When You Feel Inadequate…

When Moses met a burning bush, the LAST thing he wanted to do was take on the most powerful man in the world.

God said, “I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people out of Egypt.”

Moses said, “Who am I that I should go?”

God said, “I will be with you.”

Moses said, “Suppose they ask me, ‘What is his name?’  What do I tell them?”

God said, “I Am has sent me.”

Moses said, “What if they don’t believe me or listen to me?”

God said, “I will give you a sign.”

Moses said, “I have never been eloquent, I don’t speak well.”

God said, “I’ll give you words.”

Moses begged, “Please send someone else.”

God got angry and said, “I’ll send Aaron with you.”

This morning, I’m wondering what we think and say and do when we run into a burning bush…

Are you making excuses?  Or are you embracing your challenge?

When God calls you to an incredibly big task, you’re going to feel inadequate.  It’s bound to happen.  At first, you can try to talk your way out of the task, but eventually you have to make a choice…

Do you beg for God to choose someone else?  Or do you suck it up and listen to the voice?

Do you shrink back and run away?  Or do you keep step with the Holy Spirit?

Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.  -Galatians 5:25

 

If God’s Going To Do Something THROUGH You, He’s Going To First Do It IN You

Discipleship has always been about imitating God.

• God began something at creation, eventually sending Jesus to reach from heaven into the mess of earth.
• Jesus was imitating the Father, saying, “The Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.”  (John 5:19)
• Paul was imitating Jesus, saying, “Follow my example as I follow the example of Christ.”  (1 Corinthians 11:1)

From creation to today, there has been a direct line of men and women imitating the heart of God as they saw it in the previous generation.  Some generations have certainly done it better than others, but through several thousand years, the heart of God is still alive and beating in His people.  And now, if it’s going to pass to the next generation, it’s up to you.

Soemtimes, when you’re surrounded by a broken and messed up world, t’s easy to sit back, look at the mess all around us, and ask, “Why isn’t God doing something about all of this?”

Well, the truth is…  He is.  You’re it.

Take a look at the pain and the brokenness and the hopelessness all around you and then consider this:  The way God will shine His light into the darkness is through your life.  YOU are the conduit for His power.  You are the model the next generation is going to imitate.

That’s a risky level of responsibility.  And you’ll completely fail if you try to fix things your way.  But if you calibrate your life around God’s voice, you’ll begin experiencing unexpected breakthrough and you’ll begin to understand that if God’s going to do something THROUGH you, He’s going to first do it IN you.

That’s why, over the next couple weeks, I’ll be sharing some of what God’s been doing IN me as I’ve been learning to let Him work THROUGH me.  Hopefully, we’ll be able to journey together and begin seeing the Kingdom come to life all around us!

 

Praying Isn’t Like Trick-or-Treating

Since today is Halloween, today, we’re sharing an excerpt from Jerry Seinfeld’s book, Halloween.  It’s a great little book that my son and I laugh at every Halloween, but this year, as we were reading it, I had one of those moments when the Holy Spirit hammered me with a spiritual insight…

When you’re a kid you can eat amazing amounts of food.  All I ate when I was a kid was candy.  Just candy, candy, candy.  And the only really clear thought I had as a kid was get candy.

Family, friends, school — they were just obstacles in the way of getting more candy.

So the first time you hear the concept of Halloween when you’re a kid, your brain can’t even process the idea.  You’re like, “What is this?  What did you say?  Someone’s giving out candy?  Who’s giving out candy?  EVERYONE WE KNOW is just giving out candy?

“I gotta be a part of this!  Take me with you!  I’ll do anything they want…  I can wear that.

“I’ll wear anything I have to wear.  I’ll do anything I have to do to get the candy from those fools who are so stupidly giving it away.”

Year after year, I never gave up on trick-or-treating.  But I remember those last few Halloweens.

I was getting a little old for it…  I was just kinda going through the motions.

Bing-Bong  “Come on lady, let’s go!  Halloween, doorbells, candy, let’s pick it up in there.”

They come to the door; they always ask you the same stupid question.  “What are you supposed to be?”

“I’m supposed to be done by now.  You want to move it along with the 3 Musketeers?”

Sometimes people give you the little white bag, twisted on the top.  You know that’s gonna be some crummy candy.

“No official Halloween markings on it?  I don’t think so.  Do me a favor, you keep that one.  We’ve got all the doorstops we need already, thank you very much.  We’re going for name candy only this year.”

At the end of Halloween I was able to fill a punch bowl so full of candy that the top of it would be curved.  It was like a planet.

And I would consume the ENTIRE THING that night.

Next morning, I’d wake up, feel FANTASTIC.

For most of my life, I’ve approached God like a kid dressed up in a poorly-fitting Halloween costume, looking for just the right kind of candy.  I’d pray and pray and pray and if I didn’t get my “name brand answer,” I’d walk away disappointed, frustrated and doubting that God even cared.

But here’s the thing…  When I did get my “name brand answer,” I’d have no self-control, so I’d throw it all right in front of me and gorge myself on it to the point of being sick and missing the big picture of what God was doing.  And I never woke up feel fantastic the next morning.

Prayer isn’t a shopping list.  It isn’t like Trick or Treating.  And it isn’t self-serving.

Pray today that God would provide what HE knows you need and then have the self-control to enjoy His blessings in His way and in His time.

Not Everyone Can Hit A Home Run

Everyone loves to hit a home run.

No batter on the face of the earth has ever said, “You know, home runs are ok, but I’d really rather just lay down a sacrifice bunt.”

That just doesn’t happen!

Everyone loves to hit the bases-clearing, game-winning home run.  But you can’t clear the bases if they’re not full of runners.

I tell our Soma worship leaders all the time, “Not every week can be a home run, we need some singles, doubles and triples too.”

Now, I love the opportunity to lead Soma and I love what God has been doing in Brown County and I’m pumped to say that the past few weeks have been home runs in people’s hearts and lives.  But these last few weeks have only been home runs because we’ve had a summer full of singles, doubles and triples.  The past few weeks have been incredible, not because of our awesome plans, but because of the groundwork that’s been laid by the Spirit over a season.

The same thing is true of everything we do.  We’d all love to hit a home run and see our friend/co-worker/family enter into God’s covenant through baptism.  So we work and work and work but it seems like we aren’t getting anywhere so we get frustrated and discouraged when the truth is, we’re laying down bunts and hitting singles and advancing the Gospel in ways we haven’t considered.

When it feels like you’re fighting a losing battle, just remember, you’re loading the bases for Jesus to step to the plate and win the game.  Don’t give up, no matter how tired you get or how insignificant you feel.  You’ve got a ringer batting right behind you and the momentum IS going to shift.  Stay in the game.  Run the race.  Fight the fight.

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Previous Post…

On September 15, 2011, I shared another post about “playing church” called “There’s No Such Thing As ‘Fantasy Church.'”

Shut The Door

Sin kills.

It’s simple enough.  Hope comes through repentance and relief comes through forgiveness.

But if you don’t replace the sin with something equally consuming, you’re leaving the door wide open for the enemy.

“When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it.  Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’  When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order.  Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there.  And the final condition of that person is worse than the first.”                                      -Luke 11:24-26

Hope and relief – and repentance and forgiveness – are essential steps but NOT the finish line.

LIFE is the goal.  Life is the win.  And life only comes through transformation.

But you only experience transformation when you refill the emptiness that was sin with the new reality of God’s Spirit.

What’s filling the spot in your heart and life that used to be consumed with your sin?

God Is IN His People… And That’s Always Been His Plan.

God is IN His people.  And that’s always been His plan.  He created Adam and Eve and you and me in His image.  He literally imprinted our souls with His DNA.  He left His fingerprints all over us from the earliest days of forming us in the womb.  We were meant to reflect His Spirit in everything.

But the world was broken by sin…  The creation was given the choice to abandon the Creator…  And a barrier of separation was put up between God’s heart and ours.

God was FOR His people, but that wasn’t enough.  God was WITH His people, but that wasn’t enough.  Jesus was ONE OF His people, but that wasn’t enough.  Through the Spirit, God was once again IN His people.  Romans 5:5 says, “God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”

God is IN His people.  And that’s the ultimate goal of the Church…  To be the vehicle that God moves through to be IN the hearts of every single person He created.  The Church exists to create environments and opportunities for its culture to tear down the barrier between their hearts and their Creator.  Anything else is a waste of energy and resources.  The Church was never meant to gather an audience for a show.  The Church was created to reflect the God who is IN us.

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Make sure you check out the first three parts of the drawing…

#1 – “God Is FOR People.”  

#2 – “God Is WITH People.”

#3 – “God Is ONE OF People.”

This might be a great time to take advantage of the option to have this blog show up in your email or on your RSS reader.  Just use one of the options at the top right hand corner of the page and you’ll be sure to not miss the rest of what’s to come.

10 = 3000

Acts 1:12-14

Then the apostles returned to Jerusalem from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day’s walk from the city.  When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying.  Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James.  They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.

I wonder just what they were praying for?  Safety?  Direction?  Comfort?  Food?  Friends?

Acts 2:1-4

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place.  Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting.  They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them.  All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

I like to think they were praying for this very day to come.  Jesus lived, He taught, He died, He was buried, He resurrected, and He taught some more.  Then, He went up to heaven right before their very eyes and they stood there dumbfounded, just staring up at the sky until a couple of angels came and told them to get on with their business.

That’s when they started meeting and praying and…waiting.  What were they praying for?  I think their prayer in Acts 1 was that Acts 2 would come.  And after 10 days, it came in an overwhelmingly powerful way!  Get this…  10 days of constant prayer resulted in 3,000 baptisms. 10 = 3,000

What are you praying for?  A better house?  More money?  Happier wife?  Obedient kids?  More people to like you?

I wonder how many of us have ever spent 10 days in constant prayer that God’s Spirit would move IN us and THROUGH us.  Here’s a thought…  God won’t answer your prayer until you pray it.

Pray a better prayer.  Get a better answer.