I Heart Myself

A few weeks ago, someone commented and asked me for an example of the change theory.  If we can do better at this, we’ll see the change were looking for.

The culture we live in claims to be a culture where love is the difference, love the change, love is the hope for the future, but in all reality, our love does not reach out to the other, but rather, the self.  The love of self is quite possibly the true root of all evil.  Even the love of money stems back to a self pleasing mentality.

I am no exception to this.  I in fact, am the least of these.

Paul addresses Timothy in his second recorded letter (chapter 3) in scripture by using 19 characteristics of the people OF THE CHURCH that Timothy needs to refrain from having relationship with in the last days.  Most of these are obvious; lovers of money, prideful, and abusive.  All of these however stem back to the root;  ”People will be lovers of themselves.”

This self love hinders all aspects of a person’s life. In obvious cases, people seem to always squirm their way into the spotlight.  I however, try to be more sneaky with my self love.

In all honesty, I want people to see me serve.  I want people to think I am humble.  I desire to be loved by all. I want to be  accepted by everyone.  I want people to think that I am a good Christian.  I want people to think that I’m going places.

The world is dark because my mindset stretches wider than myself.  Paul isn’t telling Timothy to avoid these people in the world, Paul was telling Timothy to avoid the people like this in the church….aka… Paul’s message was to avoid people like myself.  A very humbling thought.

“When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.” -Paul of Tarsus(1 Corinthians 13:11)  I am no man.  I have a long way to go.  The church has few men.  The church has a long way to go.

a Shift in the Paradigm

Were in the midst of a movement; a shift in the paradigm if you will. This new direction is a crying out for a genuine authentic truth that applies to every inch of our lives.  Mindsets are changing.

This movement completely stands against the religions and politics of our parent’s generation. The rising generation see’s the failures and shortcomings of previous cultures as warnings signs as to what happens when you get caught up in the protocol of the system. We’ve asked questions as to why there is so much pain in our world.  For some, we feel we’ve been born out of place.  The chaos of the society we’ve been born into stretch us thinner than we care to be stretched.  Even in our own family units, we feel as though God made a mistake. We go home to a place where the ones who should stand with you are the very ones who strike us down.

The world doesn’t show us love.  The world’s love leaves us cynical as to whether love even truly exists.  The intimacy that we seek in relationships can never equal the passion that our heart longs to experience.  The love that we seek is an eternal I got your back love rather than the meaningless love one would use for the gain of their own agenda. For these reasons, we run and seek after God simply because our heart longs for true, genuine, authentic, love.

The beautiful thing about God is that he seeks us in spite of the fact that He needs nothing from us.  He designed us in such a way that He is the only one who can satisfy our soul’s deepest craving to be loved.  God is deeply in love with us to the point that when He created us, he determined the time and place that each of us should live so that we will seek Him.  God is not far from us.  He sent his Son to dwell amongst us so that we might understand the depth of His love.

Many say they can not follow a God who claims that he is the only way.  When Jesus Christ claimed that He was THE way, He wasn’t giving us bad news from our perspective by saying, I’ve designed this whole religious system to confuse you and send you to hell.  Christ was simply, but passionately saying,’ no one else is coming for you.  No one else loves you the way that I love you.  No one else can fulfill the deepest longings and cravings your soul has been seeking to satisfy.’

Our hope for change does not lie within politics, empty religion, or even ourselves; Christ is our new religion.  Christ is our hope for change.

Sweet Jesus Christ, my clarity.

What if all this economy stuff is a good thing?  Do we believe God really is as sovereign as we proclaim?

I want to borrow a quote from John Piper.  Piper makes the statement, “God is most glorified when were most satisfied in Him.”   God never intended our possessions or relationships to bring us satisfaction.  When we can  truly praise God for who He is no matter what our situation, God will be most glorified in that moment.

This is the problem that the rich young ruler had in Luke 18.  He couldn’t believe that Christ was supreme above all.  He could not get out of the mindset that Jesus really is greater than all his stuff.  American Christians should realize that by living in a society with comfortable neighborhoods full of large lavish houses where people have the ability to carry their Bibles out in the open without fear of arrest, were actually disadvantaged spiritually.  Jesus never says, “blessed are the rich and comfortable, for they are living the Christian life exactly how I pictured it!” NO! Jesus says it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man go to heaven.  Our desire should that of the Apostle Paul’s in Philippians 3:8.

“I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ.”

When Christianity is easy, we have large churches full of casual followers.  When Christianity gets a little tougher, the saints emerge.  By putting away our possessions and the actions and meditations that hinder and distract us from Christ, we realize that Jesus Christ and living for Him makes sense.  Not only will we see that He makes sense, we realize that the lives we’ve worked so hard to build up into being successful…don’t make sense… I think I may have just described the reason for America being so lost within the American Dream it has prided itself on for centuries.

May God’s will be done in America, and may God be truly glorified in America.

5:30 AM

For the past two weeks, we’ve been doing our 5:30 AM runs for football.  They have been mentally and physically tiring and rarely are they fun.  They usually consist of lots of up-downs, sprints, and agility drills.  You can’t help but question your reasoning for being out there.  If it were easy, everyone would do it. Don’t get me wrong, I love football, and I understand that there is a price to be paid in order to wear the jersey and step out on the field, but there was something deeper that kept the drive going for most every guy out there.

Society screams for us to stay in the mold, to fit in, to not stand out.  Culture tells us that it’s better to be comfortable in and of ourselves rather than working toward something that might be difficult to accomplish.  In spite of this, our hearts long to be part of something that is greater than ourselves.

We can only do so much in and of ourselves.  When I train by myself, it is no where near as intense or physically demanding as when I train with a team.  When I am with my team, I am constantly reminded of the bigger picture. I am constantly reminded that I am not just doing this for myself, but I am working for something that is greater than me.

God is calling us to something bigger.  God is calling us to put down the pen and let Him author the story of our lives.  He is calling us to something that is greater than ourselves to make it not be about my story, but His story.   In and of ourselves, we can only do so much; we can only push ourselves so far.  God has given us other believers to push us and make us  stronger in a faith and daily lives.

A lot of times, we go to church to feel comfortable.  It makes me wonder what church would be like if we treated it a lot more like 5:30 AM workouts; not comfortable, not always fun, but we will all be constantly reminded of the greater calling we all have on our lives.  Too much of church is about building a better me rather than building a better we.  We can only do this Christianity thing so much by ourselves.  When the world can look at us living out what Jesus taught about community, we will be able to be effective.  We need more uncomfortable church services.  We need to Preacher to ‘’step on our toes.”  We need to hold each other accountable and if someone falls, don’t tear them down more, but build them up.  We need to realize that were in this together and we all have a common goal.  If it were easy, everyone would do it.  Matthew Thiessen had it right when he sang in his song, Let it All Out, “the end will justify the pain it took to get us there.”

reTHINK: Evangelism

Jesus earned the right to talk to people and invest in their lives. He always filled a physical need then solved the spiritual one.

While most churches have outreach programs, it is too much based solely on trying to convert them. People coming to Christ is never bad thing, how many times is it that our only objective? It should definitely be the ultimate objective, but if we live life trying to win people to Christ, but never invest in their lives, were probably not going to be all that successful.  If they turn us down, we stop talking to them. How can they embrace the love of Christ when the love of Christ’s followers isn’t even genuine enough to have a relationship with them?  I’m not saying street evangelism is wrong, I’m just asking, is it right?

Church should never HAVE to plan special outreach events. Wouldn’t a true church of God naturally have the desire to serve the people around them? Maybe if our churches spent more time outside the walls of the church building, all of our money wouldn’t stay inside the church.  You invest your money where you invest your time.  If all of our time is spent inside a church, why wouldn’t we want a huge church with all the bells and whistles?  I feel like if Jesus had a church, it’d be a tent.  He might have an acoustic guitar and He probably wouldn’t have chairs.  Chairs would send the wrong message; chairs cause comfort.  I think Jesus might be against chairs.  Maybe people in the world would be more attracted to a God whose followers follow Him by going into the world helping those who can’t help themselves; the sick homeless widowed strangers.  Healthy people don’t need a doctor, sick people do.

If an outreach event takes place within the church building, its not an outreach, its an “in-reach.” When it comes to reaching new people, we need to stop waiting on people to come to us and we need to go fill their needs where they are, just as Jesus went. Correct me if I’m wrong, please, but shouldn’t meetings in the church building should only be for discipling the saved.  We’ve put way too much pressure on the pastor to lead all these people to a relationship with Christ.  A pastor’s job is to disciple the believers so that they can go out and bring in new sheep.  If a church isn’t growing, the congregation should look at themselves and ask, are we living our lives in a way that causes people to want a relationship with Christ?   Isn’t that biblical?

Just some thoughts.

From fear to faith

For the past few months, I have tried to do everything I could to know God better. I have read the word, gone to church, and had numerous spiritual discussions with anyone who wanted to talk. I’ve read books, I’ve seen movies, and all of this resorts to meaningless for my life.

To the normal Christian, this would sound completely bizarre because it seems like all of these are things that one should do in order to see and know God better, but for me, I may as well have been chasing after cars. You see, my goal was good. i wanted to know more about God because the more i knew about God, the more i felt secure in myself and the more i got that creepy feeling you get in your stomach when the worship band is really good and the bass is up real loud and they go into that really catchy bridge of that song that really makes you think (insert Hillsong lyric here…) but the reality was, I wasn’t seeing God.

My biggest goal in life, also my greatest fear; God. You see sometimes, when we say we are seeking God, its easy for us to pretend like we can’t find Him. It is easy for us to pretend like God is hiding from us. If we can convince ourselves that we are searching for God with all of our hearts, but He doesn’t show up, its not on us anymore. This is why we so many people who go to church but don’t serve in any real capacity. They are checking off the list to say, God, look what I did for you. I searched for You all over the place, and you didn’t show up. We do not have to be accountable to a God we can’t find, right?

God showed me this during my pursuit to know God in an impersonal way. I was haunted by a passage of scripture day and night. My fascination with the text led me to preach on the very thing that God was convicting me of. The passage comes from Paul’s second recorded letter to Timothy (2nd Timothy 3:5 to be exact) and he sums up a thought like this. “-…people who have the appearance of Godliness, but deny its power, avoid these people.” You see, ever since I was young, I claimed Jesus to be my Lord and Savior. I was in church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, and whenever else it was open. As I said earlier, I read books, had spiritual conversations, and even watched spiritual themed movies. If anyone appeared to be Godly, it was me.

The hardest thing to grasp was Paul told Timothy to avoid people like me. My fear wasn’t rooted in evil things that could happen to me, but rather it was in the power of God. The more I learned about God, the more I realized that God really had the power to do what He said he was going to do. My fear was putting all my faith in God, knowing that I would have to deal the past that I’ve tried so hard to forget. Is anyone with me?

If we were really honest with ourselves, we’d realize that God isn’t the one hiding.

The Kool-Aid Gospel

If you have ever pondered the state of the church and thought about the commitment of an early Christian in the Scriptures and then looked at the church around you and you think to yourself, something is terribly wrong, and there is no good place to start. You have something in common with at least one person in this world, and he is writing this paper. The first step is finding out who is your team. Jesus never held back when he wanted to clarify the cost to discern who was with Him and who was against Him. Luke 14:26-27, 33 shows this:

If anyone wants to come to Me and does not hate his own father and mother, wife and children, brother and sisters- yes, even his own life- he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which of you, wanting to build a tower, doesn’t first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? … In the same way, therefore, everyone of you who does not say goodbye to all of his possessions cannot be My disciple.

These are strong words coming from the ultimate authority. This occurred when Luke tells us that the crowds that were following Jesus were growing very large. It is not that Jesus did not enjoy the company of people or did not like being popular, but Jesus was not going to beg any one to follow Him. He wanted you to know exactly what you were getting into.

Our churches have turned into a place where we are literally doing whatever it takes to get people in the door, then tip toeing around the scriptures to keep from offending them so they will not leave. This method of doing church is a huge reason on why the church has such a bad reputation. The scriptures are here so they can judge our lives, but in a day where the only absolute is there are no absolutes and the only heresy is to believe in heresy, we have judged the scriptures and turned the blood of Christ into red Kool-Aid; red Kool-Aid tastes better and is politically correct. What happened to preachers boldly thundering, “Thus saith the Lord…?”

Revelation chapter 3 discusses an entire church that has lost touch with the message of Jesus. This letter was written to the church at Laodicea from Jesus Christ himself. In verse 17, Jesus writes, “because you say, I’m rich; I have become wealthy, and need nothing, and you don’t know that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked, I advise you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire so that you may be rich…”  The terms that Christ uses to describe this church are not terms that are seen anywhere else in the Bible that describe followers of Christ. What does it actually look like to follow Christ in a world like we have today? Is it possible to be on fire for Christ in a lukewarm world?

Come Rest

Christians constantly struggle with this idea of rest. Finding rest in God seems to be goal that we consistently fall short of rather than the reality that we live in our lives. It seems that we get most tired when we are doing the work for God (E.g. Working in vocational ministry, serving voluntarily in ministry, etc..).

Matthew 11:28-30

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Why is it that when we are working so hard for the Lord, we feel so tired and burdened? Shouldn’t it be just the opposite? Should we not live our life as though our burden is light?

I have to be honest, this is one of the greatest struggles in my life. So many times, we get caught up in the task. We get more into the ministry that we are trying to accomplish rather than pursuing a love relationship with Jesus Christ.

Think about it…

When you are head over heels, absolutely in love with someone, serving them is no burden to you. You do things you would normally not do and expect nothing in return simply because you cannot contain the love that is within you. We are constantly pursuing God’s will as if it is specific task that we have to accomplish before we pass on to the next life when really, what if God’s will for your life is just to love and trust Him right where you’re at…and not in what you’ll be when you grow up? What if our future is not as important to God as His present?

When we get caught up in the works, our burdens are heavy because we cannot bear the yoke that we give ourselves. When we get caught up in our desperate pursuit of Christ, there is nothing that can hold us back from containing the love that is within us.

In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus Christ was calling us to fall passionately in love with Him so that the things that we do are not out of our duty to Christ, but rather, it would be because of our uncontrollable love for Him. I think that is what brings the most glory to God.

If you haven’t noticed, God is all about God, and God’s will and desire is to see Himself be glorified. Welcome to your divine moment in HIS-story.

Love and Truth

Have you ever looked at the church and then read the bible and thought, I don’t think that this is what Jesus was getting at? Jesus didn’t play games.  Jesus Christ didn’t discriminate who he loved, however, Jesus did give truth in His love, but, it was the right amount of truth needed.  A lot of people get caught up with only pushing for fluffy love, and a lot of other people only get caught up with pushing the truth (better put, pushing the law or rules..).

Examples:

A. Too caught up in the fluffy, everyone love everyone and forget about everything:

I love you even though you kill people and its totally cool because God is a loving God and it doesn’t matter what you do because a loving God would never punish you or ever be upset with you because he loves you…bla bla bla…

Pathetic, I know…but it happens

B. Too caught up in truth (or laws…)

God calls us to be holy and because you kill people, God is totally mad and you are going to burn in the lake of fire for all eternity…etc…

Sound Familiar? (maybe not the killing people, at least i hope not…)

You see, the reason Jesus Christ’s love was perfect was because understood and relayed that in order to have perfect love, there needed to be truth.  A doctor isn’t going to hide the fact that his patient has cancer because he doesn’t want to ruin the patients day.. In the same way, Jesus isn’t going to sweep your sin under the rug because he doesn’t want you to be uncomfortable.

Another example:

Jesus would say to the murderer, “Yeah, what you did was a really bad thing, and yeah, i’m pretty upset about it, but, my blood covers all sin.  Your debt still had to be paid because there is a punishment that has to be dealt with, but I paid your debt if you are willing to abandon everything and follow me.

Christ’s love was great, but so was his call.  Christians have this mindset that if they ask Jesus to come into their life they are good and they can do whatever it is that they want because the grace of God covers all sin (Paul does an excellent job in Romans 6 describing all of this.  Please, don’t listen to me, go read for yourself).  I’m afraid there are a lot of people in our culture who think they are saved because they are fully relying on the prayer that they prayed that they didn’t truly mean because there was not a transformation that occurred in their life.

1st John 1:6-7

If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

Love and Truth.  Comments are welcome.

Hurting People

This is a poem I wrote in response to seeing churches attack their pastors.

“Hurting People”

The church is dead

Because they don’t feel fed

So they attack the man who is the head

When all in all, in their daily walk

They are nothing more than hypocritical talk

They end up destroying a Godly man

Not with ropes, knives, guns, or hands

But with the words that bring out the devils plan

The broken hearts of the people

Turn to words that pierce as sharp as a needle

Because inside this church and steeple

Are hurting people, who hurt people