an ocean tide's a-comin'

thisarticle mirrors a report i heard on NPR yesterday. Now, i'm not a news-blogger, but there have been a sludge-ton of dreams in our community, along with scriptures and revelations in the spirits of our people (that intuitive place where mind and God meet in the grey matter) that indicate that there is a rising tide of what the Bible calls "The Spirit of Antichrist".

Now, I'm not talking about the worldly secular folks, but among the "Christian" Teachers and churches.

Get your pants on, folks. Learn to discern and judge the spirits, like 1 John 4 says, because you're gonna need it. You already DO need it. Get in the Word and in the Spirit, in study and prayer, and band together in the church and serve the Lord with obedience to what He has commanded us!

we were kindly linked...

here is a blog that used one of our church posts in a way that really kind of says it... the gloves have to come off! and the rose-colored glasses. We're in a Jeremiah 6 and 8 generation, chock full of religious professionals who make bank on our shopping for jesuses.

there is a jesus in the bible. he's described there. now come to him for the life. John 5, late thirties...

L.

Add this to your RSS!

Do you all know how to use RSS and other feeds? it is a great way to keep up with the new posts on all your favorite blogs. Check it out. A little bit of work and you're always up to date.

Click today's title to hear a bit from brother John Piper about being unoriginal.

Love.

Skateboarding posts Moving to Never never land... ( click here)

I know that many of you who come to Lewminator.com are wanting to hear about my family and see pics and news of our life in ministry in Northside. Yet I continue to post skateboarding stuff here!


Well, first, that is what's going on! It may be hard to relate to, but I've been involved in skateboarding to varying degrees for well over 23 years, now! I got my first board when I was 12, in May, so this is year 24 we're in now...

So... Skateboarding is what's going on here. And it's going on There, too. Look around your town! What country do you live in? There are skateboards around, unless you're reading me from the bush in Africa! Oh, they're getting into it, too!

But for the sake of continuity, I'm going to start moving my skateboarding posts to http://tiredoldskater.blogspot.com/. I'll put that in the sidebar here and you can check out that journey in my life as I go...

More and more of my life falls in that sphere, every week, this year... how's my punctuation? I'm working on it...

So if you want to, check it out... I'll try to keep you up on anything I can learn and put up. Tricks are worth more when you're over 35. Not quitting? Priceless. Being led by the Holy Spirit? fageddaboutit!!!

A Good, Clear teaching on Hell...

you know, with all the "Fear of God"/"Fear of the LORD" stuff we've been trafficking in lately, i thought it may be helpful to post this teaching from brother John Piper. Check it out.

just click the title of this post...

ice cream is good.

a couple of years back i had an elective surgery go "awry". I recovered and got back to some semblance of life as usual. it wasn't until a year later that i began to get in and out of a car without pain. I remember a day in march, two years ago (the surgery was longer than 2 years back, obviously) that I remarked, "Hey, I can get out of the car without wincing! (wince--to grimace with pain) ...wincing!"

It was around that time that i realized that weighing 190 pounds wasn't my normal state... but the pastoring and the studying and the teaching and reading and writing and blogging and the trying to figure out what in the blazes I'm doing down here had me pretty sedentary, even though i was trying to skate as often as i could...

Then Effort took me on as a rep and i upped my skating. and i lost, in four months or so, about 20 pounds!

Now i'm like 2 years later and still running at the 170 mark, skating every day and i just want to say,

"Ice Cream is Good"

and then like Nacho in the scene where the kids are wrestling, "Reeeeeallly guuud!" fanTAStic!

i have ice cream more now than i did back then. and it's been really good. But now my food becomes fuel for a Fathering Machine!
I'm out there everyday with my sons and Sam (who lives upstairs) and Marcelo (a loaner son from Brazil), shredding and living life and learning to look both ways...

wow. what a luxury! amazing!

plus... ice cream!

I know hard times always loom on the horizon. yeah yeah. and i am sure i'm going to be there with Jesus, ready or not (and i think you'll find me looking pretty ready if you read my back posts--they may even help you get ready, too), but man, i'm so grateful for all the amazing physical blessings that are abounding in our life here.

L.

In Louisville

I'm in Louisville Ky today with Judy for a thing with her work. Got to "tag along" and enjoy a night away.
I was going to skate the big skatepark here (world class!) but it's raining. Honestly, I'm really pleased. Not relieved. I'm up to skate at a hat's drop, but I'm glad for a chance to catch up with you, dear readers.

We've hit the summer rhythm over here. Take Seth and Kadin to camp, Get Aaron and Marcelo involved in something, work on skatepark stuff, meet with people around the church and the gospel and Jesus and whatnot...

Recently, I've been batting around some interesting possibilities for myself as a man of God, husband, father, pastor, and worker (in that order).

One of the developments that is rich in opportunity is the loss of my status as "ordained". Our organization (The Body of Christ, Intl.) has shifted hands and we have opted to use this as a fresh beginning.
Presently, I am unable to sign marriage papers, issue tax receipts (some of you have a phone call coming, and I am holding a few checks), and... i think that's all. just can't do those things.

Do i need to? I talk to Jesus everyday! and He leads me into richer and richer ministry stuff everyday! every day! He was an uneducated Rabbi, without papers! They were freaked at how much he did in the power of the Spirit that they, with all their credentialing, couldn't touch...

hmmm...

why start a church when we're already being a church? Isn't there a denial of some sort embedded in that behavior?
isn't there a disowning of God's kingdom, there? hmm...

Hepi Brdej! Happy Birthday Prari!!!!

Our own Prari Parran has a birthday today!!! I left the following Bulgarian Birthday Song on her voicemail! Everyone join us in celebrating the gift of God who is Prari!!!

Solla Solla enna perumai

i have had trouble finding words lately so i want to share this song with you. from my heart.

This week's messin around...skateboarding-wise

something to show for my funeral. cut down and condensed with music by Beck from the movie, Nacho Libre... all of which are fair game for my funeral. you know, i'm really cognizant of my mortality... when my kids talk about death--those are precious conversations. we're dead for so long--that is, we enter such and eternal eternity when we die. Preparation of heart and life is... pretty basic... and far too rare... So here's an offering for my funeral. I'll keep these coming. it's good for me...

something funny

epicac/ipecac syrup

Here's a post I doctored up that i think says some things Jesus wants us to hear

Marcelo drops in

Marcelo, our Brazilian Exchange Son, has a real passion for skateboarding. He practises all the time, and things don't come super-easy for him. He has a lot of tenacity and heart. I admire that in him. We are so glad he has come to live with us, and I love to skate with him.
if you feel tempted to write me something about safety or headgear, I'm not there with you. Talk to the football coach, whose students have a much higher rate of head injury with helmets ON. Skateboarding is surprisingly safe, appearances notwithstanding.

So this is THAT DAY in Marcelo's skateboarding career! The day he dropped in!

One Sunday Morning at GrubbyKupp

just wanted to share a moment with you from this sunday's meeting... we cook and eat first, with everyone filtering in during that time. Then, around 11:15, we sit down together to sing and share in the word of God (who is Jesus, whom the Scriptures describe) and prayer.

why do i post so many of this trick on the web? because it's just so danged fun to do! i love to come here and look at it...
...and by the way, this footage was a series of first takes, after drinking almost 2 liters of liquid... and wicked fun.

our backyard bowl...

this represents mine and Sam's work so far. We started the bowl on my birthday, and have put somewhere around 20 man hour in on it so far. not more than that... the deepest point is, well, up to seth's neck... about 3.5 feet? maybe actually deeper since he was standing on a point not as deep as the deepest level... but it's deeper than a shovel handle...

the fear of the LORD

this is a recurring topic that seems difficult for us to get our heads wrapped around. Not different from so many of the facets of the Truth, who is Jesus.

One thing I'd like to note about all that is that the FEAR of the LORD is something delightful to the soul that is inclined to OBEDIENCE. This is central in Jesus' command that we make disciples, teaching them to OBEY. Not just teaching them about Jesus, but to OBEY all He commanded.

soooo... you get this thing, that 1 John deals with (read the whole book) by saying that if we obey him we don't fear condemnation, but if our hearts condemn us in any way, He is greater than our hearts.

The thing I think Paul W was nailing is that we christian folk are on the danger side of 2 Cor. 13:5 and Matt. 7:21. Way on the danger side of it. There's a warning to the whole body, along the lines of the book of James, right now! And the book of James will put the proper fear into you--the very fear that Philippians 2 is talking about.

Go read this stuff:
Phil. 2
James (whole book)
2 cor. 13:5
...and go find in another NT book where it says that each individual should look into whether or not they're ok with the LORD. I think Gal. 5 will help with that...
1 John, with a focus on the relationship of obedience to fear to forgiveness to freedom from sin...
Matt. 28:17-20
Heb. 3, with a good look at v.12
think on these things and don't flop around. Get solid in the fear of the LORD.

now, paul washer speaks to a certain audience, and some of it doesn't translate, but the Apostle Peter preached, "Save YOURSELVES from this perverse generation..." that was acts 2, and a clear call to get out of the trouble of God's wrath...

whether or not you like the "total depravity" rhetoric that is so commonly used to bind people under men's control, we see clearly that there is a serious wrath issue in regard to unbelief, pride, and not yeilding to the truth, who is Jesus.

So there's some food for thought.

Ultimately, it's not about the preacher, but the truth...who is Jesus Christ, Himself, among us, and soon to return.

the fear of the LORD

this is a recurring topic that seems difficult for us to get our heads wrapped around. Not different from so many of the facets of the Truth, who is Jesus.

One thing I'd like to note about all that is that the FEAR of the LORD is something delightful to the soul that is inclined to OBEDIENCE. This is central in Jesus' command that we make disciples, teaching them to OBEY. Not just teaching them about Jesus, but to OBEY all He commanded.

soooo... you get this thing, that 1 John deals with (read the whole book) by saying that if we obey him we don't fear condemnation, but if our hearts condemn us in any way, He is greater than our hearts.

I think that we christian folk are on the danger side of 2 Cor. 13:5 and Matt. 7:21. Way on the danger side of it. There's a warning to the whole body, along the lines of the book of James, right now! And the book of James will put the proper fear into you--the very fear that Philippians 2 is talking about.

Go read this stuff:
Phil. 2
James (whole book)
2 cor. 13:5
...and go find in another NT book where it says that each individual should look into whether or not they're ok with the LORD. I think Gal. 5 will help with that...
1 John, with a focus on the relationship of obedience to fear to forgiveness to freedom from sin...
Matt. 28:17-20
Heb. 3, with a good look at v.12
think on these things and don't flop around. Get solid in the fear of the LORD.

now, paul washer speaks to a certain audience, and some of it doesn't translate, but the Apostle Peter preached, "Save YOURSELVES from this perverse generation..." that was acts 2, and a clear call to get out of the trouble of God's wrath...

whether or not you like the "total depravity" rhetoric that is so commonly used to bind people under men's control, we see clearly that there is a serious wrath issue in regard to unbelief, pride, and not yeilding to the truth, who is Jesus.

So there's some food for thought.

Ultimately, it's not about the preacher, but the truth...who is Jesus Christ, Himself, among us, and soon to return.