duty day diatribe
i have duty today.
in the navy you have duty. for this it means i have to stay on the ship for a complete 24 hour period.
why you ask?
its not like we can lock the doors and set the alarm on this big gray thing.
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i meant to write about yesterday well…yesterday.
i think it would be cool if all of us shared the sermons we heard on sunday.
our speaker was a christian missionary living in a muslim country on the “down-low”. (for obvious security reasons those are the only details necessary).
he talked about Matthew 25:31-46, the parable of the sheep and goats.
to be honest i forgot most of it. not that it wasn’t good but i started daydreaming. not random things. real questions ran through my head, one after the other, like a marathon race.
how much courage must it take to do what he and his family is doing. he is truly at the most hostile “away game” you can find. its humbling being in the company of someone like this. that is bravery at its best.
on second thought, its not courage. its faith. complete faith in God.
the verses spoke about when Jesus returns and He gathers the sheep to Him, saying you clothed me, fed me, gave me drink, etc, whenever you did that to the least of these.
what did i take from all of it? there are those of us who travel to the far reaches of the world and spread Christ’s love and message in places that most of the world has forgotten. and to you, you are superheroes. and some of us stay here, being Christ’s example to those who know us, and our communities. and you too are truly superheroes.
me? honestly? i need to be transformed in the most deperate way…as long as we’re being honest. is transformation from your own effort or is the grace of God taking you up, spinning you all about yourself and instantly being transformed? so i search…sometimes so hard it hurts and sometimes so half-heartedly that when i think about it now i disappoint myself. i think at the end of the day, i want to be rocked like Paul was on the road to Damascus.
blind me.
freak my buddies out.
change my name.
change my heart.
use me to change the world.
if you want.
i want to be those sheep gathered unto Him. and i am falling short.
sorry if this seems random or disjointed. just my thoughts right now.
so what was your sermon about?
~ by adamintheocean on July 22, 2008.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags: embarrassing honesty
Hey Adam! We visited my sister’s church this weekend, partly to hear Brant Hansen teach. He spoke about the tendency of Christians to expect others to fit a certain mold, particularly when it comes to our emotional display of our spirituality. So many in the church treat people this way: “Do you raise your hands during worship? Get all goosebumpy while I can only Imagine plays? Never heard the audible voice of God? No? Then maybe you’re not ACTUALLY a Christian…”
He used the Beatitudes – Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven – as evidence that Jesus’s rules aren’t our rules, and that His kingdom is upside-down, and even those of us who aren’t emotional people and who are skeptics and doubters are loved and welcomed into the kingdom. He talked about Jesus’s encounter with the Pharisees and teachers of the law where he blasted them for adding burdens to people, and challenged us to be the kind of people who are in the business of removing burdens – the way Jesus did. Let’s not put man-made expectations on people and their faith.
That’s a pretty simple rundown of it, didn’t want to write a whole blog in your comment form! Glad you joined the cool chat last night.
The sermon I heard was about legalism. I posted my sermon notes on my blog. http://imgladyouasked.wordpress.com