... A thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. 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 of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. -- 2 Corinthians 12:7b-9 (ESV) I struggle with depression. That's not a medical diagnosis from a physician or psychologist, but it is a chronic, recurring issue in my life. I find myself, even in the best of times, grasping for a higher purpose, feeling insignificant, inadequate, and inconsequential in doing God's will. I often feel as though I make little to no difference in my place of work, and that my existence is often relegated to work, eat, sleep, go to to church, and repeat. I dream of something bigger and better that would make me happy. When presented with the smallest opportunity to serve God, then, ironically, I immediately become paralyzed by the threat of failure because of my own feelings of spiritual inadequacy and seek to escape it.
As a result of this, I have prayed countless times for God to reveal His will to me. "God, show me what I need to do to be happy serving you. To let my light shine among the world. To go therefore and make disciples of all nations," I'd pray. "Maybe give me an opportunity to use my music to reach someone. Or give me the opportunity to be involved in a different job that really matters. Help me to not be afraid to reach out and grab hold of a new opportunity." I would inevitably become frustrated with the apparent silence that would ensue after this prayer. But is God really being silent? Does He really not care about the constant drudgery of surviving corporate America? Can't I be put in a place where I'll be happier, doing bigger and better things for Him besides recovering patients from anesthesia after they wake up? The truth is that I will never find greater satisfaction elsewhere in this state, because the true enemy is my faith failing from my depression, not God failing to strengthen me. When Paul cried out to the Lord three times from whatever it was torturing his soul, he was denied reprieve but was granted God's power to overcome it. The flesh - and Satan - will likely continue to throw depression in my face and attempt to make me feel inadequate over and over again. But God's grace is sufficient and is powerful enough to overcome it, if I should only take hold of it and let that strengthen me. My joy should not be defeated by the mundane nature of my job, nor the routine quality of my week. It should not be crushed by my limited sphere of influence. The problem is not God's, it's mine. My sin is not trusting that God will give me "a mouth and wisdom" (Luke 21:15, ESV) when presented with opportunities to share His love despite my fear. My sin is the selfish feeling of inadequacy that I can't be useful to God in whatever menial position I'm in. My sin is letting depression hold me back from deriving my ultimate joy and satisfaction in the eternal promise of God's grace and letting His overcoming power work through me anyway. Maybe God, like the manager distributing wealth ("talents") to His three servants (Matthew 25:14-30), is watching and expecting me to "faithful over a little" before He sets me "over much." Or maybe God is planning to use me in a much mightier way in my current position than I ever could have imagined. Whether my role in life is to be over a little or over much, I want to be faithful to let God use His grace and His power to work through me. I may suffer from chronic feelings of depression for the rest of my life. You know what? I'm okay with that, because those feelings are merely transient emotions that provide a stark contrast for God's power to work through. Perhaps you're like me: you see yourself as a product of routine, an insignificant and useless cog in a machine that makes empty promises of happiness through a faster car, a bigger house, a thrilling vacation, or a larger retirement fund. Or maybe, also like me, you see yourself as useless to God because you feel like He has not provided you with an adequate mission field or failed to prepare you to take His gospel to those around you. My advice: flee those sinful thoughts. Cast them away. Hunger for God to provide you with contentment and happiness and joy at the mere thought of His overwhelming love and grace toward us. Pray daily that God reveals His will to you through His Word and that He would manifest His great and awesome power to the world in spite of your human weaknesses. Go, therefore, to your job and to your church and to your grocery store and to your ball park and to your favorite restaurant and to your golf course and to your local mall and make disciples. He is with you, and He has given you the power to accomplish His will despite all the weakness, fear, and doubt that your flesh may try to use to hold you back.
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Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, 'Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.' -- Ephesians 5:11-14 (ESV) When developing this website, I wanted to capture the essence of the Christian walk and my motivation for starting this project in a single verse. To me, Ephesians 5:14 is one of the most beautifully succinct and poetic verses in the New Testament: "Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." Indeed, when we awake from our ignorance to Christ at the moment of salvation, we arise from the spiritually, psychologically, and emotionally dead state that we existed in prior. It is once we arise from spiritual death to spiritual life by confessing our sins and repenting and having our faith in Jesus' perfect sacrifice worked out by the Holy Spirit that Christ begins to shine on us and through us.
This carries significant ramifications, as Paul cautions the Ephesian believers. There is no way that, once we are awake and alive in Christ, we should be spiritually able to continue in the works of darkness that we ignorantly and selfishly took part in before. Moreover, not only should we become averse to such acts, but we should feel shame in speaking about these acts. As Paul writes to the Colossian believers in chapter 2, verses 13 and 14: "And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross." (ESV) If, then, Christ nailed our sins and our lifestyles of sin to the cross, how can we in good faith continue in those "unfruitful works of darkness"? As Christ Himself suffered as he bore the fullness of God's wrath on the Cross, we too should feel the shame and the burden of sin in our lives and cast it off, pursuing and following Jesus. Not only should we feel the shame of sin when we are engaged in it, but we should feel sin's ugliness and it's shame when even speaking about such things. Too often we as believers are bombarded with materialism, depictions of lust and of adultery, depictions of violence and of wrath, and "filthiness" and "foolish talk" and "crude joking" (Eph. 5:4). Even more alarming is our propensity to subject ourselves to such depictions, believing our faith to be stronger than the sinful content presented to us, but clearly not feeling the shame and discomfort that these conversations and demonstrations should make us feel. Even if we don't engage in the physical behaviors of sin, we should be repulsed at the thought of taking part of it psychologically or emotionally. After all, Jesus made it clear on the Sermon on the Mount that our motives and thoughts and intentions are what drive sin, and that they are just as destructive as the physical act of carrying them out. The antidote to psychologically poisonous sin is, not surprisingly, the Word of God; the Bible. As Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 3:16-17, "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." (ESV) The words, the concepts, the ideas, and the teachings of Scripture prepare our hearts for works of righteousness. Reading and meditating on Scripture equips us spiritually and psychologically to carry out the works of light instead of the darkness. When we walk in the light and the life of Scripture, we expose the works of the darkness and introduce Christ's light to the world around us. It is a holy, pervasive light that convicts those around us of sin and forces them to experience and to respond to the Holy Spirit working both in our lives and in theirs. As we continue our daily walk with the Lord in our lives, we should constantly be hungering and thirsting for the Word of God. It's words should be ever more desirable and pleasurable to us. Our thoughts and motives should be growing ever further from the works of darkness and ever towards the works of righteousness that Scripture prepares us to do. We should be awake, alert, sober, on guard against all the evil surrounding us, and prepared to shine Christ's light brightly before the world around us. Today, pray that God makes His Word exponentially more desirable to you, and that the unfruitful works of the world become exponentially less desirable. Pray that the Holy Spirit prepare your mind for every good work that He gives you the opportunity to walk in. And finally, pray that God would use His light shining through you to make an impact on those around you. Welcome to the brand-new Awake & Live Media webpage!
Things are a bit empty right now, but that's okay - come back very soon for new content! To introduce myself, my name is Clifton Gardner. I live in Birmingham, Alabama with my beautiful wife, Courtney, and I'm currently a Registered Nurse employed at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital. In my limited free time, I blog, as well as write, record, and produce praise and worship music in my home studio. It was these disparate hobbies and interests that led me to create this website. Instead of having separate pages for all my various online activities, I created "Awake & Live Media" as a sort of hub for all of my endeavors. However, I hope this will become more than merely an internalized location for web content. I really hope and pray that God uses it as a collection of tools to equip, disciple, and edify the church - specifically, teachers and worship leaders. Here is some of the content the viewer should expect from Awake & Live Media:
The vision of Awake & Live Media is to provide Christ-centered, Biblical resources in various web-based content delivery systems, catering to the wide range of learning and content consumption styles that the twenty-first century has introduced. The goal is not to change the message and the absolute truth of the Gospel, but to make that message more accessible and enjoyable for all. Paul writes to Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:13 and 4:16: "Until I come, give your attention to public reading, exhortation, and teaching.... Pay close attention to your life and your teaching; persevere in these things, for by doing so you will save both yourself and your hearers." As the culture shifts away from traditional forms of media consumption (such as books and television), there is a great need for Christians to step into the growing world of internet media to engage the culture, provide resources to others, and to evangelize the world. I am merely trying to go take the truth of the Holy Bible where the hearers are going, and to provide them with solid, scriptural reading, exhortation, and teaching. I pray that God uses this webpage - and everywhere that it's content spreads to - for the glory of His Kingdom, for the evangelism of the world, and for the edification of the Church. Come back soon! -Clifton |
Clifton J. Gardner lives in Birmingham, Alabama with his wife, Courtney. He is a Registered Nurse, musician, and writer, as well as an active member of Ezra Baptist Church in Oak Grove, Alabama. Archives
January 2017
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