I am currently reading a book by John Piper called What Jesus Demands From the World. This book has short chapters covering a variety of commands of Christianity from the Lord Jesus Christ from taking up your cross and following Him to making disciples and everything in between. I wanted to share briefly about one of the chapters I read that really struck me...The title: "DEMAND 8: Take Up Your Cross and Follow ME!"
"If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." -Matthew 16:24-25
"Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men." -Mark 1:17
"I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." -John 8:12
"If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me." -Matthew 19:21
The Christian life in today's society can often times be portrayed as being "cool", "easy", "glamorous", or the answer to all of your problems. Problem is this isn't what the Bible teaches. There is not a promise that once you repent and put your trust in Christ that somehow your life is going to be daisies and roses...it in fact promises the exact opposite. Once you become a Christian and are transformed from the inside out you are now going to be going upstream in a world thats flowing rapidly in the opposite direction. When Jesus was here on earth He had actual followers, His disciples who went with Him wherever He went. When Jesus approached them and commanded them to follow Him they didn't ask any questions and were not hesitant...they immediately dropped what they were doing, left everything and followed Him. What an example to us. Although Jesus is not physically here commanding us to follow Him in a physical sense the command still holds true to those of us who are going to claim to be Christians.
What does following Jesus entail? Piper explains that following Jesus first and foremost means that you are "joining Him in what He was sent to do". What is that? He came to give life...everlasting life. That means that if we are going to follow Him we are continuing the work He came to do. We are gathering those left to follow Him too and bring glory and honor to His name...SPREAD THE GOSPEL! With this there is going to be suffering. Jesus teaches that if He suffered how much more and we who follow Him going to suffer as well. We are blessed to live in a day and age where our suffering is minimal compared to those in the past but are we willing to loose our reputation, our friends, our families, and even our lives to follow Christ? We might say we are but are we living lives that reflect that?
You see following Christ is going to create problems with everything in this world. It is going to create problems in your relationships with people. It is going to create problems in your relationships with possessions. It is going to create problems in your relationships with vocation and so forth...but then comes the question is it worth it? Is following Christ worth the cost? There is a cost.
"Jesus has no desire to trick you into following Him with a kind of bait and switch. He is utterly up front about the cost. In fact he urges you to count the cost...Let the call to follow Jesus be clear and honest. "in the world you will have tribulation, but take heart I have overcome the world!" (John 16:33)" " (74). Is it costly? Absolutely, but is it worth it? OH YES INDEED!
Saturday, June 07, 2008
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Emergen-C?
Recently I was in a bit of a debate with some friends about whether the popular "emergen-c" works to prevent sickness or quicken healing once you've already come down with something. Emergen-C promises to boost your immune system with vitamin C and other vitamins simply by taking it once daily. Some think it is a hoax but some say it works. I thought it was funny that the friends who had never tried it were the ones opposed to it and the ones who had were in favor of it. I realized that you really can't make a decision as to whether it works or not unless you've given it a try...that is see if the promises really are true.
Much like a physical ailment, we as Christians are going to go through times of spiritual "ailments" so to speak as well. What I mean is there are going to be times throughout the Christian life when we go through hard times, trials, or suffering in order that we might be refined as 1 Peter 1:7 says, "These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed."
We have "emergen-c"s in our Christian lives throughout our walk. Often times in our innate selves we are quick to run to the phone to call a friend, cry on the shoulder of a family member, or even mask the pain within ourselves. Sometimes we don't think that God's promises are for sure going to hold firm when we are in the depths of despair. We fail to realize that we have the source of all joy at our fingertips...the Living God is our Father, our friend, our Savior and He is living, real, and tangible. We have his Word to dig deep into and be encouraged, we have His Spirit indwelling within us enabling us to find strength in the weakness, and we have the ability to cry out to Him in prayer through the cross of Christ.
The Psalms are an amazing collection of encouragement. It is during times of suffering or despair that I have found myself deep within their truths and holding firm to the promises God lays so clearly out within this powerful book. When we are in despair we can find joy, when we are hurting we can find comfort, and when we are confused we can find peace through the Word of God. Just like the common cold has its remedies, God has given us the perfect tools to live a life where we can as Psalm 35:9 says "Then my soul will rejoice in the LORD and delight in his salvation." If we come to Christ in our emergen-cs we can be confident that His promises are true and He is faithful!! For those of you who have never experienced this be encouraged by someone who has run to the foot of the cross and found help in the emergencies of life...in fact in every day of life and run to Him in your emergen-c!
Much like a physical ailment, we as Christians are going to go through times of spiritual "ailments" so to speak as well. What I mean is there are going to be times throughout the Christian life when we go through hard times, trials, or suffering in order that we might be refined as 1 Peter 1:7 says, "These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed."
We have "emergen-c"s in our Christian lives throughout our walk. Often times in our innate selves we are quick to run to the phone to call a friend, cry on the shoulder of a family member, or even mask the pain within ourselves. Sometimes we don't think that God's promises are for sure going to hold firm when we are in the depths of despair. We fail to realize that we have the source of all joy at our fingertips...the Living God is our Father, our friend, our Savior and He is living, real, and tangible. We have his Word to dig deep into and be encouraged, we have His Spirit indwelling within us enabling us to find strength in the weakness, and we have the ability to cry out to Him in prayer through the cross of Christ.
The Psalms are an amazing collection of encouragement. It is during times of suffering or despair that I have found myself deep within their truths and holding firm to the promises God lays so clearly out within this powerful book. When we are in despair we can find joy, when we are hurting we can find comfort, and when we are confused we can find peace through the Word of God. Just like the common cold has its remedies, God has given us the perfect tools to live a life where we can as Psalm 35:9 says "Then my soul will rejoice in the LORD and delight in his salvation." If we come to Christ in our emergen-cs we can be confident that His promises are true and He is faithful!! For those of you who have never experienced this be encouraged by someone who has run to the foot of the cross and found help in the emergencies of life...in fact in every day of life and run to Him in your emergen-c!
Monday, May 19, 2008
This Is The Day The Lord Has Made
Psalm 118:24 says “This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
Every week recently at Compass Bible Church we have been singing the song “This Is the Day”. The lyrics to this song are quite simple yet encouraging and convicting for the believer. I am reminded that we can be glad and rejoice everyday we wake up because this day has been God-made! In fact this day has been ordained and planned perfectly by the hand of God. God is in control, He reigns, He is sovereign and therefore our circumstances are not by chance. Whether everything in our lives seems to be going great as the hand of the Lord seems to be blessing us or whether we are suffering as we go through a trial we can rejoice and be glad in today!
The word rejoice in the Greek means to be exceedingly glad and to be glad means to be well and thriving. What a neat concept to think about. As Christians no matter what is going on in this world or in our lives we can always say we are well! It reminds me of the hymn, my favorite hymn by Horatio Spafford “It is Well With My Soul”. “This hymn was writ¬ten af¬ter several trau¬matic events in Spaf¬ford’s life. The first was the death of his only son in 1871, shortly followed by the great Chi¬ca¬go Fire which ru¬ined him fi¬nan¬cial¬ly (he had been a successful lawyer). Then in 1873, he had planned to travel to Europe with his family on the S.S. Ville Du Havre, but sent the family ahead while he was delayed on business. While cross¬ing the At¬lan¬tic, the ship sank rapidly after a collision with an¬o¬ther ship, and all four of Spaf¬ford's daugh¬ters died. His wife Anna sur¬vived and sent him the now fa¬mous tel¬e¬gram, "Saved alone." Shortly afterwards, as Spaf¬ford traveled to meet his grieving wife, he was inspired to write these words as his ship passed near where his daugh¬ters had died.” (Wikipedia) In this hymn as we read about bliss and sorrow Spafford ends each thing with “it is well with my soul”.
As Christians that is the truth! We can rejoice today and always and be well because we have been saved by a living powerful and loving God who has planned and ordained today and who is in complete control!
Every week recently at Compass Bible Church we have been singing the song “This Is the Day”. The lyrics to this song are quite simple yet encouraging and convicting for the believer. I am reminded that we can be glad and rejoice everyday we wake up because this day has been God-made! In fact this day has been ordained and planned perfectly by the hand of God. God is in control, He reigns, He is sovereign and therefore our circumstances are not by chance. Whether everything in our lives seems to be going great as the hand of the Lord seems to be blessing us or whether we are suffering as we go through a trial we can rejoice and be glad in today!
The word rejoice in the Greek means to be exceedingly glad and to be glad means to be well and thriving. What a neat concept to think about. As Christians no matter what is going on in this world or in our lives we can always say we are well! It reminds me of the hymn, my favorite hymn by Horatio Spafford “It is Well With My Soul”. “This hymn was writ¬ten af¬ter several trau¬matic events in Spaf¬ford’s life. The first was the death of his only son in 1871, shortly followed by the great Chi¬ca¬go Fire which ru¬ined him fi¬nan¬cial¬ly (he had been a successful lawyer). Then in 1873, he had planned to travel to Europe with his family on the S.S. Ville Du Havre, but sent the family ahead while he was delayed on business. While cross¬ing the At¬lan¬tic, the ship sank rapidly after a collision with an¬o¬ther ship, and all four of Spaf¬ford's daugh¬ters died. His wife Anna sur¬vived and sent him the now fa¬mous tel¬e¬gram, "Saved alone." Shortly afterwards, as Spaf¬ford traveled to meet his grieving wife, he was inspired to write these words as his ship passed near where his daugh¬ters had died.” (Wikipedia) In this hymn as we read about bliss and sorrow Spafford ends each thing with “it is well with my soul”.
As Christians that is the truth! We can rejoice today and always and be well because we have been saved by a living powerful and loving God who has planned and ordained today and who is in complete control!
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Always Give Yourselves Fully
1 Corinthians 15:58 says,
"Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain."
Today Pastor Bobby challenged the summer interns with this very idea. It was both encouraging and convicting as I began to realize the depth of meaning found here. As disciples of Christ we are not given the option of not giving ourselves FULLY to the work of Christ. Always doesn't mean sometimes or when you feel like it and fully doesn't mean 50%, 80%, or even 99.9% it is 100% all the time! What a thought that is to think that if each of us as followers of Christ were living to fully give our lives to the Lord's work how radically different our world would look.
As summer approaches or for some has arrived I pray that we would seek to take every opportunity to serve the Lord and do His work wherever that might be. I pray that our summers wouldn't be wasted with mundane daily tasks, boring ourselves to death on the computer, or entertaining ourselves to death with video games, movies or music but rather that we would redeem this time for the Lord. No matter where God puts us, whether it be working in a church or working at the neighbor's house pulling weeds, He has created us as Paul writes in Ephesians 2:10 as His workmanship to do good works for Him. May that be our goal this summer and always! May we seek time alone with Him in prayer, in His Word and meditating on His truths to sharpen and encourage us.
We cannot do this in our own strength, in fact we cannot do anything good apart from Him. We must continually depend on him for all we need. When the days get hard and we feel like we can't serve Him with our whole hearts we must lean on Him, when we are exhausted and feel like we can't put in that extra hour of ministry we need to depend on Him, and when that opportunity to do the Lord's work arises and we have something we'd rather do we must die to ourselves and serve Him!
May we as Christians, followers of Christ, shine like lights in this world and how better then giving ourselves fully to HIS work wherever and whatever that may be.
"Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain."
Today Pastor Bobby challenged the summer interns with this very idea. It was both encouraging and convicting as I began to realize the depth of meaning found here. As disciples of Christ we are not given the option of not giving ourselves FULLY to the work of Christ. Always doesn't mean sometimes or when you feel like it and fully doesn't mean 50%, 80%, or even 99.9% it is 100% all the time! What a thought that is to think that if each of us as followers of Christ were living to fully give our lives to the Lord's work how radically different our world would look.
As summer approaches or for some has arrived I pray that we would seek to take every opportunity to serve the Lord and do His work wherever that might be. I pray that our summers wouldn't be wasted with mundane daily tasks, boring ourselves to death on the computer, or entertaining ourselves to death with video games, movies or music but rather that we would redeem this time for the Lord. No matter where God puts us, whether it be working in a church or working at the neighbor's house pulling weeds, He has created us as Paul writes in Ephesians 2:10 as His workmanship to do good works for Him. May that be our goal this summer and always! May we seek time alone with Him in prayer, in His Word and meditating on His truths to sharpen and encourage us.
We cannot do this in our own strength, in fact we cannot do anything good apart from Him. We must continually depend on him for all we need. When the days get hard and we feel like we can't serve Him with our whole hearts we must lean on Him, when we are exhausted and feel like we can't put in that extra hour of ministry we need to depend on Him, and when that opportunity to do the Lord's work arises and we have something we'd rather do we must die to ourselves and serve Him!
May we as Christians, followers of Christ, shine like lights in this world and how better then giving ourselves fully to HIS work wherever and whatever that may be.
Thursday, May 08, 2008
What A Friend
This old hymn brings so much joy and encouragement to me every time I read it because I am reminded of God's faithfulness and unchanging character.
What A Friend We Have in Jesus
What a friend we have in Jesus,
all our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry
everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit,
O what needless pain we bear,
all because we do not carry
everything to God in prayer.
Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful
who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Are we weak and heavy laden,
cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior, still our refuge;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee?
Take it to the Lord in prayer!
In his arms he'll take and shield thee;
thou wilt find a solace there.
He truly is the best friend we have or could ever want or need...
What A Friend We Have in Jesus
What a friend we have in Jesus,
all our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry
everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit,
O what needless pain we bear,
all because we do not carry
everything to God in prayer.
Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful
who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Are we weak and heavy laden,
cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior, still our refuge;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee?
Take it to the Lord in prayer!
In his arms he'll take and shield thee;
thou wilt find a solace there.
He truly is the best friend we have or could ever want or need...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
