29. May 2009 by Annette Colon-Alvarenga.

I received an unexpected email this week. My most recent posts have not been very popular with at least one of my readers. This person really ripped into me telling me all that was wrong with me and the reason for my recent “attitude” (it’s a good thing the email was from a friend).  Perhaps I was too honest.  I’ll tell you, I’ve come a long way from being a repressed person who never expresses anything to, well, perhaps expressing more than I should. I respected her point of view and did not attempt to justify myself before her. After all, she is partially right.

I do wear a titled halo. I am a sinner, inept, poor, week, needy, powerless, helpless, an inconsistent and unsteady disciple. I have been bent, bruised, beat-up and burnt out. I say things I shouldn’t say and don’t say the things I should.  And like the Apostle Paul said, I do the things I shouldn’t do and don’t do the things I should. I am a ragamuffin if ever there was one. And I am one of the “poor in spirit” that Jesus talked about in the Sermon on the Mount.

I enjoy reading Charles Finney sermons as old as they are (written in the 1800’s). In his sermon titled, “Blessed are the Poor in Spirit” taken from Matthew 5:3, Finney provides a list of what it is to be “poor in spirit.” The following is only 1 of 7 descriptions:

“Being poor in spirit implies that we see in its true light the tendency in us to every thing evil–that we understand that the habitudes of our minds, that our appetites and propensities, that nearly the whole power of the sensibility continually tends to selfishness. . .”

I am not writing this to justify anything that I have previously posted that may have been offensive.  I do understand my “tendency” as Finney describes it. I understand that I am at times impulsive and write out of my frustrations. But I thank God that it was for the “imperfects” such as myself that Jesus came. I live by grace and grace tells me that even if I am not who I think I should be or others think I should be, I am accepted just as I am. “But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more.” (Romans 5:20)

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, the Russian author and philosopher, wrote in his most famous novel Crime and Punishment:

At the last Judgment Christ will say to us, “Come you also! Come, drunkards! Come, weaklings! Come, children of shame!” And he will say to us: “Vile beings, you who are in the image of the beast and bear his mark, but come all the same, you as well.” And the wise and prudent will say, “Lord, why do you welcome them?” And he will say: “If I welcome them, you wise men, if I welcome them, you prudent men, it is because not one of them has been judged worthy.” And he will stretch out his arms, and we will fall at his feet, and we will cry out sobbing, and then we will understand all, we will understand the Gospel of grace! Lord, your Kingdom come!

I clearly don’t fall into the category of the “wise and prudent” at this stage in my walk . My writings lately would attest to that (and I have been judged “unworthy” lately as a result). But praise God for the Gospel of grace!

I have removed my blog post from last week from this site in order to avoid any further “offense.”  I will continue to be transparent and honest in my future writings expressing unapologetically what the Word speaks to me, absent the frustration I sometimes encounter.  But when I have written something that perhaps does not jive with the title of this blog, “Seeking the Truth in the Word,” do remember that I am simply a ragamuffin living by the grace of Jesus Christ. All comments are always welcome.

P.s. If you do not wish to receive these posts, please simply email me and I will remove you from the blog-mail list. No hard feelings.  Really.

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15. May 2009 by Annette Colon-Alvarenga.

I’ve just got done reading a book I received in the mail today, “The Furious Longing of God” by Brennan Manning, my favorite author. Brennan Manning writes the kind of book that once you start reading, you just can’t put it down. He has an incredible way of describing the depth, width and height of God’s unconditional love for us that you just can’t get enough.

One question in the book brought great conviction to me this night: “Are we responding to the love of Jesus living within us concretely and consistently in our love for one another?” (Emphasis added.) Reading this I immediately began to feel uneasy and wondered if it was time to put the book down. The truth of the matter is that I personally have not been living out Jesus’ command to “love one another.” Sure I “love” others, but only those I choose to love; you know, family and a very few selected friends (those I can put up with and that put up with me). But I know that is not what Jesus meant in his command.

We Latinos have this catchy phrase (cliché) we put at the end of our emails/letters/cards: “Te amo en el amor de Cristo.” Translated it means: “I love you in the love of Christ.” What does that even mean and do we really mean it? Jesus tells his disciples in John 15:12 “Love one another as I have loved you.” And how did Jesus love? By giving completely of himself for all; sacrificing his life for all; touching the leper; talking to the prostitute and the Samaritan woman (adulteress) at the well; eating with sinners, washing the feet of His disciples, etc. You get the picture, right?

I am kind and even generous at times with others. But that’s not what Jesus commanded. Jesus commands me to love and to do so unconditionally and without reservation. That’s a tough order to fill. I told a friend of mine that I didn’t want to open a cell group (study group) because I didn’t want to have to be committed to a group of women. I was at one point going to open up my home and invite the women in my building over but after getting to know them a little better, I had a change of heart. Yikes! Not exactly Christ-like.

Jesus said, “34 A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:34-35. This is how others will know that we are authentic disciples’ of Christ, the children of God. Our Christ-likeness is not going to be measured by the size of the church we attend, the success of our businesses, the amount of money in our bank accounts, the size of our house, the car we drive, how many times we read through the entire Bible, how long we spent in prayer each day or even the number of cell groups we have. Brennan says it clearly: the one that is truly closest to the heart of God will be the one who loves the most. “The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.” Galatians 5:6. Yeah, major conviction.

It’s easy to make excuses for not doing what we’re called to do. I’ve become pretty good at it. We want to find that major purpose God has created us for, and we forget one of the most basic purposes of our creation, loving one another. There was one other question in the book that caught my attention: “If Jesus were to ask you, right now – what do you want? – what would you say? Seriously, what would your answer be?” To be completely honest, the thing that came immediately to mind (after completing the book) is to be able to love as Jesus loves. This would mean allowing myself to become dangerously vulnerable, a risk I am willing to take so that the “unconditional love of God” does not become a simple cliché in my life.

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10. May 2009 by Annette Colon-Alvarenga.

Now, don’t jump to any conclusions just by reading the title of this blog. I have not taken a vow of poverty nor do I believe that that is how God wants his children to live, in poverty. God does in fact want His children to prosper and He wants them to live an abundant life. The problem is that prosperity and abundance is being equated to money and material possessions, and a whole lot of it.

Let me share a little testimony. Today is Mother’s Day and it is the one day of the year my unconverted husband accompanies me to church. I have prayed and prayed for my husband to accompany me to church and today I regretted his accepting my invitation. While I expected a message relating to mothers, what we got instead was preaching from a guest pastor about how we don’t receive answer to prayer because we are not asking for more or enough. His example was that, while you may have lost $1,000 in income due to a slowing economy, and you are praying for that $1,000, you’re not receiving an answer to that prayer because you should be praying for $20,000 per month more. He went on to justify this prosperity preaching by stating that while you build up a company that makes multi-million dollars each year then you can hire Christians and also non-Christians for whom you can pray and witness to. I’ll tell you, this is the first time I have seen my husband clap continuously in agreement with a pastor in any service he has ever attended over the years. He could really relate to this message. After all, he has a materialistic world view. He was elbowing me throughout the service.

As if that weren’t enough, there was a hint in this pastor’s preaching that illness, such as cancer, should not afflict Christians if they are in a right prayer life. How heretical is that? What about the hundreds and maybe even thousands of Christians that die each day from cancer, diabetes, heart disease and other illnesses? Does that mean none of these had a disciplined or right prayer life? To tell you the truth, if my husband had not been with me this day, I would have walked out of the service.

So what did my husband hear today? He heard that because I am a Christian, I should have a successful business, I should own my own home and additional property (the pastor prayed that all mothers have not just one house, but several), I should be making thousands upon thousands of dollars each month, and I should not be sick (I have been battling with illness lately).

What he did not hear was anything about what Jesus did on the cross. He did notnot hear that the only way to the Father is through the Son. He did not hear that the Word of God tells us that we will have tribulation; that even the Apostle Paul was afflicted throughout his entire ministry. (9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Cor. 12:9-10) He did not hear about how God allowed Job to lose everything, even all of his children. He did not hear that even Christians are afflicted with terrible illnesses and never receive healing, and even die as a result of those illnesses, because God wants to use that illness in that person as a testimony of what it really means to worship God in the difficult times. All that my husband heard is that real Christians should be successful in all areas of their lives. hear that our sin separates us from God and it is only through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross that we receive salvation and are justified before God. He did

As much as I pray for my husband and my children’s salvation, I was not disappointed when the call to the altar was made today and my husband did not go forward. If he had gone up, it would have been for all of the wrong reasons.

In his letter to the Philippians, chapter 4, Paul tells the church that “my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” Prior to this, however, he tells the same audience in Philippians 1:29 “For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him.”

I believe in tithing and I believe in giving offerings and even pledges to help build up not only the local church but also churches throughout the world. I don’t have any problem with that. I also believe that God blesses his people and provides for their needs according to His riches. I believe in the principle of sowing and reaping. I believe that God miraculously heals even the most devastating “incurable” illnesses and I actively declare God’s promises for my life and the lives of my loved ones. But I am having a real hard time with this new “gospel” and quite frankly I want nothing to do with it. I will not take part in the bringing of people to the Lord based on what you can get or how you could be/should be living. On the contrary, the only message that should be bringing people into a relationship with Christ is that which has already been done on the Cross. I question the motives of those stepping up to the altar this afternoon. Did the Holy Spirit convict them (I personally didn’t hear any preaching that would bring conviction today) or were they thinking about those $20,000 per month the pastor said we should be praying to God for (and receiving)?

I don’t know what direction my church is taking at this time. I pray it does not move into the direction of “prosperity preaching” and an aberration of the Word of God. As for me, while I struggle with a slowing business, decreasing finances and health issues, I will continue to pray as Jesus instructed, “Your will be done (in my life); give me this day, oh Lord, my daily bread.”

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