Answering Why am I Here?

Problem with us today is not that we are perturbed waiting on the “Next Big Thing”.

The problem is that the “Big Thing” has happened but we looking for something else. 

A thing about us humans is that we are never satisfied. 

I have a new iPhone and I want the Apple Watch. I have a cookie but I want two. Well eight. I have a girlfriend, but I want her to give me more thrill in the relationship. I have a job, but I want high pay grade and a better office space. And a Ferrari. 

It’s like we are born with a void, a chasm inside our souls that never can be filled. Or that it can be filled but not with what we are filling it with. 

What happens when I kept my dog Sharp in a bird cage for a week. Well, he starts tearing everything inside the cage, barking at every two feet that passes by him, and poor him spinning in circles until he spills his water bowl and then falls into a “doggy depression”. 

He is a dog. While I had him in there to protect him from the poison that had been placed in the yard that would kill him, he wasn’t made to live in a bird cage. He was made to bark, frolic and run, and slobber my face with his wet licks. 

Maybe the problem in your life is not that you’ve grown tired barking at squirrels but that you are in the bird cage trying to squawk. 

We’ve have been pitched by books, speakers and speakers with books to live life on purpose, but how can I live a “purpose driven life” if I don’t know what my purpose in life is? 

Have you asked yourself yet: “Why am I here?” 

Even if you were made by a cosmic accident, what reason do you have to roll out of bed and make most of the day? 

I don’t know about you but it is bothersome to dress differently each day just to quiet the noise of bothersome people who noticed I wore the same pants twice. 

The one great thing about college is that your “Monday, Wednesday and Friday” class doesn’t know what you wore on “Tuesday and Thursday”. I did take this advantage. 

What is your reason for living today? 

Can I say that I don’t have the faith that I am an accident and therefore life is really meaningless. What meaning is there if your origin was meaningless? 

I grew up in church, and I never asked these questions, because theology just has this “God is” answers to my internal curiosity. 

It wasn’t until one day in high school that my art teacher kept me in class to finish a project. While we sat in silence, we attempted to break the sound barrier. Soon enough she asked me about my life and being a son of a pastor, religion instantaneously became a centerpiece in the conversation. 

She wasn’t rude but very perturbed. She was perturbed that most my answers to her questions was “because”. 

“Why are you living in Antigua?”

“Because my family were called to be missionaries” 

“How do you know you were called?” 

“Because God told my parents to leave America to serve here in Antigua.” 

I stood behind my answers until she asked me what I wanted to do with my life. 

I told her a pastor. She asked why and I told her because I always wanted to be pastor “because” my dad was a pastor and “because God called me”. 

She turned from me and  watched the sun beams glare from off the table. It seemed she was gathering energy from that beam, because she brought her eyes up and then gazed deeply into my eyes. She pierced into the window of my soul with her sharp blue eyes. 

Her wrinkled lips drew opened. Drawing a breath, she calmed the frightening silence but yet stirred what will be a tempest in my heart. 
“But what do you want to do?”
Her simple question complicated my life. I confidently knew what I want to do in life and still today I am still want to pastor. 

It’s wasnt what she said but what she meant by what she said. 

My high school art teacher struck an unsung cord in me, for the first time in my life, I challenged my beliefs. 
Let pause to say this: If you have beliefs and cannot challenge them, then they aren’t worth believing. 
Even the Bible says test what you hear. Her question wasn’t divine inspiration, but I did began testing my belief. 

I openly questioned the inconsistencies I saw in church. My pastor thought I was being defiant, but I recognized a frailty that did not match their convictions which they were persuading people to adhere to. 

I did ask myself that question “why am I here?” 

Last year in high school was complied with depression and apathy. My parents saw it best that I changed my geography for a little bit. 

A cruise is a good idea. Being clergy, I was sent to a Christian ship. But this ship carried a genre of Christian that most of us in the world have yet to encounter. 

Day one, my brother and I learned that ties and a tucked in shirts weren’t not the symbols of a righteous person. Love was the shirt men and women wore. 

Men like Alex from Uruguay who at the break down of our faithful ice cream machine, stilled the angry mob with a ray of unearthly compassion. The forecast of their faces turned with burning red to beaming as they clustered around him as he laughed, apologized and touched them with a warmth of sincerity. 

I lost my composure, because I never spectated such compassion all in one being at one moment. Besides mother of course, that’s a given. 

I grew up impressing people with my theology on Sunday morning then fighting with my siblings on Sunday night. I boarded that ship with the demand to be on the fore front of ministry. 

“I want to preach to the people” but they sent me to their little snack booth. I stood mystified in my little red uniformed shirt at Alex, because I had earlier yelled at some customers. 

He received the same harsh words and rude language that I received, but he responded differently. He didn’t fight for his right to be treated properly. He humbled himself and made the word “love” into an action. 

I cried in my cabin, beating my chest while I chanted “I want that. I want that. I want that.” 

He has something that I don’t see much on our planet. 

Could one posses something more pure than  religious piety and ceremonial ritual?

Is there something underneath the surface of human harmony that is deeper and more sincere than social tolerance? 

I realized for him to live this way he had some purpose to his life. I wish I can say that in my search to find his purpose I did so in a “piteous manner” (Christian way). 

I attempted to get him angry, make him stumble. I wore the devilish horns for a week, but he always maintained this gracious responsive manner. 

Then I threw down my hands and stopped “barking” and just watched him. 

I watched him play football (soccer) and when he was fouled though angry he reacted positively. I watched him converse with his friends, and he always seemed to me to be the central figure, because he lived in this constant loving way that drew people around him. 

I coveted his life and soon enough he started to answer my question. Providentially, he started to work more with me. There I saw his humanness. He did “sinned” like he lose his patience, and few days didn’t pull his share of the work, but what I didn’t see him was his gracious behavior. 

It came out in him saying, “John, I’m sorry”, and “John, you’re right”. I’m not trying to make him a deity but there was something internally differently about him. He was graciously kind enough to share it with me. 

It was Jesus. I worked for him the next month and saw he was just as human as I was but there was like two Persons living inside him. There was Alex and there was this Jesus. 

Jesus would come out of every time he apologized. He would come out every time work was hard, but there he would burst into a joyful rave and inspire us to push the day through. He would come out of his conversations where at the sound of his name, his eyes would expand with such delight and thrill like “this Guy is amazing John, I’m telling you”. 

Some nights, I stayed up under a light and read the books that talked about Jesus. The more I read the more I saw that this Man had some purpose that outlived His work and earthly life. A purpose that endured the rejection, the scorn and persecution. A purpose while he hung accused, sentenced, left to die, He could look at each person that unjustly kill Him and say “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”
I dived deeper into the Bible, and I saw that I was closer to the Truth than I thought but yet still far off. I realized that we all have a purpose but it isn’t found in ourselves. It’s found in God. 

He made us for us as His masterpiece, intended to live a life of doing good things he planned for us long ago (‭Ephesians‬ ‭2‬:‭10‬). He planned a life for me and you that wasn’t disastrous, but it had a future and a hope that was worth living (Jeremiah‬ ‭29‬:‭11‬). 
I realized my depression in high school that climaxed in not graduating was just a moment that did not define my life. I realized on that old rusty ship that I wasn’t made to be somebody but to know somebody. 
You can say Jesus is some kind of thought up idea to control society, but I say seek Him for yourself.

I had to listen to atheistic art teacher and question my beliefs enough to see the purpose to why I build my life around them. 
Maybe you can’t see yourself walking into a church building. Maybe that’s too much. 

But Jesus isn’t a steeple with a cross. He is a Person that relates to all our weaknesses, for He faced all the same hardships as we as humans face (Hebrews 4:16); yet He is also God Who made a life for you that outlives the useless pursuits of happiness in a life that on average ends at 75. 

And He is the purpose that filled the chasm of that Urguain man. 
What if today you gave in to my appeal and just looked for Jesus? 

What if you for one day diverted from your regular routine and charted a different course? A course that led into the presence of Jesus. 
Sounds wild. Maybe not yet. 

Maybe this whole time God has been Someone behind the door at the end of the hall that you only knew as much as you can see through the little keyhole. 
Maybe you just needed an opportunity such as this and be invited to open the door and see Him fuller. 

Maybe it will be end of how you live life and what you call freedom. But what if losing yourself you found a greater gain? 
A purpose that fulfills you. Someone that completes you. A life that satisfies you. 
A book in the Bible says: 
“Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; Blessed is the man who trusts in Him!” (Psalms‬ ‭34‬:‭8‬ NKJV)
Give God a chance to give you His promise to completely satisfy you. 
He has promised to direct to a life that will bring meaning and joy to you. 
“You will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” (Psalms‬ ‭16‬:‭11‬ NKJV)
If Jesus does exist as God that makes Him the source of life and pretty everything. And if that’s our conclusion doesn’t that make Him the source of all pleasure? 
And if He is the Source of all pleasure, what meaning is there for us to be content with a life that is short of this experience?

Your purpose in life includes a plan that will satisfy you. 

And you know what? If you really look for it, I think you will find the “Next Big Thing”. 

Seeking Jesus for the first time, read the Gospel of Mark. Meet a Man that wasn’t just a Man. 

Seeking Him again? I invite you to read the book of Philippians. Encounter a joy that cannot be robbed by bad days, a joy found in being with Jesus. 

Looking for Elsewhere

 Elsewhere is a place for hearts that can never find a belonging. They are always wandering, looking for somewhere that will give them a sense of security. But they will never find it, because what they are really looking for is not out there. 

Driven with this restlessness, a son leaves home. He demanded his share of his father’s inheritance that was coming to him when his father died. Taking his share of his father’s wealth, the son ventures out for elsewhere. 

“And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living.” (‭Luke‬ ‭15‬:‭13‬ NKJV)

Relocated, the son enjoys some wild living, he exhausts everything he has on things he didn’t need, on people who didn’t like him, on places he shouldn’t be, with aspirations he will never find in any of them. 

See the thing is, belonging is never where you are. Geography doesn’t give meaning to anyone. It’s not where you are that fulfills you, it’s who you’re with. 

So happens after the son has wasted all his money, that a famine swept in, and he began to starve. He looked for elsewhere to meet his need but he only met rejection. 

Desperation persuaded him to feed pigs which was the epitome of desperation in this ancient culture. He was so hungry that he even craved the slop of the pigs, but not even that would anyone give him.

Sometimes you need to lose what you have to appreciate the value of it. 

“But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!” (‭Luke‬ ‭15‬:‭17‬ NKJV)

The son came to his senses and realized his problem was that he was discontented. Everything he needed was at home. 

Somewhere to belong is an ache many of us struggle with. It cries from inside us and we feel it needs to be answered. But it’s lie. It’s just a shade of being discontented with what has become too normal to cope with. It’s an insecurity that my present circumstances will not give me fulfillment. Relocation is a bad thing if it serves a means to escape a feeling of discontentment. 

Feeling that he didn’t deserve the right to be part of the family anymore, he decides to ask his father to take him as a slave. 

“And he arose and came to his father. But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.” (‭Luke‬ ‭15‬:‭20‬ NKJV)

While he contemplated, his father caught sight of him and with his heart pounding, he ran to his son. He lost nights of rest, he spent days with his eyes over the horizon, looking for his child to come home. 

In his culture, it was improper and bad for old men to run, but this father didn’t care. He wasn’t a whole since his son left. He lost a part of himself that if it return, he was not going to let anything keep him from getting it back. 

He ran on air until the father broke his son’s standing, throwing him into his chest. His son muffled his speech inside his father, but his father wasn’t listening. 

“But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet. And bring the fatted calf here and kill it, and let us eat and be merry; for this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ And they began to be merry.” Luke‬ ‭15‬:‭22-24‬ NKJV)

The son returned home finding all that he recklessly looked for was right under his nose. The son like many of us was ungrateful. He imagined love, acceptance and joy would be among a different group of warm bodies. But true love was right around him, waiting for him and merry when he got home. 

Sometimes, to have what you want, you have to want what you have. 

Elsewhere is somewhere that takes you anywhere because it’s nowhere. 

Where you need to be and where you actually want to be is around those you do love you. Being human sometimes causes us to disregard that. But where you belong sometimes is who you are with. 

Be grateful. 

Still long way off for some of you, there is a God Who’s heart is pounding, waiting for you to come to Him (or even come back to Him). He is anxious for to hear your voice, to feel your presence, to know you are His. There is no distance to His love for long ago He said: “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.” (‭Jeremiah‬ ‭31‬:‭3‬ NKJV). He won’t relent until He has you. He will wait until the sun sits under the sky and when it rises again for you to find Him. 

Let God love you. 

God’s Pleasure: He Wants You

  We aspire to answer the question: am I wanted? Too often our heart strings are racing to be  entangled with whatever hope of someone possibly loving us. We relish at any attention we’re given, either negative or postive, because we are captivated by the thought that someone desires us. 

The long fall back to earth happens at the reality we attained less of our sense of self worth. Wounds cut deep to realize someone we assume cared about us only acted in such a way for their own selfish gain. 

Trust is hard earned today. Honestly, why should we blame anyone for keeping such a guard? We can’t see sincerity in face value as much anymore.

But as cliché as it sounds: God wants us…for us

“Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.” (Ephesians 1:5, 6 NKJV)

God determined beforehand by Jesus Christ to adopt you. He decided that when at your coming to Him to be saved from all wrong that would destroy you, He was going to bring you into His family. And he did for the praise of the glory: He did it because He was pleased to do it. 

Being belonged to God is something that makes Him happy! 

How unfathomable is that? It’s inconceivable enough that God would want to save us in the first place.

It was justice for the terrorist Osama Bin Laden to die, because of he was responsible for the death of countless thousands that are still piling today. What scares me is that God sees it justice by sending everyone to Hell. 

God commanded: The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. (Ezekiel 18:20 NKJV)

That means that the person who sins will die. Sin is whenever you displease God. You displease God when you lie and you displease God for not thanking Him for life. Both are sin. It feels harsh but God made man to make Him happy. Not vice versa. 

He will be individually responsible for his wickedness against God and be punished. Romans 3:10 declares that there is none good. We have all missed the mark. 

The justice of a righteous God demands punishment for every crime against His precepts. The sentence God placed for our disobedience to His precepts is death.

At the shooting of Osama Bin Laden, could we imagine someone taking the bullet for him. No! We all wanted to see him die. He deserved to lose his life for taking so many others’ lives away. 

God is not a man. He looks at wrong differently from us. He doesn’t measure wrong. He sees a toddler throwing the pacifier across the room as bad as a terrorist planning to drive two planes into two skyscrapers to kill people. I lost an uncle at 9/11. He sees every wrong inexcusable and worthy of punishment.  

All that is within me cried for the head of Bin Laden, but at the same place when I first disobeyed God, all heaven cried for my death.

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), (Ephesians 2:4, 5 NKJV)

God loved us so much that while we were dead because of our wrong, He gave us life through Christ. God wanted us. And how much: But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8 NKJV)

Its overwhelming to imagine all that it took for God to bring us to state of being clear of wrong. Christ became sin (2 Corinthians 5:21). Every nasty thing, every secret fault, every evil deed, every selfish motive- Christ became that so you could literally have a clean slate.

I have cried at this fact of Christ dying to save me from death because of my sin and to give me a right standing with God. What also causes my eyes to become teary is to see that God didn’t just saved me from sin but He also adopted me. He made me a part of His family.

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: (John 1:12 NKJV)

All who believe Christ, God decided to give them the right to be His children! We are born into this family not by human passions or plans that can later be regretted by a parent who has lost concern for his offspring. 

We are born into God’s family by God’s choice. This is what God wanted to do. According Ephesians 1:6 (see top), it gave Him great pleasure to do it.

Just allow your mind to entangle itself around the idea that God loved you at your worst and saved you with His best (the cost of Your Son) and then poured out His love on you by making you a part of His family. I leave you with a story that has impressed me gravely to understand God’s extravagant love.

Indeed if anyone has reason for justice it was Adele. At a genocide in Rwanda, Adele lost her husband. She saw as attackers came and flay his body with a machete. She saw as they slit his throat. As her husband fell to the ground that was a pool of his own blood, the pastor cried out to God to forgive his attackers. These men turned on Adele. They sliced her face deeply. Everyday a mirror shows her great scar. Adele was left among dead bleeding from her face, back and her wrist at the cuts of machetes. Three years it took her to recover. For many it would take a lifetime to even to consider forgiveness. Not Adele.

“I could be a bitter, angry, resentful old woman, but I’m not going to do that.”

Adele started going to the prisoners and mothered the very men who had attack her village. One day Adele met Luis. She met him prostrated before her, kissing her feet and crying bitterly. Adele examined the trembling man and saw that Luis was the man that had killed her beloved husband and the man that marked her face. A man’s love draws its limits at such a woeful event, but Adele was filled richly with a love we saw earlier in God.

Luis asked, “Adele, would you forgive me?”

Adele bent over as the Father did from the clouds of heaven and pulled Luis up as God did from our place of unwantedness. She looked into Luis’ eyes and said, “Luis, I forgive you.”

The story could end there, but it doesn’t. Luis was released for good behavior, but he entered society unwanted. Then entered Adele. Adele found Luis and she saw these words, “Luis, you come and I will adopt you as my son.”

How much does God love you? Enough so that He made death so that it would be difficult for you to remain in wrong. Enough that He made a way for you to escape punishment by the cost of His dear Son. Enough so that He decided to make you His child when you ask for His forgiveness. And it was His great pleasure.

You are wanted.

Desiring God vs Dating

There is such a great wealth in being content with desiring God. It is futile to live to culminate earthly treasures that will ultimately sift through our fingers when we leave earth at death.

And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. (I Timothy 6:8 NKJV)

So what about romance? There is nothing under this profile of contentment in 1 Timothy 6 that talks about being content with being single!

After all, wasn’t God who said, “It is not good that man should be alone.” (Genesis 2:18 NKJV)?

God did said that. In fact, Proverbs 18:22 says, “He who finds a wife finds a good thing, And obtains favor from the Lord.”

So what’s the problem, John? I find a wife: it makes God happy, and He even blesses me with His favor.

I interrupt the eharmony chat room only on this ground: Is she/he the upmost pursuit to win your greatest interest? In other words, is she the center of your drive through life?

If so, you might need to evaluate.

Check this out. You’ve decided to follow the Son. I mean that’s why you’re reading this blog right?…right?

Then what does this verse convey to you?

If then you were raised with Christ [dead to sin and now alive in Christ as this new creation] seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. (Colossians 3:1 NKJV)

Seek Heaven’s treasures: golden streets, big mansions, loved ones and crowns. No. Seek those things which are above: where Christ is. The things we glean from above is the outcome as we set on eyes on Jesus. The focus is Christ. He is our life.

Read what follows verse three:

For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. (Colossians 3:3 NKJV)

This new life we have been rebirthed in is inside Christ. So we set [our] mind on things above, not on things on the earth (Colossians 3:2 NKJV) because Christ is literally our life now.

I’m all for relationships! I just want you to see that Christ is crazy about you.

You know enough that in any romantic relationship, you need to give your everything for that person. Christ gave Himself for you that He might redeem you from sin. And it goes on. Read Ephesians 1 and see some great blessings of God you have in Christ!

He is jealous over you (Ex 34:14). In my opinion, I wouldn’t venture in a relationship, if you’re cheating on your first love!

Being content in God is great wealth in itself. Romance should never steal your heart from loving the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. (Deuteronomy 6:5 NKJV)

Enjoy relationships but enjoy God more.

God’s Plans Override Our Ideas

“But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise…”(I Corinthians 1:27 NKJV)

God confounds our intellect when He uses debased things to carry out His intelligent operation. An excellent example is God’s sovereign use of Jonah to convert Nineveh.

Jonah hated Nineveh. Their people had oppressed Israel. Now God called Jonah, an Israelite, to witness to his enemies.

From start to end of the book of Jonah, Jonah carried a bitter grudge against the very people God desired to experience his mercy.

In sheer awe of God’s wrath, Nineveh immediately repents:

“Then God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it.” (Jonah 3:10 NKJV)

God enjoyed to take pity on Nineveh; however, Jonah shared a different response:

“But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he became angry.” (Jonah 4:1 NKJV)

Hatred propelled Jonah to run to Tarshish, and hatred hardened his heart to Nineveh’s revival. He hated the idea of Nineveh receiving salvation. Yet God chose this hateful person to deliver hope.

God doesn’t choose us by our skills or talents; He qualifies anyone whom He wills to accomplish His plan to receive glory for Himself.

Jonah shows us that God’s delight to receive glory exceeds the liberty of man. God doesn’t bend His plans to suit man’s feelings. He uses whomever, whenever and however.

He used a disobedient, unreliable son to be the chosen ancestor of the Messiah to convey God’s road of glory may even include unexpected potholes.*

He used a prostitute to save the spies of Israel to show His grace confounds our reason.**

He used a false prophet to bless His chosen people to say He can even use evil men to please His wants.***

God has called all his own to serve in bringing Him praise:

“…who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began.”(II Timothy 1:9 NKJV)

God saved you not to be a pet in His collection of souls, but a masterpiece of His wide scale operation to fulfill His wants.

Ephesians 2:10 puts it this way, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:10 NKJV)

If God has determined an event that involves our participation, He may use us even with our unwilling attitudes. Let us then see that our destiny is designed by God to glorify Him. And on that thought, let us want to complete it with a willing spirit.

*Gen 49:8-10
**Joshua 2
***Numbers 22-24

God’s Pleasure for Glory

God is eager to glorify Himself. He goes as far as using providence to manipulate the course of man’s will to author a testament of praise to God.

Joseph is a classic work piece of praise to God. Joseph suffers the anguish of being sold into slavery by his own brothers, then is framed for adultery and imprisoned for 2 years. Yet it delighted God for Joseph to undergo these trials. And while we know the prosperous outcome of Joseph, we neglect to imagine the grief Joseph experiences through these circumstances for the sake of God’s pleasure.

And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. (Genesis 45:7 NKJV)

At the moment Joseph reveals himself to his brothers, he comforts them by disclosing to him that his descent was purposed by God to save their lives.

God confounds the wisdom man when he uses tragic episodes of life and transforms them to handiworks of glory.

Joseph did not expect his struggles will result in being a father to Pharaoh and a ruler of Egypt. Egyptians hated the Hebrews so this is never enter into the thought of Joseph (Gen 43:32). Yet Joseph’s trauma birthed a testimony of God’s grace that forces him to glorify God.

God wants to author your life to tell of His magnificence. God does works all things together for good to those who love God (Rom 8:28), but those who are sincerely being conformed to His image (Rom 8:29) would hold their good to the good of God which is for His name to be lifted up.

God desires for the knowledge of His glory to fill the whole earth (Hab 2:14).

All the scans of the known world lived off the fat of Egypt during the global famine, and it is inevitably possible that the nations learn of Joseph’s Great God and worshipped. Joseph’s house manager glorified God at Joseph’s brothers’ curiosity of their money in their sacks (Gen 43:23). Pharaoh glorified God and set His ambassador Vice President of Egypt (Gen 41:38).

You have to give God every chapter of your life for the praise of His glory.

He is passionate for His glory, and He has commanded that you effort everything for His glory (1 Cor 10:31). Make it a delight to God to offer yourself available to His pleasing (Rom 12:1). He wants to be praised!

Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer

Here’s a great book to refresh that zeal to chase after God: Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer.

Tozer in his book confronts various life transitions that permeate our lives, steal our attention in seeking God and leaves us complacent. You will find that though this book is over 50 years old, that is still very relevant today.

Pursuit of God can be a good warm up to restart your chase after God!

Phil 1:21 vs Phil 2:21 Christian

My buddy Carlo in our prayer group commented, “There are two types of Christians: A Philippians 1:21 Christian and Philippians 2:21 Christian”.

Philippians 1:21 Christian lives by the verse: For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. (Philippians 1:21 KJV)

This Christian understands God is passionate for His glory. He looks at the Scriptures and accepts the fact that he was created to exalt God. His life channels through this verse:

Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. (I Corinthians 10:31 NKJV)

This person sees and reflects the glory of God as the Spirit makes him more and more like Christ (2 Cor 3:18). He accepts that his life was predestinated to be conformed to the image of Christ (Romans 8:29 NKJV).

He leaves behind the past and sees himself in the aftermath of his choice to follow Christ. He accepts that he is a new creation (2 Cor 5:17) and that the life which [he] now live in the flesh [he] live by faith in the Son of God, who loved [him] and gave Himself for [him]. (Galatians 2:20 NKJV).

To him, salvation wasn’t an insurance of eternal security from everlasting damnation, but a sorrowful repentance of his rebellion against God and a sincere acceptance of God’s offer of mercy by believing in Christ’s shedding of His holy blood, he is remitted of his sins and is imputed Christ’s righteousness.

Being born again to him is to be an imitator of God (Eph 5:1). He realizes when 1 John 2:6 says, “He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked” (I John 2:6 NKJV), he sees that he must “deny himself, and take up his cross and follow [Christ] (Luke 9:23 NKJV).

To him, he counts all things as loss for Christ (Phil 3:7). He views the mercy God had on his life, and he gives up his wants, dreams, ideas, presumptions, goals, plans, ambitions, desires, temptations to live for the wants of God (Rom 12:1). He isn’t entangled with the culture of this world (2 Tim 2:4; Rom 12:2), rather he aims for Christ always to be magnified in [his] body, whether by life or by death. (Philippians 1:20 NKJV).

Suffering for Christ is not a trifle, but a privilege (Phil 1:29).

His joy is unconditional. His delight sings the same song: Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. (Psalms 73:25 NKJV).

Death is not a dead end to him, but the obviosous anticipation to desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better. (Philippians 1:23 NKJV).

The profile of the Philippians 2:21 reflects the verse: For all seek their own, not the things which are of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 2:21 NKJV)

His life is centered on himself. He abuses the grace that Christ dreadfully purchased for him (Rom 6:1). He lives totally to gratify himself. Although his pattern of lifestyle can be affiliated with a follower of Christ, his true colors are as the Apostle Paul describes:

For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame— who set their mind on earthly things. (Philippians 3:18, 19 NKJV)

He is hindrance to the advance of Christ, because (pretty much) he is in the way. His religion is impure and defiled (James :27), because he lives well and sees others in need and takes no pity on them (1 John 3:17). His wealth is stored for the here and now. He is so ineffective to share the Gospel because he is so preoccupied with life here on earth. Every success he makes, he perceives it as a blessing and blames the Devil or even God for any discomfort.

He is pretty much useless to the cause of Christ (Luke 14:34-35). These words of Christ label his worship: ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honor Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me. (Matthew 15:8 NKJV)

He believes that he is a valuable asset to God, but he is actually nothing more than a whitewashed tomb (Matt 23:27).

What he says in his heart is what Christ condemn to the Church of Laodicea: Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked— (Revelation 3:17 NKJV)

Both profess Christ, but they don’t walk the same path. Which of these profiles address to you?

…When you’re wildly in love with someone, it changes everything.
-Francis Chan, Crazy Love

Our God by Chris Tomlin

God is passionate for His glory to shown on the earth. He desires that the earth look to Him and accredit Him for their existence, their success, their capabilities, their strength – their everything pretty much.

The Lord thunders His own greatness in Isaiah 45:5-7:

“I am the Lord, and there is no other; There is no God besides Me. I will gird you, though you have not known Me, that they may know from the rising of the sun to its setting that there is none besides Me. I am the Lord, and there is no other.”

Chris Tomlin’s song “Our God” really grabs you by the shoulders and rattles you to remind us that “Our God is greater”. This song touch me personally when I was under a stockpile of stress. I was in over my head with assignment deadlines and on top of that I was under the weather.

Thank God for Pandora. I had my playlist on and then this song faded in:

Water you turned into wine, opened the eyes of the blind there’s no one like you, none like You!
Into the darkness you shine out of the ashes we rise there’s no one like you none like You!

The problems around me grew strangely dim as I listened intently to the song. Then the chorus rolled in:

Our God is greater, our God is stronger, God you are higher than any other.
Our God is Healer, Awesome in Power, Our God! Our God!

I felt like an idiot for a brief instant. I thought: “I’ve been adopted by the God who is all awesome in power and I am here moaning in anxiety?”

Romans 8:31 rung loudly in my soul: “If God is for us, who can be against us?” Sounds very familiar to the bridge of the song doesn’t it?

And if our God is for us, then who could ever stop us.
And if our God is with us, then what could stand against.
And if our God is for us, then who could ever stop us.
And if our God is with us, then what could stand against.
What could stand against.

God is passionate about exerting His power to us so we can see and confess His awesomeness. God delights in these situations, because it’s an opportunity for us to experience His excellent, everlasting strength when we call on Him for help.

For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him. (2 Chronicles 16:9 NKJV).

(Read about God’s glory and our prayers: Giving God Burdens, Your Obedience, His Glory)

Our God is greater than all and fill in the blank. I’m so grateful that God has blessed us with songs like these that awake our soul to turn our eyes upon God and trust in Him.

If you haven’t heard the song yet, check it out:

Dealing With Heartache

Dealing with heartache is a life transition that still today I struggle traveling through.

Maybe everyone does.

Old Wounds seem to reopen and refresh their infliction. Last night I reminisced a girl that I really loved and I grieved for her all over again. It seemed it was just yesterday that this pain occurred.

Some immediate remedies I find in the Bible are “the Lord is close to the broken hearted” (Psalms 34:18 NKJV). Strength to find that God will meet me at my pain.

“Pour out your heart before [The Lord]” (Psalms 62:8 NKJV). I can cry to God. That’s soothing to me that I can just fall apart to Someone. I can just vent all my hurts, upsets, etc to Him.

It’s been 18 years since God adopted me into His family. I do feel belonged to Him, but honestly there are times where I still struggle with just running to Him first and disclose my pain, rather than dealing with it my way.

I think also that I’m just feel pulled to releasing my hurt to another human soul. Even then Jesus is also man who sympathize with our weaknesses (Hebrews 4:15 NKJV).

Please if you can pray for me.

Thank God that He is a refuge to all of us, especially during the storms of life.