Communion Never Ends

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Communion Never Ends

Oh! How beautiful!

“For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.”
—1 Corinthians 10:17

We are one bread.

Communion is more than eating bread and drinking wine.

When we participate in communion, we partake of the Bread of Life which is Christ (John 6:48) and we drink of the wine of His blood (John 6:55), then we BECOME communion—we become what we eat—Christ.

Our Catholic brothers and sisters are on the right track with transubstantiation, except what becomes the body of the Lord isn’t the bread or the wine, it’s us.

Hallelujah.

We are called to communion as a celebration and revelation of the oneness we have through Christ—through the consumption of His person: His body and His blood where we become one with Him so that we too are bread and wine that others can consume to be brought into communion.

What this practically looks like is us breaking bread as believers in remembrance of Him, with the expectation of union with Him and through Him.

Then we take it out, breaking bread with others: over breakfast, over lunch, over dinner, with the expectation of sharing Christ so that they may taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8), with the hope to draw them into Holy Communion.

Let’s walk this out together. Let’s break bread with one another with the full expectation to share the Lord bodily.

And, let’s do as our Lord commands, let’s not fail to discern the Lord’s body by showing partiality—only inviting those from who we stand to benefit, but also invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and be blessed (Luke 14:12-14).

Communion never ends.

#communionneverends

*Art Copyright Mike Moyers. “Lenten Labyrinth”, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN.

See the full sermon, “Communion Never Ends” here: https://youtu.be/btUcr_DHL3E

52 Weeks Of Gratefulness #38 – The Leading Of A Child

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - 52 Weeks Of Gratefulness #38 - The Leading Of A Child

“The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb,
The leopard shall lie down with the young goat,
The calf and the young lion and the fatling together;
And a little child shall lead them.”
Isaiah 11:6

In Week 38 of 52 Weeks of Gratefulness, I give thanks to God for the leading of a child.

July marked the completion of my first year working in public education. As I reflected on that year, there were many great and memorable moments, but one was really special.

Upon visiting an elementary school classroom for the very first time, two children sprang toward me and led me by the hand to a tiny seat at their table. I was subsequently surrounded by students eager to tell me who they were, where they were from, and what all they could do (one young man was eager to show me how he could flip off the wall).

As they huddled around for each of them to tell me their stories, I caught a student out of the corner of my eye staring intensely at me. After some time, she snuck up as I was talking to other students, hugged me from behind, and then promptly returned to her seat.

I thought my heart would explode.

At that moment, I felt Matthew 18:3: “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.”

What I found most remarkable was that none of these children knew me or had ever met me, but they were readily willing to bring me into every part of their world without hesitation or reservation.

It was like, of course, we accept you. What else is there?

Not one of them had any money, they didn’t own a car or a house, no fancy titles, and however they were “educated,” they were willing to share. They were not encumbered by many of the things we commonly use to stratify and separate ourselves.

There was just us.

We are foolishly dismissive of children and regard them as almost people, waiting for them to become something else—like us, not realizing that they, more than we, have a firm grasp of the goal.

“Then they brought little children to Him, that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked those who brought them.

But when Jesus saw it, He was greatly displeased and said to them, ‘Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God.

Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it.'”
— Mark 10:13-15

One of the most beautiful gifts I enjoy as a born-again child of God is knowing that wherever I go, when I encounter another child of God, they will love me.

“Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him.”
— 1 John 5:1

In my experience, however, it takes some effort to get to a place where we can even begin to enjoy that love, we let things get in the way, but children do not.

A wonderful hope I have in Christ is our being “converted” and made like them.

I am so thankful to have their example, and I am learning so much from them as they lead me by the hand into the Kingdom.

I’m grateful.

#52WoG

Beware The American Leaven

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Beware The American Leaven

When we raise hell for something that’s not in heaven, we’re guilty of loving the world and reveal ourselves as sons of hell and that we are not sons of God. (1 John 2:15)

There is no America in heaven.

Sons of God preach and seek above all the kingdom that is not of this world.

But instead we speak as the hypocrites Jesus rebuked,

“If something is not done, we will lose our place and nation!” (John 11:48)

Rightly did Jesus say of us,

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.”
— Matthew 23:15

REPENT!

Come out from among the blasphemous religion of American idolatry in the name of Christ. They are hellbound.

Come out from this kingdom of darkness that is counterfeiting light and into the true light of His Kingdom that is not of this world and be saved.

52 Weeks Of Gratefulness #30 – Church

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com -

In Week 30 of 52 Weeks Of Gratefulness, I give thanks to God for safe places with authentic believers in Christ where the more sin I share the more I am loved.

They make 1 Peter 4:8 real to me, “love will cover a multitude of sins”

I don’t have to pretend.

I don’t have to be perfect to be loved, I am perfected by being loved.

This is not love that excuses wrongdoing but love that both warms my heart (affirms me) and burns away sin (holds me accountable).

I’m eternally grateful. #52WoG

This Is Not Church

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - This Is Not Church

These are not churches.

These are businesses.

They are places where you can buy justification, where an organization certifies that you’re a good person.

In exchange for your money, some spare time and the legitimacy that you lend to the organization, you get justification so that you can continue your worldly life, pursuing dead and worthless things, but with a certification that allows you to do it in God’s name. #industrialchurch

The authentic church is the church Jesus established made up of His disciples who believe, love, walk with and obey Him as the Christ, who do so at the expense of everything, whose obedience is evidenced by their going out and gathering in with the Master for communion —a coming together characterized by Love —a One-ification with God through Christ to the ever increasing glory of God.

Therefore let us be disciples, make disciples, seek each other out for communion, abiding in His love, assembling ourselves over food and drink in celebration of the breaking of His body and the shedding of His blood to make us One, endeavoring to keep the unity purchased by His blood, fighting toward each other, encouraging each other every day until that great day when we shall see our King face-to-face, the One whom our hearts adore, and drink it new with Him in the Kingdom of God.

That’s church.

Leading With The Need: How We Get More From Church

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Leading With The Need: How We Get More From Church

Why can church seem plastic and empty?

Because I come to the King’s treasury laden with debt but I pretend like I’m rich.

I only leave empty because my pride prevents me from taking advantage of the King’s debt forgiveness program.

In order to do that I have to openly declare bankruptcy.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
— Matthew 5:3

In James 5:16, the author writes,

“Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.”

Notice that confession of our sin PRECEDES healing —the establishment of healthy function.

Very often I get nothing from church because I pretend that I have it all together.

A pastor and mentor of mine, Pearson Liddell, advised me regarding ministry, “get real as quickly as possible, otherwise you’re wasting people’s time”.

When we don’t confess our sin, we leave money (healing) on the table.

So, for me, moving forward, every church service, fellowship, Bible study will begin with this question, “Where is the sin in my life?”

And what is sin?

Missing the mark.

It’s being outside the circle of love, outside the Kingdom of God. (sin state)

The result is always that we don’t love properly. (sin action)

Leading with the confession of our sin requires humility, looking into the mirror of the perfect law of liberty, turning the sword of the Word (which is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart -Hebrews 4:12) on myself (rather than against others as we so often like to do) and praying, “Lord, show me where I’m apart from You. Show me the areas where Satan sits on the throne in my life. Show me where I’m failing to love properly.”

There will always be something to confess, always an area where we can be healed, always a place where God can make us more glorious.

“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”
— 1 John 1:8

There’s no sense in being sick, coming to the hospital and pretending that I’m OK.

I come to Christ through fellowship because I’m in need.

We should lead with our need.

I’ll start:

One of the greatest hindrances to my loving properly and to God’s glory being expressed in my life is that my regard for many things in this world have not yet descended to the level of trash.

“Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ”
— Philippians 3:8

I am preoccupied with my appearance and have burdened myself with debt and unnecessary things to bolster it which keeps me from fellowship and hinders me from following Jesus completely and fearlessly.

Please pray for me.

Jesus In The Midst

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Jesus In The Midst

“For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.””
—Matthew 18:20

Jesus made a promise with this condition:
If two are more gathered in My name, meaning for the purpose(s), and for the pleasure of His position / office / station (Messiah),

Then, we are granted His power.

And, He, Jesus, is in the midst.

Therefore:

1. I will seek out and connect with people who are operating according to His purpose(s).
2. And, I will expect Jesus.

He is there because He said He would be.

There, I will tune my heart to His presence, so that I may see Him, hear Him, feel Him and know Him.

To do that, I must not harden my heart by embracing this world, by accepting the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and instead become as a little child who knows nothing and look to my Father and learn of Him for everything.

“Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”
—James 4:4

We can’t have both. We must chose where we will ultimately put our trust. A double-minded man gets nothing.

I must distrust this world -that is, divest, take my trust out of the identities the world tries to give you, out of the things the world treasures, and out of the meaning or meaninglessness the world proclaims.

“let God be true but every man a liar”
—Romans 3:4

Instead, I must, invest, put my whole trust in Christ and trust Him to define my identity, to treasure what He treasures, and to trust that His purposes are true, will not fail and is what life is all about (meaning).

Then, I will be able to see Him more clearly.

“For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.”
—1 Corinthians 13:12

On a related aside, in a Christian home with a husband and wife, those are two, so there should be three. Jesus should be in every such home.

Where two or more are gathered in His name, Jesus is there in the midst.

We can do more than “know about” God.
We can know God.
We can be sense, experience and be with God!

I can see Him if I want that more than anything. (Matthew 10:37-39)
#goals #KnowGod #KnowingGod

Why I Hate This Cross

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Why I Hate The Starkville Cross Of Christ
Photo Courtesy Of Columbus Dispatch

Someone asked me privately why “I hate this thing” referring to the Starkville Cross of Christ as I mentioned in a previous post.

The ultimate point of that post was not the cross but how those of us in Christ can, by His grace, push past even very strongly held positions to fight toward each other in love.

Notwithstanding, I think it would be helpful to the cause of “fighting toward each other in love” to understand why I disdain this monument.

Despite a lot of responses to the post focusing on it, for me, it is not about the money or what it could have been better spent toward. That’s tertiary, at best.

But as I have written previously, I find the giant cross problematic, “not because of what it is but because of what it was erected in the absence of”.

The absence I’m referring to is love, basically.

Everything else is derivative.

It’s unfortunate that this cross was erected during one of the most divisive times in history, meanwhile:

there is no concerted effort by the Christian community here to address the schisms in the church. Sunday remains the most segregated day of the week.

there is no concerted effort by the church to address schisms in our community. We remain very divided.

and, there are a host of community challenges we, as the church, are well equipped and well resourced to address, yet no concerted effort.

We seem happy with the level of suffering around us, but erect a giant cross to symbolize Christ’s love.

Sigh.

Love is the primary thing.

And, that is what I find absent.

Building shelters, providing food banks, or erecting giant crosses will all be ultimately unprofitable without love.

As the Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 13, I can do all sorts of amazing and even extreme things like selling everything I have to feed the poor or even giving my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).

Christ’s love is supernatural because it’s God’s love.

That love will transform our community and us.

That love will engender the response appropriate to meet the specific need of each individual and branches properly to connect them all (to God).

It’s only something that those of us who are called by Christ can do.

Tactics ain’t gonna get it.

At the very most basic application, I can tell you that no one I love is going without anything if I can help it.

The problem is we don’t love each other.

Is there truly a God?

I believe there is.

Prove it.

Love miracuously.

52 Weeks of Gratefulness #1 2023 – Fellowship With Brothers And Sisters In Christ

Do you remember when I said I was going through a rough patch a while back?

It was a season that started much earlier than the day I finally mustered the courage to admit it and ask for help.

It started around the time the 52 Weeks of Gratefulness posts stopped.

One of the first things Satan attacked was my thankfulness. There was a campaign to maximize self by emphasizing my trouble and minimizing the triumph I have in Christ.

Earlier last year, I was in a very dark place. I came to a point where after over 20 years preaching the gospel I was ready to walk away from God. Some people who have heard that thought I was overstating the case, that I was exaggerating or that I’m being dramatic. But, no. I began to doubt the very existence of God. I started questioning the reality of His person, His power and His presence based on what I thought should (or shouldn’t) be happening in my life.

There were a lot of things that led to that moment, aging loved ones, difficulty in my marriage, financial troubles, but it came to a head during a really rough summer for my business. It was worse than it had been in a long time. I was finding it difficult to cover basic expenses. It just felt like I had been struggling forever. Here I am following God, trying to honor Him, but there just doesn’t seem to be any relief or breakthrough, and for all I’ve done, I’m still a failure.

But, thanks be to God that even though I was ready to walk away, I found that I wasn’t holding on to God, God was holding on to me! His Word came to me as gentle as a whisper “Where are you?” When God asks a question, it’s not because He needs information but because He is trying to show us something. His question began a dialog called prayer where I confessed my anger, my frustration and how I just don’t feel God anymore.

God gave me one verse. He brought to remembrance one line and made it burn on my heart (this is why it is vital to get the Word in you.) That verse was Proverbs 18:1 “A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire; He rages against all wise judgment.”

The idea was that part of my problem was that I was focused on myself. I had allowed a root of bitterness to spring up in me and I went into myself, crawling into the dungeon of my heart to nurse and steep in that bitterness. In doing that I had cut myself off. But God gave me a Word that prompted me to seek His face in the presence of His people.

So, I stepped out on that Word and that led to me attending the Men’s luncheon that they host at New Horizons here in Starkville, and that led to me engaging with Brian Spencer at the gym, and that led to me attending my first Man Church and that led to me developing new relationships and my wife and I started hosting a marriage ministry in our home and you know what I found? The Word of God is true! I found revival in the presence of His people.

Look, I have long considered myself a rabid introvert. I am not fond of being around people. I like being by myself, I’d rather be by myself. Being around a lot of people was torture and zapped all the strength out of me. When I’m around people for an extended amount of time, I go home and just collapse and sleep for the rest of the day because of how much it takes out of me.

But now since I’ve tasted the sweet communion of being in the presence of God with other believers, since I’ve experienced Christ where two or three are gathered in His name, I’ve been going out, seeking Him out almost every day.

I’m not talking about “going to church”. I’m talking about seeking to live and function along with other members of the Body of Christ and being the church.

Thankfulness is not just something you should remember to do occasionally, thankfulness should be developed and practiced as a discipline. “In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” -1 Thessalonians 5:18

Thankfulness is a practical and important tactical maneuver in spiritual warfare.

So, in Week 1 of 52 Weeks of Gratefulness, I give thanks for fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ. It saved my life.

If you prayed for me, thank you. The prayers were effective.

I’m thankful. #52wog

Pictured is a regular get together with other members of a marriage ministry Melissa Luckett and I attended that was hosted by Pearson & Pepper Liddell. It was the first place we encountered authentic church.

Originally posted by Paul Luckett to Facebook here.

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52 Weeks of Gratefulness #16 – Fruitful Words From A Friend

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com Thankful For Fruitful Words From Josh T Taylor

In Week 16 of 52 Weeks of Gratefulness, I give thanks for a fruitful word from a friend, Josh “T” Taylor.

I want to advance the Kingdom of God.

But, how we imagine the Kingdom and what it actually is are often starkly different.

It is easy for us to be deceived by appearances, to busy ourselves with religious activities, to feel affirmed by big crowds and large projects, but all the while having done nothing for the Kingdom. (Matthew 7:21-27)

I have struggled with wanting to do something “big” and feeling like I’m not doing enough… that is, until my brother, Josh “T” Taylor, shared a word that has been setting me free.

“T” and I attend a marriage ministry together. It is a small group but it is very rich.

One day, we were talking about the role our marriages play in the Kingdom by glorifying God in how we as husbands and wives reflect Christ’s love.

In that moment “T” pivoted and said something that completely shifted my view of ministry. He was sharing water that he had received elsewhere but it was particularly refreshing to me because it was filtered through his sincerity, his love for me and his applying it in his own life.

He said, “The Kingdom of God advances at the speed of relationships.”

That word immediately affirmed itself. My heart was set on fire as much by the messenger as by the message.

It was illuminating. It revealed, among many things, how I often get distracted seeking outcomes while God seeks hearts. And, we reach those hearts, not by large, flashy ministries but by Spirit-filled, sacrificial, longsuffering love for people as they come to us, which is most often one at a time.

I repent. Not my will Father, but Your will be done. (John 6:38)

This word from a friend and dear brother has been a great ministry to me. I will go forward in service to the Father, seeking to be faithful with whatever He places in my charge -one talent or five, and trust God with the rest.

Thank you “T”. I love you.

I’m grateful. #52WoG