Friend, you need Jesus…
Hey what the heck, I’ll toss in my two copper coins on the whole mission idea that dang near most of the other links are pondering. I say this all the while a voice in the back of my mind is telling me that my Father’s will isn’t too hard to figure out. After all, most of the disciples were simple fishermen. That fact has always disturbed be because I am a fisherman and I have yet to catch as big of a fish as the one that I tell stories about. I’m not trying to tell you how to do it at all. I’m going to tell you about my friend Dave.
Dave came into my store at a time when I was most vulnerable. My previous employee had just cleaned out the cash register last night and today was the day that I was receiving a truck load of food. To say the least my current thoughts on employees wasn’t pure. Dave asked me if I needed some help and wanted to work for me. I was hesitant, after all he wasn’t dressed like a guy that wanted a job but I was desperate and so he started immediately. He easily outworked me and then some for the remainder of the day. I expected him not to show up the next day at all and to my surprise he was 20 minutes early. He rides the bus and it takes him about 1hour and 20 minutes to get here (a 15 minute drive for the rest of reading this). Again he worked his butt off and kept a tune to the radio while he worked. Think of it as Snow White wearing a 5 o’clock shadow, a bandana and some ‘80’s style sunglasses on his head – minus the 7 dwarfs of course.
Dave’s background was the complete opposite of mine. He lived in a two bit apartment that most of you would consider dangerous. I will not divulge his past but for those of you who are street smart: meet the professor. His history could have been an issue for me as an employee but his hard work was worth the risk of running the register and what not. As the time passed, Dave became an icon in my store. His personality and character traits are some of the best I have seen in any man I’ve met, all he needed was a chance and the customers knew this as well.
While time went on, I started sharing the stuff that I was pondering. I told him about what I believed and invited him to church; after all, it was the Christian thing to do. I guess you could say he was my mission but I didn’t know it because I was too busy enjoying him as a friend. I think I learned more from him during the time we worked together that any other time I spent serving at “Church on the Street” and Ronald McDonald house.
The only thing that I regret was not having him at my house or his more that I did before we moved to Prescott. He is still there at Harvest Foods working at my job and he is doing it much better. I didn’t realize how much he cared for me until I said goodbye. After working at the store for over 4 years I was sick of the place and couldn’t wait to get out of town. I shook his hand and wished him good luck and that I would be keeping in contact with him. He was speechless and crying and all he could utter was “you gave me a chance”. I was taken back and I didn’t know what to say. The one thing that I wished I could have told him was that I learned more about life and the love for people through him than I ever have before.
So what is the point? Get over the word mission and just keep your eyes open to whom our Father puts us in contact with. I’m willing to bet that you will learn more yourself that the person or people you are trying so desperately to love. It doesn’t need a plan just a removal of barriers – yours.
Now I’m not one for political correctness, and for the most part I can hardly spell it, and
THIS pretty much confirms it. I damned near wet my pants.
“Hey Dad watch this! Dad!! DAAaad… look at me!!” (dad is a bit hard of hearing). Dad turns to watch his son jump on his hands and kick his feet out and eventually slams his body on the ground. He is attempting to perform a kicking action that his mind has created but they are the most awkward movements that I have witnessed and yet the most beautiful thing that I can see.
All he wants is for me to keep my eyes on him. Kicking or not, he wants my attention which mostly is a form of affection to him. At that moment I am reminded of what my Father sees in me. I may be as clumsy as an ox in a Waterford crystal store but my Father isn’t interested in my graceful movements. He doesn’t care so much at what I am doing at the time as how badly I need His attention.
I think I nailed down what my issue is with tithing. It isn’t the actual act of giving at all. It is the fact that the giving goes to the givers – that is about 75% of it. It goes back to their benefit: buildings, projectors, staff…..Today a church is doing very well if it gives 25% of the money received to the outside community; be it clothes, food, rent or you could hold a vacation bible school and that would encourage more givers – I digress. It costs money to run a church and pay the staff and liability insurance and utilities and the ski trips that the youth must go to all in the name of attaining the life of Jesus. Sadly this goes completely against the teachings and life of Jesus.
Those that followed Him while He was on earth had a substantially different outlook when it came to giving; more specifically after He ascended. They became passionate rather that dimwitted. Their life was already dead and it was He that lived in them. Everything that they did was to speak of the good news and be the Life that others might question or fear. Back then understanding Christianity was easy but becoming one was difficult (persecution). Today understanding Christianity is difficult but becoming a Christian is very easy indeed. (yup I stole that last thing from someone else’s blog – sue me)
I had to go to Phoenix to drop off a trailer yesterday and had some time to listen to Wayne and the Power of the Cross. I needed that badly. I have listened to the CD many times but I still struggle to fully comprehend it. My previous education tends to drown out most new stuff after I have listened to it. He makes so many awesome points about the relationship between Father and Son and what sin is and what actually the Father’s wrath is. I’m gona write this down so I don’t forget it… and it is my blog and I have ultimate power…so there.
The enemy’s job is to offer us God’s promise without the relationship with Him (eat the apple and you will be like God). Sin is what destroys that relationship. God’s wrath is poured out on that which will harm us – sin (we are, by our very nature, objects of God’s wrath - Paul). Jesus being fully God and fully man grew in favor with God and man which means that he voluntarily relinquished all the knowledge of being God when he became a baby. This is why he only did what he saw the Father doing – he was walking in a pure relationship with Father. When Jesus was on the cross he became sin so that the Father would pour out His wrath on the Son in order to destroy sin. This was the only time that the relationship that they had was torn apart. Father knew for the first time what is was like to be Sonless and Jesus saw for the first time what it was to be without the Father. This is why he said “Father why have you forsaken me” – he couldn’t see His Father.
I’m sure I messed up some parts of it up but you get the general idea. I’m not sure why I tend to forget these parts when I toil over the cross in my head. I usually think that Jesus died for our sins and now we are free. That is just too simple and without depth. Regardless, the cross is the crucial issue in our faith and without us fully understanding this matter we will feel distant. I think that is why so many Christians are so pissy. They usually have three venues to vent there frustration: sexual perversion, anger and drugs. Living under the obligations of Christianity without the relationship with the Father will drive you mad. Until you die and let Father have total control you will continue to be dissatisfied.
