Where do you start a blog? Since its completely up to me, i am going to start with a story about myself that i recently journaled. If you move in religous circles, you might call this a testimony:
I begin my story after I became a Christian, kind of. It’s as good an arbitrary starting point as any. How did I become a Christian? Good question. Before I did I was arrogant and prideful. After I did, I was arrogant and prideful. One year after I went on my first short term mission project. Two weeks in Venezuela, building houses for homeless children. We worked on a ranch that already had one house complete, and a family, made up of two parents and many adopted street children, lived there. Our days were filled with manual labor and then playing with the children. Personally, I got my butt kicked nightly at chess by those kids who until recently had been homeless. Before going I thought I was good at chess; and I struggled with pride… One night, lying in the tent that I and several guys slept in while there, I received a call from God. Go into ministry, share Jesus. It was a powerful, back breaking moment. Yet, it was so vague. Ministry? Where? How? At least give me a denomination Lord? Was that experience easy? No.
One year passed, and I graduated from high school. I now had a direction in my life. I was going into Engineering. I was aimed at security, money, and today’s version of the “American dream”. Ministry? Yeah, maybe on the side, as I have time or after I am secure. I had bought the lies. I had taken in, uncritically and almost unknowingly, the ideals of the day. It doesn’t take a long look at the world today to see that what we are told to pursue and how we are told to live doesn’t really lead anywhere good. High divorce rates, loneliness and rejection, never having enough because we just can’t stop consuming. Meaning in a sixty hour work week, from which you come home exhausted and seeking escape entertainment? Perhaps therapy bills to deal with the stress? I could tell you the month and year that I became a Christian, but I couldn’t tell you when I was converted to what our culture tells us about life. God didn’t let me stay there though and it took all of six months for my new direction to break. This time it was God who kicked my butt, through some loving and caring people that He introduced into my life over my first semester at University. Go into ministry, share Jesus. Was that experience easy? No.
Today I have many of the same struggles. I am often still prideful. Our culture rewards pride after all. As for following the Lord, I do my best. I keep catching myself turning back to those same lies, to seeking comfort, convenience and security. But I know that my Lord is not there for my convenience, He is not there for my comfort. Not when those things come in the way of His purposes. I know he wants the best for me, but I am more than willing to consider that could mean a lot of things that aren’t easy, by now I expect it. You want something easy? There’s lots out there for you to choose from. If you want to, you can follow the current style, which is to make the whole thing a big smorgasbord and take what you want from where you want. Personally, I have found that easy isn’t usually the way. Jesus is the way. I have accepted the grace of Jesus, but then been turned around to see that it was bought with possibly one of the cruelest torture devices of all time, and in the same breath been asked to extend that grace to the those around me. I have accepted His love, unconditional and forgiving, to be turned around and shown a world in pain and asked to give to it what was given to me. Jesus predicted his death, and then turned to say to His disciples that if they wanted to follow Him they must also take up their cross. The way can be simple, and sometimes it is easy. It is often hard, and it can be complex. G.K Chesterton had a dictum that meaninglessness does not come from being weary of pain, but from being weary of pleasure; I can see that, I think he was right. What good does it do for a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul?
I don’t really know where I am going, but I know whom I am going with. Jesus. He is worthy of being follow, and of learning to live from. He died, and on the third day rose again, appearing to many of the disciples and to Paul; he has been exulted to the right hand of God the Father; He is Lord.
Cya all later,
God Bless
I begin my story after I became a Christian, kind of. It’s as good an arbitrary starting point as any. How did I become a Christian? Good question. Before I did I was arrogant and prideful. After I did, I was arrogant and prideful. One year after I went on my first short term mission project. Two weeks in Venezuela, building houses for homeless children. We worked on a ranch that already had one house complete, and a family, made up of two parents and many adopted street children, lived there. Our days were filled with manual labor and then playing with the children. Personally, I got my butt kicked nightly at chess by those kids who until recently had been homeless. Before going I thought I was good at chess; and I struggled with pride… One night, lying in the tent that I and several guys slept in while there, I received a call from God. Go into ministry, share Jesus. It was a powerful, back breaking moment. Yet, it was so vague. Ministry? Where? How? At least give me a denomination Lord? Was that experience easy? No.
One year passed, and I graduated from high school. I now had a direction in my life. I was going into Engineering. I was aimed at security, money, and today’s version of the “American dream”. Ministry? Yeah, maybe on the side, as I have time or after I am secure. I had bought the lies. I had taken in, uncritically and almost unknowingly, the ideals of the day. It doesn’t take a long look at the world today to see that what we are told to pursue and how we are told to live doesn’t really lead anywhere good. High divorce rates, loneliness and rejection, never having enough because we just can’t stop consuming. Meaning in a sixty hour work week, from which you come home exhausted and seeking escape entertainment? Perhaps therapy bills to deal with the stress? I could tell you the month and year that I became a Christian, but I couldn’t tell you when I was converted to what our culture tells us about life. God didn’t let me stay there though and it took all of six months for my new direction to break. This time it was God who kicked my butt, through some loving and caring people that He introduced into my life over my first semester at University. Go into ministry, share Jesus. Was that experience easy? No.
Today I have many of the same struggles. I am often still prideful. Our culture rewards pride after all. As for following the Lord, I do my best. I keep catching myself turning back to those same lies, to seeking comfort, convenience and security. But I know that my Lord is not there for my convenience, He is not there for my comfort. Not when those things come in the way of His purposes. I know he wants the best for me, but I am more than willing to consider that could mean a lot of things that aren’t easy, by now I expect it. You want something easy? There’s lots out there for you to choose from. If you want to, you can follow the current style, which is to make the whole thing a big smorgasbord and take what you want from where you want. Personally, I have found that easy isn’t usually the way. Jesus is the way. I have accepted the grace of Jesus, but then been turned around to see that it was bought with possibly one of the cruelest torture devices of all time, and in the same breath been asked to extend that grace to the those around me. I have accepted His love, unconditional and forgiving, to be turned around and shown a world in pain and asked to give to it what was given to me. Jesus predicted his death, and then turned to say to His disciples that if they wanted to follow Him they must also take up their cross. The way can be simple, and sometimes it is easy. It is often hard, and it can be complex. G.K Chesterton had a dictum that meaninglessness does not come from being weary of pain, but from being weary of pleasure; I can see that, I think he was right. What good does it do for a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul?
I don’t really know where I am going, but I know whom I am going with. Jesus. He is worthy of being follow, and of learning to live from. He died, and on the third day rose again, appearing to many of the disciples and to Paul; he has been exulted to the right hand of God the Father; He is Lord.
Cya all later,
God Bless
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