Going so Deep You Drown

One of the comment I hear a lot among believers who have been in the church for a little while is, “I want to go deeper.”  This is the very issue that drives people from church to church until they find someone who is consistently “deep” enough for them.  What bugs the heck out of me is that it doesn’t matter how deep many of them get, they aren’t do the very thing Jesus came to do – Seek and save the lost.  Even in student ministry, I’ve had students tell me that they were going to a different student ministry because they want to “go deeper”.  Most of the time these are the students that we reached out to when they weren’t going to church anywhere.  Many of them accepted Christ while in our ministry and were once outreach machines because of their initial excitement.  Somewhere along the way their vision for seeing people the way Jesus did got blocked by a mirror and all they could see is their own wants and thought needs.  They got disconnected because they stopped being missional in the way they lived and became “me-centered”.

I’ve been thinking about this a couple days now.  One thing I thought about was that Jesus’ initial call to his followers was to “follow me.” One of the last things he told his disciples was, “do as I have done.”  Through out his ministry he was focused on teaching his disciples how to go out and reach the lost.  The “religious” people who knew scripture the best were the people he got most mad at.  This is not to say that we don’t need to study scripture.  If you know me, you know I love scripture.  One thing I think is interesting though is that in Deuteronomy where we first see, “You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength”, it is immediately followed by and pay attention to his command.  Then after that in Deut. alone, when it says love the Lord, it gives an action step of doing what it says.

Here is what I have an issue with when it comes to the idea of “going deep.”  Last night I sat in the midst of several hundred students that no one is reaching with the gospel because no one is reaching out to them the way Jesus would.  All along we have students who want to “go deeper?”  How much deeper does a person have to go before they start loving on the people God called us to love? Reaching the people Jesus came to reach? It doesn’t matter how much you understand of God’s word if you aren’t doing the basics of what it says?

Remember the two main things that Jesus gave us when asked what the most important command was?  Love God and love people.  Very basic.  When Jesus called his disciples, he didn’t say come grow deep with me so that one day you can make an impact.  He said to come follow me and do what I do.

Ok… so I started this blog thinking it would be a short one just to throw out some thoughts I’ve had on my mind, but it got a little long, so I will shut it down here.  Let me encourage you that regardless of how much you know about God’s word, you can and are called to make an impact in the world we live in by love people the way God loves them.

Surrounded by Selfishness

Selfishness sucks.

Not trying to be negative, but it’s true. Now that I put it out there, let me explain.

I think selfishness pretty much drains the life out of everything.  Think about it.

When I don’t get my way. I get mad.  When someone does something that I don’t like. I get mad.  When I am being selfish, it drains the life out of me.

When others are being selfish, it does the same.  So I thought about this…

You might be selfish if…

- You only consider your own ideas
- You are willing to inconvenience others for your own comfort
- You rarely consider what is best for others
- You have a hard time celebrating with someone when something good happens in their life

Just curious… how would you finish this statement?

You might be selfish if…

Hungry

Typically on Sundays I don’t eat a lot for breakfast.  It tends to mess with my stomach which in turn messes up my band rehearsal… if you get what I’m saying.

A couple weeks ago I was in the back of our Jr. High building, next to the snack bar, waiting for service to end.  As I was standing there, the candy and junk food on the snack bar seemed to call my name.  As I was sorting through the candy, looking for my prey, it hit me that I really don’t want any of that food.  I was just hungry, and that was easily accessible at the moment.  I resisted, and waited for much healthier, more filling lunch.

Later I was thinking about how we can be like this spiritually too.  When we aren’t getting good spiritual nutrition, many times we end up filling ourselves with spiritual “junk food”.  Stuff that isn’t healthy for us nor will it ever fill us up.  God wants to fill us up, but we have to be committed to going to him to be fed on a consistent basis so that we won’t get so hungry that we begin to fill ourselves with other spiritual junk food.

I’ve been thinking since then, what is my junk food of choice.  When I’m not filling myself with good food spiritually, what do I tend to feast on?  What about you?

Glory to God, Not Me

Why do we pray that God heals us when we are sick, then when we feel better, we tell everyone about the drugs we took to make us better or about the doctor that gave us a shot?  Was it God who healed you or the medicine?  The other day, God opened my eyes to my lack of faith through prayer that seems to be rooted in my personal pride.  When I get sick, I will pray and ask others to pray for me.  Once I feel better, I will tell people of how Nyquil helped me get better fast.  Then I think about how we will pray that something at work will go well, then when it does, we turn around and tell people how we strategized and organized to make something successful.  We ask for God to give us wisdom and creativity, then brag about the great idea that we had.  Where is God in these equations and celebrations?  Too often I forget and boast in my own abilities, wisdom, insight, creativity etc. God is to be praised for all of that.  God answers our prayers.  Let’s not be so prideful to think that we answered our prayers.

What Goes On in My Head

I know… Some of you are thinking… There is actually stuff going through his head… Well, just read on and be impressed.

I was riding down the road the other day when a thought came to my mind for a joke.  Before I could stop my train of thought, this entire story played out in my head.  The I laughed.  Not because it was that funny, but simply because this whole thing had just played out in my head.

Two guys were outside on a rather windy day.  One was writing a check to the other to  pay him back for tickets he had bought to a football game.  When he went to hand him the check, the wind took the check right out of his hand.  The guy who had just written the check, looked at his friend and said, “Cash it if you can.”

The end.