David George Montalvo | Communicate Christ

5 Signs You Are A Real Jesus Follower

Read on if you dare & judge yourself...

This evening, I wrapped up an article on the Holy Spirit by J.C. Ryle (click here for full text). Below you will find a synopsis of what I considered the most important part of the text.

The article weighed on me a great kind of heavy that convicted me of righteousness and the need to be frank and honest with myself first and with the body of Christ as well as with an unbelieving world.

• A Jesus Follower Is Filled With Christ's Spirit
  
  "If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him." (Romans 8:9)
  
• Sign #1 - A Jesus Follower Has Conviction of Sin & Then Repents
  
  Where the Holy Spirit is, there will always be deep conviction of sin, and true repentance for it. He shows the exceeding holiness of God.
  
  He teaches the exceeding corruption and infirmity of our nature. He strips us of our blind self-righteousness. He opens our eyes to our awful guilt, folly and danger. He fills the heart with sorrow, contrition, and abhorrence for sin, as the abominable thing which God hates.
  
• Sign #2 - A Jesus Follower Has Lively Faith In Jesus
  
  Where the Holy Spirit is, there will always be lively faith in Jesus Christ, as the only Savior. He leads the soul which feels its sin, to Jesus and the atonement made by His blood. He shows the soul that Christ has suffered for sin, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God. He points out to the sin-sick soul that we have only to receive Christ, believe in Christ, commit ourselves to Christ, and pardon, peace, and life eternal, are at once our own.
  
  He makes us see a beautiful fitness in Christ's finished work of redemption to meet our spiritual necessities. He makes us willing to disclaim all merit of our own and to venture all on Jesus, looking to nothing, resting on nothing, trusting in nothing but Christ, Christ, "delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification." (Rom. 4:25.)
  
• Sign #3 - A Jesus Follower Desires A Holy Life & Holy Conversation
  
  Where the Holy Spirit is, there will always be holiness of life and conversation. He is the sanctifying Spirit. He takes away the hard, carnal, worldly heart of man, and puts in its place a tender, conscientious, spiritual heart, delighting in the Word of God.
  
  He makes a man turn his face towards God, and desire above all things to please Him, and turn his back on the fashion of this world, and no longer make that fashion his God. He sows in a man's heart the blessed seeds of "love, joy, meekness, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, temperance," and causes these seeds to spring up and bear pleasant fruit. (Gal. 5:22.)
  
• Sign #4 - A Jesus Follower Has A Habit of Prayer
  
  Where the Holy Spirit is, there will always be the habit of earnest private prayer. He works in the heart as the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father. He makes a man feel that he must cry to God, and speak to God—feebly, falteringly, weakly, it may be—but cry he must about his soul.
  
  He makes it as natural to a man to pray as it is to an infant to breathe; with this one difference—that the infant breathes without an effort, and the new-born soul prays with much conflict and strife.
  
• Sign #5 - A Jesus Follower Loves The Bible
  
  Finally, where the Holy Spirit is, there will always be love and reverence for God's Word. He shows man a fullness, and depth, and wisdom, and sufficiency, in the Holy Scripture, which is utterly hid from a natural man's eyes.
  
  He draws him to the Word with an irresistible force, as the light and lantern, and manna, and sword, which are essential to a safe journey through this world. If the man cannot read He makes him love to hear—if he cannot hear He makes him love to meditate. But to the Word the Spirit always leads him. 

If after reading this you find yourself questioning your faith in Jesus, then great! That's a good thing. Make sure that you are in the faith. The last thing you want is a weak faith in a dress wearing hippie poet from Israel who said neat things but is powerless to change you. That's a fake impotent Jesus. He's not the real McCoy.

The real Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit and was full of power to make change happen. And He did.

Make sure you are bending toward His will. You may not have arrived but make sure you are heading in the right direction.

But don't be fooled, if you are running 100 miles an hour in the opposite direction, away from everything that is pure and holy and true, then it is time for you to check yourself.

You may be hell bound.

And if you are a Christian and you've taking the plunge into a great backslide then wake up, the mercy and grace of God calls to you to come home. Come back to the family of God. Come back into the arms of a loving God... before He hands you over to Satan so he can deal with you and drive you back to Himself.

Either way, check yourself. Make sure you're sure. Then check again. This is serious. It's not a social club buddy. It's not a game.

It's about glorifying Christ from one of two places, willingly in the presence of God, or begging for mercy & to experience the richness of Jesus with your knees bent while being licked by the fires of hell.

Rivera-Montalvo | Hidden Treasure, Persecution & Counting Cash

Alfredo Montalvo - My Grandfather
Jewish Italian Heritage

Descended from Italy, the Montalvo's, while running to avoid religious persecution because of their Jewish faith, finally landed at Vera Cruz. Family legend states that after our forefathers threw a rod like object to direct their path, they divined that the family should traveled north.

So the Montalvo's, with a treasure in tow, took off in search of mountains wherein they would hide their precious cargo. They ended up settling in Cerralvo Nuevo Leon. See map. There's a small mountain range west of Cerralvo.

Lucy Rivera Bolanci - My Grandmother
Catholic French Heritage

During the great depression, the Rivier clan (earlier generations changed name to Rivera for ease of pronunciation and to distance themselves from anti-French sentiment) was left completely unscathed.

They had great wealth, lots of cattle, prosperous farm land, and much much more. In fact, stories are told of how the family would regularly gather around a large table made of railroad ties where large sacks of money would be tossed out for the family "accountants" to count. As a child, my grandmother would sit at this table and watch the happenings. And later, she participated in the counting.

The family farm house, which I remember visiting as a small child, had awesome French architecture, large barns for the huge farm equipment, and lots of fruit trees scattered everywhere. That house was the last visible remains of the former greatness of the family wealth. Children later divided the land and the wealth.

Links Of Note:

• Crypto-Judaism - See subtitle Nuevo León — 1590s to early 1600s
• Nuevo Leon - Territory in Mexico founded by secret Jews from Spain
• Coat of Arms - Italian heritage
• Montalvo - Wikipedia has an article on us
  

House of Sea & Sun and My Summer Reading List

STREETVIEW GOOGLE MAP

This is how I plan on spending my summer vacation. Nestled in sunny St Augustine Florida among the Palm trees with the roar of waves from the other side of the small hill seen on the lower right of the above photo.

The beach is beautiful as the Google satellite map will attest to. No fishy smells. No bugs. Just peace. So what will I be doing.

For at least 4 to 5 hrs a day, I'll be sitting on the beach. Yup. Sitting. When I am not exposed under the beam of the sun while slathered in some hyper tanning Tropic Tan lotion, I'll be under a large umbrella with my wife Jenny and a stack of books. The kids will be doing their kid thing.

Here is my summer reading list which I'll enjoy with a nice drink of some kind, preferably with a small umbrella in it...

• Branding Faith
  Why Some Churches and Nonprofits Impact Culture and Others Don't
• The Last TV Evangelist
  Why the Next Generation Couldn't Care Less About Religious Media
  
• Pop Goes the Church
  Should the Church Engage Pop Culture?
  
• Less Clutter. Less Noise.
  Beyond Bulletins, Brochures and Bake Sales
  
• Killing Cockroaches
  And Other Scattered Musings on Leadership
  

At night, we'll share a dinner out, enjoy a trip into town, and we'll have a great time! No TV. No radio.

• Ripley's Believe It or Not tour
• A haunted train ride
• A cruise around the bay
• Santa Maria's restaurant where we eat & feed the fish
• plus a train ride around the entire historic city

Honestly, I've got a summer vacation itch real real bad.

Complaint Dept, Grilled Quail & A Can of Whoop

Thoughts On Exodus 16-17

ONE:

This morning while reading the Genesis account of the Bread From Heaven I made several observations:

• God's people complain a lot.
• God doesn't have an appreciation for complainers
• The complaining brings a test (Exodus 16:4)

How do you complain? How do you show disregard for what God has given? I'm not saying that in grumbling you're ticking off an infinitely powerful God (but you're not making friends with God).

I am saying it would seem that we should be very thankful for what God has done in our lives.

Let's say life's circumstances have you in the crapper, maybe we could be more like the reformed Paul and "rejoice in the Lord always." Having an attitude of thanksgiving may cause you to avert tests of some kind in your life. The good thing about God tests is He gives you cheat sheets with the answers. You may not like the answers and the answers may be hard to swallow but you are not left guessing about what the answer may be.

TWO:

While reading the passage I also noticed that in the midst of their grumbling God provided.

• a fine flake like thing showed up on the ground that tasted like honey wafers
• some gathered more, some less
• whoever gathered more had nothing left over and whomever gathered little had no lack

That's great news huh? God provides! It wasn't escargot in butter wine sauce with a nice Merlot. But dude, it was quail you could walk right up to, bonk on the head and toss in your pot. It was wilderness honey wheat thins to munch on with your grilled quail. Man that's good eats!

It might get a little old after 40 years but if you didn't complain endlessly you might get a clue about where you should be going (instead of walking around like a fool in circles in the "wilderness of sin**").

THREE

And finally, "the LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation." This is great news here. Man I love this. OK, are you ready?

"God's got your back, Jack!"

So here's what I saw when I read this. Even though you may be acting like an idiot and you don't know when to stop complaining about whatever is going on in your life, even though you have trouble trusting in God's provision & care and even though you almost seem to want to live in your muck & mire, that doesn't stop God from loving you!

So if some crazed circumstance comes up from behind and tries to bonk you on the head and overtake you, God's got your back, Jack! We belong to Jesus baby! And He loves us no matter what. God sent Jesus and Jesus opened a can of whoop on whatever could ever ail ya. In fact God promises to those that are His, "The LORD will have war with Amalek* from generation to generation." Exodus 17:16.

I promise you this, whomever GOD makes war with isn't coming out alive. If ever you wanted to be in someone's corner, it would have to be GOD's.

Yes He loves us! Wow, I am fired up on a Monday morning. Hope you get fired up too!

* Amalek was a tribe thought to be descendants of Esau (who sold his God-given birth right). This tribe liked to sneak up from behind and pick off the weak. God didn't like that so he arranged for a confrontation that left them slain all over the wilderness of sin.

** I've been guilty of some wandering

Death & Imago Dei

Since time’s inception, from God’s creation to man’s care to name distinctions, every single thing has been distinguished. Scripture also teaches of a moral distinction; “You are to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean,.” Le 10:10

DISTINGUISH
to tell apart, to differentiate

□    Between the Holy and the common
□    Between the unclean and the clean

The simplest yet most dramatic distinction was that between life and death. While the heart beat, the issues of life flowed out. Upon death the body was as common as dirt; from ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Another distinction was that God called us to be holy, to be clean. The heavy burden upon us to be Holy, to make distinctions, to live up to those differences put strictures (rules) upon us (as per the Talmud & Torah) that included avoiding being near and around death.

Simply being near the dead itself a transgression of sorts. Being near death, seeing it, touching it, made one unclean or impure. But why?

DEATH IS THE POLAR OPPOSITE OF THE IMAGO DEI

Death is the polar opposite of the imago dei, of the image of God. God’s people were designed to reflect back the perfect nature of the Godhead. But death impeded an accurate view of who exactly God is. Death itself was a gross misrepresentation of the very thing God is.

The true living God is life. Death is ungodly.

All of creation was designed with eternity in its fabric, from man to beast, aromatic flower to fledgling foul, and everything in between.