The Passion Well
My Journey To Find It
Written by Jeff Holmes
“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of—throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.” C.S. Lewis
My Journey To Find It
Written by Jeff Holmes
“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of—throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.” C.S. Lewis
This is written in earnest humility to the eternal spirits of men created in the image of the indescribably awesome God, that they may hear from yet one more humbled witness to the discover-able wonders of His character in the hope that they will be tempted even more earnestly to know Him as He is ... jbh
If you're reading this and you're not a follower of Christ (commonly known as a "Christian"), I sincerely hope that you'll continue to read and perhaps begin to unravel some of the mystery that the world attributes to Christ's people.
Foreward: An Invitation To Walk A Short Mile In My Shoes
If you're reading this and you're not a follower of Christ (commonly known as a "Christian"), I sincerely hope that you'll continue to read and perhaps begin to unravel some of the mystery that the world attributes to Christ's people.
In honest humility, I confess that it's my far more sincere hope that you might begin to know and understand something real and true about the God that created us and that has offered us an opportunity to be redeemed and reconciled to Himself regardless of any errors in past history.
My primary intention though, is to offer some encouragement by personal example to those who've acknowledged Christ, but haven't moved beyond the low hanging fruit of their initial salvation into the far more alive and rewarding intimacy that our God makes available to us when we reach out and actively press in to know Him in a very real, living, daily relationship.
I'm a just layman. I'm not a trained biblical scholar. I'm just a simple, passionate and imperfect man - One blessed well beyond my worthiness with a driving need to understand the things I encounter in life. I'm also my Father God's child and one whose had His close attention and training well longer than I once recognized. My initial attempt to commit to the Lord's teaching and training began at an entry level when I was about 8 years old. As I write this, that was about 48 years ago.
In that beginning and for years afterward, mine was a fledgling but sincere and resolute faith, but it was one devoid of much real depth of understanding or sustained investment. For many years, I wavered in and out of any kind of focused effort to walk the narrow path and I neglected to invest to any great degree in that faith - until it was questioned to such a point that it became paramount for me as an adult to determine the real basis of its foundations. I needed to know what it was all really about and why some things happen that seemed unexplainable to my simple, more shallow understanding at the time.
Over the course of that journey of discovery I've searched and studied so many things in an effort to understand who God is as a person, what I can know of Him and how He sees me. What I will say to anyone who finds themselves on a similar quest is that if you're willing to invest - to earnestly and seriously seek Him out and to submit yourself completely in any way that's required to know Him intimately - you're going to find what you're looking for ... and more.
What I've learned through my own personal efforts now irrevocably shapes my future and satisfies my heart more fully than I could have previously imagined. I found by conscious personal investment, that our God, the object of my personal character investigation, fully fills a gnawing void. It's a void that we were all intentionally created with. He's the one that by His own design, I was created with a burning desire to discover and to know. And He's the one whose tenderness and passion for us is revealed continually ... if we're willing to attempt to see things through HIS perspective rather than our own limited humanity.
Some of us as human beings have a tendency to view life through a narrow scope - one contained within the invisible boundaries of our physical life span and the variable combination of everything contained within those same boundaries. Some have an even more narrow scope and focus, judging life on content within a year, a month, or some just living for the day. But through Christ, those redeemed have a much different life span that requires a different focus...
***
1 Thessalonians 5:10 (NLT)
"Christ died for us so that, whether we are dead or alive when he returns, we can live with him forever."
***
If we were a good, perfectly wise and diligent parent, we'd be nurturing, encouraging and training our child for true success and prosperity that encompassed the entire span of their life ... wouldn't we?
What if as that same perfect, all knowing parent, we knew that there was a chance that our child could live forever and that our opportunity to train them for that future was just the current given season? I believe that we'd be preparing them with great hope and expectation for life well beyond the moment. It may not be a completely accurate analogy, but it would tend to make one think with a bigger focus in mind ... maybe Father God big.
You'll obviously draw your own conclusions about what I will say following. But having said that, I pray that you will consider the merit of my thoughts before the Lord and consult Him regarding them. No matter what any man (including myself) might feel worthy to put forward, in the end there is only one true author and judge of truth. What HE"S said is always what we have to use to sift other things in life through in order to determine their validity and
value.
If the page appears blank and you don't see the post that you're looking for, please scroll up.
My primary intention though, is to offer some encouragement by personal example to those who've acknowledged Christ, but haven't moved beyond the low hanging fruit of their initial salvation into the far more alive and rewarding intimacy that our God makes available to us when we reach out and actively press in to know Him in a very real, living, daily relationship.
I'm a just layman. I'm not a trained biblical scholar. I'm just a simple, passionate and imperfect man - One blessed well beyond my worthiness with a driving need to understand the things I encounter in life. I'm also my Father God's child and one whose had His close attention and training well longer than I once recognized. My initial attempt to commit to the Lord's teaching and training began at an entry level when I was about 8 years old. As I write this, that was about 48 years ago.
In that beginning and for years afterward, mine was a fledgling but sincere and resolute faith, but it was one devoid of much real depth of understanding or sustained investment. For many years, I wavered in and out of any kind of focused effort to walk the narrow path and I neglected to invest to any great degree in that faith - until it was questioned to such a point that it became paramount for me as an adult to determine the real basis of its foundations. I needed to know what it was all really about and why some things happen that seemed unexplainable to my simple, more shallow understanding at the time.
Over the course of that journey of discovery I've searched and studied so many things in an effort to understand who God is as a person, what I can know of Him and how He sees me. What I will say to anyone who finds themselves on a similar quest is that if you're willing to invest - to earnestly and seriously seek Him out and to submit yourself completely in any way that's required to know Him intimately - you're going to find what you're looking for ... and more.
What I've learned through my own personal efforts now irrevocably shapes my future and satisfies my heart more fully than I could have previously imagined. I found by conscious personal investment, that our God, the object of my personal character investigation, fully fills a gnawing void. It's a void that we were all intentionally created with. He's the one that by His own design, I was created with a burning desire to discover and to know. And He's the one whose tenderness and passion for us is revealed continually ... if we're willing to attempt to see things through HIS perspective rather than our own limited humanity.
Some of us as human beings have a tendency to view life through a narrow scope - one contained within the invisible boundaries of our physical life span and the variable combination of everything contained within those same boundaries. Some have an even more narrow scope and focus, judging life on content within a year, a month, or some just living for the day. But through Christ, those redeemed have a much different life span that requires a different focus...
***
1 Thessalonians 5:10 (NLT)
"Christ died for us so that, whether we are dead or alive when he returns, we can live with him forever."
***
If we were a good, perfectly wise and diligent parent, we'd be nurturing, encouraging and training our child for true success and prosperity that encompassed the entire span of their life ... wouldn't we?
What if as that same perfect, all knowing parent, we knew that there was a chance that our child could live forever and that our opportunity to train them for that future was just the current given season? I believe that we'd be preparing them with great hope and expectation for life well beyond the moment. It may not be a completely accurate analogy, but it would tend to make one think with a bigger focus in mind ... maybe Father God big.
You'll obviously draw your own conclusions about what I will say following. But having said that, I pray that you will consider the merit of my thoughts before the Lord and consult Him regarding them. No matter what any man (including myself) might feel worthy to put forward, in the end there is only one true author and judge of truth. What HE"S said is always what we have to use to sift other things in life through in order to determine their validity and
value.
If the page appears blank and you don't see the post that you're looking for, please scroll up.
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