BrianAyers.net

If you’ve been a Christian for long at all it’s likely you’ve found yourself in a situation where you’ve thought, prayed, planned, and even felt a peace about your decision… only to find-out once you start to move forward that God has seemingly changed His mind.  You were convinced that you knew what God’s will was, only to discover that He now seems to be moving you in a different direction.

These situations can be heart-breaking ones. When a relationship doesn’t turn-out like you thought it would. When that job or school doesn’t end-up working-out like you’d planned.  When your well-planned and hard prayed-over ministry ideas end-up falling apart.

I had a situation like this when I was a college freshman.  I felt called to youth ministry, so I thought it through,  prayed long hours, asked advice and I was convinced that heading-off to a Christian college to pursue a degree in youth ministry was God’s plan for me.  As soon as I started to make these plans though, it became glaringly obvious that God was about to put me on a different path.  That was a bit of a difficult time for me not because I didn’t like God’s plan or that I didn’t trust Him- I just felt a little confused as to why he didn’t just show me that in the first place. (by-the-way His plan worked-out much better! I spent 8 awesome years working youth ministry, got training I never would have in the classroom, and ended-up meeting my wife during this time).

Reading 2 Corinthians 1 this week something jumped-out at me that I’d never paid much attention to before; even THE Apostle Paul had moments like this with God!

II Corinthians 1:15-20 Since I was so sure of your understanding and trust, I wanted to give you a double blessing by visiting you twice—16 first on my way to Macedonia and again when I returned from Macedonia.s Then you could send me on my way to Judea. 17 You may be asking why I changed my plan. Do you think I make my plans carelessly? Do you think I am like people of the world who say “Yes” when they really mean “No”?18 As surely as God is faithful, our word to you does not waver between “Yes” and “No.”19 For Jesus Christ, the Son of God, does not waver between “Yes” and “No.” He is the one whom Silas, Timothy, and I preached to you, and as God’s ultimate “Yes,” he always does what he says.20 For all of God’s promises have been fulfilled in Christ with a resounding “Yes!” And through Christ, our “Amen” (which means “Yes”) ascends to God for his glory.

Paul was convinced that it was God’s will for him to visit the Church of Corinth on his way to Macedonia. He had prayed about it, made plans, scheduled the flight, booked the hotels… and then it didn’t end-up working-out.  Paul was heart-broken about it too; he worried that now the people in Corinth might discount all he’d told them about Jesus because he wasn’t able to keep his word about this trip.

But Paul offers some great advice: What do you do when God changes your plans? You say “Amen,” “So be it,” and “yes” and let God be the Lord of our lives that we claim Him to be.

Its kind of comforting to know that I’m not alone in going through times like this.

I don’t think I’m alone it this, but I’ll confess: I like to be complemented.

I like to be told I’ve done a great job or to feel that sense of approval from others.

I’ve learned more and more though that there are some complements that you shouldn’t listen to!

Here’s a few examples:

• Sometimes people complement you for the wrong things; accepting that complement encourages, in yourself, that wrong behavior again in the future.
• Sometimes people complement to gain influence over you.  You accept their praise you become a debtor to them.
• Sometimes what is presented as a complement is actually a subtle insult.  You swallow it only to be stabbed by it latter.
• Sometimes a complement is directed at you but deserves to go somewhere else- accepting it would be stealing.

I’m not saying that you should never listen to a complement (encouragement is a needed and important spiritual thing) but just that we have to be careful about just taking everything that’s handed to us.  If nothing more, being careful about what complements we receive guards against us developing an addiction to others’ praise.

Better to be criticized by a wise person than to be praised by a fool. – Ecclessiastes 7:5

Thoughts?

Maybe you know this and maybe you don’t…

There’s this really cool site out there called “Alltop” which has, as their name implies, the goal of compiling all the top resources on a wide variety of topics.  …if you can think of a topic they likely have a page for it.

Anyway… one of these pages compiles what they believe to be “all the top Church news” sites.  I’m honored that I made the cut.  I’m particularly honored to be listed along with some men and women who I really look-up to and respect. (they move the feeds around sometimes, but currently I’m sandwiched just below Tim Stevens and right next to Shaun King – That’s some good company!).

If you enjoy reading this blog, odds are you might enjoy a bunch of others at church.alltop.com

Last year I finally made the jump from TypePad (where I’d blogged for two years) to WordPress.  One of the reasons for the change was because the design flexibility offered by WP.

Since switching though, I’ve tried a couple different themes- neither of which I was totally happy with.  So recently I’ve been on the hunt for a new theme.  After some tweaking and a little improvised code hacking…

I think I finally have a design I’m happy with (at least for a while).

A few of the things I’m excited about in this new theme:

• easy to read text (I liked the last theme, but dark backgrounds make reading hard)
• easy to find RSS links and search fields
• clean & simple design

I’d love to hear what you think.

my old TypePad blog

1st WordPress Theme

My Previous design

I saw this video this week and it made me think of the story of Hosea.  It made me think of how, in spite of our unfaithfulness, God is constantly looking for the opportunity to reconcile us to Him.

It’s a bit mind-blowing.

A Thousand Honeymoons