Get in the game

I guess it's about time I posted again since it has been since February!   It's hard to believe how fast time slips away from you but I really do want to take time to get things in print so I can look back at how God is working in my life.  Take this last week for instance.  I just got back from the Nebraska NYI Teen camp and it was an awesome experience.  I really loved all the kids and adult sponsors.  I feel like I've known them all for a long time, they already seem like family.  This was the first camp that I have spoken at outside of our district and I was really nervous.  But, as usual, God came through and we had a great camp.  It's my prayer that everyone there will be able to use what God revealed to them to deepen their walk and faith in Him. 

Nebraska NYI, if you're reading this I want you to know that you all had a great impact on me and I will always treasure the chance I had to get to know you.  I know our paths will cross again and again over the years and I can't wait to see how God will use all of you in the game of life.  I know as you enter the field of this epic battle for the good over evil you will all stand strong with brave hearts and a passion that will never die.  You are warrior poets (Braveheart) and I count myself privileged to fight alongside you.    

      The triumphant Christian does not fight for victory; he celebrates a victory already won. The victorious life is Christ’s business, not yours.

                                                                               Reginald Wallis    

Get on the field, learn the plays, be brave of heart, you're on the right team and we will be champions at the game of life.

Peace out ya'll, Jan           

Hey I know I'm always kind of weighty in my post but I want you to know...life is to short to always be introspective.  Sometimes God just wants us to enjoy the moment because you never know when your going to walk out in front of a bus..that's parked...next to a drug deal gone bad where you get caught in the cross fire...but dive behind and old rotten log...where you get bit by a rattle snake on the butt...then roll down a hill into an emergency room...that's on fire from a riot about snakes rights...but the Doctor grabs you on his way out of the fire and gets you in a waiting ambulance...that gets hit by a train on the way to the crosstown hospital...and you get thrown out and into a snake milking plant where they have plenty of anti venom and you are saved...and featured on extreme home makeover and given a beautiful new home...and as you step out to see your new house......the crowd yells, "Move that bus!!!!"...and you get run over and die!

So enjoy the moment for the moment is all we really have!

Currently Listening Beautiful Letdown By Switchfoot Twenty Four see related

Man, it has been a while since I posted so I think it's about time.  I'm breaking with tradition and making this post while the sun is still shining and I haven't even been up all night!

I guess I have just been to busy to take the time to write out my thoughts.  It has also been a rather introspective time since I last wrote.  This is something that we all must go through.  If it were not for the valleys of our spiritual lives we would never have the opportunity to grow.  If you ever get a chance to be at the top of a real mountain take a look around.  The view is great but there is nothing growing up there.  It is in the valley that the soil is fertile and the roots grow deep.  So it is in our lives, God must continually takes us to the fertile soil of spiritual valleys so we can grow deep in our knowledge and trust of Him and His plan for our lives. 

This past week God blessed Shelley and me with the chance to go and spend some time with Tevis and Tami.  I can't tell you how much I needed that service for a time of refreshing in my own heart.  God used the music and the message but especially the company of our friends to assure me that He has a plan.  The hard part is trusting God when we can't see His hand moving in our lives.  I am confident that when we can't see His hand moving it is because He is holding us in His hand.  What peace the thought of that brings to my heart.  I believe we are all born with a sense of a call to greatness.  I believe this is because we are created in the image of God and that alone IS a call to greatness.  The thing is, that greatness in God's eye's is not always greatness in the worlds eyes.  I am convinced that it is enough in my life to be the servant of my God and Christ in the most menial of task as long as I know that I am in the fellowship of my beloved Lord and Savior.  It is the greatest station of life to find ourseves in the service of Christ, no matter what that service is.  Beware of planning your service to Christ so well that you need not care for His help or His presence in that service to Him. 

So what about you?  What is God calling you to?  And what is the valley you find yourself in?  Take courage my friend in these words;

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed…Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.  2 Corinthians 4:7-9, 16-18

Lord,                                                                                    

I come to you as one who knows my need for you.  You are not only the giver of life, you are life and peace and hope.  May you take this life that you have given me as an offering of my love for you.  Use me as you will, where you will and how you will.  Father...you are my past, you are my future..you are my all.  

                                                                                                                    Amen

Hello all!!

The last couple of weeks have been very busy, to busy, but then that is life.  It seems especially true in this day and age that there aren't enough hours in the day.  I have been doing chapels at Heartland Christian School, moving someone and preparing for Rocktoberfest 05.  Rocktoberfest didn't do so good and I don't think I will do it again next year, it's just to much for me to get done and done well.

But then again there are many things in life that I don't always do so well.  I guess that most of us could say we feel that way though.  Tomorrow I am finishing up my series of messages on discipleship.  I have enjoyed doing it but I don't know if I can do the subject the kind of justice it deserves.  I know that some of my words have been offensive to some.  If they really were my words then I would regret the offense but I really believe that they are not my words at all,  but the Lords.  It is so very true that the Gospel offends those who would rather remain in the darkness. (John 1:1)  But I was once there too so I don't mind taking a little grief every now and then, especially in light of the suffering Christ endured to bring the Gospel to me.  If there is anything I have regretted about this topic it is the fact that I think sometimes I have not communicated clearly enough that discipleship is not a list of rules and do's and don't's. 

The nature of a disciple is to be so at one with God that our thoughts, actions and will are an extension of His.

I truly believe this!  I just wish that I could get that across in a way that would help people understand the depth of God's desire to know them and be known by them as an intimate friend.  I am convinced that if after death there was nothing more in the terms of existence it would still be worth living a lifetime as the friend of God.  I can personally attest to the joy, freedom and deep and abiding peace that knowing God has brought to my life.  I love this passage from Oswald Chambers, My utmost for His highest.

This friendship means being so intimately in touch with God that you never even need to ask Him to show you His will. It is evidence of a level of intimacy which confirms that you are nearing the final stage of your discipline in the life of faith. When you have a right-standing relationship with God, you have a life of freedom, liberty, and delight; you are God’s will. And all of your commonsense decisions are actually His will for you, unless you sense a feeling of restraint brought on by a check in your spirit. You are free to make decisions in the light of a perfect and delightful friendship with God, knowing that if your decisions are wrong He will lovingly produce that sense of restraint. Once he does, you must stop immediately.

                                                                                                        Oswald Chambers

We are, "God's will", how I love the thought and sound of that.  I really can't believe that God, the creator of the universe could love me so?  How our enemy loves to infuse our minds with the thought that God could not love one such as me.  How well satan has used this lie in the lives of those he would seek to cut off from this blissful life of oneness with our father.   But we know that if we remain in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ nothing can separate us from the love of God. 

Romans 8:37-39

^{No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.}

I'm sorry to go on and on...but I long to be just a small part of shedding the light and hope of Christ into the lives of those who are still groping in the darkness of this world to find...just one...small...ray of hope.  Jesus Christ IS, the light of the world.  Jesus Christ IS, my savior...my friend!

Lord, how can I begin to express the gratitude of my heart for your love and your grace.  Thank you that you created me for the sole purpose of walking in fellowship and friendship with you.  May time prove that I was one who knew you, not only of you.  Abba Father....Daddy....I love you......                                                                                                                                                              Amen

Self pity and self loathing are very good friends with each other and they love to visit us at the most inopportune times.  It is amazing how your mood can shift in such dramatic fashion the moment you take your eyes off of Christ.  I whish I didn't know that so well but then again I guess we are all human.  The question is what do you do about it when it comes along?  I have faced many dry and desolate places in my life when it seemed that the road ahead was just to hard.  But those are the times when God's oasis is just over the next hill.  there are times in life when you just have to take that next step and do the thing that is before you to get to the place God wants you to be.

Galatians 6:9-10

^{Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.}