Tag Archives: prayer

Unemployment it’s especially hard during the holidays. Enjoy the holidays, but on Monday try this

Leave a reply

I have developed a heart for those dealing with unemployment. I worked in corporate finance for twenty years and went through my share of. Corporate challenges  I do know the drill. If you are dealing with this I am sure you have been working hard, doing all the things that are recommended and still keeping a great attitude. I would certainly encourage you to keep trusting in God, looking for His will and trusting that he is moving you where you should be.  I truly hope that you will take your foot off the pedal for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Keep a positive attitude, keep regular hours do what you can do but take time to enjoy family and friends to let a group like ours give support, for your pastor to encourage and give comfort. I know how you’re feeling and you need to stop beating yourself. This time of year is particularly tough for two groups, those who have lost a loved one and those who are unemployed. Please be with brothers and sisters in Jesus and enjoy their support. If you are in the York, Pa area and we can provide support of clothing, food, fellowship, please don’t hesitate to contact me at bm2driskell@aol.com.

Now something to think about for next week, maybe you’re kind of in a rut so try this. This is something we suggest to people in the group we facilitate, but now it is backed up with professional opinion. The following is from “Men’s Health” Jul/August 2014 page 20:

“Donating your time really will help you get ahead. In a study in the “Journal of Career Assessment”, unemployed people who volunteered weekly were far more likely to have a job within six months than those who didn’t lend a hand. Even those who volunteered less than two hours a week had a better shot at being hired elsewhere, says Varda Konstam PhD, the study’s lead researcher. The key word here is “elsewhere”. The ability to ladle out soup doesn’t mean you’re qualified to work only in a cafeteria. Interviewers are increasingly viewing such basic skills as indicators of broader skill sets. That means serving soup isn’t about serving soup; it shows that you’re good at customer service and work well with others. Try telethons to show off your sales and marketing tactics  or find another opportunity in your area at volunteermatch.org ”

i have seen at least two people in our group end up with really great positions by following this advice. One other note we are more and more seeing ages forty and over with this group. Either they’re the only ones taking the initiative to be part of such group or it’s hitting older workers. I’d be willing to be a combination of both. Any discussion on that would be appreciated we would like to get better in this area and input would be appreciated. Again Happy Thanksgiving and God bless.

Where are you being guided to in Jesus? First St Johns, York, Pa. October 26, 2014

Leave a reply

Please click on the above link to hear the audio of this sermon

We make our beginning in the Name of God the Father and in the Name of God the Son and in the Name of God the Holy Spirit and all those who are led by and follow the Holy Spirit said … AMEN
Paul’s charge to the Thessalonians tells us that: “…we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into His own kingdom and glory.” (1 Thess 2:12) Those who are faithful brothers and sisters in Christ are constantly being guided, are constantly being charged to walk, to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit. Marge and I were moved to pick up our lives in Massachusetts to go to St Louis for a season, complete education and then to be led to where? We didn’t know, but as things unfolded and we were faithful, we were guided to be in York, Pa. Dr Jerry Kieschnick asked me, as I received my call papers if I knew where York, Pa was? Not really, but in our faith we didn’t question where York was, we were led here and have been made a part of this great family in Jesus here in York.
On this Reformation Day, we remember Dr Martin Luther, posting the 95 Thesis on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg on All Saints Day. As I’ve said before, Dr Luther wasn’t looking for some kind of showdown, too many times we see him depicted as a Christian version of a gunfighter at the OK Corral. That was not his intent. He was a brilliant man who never stopped studying, as he studied, the more he realized that there were problems with the doctrines that the Roman church was teaching. He was a teacher at the time and the more he had to deal with these doctrines, the more he felt led to start a journey of inquiry. He never anticipated what would happen as he nailed his document to that door. His whole intention was to raise these issues in a genuinely collegial sense. He wasn’t looking for a brawl, a battle, but I have no doubt that God led Luther to do this in order to raise issues about God’s church that demanded discussion. The Roman church, at the time, chose not to discuss those issues. Luther wrote: “In the year 1516. I began to write against the pope. In the year 1518 Doctor Staupitz released me from obedience to my order and left me alone at Augsburg when I had been summoned before Emperor Maximilian and the pope’s legate, who was then at the place. In the year 1519 Pope Leo excommunicated me from the church and so I was released a second time. In the year 1521 Emperor Charles excommunicated me from his empire and so I was released a third time. But the Lord took me up.”1
Many times when we are led to leave, by God, we’re told to leave by the world. Luther has the distinction to be told to leave three times, you think you have it rough, you may be told to leave your work, your school, wherever, because of your Christian beliefs, but probably only once. Luther got “shown the door” by the head of the Augustian Order where he had lived and served as a monk, by the head of the Roman Catholic Church and then by the head of state of the largest empire in the world. Luther could honestly say that he had been thrown out of better places then most people. Sometimes to be thrown out of places that are just frankly not good to be in to begin with, is a badge of honor. No one wants the shame of being publicly asked to leave, but afterwards you realize that being thrown out was the right thing, was something that needed to happen in order to glorify God, then so be it and God speed.
It is then usually a case of not just being led somewhere, but also a commentary on being thrown out of somewhere. Jesus told His disciples that they would be thrown out of houses and towns; “And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town.” (Matt 10:14, Mark 6:11 and Luke 9:5), each of the Synoptic Gospels. The Synoptic Gospels, do not tell all of the same events or sayings, but apparently they were all so aware of the fact that they would get tossed out of places, that they all made a point of relating this direction of Jesus. Did that mean that they had failed, or were somehow not completely adequate disciples? No, it could well mean that Jesus was making sure everyone knew that they had a chance to hear the Gospel, if they rejected it, well too bad for them, Matthew 11:23-29: “And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.” If any place had its chance it was Capernaum. Jesus had been led there, most of the disciples lived and worked there, all sorts of miracles and preaching went on there. What happened? Luke 4: starting at verse 17, do you remember what Jesus did? After reading Isaiah He declared that He fulfilled Isaiah’s prophecy that “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me…” Jesus was the anointed of God, the Messiah. Their response? Woe, wait a minute there, this is Joseph’s son, He’s saying that He’s the Messiah? No, I don’t think so. Jesus responded, yea, kinda figured, because no prophet is acceptable in his hometown, and that is when the people in the synagogue tried to hustle Jesus down to a cliff to throw Him off of it. Yea Jesus got run out of Dodge, but did that make Jesus find a corner to sit and cry? “They threw me out of my hometown, wah, what will I do?
Sometimes we are moved as Paul described to the Thessalonians. Now Paul had certainly been moved around by the Holy Spirit, a lot of places we don’t know about. But he tells the Thessalonians: “…like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into His own kingdom and glory.” (1 Thessalonians 2: 11). The Greek word Paul used peripate,w like the English can mean how we conduct ourselves and to also literally walk. No doubt Paul expected that some of those in Thessalonica that he was preaching to would be led on their own literal walk or journey.
Luther was led on a walk, to initiate that walk he was thrown out of somewhere else. The door was closed on him at the monastery he was at the church he preached at and even the country he lived in. Clearly God was using an exclamation point to emphasize that it was time for Luther to step out in his Christian faith. That wasn’t Luther’s perception, no doubt he was otherwise comfortable and at home where he was. God emphatically moved Luther so that Luther was left without any choice. He had to pursue the issues that he raised. These issues weren’t going to be in terms of some hypothetical debate, something that maybe would result in changes or maybe not. No! God didn’t leave any room for Luther to maneuver, there was only a straight line and that was to see through the establishment of a church that would faithfully preach the Word of God. A church that would be faithful to Scripture, God’s Law and the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
The question before you is this: Are you truly listening to what God is saying to you? Are you faithful in prayer, not the kind of prayer that’s “OK God listen up, this is what I need from You and what I need You to do!” But prayer that is also asking and seeking God’s will in your life, where he wants you to walk to? I doubt that most, if any of you, are being asked to pick up and leave York. Dick and Gloria have already gone and returned from their mission trip in Liberia. But, God might be guiding some of you to short term mission in Africa, Haiti, Guatemala, or maybe to Helen Thackston charter school, your next door neighbor, the man or woman in the cube next to you at work, to a young man or woman who may be making bad decisions and needs someone to turn them to Jesus. You might have to walk across the world or across your lawn.
Ya, here we go, take out that journal and pray over it and listen for God’s guidance. Where is He directing you to and who is He directing you to witness to or to serve, to faithfully build a relationship with in order for them to come to know the love of Christ? What comfortable place are you being asked to move out of? You may have to stand up against the powers, but the Holy Spirit will give you the words.
The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Shalom and Amin.

Our brains designed by God to be receptive to Him, our sin messes up that design.

4 Replies

I’ve seen a lot has been written lately on the unique design of the brain. That the case could be made that  the human brain was designed by God to be receptive to God’s guiding. The point is also made that the human brain is very elastic, very malleable. This means that the brain was made one way and intended by God for His guidance. Because the brain is so elastic, though, it is very subject to being changed from its intended purpose and to our human thoughts and deeds. Meaning, by our sin, by our lusts, obsessions, hatreds, substance abuse, lack of exercise, poor diet, anger, bitterness, we change our brains to be very different from what God intended them to be.

The research I’ve seen has shown that damage to the brain either physical or psychic can impact the brain very negatively. The “prefrontal regions” of the human brain is responsible for what is referred to as the “executive functions of the brain”. This part of the human brain is vastly different than any other animal brain. As Gary Sibcy PhD points out: “Spirituality is not some separate part of our functioning, but refers to how well all the different components work together in a synchronized and coherent fashion. Just as the term ‘team’ is about how well all the players work together, spirituality is about how well our thinking, feeling, behaving, relating, communicating and problem-solving operate in relation to others and God. Jesus’ life itself represents a living example of perfect harmony across all these domains.” (Christian Counseling Today Vol 20 No 3 p 42)

One thing that does come out in the research is that this part of the brain is rather vulnerable, subject to physical trauma and also psychic trauma (issues like bullying, sexual abuse, trauma, stress etc). I know that there are people who have been affected this way and have become bitter and anger, often against God and those who try to help them. But, it does seem to me, albeit my lay mind, that the elasticity of the brain can be used to shape the brain back to being receptive to God and away from anger and bitterness. Seems to me, that secular ways of dealing with this simply reinforces the anger and bitterness, trying to find a way to justify the anger and bitterness and resentfulness against Christians who are trying to help someone by adjusting their brain away from the bitterness and toward the love, care, compassion of Christ and Christians.

Well this doesn’t seem to play well into the secular. It frankly seems that the secular is much more interested in justifying the anger, justifying striking back and dispensing with any hope that they can come back into a healthy relationship with others.

Anyway, the prefrontal regions regulate/coordinate the higher functions of the brain. The claim seems to be that when the brain is operating properly, when we are allowing God to guide the Executive functions, instead of what people usually do and resort to the use of the lower functions of the brain. Sibcy writes: “…the prefrontal region … plays a critical role in spirituality because it provides the underlying biological platform that supports a wide number of neurocognitive processes and allows us to achieve ‘maturity in Christ’.

I’m not going to camp on this or bet the house, but it seems logical; God operates the higher functions of the human brain, we take our brain to the lower functions. It’s not to say someone is “smarter” because, I believe, there are other parts of the brain more engaged in just pure intelligence. But it seems that we are allowing God to manage and coordinate the brain when we rely on Him to guide us by our prefrontal regions and that does give us maturity, emotional depth, warmth, patience, humility etc. I’m sure you know someone who is quite brilliant but has little ability to effectively coordinate their brain between their brilliance and having emotional depth, empathy, humility etc., a great example is Sheldon the off the chart brilliant astro-physicist on the television program “Big Bang Theory”.

Again, I am a lay person, but for some reason, lately, I’ve been reading some very deep material in the elasticity of the brain. This is a rather new development in science and a factor that isn’t taken into account in secular psychological treatment. It seems as if secular treatment allows the mind to be hardened into the trauma by repeating the trauma,  establishing who is the victim and villan and allowing the patient to be divided and enabled in their trauma, instead of trying to use the plasticity of the brain in order to overcome and move beyond the trauma.

As Christians we have to continue to pray and encourage those who are dealing with trauma, but we also need to challenge them to grow in maturity. We need to encourage them to trust healing in the Holy Spirit who, I have no doubt, will influence the patient, as He does with all of us, through the higher/executive functions of the brain. Through our encouragement and prayer I have no doubt that we are helping this person to use these executive functions in order to coordinate all the parts of the brain to rest and trust in God and follow His leading. It frankly seems that the secular says, “no you have to do everything by yourself, continually relive the trauma and let your brain harden into the bitterness and resentment of your trauma and you can simply sit and stew in your anger at the world and God.” We are called to a higher solution. God’s love, compassion, comfort, healing works through the prefrontal parts and heals, the world appeals to the lower parts of the brain and allows bitterness and anger to build. Obviously we are called to encourage, pray, include in community and turn from anger and bitterness to God in Christ.