Guilt vs. Joy

Hmm.  Sitting here today, I've realized that I haven't posted a blog in quite some time.  I'm not going to apologize, however, because I'm pretty sure that there aren't thousands of people who wait everyday for a blog from me and turn away disappointed every time.  But, I wanted to stop being super stressed out for the 7 quizzes/tests/presentations I have tomorrow and do something that would make me feel happy, and more focused on what's more important than school.

Today I was talking with someone about Jesus/morality/ethics/emotions/whatever.  It was cool.  Unfortunately, I am quite a slow thinker and generally am able to put down my thoughts in writing better than I can while speaking. 

Somehow, we started talking about Christianity, and I was emphasizing grace, something I can do in my sleep because I love the whole concept so much.  I was talking about how you can't get by on works, and how Jesus came to bring grace so that we could have a relationship with Him.  He's the atoning sacrifice, and he cleans us off better than anything that we could try to do.  So I kept emphasizing grace. 

And then she mentioned guilt and fear.  She asked me why I would worship Jesus, and why I would go to church and do stuff like that, if it's not about works, and completely about grace.  She said that it would seemingly be because of guilt that Jesus died on the cross, and now I have to pay Him back, or fear, that I was scared of what would happen if I didn't do anything.  Maybe both.

Me being the quick thinker that I am stumbled off a couple of words about thankfulness. And she said that if someone gave her a really nice gift, she would feel guilty that that gift is so nice, and then out of that guilt, she would try and pay the person back.  She thought maybe that's what I did too, because it seems crazy that someone would die for you, and you wouldn't feel guilty or insufficient for it or something like that.

And to be honest, I was like "whoa, is that the reason that I worship Jesus?  Is it for fire insurance or out of guilt?"  but then after like 3 minutes of hard-core brain action, I was kind of able to come up with an opinion.

I don't know about you, but I've gotten some pretty cool gifts in my life.  The list includes T-ball things, iPods, cell phones, and Rambos.  And I remember the point in my life when I was able to receive a gift and not feel guilty that the person spent money or time or energy to get it for me.  All I knew was, "I can hit a ball really easily on this T-ball set."  And maybe that's not a bad thing.   

Christmas morning would consist of me opening a gift, maybe saying a quick thank you to my parents, and then opening the plastic box and trying to play with whatever it was.  Maybe I never said thank you to my mom or my dad.  Maybe the words never came out of my mouth.  But in my little 4-year old brain, I was so thrilled.

My parents might not have been thanked, officially.  But the best way to show someone that you like the gift and appreciate the giver is by using the gift, and playing with it, and enjoying it.  That's when a parent knows that they hit jack-pot.  When the kids eyes are glowing, and they play with the gift.

See, there's no way that as a 4 year old, I was able to get my parents something that they were remotely interested in.  I didn't have the resources, I didn't know what they wanted, and while I could have attempted walking to the mall, things might not have worked out so well.  All I could do was what I liked doing the best: playing with the toys, and appreciating what my parents got me. 

Same goes with us.  God gave His Son, who was also God, to come down and be sacrificed for us.  Jesus was the atoning sacrifice that made a relationship with God available to everyone.  No longer do we have to sacrifice, because Jesus was sacrificed.  Now it's all about the grace of God, and while it's the grace of God alone, we as humans do something about that grace that we have received.  We're changed after we experience that gift of true love. 

And many times people try to pay God back.  They work and they work and they work, and they try and they try and they try.  They're so caught up in what they do good and what they do bad, that they forget that they're thanking God for grace so they don't have to be perfect.  That's what guilty-grace looks like.  Always trying to pay God back for what He's done for us.

Other people try doing works in fear that God's grace is not sufficient in their lives and that they need works if they're ever going to be fully saved.  Now it's true that good things/works are a result of grace, but they are no means a means to grace.  Both situations get frustrated and mad, because they're trying to be perfect, and yet they keep on failing. 

But then there are those people who take grace for what it is: a gift.  God didn't sacrifice His Son so that we would do something for Him, because we can't do much for Him at all.  How could He expect to improve His perfection?  He can't.  He gave Jesus to us so that we could experience His love for us.  "For God so LOVED the world."  He loves us.  That's just it.  He loves us like a good father loves his kids.  He doesn't get them gifts so that He could be repaid, He gets them gifts because He wants them to know that He loves them.  And that's exactly what God has done.  So, please don't try to earn your salvation.  Please don't try to pay God back.  Accept God's gift of grace as a gift, and worship God by using His gifts!

Eclipse

I've been watching some Louie Giglio videos lately.  So what I'm trying to say is this:  The universe is fascinating and reflects the glory of God.  Anyhow, now that I have that off my chest, I feel free to talk about what's on my mind.

Did you know that the sun is 400 times bigger than the moon in diameter?  It's a fact, and the earth is also smaller than the sun, by about 100 times.  So the moon is the smallest of the three, the sun is the biggest, and the earth is right there in between. 

The moon is constantly orbiting the earth, constantly circling the earth with the same side facing us at all times.  It circles us about once a month, or every 27 days to be exact.  Stay with me, I swear I'm getting to a point pretty soon.

Every once in a while, there is what we call an eclipse.  I tried to think of another word to say this, to try and steer away from Twilight connotations, but I couldn't find a good substitution.  Any how, an eclipse is when the moon passes in front of the sun, and then everyone goes out and looks at it with 3D goggles or something that looks similar to that.

So here's my point.  I feel like we have all experienced eclipses in our lives.  I don't mean that an actual solar eclipse has happened in each of our lifetimes, even though I'm pretty sure that it has.  I'm talking about the point in our lives when we're frustrated, when we're worried, when we are down, and it seems like we can focus on nothing but the pain. 

Hope, Jesus, and life are blotted out from our views, and all that we can see is despair, and we are paralyzed from action, wondering why Jesus is gone, and wondering why He would leave us.

"Where are you God?"  we ask.  "Why can't you be with us even in our hardships?  Why have you departed us?"

In our own minds, God becomes small, and our obstacles seem daunting and insurmountable.  The Bible says to fix our eyes upon Jesus, but we are convinced that Jesus is no where to be found, that He was quick to desert us. 

But God does not abandon His children, and He certainly is not unable and helpless to reach out and pull us out of our misery.

Listen:  The sun is 400 times bigger than the moon, yet sometimes, the moon completely covers the sun from our perspective.  The moon is pressing, close, and demanding our attention, and we as humans cannot get past the moon and see the sun.  Same goes with our lives.  Our issues, our shortcomings, our obstacles get so close to us and stress us out so much, we feel like we have no hope.  I suddenly find that I can't focus on Jesus, because I'm worried about what people think about me, or the school project that's due soon, or wondering if I'm ever going to actually hold a girls hand, and if my hands will stop being so sweaty by that stage in my life.  But you really didn't need to know that, I suppose.

But the thing is, God is so much greater than anything that we're struggling with, or going through right now.  It's funny to me when people talk about the "fight" that satan and God are going to have someday.  To be honest, it's not going to be a fight.  It's the infinite against the finite, the perfect against the blemished, and statistically speaking, there is absolutely no chance or odds that satan will win.  Absolutely none.

You see, Jesus is there.  I know sometimes you can't see Him.  He's there.  Sometimes you can't feel Him.  He's there.  I know that so many times, we have a storm rocking our boat, and death seems certain, but Jesus is the one who will calm the seas.  Jesus will not be overshadowed by something infinitely lesser than Him.  Like a speck of dirt on a telescope, troubles seem to be so large and looming, but there is a truth far greater than that.  The truth is that Jesus will shine through our storms.  Jesus will shine through our troubles.  Despite what you're feeling now, there is not only hope that Jesus will break through, but there is assurance that He will. 

So I don't know where you are in life.  Right now it could seem like darkness reigns or you could be living in light of the light of Christ.  But I just want to say this.  God is there, and he is omnipotent.  He is far stronger than darkness, and He is shining through the pain.  So live in light of the knowledge that Jesus reigns, and He will never depart us and that He is bigger than any eclipse in your life, or any struggle in your life, or any darkness that you're in and His greatness will be known throughout the universe, that He is Lord.

Man-hood

I'm watching football with my dad right now.  Meaning, I'm watching the game, and my dad is working hard on his computer.  So this is a mix of adrenaline/testosterone and male role models like my dad, but I've decided that I want to be a man. 

I don't mean that I want to be allowed to smoke pipes, or drink Miller Genuine Draft 64.  I'm not even talking about having a wife someday.  In fact, my future wife will not be mentioned after this.  It's that serious.  Just know that I'll be thinking about her.

But really, the topic of man-hood and being an adult has been controlling my mind a lot lately.  I feel like God really wants me to grow up and take responsibility.  Here's what I've decided that man-hood is to me:

Responsibility.  I really want to be responsible.  I want more weight on me, so that I HAVE to grow, and I HAVE to learn, and lead, and I feel like the best way to do that is to have responsibility put on me so I can learn to take that successfully. 

Work ethic.  I don't want to ever be known as lazy.  God's given me so many opportunities to succeed so that I can be the best I possibly can be in my future job, my future school, my future marriage (oops, I lied at the beginning.  Shout out to the wifey) and everything I do.  I don't want to ever take the easy way out of anything if it could possibly be detrimental to me.  So I'm working on that.

I'm really working on that.  Those are the big two that I'm majorly working hard on, because I want to be a man, and a good man.  I'm working on my work.  I'm learning how to put effort into things.  I don't close the door to my room anymore, because I want to work out my faith (Phillipians 2:12), and there is plenty of stuff that I could be doing behind closed doors that is not beneficial to me at all.  I have learned that things aren't going to change in my life until I actually change. 

It sounds super elementary, but so many people think that they'll change at some point, without doing anything about it.  We turn into lazy people who refuse to work because they want life to be easy and have all their troubles go away by wishful thinking.  We take grace for granted, and sometimes never get our act together, and spend our lives in the rut of wishful thinking.  The only way you can change, is if you change.  So change.  Put in work, so that you can become better.  Jesus came to save us from our sin, not to give us a free pass to do it. 

So that's what I've been thinking about.  We need to do work, son.

But grace still freaking rocks.

Jesus is for Losers

Last week, I went to City Church on a Saturday night with some friends.  This was because it was man-night, and my pastor was involved.  I had been to City Church once before, and all I remember of it is that they served root-beer floats.  Thus, I was pretty excited to go to the City Church again.

I was also kind of nervous for some reason.  Something deep down inside me was telling me that someone would judge me for what I was wearing, not speaking in tongues, or not wearing skinny-jeans like the lead pastor.  I wanted to be able to go in there without any one looking at me, because I felt like the minute that they looked at me, was the minute that they would start judging me.

I feel like this is how a lot of people think when they go to an unfamiliar church.  "They're going to judge me, they aren't going to like me, I've never sacrificed a goat before."  And in all honesty, except for the last one, maybe we as Christians have brought that on.  Maybe we are constantly trying to hide in a shell of self-righteous works, pretending that we're perfect even though we're screwed up inside.

I thought about how people who come to Overlake must feel, and how thinking that we're going to judge them at all is so off base of what we actually try to do. 

You see, the whole point of Jesus is not that He came for the good little boys and girls who never have problems, and never struggle with anything, and do everything that they're supposed to.  Jesus didn't die for perfect people, because that would be pointless. 

Jesus died for the broken, and the sinful.  He Himself says that He didn't come for the healthy, but for the sick.  He came for the people who can't do it by themselves.  He came for the sick.  Jesus came for the losers like me who can't seem to do what is right very often. 

So why then do people think of Christians as judgmental people who look down on other people because of all the bad stuff that they do?  If anything, Christians should be the most humble people on the face of the earth, because the description of a Christian is someone who knows they aren't good enough, and therefore let Jesus save them.

And yet we still get a reputation as being the good boys and girls of society who never have issues and look down on the kids that do.  That is completely and utterly wrong, and not what we're supposed to be doing. 

So for all the people who are reading this and think that Christians are judgmental, I say sorry on behalf of all of them, including myself.  I'm sorry that we've been a poor representation of truth.  I'm sorry that we've looked down on you even though we're just as bad off as you.  I'm sorry.

And to all the Christians reading this, I say let's step up our game a little bit.  It's our job to represent Jesus, the one who ate dinner with the tax collectors and prostitutes and the fallen and the sinners.  Let's show people who see us what our Lord is really like, rather than a twisted version of what He came to do.  Jesus died for the losers, so let's not be prideful, judgy, or arrogant.  Deal?   

My future wife!

Right now I'm listening to Marvin Gaye.  Thus, this blog post is going to be about my future wife.  Duh.

I think a lot about my future wife, probably due to never having had a girfriend.  I'm actually kind of stoked. 

Here's what I've decided about her:
1. She is going to love Jesus more than she loves me.
2. She's still going to love me a ton though.
3.  She's going to be beautiful, and when I say beautiful, I mean "If she's walking around in a garbage bag with holes cut in it for legs and arms, she's gonna be a stunner.''
4.  She's going to actually laugh at my jokes.  Boy, one-in-a-million, huh?
5. She'll be hilarious. 
6.  She has to balance out my social awkwardness, so that our overall average will be at least 7.5 on the Acone scale of awkwardness.  This means that she'll have to have at least 14 Acone points.
7.  She's going to be super cute. 
8.  Gorgeous.
9.  She has to be appreciative of 80s R&B Soul.  I won't know how to woo her otherwise.
10.  She'll watch sports with me, and we'll snuggle. 

But having said all that, I need to work on stuff myself, because I'm not ready at all for anything like marriage.  You can call me "15", but I just call myself "AHHH, I still don't have a job."  Here's the list of stuff that I want to be for my wife.

1.  I want to be a leader that she can trust to lead her in the right way. 
2.  I want to be able to bench press her body weight.  Is that too much to ask?
3.  I want to be a provider for her.  So that we can, like, eat.
4.  I want to be able to be a bit better of a hugger for her.  Ah well, we'll practice that in the context of marriage.
5.  I want to be totally Christ centered.  As in, "too busy being centered around Jesus to write a long blog post about her."
6.  I want to be able to know which colors match with what.  Because that could be important, I feel like.
7.  I want to be able to ask to see a wine-list without the waiter laughing at me.
8.  I want to rely on Christ everyday, so that the relationship isn't about us, but it's about Jesus.
9.  I want to know the Bible.  Really well.
10.  I want to resemble Bruce Wayne at least a little bit.

So there you go, that's what you get when listening to Marvin Gaye.  Until I get married, I'm going to become what I want to be so I'm ready.  And also, I'm going to be so pure, it'll be awesome.  Super hot abstinence.

The story of Danny and Zsa-Zsa

Once upon a time, in a far away land, lived a family made up of a little boy named Danny, and a little girl named Zsa-Zsa.  Yes, Zsa-Zsa.  They were in a household in which their dad loved them very much, and they were always joyful and happy, playing basketball like life was perfect.

One day, they were watching Rocky, and Danny and Zsa-Zsa realized that they too wanted to become boxers so that one day they could be even stronger than their dad.  They wanted to be the best boxers in the world, so obviously they moved to Philadelphia, where Rocky trained. 

Once there, they quickly realized that not all of Philadelphia was a meat processing plant in which they could train, and they became quite disappointed.  Trying to mask their sadness, Danny and Zsa-Zsa decided that their next best option was to be WWE fighters instead of what was shown in Rocky and Million Dollar Baby. 

They got into a rhythm of loving WWE, and they soon forgot all about basketball at home, or their boxing dreams, and they started enjoying "fighting" in the WWE.  They were making money, on pay-per-view, and their lives seemed just great.

But soon even their fighting days were gone, and they found themselves homeless, entertaining themselves by making toy boats out of thrown away newspapers and floating them down the torrent of water that was flowing down the gutters.  Yeah, life had gone downhill.

But you see, their dad had never actually forgotten about their basketball dreams, or their boxing dreams, and remembered how much passion they had for those things, and how much he knew they enjoyed it.  Mostly though, their dad just missed them.  He was longing for the days where they would watch a movie together, or wrestle them until they were too tired to get up, lying on the floor giggling. 

Often times, he would try to call them, or to hook them up with a facebook message.  But they never responded.  You see, they were quite content with their boat making, and they were getting good at it.

Finally, though, he sent Michael Jordan to convince the kids that the dad wanted them back, and to come back into the household and hang out with Jordan and the dad.

"No," they replied, "we're actually getting really good at making these little boats.  See?  Look at that one.  Look at the sails and how fast it goes down the street."

The Air himself tried to convince them, but it wouldn't work.  They could no longer imagine a land besides the paper boats, and were convinced that this "dad" that they heard of was just like a Nigerian prince who often emailed them looking for their bank account numbers.

Michael kept persisting however.  One day he told them straight out, that there was more to life than paper boats, and that they could have a better life.  Becoming defensive, they  shook their heads in fury and screamed "Don't take us away from this life!  You're a liar, and we don't want anything to do with you!"

And they stabbed poor Michael with the only weapon they could find, their scissors.  And Michael Jordan died that day.

 And three days later, Danny and Zsa-Zsa saw MJ playing basketball on a playground.  "MJ," they said, "What the heck just happened.  Why are you still alive?"

Michael was still alive because, let's be honest, we all know what's going on in this story already, of God.  And because I couldn't think of a relevant thing that would be equated to someone dying and then raising to life.  Because that doesn't really ever happen.  

Michael explained to Danny and Zsa-Zsa that it was true.  They had a dad, he existed, and he actually really liked them.  He also explained that his Rolls-Royce Phantom was the only way to get out of the hood and to his dad.  They jumped into the Rolls and headed towards their dads house. 

There, they played a game of 2 on 2, which, of course, the dad and Michael Jordan won.  But it was still a party.  And the kids promised to never ever leave their father again.  And everyone was very happy.  And, if you haven't noticed, that was more than a story of Michael Jordan's only successful comeback in his life.

Nerd Alert.

This past weekend, I drove to Washington State University to visit my sister, who goes to WSU and majors in something about broadcasting and Spanish.  It was pretty much a party all weekend, and on Sunday we pulled ourselves off of the couches in the basement to go to their church, called "Real Life."

Once there, I quickly realized that I was in the wrong spot.  This is what my brain immediately jumped to as an uncool church.  The nerd alert in my brain was blasting through my brain as I entered into a time of worship.

I couldn't stop thinking about how the woman keyboardist looked like Tina Fey.  The male keyboardist looked like Phil Collins.  Gabe from "The Office" was playing guitar, and the main singer kept throwing up hand gestures that I was convinced were Christian gang symbols that people who were holier than me knew.

I'm not used to this atmosphere.  My church has pool tables, people who dress in basketball shorts, and a worship pastor with mountain man facial hair.  We listen to Christian rap, and this church probably liked Michael W. Smith.  Yes, I was in a different style of church, and I was freaking out.

Then something in me began to stir.  The Jim Gaffigan look-a-like came out for announcements, and I laughed at his jokes.  Surely I was already becoming one of them, and might walk out of the church saying "thee", "thy", and calling people "bless-ed." 

But I kept being stirred.  A back-up pastor came up and began to speak about prayer, and it was awesome.  I found myself learning, and applying what he was saying to my life.  And I realized that the coolness of a church is based off of Christ, not cultural relevance. 

I began to process the amount of time that I think about what people think, rather than what I know about God, and what He thinks of me. 

I realized that people think that I look like a main character from "American Pie", and that that's a lot worse than looking like the guy who wrote the Tarzan soundtrack.

So as I go into life, I need to focus on Jesus, rather than myself.  I need to look to Him, so I know what I should be like.  I need to stop judging people.  And I need to realize what God has done for me, and what He will continue to do in this world.