"If what we call love doesn't take us beyond ourselves, it is not really love." Oswald Chambers

     Last week, in the Ukraine, a deal was reached that is pushing to end a protest that has lasted a month with which has been a demonstration of democracy in the world. Currently in Venezuela there is a student led, nationwide, protest of the government, protesting the Government and it's treatment of violence in the Country. These are just two of the most recent examples of a Government and it's people. We have established governments in order to organize, protect and provide for their people groups.

     But how why do a lot of these governments continue to fall short of their intended purpose? Revolution after revolution have been intended to rebel against a government that can't properly represent all or some of it's people groups. I recently watched a Video where Venezuelan youth are praying for their country and for their leaders. Praying for peace and goodness. This isn't an anti-government post. It's a post about the very thing that makes us Human and not God. Our brokenness.

     When you build a car with broken parts, you end up with a broken car. It's inevitable, when you form a Government run by people, with all their greed, insecurity, hate, malice, selfishness etc... that Government will inherit those traits.

     I don't believe that we are perfect, and I don't believe that I need to present evidence in order to back up that statement. The Word states that all have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God. In order to attain an eternal life with God, we must adhere to the Creator's standards. What role does or should the Church play in these revolutions and protests against government?

     Our God calls us to pray for our leaders (1 Thessalonians 2:1-3) it's a good thing to do that, even if we don't like them or their practices. There are leaders in Government who's hearts are in the right place and are choosing to chase after the betterment of their constituency every day; however, as is oft the case, the demons will continue to shout down the better angels in government.

     When Jesus comes back, His government will be established, the odd thing is that I don't see government as a positive term, it carries a negative connotation. The problem is that I don't have any experience with a government that is of pure heart, pure execution of it's morals and it's mission.

     I invite you to pray with me, for the coming of Jesus and establishment his government on earth. To bring comfort and healing, to bring an end to the conflicts between brothers in this world. To pray for the governments in place in the world, for wise decisions,  I don't believe this is as much of a political issue as it is a spiritual issue. This isn't a belittling of the actions of brave young people who are taking a part in their government and enforcing the rights given to them by their constitutions. Those are brave people who are willing to stand up, declare injustice, then DO SOMETHING about it. I just wish the Church had the same philosophy sometimes when it comes to the issue of Sin in the world. That we as a church would stand, declare something injustice, then LIVE OUT our lives the way Jesus calls us to.

"Acquire a peaceful spirit, and around you thousands will be saved." St. Seraphim of Sarov

I will choose to let my First Love influence my Marriage.

So I'm roughly 30 days out of getting married to my best friend. Food for thought:

Does my families marital history have to be reproduced in my marriage?

I don't think I could conduct my marriage to the principles of American or World Societal standards. I pledge to love my wife with the most fervor I can muster. To love and lead her as close to Christ as I am able. My love for my wife will not be conditional. It will not depend on her win-loss record. Such is the love of Christ; unconditional, all encompassing, unsurpassed, unequal to any love that could be displayed. I will love my wife, deeper and better than anything else. 

Marriage is a unique institution where we as individuals give up what makes us unique and live as a group for the rest of our lives. it's holy, it's sacred, it's strong. Just because I have a family past with divorce does not mean that they are my standard. I have been pursued, I have been redeemed and freed. All by grace. By a fully encompassing grace. As a young man saved by Jesus, I choose to live my life like Jesus. I choose to give up my selfish wants and desires and choose to moderate my spirit. I am not perfect, I will always endeavor to choose Christ and pureness over, self love. I will choose to let my First Love influence my Marriage.

"God will look to every soul like its first love because He is its first love."

CS Lewis

Do you believe in destiny?

What can I say? I'm in the part of my life where I am looking for what the future is going to look like... A phrase that repeats itself over me has always been, "What is God's will in your life?" which I don't necessarily think is a bad question to ask yourself. However, I feel if I look for "God's will" in my life then am I "God's Will" is God's will situation and physical? Can I be in or out of God's will? Can I be going towards God's will, or should I BE God's will?

I know one thing I should "...work heartily, as for the LORD, not for men." in ALL that I do. So in all that I do I should be doing everything for God, not for myself and I guess not to be in the will of God. But I should do things to BE God's will. Wherever I am put should exalt the Creator of all things. To use the passions and gifts God has given me to make as an offering to God the Father.

When building the Tabernacle everyone was told to use their gift's and talents in order to bring the Tabernacle to reality. That was the will of God, to have his creation using the skills that he gave us in order to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to earth. Where Holy Spirit resides the Kingdom of Heaven is established; praise and worship, is a time at which we catch a glimpse of what happens in the court of Heaven.

But back to the issue, I struggle everyday to make sure that what I do is in line with the "will of God"  so why not this - Strive toward Jesus all the time, and in doing that, I am the will of God....

Real Jesus, Really.

If Jesus were to trim down your Christian experience to the bare essentials, what would He keep, and take away?

I'm scared of this question.... It scares me because I am going to be removed from my comfy spot in the church. I would be placed in difficult position of not being an "event planner" but an actual pastor.
I can't make my world more receptive to Christ. Christ is already the most appealing thing about life. (if you don't agree, how appealing is grace to you?)

Christ should be the christian experience, not Christ and the late night event. or Christ and the Worship Band. it has to be Jesus and only Jesus and nothing else......

Take the world, but give me Jesus.

Being an American, I don't get to see a whole lot of pomp and circumstance. Which is probably why monarchies fascinate us. We're business. but seeing dynastic royalty, that have order and code. Now that's exciting! Right? I have recently finished season 3 of, the period drama, Downton Abbey. I'm not going to lie, I loved it. (Before you try to strip me of my man card, watch it.) It is clean, it is well written and acted; most importantly, it is fascinating to see such an order, and social structure that’s completely different from ours in 21st century America. 

There's Carson, the traditional butler who lives for tradition, order and respect. There is a spoon, fork and knife for every food. There is a different dress for different parts of the day and occasion. All of this order and routine just to satisfy the obligation of showing the "proper amount of respect" to other human beings. In our lives we go through these same things, they have just tweaked a bit, from little things like saying, "bless you" when a person sneezes, to holding the door open for people at the outlet mall, or using your blinker when changing lanes, shaking hands correctly.[i]  All of these are small but part of current social etiquette. Things that we ,as humans, go out of our way to do out of respect of others.

            There was this guy, well I can’t call him just a guy. In fact, the Bible says this: “He was a mighty man…” a mighty man that the LORD brought up to make victories for his country and king, but (there is usually a but in these circumstances.), “…..he was a leper.” This is a pretty relatable guy. He was a mighty man. He was a nice guy, did things right, didn’t do a lot of wrong. He was doing ok for himself, but. We all have buts,[ii] even the most sparkling of characters contains the inescapable, “except”, “but”, “well….” His name is Naaman. He was a Syrian Army commander; the LORD brought him up in success.[iii] His success was attributed to God, and how he decided to bring him up.

            Back to this boss’s leprosy, the cool thing about leprosy is it is not prejudice. This disease doesn’t discriminate between social status, accomplishments or race. It was an incurable disease that separated you forms society and life. Naaman broke down and followed the advice of slave girl, under his wife, to go see the prophet in Israel.  In Monarchies there are many ways of doing things, there are right ways, and wrong ways. Usually the wrong ways have dire consequences. The king of Syria sent him along with a note to the King of Israel. He went he King of Israel tore his clothes…in comes this man Elisha…

            I really dig the guys from the Old Testament that saved the niceties and just dealt and met with people where they were in life. So Naaman is sent into Israel to get fixed, and he shows up at the king of Israel’s court and hands him the letter and the king gets upset and tears his clothes! But! Check it, it’s such a big deal that Elisha sends the king a letter that says, I heard your tore your clothes. Send your visitor to me so that he’ll know that there actually is a prophet of God in Israel.  

            So Naaman visits Elisha. He shows up with his caravan and his escorts with his chariots and grandeur. Then, here comes the coolest part, Elisha sends out MESSENGER! Ok, so this big deal of a dude, THE commander for the army of Syria shows up to your door step and you send out a messenger?! Wow…burn…. right?! this messenger sends the message for Naaman to dip/wash/cleanse/immerse into the Jordan River seven times. So, to recap, the commander of the Syrian Army shows up, Elisha sends him the equivalent of a text message from inside his house.

Here’s the best part, skin disease is the equivalent of sin. Leprosy[iv] does not discriminate; it does not pick and choose who deserves it. It just comes. Sin also, does not discriminate, no matter who you are; you can be affected by sin. So Naaman, this big and powerful guy that, granted, people were afraid of, had skin disease that made him self-conscious and they’re for incomplete. The only thing that could remove the skin disease of sin was the power of God.

            In this age, the only thing that can remove us from eternal separation and condemnation from sin is Jesus; who is God incarnate, Immanuel, and the only human being to walk a pure life. He’s much more than a decision that you’ll ever make. He’s a relationship. King Jesus exists to walk with you, Holy Spirit exists to influence and be the intimate relationship that we have with God. It’s much more than just condemning sinner, Elisha never condemned, he allowed God to do his work. Elisha chose to get rid of the usual order and rules and just help someone. It didn’t matter much at the time whether Naaman was Jewish. He just displayed the power of God. Why don’t we do that to?

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[i]  The first web space (the space between your thumb and forefinger) need to make contact, then a firm but not crushing grip must take place then an optional shaking, not to much now! You’re not shaking out demons. Just a subtle shake.

[ii] Haha multi-leveled truth…

[iii] 2 Kings 5:1 “…because by him the LORD had given victory to Syria.”

[iv] Keep in mind that leprosy is the bible is not always Hansen’s Disease. It’s usually some form of skin disease.

Fruitful and acceptable worship begins before it begins. - Alexander MacLaren

Fruitful and acceptable worship begins before it begins.

Alexander MacLaren

Most of the Body of Christ gathers to worship corporately in song and praise for a good solid 30-50 minutes a week which equals to1560-2600 a year. There are 525,600 minutes in a year this makes the percentage of the Church gathering to worship together, 0.3957382039573821% of our year….[i]  Funny enough, if every Christian that’s the same percentage of our lives that we worship God together in our lives. Does it seem weird when we do something once a week, but we look at the numbers it is so little?

            This isn’t a shame on you essay. It’s a thought essay. I want to find out what I’m doing as a young Christian. This is my way of taking inventory, if you will, relating it to myself; and, understanding my walk with Christ. I don’t intend on presenting a problem, harp on said problem then not offer a solution to the problem. I digress.(did I use that right? “I digress” is a phrase I have always wanted to use but have never used it right. Just like the “when in Rome” scene in Anchorman, a grossly inappropriate movie.)

            Now my math may be way off. I did take a lot of math classes in High School, they were just remedial and repeats because I had initially failed the course. The percentages can be different based on denomination, occupation, residence etc… What if…(dun dun dun) the church gathered for at least 1% of the year and worshipped and sang to Jesus? That’s roughly two and a half times more than we do now. I understand that worship carries through out the day. But there is something to be said for coming together as a body and praising Jesus through song. Right?

            There used to be a church on the interstate between Austin and Dallas that had a banner that plugged it’s 30 minute service. There are other churches that have plugged their streamlined easy experience services. I cannot tell you about the motives behind these practices, but I can ask the question again. Why don’t we spend even one percent as a church together in worship of our creator. 

            We all need to know that what we do during the day can be fragrant to God.[ii] But there is something to be said for gathering together as a family, as a bride, as a body to worship Jesus. This intent isn’t to call anyone out, or to shame anyone into raising their hands during worship; but, rather, to talk it through.

            Is it realistic? Is it conventional? Or even do able? I don’t know. But what if? What if admiration and worshipping the Creator of everything took precedence in everything we did? Altering how we even do the smallest business? Our careers, our lives our plans all revolved around Jesus and whether or not we’re fragrant in our public and personal lives?[iii]

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[i] Taking the average time a year, which would be 2,080 minutes.

[ii] Read a book called Praise Habit by David Crowder.

[iii] For the record, that’s how our lives are supposed to be…..

Jesus the Nazarene came, lived perfectly, and died dirty. All so we can experience Love that is unlike any other power in this universe.

Evangelism is hard for me to wrap my head around. The Great Commission is plain. "Go, and make disciples of all nations." [i]  except that it does not show me how to do this step by step.  There aren’t detailed instructions on how to approach a human being and give them the love that you’ve been experiencing. There aren’t exceptions based off of whether it’s an old friend, or a stranger; girl or boy; adult or child. We just have to fill these holes ourselves, right? Jesus tells us to do it, we just figure out how right?

We do have the Holy Spirit to lead and guide us who calls us to Himself.[ii] But look, there’s more to scripture than just words. The words are the only things our minds can understand…. In the Book of Luke, it is written (I always feel like this is just a fun way to write….it is written….very stately. Hufflepuff…..) “Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.”[iii] This tells us this: Jesus IS telling us the details! But can our carnal finite minds understand the deetz? Nope. I’ll use an extreme. They can’t. It’s like a new language that we can’t understand so it’s translated, however there are terms that don’t quite translate fully.

Ok, coming back to Evangelism. I see it happen. There are ways that I see work and there are ways that I think don’t work well. I believe in relationship. I believe in sharing Jesus. Although, I also believe in sharing Jesus with action and life, rather than words all the time. Personally, I just can’t do Jesus good when I’m sharing Him with words, UNLESS (yes I’m throwing the unless into the ring) Jesus is sharing Himself with me. Wait, that’s an option? Oh, yes. It’s the only option.

            It has to be the only option available. Folks, check it. We really don’t do anything. We just need to be available.  I guess Evangelism isn’t ours to perform at all. In fact, since it belongs to Christ; we are just hollow vessels. Slaves. But, slaves with a gracious master: slaves with stock options.  Why not say this, we are born able to inherit all that our parents have. Christians, we choose to die to our parent’s inheritance, and choose to inherit the inheritance of Heaven. In this choice we become a child of God, pulled into the family of God. Our prize isn’t only going to Heaven(which is a big thing.), our joy comes from this: that we are bonded with Christ and made clean in order to stand before God, the Father, and see Him. It’s much deeper than just the phrase, “Accept Jesus as your personal LORD and savior and you won’t go to HELL.” You aren’t holes punched in our evangelical members punch card. But know this…

Jesus is more than just a guy. God is more than just a mean punisher.

God created this world to be beautiful. We as humans have been poor stewards of this world. We have allowed sin (which is an unholy thing; a un-God thing) to become a staple in our daily life, we are unable to escape this now. We could never do good our whole lives, even if we tried. We will always mess up and make a mistake. But here’s the deal. Since the beginning of time God has made covenants with us. Giving us chances to come back to Him, some using sacrifices and atonements, with Law and order. But being human we weren’t able to do this either. So God, giving us so much of himself; made Jesus. Now, Jesus is the perfect man, He is tempted, but falls not. Keeps communication with God. Since Jesus didn’t sin, He didn’t deserve death.[iv] No sin; no death. Now, as far as these covenant sacrifices were concerned, they were usually blameless things, like lambs or crops or bulls. There would be a blood offering and then a burnt offering. Now check it, here’s where it gets the best. Jesus WAS the offering. When Levite priests would make an offering all the sin from the people’s past would cling to that offering and they would be atoned for. But Jesus was much more. When Jesus became the offering, he not only took on EVERY sin that was committed, He took every sin being committed at that time, and then he claimed every sin that would be committed. Jesus claimed every single piece of dark, dirty, filth that had kept human beings from being in communion with God. Essentially, he paid our bills, debt, and gave us a little something for the afterlife. His death didn’t just break us even, it reached into even our future. Now all that sin, sent Jesus to Hell. Funny thing is. Jesus didn’t stay in Hell. Being God, he just collected the keys got some folks and walked out. He walked out and came back, He appeared to his Disciples. Then ascended (the best word for what happened) into Heaven to sit with God. Believing in this we receive the spirit of God, or the Holy Spirit. This doesn’t make us perfect, for we as Christ Followers still must strive to give ourselves completely to God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, every single minute.

You know what? Sometimes we fail at that. It happens, were in broken earth suits. But we will strive to hit that mark of total and complete servitude every moment, no matter how many times we fall. We stay in communication with our Jesus, and we strive to be like Jesus.(it doesn’t always happen that way) it’s hard. It’s not a box to check, or a thing to put down on a resume. It’s a lifestyle change. It’s a life thing. It involves shutting doors to the old way of life. And going through the open door of true life. This is a lot to take in, however, if you have decided that you would like to know more about this Jesus thing, or this God thing then feel free to contact me. Or I do know this. You can click this link and it will bring you to resources to get in touch with a church body or pastor near you.

Here are some resources to help you find what you need: when looking for a church body, please look for a pastor that desires to serve you, as well as a healthy community of people. You are loved by God so they should love you too.

Acts 29 Network of churches, is a nationwide network of churches.

http://www.acts29network.org/churches/

Southern Baptist Convention is a huge network of churches in America. This is a group of churches dedicated to Jesus and strengthening families.

http://www.sbc.net/churchsearch/default.asp

These are only two resources. Check with your local listings on finding a church in your area that will serve you and that you can serve in! different churches hold different aspects, beliefs and rituals. Find a church and get to know the people.

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[i] Matthew 28:18 – Then Jesus came near and said to them, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

[ii] The Holy Spirit the third application of God. “it” is God, a part of God, and should be treated as such. In order to be in right with God, we must be in right with Jesus AND the Holy Spirit.

[iii] Luke 24:45

[iv] Sin is a dangerous thing. It’s a word thrown around a lot in common thought. Usually it is meant to alienate someone, either away from their friends, or family, or help. And that’s normal, sin is an alienation. It’s not good, but it’s normal. Now sin has a little progression. It starts as temptation, and then if you give in to your temptation, that poor choice turns into sin. That sin, then does something, it changes the spirit and thus it changes the body; because, God is life, and sin is separation, then we become separated from Life itself. It’s like being grounded from water, you’ll live but eventually the effected will catch up to you. So that sin, then leads to death.