We are in Hawaii Safely - After many delays

Well we are here... We had a 24 hour delay, more on that later, we are heading to the beach!!

laterz

Just Dont

Haha!!! I love this shirt!



(http://www.bustedtees.com/bt/images/BT-amish-gallery-1401.jpg)

Oh and by the way... does anyone read my blog? I know Hurley does cuz he is always disagreeing with everything I say.. .but is anyone else? Your thoughts on what I've been saying? Come on, give me some feedback!

Thank you! Come Again!

How Things Fit Together

So I’ve been thinking about what I said last post and what Hurley said (basically, he said not to focus on the works but on Christ). I was also reading some Colossians this morning and here is how I think all this fits together.

First, my response to Hurley. I agree with you, that the works can not be the focus of your life. However, they can be the focus of a set of thoughts when they are viewed through Christ. Christ is supreme. Christ is everything in my life. Now how do works fit in to that? Second, I say that because the NT writers talk about works all the time…

So… where does what I said and what Hurley said fit together? I think maybe in this semblance of an order.

1. I think that most people in America who call themselves Christians are not. Christ is not reigning supreme in their lives. They show no evidence of salvation. They are not saved. No, I’m not making a judgment call or condemning them, I’m simply saying that scripture says that if there is no evidence of your salvation (works, fruit whatever you want to call it) then you probably aren’t.

Most people are completely clueless to this. They are completely comfortable with warming the pews at church every week. They don’t examine themselves as scripture says they should.

THEREFORE, I think that the message that is burning in me (aka, no fruit can give evidence of no salvation) is only part 1… it’s purpose is to be a smack in the face and say ‘HEY!!! You need to wake up and pay attention because you may not be saved!”

2. THEN… part 2 comes. When they realize that their fruitless lives speaks against their salvation, then they are open to hearing about Christ being supreme. Before they don’t want to listen because they are ‘Christians’ and why would they pay attention to a sermon on Christ’ Supremacy when no other sermon they have heard has changed how they live. Part 1 wakes them up and gets them ready for part 2.

Part 2 is that Christ is supposed to reign supreme in your life. He is not supposed to be first on your priority list, but ruling over your life, decisions, and priority list. He is not your mascot but your monarch that you bow before and that every decision you make during the day goes through the filter of ‘would this glorify my Lord?’

This is the foundational message. This is where you spend your time building them up in Christ and building their base / foundation of though. This is what is most important.

3. Then, when they have gotten that Christ is supreme and that he is over their life, not just first in it, then you can go to application. How should that look? How / why should you study scripture, pray, fast, give, love, help, heal….. Without Christ as supreme, actions are just legalism and trying to be ‘good enough’ to get into heaven. When Christ is supreme in your life, when you are overcome with gratefulness for Jesus being beaten within an inch of his life so that you are not suffering in hell for all of eternity, you can do NOTHING BUT change your life and mold it around him. When he changes your very nature, you no longer enjoy sin, you hate it. You want to give up gossiping in the workroom. You want to give up your self-centeredness. You can’t imagine yourself sleeping with your boyfriend because those things are self-focused instead of glorifying to God! It’s not following the rules. It’s changing your lifestyle in response to God’s love. Rules, without relationship, brew rebellion.

Instead, people must be in a true love-relationship with Christ. Then the works will joyfully flow out of a response to that. But make no mistake, scripture is clear. If you have no fruit, no evidence of a changed life, no good works, no nuthin…. then scripture says that those voids give evidence that you most likely are not saved. We MUST examine ourselves and our lives so that we can be in a true, deep love-relationship with our God and savior, Jesus Christ.

The Least of These

So I was reading in 1 john 2 today, and I came across this passage:

9Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. 10Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble. 11But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness; he does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded him.

So I started off…. Hey, I don’t hate my brother. Kat’s a pretty cool guy (when hes not being melodramatic, which he doesn’t do much anymore =) ). So I’m ok! But then I thought, wait, Christ speaks of ‘brother’ as pretty much anyone you meet on the street (Luke 10, Good Samaritan). So do I hate anyone? Umm…. I don’t think so. So I’m OK.

However, then I gave it one more thinking… The story of the Good Samaritan about the fact that your brother is anyone who needs help. The religious guys who went around the hurt man were not loving him. The Samaritan, who went out of his way to help someone, even his enemy, was the one who loved him. The reason I point this out is that the passage above says that whoever LOVES his brother lives in the light. (By the way, this is not brotherly love or family love, its agapeo, Godly, selfless love). When Jesus gives us an example of loving our brother it is helping a guy who just got mugged. On top of that, its stopping and helping a guy who just got mugged in the slums of downtown Dallas. This wasn’t suburbia. This was the road, where all the gangs hung out and jumped people who were by themselves.

I say this because the guys who didn’t love the man didn’t spit on him or laught at him. In fact, they probably felt sorry for him but were too busy. So their ignoring him was a default hate. If you pass a drowning child in a lake but continue because you are busy, that’s default hatred towards the child. We are no different.

I wonder how many times we stop and help the homeless guy on the side of the road? I wonder how many times we just drive by those guys because we cant be late. Instead of helping we just callously assume that he is going to use the money for booze. Why not go buy the guy a bag of jumbo jacks? It takes $10 and 10 minutes. But that’s ok. Him eating today and tomorrow is not nearly as important to us getting to our meeting on time.

41"Then [Jesus] will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.'

44"They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?' 45"He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'

46"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

I say these things because I am guilty of them. I pass by people all the time. I cant remember the last time I took my dinner money and went and bought food for the homeless guys over at the intersection of 20 and 820. I am too busy… I pass right by the least of these all the time.

May God change my heart.