Radical

So I recently finished the book "Radical" by David Platt and let me just say to those of you who haven't read it - Go.  Now.  Don't delay.  Read it.  Did I mention now??


There's a catch, though.  A big one.


If you want to keep living your church-going, song-singing, comfortable-living, status-quo, "keeping up with the Jonses" lifestyle...well...this book is not for you.


BUT...


If you want to have your world completely rocked, if you want to be haunted by the message that it speaks to your heart, and if you want to radically change your life for the glory of God and the furthering of His kingdom then this book IS for you.


I can't put into words all of the thoughts that are going through my mind and heart about this book.  Specifically, I'm convicted that I am much more concerned with the things of this world than the things of God and - let me be honest here - that is NOT the picture God has for my life (or yours for that matter).  I spend way more time and money on food and books than caring for the widows and the orphans of this world.  And guess what?  There is not a single verse in the Bible that says it's okay for me to worry about the next book I buy or the next meal I eat.  However, James 1:27 makes it crystal clear as to what I should be concerned about:

"Religion that our God and Father accepts as pure and faultless is this:  to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

I don't know about you, but that doesn't leave much room for interpretation.  In fact, it seems to be exactly opposite of what I just described that my own priorities are looking like.  Go look at your own checkbook - what are you spending your time and money on?  Does your list of priorities seem just as backwards as my own?  Are you living a life that is "polluted by the world?"


And that's just one point that Platt brings up throughout the book.


Here's the long and short of it:  This is not meant to be a book review.  This is meant to be a challenge.  Go read the book.  More importantly, go read the book and come away changed, altered, distressed and disturbed.  The point is not for Platt to get the recognition for writing a good book and saying all of these things that are convicting and unsettling.  The point is that we should be convicted.  We should be unsettled.  We should be reminded of and called back to our first love - Jesus Christ - and we should align our lives with what Jesus actually said for our lives to look like, not what we're pretending Christianity is all about.


If you spent more time reading this than you have your Bible all week, there's an issue.
If you spent more time on facebook than sharing the gospel all week, there's an issue.


I'm not perfect and I certainly have just as much to work on as you do, probably more.  The reason I write all of this is not to make you feel bad and put myself up on a high horse casting judgment and condemnation down on everyone else.  The reason I write all of this is because I want more.  I want more than just the mundane drudgery of going to work and bringing home a paycheck and spending money and dying with nothing to show for it but a bunch of stuff!  I want to spend my energy giving it all away - my time, my money, my life - for the glory of God the Father.  It's what we were made to do anyway!


Who cares if people think we're weird because we do things differently than they do?  That's what people need to see.  It's radical to follow Jesus.  Normal to Him is entirely backwards to the rest of the world.


So be radical.


I dare you.

Molded

Thursday for my quiet time I was reading in Hebrews and there was a particular verse that stuck out to me.  Honestly, I didn't even know why it did at first.  I've been mulling it over for the past day or two just trying to make sense of it in my heart and let God show me what He was trying to show me through that verse.  Here it is:

"For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering."  Hebrews 2:10

I ended up leaving for work quite a bit early (because of meeting with the guys that I meet with on Thursday mornings), and I sat for about an hour and read through a sermon on this exact verse that was preached in 1826 (or so) by Charles Haddon Spurgeon.  Enlightening to say the least.  Spurgeon spoke about the fact that it was not Christ who was made perfect through suffering (because He already was) but the sacrifice itself that was made perfect.  Here's the thing - I don't really understand how all of that works.  But I know this:  If Jesus was making a sacrifice that was perfected through suffering, then it only makes sense that suffering in our lives has some purpose (whether we can see it or not) and that this suffering is molding us more and more into the image of Christ.


C.S. Lewis said in his book The Problem of Pain, "Tribulations cannot cease until God either sees us remade or sees that our remaking is now hopeless."  I tend to agree with Mr. Lewis, especially after this reading of Hebrews 2.


So, I think God is reminding me that pain hurts.  A lot.  But that ultimately His purposes are served through that pain and He's using it to make me more like Him.


I think He's also showing me that if I find myself in situations where I'm not being challenged to be more like Christ, then I need to run away as hard and fast as humanly possible.


And so I ask myself (and you) - Am I being molded into the image of Christ?  Is God perhaps using the pain I may feel at times to draw me more into Him and His will for my life?  Is God showing me something that I need to run hard and fast away from?


Lord, help me to humbly face the answers to these questions and give me the strength to change my life accordingly.

Forsaken

The past couple of weeks have been a blur, to say the least.  However, I've had this thought brewing in my mind the whole time.  It started one morning (I think) while I was driving to school: "What does it look like to completely forsake the world?"

I think what shocked me most about the line of thinking that followed was that I wasn't even thinking "spiritual" thoughts when it came to me.  Literally, driving down the road, it just popped in my head - out of the blue, you might say.  After the initial shock of such a thought I began to try to wrap my head around this idea.  What does it look like to forsake the world?  It's an uncomfortable conversation for me to have with myself because there are so many things in this world that I love, so many things that I devote myself to doing, so many things that I give time and effort and money and attention and...and...and...you get my drift?

For me, thinking about forsaking the world means giving up a lot of things.  It means my passions become different.  It means my priorities change.

It certainly didn't help the process when our pastor spoke at Wednesday night service.  He referenced this verse:

"For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation."  Galatians 6:15

You see, his point was the same that I'd been pondering for more than a week.  It's the same point that Paul is making in his letter to the church in Galatia.  It's the same point that we all as Christ followers should be asking ourselves on a daily basis - when all is said and done, is your life being made every day into a new creation in Christ?  Are the things that you pursue of this world or of Christ?  Or are you trying to compromise and do both - pursue the world and Christ?

You can see why Wednesday was so effective in my heart.  It served to confirm these thoughts that have been floating around in my head, it helped to solidify things and make them more clear.


Our church calls Wednesday night service 'Renewal', and for me it was that and so much more.  For me it was confirmation of the calling on my life.  It was affirming and encouraging to be reminded of what God's been doing in my heart and where He's been molding different areas of my life to change me more into His image.


And it was also convicting as I began to think about the things that I pursue in life that are not what I should be pursuing.  In my own life, it's books, movies, approval and a host of other things.  What is it in your life?  Football?  Maintaining an image?  Clothes?  Popularity?  Being religious?  Regardless of what your pursuits are, the question is not what are you and I pursuing.  The question is what are we doing to change the things that we pursue in life?  What are we doing to seek more after Christ?  What are we doing to forsake the world?


This question's been on my mind ever since our pastor asked it Wednesday night.  He said he wanted to haunt us with this question, and I'd say he did a good job of it (at least with me):

"What is your life marked by?"