I should probably be being productive right now. You know... tackling the to-do list that now spans two legal pads and is probably full of overdue items. But I'm not... instead I'm going to share what I thought was pretty darn good tonight.
Pastor Jim at VBF made a good analogy today. Are you letting God be the manager of your life? Is He the boss? Is He calling the shots? Or is God just your crisis counselor? The guy you go to when things get bad so they can tell you how to fix it? A crisis counselor is a great help after the fact... but God helps you stop before it gets to that point.
He talked about a man who is mad at God because his marriage fell apart. But really, why is he mad at GOD? "Well God could have used His divine power to restore my marriage." Yeah... or you could have let God use His divine power in your life from the beginning. God could have helped you fight that temptation, get rid of that resentment, end that addiction. But instead we go to Him AFTER things go wrong and get mad that He doesn't just step in and clean up our mess. But God is our FATHER. Our PARENT. Our AUTHORITY. His job is NOT to come in and clean up our mess (as I frequently tell Nicholas and my students). His job is to guide us. It is up to US to choose whether to accept and follow that guidance. As any parent knows, his job is also to teach us. He teaches us through his Word, through his disciples here on Earth, and *drumroll please* through experience. So you know what... YES, God's divine power can clean up your mess. Or God's divine power can transform your life so that you learn from the mess YOU got YOURSELF into.
He also discussed "lost causes" and I really thought it was wonderful. Absolutely positively amazingly beautiful. The example he gave was Paul in Romans 9-11ish. Who are we to label anyone a lost cause? Who are we to put anyone out of our lives... to write anyone out of the Kingdom? Paul said himself that if HE could be saved, ANYONE could be saved. God didn't write Paul off. Paul was off hating and killing Christians. Can you imagine what the Christians around him thought? I'm sure they prayed he would stop killing... but do you think they honestly thought there was a chance that his heart could change? I'm thinking probably not. But God spoke to Paul (Saul at the time) and changed his heart. This man who was KILLING Christians became one. And not only did he become a follower of Christ... but he became one of the most faithful servants, writing over half of the New Testament (statistic from Pastor Jim). Imagine what if God had written Paul off the way others had. Think of the inspirsing words we read that were only made possible because God has the power. You never know when someone is just one prayer away. It reminds me of why Christians have got to stop being judgemental. Who are WE to judge someone else? Who are WE to say they're too far gone or they aren't doing enough? Isn't that almost insulting to God? To try to step up and take that role?
Along the same lines... we are ALL works in progress. We're all at difference places in that process... but God isn't finished with any of us yet. I'm so thankful for that. I'm so thankful that my flawed and imperfect heart hasn't been written off my God. As long as I let Him, He'll continue to mold and polish me until the day I join Him again. Isn't that amazing?!
Anyway... now I DO need to go work on stuff. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment