To Bind and Loose....

1. What do you have the capacity for (or to do)? - Where your ability can thrive....

2. How much capacity you have? - ie. holding capacity...

The first question was addressed in a service at church a little while back, so I'm address the second.

You may believe (and could be right) that you possess an ability of infinite amount of capacity. I see the limits. I see the limits, however, as a an infinitely positive and divine creation. With this understanding, I believe that God is the boundless capacity of everything.

So....in steering clear of defining God's capacity, because I have one of two choices in addressing that.....being completely wrong or chasing my tail....I'll save you and I the headache.

We are bound with a capacity for a very finite and definable amount of things and experiences. Maybe some have more in some area and less in others, but we aren't limitless.

Understanding that we are not infinite and unbound is liberating and refreshing. It gives me a peace that I'm not meant to doing everything, and that all issues aren't mine to address. I don't need to excuse the universal issues like abuse, poverty, and injustice, but I need to understand that every problem cannot and will not be fixed by my hands. I, like you, have a certain and definable (by God) capacity to create, restore, redeem, and have a heart for.

Why is important to understand that we are not infinitely capable?

1. We need to understand ourselves, our strengths, our passions, and our capacity to understand God's will. We need to lead from these understandings in our ministries (not bound by religion or religious institutions). Your life, every possible thing you can do, is ministry and worship. You are always ministering and worshiping. Always (even if it isn't on our Creator's behave and for His Glory).

Don't forget this....EVER.

2. The second reason why capacity is important is because you need to understand that principle, "What goes in, Must come out".

If you aren't limitless than you have to release things from within.

If you can truly capture the understand and awareness of this truth, then you begin to ask the question "How is this, what I'm putting in, going to come out?".

I love when someone tells me that tv, music, movies, books, magazines, diet, etc. doesn't affect them. Maybe so, but I doubt it. And let's say, hypothetically you can resist it influencing you, it's still going to come out of you. This is a double-edged truth. Open your mind, heart, and body to great/healthy/eternal/holy things and that is what will spill out of you. Open them up to earthly/perverted/selfish things....you can guess what will come out.

We all struggle from time to time on this awareness, but it doesn't invalidate it, it only reinforces it.

So if I asked why are you watching Jersey Shore? or listening to ________? or going to ________? The reason isn't that I'm thinking I'm better or that my decisions are wiser. The reason is I want to know is how is it going to benefit you and the Kingdom.

Why we read the Bible, pray, and serve? It is because there is an input/output affect that draws you closer to God, and an understanding of God's will.

May you understand how much capacity you have in every area of your life and may you understand that you can't avoid influence both the divine and the undivine.

With peace and humility, ryan

There is something about being around other people working on improving themselves that rubs me the right way....but.... then I think of the narcissism, the self-image issues, the eating disorders, the extra (not naturally produced) testosterone. There are whiffs of negatives that seem to distract my mindset as I exam this niche of people that seem to personify something.

For the longest time, I didn't understand it. I notice many things about the nature of working out. I understand the ridiculousness about muscles that aren't needing to be the size of my head. I see the craziness of killing yourself in a gym for sport while others perform manual labor to put food on the table.

I can empathize with those that will never step into a gym and I'm one of those that is frustrated when I go a week without gym time.

Today, I realized why I need it and why I want it. (Need, obviously thrown out loosely)

There is an underlining mentality of many people in the gym that can be best describe as "Go as hard as you can, until you fail". I love it. The purpose of my working out is going in knowing that when I leave I'll have failed in that failure is my success.

And inversely, if I leave without failure, my experience WASN'T a success.

When we live in a culture that harps on failure, the gym sees them as victories.

This, like almost everything, tangents me into spirituality. God can use are failures better than our successes. It's not that he doesn't use our successes, but our egos tend to take the credit most of the time. But when we fail, and we will fail, God's glory shines through and when our limping egos can't take it....we see God.

The failures in life are similar to the failure in the gym. They are marked with humility and they are the catalyst for growth.

How many times have you learned from success?

How much does failure move us?

I guess, in summation, I go for failure in the gym...maybe I need to do the same in life sometimes.

If you don't understand what working out does....when you do it right, it literally rips and tears your muscles. You get bigger and stronger by the rest and nutrition between workouts. The growth come after you've hurt (minor) your body.

Your muscles can't grow without this tearing, why do you think you can grow closer to God without the same principle?