One of the biggest barriers to faith is the supposed or imagined conflict between faith & science.  We talked about this on Sunday and you can listen in by clicking here.  In my view this conflict is one of the more disappointing things to happen in our society.   And the saddest part is, I think it’s mostly avoidable.   As we talked about on Sunday… I don’t believe that faith is the enemy of science, nor do I believe that science is the enemy of faith.  We just spend a lot of our time misunderstanding one another.

500 years ago when Galileo theorized that the earth revolved around the sun (rather than the other way around which is what had always been believed) the religious community reacted violently.  They said it was impossible since the Bible says that the earth is set on its foundations and cannot be moved.  Turned out Galileo was right.  But that didn’t make the Bible wrong.  The theologians just misunderstood what the Bible was saying.

Today the biggest debate is over the origin of the universe and how life began.  The scientific community (for the most part) believe that the universe is billions of years old.  This has upset many theologians who think that the book of Genesis sets the age of the universe at less than 10,000 years old.  So who’s right?  Here’s my short answer:

I don’t care.

I had a friend named Thomas a few years back.   We worked together at Domino’s pizza.  He was an atheist and he knew I was a Christian.  He loved debating the origins of the universe because he thought truth, facts & logic were all on his side.  He would ridicule me (in the nicest way you can possibly imagine) and ask me how I could believe that the universe was only 10,000 years old.  I told him I didn’t care how old the universe was.  He was a little confused.  He said,

I thought you believed in God…

I told him I did. 

So how can you believe in God and not believe that the universe is less than 10,000 years old.  Don’t you know science has proven that the universe is billions and billions of years old?  The universe’s origin is in the big bang.

I told him something that drove him nuts.  I told him,

I don’t care how God created the universe… I just believe that He did.  He could do it in 6 literal days if that’s how He wanted to do it.  Or he could do it over billions and billions of years using the mechanism of the big bang & evolution… it doesn’t matter to me.

Talk about driving someone nuts.  He’d say,

so how am I supposed to argue with that?!?!?!

  And I’d say,

you’re not… that’s the point.

There are some Christian’s out there who would say such talk was heresy.  I’ve known some folks who would say that if you don’t believe the way they do about creation then you’re going to hell.   The problem with that kind of thinking is, the Bible never says that. 

Now let me be very clear… I don’t have a problem believing that God created everything in 6 literal, 24 hour periods of time.  I figure if there’s a God out there powerful enough to create all of this, He could do it in 6 days or over a period of billions of years.  I just don’t care how He did it.  It’s not something that God has impressed upon my heart as being terribly important.

Some people find it terribly important.  It’s the thing that they wake up and go to sleep thinking about (and they dream about it while they’re sleeping).  That’s fine… if that’s the thing that God has given you a passion for, knock yourself out (but please do it in a way that is gracious, kind, loving sincere & thoughtful).  I think there’s  a place for creation science out there…  it’s just not what God has impressed on me.

The thing that God has really hit me with is reaching those who are embarrassed by the way that Christian’s have presented themselves over the last few years.  At Riverside we try to be a place for those who have questions and are struggling to find answers.  If it’s not one of the values that God has tasked Riverside with reflecting to Eagle River & the world then we just don’t focus on it. 

So what are the things God has tasked Riverside with reflecting to the world?  Things like love, modeling (leading by example rather than saying, ‘do what I say… not what I do’), generosity, acceptance, progress, flexibility, & enjoyment.  We’ll talk about them in detail this spring…

What about you?  How do you see the whole “Faith –vs- Science” thing?  This is a touchy subject for a lot of people.  I’ve never seen anything that science has come up with that would cause me to abandon my faith… so I just don’t lose much sleep over the whole thing.  But by being gracious towards Thomas I opened his eyes to a whole new possibility.  He once told me that the only thing that ever made him doubt his absolute certainty that there is no God is my reaction to him… and I didn’t really do anything except accept him and treat him with love and respect in spite of our differences.  I never cease to be amazed at how powerful a little thing like acceptance can be in the hands of God.  Try it and you just might change your life (and someone elses too).

Peace.

Ed

So… we’ve established that doubts are a part of being human and that all of us struggle with them.  We’ve also established that God is ok with our doubting.  Today I want to look at how we should choose to live in spite of our doubts.

When I was a youth minister in Southern California I told the kids the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.  The most amazing fact in that story (to me at least) is not that Jesus was able to raise His friend from the dead after his friend had been in the tomb for 4 days… it was what happened afterwards.

The Bible says that after Lazarus was raised that many of the Jews “believed” in Jesus.  The problem was that there were certain people in leadership positions who didn’t “doubt” that Jesus had actually raised a dead man from the grave… they just weren’t willing to let their belief change how they lived their lives.

Sound familiar?  We do that all the time (at lest I do)… we know what God wants from us and we choose not to let it impact the way we live.  The Bible says:

Meanwhile a large crowd of Jews found out that Jesus was there and came, not only because of him but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. So the chief priests made plans to kill Lazarus as well, for on account of him many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and putting their faith in him.  John 12:9-11 (NIV)

What I can’t believe is that the Jews who wanted to kill Lazarus and Jesus didn’t seem to doubt that Jesus had raised someone from the dead… they just didn’t want to let that threaten their way of life.

One of the teenagers in my class said:

If I had lived back then… I would have believed.  It would have been easy because of what I could have seen Jesus do.

But apparently that’s not the case.  Biblical faith isn’t just a matter of believing that Jesus is who He claimed to be.  It’s believing that Jesus is who He claimed to be, and then letting that change who you are.

And that leads us to today’s main theme… that even though certainty is not possible, faithfulness is always on the table.  In fact, faithfulness is the only thing that allows us to move forward in our lives with God.

The Bible is filed with men and women who doubted God.  Job, Abraham, Sarah, Elijah, John the Baptist, Jesus’ family (they thought He was nuts), and even the disciple Thomas now has the moniker “doubting” permanently attached to his name. 

Maybe you're a doubter too?

It’s interesting to me that Jesus never gave Thomas a hard time for his doubts, because Thomas never let his doubts get in the way of his faithfulness.  In fact, just before Jesus went to Bethany to help Lazarus they were all hanging out together in the northern part of Israel (Jesus did this all the time during His ministry- He’d spend time in the southern part of Israel until the leaders of the Jews got so angry at Him that they wanted to kill Him and He’d go to the north and stay there until the leaders got so angry that they wanted to kill him and he’d go back to the south… He followed this pattern until it was time for Him to die and then He stayed in the south until His crucifixion).  A friend came to Jesus and told Him that Lazarus was sick.  Jesus didn’t leave right away and Thomas was thankful that Jesus was using some common sense.  But a couple of days later Jesus announced that Lazarus was dead and it was time to go back to the south.  Thomas didn’t think it was a very good idea but at this point Thomas demonstrates today’s theme… he says:

Then Thomas (called Doubter) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”  John 11:16 

Thomas didn’t have a lot of certainty but he certainly had a lot of faithfulness.  He never let his doubt get in the way of doing what God was asking him to do.  Because of that we’re still talking about him today, even though he doubted.

Here’s the point… you may have lots of doubts.  You may not know a lot of stuff (join the club).  In fact, you may feel like there is more that you don’t know than what you do (again, join the club).  The point is, that doesn’t have to stop you from following through on what you already do know (loving people even when it’s tough; forgiving people when they hurt you; asking for forgiveness when you hurt someone else; doing your best to control your anger; etc).  The more you faithfully follow in the footsteps of Jesus the more your doubts will be healed and the more you’ll start to see what God is asking of you. 

When you faithfully do what God has already asked the future becomes clearer and clearer… but the opposite is true too.  If you let your doubts prevent you from doing what God is asking you to do (loving people even when it’s tough; forgiving people when they hurt you; asking for forgiveness when you hurt someone else;

If you don't like foggy... start following the Leader.

doing your best to control your anger; etc) the foggier and more mysterious your future will become to you… and you will have a tough time deciding where you should go and how you should get there.

So all of that to say this.  God never asks us to manufacture certainty.  But He does ask us to be faithful to what we already know.  So start doing the things you know God wants you to do and the rest will become clearer as you move forward with God.

Peace,

Ed 

So what doubts drive you nuts?  What doubts nag your soul when you’re willing to admit that they’re there.  One thing I’ve noticed about human beings is, we all have doubts.  I grew up in a church environment where doubts weren’t encouraged… in fact, they were discouraged.  It wasn’t ok for me to admit I had doubts about anything. 

So I grew up trying to manufacture certainty (or at least the appearance of certainty) when I was going through times of doubt.  Have you ever done that?  I’m not sure why we do that, or how the church got here.  In the book of Jude the Bible tells us:

Be merciful to those who doubt.   Jude :22 (TLB)

I am SO glad that passage is in there.  Not because I’m someone who doubts continually… but because when I do I know that God understands.  As I said earlier, the Bible is filled with people who doubt.  God never scolds people for honest doubts… in fact, in the book of Job He scolds Job’s friends instead of Job.  In a nutshell the story of the book of Job goes like this:

• Job has it all
• Job loses everything
• Job’s friends show up and mourn with him (for days they don’t say a word and that’s maybe the smartest thing they ever did… then they open their mouths which it turns out isn’t so smart)
• Job’s friends ask him what he did to deserve this calamity (a common idea in that day was that if things are going well for you then you must be doing everything right and God likes you… if things go badly you must have done something wrong and God’s ticked!)
• Job denies any big changes in behavior… he basically says, “I haven’t changed.  It’s not like I’m perfect but I was the same the day all this happened as I’ve been my whole life.  So I don’t know what caused all of this, but it’s not that I was good before and God blessed me and when I changed and started doing bad stuff He thumped me… I don’t know what it is, but it’s not that!
• Job’s friend’s say, “come on Job, you can tell us… we know you must have done something bad… tell us what it was”.
• Job says, “no really… I didn’t do anything to ‘deserve’ this”.
• Job’s friends say, “come on Job, you can tell us… we know you must have done something bad… tell us what it was”. (this back and forth goes on for about 38 chapters).
• Job finally loses his famous patience and calls God out.  He shakes his fist at Heaven and demands that God come down and explain Himself.
• God shows up and it’s pretty scary for Job & his friends.  Job changes his mind and tells God everything’s ok but God insists on talking to Job.
• God doesn’t explain why Job is going through what Job is going through… but lets Job know that he’s not alone.
• Job says, “I still don’t understand… but I trust the One who does.”

 Now here’s the kicker… God finishes up by saying:

I am angry with you and your two friends, for you have not spoken accurately about me, as my servant Job has.  Job 42:7 (NLT)

Now here’s the thing (and hopefully this brings us back to the concept of doubting being ok with God)… when Job finally loses his famous patience what does he express?  Doubt!  He doubts God, he doubts himself, he doubts everything.  Why?  Because he was in the middle of one of the toughest times in his life. 

There are lots of things that can bring about doubts in us… not getting enough sleep, sickness, tough times, etc.  Any of these can cause us to struggle more with doubts.  But even without any obvious external cause… doubts are just part of being human.  How we handle them determines whether God says,

You have not spoken accurately about me.

-or-

You have spoken accurately about me…

It’s a fine line between the two… and I’m not trying to make you nervous about how you’re doubting while you’re struggling with the tough times in life.  Job says some pretty nasty things about God… and God’s ok with that because Job is being open and honest about his doubts.  I guess what I am saying is, God can handle your questions, and even some serious fist shaking at the Heavens… what He can’t seem to work with is when we try to ignore our doubts and sugar coat our suffering. 

So what do you think?  Feel free to add your two cents to the conversation.

 

Peace.

Ed

We’re going to take a left turn now and start talking about Faith & Doubt (at least for now).  We began a brand new lesson series on Sunday that will take us through the next couple of months looking at the struggles that can sometimes surround our journey with God. 

Let’s face it… we live in a culture that enjoys ridiculing those who claim to have faith in the God of the Bible.  The news, the internet, talk shows, tv, movies, books… the venues for bashing people of faith goes on and on.  If you believe the voices in our culture, people of faith are the silliest creatures around. 

What amazes me is, Christian music, movies & books have become big business.  iTunes has a huge Christian music section.  WalMart’s Christian book section is one of their most profitable divisions.  And after the success of Mel Gibson’s Passion Of The Christ every major movie studio scrambled to create their own Christian production wings.

But where are all these Christians?  How many people do you know who claim openly to be believers in Jesus?  Other than the people you go to church with, how many do you know?  In Alaska things are a little different than in the lower 48 but still, we all seem to be “under cover”.  Why is that?

I think part of the reason is that we are embarrassed and let’s face it, we’re mostly to blame.  Christian’s have done things in the name of God over the last 200 years that must have made Jesus cringe.  To be fair, that’s what people do.  We use whatever means is at our disposal to further our own plans.  People have done that with Christianity, atheism, Boy Scouts & Girl Scouts, the PTA and of course… the dreaded homeowners association.  But still, we need to accept responsibility for where we find ourselves and move forward.

That’s what this lesson series (in part) is all about.  Recognizing our limitations, and learning to move forward in spite of them.  By talking openly and honestly about our struggles in faith & with doubts I hope we will be able to move forward into the future God has in store for us.  We will learn how our doubts can actually lead us into a deeper faith if we deal with them instead of sweeping them under the proverbial carpet.  And we’ll look honestly at the claims of science & our culture to see how our faith can stand up to those claims.  We’ll be looking at questions like:

·         Does God really exist?

·         Is there life after death?

·         Are human beings really destined for eternity, or do we just go out like candles when we die?

·         Is the universe an accident, or did a personal God create it for a reason?

·         Will we all one day be held morally accountable for our lives and our choices?

·         Will justice finally prevail, or is existence just one long string of events leading to an unknown end?

·         Is the Bible an authoritative and reliable guide to life, to God, or has it been discredited by historical criticism and science?

·         If there is a God, why is there so much suffering?

·         Why do my prayers seem to go unanswered?

I hope you’ll join me on this journey.  I think that only by being willing to ask the hard questions and listen for God’s answers can we ever mature in our faith.  Maybe you don’t feel like you have much faith right now… Jesus says you don’t need much.  In fact at one point He says to His disciples:

You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.

Moving mountains is hard...

I used to really get hung up on the whole “moving a mountain” part of this verse.  I have to admit… I still have no idea what that’s all about.  I’ve never seen an actual mountain move (I have seen God do miraculous things but still… I struggle with the mountain moving analogy).  But now I don’t let that distract me from what I think Jesus was really trying to get at… you don’t need a lot of faith.  Just a little bit will allow Him to do miraculous things in your life. 
So even if you don’t feel like you have much faith… join the club.  The club of people who have expressed a lack of faith & a lot of doubt and still managed to find ways to follow God.  The Bible is filled with stories of these kinds of people.  People of little faith & big doubts.  Do you know what the Bible calls those people?  Heroes.  Read Hebrews Chapter 11 and you will find God’s “Hall Of Fame”.  Most of those people dealt with doubts & a lack of faith.  But they were honest about them and continued to move forward in spite of their doubts.  That leads to a maturity & power that you never knew you could possess. 

 

How is everyone doing?  I had a tough weekend.  We took down a wall at church to expand the size of the stage (which if you go to Riverside you know has been shrinking as our band grows).  Anyways, I’m pretty sensitive to dust and spent all day friday in it.  Friday night I had some kind of reaction and was so dizzy I was bumping into stuff and feeling pretty sick.  I don’t remember ever being that dizzy in my life (at least not since I quit abusing alcohol).  So my typical Saturday blog entry didn’t quite make it.

But I did want to let you know that I have been really working on living my days with God.  For me that gets easier when my life gets tougher.  The more challenging my life becomes, the more I rely on God.  For some of us I know it’s the opposite- the easier life gets the more we rely on God.

I spent the last couple of days asking God to get me through.  I was way behind when it came to my regularly scheduled activities (working on my lesson, getting my video clips together, cleaning the church building, etc) and then I added in a pretty big project with Pastor Jeff & Mark Wells who helped tear down the wall.  What I discovered is what I always discover in those moments but am so prone to forget… that God shows up when we ask Him to.

So what will today (it’s Sunday morning right now at about 6:45 AM) be like?  I’m not sure… probably a bit of an adventure.  These kind of days my lessons are usually an adventure.  But I’m praying that God will show up and save the day again… and I’m pretty sure He will.  He hasn’t let me down yet.

How about you… what has your week been like?

Whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus. Colossians 3:17 (NIV)

What does it look like to “do it all” in the name of the Lord Jesus?  That’s the thread we’ll be following for the next few days as we look for ways to draw closer to God by making Him part of our day to day lives.  I guess the first thing we need to decide is what does it mean to do anything “in the name of the Lord Jesus”?

Lots of implications with that question.  First off I’d say it means to do it “with Jesus”.  As though He were walking through your day with you.  Ask yourself the question,

How would I do this (fill in the blank with whatever you’re currently doing) differently if I weren’t doing it alone, but was in fact doing it with Jesus?

Here’s the catch… you aren’t doing anything alone- God is always there with you.  The only question is, do we let that reality impact how we are living our day to day lives. 

Doing it all in the name of Jesus also means doing it with His character.  You may remember the big WWJD craze in the90’s.  Everyone was wearing those cool bracelets and theoretically asking themselves What Would Jesus Do before they made any choices.  It’s a great question to ask, and one that would deeply and profoundly impact our lives if we really asked the question and then did what Jesus would really do.  So should you rush out and buy a bracelet… that’s up to you.  If it would help you, absolutely.  But people might see you and say:

The 90’s called, they want their bracelet back!

So what would this look like in my day to day life?  We talked about that on Sunday… what’s the first thing you have to do every day?  For me I have to…

Wake up.  I try my best to wake up with God.  When I wake up I ask God to make the day an awesome day.  To let me enjoy it and live it for Him.  One thing that really helps me to remember to do that is setting my alarm to K-LOVE radio.  Then I listen to the song that comes on and see if God has anything special to say to me.  One thing I’ve learned is that God can speak to me through anything (books, TV, movies, even my wife!) if I’d just open my hears and listen for what He may be saying.

A few years back we helped a lady who was being evicted from her home.  She walked in one Sunday right after church and told us she had to be out by the next day and the landlord had thrown all her stuff out in the snow.   A couple of us went out and lugged her stuff over to the church and put it under the awning so she could sort it out and store what she could salvage and throw out in our dumpster what wasn’t.  As we helped move her stuff over we realized it all should have gone right into the

This is pretty much what the stuff under our awning looked like...

dumpster but she couldn’t let it go and I’m a big softie.

She promised it would be gone by the next Sunday but it quickly became apparent that was not going to happen unless I made sure it happened.  So I told her we’d move it to the storage units in Eagle River on Saturday.  I sent out an email begging for help because I knew I couldn’t do it alone.  I asked for help especially from people who had trucks.

That Saturday morning I woke up a little stressed out.  I wasn’t sure if anyone would show up and my back was already hurting with just the thought of lugging all that stuff to the storage units.  I started praying as soon as the alarm clock went off.  I was praying that God would make the day work out “better than I could have hoped or planned on my own” (I pray that a lot because I’ve discovered God’s plans are ALWAYS better than mine… I know that may be hard to believe since you all know what mad skills I have when it comes to planning and implementation).  I was in the middle of my prayer when the radio (tuned to K-LOVE) began to distract me.  I was  a little irritated that the song on the radio was distracting me from my prayer but I’m easily distracted so I didn’t have a lot of choice but to listen to the song. 

Maybe you can imagine my surprise when I heard the lyrics to the chorus from a song by Mercy Me called “Hold Fast”:

Hold fast, help is on the way.  Hold fast, He’s come to save the day.  What I’ve learned in my life is one thing greater than my strife is His grasp… so hold fast!

Have you ever felt like someone was “punking” you (punked is the new Candid Camera for those of you who’ve never seen it).  I sat up in bed and thought, “are you talking to me”?   I really hoped so. But my doubts and fears kept nagging at me.

All the way to church I kept struggling with my thoughts.  My heart sank when I pulled into the parking lot and there were no trucks there yet (sure, it was like 15 minutes before I asked for people to come but that didn’t stop me from worrying).  I went into the church and put on some coffee for the people that I was praying would come to help.  The words from the Mercy Me song kept running through my mind and I was praying that the words meant what I thought they meant (ever misunderstand what God was saying to you?  I’m an expert at it.  Just because I misunderstand what God is saying doesn’t mean He was wrong… it means I was).

Anyways, a couple of minutes later trucks started pouring into the parking lot and people started tossing the garbage that this sweet lady couldn’t let go of into their trucks and hauling it down to the storage place.  There were so many people helping it only took about an hour and all I had to do was supervise (that means I stood around with my hands in my pockets and told other people what to do, I’m an expert at that).

That’s an awfully long story but I wanted you to see how God speaks to me when I’m smart enough to listen.  I listen to K-LOVE all the time and listen for what God might be wanting to tell me.  How do you listen for God’s voice?  It doesn’t have to be through Christian music… find your favorite way to listen to God and then listen.  By doing that in your day to day life you will make ordinary things like waking up or driving to work holy moments where you meet with God… talk about making a miracle out of the mundane!

 ps:  you can listen to the song Hold Fast by clicking here.

Peace.

 

Ed 

Not an actual picture of Ed... he doesn't own a cool sweater vest like this guy.

Now that I’m done talking about how to focus your life by defining your dreams, roles/relationships, directions & values I guess I’ll just see where the Spirit leads. Today I was sitting in front of my computer drawing a blank (that happens to me a lot). So I guess I’ll just talk a little bit about some of the topics from my lesson last Sunday… In case you weren’t there (and that would be a trip since there were like 450 people spread out between all three services- an all time high for Riverside other than a Christmas Eve or Easter service) you can listen to the podcast dated 1/18/2009 online. Basically we were looking at how to make ordinary days extra-ordinary. How to introduce the miraculous into the mundane. We were talking about spending an ordinary day with God. Paul says in Romans 12:

So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Romans 12:1 (MES)

But what would that look like in our day to day, ordinary, mundane lives? I think maybe that’s what we’ll talk about for the next little while on this blog… and I think we’ll start with why this is important.

Have you ever wanted to learn to play the piano (or the guitar, or learn a language or run a marathon, or… well, you

 

get the picture)? Nobody would say,

I wonder if I’ll learn to play the piano this year? I’m kind of curious about that… I wonder if one day at the end of this year I’ll wake up and be able to miraculously play the piano.

The reason nobody ever says that is because we know that things like that are up to us. We only accomplish them if we put in the learning and hard work that are required to accomplish them. It’s like Judy said last Sunday (if you weren’t there you missed another “tag-team” lesson that Judy and I did together. It was cool but a lot of people were hoping she’s hit me with a chair… what’s that all about???) about exercise… you don’t exercise to get really good at exercise. You exercise to get fit. And piano players (even aspiring piano players) don’t practice their scales so that they can get really good at scales. They practice scales so that when the time comes to play something really cool they will have the skill and freedom to play what they truly want to play.

The same thing is true in your spiritual life. Don’t work on making the mundane miraculous

Playing the piano isn't easy...

because you want to be really good at certain spiritual habits… work on them to draw you closer to God and to lead you into the life you were created to live. Then when something hard comes along in your life you will have the freedom, the skill and the power to stand up under whatever may come.

So this week we are going to work on spending our ordinary days with God. Don’t change everything in your days to make it look like you’re doing super-spiritual things… just continue doing the same stuff you always do, but do it with God. We’ll walk through a lot of it together and if you have any questions let me know… I may not have the answers but at least I can share my journey with you. And remember what the Bible says about your day today:

Whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus. Colossians 3:17 (NIV)

What would it look like to “do it all” in the name of God?  That’s what we’ll be talking about in the coming days… stay tuned.

Alright… almost done with the whole “focusing your life” thing. The last task in focusing your life is to clarify your values. In other words… create some statements that will shed some light on what those values (you know, the ones

Clarity is good...

you WROTE DOWN after the last blog entry) really mean to you in relation to your dreams, roles/relationships & directions. For instance… one of my most important values is faith. A clarifying statement for faith might be:

Value: Faith—-Clarifying Statement: “I am listening for God’s direction and following that direction as best I can.”

 This clarifying statement might seem like it’s no big deal. You may be wondering why you even need to clarify your values. All I can say is, it adds focus to your values. And focus, as we have already noticed is what brings intensity and power to your life. Clarifying your values makes it more likely you will follow those values when times get tough. And following your values (or more specifically, adopting and then following God’s values) leads to a lot more than just intensity and power… it leads to success. And I don’t know about you, but I LOVE success. After Moses had died, God promoted Joshua. Joshua had been second in command for 40 years. He was good at following orders. But now he was going to be leading all of Israel as they entered the promised land. You might think Joshua had been chomping at the bit to take his turn at being top dog, but I think you’d be wrong. I think Joshua was more scared than anything else. Why do I think that? Read Joshua chapter 1. It is mostly a pep talk from God encouraging Joshua and telling him how to be a great leader:

After the death of Moses the LORD’s servant, the LORD spoke to Joshua son of Nun, Moses’ assistant. He said, 2“Moses my servant is dead. Therefore, the time has come for you to lead these people, the Israelites, across the Jordan River into the land I am giving them. 3I promise you what I promised Moses: ‘Wherever you set foot, you will be on land I have given you—4from the Negev wilderness in the south to the Lebanon mountains in the north, from the Euphrates River in the east to the Mediterranean Sea£ in the west, including all the land of the Hittites.’ 5No one will be able to stand against you as long as you live. For I will be with you as I was with Moses. I will not fail you or abandon you. 6“Be strong and courageous, for you are the one who will lead these people to possess all the land I swore to their ancestors I would give them. 7Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the instructions Moses gave you. Do not deviate from them, turning either to the right or to the left. Then you will be successful in everything you do. 8Study this Book of Instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night so you will be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do. 9This is my command—be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”

Did you notice what God had to do? 3 different times He tells Joshua to be strong & courageous. I don’t think it was working because finally in verse 9 God appeals to Joshua’s military side… He commands Joshua to be strong & courageous. But that’s not what really gets me… what gets me is what God promises Joshua in verses 7-8. He tells Joshua that if he obeys the instructions from Moses, if studies them and meditates on them, then there will be a certain outcome. Did you notice what it was? Success!

Adopting God's values is the key to success in your life.

According to God, when we adopt His values then the natural result is success. Are you still wondering why it’s important we clarify our values? If you want your life to be a success then you must know what God’s values are. You must study and meditate on those values. And you must adopt & follow through on those values. Doing that will give you the kind of life that will make a difference in this world. It will lead to the same promise that God gave Joshua:

Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do. This is my command—be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”

I have no idea what 2009 has in store for you… but if you want to prosper and succeed in everything you do, then clarify your values. And do it now. Come on… what are you waiting for? Get out some paper and clarify your values. Yes you… who did you think I was talking to? Get to work ;0)

Who are you being while you're going where you're going?

In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.

  Matthew 5:48 (MES)

 

 

OK everyone… theoretically you have come up with a dream, clearly defined your roles/relationships & written out some tribute statements that reflect how you’d like to perform in those relationships (if not go back to the beginning of these blog entries and WRITE THEM DOWN!).  Finally you chose some directions to head towards or aim at in 2009 to make your dreams & tribute statements come true.  What’s next you ask?

You need to decide what VALUES are going to guide you as you follow your dreams, fulfill your roles & travel in your chosen directions.  Values are the internal compass that points us in the direction we need to go whatever we may be doing.  If your values are godly and built upon God’s kingdom, then you will always make decisions based upon those values that will lead you deeper into the image of Jesus.  On the other hand, if your values are based on the judgments of the world & our culture they will guide you farther away from the image of God.

Choose your values wisely...

So choose your values wisely.  You do get to choose them you know?  We don’t often speak in those kinds of terms but people choose their values every day… and most of them you don’t even think about.  For instance, I don’t have to work hard to keep myself from jumping off a 10 story building.  That’s a pretty easy choice for me.  I don’t argue with myself over the wisdom of not jumping… I just avoid getting myself anywhere near a place where I might fall.  That’s because a healthy respect for gravity is one of my strongest held values.  I believe deeply that choosing to ignore the law of gravity would be detrimental to my well being.  I am free to embrace the value of flying with my two arms flapping as fast as they can go, but you probably wouldn’t recommend it.

 

I see the values of God’s kingdom the same way.  God invites us to choose His values over the values of this world and its cultures.  You can decide to reject God’s invitation… you’re free to go any direction you want.  I just wouldn’t recommend it:

Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.  Romans 12:2 (MES)

When you choose to “fix your attention on God” and “readily recognize what he wants and quickly respond to it” you will be developing within you the internal compass that will guide your every choice.  Will you always make the right one?  Not even close… but at least you’ll be on the right road.  God doesn’t expect perfection, but He is looking for people who are willing to travel with Him and do their best.  If you can do that then He can and will bring out the best in you. 

So back to our values.  What do you value?  Here’s a list of my top values:

1.     Faith

2.    Family

3.    Enjoyment

4.    Calling/Career

5.    Integrity

Those are my top 5.  What are yours?  Need some help?  Here’s a list of some common values.  Look it over and figure out what values God is calling you to adopt.  Write them down and ask God to start making them a reality in your life today.  Then next time we’ll look at clarifying these values so that we can begin the process of changing or focusing our internal compass.

Peace.

Ed

 

Values

Abundance

Acceptance

Action

Adventure

Affirmation

Appreciation

Authenticity

Balance

Beauty

Bliss

Bravery

Camaraderie

Celebration

Character

Clarity

Community

Compassion

Composure

Confidence

Connection

Contribution

Courage

Creativity

Curiosity

Design

Direction

Discernment

Education

Empowerment

Encouragement

Endurance

Energy

Enjoyment

Enlightenment

Enthusiasm

Excellence

Fairness

Faith

Faithfulness

Family

Fitness

Flexibility

Focus

Forgiveness

Freedom

Friendship

Fulfillment

Fun

Generosity

Gentleness

Godliness

Good Judgment

Goodness

Grace

Gracefulness

Gratitude

Growth

Harmony

Healing

Health

Holiness

Honesty

Honor

Hope

Hospitality

Humility

Humor

Independence

Innovation

Integrity

Intelligence

Interdependence

Joy

Kindness

Knowledge

Leadership

Learning

Legacy

Love

Loyalty

Mastery

Meaning

Mercy

Motivation

Nobility

Nurturing

Openness

Optimism

Organization

Patience

Peace

Perseverance

Playfulness

Productivity

Progress

Prosperity

Prudence

Purpose

Purity

Quality

Respect

Responsibility

Results

Self-control

Significance

Simplicity

Sincerity

Spirituality

Strength

Style

Success

Teamwork

Temperance

Tolerance

Transcendence

Trust

Truth

Truthfulness

Unconditional love

Understanding

Unity

Usefulness

Vision

Willingness

Wisdom

Wonder

Zeal

Zest

 

 

How Do I Get There?

Ok… now that you have your Big Dream written out, your roles/relationships defined and your tribute statements for each role clearly stated you are ready to chart your course.  You need to choose some directions (very similar to goals but with the focus and power of your dream & roles behind them) that will give 2009 something to aim at.  These directions will help you make decisions about what to do and what not to do in any given moment/day/week/month/year.   Remember the verse from one of our earlier lessons:

 An intelligent person aims at wise actions, but a fool starts off in many directions.  Proverbs 17:24 (GN)

Don’t be foolish- using your dream & roles as a guide CHOOSE some directions to take your life in 2009.  What will help you make your dream a reality?  What will lead you closer to making the tribute statements you dream of come true?  When you use your dreams and roles as targets that you aim at while choosing your directions you can really add some focus to your life… which will bring the power & intensity that will make your life the kind of life you’ve dreamed of.

 When I was 31 I was drifting.  I had gone to college and gotten my degree in Biblical studies but I had run from the idea of working for a church.  I wanted to trust God but I had seen what trusting his people could lead to.  I didn’t want any part of it.  So I was delivering pizzas and looking for a way to make my life a success.  It wasn’t working out very well.  I tried to become a cop… it didn’t work out.  I tried to become a firefighter… it didn’t work out.  I tried to go to medical school… it didn’t work out.  I tried to become an emergency medical technician (everyone together now)… it didn’t work out.  My problem wasn’t that there was anything wrong with doing any of the things I was trying to do (there are plenty of cops, firefighters, doctors & emts who are exactly where God wants them to be)… it was that I really wasn’t trusting God and designing my life around & upon His kingdom.  Nothing was working out for me (I had an awesome wife and a 1 ½ year old son but I was still dissatisfied with my life). 

So I decided to start building my life on God’s kingdom.  We talked yesterday about building our lives on what matters most.  Jesus talked about this when He said:

So don’t worry about these things, saying, ‘What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?’ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs.  Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.   Matthew 6:33 (NIV)

I was letting something other than His kingdom dominate my thoughts.  I was seeking my own little kingdom first and then hoping He would add His kingdom to my life as well.  The problem was that my thinking was completely backwards (which if you know me isn’t all that unusual ;0).

So I made a tough decision.  I decided to base my life on God’s kingdom FIRST and then let Him add everything else like He promised in the scripture above.  It was scary and there was more than a little grieving over letting go of the “successful” life I dreamed of (I wanted to have LOTS of money and stuff).  The grieving seems silly now because it’s not like I was really in any danger of ever making LOTS of money anyways (but some of my toughest battles are with my unique brand of fantasy). 

I started volunteering at church (the same one I work at now), I tried to add God into my everyday life the best I knew how, and I did my best to listen for His guidance and direction.  God didn’t change everything about my life right away though.  It took time for me to get myself to the place I was in… it took time for Him to get me closer to where He wanted me to be.  I wish I could tell you I’m perfect at this “following God thing” now, but I’m a long ways away from that.  What I find absolutely amazing is how God can do miracles even with my meager efforts.  But He can.  He did miracles with my meager efforts, and if you let Him, he’ll do miracles with your meager efforts.   

Are you aiming at anything?

 

So take another look at your dreams, your roles and your tribute statements.  Choose some directions to start heading (read that as “aiming at”) in your life.  In fact, every time you sit down and plan out your week look over your dreams, roles & tribute statements.  It will give you the direction you need to add the focus to your life that will allow you begin building your life on God’s kingdom, rather than your own.

  

 

ps:  maybe you’re afraid that if you build your life on God’s kingdom then you will end up in some foreign country working with people you don’t understand and that your life will become a living hell.  It’s ok if that’s what you’re afraid of… so was I.   If that’s your fear let me reassure you.  Most of us will spend the rest of our lives right where we are when we begin building our lives on the foundation of God’s kingdom.  And if He does move you, or change your career… I guarantee you won’t regret it.  I would never have dreamed that this is where God would eventually lead me… and if you had told me that this is where I’d be in 13 years I’m not sure I would have taken the first step 13 years ago (that’s why God doesn’t tell us where we’ll end up).   But I can tell you this… God knows SO much better than I do (the understatement of the century).  I wouldn’t trade where I am now for anything.  God can be trusted.