowliness of Jesus , and my ambition; the purity of Jesus , and my unclean heart; the faithfulness of Jesus, and the deceitfulness of my heart; the unselfishness of Jesus, and my selfishness; the trust and faith of Jesus, and my doubts and unbelief; the holiness of Jesus, and my unholiness.  I got my eyes off everybody but Jesus and myself, and I came to loathe myself." 

Samuel Logan Brengle p47-48 of 'Samuel Logan Brengle' by Hall

Great words of Samuel Logan Brengle - my experience tonight, but I thank God that as I can't sleep even though I'm exhausted, Jesus came to save me tonight from my inadequacies and all the feelings of unholiness, just like Isaiah felt in chapter 6, the live coal has touched my lips, and maybe even my heart. I thank Jesus that right now, I no longer loathe myself though as Brengle says, but in Jesus changing my heart, I am now starting to see myself as He is re-shaping me - it's a work in progress though!

Jesus can and will do the same for you, that is my testimony.  I pray that Jesus will be all you need today and as I was reminded while standing collecting in a shopping centre today and saw a guy missing an arm - Jesus wants to make you whole today - not necessarily physically, but spiritually, the essence of yourself.

Why don't you just take a moment and soak up His presence.

May Jesus, who died to give you life, give you rest and wholeness that you need today.

Be blessed
Simon

Litter vs Sin

Is litter and sin related?

I was at KFC last week and a few little thoughts came to my mind as I was sitting there.

It was quite busy at lunch time and all the workers were busy serving and cooking, and every table was full of rubbish! The workers didn't have the chance to leave the customers to clean the mess of the customers; customers that were fully capable to cleaning up after themselves, but they couldn't be bothered putting in that little bit of effort.

That really annoys me!

I notice some people don't worry about the trouble or inconvenience they can/are causing others, being selfish, for personal benefit which costs another.

Sin is similar, where we often do something to benefit ourselves, which is at the cost of someone else. We leave a mess that someone else has to deal with - that makes God sad!

Think the next time God convicts you that you're doing something that's not quite right how it's hurting or affecting someone else, and look at it through His eyes, repent and fix it up - clean up your mess to enable someone else to live the life Jesus wants them to live, in freedom - freedom from your mess!

Hope this short insight to my lunch time helps you today

Bless ya

Red hot and Committed??

I was reading some of Catherine Booth's book 'Practical Religion' the other day and found an interesting paragraph I'd like to share with you. The passage is found within the chapter entitled 'Hot Saints'.

Catherine wrote;

"WHY does God like people to be hot in His service? For the same reason that we like people to be hot in ours. We have no confidence in half-and-half, fase and-loose friends; milk-warm adherents who in times of danger wait to see which way the wind blows before they commit themselves to our views or interests; sevants who will serve us while at the same time they can serve themselves but the moment our interests and theirs appear to clash will leave us to our fate. We may use the half-hearted as far as they serve our purpose, but we have no confidence in them, no heart-fellowship with them, no joy over them. We would rather they were hot or cold out-and-out friends or foes." p109

Have you ever heard the saying, 'treat others how you would like them to treat you', how would God, then in return, treat those outlined above? Does God see you as trustworthy? Have you earnt God's trust?

I want to be red hot and consistant so on that day when I meet Him face to face He will smile at me! [Can you imagine that day you stand before Jesus and not being able to look Him in the eyes.. your heart just sinks knowing what's in store for you - your choices this very minute shapes that moment]

Decide today whether you are fully committed or fully not - THER IS NO IN-BETWEEN!

Saved or doomed! In or out! For God or against Him, headed for Heaven or headed for Hell - totally your choice, but you already knew that!

Know where you stand, and don't waver!

'I would thou wert cold or hot'

Revelation 3:15

Ego

Having trouble with a big head?

When was the last time you came before the Creator of the Universe? I was thinking the other day, we were talking about keeping humble, especially when you are entrusted with a huge task or with a large group of important things, it is easy to either be daunted, but if things go well it's easy to think that it was because of your greatness.

I'm sure it was because of your abilities and capable skills, but make sure it's all placed in proportion. God is the giver of all abilities and skills and some are entrusted with more 'talents', but that comes with great responsibility and accountablility.

Would you be able to be entrusted, like the parable, with 5 talents, or even 8 talents?! That's a huge responsibility, and can be classed as a burden by some leaders I know. Sure it's an honour, but at the same time, a huge expectation is placed upon you.

Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability. ...

'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'

Matthew 25:14-15, 21

Keep it in perspective, come before your God honestly and openly and you'll see things straight.

Bless ya!

Cost of following Jesus

18When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other side of the lake.

19Then a teacher of the law came to him and said,

"Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go."

20Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."

21Another disciple said to him, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father."

22But Jesus told him, "Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead."

Mathew 8:18-22

Good relationships

Sunday night I gave this message at the youth meeting at Macleod Salvation Army.

The night was captured on video and has been youtube-d, so I've put them below so you can watch the message yourself.

This is an important topic that isn't covered much, and needs to be. It hit some of the youth quite hard. Feel free to watch and pass on for your youth to see also.

[The video had to be broken into 3 parts for youtube acceptance (length of video)]

I'm no longer a Salvo

I've realised there are becoming more and more people that are calling themselves 'Salvo's'.

Many people that attend The Salvation Army once a year for Christmas or Easter or a dedication etc are calling themselves 'Salvo's', people that work in Salvo's stores or Employment Plus, or even people that just have family members who are connected with the Salvation Army in some form, or possibly just be fed by the soup van's are now saying they are Salvo's.

The name 'Salvo' is getting watered down so much and is loosing it's power and it's true intended purpose, so I am no longer a 'Salvo'!

These people are watering down what the Salvation Army is all about - so I don't want to be associated with an organisation that is becoming a club that is no more than a name that has a good reputation that makes me look good in return.

I now am going to start calling myself a SALVATIONIST! Why - because I am signed up, paid up, committed and actually in the fight. I'm not happy just even attending 'church' on Sunday, but without exception, or excuse, will obey God's plan for my life - everyday of my life, whether a public holiday, RDO or my birthday. Enough is enough of people who talk it up and in reality do nothing - I will not talk up myself or my actions, but only talk up the awesomeness of God and Jesus alone.

I am a soldier, a prayer warrior, of the Army of my God.

The Lord Jesus Christ is my Commanding Officer.

The Holy Bible is my code of conduct.

Faith, Prayer and the Word are my weapons of warfare.

I have been taught by the Holy Spirit, trained by experience, tried by adversity, and tested by fire.

I am a volunteer in this Army, and I am enlisted for eternity.

I will either retire in this army at the Rapture or die in this Army;

but I will not get out, sell out, be talked out.

I am faithful, capable, and dependable.

If my God needs me, I am there.

I am a soldier, a prayer warrior. I am not a baby.

I do not need to be pampered, petted, primed up, pumped up, picked up, or pepped up.

I am a soldier, a prayer warrior.

No one else has to call me, remind me, write me, visit me, entice me or lure me.

I am a soldier, a prayer warrior, I am not a wimp.

I am in place, saluting my King, obeying His orders, praising His Name and building His Kingdom!

I am a soldier, a prayer warrior.

No one has to send me flowers, gifts, food, cards, candy, or give me handouts.

I do not need to be cuddled, cradled, cared for, or catered to.

I am committed.

I cannot have my feelings hurt bad enough to turn me around.

I cannot be discouraged enough to turn me aside.

I cannot lose enough to cause me to quit.

When Jesus called me into His Army, I had nothing

If I end up with nothing I will still come out ahead,

For I am more than a conqueror.

The devil cannot defeat me. People cannot disillusion me.

Weather cannot weary me. Sickness cannot stop me.

Battles cannot beat me. Money cannot buy me.

And Hell cannot handle me

I AM A SOLDIER

Even death cannot destroy me.

For when my Commander calls me from this battlefield

He will promote me to glory and there I will rejoice in His presence.

I am a soldier in God's Army and I'm marching claiming victory.

I will not give up, not turn around.

Here I stand.... a soldier!

(author unknown)

Are you signed up and fully committed? Why not - would you prefer to watch TV or sleep in??

"Give up you small ambitions and come, change the world!"

Mark 8:34-35

Leadership qualities

I've been doing a lot of reading on leadership the past few weeks.

We had an interesting conversation with a 'leader' of the Salvation Army on Sunday after one of our Anzac day ceremonies, where this person was very discouraging and was pulling down all the hard work that we have been putting in to building up the organisation.

In my reading, (s)he was the perfect example of what not to be like! It's quite humorous how perfect examples come along at the right time. These examples really show you what you don't want to become.

So, some of the good points I picked up in my reading were;

• you need to maintain a good relationship with God (number 1)!
• you need to maximise your human relationships
• spend time with people you love
• understand that everyone has value!
• be a servant of Jesus
• inspire, encourage, pray for and enable others to become high achievers themselves
• build up others, and build up new leaders, ie empower others!
• unify the people you are leading
• be committed - something that is really lacking in the world currently
• persevere - never give up, no matter what

That's enough for now, there are plenty of principles that good leaders must develop.

Are you a leader, what areas can you improve upon? If you're not developing your leadership qualities, then you're not being a very good leader, we all can improve something. If we want to be good leaders, we need to always be expanding ourselves for the benefit of the people we're leading! How can you lead someone who has passed you in knowledge, wisdom, ability or even their own leadership!

"if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully."

Romans 12:8

Dialogue with God

As you were going home from church on Sunday morning you heard God say to you;

“Go to church tonight”

You reply – "But there’s a really good show on TV tonight that I wanted to watch"

“Come to my House tonight” God stated again

“God, I’ve already been to You’re House today, how much time do you want me to spend with You?”

“Forever!” God replied, “if you want to be with Me for eternity, you have to convinced Me that you do – but if you’d prefer the world, you can have that instead”

©S.A.S. Productions 2008
Simon Mapleback

"Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy"

Exodus 20:8

The walk of Holiness

How's your walk of Holiness going?

I ask because of a few things that have been brought into the light lately.

As Christians, we hope to become more like Jesus every day - don't we? We, as Salvationists enter into a covenant with God - God keeps His part, so ultimately it is us who needs to keep the commitment that we sign. How much integrity do we have with ourselves, but most importantly, with God!

I had a dream last night that I was moving into college to start my training for Officership, and I was sharing a room with someone else and I happened to see in his case a stash of cigarettes! Even the covenant for Soldiers forbids the use of these death sticks, but it made me so angry that someone training to become a leader and person of influence of this 'organisation' would have them and assumed to be using them.

There has been reports of other 'Soldiers' also breaking thier covenants by consuming alcohol also - but this wasn't a dream. What does this tell you about their integrity?

We're fighting more than the flesh in this battle, we need to overcome the flesh and sin and move to the real battle here which is in the spirtual! Get real!

As it says in one of my favourite battle songs "Raise the glorious standards higher" [SASB 696 v3] so let's take the worlds standards and live much higher - set the standard as it is in Heaven.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Ephesians 6:12

The Ten Commandments

A new movie is on it's way - a cartoon of 'The Ten Commandments' staring actors such as Christian Slater as Moses and Sir Ben Kingsley as the narrator.

Do you know the 10 commandments?
Have a look at this;

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In case you can't 'remember' the 10 commandments from God - an easy way to remember them is;

I dolitary

A dltery - Don't worship idols
M urder - Don't commit murder

T ake - Don't steal
H onour - obey your parents
E nvy - Don't be jealous

L ie - Don't ever lie
O ne - Only one God to worship
R est - On the sabbath
D isrespect - Don't use God's name in vain

Exodus 20 has the commandments that God told us to follow if you want to look them up for yourself!

"You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name"
Exodus 20:7

How well have you tamed your tongue?

To God be the glory!

Well, this morning was the big celebration meeting of the Salvation Army being in Glenroy for 50 years. What a morning - it was a great time of many past soldiers and their families and friends returning to remember the past and to honour many people that have helped build what now stands as God's army in the Hume City area.

We had one of our founding members give the story of how the Glenroy Corps started and then an emotional standing ovation when he was finally given a framed certificate of recognition of all his hard work. We also had a representative of the women of the corps to give her perspective, then the younger folk (represented by myself) and then our CSM to look at where to from here.

We had my brother enrolled as a Senior Soldier with a powerful testimony - (in summary) 'You have to make a decision - what is it?!' Powerful and straight to the point!

A large brass band and a combined Songster brigade both participated in the celebration with a small number of past Officers leading the singing while 2 past past bandmaster's led the band along with the present bandmaster and also an honorary bandmaster for the celebration.

The meeting was finished with a short word from our 'Spiritual' leader from THQ Lieut. Colonel Brian Hood who has been leading most of our Sunday meetings this year in our absence of Corps Officers. You won't find many better people than Lieut. Colonel Brian and Elaine Hood - please pray for them and the many ways they serve God.

We had a great time of sharing over lunch and watched a PowerPoint presentation of many, many photo's/video's from the past 50 years.

We captured the day on video, a DVD should be released of the morning soon, so if you're interested in obtaining a copy just let me know!

"Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.

Worship the Lord with gladness;

come before Him with joyful songs.

Know that the Lord is God.

It is He who made us, and we are His"

Psalm 100:1-3a

To God be the glory great things He has done (and is still doing!)

The banquet

Tish and myself decided to have a 'party' tonight to celebrate Tish's full time employment and my trip to Rwanda just for an excuse to invite most of our friends round for a good time together.

We didn't hear any replies back except for one and also that another 3 people might possibly make it - but never got back to us. In the end 3 people turned up from a large number that were invited.

In Luke 14:15-24 talks about a great banquet, where a certain man was preparing for the banquet and invited many guests but they all ended up having different excuses and none of them turned up. This man decided to go out and invite people off the streets and in the alley ways and anyone else that could be found.

It reminded me of tonight!

I felt like going out to the streets and eating all this food that Tish spent many hours cooking with the people sleeping on the streets - people that would appreciate it (nothing against Tish's cooking please note!).

I have noticed that 'the way' of today lacks courtesy and manners - no replies, just rock up if you can be bothered and places no value of importance on anything really - this attitude is spilling over into our worship of God! Christians are taking the ways of the world into the church, it should be the other way - we should be taking the ways of the church into the world. That consists of things such as dedication, devotion, discipline, determination, reliability and most importantly - integrity. Even church attendance is reflecive of these things.

Time to lift the game disciples of Jesus - soldiers of the cross! God made us in His image - now lets repay Him and become like Him!

Lets not make excuses and miss the Great Banquet - finish the race and finish it well. Work towards Holiness and be like Jesus as much as we can possibly be.

Glory to God!

"And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple....He who has ears, let him hear"

Luke 15:27,35b

Holiness

On Sunday, our youth led the Holiness meeting - it was an amazing time in the house of God!!

God showed up and everyone present witnessed Jesus in our midst.

We didn't have just one message, but three - one pre-taped the night before, due to a last minute forced absence.

Our theme was the body of Christ. We, the ones who gave the messages talked about things such as Spiritual gifts, different body analogies, 'the body is made up from many members - but are one unit', etc.

The final talk was myself, and I drove home the point, we as the body of Christ are meant to replicate Jesus in the world today - and the biggest point was - Jesus was HOLY - so we should be HOLY also!

Leviticus 11:44 says "I AM the Lord your God; consecrate yourselves and be HOLY, because I AM HOLY".

We gave the chance for all in attendance to sign a covenant of Holiness and to pray for healing - since if one part of the body is 'ill' the rest of the body is effected also.

We had many come forward who entered into a covenant of Holiness with God and a few for prayers also. It was a very encouraging time for our corps!

A final observation too - as I said - the youth led the meeting but we had songs mostly from the song book compared to praise & worship songs!! There is soooo much in our songbook that is so rich in doctrine and Biblical teaching!! Our youth showed a really impressive depth in their relationship with our Lord and Saviour - I was so proud! I'm sure God was also!

"The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ."

1 Corinthians 12:12

Determination

How determined are we to claim God's promises. How determined are we to pray through problems? How determined are we to get as many people into Heaven as we can?

How determined are we as people of God to be determined about anything?

Determination and dedication are two things that are generally missing in the world today. Dedication and determination in relationships/marrage, with our children, discipline, and so on.

The reason I bring this up is God asked me to make a new covenant with Him last Sunday night, a covenant to be Holy, not just know about being Holy, but acutally BE HOLY. I had to let go of things in my life that were getting in the way - 'flesh' things from being human that I had to totally give up to make this covenant. I could have very easily just said "yeah God, I'll do that" but not really entered into a true covenant!

I was determined to dedicate myself totally to this covenant with God. He asked me to do this so it must be for a purpose but most importantly - for His glory, so I set my whole self to do this - body, mind and soul. It took me a whole 10 minutes or so to pray through this before saying 'yes' and committing to it.

How often do we dedicate determined prayer to pray through things to truly commit to things like this?? This particular example only took 10 minutes to pray through, but if it took 3 hours, I still would have done it!!

We need to refuse to stop praying until we receive the blessing. I am reminded of Jacob when he wrestled with the Angel all night and refused to let it go until he got his blessing (see Genesis 32:22-31) and it even cost him an injury! For God's sake, lets be determined to finish everything we start, see it from start to finish and be determined to succeed and ultimately bring God glory!

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God."

Philippians 4:6