Thursday, July 21, 2011

Watchman

Watchman…

You know those verses in the Bible that after you finish reading you think, “That was weird, why did he say that?” Well, I ran across one of those the other night while I was reading… And usually, I just let those verses disappear in the back of my mind, but for some reason I couldn’t bury this one.

In the last chapter of Colossians, Paul is giving his final instructions to the church, and he writes, “Devote yourselves to prayer, being WATCHFUL and thankful.”

WATCHFUL…? That seems obscure…especially in connection with prayer... And even more obscure in light of the way we are taught to pray in our culture…Heads bowed and eyes closed.

How can I WATCH with my head down and my eyes closed? And better yet, why be WATCHFUL, and what am I WATCHING for?

The answer to the first question is pretty obvious…You cant… Well , not unless you are a mom…all moms have eyes in the back of their heads…thats obviously why I always got caught sneaking out of the house…but that’s a different topic for a different day.

Why WHATCHFUL? And what should I be WATCHING for?

I took the liberty (I was bored at work) to look up the Greek word Paul uses for WATCH… and what I found was that at its root the word means…to be aroused from sleep…to open your eyes…to be alert.

So in other words Paul is telling us to devote ourselves to prayer…with our eyes open and our radars on…And I don’t think he is just talking about the posture in which we pray….heads bowed, eyes closed vs. heads up, eyes open…it goes much deeper than that.

You see Paul realized something that most of us have never realized or often forget. He understood that EVERYTHING is spiritual.

Not just going to church, listening to Christian music, reading the Bible, and praying….but EVERYTHING

“Unfortunately for most of us its far too normal to separate our spiritual life from our real life…but in reality there is no distinction….everything we do is Spiritual” The truth is whether we are playing golf, eating lunch with friends, sitting at our desk, or studying for a test…we need God in all those moments and places. And He is moving in all those moments and places.

Its this separation of my world into different compartments that I fear causes me to miss out on moments where God’s Spirit is moving in my life and in others all around me.

You see its not just about remembering to pray over our meals or before we hit the sack…But its about living AWARE of God moment by moment.

That’s what I believe Paul is calling us to…To devote ourselves to prayer as we watch where He is moving in every moment…this is a DISCIPLINE that will take a lifetime to learn, but one we must start practicing…

Because God is not just part of our life; He is our life…

And if we want to join Him in His work of redeeming the world, we must begin to PRAY…

with our EYES OPEN

and our RADARS ON

Let me and you make this our practice…

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Intentional

Intentional…intentional…intentional.

Do you ever have those days where you CANNOT stop thinking about all the things you wish you could be doing? Those dreams you thought you would have done by now or at least be doing by now? That was my day…I couldn’t shake the mental pictures of me and Tot walking on red dirt, bending our knees to pray for hurting people, telling them we would be their family and friends. Then walking hand and hand through a garden with people in the village picking squash and other vegetables that would feed their families hungry bellies.

these images, along with many others, just keep playing over and over and over.

Most of the time these thoughts follow with feelings of guilt and remorse. But that’s not what I felt. Instead, I felt a hint of FEAR. A FEAR of never getting there. A FEAR of settling for lesser dreams.

I know WAY… and I mean WAY to many people that say “I never thought this would be what I would do with my life…or… I always really wanted to do that, but then life just happened.”

LIFE JUST HAPPENED…that phrase terrifies me.

“Unfortunately, his (the Enemy’s) method often involves diverting us from our heart’s desire by getting us to settle for what’s normal instead of pursuing God’s best.” Isnt that what we usually do. Settle for what is NORMAL. We have these dreams that seem so far away and so unlikely, and we look around and see others on the escalator cruising through life…and we walk right past the stairs and jump on the escalator.

That’s my fear. Getting on the escalator and unknowingly and unintentionally missing out on the things I always really really wanted to do. Then five or ten years later looking back and saying, “Dang it…If I had only taken the stairs…then who knows what I could have really done.”

I guess these thoughts hit me so hard, because my wife and are inching toward big decisions that will greatly impact our future. Should we go overseas, should we stay here and get more schooling, should we move closer to our friends, should we buy a new car? I know the last one seems minuscule, but for us its been like facing Goliath. Our car is in bad shape, all our other friends are newly married and buying new cars, and isn’t it normal to get a new car when you both get a job? Maybe, but there are dreams we could make small strides toward if we choose to sacrifice the car. So we have a choice.

That’s where that word INTENTIAL comes in.

EVERY DESTINATION AND EVERY DREAM IS REACHED BY INTENTIONALLY CHOOSING THE PATH THAT LEADS THERE. And there are going to be plenty of distractions that tempt us to choose the escalator. The NORMAL route. But we must stay focused and deliberate.

There may be forks and a re-shaping of dreams, but with every dream there are escalators that must be avoided and stairs that must be CHOSEN.

INTENTIONALLY CHOSEN.

Let me and you CHOSE the stairs and walk intentionally toward our dreams.