Even If i Walk Alone

Instructing and encouraging you to live your life as a disciple of Jesus

Discipleship

Take a Breath

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Take a breath.  What are you running from?  What are you running to?  What’s it all mean anyway?  We push ourselves to the limit day after day after day in search of some peace, finding some meaning or perhaps just a little bit of hope.  Why are we so obsessed with doing when the end result turns out that nothing is getting done?  Step back.  Take a breath.

Did you ever notice that Jesus never seemed to be in a hurry?  He always had time to touch the person in need, to play with little children or to speak to the outcast.  He never seemed to script His day; He just met needs as he found them.  He knew what He was about.  He understood His core mission.  Yet He never seemed overwhelmed by what we might call intrusions on His time.  He walked in perfect peace, knowing exactly where He was headed and knowing exactly what He was going to accomplish.  Jesus wasn’t perplexed by the unexpected roadblock or stressed by opposition to His plans.

So here we are claiming to model our lives after Christ.  Reality check:  our lives look absolutely nothing like that of Jesus.  We’re fooling ourselves.  We have gotten so good at being “Christian” that we no longer seem to be followers of the Way.  We claim His Lordship but fret over the pettiest of problems.  We claim to love others like He did but seize every opportunity to go along with hurtful words and gossip.  We rush and hurry and stress and rejoice when we take five minutes out of our day to pray.  Jesus regularly got alone with God to pray.  It was central to His life, not simply something he tacked on at the end of the day as an afterthought.

Jesus took time to breathe.  He left space around all His activities.  He wasn’t afraid to rest or withdraw from everything to keep perspective.  He breathed.  When was the last time you took a breath in your life?  When was the last time you remember being so on mission that you were unbothered by the mess the day threw at you?  Have you ever been that certain of your life, your purpose?  Or like most of us do you rush about doing something – anything – to prove you are moving forward?

Take a breath.  Withdraw from everything; get rid of the cell phone and the pager.  Sit in the presence of God and just… breathe.  Ask Him to give you a vision of what your life could look like if only He truly was Lord.  Ask Him what it would look like if you were a little less of a Christian and a little more a follower and lover of Him.  And then breathe.  Feel your lungs expand and release.  Move forward with a passion of purpose.  See, really see, the needs around you and minister to them as Christ did.  In this you will find the beautiful rhythm to life that you have always sought.

They Gave Up Everything

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As I was reading a familiar passage of Scripture today, I was struck anew by a thought: when Jesus called His first four disciples, they immediately gave up everything that they had and followed Him.  Peter, James and John left behind their fishing business and jobs and just followed.  They didn’t question Jesus, they didn’t plan how they would make a living or pay the bills; they simply followed.  If Jesus were to appear on the scene today, come to your place of work and tell you to follow Him, would you?  Would I?

It’s so easy to read through these Bible stories without pausing to reflect on what they are really saying.  “Wow, the disciples left everything and followed Him.  How cool were they?  They were such spiritual giants.  Next.”  Let the story sink in; apply it to yourself.  Honestly, ask yourself, if Jesus told me to give up everything, to leave it right then and there, would I?  This call to follow Christ is not for the faint of heart.  There’s no promise of monetary success or fame.  In fact, to the contrary, Jesus tells us straight up that we will probably not have as much as a place to sleep at night and that we’ll face hostility and persecution.  Cool.  This is exactly why I’d want to give up my current lifestyle.  Well, okay, not so much really.

Yet, this was the call to the first disciples and it remains the call of Christ to each of us today.  Will we give up everything?  Will we risk alienating our friends and family?  Will we endure embarrassment and persecution?  Would we even (gulp) be willing to die?  All this simply because He said to follow Him; How much do you love Him?  Can we honestly say that we would do for Him what He did for us?  Or is it more comfortable to just thank Him for what he did and then snuggle down in our warm beds to catch a good night’s sleep?  What are you willing to give up?  If it’s less than everything then that is simply not good enough.  Christ demands it all.  We call Him Lord yet refuse to honor Him as such.  Do you trust Him to care for your needs, trust Him enough to spit in the face of logic by giving up all that we possess? Do you trust Him with your life to the degree that you are willing to lay it down?

It’s easy to give a lip service answer to these questions.  Of course we love Him; of course we trust Him.  Why of course we’d die for Him!  But would we?  What would your neighborhood, your city and your state look like if all the Christians returned to the New Testament model for the church and we sold everything we had so we could care for the needs of those who had less than we do?  I’m not talking Socialism here; Jesus never advocated any political system.  But I am talking about love, something Jesus was adamant about providing.  Would we be willing to give up everything?  Are we willing to follow Him to dangerous places so we can demonstrate and apply His love?  If Jesus were to start all over today, would you be one of His first disciples?  Until you are willing to give up everything – everything and everyone – then that answer would have to be ‘no’.  Let us repent of our lack of belief and beg that God would give us the strength to follow Him at any cost.

Let It Go

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Chinese philosopher Lin Yutang said, “Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone.  The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials.”  Which begs the question, of what do we need to let go to better serve Christ?  What are those things that need to be put aside?

In our modern culture we tend to fill our lives with so much.  We have family commitments, work commitments and personal commitments.  It can be hard to find a moment of peace.  Television, radio, cell phones, the internet (you are reading this online after all!!); so much calls out and begs for our focus and attention.  Entire industries have arisen with the single goal of capturing our attention.  Of course everything looks appealing and it seems like such a good idea at the time.  Suddenly we have overfilled our capacity and overbooked our schedules.  More often than not it is Christ that is the first thing to get squeezed out.  We need to let something go.

Being full of Christ means there is no room for any of this other stuff we may have in our life.  It seems we’ve gotten it backwards.  Our lives are so full that we’ve run out of room for Christ.  I think Satan smiles when He sees this.  He barely had to lift a finger to get our eyes off of Jesus.  He simply had to tempt us with the modern day fruit from the tree of what society has defined as “life”.  We have not only taken a bite, but we have made a feast from this tree.  We grab all we can and eat until we are full.  But where is our first love?  Where is the One who saved us from a life of pointlessness and despair?  He has become the forgotten Man.

We need to go on a diet.  Like all diets, the best ones are those that make slow but steady progress.  Sure, simply casting off all the trappings of modern society all at once may work for awhile, and it may even work permanently for a few.  But by and large, experience and research has shown that lasting results comes from slow but steady changes.  We need to make the shift to being full of Christ and empty of everything else.  We need to be so full of love that it overflows and permeates everything we do.  There is no room for anything other than this in a life fully devoted to Christ.  There is no half way to living a full life; being full is all or nothing.

So what are you full of today?  Is it Christ and His love or is it the pleasures and accomplishments of our culture and society?  What do you need to let go today?  Write a list of everything in your life that is not contributing to the goal of being completely filled by the love of Christ.  Take the time to get it all down on paper.  Now look at your list and pick one item that you will begin eradicating from your life this week; write down a plan for how you will let it go, then execute that plan.  Once this particular item is out of your life, move to the next one on the list and do the same with it.

We all want to live a full life.  The only question is with what will we fill it?  Will it be with self-importance, achievement, popularity, the glitz of Madison Avenue?  Or will it be with the love, humility and gentleness of the love of Jesus Christ?  What will ultimately matter when all is said and done?  What is keeping us from being truly full of Christ today?  It’s time to let it go.

Check Your Balance

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Let’s change.  Let’s do it now.  When we wake up tomorrow, let’s determine to stop wasting our time and effort and start living the life we desire to live.  Let’s stop seeking to serve ourselves and instead serve the one who gave His life for ours.  Let’s determine to fight every temptation and to embrace every opportunity to love and live in the manner Christ demonstrated for us.

To lead the life we desire requires balance.  Satan loves to use our weaknesses to knock us off course.  We need to identify those weaknesses and develop a plan to strengthen those areas of our life.  Some have problems staying focused when they’re tired, others when they’re hungry and others when they lack energy due to their physical conditioning.  If any of these apply to you, or whatever your weak spot might be, it is a simple choice to correct the problem.  Determine to go to bed at a time that will give you 7 or 8 hours of sleep each night.  Eat regular small, healthy meals.  Start walking 30 minutes per day.  As we start to feel in control of our lives, we will see more success in our spiritual life.

All of God’s creation demonstrates balance, and we are certainly no exception.  Once we have achieved balance we can fully and confidently focus on living a life modeled after Christ.  So where do you struggle?  Right now, write down your main area of weakness; if you have multiple areas of weakness, let’s tackle them one at a time.  Now that you’ve identified your weakness, the next step is to write out an action plan to overcome with that weakness.  Be specific; set milestones and goals to measure your progress.  Finally, execute the plan.  Each day you should review your plan and stick with it.  Remember, the whole goal of doing this is to lead a more effective life for Christ.  The wonderful side effect is that as we achieve better and better balance, we will find ourselves living measurably happier lives, lives pleasing to God!

How about you?  Are you willing to do what it takes to get your life in balance and start on the path of more closely following Christ?    We honor Him by restoring balance to our lives.  As our balance improves we will find a richer life waiting for us.  We will find more time to study His word, more time to love others and more time to bask in His peace.  It’s all about focus, and focus is the result of balance.  If you find yourself not living a life focused on Christ, check your balance.  Make corrections where necessary, and do it today.

No Days Off

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I’ve been kicking around an idea for the past several weeks, and think I am finally comfortable enough with it that I need to integrate the principle of it into my life. The concept is simple, yet I believe it can have an incredible impact on the effectiveness of our walk. The concept is simply this: we as Christians are not allowed to take any days off. In fact, it goes deeper than that; we’re not even allowed to take a lunch break. Just as I have long espoused that every second of every minute of every hour of every day we make a choice to follow Christ or turn away from Him, I now am convicted that we must be “on” every second of every minute of every hour of every day.

For too long we have bought into the illusion that we deserve to have everything that Western culture has to offer, and oh by the way, we’ll also follow Christ. This isn’t the call I see in Scripture. Jesus demands that we give up everything and follow Him. We speak our belief to others whenever we are seen by them throughout the day. We speak our belief to God when no one else is around. This covers our actions, thoughts and words at all times, not just some of the time. God never ceases to observe us, and as long as there are other people on this planet, neither will they.

We don’t have the luxury of time. When we meet someone, we must demonstrate the love of Christ and the integrity of our faith to them; we may never get another opportunity. When we are alone, we must always use that time to recharge our spirit by communing with God, practicing spiritual disciplines and resting quietly in Christ – not in front of the latest television phenomenon. There are many things in this world that are inherently neutral – sports, hobbies and entertainment to name a few; but time is not neutral, it will either be used for God or it will be used against God. If we use the time God has given us to indulge in things that do not further His kingdom then we are not living true to our commitment to forsake everything for Him.

Nurture relationships, show love to others. Share a kind word and a few dollars with those in need. Perhaps now more than any time in American history we must realize how quickly our window of opportunity is closing. Our nation is changing and we do not know how long we will enjoy the absolute religious freedom we currently do. We must redeem the time – every second of it. We must work harder to live and love as we told Jesus we would. There are no breaks, there is no time off, but there is a great reward for all who persevere.