Continue the Pursuit

I am blessed as a pursuer of Christ to be surrounded by a group of brothers, sisters, and fellow believers who each possess an individual spark of every characteristic that I want to be known for when I become a leader; whether it be patience, kindness, clear-headedness, reliance on prayer, knowledge of the Scriptures, or any other of the multitude.

These people act as examples for me in that one specific area - they usually don't know it, and I usually don't tell them, but I look up to them secretly and silently. Those people may be reading this post, and if you are, then I deeply thank you for being the example that you have been, and I would encourage you to continue the fight and keep in it - for you stand as an example for many people (who you may never know about.)

Not only do I thank you, but I would give a commission: we who stand as examples must seek to refine each and every part of our lives in order to remain standing as a mirror of the One to come. For our example can be used by the Lord even without our conscious effort to bring both the lost and the believer closer to Him.

We do not know how many the Lord has affected through us, but I pray that we would never forget that it is not just the evangelism that we ourselves consciously do that affect the people around us, but also the unintentional testimony that is given through our lives. Lifestyle evangelism provides a solid starting base for a new believer to begin pursuing Christ, and it also gives fellow believers comradeship and encouragement while they run the race.

Pursue the Spirit and uphold a God-pleasing life in every aspect, for you do not know the number of those who are looking up to you.

Refined by Love

I think that as I am refined by God in my pursuit of His heart, my heart for His people is slowly being redefined and renewed. When I see a person making so many mistakes, and I can clearly see their drifting away, my heart breaks for them, and I see just a glimpse of the sadness that God has for His children.

The situation is made clearer to me every day - I see with greater shame the fact that God sent His Son to earth and went through the horror of tearing a piece out of the Godhead in order to save us. And yet, at the same time, I feel an equally strong feeling of thankfulness and love for this Father who loved me enough to do all of that. Every day, it seems like, I see or hear about another one of His children rejecting this amazing sacrifice and pursuing the world. Every time it seems to hit harder and deeper in my soul. I feel a terrible anguish for the people around me.

I am in the process of writing a paper for one of my classes. It is on the subject of Hell and its necessity, and how it can be balanced against the idea of a loving and caring God. As I study the horrors of Hell and the reality that is portrayed in the Bible, it further makes my heart cry for a change - I so desire for they whose souls (and bodies) will burn in anguish in a literal, eternal, dark fire for all of eternity for the simple reason that they could have, should have accepted the message of God.

I have always prayed for God to reveal Himself to me and to form me to Himself. I believe that He is beginning to do that - starting, perhaps, by creating in my a deep love for His people and a great longing for them to be reconciled to Him. I pray now that this would continue - that I would always be refined to greater purity and greater love, that I may show only a glimmer of the Light.

Great Minds Occupied On Little Things

I was having a discussion with my accountability group, and the subject turned to the matter of what was preoccupying our minds and inhabiting our thoughts the majority of the time. We all spoke of what we were concerning with, worried about, and thoughtful of. When it came to my turn to speak, I told the group of men about the thing(s) that had been occupying my thoughts of late - thoughts of God and of theology, of religion and the difference between Christianity and other religions, that is to say, love. 

     

One of the men in my group then told me that, had he not known me as well as he did, he would not have believed me when I told him that I thought about God in my free time. While I deeply appreciate his honesty, and even more so his concern with my spiritual state, I can't help but feel saddened that thinking often about God has become something that is so rare that people don't believe you when you tell them that you are preoccupied with thoughts about God. 

   

  God created us with a supercomputer in our heads - something that can do anything from complex equations to figuring out how to change the oil in your car; you can create a beautiful work of art, and then turn around and set the table, simply because God gave you a mind that can both complete simple tasks and also consider complex and abstract ideas. The human mind has more capability than the greatest computers that we have created (using our minds). Why then, are we so preoccupied with unimportant, irrelevant issues?

     

What should I wear? What should we have for lunch? Who will I date? When will the world end? What style of music should we play in church? We become so consumed by irrelevant things that have no real importance to your life (meaning your eternal life), that we lose sight of the bigger picture. We get so concerned about the world that we forget about the Kingdom. We get so worried about tomorrow that we forget about today. We wake up ten years later and wonder how we got to be the apathetic, stale Christian that we are. 

    

 As a person who hates to waste time, I simply don't understand how people can take the precious time that they've been given and use it thinking about unimportant things - things that we should really put into God's hands, or that shouldn't be put into anyone's hands at all! 

We spend our time pondering questions that have objective answers - simple, universal answers that give us a direct instruction - and we try and label them with a subjective answer, where we say "I'll wear clothes that honor Christ, but what color and style should they be?" or "I know Martha has a deep relationship with Christ, but Mary says she's a Christian, and God made me more attracted to Blondes than Brunettes, so I'll date Mary."

My goodness, why are we concerned about those issues when there is the issue of starving kids in Africa who need care; homeless people in your hometown who need prayer. How can we be so concerned about the little things and miss the huge issues in our lives? Why are there Christians who graduate high school but don't know the books of the Bible? Why are there people that ask for a pastor while they are on their deathbed, because none of us went and talked to them beforehand? 

Why do we miss out on all the opportunities that God has placed before us? 

In the end, it is because we would rather spend our hours watching t.v., playing games, and shopping rather than sitting down and meditating on the Bible. We would rather think about nothing than think about the Everything. 

What would happen if we all spent a little time thinking about God in our everyday lives? (On some day other than Sunday)