Our world is changing, and it’s changing very quickly.
Let’s look, for example, at the business model that Christians use to reach unsaved people. It used to be that we (Christians) would invite people to come to church, or maybe a Christmas program, so that the people we invite could hear the message that someone else delivers. Or maybe we’d support missionaries in bringing Jesus to the natives of some far-off land. There’s nothing wrong with those things, but “inviting people” or “supporting missionaries” aren’t spiritual gifts. They’re important functions, but it’s also important to remember those that speak from a pulpit or travel to foreign lands are not the only ones with holy ministries.
Maybe this general attitude of “buck passing” is what’s led to the condition of the church now.
Every church is made up of imperfect people, so a church is never perfect, but these days it seems like things have gone off the rails. Many individual Christians have lost sight of the fact that Christ is the most important thing in their lives. It’s now common to have Christians (even members of the same church) torch each other over, of all things, politics or whether or not to get the COVID vaccine. I’m talking, like, vicious attacks, burning bridges kind of stuff. It’s as though these folks honestly believe that expressing their opinion is more important than the commission we’ve all been given to point others to Christ.
Jesus didn’t shy away from the controversial issues of the day, but He also rolled up His sleeves. He met people’s needs as a way of getting them to pay attention to what He had to say. People these days who think their spiritual gift is to gaslight other Christians on social media have lost sight of their priorities.
The thing that’s supposed to set us apart has now become a rarity. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. –John 13:35
In a time like this, we need people that are willing to live their lives for Christ in ways that are not commonplace. The ways that you can show love for or meet the needs of your neighbor are limited only by your imagination. People out there are struggling not only with the basics of food, water, and shelter, but are struggling with anxiety, infertility, holding a job, PTSD, insecurity, a special needs child, depression, bullying, or any number of other problems. Some of you reading this may have experience in one or more of those areas, and could be specially equipped to come alongside others currently facing that struggle. You may be considering taking a bold step to help meet someone’s needs, in the process opening the door to share Christ, but you’re hesitant because it seems too risky.
It’s not really my place to give it, but sometimes people feel like they need to hear it from someone…so, if that includes you, let me try to help out: you have my permission…go ahead and break the mold. You’re uniquely suited to do incredible things if you’ll allow God to use you. Reach people for Christ in a way that is nontraditional, is unusual, or hasn’t been done before. You were made for this! There are just two criteria you need to abide by: Love Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, and you are free to do anything short of sin to point other people to Him.
I don’t know who you are or what your plan is, but if you’re meeting those two criteria…I’m rooting for you.
In signing off, here’s a song by Jen Ledger that speaks to this topic. She herself broke the mold, and may inspire others to do the same.
People are fantastic at talking themselves out of things.
Did you ever just kind of “know” that you were supposed to take a certain action that had no other origin other than the Holy Spirit moving you to do it? Maybe it was to give some cash to someone you didn’t know. Maybe it was to connect and have a conversation with someone you hadn’t spoken with in a long time. It could’ve just been to speak up at a certain time.
But you didn’t do it.
Ever have a moment like that? Afterwards, you can brush it away, saying “It’s fine, that wouldn’t have made any sense.” On the other hand, maybe you actually resolved to do it. “You know what? No, that doesn’t make sense, but I just feel like I’m supposed to.” Then you never really got around to following through.
I’m curious; for every time God prompts a person to do something that they then follow through on, I’m a little scared to know how many prompts go ignored or are rationalized away.
When God does big things, He invites people to come along with Him; the people that go along and get to be a part of those events usually aren’t the people that say “no.” Sure, there are some “Jonahs” thrown into the mix, but by and large, God wants willing participants. You’ve heard the clichés. “If you want to walk on water, you’ve got to get out of the boat.” You know in your mind that God has an infinite number of ways to unlock your potential, but you struggle with giving up control and actually allowing Him to do it.
I get it. Really, I do.
Don’t let the story end there, though. Just because you struggle with something doesn’t mean it’s not worth the struggle. A step of faith, plus another step of faith, followed by additional steps of faith leads to walking by faith.
There’s a term in physics called “inertia.” You’ve probably heard it expressed as one of the famous laws of motion: a body at rest tends to stay at rest, and a body in motion tends to stay in motion, unless acted upon by an outside force. Whatever your life’s trajectory, when God sets something new in your path, He’s presenting you with a task that’s going to require a change in inertia. Being aware of your shortcomings and taking actions intended to combat your weaknesses can help build the momentum you need to overcome your existing inertia.
An example would probably help. When I feel God’s leading to pursue a course of action, my natural tendency is to stew on it for a bit and let the idea grow on me. “Let me sleep on it” is a common mantra in my life. That can be very helpful if I’m thinking about refinancing a mortgage, but it can be a bad thing if it’s following a calling from God. With time the idea fades or the window passes. There are times I’m reluctant to pursue something, but I know I really need to do it anyway. In my case, as a way of holding myself accountable, I tell someone about the idea. I’ve found that if the idea spreads to someone else, it has a tougher time dying. The person or people that know about it can ask me how it’s going. They can hold my feet to the fire, even if they’re just curious about whether or not I was even serious about it. God can use me to do things for His glory, but I have to be willing to make an effort…to take steps to fight through the distractions, to withstand all the other things that compete for my time, attention, and energy. In that fight, I can be my own worst enemy, so I have to take additional measures to move toward that goal.
Let me drill down a bit further, hoping it helps you in your own Christian walk.
I absolutely love it when God uses people that are “unqualified” to accomplish big tasks. David killed Goliath. Moses, at age 80, with a speech impediment, became the voice of God’s people. Jesus gathered 12 “nobodies” and changed the world. These are well-known Bible stories, but these things still happen today. God calls people to do big things that don’t make sense on paper, and He brings them success in order to showcase that it could only have happened through His intervention.
A little about me for those that don’t know me well. I’m very left-brained. My mind naturally gravitates toward math, science, logic, analysis, organization…all the things that are boring or cold for right-brained people, who favor imagination, intuition, the arts, and creativity. Now…I have some of those right-brained qualities, but my natural thought processes lean more toward a left-brained style.
So imagine my surprise when discovering that I feel led to write a fiction book. This is honestly a project that I feel God has laid before me.
That makes no sense, right? If you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time you might say “well, he already does a lot of writing, so that’s not really a stretch.” It’s true, I do a lot of writing for DareGreatlyNow.com, but almost none of it is fiction. I have no training in creative writing (or in whatever style blogging is considered, either). These entries are usually only two pages or so, and they’re not difficult to write about because most of them are either my experiences or they come right out of the Bible. I’m talking about a book that’s like, 40,000-50,000 words. The word that keeps coming back to me is unqualified.
Still, if you work at it for a long time, you could probably make that goal happen once, even if it’s difficult. Seemingly to make it apparent that God’s involved and that His strength is made perfect in my weakness, I feel led to write not one fiction book, but a series. Not just a trilogy. This is a seven-part series of books that are about 40,000-50,000 words each. That’s like starting with a blank piece of paper and ending up with The Chronicles of Narnia. Not just The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe…I’m talking even the ones you don’t remember or never heard of. (How many of you are now trying to see if you can name all the books in the series, I wonder?)
Alright, so let’s say I get past the nagging “unqualified” lens. The next word I deal with is “daunting.”
That’s absolutely an overwhelming task. I don’t have the time or the drive to do that! Here’s the thing though: if your vision of a God-initiated project in your life isn’t scaring you at least a little bit, you may not be envisioning something big enough. When God commissions you to do something, He also empowers and equips you to do it. Additional requirements that will need to be in place in order for your endeavor to succeed will be set in motion at the appropriate time. He’s not going to leave you flapping in the wind. As you start taking steps to make it happen (I have a colleague who might say “as you start taking bites of that elephant”), He sustains you and gives you what you need to move ever closer to the goal. By the time it’s over, it becomes evident that it could only have happened with His help.
Well there you have it, I’ve shared with you something that I feel led to pursue. Now I’m on the hook for it. I don’t really have a whole lot of experience with estimating how long this should take, but I’m guessing I’m signing up for something that will likely take the better part of a decade, unless I can somehow quit my job to work on it full time, but, you know, still have money for food, shelter, and all those other things my family’s grown accustomed to.
That’s me; that’s what I’m working with. I said in last week’s post that I’d have more on what God is asking of you. Odds are that you’ve been spending a lot more time at home over the past 10 months or so. That much time can drive a person crazy, but it can also provide opportunities for quieting yourself to hear what God would tell you.
I’m going to show you a less-than-3-minute video that I’ve shown you before, but a lot has changed in the world since the last time I did. It’s an advertisement for a product, but that’s not why I’m showing it to you. I don’t have any financial interest in the video or what it’s advertising. In fact, I haven’t even looked too far into what the video’s selling. I just think it’s a phenomenal video because it articulates a feeling I’ve experienced, so it hits home a little more than normal. I’m hoping that it helps provide some clarity for you, and maybe help you make sense of a restlessness that’s been pulling at the fringes of your mind.
After watching this video, if you have a picture in your mind (anywhere between super fuzzy or remarkably concrete) of what it’s talking about, I encourage you to do what I did in this post: know yourself enough to take some actions that will help you overcome the inertia that would otherwise keep you from following through. If you need to tell someone, tell them. If you need someone to tell but can’t get past how crazy you think it sounds, email me: tim@daregreatlynow.com. If God lays something on your heart, please pursue it. Think of it as the next “step of faith” in your journey toward “walking by faith.”
Let’s pause for a moment to think about what the term “the body of Christ” means. The people of the church across the world constitute “the body of Christ,” but what does that mean?
Think of the average human body. It has two arms, two legs, a brain, a mouth, etc. Each part of the body plays a role. Some of those roles are more visible (a pastor, for example). Others are less prominent, but are still important to glorifying God. Volunteering to clean bathrooms in the name of Christ truly takes a servant’s heart, but isn’t a function that gains a lot of attention. Think of this as a middle toe in the body of Christ.
If you’re a Jesus-follower, you’re a part of the body of Christ, and the Holy Spirit has blessed you with talents that you’re to use for the purpose of glorifying God. For some people, their calling is obvious. If teaching from the Bible comes very naturally to you, it’s probably not terribly difficult to see the direction you should go (the particulars may be a mystery, but the broad strokes aren’t). For others it may not be so clear cut. If you absolutely excel at being a business leader or entrepreneur, it may be confusing to try and see how to glorify God using your God-given talents. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to start a God-focused business. It might mean exactly that, but it could also mean that you should use your talents to run a successful business using God-honoring business practices in order to fill a need that’s not being addressed. Maybe it means that God commissioned you to make a boatload of money that can then be used for His glory. My point is that whatever you are naturally good at should be one of the ways you make an effort to glorify God.
Many of us are glad to see 2020 pass into the history books, but what impact will you make on the year 2021? What is it that you’re here to give, to achieve, for the glory of Christ? Maybe you don’t have something specific in mind, but then again maybe you do. Don’t let the fact that you lack a vision of the final product hold you back from starting the endeavor. About two and a half years ago I started getting a vague picture in my mind. I knew I had a lot of unique experiences, and I knew that I had a knack for writing. I could put them together somehow, but I wasn’t sure what that would look like…a book of some kind? How do I consistently write about my experiences in a way that doesn’t come across as, well, being “me-centric,” but instead honors Christ?
The truth is, this effort is still evolving. Even now I don’t know what the end version will look like. What comes naturally to me is writing about things I’ve observed or done and putting a Godly spin on it. Over and over it comes back to the same thing: I want to encourage people to reach their full potential in Christ, but I need to be flexible about how God actually does that through my efforts. The important thing is that, even if it’s not perfect, I’m pursuing the thing I feel called to do. This is my 150th post, and I still have tons of ideas about future posts. This blog is not wildly successful in terms of a vast readership, but I believe it honors God, and I think many times God wants to see actual obedience before He opens doors to new possibilities or additional responsibilities for His followers. He wants to see you move from “I would” to “I’m doing.” Lots of Christians say “sure, I would do that if I felt God wanted me to,” but I imagine a much smaller percentage say “I think I’m called to do this, and it’s time for me to step out.”
I love it when people make that leap into the unknown, and I want to encourage you to make the jump. Just a word to help buck you up…some of the people that start this process are successful right away. For the vast majority, this is not the case. There will be some struggle, some personal cost, and some frustration when seeing someone else’s quick success. I understand why you may feel that way, but don’t lose sight of the goal and start thinking that lack of quick success translates into a valid excuse for quitting.
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest, if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9
God put you where you are, He gave you talents and resources, and He wants you to follow through when He tells you which direction to go. Sometimes it will be close to home, other times it will require leaving the comfort and familiarity of your surroundings.
To close today’s post, I’d like to provide a quote from the movie “The Ghost and the Darkness.” In a scene where the main character, John, is conflicted about leaving his pregnant wife to embark on an exciting trip to a far-flung place in order to build an important bridge for his job, his wife helps put him at ease about leaving at a terrible time for their family life. In light of today’s post, it’s a quote that applies to us all, and I hope you’ll apply it in your life.
“You build bridges, John. You have to go where the rivers are.”
This world will crumble and it will get darker, and that provides the Body of Christ with more opportunities to shine brighter. May we all be ready and willing to go where we’re called in order to do God’s work in 2021 and beyond!
I’ve done two tandem jumps (where you’re connected to a licensed instructor) and 75 solo jumps. I’ve taken off in a plane 77 more times than I’ve landed in one. Cumulatively I’ve racked up just over 51 minutes of freefall.
To those that have never jumped, that might sound like a lot. For those in the know, though, it’s not that impressive. Seventy seven jumps is enough to know what you’re doing, but it’s nothing to brag about.
Contrast that with Don Kellner. He’s one of the owners of the drop zone where I learned to skydive, and is the Guinness World Record holder for most sport parachute jumps. In 2019 Don made his 45,000th jump! He probably doesn’t even remember the last time he landed in a plane.
I can’t find Don’s cumulative freefall total anywhere, but if you can measure mine in minutes, his can probably be measured in days or weeks. He’s performed over 10,000 tandem jumps; if he got 30 seconds of freefall for each one of those, that’s nearly three and a half days of his life he’s spent falling to the earth with someone else connected to his harness. The time he’s spent steering his parachute to the ground is in addition to that. Between plane rides up, freefalls, and parachute rides down, Don’s probably spent more than a year of his life off the ground.
Don and his team turn in his log books to make the record official after every thousandth jump, but in reality every jump Don Kellner makes is a new world record. Nobody has jumped as many times as him; every jump he makes is an endeavor nobody else has ever undertaken. Every single one is unprecedented.
I asked him once if any jump sticks out in his mind more than others, or if he ever had any especially dangerous problems during a jump. He recalled one jump where he tried to deploy his main chute, but when he tried, nothing happened. He then pulled the handle to open his reserve chute. Nothing happened then, either. Hurtling toward the earth without any functioning parachute, Don Kellner resigned himself to his fate. God must have smiled on him that day though, because one of the chutes shook loose and opened on its own, allowing Don to live to tell the tale.
He’s famous for not making a big deal of any particular jump. The folks around him have staged big events to commemorate big, round-number jumps, but leading up to it he always waves off the extra attention and says “just another jump.” It’s important to remember that jump number 45,000 could not have happened without jump number 26,373, without jump 999, or without jump 12.
Like Don, you and I lead lives that are record-setting in their own way. God calls us to a life of service in His honor. No two lives are the same. Each act of service we perform on Christ’s behalf, whether it’s something we’ve never done before or is the 45,000th time we’ve done the same thing, is unprecedented.
Also like Don, we don’t know how much longer we’ll be able to do the things God’s called us to do and what number “jump” will be our last. Sometimes we’re a part of doing something for God that’s surrounded by more fanfare, but most of the time our obedience is tied to things that are relatively unspectacular and rely on our regular faithfulness day after day.
That brings us to today. Each day we wake up presents opportunities to live for and honor God. Right now we live in very unusual times, which means we can collectively be faithful in ways we normally aren’t. I don’t know what that looks like for all of us, but you might already have a pretty good idea of how you can do the work God’s calling you to do.
Quarantines, social distancing, stay-at-home orders, and all the other recent buzz words result in a new (hopefully temporary) version of what we consider normal. There are a lot of lonely, confused, and/or scared people out there. In order to radiate God’s love during times of this “new normal,” we may need to take unprecedented steps to deliver it. From now until COVID-19 is a thing of the past, every day in a sense is a record-breaker in terms of the actions we take. We…you…are breaking new ground here, every day. Take the precautions you need to (and in some cases have been mandated to do), and within those parameters, have a look at practical new ways to love your neighbor.
And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ -Matthew 25:40
When I was in college I took classes in Outdoor Leadership, which included developing skills in both technical areas and in leading individuals and teams toward outcomes. One day our class was learning about how to properly set rope anchors for rock climbing. Obviously, it’s very important that your equipment catches you if you fall off a rock face, so our instructor was teaching us how to secure the safety rope to a number of anchors we had established at the top of the cliff.
The instructor, Kevin,
demonstrated a variety of ways to attach safety equipment to boulders and trees
at the top. He made a point to emphasize that we’d need to establish three
solid anchors before being able to proceed. “That way, if one of them
fails, you’ve still got two. Even if two of them fail, you’ll still have one
more.”
Of course, someone
asked the question. “What if this one goes, that one fails, and the other
one goes, too?”
Kevin looked at him, confused.
“You mean if all three of them
fail?”
“Yeah.”
“Then God wants
you dead.”
When you have a God-given
task laid out in front of you, it’s certainly a good thing to spend time planning
and preparing, but there comes a point where you’re prepared enough and it’s
time to get moving. Kevin didn’t want us to establish four anchors, or five.
Three was enough. The chances of all three anchors failing was so low that
setting more of them would have been a waste of time. If we spent time focusing
on more than three, that time took away from our actual reason for showing up
at the cliff that day.
It’s possible to take
so many safety precautions that it becomes too cumbersome to do anything. There
comes a point at which you are suitably prepared, reasonable precautions have
been taken, and you’re ready to leave the comfortable behind. The only thing
that remains is for you to take action.
By all means plan
effectively. Expect problems and make backup plans if necessary, but don’t let
perpetual planning stop you from getting started. If all the necessary pieces
are in place, it might be that you
are the only thing holding you back. What are you waiting for?
There was a lake not
too far away from the college I attended. Some of the college’s classes either
took place on the lake or took field trips here. I did some canoeing on the
lake for one of the Outdoor Leadership Training courses. The college offered waterskiing
during the first half of the fall semester, too.
I don’t remember what
course it was; it must have been some kind of Biology or Ecology class that
brought us to the Lake one September day. Our class was going to use the same
speedboat that the college used for waterskiing to go out into the lake and take
water samples at various depths.
There were too many
students in the class to bring out in the boat all at once, so we split into
two or three groups that took turns heading out to the middle of the lake. The
driver, a student named Laura, spent a few minutes driving out to deeper water,
a few minutes taking samples, a few minutes joyriding, and a few minutes
heading back to the dock to switch out students.
I was in the last group
of students to head out on the lake. In order to make room for more students,
the professor stayed behind on the dock while the rest of us rode off to the
middle of the lake. As we sped along, I looked around the boat. It was very
similar to the one I had driven for a few summers and had enjoyed going
kneeboarding behind. As providence would have it, on the floor of the boat sat
a lifejacket, a kneeboard, and a ski rope.
We started collecting
our samples or doing whatever experiments we were supposed to do. I wanted to
say something about wanting to give kneeboarding a try, but thought it would be
too crazy. As we wrapped up our tasks on the lake, I couldn’t help myself any
longer. I forget how I did it, but I asked Laura if she’d be open to letting me
jump in the lake to go kneeboarding. To my great surprise, she said
“sure.”
I didn’t ask any other
questions. I lost the shirt/shoes/socks, emptied my pockets, donned the life
jacket, grabbed the board and rope, and jumped into the water. It was cold, but
I didn’t care. We got lined up, Laura hit it, and we were off to the races. The
water was a lot choppier from the wind than I was used to, but I was kneeboardingin a science class.
We were far enough away
from the dock, or maybe around a bend in the lake so that the professor and my
classmates on land couldn’t see us. We didn’t want to goof off too long and get
in trouble, so after a bit of tooling around, Laura stopped the boat and I
climbed back in. We stowed everything and headed back to shore. Come to think
of it, I don’t think anyone on shore even knew what we’d done.
There will be key moments in your life where you only
have a single opportunity to seize the chance to do something you want to do. There’ll
be times when it simply will not happen unless you step out and make it happen.
If you hem and haw, you’ll be stuck watching as the opportunity passes you by.
You might have to
abandon the norms you’re accustomed to. I didn’t even have swim trunks, but
when Laura said she was open to my request, I was in the water with no
questions asked, wearing whatever clothes I already had on.
Many times in this blog
I’ve written that God will place opportunities in your path to do something
great. I’ll use this post to clarify: He will place the opportunity for you to
do something great just off your path.
God loves the timid, but He also has a special place in His heart for the bold.
If there’s something big, bold, and brash that you feel called to do on Christ’s behalf…don’t sit on it. God might bring an opportunity near your orbit, but you’re going to have to pursue that chance…you’ll need to run after it and chase it down. If you feel called to make it happen, live with abandon. You might even have to jump into the cold water with your regular clothes on.
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Once I finished
college, I didn’t do anything related to my academic major. I needed a job, but
didn’t have anything professional in mind, so I moved back in with Mom and Dad
and worked construction.
Since I had worked
construction the past few summers, nothing felt different initially. Doing the
job as a college grad didn’t feel any different than doing the job the previous
summer. It didn’t really seem strange until the end of the summer, when I
ordinarily would have prepared to head back to school. To help mark the
occasion of our entry into the “real world,” a college buddy and I decided to
go skydiving.
We made some
reservations, then showed up at the airport one Saturday morning early in
September. We signed the waivers, took the short class, then waited our turn.
We signed up for tandem
jumps. That’s where you’re connected to an experienced jumper that’s trained to
do two-person jumps. You don’t have to focus on any of the flight plan, what
your altitude is, etc. All you have to do is go along for the ride and enjoy
yourself. My tandem instructor was Frank. He took us over to the tiny plane
we’d use and walked us through the steps we’d later take when exiting the
aircraft. After that we squeezed into the plane, took off, and started the
climb to 10,000 feet.
(I paid extra to have my jump recorded, so there was a jumper with a camera and video camera on her helmet that went along. Unfortunately I don’t have a digital copy; it’s still on VHS format, so I can’t show it here. I can share some of the pictures though.)
There were six jumpers
and a pilot crammed into a little Cessna. As we reached 3,000 feet, the door
opened and one of the guys jumped out. I’m not sure if I was aware of this at
the time or not, but it turns out this man was Don Kellner, who was (and still
is) the world record holder for the number of sport parachute jumps. At the
time, he had about 30,000 jumps or something ridiculous like that. In order to set
and build on his record, he’d be on just about every plane that went up, and
most of the time he’d hop out around 3,000 feet. He’d skip the freefall and
deploy his parachute right away. They called this type of jump a “hop ‘n pop.”
I didn’t see it coming, so all I knew was that the door blew open without
warning and a guy fell out.
The rest of the climb
to altitude was uneventful. It was my buddy and I, our two tandem instructors,
and a videographer. They kept the mood light by making plenty of jokes, so that
we’d stay loose and not seize up when the door opened and we stuck our heads
outside the plane and looked down.
The time finally
arrived. We shuffled around inside the plane to get connected to the
instructors. We went over a few last-minute things, gave a final thumbs-up, and
then they opened the door.
Inside the plane it got
windy and much cooler than it had been on the ground. We inched up to the
doorway, and the videographer actually climbed outside the plane and hung from
the wing strut while she waited for us to exit. Frank shouted in my ear, I did
what he had showed me on the ground earlier, and out the door we went.
This is the only part that feels like you’re falling
There’s really not a
good way to convey what it’s like to freefall. It’s unlike anything else. There
was only a brief fraction of a second where there was any falling sensation,
and that was as you fell out of the plane. The ground didn’t seem like it was
rushing up at me at all. It was just windy, loud, and amazing. You can judge
for yourself just how miserable I was.
We fell for about 30
seconds, reaching a max speed of around 120 mph. It didn’t feel that fast,
because there were no references other than people falling at the same speed
(it’s not like you fell past a bird or a hot air balloon at 120 mph, for
example). It was smooth. The video shows that Frank and I did some goofy stuff
and made weird faces (imagine what kind of silly stuff you’d do if someone
pointed a leaf blower at your face). Then Frank deployed the main chute, and after
the rapid deceleration the loud rush of air gave way to a gentle breeze and
relative silence as we slowed down to about 20 mph. He then gave me an aerial
tour of the surrounding area as we continued our descent. Five minutes later we
were safely on the ground, and I was ready to do it all again.
I fell over a mile and a half straight down and lived to tell the tale
I was hooked.
Eventually I went back and did it again, and I’ll share more skydiving stories
in the future, but for now here’s what’s important. When you jump out of a
plane, there’s no doing it halfway. There’s no way to stay in the plane and at
the same time experience what it’s like to leave it midair. You either leave
the plane or you don’t, and the two outcomes are vastly different.
Despite what many
people seem to think, access to Heaven is based on an either/or criterion: you
either have a saving relationship with Jesus Christ, or you don’t. Here too,
the two outcomes are vastly different. If you don’t have that relationship,
you’re not going to get into Heaven.
“That’s incredibly
intolerant!” It’s okay to think that, because it is. I serve an intolerant God.
For some reason that seems to shock people. God doesn’t tolerate our antics and
rationalizations. I can’t really blame
Him. Why should He? Imagine you had a child that wanted nothing to do with you,
yet demanded all the benefits of being associated with you. On top of that,
they replace you with someone else and still want the rights and privileges of
being your child. How tolerant would you be?
These days there seems
to be very little in terms of pure black and white. Just because the world
looks at things with a “everything is relative” mindset however, doesn’t make
it true or mean we get to water down God’s truth. There ARE absolutes. One of them is that the only
way to Heaven is through Jesus Christ.
People will decry this
view as having a lack of inclusivity. I’d counter that Christ was one of the
most inclusive historical figures ever.
He went out of His way to reach the dregs of society; He violated cultural
norms by empowering and addressing women directly; and He advocated for fair treatment
of foreigners.
The difference is that
Christ wanted all people to hear the truth so they could make their own
decision. He wanted everybody to have access to this information regardless of
their background or standing. What they did with it was entirely up to them,
but He wanted everyone in the world to know that the only way to God (and
Heaven) was through Him.
You either have that
saving relationship or you don’t. There’s no doing it halfway, and there’s no
middle ground. The good…no…the great
news is that you’re welcome to start that saving relationship right now. Even
if you think you’re beyond saving or that you’ve done things that are too
terrible to be forgiven, He won’t turn you away.
Maybe you’ve never
prayed before, but if you’re open to this, pray this prayer along with me:
Dear Jesus…thank you so
much for loving me even when I don’t deserve you at all. Lord, come into my
life, change me, break me, make me new, make me whole…forgive me. Purify my
heart. Jesus I believe you died on the cross and rose again three days later.
You are my savior and one day I will live with You forever. But meanwhile, help
me to stand for you. To shine for you, to make a difference and let your truth
be known. Use me Lord, Holy Spirit fill me to overflowing. I love you so much!
In Jesus’ name, amen.
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The church we attend is
fortunate to have a large amount of musical talent among its congregation.
Each week the church
holds multiple services, so it’s asking a lot for the same people to be on the
worship team week after week for all the services. Volunteers from the
congregation stepped up, and as a result the worship team has a good amount of
“bench strength.”
When the team is
leading worship, there are usually a lot of people on stage. Normally there are
two keyboardists, three or four guitarists, a drummer, and some singers.
There’s a lot happening during a given song.
I’m not sure why, it’s
probably the amount of movement, but my eye is always drawn to the drummer. Like
any other role on the worship team, there are different types of people that
play the drums. All of them can keep the beat just fine, but while some of them
look calm and in complete control of the rhythm, others play with intensity and
look like they’re out of breath and are right on the edge of losing musical
control.
I always enjoy when one
young man in particular takes his turn at the drums. Not only are his arms
flailing around in perfect timing, smashing his instruments, but his head also
bobs to help keep the beat. At the same time his facial expression conveys his
sheer passion for the task.
The drums and cymbals
our church uses are electronic; I’m guessing that someone made the decision to
use electronic cymbals so that metal ones don’t overpower the rest of the
worship team. They make less noise when the drumsticks physically strike them,
and the sound system adds it in to the overall mix coming out of the speakers.
When I’m sitting in the congregation and this guy is drumming, I can clearly
hear the sound of his drumsticks slapping the cymbals no matter where I sit in
the room.
This is someone that’s doing what he was created to do,
and it’s a joy to behold.
We’re all created with
gifts. I heard someone describe a gift as “the thing you do the best with the
least amount of effort.” You might make a living from it, but not necessarily.
For some people, standing up in front of a group and teaching is something that
comes naturally, but for others that idea is terrifying. Some people are
amazing hosts/hostesses. It’s possible to be an incredibly empathetic
conversationalist and have an occupation where that skill isn’t used at all.
Your gift might be
something you think is absurd, or even worthless. It doesn’t matter how you
feel about it, but I’ll tell you that you’ll feel satisfaction in using your
gifts to glorify God. If you make amazing fried chicken…fry it while giving God
glory. If mowing grass in cool patterns comes naturally to you, mow it like
there’s no tomorrow. If you write computer code or create algorithms
effortlessly, write and create with passion! There’s no telling how your gift
will combine with others that are using their gifts, and what that will result
in.
What were you created
to do? The more important question is: are you doing it? (What good is a drum
that can’t be played, or a Lamborghini that sits in the garage?)
The drummer in our
church isn’t changing lives or saving souls by playing the drums. I can only
imagine though, that if it’s fun for me, an ordinary guy, to watch him play, our
Heavenly Father is smiling even bigger to see one of his beloved children employ
the talents entrusted to him to pursue his calling. Wouldn’t you like to bring
the same kind of smile to God’s face?
As a kid I always hated
this time of year. There’s a mental shift once the calendar gets close to
rolling over from August to September. Even if the temperature is in the 80s or
90s, the pool’s still closed after Labor Day. All the fun and relaxed schedules
of summer come to an end, and it’s time to once again get into the routine of a
new academic year.
As an adult I look
forward to this time of year. The heat and humidity of summer (ever so
slightly) start to fade, it becomes safer to venture outside without breaking
into a sweat, and football season starts up again.
It’s a time of new routines.
Once you’re set in a
routine, it becomes difficult to make changes to it. My guess is that if you
regularly attend a church, there are either end-of-summer events going on right
now or a series of kickoff events for various ministry programs coming up in
the next month.
My challenge to you: be
intentional about designing your Fall schedule. If you’re like most people, you
probably don’t have a whole lot of extra time. If you’re interested in a Bible
Study, some kind of home group, or discipleship class that’s starting up soon,
you’re not likely to join it once it’s already been meeting for a month or two.
If you want to make it happen, do what you’ve got to do so you’re at the
kickoff event or the first meeting.
Hello Fall
I know it doesn’t seem
like it now, but in about six weeks you’re probably not going to be willing to
commit to an ongoing gathering because Thanksgiving is right around the corner.
After that December starts and, well, we all know how busy that month can be,
so you won’t be able to jump in to anything new until a few weeks into the new
year.
Whoa! In two sentences,
four months flew by! I meant for this to be a little ridiculous, but I suspect
it also rings true for a lot of people. The sole point of this post is that you
can’t just let life “happen” to you; you have to take control of your calendar
and wrangle it so that you set yourself up to spend time doing the things you
want to be doing.
The end of summer is a
great time to look ahead. By all means celebrate the fun memories you’ve made
over the past few months, but if you spend too much time looking backward, your
schedule will be dictated for you.
Little kids are a hoot,
man. Mine are all old enough to swim on their own at this point, but it’s fun
to think about when they were younger and the things they’d do at the pool.
As a dad, one of the fun
things to see is the trust your kids place in you. The pool is a place where
the trust you’ve built with your kids becomes most evident. For a kiddo that’s
3 or 4 years old and doesn’t know how to swim yet, it’s a scary thing to walk
to the edge of the pool and jump into water that might be too deep to stand in.
It’s a big deal to jump off the side of the pool into Daddy’s arms! You look at
them and you can almost see the wheels turning. It’s like they’re thinking “Daddy’s
right there, but will he catch me if I jump?”
It’s so fun to stand in
the pool, looking up at them, and say “go ahead, I’ll catch you,” and to see
them think it over. I have three kids, so I’ve seen a few different reactions.
There’s always some hesitation; sometimes it passes quickly and other times it
takes some additional coaxing for them to commit to the jump.
It’s fun to watch their
eyes, too. They look at my outstretched arms, gauging whether or not they think
they can make it. Once they decide they think they can do it, they look me in
the eyes, seeking assurance that I’m focused on them and will be there when
they need me. My next move would be to give them a non-verbal green light.
Sometimes it was a silent nod. Other times it was a big smile. With intense focus, they’d stick
out their little tongue, crouch, and take a flying leap into Daddy’s arms.
It’s a simple, but
beautiful picture. As the father to my children, I cherish that trust that
we’ve developed together. They each placed so much trust in me that each one of
them were willing to step outside their comfort zones to do something beyond
what they could do on their own. Building trust is something that’s done over
time, but can be shattered in an instant. As they each belly-flopped their way
into my arms, it was so fun to join in their celebration with exclamations, smiles,
and laughs. Almost right away they wanted to do it again, and then again. Building
further on that trust, I was able to back farther away from the edge, or move
into deeper water, and they’d be okay with making the leap because they knew.
They knew “it’s okay, he’s got me.”
Your Heavenly Father
takes pleasure in seeing you demonstrate your trust in Him, too. Nothing brings
Him a smile quite like seeing His children trust Him and leap with both feet
into the challenge He’s given to them. Like an earthly father, He coaxes the
child according to what he or she needs. Maybe it’s a silent nod, a big smile,
or in some cases, a push from behind.
Give Him an opportunity to build more trust with you. Summon up your courage and concentration, stick out your tongue, and take that flying leap. He’s got you.
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