Identified with Christ (Make much of him, not yourself)

Lately, I've been reading Paul's letter to the Romans (I'm still in Chapter 1).  I've literally been stuck there for a couple of months and, I don't mean that in a bad way...  I had been wanting to study and memorize parts of Romans for a while now, but since I have been reading it this time through, I keep going back to Paul's introduction in the first six or seven verses.

It's the longest of all of Paul's introductions in his letters to the churches.  And, that is largely because it is to a church that he did not have a part in launching nor had he even visited.  But, he longed to visit and he also appears to want to make Rome a new ministry base for his ministry in the "West".  This eventually happens, but not in a way that you, me or Paul would have drawn it up.  It became his base a few years later as he sat their imprisoned; and there he also eventually died.

But, back to the verses and what I believe they say to me the most...  Paul talks about himself for half a verse and even that is pointed to Jesus and Paul's role as his servant.  As Paul gushes on and on about the gospel and how it was foretold for hundreds and thousands of years by the prophets; and about Jesus and how he's the Son of David and the Son of God; and God's grace towards us via apostleship and the establishment of his kingdom, I lose sight of Paul himself as a man.

As for me; I find my identity in Christ, but if I some days I do find my identity in being a 6 foot 4 inch 240 pound black dude; in being an engineer, in working for the "power company", in being Kimberly's husband, in being Caleb's dad,  in being Jessie's youngest son; in some sort of political allegiance; in a social club; in the house I own; or the car I drive...   You get the picture!  Christ follower, identify with your savior before you identify with anything else.

The gospel is being watered down with the lives we live that are about us, our desires, and our dreams.  Churches have become social clubs and sermons have become about having your best life now and reaching our personal goals.  Instead, we should all pursue what Paul speaks of a little further into Romans Chapter 1...  He was obligated both to Greeks and Barbarians to preach the gospel to them.  Make it your aim to preach the gospel of Jesus' life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension and his return.  That's worth living for... When we make much of him; and less of ourselves, our lives then have the most value, they'll ever have.

Much love!!

I'm Getting Closer

I love this song, Closer by Lara Landon...

It is my hope that I am being sanctified day by day, growing closer to the image of my Lord and Savior...

And, I'll admit before you watch this video, the song is better than the video.  I'm not sure what she was thinking...making a hokey video like this.  :o)




Much love!

delusions of grandeur

A definition of delusions of grandeur is as follows: delusions (common in paranoia) that you are much greater and more powerful and influential than you really are…

I’m willing to admit that I suffer from this.  I think I can dance better than I really can.  I also think that I can sing like one of the three tenors.  I believe that I can accomplish great feats like dunking a basketball.  (That one isn’t too far fetched since I could do it in high school and college.)  I even think that I’d be a great racecar driver as proven by my weaving skills on Highway 280.  But lately I’ve been feeling like I should be a rapper.  And I mean literally, I could just turn into LL Cool J and just start breaking out into song mid-stride.  "Mama said knock you out!!!"

So I’ve always suffered from these delusions.  But, I also suffer from great thoughts of defeat.  I often think that I’m a weakling that has no authority, no power even in my own home and that I should go crawl under a rock somewhere and no one would ever notice.  So, I guess you could say I’m not only paranoid, schizophrenic, and delusional, but I’m also bi-polar.  Anyway, on the delusional note, I’ve been aided along in my delusions by the preaching of God’s word.  Our pastor has been preaching from the book of Acts.  And, this week’s sermon was on Chapters 5-8 of that book.  There we see that the only purpose for our lives as Christians is to move the gospel to the ends of the earth...  to make known that there is only one God worthy of worship.  And, in that purpose God has made us unstoppable.  We as the church will accomplish the purpose of God for our lives or die trying.  And, that’s no delusion my friends!  Come lose your life with me, and together we will find our lives.  That’s the gospel.

Much love!

One Year Ago...

Tonight is January 11, 2011.  Tomorrow will be the one year anniversary of an earthquake near Port-au-Prince, the capital city of Haiti.  The earthquake hit the city and the nation like a ton of bricks.  Haiti, the poorest country in the Western hemisphere did not have the infrastructure to withstand the quake.  Thousands died and most structures near the center were either destroyed or severely damaged.  Since that time, there has been very little rebuilding.  Thousands live in tent cities.  They have for months.  As if an earthquake that killed thousands wasn’t enough, in recent months, the country has been ravished by cholera…a disease that could easily be eradicated by clean drinking water and proper hygiene.   My heart aches for the people of Haiti.  I’ve longed to see them and to encourage them, but twice now I’ve thought I would see them and twice the trip has fallen through.  But, I am praying for them.  I read the stories on websites for CNN and Samaritan’s Purse.   I pray for them and I hope to go there soon.

It would be so easy to judge Haiti and say that they deserve what they get.  The country’s government is corrupt.  There is widespread voodoo practiced on the island.  They have mistreated a number of people that have come to their aid.  They have abused and robbed the earth of it’s resources until the country is barren and unable to support itself.  But, when I hear people say things like that, it reminds me of a rebellious and stiff-necked people that refuse the love of God.  Yeah, that’s us.  So, I don’t want to judge because I am them.  Love the Haitians and pray for them.  If you’re able and God burdens you, go to them.

Much love!

(P.S.  Read this article.  It will bless you.)

I am blessed

I’ve been thinking about my blog entries and as I’ve thought about them, it seems like I lament a lot.  So, I wanted to write a more upbeat entry, because if you know me, you know that I enjoy life and I laugh a lot (a whole lot).  In some ways, my thoughts and my personality have intensified over time.  And, that ultimately stems from a heightened desire to please God in my actions and to see the world around me changed for the better.  But, in all that intensity, I’m still a happy, joyful, upbeat person.  So, what I want to proclaim today is that I am blessed beyond all measure and in more ways than can be enumerated.  God has given us more than we need for every situation.  It’s just like his name says of him Jehovah Jireh, he’s all we need, a great provider.  Yes, I am blessed!  I praise God for that because I am truly grateful!  I never want to stop praising him and blessing his name for all he is and all he's done!

Gravy
So, here’s the lament part of this, but it’s really not a lament.  It’s an encouragement or maybe even an admonishment to myself and others.  Recently, I was sitting around the table with a bunch of folks.  And, we were talking about our annual performance incentive and how we performed in 2010.  Well, it turns out that we had the worst year ever as an operating company (by far).  And, in the room that I was in, nobody was complaining because the year ended better than we thought it would.  But, like everything for the few that are happy to just to get something there are many more that complain about the goals that were in place that prevented us from having the highest achievable incentive.  But, as I sat and thought about the whole thing, I said [to myself], “This is gravy!   As a matter of fact, it’s all gravy.  Half the world lives on two dollars a day.  Anything beyond that is gravy. “  In a subsequent conversation, I did share that with someone,  and he said, “My friend if you roll out of bed in the morning, the rest of the day is gravy, forget about making one red cent.  Living life is gravy.”  So, I’m blessed.

Comforts and Luxuries vs. Survival
Now back to this two dollars a day business…  We need a car.  Well, according to middle class American standards, we need a car.  We have two old cars…one that’s twelve years old and one that seven years old.  The twelve year old car runs a little sluggish and it leaks multiple kinds of fluid.  The shocks are shot and it sometimes scrubs the ground.  It creaks and rattles as I roll along.  And, it has 170,000+ miles on the odometer and we take it to the shop and spend several hundred dollars on it at least twice a year.  So, I hope I’ve drummed up sympathy for our plight here.  And, if you know us, you know we Dave Ramsey disciples as far as not adding on debt goes anyway.  So, we’ll pay cash for a gently used car one day.  But, I don’t think that day is today.  Unless the twelve year old dies and few hundred dollars want fix it’s death, we won’t be getting a “newer” car.  And, here’s the reason.  I’ve been reading about Haitians that walk for hours to get their sick family members to a clinic for treatment of cholera.  And, I’ve actually been to Belize with a medical team where people walked for miles and miles just to see American doctors that were treating minor ailments.  If the people in these two countries have cars they are most likely older than the ones we have and leaking a lot more fluid than the ones we have.  So, what I’m saying is middle class America leads us to revel in comforts and luxuries while the rest of the world is just trying to survive.  I for one want to change that.  I want to acknowledge that I am blessed and then use what I have to bless others and help them transform their lives… pulling them back from the brink of both spiritual and physical death.

Conclusion of the matter
I am blessed.  We are all blessed.  Even people in America that make the 10 or 12000 thousand dollars it takes to be at the poverty line are blessed.  We are all waking up in the mornings and we have far surpassed the $2/day mark.  We have access to the best health care in the world.   Almost all of America has clean drinking water which solves most of the world’s disease problems.  Folks, we are blessed.  So, let’s connect our blessings with those in need.  Give your heart, your time, and your financial resources to change the life of another person for the better.

Much love.

Why don’t we pray?

For two successive nights this week, I woke up between two o’clock and three o’clock in the morning.  It was not because I wanted to; I just couldn’t stay asleep.  And, I found that when I woke up, I had a great burden to pray.  I prayed for my family; that I would be a better husband to my wife, loving and leading her.  I prayed for my son’s salvation.  I prayed that we would let God use our family however he wants to.  I prayed for the church.  I prayed for our church.  I prayed for our small group; for every person and for their children.  And I prayed for a lot more things like the mending of broken relationships and for wisdom…all kinds of good stuff.

Now, I am not boasting because I can tell you my greatest conviction for both nights was, “Why don’t I do this more often?”  And, by that I didn’t mean, “Why don’t I lay awake in the middle of night?”  I meant pray.   When friends who have had great trouble having a baby in the in the past says they are trying again, why don’t I say right then and there, “Let’s pray.”  When Kimberly and I are frustrated with each other, why don’t we pray?  And when God blesses us unexpectedly with his grace, why don’t we celebrate in prayer?   What arrived at is that I lack faith.  If I believed that God would do what he says he would do, I would ask him to do it.  And, that asking is prayer.

So i said to God, “Lord I believe! Please oh please, help my unbelief"

Much love!

Two Houses (Be sure you have a good foundation)

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.” - Matthew 7:21-27

So, Jesus has talked about roads and trees and now he breaks out telling talking about houses and foundations. But, just before that he‘s telling people they can’t enter a kingdom called heaven unless he knows who they are. And, he renounces them as workers of lawlessness. It’s remarkable to me that Jesus is calling out people that seem to think or maybe even KNOW that they are in good standing with him. He refers to a group of people that call to him maybe even crying out to him saying Lord Lord and he says of that group of people that not all of them will enter the kingdom. He goes on to say that some will even say that they did great works on his behalf (but they won’t necessarily get in). That’s remarkable for this reason; it seems that we make it a lot easier to get to heaven than Jesus does. We’ve taken God’s Amazing Grace and cheapened it such that anybody that labels themselves as a Christian or even just a good person goes to heaven. To paraphrase a statement from a book that I read recently, it is as though we have made heaven the default position when a person dies. But, it seems to me that Jesus is saying quite the opposite. It appears that he’s painting a picture that we’re all bound to spend eternity in a desperate state unless we are given his approval – approval that changes the default from hell.

Getting down to the foundations… Jesus encourages us not to be hearers of his word only but doers. In fact, he sets a clear distinction between those that hear his words and don’t change their actions versus those that do what he says. Jesus is putting the finishing touch on his sermon. I can hear him preparing his closing as he leads us through the progression 1) If you choose the right road, 2) you will bear fruit like a good tree AND 3) you will build your house like a wise man. And, he essentially says that the wise man’s house will last forever. That’s it! Make the right choice. Live the right life (only by God’s grace). And, you’ll have a house that lasts forever, eternal in the heavens. But, if you make the wrong choice (of paths that is) then you’ll be the tree that bears diseased and rotten fruit yielding a life that leads to a house that is destroyed when the true test of houses comes. Jesus is making it ultimate that a storm will come. The rain will fall, and the floods will prevail. Will your house stand the storm?

You see one day, the end will come. We only have one life to live and then the judgment. That bothers me. It bothers me enough that I have to “test [myself] to see whether I am in the faith” because in the end folks, I simply don’t want to be lost. And, if I am lost, as my grandma would say, it’s nobody’s fault but mine. I want to spend eternity celebrating God’s presence and I want you to be there with me.
Much love (and with many tears)!