I Got Saved

Today I sat across the table from one of my students. A young man who had drifted away from the youth group and made some bad choices and found himself in a very dark place. We talked for two hours. God. Girls. Drugs. Life. Choices. Friends. Music. Talents. Future. Etc... It ended with this young man literally giving me his drugs and rededicating his life to Christ.

Now this situation came at a very interesting time in my life. A time, to be very vulnerable and honest, where I really felt like I wasn't making any difference here. The fruit just hasn't been showing. All the time. All the sowing. All the junk. I had just had a conversation with my wife about what I was doing here. Had I made a difference? What is wrong with this place? Am I just wasting time, talent, and energy? And then out of nowhere this young guy steps back into my world.

He said that I was the only person he knew he could turn too. I was the only one who hadn't quit on him. Wow.

During the whole conversation I felt like God was ministering to me. Reminding me of why He brought me here. Reminding me that people do change. Reminding me that people really do still need Him. Reminding me that we do reap what we sow.

I don't share this to toot my own horn. Honestly, I felt kind of guilty afterwards. Guilty because I have been so focused on myself and my situation that I almost forgot why I was here. All I could see was the disappointments and obstacles. All the things that weren't going my way. Focusing on the uphill part of the journey and not the journey itself. I almost forgot about the mission.

I thank God for today. Not only for God saving this young man but in essence God, through this young man, saving me.

Sabotaged!

"Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life." Proverbs 4:23 (NLT)

I have currently been engaging our students in a discussion about creating a dramatic change in our culture. An overthrow. A mutiny. A revolution. I know the word has been overused since the postmodern and post post modern movement but that doesn't negate the importance of it. I challenge you to read II Timothy 3:1-5. I think it looks a lot like our culture. And it is the catalyst for this call to change.

As believers in Christ we all have a revolutionary spirit within us. We all have the ability by the Grace of God. He enables us to create change in our world. The Great Commission is a call to do just that. Go and make disciples. We are the ones doing this now or at least we should be.

This leads me to the point of this little note. Why do people fade out? Why do they quit? Why do they give up and walk away from "the life that is truly life"? Solomon implores us to guard our hearts because that is where life starts. Who we are, where we go, what we do all starts within us. We must relentlessly protect it. If we don't, we leave it open to sabotage. Sabotage simply means to deliberately destroy, damage or obstruct something. If we are not careful we can allow some things to penetrate our hearts and destroy our revolutionary spirit.

I'm sure there are many ways to do this but I just want to focus on a few, the last being the main focus. I think one thing that will cause a downfall in our lives is blending in. Ezra 9:1-2 is an example of God's people blending in instead of being separate. Ephesians 5:1 tells us to "be imitators of God...". We, as followers of Christ, have been asked to be light and salt, two very distinct things that always stand out. You know when your food is lacking salt or not. You know when light is in a room or not. We are to be separate. We aren't supposed to imitate all the celebrities and athletes. We aren't supposed to mimic all the trends. If anything we should be the ones setting them. Who are you imitating? The world or Jesus?

I think another thing that ruins us from the inside is selfishness. Jesus calls us to deny ourselves (Luke 9:23). We are to put our selves last. But we live in such an image driven society that dying to self is the last thing on anyone's mind. I wonder if the image of the church as become more important than the mission of the Church? I wonder if it has made its way into the depths of our hearts? Why is selfishness so bad? It causes us to not take action. We will never step out because it might cost us something. It might be inconvenient to help someone. We might get uncomfortable. It causes us to ignore those in need. We will never help someone else if all we see is ourselves and our desires. It causes us to become prideful. We won't do anything because we are above those things. Our concern for our image must come to an end.

Finally, I think the greatest act of sabotage in our lives is apathy. When I looked up the proper definition of apathy I got this: a lack of interest, enthusiasm, or concern. We know that it basically means you just don't care. What could be more deadly in the Body of Christ? There is no revolution where there is no concern. How do we become apathetic? How can someone go from zeal to apathy? Here are some of my observations:

Apathy can occur when we let disappointment linger in our lives. We didn't get the job. We didn't make the team. We didn't get the girl/guy. We didn't get our way. We lost something. The relationship ended. There are many ways to be disappointed and we are never promised that we won't be disappointed. But if we let all the things that let us down in life linger they will soon sour and become bitter. When we become bitter we eventually want nothing to do with anything and we no longer care about the things we used to care about. Bitterness always drains enthusiasm. You can see the bitter people in church and life. Smiling is like a foreign language. The eyes never lie either. So, if you want to ensure a life that lacks interest, enthusiasm, and concern, hold on to those things that let you down in life.

Apathy can also occur when we listen to the enemy. When we listen to all the lies that are whispered in our ears we set ourselves up for apathy. You aren't good enough. You aren't pretty enough. They only like you because you are rich. They only like you for what you can do. You aren't successful. They don't love you. And on and on they go. What happens is we give ear to these lies and eventually believe them. Then our whole life becomes about those lies. We don't care about the mission anymore. We are to wrapped up in deceit.

It also occurs when we lose focus. We spend way to much time looking backwards and not enough time looking straight ahead. We are distracted by all the stuff going on around us and all the stuff that happened yesterday that we get off course because our focus is blurred. We eventually get so wrapped up in all the stuff that we don't care about the mission anymore.

Finally, I think the greatest cause to apathy in a follower of Christ is when knowing Him better is no longer the greatest thing in our life. It may seem obvious but is it? There is NOTHING in this entire world that should be more important. Our jobs. Our dreams. Our ministries. Our ideas. Our stuff. Our hopes. Our fears. Even our families. Nothing should be more important to us than Jesus. We must be constantly striving to know Him better. No one has arrived to perfection yet. And yes, it is an uphill journey. Sometimes it is hard. It gets tough and slow but that is no reason to stop. Things may not go your way. That is no reason to give up on knowing Jesus better. We have placed to much importance on other things than this one simple element. Let us be reminded again: without Jesus we have nothing. Enough with programs, ministries, philosophies, new movements, politics, and so on. It is about your relationship with Christ and striving, toiling, running, pursuing, crawling, to know Him better. Without this you can't care. You can't be enthusiastic. You can't be interested. It is Jesus or nothing and I think we should be reminded again.

Are you apathetic in this stage of the journey? How do you know? Are you cold? Cold towards people? Cold towards the things of God? Are you numb? Do you just not feel anything anymore? Do the things that used to move you no longer move you? Have you become hardened inside? Can nothing get through? A yes to some of these might be a good indicator.

We can come up with plenty of excuses to justify our present condition but those excuses don't nullify the truth. We must guard our hearts from sabotage. We must protect the source of life. I know what is like to experience all this. Thanks to God's never ending Grace, I am still kicking. Let us be reminded in this day and age to guard our hearts. We are the agents of change in the world. We can't afford to give up. we can't afford to quit. We can't afford to self-destruct. We must guard what has been given to us. One day we will see the fruit of our labor...