Ramblings of a Believer

When I was a kid and just starting to play soccer, my dad would have me kick the ball over and over again. He worked with me on techniques and methods ad nauseam and I normally fought him throughout the process. He would tell me to straighten my foot and bring my knee over the ball, but I would turn my foot and lean back trying to lift the ball instead of powering through it. Finally, after weeks of doing it on my own I gave in and did it his way… wouldn’t you know it, I started actually kicking the ball with some power. After about a year of practicing and listening to his advice my dad started showing his team, comprised of kids four and five years older than me, how to kick the ball by watching me. This was a proud moment; after all, I was the one who persevered and became the kid with the golden-foot, wasn’t I??? It was not until many years later that I realized that it was my dad’s perseverance that gave me my ability.  My dad could have given up on me several times, but instead, chose to work with me day after day until I learned the right thing to do and started doing it on my own.

How much more is God’s perseverance than ours when it comes to our relationship with him? “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:7–8. It is not from my sheer will that I am who I am in Christ. God has chosen to love me no matter what. He has never left me no matter what I’ve done in my past and knowing what I will do in the future. Contrary to what the world chooses to understand, even though I am a believer and saved by God’s grace, I will still make mistakes and it is not by my perseverance that makes me who God wants me to be. God’s perseverance and his ability to stick with me and change me is what gives me the ability to experience a genuine relationship with him.  I cannot fix me, only God can do that. I have to be willing to be changed, but in the end I have no ability to change me. Praise God for having the desire to stick with me no matter where I am in my relationship with Him.

I hate surprises; just ask my wife. Actually, the truth is I love surprises as long as I don’t know its coming.  Never tell me on Tuesday you have a surprise for me next Sunday because I will pester you relentlessly until I take all the fun out of it; which I am usually OK with because, like I said, I hate surprises.  Why do I hate surprises so much? Mostly because I have an overactive imagination, which starts with thoughts of really cool stuff, then turns into a worst case scenario where I have the “privilege” of helping my wife clean out the garage when what I really hoped for was a weekend of watching football on the couch.  In the end, the surprise she has in store for me is so much better than anything I could have imagined.

My life has so many moving parts.  There are so many things happening around me that I just want to know where this is going. I just want God to reveal his entire plan so that I am not surprised with what’s in store for me down the road.  My imagination hopes for an incredible inheritance, but instead I allow myself to accept that I will probably get more work than reward.  The truth is that God has a much better view of what is in store for me than I do.  If I knew my target before He was ready to reveal it I would take shortcuts and look for the easy way out… every time!!! In the end, He wants me to realize that this journey is not just for my sake but for those he has placed in my path so that I may be blessed as his instrument. What a privilege it is to be used by God.  Who am I to take away his pleasure to use me in his perfect plan?  Thank you Lord for using me and allowing me the privilege of serving you.

2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Does God approve of me? Am I concerned enough with what God thinks of how I live my life? I’m not sure I am concerned enough about receiving God’s approval for the things I say or do.  I tend to worry more about what people around me may think. If I’m sitting in church and feel moved during worship to raise my hands, I don’t because I think about what others around me may think.  Even though I am moved by the Holy Spirit and feel his presence I feel hesitation.  God could care less about what others think of me.  He only cares about my faithfulness and obedience to him.  I need to work harder at reaching for God’s approval of the direction and actions of my life.  I need to realize that the creator of the universe is all that really matters.  50 years from now no one will remember who I was during my time on earth.  I may get lucky and my great grand kids may know that I existed, but for the most part the rest of the world will forget the majority of the accomplishments of my life.  My life needs to be more concerned with the things of eternity than the things of this present life.  My relationship with God is what will last beyond the blip that signifies my life.  God’s approval of my life is the only thing that should ever really matter.

Peter 2.21 – “To this you were called because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in His footsteps.”

This is Reverend David Wilkerson’s soul-stirring sermon on the necessity of anguish – to bear God’s heart, passion, and burden within our lives.  It is lest than 8 minutes long and is one of the more powerful messages I have heard in a while.  I’d love to hear your comments on it.

Recently, I came to the realization that the “Root” system of my faith, the foundation, is the area of my life that I must protect the most.  A few weeks ago we had a guest speaker at our church, Wayne Cordeiro of New Hope Christian Fellowship in Honolulu, Hawaii.  He used the example of the giant Sequoia trees in California, living to be up to 2,200 years old and hundreds of feet tall.  While many of these trees have been cut down in the past; healthy trees never fall over no matter what the conditions may be.  These are massive trees with up to 26 feet in diameter. One day one of these giants just toppled over and scientist could not explain why.  Finally, the scientists found the reason to be because  the root system was very shallow in correlation to the size of the tree.  After years of human traffic building around the Sequoia’s base, the effects caused the root system to weaken.  The park had to build barriers to keep visitors from trampling the roots of the remaining trees in order to protect them.

We are very much like these giant Sequoias.  We allow innocent interactions (TV, magazines, news, etc.) to happen around us thinking they will not effect us.  We must be deliberate in protecting our roots (mind) from being influenced by these external factors.  We never realize how sensitive we are to how it effects us without knowing it.  In Ephesian 6:13-17 the Bible tells us to protect ourselves.  The protection comes from spending time in building our relationship with God through time in his word and time in prayer.  Let me never forget that my relationship with God does not just happen.  It takes time and effort on my part.  The beauty is that I never have to wait for God to be in the mood to spend time with me.  He is alway ready for me.  The ball is always in my court becasue he longs to be an active part of my life.

Ephesians 6:13-17 “³Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. ¹⁴Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, ¹⁵and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. ¹⁶In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. ¹⁷Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

This is one of the best skits to show us what God really wants to be…

It’s interesting to think how much doubt we actually have in ourselves.  The truth is that we don’t necessarily doubt what God can do, we just doubt what He can do though us. We limit God based on what we think we are capable of.  Knowing that I am personally capable of so little limits my scope of what I think God can actually accomplish.  It is amazing how little I allow myself to believe that God is capable of so much.  I need to open myself up to God’s amazing possibilities in my life and know that he is willing to do so much in me, through me, and in spite of me.  God created me because he loved me and he showed me this love by sending His son down to earth to die on the cross for me.  One of the hardest things to understand is that God did this for me specifically.  I tend to feel that Jesus came “to save the earth”.  The reality is that Jesus came to the earth to save me specifically.  It’s hard to understand the personal gift He gave to me, so I limit His ability in me.  I forget that He created me and lives in me and wants to have a relationship with me.  He could care less about what I can do for Him, because the truth is that I have very little to offer the Creator of the Universe.  The only thing He wants is for me to love Him and allow Him to unconditionally love me.

So here I am looking back at these words and I realize that I limit God and His enormous ability by my limitations.  I need to stop looking at God’s ability through my limitations and allow God to accomplish all that he is capable of doing regardless of me.

There is so much more to our spiritual lives than living a life of trials.  As a believer in Christ I tend to think in one of two extremes; I am destined for suffering or a life of privilege.  God never promised a perfect life to any of us, but He certainly never promised a life of endless trials.  There is so much more to rejoice in and around our lives.  No matter who you are and no matter what the circumstances of your life may be, God is always with you.  I feel so blessed to be heading in the direction of God’s leading and I can rejoice in all of the blessings in my life.  I often look at the unbeliever and wonder how they make it without a relationship with God.  I can rejoice in knowing that God will always be there for me.  If I allow Him to guide and direct my life through His perfect plan I will be blessed.

Philippians 4:4 “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.”

There are two great moments in your life – the day you are born and the day you know WHY you were born. Knowing  why God created me and why He put me on  this earth is the most important thing to me.  I know God has great plans for my life, but great in my mind may be something totally different than God’s plan. God wants us to be a reflection of His light in this world. I need to remember that He is the light; He is the one who can change people’s lives, not me.  The other morning while listening to the radio morning show, the host posed the question about the effectiveness of “nagging” someone into doing the right thing. A caller responded with “how can we as imperfect beings impose our will on others when the perfect creator of the universe doesn’t impose His will on us?”  What incredible insight…

My will makes little to no difference in changing anyone’s life. I need to remember that I represent, as an ambassador, God and that I need to represent Him the way He wants and needs to be represented.  So many times people refuse to have a relationship with God because of the way Christians have portrayed a life with Christ. The legalism and rules and nonsense keep t0o many people from understanding what a true relationship with God really is – just that, a relationship.  The older I get the more I realize that there is so much more to being a “Christian” and there is so much less too.  The life of a beliver is not complicated, it is not rocket surgery, it is simply a relationship with God that allows me to be fulfilled by His power, love, and grace; if I can break through the clutter.