Week 4, Monday started off with some intense pain from physical therapy, It was needed though. Just like our spiritual life, stretching hurts, but its necessary for growth! We could stop their and preach a while lol. This week has been filled with blessings on top of blessings. Im learning more and more that God doesn’t want our lip service, he wants our lives to live out those things which we profess, like trust. From the first service, God began to show me many things in the scripture. First we looked at how we really view God. We looked at Isaiah as an example. He saw God as HUGE! The hem of his garment filled the temple! I also learned about those seraphims that are constantly flying around going “Holy holy holy, is the Lord God almighty”. You know, they were made to worship God, and that’s what they did 24/7. They didn’t know anything about “redemption”, or being “saved”, yet they praised God all the day long. We have even more reason to proclaim God, we have been REDEEMED! We have a story! Those seraphims weren’t bound for hell, we were, but thank God that Jesus’ death took care of that penalty. So how much more should we tell others about Jesus? Sometimes we get this view of God as a God with guns drawn, waiting to zap us. People also view him as their “Buddy”, or their “Coach”. When we start seeing him as absolutely HUGE, HOLY, as a HERO, we start understanding more of who he really is. Can you think of any story, where the hero dies for the villain? Try batman..nope, superman?.no, spiderman!...nah. Any comics? Hollywood movie?....I don’t think so. The HERO (JESUS CHRIST) dies for the villain(HUMANITY), and saves us all. What a SAVIOR! Many times I put God in this little box, confining him to little things, and guess what, my faith stays “little”. But when my view of God increases, my faith increases, because I realize he’s big enough for anything, he’s in control of everything. This week was also encouraging because the doctor cleared me to get off of my crutches. And let me just take a second to just brag on God for being my literal physical strength throughout this whole injury, especially being at camp with crutches. He’s kept my mind off my pain, and kept it on the big picture, getting closer to him and serving him! A great point of this week was secondary issues of life. We put so much emphasis on secondary issues of life, like sins we struggle with. In 1 Peter 2, it start off by saying to “lay aside” certain things,( malice, guile, hypocrisies, envies, evil speakings), then V.2 says you will desire the word like new-born babies desire milk, then V.3 says If you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. BUT, if you have never really been saved, trusted Jesus with your life, started following him, we will spend our whole life trying to get rid of those things. Those verses were meant for believers, but when your dealing with people who haven’t been saved, you should flip those verses. Start at v. 3, FIRST, taste and see that the Lord is gracious,(GET SAVED), truly put your trust in Christ alone, then go to verse 2, if you truly start following Jesus, you WILL desire the word, then verse 1, When you trust your life to the Lord, and you desire his word, he will change your life, and get rid of all those things! I tried so hard in my life to get rid of those Secondary things, and it wasn’t until I really started following Jesus and giving him full control of my life, that those secondary things began to change. When you get that taste of God, he changes your desires. We think we can change our life, or clean up in order to reach God’s favor, that’s crazy talk! We can never be good enough for God, he wants us how we are. He does all of the cleaning! Until you “Acknowledge your need” of a savior, what in the world is there to be saved from? It took me so long to realize I needed to be saved, and that my own merit wasn’t good enough, but when I acknowledge that need, it meant I acknowledged that I needed Jesus. When you taste and see that the Lord is good, it changes you. You wont be able to stop talking about it. If you have no desire to share your faith, you might want to do a checkup, cause last time I checked God didn’t save us to go sit on the bench. We are to be lights in the world! I was privileged to Lead a camper to the Lord on Wednesday night! It was awesome to see him start to understand the gospel, and acknowledge that need of a savior. He accepted Jesus into his heart, and right off the bat began digging into his bible and studying scripture. It was just neat to see a young boy really want to get in the word and learn about God. It challenged me to keep doing the same. I started reading a book called Christian Atheist, crazy title I know. What it means is believing in God, but living as he doesn’t exist. What a convicting thought. I know that for a long time, I believed in God, but lived like he did not exist. God is just continually speaking to me through preaching, quiet time, music, and books like that. One message that really spoke to me, was of Daniel and the lions den. We took a different approach to it than normally. Apart from God shutting up the lion’s mouth, which is an incredible miracle itself, we see the testimony of Daniel, and his walk with God. He was old at this part of his life, and people knew of his testimony. The rulers made a decree to put anyone in a den of lions if they prayed to any God other than the king for 30 days. They did this because they KNEW they would catch Daniel. What a testimony. Do we have that testimony? That People see in our lives that we follow after Jesus. Daniel prayed 3 times a day, and was very disciplined in his walk. The crazy thing is he did not care if he was going to be eaten by lions!!!!! If a decree was made today like that, and someone like one of my grandfathers were in the place of Daniel, I would do everything I could do to convince them to stay inside, and not go out and get caught. I would say “God knows your faithful”, “30 days isn’t going faze anything”, but wait…..is that right? Did Daniel do that? He could have made that same excuse, “God knows my heart”, but no, he valued his time with the Lord so much, that he was willing to die for it. Are we willing to die for our time with the Lord?? Im not talking about listening to Christian music all day, or hearing preaching on Sunday’s, or going to a bible study, but that time where we get alone with the Lord. Is that valuable to you? Would you be willing to die for it? Wow, so convicting! I want that testimony, to be known as someone who follows after the Lord, and someone who values that time. God spoke to me through that message, and it changed the way I looked at my quiet time. Another interesting thing we hit in that story was that when Daniel was in the den, he was not worried, but the king who made the decree was! How backwards is that? God shut the mouth of those lions up, and opened up when the men took Daniel out, and they had them a feast! Daniel knew who was in control. Do we have that same faith in God? I can’t speak for others, but in sermons like this, I tend to get real quiet…a.k.a conviction is going on. Daniel was blameless before the Lord, and that is the testimony, and relationship we should all strive for. I want to leave a legacy for Christ, just like Daniel did. We are here for a very short time, and It would be a shame for me to be remembered for something other than being a light in this dark world. Im an example of how God can use anyone! Just give your life to him! Treat your time with him as precious! I was privileged to lead another boy to Christ! God did the saving part, and I was blessed to be a part of the pointing to Jesus. We went over many verses, and he understood what they meant, and that he needed it! Paul says it well when he says to live is Christ, and to die is gain. Of course we would want to be with Jesus, but he doesn’t save us and then send on a direct flight to heavens gates, he gives us a chance to tell others!! To live is Christ! While were here , lets spread his word, not in words alone, but through our lives. Easier said than done I know. God is good, all the time, and all the time, God is good! I miss my family and friends but I know this is where God has me right now, so im going to do my best to faithful to him here. I still have so much to say but couldn’t put it all down! Haha. Can’t wait for another new set of campers, challenges, and most importantly, blessings.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Jul 2013 05:04:46 +0000
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