MAKING ORDER OUT OF CHAOS

“Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Matthew 4:19

Hello Friends:

     Welcome to the Soulwinnersr.us website. Remember again what Jesus said in Matthew 4:19, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
     I’m struggling lately with thinking of content related to evangelism for my website videos. And for that matter, sharing the life-changing gospel of Jesus Christ with others.
     Our family has been hit with many unforeseen blows in less than two months. It started with the frigid snow and wind storm before Christmas resulting in a power and internet outage. After that several other things went wrong:

1. Our garage door sensors stopped working requiring me to get new ones. The door opened, but we had to shut it manually until I installed the new sensors.
2. We got a new internet service provider after our old one failed three times in the last year for up to two days. This change required many changes with emails and all the websites that used our old email. What a long chore that was!
3. Our basement started leaking some water again after last summer thinking I had it fixed. It's not bad, but any water in a basement is not good.
4. I had to take my wife’s laptop to a computer repair shop to replace her hard drive with a solid-state drive. Thankfully, my cloning of the drive was successful! I was sweating it for a while. Some computer companies sure don’t make laptops very accessible to change things.
5. An unexpected problem out of the blue with Social Security.
6. Heat pump failure. Does anyone realize the cost of replacing an old R22 coolant system with a new R410 system? It isn’t cheap.

     I don’t deal well with circumstances causing chaos in my life. Anyone that knows me understands that I like things to be orderly. When things get out of order and chaotic my feeble brain almost can’t take it.
     I don’t think I have a full-blown Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder or OCD, but I do think I have some OCD tendencies like perfectionism or a preoccupation with details. It makes it difficult at times for me to move forward with a task if something else is looming in the background. I’m very prone to try to resolve first the nagging background problems, or chaos if you will.
     My OCD tendencies have followed me all my life, even into employment. My former bosses acknowledged it in me, but I think they sometimes saw the benefits of it, as long as I was able to reign in the time-consuming aspects of it. 

     I had one boss tell me when I was thinking about going back to college to get a higher degree, “Arlen, just do what you have to do to pass. No employer will ever look at the grades you got.” That boss didn’t know me very well, thinking I might be able to do something just half-hearted.
     At my last job, I ran an employment program. I took time to assure the procedures of the program were as repeatable and standard as possible. The benefit of the extra time I took was that I and the workers under me didn’t have to strive so hard to follow the standard procedures. My bosses knew that I would to the best of my ability follow the directives of the State of Ohio oversight board to whom our program was accountable.       Also, the national accreditation board every three years was always very impressed with my attention to detail. One accreditation official from New York City even gave me his card and encouraged me to consider becoming a fellow accreditation official, traveling the country to make sure that other employment programs did things correctly. I was honored, but with a family to consider, I declined to pursue it.
     Now that I’m retired I still have that drive to get things right—to make order out of chaos. It has helped me to write grants for Mission to Amish People. It has also helped me when doing remodeling projects at home and for others. I am persistent to try to do things right.
     But how does this OCD tendency to make order out of chaos affect my drive to share with others the life-changing gospel of Jesus Christ? It hasn’t been easy, as evidenced by the fact that I haven’t posted anything in about a month. And worse yet, I’ve only personally shared the gospel with two heat pump guys.
     My conclusion is that my only option is to trust Jesus and His Holy Spirit to help me make order out of chaos. Probably my favorite verse lately that I’m calling on to help me is found in Jeremiah 33:3. I have used it in several posts in the last number of weeks. Here it is:

“ Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and incomprehensible things you do not know."

     Who is better to help us make order out of chaos than God?

Until I see you next time keep sharing the wonderful love of Jesus with others,
Arlen

ARE YOU AND I LIVING AN ABUNDANT LIFE?

          

“Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Matthew 4:19

Hello Friends:

     Welcome to the Soulwinnersr.us website. Remember again what Jesus said in Matthew 4:19, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”

     Do you feel like you are living an abundant life? I fluctuate in my feelings about it. Sometimes I feel very close to Jesus and His wonderful Holy Spirit, and I feel very thankful for the life He has given me. Then things happen—and I don’t feel the same way.

     Starting in 2023 I’m trying more and more to focus on God’s promises. God’s promises to us as Christians are too numerous to mention all of them. I’ll share just a few of the nine that I try to look at each day:

• “I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance.” John 10:10. 
• Dictionary.com defines abundance as “an extremely plentiful or over-sufficient quantity or supply.” 
• I think it’s clear Jesus isn’t talking about financial wealth. Jesus, after all, wasn’t financially wealthy. He was talking about a life full of joy and contentment living for Him.
• “For he will give his angels orders concerning you, to protect you in all your ways.” Psalm 91:11.
• Do you ever think about angels protecting you? Do you ever think about the fact that we as Christians can be sure that angels are all around us, just ready to protect us?
• There is one song about angels that had a profound impact on me as a young boy over 60 years ago. Mom played at Christmas, a song sung by Fred Waring and the Pennsylvanians entitled “Angels We Have Heard On High”. I remember laying on the couch and thinking it was the most beautiful song I ever heard. I remember picturing the shepherds in the field looking up at the sight and searching our Bible encyclopedia for more pictures. I still often play the song at Christmas.

Angels We Have Heard On High

(Verse 1)

Angels we have heard on high

Sweetly singing o'er the plains

And the mountains in reply

Echoing their joyous strains

(Chorus)

Gloria in excelsis Deo

Gloria in excelsis Deo

(Verse 2)

Shepherds, why this jubilee?

Why your joyous strains prolong?

Say what may the tidings be

Which inspire your heavenly song

(Verse 3)

Come to Bethlehem and see

Him Whose birth the angels sing

Come, adore on bended knee

Christ the Lord, the newborn King

(Verse 4)

See within in a manger laid

Jesus Lord of Heav'n and Earth

Mary, Joseph, lend your aid

With us sing our Savior's birth

• Also, some years ago we bought a Ring doorbell camera. Included in the box were Ring decals to place on our door, warning would-be intruders that the house was being protected. After that, Dee found in a store door window decals with an angel on them that stated the following: “Warning! This Property Protected By Angels Wireless Security System.” We loved it, but the decal faded severely, so I recently printed out a bigger, more colorful version of the decal. I placed it above my Ring decal on two of our front doors.
• We are now double-protected—but I’m sure that the Angels Wireless Security System in our house—and yours—offer much greater protection than Ring.
• Two great verses were written by Jeremiah in the Old Testament, and Paul in the New Testament that contain words describing God’s great, great love for us—and the insurmountable power He gives us to do His will.
• “Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and incomprehensible things which you do not know."  Jeremiah 33:3. 
• “I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you may know what is the hope of his calling, what is the wealth of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the mighty working of his strength.” Ephesians 1:18-19.

     I want to point out three things in these verses about God that will almost knock your socks off.

1. God will show us “great and incomprehensible things” that we don’t already know. 
• Think of people called savants. One dictionary defines a savant as a person that is "over-the-top smart" in a specific area. While we may take an entire day to solve a problem, a savant can figure it out in maybe, five minutes. God is saying, in essence, that if we call out to Him, He can make us spiritual savants.
2. God will cause the "eyes of your heart to be “enlightened”.
• To me, the term "eyes of your heart" is somewhat amusing. I said it in a recent Facebook post. The bottom line is that God wants to "enlighten" us. Again, He wants us to know what other people will never come close to knowing on their own.
3. God will use His “immeasurable” great power to help us and protect us. 
• That is one stupendous amount of power."

• Jeremiah 3:15: “I will give you shepherds who are loyal to me, and they will shepherd you with knowledge and skill.”
• I’ve always wanted a mentor in my life who is loving and passionate about Jesus. I don’t think of myself as a needy person. But in a way, all the people surrounding Jesus in and around Galilee were needy—so I’m in good company.
• Jesus was in no way mediocre. And I think He in no way wants the people that lead us to be mediocre. He wants them to be excellent. I’m not saying “perfect”—but I am saying “excellent”. And they need to be men and women that love Jesus with their whole hearts.

     There you have it. Four or five Bible verses—and there are many more where those came from—that can change your life—and where God and His Son Jesus are calling us to live an abundant life.

Until I see you next time keep sharing Jesus with others,

Arlen