Sitting next to a fire drinking some coffee I was reminded of something, a simple idea really, at least at first glance. We were called to live our lives for God. Wow! Have we not heard that a couple hundred times in our lives. Is that not what EVERY pastor says every Sunday at the end of their sermon. I mean is that not what the 'life application' is there for, to tell us how to utilize the last 45 minutes we spent listening to this framed idea in our life for Him. Somehow, though, we all fail to grasp this concept of living our lives for God.
Most of us will look at our life and try and incorporate God in their somewhere. For some it looks like a quiet time a few times a week; for others its just going to church every Sunday. We get wrapped up in this idea that we need God-specific time and make our goal to increase the amount of time we spend with God each week. I think somehow in the mix of things we come to this point where we think He is calling us to spend an hour a day reading our bible, or something along those lines, and that is what our walk is supposed to look like. That in turn leads to a subconscious separation of God and our life, a BIG problem.
God didn't call us to live for him 3 or 4 hours out of the week, or even out of the day. God wants our hearts. He wants us to reciprocate the love he has for us back to him. He wants our lives! If we 'give Him our life' then why do we think one hour a day is enough? What is it that makes us think that devoting a specific time every day to worshiping the Father is living our lives according to His will. We are missing the point if that is what giving up our life looks like.
Think about a marriage. You make a commitment to love someone else and devote your intentionality to that person. When that commitment is made we don't walk that path trying to devote just one hour a day to our spouse. No! We consider that person in every decision we make. We try and please them whenever possible. There joy is what we seek in that marriage. Why do we think its different in our walk with God!?
24 hours a day is what it takes to glorify our God. He wants every second of our day to be lived in worship for Him and the love and grace he has extended. Our calling is to glorify Him in all things, ALL! Not just the parts of our day we can squeeze in. All is defined as the whole of, the greatest possible. We were called to surrender our life for God, our WHOLE life, ALL of our life! In every single thought we have we should be worshiping Him. We are to live our lives for God and God alone. Notice that if we live for God 24 hours a day, there is no time left to live for ourselves, not a single minute in the week, month, year, or life.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Friday, March 25, 2011
Who Are These People?
That is a very good question, in fact that might be the right question! Or is it? It was recently brought to my attention that I did not talk much about the team I am going to Kenya with this summer in my support letter. This may be attributed to several different things, probably the primary reason being that I don't know them!
Wo, say what Tim? Your going to Kenya this summer and you don't know the team? Crazy thought huh? Crazy that I am going to a land unknown with 6 other people that upon first glance are no further in life than I am. Crazy to think that God has called me to spend 10 weeks living in extremely close proximity to people I have never met, or even talked to for that matter. Is that idea crazy though?
God is big, way big. My presumption would be that most people reading this would agree with that statement. So if we have that perception are we allowed to look at this situation and say 'that is crazy'?
No! You see crazy, by definition, is something full of cracks or flaws, unsound. Crazy is generally accepted in a negative conontation. The idea of someone following Gods calling is never crazy, no matter the circumstances. Unorthodox in our eyes maybe, but not flawed or unsound. Our awesome God is perfect and thus His plans are. Something incredible to think about following Gods plan is that it always works out for the furthering of His kingdom.
My decision to become a part of this team was due to the sole fact that God opened a door and asked that I step through it, and out of obedience I did just that. It had nothing to do with the fact that these 6 other people are my friends or awesome people that I wanted to hang out with over the summer. I have faith that if He ordained this path, that the 6 other people on this team are incredible servants with sole purpose of glorifying their master and commander and I needent worry about exactly how 'compatible' I am with them,
Now that is not to say that I shouldn't get to know them as much as possible before we embark on this journey, and with time, I am sure that will happen. It is just difficult because they live a solid 12 hours away in Fort Collins, CO. Yupp, they aren't from around these parts. Eileen, Hanna, Joe, and Brandon attend Colorado State University, Rachel goes to Metropolitan State College of Denver. Ryann lives in Denver. Obviously I am the odd ball in Norman, OK.
As the weeks progress and school begins to wind down for them, team meetings and prayers will occur presenting an avenue to learn a few tid bits about these servant hearted college age students. Not completely in tune with Facebook stalking, I will try and learn as to figure out more about these 6 others I have been given the opportunity to serve with. If you choose to follow my blog, I will talk about them and my hope would be that by the end of this journey you wouldn know only my heart, but theirs as well. Hopefully this question will be answered not only for me, but you as well.
Wo, say what Tim? Your going to Kenya this summer and you don't know the team? Crazy thought huh? Crazy that I am going to a land unknown with 6 other people that upon first glance are no further in life than I am. Crazy to think that God has called me to spend 10 weeks living in extremely close proximity to people I have never met, or even talked to for that matter. Is that idea crazy though?
God is big, way big. My presumption would be that most people reading this would agree with that statement. So if we have that perception are we allowed to look at this situation and say 'that is crazy'?
No! You see crazy, by definition, is something full of cracks or flaws, unsound. Crazy is generally accepted in a negative conontation. The idea of someone following Gods calling is never crazy, no matter the circumstances. Unorthodox in our eyes maybe, but not flawed or unsound. Our awesome God is perfect and thus His plans are. Something incredible to think about following Gods plan is that it always works out for the furthering of His kingdom.
My decision to become a part of this team was due to the sole fact that God opened a door and asked that I step through it, and out of obedience I did just that. It had nothing to do with the fact that these 6 other people are my friends or awesome people that I wanted to hang out with over the summer. I have faith that if He ordained this path, that the 6 other people on this team are incredible servants with sole purpose of glorifying their master and commander and I needent worry about exactly how 'compatible' I am with them,
Now that is not to say that I shouldn't get to know them as much as possible before we embark on this journey, and with time, I am sure that will happen. It is just difficult because they live a solid 12 hours away in Fort Collins, CO. Yupp, they aren't from around these parts. Eileen, Hanna, Joe, and Brandon attend Colorado State University, Rachel goes to Metropolitan State College of Denver. Ryann lives in Denver. Obviously I am the odd ball in Norman, OK.
As the weeks progress and school begins to wind down for them, team meetings and prayers will occur presenting an avenue to learn a few tid bits about these servant hearted college age students. Not completely in tune with Facebook stalking, I will try and learn as to figure out more about these 6 others I have been given the opportunity to serve with. If you choose to follow my blog, I will talk about them and my hope would be that by the end of this journey you wouldn know only my heart, but theirs as well. Hopefully this question will be answered not only for me, but you as well.
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