Sunday, August 12, 2007

New Song

love this song...

Hillsong United - Hosanna

I see the king of glory
Coming down the clouds with fire
The whole earth shakes, the whole earth shakes
I see his love and mercy
Washing over all our sin
The people sing, the people sing

Chorus
Hosanna, hosanna
Hosanna in the highest

Verse 2
I see a generation
Rising up to take the place
With selfless faith, with selfless faith
I see a new revival
Staring as we pray and seek
We're on our knees, we're on our knees

Bridge
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like you have loved me
Break my heart for what is yours
Everything I am for your kingdom's cause
As I walk from earth into eternity

we sang this during service today.
my personal response- tears.

Thursday, August 02, 2007

So true!

This is an absolutely incredible interview with Rick Warren, "Purpose
Driven Life" author and pastor of the Saddleback Church in California .

His wife now has cancer, and he now has "wealth" from the book sales.

In the interview by Paul Bradshaw, Rick Warren said: "People ask me,
what is the purpose of life? And I respond: In a nutshell, life is
preparation for eternity. We were made to last forever, and God wants us
to be with Him in Heaven.

One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body --
but not the end of me. I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am
going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act -
the dress rehearsal.

God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity. We
were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't
going to make sense.

Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just
coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one.

The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than
your comfort. God is more interested in making your life holy than He is
in making your life happy.

We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life.
The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.

This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the
toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer.

I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark
time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe
that anymore. Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that
it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have
something good and something bad in your life. No matter how good things
are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked
on. And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always
something good you can thank God for.

You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems. If
you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, "which is
my problem, my issues, my pain."

But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off
yourself and onto God and others.

We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of
thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for
her. It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her
character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a
testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.

You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life.
Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For
instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million
copies, it made me instantly very wealthy. It also brought a lot of
notoriety that I had never had to deal with before. I don't think God
gives you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of
ease.

So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety
and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide
what to do, II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72.

First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our
lifestyle one bit. We made no major purchases. Second, about midway
through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church.

Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan
to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and
educate the next generation.

Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I
started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able
to serve God for free.

We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity?
Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or
am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)?

When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if
I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You
better

God didn't put me on earth just to fulfill a to-do list. He's more
interested in what I am than what I do. That's why we're called human
beings, not human doings.

Happy moments, PRAISE GOD. Difficult moments, SEEK GOD. Quiet moments,
WORSHIP GOD. Painful moments, TRUST GOD. Every moment, THANK GOD. "

This is beautiful and "food for the soul!" A friend sent it to me, I'm sharing it with you.