The Writing Life
“The commander must decide how he will fight the battle before it begins. […] He must make the enemy dance to his tune from the beginning and not vice versa.”
— Field Marshall Bernard Law Montgomery, nicknamed “The Spartan General”
Some people hold misapprehensions about the Christian life, thinking it weak or passive. The Bible, though, presents a different picture. It says the Christian life is not only active and strong but also engaged in a mighty war.
At The Austin Stone, the pastors have been teaching on our church’s practices and why they matter. Matt Carter started the series with a sermon about the importance of preaching the Word, i.e., the Bible.
Excellence is a subject never far from my thoughts, but it’s a higher priority one at the moment due to the Gospel and Work seminar I attended on Saturday and the excellence module I’m studying in The Austin Stone Worship Foundations course. I’m still pondering what to say about the subject–I’ve written about it previously and need to figure out a new angle–but I won’t leave people bereft of anything. I’ll share some of the thoughts found in my REAP journal, as well as some handlettering.
Sometimes, life is hard. You find out you owe thousands of dollars in taxes. You have a huge deductible to meet. Your house payment has gone up because of county taxes. Your brother can’t find a job. You’re lonely.
The word of the Lord came to him [Elijah], saying, “Go hide yourself by the brook Cherith, which is east of the Jordan. It shall be that you will drink of the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to provide for you there.”
So he went and did according to the word of the Lord, for he went and lived by the brook Cherith, which is east of the Jordan. The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening, and he would drink from the brook. It happened after a while that the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.
1 Kings 17:2-7, NASB
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Why are you in despair, O my soul?
And why have you become disturbed within me?
Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him
For the help of His presence.
Psalm 42:5, NASB