5.07.10_1 Cor. 1:26-28_What were you...

Praise the LORD!!!

    Many times we tend to forget what we were when GOD laid HIS hands on us! Now I don't know about you, but I definitely wasn't a choirboy or the Pope. I was one heck of a messed up mass of emotions and problems. One of those people a psychologist could write their thesis on. But right down to the smallest of details, GOD had it all under control and planned out. I'm sure there will be many that will read this and either laugh and call me a fool or they'll blow a fuse, "because that isn't what GOD is" will come to their minds.

 1 Cor. 1:26-28

    26 Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth.  27 But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.  28 He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are,

   Too many people these days have been brought up with the idea that GOD is totally loving and that HE wouldn't allow bad things to manifest themselves in this world. Well if this were so, why would HE of chosen people like those mentioned above to represent HIM before all of mankind? Plain and simply put, HE wouldn't of. HE would of chose those that we representative of HIS likeness. As it is HE's shown us through our imperfections that we've great needs within our lives and that HE is the only means to fulfill them. Then HE's picked the cream of the crop to reveal this to the rest of the world, with all their imperfections shining forth in their glory.

   For me I can say this is true, 100%, for I was a real work of art when GOD pulled me up by the shirt tails. I'd spent the last quarter century addicted to drugs of all sorts. Longer then this addicted to the lust of the flesh and pornography. An arrogant, manipulator that would lie to your face and then jump in... well I think that is enough for you to get the hint that I wasn't of what you'd call the highest caliber of person. Heck, I wouldn't even say I resembled a person at all at times. There may of actually been those types out there that were worst then me, which I know there were, because while I was in prison I got to see a bunch of them. Now I'm getting a little off coarse here, so back to our verses.

   As you can see, I've not forgotten that which I was when CHRIST found me and pulled me up from out of the mire. I was covered by filth from head to toe and reeking to high heavens of all the ways of the world. Pulled up from what I knew to of been the lowest point of my life, having been completely crushed and ground into the finest of powder. My heart was to say the least, 'contrite'! All that I had known and cherished had blown away, or was running for the hills to escape being pulled down along with me. But after the LORD had picked me up, dusted me off and began to lead me in the proper directions in life, none of that mattered in the least. Sure there was my family, which I cherished greatly, but even when I found out my wife had been cheating on me with my partner in crime, it didn't bother me. Even when my son began to rebel an talk to me like trash, because his mother did and he didn't want anything to do with that 'Christian baloney.' This too didn't even stir me like one would think it would of. Sure these hurt, but they had become associated with the happens of this world and the man that I'd once been and those things didn't matter.

   What had grown to be important in my life was dispelling that which it had once been about. Those ways, habits and manors that had for so long controlled everything I said, thought and did. Those things that had held me and bound me to a life that represented the worst that society had to offer. Those mannerisms and standards that are so wonderfully framed in our verses for today. These are the reasons that I forget not that which GOD raised me up from and these are the very reasons that I'll remember them until the day that I die to this world and go on to meet my SAVIOR on the other side of the veil. So if you want to call me foolish or argue about some theological differences in go right ahead, because I'll not listen to either point of view. What GOD has wrought in me, HE's done with a lot of hard work and many a mile of well fought over ground. HE's run me up onside with the Bible and then down the other, and the whole time letting me know what every single blessed WORD within meant. I may not be some multiple doctorate scholar, I may not be some high and mighty theologian, but what GOD has turned me into, is one of a kind and HE has a specific purpose for every breath that I take. But the truth is, I'm not alone in this ranking. Each and everyone of us that has called upon the name of JESUS CHRIST as personal LORD and SAVIOR, is in the same boat as I. For you too were created to stand for GOD like no other person in creation can accomplish. Your job is cut out for you and your calling is secured, you just have to step forward and fill those boots, just as the LORD has led you to!!!    



Prayer request can be sent to: prayers@vineofchrist.org 

GOD bless and good day,

Rev. Marshall Barth

Vine of CHRIST Ministries

Vine Ministerial Network International