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This book is ideal as a personal and/or small group workbook for inner healing. It's my private counseling practice and my years of experience in book form! If you or the people you care about need help with anxiety, depression, motivation, addiction, anger, recovery from abuse, broken relationships, forgiveness, low self-worth, guilt, or just general life struggles, this is your book. Each chapter has discussion questions and worksheets addressing issues such as getting rid of false guilt, getting motivated, forgiveness, how to have effective devotions, how to eat for brain health, etc.
"Best devotional book I've read/done in forever. Our Bible study went from ho-hum to WOW with this!"
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10 or more gets the better deal!
This book is ideal as a personal and/or small group workbook for inner healing. It's my private counseling practice and my years of experience in book form! If you or the people you care about need help with anxiety, depression, motivation, addiction, anger, recovery from abuse, broken relationships, forgiveness, low self-worth, guilt, or just general life struggles, this is your book. Each chapter has discussion questions and worksheets addressing issues such as getting rid of false guilt, getting motivated, forgiveness, how to have effective devotions, how to eat for brain health, etc."Best devotional book I've read/done in forever. Our Bible study went from ho-hum to WOW with this!"
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A 4-part audio series plus Powerpoint from the Central CA Christian Women's retreat given October of 2010. Learn from Scripture, science, and story about the creation of woman, her tragic suffering, and her deliverance in Christ.
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Describing the wonder of friendship, Solomon said “two are better than one.” This story begins with friends David Asscherick and Nathan Renner—but before they were friends. What appears to be fate connects them, tumbles them together in the same late 20th century youth culture and spits them out as fellow proponents of a strange new religion. Experiential and temperamental contrasts and parallels create dimension, symmetry and depth in this portrait of two lives.
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Don't assume you know the gospel, for the enemy is ever ready to pluck it from our minds and hearts. Legalism is alive and well and living in the human heart. This book chonicles Jennifer's journey from works religion to righteousness by faith. Pat Arrabito of LLT ministries says, "Jennifer makes the Gospel clear and so very inviting, with stories from her own journey that most of us can easily identify with."
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Love in the Last Days$30.00Love in the Last Days - (3 Part DVD Series)
Add Slides for $10.00
This seminar deals with the art and science of relationships--particularly romantic relationships, and provides Biblical guidelines for them.
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Basic Bible doctrines taken from a whole new angle, treating questions such as “Why Suffering?” and “Why Death?”
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"Pure Love" is a rare thing these days. Sexual purity is seeping through the increasingly loose moral fabric of our society. Sexually transmitted diseases are pandemic. The nuclear family is under attack. Lasting love is becoming an antique. The media is deadening the masses to the principles of God. As Jesus predicted, the end times are bringing a desperate scenario:
"Because lawlessness is increased, most people's love will grow cold," Matthew 24:12
But there is a warm place on the earth. It is every place where God's love is understood and appreciated. This love, called agape, is the constraining power that maintains the structure of the human soul. It is the bedrock of moral purity. Comprehended and embraced, agape provides the foundation for sexual fidelity in all phases of life.
Jennifer Jill Schwirzer is dedicated to the task of presenting the subject of moral purity in the light of God's love. We can't afford to take our own purity, nor the purity of our youth, for granted. "Pure Love" will motivate and inspire toward the high ideals that insure happiness, holiness and love for God and man.
"Pure Love" comes in two forms:
1. The One-Shot Deal- A one-time presentation lasting about one hour
Cost: Food and lodging, some monetary contribution to Michael Ministries
2. The Week of Prayer or Weekend Retreat- This is a more in-depth study which can last anywhere from two to seven meetings.
Cost: Although cost is negotiable, we suggest a donation of at least $50 a day to Michael Ministries
If you are interested in booking a "Pure Love" talk or series, please call 1-215-233-1286 or Contact Us! -
This book offers a ladder out of the black hole of food fixations: anorexia, bulimia, and exermania. The author reviews the standard therapies (behavioral, cognitive, psycho-dynamic, family, support groups, medicines), and includes appendices on books and treatment resources. But it is the detailed, heart-rending stories of struggle and triumph--including Schwirzer's own--that lift the heart. Ultimately, the secret of victory is to take sufferers our of their isolation, turning the eyes away from self and fixing them on God.
"A fresh voice in the field of eating disorders."
Elizabeth Poss Colebrook, Ph.D. author, Anorexia Nervosa
"Schwirzer's personal and anecdotal insights provide a timely call to a culture inundated by the message to be perfect or fail"
Joe DeAngeles, M.S. Licensed Professional Counselor. -
A 3-DVD series on eating disorders with Don MacIntosh.
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A 2-DVD interview with Shelley Quinn on self-esteem, assertiveness, and depression.
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God's Wrath, God's hell-fire, God's. . . love?
Christians have always struggled to harmonize a God who chose to suffer and die for souls. . .yet is also willing to condemn them to hell. Is He heart-meltingly merciful, or is He unsparingly just--or can these seemingly antagonistic attributes be reconciled?
Authors Leslie Kay and Jennifer Jill Schwirzer courageously explore God's "dark side" to finally resolve one of the most troubling stumbling blocks of faith. With candor and elegance, they tackle the toughest questions to unravel the complex formula of mercy and justice--leading to an ultimate picture of God that will warm your heart and transform your faith forever. -
Healing Inner Wounds$20.00Healing Inner Wounds (4 Part CD Series)
Add Slides for $10.00
This four-part seminar uses the Bible as its chief source to explore the subject of mental and emotional healing. The message of the gospel has been called the "message of His healing grace”; it is the source of true recovery from all that ails. The seminar isn’t a cliche-driven, surface treatment of the subject, but rather a careful analysis of the human condition and God’s method of change. The four meetings cover:
1. Assessing the Damage—- The first step toward healing is proper diagnosis. Spiritually, we must gain an understanding of the human condition. Genesis chapter three is the basis for this. It is there that we where our alienation, misapprehension, guilt, shame, denial, self-righteousness, blame, animosity and fear came from.
2. People Change—This Is How: Many despair of overcoming deep-seated tendencies toward destructive thought and behavior. Addictions and compulsions abound, even in Christian circles. But when Jesus said He would save us, it was from more than the penalty of sin. It was from its power and dominance in our lives.
3. Case Study Number One— Psychological theories must ultimately be validated by evidence. One of the most common methods of testing is a “case study,” in which an individual subjected to the variable in question is observed. Mary Magdalene was just such a case study. Her miraculous recovery from demon possession and mental illness marked Jesus’ simple method as 100 percent effective.
4. A “Me” Replacement— Self-concept is a powerful determinant of behavior. God’s answer to our identity crisis is to make us new creatures in Christ. This ability to see ourselves as God sees us is key to overcoming long-standing cycles of defeat.
5. Hope for Sad, Anxious People— In our “prosperous” culture, mood disorders are epidemic. Yet God’s will is that our souls prosper. While attempting to change our emotions is like trying to catch the wind, it is possible to change our thoughts. Careful management of the thought life leads to lifted mood and often the resolution of serious psychological disorders. -
This is a set that could include a CD, songbook, and a companion devotional. Be sure to select the ones you wish!
"I am really pleased by the new album. I've played 'Only Wounds' for every one who comes near my studio. I LOVE THAT SONG! Your production is really very grand for an 'independent label project.' I think you should be very pleased."
- Loren Paul Decker, Songtime USA Radio -
A young woman's unusual journey to grace.
Chapter One
Little Martyr
Spring 1968. Afternoon recess at Bayside Elementary School, an upper-middle class suburb of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Some of the hundred or so playground occupants are doing what one would expect, jumping rope, playing tether ball, shooting baskets. But there are others, gathered off to the side of the building beyond the baseball diamond. They are circling around a golden-haired adolescent girl wearing a bright green and blue sweater dress. She looks calm from a distance, but zooming in one can see the sweat of panic on her upper lip.
"But why?" says the frightened young girl, looking imploringly at the crowd.
Beside the brick wall of the building, an unseen being stands, the noble form of which trembles with compassion.
"Your ways are past finding out, oh God," says the noble being, "but may I ask why I can't protect her?"
"Because you're a boyfriend stealer!" shouts a lanky girl in a short, tight skirt, apparently the ringleader of the group. Taking a step closer, she cuts loose with a string of profanity as her long arms jut out from her body and shove the golden-haired girl to the ground. The girl offers little resistance, almost as if she accepts the unfair sentence this young judge has passed upon her. Crashing backwards, she feels the long arms of the ringleader pin her shoulders to the ground.
"Yeah!" several voices in the crowd cry out, "you're such a slut!" The crowd circles closer to her like wolves closing in upon their prey.
*****
I will begin my story at the point when life lost its simplicity; those pimple-ridden teenage years I would in some ways rather forget. Oh, there were redeeming elements- like music, something that has always been able to take the edge off of lives harsh realities.
I always wanted to be a songwriter. As a teenager, I idolized Joni Mitchell, the poet-muse of the flower child generation. Her ballads were set to acoustic guitar with the likes of James Taylor crooning in the background. I could sit in my room for hours whining along with "Blue" and "The Last Time I Saw Richard" until my older brother would come to my door and impersonate me, after which I would sit in silence and wish I could write a song. Oh, how I wanted to be a songwriter.
The fact was, I did not know what to say. I had no burning interest in politics and I was too embarrassed to write a love song. So I learned her songs, plucking my guitar and singing softly for friends. I went on to learn a Neil Young song about the National Guard killing four teenage protesters at Ohio State University. "Ohio" even made me famous with a few people! "For a freak you're a good kid," one fan wrote in my yearbook, "you got a nice voice and you play a mean guitar." Little comments like that set off sparks in my soul. I wanted more than anything to express myself, whatever myself was, in music and words.
I have learned since those days that I often admire people who do things that I will eventually learn to do. I was awed by Jonas gift partly because I had the same gift, although it was buried within me. Between those awkward teenage years and now my gift has been cut loose, giving birth to hundreds of songs. Maybe even a thousand. And there was a time when I couldn't write so much as one.
But this story is bigger than the saga of a songwriter. More than just liberate my poetic gift, the Lord God has freed my soul. He has made something beautiful out of my life. In this respect my story is the story of every persons potential in Christ. If God can take a bewildered teenager like I was and transform me into a servant of God, He can do anything. And that means He can do anything with you. I have no hopes of impressing you with my being exceptional; I am not. The encouragement you receive from this journal will not be from a great person, but from a great God working through an average person.
*****
I was born into a picture-perfect, white-Anglo-Saxon-Protestant family. There was a beautiful lady who married a strong man. The man got a good job and they settled into a pretty house. Then the children came; a boy, then a girl, then another boy, and then another girl. They were all healthy and cute. The beautiful lady stayed home with the children and the strong man went off to work every day. The snapshots of those years are like pages out a Norman Rockwell portfolio-sparkly Christmases and vacations to Florida, laughing faces around a brimming table. Life was idyllic, and I was a simple, contented child.
Then reality hit.
We had moved from a small town in Ohio to a suburb of Milwaukee, Wisconsin - a much more cosmopolitan area. There I experienced ridicule and rejection for the first time in my life. My first day at the new school, I wore little white ankle socks, and found most of the other girls had graduated to nylons and mini skirts. In the sometimes cruel mind of an adolescent, deviating from the norm of fashion is a crime worthy of public humiliation. I was ignored, teased, and taunted. I went home after school and cried every day. My mom tried to get me to befriend girls who were like me -unpopular - but I could not rest until the "brat pack" allowed me admittance. Something within me blazed ahead even when I knew the territory was not safe because I wanted to run with the fast horses.
I have often wondered why it is so. We tend to crave acceptance from the people who are the most reluctant to give it. It seems we want to earn acceptance because then we can take credit for it, feeling we did something to deserve it. At this point in my life I had no way of comprehending that true love was unconditional, and so becoming part of a clique became a way of finding self-worth.
Finally I gained a measure of acceptance, but it was always tenuous, and it wasn't long before a strange phenomenon began to take place. The group would pick a person they wanted to hurt, and they would turn upon them like sharks in a feeding frenzy. From the moment this poor individual entered the school doors until they boarded the bus to go home, they suffered a continual stream of ridicule and abuse. I watched for the most part when this occurred, too tender-hearted to join in the abuse but too cowardly to stick up for the person. Then one day it was my turn.
Many long weeks passed during which my "friends" harassed me hour by hour, in the classroom, on the playground, in the halls. There was no specific infraction I was guilty of, just a general malice that decided I was next. Day by day I endured my crimeless punishment, and just when I thought the malicious treatment would end, it got far, far worse than I ever thought it could.
On a sunlit playground, at an age when we all should still have been playing hopscotch, these "friends" instead formed a plan to repay me for a crime I never committed. Under the pretense that I had tried to steal another girls boyfriend (I never even spoke to him!), they pinned me to the ground and viciously molested me. A crowd of kids watching, I was a little martyr without a cause. The worst fear of any person-public ridicule and abuse-was heaped upon me at an age when that very fear is at it's most acute. It was an adolescents nightmare, a young lifetime of terrors fulfilled in one twenty-minute recess.
Our teacher, Mrs. Manns, saw my mud-streaked cloths and disheveled hair as I sat trying to recover from the ordeal. "I know who did this, and it's just horrible!" she yelled at my abusers. She couldn't punish them, though, because she knew it would bring on even more resentment of me, and possibly more torture.
Abuse is an improvident thing. Still, so many of our lives are littered with instances of suffering at the hands of our fellow creatures. Strangers, relatives, friends, line up in memories hall of infamy, weapons of sexual and physical mischief in their hands. Why is it so, when we were created for harmony? It must be that sin has caused "most people's love to grow cold" (Matthew 24:12). Mercy and compassion die out of the Christless heart, and people harden in unbelief.
But for those of us who have those bitter memories, I can say without hesitation that God can use it all. I know how this has worked for me. Because of that day when a mocking crowd surrounded me, I can imagine better how Jesus felt when. He said, "many bulls have surrounded me . . . they open wide their mouth" (Psalm 22:12,13). Because I have been humiliated before jeering onlookers, I appreciate more the fact that Jesus, "endured the cross, despising the shame" (Hebrews 12:2).
Our mind's eye has largely accepted the rendition of the cross that masterpiece paintings have given us. Beautiful as they may be, they are not accurate. Jesus hung naked before the people whom He died to cloth with His righteousness. During His trial He "received every indignity." "Never was criminal treated in so inhuman a manner as was the Son of God" (Desire of Ages, 700,710). Every species of abuse was heaped upon our Jesus. Certainly His wounded side holds a refuge for those of us who are victims of the same.
There is hope and light in this for the walking wounded, because "of all the gifts that Heaven can bestow upon men, fellowship with Christ in His sufferings is the most weighty trust and the highest honor" (The Desire of Ages, p 225). My own small sufferings have brought me into fellowship with the crucified Christ. I can't imagine a better resolution to the painful dilemma of abuse.
*****
Eventually we all became more civilized. I found a friend or two, and became the captain of the cheerleading team. I had the distinctive honor of being the first girl in fourth grade to go steady with a boy. I had earned the respect of my peers, and I was happy for it.
And this served to replace what I really needed, which was God's acceptance. I had no knowledge of God except what I heard at church, which basically went in one ear and out the other. The kind of church I attended advocated the "social gospel" but didn't focus much on personal salvation. No one ever approached me in regards to my own relationship with God or shared a personal Savior with me. The youth leader was fond of New Age ideas, and once read my aura*, but never talked to me about Christ. The pastor, a charismatic man who was greatly admired by his congregation, divorced eventually, and the choir director left his wife to marry the lead soprano. All of this touched my idealistic young heart like pins to a balloon. Cynicism began to take root as I saw the faults of professed Christians, and I came to the conclusion that Christianity was just a culture and the church a country club.
My parents had high ideals. My dad was a hard-working, honest, faithful businessman. My mom trained as a speech pathologist and always encouraged me to do good and help people less fortunate than myself. They tried their best to keep me on the "straight and narrow," but I don't think they realized how much the world had changed since they were young. For me to live by their standards in the social circles I ran in was like asking me to swim up Niagara Falls. I was a very curious kid, and one that wanted to try every thing every other kid tried. So during those pre high school years I ran as wild as I could run and not get caught. Then one day God looked down upon me from heaven and said, "She needs a wake-up call."
*The supposed energy force surrounding a person that is detectable to the naked eye only when special psychic powers are employed. -
My personal discovery of liberating joy in the gospel of Jesus.
Published by Pacific Press
Chapter Eight
Agape, the Intruding Force
My children were toddlers, not old enough to help pack for a trip but old enough to think they could. We were headed for Florida for Christmas, mommy and kids would go first, daddy would come later. That meant mommy was the alpha and omega of the packing and traveling ritual.
I had to hover closely enough over the little ducklings to make sure they didn’t pack a suitcase full of swimsuits and nothing else, but remain distant enough to avoid insulting them with the insinuation that they couldn’t manage alone. It was an exhausting day, but finally their suitcases, all six of them (I have two children), were packed and waiting by the door, and they themselves were tucked neatly in bed, totally unconscious. Now I could stumble through my own packing with my eyes at half-mast, hoping my semi-comatose state didn’t cause me to forget something crucial, like clothes. Then there were business details to tie up, pets to house, airport convenes to coordinate and Christmas presents to wrap. Finally at midnight I set my alarm for 4 AM and flopped into bed muttering, "I will sleep on the plane tomorrow."
On the plane tomorrow, which in four wee hours became today, I was reminded of the foremost rule of airplane seating etiquette; the middle seat is for mommies. In other words, no one wants the middle seat, and in the pecking order of preferences, mommy’s preferences come last. So there I was, the one who vowed she would sleep, sitting between two toddlers on their way to see Gramma and a bunch of Christmas presents with their names on it. They carried with them an atmosphere that was about as conducive to sleep as a playpen full of Mexican jumping beans. I tried tipping my seat back and laying my head on the headrest, but one of them accidentally smacked me in the nose. I put my elbow on the armrest and rested my tired head in my hand, but one of them knocked my arm out from under me.
My exhaustion overcame me. I envisioned almost simultaneously my hands wrapped tightly around a little neck and headlines in Tampa Bay’s morning paper declaring the same. No, murder is not the answer, I thought, reading is. I pulled out the book I happened to be reading, which was E. J. Waggoner’s "Waggoner on Romans," and opened it to the bookmark. My eyes literally fell on the following passage. I could almost hear Waggoner speaking plaintively:
"What is patience? It is endurance of suffering. . ."
Oh, I don’t believe it, I thought. He nailed me! ! I read on:
"The root of the word "patience" means suffering. We see this in the fact that one who is ill is called "a patient" that is, he is a sufferer. People often excuse their petulance by saying that they have so much to endure. They think that they would be patient if they did not have to suffer so much. No, they would not be. There can be no patience where there is no suffering. Trouble does not destroy patience, but develops it. When trouble seems to destroy one’s patience, it is simply showing the fact that the person had no patience."1
I realized at that moment what God was trying to say. I had no patience, but this patience-testing circumstance was the perfect opportunity for me to get it. I couldn’t even achieve patience without something to test it! In short, patience, like all the attributes of love, requires suffering.
I felt my nerves decompress and the muscles of my neck release. The rest of the flight was no different as far as the external circumstances were concerned; the Mexican jumping beans continued doing the cha-cha, which caused several more accidental blows and continued intrusion upon my personal space, I was still exhausted and still unable to sleep, but I was different inside. I was drinking from a deeper well that fortified me for life’s irritations by showing me how God could use them. Finally I could say, "I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me" 2 Corinthians 12:9.
This experience in childrearing and so many others have provided a window into the fourth characteristic of agape—self-sacrifice.
Suffering Love
Suffering is innate to love. Why? Because the fallen creation is calibrated to work in opposition to love, so love requires going against nature. Nature includes our human nature, also calibrated in the school of self-centeredness, which opposes the existence of love within us. Agape love is an intruding force in this world, causing an alarm reaction befitting an alien invasion whenever it is manifest. There is no chance for negotiating peace between the two worlds, either. Something must die, agape or nature. It is God’s will that nature dies and agape lives.
This is called self-denial, a foreign concept to this world where me-ism increasingly reigns. It is different than self-discipline in that self-discipline practices temporary denial in order to secure lasting fulfillment. Self-discipline delays gratification in order to have greater gratification in the end. There is nothing innately Christian about self-discipline, and it shouldn’t be confused with Christianity because any strong-willed egotist can practice self-discipline without one drop of the Holy Spirit’s infusion. Self-denial, on the other hand, takes the working of a power outside of ourselves. It is not temporary nor does it seek greater gratification. It is a complete surrender of self, forever. Embodied it is this, that the Father denied Himself (gave) His Son, and that Son denied Himself His Father, that we might be saved.
Can you look at that reality and not be gashed open in remorse? If you can, you need to take a closer look, something we can all afford to do at any time, something the Lord tried to lead His church to do in 1888, and something we will do right now.
Seeing is Being
A staid focus on the closing scenes of Christ’s life will characterize the Christians of the last days of earth’s history. It is from this well that God’s followers will draw their motivation to remain loyal to Him through the greatest test that has ever come upon humankind—the test of the Mark of the Beast. Biblical accounts of the last days depict a time when faithfulness to God will necessitate passing through a trial so severe that only fully mature Christians will maintain their fidelity. What characterizes the people who pass this test? The fact that they "follow the Lamb wherever He goes" Revelation 14:4. "The Lamb" refers to Christ in His office of self-giving Redeemer. The remnant people do not, in this scenario, "follow the Lion wherever He goes," or the even "follow the Creator" or "follow the Law-Giver," although obviously they are one and the same Divine Person, Jesus Christ. This reference to the self-giving of Christ shows that God’s last-day people will follow the spirit of self-denial manifest by the Lamb as He hung upon the Cross of Calvary. In short, God’s followers will be selfless.
The Power of Identity
How can self-entrenched human beings ever come to this point? By a simple dynamic called beholding. It works in two steps:
1. I come to identify with what I spend time observing.
2. I become like what I identify with.
Why did I iron my wavy hair as a teenager? Because I came to identify with the models in the fashion magazines, whom I spent time observing (They all had stick-straight hair!). Eventually I conformed myself to what I identified with, even if it meant risking burning my hair off. The same thing can work in the positive. I can learn to identify with Christ and in so doing be conformed to His image.
But what is the initial attraction to Him? Something must grab our attention to lead us to even want to spend time beholding Him. As mentioned previously, the foundation of "What did Jesus do?" must be in place before I can be properly motivated to do anything good, including spending time with God. So many of our attempts at devotion are ritualistic and dry. Shouldn’t it be our desire to seek the Lord? If so, what will spark that desire? What will make us want to start identifying with Him?
For me, it has been discovering how closely He first identified with me. This was a prominent feature of the 1888 message, and played a huge role in enticing me into a deeper study life. I saw that Jesus became "like His brethren," identifying Himself so completely with sinners that He identified with sin itself and suffered the wrath of God as if He Himself was a sinner. This drew me into fellowship with Him. How? Let me give you an illustration from my own life. It’s not pretty, but it will get the point across.
One of the most isolating experiences I can draw up out of my childhood memory bank was being molested by a group of kids on the playground at school. Yes, molested, as in physically, sexually and every-ally molested. You don’t need to hear the details, but I remember it so vividly that I can relive it as if it happened yesterday. I can still see the faces flashing back and forth between mean and angry to mocking laughter as this group of kids literally sabotaged me emotionally and physically. There was absolutely nothing I could do about it, and I had no way to defend myself. As a result, I know what it is to be violated and helpless to stop it.
This event was no more than an embarrassing memory until I saw it in the light of Christ’s humanity. Jesus, in becoming man, subjected Himself to all the trials and temptations that afflict men and women, including the trauma of abuse, and in so doing walked into my private hell in order to reach me. That Jesus would subject Himself to torture and mockery, that He would embrace as part of the Father’s plan the cross and all the abuse that it involved touched my heart in a way nothing else could. Consider these statements pertaining to Calvary:
"At the hands of the beings whom He had created, and for whom He was making an infinite sacrifice, He received every indignity."3
"Never was criminal treated in so inhuman a manner as was the Son of God."4
The point of this is not to try to prove that Jesus was sexually molested, but it is to prove that His dignity was violated, and that horribly. Essentially all abuse is the same in this respect. The difference between his abuse and mine, however, is that in His case it was avoidable. He could have called ten thousand angels, or just pointed one Sovereign Finger at the idiots and reduced them to an ash heap. Why didn’t He? Because He relished the opportunity to come near to me where I am. Not many people have come to the part of me that was isolated that day on the playground, but Jesus has. He came through the obstacle course of my pain so that He could look me in the eye and say, "I know how you feel."
And do you know what? I believe Him. I read the account of the Cross and the nearness of Christ becomes perceptibly real. I see in Him a high and holy God who came down to the level of humanity on every point except participation in sin itself. I see the ugly faces surrounding Him and sense His yearning for sympathy. I feel the invasion of hateful hands that crawled over His body in swarms, and the gashing of implements of torture. I taste the blood and smell the spit dripping down His kind face. I see Him in the midst of all this, looking straight into my soul and saying, "I am here to find you. I am earning the right to your affections and your worship. I am touched, forever touched, with the feeling of your weakness."
Somehow my spirit’s frontier is transformed. The wilderness is tamed, and a clear path that leads to the throne of God is in clear view. I want nothing more than to follow this Jesus who followed me first into the wilds of sin and sadness. I want to rest in His presence, to know all there is to know about Him.
Once I am drawn into fellowship with Jesus, the law of beholding begins to unfold itself in my life.
1. I come to identify with Jesus as I spend time observing Him.
2. I become like Jesus as I identify with Him.
It is simple but very, very potent. This identifying with Christ will produce the same spirit of self-denial in His followers that He Himself exemplified. Once I have been touched with His identification with me, I not only identify with Him, but I feel naturally compelled to identify with fellow sinners. In this way the love of Christ awakens love, not just love for Him, but love among people.
It is not the mighty, the disciplined, the gritty or the gifted that will finally and fully reflect Him to the world, it is the weakest of the weak, the helpless, the hurting like you and me. The opportunity to come into the closest fellowship with Him is open to any and all who are willing to follow the Lamb. This will naturally produce Christian character, and with it the spirit of self-giving.
Giving to Get
But much of our religion today indicates more self-discipline than self-denial. We may "give up" certain things, but we see them as a means to gain something greater. We sing of "joy by and by," seeing the trials of life as a kind of price we pay for a waiting reward. The only difference between those of us who view the keeping of God’s law as an act of penance which will gain heaven and the Catholic monk of the dark ages wearing a hair shirt is that the monk does what is not required while we take what is required and transform it into an act of self-salvation. Waggoner said this was like "crucifying ourselves on our own crosses. . . we were antichrist ourselves, and all the time we were doing that, we were throwing stones at the pope."5
Although God works with us where we are, self-centered motivations are limited in what they can produce. If we rest satisfied in them, we are bound to regress into this kind of salvation by works. While I have no burden to belittle the reality of our heavenly home, it is a sad thing when our motivations go no deeper than longing for streets of gold and an end to taxes. Wouldn’t it bring comfort to Christ’s heart to know that we were serving Him, not to gain heaven or lose hell, but because we love Him?
When the world is divided into but two camps, every character will be fully developed. This means that the motivations of the heart will come to fruition, and there will be no hiding who we really are. We have the privilege today of allowing God to transform and purify our motives to the point where we are clear channels through which He can shine. No, we aren’t there yet, and anyone who claims to be is giving conclusive proof that he’s not. We are, however, called to operate on better motives than fear of punishment and hope of reward. A realization of Christ’s identity with me and my subsequent identification with Him will produce those better motives.
Ah, but I haven’t even scratched the surface of this phenomenon called self-sacrifice. We see glimmers of it in the crucifixion, but we see it in its zenith at the cross.
You see, the cross was much more than the crucifixion. What really happened at Calvary was as far beyond mere human abuse and physical torture as cancer is beyond a flea bite. Yet the physical and emotional sufferings of Christ at the hands of men do help us understand the soul-agony he suffered at the hands of God by giving us a reference point from which to work. As we hear of the blood and bruises, the interrogation and abuses, the degree of empathy we feel serves as a launching pad for our journey into the realms of the soul-suffering which we naturally have a dimmer conception of. The next step in my journey, hopefully a journey you will continue to share with me, was to take a hard look at what it was about Calvary that constituted the greatest sacrifice ever made.
Emmanuel, God with us
Oh, what a sacred thought!
A holy God born human
In form of those He sought
A Sunbeam in the shadows
A Rose amid the thorns
A King among the common He was born
Emmanuel, God with us
And even more than this
The Sun was wrapped in darkness
The Rose in ugliness
The King laid down His scepter
His crown He put aside
And looked like any man who lived and died
Emmanuel, God with us
My heart is strangely warmed
And in my foggy thinking
A pure conception formed
Identifying with me
He turned away from sin
And now I can identify with Him
Emmanuel, God with us
A holy God involved
In sin’s pathetic problem
And finally, it’s solved
A Blossom in the refuse
A Lily in the dirt
Sweet Flower, for our sakes forever hurt
Emmanuel, God with us
Today still coming near
The bleeding of His brothers
On battle grounds of fear
Five wounds to prove His oneness
Five wounds are proof enough
We see Him in our flesh and call Him Love.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1E. J. Waggoner, Waggoner On Romans, page 5.94.
2 Ellen White, Steps to Christ, page 58.
3 Ellen White, The Desire of Ages, page 700.
4 Ibid., page 710.
5 E. J. Waggoner, Christ and His Righteousness, page 190 -
Review and Herald Publishing
Teen Devotional for 2003
So you want it all, do you? Well, you've come to the right place--a one-stop shop of lessongs on how to get life's most important blessings. I should clarify that, though. You don't get God's gifts, you receive them. And I hope this book will tell you just how to do that in several ways:
Obscure Bible Stories:
You've heard the awesome accounts of Moses, Gideon, and David from the time you were a little tyke, but have you heard about the crippled Mephibosheth, the Levite's concubine, or the timid Zipporah? These stories let the unsung heroes of the Bible have their moment at the microphone. Let's hear a little from one of them:
"I felt goosebumps on my skin, chilled and damp under the linen sheet I was wearing. It was my only garment, and the only thing between me and the ravaging beasts. Could I stick close to the friend who stuck closer than a brother? I looked at His face, all holy and childlike. He was all alone. I felt the pull of fidelity, of faith. I wanted to be there for Him, but just at the moment my mind was reaching a point of decision, I caught the face of one of the thugs in the mob. Animal, not human, wanting a feast of innocent blood befre he slept. Then a shout came, and the thug, along with several others in the crowd, lunged at me." "The Young Man with the Linen Sheet," page 103
News and Views:
Here and there, I do the journalism thing--you know, taking some news item and drawing a spiritual lesson from it. What can we learn from cross-dressing athletes?
"Polish contestant Stella Walsh competed in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics and won the 100-meter dash. Stella rode on the waves of glory and fame until 48 years later when an autopsy revealed that Stell Walsh was a. . ." "Stella Goes for the Gold," page 115
Quirky Parables:
When I ran out of stories to tell, I made some up.
"'What really turns my stomach, though, is the warts!' said the older through slimy lips. At that moment he wrinkled his nose, and his own large, gray-green wart twitched like a bug on a bedpost.
'Oh, Yeah!' said the young goblin. 'Warts really turn me off!' He waved his wart-encrusted hand with an air of superiority as if to shoo away a fly. Neither seemed aware of his own warts. In fact, at the moment these warts were mentioned as being on a goblin not present, the conversing goblins became blind to those very blemishes upon themselves." "The Gossip of the Goblins," page 65 -
Thy Word Creations$0.01Thy Word Creations - Scripture memorization (Book and CD Sets) Each set $15.00. Total set $131.00. Select Below.
Psalm 23
1 Corinthians 13
The Ten Commandments
Psalm 91
Psalm 139
The Lords Prayer
Isaiah 53
The Beatitudes
The Temptations of Jesus
The Creation
Entire Set
"As the children of Israel, journeying through the wilderness, cheered their way by the music of sacred song, so God bids His children today gladden their pilgrim life. There are few means more effective for fixing His words in the memory than repeating them in song" (Education, 167).
Please select which set you'd like to have included in your purchase.
All material copyright Jennifer Schwirzer 1999; please do not duplicate without permission.
