Fight for you

If you are anything like me you have faced some challenges and really hard decisions in your life these last few years. We made the move back to Michigan for a handful of reasons, but really felt like God was leading us home. We had been living in Nashville for a few years, we loved it. We loved the friends we made, we were involved in a sweet church there. From an outside observer it looked like we were on a normal path.

The reality was money was always real tight, even with my wife and I both working living is expensive. Rent, food, insurance, cars, kids, jeans, coffee... well the coffee was always entirely worth it. All this to say life was always a battle, but i tried to start with my eyes on Jesus. The days i didn't start right, the enemy would feed me lies and distractions like; you will never get ahead financially, you will never get promoted, you will only loose what you have, what are you really doing with your life... you know the lies very well i'm sure. And i fought, every day to keep my head up, to look for my hope, and i found it in Jesus. When you are seeking, you will find, and Jesus loves to be found by us each day. Sometimes we get so used to fighting our battles, we forget that He fights for us.

"Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us." -Romans 8:33-34

Let us paint a picture of the battle in the spiritual places. The enemy, Satan condemns, accuses, calls us names, wants God to abandon us. He wants to steal, kill, and destroy. He wants to kill our hope, wants to steal our joy, wants to destroy our potential for ministry. BUT while Satan attempts to condemn us before God we have the best attorney that ever walked this earth, Jesus. The one who was there when the foundations of the existence was spoke into being. Who was co-author of light, to whom all knees will bow and all tongues confess Him as lord. Yeah, i'm glad he is on my side. I am glad he lived a perfect life and died and was raised from the dead, and he sits at the right hand of God the father.


What does this mean for our worship?
It is easy to think about ourselves, it is easy to spend that one min we have in the morning to try and focus on God. It isn't easy to live our entire day with an attitude of worship, at least not at first. When we are focused on OUR battles we will stay focused on ourselves. We must first remember that He, Jesus fights for us. We don't need to take that on, we need to trust that we have the best and only blameless attorney in Jesus. Once we remember that our response should be worship, always our go-to should be worship. Our worship and our love, our obedience, thats what He wants.
All that time i spent fighting battles, i thought they were my battles, and the world told me they were, that was the cost i had to pay in life. Honestly those things don't matter in the big picture. I was following what God had told me to do, and that obedience had a purpose in retrospect. My family is in a wonderful place now, my marriage is stronger than ever, my kids amaze & challenge me every day. I have more love in my life, and i owe it all to Jesus the one who fights for me. So it is Him i will worship.

This is our battlefield, the stage where we join together and remember who has already won.

Gift of Jukebox

"Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith; if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; or he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness." (Romans 12:6-8 NASB)

It is amazing to serve a God who gives grace. Having just celebrated Christmas and the greatest gift to man in history, Jesus. I am struck with the generousity of  our God. The depth of his love, that is constant toward us. Through that love He pours out gifts, and expects us to play with them. Like a child on Christmas morning, who upon receiving a new gift decides spend his day using the gift to its every possible application of fun. When was the last time we spent a day with God asking Him how we can use our spiritual gifts? 

The beauty of a gift is it's voulentairy, and we can't earn it. All you can do is receive it, and enjoy. I love the picture of a persons attitude that looks at life asking God what they can give. No matter what has happened to them, no matter what the world tells them they lack. 

The world wants us to feel empty, so we can try to fill those holes with what they are selling. We can apply that to ourselves, and wonder why we can't dance, sing, and be as funny as Justin Timberlake. 

The question is not if we have been created equal, which is a perspective of entitlement. Instead, have we prayed to receive our full portion of His grace? 

God is a giving God. He who is seated on the throne in full glory, whose robe is light. He who sent His spirit to dwell in us, He calls us to use the gifts He gives. I like to see Him like a father on Christmas morning helping us open up our gifts, and ask us what we are going to do with them. If we are dedicated to prayer we should be asking Him consistently to play  with us. Gifts are best when shared. 

I remember as a young boy a friend of my dad gave me a classic jukebox. Like any respectable jukebox it came preset on the local oldies radio station. Being young and enjoying oldies, I assumed for some reason that was the only radio station it could play. I mean why would a jukebox play country or hip hop? So for about three years I listened to oldies. Until one day my best friend asked me why I always listen to oldies. Before I could even respond, my friend had flipped down a secret panel and was tuning through the vast space of FM radio. My world was rocked, and my perspective of the gift I had been holding for years was radically changed. 

-=What does this mean for our Worship=-

Do you have a Jukebox? A gift you know God has given you that you kept to yourself. I think it is good for our hearts to share. If we ask God to flip down the panel on our jukebox to open up what He can do with our gifts, I think he answers that prayer. 

I know we can get distracted asking for more, more, more. When what we really need is perspective that what we already have is good. When I think about the family and friends God has blessed me with and the gifts He has grown in me, all I can do is worship Him. In a spirit of thanksgiving I give Him praise, and desire to spend time with Him. 

I pray that God would help you to open up the jukebox of your gifts, and receive your full portion of His grace. 

Yet i will Rejoice!

"Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor the fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet i will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer's; he makes me tread on my high places."
-Habakkuk 3:17-19

I will have days when it seems like God isn't near to me, or i am not near to Him. On those days or hours, minuets, seconds what attitude should i take? It is easy to pout, or be grumpy and say things like, "Lord why?" or, "I just don't feel like praising you right now, I'm not in the mood."

The word of God says something should be different in the heart of a worshiper. The example of worshipers in the old and new testament are like Habakkuk, Job, Paul... the list goes on. They worship God regardless of the day, what has happened to them, how they feel, or what He wants them to do. (Jonah isn't in this group, his fish might be)

What does this mean for our worship?
God is to be worshiped always, regardless of our mood, our state of heart, our worldview, our distractions, our sin. Simply because He is God. Worship is taking joy in God, delighting in Him, and giving everything to Him no matter the times. This is a state of worship, to be giving to God.
We tend to talk about "corporate worship" as "worship," when we sing and pray together, and that is when God moves in us together. I cherish those times, but maybe God is calling you to one-on-one worship. To grow your heart, and shape it like his, into an obedient joy.

I think that complaining is the enemy of giving praise. Pray against the spirit of complaining.

Pace your Face, take a love day

Sabbath, rest, hanging out, relaxing, kicking back, or my personal favorite, bustin a chill.
All things we might use to describe a day of Sabbath. I want to look at our personal motivation for a day of rest.

I think a lot of people genuinely work hard and feel like they are "owed" a day to relax. Considering we cant earn salvation through works, I'm going to say we can't possibly be "owed" much. All these diversions aside, do you ever think about why God gave us the Sabbath? I know i do.

Was it to spend time with love ones? Was it to recover from our labor? Was it to have something to rush toward every week, and pass up 6/7 of our lives? (or 1-7/7 depending on your work ethic and how much you long for the weekend)

What i do know is Jesus said that the Sabbath was created for man, and not man created for the Sabbath. So i shouldn't place busting a chill on the top of most exciting things to do this week? I think we can be quick to put rest on a pedestal, and then if something gets in the way we get grumpy or cranky. I know this has happened to me before.

So what does God intend the Sabbath for?
"But as for you, speak to the sons of Israel, saying, "You shall surely observe My Sabbaths; for this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you."" - Exodus 31:13

Here is God speaking to Moses, giving him the Ten Commandments. What i gather from this EPIC verse 13 is this: The Sabbath belongs to God, it is a sign of our relationship, and it is to remember Him, that He is God and He alone cleanses us of sin.

What does this mean for our worship?
Like usual the questions about Sabbath i ask first are all "me" questions. We can be so focused on ourselves. Here God has made it obvious that Sabbath is all about Him. All the me questions melt away in the fire of God's passion for us. When you think about how He gave us the Sabbath to remember Him. I am going to go so far as call the Sabbath a day of romance with God. Like escaping with a lover, or a honeymoon. But we get to have it with God every week! When we think about it in this context the questions about "what should we do on the Sabbath?" also disappear.
And all that remains, is intimate worship.