the pattern continues
It will go on and on forever... the pattern will... that's just the way pattern works... the pattern continues until I see the lie and stop believing it.. our purpose in life is not about doing some great thing... having some wonderful ministry... being a success ... however we might define success... it is not about all that stuff... that whole thing is just a lie.... the purpose of our lives is so much more simple than that...
Yet I was no closer to seeing it in 1976 than I was in 1968.... once again I had come to the brilliant conclusion that all of the things that had happened during those past 8 years... both the successes and the failures... had all just been preparing me for such a time as this... God's purpose in life for me actually was.... to pastor the perfect church! .... :)
I can laugh about it all now.... even the thought of it ... but back then... it was all so real... I mean... wow... for God to have hand picked Philip to do this great and wondrous work? Oh my... I guess! ....and it even went on for ten years... getting greater and more wondrous every year... three congregations in N.J....one in London... six in Vermont.... planting new churches every year... and ... of course... we were doing it right... better than anyone else... the way God intended for it to be from the beginning... it didn't get any better than this... until God shook it... and then... in one year... nothing remained.
And... can you believe it... I still didn't get it... still didn't see it... I was so programed into the lie... that I had to go thru it all over... again and again... for another almost 25 years before I actually got it... actually saw it... and got free from it...
You see... if what I had thought was God's purpose for my life... totally came apart... so obviously could not have been His purpose... then I had to quickly find some other great thing... something else to go after... that He had actually been preparing me for in order for me to serve Him... or... guess what? I would have no meaning or purpose for my life... that would be pretty depressing..... :(
Unless... of course.... that whole built-in concept was a lie... right from the beginning... a lie.... just a lie from the pit of hell.... designed to destroy me.
It almost did.... until my meeting with Him at the picket fence in 1999.
The story isn't over.
:)
Yet I was no closer to seeing it in 1976 than I was in 1968.... once again I had come to the brilliant conclusion that all of the things that had happened during those past 8 years... both the successes and the failures... had all just been preparing me for such a time as this... God's purpose in life for me actually was.... to pastor the perfect church! .... :)
I can laugh about it all now.... even the thought of it ... but back then... it was all so real... I mean... wow... for God to have hand picked Philip to do this great and wondrous work? Oh my... I guess! ....and it even went on for ten years... getting greater and more wondrous every year... three congregations in N.J....one in London... six in Vermont.... planting new churches every year... and ... of course... we were doing it right... better than anyone else... the way God intended for it to be from the beginning... it didn't get any better than this... until God shook it... and then... in one year... nothing remained.
And... can you believe it... I still didn't get it... still didn't see it... I was so programed into the lie... that I had to go thru it all over... again and again... for another almost 25 years before I actually got it... actually saw it... and got free from it...
You see... if what I had thought was God's purpose for my life... totally came apart... so obviously could not have been His purpose... then I had to quickly find some other great thing... something else to go after... that He had actually been preparing me for in order for me to serve Him... or... guess what? I would have no meaning or purpose for my life... that would be pretty depressing..... :(
Unless... of course.... that whole built-in concept was a lie... right from the beginning... a lie.... just a lie from the pit of hell.... designed to destroy me.
It almost did.... until my meeting with Him at the picket fence in 1999.
The story isn't over.
:)
