We Are All Dependents

For anyone familiar with the US tax system - no, we are not talking about filing taxes. That's not the kind of "dependent" we're talking about today.

    My dad is an extremely hard worker. His work ethic is exemplary (particularly within the church). Having grown up in the church, I saw him plug in all over the place - setting up for events, shoveling snow, working the car wash - whatever needed to get done he was there to help. As I grew up, I slowly took on his work ethic for myself, too. But there was a dark side to it that I also took on - my dad hated asking for help. He was always willing to help others, but never willing to receive help himself.

    When we see someone working on something, our first instinct is to step in help them get it done. However, if someone came up to me and asked if I needed help, my immediate answer is almost always "no". Technically, its an honest answer. Do I need help most of the time? No. I am capable of completing most tasks on my own, and I like it that way. But even if I don't need help, I could certainly benefit from it. Whatever I am doing, I can probably do it faster and better with help that on my own.

    So why wouldn't I want help? Well, I think it comes down to the fact that we live in such an individualistic society. American culture pushes the idea of being self-sufficient, independent, and doing things on your own. We see it all the time in TV shows, where one of the characters will have this really hard thing to do, and they'll be like, "This is something I have to do on my own". EVEN THOUGH it would go way better and be much easier if they accepted the help of their friends or family.

    We did a little game during youth group where one of the students had to take plastic balls from one bucket and run them, one by one, across the room to another bucket. The goal was to see how many he could run across in 30 seconds. He was pretty fast, and managed to get 7.

    So then we added 5 more people, and they formed a line and passed the balls down the line into the other bucket. As you can imagine, they were able to get a lot more working together than he could by himself. I believe they reached 18.

    But then I added one more challenge to the game. Or rather, took something away. I took away the bucket that had the balls in it. Guess how many they were able to get across without that bucket? 0. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Without access to the bucket, they couldn't do anything, even when working together.

Our message focuses on one verse:

John 15:5 - "I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing."

    This is Jesus speaking to His disciples about the life and work He has called them to. When we put our faith in Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we receive new life from Him, and with that new life comes a whole mission to make disciples of every nation all over the world. We are called to live for Him, according to His Word and teaching, and to share the good news about salvation through Him to everyone we meet.

    In this verse He gives both an encouragement and a warning to those who have put their faith in Him. The encouragement is that when we stay connected to Him, He will empower us for ministry. He will give us the energy we need to "bear much fruit" and live the life He has called us to. He will work through us to spread salvation to our friends and family. This is wonderful news!

    But the warning is that when we are disconnected from Him, our efforts will be fruitless. We cannot live the life or do the work He has called us to without being directly and consistently connected to Him. We won't be able to live according to His Word, we won't be able to obey His teachings, and we won't be effective in bringing the good news to others when we are disconnected from Jesus.

    Jesus is the bucket from that game earlier. When we have Him in our lives, we can do some great work for God's Kingdom. When we have Him and other believers working alongside us, we can accomplish even more amazing things! But when He is not there, when we are disconnected from Him, we cannot do nothing.

    As I mentioned before, our culture pushes this idea that we have to be self-sufficient, that we have to be independent. But when we put our faith in Jesus, we are already acknowledging that we are not self-sufficient. Jesus is the only way to salvation - we cannot obtain salvation without Him. We already depend on Him for salvation, so why stop there?

    Our culture tells us that dependency is a weakness, that we are weak if we need to rely on someone else. But Jesus says that's ok. Because we absolutely have to depend on Him. And He says that unless we depend wholly on Him, we cannot live the life He has given us.

    So, if you want to live for God, if you want to serve Him, if you want to please Him, and receive the joy, peace, and love that His life offers, you have to keep going back to Him.

How do we connect to God?

By spending time reading His Word.

By spending time praying to Him.

By spending time worshiping His name and His mighty works.

By spending time with other believers.

    Ask yourself this: how often do you do those things? How often do you read the Bible per week? How often do you pray each week? How often do you worship God? And how often do you spend time with other Christians?

Once you have answer for those questions, consider this: How connected do you feel to God?

    Let me reassure you, if you have put your faith in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you are saved. God is with you wherever you go and He will never leave nor forsake you. But the question is meant to assess how connected you feel. Because I am willing to bet that if you don't spend much time in the Word, in prayer, in worship or with other believers, you probably don't feel very connected with God.

    And this isn't some kind of a recipe for connectedness, as though you can do these things and always see an immediate result. But these are the practices of those who are actively seeking to be near to God. He has revealed Himself in His Word, He communes with us in prayer, He transforms our hearts when we worship, and He encourages us through fellowship with other believers.

    If you want to be connected with God and be effective in the work of His Kingdom, these are solid practices to help get you there. These teach us to depend on God, because after all, we are all dependents.

Do You Know God?

 HEYO! Last night was a good night. We had a good crew and shared a few laughs together. I learned that some of yall are VERY EASILY distracted, which I suppose wasn't really "new" information. Sister Spatz brought out her favorite game, Dutch Blitz, which is apparently a fast-paced and fun game (I just don't get it). We attempted to play "keep up" with a volleyball, but this was the part where I learned about yalls distractedness.

We played some Nuke 'Em as our main game and not to boast or anything but I did this amazing diving catch which turned into a roll upon landing. Obviously, I didn't get to see it happen (as I was the one doing it), but in my mind's eye it was EPIC. Definitely one of the coolest things I have done in a while.

Our message last night was a continuation of our study of the devotions of the early church. This is all based out of Acts 2:42-47 - "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the LORD added to their number daily those who were being saved."

So far, we have talked about being devoted to teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, prayer, and true community, and last night we talked about the second-to-last thing, praising God.

When I was a kid, I did a LOT of reading on my own time. I had this awesome series of books called "Dinotopia" which was about a secret utopian society on an island where intelligent dinosaurs and humans lived together in peace. I highly recommend these books. Anyway, I used to hate the beginning of a book. It was so boring as they introduced characters and setting and plot. I wanted to get to the action. So, I got in the habit of skipping the first 3 chapters of a book, reading it to the end, and then after finishing I would go back and read the beginning. What would happen is I would start reading in chapter 4 and have to ask "Who is that? What is he doing? Who's that guy? Where are they going? Why are they doing that?" Since I had skipped the intro, I had no clue what was happening in the story or how the characters related to each other. And then, when I would go back and read the beginning, suddenly all the pieces would fit together and those questions I asked in chapter 4 were answered.

Many Christians today (and perhaps you, too) prefer to read the New Testament over the Old Testament of the Bible. Sometimes this is because the OT is hard to read or understand, while the NT is pretty straightforward. Other times this is just because that's all the church covers on Sunday morning. The problem is, only reading the NT is like skipping the first 3 chapters of a book, you miss a lot of the setup and background information. You have no idea who anybody is or why they are doing what they are doing. The early church described in Acts 2 didn't have the NT to read and study like we do. They had the apostles' teaching (which would have covered a lot of what is in the NT) and the OT Scriptures. Their knowledge of God, who He is, what He has done, and how He relates to us came directly from the OT Scriptures. And their praises were based on what they knew of God through those Scriptures.

So as we talk about what it means to be devoted to praising God, we're taking a trip back to the beginning - the very beginning. Click here to open up Genesis 1 on Biblegateway.com. Or, if you would prefer, pull out your Bible and open to page 1. Let's see what we can learn about God from the first 3 chapters of the Bible. (For the sake of space in this post, I will not be including most of the verses so you will need to follow along using your Bible or Biblegateway.com)

Genesis 1:1 - "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." This is the first sentence in the entire Bible, and it sets the stage for everything else that follows. "In the beginning God..." This verse tells us that God exists already at the beginning of everything, which tells us that He is eternal (has no beginning).

This verse (and the rest of the chapter) also tells us that God is both powerful and creative. We also learn from this first chapter that God's Words are powerful (He creates by speaking things into existence) and that He is orderly - He creates in a specific order, with complexity and purpose.

Genesis 1:27-29 - "So God created mankind in His own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them. God blessed them and said to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.' Then God said, 'I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.'" We learn here that God delegates authority and provides generously for His creation. He put mankind in charge of the earth and made sure they had an abundance of food to eat. Here and also in chapters 2 and 3 we see that God is personal - He interacts with His creation on a personal level. He walks and talks with Adam in the Garden of Eden. He is not some distant god with little or no concern for us - He knows us and is concerned about us.

In Genesis 2 God establishes one rule for Adam and Eve in the Garden - they must not eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They have free reign over everything else, just not that tree. This tells us that God is moral - He knows the difference between right and wrong and establishes rules for living rightly.

In Genesis 3 Adam and Eve are persuaded by the serpent (imagery for Satan) to break God's rule and rebel against Him. It is in this chapter that we learn that God is just - when rules are broken there must be consequences, or justice. He sets consequences on all the involved parties: the serpent, the woman, and the man (and through this consequence the earth also becomes cursed).

But we also see at the end of chapter 3 that God is loving and merciful, because even though Adam and Eve rebelled against Him, He still provides clothing for them.

And finally, we learn that part of the consequences of rebellion is separation from God. He banishes mankind from His presence (and the Garden). This is because He is holy and mankind's sin was unholy - those two things cannot go together.

So just in the first 3 chapters we have the establishment that God is eternal, powerful, creative, orderly, generous, personal, moral, just, loving, merciful, and holy. We learned how the world was created, how mankind was made special (in God's image), how mankind rebelled against God and received the due consequences, and how God worked through it all. All of these things we learned about God remain consistent throughout the entire Bible and these chapters set the stage for all of history.

Go back and read Genesis 3:14-15 - "So the LORD God said to the serpent, 'Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.'" This is God's judgment on the serpent for deceiving Adam and Eve into rebellion. And that last part, "he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel", is an important foreshadowing of something we just celebrated a few days ago at Easter - the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Devil's plan was to kill Jesus (the offspring of Eve) and he succeeded. Unfortunately for him, though, Jesus didn't stay dead. He arose from death, which was the point at which the Devil's demise (his defeat) was realized. Jesus' resurrection was a deathblow to Satan's plans. So, even in the first 3 chapters of the Bible we already have a foreshadowing of God's plan of redemption for mankind in Jesus Christ on the cross. Although we are the ones who broke God's rules and deserve our punishment (death), God entered our world as Jesus and paid the price for us - because He is just (someone needed to be punished), AND because He is loving. John 3:16 - "For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."

Getting back to the point for today, being devoted to praising God, in order to praise God we have to know God. We have to relate to Him somehow. And how can we come to know Him unless we read His Word? How can we praise Him if we don't even know Him?

The early church's praise was born from their knowledge and experience of God. Our praise must be driven by the same thing. We must know and experience God personally before we can be devoted to praising Him.

Remember how God banished mankind from His presence? That was a consequence of their sin. Because of our sin, we also are separated from God and cannot know Him personally. But, because of what Jesus did for us on the cross, we can now have our sin removed from us and be reunited with God! We CAN have a relationship with Him and know Him. To try and know God without believing in Jesus as your Lord and Savior is like trying to look up facts about someone on the internet. You may learn something about them, but you won't know them, not really. To get to know them, you have to be in a relationship with them. It is the same with God. We can know about God by reading the Bible. We get to know God when we believe in Jesus, enter that relationship, read His Word, pray, and experience His love and mercy and forgiveness for ourselves. Then, it is out of this knowledge and experience that we sing praises to Him.

So, ultimately, it is as we are devoted to these other things (teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, prayer, and true community) that we then can be devoted to praising God like the early church was. Praise and worship come out of knowledge and experience.  The question for you is:

Do you know God?

Community: True or False?

 Heya peeps! We had a fun Summit last night between Spicy UNO and Gaga ball. I, myself, am exhausted. But beating MadFrame in a 1v1 was worth it! I wasn't paying too much attention to Spicy UNO until after Gaga, so I missed the setting of the rules, and yall really messed up how that game is played. First of all, no one is ever truly "out" until the game is over. So even if you have no cards in hand, you're still in the game and still need to follow the rules. That means, second of all, that 7s count for EVERYONE. That game better be SILENT or someone is drawing cards. Just saying.

Anyway, we announced last night that summer camp is officially ON, and initial registration is due NEXT WEEK. By the time any of you read this, "next week" will have been weeks, months, maybe years ago (based on current viewing trends), but just thought you should know, we weren't sure about camp and now we are. =)

We sang "All Because of Jesus" by Fee and "Fill This Place" by Red Rocks Worship last night for our singing time, both of which served to remind us of why we are devoted to the things of God. The reason is the same for us as it was for the early church in Acts 2:42 - its all because of Jesus. We are surrounded and filled with a profound love that can only be found in Jesus Christ. It is out of that love that we live and breathe and serve the Lord.

This led us right into a message on being devoted to true community, delivered by our very own Statistician (I looked and I did, in fact, spell that correctly). I avoid using names on this blog when I can, so for anyone who is not sure who that is, you can also call him Mr. L. Hopefully that narrows it down for you. =) He's a statistician, hence the nickname.

He opened with our main passage for this study on devotions of the church: Acts 2:42-47 - "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved."

Out of this passage we draw 7 things which the early church was devoted to: Teaching, Fellowship, Breaking of Bread, Prayer, True Community, Praising God (worship), and Welcoming new members daily. True community is closely connected to Fellowship, as both share that sense of togetherness, so as we focus on it you'll see that when we talk about being devoted to true community like the early church was, it comes down to a focus on Others First.

1 John 1:3 (CEV): "What we have seen and heard we declare to you so that you and we together may share in a common life, that life which we share with the Father and His son Jesus Christ."

There are two sides to this for us to understand. There is "Sharing Together" and "Sharing With". Sharing together has this idea of relationship and partnership. In 1 John 1:3, above, the author points to our having a common life with God the Father and His son Jesus Christ. When we come to faith in Jesus, we all enter into a common, shared life as Christians. We enter into a relationship with every Christian on earth (even those we don't even know). In that sense, we have this massive community across the globe of fellow believers, all striving to serve and love God together. And we also have partnership with other believers, and this is specifically the ones we know and interact with. Partnership describes believers as a community in action. So its not just that we share life together, we act in obedience to the will of God together.

Sharing with has the idea of with whom and how we share. In Acts 2, the church was eating together, praying and worshiping together - they communed with one another. It was a very intimate group, despite being such a large group (more than 3,000 people). They loved and cherished each other as fellow believers in Jesus. Luke (the author of Acts) goes so far as to describe what they did to show their love: they sold possessions and property so they could give to anyone who had need. They shared their material possessions. Many made personal sacrifices so that others in the community could be provided for. That is the picture of true community that we want to be devoted to. A willingness to make sacrifices for the good of others.

We closed out the message with a few general things we can be devoted to in order to build true community with each other:

1. Put Others First

- Philippians 2:3-4 - "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others."

- 1 Corinthians 10:24 - "No one should seek their own good, but the good of others."

2. Share Material Possessions

- Romans 12:13 - "Share with the Lord's people who are in need. Practice hospitality."

- 2 Corinthians 9:12 - "This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of the Lord's people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God."

- Hebrews 13:16 - "And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased."

- 1 Corinthians 12:25-26 - "so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it."

3. Serve Others

- 2 Corinthians 9:13 - "Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, others will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else."

- 1 Peter 4:10 - "Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms."

4. Encourage Others

- Ephesians 4:29 - "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen."

As you go into the rest of your life, begin thinking about how you can put others first in your life. As Philippians 2 puts it, "not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others." Imagine what our community would look like if we were all looking out for each other instead of just looking out for ourselves. What would your family look like? Your friend group? Your romantic relationships?

The community of God, our youth group, needs to be devoted to living in true community, looking out for each other instead of for ourselves. This means having a willingness to sacrifice your time, energy, or resources for the good of others in the community. This all means that others in the community will have the same mindset for you, looking out for you. As with most things, though, it starts with you (whoever "you" are). Set the example, put others first, share your stuff, serve others, and be an encouragement to everyone you come across. As we begin to be devoted to this, you will notice a positive change in our group dynamic that reflects the love of God.

Be There or Be Square (because you're not aROUND)

 Hey gang! We had a great night last night and I was so glad to see some familiar faces return to our Summit gathering! We got in a massive game of UNO (10 players!) and plenty of 9-Square action. Those of you who were unable to attend, you missed a fun "new" song we sang together - You Are Holy by Michael W. Smith. Check it out and imagine the guys and girls singing their respective parts. It was pretty sweet.

The message this week was focused on Fellowship. Last night, we answered 3 basic questions: 1) What do we mean when we say "Fellowship"? 2) What does Fellowship do/accomplish for us? and 3) How can we be devoted to Fellowship? To focus our attention, we used Hebrews 10:24-25 - “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”

What do we mean when we say "Fellowship"?

Hebrews 10:24-25 uses the phrase “meeting together”. Taken very simply, Fellowship is whenever we meet together. But it is also much more than that. It means more than just “showing up”, being devoted to Fellowship means being present in the group and actively engaged in what the group is doing – if the group is praying, you’re praying. If the group is singing, you’re singing, if the group is playing games, you’re playing games, if the group is serving others, you’re serving others. You see what I am saying? I can easily “show up” on a Wednesday and be completely disconnected from the group – I can go sit in a corner and ignore everyone. So, when we talk about Fellowship, we are talking about being actively engaged with a group of believers in whatever that group is doing. It is about doing stuff together.

What does Fellowship do/accomplish for us?

A lot of the Christian life is impossible to live out on a Sunday morning (or Wednesday night) alone – evangelism, good works, serving the community, personal prayer and devotions, generous giving, life witness, etc. Most of that happens throughout the week, outside of our time at church.

Fellowship is part of the glue of all the other things we are to be devoted to. It forms the context for everything: we are taught in groups, we meet in groups, we pray in groups, we praise God in groups, we serve in groups. God set up the church so that His people would not be lost in isolation, sitting in a corner by themselves, trying to do His will. He set up the church so that we could be together and obey Him together. To build His Kingdom together.

All of the other things we talked about two weeks ago (teaching, prayer, sharing meals, true community, praising God, and welcoming new members) are meant to be done as a group, not individually. This is because God knows that human beings need companionship. We need each other. In a group, we can support one another, love one another, encourage one another, correct one another when we mess up or go the wrong way, and celebrate together when God works in our lives.

How can we be devoted to Fellowship?

-Show up. Make it a point to be here regularly.

-Be active when you show up. Don’t just come in and sit down – be active. Play a game, start an activity, strike up a conversation. Don’t just be a potato.

-Meet together outside of Summit or church on Sunday. And not just to hang out (not that that is a bad thing). Meet to go help someone, or to read the Bible together, or to witness to a friend (that’s right, that’s not supposed to be an individual thing, either). Meet together to pray, sing songs of praise, or to learn something new about God. Do it with food, after all, sharing meals is a thing we are supposed to be devoted to.

-Join a Bible Study. These are small groups of people meeting together to learn and grow – it is fellowship.

-Invite others to join you here, or to church, or to other events and activities. A lot of fellowship is about being invitational. It is only when we are inviting that we get the opportunity to welcome new members!

-And finally, for us here, you can use our Discord channel. That’s a useful social tool for connecting outside of Summit. You can chat, play games together, and communicate through Discord.

My challenge to each of you is to make the decision to be devoted to Fellowship. No matter where you are (here, in college, or moved to another state), don't ever give up meeting together with other believers. "And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another - and all the more as you see the Day approaching."

A Piece in His Puzzle

 Greetings gang! Despite all this recent snow, we were able to meet in person last night for Summit. =) Although we had a fairly small group, I really enjoyed seeing everyone's faces and playing Gaga with a bunch of you. As I commented last night, I really miss gym class (it was one of my favorite classes in school, which I know is not the case for many of you). Without it, I am left without much pressure to get up and move around from day to day, which leaves me sitting around at home or in my office most of the time. Let's just say that this lifestyle does not lead to health and fitness. All of that to say, Gaga really took it out of me last night. My legs are feeling it today! Whew! Since many of you weren't able to join us, let me just share with you three new moves I introduced in Gaga - the Swooping Strike, the Ricochet, and the more defensive Redirect. The Swooping Strike is simple in concept, but can be hard to pull off, especially if you are close to the wall. Essentially, you swing your striking arm up first (like pitching in Softball) and then swiftly swoop down at the ball. You can get a lot of power out of this, and it looks cool too! The Ricochet is exactly as it sounds (and perhaps it isn't exactly a "new" move). You hit the ball off the wall, angled so it bounces toward your target. Jummel improvised another version of this where she was aimed at one person but struck the ball at an angle so it shot toward a different person. It was pretty awesome. And finally, the Redirect is also as it sounds (maybe I should work on the names?). When the ball is coming at you, rather than dodging or straight up blocking the ball, you hit it to the side. This is especially useful when someone who hits like a cannon is in the game, as it makes it so you don't have to take the full impact of their strike. This can also be offensively to redirect the ball toward someone else - midair. I like to aim it directly at someone's feet so its harder to dodge.

Anyway, enough about Gaga! We tried something different last night in an attempt to bring some intentional worship back into our Wednesday gatherings. Using our Summit "boombox" (bluetooth speaker), I played two songs - Heart of God and Build My Life - and passed out lyrics to both songs to everyone. Then, we sang along with the song. Personally, I think it worked pretty well. The challenge was to be comfortable enough to sing out loud and also to actually mean what we were singing. Worship is a central aspect of what it means to be a Christian, and I am glad we were able to intentionally engage in it last night together.

Now, as for the message. Emilie and I like to put together puzzles (on occasion). *whispers* For Valentines Day I bought a custom puzzle with one of our engagement photos on it that we can work on together. *stops whispering* When I work on a puzzle, I tend to start with one section and look for pieces that fit into my section. Unfortunately, since I usually work on 1,000 piece puzzles, there are just too many pieces to look through and this can get really frustrating. So then I switch gears, and I take one piece and begin to look at the big picture to try and figure out where this one piece goes. Then I take another piece and do the same, over and over until I start to see the big picture coming into focus.

We are each a piece of God's puzzle, but a lot of times we don't think about it that way. Instead, we focus on our little section of life and try to figure out how God fits into it rather than looking for our place in God's puzzle.

The main point of this message is this: When we become Christians, we are not asking God to come into OUR story, rather, we are looking for our place in HIS story!

Matthew 28:18-20 says this: "Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

This is Jesus' final command to His disciples before He ascends into Heaven. This is the end of the Gospel of Matthew. However, it is not the end of the story. More on that in a minute. The bolded part there is better translated "as you go, make disciples". And here is where I want you all to make a perspective shift. You see, when become Christians, and we live out our lives here on earth, I think we too often think that we need to fit God into our picture. "Ok, I am a Christian now, so how can I fit time with God into my week?" This carries the idea that somehow God is added to our lives. But, this is not the case. What really happens is when we become Christians, we are not asking God to come into OUR story, but rather we are looking for our place in HIS story.

The next part of the story, after Jesus ascends into Heaven, is found in the book of Acts. Jesus gives the disciples this command to make disciples, and they go home. Then, on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit comes on them and they begin to speak in tongues in the streets, and Peter gets up and starts sharing the Gospel in a powerful sermon (in languages he never learned) to the people, and thousands of them get saved - Peter made disciples. The entire book of Acts is about Jesus' disciples starting the church, making disciples, and pretty much doing what Jesus said to do! When people accepted the message of the Gospel and became disciples (became Christians), they didn't just add God to their lives, they joined into the community of believers and found their place in God's story. They spent time praying, worshiping, reading God's Word, sharing meals, ministering to the needs of others, and sharing the Gospel. Acts tells us they dedicated their lives to these things.

What is really neat is that these things don't require us to pursue a particular career path or live in a particular area. You can pray, worship, read the Bible, share meals, minister to others and share the Gospel wherever you are and whatever you are doing. So in that sense, we can all easily find a way to engage in God's Kingdom work just by dedicating ourselves to these things. The challenge then becomes determining where God wants to use us and where He wants us to go (figuring out how we fit into His Story). Romans 12:1-2, a familiar passage to most of you (especially if you went to the Winter Retreat), gives us a clue: "Therefore I urge you, my brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - His good, pleasing, and perfect will."

Did you see what Paul said there? When we respond to God's love and mercy by submitting to Him (dedicating ourselves to the things mentioned above), it attunes us to God's will. The more time we spend in prayer, reading, worship, fellowship, ministering to others and sharing the Gospel, the more we will become aware of God's will for our lives. It opens us up to hear His voice guiding us like a Shepherd guiding His sheep.

So, this means we need to make the mindset shift. We need to enter each week with this thought: "What is God doing this week and how can I be a part of it?" And this will then affect your week-to-week activities like school, work, hangouts with friends, hobbies, family time, and even shoveling snow. This mindset shift will cause you to start thinking more about how you can be representing God and sharing the Gospel wherever you go. This shift has already caused me to think about how I can demonstrate God's love to people I interact with in videogames. I offer to pray for people, I show kindness and compassion to those having a hard time, and I stick up for those getting picked on (which happens a lot in videogames). And guess what, when you start to look for ways to engage in what God is doing each week, the time you spend reading the Bible will be more helpful. When you have a goal and a mindset that wants to follow God, His Word lights the way on how to do just that!

My challenge to you all is this: if you are a Christian, make the shift. Stop thinking about how God fits into your story and start looking for where you fit in to God's story. How can God use you where you are right now, and where might He want you to go next? Then, no matter where you are or where you are going, "as you go" be the light to others that God wants you to be. Share the Gospel, share His love, show His love to others, and make disciples. Then, as you spend time in prayer and reading God's Word, you will find that it lights the way, showing where to go next and what to do. "Thy Word, Lord, is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."

May God bless you as you seek to serve and follow Him.

Check Yo'Self B4 You Wreck Yo'Self

 We decided to go virtual for this Summit because the Winter Retreat is this weekend, and I for one did not want to take any chances of a Covid exposure and ruin the retreat. We tried out something I saw another youth group do, which is having one student "dance" "interpretively" through a song while everyone else does their best to mimic them. We opted for "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys with The Whiz Kid as the lead. It was... interesting. Can't wait to see how it goes in person!

Well, as some of you know, I am currently taking a class on the practice and theology of worship – basically, what does it mean to truly worship God and what does that look like. Right now, the class is going through the Old Testament worship of the Israelites, back before Jesus came to the earth and died on the cross, and the author is comparing those rituals (and the sacrifices) with what Jesus did for us on the cross. The imagery alone is really cool.

I would like to share a quote with you from one of the books, and while I know it is hard to follow along, please try to listen to what is being said about sin, confession, and forgiveness.

 

“In the Old Testament forgiveness of sin was granted whenever confession was made… the sacrifice symbolically completed the process, showing that forgiveness was based on the shedding of blood. The confession without the ritual was incomplete, but the ritual without the confession was worthless. In this way the Israelite experience is not unlike the Christian’s. We also need to confess sins and acknowledge defilements in order to participate fully in the worship and service of the Lord. God forgives people when they confess to Him. The ritual is the public expression of faith in the provision of forgiveness through the blood of the Lamb.”

 

You all know that mankind suffers from separation from God because of sin, and that it is only through the blood of Jesus Christ, who died on the cross as a sacrifice for our sins, that we can get to God and have a relationship with Him. On a grand scale, we admit to our sins and believe in Jesus, and we are saved. Romans 10:9 says “If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord”, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” Our salvation comes through confession of sin and belief in Jesus as our ritual sacrifice. His death in place of ours. And this bridges the gap.

 

But this is also true on a smaller scale. Jesus’ blood covers over our sins so that when we confess them before God we are forgiven. And I know from my own experience that when I have unconfessed sin in my life – where I have chosen to sin and then try to come before God – it is like that gap is back, like there is something separating me from God again. I haven’t lost my salvation or anything, but I have wandered away from God. How many of you have experienced this? Where you feel like you have somehow become far away from God again?

 

This is the result of unconfessed sin. When we are holding on to something, or doing something, that we know doesn’t please God. And when this is going on, it can be very hard to engage in worship, prayer, Scripture reading, and sharing our faith with others. And if we let it go on unchecked, it will lead us further and further from God. Sin, especially when we consciously choose it, drives a wedge into our relationship with God – it doesn’t separate us completely, but it certainly gets in the way.

 

This weekend some of us are going to Rock Mountain for the Winter Retreat (woot woot), and there we will be spending time in prayer, reading, and worship. But first, we need to prepare ourselves. We need to look inside and see what sin has taken hold in our lives. What are we doing (or not doing) that is driving us away from God? We need to identify those things and confess them to God, looking for forgiveness. Then, when we are at the retreat, we will be able to engage in full and genuine worship.

 

And this is not just for those going on the retreat. This is something we all need to do regularly – daily, weekly, monthly. I think the phrase is “check yourself before you wreck yourself”. Reflect on who you are and what you have been doing, identify any sin that exists in your life, and confess it to God. He will forgive you, but you must confess and believe in Jesus for forgiveness.

 

God is looking for worshippers who worship both in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). We must have a spirit which is willing to submit to God and be humble before Him, as well as be honest about who we are, who God is, and who deserves all the honor and glory. So tonight, tomorrow, and pretty much every day for the rest of your lives, “check yourselves before you wreck yourselves”.