“We are settling for a Christianity that revolves around catering to ourselves when the central message of Christianity is actually about abandoning ourselves.” — David Platt (via littlethingsaboutgod)
(via ohhyemin)
“Don’t pick a fight unless you think it’ll matter in ten years.”
(Source: elizabethcho)
“Instead of saying “I don’t have time” try saying “it’s not a priority,” and see how that feels. Often, that’s a perfectly adequate explanation. I have time to iron my sheets, I just don’t want to. But other things are harder. Try it: “I’m not going to edit your résumé, sweetie, because it’s not a priority.” “I don’t go to the doctor because my health is not a priority.” If these phrases don’t sit well, that’s the point. Changing our language reminds us that time is a choice. If we don’t like how we’re spending an hour, we can choose differently.” — Laura Vanderkam, via the WSJ (via sofrabjous)
Tomorrow is my official first day as a Youth Pastoral Intern at CCIC-SV. I am so thankful for the process, thankful for the rest God has given me in the past few months, and for the blessings of peace that God has brought to me in many ways. It is now time to serve Him wholeheartedly and recognize that a surrendered life is a life that lives to serve others.
Phil Wickham best captures what I need as this new process begins:
I need eyes to be my guide
I need a voice that’s louder than mine
I need hope, I need You
‘Cause I can’t do this alone
Grace, I call Your name
Oh won’t Your smile fall over me
I’m cracked and dry, on hands and knees
Oh sweet grace, rain down on me, I need you, grace
Excited for new beginnings!
“Every Christian has the Holy Spirit. We are never commanded to “receive the Holy Spirit.” But every Christian is not filled with the Holy Spirit. So we are commanded, not to receive the Spirit, but to be filled with Him. He is in us, but He may not be in control. We may be saved, and yet we may not be “spiritual.” And so Paul writes, “Let the Spirit be in control of your life.” — grace for today. (via thelittleyu)
“The true God of your heart is what your thoughts effortlessly go to when nothing else is demanding your attention.” — Tim Keller (via stephanielyu)
Some slightly emo and unorganized thoughts on church.
The church has often been referred to as “The Bride of Christ.” It’s a metaphor that is used often. The church is married to God. I’ve seen it depicted this way in many Christian skits/sermon illustrations/bible studies/articles etc.
Never have I understood this more than right now.
When people left from the church I grew up at, CCIC-SV, to go and start another church, there were those who said it was like a divorce. While I would refute that in every way because the Bible isn’t about always keeping everyone in one church forever, I do now see where they were coming from in saying this.
When you leave a church/community that you’ve been a part of for many years, it is the hardest thing you can do. And that’s good. It should be hard. If it was easy than it means that the time you spent there wasn’t meaningful/went south/etc. It feels so weird to me not to be at The Vine, and not go to CCM on Thursday nights. I’ve never missed a group of people so much in my life. That’s when you know and understand that church is a serious relationship. It is like a marriage. If this is the case and you leave a church, the next church you go to had better be married to Christ. If it isn’t, it will not sustain you. If it isn’t a place where you can serve and you are just going because it “feels good,” because you like the people, or because it meets YOUR needs, then you are not going for the right reasons. But when you serve the church, you in turn get blessed. It’s how God works. It was an honor and a privilege to serve at The Vine and CCM for many years. I miss those two families dearly, and I’m seeing just how seriously important it is to have a great church family.
That being said, when God calls, He calls. I am happy to know where I will be serving at going forward. It was not at all a peaceful process but I have an incredible amount of inner peace right now, peace that I have not felt in a long time. It feels so good to be home, it feels so good to be around another truly amazing group of brothers and sisters, where I will have to work to cultivate both new and old friendships.
I hope and pray that if you read this that you will come to experience just how amazing the church can be. For all it’s faults, sins and shortcomings, it truly is the Bride of Christ and I’m so blessed to be able to experience this!
In exactly 2 weeks I will be somewhere on the 5, 101, 129 or 1 Freeways on my way home to Santa Cruz with a car containing my belongings (which consists of 3 things: Clothes, Books, Golf Clubs, in ascending order of importance).
As much as I like to complain about LA, about traffic, weather, distance from everything I was involved in, and pretty much life in general, the past 10 years and 4 months that I have lived in socal have been very good to me. I believe God is calling me back home to San Jose, to what specifically He has yet to reveal to me, but I’m going now and letting Him work out the details in His own timing.
I heard these words in a sermon I listened to today that were utterly convicting and relevant.
“I will bless you that you may be a blessing, because through you all the families and peoples of the earth will be blessed.” To become a Christian is to be changed so that now you are not making your decisions on the basis of “what is the most comfortable for me, where do I live that is most comfortable, what job do I take that is best for my safety, my comfort, and my influence, and my status.” You don’t make your decisions like that anymore. The call of God reshapes you, so you’re asking yourself the question, “where can I most be a blessing?” The call of God goes like this, “if you seek to be blessed, you will be empty. If you seek to bless others, I’ll bless you.If you live for the blessing of others, if you live to fill others up, I’ll bless you, says God. I will bless you that you may BE a blessing.” God ONLY blesses that you might be a blessing. And you say, “well then how can I be a blessing?” and the answer is “you gotta get out! Get out, and I will bless you that you might be a blessing!”
– Rev. Tim Keller on Genesis 12 “Real Security and the Call of God”
For everyone that I have had the privilege of meeting in LA, thank you for being so good to me. God has blessed me with the most incredible relationships and experiences that anyone could ever want. I will miss you dearly but I know that this is not the end for many reasons!
Time to get out!
Great read. Clarifications on Jesus. (link) -
Kevin DeYoung took the words right out of my mouth. I love that new viral video “Jesus hates Religion” because the infrastructure of its poetic verses is the amazing grace of God. It is a glorious reminder to myself, as I remember that those who do not abide by the law are cursed but that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us when he hung on that tree. (Galatians 3:10-13) I also love the speaker in the video simply because I’m convinced that he just wants people to know the unfathomable love of God in His Son, Jesus. Lastly, I’m thankful that such a video has gone viral because whatever the case, the name of Jesus is being proclaimed all throughout the internet.
But I’m also hesitant to completely advocate it because it can be misleading. It can be received (note: received, not transmitted) in a skewed manner to think that institutionalized church should be hated and working out your salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12) should be ignored and that faith without works is encouraged (James 2:14-26). It’s daunting to think that some would even receive it as a license to sin because pursuing righteousness is apparently synonymous with religiosity.
That’s not true. To say that would be like portraying a building—yes, with a grace-built infrastructure, but without the cement and walls and windows and floors and elevators and a rooftop and an air ventilation system and anything else that is part of the complete composition of the most grandiose skyscraper in all the universe, the beauty and majesty of Jesus Christ. It is otherwise merely a dead, towering skeleton that is as cold as its naked steel exterior.
So please, with humility, give ear to what this Christ-exalting, grace-loving, Scripture-revering older man of God has to say with the wisdom that God has granted him.
Food for thought.
vacation was a whirlwind. tried to spend as much time with family as possible (success!) and tried to see friends that i will not see for a long period of time. i didn’t see half the people i had hoped to while i was home but it was a lot of driving back and forth between santa cruz and san jose and semi-restful at best…
so ive more or less been graduated and off of any kind of regular schedule for the past 4 days. 3 of the days have been well spent, including a day of golf and watching bcs games with friends, doing some heavy sermon prep and exegesis, and tearing out one of the walls at alpha blueprint. the other day was video games and movies and i felt very unfulfilled at the end of the day.
i had an unemployed friend who talked about the importance of mini goals. while not having a job, it is important to make the most of the time and be paying bills, shopping for groceries, etc. i agree with this. having not been unemployed for about 5 years (and i still have a few more days at the blueprint shop) i have to say that i agree with this. we cannot spend our time off doing nothing. i think God invented goals so that we can feel good about them when we meet them or make progress in them. this is something i hope to do this month. the trick is to know that He still loves us when we don’t because i really believe God wants us to feel good about ourselves. thus, i will set goals daily, and i hope this will last well into the rest of my life…