Each Man's Life Touches So Many Others

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I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

“I don’t think God cares if I go or not.”

That’s what one woman told me.  She was trying to decide whether she should make a certain trip or not.  I said, “Well…pray about it.”

She said, “I don’t think God cares if I go or not.”

I said, “It’s not that He’s going to zap you for making the wrong decision.  I just mean that He might give you some wisdom about the decision.”

I realize not everyone thinks like that.  I just really want God’s wisdom in everything.

Someone told me, “You’re the kind of guy who probably stands in front of his closet and says, ‘God, what should I wear today?’”  I said, “No…but some people SHOULD do that.”

I got to thinking, “Why DO I think this way?  Why do I want God’s wisdom so much?

First let me say that I don’t just sit around and do nothing until I get hit by lightning from heaven.

But my thinking is rooted in Romans 12:2 where it talks about discerning God’s will…His good and acceptable, pleasing, and perfect will.  I want that.  I want to live within God’s will, His parameters, His guidelines.  I want to build my life on a solid foundation, with good life-construction principles.

How to do that?  That same verse, Romans 12:2, talks about being transformed by the renewing of our mind.

Let me just share with you all of Romans 12 verses 1 and 2, in the NIV since that’s where I first memorized it:  “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.  Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

I want God’s will for my life, my family, my work, everything.  How can I get it?  According to Romans 12:1 and 2, I offer my body as a living sacrifice to God.

Here’s something I do each morning when I roll out of bed.  I take a knee, point a finger toward heaven and say, “Reporting for duty, Sir.”  That is me offering up my body once again as a living sacrifice. “Lord, I’m all Yours.  I’m all in.”

Then I seek to follow Him, and not the ways of the world, and in the process He is renewing my mind.  And through all of this, it says, I will be able to test and approve what God’s will is.

Then I got to thinking, “Why is Romans 12: 1 and 2 so foundational in my life.”

And I got to thinking about the Christian Campus House at Eastern Illinois University.  When my wife and I were dating we decided to go there and take their discipleship class.  The head of that ministry was Roger Songer and he had us memorize Romans 12:1-2 among others.

Out of all the Bible, why do I operate out of Romans 12:1-2 so often?  It’s because Roger Songer emphasized it in his discipleship class.

So here I am, decades later, taking a knee each morning, offering up my body as a living sacrifice to God.  My heart is more passionate for God’s will than ever before, and I hope I’m having a positive, Godly, spirit-refreshing influence on everyone I come in contact with.  And some of the credit for any good I’ve done has to go back to Roger Songer and his influence in those influential days.

It reminds me of the movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life.”  George Bailey wished he had never been born and his wish was granted.  Clarence the angel then showed George what the world would look like if he had never been born, and it was quite a bit worse.

Finally, Clarence said to George, “Strange, isn’t it?  Each man’s life touches so many other lives.  When he isn’t around he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?”

Yes, each of our lives touches so many others, and that’s why our decisions are so important.  We don’t know how the future will be changed by our decisions.

This is why I want God’s will so much.  I don’t know the future, and I don’t know the best thing to do.  But God does, and that’s why I daily offer myself up to Him as a living sacrifice and seek His wisdom.

Maybe you don’t think God cares whether you go on that trip or not, but I still say, “Pray about it,” because your decisions are making a difference in every life you come in contact with.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

Lord, I Believe, Help My Unbelief

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I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

Your faith is not in your faith.  Your faith is in God.

Your faith is not in your prayers.

Your faith is not in your purity.

Your faith is not in your pastor.

Your faith is in God, and He is trustworthy.

Your beliefs and knowledge about God are probably not 100% trustworthy, but God is trustworthy.

We just don’t know enough, believe enough, obey enough, and follow closely enough to put our faith in any of that.  What that leaves is putting our faith in God.

I say this because many times we put a thermometer into our faith and see if it measures up.  And especially other people will put THEIR thermometer into your faith, and wow, you REALLY don’t measure up.  And that hurts.  And it’s frustrating.  

And God isn’t doing what you thought He would do, and why?  It must be because of your lack of faith, some people will say.  But then you don’t know how to build up your faith, and it is hard to build up your faith when it’s weak.  Now you don’t even have enough faith to build up your faith.

There was a man like this in the Bible.  He carried a great burden.  He stepped out in faith.  God didn’t come through like the man thought He would, and it all became so overwhelming it left him in tears, crying out to God.

We find the story in Mark chapter nine.  This man had a son, and the son did the craziest things, even from a young age.  He would throw himself into a fire, or into water.  He would fall on the ground and foam at the mouth, basically seizures.  It was horrifying for the father to watch.

Then the father heard about this “Jesus movement” and decided to see what Jesus could do for his son.  He took him to find Jesus, and he found Jesus’s disciples, but not Jesus.

But the disciples were good enough, right?  In Mark six Jesus gave them supernatural power and they went out and healed people and cast out unclean spirits.

So, the man brought his son to the disciples, and guess what.  They couldn’t heal the boy.  I imagine they tried, used different approaches, but nothing worked.

Then the scribes got involved and the arguing began and the crowd swelled around them and it was a whole “thing.”  And the father was there with his son, and all he really wanted was for his son to be healed, but all he got was disappointment.  He must have been thinking, “Why did I even bother?  This is worse, not better, and now my son is a spectacle.”

Then Jesus showed up, with Peter, James, and John, and started to get to the bottom of things.  He finally said, “Bring the boy to me.”

But when the boy was approaching Jesus, the Bible says that “immediately the spirit convulsed him, and he fell on the ground and wallowed, foaming at the mouth.”

Any parent whose child has had seizures is feeling this father’s pain right now.  And worse, it was happening in front of a big crowd, and in front of Jesus and His disciples, the very people he thought would help his child and didn’t.

Do you think this man’s faith level is very high right now?  Maybe it was when he first decided to come to Jesus, but at this point everything seems worse, not better.

Finally, the father said to Jesus, “If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”

Now I know some people who would say, “Uh oh, that man said the I-word.  He said IF.  God doesn’t have to do anything for you when you dare to say the word if.  How much lower can your faith go than when you say to the Lord of the universe IF?”

Jesus’s simple response was, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.”

Many people find this verse encouraging, and many find it discouraging.  And some people use it as a weapon to club other peoples’ faith.  “See? IF you believed, your child would be healed.  Your prodigal would be saved.  Your marriage would be restored.  So apparently you don’t believe because good things aren’t happening for you.”

Well guess what.  The father himself heard Jesus’s words, and he hit rock bottom.  He knew he had nowhere else to go but to Jesus, but when he brought his son to Jesus, he wasn’t healed anyway.  His faith was not rewarded.  It was actually brought to a new low.

Mark 9:24 says, “Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, ‘Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!’”

I’ve heard some people say that his prayer was wrong.  That you should never show any signs of unbelief in your prayers, or you should not expect anything from God.

But remember, your faith is not in your faith.  Your faith is not in yourself at all.  Your faith is in God, so if you say, “Lord, help my unbelief,” that is actually a prayer of faith!

Because people who don’t have faith, you know what they pray?  They don’t.

So, if you are praying to God, you do have faith!  And if you are asking God to help you in your areas of unbelief…that is a prayer of faith!  You are putting your trust in God that He will help you in those areas, that He will help your unbelief.

In the end Jesus did heal the child, and I don’t know what happened to that family after that, but this father’s words echo down through the centuries, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”

He was at the end of his rope.  He had stepped out on faith and even that didn’t work.  He took his child to the men of God, and they couldn’t help.  

It seemed to come down to this:  did the father believe?  Or did he believe enough?

And when he realized that his son’s lack of healing might be due to his lack of belief, it almost drove him mad.  It drove him to tears.  He lost his composure and just cried out to Jesus, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”

And that is a prayer that you and I can legitimately pray today.  Of course, your faith isn’t perfect.  Of course, it’s not 100%, but that doesn’t matter.  

God is what matters, and we are free to cry out in whatever faith we have, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.