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Published: 23 July 2021

Guest Blogger: Pastor Bart Bouman Recently I’ve picked up the book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. It begins by talking about the power of our paradigms. A paradigm is a “model, theory, perception, assumption, or frame of reference. In the more general sense, it’s the way we ‘see’ the world.” I included three pictures found in the book. The first picture (on the left) looks mostly like a younger woman. The last picture (on the right) looks mostly like an older woman. And, the middle is a blend of both of them. It’s a challenge to see both ladies, isn’t it? When someone begins by looking at the far left picture and then looks at the middle one they tend to see the younger woman. But when someone begins by looking at the far right picture and then looks at the middle picture they tend to see the older woman. That is the power of paradigm. Our perspective on life does not change reality but it does affect how we ‘see’ it. And, as children of God, our Father wants to train us to see life in a certain way. We all have certain automatic ways of perceiving life but they may not be ‘the whole picture’ or even in harmony with reality. Jesus encouraged us toward a life of re-thinking what life is all about and how to live it (Matthew 4:17). For instance, do you automatically see the struggle or have you trained yourself to also see the Shepherd? This Sunday, we are going to look at David’s perspective as one of the LORD’s sheep found in Psalm 23. His viewpoint is more than wishful thinking. For God’s beloved kids, it’s reality.

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Published: 16 July 2021

Did you ever hear this playground chant? “I know something you don’t know.” Wasn’t that annoying? Unless you also knew the thing that somebody else didn’t know. If you were “in,” you probably enjoyed, with some smug satisfaction, knowing the delicious morsel of information that some people didn’t know. It is human nature to enjoy having information that others do not have. To be an “insider” makes us feel powerful and important. The Gnostic heretics used that propensity of human beings to draw people in to their mixed up religion. They claimed they had the secrets to a “real” life with God. They reduced the person and work of Christ to simply “another of the emanations” from God. They did not honor the supremacy and preeminence of Christ. Since Christianity is Christ, to minimize Him is to eviscerate the core content of the faith. To deal with the heresy that was taking hold in Colosse, Paul reminded the church that they already had all the secrets they needed to have in Christ. In Christ, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are “hidden.” It reminds me of that saying, “If you have Christ and nothing else, you have everything you need. If you have everything else, but you don’t have Christ, you have nothing.”