It Wasn’t Like You Were Married or Dating… - Friendship Myths #5 - Purity 1337

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.com or mt4christ.org, or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of the sky and trees reflected perfectly in the waters of the Rivers Torrens in Adelaide, South Australia, comes to us from Dave Bond Photography, who shared this tranquil scene on social media 2 days ago, along with the Indra Devi quote stating, Like water which can clearly mirror the sky and the trees only so long as its surface is undisturbed, the mind can only redirect the true image of the self when it is tranquil and wholly relaxed. While I can understand the sentiment that we can only get a good sense of who we are when we are— have a measure of peace, I would go a little further in saying that it is only when we have true peace by having peace with God through faith in Jesus Christ, that we can really know our true selves who are in Christ, who we are in Christ, and begin to become the person God created us to be. Well, it's Saturday and I'm finally at peace because after 3 days, mt4christ.org has been raised to life again as the good people in tech support at WordPress assisted me this morning in redirecting the stalled traffic to mt4christ.org. Mt4christ.org to flow smoothly to mt4christ.com. My attempts to go to www.mt4christ.org over the last 2 days all crashed and were still crashing this morning, but a few minutes after putting tech support solution in place, this skeptic became a believer as all my devices showed me that the fix did indeed actually work. And I just control-clicked the hyperlink in my Word document above to, to see it work again. Hallelujah! Oh, happy day! Anyway, our friend Dave pointed us to a quote from a questionable source. Indra Devi was the first lady of yoga. Uh-oh. But because we are friends, I know that he's not into yoga as a religion, as Dave and his wife Lisa Grace are Christians who were brought together by the Lord in a truly amazing story. Which we shared on the blog 3 years ago, and if you want to read it, I'm sharing the link today on the blog. But suppose our friendship did end. While I have never met Dave or Lisa Vaughn in person, I do— I do consider them friends of mine. I've shared Dave's work quite a bit over the years. Just search Dave Vaughn on the new site and you'll— you will be blessed with a whole list of the posts that feature his photography. And it— and if our friendship did end, it would hurt. It would hurt if I lost their friendship. But maybe you believe the lie that my loss of a friendship would be less than the loss of a roman— or a romantic interest, and thus would be no big deal. And that brings us to our current series on friendship myths, which was inspired by a recent prayer ministry session and the discovery of Sarah Epstein's 2022 Psychology to Gay Today article on destructive beliefs about friendship. While I have to agree that the loss of an online friendship would not hurt as much as the loss of my romantic relationship with my wife Tammy Lynn, we go into dangerous territory when we buy into the next destructive belief on Epstein's list, which is the end of a friendship is not as bad as the end of a romantic relationship. Epstein writes, while friendships do not get the airtime that romances get, friendship break— friend breakups can be incredibly difficult and heartbreaking. Those whose friendship ends should allow themselves to mourn the same way a person would after, after an important romantic attachment ends. Come on, dude, it's not like you guys were married or dating. Get over it. They were just a friend. Grief is grief, guys, and whether or not that sentiment is spoken to you by someone else or said to yourself or whispered by unseen spiritual forces of darkness, we have to realize that this dismissive attitude towards our legitimate grief is not healthy. While we have previously stated that we have to normalize the idea that friendship— friendships can end and that's okay, we don't want to fall into the trap of believing that the loss of our friendships don't matter at all, or that they matter somehow less than other relationships, and we are not entitled to grieve the loss of them. Disenfranchised grief is the phenomenon of being shut down, shamed, or to be left alone in your grief as others devalue or can't recognize your legitimate need to grieve a loss. Friendships— friends can be hard to find in this world for some, and And we can't really judge one another's losses. We shouldn't shame ourselves or talk ourselves out of grieving the loss, the losses we suffer. When we fail to grieve properly, dysfunctions in our souls can manifest later. Our wounds can be seeded with the lies of the enemy, and that can lead us to making vows that change how we approach life in the future. By believing the lie that the loss of friendship is less than the loss of other relationships, It could cause us to repress our emotions, devalue the friendships we do have, or cause us to choose not to pursue friendships that could end and cause us to grieve, quote unquote, inappropriately in the future. Believing this myth, which does have a measure of truth in it, mind you, could lead us to becoming cold emotionally and lead us to seek fri— lead us not to seek friendships, leaving us isolated and alone where the enemy can torment us, tempt us, or lead us into destruction. So don't believe the lie that the loss of friendships is no big deal. Allow yourself to grieve the loss you encounter and love and, and be loving towards others who have suffered loss, letting them know that it's okay to express their grief even if the person was Just a Friend. Today's Bible verses come to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on death and eternal life, and today's verses come from John 3:14-15, where Jesus said, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes will in— believes will in him have eternal life. Today's verses are the first of 4 passages of scripture that fall under the 19th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on death and eternal life. And that 19th point is: All who believe in Jesus will have eternal life. Today's verse— verses show that Jesus put up um, put forth— yeah, he put forth, uh, he put forth the Old Testament scriptures as true and that they reveal his coming and the gift of eternal life to those who put their faith in him. This admittedly weird story from the Old Testament really does demonstrate it, demonstrate that it is through faith alone that we are saved. As it was only those who trusted in what Moses said to make a fiery serpent and to put it on a pole and to look upon it that would be healed. God sent into the camp, um, uh, sent snakes into the camp. He did send snakes into the camp as an expression of his wrath, and many were bitten and died. And it was only only they who listened to his prophet Moses that lived. And so Jesus points to this story, which doesn't make a lot of sense, mind you. Look at the idol and live? Really? I'd rather have some anti-venom, thanks. It points to the faith— it points to the faith in God, what he said and who he sent that would bridge the gap between God and man and give us peace. Heaths and eternal life. We didn't— we don't have to look at a snake on a pole. We look to Jesus and we are saved. Praise the Lord. As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.com or mt4christ.org, where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from According to Your Word: Morning and Evening Through the New Testament by Stephen F. Alford.. In his devotional, he prompts us to read a chapter of the New Testament every day, and today's chapter is Acts 8. And from Acts 8, he shares a portion of verse 19, which says, "Give me this power also." And Stephen Allford writes, "In verse 13, it is recorded of this Simon that he believed, was baptized, and continued with Philip." From all external appearances, it would seem that he was a sacred man, but as Peter says in verse 22, Simon's heart was not right in the sight of God. This was manifest in the way he coveted the power of God for his own ulterior motives. He offered them money, verse 18. What an act of utter ungratitude! Is it any wonder Peter says, "Your money perish with you," because you thought that the gift of God could be purchased with money. Verse 20: Give me this power also. He did not desire it for God's glory; he merely wished to become as someone great. Verse 9: He had not the love of the Father, but the love of the world. Notice that Simon saw the laying on of the apostles' hands lust of the eyes. He offered them money, saying, give me. Lust of the flesh: anyone on whom I lay hands may receive the Holy Spirit. Pride of life. So yeah, you can see offers pointing to the sin there. Then everything Simon said revealed that he had lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. Anyway, that wasn't very clear until you back up on it. But after that, Alfred ends in prayer by saying, uh, by praying, personal power is fleeting and for fleshly gain. True power is from you and for your glory. Amen. So there we go. Our power to serve our own purposes, if we're seeking to use our faith to do things for ourselves personally. We have to make sure that we're not Simon the Sorcerer and trying to wield our power to look great in front of other people. Um, it's, it's pride, pride laid at the end of it. And I think there's a fundamental lack of faith and understanding on Simon's part. He saw, you know, he saw the benefits of faith but not really even see God. He didn't know God, apparently, because he just wanted the power. He didn't want a relationship. And some people just want to go to heaven but don't want to be bothered with, you know, following the Lord and the way they live their lives. And so, you know, we have to be very careful when we come into faith and to seek a relationship with God, which is a difficult concept to understand when you don't have faith. But when you realize the gospel is true and it's given by a God who's alive and well and active, that there's a relationship that's been established. And I put my trust in Jesus and God the Father approves me and I become part of his family. It's a relationship. That's the thing about our faith, not the fact that I'll be blessed. I'll be given good things. I'll be given eternal life. We don't look at the gifts. We look at the relationship we have with the Lord. You know, it's like, I'm only going to be friends with you because of the car you have. Yikes. You know, I'm friends with the guy who owns the nice car. And the nice car in this analogy would be eternal life, right? But, you know, and that's not how our faith is supposed to be. And whether it's gifts or blessings or promises of eternal life, this isn't why we believe. We believe because it's the God of all creation, the one who made everything, that we're coming in relationship with. We show our gratitude and our desire to be with him forever. That's what our faith is supposed to be. Anyway, and as today's Bible verse pointed out, that's how we're saved, not because of what we do. Although they did create, you know, a fiery serpent and put him on a pole. It wasn't a matter of, you know, if you make the idol and put it on a pole, you'll be saved. That was the means towards the faith that was expressed, but it was listening to the Word of God, do doing what the Word of God says that saved us and believing in the one who said it, you know, not, not the prophet Moses, but the Lord who spoke through him. We believe God and we're saved, and we put our faith in God and are saved. And so, um, yeah, that's what we do. Anyway, today is Saturday. I'm very happy because my website issue has been resolved. It's just a minor fix that would have been left undone, but luckily I got a tech— got good advice from tech support, and even though I didn't believe because it didn't work immediately, I was proven to be patient and wait on the Lord and the internet to catch up, but because it works now, so I'm very happy about that. I have the day with my wife. Today, and I don't know if we have any plans, but I'm going to be very happy in her company. So I'm going to move on to that part of the day, and so we're going to pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for all that you do for us, Lord. We thank you for the blessings of this life, but it's not the blessings, Lord, that make us love you. It's you. It's you we want to be with. Lord, we just pray for us to remember that as we try to, you know, be faithful and be blessed, um, that it's because of you. Even if blessings don't come, we're going to believe in you, Lord, um, because you created us, you made us, and you've given us everything. And if we never receive anything again, we're going to be content and happy to know you and follow you all the same. So Lord, we pray for anyone who's listening or reading today's message. Welcome to anyone who's trying to get on to www.mtforchrist.org. Lord, we pray for you to bless them and come alongside them in their prayer request and lead them in the way they should go. And Lord, we also pray for you to, um, lead us in the way we should go today. Open our eyes to the things we need to see and lead us in the way we should go, because all we want to do is represent you in your kingdom, Lord, and we definitely need help with that. So, Lord, we pray all these things today, and, uh, Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you. We pray all these things in the mighty name, in the name of Jesus. Amen.