What would God say if He had a twitter account? What would He communicate with those that are following him? Oh I know some of you will say…”read the Bible” or “go to church”. Those are great things and should be done, but this is Twitterville.
For those of you that don’t know what Twitter is don’t feel bad. Simply, it is a way to communicate your thoughts or what you are doing to a number of people all at the same time via the internet and phone. You send it out and it goes to everyone that wants to “follow” you. The catch is that you can only use less than 140 characters to get your message across. Characters…not words, sentences or pages! You have to be concise in what you are trying to say.
Check out three of my friends tweets (that is what they are called) within the last day:
Woke up to no new snow. this is good. (johnfehlen)
Working in a mall kiosk may be the most boring job in a snow storm (Toryfarina)
Forgot power cord going home to get it; I’ll be late to camp (pastortimclark)
What would God tweet to all of us?
Man that is a really awesome mountain I built
Helped a bird that was caught in a tree today
Who order this rain?..ah right I did
The cool thing with God’s Twitter account is that He has a really cool exclusive app. Instead of sending one message to the masses He sends individual tweets out to each of us. We know it as that still, small (less than 140 characters) voice that we hear as we go about our life.
Check out some recent tweets I got from God:
Stop what you are doing it isn’t productive to what I need
Why don’t you shut up (yup God tweets that to me a lot)
I really love you
If you are a follower of God’s Twitter what is he saying to you? If you aren’t a follower of God’s twitter you need to check Him out today.
It was eleven years ago that I started training for my first (and last) marathon. After that cold five hour run in October I turned those shoes into lawn mowing apparel and haven’t felt the pounding of pavement on my knees since.
Well I am announcing today that I am coming out of retirement. I know this isn’t national news but I am preparing for a run in July. This one is 184.9 miles from Blaine to Langley WA. This equates to around 27 hours of straight running.
The catch is I am running it with a team of 11 others. In community the way life is supposed to be ran. Each one runs three separate legs of the race from 3.5 to 8.5 miles each time. You run…then you rest…then you run…all the time cheering for your team to finish.
Isn’t this the way we are supposed to do life. Run hard…then rest…then run hard…all the time cheering on those around us. It makes me think about whom I am running the race of life with? Am I supporting them and doing my part?
Ps. we are also running to raise awareness and money for www.startoutright.org . Check it out.
Joseph Fehlen – A Plague For Ever Occasion
From the series “Exodus: Movement of the People”
Did you know hallmark has a card for almost every occasion? If it be sympathy, a new baby or a glad you worked here; they have a card for you. You want one that is serious: perfect they have it. You need one that has old people’s backsides: no worries they have those also.
I have been reading Exodus and am at the point when God completely annihilates the land of Egypt. After reading into the ten plagues most scholars would say that each plague was a direct in your face action by Yahweh to an Egyptian god. The first plague of turning the Nile into blood was to show that He was stronger than Hapi, the god of the Nile. Another being when God turned the skies black for three days to show the people that He was stronger than Ra, who was considered the most powerful of the sun gods.
He is like Hallmark, A plague for any occasion. You got a problem weighing you down…no problem. You got a relationship that needs healing…don’t even worry about it. Life getting you down…He can shine through.
The plagues that once gave me the night sweats because they scared me so much now bring me a sort of comfort. The cool thing is God never desired to obliterate a people, but eradicate their gods. I AM desires so much for us to be saved that by many different means He will make it happen. He will go face to face with our addictions, attitudes, burdens and issues that are weighing us down.
He is the like the handy man that has many tools and like hallmark that has a card for any occasion. God wants us free so bad he has a plague that might not feel good or seem like a nice thing but will defeat the god that is holding us back.
“…and then a chill blast came in which the torches flickered and went out, and could not be rekindled…He (Glimli) stumbled on until he was crawling like a beast on the ground and felt that he could endure no more: he must either find an ending and escape or run back in madness. Suddenly….light grew, and lo! the company passed through another gateway”* A little glimpse into one of my favorite books made into my favorite movie trilogy.
Middle Earth was in turmoil and it seemed like the inhabitants would not survive this onslaught from the evil lord Sauran. Their world was crashing in and the times were dark. Their only hope was with a man from the line of the kings, Aragon. Unwilling at first, he finally realized that he was the chosen one to lead his people into battle and into freedom. But before he would experience freedom, life would get much worse. He would have to enter one of the darkest of places first before he would experience the light. That is where we find him and his companions: lights out, pitch black. They were longing for the end to happen and thinking about returning to where he came from all at the same time.
The saying goes, “it is always darkest before the dawn”. As the moon is leaving the sky and the sun is yet to come you experience a time of darkness like no other. So close to the sun but yet it seems so far away. It is a cold, dark place to be and the only saving knowledge is that the sun will be soon to come.
We read in Exodus 5 that Moses (not unlike Aragon) was going to lead his people out of slavery but Pharaoh would make it much harder for them first; more bricks with no straw. It would be harder work and more consequences. So close to freedom but it must have felt so far away. They would have to experience the darkest part of the night before the dawn.
I wonder what would have happened if they would have given up at that point (just before their deliverance) just because it was such a dark time.
Then I think about all the times I have given up just before the dawn. All the times I wanted to give up because it was getting hard. Or the times I almost gave in but the answer came the next morning and I was so grateful I didn’t throw in the towel. It is truly darkest before dawn, but when dawn comes it always makes sense and the dark was worth it. We just might have to stumble on and crawl like a beast to see the light first.
*(JRR Tolkien, The Passing of the Grey Company, The Return of the King)
