The Way Matt Sees It

Lately, God has been growing me in my calling.  The past few weeks have been events, prayer times, class sessions, discussions, etc. that have all served as confirmations on the calling God has on my life.  It’s pretty cool how it’s been happening. This also comes with certain convictions as well.   I’ve been realizing just how incredibly selfish I am, in my relationships with people, the opportunities I have, the way I spend my money, and the list goes on.   While I feel like God has been confirming to me more and more what He wants me to do with my life, He’s also pointed out the great areas that need work in my life.   It’s just so, “ ME ” centered I see two versions of myself, in a manner of speaking. CRAPPY ME Living a ME-CENTERED lifestyle is the “crappy me.”   Although God may not be at the center, I can probably still live a relatively nice life.   Besides, there are plenty of people with seemingly “successful” ministries, ...

What would people say about me if I died tonight?  Morbid, I know.  Let me explain. Tonight was the Welcome Convocation for the new students here at Valley Forge.   Today was a busy day welcoming new students, showing them around, etc.   It was busy but fun!   At the service though, I had some mega “Holy Spirit conviction” that I felt like blogging about. FOR MY GOOD Your Love Never Fails is an awesome song.   The bridge goes, “You make all things work together for my good,” repeated over and over again.   This is taken from Romans 8:28, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for the good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose” (NASB). Wow, did that speak to me.   The very first line was enough.   In a moment, I felt like I was able to see my entire life over the past year, and how much of it I just waste away.   I realized how utterly undeserving I am of God, and all o...

Have you ever felt like you don’t love Jesus that much? I mean when you’re being truly honest with yourself, it’s tough for you to say that you really  love  Jesus? What do we do when we’re in this type of position? How do we come to actually  love  Jesus and have a  relationship  with Him, rather than merely acknowledging intellectually that Jesus is God? I think the Bible provides us with an answer in Luke 7:36-50.  There are three characters to remember: Simon the Pharisee, Jesus, and Woman A (because she had no other name in this story). GET THE CONTEXT In Ancient Near-Eastern Culture, people wore sandals and walked on dirty roads.  And just like when you wear flip flops to the beach, your feet get dirty and need to be washed. So back in the day when you went to someone’s house, it was custom for them to wash your feet. This was a regular part of ANE culture. Also in ANE culture, if you wanted to honor a guest, you would pour pe...

I spent approximately 20 hours outside this past weekend.  It was beautiful weather the entire time, with the sun shining and it being between 80 – 90 degrees.  I had the opportunity to speak at a sectional Royal Rangers Pow Wow meeting, with about 130 people there.  Sunday was Searchlight Church’s picnic, which was a blast. Perhaps the only downside was the thousands of cicadas that were everywhere (if you don’t know, I really dislike insects), but thankfully they are completely harmless and are really slow, so they don’t really surprise you. The Glory of God Revealed Anyway, I think there is something special about spending an extended amount of time outside.   Even spending just a few minutes outside can be powerful.   I think that God’s glory is revealed in a special way when we meditate on Him in His creation. “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.” (Psalm 19:1) The Pow Wow was in Blairstown, NJ...

Sometimes Jesus’ words can make you look twice and go, “ What was that again?”  If you’ve grown up in church, it can be easy to dismiss these sayings because we’ve heard them before, but honestly when you think about it, some of His sayings are pretty strange! Hungry Much? One of these sayings are in John 6.   Right before this, Jesus fed 5,000 men (aka 15,000 – 20,000 people), and now the crowds followed Him across the sea to get even more food from Him.   When they ask for more food, Jesus responds by saying they need to eat Him!   He says that He is the “bread of life,” and that we need to eat His flesh and drink His blood to have eternal life. Come on, I mean just think about this.   If a hairy, homeless guy appeared on CNN talking about how we need to eat his flesh and drink his blood to live forever, what would you think?   I mean this is just not a normal thing to say! After Jesus says these things, many of His followers found this...