Flyleaf’s new album, Memento Mori, is now out.  Suffice to say, I’m very happy!  This band is awesome and this album has been described as more of “them” and less of the record company.

This can only be seen as a good thing as it allows them to express themselves without having to bow down to the demands of their record label.

Having said this, Flyleaf is faithful to their own style and this is exemplified in the following video, “Beautiful Bride”.  I had a good chuckle at some of the comments left on their YouTube page on this song.  Comments like, “this is a scary clip” were all over the place.

But I really, really like this song and the lyrics are simply awesome.  Have a watch of the clip and then watch it while reading the lyrics.  You’ll simply love it…

Lyrics to the song…

beautified diversity
functioning as one body
every part encouraged by the other
no one independent of another
you're irreplaceable, indispensable
you're incredible, incredible

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

strengthen your arms now
train your fingers for battle
urgencys here now
train your fingers for battle
fighting this violence
with your feet wrapped in peace
sad tears and silence
now screams of joy
victory

beautiful bride
body of christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying

we're not gonna fall and forget
how far you went to pick us up
if one parts hurt the whole body's sick
if one part mourns we all mourn with him
rejoice, well sing with you
hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

One of my favourite bands these days is Fireflight.  These guys simply pump out unbelievable songs and lyrics I totally relate to.

It’s like they capture the heart cry of an honest human being and verbalise it in their lyrics and cloak it with awesome music.

The net effect is a listening experience that simply propels you to worship – a totally unique experience, especially when you consider the fact that they are a hard rock band.

My current stand out song is, “Forever” – an honest heart cry to a Creator to show His love towards us despite the circumstances we find ourselves in.

Instead of sugar coating their lyrics with typical – but pathetic Christian cliché – this song cries out;

“Oh, tell me You’re here.  That You will watch over me.  Forever.  Oh take hold of my heart.  Show me you’ll love me.  Forever.  Oh tell me You’re here, that you will watch over me.  Forever.”

It reminds me of the story Jesus told about the sinner and the Pharisee while they prayed.  The Pharisee leaned on what he did to justify himself before a holy God.  The sinner knew how broken and pathetic he was and just pleaded with God for His grace and mercy.  And it was the sinner who walked away after prayer who was justified before His creator.

There is no official video for the song “Forever” – so I’ll just have to share a lyric video instead.  I hope you enjoy…

To get to know the band, below is a video of their song, “Unbreakable” – again an awesome song.  Hope you enjoy their music and their talent.

2nd Corinthians 2:11 says:

“…in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes.”

The context is in regards to forgiveness here but the subject is being aware of the schemes of the enemy.  In today’s day and age where we crave for instant gratification, I reckon that the schemes of the devil are largely forgotten by so many people.

Do I need to remind you that we as humans are the centre piece of a cosmic battle we have little comprehension of?  The prize is the human soul – which is you and me – and the main players are God and Satan.

Just like wooden chess pieces have no comprehension of the hand that moves them, we also have very little comprehension of the players that battle for our souls.  And a battle it is.  We know that God has won – but it took the death of His Son to accomplish this.  Anything less and it wouldn’t have been good enough. 

We have a powerful and crafty enemy who understands the human psyche very well indeed.  We fall for his handy work constantly and because of our ignorance, we are walking targets.  Even Scripture alludes to this when it says:

“Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” 1 Peter 5:8

Spirituality in 2009 is very much centred on the “me" and “I” – whatever helps me and gets me what I need and crave for is the team I will follow.  And often truth is sacrificed in order to reach this self centred goal.

You don’t have to look far to see this happening all over the place.  It happens in our families, in our churches, neighbourhoods and workplaces. We are “human” after all.

But I want to share a video that exemplifies this to another level.  Travel to Thailand and you will come across the following festival…

What comes to my mind is what is echoed in 1 Cor 10:20..

“No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons.”

I strongly believe these people are possessed by demons.  And they enter a trance and the demon manifests into their lives and they perform and endure miraculous things.  And all this is verified by “miraculous healings” of others.  The end result is that people believe.  So what’s going on here?

This exposes another facet of the “schemes of the devil”.

As a Christian I believe that many ailments people endure have a spiritual connotation to them.  Even a casual reading of the Gospels reveal Jesus curing all sorts of physical and mental ailments by “casting out demons”.

Decisions and lifestyle choices open up the door for a demonic influence we really have no idea about.  Paul urges to not let the sun go down on a simple argument in order to not give the devil a foothold.  Now that’s just for a simple argument – imagine repetitive decision making – we open the flood gates so wide.

One of the schemes of the devil is to take away our attention off Jesus.  In the above video, it’s plainly seen that to heal and protect people, it’s up to these possessed people to appease the “spirits” – Jesus is nowhere to be seen.

You may feel removed from the above example, but let’s bring it closer to home – the context of your local church.  How are these schemes manifesting themselves – the ability of the devil to take away the focus on the life, death and resurrection of Jesus as the means of obtaining grace in your life leading to salvation?

Let me share of something that happened at a local church.

Recently there was a movement to pray over handkerchiefs in order for their recipients to experience God’s miraculous healing in their lives.  Scripture used to support this view was..

“And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them.” Acts 19:11

As was expected, some of the recipients experienced “miraculous healings” and people’s hearts were stirred.  But you know what the problem was?  Jesus was not in the picture at all.  It was these supernatural handkerchiefs – probably bought from a local discount store – that were “prayed over” – that kicked Jesus out of His place.

Let me ask the questions.  How different is this to the above video? How much bondage does the schemes of the devil wish to achieve? How can we learn from this experience?

Let me state my position.  I am not one of those who believe the works of the Spirit ended after the NT was penned.  I strongly believe that the Spirit can manifest powerfully even today.  But what I also believe is that the pursuit of such things, while replacing Jesus, can have disastrous effects.

For example, if someone was experiencing illness due to demonic influence as a result of life style choices, if one of these “handkerchiefs” was presented, who’s to say that the demonic influence would be lifted only under the sole purpose of taking this person attention away from Jesus and place it squarely on these mystical occurrences?

A “miracle” would occur and this person would be gob smacked with what just happened.  But would he/she pursue Jesus or would he/she have a desire birthed in them to chase down further miraculous events?

Our enemy is a mastered craftsmen of using even God’s Word to deceive many.  Even when he was tempting Jesus, did he not quote Scripture?

I am often scared by the reality of the battle for my soul.  An unwilling participant between two warring parties.  How I wish I was simply safe in the arms of my Creator.  But the reality is, that without Jesus and a proper understanding of who He is, I am a sitting duck.

And spirituality in the naughties has made many of us sitting ducks with a signpost over our heads attracting attention to an enemy prowling around like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.

Jesus.  I need you to save me from this reality.

I came across Switchfoot’s new single “Mess Of Me” from their new album, “Hello Hurricane” and can I just say I am blown away by how good this song is!

It seems that these days you have two camps in Christianity.  The first are living their best life now following the 7 steps to success and prosperity.  The second group are those humbled and wrecked by the realisation of what their true life is all about.

Let me assure you, there are no shortage of spin doctors, I mean “pastors”, who belt out the swan song for the first group.  And the hordes that follow them do so while scratching their itching ears.

At the same time, scratch beneath the surface and you get a growing, rumbling and groaning group of people exposed to good teaching which does nothing but expose sin in their lives in the light of Scripture and points them straight to Jesus  – bypassing any hint of “their best life now” or financial prosperity.

It seems as if God is cleaning out the house these days and separating those He calls His own to those who call God their own – only when it suites them. Whare am I in this cosmic sifting?  Right about where sin is being exposed and I am starting to hate it deeply.  And that’s why I love this song, “Mess Of Me.”  Lyrics follow the clip..

I am my own affliction
I am my own disease
There ain’t no drug that they could sell
Ah there ain’t no drugs to make me well
There ain’t no drugs
It’s not enough
There ain’t no drugs
The sickness is myself
- Chorus –
I made a mess of me I wanna get back the rest of me
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna spend the rest of my life alive
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna reverse this tragedy
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna spend the rest of my live alive
The rest of my life alive!
We lock our souls in cages
We hide inside our shells
It’s hard to feed to the ones you love
Oh when you can’t forgive yourself
Yeah forgive yourself!
There ain’t no drugs
There ain’t no drugs
There ain’t no drugs
The sickness is myself
- Chorus –
I made a mess of me I wanna get back the rest of me
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna spend the rest of my life alive
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna reverse this tragedy
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna spend the rest of my live alive
The rest of my life alive!
AHHHHHHOOOOO!
There ain’t no drug
There ain’t no drug
There ain’t no drug
No drugs to make me well
There ain’t no drug
It’s not enough
We´re breaking up
The sickness is myself
The sickness is myself
- Chorus –
I made a mess of me I wanna get back the rest of me
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna spend the rest of my life alive
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna reverse this tragedy
I’ve made a mess of me I wanna spend the rest of my live alive
The rest of my life alive!

I’m tired.

Tired of the following things.

• Christian cliché.
• Whipping up a “spiritual” but totally emotional frenzy
• People who “hear from God” while only trying to justify their own thought process.
• “Off the cuff spiritual transformations” while relying totally on your own ability to “unprave” our depraved life just to make you feel normal.

One thing life has taught me is that I am an open book in the hands of a terrifying God.  While this rattles me to the bone and kicks me out of my comfort zone like there is no tomorrow, I take comfort in that Jesus knows exactly where I am am – right here, right now.

He knows my strengths.  He knows where I suck.  He knows the way my enemy wrecks me.  He knows how to progress me forward and He knows what gets me down.

He knows everything.  Even a casual reading of the Gospels reveals an all knowing, all perceiving God who knows everything about anything of a person life.

And because of this, I’m tired.  Tired of my short comings.  Tired of my failures.  Tired of the consequences of my failures.  Tired of the effect that sin has thrust upon me and those around me. And tired at my attempts, and the attempts of others to justify themselves in front of a Holy God.

Who the hell do we think we are?

And it’s for these reasons that I crave to rest in the words of Jesus when He uttered..

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Mat 11:28

Jesus.  I am burdened.  Burdened by my own sin and burdened by those around me trying to justify themselves without coming to You first.  I need Your rest.  A rest I don’t think my soul has ever experienced.  I need to know Your gentleness and just how low You would stoop for a person like me.  I need to know this not just in my head – but in my heart and in my soul.  I need to know this because my soul needs to rest.  It’s totally beat Jesus.  I’m not going to pretend because You would instantly know. Your words “easy” and “light” are drawing me right now.  Help me find You the way you intend it to be.

One of the most pathetic aspects of “Christianity” out there is the so called prosperity gospel.  It teaches that God wants you to live life to the full and prosper with material wealth and possessions.

I don’t know who is more pathetic – those who teach this so called gospel or those that adhere to it. One thing is sure though, the Bible anticipated this a long, long time ago..

“For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions” 2 Tim 4:3

It’s no surprise that some of the biggest and fastest growing churches in the world spew this crap week in week out from their pulpit.  Itching ears wanting what the world craves for instead of what Jesus craves for.

I’m not going to name names here as I’m sick to death of the crap they teach. Instead I want to post a video that exposes this rubbish for the rubbish that it is.  It’s a satirical take on things but I believe it hits the spot square in the eye.  Hope you enjoy..

HT: The Work Of The People