Even If i Walk Alone

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

mission

Shortness of Breath

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Whether we realize it or not, we are all suffering from a shortness of breath. Each inhale leaves us one less before we breathe our last. While this may sound morbid and depressing to some, it should not be the case for followers of Jesus. For me, the thought invokes both excitement and a sense of urgency. I have no greater desire than to be with Jesus.

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I don’t fear death and neither should you if you have placed your faith in, and pledged devotion to, Christ. Paul said to be absent from the body was to be in the presence of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:7-8). There is no fear in being surrounded by perfect love (1 John 4:18).

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Love God and Serve People

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Everything I write, and all I aspire to be can be summed up by the phrase “Love God and serve people”. It is the essence of discipleship because it is the quintessence of how Jesus lived His life. If we would only do these two things, everything else would take care of itself. If we focus on loving God and serving people, we will never be selfish, greedy, prideful, lustful, covetous, or evil.

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It is the elixir for all our struggles. Jesus asks very little of us, only that we love God and serve people.  We overcomplicate things when we pile on additional rules, regulations, do’s, and don’ts. Living the life Christ created you to live is as simple as loving God and serving people.

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Destined to Lose

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I had a disturbing thought recently: We are destined to lose. I’ve read the Bible and I know how this war ends. God wins. We win. But this battle we fight today? We are destined to lose. God’s will for our lives is we continue the mission of Jesus. We are to bring the Kingdom of God down to earth. It is our job to model the love of Jesus and proclaim the incredible truth of God’s character to every person we encounter.

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Unfortunately, the Bible makes it clear things will get worse before they get better. We live in dark, evil times. Many think these are the last days. We are not to the first to think this way; most generations before us believed the same for their own lifetime. The fact is, until Jesus returns, we are fighting what at least appears to be a losing battle.

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What Do You Deserve?

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One of the reasons I believe we don’t take the call of Christ more seriously in our lives is because we don’t see our sin the way God does. We don’t tend to see ourselves as deserving of hell if not for the blood of Jesus. We might say we deserve hell, but do we honestly believe it? As A.W. Tozer wrote, “from the way we love, praise, and pamper ourselves it is plain enough that we do not consider ourselves worthy of damnation!”

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There’s a disconnect between what we say we believe and how we live. Instead of living as if we were humbly and eternally grateful for the salvation of Christ, we instead live as if there’s always something more we “deserve”.

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The Purpose of Church

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In “Counter Culture”, David Platt writes, “When we observe our churches today, do they look like groups of people who gather with one another as they give their lives to spreading the gospel among unreached people, impoverished communities, abandoned orphans, lonely widows, dying babies, sex slaves, and suffering brothers and sisters around the world?” His conclusion is the same as my own: we do not.

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His question comes straight from the Bible (Matthew 25:31-41; James 1:27; Isaiah 58:6), and reflects God’s will for each of our lives. It’s sad enough most of us are not dedicating our own lives to this, but absolutely tragic we as a body of believers are not marshalling our forces to combat these evils in the world.

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