A Litle Pick-me-up

Psalm 118:1
"Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good;
His love endures forever."
Psalm 107:1
"Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good;
His love endures forever."
Psalm 106:1
"Praise the LORD.
Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good;
His love endures forever."

Why do so many of the psalms start out this way?

We forget over and over again that God loves us, and we live our lives in such a way that fails to show others the love of God. The psalmists wrote this as a praise to God, and for others to remember that we can always rejoice and we can always give thanks to the LORD because He loves us and always will. I am beginning to understand how Paul found joy in all situations. Paul understood one simple truth: God is love. He knew that whatever mess he found himself in, whatever beating he took, that God still loved him and that's how he had joy that surpassed all understanding.

Remember today that God loves you. Let this fact shine so brightly through life that it touches someone else today.

What is Love?

Webster's defines love as an affection or feeling towards someone or something.
The Bible defines love as laying down one's life for another.

What does this mean to us? Even if we do figure out some way to define love, how do we do it? How can I love another person? How do I love God?

I am a prideful person. I think of myself as someone who has things pretty much figured out. I am smart, athletic, tall, and posses many qualities seen by the world as good qualities to posses. At the same time, I know that by myself, I am nothing. I am not bad, good, or anywhere in between, I am just nothing. Without the saving knowledge of Christ and Him crucified I am absolutely nothing. Without Christ, nothing I ever do will ever mean anything, nor will it amount to anything of any significance or importance. On the flip side, with Christ everything I do is meant to have eternal significance and importance. I am centering my life and career around this fact and hope that God will use me in some manner for His glory and for the furthering of His kingdom here on Earth.

All that to say that I find myself at times looking at other people who have such a skewed view of God and judging them. I think somehow that I am better than them because God chose me, when in reality, I did nothing to earn this salvation, and I am no better than anyone else ever. God chose me because He wanted to. I did nothing to earn His favor or His grace, He simply loves me and called me to be His son. I am writing to confess my pride and ask that you will pray that somehow I get it through my head that God is everything and I am nothing. I am asked to do things for God and that is what I do. He tells me to love, not judge, so that I what I need to be doing.

That being said, how do I love someone who has such a skewed view of God? Do I simply love them and live my life out in front of them hoping that they will see the truths about God lived out in my life? Do I talk to them in a kind and understanding way about why they believe what they believe? Do I, like Jesus, turn over the tables of their wicked ways and call sin what it is?

In talking this out, I see my pride coming through and have discovered what I need to do. I need to throw myself on the grace and mercy of Christ and pray that God will pull me closer and closer to Him, and that through my getting closer to Him, He will shine through me in ways I can't quite comprehend.

What is love? Love is submitting my life to Christ who called me out of the ashes and letting Him love through me.

Friends

We had some old friends over last night and it was awesome. There are so few people in this world that we really click with instantly and bond with and the Howers are some of those people. Brock and Heather Hower are missionaries in Mexico running a camp and conference center. We have known them for a few years now and have been to their camp a couple of times. They were in town for a day on their way back to Mexico from their home in New Orleans and just had a couple of hours to spend with us, but we loved it. They brought their youngest two kiddos, Rueben and Annie, which was awesome because they are around the same ages as our kids, so they had fun playing with each other. Talking to the Brocks (as I often refer to them) was refreshing because we are so like minded. We both love God and desire to serve Him in a culture other than our own. I love how God gives us people like them to come along side us and rejuvinate our spirits as we make the long journey toward Heaven.

On a crappier side of things, I had my first classes today and it's going to be a rough four months.

Vision

What is vision?

I started reading a book with a buddy of mine called "Visioneering." The book is pretty awesome so far. It helps me put words to a lot of thoughts I've been having. This book's goal seems to be to help the reader understand what having a vision for life is and how to discern that vision through the lenses of Christ in one's life. I will definitely write more on my vision as we progress in the book, but for now I am going to try my best to blog everyday. It may not be great, but it will be from the heart and will hopefully be an encouragement to all my reader.

Today I learned about humility. I tend to be a proud man. I have some really cool skills (like numchucks) and gifts, and a lot of the time I tend to rely on my own gifts to get by in life instead of recognizing that I am really nothing and Christ is the only way anything in my life will have any impact on anything. As I was having a conversation over lunch, I began to see why I'm not ready to be a pastor. I hate it, but the guy I was talking to was right. He told me how I need to be humbled leading adults to understand how to lead. I didn't want to hear it at the time, but I do desperately need humility in order for me to get out of the way of God in my life. I saw this again tonight at my small group Bible study. We were talking about prayer requests and I began to think to myself, "I'm way closer to God than all these guys." In reality, I've been somewhat depressed lately because I haven't been spending time with God reading and praying and meditating on Him because I've been too wrapped up in video games and movies. God smacked me in the face tonight. I can only hope and pray that I will learn from this experience and that God will continue to teach me that I am nothing without Him.


Thanks for reading

Feel free to leave comments (in other words, please leave a comment)

Update

To all my reader out there, I've been really busy lately with finishing this semester and working a ton and trying to get some sort of ministry in that I haven't had time to write. I am still learning and still doing whatever I can to further the Kingdom of God in this world, although it feels as though other things have snuck up and taken priority. I know this is wrong, but it's what I'm dealing with at this time in my life. This next semester, I will be attempting to graduate college so I will be taking a ton of classes and I will also be attempting to put food on the table at home so I will be working a ton of hours, so I'm sorry in advance for not writing much over the next few months. That being said, I have had some awesome opportunities to share Christ with a few co-workers, although it hasn't turned out like I wanted it to. I also have an awesome opportunity to preach this week at my church, Grace Bible Church, here in Killeen, TX. I will be talking about John the Baptist, specifically in Matthew 3, and examining his life and ministry. I appreciate your prayers and love during this stressful season in my life and also for my preaching, that I would get out of the way and let God speak through me. Anyways, I'll try to write as much as I can.

What do they say?

Working in a restaurant I hear a TON of people talking about other people when those people aren't around, and it made me think. What do people say about me when I'm not there? I believe that people would have nothing but nice things to say about me. I don't know if I like that or not. I'm pretty sure that when Jesus was here, everyone talked about him when he wasn't around, and I'd be willing to say that most people talked pretty bad about him. He was stubborn, rebellious, insubordinate to the religious leaders, and he broke a lot of rules. He also loved people whom no one else loved. It would've been cool to be there and listen to what people said about Jesus.
I also think it's fair to say that people didn't talk that nicely about Paul when he wasn't there. He was ignorant, uncontrollable, and you never knew what he was going to say, because he spoke from the heart no matter who was there to hear it. He was 100% committed to God no matter what the cost, even people talking bad about him behind his back.
I want to live a life of love, both for God and for people. I want to speak truth all the time, even when it hurts to hear. I want people, when they talk about me, to talk about God, and how crazy it is that I live my life entirely relying on God. I think if a non-Christian could say that about my life, then it would mean I'm doing something right.

What do you think people say about you when you're not there?

Mediocrity

I desire to be something great, and to do great things, but lately I feel doomed to a mediocre life. Right now, I am in the midst of preparation for some truly awesome things, but it seems as though these things will never come to pass. I have always been pretty good at everything I've done. I was one of the smarter ones in school, I was always one of the more athletic kids, and even in church I have been put in leadership roles, but I feel as though I've never been great at anything. I desire to find what I am great at and then use that gift for God in whatever manner I can. I have tried and failed at a number of different things, and it's starting to get frustrating. I keep asking God where I am supposed to be and what I'm supposed to be doing, but I can't seem to figure it out. So I just keep on failing. I will keep on failing until one day I find greatness, not for me but for God. I am not taking away from God what is rightfully His, the power to govern my life and decide what I will or won't do, and I'm also not replacing God with doing things for Him, but I feel at a stand still. I guess the devil is better at what he does than I originally thought. He has been hitting me from every angle since I let go of everything I wanted and sacrificed my life for God's will. Every time something seems to be headed in the right direction, something comes up that takes me back a step. Maybe it's just called sanctification, and it hurts. I talked with a friend just today about how we continue to work out our salvation and it will continually hurt, but I just wish that, for once, things would go as planned. I will not give up, though. I will continue to fight for what I know God is calling me to, and I will continue to fight to be closer and closer to God. I just don't really know where to point my sword at the moment. Maybe I'm just lying to myself by telling myself that I am meant to be great, or maybe I just need to shake off my immature Christian dreams of changing the world. I feel as though I owe it to God to do all I can do to increase the size of the kingdom by as much as I can, and yes I know it's really not me but God using me and allowing me to be a part of His work, but sometimes I wish there were something in it for me here on Earth.



It's a constant battle, hints the name of the blog, fighting my sinful and fleshly desires and reaching up to the hands of God always ready to take me where He can best use me.



"You never said it would be easy. But You said You'd see me through the storm." - Mark Schultz