Desires

Ever wonder if your actions and words make a difference?  Ever wonder if what you are dreaming of is actually going to happen?  Ever wonder if God's working behind the scenes, even when you can't see it? 

It's my dream to see students turn to Christ and follow Him with everything in them.  It's my dream to see a church full of people come to rely on Christ and each other, fully in unity and fully in relationship.  I'm starting to see it!  Last week, two students showed me the journal of Bible verses and thoughts they are keeping everything, evidence of their alone times with God's Word.  A week and a half ago, the we moved into our new house closer to church, where I've been dreaming of starting a small group to teach others how to host small groups in their homes!  God's plans and my dreams are starting to collide...what a beautiful moment. 

In Psalms you can find a passage that is very familiar to most Christians, especially those who are waiting for something significant in their lives: "Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart."  This isn't saying that God is some waiter who will bring you everything you want, but it is saying that God's desires become YOUR desires when you draw closer and closer to Him.  He puts those desires in your heart!  I recently spoke to a friend of mine who desires to be married.  She said, "maybe that's just not God's plan for me."  Friends, if you have a deep desire in your life, chances are, God put it there!  The key is to grow closer and closer to the Lord while you are waiting, and you'll begin to see everything fall into place as you become the person the Lord wants you to be.

Happy waiting!

Powerful Moment (in the shower?)

I've been getting up early (5:00am) to workout on the eliptical machine before work.  Wednesday, I did NOT want to get up!!!  It was the LAST thing on my mind, but I ended up doing it anyway.  While I was in the shower, I started praying for my youth kids and students I had just seen on a DVD called "Gospel Journey Maui".  All of the sudden, the presence of God filled my bathroom and I began to cry.  The Lord told me that many of the people I was praying for were running from him, just like I was running from trying to workout. 

How many of us know someone who is running from the Lord?  I would venture to say that almost all of us do.  Perhaps in many ways, we could be running from the Lord ourselves.  The greatest thing about our Lord is that he CHASES us!  What's more is that he wants us to chase others for Him! 

When was the last time you seriously prayed for someone in your life who is running from God?  When was the last time you took moments out of your busy day to chase someone who needs love or needs to know more about our amazing Lord?  God really broke my heart on Wednesday for a lot of people that I care about, but had not been too serious about praying for.  Will you let him break YOUR heart too?

In Prison

I woke up this morning remembering a dream that I had during the night.  In my dream, I found myself in a prison, sentenced to ONE day in jail.  I kept thinking that it was a mistake.  I hadn't really done anything really wrong; I just knew it.  They made me wear blue overalls and slippers.  I had to give up all of my possessions.  They took me through the jail looking for a cell that wasn't crowded and as I looked at everyone there, I kept thinking how DIFFERENT I was from them.  They were CRIMINALS!  All the while, I'm thinking it must be a mistake that I was there!  In each location in the jail, I saw people I knew.  There were students from school, kids from youth group, people from work--and all of them looked disappointed in me.  They couldn't believe that I was there with them, guilty, in the jail!  And I kept telling them it was a mistake, but as I walked further and further through the prison, I started to feel my guilt.  Could it be that I actually deserved to be there?

You know, I think as church-going Christians sometimes we have a temptation to feel better than everyone else because we think we are more "holy" or "righteous" but when it comes right down to it, we are just as guilty as everyone else.  The Bible says that we have ALL fallen short of the glory of God because of our sin.  ALL of us!  It doesn't matter what that sin is either--lying, gossip, murder, homosexuality--it is all sin to God and therefore makes us unclean UNTIL we place our faith in Jesus Christ as the savior and forgiver of our sins.

However, as Christians, we do have a responsibility to live different lives than the ones around us!  We have to "put on the Holy Spirit" and be Jesus to the people around us.  They shouldn't see us doing the same things they are.  We shouldn't want to live "in the world" and desire the things of the world like non-believers do.  We have something better to live for!  An evangelist at church today said that as Jesus was hanging on the cross, one of the thieves beside him was hateful and the other was accepting.  The accepting thief, the one who asked Jesus to remember him when He got to His kingdom in Heaven, must have seen the compassion in Jesus' eyes.  He must have felt the love Jesus had for him even though he was a sinner.  The same must be true of us.  People around us must be able to see Jesus in our eyes.  They need to feel Jesus' compassion through OUR actions and communications with them.  As our evangelist said this morning in church, the best way to witness is to live the life of a Christian that loves God instead of the fleshly desires of the world.