by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

This meal at The Training Table is the final seating of a three-part series based on one of the most important “passages” (Mathew 7, and phases of ministry) in the life of Jesus Christ.

“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it” (Matthew 7:13—NIV).

The Wide Gate and Broad Road: The Mixed Blessings of Living in a Culture of Comfort

In my book, “The Weeping, the Window, the Way” (Preface, Chapter 7), I offer what first arose in my heart as an “aha insight” into a dilemma. However, after simmering in my spirit for just a little while, the issue grew into a quagmire so vital and complicated that it might be better described as a burden—that includes both a deep pain and a high promise of my temporal and eternal life: “the mixed blessings of living in a culture of comfort”.

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“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it” (Matthew 7:13—NIV).

The Narrow Gate—God’s Open-Armed Grace—of Sanctified Suffering

The Baron de Montesquieu astutely observed, “Happiness is not the absence of problems but the ability to deal with them.”

If this quote sounds reminiscent of Jesus’ definition of “happiness” as “Blessed…” (Matthew 5), it’s for good reason: The Son of God began His earthly ministry by turning the things of this world upside-down, and inside-out… to be more in line with God’s reality.

Once a person is a “new creation in Christ” (2 Corinthians 5:17) the same radical reorientation lives within that person. But does this reality preclude that what is INSIDE will necessarily be manifest OUTSIDE? Amongst other things, it’s a choice between “the narrow gate or the broad road”.

In my book, “The Weeping, the Window, the Way” (Chapter 1, 2, 3; 8-13), I describe how, when I fell to my knees in the snow next to my suicidal Dad on Christmas night 2002, God miraculously blessed me with specific Bible verves that formed “a protocol for sanctified suffering”:

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13-14—NIV).

In my book, “The Weeping, the Window, the Way” (Chapter 7), I offer up an age-old yet alarmingly relevant maxim whereby the many COMFORTS we have been wildly blessed with have the potential to become “the broad road that can lead to destruction”.

To sharpen the point, my book targets “Christians living in a culture of comfort”. And, in particular, how many in and of the church can easily lose the benefits of unavoidable suffering (Romans 8:28; 1 Peter 1:6; James 1:2)—if they knowingly and/or unknowingly avoid DIScomfort of any sort.

“The narrow gate”, as originally described by Jesus, is is the only way to eternal life—in that it is through Him alone. Those who choose “the broad road” (seeking the approval of man rather than God) will find the way that leads to destruction, utlimately to eternal punishment and separation from God.

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the eleventh course of Stories from the Cleft at The Training Table—set to serve and help sustain all those who are “running the good race” (1 Corinthians 9:26; 2 Timothy 4:7).

Please check out where we’ve been along the journey at The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

Dressed… For a Killer Challenge and Mountainous Fun!
On a Colorado Bluebird Day in January, my long-time mountain running partner Skip and I arrived at the base of Snowmass Mountain just before sunrise. The temperature was 50° below zero. The hoarfrostwas a beautiful 3 to 5 inches in height—and like running through tiny china teacups in our snowshoes!

Our day’s goal was to run from the Snowmass Ski Area to the base of Aspen Mountain—via each ski mountain between Snowmass and Aspen. The ascents and descents of Snowmass, Buttermilk, Highlands, and Aspen Mountain would take into account approximately 30 miles and a combined loss and gain of elevation of 19,000’ or so.

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the tenth course of Stories from the Cleft at The Training Table—set to serve and help sustain all those who are “running the good race” (1 Corinthians 9:26; 2 Timothy 4:7).

Please check out where we’ve been along the journey at The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

This Training Table is devoted to introducing a new video, “I Am Yours”…  A song that was inspired my book, “The Weeping, the Window, the Way”. In a broken world, suffering is unavoidable. The question is how we will respond to trials. As the book’s subtitle asks, ‘Will suffering make you bitter or better?” My book and the song reminds us that, in the midst of trials of any kind, God wants us to remember and remind others, “I am yours, oh God… I am yours!”

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the ninth course of Stories from the Cleft at The Training Table—set to serve and help sustain all those who are “running the good race” (1 Corinthians 9:26; 2 Timothy 4:7).

Please check out where we’ve been along the journey at The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

Before Running Forward… Always Recapitulate!

Today’s Training Table is a set menu of three courses. The courses are compact, nummy, and most nourishing for anyone running the good race. E.g., not “the rat race”, but rather, the sometimes gruesome yet in all ways glorious journey of, “TODAY… if you hear God’s voice, do not harden your heart…” (Psalm 95:7-8).

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the eighth serving of Stories from the Cleft at The Training Table—set to serve and help sustain all those who are “running the good race” (1 Corinthians 9:26; 2 Timothy 4:7).

Please check out where we’ve been along the journey at The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

The foundation of mankind’s deepest desires can be summarized in one simple yet very complicated statement made by (God the Father and) Jesus, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself’” (Luke 10:27; Deuteronomy 6:5).

This statement (or commandment), given by God to mankind out of pure love and truth, is “simple yet complicated” due to impact of inherited and personal sin (Genesis 3). But, like Gordian’s Knot, the complexity, the giant-sized hairball of getting it worked out, can be cut through by God’s word, The Sword of Truth!

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the seventh installment of Stories from the Cleft.

Please check out where we’ve been along the journey at The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

Today’s feast consists of some of the most important truths a person can chew on. As I discussed in my book, “The Weeping, the Window, the Way”, God has a redemptive plan for not simply surviving but flourishing in the era of unavoidable suffering that we presently live in—between the time of the Fall (Genesis 3) and Jesus’ Second Coming to make all things new (Revelation 21).

However, there’s a very big problem that exists in any people or era “living in a culture of comfort”: The denial, avoidance, and suppression of all things difficult, dying and, of course, death itself. In order to avoid the unavoidable, much of humanity has unwittingly, yet methodically and over multiple generations, built a mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical house of cards to sequester itself in… and to wait out the storm. This is no way to live.

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the sixth installment of Stories from the Cleft.

Please check out where we’ve been along the journey at The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

The first REMEMBRANCE I want to serve up today is this: GOD’S Story Includes YOUR Story—in the sort of detail that should rock your world each and every day.

As you follow the www link to “God’s Story” to spend some time refreshing your memory, please (oh please) try and be as explicit as possible about how God has shaped YOUR STORY (see www link for a great tool) as, (a) a reflection or pattern or “template” of God’s overall Plan of Redemption, and (b) includes details that, if you make it your business to dig deep and see them, you will be in awe of them, praise God for them, and influence others through them! And you will see God’s glory every day.

Remembering God’s story, and yours within it, is a VERY big deal! Moreover, never knowing, or forgetting it, is disastrous: Without knowing our story, we are lost souls, anonymous, living devoid of The Great Narrative that’s fixed in the heart of all humankind, and yet foiled by sin, and must be figured out by each one of us… SO WE REMEMBER AGAIN.

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by John DozierPosted on Posted in Training Table — No Comments ↓

Welcome to the fifth installment of Stories from the Cleft: Examples of how God answers our prayers to see His glory each day by being light and salt to a dark and decaying world.

If you care to see the context for these stories or review where we’ve been along the journey, please check out The Training Table Archives section of Feast of the Heart. Be sure to recall the Bible passage from Exodus 33:12-23; 34:29-35 where the story of Moses and “the cleft in the rock” can be found.

Before we dig in, please forgive me for leaving out an important segment of the last feast at The Training Table, “Prayer: Re-Creation of the Grandest Kind”, February 16th, Resources on Prayer (bottom of the page). I hope you find them helpful. I’m sure you have some great references on the subject of prayer as well.

“The Thank-Full Heart”… Pondering While on a Pedal
As I was on a longish bike ride thinking about the menu for today, I was letting my body and heart spin free in the warmed winter air. It was glorious! In this familiar and blessed state, I’m intentional about opening myself to listen for ideas, melodies, chirps, and trills, to look for symbols and signs, to smell the air for clues, and to empty my mind of anything connected to my worldly to-do list.

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