10.07.09
Jonah 1:17
"But the Lord provided a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was inside the fish three days and three nights."
What does it take to get our attention sometimes? For some people noticing things comes easier than others. Some people really need to be smacked in the head before they will see what's best for them. When I was about ten years old I loved doing stuff that my parents would classify as not really well thought through. We had a space in our basement that only I could fit in and I would climb in there and hide and scare the garbage out of my mother. She used to tell me all the time not to hide where she couldn't find me, but I ignored her. I would also pop out from time to time and watch her jump in fear. I was a little bit of a devil as a kid.
Much like any other small kid I was also a bit of a daredevil. Mix this with the desire to go against what my parents told me to do and it made for some pretty amazingly stupid outcomes. I can remember one time being at the park where my friends and I all hung out and having all my friends egging me on to jump a ridge by the slides, with my bike. Now as an adult I can look back on this see how absolutely dumb it was, but back than there was nothing that was going to stop me, not even my mother driving by and warning me not to try it.
Well needless to say I ignored my own mother's warning and jumped the ridge. (If only I hadn't ignored the warning voice of a loving parent.) Well I should clarify that I didn't so much jump as much as I gained speed and plummeted six feet doing a complete flip and landing on the back of my neck with the weight of a Huffy mountain bike baring down on my shoulders. It was not my proudest moment. Not only was my pride hurt but my ego was torn, shattered and bruised by the fact that I just didn't pay attention to my mother's voice, trying it's best to keep me safe and far out of harm's reach.
I have been studying the book of Jonah a little bit lately and I have been intrigued by some of the way that the book is worded. If you don't know the story God tells Jonah to go to Nineveh to preach to the folks there about Him. Jonah is reluctant to listen to God because of the type of people that live in Nineveh. The really surly type lived there and Jonah wanted no part in risking his life. So he tries to escape by taking passage on a boat. Well there was no hiding from God and the boat was hit with a major storm which led to the crew throwing Jonah overboard and than something cool happens. The NIV version says the Lord "provided a great fish" to swallow up Jonah and he than spends three days and nights on what was I'm sure a wonder cruisee inside the belly of the fish.
The word "provided" is interesting to me because we do not think that God would do something like that all the time. We expect Him to fix things with miracles and heal without thinking, but when He provides us time, like he did Jonah, it gives us time to realize what God truly wants for us. Sometimes we get caught in what refer to as ruts, where we think that God is not listening or God is angry at us. The question we have to ask ourselves, is it possible that God "provides" us with time to sit back and realize that He has a better plan for our lives? Is it possible that He wants us to come to the conclusion that His way is better than our way.
It goes on in the book of Jonah to say that Jonah eventually gets out of the "great fish" and agrees to go to Nineveh and do what God had originally intended for him to do, and that is preach to the folks of Nineveh about a great, awesome and powerful God. It took God "providing" a great fish for Jonah to sit and realize that God's desire was better than his own.
What do you thinkt he first day or so of that fish frenzy looked like for Jonah emotionally. Probably started with fear, and than moved to anger at God, than understanding and than praise. Does this look similar to your relationship with God? Do you ever experience a rainbow of emotion in your relationship with the Lord? Do you think it's possible that God "provides" us today with opportunity to sit and think about how His plan is bigger than ours?
Thought question: What is your "great fish"? What is God putting in your life to try and get you to see that His plan is bigger and better? Where do you have sit and think about for "three days and nights" before you realize that God wants to use everything for His glory?
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Friday, September 4, 2009
My God the Prize Machine
9.04.09
Matthew 19:21-22
"Jesus answered, 'If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.' When the young man heard this, he went away sad..."
For my ninth birthday I asked my parents to buy me a mountain bike. At the time they were the hottest thing out there, and I wanted to make sure that I had one. For weeks I scoured the newspaper adds for pictures of mountain bikes and I spent hours upon hours circling bikes in the Toys R' Us catalog. A few weeks before my actual birthday I found the bike that could not be topped. I circled it four times, cut it out of the catalog and left in plain sight for my parents to find. I was so excited because I thought I had picked the perfect bike. The color was perfect the hand brakes were awesome. It was exactly what I had always dreamed a mountain bike could be, and I made sure my parents knew exactly what I wanted.
The weeks passed and my birthday arrived and I watched as my father pulled into the driveway with the trunk of his car propped open and a tire sticking out. I ran out of the house and was on my father like white on rice. I was absolutely beaming with excitement. I was hopping up and down like a rabbit on Red Bull.
My father opened up his trunk and slowly pulled the bike from the trunk of his car and I remember the thoughts in my head went from pure excitement to utter disappointment. The bike they had gotten me was not the one I had asked for and circled from the catalog. In fact it was a little too big for me and I remember my parents saying that they bought it big because they wanted me to be able to use it as I grew. I had asked for a blue bike and this one was gray and green. The fact of the matter is that this bike was nicer than the one I had asked for, but because I was nine and this wasn't what I had asked for, I got upset and relunctantly said thank you and rode it over to my friends house in silent protest.
What I had failed to recognize was that my parents had given me something nicer than I had asked for and the fact of the matter is that I didn't even deserve what I had gotten because I had acted like a brat when I did not get what I wanted. I pouted and sulked for days, and at points even got angry at my parents for not listening to what I had asked for. My parents had gone above and beyond what I had asked for but in my selfishness all I saw was that I didn't get what I wanted.
Have you ever felt like your prayer life resembles me as a nine year old child? You ask for things over and over, build up expectations of God and when He chooses to answer prayers differently than you expected you get angry at Him. The rich young ruler was sad when he left Jesus because he didn't get the answer that he wanted to hear. He was upset because he asked for something expecting a certain response and when he didn't get what he wanted he sulked and pouted.
We tend to treat God like he is a prize machine we stick in a prayer and out comes exactly what we want and when it doesn't work out it's His fault and He's to blame. The reality is that God does not ignore prayer, He does dismiss any prayer request. The thing that we have to remember is that sometimes God chooses to answer things differently than we had hoped for. The problem with this is that we build up our expectations. We spend hours upon hours asking for things and spend seconds looking for the way God wants to answer it. The fact of the matter is that God wants to build us into His vessel and He is going use circumstances and situations for His glory.
We have to learn to stop looking at God as a slot machine, we have to stop expecting God to do something just because we pray a certain way. Our prayers should be an opportunity for us to spend time with our Heavenly Father, if God does not answer your prayers the way you had hoped for the question is, is it possible the answer He gave you was for His glory and will turn out to be better than even your expectations had imagined?
Thought question: Do you tend to see how God is answering prayers or do you just expect Him to answer them the way you want Him to? When you pray are you asking for God's desires to be met or are you asking for your own to be met?
Matthew 19:21-22
"Jesus answered, 'If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.' When the young man heard this, he went away sad..."
For my ninth birthday I asked my parents to buy me a mountain bike. At the time they were the hottest thing out there, and I wanted to make sure that I had one. For weeks I scoured the newspaper adds for pictures of mountain bikes and I spent hours upon hours circling bikes in the Toys R' Us catalog. A few weeks before my actual birthday I found the bike that could not be topped. I circled it four times, cut it out of the catalog and left in plain sight for my parents to find. I was so excited because I thought I had picked the perfect bike. The color was perfect the hand brakes were awesome. It was exactly what I had always dreamed a mountain bike could be, and I made sure my parents knew exactly what I wanted.
The weeks passed and my birthday arrived and I watched as my father pulled into the driveway with the trunk of his car propped open and a tire sticking out. I ran out of the house and was on my father like white on rice. I was absolutely beaming with excitement. I was hopping up and down like a rabbit on Red Bull.
My father opened up his trunk and slowly pulled the bike from the trunk of his car and I remember the thoughts in my head went from pure excitement to utter disappointment. The bike they had gotten me was not the one I had asked for and circled from the catalog. In fact it was a little too big for me and I remember my parents saying that they bought it big because they wanted me to be able to use it as I grew. I had asked for a blue bike and this one was gray and green. The fact of the matter is that this bike was nicer than the one I had asked for, but because I was nine and this wasn't what I had asked for, I got upset and relunctantly said thank you and rode it over to my friends house in silent protest.
What I had failed to recognize was that my parents had given me something nicer than I had asked for and the fact of the matter is that I didn't even deserve what I had gotten because I had acted like a brat when I did not get what I wanted. I pouted and sulked for days, and at points even got angry at my parents for not listening to what I had asked for. My parents had gone above and beyond what I had asked for but in my selfishness all I saw was that I didn't get what I wanted.
Have you ever felt like your prayer life resembles me as a nine year old child? You ask for things over and over, build up expectations of God and when He chooses to answer prayers differently than you expected you get angry at Him. The rich young ruler was sad when he left Jesus because he didn't get the answer that he wanted to hear. He was upset because he asked for something expecting a certain response and when he didn't get what he wanted he sulked and pouted.
We tend to treat God like he is a prize machine we stick in a prayer and out comes exactly what we want and when it doesn't work out it's His fault and He's to blame. The reality is that God does not ignore prayer, He does dismiss any prayer request. The thing that we have to remember is that sometimes God chooses to answer things differently than we had hoped for. The problem with this is that we build up our expectations. We spend hours upon hours asking for things and spend seconds looking for the way God wants to answer it. The fact of the matter is that God wants to build us into His vessel and He is going use circumstances and situations for His glory.
We have to learn to stop looking at God as a slot machine, we have to stop expecting God to do something just because we pray a certain way. Our prayers should be an opportunity for us to spend time with our Heavenly Father, if God does not answer your prayers the way you had hoped for the question is, is it possible the answer He gave you was for His glory and will turn out to be better than even your expectations had imagined?
Thought question: Do you tend to see how God is answering prayers or do you just expect Him to answer them the way you want Him to? When you pray are you asking for God's desires to be met or are you asking for your own to be met?
Friday, August 28, 2009
Sin Assumption
8.28.09
Romans 5:8
"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
When I was ten years old my sister and I did a pretty good job of getting along with one another, but the fact of the matter is that as the summer months of youth go along, days get longer and longer and hours seem to drag on for eons. As I sit and write about this period of time in my life I want to take a minute to thank my mother for being a saint, and putting up with us, but I digress. I remember one particular summer when I first moved to Richmond and it was a hot day and nobody wanted to be outside. It was the kind of hot that made you not even want to go to the pool and cool off because the walk or bike ride to the pool would cause too much anguish.
On this particular day my sister and I both stayed in the house and did not move all morning. Needless to say we began to bicker back and forth about anything and everything. This in turn led to an all out nuclear blast of a fight that culminated with me attempting to practice maturity and walking away. I went upstairs and turned on the TV to calm down. Not five minutes later she walked upstairs and did something that would push me from angry to volcanic. She walked right up to me and took the remote out of my hand and changed the channel. As any little kid would I lost it and I don't remember if I hit her or pushed her, but the next thing I knew she was in tears and I was running for dear life out of the house before my mother could get a hold of me.
Hours later I returned home, notice I said hours. I waited patiently outside of my house (more like across the street out of sight) for my father's car to pull into the driveway. Than I waited another hour or so before I finally went in the house. I thought I would give him time to cool off before I took on the yelling that I was for sure doomed to receive. When your little you assume the worst is bound to happen, but I never would could have assumed what would take place next. I slowly walked into the house where I found my father, mother and sister (who mustered up the courage to start crying again) sitting at the kitchen table waiting for me.
Here it was the moment of truth, or the worst yelling or whooping anyone ever deserved, I thought I would ever receive. That was in fact not the case, my father took me calmly and sat me down and spent an hour talking to me about how I shouldn't have left the house and I shouldn't have done what I had done, but it was even worse that I left my mother feeling sick not knowing where I was or what had happened to me. The fact of the matter is that my father was upset that I had hurt my sister, but both of my parents concern fell to the fact that their child was missing.
Had I done something wrong, absolutely. Did I owe my sister the biggest apology ever, without a doubt, but I did learn that day that my parents care about ME their son than what I did. Their love was not gauged by what I did or say but more so the fact that I am their son. I was so afraid of what they were going to do to me that I stayed away from them. I ran, when in fact I should have found comfort in the love of my parents and I should have given them the chance to forgive me and teach me.
In our spiritual lives we have a tendency to run from God when we think that He will be disappointed with what we've done or what we've said. We think that what we do is too ugly for God to love through. We think that what we do is too sinful or weighs more than other people's sin, so we avoid church, or spending time with God. We avoid fellowship with people that God puts in our lives to be an encouragement. We think it better to avoid "God things" than to have our sin continually put in our face. We assume that God throw our sin back in our face and call us sinners. The people in Christ's time ran to Him for healing, yet today we have a tendency to run away and hide from Jesus because we think He will condemn us.
The hope that we need to learn to cling to is the fact that God demonstrates His love for us in the fact that while we are sinners and will continue to sin CHRIST STILL DIED. Jesus does not want us to avoid a relationship with Him because we think we're too dirty for Him. He does not want to run from, He desires us to run to Him when we are at our weakest. He wants us to find comfort and shelter in Him and the other believers that He puts in our lives.
Are we going to sin, yes. Are we always going to have a burden of human nature, yes, but that does not mean that Jesus is any less of a savior. That does not mean that we should turn our backs on Him. He will never turn His back on you, no matter how dirty or bad you think you are. There is nothing too gross for Christ. As you think of a loving God think of one who hung on a cross and thought about your name specifically as He paid the price for the sin you think is too dirty. While we were sinners Christ died.
Thought question: What are you holding onto that makes you run from Jesus? What keeps you from having the loving relationship that He desires to have with you? Maybe it's that you think He will be mad at you, or maybe you think it's that you just are too sinful or dirty. Be secure in the fact that you are not "too dirty" for Jesus. He just wants YOU!!!!
Romans 5:8
"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
When I was ten years old my sister and I did a pretty good job of getting along with one another, but the fact of the matter is that as the summer months of youth go along, days get longer and longer and hours seem to drag on for eons. As I sit and write about this period of time in my life I want to take a minute to thank my mother for being a saint, and putting up with us, but I digress. I remember one particular summer when I first moved to Richmond and it was a hot day and nobody wanted to be outside. It was the kind of hot that made you not even want to go to the pool and cool off because the walk or bike ride to the pool would cause too much anguish.
On this particular day my sister and I both stayed in the house and did not move all morning. Needless to say we began to bicker back and forth about anything and everything. This in turn led to an all out nuclear blast of a fight that culminated with me attempting to practice maturity and walking away. I went upstairs and turned on the TV to calm down. Not five minutes later she walked upstairs and did something that would push me from angry to volcanic. She walked right up to me and took the remote out of my hand and changed the channel. As any little kid would I lost it and I don't remember if I hit her or pushed her, but the next thing I knew she was in tears and I was running for dear life out of the house before my mother could get a hold of me.
Hours later I returned home, notice I said hours. I waited patiently outside of my house (more like across the street out of sight) for my father's car to pull into the driveway. Than I waited another hour or so before I finally went in the house. I thought I would give him time to cool off before I took on the yelling that I was for sure doomed to receive. When your little you assume the worst is bound to happen, but I never would could have assumed what would take place next. I slowly walked into the house where I found my father, mother and sister (who mustered up the courage to start crying again) sitting at the kitchen table waiting for me.
Here it was the moment of truth, or the worst yelling or whooping anyone ever deserved, I thought I would ever receive. That was in fact not the case, my father took me calmly and sat me down and spent an hour talking to me about how I shouldn't have left the house and I shouldn't have done what I had done, but it was even worse that I left my mother feeling sick not knowing where I was or what had happened to me. The fact of the matter is that my father was upset that I had hurt my sister, but both of my parents concern fell to the fact that their child was missing.
Had I done something wrong, absolutely. Did I owe my sister the biggest apology ever, without a doubt, but I did learn that day that my parents care about ME their son than what I did. Their love was not gauged by what I did or say but more so the fact that I am their son. I was so afraid of what they were going to do to me that I stayed away from them. I ran, when in fact I should have found comfort in the love of my parents and I should have given them the chance to forgive me and teach me.
In our spiritual lives we have a tendency to run from God when we think that He will be disappointed with what we've done or what we've said. We think that what we do is too ugly for God to love through. We think that what we do is too sinful or weighs more than other people's sin, so we avoid church, or spending time with God. We avoid fellowship with people that God puts in our lives to be an encouragement. We think it better to avoid "God things" than to have our sin continually put in our face. We assume that God throw our sin back in our face and call us sinners. The people in Christ's time ran to Him for healing, yet today we have a tendency to run away and hide from Jesus because we think He will condemn us.
The hope that we need to learn to cling to is the fact that God demonstrates His love for us in the fact that while we are sinners and will continue to sin CHRIST STILL DIED. Jesus does not want us to avoid a relationship with Him because we think we're too dirty for Him. He does not want to run from, He desires us to run to Him when we are at our weakest. He wants us to find comfort and shelter in Him and the other believers that He puts in our lives.
Are we going to sin, yes. Are we always going to have a burden of human nature, yes, but that does not mean that Jesus is any less of a savior. That does not mean that we should turn our backs on Him. He will never turn His back on you, no matter how dirty or bad you think you are. There is nothing too gross for Christ. As you think of a loving God think of one who hung on a cross and thought about your name specifically as He paid the price for the sin you think is too dirty. While we were sinners Christ died.
Thought question: What are you holding onto that makes you run from Jesus? What keeps you from having the loving relationship that He desires to have with you? Maybe it's that you think He will be mad at you, or maybe you think it's that you just are too sinful or dirty. Be secure in the fact that you are not "too dirty" for Jesus. He just wants YOU!!!!
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
In God We Trust?
8.19.09
John 14:1
"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God;"
About 10 years ago I had an awesome opportunity to serve at a Young Life camp in upstate New York. My job for the month was working on the ropes course where I would get to spend time getting to know each camper as they climbed their way to the top of the trees and put their lives in the safety of only the ropes and me and the other course workers. The month started out great with a few folks who would be in tears by the time they got to the final obstacle which was the free fall. This turned out to be the hardest thing in the world to coerce some people to try. We spent hours trying to convince people that the rope was there to secure them and there was no way that they would get hurt. Some just got lowered down and gave up and others spent so much time in literal tears of fear of not knowing what would happen if they just jumped and trusted that the rope would secure them before they hit the ground. There was one girl who spent forty five minutes crying and screaming that she didn't want to be lowered and certainly didn't want to jump down. There was no way to get her to budge. It took the words and quite literally prayers of four course workers to convince her to trust us that the rope was secure and that she was in no danger by just jumping and trusting that we were trained and that the ropes course was secure.
She finally jumped after the forty five minute therapy session. The look on her face as she plummeted was awesome, but nothing next to the reaction she had when she got unhooked from the ropes. She turned to myself and her leader and asked if she could do the course again later in the week, and maybe even try a flip during the free fall. She went from tears of fear to desires of repetition all because she trusted. To think if she would have never trusted she would have never have had one of the greatest experiences of her week and possibly her life.
Trust is not always the easiest thing to give God. Sometimes it is because we have some stuff that we do not want to hand over to God. Other times it is because we feel like it is just to big. Other times it is because we feel like the stuff we have is just too dirty to bring to God and trust that He is not going to look away. The fact of the matter is that there is nothing that is too big, too ugly and too difficult for God. He wants it all.
The question that we have to ask ourselves is are we going to trust God enough to give Him all that burdens our heart and trust Him with it. One of our biggest struggles as human beings is not wrestling with God it's wrestling with thing on our own and not trusting that God is there for us and will provide for our needs.
We sit on that ropes course ledge in tears not wanting to go back and certainly not trusting enough to drop off and let God be who God is. In His very nature God is a loving, secure, understanding, merciful Father. He has always been and will always be there for us to catch us when we fall. The thought that we have to keep in mind is not whether we CAN trust God, it's whether or not we will trust God.
If we do not trust God to be who He claims to be we may miss out on the best experience that He created us for and that is a life to the full. If we lean on our own understanding and not on who God is than we might miss that free fall at the end of an exciting ropes course.
Thought question: What are you holding onto and trying to figure out on your own? What is it in your life that you will not trust the God of the universe, the creator of life, with and why?
John 14:1
"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God;"
About 10 years ago I had an awesome opportunity to serve at a Young Life camp in upstate New York. My job for the month was working on the ropes course where I would get to spend time getting to know each camper as they climbed their way to the top of the trees and put their lives in the safety of only the ropes and me and the other course workers. The month started out great with a few folks who would be in tears by the time they got to the final obstacle which was the free fall. This turned out to be the hardest thing in the world to coerce some people to try. We spent hours trying to convince people that the rope was there to secure them and there was no way that they would get hurt. Some just got lowered down and gave up and others spent so much time in literal tears of fear of not knowing what would happen if they just jumped and trusted that the rope would secure them before they hit the ground. There was one girl who spent forty five minutes crying and screaming that she didn't want to be lowered and certainly didn't want to jump down. There was no way to get her to budge. It took the words and quite literally prayers of four course workers to convince her to trust us that the rope was secure and that she was in no danger by just jumping and trusting that we were trained and that the ropes course was secure.
She finally jumped after the forty five minute therapy session. The look on her face as she plummeted was awesome, but nothing next to the reaction she had when she got unhooked from the ropes. She turned to myself and her leader and asked if she could do the course again later in the week, and maybe even try a flip during the free fall. She went from tears of fear to desires of repetition all because she trusted. To think if she would have never trusted she would have never have had one of the greatest experiences of her week and possibly her life.
Trust is not always the easiest thing to give God. Sometimes it is because we have some stuff that we do not want to hand over to God. Other times it is because we feel like it is just to big. Other times it is because we feel like the stuff we have is just too dirty to bring to God and trust that He is not going to look away. The fact of the matter is that there is nothing that is too big, too ugly and too difficult for God. He wants it all.
The question that we have to ask ourselves is are we going to trust God enough to give Him all that burdens our heart and trust Him with it. One of our biggest struggles as human beings is not wrestling with God it's wrestling with thing on our own and not trusting that God is there for us and will provide for our needs.
We sit on that ropes course ledge in tears not wanting to go back and certainly not trusting enough to drop off and let God be who God is. In His very nature God is a loving, secure, understanding, merciful Father. He has always been and will always be there for us to catch us when we fall. The thought that we have to keep in mind is not whether we CAN trust God, it's whether or not we will trust God.
If we do not trust God to be who He claims to be we may miss out on the best experience that He created us for and that is a life to the full. If we lean on our own understanding and not on who God is than we might miss that free fall at the end of an exciting ropes course.
Thought question: What are you holding onto and trying to figure out on your own? What is it in your life that you will not trust the God of the universe, the creator of life, with and why?
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
For What Reason?
5.20.09
Colosians 3:23-24 "Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lordas a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving."
Being the baby brother to an older brother can have it's advantages. I can not tell you the amount of times that I got away with anything I wanted to just by screaming at the top of my lungs while unleashing a barage of tears that makes Niagra Falls look like a drippy faucet. I remember more times that my brother got grounded just for giving me an ugly look. It truly was one of the easiest things in the world to accomplish when I was a little boy. Anyone with an older sibling knows exactly what I'm talking about.
As I grew older the desire to get my brother into trouble got channeled in a completely different direction. I lost the baby brother mentality and became true competition for my older brother. By the time I got into high school I no longer wished to use my parents to out do my brother. It became my only mission in life to beat my brother at every thing that we did. He played football so I played football. If he was good wide receiver I was going to be the best quarterback. I was going to make sure that I was taking it a step further. When he took up high school wrestling you'd be right to guess that I took it up too. In fact I would set goals for myself to be better than him by and earlier age. I set my goals by what he did to be able to out do him. When I was a freshman in high school I set a goal to have a varsity letter by my sophomore year.
The problem with my way of thinking was that my goals had nothing to do with what I wanted or what was truly healthy. It came only from a desire to beat my brother. Eventually my father helped me realize that I didn't have to make everything with my brother a competition but I should continue to strive for exellence with a different goal in mind, to make myself a better person.
I think often about the competition that I had to beat my brother because it makes me think about how I serve today and what my actions truly mean today. It can become so easy in our competitive world to lose sight of why we do what we do. Sometimes it is because we want to out do a co-worker, or because we want our boss, colleagues, friends and family to see how great we are. Have you ever found yourself doing something nice for someone just to get the congratulations, or working extra hours at work just so that your boss will tell you how great you are, so that you can have your ego stroked. We all do it. Who doesn't like being told they're great? If you say "Not me" I challenge you to re-examine yourself.
What happens when we begin to work for the accolades is that we actually take the focus off the one we serve and focus it on us as the servant. We begin to become competition for attention, and the competition is against our Lord the one we serve. You see God wants us to continue to strive for exellence at work, and do nice things for others but not so that we'll get the praise but rather so that folks will see Him alive in us. Christ has a desire to be seen in all that we do. One of the greatest thoughts I ever heard growing up was Share the Gospel with someone today, use words if you have to. Meaning we have to let go of the me and let others see Him in all that we do. Next time you are faced with an opportunity to serve, do it and don't tell anyone. Your inheritance and blessings come from the Lord. If someone doesn't know that you did it for them does it count just the same? Sometimes that is where people see the Lord work. In a anonymous blessing.
Thought question: Would you still act and do what you do if no one ever saw, heard or knew about what you were doing? In other words are you living the Gospel despite who sees it?
Colosians 3:23-24 "Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lordas a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving."
Being the baby brother to an older brother can have it's advantages. I can not tell you the amount of times that I got away with anything I wanted to just by screaming at the top of my lungs while unleashing a barage of tears that makes Niagra Falls look like a drippy faucet. I remember more times that my brother got grounded just for giving me an ugly look. It truly was one of the easiest things in the world to accomplish when I was a little boy. Anyone with an older sibling knows exactly what I'm talking about.
As I grew older the desire to get my brother into trouble got channeled in a completely different direction. I lost the baby brother mentality and became true competition for my older brother. By the time I got into high school I no longer wished to use my parents to out do my brother. It became my only mission in life to beat my brother at every thing that we did. He played football so I played football. If he was good wide receiver I was going to be the best quarterback. I was going to make sure that I was taking it a step further. When he took up high school wrestling you'd be right to guess that I took it up too. In fact I would set goals for myself to be better than him by and earlier age. I set my goals by what he did to be able to out do him. When I was a freshman in high school I set a goal to have a varsity letter by my sophomore year.
The problem with my way of thinking was that my goals had nothing to do with what I wanted or what was truly healthy. It came only from a desire to beat my brother. Eventually my father helped me realize that I didn't have to make everything with my brother a competition but I should continue to strive for exellence with a different goal in mind, to make myself a better person.
I think often about the competition that I had to beat my brother because it makes me think about how I serve today and what my actions truly mean today. It can become so easy in our competitive world to lose sight of why we do what we do. Sometimes it is because we want to out do a co-worker, or because we want our boss, colleagues, friends and family to see how great we are. Have you ever found yourself doing something nice for someone just to get the congratulations, or working extra hours at work just so that your boss will tell you how great you are, so that you can have your ego stroked. We all do it. Who doesn't like being told they're great? If you say "Not me" I challenge you to re-examine yourself.
What happens when we begin to work for the accolades is that we actually take the focus off the one we serve and focus it on us as the servant. We begin to become competition for attention, and the competition is against our Lord the one we serve. You see God wants us to continue to strive for exellence at work, and do nice things for others but not so that we'll get the praise but rather so that folks will see Him alive in us. Christ has a desire to be seen in all that we do. One of the greatest thoughts I ever heard growing up was Share the Gospel with someone today, use words if you have to. Meaning we have to let go of the me and let others see Him in all that we do. Next time you are faced with an opportunity to serve, do it and don't tell anyone. Your inheritance and blessings come from the Lord. If someone doesn't know that you did it for them does it count just the same? Sometimes that is where people see the Lord work. In a anonymous blessing.
Thought question: Would you still act and do what you do if no one ever saw, heard or knew about what you were doing? In other words are you living the Gospel despite who sees it?
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Blind Faith
5.14.09
1 Peter 1:8-9 "Though you have not seen Him, you love Him; and even though you do not see Him now, you believe in Him and are filled with an inexpressable and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls."
When I was little I can remember getting ready for bed and saying goodnight to my mother. Each night she would tuck me in and say goodnight and go to the door to shut it and I would plead with her to leave it open as much as possible and she would almost always concede (I think do to the fact that I would have screamed like a air raid siren if she hadn't). She would however always shut out the lights and that would send me into a state of fear that was like nothing one could ever imagine. I was so afraid of the dark it wasn't funny. The reason being because I was 100% sure that some sort of undead creature or ghost was going to come after me. It never helped that I had older siblings that convinced me, after watching the movie Night of the Living Dead, that there were really living dead people found in Kansas and they weren't sure how to kill them.
Anyway my only combat against the creatures of the night was to hide desperately under my blanket and leave only a hole enough for me to breathe. Some how in my mind my blanket made it impossible for anything to see me. The fact was that I thought if they didn't see me than they couldn't get me. I was little how was I to know that a small bit of fabric and cotton wasn't keeping anything out. That blanket was used to make forts and strongholds that no weapon could take out, what would keep it from stopping the undead while I slept?
Whether or not the blanket would stop the ghouls and goblins of night was not the issue, and obviously it worked because I'm here today to write. The issue is as a child I was completely convinced that something was out there to get me and I had never seen an undead person or a ghost in my room. I had never once witnessed a zombie attack anyone and further more had never once seen a news report that would support such a claim. It remains that I believed strictly on the fact that someone told me that the undead were real and they wanted to suck my brains out. I was very much influenced by the words of another human being.
It seems to me that this is the way that the early Christian church had to have gotten started. It took hundreds and thousands of people who would take on the attributes of children and just believe the words of others. They would have to take to listening to the experiences of folks who walked with Christ. Jesus often talked about wanting us to be like little children with our faith. He wanted us so badly to trust and believe in Him. Like me with my older siblings Jesus wants us to hear His words and believe in them.
This childlike faith does not mean that we become drones and robots to the faith and every thing everyone tells us. It means that we trust in One, the one who claimed to be Immanuel, God with us. Hebrews 11 talks about faith being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. I think this verse and the verse in 1 Peter sum up what Jesus wants for us more than anything in our personal walks with Him. I believe He wants us to have faith that He is who claims to be, and the fact of the matter is that He is a loving Savior with a desire to walk with us everyday.
Thought question: For you what does childlike faith mean you have to let go of? In other words what keeps you from just believing without having to see the actual physical evidence?
1 Peter 1:8-9 "Though you have not seen Him, you love Him; and even though you do not see Him now, you believe in Him and are filled with an inexpressable and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls."
When I was little I can remember getting ready for bed and saying goodnight to my mother. Each night she would tuck me in and say goodnight and go to the door to shut it and I would plead with her to leave it open as much as possible and she would almost always concede (I think do to the fact that I would have screamed like a air raid siren if she hadn't). She would however always shut out the lights and that would send me into a state of fear that was like nothing one could ever imagine. I was so afraid of the dark it wasn't funny. The reason being because I was 100% sure that some sort of undead creature or ghost was going to come after me. It never helped that I had older siblings that convinced me, after watching the movie Night of the Living Dead, that there were really living dead people found in Kansas and they weren't sure how to kill them.
Anyway my only combat against the creatures of the night was to hide desperately under my blanket and leave only a hole enough for me to breathe. Some how in my mind my blanket made it impossible for anything to see me. The fact was that I thought if they didn't see me than they couldn't get me. I was little how was I to know that a small bit of fabric and cotton wasn't keeping anything out. That blanket was used to make forts and strongholds that no weapon could take out, what would keep it from stopping the undead while I slept?
Whether or not the blanket would stop the ghouls and goblins of night was not the issue, and obviously it worked because I'm here today to write. The issue is as a child I was completely convinced that something was out there to get me and I had never seen an undead person or a ghost in my room. I had never once witnessed a zombie attack anyone and further more had never once seen a news report that would support such a claim. It remains that I believed strictly on the fact that someone told me that the undead were real and they wanted to suck my brains out. I was very much influenced by the words of another human being.
It seems to me that this is the way that the early Christian church had to have gotten started. It took hundreds and thousands of people who would take on the attributes of children and just believe the words of others. They would have to take to listening to the experiences of folks who walked with Christ. Jesus often talked about wanting us to be like little children with our faith. He wanted us so badly to trust and believe in Him. Like me with my older siblings Jesus wants us to hear His words and believe in them.
This childlike faith does not mean that we become drones and robots to the faith and every thing everyone tells us. It means that we trust in One, the one who claimed to be Immanuel, God with us. Hebrews 11 talks about faith being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. I think this verse and the verse in 1 Peter sum up what Jesus wants for us more than anything in our personal walks with Him. I believe He wants us to have faith that He is who claims to be, and the fact of the matter is that He is a loving Savior with a desire to walk with us everyday.
Thought question: For you what does childlike faith mean you have to let go of? In other words what keeps you from just believing without having to see the actual physical evidence?
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