Idols Idols Everywhere

Last week Wednesday our church's young adults group got together for a night of singing and teaching. I was given the task of preparing a message so I went to the topic of Idolatry.  Here are some of "highlights" of it:

Simply put idolatry is any time we put something in ahead of God in importance in our life. The question is, what is it that you are putting ahead of God in your life? Maybe it’s money. Education, a relationship, family, health, your physical appearance, stuff. What is it in your life that is so essential that you could not imagine life without it?

Here are 5 things I currently hold as idols in my life: Nadine, health, parents, money, and  comfort. Some of you may be thinking, what’s wrong with those things? And you’d be right  in asking that. The answer is nothing. There is nothing wrong with any of those things. It’s good that I love Nadine. It’s good to want to be healthy. God has blessed me with great parents.  There’s nothing wrong with any of those things. But as you’ll find out, so often the biggest idols aren’t the evil ones.

Most of us know that it’s wrong to bow down to idols of stone  and wood, most of us have no problem sacrificing to acceptance, X-box, cell phones, sports,  friends, food, etc. Now in and of themselves there is nothing wrong with any of these things. But  when they start to take on such weight in our lives that they become vital for our joy it becomes  a problem. You see most of the idols that we have are when good things become God things.

Exodus 20v3-5. God is an incredibly jealous God. He doesn’t want to, nor does He deserve to share. He isn’t content unless He is the ONLY one. God gave us marriage so that we could have an idea of the relationship that He wants with us. Imagine that you were married and one day your spouse told you that you would only get Monday-Thursday, and Friday. Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday there were other  people that got those days. That wouldn’t go so well. We would feel cheated. Robbed. We  gave up so much for them and they just turn their backs on us for these other things? Sound familiar?

Too often we sacrifice our time, money, or attention to our idols. 

What are some idols you see North Americans worshiping?

What are some idols that YOU find yourself worshiping? 

 

Finding Joy

As you all read in my last blog, these last few months have been very challenging. Although there has been a lot of pain, there has also been many times where God continues to amaze me. 

When trials, pain and suffering come into your life, it is very easy to just focus on yourself and how you are feeling. It’s hard to think of others during these times of our life. I can speak from experience. It’s easy to get down on yourself, and on everything that is going on around you. During this time, I have really had to put an effort into finding the joy in my day. No matter what kind of situation you are in. God is there and He will reveal himself to you. 

I can think of multiple times that God has been revealing himself to me. During this last month, my friend who is not a believer, has begun to ask questions. This is awesome, and very exciting as I have been friends with them for many years. That day, in that situation I found joy. However, as I went along in my day, I began to focus on my cousins’ passing, and forgetting what God had just done. Looking back, I can see God and I also saw Him in that moment. However, I did not carry that realization through my day. This is something that we need to recognize when we are grieving or going through hard times. God is ALWAYS working, are we choosing to recognize it? 

Another way that God has been working in my life is through my education. I have been accepted to go to Costa Rica for 5 weeks at the end of April to teach. Getting to the point of being accepted was a long stressful process. However, throughout the process, I had peace. I knew that God was in control, and that if I was not meant to go to Costa Rica, I would not get accepted. I am very excited to be accepted and am excited to see how God is going to work in Costa Rica. I have to teach in Spanish... so I know God will most defiantly be helping me through that. 

As we go through hard times we need to choose to find joy in our days. Is this easy? No. It means taking the emphasis off of the pain that you (I) have been feeling. It is not erasing the pain, but it allowing you to look at your life through a different lens. This is something I have to remind myself of daily.

“The Joy of the Lord is our Strength.”- Nehemiah 8:10... This verse has never been so real to me as it is today. Without recognizing the joy that God has placed in our lives everyday, I am weak. I am lonely. I am sad. With recognizing the joy God has placed in our lives, I am stronger. I am secure. I am accepted. When you change your mindset, your day will be changed. 

Michelle

Lost and Found Peace

So many days I have felt like there is so much I want to get done and so little time to do it all! Can anyone relate? It starts getting hard to spend time alone with Jesus, you start going through your day forgetting about his presence completely and isn’t it funny how stress always seems to follow. 

I have come to know that when I am stressing it means that I’m not aware of Jesus’ amazing love. Let me explain:

For a couple of weeks I got really behind on some of my school work. I honestly didn’t really realize it  but I was pretty stressed about it. I started doing tons of studying to try and catch up, I studied and studied and studied, and then studied some more. Where did that leave me? With an A+! Haha nope. Actually still behind and still stressed. When I finally came to Jesus and talked to Him about it I finally came to the realization of how much I was stressing. I thought I could gain my peace by catching up on my school work! I was willing to study every waking moment of my days in order to get that. What I forgot was that peace doesn’t come from having my ducks in a row and being all caught up on school work but, as He told me, from knowing the Truth of who I am in Him.

Trying to be caught up on school work was the way I tried to find peace apart from Jesus. Maybe you are looking for that in hanging out with friends, having money, looking a certain way, playing sports, doing well in school. Living in the revelation of Jesus’ love changes everything. 

Check this out:

2 Cor 4:17-18 For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison…

In Paul’s life, part of the momentary light affliction was what he had described earlier in the chapter: 5 times he received brutal whippings almost until death, in danger from his friends, in danger from his enemy, gone hungry, to name a few. Paul could he have feared tons of things but he chose not to. How was he able to keep this mindset? lets continue…

v18 …while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

The bottom line is that when we are looking at Jesus nothing else matters. When you set your mind on Him you will no longer stress about the rest of the world. I Promise! It’s SO freeing and the peace He gives is incredible!

Here’s a couple of ways I’ve been setting my mind on him:

Delighting in Him in the fact that: 

His Spirit, lives within your physical body! (1 Cor 6:19, Eph 2:21-22, Rom 8:9) 

Resting in the Fact that:

No matter what you have done you will be presented spotless before Jesus, he will look at you and declare that you are AMAZING, that He is yours, you are His, and that he wants to spend forever with you! Eph 5:25-27, Jude 1:24-25, 2 Cor 11:2

Finally I want to encourage you all to pray without ceasing. Galatians 5:16 says, “Walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.” The flesh will want us to look for peace anywhere but in Jesus, but the Spirit says “Aint-nobody-got-time-fo-dat!” I believe that we walk in the Spirit to the degree that we communicate with the Spirit. When it says pray without ceasing, it’s not kidding! You can talk with him everywhere you go! He’s got awesome thing’s to say to you today! Go ahead and listen to Him and trust that what you hear of His character is Him talking to You!

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

You guys are awesome! Stoked for the reunion!

-Seth

Save the Date

Hey LDPS!! I have a very special announcement to make! Some of you have been waiting a long time for this one...

REUNION TIME!!!!

That's right! We're working on planning a LDP reunion! A lot of the details have yet to be ironed out but I want you to all mark down April 4-6, 2014 on your calenders. Some of you might be wondering why it's so late in the year. That is simply because WBC is an incredibly popular place so trying to book it is a nightmare. Ideally it would be sooner but we figured it's better late than never. 

Stay tuned to the blog and your email for details as they come in!

When It Feels Too Heavy

“Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for you souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” -Jesus (Matthew 11:29-30)

      

    I don't know about you, but for me, sometimes the burden that comes with following Christ feels anything but 'light'. No, sometimes it feels very heavy. Sometimes the weight of what I'm called to do and be as a follower of Jesus feels like too much to carry. Loving my enemies, serving my neighbours, living a pure life that glorifies God... the list of burdens goes on and on and the weight of what I 'should do' gets heavier and heavier.

     Sometimes the weight of what I'm called to do and be as a follower of Jesus feels like too much to carry, because I was never meant to carry it. Jesus was.

     If you're in a season in your life right now where the burdens of what you 'should do' are feeling heavy, turn your eyes towards Jesus. He wasn't lying when He said that His “yoke is easy and [His] burden is light.” Jesus is our burden-bearer, and we are to lay every care upon Him. (Phil 4:6, 1 Peter 5:7)

     As many of you know, besides working at camp, I have worked at Starbucks for that last few years. I always had a sense that God had me at Starbucks for a reason and I knew I was doing more than just serving people coffee. I was there to serve people to show them Christ's love. But when I started at Starbucks I had the attitude that I was going to show them Christ's love, and most days I was relying on my own strength to do that. And the weight of that call was heavy. I felt so inadequate and so unprepared to convey how awesome God is to the people around me.

     The burden of showing God's love to people became heavier and heavier until I realized I couldn't do it. Not on my own...

“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)

     I hung this verse on the inside of my pantry door and every morning, before going to work, I would pray through this verse. I was no longer relying on my own strength to accomplish the things that God had called me to. I was abiding in Christ, and that made all the difference. The burden I felt to reach those at Starbucks for Christ became light. Because I was no longer carrying it on my own. I was able to see that God was and is working at Starbucks and He is just letting me be a part of it. I still feel inadequate for the task of showing God to people, but I know that Jesus is adequate and He equips us through the Holy Spirit.

“The Master-workman surely has a right to use any tool He pleases for His own work, and it is plainly not the business of the tool to decide whether it is the right one to be used or not. He knows; and if He chooses to use us, of course we must be fit. And in truth, if we only knew it, our chief fitness is in our utter helplessness. His strength is made perfect, not in our strength, but in our weakness. Our strength is only a hindrance.”

 -Hannah Whitall Smith (1832-1911)

     When you feel as though your burden to 'do what you should' is heavy, surrender your control to the Lord. Stop trying to control your life and do everything by your own effort. We were never meant to carry that burden. Christ came and died for us, to put us in right relationship with our Heavenly Father, so that we might accomplish things for His Kingdom by His power. So surrender your will to Christ, saying “Yes!” to everything He calls you to and trust Him to work in you to bring your will and desires into conformity with His perfect will.

     When we do this our burdens do become light, and service to God become exciting and enjoyable. Because God begins to change our desires to His desires, and we want to do the things He calls us to do. It's no longer that we should do them, but that we want to do them. And there is so much freedom and joy in serving our Father God in this way. 

 

This story came to mind as I was writing this post. This woman is an amazing example of someone who has surrendered her will to God, and is humbly serving God and others with JOY! 

Have an awesome week serving our amazing God through the strength that He gives!