- Details
- Written by: Don Goulding
When they placed their threshold by my threshold and their doorpost by my doorpost, with only the wall between me and them, they profaned my holy name by the abominable deeds they committed. (Ezekiel 43:8)
Dani and I once lived next to furloughed missionaries with a doorway connecting our apartments. Residing adjacent to them made us self-conscious of playing loud music, the clutter we left out, and our conversations near the thin door.
The Bible says we are the new temple of God. That means his Most Holy Place is inside me, just over the threshold from the Holy Place of my mind. It makes me think twice about the garbage I permit into my thoughts.
In the days of the physical temple, the Holy Place was where consecrated priests continually offered incense. Today, it’s the place in my mind from which prayers float upward, offered by a purified conscience. This is meant to be a quiet, reverent space in my being, filled with sweet thoughts of my wonderful Savior. I fear it is otherwise.
Oh, what sacrilege I permit in my thoughts, right next to God’s abode. Instead of a sanctuary, my mind is a party house with every kind of impurity running in and out. I may not act on the demonic banter in my head, but I often entertain temptation before giving it an eviction notice.
I want to clean up my Holy Place for my incredible neighbor’s sake. It’s time to refuse visitors of fantasy, envy, or worry. I must point to the narrow threshold that separates my mind from the home of the Most High God and send those thoughts scurrying.
Prayer: Holy Father, forgive my trash and help me clean up.
- Details
- Written by: Don Goulding
Are God's consolations not enough for you, words spoken gently to you? (Job 15:11) (NIV)
A forty-something woman came trembling after I preached in Pakistan. “I had a daughter fourteen years ago, but never any boy. I am useless.” Tears streamed down her coffee-toned cheeks from under her pink shawl.
Pakistani culture dictated that she produce a male heir for her family. The poor soul had convinced herself that some great curse was on her. Her body convulsed as she pressed her palms together and begged for prayer to conceive a boy.
As I sought help from the Holy Spirit, I found myself in a difficult position. This dear sister needed to let go of her obsession with a boy and find fulfillment in Jesus. I passed a note in Urdu with the verse from Job about God’s consultations. It was a hard message, but the condition of that precious woman’s heart was more important than the fruit of her womb.
I am often a sharp knife when ministering God’s truth to others and a dull mallet when applying it to my faults. After we helped the Pakistani, Jesus worked on my heart.
“Is my love enough to make you let go of lesser blessings?”
I held secret dissatisfaction with certain cards life had dealt me. By my attitude, I had said to the lover of my soul that I wanted, that I deserved, more than him. I wanted Jesus plus an easy life, Jesus with a bit of popularity, Jesus and some fun mixed in. The consolations of Christ had not been enough for me.
I sorely needed to listen to my preaching because the condition of my heart is more important than the fruit of the world.
Prayer: Lord, I have been a fool with your love. It is enough.
- Details
- Written by: Don Goulding
And he died for all so that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised. (2 Corinthians 5:15)
For centuries, the love of Romeo and Juliet has been celebrated because tragic love is the most profound.
The families of the lovestruck couple were feuding, so they married secretly. Then Juliet’s father engaged her to a self-absorbed count. In response, she swallowed a drug to simulate death. Her plan was to be entombed and later rise to escape with Romeo, but he found her comatose and assumed she was dead, so he poisoned himself. When Juliet awoke and discovered the truth, she stabbed herself to join Romeo in death.
The story of John meeting Jane in high school, marrying, having 2.5 healthy children, and living happily ever after doesn’t engage our hearts because it’s unchallenged love. Jesus’s love for me is not John and Jane’s love but Romeo and Juliet’s love. It’s tragic love.
Jesus said, “I will die so we can be together.” He knowingly left perfection to enter a hateful world that murdered him. The intensity of his love compelled him into this most epic tragedy in history.
Like Juliet, it’s now my turn to die for Jesus. But this plot has a twist. Though Christ died, he arose again, and his Spirit returned to live in me, his lover. As I die to myself, the life of my true love lives on in my body. In new ways every day, I reciprocate the death of him who is my passion. It’s the love saga of ultimate sacrifice and perfect union. Our mutually tragic love will be celebrated throughout eternal history.
Prayer: Yes, Great Love, we willingly die for each other.