Glamorous

magic.

by some magical occurrence, I have returned to tumblr. I literally tumbled across it. My mind had forgotten, my fingers are rested, my mind more full than it has ever been.

welcome one, welcome all!

……… Glamorous

are we ready?

me and my small group are on the last day of a 3 day fast. many people have asked what we are fasting for, and my response has been ‘to see Jesus’. there was no specific reason in which i thought we should fast, except just feeling like the Lord was telling me we should… i feel like that is reason enough. 

as i was reading the other morning in psalms, i happened to look over to the last chapter of job. the first verse i saw said “i had only heard about you before, but now i have seen you with my own eyes”. this was job talking to God after he been tried and tested.. the next day i was reading in john 14. it is Jesus speaking and he says “those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. and because they love me, my Father will love them. and i will love them and reveal myself to them.” i began to wonder what this means. what did job mean when he said he saw God with his own eyes, and what does Jesus mean when he says he will reveal himself to us. when i looked it up i was amazed. the word john uses in that verse is the same word that is used when Jesus appeared to many after his resurrection. it is also the same word that is used when Jesus says that he will appear before God on our behalf in hebrews. just think about that for a minute. are we really ready to have Jesus reveal himself to us? are we ready to see him face to face and worship him?… well get ready. 

we can try, but we will fail. Jesus is our only hope. Jesus is in control.

it’s a revolution, and yes, you cannot resist it.

a few quotes from the book i just read, The Irresistible Revolution.

“We can admire and worship Jesus without doing what he did. We can applaud what he preached and stood for without caring about the same things. We can adore his cross without taking up ours. I had come to see that the great tragedy in the church is not that rich Christians do not care about the poor but that rich Christians do not know the poor.”

“Few people are interested in a religion that has nothing to say to the world and offers them only life after death, when what people are really wondering is whether there is life before death… Don’t get me wrong. I’m excited about the afterlife… yet I am convinced that Jesus came not just to prepare us to die but to teach us how to live. Otherwise, much of Jesus’ wisdom would prove quite unnecessary for the afterlife. After all, how hard could it be to love our enemies in heaven? and the kingdom that Jesus speaks so much about is not just something we hope for after we die but is something we are to incarnate now. Jesus says the kingdom is ‘within us,’ ‘among us,’ ‘at hand,’ and we are to pray that it comes ‘on earth as it is in heaven.’” 

traveling

my, oh my. what an interesting event. in the past 8 weeks i think i have traveled more than i ever have (in the united states, of course). i have gone from missouri, to kansas, to new york state, to the jersey shore, to arizona (where i currently am), and colorado (hopefully in about 3 hours). I have slept in airports and flew here and there, all to realize… i love it. i love to travel and see new places and face new adventures. I have done all of this traveling alone, for the most part, and i realize that i am very independent, while at the same time, I love to be around people. It is the perfect mix for my life right now. Now i just have to pray that i get on this next flight so i can get to colorado tonight! 

kamp

no, i did not spell it wrong. tomorrow i depart for kamp kanakuk in bransen, missouri. this is an adventure like none i have taken before. i am going someplace i know nothing about, with nobody that i know. yes, i have gone on adventures before, however this is different. i am going alone. i am going with an open mind and an open heart. i am willing to meet new people and build new friendships. i am excited to share my life with the kids that i will be counseling and influencing. i will admit, i am going to miss my family and the friends i have here at home. but i will be home again. this is the opportunity of a lifetime and i am taking it. have an outstanding summer wherever you are and until next time… take care.

Chasing Francis

“If someone insists on labeling me in the future, I’d like to be known as a ‘come-and-see’ Christian. if someone asks me what kind of church i belong to, i want to say, ‘a come-and-see church’. come and see how we love the poor, come and see how we give dignity back to those who’ve lost it or given it away, come and see how we encounter God through every spiritual practice at our disposal, come and see how we love one another in community, come and see how we stand for peace and justice, come and see how we’ve been freed from consumerism and have become radically generous, come and see our passion for beauty, come and see how we defend the earth, come and see how we preach the gospel at all times and when necessary use words. come and see- and perhaps after a while you’ll decide to join us in the story we’re living in.”

thats what it’s all about right there. thats a part of my vision for a church one day. let it be. 

Church

so this morning was the first time since i’ve been here at Liberty that i attended a church that did not have about 3 million people at its service. i went to Brentwood Church, which is like 5 miles from school… and i really really liked it. i did not realize how much i missed the community of a local church family. although this church was still heavily populated with college students, it had the feeling of a community. the pastor was sharing about their vision for their new church building and their missions statement. it is a church based on reaching the lost in a relevant way. being there was a real encouragement to me. i have lost the desire that i had to be involved in the church since being here. mostly because i have not been a part of a church family that involved fellowship, but being there today has rebirthed that longing and desire to get involved. i’m excited to get involved with a small group and begin branching out and building relationships outside of my school and in the lynchburg community. thank God for fellowship and friendship.

Honor

i was thinking about being around in Jesus’ time yesterday. the crazy, wild things that were going on all the time around Jesus. it would have been so exciting, such and adventure to have been able to follow him around. he was like no other rabbi of that day. his theology was new, his ideas were different, and people either loved him or hated him.

to my next point.. this weekend myself and 8 friends went to massanutten ski resort and stayed with my grandparents. like usual, we had a nice little sunday morning service with all of us together. 5 guys, 3 girls, and 4 elderly. grandpa asked me to speak, which is typical, and to have 2 of my friends give a little testimony. it went great, all 3 of us spoke for about 5 minutes or so, then grandpa decided it would be a good idea to have all the kids, and elderly, share what God is doing in their lives. oddly enough there was a very similar statement from each of us. we all stated that our main focus is to put Jesus above everything else in our lives. that we need to stop trying to please ourselves, and instead give everything we have to glorify God.

here is where my thoughts come together.. why is this so hard for us to do in the world today? why is it such a struggle to put Jesus before ourselves? here is what i realized as we were all talking yesterday. back in Jesus’ day it was an absolute honor to be asked by a rabbi to follow him and learn his ways. kids studied their whole lives up until the age of about 16 to be able to follow in a rabbi’s footsteps. when Jesus asked the disciples to follow him, it was an honor. it was not a struggle, or even a hard decision. they immediately dropped what they were doing and went. how come we feel like we are doing Jesus a favor by telling him we will put him first? we are doing nothing for him. we should feel honored to be able to say that we are following Jesus. we are not doing God a favor, but he is doing us the biggest favor that was ever recorded in the history of mankind. maybe, just maybe, if we were to think about this and meditate on what Jesus did for us more often, glorifying him would not seem so difficult. 

A Philosophical Worldview

i was reading for philosophy yesterday and came to a stunning conclusion… i am pretty much brain dead. how often is it that i think past the surface about anything that really matters in my life? the book stated that all Christians need to be both spiritually regenerate and also intellectually engaged in our faith. “Our churches are unfortunately overlypopulated with people whose minds, as Christians, are going to waste… they may be spiritually regenerate, but their minds have not been converted; they still think like nonbelievers. Despite their Christian commitment, they remain largely empty selves. What is an empty self? An empty self is a person who is passive, sensate, busy and hurried, incapable of developing an interior life. Such a person is inordinately individualistic, infantile and narcissistic”. 

unfortunately this reminds me a lot of myself. i do not want to be this type of Christian. i want to be a believer who is able to confront the secularism that is drowning our faith with questions that many of us cannot answer. i want to answer those questions and change the impact that Jesus has on this culture. i want my church to raise believers who follow Christ with more than just their outside. i want to train people to be who will be able to share Jesus in a compelling and real way. i am reading C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity right now and i want to be able to speak like he does. i no longer am satisfied to just know the broad concepts of my faith… it is time to dig deeper. its time to create for myself a Christ centered worldview that i know about and can explain with confidence. i am finally ready.