Your Story Isn't Over

I enjoy a good movie or a good book just like the rest of you. Many times there are good ones, but you can see the end coming and how it all will play out a mile away. Every now and then you get a good movie or book that has a surprise twist that you never saw coming. Many of us enjoy those type of books or movies. You know what is interesting though? We usually don't enjoy it as much when it is our own lives that it is happening to. We like stability and knowing how things are going to turn out ahead of time when it comes to our lives. Yet, the danger of this is that we can get in a rut. And if you haven't been having a life that is what you have wanted, you may begin to think, "I guess this is all there is".

When I was 10 I had my life all figured out. I was going to play major league baseball until I was 40. I would then retire and manage a major league team until I was 60. At age 60 I would become the commissioner of major league baseball.

By the time I was 15 all my plans had changed. I was now going to be a rock star of some sort. I started playing the guitar at 13 and I was playing in a couple of bands. I had the bug.

As of this writing I am 45 and pastoring a church and I have been involved in ministry for about 15 years.

I still enjoy watching baseball and all the statistics that go with it. I am still a musician. But I am pretty sure that my life is not going to turn out like I thought it was going to when I was 10 or 15 years old. And you know what? I'm ok with that. I am enjoying life.

As I look back now, I can see where God was preparing me for what I am doing now. At the time though I didn't see it coming.

When I see pictures that people post on facebook of when they were younger I sometime think to myself,"I wonder what their dreams were at that age?"

Life is full of twists and turns. There is an old saying that says,"If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans." I think most if not all of us can relate to that. We all thought earlier in our lives that life would be one way, but as we have grown older it hasn't all turned out like we thought.

Hopefully, it has turned out better than you had imagined. But for those of you who may be feeling a little down right now about life, just remember-your story isn't over yet.

You were created with a purpose and a plan. Whatever that purpose or plan is not just about you, but is also part of a bigger story. Don't be surprised by the twists and turns your life may take. They may be leading you to the place where your dreams come true. Your story isn't over yet.

Don't ever think that your life could never change. God has always been in the business of changing lives and situations. Why not begin to follow Jesus with your life and see where it leads. God has created us and He knows the longings in our hearts. He does His part to lead us to those things that will bring fulfillment in our lives. Sometimes we follow His lead, sometimes we don't. But remember, He hasn't given up on you just because you took a few wrong turns. Your story isn't over.

Saul of Tarsus was a man who would go out and murder Christians, years later he would become the Apostle Paul and write many of the books in the New Testament. His story wasn't over.

Moses killed a man and then went into hiding. Years later he would be the man chosen by God to lead His people out of Egyptian slavery. His story wasn't over.

Joseph was thrown into a pit by his brothers. He was taken captive. He was sold. He was lied about.  He was thrown into prison for a crime he didn't commit. He was forgetten. He ended up years later being the second most powerful person in Egypt. His story wasn't over.

Your story isn't over yet either. Why not let God lead the way and see what He does with your life?God is at work in your life right now. You may not see it or you may not understand, but remember, your story isn't over yet.

Man's steps are ordained by the LORD, How then can man understand his way ?
Proverbs 20:24

Many plans are in a man's heart, But the counsel of the LORD will stand.
Proverbs 19:21

Troy

Is He Really Talking About Poop?

Where no oxen are, the manger is clean, But much revenue comes by the strength of the ox. 
Proverbs 14:4


This is a classic verse from the Book of Proverbs. It has so much truth to it. I have to remind myself of this proverb when things get difficult, or don't go the way that I would prefer.

What is the writer of the proverb trying to say? Well, here is how I interpret it. First of all we have to think of the times the proverb was written and the customs and culture of the day. Most of the wealth was aquired from your animals etc...

The first part is telling us if you have a clean manger, you probably don't have any oxen. But the second part of the verse is telling us if you want revenue you need oxen. So it's your choice, if you want a clean manger don't have any oxen, but if you want revenue you will need oxen which also leads to a dirty manger.

Let's think about our lives now and our times and situations. Here is how I interpret the proverb. "If you want to accomplish something you will have to deal with poop". Think with me- you need "oxen" to accomplish something. Part of having "oxen" is knowing they come with poop. That is what makes the manger dirty.

Basically there hasn't been much that we have accomplished in life without having some "poop" attatched with it. It seems we are always looking for a "poop" free situation, but there aren't too many of them.

So the next time you are having to deal with "poop" in your life remember it is a part of life. Remember if there is something you are wanting to accomplish you will probably have to deal with some "poop" to see it get accomplished. If you or I want a "poop" free life we probably won't accomplish all the things we would like to in life.

You and I are not alone in life when it comes to having to deal with the truth of this proverb. Just think of all the people in the Bible and their situations and you will see that many, if not all of them had to deal with the truth of this proverb.

Let us also remember that we have a God who will help us to deal with all the "poop" of life. The key is remembering to ask of His help instead of just trying to deal with it on our own.

Troy

Prayer

I don't understand all the intricacies about prayer, but I have found out  that prayer works. I am no expert at prayer, but I have found that prayer works. I have experienced events in my life and in the lives of others that I believe were the result of prayer.

Oftentimes when we are in a bind we do just about everything to fix the situation except pray. We worry, manipulate and get angry yet don't pray. I know I have.

Sometimes we throw up a half hearted prayer. We sometimes treat prayer like rubbing a rabbits foot or some other superstition.

Prayer really is about being in conversation with God. When we converse with others we speak, they speak back. We get signals from the other person as we are talking with them. I have found this to be true when it comes to prayer.

I have found that if you have a sincere heart, God will work with you in your prayer life. You don't have to know much, just be willing to be taught by God. He will begin to guide your prayers. Sometimes we may not be getting an answer to prayer and God will speak to us about changing something in our life. That's the type of occasion where we get to see how badly we want that prayer answered.

I don't claim to know why some prayers get answered and some seem like they don't, but I know prayer works. I don't know why some prayers get answered quickly and others take a long time, but I know prayer works. I have prayed for people on the verge of death, some have lived, yet some have died. I don't understand why, but I know prayer works.

Finally, think of the people you deal with. They may get angry with you, but you can still pray for them. You may know someone going through a rough time and yet when you have tried to share with them about following Jesus wth their lives they become angry. Guess what? You can still pray for them.
You may have people who don't want to hear about Jesus, but you can still pray for them.

Never underestimate the power of prayer. I have seen it change people and situations. We can never spend enough time praying.

Troy

I Believe... Now What ? Pt. 2

Most of us can remember when we first started following Jesus with our lives. It was refreshing, exhilirating, and basically your life is turned upside down, or downside up. There is something amazing that happens to someone when they finally get the revelation that God loves them more than they can imagine. That wonderful feeling of being forgiven and cleansed from all past sins. You had heard people talk about it, but now you are actually experiencing it yourself. It is an amazing time. It's like you have just stepped into a new world that you had only heard about and doubted that it existed.

The part where I find many followers of Jesus struggling is with the "now what'? What I mean is that we are taught to go to church regularly, we are taught to pray, we are taught to read our Bibles. We are taught to let go of our old ways that brought harm to our lives. We are also taught to tell others about the life they can experience by following Jesus. We are also taught the wonderful truth that after we die we will go to heaven to live forever with Jesus.

The "now what" has to do with, what do I do when I'm not doing the things I was taught? I mean beyond all that was mentioned in the above paragraph. What about work, a career, family, relaxation, vacation, etc...  When I'm not doing the "religious" stuff what am I to do?

If I don't feel a "call " into ministry then what? Do my giftings, talent and knowledge matter? Am I just living, waiting to die and go to heaven?

This is how many feel after they get going in their "Christian walk".  One of the reasons I believe we can feel this way is because too much emphasis can be placed on getting someone to "believe". By that I mean intitial conversion. Somtimes we can emphasize that so much with the idea that once you "believe" you can now go to heaven that we don't help people with the "in between" time.

I have come to find that the "in between" time is for transformation. Some may call it discipleship. Some may call it becoming more Christ like. But if you don't have this,  your life will seem to be  just like a process of believe and then  wait to die and go to heaven.

The good news is that there is more than just believe and wait to die and go to heaven. In the next post I will look at ways the transformation process happens. What God does and what we do. But in reality it is all grace. All a gift of God. It appears we are doing something, but whatever we do is because of His grace in allowing us the ability to be able to do it.

Troy

I Beleve...Now What?

In my personal library at home I would have to say 2nd to books on prayer, I have more books on the topic of how to behave as a follower of Jesus. I have accumulated them over the years to help me live as a follower of Jesus and to help others. Basically it is trying to help with myself and others with the question, I believe... now what do I do?

 I had so many questions, and I continue to find others with questions. Are there a set of rules to follow? Can I do this or that as a Christian? Will I just start living like like Jesus? Why can't I stop some of my old habits? How good is good enough? The questions go on and on...

I would like to over a series of blog posts keep returning to this question. I by no means have all the answers. I continue to learn myself. But I do believe after many years of trying to follow Jesus with my life, I have learned a few things that I would like to share.

For simplicity sake let's say there are two camps. Of course, it isn't this easy or broad, but for argument's sake let's just go this route. On one side we have people who believe that there are a list of rules that we are given to obey as followers of Christ and we should obey them. In the other camp are those who quote Paul the Apostle and say," Christ is the end of the Law". It may take us awhile to figure out how to live as Jesus wants us to, we may make many mistakes along the way, but eventually we get there. Any of these two camps sound familiar?

Camp A believes there are rules for us to keep whether we like it or not. Camp B doesn't want to be hypocritical, so they think we should be authentic. Part of being authentic is that we are going to mess up as we "discover" the life we should live.

Camp A thinks that those in camp B are moral relativists, no black and white, just grey. Those in camp B think that those in camp A are legalists. Those who live by everything the Law says and push that belief on others without showing mercy like Jesus did with sinners.

Which camp would you say you identify with more?
Which camp have you encountered at church?

What I find is that both camps are really just trying to help us to become followers of Jesus and experience the life that He has intended for us.

Let's look at another issue. What am I here for? That is a question most human beings eventually ask themselves. It is also a question you will return to after you begin to follow Jesus with your life. We go through our lives not following Jesus and we ask the question What am I here for? Then we find out it is to serve God and live the life that He has prepared for us. But after that realization comes, we ask the question again, because now we want to know how do I live that out? We also wonder, do I just wait to die so I can go to heaven? What do I do with my life? How do I live it out between now and when I go to heaven?

Essentially what I am saying is that after we believe, we ask ourselves two questions, many times without knowing we are asking these two questions.
How do I live my life out between now and the time I die?
How do I make moral choices  now that I am a follower of Jesus?

I don't want to try to sell you on my view (actually I wonder if I have a view). But I would like to make us aware of some various views and explore these questions. I would like to help you explore those questions more in depth. The reason being, those two questions will be a part of your life now that you are a follower of Jesus. It all can begin with a simple question, I believe, now what?

Troy

How Quickly Things Can Change In Life

We don't know what he did except that he was a thief of some sort. Whatever it was, it was ruled that it was worthy of death. He is sentenced to die along with two others. As the day progresses, he along with the other thief who has been sentenced to die insult the other man sentenced to die. In fact, many in the crowd are insulting this other man who is not charged with being a thief.

I have had the opportunity to play music at many correctional centers, prisons if you will in my life. For the most part, the residents behave well and even helped us with carrying our equipment and wanting to talk with us. But, I will always remember the first prison I played at. Why? One reason is that I was around 15 or 16 years old and as we were setting up our equipment  to play outside in the yard, there was a small building somewhat close to where we were going to play. Inside the small building, though we couldn't see who was in there, we could here who was in there. What we heard was just filth coming from these men's mouths who were in that building. I don't know if it was directed at us or not. The guards told us just to keep walking to where we were supposed to set up. But even from where we set up we could still hear them cursing at us. I know they weren't directly mad at us, they were just made at the world.

I mention that story because when you get around people mad at the world, mad at their circumstances, they all basically start acting the same. I imagine those two thieves being like the inmates that I encountered at that first prison I played at. They were mad at life, mad at their situation, and they just take it out on whoever is around them. These thieves start yelling insults at this other man sentenced to die along with them.

As the day progresses, something interesting is taking place. The third person sentenced to die that day isn't acting like the other two. He isn't striking back and insulting the other two who are insulting Him. That would be a natural reaction. You are getting ready to die and you aren't going to let someone get the best of you as you leave this Earth. He also isn't striking back at the crowd insulting Him.In fact,  He hasn't said anything against the people who are helping to kill Him. What you do hear Him say is,"Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing."


 All the two thieves know is that this Man has claimed to be the Christ. Of course, earlier in the day they don't believe it.We aren't told when, we aren't told how, but at some point during that day one of the thieves sentenced to die realizes there is something different about this third man sentenced to die. He is not acting like everyone who has been in that situation acts. He is not defending Himself to those insulting Him. He is not taking one last opportunity to lash out at people and this world before He dies.

As their lives are drawing nearer to death one of the thieves makes one last ditch effort to save himself. He doesn't believe that this other man is the Christ. But maybe he figures," hey, what if He is, He can get me out of this situation." The thief is just thinking of himself. But as we read what follows, it isn't this man's life that is going to be rescued, but the other thief's life that will be rescued. Not from this experience, not from this death, but from eternal death.

One of the criminals who were hanged there was hurling abuse at Him, saying, "Are You not the Christ ? Save Yourself and us!" 40 But the other answered, and rebuking him said, "Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation ? 41 "And we indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds ; but this man has done nothing wrong." 42 And he was saying, "Jesus, remember me when You come in Your kingdom !" 43 And He said to him, "Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise."
Luke 23:39-43

He had been on this Earth for approximatley 33 years. He had spent the last 3 showing who He truly was. Teaching about God's Kingdom, healing the sick, showing kindness, forgiving, and yet at this point about the only one who understands who He truly is, is this convicted criminal. The disciples? Outside of John none of them are here. Peter? Some hours earlier he had denied that he even knew Jesus. Not once, but 3 times. The crowds  who were shouting,"Hosanna" a week earlier? They were yelling," Crucify Him" a few hours ago. The religious leaders? They are insulting Him. They are telling Him if that He really is the Christ then prove it by coming down from the cross.

At the end, it's this convicted criminal who gets it. He sees who Jesus truly is. In the end, we once again see God's heart. Here is a man who probably had spent much of his life in crime. A man who society had given up on. A man who had probably years earlier given up on himself. But One hadn't given up on him, and that was Jesus.

We get another chance to see that it doesn't matter what we have done in the past. If we truly recognize Jesus for who He truly is we can spend eternity with Him. Your past doesn't have to define your future.

This thief starts out his day knowing that he is going to die. During the day he is insulting Jesus along with everyone else. Later on, he realizes who Jesus truly is. Before the day is over, he is in paradise with Jesus. How quickly things can change in life.

Troy

When We Are Feeling Sorry For Ourselves (a lesson from C.S. Lewis and Narnia)

Over the past year I have been rereading C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia series. I was first introduced to The Lion Witch and Wardrobe in a Children's Literature class in college. I remember enjoying that book as a fairly new follower of Christ with all the allegory.

Currently I am reading The Horse and His Boy. I won't go into all the details of the book, but for those of you who are not familiar with the series let me give you a very quick background. There is a place called Narnia and there is a Lion named Aslan who is a Christ like figure. There are diffeent characters in the book but, Narnia and Aslan remain constant.

As I was reading chapter 11 today, I was again reminded of Lewis' wonderful way that he could put spiritual truth in a "children's book".What I would like to do is relate what I was reading to our lives.

 There is a boy named Shasta who is feeling sorry for himself. We have all been there I'm sure. We feel like the world is against us. That nothing is going right and nobody cares about our situation. When we are feeling like this we think of everything that has gone wrong in our lives, even since we were kids. This is what Shasta is feeling like. At this point Shasta is crying because he is feeling sorry for himself, but then he senses a presence. Lewis puts it like this:
It darted into his mind that he had heard long ago that there were giants in these Northern countries. He bit his lip in terror. But now that he really had something to cry about, he stopped crying.

Eventually Shasta starts having a conversation with this presence. He doesn't know what this presence is, but he begins telling it all of his troubles, and how things have gone bad for him. He also tells this presence how lions had been chasing him etc...

The presence lets Shasta know that he was the Lion that was in all these different episodes of his life:
I was the lion who forced you to join Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I was the lion who gave the Horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you.

Again you have to remember that in Lewis' Narnia series, the lion Aslan is a picture of Jesus. In this passage we are being reminded that Jesus has always been with us. Think over your life, Jesus has been there with you through it all. He has been orchestrating it to get you to this point of your life. Though you and I may have only seen bad in the past, what we fail to see so often is that Jesus is leading us to something that He has planned for our good. Sometimes that involves difficulty. But remember what is going in our lives isn't just happening by chance. There is purpose behind it. I agree that it doesn't always make sense to us. We are just human and we don't always understand God's ways. But make no mistake, He was there in your past, He is with you right now, and He will be with you in your future.

After his encounter with Aslan, Lewis describes what Shasta feels:
Shasta was no longer afraid that the Voice belonged to something that would eat him, nor that it was the voice of a ghost. But a new and different sort of trembling came over him. Yet he felt glad too.

When we encounter Jesus in our lives isn't this what happens. We know He has the power to destroy us if He desired to do so. We know that He would have every right to pronounce judgment on us if He desired. But we realize that He isn't going to. And a new and different sort of trembling comes over us. But it isn't a negative fear but a positive fear. A reverence if you will, what the Bible refers to as "fear of the Lord".

As Shasta finally sees Aslan and His glory, here is what happens:
But after one glance at the Lion's face he slipped out of the saddle and fell at its feet. He couldn't say anything, and he knew he needn't say anything.
The High King above all kings stooped toward him......He lifted his face and their eyes met.

Some day those who have followed Jesus will see Him and what will we be able to do in response to seeing Him? Probably like Shasta nothing but fall at His feet like Shasta did with Aslan.

If you have never read The Chronicles of Narnia series I would encourage you to do so.Though geared towards children, countless adults enjoy these stories. If you have read the series, let me encourage you to go back and reread them as I have. Though I have enjoyed the movies made so far in the series, they don't come close to depicting what you experience when you read the books.

Finally, the next time we are feeling sorry for ourselves, let us remember that Jesus is there with us in our situation.

Troy