From the depths of despair, O Lord, I call for your help. Hear my cry, O Lord. Pay attention to my prayer. Lord, if you kept a record of our sins,
 who, O Lord, could ever survive?
 But you offer forgiveness,
 that we might learn to fear you. I am counting on the Lord;
 yes, I am counting on him.
  I have put my hope in his word.
  I long for the Lord
 more than sentries long for the dawn,
 yes, more than sentries long for the dawn. O Israel, hope in the Lord;
 for with the Lord there is unfailing love.
  His redemption overflows.
 He himself will redeem Israel
 from every kind of sin.  Psalm 130

A year ago I felt called by God to start this blog and share my journey deeper into God’s Word.  And that includes the joys and discoveries as well as dealing with those parts of me that I am not happy with.  I don’t write this blog for who will read it, though I am aware that people do, but I write it as a record of what is going on in my faith walk today.  And sometimes that is raw and painful.  But I don’t hide from that as that is my journey.

And right now I am very aware of my desperate need for forgiveness.  Without forgiveness, without the death of Jesus on the cross and Him raising to new life I am not sure how I would cope.  I am serious, the ability for me to receive forgiveness is incredibly important to me right now.  And the beauty of forgiveness is that God forgets.  They are completely washed away and I am made new again!  Lord, if you kept a record of our sins,
 who, O Lord, could ever survive?

So God forgets then surely I can forget?

Why then do I continue to beat myself up over sins of the past?  Forgiveness in the greek literally means to send away, to dismiss, so it is clear that when we are forgiven our sins in the eyes of God are dismissed and sent away.    My sin is like some rubbish, when I throw it in the bin it is gone, my house is clean again. Well in the same way I need to view my own sin as something that I have given to God never to return.  I am free of that rubbish for good!  The key challenge is that I need to realise that and work towards making sure that sin doesn’t return.  In the eyes of God that rubbish is gone!!

And where is my hope?  I am counting on the Lord;
 yes, I am counting on him.
  I have put my hope in his word.
  I long for the Lord
 more than sentries long for the dawn,
 yes, more than sentries long for the dawn. O Israel, hope in the Lord;
 for with the Lord there is unfailing love.
  His redemption overflows.
 He himself will redeem Israel
 from every kind of sin.

How are you with sin?  Able to let go or do you also need to learn like me to forget the rubbish and move forward.  Be great to read your comment below and if you are reading this on email, you can head to the blog by clicking here: BLOG to leave your comment.

Praise God!!

Mark

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http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

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Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for today is: Psalms 93-95

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Psalm 40:7-8 : Then I said, “Here I am, I have come — it is written about me in the scroll. I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”

I spent years not reading the Bible.  I am not sure how it happened but I just somehow managed to lose touch.  My prayer life went as well and I had a growing sense of discontent about church (why is it soooo boring??).  For way too long I walked away from the disciplines that are essential to growing my faith: reading the Bible, prayer, fellowship and dealing with sin.  And the funny thing is that I really didn’t see it as an issue, didn’t bother me most of the time.  And I look back and realise that there was no one in my life asking me the simple yet totally key questions:  how is your Bible reading?  How’s the prayer life?  How you finding church? What sin are you struggling with right now?  I don’t know, maybe because I was a leader in the church they assumed I was sorted.  Well I wasn’t, far from it.

I think we need to ask each other those questions regularly:

How is your Bible reading?  How’s the prayer life?  How you finding church? What sin are you struggling with right now?

It opens up discussions that should happen and need to happen if we are to be real with each other as Christian brothers and sisters.  It is not about being judgemental, but encouraging each other deeper into the presence of God.  The questions need to be asked in love.

The reading above is clear when it says: ‘Here I am, I have come’: that I need to be ready and available to do God’s will.  God’s will should be absolutely central in my life, everything should be secondary to the pursuit of God’s will.  How do I discover God’s will? O my God; your law is within my heart. By absorbing and understanding the Bible, through prayer and fellowship.  And I cannot get close to God without first facing and confessing my sin. So I need to be doing the basics often.

So let me start, how am I going with the basics?

My Bible reading needs to be every day, it has slipped a bit to every second day.

I want to pray more, I am falling in love with prayer, and could pray way more if time permitted!

I have started attending Church Online by Lifechurch.tv, which is very cool.

I am struggling with sin but I know that Jesus forgives me when I come to Him humbly and seek to make changes.

So what about you?  Let me ask you:  How is your Bible reading?  How’s the prayer life?  How you finding church? What sin are you struggling with right now?

Please leave your answers below in the comments section, and if you are reading this on email, you can head to the blog by clicking here: BLOG and leave your answers.

I look forward to reading your answers and praying for you.

Bless ya,

Mark

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http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

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Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: 1 Chronicles 1-4

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Philippians 4:13 : For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. (NLT)

Click the play button below for my vid!!!

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: Leviticus 25-27

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Psalm 38

O Lord, don’t rebuke me in your anger or discipline me in your rage!

Your arrows have struck deep, and your blows are crushing me.

My guilt overwhelms me— it is a burden too heavy to bear.

My wounds fester and stink because of my foolish sins.

I am bent over and racked with pain. All day long I walk around filled with grief.

I am exhausted and completely crushed. My groans come from an anguished heart.

You know what I long for, Lord; you hear my every sigh.

My heart beats wildly, my strength fails, and I am going blind

For I am waiting for you, O Lord. You must answer for me, O Lord my God.

But I confess my sins; I am deeply sorry for what I have done.

Do not abandon me, O Lord. Do not stand at a distance, my God.

Come quickly to help me, O Lord my savior. (NLT)

How often it happens that I sit down and read the Word and it is exactly and magnificently perfect for what I am dealing with right now.

But actually when I first opened the Bible this morning, I was in no mood to read it – all too hard.  Mind was elsewhere, took discipline to read it anyway, even when I didn’t feel like it.  And my determination led to me reading the above Psalm and to be massively affected.  Those final two lines are my lines today:

Do not abandon me, O Lord. Do not stand at a distance, my God.

Come quickly to help me, O Lord my savior.

But I want to add something as the story doesn’t end there.. 1 Peter 1:3-8 notes:

All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is by his great mercy that we have been born again, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Now we live with great expectation, and we have a priceless inheritance—an inheritance that is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay. And through your faith, God is protecting you by his power until you receive this salvation, which is ready to be revealed on the last day for all to see. So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy.

The key is that I am not alone, in the risen Christ I have new life!  Yes there are trials, yes there are moments of massive struggle, but the key is discipline.  Through these times I just keep going:  keep reading the Bible, keep praying, keep praising, keep serving, and keep facing my sin.  Even when I don’t feel like it.  I will work on my faith even when I don’t feel like it.  I will just keep walking, trusting in my amazing and awesome Lord!

I would love to pray for you, leave your prayer comments below by clicking on  ’Comments’ and scrolling down.  If you are reading this on email.. click on the Title above to head to the blog to leave a comment.

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: 1 Thessalonians 4-5

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Got the following message:

Hey Mark(:

My name is Charlie and I’m 14 years old.

I saw your video about how you became a Christian. It touched me, deeply. My whole family are Christians, so I think I am too. I recently went on a missions trip, and invited Jesus into my heart…Again. You see, I’ve been inviting Jesus back into my heart a lot. For some reason I keep pushing him away. He’s put me through so many trials, making it seem impossible to go on. Every night I stay up late thinking about how ashamed I am of my sins. I’ve done some pretty bad things that I’m not proud of. I repent and pray all night. Sometimes into the morning. Yet I never feel like I’m quite getting it. Like I just don’t love Him enough. I don’t know what to do, and there’s not really anyone who can help me. My parents and I don’t get along, and I don’t have any Christian friends. I hope I’m not asking too much by ask for a little help from you…Do you have any tips or bible verses that you think could help me out? Thank you again for putting up your video.

Thank you for your time,

Charlie.

And here is my short response :

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: John 1-2

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: Ezekiel 43-48

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: Proverbs 14-15

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Galatians 5:13 : For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. (New Living Translation)

Straight out of high school I did a couple of jobs where I spent way too much time looking at the clock, hoping it would time to stop doing the utterly boring work I was trapped in.  My aim since then is to do work where yes I look at the clock, but find myself instead thinking, ‘oh that time already?’

What stands out about those mind numbingly boring jobs was that I felt trapped. I couldn’t leave as I had bills to pay, and I found that very hard. When this awesome passage talks about For you have been called to live in freedom it is talking about freedom from slavery, the bond to a master, being forced to serve in circumstances that are harsh and restrictive.  And that freedom isn’t from a boring or harsh job, but from being trapped by the old law.  And for me this means that when I gave my life to Jesus, I stepped out of my old ways, my old practices – a life determined by the world and dominated by sin.   Through Jesus’ death on the cross I am free!  So what do I do with that freedom? Just smile and keep on with my life as I choose?

This is where the passage really speaks massively to me.

It tells me to avoid slavery, being trapped again and it tells me to seek to be a slave, trapped again.

But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. I am to as best I can avoid getting caught up in the trap of sin, and this happens by not only confessing my sin and embracing the power of the resurrection, but turning from those practices that lead me into sin.

When I worked as a psychotherapist I had a number of people I was helping who had a drug addiction, and part of the treatment was not only to encourage them to recognize that their addiction was an issue, but to make changes in their life to reduce temptation, to reduce the chance of them slipping.  In the same way, not only do I need to come before Jesus and confess my sin, I need to make the changes necessary to make sure I don’t do it again.  And then this awesome passage encourages us to become slaves again..

Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. The greek word for serve is douleuo which can mean to be a slave.  But this is a different kind of slavery, it is where I choose to be a slave and my master is God and the work is to love others.  Which in the greek speaks of a generous concern, delighting in those people who we don’t know as well as those we do.

So with my freedom from a life of sin I choose not to fill it with a focus on myself, my own desires, but I choose to be bound to serving Jesus in loving others as much as I can, especially those who others ignore.

What an amazingly challenging passage!!  Praise God!

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: Psalm 90-92

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

On my Facebook wall I shared the following prayer:

God, take a hammer to my pride, crack open the hard and ugly to reveal your gentle beauty within me.

And Amy Dorvick shared the following video link, a 9 minute skit by the Skit Guys which had me in tears.  Check it out by clicking the play button below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXut0HxncvY

God work on me, take a hammer to my pride, crack open the hard and ugly to reveal your gentle beauty within me.  Amen.

What did you think of it? Amazing huh?

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: 2 Kings 21-25

To access the complete plan for the year click here.

Bless ya,

Mark

http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page
http://twitter.com/RevMarkB

If you would like to subscribe to this blog and receive my reflections as an email for free: click here.

Got something to share?  Be great to hear from you!!   Scroll down and leave a comment.

Yahweh’s Yarn in a Year : 1 year Bible reading plan

The Portion for next day is: Leviticus 22-24

To access the complete plan for the year click here.