Don't Waste Your Life

This is an excerpt from John Piper at the One Day Conference in 2000.

"I tell you what a tragedy is. I'll read to you from Reader's Digest (Feb. 2000, p. 98) what a tragedy is: "Bob and Penny... took early retirement from their jobs in the Northeast five years ago when he was 59 and she was 51. Now they live in Punta Gorda, Florida, where they cruise on their 30 foot trawler, play softball and collect shells." The American Dream: come to the end of your life - your one and only life - and let the last great work before you give an account to your Creator, be "I collected shells. See my shells." THAT is a tragedy. And people today are spending billions of dollars to persuade you to embrace that tragic dream. And I get forty minutes to plead with you: don't buy it."

"Don't waste your life. It is so short and so precious. I grew up in a home where my father spent himself as an evangelist to bring the gospel of Jesus Christ to the lost. He had one consuming vision: Preach the gospel. There was a plaque in our kitchen for all my growing up years. Now it hangs in our living room. I have looked at it almost daily for about 48 years. It says, "Only one life, twill soon be past. Only what's done for Christ will last."

To read more go to
Desiring God.

Or read his book "Don't Waste Your Life."

Allowing the Holy Spirit to Transform Part 2

Dye tells this story:
While working in the Wagu village, many came to Christ. Instead of making a list of behaviors, the missionaries advised the Wagu people to go to God for wisdom and direction regarding how they should act, what they should do or not do, what ceremonies or parts of their culture should be kept, which should be dropped. The missionaries tended to be impatient about certain activities that were displeasing to God. But, they restrained from expressing their opinion. They wanted the people to develop a relationship with God and to be able to hear God’s voice for themselves.

One aspect of the culture that disturbed the missionaries was polygamy. The older men took several wives which left no women for the younger men. Therefore, not only was there polygamy but also adultery was rampant in the tribe. The Wagu people determined that if they were to love one another, then polygamy was selfish. The developed a law that stated that no man was allowed to take a second wife if there was a single man without a wife. After 15 years, polygamy was non-existent; all the young men had wives; the rate of adultery was drastically cut.

This article convicted me of the arrogance that I carry, thinking I have a right to determine the path of transformation. It taught me that if I will focus on teaching the 3 key principles, the Holy Spirit will step in and create real, sustaining transformation in people and communities. It has rocked my discipleship principles to the core!

Allowing the Holy Spirit to Transform - Part 1

An article by T. Wayne Dye has rocked my core theology of discipleship. (From my Perspectives Class)



Dye walks you through the life of Pete the missionary. A tribe that he is working with has just become Christians. There are some traits that Pete cannot stand in this tribe and that they need to be changed now that they have become Christians. He has taken it upon himself to let this tribe know what they are doing wrong (all under the pretense of trying to help them).

Dye is making the argument that we as disciple-ers are to allow the Holy Spirit to bring about transformation. And even harder to hear, that maybe the Holy Spirit will convict in a totally different sequence than he did with me.

“Anyone who has followed Christ for long has experienced the Holy Spirit convicting him or her of behavior that they had not realized was sinful. This is not a once-for-all experience. God repeatedly and progressively leads individuals through a process of transformation to become increasingly like Christ. In a similar way, God moves by His Spirit and speaks by His word to bring about gradual changes in a community of believers. We find that the Holy Spirit brings conviction for particular sins in different sequence from one people to another” (Dye).

It is not my right or responsibility to point out what “sins” people need to work on. By doing this I am making the gospel about a list of “to do’s” instead of about salvation by grace. What I am responsible for teaching is
a) God is sovereign
b) The Bible is the authority of Truth
c) To love one another

Through these core teachings, the Holy Spirit will be able to transform a society.

Living as the Poor

My friends from Indiana, Jeff and Adrienne Reichanadter are having an incredible expereince with their family. They have left everything and gone to India for 6 months to work at an orphanage. Their blogs are so awesome of what they are seeing as they live as the poor.

This was their most recent post. Awesome. I wonder if God would give my family an experience like this?

The Reichanadter Journey

Thy Kingdom Come

Perspectives Week 3- “Thy Kingdom come…”

One of Jesus’ main themes in His teaching was the Kingdom of God. He taught in order show people how to enter the Kingdom of God. His miracles were proof that the Kingdom of God had come. His parables illustrated the truth about God’s Kingdom. He even taught His disciples that in prayer the heart should be, “Thy Kingdom come.”

“The Kingdom of God is His Kingship, His rule, His authority. When we realize this, we can see this meaning in passage after passage in the New Testament. We can see that the Kingdom of God is not a realm or a people, BUT IT IS GOD’S REIGN. Jesus said that we must “receive the Kingdom of God” as little children (Mark 10:15). What is received? The church? Heaven? What is received is God’s rule. In order to enter the future realm of the Kingdom (heaven), people must submit themselves to God’s rule here and now” (George Eldon Ladd). Therefore in the prayer “Thy Kingdom come,” we are pleading for God to reign on earth.

Do we really desire God’s Kingdom to be on earth?

I can only answer this from an American point of view. Because the current generations of Americans have never experienced a tyrannical ruler ship over our country or much suffering, I don’t believe that we necessarily desire God’s Kingdom to be set up. This is a very different mindset than what a New Testament Jew would want. Israel had been under Roman rule, Babylonian rule, plus many others. They very much wanted God’s Kingdom to conquer all who had tried to rule over them. We in America still have our freedoms and our “good life.” Why would we want that disrupted by God’s Kingdom? I don’t think until we really see and experience the godlessness and suffering of this world , do we crave to see God’s Kingdom rule.

Ruined for the Ordinary

In my Perspectives Course (www.perspectives.org) there were several people who gave their testimonies of what Perspectives taught them. One college girl said, “This class will ruin you.” The leader took that phrase a little further by saying, “This class will ruin you for the ordinary.” I found myself excited to ask the Lord for this, but also very scared.

I have always enjoyed doing things that were exciting, thrilling and adventuresome. Yet I also have grown to enjoy a predictable life with much routine. This statement reminded me how much I desire to be a part of things that are out of the ordinary. But, that same week I had to wrestle with giving up stability as I define it: a Pottery Barn home with room for everyone, a good school that my kids can stay at until they graduate, a car that works, a job that is reliable and a community for me to participate in.

You see I have given up the right to control my life. I believe that God is much more capable in organizing the experiences that I have and the environment that my family is to be raised. With having given up the control of my life, are times when the realization comes that I am holding too tightly to a dream, a hope, a wish. My prayer became, “Lord, ruin me for the ordinary.” I want to look back on my life and my family’s life and see exciting adventures. But with that my life will probably not look like what I define as stable. I have prayed that the Lord would make me okay with that.

Two sites to check out if you are interested in being "ruined for the ordinary.



www.perspectives.com
www.wreckedfortheordinary.com

Saved by Trash

Today the pastor in our church told the best story of someone finding Jesus: (This is told from the Pastor's point of view)

"Today we are welcoming new members. There is one member that you need to hear the story of how he ended up here. Doug Shoemaker is a sanitation worker. Someone had thrown away a CD that had one of my sermons on it. Doug found it while working, amidst the trash. He took it home; he listened to it and decided that he needed to come to Village Bible to hear more. My question is, 'Who threw away a sermon of mine? (lots of laughter) I just want you to know that what man intended for evil, God intended for good! (and the best part) Don't forget that God is in the details, and no detail goes without His notice."

How cool is that story. A sanitation worker would find a discarded sermon on a CD, take it home, listen to it and become a follower of Christ. Our God is so much bigger than we can imagine. This encourages me at a time in my life when I can't see how God is going to fulfill His promise to us.

Yet as our pastor is saying throughout his new series on God's promises, "Are you promise level living, or feelings level living?" Do you base the evaluation of your life on your feelings or on the promises of God