Facebook

Facebook is tempting.  Everytime I want to do homework, I feel like a couple hours goes by and all I was doing was facebook for the last couple of hours.  I know that one day I am going to have to take certain tests that will acquire the knowledge I learned while studying various subjects. 

Believe it or not I can relate this to my walk with God recently.

Getting good grades in school is my deepest desire.  An A on a test will fulfill me way more than two hours of non productive facebook time.  In the moment though, facebook is addicting.  I can’t seem to pull myself away because sometime it appears more valuable than studying. 

Recently in my life I have felt a distance from God because of my doing.  The “facebooks” of my life looked good for a shortwhile.  But they only leave you with a feeling of discontent from God. 

When I am on the literal facebook I am not thinking about the day I am going to have to take a test.  I am sure that there is someone out there who has figured out every hour or so spent on facebook, and the percentage it lowers your grade.  Every time I am on facebook I am lowering my grade, and I know that one day I am going to have to sit before a teacher who will grade me on everything I have learned.

The same thing happens in life.  Some of my sins appear really good right now.  But I know that one day I will have to stand before The Judge.  And He is going to go over with me everything that I did to fall short of a perfect score.

I don’t have time to live my life on facebook.  I will drop out of college and work at a fast food restaurant the rest of my life, maybe not that bad but my family would be pretty upset and my future would get harder. 

I don’t have time to live for the “facebooks” in my life.  One day I am going to stand before a judge.  And if I don’t pass this test it isn’t going to be a class’s grade on the line, it will be my eternity.

The good thing is there is a pre test.  My seventh grade language arts teacher you to give us pre tests for spellings b’s and if we passed it we get a 100% on the real test.

What my teacher didn’t do was give us a cheat sheet for that pre test.

How incredible is that!  We have a cheat sheet for the most important test anyone can ever take in their lives!  It is called the bible.

The bible gives us the answer to the pretest and the test.  For the pretest we will be asked one question.  And it is a pass or a fail question.  Do we fully believe that Jesus Christ was crucified for our sins?

Most of the time I didn’t ace the pretest, so I would have to take the real think.  That test will be in account for all the “facebooks” or any sins you have had in your life.  This also, is a pass or fail.  You either get 100%, which has only happened once, or you spend an eternity away from God. 

Are you planning for the test to come?

Unconditional Love

I hurt some people I love by the blog last week so I ended up taking it down.  What I did was make a comment about God loving Hitler and didn’t emphasize the fact that God hates sin.  Without a doubt Hitler sinned more than anyone I can imagine.  I cannot fathom the holocaust.  I have grown up learning about it and have spent my time weeping at museums because of the horror that went on at that time.

My problem is that I am a new Christian and sometimes have a hard time figuring this whole thing out.  Sometimes God will light me on fire and I have this message of unconditional love I want to share with everyone because it has been so real in my life, but instead of doing that I can sometimes make it sound like a message of hate.

I am not the only one to do this.  Many people when Christian comes to mind don’t have very good thoughts.  There are pastors molesting kids, preachers who give false testimony, and lukewarm Christians who will make it seem like because they prayed a prayer when they were little they can do whatever they want but they are better than you.

I have sinned just as much if not more the most.  I fully believe I am undeserving of this gift God has given me.  But man have I messed up when my pride gets the best of me.

If you were to say one word that would sum up the bible it would be love.  It is all about this unconditional love God has shown us.  The one thing God hates is sin.  He made attempts to free us from that.  He wiped out all of mankind except Noah because of the sin that corrupted the world.  We continue to sin so in the torah he told us about a Messiah that would come and salvation will come to this world. 

Finally, a “man” by the name of Jesus came and lived free of sin.  He also fulfilled every prophecy at the acquired time and will continue the rest upon his second coming.  “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” –John 3:16.

What I have found is that you can look at anyone, definitely including myself, and end up disappointed.  We all sin and when that sin is brought to the table it makes question marks arise on what Christianity it.  I have learned to keep my eyes on Jesus, one who the closer you look, the more overwhelmed you will be. 

I am trying to work out this “bible thumper” thing I have going on.  But I will never stop sharing the good news of grace that God brought to this earth a little over 2009 years ago.  The news that there is nothing you can do that will make God love you any less, and he wants better for every person in this world.  Christianity has not been Christianity as intended, but God has always been and will always be God. 

I am still trying to figure this out, and I got knocked down by my actions, but I will get back up and continue to persevere spreading the gospel until the day comes where this vapor of a life on earth I have  is gone.  Will you join me?

Thoughts for the day part 1

So I had some thoughts the last couple of days and I thought I would just write them down.

1)  I just got done speaking to someone I know who had dodged a life sentence and has now accepted Christ and is doing full time ministry work for the gospel.  Also I always get, “Aaron, you never go out anymore!”  Which if you don’t speak high school/college it means you don’t go to bars or parties, and you know there is nothing else in this world that can be more fulfilling than those two things.  So anyways to my thought, you always here of people giving their life to Christ.  “Dead to sin, but now alive in Christ Jesus.”  What you don’t hear is, “You know I really surrendered my life to the Lord and gave him everything, but it just wasn’t for me.  I think I will go back to my old self now.”  Now you may here people who went to church and tried out the whole lukewarmity thing for a while say that.  But I think the church, and me often, has focused a lot on that we shouldn’t sin because it is against God.  That certainly is part of it, but thats not really the main reason of letting go of your sin.  When I surrendered my life to the Lord and got into an intimate relationship with him, I didn’t care about drinking or any of that stuff anymore!  I have God!  What can be better than this!  Accepting Christ isn’t about giving up things, its about what you get!  An intimate relationship with your creator!  So am I missing out on life because I don’t live like I used to?  I have never been this alive in my life.  I will tell you first hand, you may be having the time of your life right now.  Many people who read this are in high school or college, and I understand how much fun it is to go out and get messed up every weekend.  But when you put an intimate relationship with God into the equation, it doesn’t even compare! 

And that was a little longer than I thought it would be so I guess I will have a thought of the day tomorrow too!

Poser

Remember back in middle school?  The skateboarding days.  I loved them even though I was too much of a baby to do most of the tricks (thank you mom).   We used to only wear skateboarding clothes.  Etnies, DC, Osiris, and at the time vans were for losers.  And what did we call everyone that wore the name brands but didn’t “skate”?

You guessed it!  A POSER!  That was the ultimate diss back in the day.  If you wore skater clothes you better of made sure you were a skateboarder, because the worst thing on earth was to be called a poser.

You know what I think is interesting?  How 94% of Americans believe in a God, the majority of them would say they believe in Christ as well, but when I walk into most places I feel like the minority.  Like I get questioned all the time about my faith, by people who say they believe in Christ as well!

I recently heard a sermon on this by Craig Groschel who gave me a term for this.

The term is spiritual atheism.  That is defined as someone who believes in God, but does not fear him.  Another definition is one who believes in God, but lives as if he doesn’t exist.

Is that you today?  Do you intellectually believe in God, but haven’t accepted Christ into your life?  The bible says that even the demons believe and got, but they tremble at his presense.  Do you believe there is a God out there but still do drugs or drink at parties?  Do you believe in a God but still have sex with your boyfriend or girlfriend?  Do you believe in God but don’t feel like you should tithe the full 10 percent? 

A lot of us want to view our faith like a buffet.  We want to go down the line and pick the things we like about God and leave the things we don’t. ”I like heaven, but that celibacy isn’t looking to good, wow answered prayers (Ill take a bunch of those), ehh tithe im not in the mood for that.  I like the grace part, but I don’t feel like loving everyone.”

You see when Christ enters your life he gives you a new heart.  You began to hate the things he hates and love the things he loves.  It doesn’t mean that you will never sin again, I sin all the time, but it does mean that when you do sin you will have a persecution of your sins.

This is why the bible says it is such a narrow road to make it to heaven.  In America we are rich.  If you don’t think your rich 53% of the world lives on a dollar or two a day.  If you are homeless in America you are in the top 10 percent of richest people in the world.  We don’t need God.  In Africa kids are walking 5 miles both ways just to get water for their family for the next day.  We don’t need God for food.  We don’t need God for the majority of our lives.  Except in times of need, then we wonder why God doesn’t answer in our favor.  The bible says that it is so hard for a rich man to make it into heaven, for it is far easier for a camel to squeeze through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to make it into heaven.  I believe that 100 percent.

I don’t care whether you’re a fully devoted Christian or a drug addict that lives on the street or a high school kid that wants to fit, and drinking and smoking is your way of doing that.  God deeply love you and he wants to be with you.  When sin entered the world it caused a separation between us and God.  Jesus came and way nailed to a cross so our sins our forgiven.  The cross is what holds us on to our father. 

Jesus did not die so we could intellectually believe in God.  He died so we would live our lives as a full sacrifice to the one who has done everything for us, and who says that he will hold us in his hand all of our days. 

In Revelations God is talking to the church of Laodicea which is very similar to America today.  He tells them that they are lukewarm, not hot nor cold; they don’t want to live in full sacrifice for God.  God says because of this I want to spit you out of my mouth (Revelations 3 I believe, look it up).  He ends by saying that he is knocking on the door and he wants to come in, will you open it up for him?

I know that upon reading this many of you are never going to read my blog again.  Some of you may not want to talk to me again.  But when I stand face to face with my father and he says what you said to everyone you loved whose salvation was on the line, I do not want to hold anything back. 

Are you ready to live for a God who sent his Son to die on a cross?  And even if it was only for you, he still would have done it.  Or is your life, a mere vapor, more important at the moment and you just wanted to have fun and live for yourself? 

Ill adds one more thing. Many people and I sometimes act like when you except Christ you lose all of this pleasure.  That couldn’t be more wrong.  When you are walking with the Lord, those things that take up your life now will not matter.  The grace of God through his Son is far better than anything this world has to offer. 

Practical Atheism:  One who believes in God, but does not fear him.
                                    One who believes in God, but would rather have sex with their boy/girlfriend.
                                One who believes in God, but does not want to live out there life for him.

broken

I grew up playing basketball.  I loved basketball, it was my life.  I remember many days where I would go from school to school basketball practice to aau practice to my rec game.  I put everything I had into getting as good as I can and I had great expectations for myself.  At my peak, I was a pretty decent player.

 But then I stopped playing.  And when I say stop, I mean I STOPPED. 

About a month or two ago I decided that I haven’t played in a long time and that I would go to the rec and play some pick up ball.  That was a horrible decision that only made me feel terrible about all the years I put in to this game.  I stunk it up!  It took me maybe 5 or 6 games to get warmed up, and even then I wasn’t all that great.

Recently I have found that in my relationship with God.  It wasn’t long ago that God just took a match and set me on fire.  I was so red hot for God, I had only been that on fire twice since I became a Christian.  I craved watching sermons, reading my bible, planning big things to glorify the kingdom here on earth.

Then life happened.  It felt like a ton of things hit me at once.  All of a sudden I had relationship problems, family problems, school got tough, and my injury has gotten on my last nerves.  I began to walk around a little depressed.  And you wanna talk about getting IT and losing IT, I got IT and lost IT within a matter of days!  In feeling like I have been dealt the wrong card for a short period in time, I began to take my eyes off of God.

As I am writing this I am just thinking, “Man!! What happened!!!  Remember three days ago, things were awesome and now look!”. 

In the time where I most needed God, I took my eyes off of him, I stopped focusing on what He wants for me.  And here, another spiritual dip.

Have you ever felt at times that God wasn’t hearing you or that he wasn’t with you?  Usually we feel it in times of brokenness, the very thing that God made for us to get closer to Him. 

Does sin have big role in your life right now?  Because many times I have put myself in a spiritual dip for turning my back against God.  Do you need to ask God to do whatever it takes so you will leave your sin and follow him? 

Many of you know the story of Ted Haggard.  Ted Haggard was a pastor for over 30 years.  He had a congregation of 14,000 and a t.v. following of over 30 million.  Ted was caught having an affair on his wife with a male escort and doing meth all the while.  When I first heard of him I thought, “Oh boy, another downfall for the Christian name.”  But then I listened to his story.  He had struggled all his life with temptations.  He loved his wife but he couldn’t seem to get his lustfull thoughts for men out of his life.  It eventually took control and almost ruined his life.  Infact if you were to take a outside perspective you would probably say his life is in fact ruined.  But Ted was a man of God.  And if you think I am crazy for saying this, his sin is no worse than our judgement or our anger.  He asked God to do whatever it takes for him to get his sin out of his life.  Months later Mike Jones, the male escort, found out who Haggard was and went public with their relationship.  Ted was banned from his church, from the state of Colorado (I believe), and had to promise to never preech again.  He was close to suicide, losing his wife, and his kids.  But through his brokenness he will probably never do that again (I can’t say for sure because I am not him), and his relationship with his wife is far better than it ever was before.  His kids don’t see there father on a pedestal anymore, yet as a human being and have grown to respect him more.

God will do whatever it takes for you and I to be with Him.  He doesn’t want us to be bound by sin.  He sent his Son not only to forgive us of our sin, but to set us free from our sin. 

So yes I have been down recently, and I have been distracted.  But I serve a faithfull God, and no matter what my circumstance is, I know he is with me.  He loves us and he can take your sin, no matter what it is, and set you free right now.  Not in the next couple of days, at this very second, he can enter your life and give you a brand new heart.  Because he is a jelious God, and he wants nothing more than to spend eternity with us.

There is no title

Please Please Please take time to watch this video if you haven’t already seen it.  Watch all 5 parts.  If you have, watch it again.  If you can watch this video and not fall to your knees, your legs are much stronger than mine and I wanna know your secret.

When I watched this video, all I wanted to do is be in constant worship to my Dad.  How does my sin compare to a God this great?  Why do I keep struggling with the same sins over and over and over and over again? 

I can not continue to live my life for myself.  Many of my closest friends turned into friends that I hear a word from them on occasion because I have “changed”.  I will admit it right now, I have changed.  Christ entered my life and gave me a brand new heart.  When I saw a little more on how big God is, and how he sent his Son to belittle himself because of the love my Father has for me.  What isn’t worth not living everyday a living sacrifice to the glory of God. 

Watch this video and tell me that we are made from particles of dirt (if you don’t know the theory of evolution, look it up).  Tell me that going to bars and doing drugs to maintain relationships with my “friends” is more important.  Tell me that the feeling you get from pre marital sex is worth living eternity apart from a Father who has done everything and more for me.  My life belongs to Christ, and I awaite the day when I meet him face to face and sit next to him on his throne in heaven.

Jesus is not my homeboy

We hear it all the time how God loves us and how big he is.  But most of the time I act like its not that big of a deal.  The truth is Jesus is not my homeboy.  I cannot fathom how big God is.  Many times as a matter of fact it is really hard to believe.  This God that we talk about and serve, I cannot comprehend the power he has. 

This is the God of Revelations.  Where if we were to just look at him as humans we would die because of how bright He is.  The God who created the heavens and the earth (in seven days I might add).  He is so powerful and so holy that at all times there are angels sitting around his throne singing “Holy, holy, holy (because once isn’t enough) is the Lord God almighty who was and is and is to come”. 

Take a look at this video for a moment.

That’s our God.  We will never be able to really comprehend how big he is.  And even though he is this Big and this powerful, that’s not the best part.

This God loves us.  You hear it everyday how God loves and cares for us but I can’t really understand that.  I turn my back to God daily and perform the same sins over and over again.  I am constantly falling short of the glory of God.  But he loves me so much he sent his Son down, to degrade himself and become human for a short while so the walls would be broken and that we could have an intimate relationship with Him. 

What!?!?!?!

I don’t get it.  This God wants relationship with me?  Someone who sins against him DAILY?  And he sent his one and only Son so I am forgiven?  Why? 

There is a quote from an old pastor that says “This is God’s universe and God does things his way. You may have a better way, but you don’t have a universe.”  If I was God im sorry but everyone would be going to hell.  I am horrible at forgiving people. 

Not God though.  For some reason he actually sent his Son so we would be forgiven.  Amazing would be to less of a word to describe this type of Love.   Or any other word I can come up with.  If you can think one please let me know, but good luck.

And every day for moments in time I actually in my head for some reason think that this sin I can’t overcome is bigger or more powerful that God.  The God who when asked what shall we call Him couldn’t even belittle himself to a name, instead just responded I am who I am.

I really have nothing else to say.  I have just been overwhelmed with how majestic God is.  If he has done all of this so I can have an intimate relationship with him wouldn’t I pray and worship him without ceasing, read my bible throughout the day, live my life as truly a living sacrifice.  I am not very good about doing all these.  What’s holding me back?