The Cycle of: Time, Change, Adjustment, Uncertainty

Wow, it has been over a month since I’ve posted on here! I cannot believe how fast that time went by. It’s so amazing how all the little things in life just add up and make life busy and make time seem like the Energizer Bunny…you just can’t keep up with it.

When Obama was running for Presidency his campaign slogan was “Change”  and with this campaign he won the election. This is interesting to me because in the secular world (the world of our everyday lives) change is something that is expected or embraced. Although no one really knows what will happen next, we still expect time to move on and things to change with time. In the Church world of Americans, change, for some reason, is not something to be embraced. In fact it would appear to be quite the opposite. This is saddening news.

We all know how fast time is, at least I would assume we do. Along with time comes change and along with change comes adjustment and along with adjustment comes uncertainty. Now if time is fast it also makes change fast as well, does it not? The difficulty people face with change, especially when it is fast, is the adjustment factor. During the adjustment factor our faith gets squeezed like an orange when making orange juice. It’s a time when uncertainty arises and along with uncertainty comes ZERO control and control is what we love. YIKES! How can someone have faith when he is in control of his life and not God? The Bible says that if we have control (meaning we don’t have faith in God) it is IMPOSSIBLE to please God.

Hebrews 11:6

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

 Often times we earnestly seek self and not God if we’re honest. Control is something that lays active in the backs of our mind AND ultimately in the depths of our soul. It is something we don’t carry out in the open but we guard with layers and layers of defense…and control is what God wants. Maybe that’s why God intended life to change so much so fast…so that we do not get caught up in the defeat of our own puny control. So that our faith wouldn’t be in ourselves, but in Him.

Babies Are Messy

Babies are the most unique people I think; as messy as they are we love them like crazy. Let’s be real for just a moment…babies will poop on you ( or pee, or puke, whichever they prefer). My parents tell me that when I was little I’d pee on people! There was a specific incident when we had an evangelist stay the night out our house. Apparently my mom and dad let our guest sleep in their bed and they slept in another one. I was not informed of this. From what I am told, that night I got out of my bed and crawled into my parents bed where our guest, the evangelist, was sleeping. Unknowingly, I then took the liberty to pee all over him. You’re welcome! 🙂

The Church is constantly filled with “babies” because we are called to constantly reach out into the world and make disciples. Remember that because we are helping “babies” they will whine and complain, they may even pee, poop, or puke all over YOU! They won’t miss, it will be on you! You will get covered in mess that smells so bad your next door neighbor can smell it. Sometimes your community will smell it and then come to you complaining about the way you smell. On the other hand, they might complain to other people about the way you or the baby smells while pretending around you that you don’t.  They might think it smells so bad, they’ll try to get you to leave or the baby to leave or they might just leave themselves.

Some communities would rather keep things clean and tidy so they don’t focus on helping out helpless babies at all. They might not even care about babies. In fact, some communities care more about keeping things so sparkling clean that if a baby happened to come crawling in they would remove it immediately then talk about how bad he smelled, or how messy he was. Instead of helping that baby, they may discuss among themselves “Do you think he was pre-destined to be that way or did he choose to be?”

What if you were watching the news one day and heard a story about how a helpless baby was left on someone’s porch, but after several days the baby died because the people living in that house ignored it. Instead of helping the baby they moved it to the side of the house where no one could see or hear it. “Why did you do this?” asked the secular news station. The homeowner replied with a smile, ” That baby was really messy. It smelled bad and cried day and night. I had to put it out of sight because I was embarrassed of what my neighbors would think. It was a REAL inconvenience, but I’m glad it’s over with.”

How SICK is that! If that was a real story, that person would be hated by EVERYONE and probably go to jail.

What about the Church?

What about your church community?

Are we afraid to get a little messy?

Are we afraid of what our neighbors think?

Are we more concerned about our reputation than helping dying “babies?”

Are we sending more people to hell or heaven?

Church…we are on a RESCUE MISSION!

Luke 18:15-17

WAR!

This is a WAKE UP message for all you Christ followers (not for church people who just attend church because that’s what they’ve always done)

If you claim you love God;  if you claim that Jesus is your King; if you believe you are in His army; if you believe He has the power to save; if you believe you can do ALL THINGS through Christ; if you believe that “He that is in me is Greater than he who is in the world;” if you believe God has the power heal; if you believe that He can mend the broken heart;  if you claim that God answers prayer; if you believe God is all powerful; if you believe that He can do IMMEASURABLY more than we can ask or even DREAM…..What are you doing about it???

Do you have the guts to follow Jesus?
Are you doing everything you could possible do right now to change the world for Jesus Christ? Or do you even care?

Are you doing whatever it takes? Or do you create limits?

Are you praying without ceasing? Or do you just say, “Thank you for this chicken I’m about to eat.”?

Are you willing sacrifice whatever God requires? Or do you pick and choose?

Are you fighting in the battle? Or are you standing on the sidelines?

Are you getting dirty? Or are you concerned about what others think?

Are you hurting for the lost? Or just looking out for yourself?

Are you desperately seeking after God and pursuing Him? Or does 1 hour on Sunday’s cut it for you?

Are you still in awe of God? Or does He just seem ordinary to you?

Are you running the race to actually win it? Or have you settled with whatever place you’re in?

If you are PASSIONATE about Jesus, get up, get suited, grab your sword and charge into WAR!

“War is upon us, wether you like it or not.” -Aragorn (Lord of the Rings)

Quick Thought…and be REAL

What an awesome winter day it is in North Carolina! When I got in my car at 8 am it was 54 degrees outside! One third of the country is covered in one of the largest snow storms in history and we are just chillin’ in the warm weather. Not trying to rub it in to all you snow bound folks, but it is so nice right now. I don’t know about you but nice weather really makes me happy so I had to write about it 🙂

This morning I decided to come to my new favorite coffee shop “Robust-ah” for a good drink and to read for a little bit. The book I started reading is called “Christian-atheist.” It’s pretty self explanatory; it’s about believing in God but living as if He doesn’t exist. When I first read that statement I thought to myself, “I believe in God and I live as if He exists.” Do I really? Do you really? If you claim to be a Christian, take a moment and assess yourself. It’s beyond asking yourself “did I sin or not.” I’d just like to make one quick thought for us, a question actually:

Are you living for God part-time?
You can do full-time ministry and be focused on helping others, which is great, but working full-time in ministry while having a part-time relationship with God will result in a disaster. Don’t fool yourself, BE HONEST!

Does Your Church Wear Bell Bottoms?

The art of fashion is one of many things that drive a culture. This is true especially in America. In the 18th century men would wear pouffy white wigs with lots of curls and ribbons. To top it off they’d also where tights to show off their legs. Manly. Moving through time, in the 1980’s men decided for some reason to have big hair again and appropriately call it a mullet. To top it off they went back to the skin tight pants. Really?

Something I really enjoy doing is looking at old pictures of myself and my parents and in-laws because it is so funny to see how ridiculous we used to look. My dad has a picture with his crazy thick hair down to his butt. My father-in-law has a picture of him wearing a white leisure suit that’s unbuttoned down to his belly button and wearing bell bottoms. I have a picture wearing a white turtle neck under a red sweater with a cowboy hat on and wearing huge glasses while waiving at people in a parade. When people see this picture I have to convince them it’s me. Those fashions used to be in style (maybe not mine) but now they’re just dumb.

Have you ever been out somewhere and saw someone wearing something so out of date (like a leisure suit or mullet….no offense) that it makes them look so ridiculous it makes you laugh? Later the next day you might even talk and laugh about it with someone or take a picture to post on failblog.org. The truth is that many churches are like that person who is dressed way out of date. Some people might even laugh and share about their ridiculous experience with their friends or even failblog. Bellbottoms might have looked good back in the day but not in 2011. Old fashion methods may have worked in the past just like wearing white wigs were cool, but those wigs are a joke today.

Church, it’s 2011

PRAY-Stop praying small prayers.

DREAM-Don’t let Wal-Mart out dream us (Ephesians 3:20). Make your dreams God-size and maximize your prayers!

Be CREATIVE-Don’t let your creativity be dull, boring and lame because God is the Author of all created things and we are made in His image. We were made to be creative by the Creator.

CELEBRATE-Don’t let something like gaining more money be more exciting than winning lost souls for Jesus. We should celebrate more when someone repents of their sin and comes to Jesus than if we won the lottery!

REACH OUT-Shame on us for letting McDonald’s out advertise us. Ask anyone what the golden arches stand for and they’ll know, even kids know. Ask anyone who Jesus is, you’ll be shocked!

CONNECT- Shame on us for allowing ABC, Nickelodeon, Disney, MTV, and VH-1 to reach a generation that we leave out. TV has a way of grabbing culture by the horns and taking where ever it pleases. Why do we forsake culture in America while missionaries in other cultures use the culture they’re in as a means of introducing the Gospel?

It’s time we wake up and change out of those groovy bellbottoms. We are the Church! Be the Church!