WORDS

I bought a movie the other day—The Kingdom, starring Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper and Jennifer Garner. More violent than my usual but I felt led to watch it. I learned several things from the film, which is set in the land I was born in, Saudi Arabia. The film is about a team of FBI operatives who fly into the capital, Rhiyadh, to try to solve a terrorist plot. In one scene, one of the agents is swearing profusely. Their Saudi Policeman host asks him in no uncertain terms to stop. Our agent seems a bit surprised by this, but out of respect for their culture, he complies.

I have thought much over the years about the power of words. The Bible claims that as a man thinks in his heart, so is he (!). And that by our words we will be justified and by our words, condemned. Wow! Something so simple as words have the power to bring us into heaven or send us to hell.

If you're like me, you struggle sometimes to believe all that the Bible says. Those of us with a scientific background are used to having evidence. Well now there is some. By way of background, there has been a debate in scientific circles for decades about the role of environment vs. heredity as to their respective effects on human life and society. My father, a Professor of Public Health at Harvard, used to refer to this as “Nature vs Nurture”. The debate over which has the upper hand in determining what kind of people we become has swung back and forth over the past 40 years or so.

One other background point--Neuroscience has made incredible advances over the past 15 to 20 years, so much so that my wife, a Physician, felt she needed to buy a new textbook to help catch up on some of the new understandings that have emerged since she was in Medical School. Now bear with me as I attempt a brief foray into genetic science. One of the new areas of study is that of gene expression. It turns out that who we are is not only determined by our genetic makeup, i.e. what genes we are born with. It is also influenced by which genes are “expressed”, or turned on by what is called the “epigene”, the part of the genome on top of the DNA which actually codes for our individual characteristics.

Dr Caroline Leaf, a Christian neuroscientist, reports the result of a fascinating experiment that reinforces the incredible influence of our environment and in particular our words. Samples of DNA were extracted from a number of researchers. The DNA was normal. For a period of time, half of the researchers spoke all kinds of negative words in the room . They then examined the DNA again. It had shriveled up and become largely non-functional! (This was true both of the genes in the test tube, that in those speaking and that of those hearing the words).

They then did the experiment again, speaking all manner of positive words. This time all the DNA had returned to normal, “plumping up” and becoming functional once again! If you have struggled with believing that what you say and what you listen to has any effect on your life, here is your proof! The words that are spoken around us have tremendous power. The good news is, all of us have the ability to influence what we think, read and hear each day. Choose to make those inputs positive (the Bible, anyone!) and watch your life change like you could never believe!

THE GLORY OF REST!

This past weekend we (my wife, son (amazingly) and myself) rested. Like many families, weekends are often filled with activities: church, visiting friends, going ice skating and on and on. I'm not against any of these "things-to-do" per se. They all have a place and a time. But here is my experience: setting aside a major block of time to rest, focus on the Lord and just BE, and especially in the context of your family or other community, can do wonders.

This morning, after the weekend was over, I believe the Lord shared with me several crucial insights for areas I have been struggling in, sometimes over a period of years. Yes, I plan to share these with you! But for the moment, I want (and hope that you will also desire) to step back and, in wonder, proclaim the Glory of Rest!

To My Family and Friends...

To my Friends and Family-in-the-Lord:
I want to thank so many of you for the encouragement you've given to and confidence you've shown in me. As Zig Ziglar notes, even those who try to encourage others need to be encouraged themselves.
All of us can reach our God-ordained potential, the "high calling" He has for us, of that I am now sure. All that is required is staying the course, which we can only do with the help of our friends and family. Doing so involves willingness to endure pain. Pain requires us to grow in love, for without love, none can withstand it.
These are amazing times in which we live. Evil is growing in intensity and scope, yes.  But, even more, the Kingdom of Light is igniting. The fires of the Holy Spirit are being kindled, in far-off places as well as close to home. Many hearts are being joined into the Great Family that We will be (and already are) for eternity.
My prayer is that I can be there for you and others as you have been for me.
Let's each bring our fuel to the fire. We have much to give.
There is much more to say. Let me close as I began:
THANK YOU!
Quaife Nichols
Ps I recently read (or better put, experienced) a book that has had more effect on me than any other than the Bible itself: Heaven Awaits the Bride, by Anna Rountree. Some may have a theological issue with someone visiting heaven. If so, perhaps you could read it as an allegory (such as the Narnia Chronicles) that contains much truth.

How to influence nations

The apostles of nations were all interior men, endowed with a sublime spirit of prayer. The salvation of souls being a supernatural end, the instruments ought to bear a proportion to it, and preaching proceed from a grace which is supernatural. To undertake this holy function, without a competent stock of sacred learning, and without the necessary precautions of human prudence and industry, would be to tempt God. But sanctity of life and the union of the heart with God, are a qualification far more essential than science, eloquence, and human talents. Many almost kill themselves with studying to compose elegant sermons, which flatter the ear yet reap very little fruit. Their hearers applaud their parts, but very few are converted. Most preachers, now-a-days, have learning, but are not sufficiently grounded in true sanctity, and a spirit of devotion. Interior humility, purity of heart, recollection, and the spirit and the assiduous practice of holy prayer, are the principal preparation for the ministry of the word, and the true means of acquiring the science of the saints. A short devout meditation and fervent prayer, which kindle a fire in the affections, furnish more thoughts proper to move the hearts of the hearers, and inspire them with sentiments of true virtue, than many years employed barely in reading and study. St. Patrick, and other apostolic men, were dead to themselves and the world, and animated with the spirit of perfect charity and humility, by which they were prepared by God to be such powerful instruments of his grace, as, by the miraculous change of so many hearts, to plant in entire barbarous nations not only the faith, but also the spirit of Christ. Preachers, who have not attained to a disengagement and purity of heart, suffer the petty interests of self-love secretly to mingle themselves in their zeal and charity, and have reason to suspect that they inflict deeper wounds in their own souls than they are aware, and produce not in others the good which they imagine.
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume III: March.
The Lives of the Saints. 1866. March 17 St. Patrick, Bishop and Confessor, Apostle of Ireland

A Prayer for 2012

Lord, I offer up the coming year to You. Use it and me as You would. Set me free from fear, laziness or any other besetting sin that keeps me from fullfilling Your perfect Plan for my life.
Help your vision for my life to be realized, first in Jerusalem, then in Judea, Samaria and the the Ends of the Earth 9metoaphorically speaking).
I commit to follow Your Word, Your Spirit, and godly counsel in the year to come, as You enable me. Make me willing to obey, as you promise to do in Your Word.
Let not desire for comfort or any other earthly desire keep me from fulfilling Your desires. May the anointing of Your Spirit break every yoke in my life and the lives of all I influence.
So be it, Amein, let it be so, Amen!

QUESTIONS

This morning I woke up (as I sometimes do) with a number of questions running through my mind.  They concerned various areas in my life and covered different types of issues from leadership to relationships, financial to family focused.  As I prepared to take them before the Lord to try to resolve them, I believe I heard Him say, "My son.  Do not worry about the answers.  Sometimes the questions are what are important."

What do you think He meant by that? 

L-I-F-E, LIFE!

L-I-F-E, LIFE!

LIFE! The word itself seems filled with energy. Just thinking about it invigorates. But what is this thing we call Life? Surely, it is a mystery. If you ask a child how we can tell something is alive they will say something like, “it moves.” or “ it can grow”. But many things in nature appear to be alive and yet are not: leaves can move with the wind, crystals can grow and change shape. But somehow we can eventually tell , can't we, when something is truly alive. How? Often by how it (yes) moves, grows and interacts with what's around it. But isn't there something deeper to every living being? A (bear with me) life force that animates it and is its essence?

The Word says “in Him was life...”. The One through Whom the Father created all life is life, in its essence. True life is both a reflection and an embodiment of who He is. No wonder Life is something mysterious: “for who has known the mind of the Lord...”. We cannot know or understand everything about life, anymore than we can know all about Him.

Yet life itself is a never-ending quest to receive more life! Life has its paths and ways (Acts 2:28) and He is ever willing to show them to us.  What a joy!  Are you in Him?! Truly?  He is life.  There is no true life apart from life in Him.  Why waste a moment trying to find life from some where other than its only source?!  Come to Him.  Come to Life!