A Coward Free Heaven

On the recent youth retreat at Camp Bethel, we heard Francis Chan make a very interesting comment: “There will be no cowards in heaven.” I had never heard anyone say that before, and it kind of freaked me out a bit, as I have been a coward before. Francis based the comment on Revelation 21:8, which says, “But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars – their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.” I had always focused on the rest of the verse but somehow overlooked the very first thing on the list: cowards.

Chan is right in his remarks regarding the cowardly in heaven. In Matthew 10:32-33, Jesus tells His disciples, “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.” We, as Christ-followers, will be put on the spot and it will take courage to not only confess that we believe in Jesus for our salvation, but also to act like Christians on a consistent basis. Paul warns Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:12 that, “Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil men and imposters will go from bad to worse.”

We often try to avoid uncomfortable situations and hardships, as that is natural for us. It is time, however, that we stand up for Christ, not by being political or arguing with a science teacher about evolution, but stand up for Christ by being “Little Christs” (that’s what “Christian” means) and love the unlovable, support the poor, defend the bullied, comfort the brokenhearted, and feed the hungry. It is surprising that such kind acts do bring persecution, but they will, and we need to be willing to stand up for Christ as He literally died for us.

In Him,
-Adam

The Lessons of Rigor

This month we are announcing our mission’s trip to Nicaragua,
from July 31st – August 6th. I am willing to bet that about half of
you might say, “Hmm, there’s nothing on the calendar that week,
but I wonder what might come up? It’s awfully early. We need to
wait and see what’ll be happening that week before we commit.” I
say this because I hear that a lot in ministry work. Many people are
afraid to commit to a church activity, or a family vacation, because
they are nervous that a coach might announce a “voluntary” camp
or a club leader may be requesting your teen’s services, so they wait
for the “just in case” scenario. I propose that, if the calendar is
blank and you are planning a family trip, or thinking of going on
the missions’ trip, you write it on the calendar and the extracurricular
activity can take second place to family time or church
activity.

I am not saying this as an outsider, but as a former athlete and
coach, and current pastor who is frustrated with how little time our
teenagers have to spend in church activities they used to enjoy, or
with their families, because we fill it with the “rigor” of school and
extra-curricular activities. What lessons do our teens learn from
having to be to school an hour early, and spend two to three hours a
night doing homework, forfeiting family vacations for basketball
camp, or a mission’s trip for a school-related, “voluntary” activity?
We teach them that responsible youths put their academic and
athletic life, as well as achievements, ahead of family and God. We
teach them that when they are married and have kids, it will be
more important to stay at the office and get the job done, or travel
away on business, rather than attend a little league game, because
achievement is the top priority. Is that the lesson we want our teens
to glean from their teenage experiences?

I am not saying this so that kids go on the mission’s trip. I believe
God will move the right kids to go on the trip. I am saying this as a
concerned adult who works with teens and sees teenager after
teenager forsake family for an AP class or an athletic schedule that
keeps a family from eating dinner together – ever. Such a schedule
does not demand too much of their abilities or energy, but it
demands too much of their allegiance. The grade, and the sport,
must come first; families and church are for graduates.

This former coach and former teacher disagrees. I think it is time
that we put Mark 12:30 to practice, and love the Lord our God with
our everything, not just our left-overs. I think we should care more
about what God and our parents think, and less what our teachers
and coaches think. You will have temporary fame and achievement
during your short four years in high school, most of which people
will forget about within four years of your departure (sorry to break
it to you). You will spend a lifetime on earth with your family and
an eternity with God; don’t you want a strong bond with those who
matter most? I use to be afraid of what my coaches thought of me
when I missed an open gym or off-season workout for a family trip.
Now, not one of my coaches even knows where I live. I received
many athletic accolades as a high school student, and not one of
them has transferred to career success as an adult. Did I learn some
great lessons as an athlete? Absolutely. The lessons, however, are
starting to gravitate from actual lessons to pride in accomplishment,
something that we are warned to be very careful about.

So next time your family is faced with a conflict of family time vs.
school or extra-curricular activity, I urge you to think long and hard
before you take these years for granted.

"Knowing" God Takes Work, Devotion

Last post we talked about how we were created by God with purpose, protection, and also a sense of belonging. This post, however, will address the crummy reality of our current lives living in the "post-fall" world. While we are are still created with a purpose by God, protected by God, and with the desire to belong with other people, we now have to work for our knowledge of God. Let me be clear from the beginning, we do not work for our salvation - we are saved by grace, but we do have to work on our relationship with God. When you look at the relationship Adam had with God prior to the eating of the fruit in the garden, you'll notice an intimate an natural relationship where God and man conversed and walked together in the Garden of Eden.

This is in stark contrast, however, of the relationship Adam and Eve had with God after disobeying the one command God gave them. In reading Genesis 3:8, the immediate response of Adam and Eve upon eating the fruit and hearing God approaching was illogical: they hid from God. Immediately upon the fall of man, Adam and Eve lost some of their knowledge of God. They knew God as creator and omnipotent. They knew that he could not be hidden from, yet they panicked and hid from God, an action that made no sense at all.

Ephesians 4:18 says of mankind, "They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts." Because of our ignorance, we are darkened. We are not born with knowledge of God. Even as we grow up we lack an understanding and knowledge of the true God. We may know some things ABOUT God, but we don't know God. I know a lot ABOUT Tim Tebow, but if I walked up to him tomorrow and said "Hey Tim!" he'd look at me and ask, "Who are you?" Only until we place our faith in Christ can we truly know God, and even then, we have to work to understand Him more. It doesn't happen naturally or by osmosis.

What is my point? Too many Christians sit back and wonder why we don't understand our faith better, or we are lazy and figure salvation is enough for me so why bother trying to understand it better? Knowing God takes devotion, hence the term "devotions." We must be devoted in our study to better understand God. In order to do this, we must be "devoted" to reading our Bibles, and "devoted" to prayer. If you truly want to know God, you have to put in the work. This is a direct consequence of the fall of Adam and Eve. Before the fall, no work was necessary for man to know God. After the fall, the world in which we all live, we must work to know God better. Are you willing to put in the work?

-Pastor Adam

The "Good Stuff" We Were Created With

This past week in the high school SYMOTA group, we started a series that strives to discover who we are in Christ and what that means for our outlook and perspective on life. The first discussion we engaged in on Sunday dove into how we, as people, were created with significance, security, and with the need for belonging.

A unique feature of human beings is that we were created with a higher responsibility and purpose than the rest of creation. I know that sounds elitist, but the only thing that should be offended is a shrub or a duck. We, as homosapiens, are more significant than all the rest of earthly creation. We know this from Genesis chapter, 1 verse 28, which instructs Adam and Eve to “subdue” the earth. God goes on to tell his first children to “rule” over all of the living creatures. This is an important point because we were not created by chance, meaning we have a purpose to our lives. Every one of us has a reason for being here. God doesn’t make accidents, so when He made you; he made you for a significant reason. Plants and animals were created to offer God glory through their appearance, complexity, and beauty, but when all is said and done, their mission in life is to exist. Ours is not merely to exist. It is to accomplish great things for God.

As God’s children, we are also covered by a heavenly security blanket. We first see this in Adam and Eve as well. In Genesis 1:29, we read about how God provided for all of their needs in the garden. Even after their fall, God provided for them by fashioning clothes for them before banishing them from the Garden (Gen. 3:21). This promise of provision has not changed. Jesus reiterates this promise in Matthew 6:25-34, in which he urges his listeners to quit worrying about their physical needs, as God knows what they need and will provide for their needs. Paul reminds us as well in Philippians 4:19 that God provides according to His will. This is a significant concept that many of us fail to grasp. First of all, we need to rely more on God and less on ourselves. (This does not, however, mean to quit your job and just wait for God’s provision. His provision may be through the job he has provided for you!) Secondly, we must prioritize what a need is in our lives. Do we need cable television or a Wii? We often behave as if we do.

Finally, we also learned that God created us to live in a community with one another. Our lives, and our faiths, are not meant to be alone. Harkening back to Adam and Eve once more, we see this in God providing a wife for Adam, stating “It is not good for man to be alone” (Gen. 2:18). I will venture to say that God would also say, “It is not good for woman to be alone” either. I say this because our faith is not meant to be practiced in solitude. Not everyone is meant to be married, but everyone is meant to have relationships. The church, our Christian brothers and sisters, as well as the non-believing friends we witness to, all fill a need that God intended us to have – a need for companionship. This includes our fellowship as believers. Hebrews 10:25 warns us to not give up meeting together. Our faith, and our lives, were meant to be spent with others. We must avoid the temptation of holing up by ourselves and shutting the world out. Make an effort to find a good support system of believers whom you can trust to rejoice with, pray with, and be held accountable by.

Next week’s topic is the “bad stuff” of our nature that led to the fall of Adam and Eve, and what that means for us believers.

Till then,
Adam

Be Known For What What You Do.

Last week kicked off a new season of our SYMOTA youth group for 2010-2011. My goal this year is to blog each week about the topic (or topics) we talk about at youth group that week. This past Sunday we challenged the teens to be known this year for the things they do, and not for what they don’t do. In other words, don’t be known for what you don’t do; don’t be known as the kid that doesn’t drink, or doesn’t smoke, or doesn’t have sex. Our aspirations should be greater than just the kid who abstains. We, as believers, should be known for the great things that we are doing for Christ, and not the great accomplishments we may get on the sports field, in the classroom, or in music. We should be known for helping others, regardless of their appearance, ethnicity, or interests. We should be known as people who sacrifice personal comfort for the benefit of someone else. We should be known as people willing to listen to the problems of others. We should be known for our faith being lived out in action. Our physical accomplishments are not bad, especially if provide us an opportunity to praise God and bring people’s attention on Him, but we must be careful to not set our goals to be physical accomplishments as they all stay here on earth when we perish.

We see this happen in both Colossae and Ephesus. In the opening verses of both Colossians and Ephesians we see that Paul, while stuck in prison, hears about the faith of the believers in Colossae and Ephesus and commends them for it (Ephesians 1:15-21 and Colossians 1:3-14). The account in Colossians gives details of Paul’s expectations for the continual good works of the believers there. In Colossians 1: 9-13, Paul instructs the believers he is praising to continue to become as knowledgeable as possible, to endure, to have patience, to be joyful while giving thanks, and to bear fruit. What type of fruit should we bear? Galatians 5:16-24 offers us two types of fruit, the good and the sour. You know the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. As you examine your life, how are you doing with bearing and displaying the good fruit? It cannot be just a display, but a genuine effort to exude the fruits of the spirit. For when we do, we may draw some to Christ.

It is interesting that the fruit of the spirit passage is found in Galatians, as Galatians is written as a bit of a tongue lashing to the Galatian believers who were known for something as well. They were known for being easily swayed from their faith by false teachers (Galatians 1:6-10). Paul writes the letter of Galatians to remind those in the church there to return to a gospel of Grace and not be swayed by false teachers. Paul also warns them to avoid a whole myriad of negative behaviors prevalent around them (5:19-21). Unfortunately many Christian teens today become known by their peers for many negative behaviors instead of for bearing the fruit of the Spirit.

My challenge to all of you is to be known for doing great things for God, not for negative behaviors, or being the person who abstains from everything. It may not be popular, but it is what we are called to do, and it will have an impact for the Gospel upon those around you.

-Pastor Adam

Lessons from the Vikings

Lessons from the Vikings

In reading Do Hard Things over the past six weeks, an interesting story stuck out to Me. The authors of the book, Alex and Brett Harris, point out an interesting tid bit about how the vikings were able to be so dominant in their era. The answer is easier than you may think: they rowed. In an era when most world powers used servants or slaves as their rowers when traveling to overtake an enemy, the Norsemen rowed themselves, making them completely ripped. The sheer size of the vikings is legendary, but that size was not necessarily genetic, it was earned through hard work.

Now granted, the vikings do not hold an exemplary human rights record, but we can still learn from their success. Many of the big things we want to accomplish in this life take work, and often tedious, seeminly menial work. I doubt the vikings looked forward to rowing their boats hundreds of miles, but the workout, and pain, of the process prepared them for the big goals they wanted to accomplish: conquest.

What big goals do you have in your life? Are you trying to skip steps, or take the easy route to success? More times than not, the lazy way leads to defeat. Occasionally someone will get lucky, or be at the right place at the right time. But more than likely, you will need to work for what you accomplish in this life. Be like the vikings, work hard in the small things and you might be surprised when you find yourself accomplishing something great.

Remember, though, our goal is not to accomplish great things for ourselves. It is to accomplish great things for Christ!
1 Corinthians 10:31 – “Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

-Pastor Adam

Meet The Parents!

Dear Parents and Youth,

Youth, when you first get a date with your crush, and they come to pick you up or you go to pick them up, do yourself a favor and meet the parents. I know it sounds like a small, and also intimidating thing, but it is a great way to hold yourself accountable on your date. By looking at your dates parents eyeball to eyeball, you suddenly now realize that you are taking out someones son or daughter, and not just he object of your infatuation. You are less likely to put yourself in a tempting situation if you make yourself available to be accountable to one another’s parents. It will not totally remove temptation from you, you will still have to make decisions to avoid tempting settings, but it does reduce the likelihood of you fooling around with your date that night.

Parents, the next step is where you come in. Insisit in meeting your child’s date. Then, when you meet them, find out their plan for the evening. Adopt the policy of, “no plan, no date.” Listen intently to the plan and see where the teens might be putting themselves in a bad situation with eachother. Finally, lay out your expectations for their behavior on the date Trust your child, but don’t trusth their hormones. The best, most Christlike teens, still fall into sexual temptation every day. Your responsibility as a parent it to protect them from themselves. Promote group dating and creative dating ideas for your child where they can get to know the other person, instead of vegging with the lights off alone in your basement watching a movie. Even if you are upstairs, there is a high liklihood that some lip-locking is going on when you’re not actually in the room. It is okay to check up on your child when they are on a date, but let them know before the date starts you will be checking up on them, do not be sneaky about it.

Finally, for both of you, have a conversation when the date is done. Parents, ask specific questions. Teens, be honest. Avoid the, “How was your time?” question, with the response of “fine.” Ask if they kissed, ask if they went further, be specific. Teen, it may be uncomfortable, but knowing your mom or dad will be asking at the end of the date what you did is a great deterrant to sexual mistakes.

We are called to glorify God in all we do, that includes your dating life.

-Pastor Adam

I Want Kindergarten Faith

Recently my son went to play at a friend’s house. One of the first play-dates he had ever had without one of his parents going along. His friend’s mother told us a very cool story the next day. It seems that while the boys were playing a video game together, my son equated something that happened in the game with the story of David and Goliath. Upon vocalizing this epiphany, his friend asked, “who is David and Goliath?” His friend’s father was sitting in another room overhearing the conversation and was quite embarrassed that his elementary aged son did not know the story of David and Goliath. That night, he got the Bible out and read the story of David and Goliath to the entire family. I was so proud of my son for talking about something from the Bible with one of his friends, but then realized that for my son, it was just a normal, unconscious thing to do - natural even. That does not diminish my pride in him, but made me think, I wish I were more like a kindergartner.

We, as adults, for whatever reason, shy away from Biblical conversations and discussions. Kindergarteners don’t sense any awkwardness or nerves; they just blurt it out as it is engrained in their culture if they’re being brought up in a foundationally Christian home. The coolest part of the story was that my son’s small vocalization led to a family sitting down together to read the Bible. God can use the smallest of events and people to make a large impact for him. Jesus says in Mark 10:15-16, “’I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.’ And he took the children in his arms, put his hands on them and blessed them.” Our faith is not complicated, our mission is simple, yet as grown-ups, we make it more complicated and bog ourselves down with periphery theological issues or relational complications. It may sound elementary, but I want to be more like my son. Living in ignorant fearlessness for Christ, being so wrapped in a relationship with Him that it is natural to speak of Him and live for Him in all of the relationships and settings I find myself in.

-Pastor Adam

Married Couples and Parents, Are You Companioning?

NOTE: THIS IS A SPECIAL POST FOR YOU PARENTS OF YOUTH AND CHILDREN. OFTEN TIMES PARENT'S PUT SO MUCH EFFORT AND ATTENTION INTO THEIR CHILDREN THAT THEY FORGET ABOUT EACH OTHER. THEN, WHEN THE KIDS ARE GONE, THEY LOOK AT ONE ANOTHER AND ASK, "WHO ARE YOU?" WE HAVE TO BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT COMPANIONING WITH OUR SPOUSES. THAT IS WHAT THIS ARTICLE IS ABOUT:

I am currently taking a marriage counseling class as a part of my seminary coursework. In the course of reading a very good book about strengthening marital intimacy, I came across a term I had never heard before: companioning. The term does exist, as evidenced by the lack of a squiggly red line beneath it on my word processor right now, but what does it mean? Companioning is the term used to describe the intentional effort of a married couple to devote large blocks of time to the ongoing development of their friendship. Roland Hawkins, a very wise marital counselor, states that, “The strength of a marriage is directly related to the couple’s desire for togetherness. The average Christian marriage that fails does so because of the lack of appreciation for the importance of companioning.”

Notice the term intentional used above to describe companioning. It will not happen by accident. In fact, if a married couple, or a family, does not intentionally plan fun time together where their attention is undivided upon one another, they will not have time together. Life is busier now than ever. Between workaholic jobs, house chores, home-improvement projects, school schedules, youth league sports, business trips, retreats, and even Bible studies, we are pulled many different directions, none of which include our spouse. It is no wonder that marriages suffer once the children are grown and out of the house. The couple who fell in love years before, don’t really know each other because they haven’t taken the time to know each other when time was scarce.

Companioning is Biblical. Moses wrote in Deuteronomy this command to husbands, “If a man has recently married, he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free to stay at home and bring happiness to the wife he has married.” (Deuteronomy 24:5). This command from God is not renounced or revised anywhere in scripture. Obviously we cannot take a year off from our jobs, but God’s plan for marriage was for us to companion together. He desires for us to be friends with our spouses. To be friends we must invest enjoyable time with one another to strengthen that friendship. Genesis 2:18 God stated that it was not good for man to be alone, showing us that He intended for us to have a relationship with our spouse that fulfilled the three-cord bond between God, man, and woman.

So what barriers are keeping you from companioning with your spouse? Is it relationships with your friends? Your job? Household duties? The kids? Does the wife go to a woman’s Bible study, the husband to a men’s Bible study, but neither attend a Bible study together or participate with one another in a devotional time? Sometimes churches are the best at pulling spouses in different directions. I cannot encourage you to enjoy one another as much as possible. It will mean saying no to other people and commitments. But our responsibility to our spouses is second only to our relationship to our creator. Please treat them like the priority they should be.

-Pastor Adam

Christ Knows Pain

Often times when we look at Jesus in the light of scripture, we recognize His miraculous works, wisdom, power, and compassion. We think of these attributes, however, with the mindset of His deity. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but we seem to miss the human nature of Jesus that is so evident in the record of His life. Hebrews 4:15-16 re-emphasizes this by telling us, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” (NIV). We cannot forget that Jesus suffered in all the same ways we do, with one exception, He did not give in to temptation the way we all have at some point in our lives. Jesus still knows what sin feels like, however, as He bore the brunt of it while on the cross, not because He sinned, but because He took our sins upon Himself while hanging on that brutal tree. Jesus, at some point in His life, had to wrestle with temptation, grief, triumph, anxiety, betrayal, and loneliness. Do any of these afflictions or emotions resemble anything you’ve had to deal with in your life?

Jesus was tempted at His weakest point, when He was “hungry” after fasting for forty days (Matthew 4:1-10). Satan waited until Jesus was at his most vulnerable as a human to introduce the one thing Jesus craved the most at that one point in His life: food. We learn from Jesus to lean on scripture during those times of struggle, not our own abilities. All of us have been tempted and cannot claim that Jesus doesn’t know what that feels like, as he obviously had a three-round bout with the devil in the desert, at the end of which God the Father sent His angels to tend to Jesus’ need.

Jesus, surprisingly, experienced grief as we do when a loved one passes away. Jesus’ knew well where Lazarus was after he passed away, but the grief Jesus saw in Lazarus’ family and the loss of His own friend caused Jesus to weep (John 11:35-38). Jesus knew He was going to raise Lazarus back to life again, but yet allowed Himself to feel the grief we all feel when we lose a loved one.

Not all of the emotions Jesus felt as a human being were negative. In the story of the Triumphant Entry (John 12:12-15), Jesus was adorned as a King. He did not deny or tell those honoring Him to stop; he accepted the accolades, in one of the few cases people praised Him while He was on earth. So like Jesus, we at times triumph in our lives – something Jesus knew quite well what it felt like.

Some people disagree that Jesus felt anxiety, but the case is strong that He indeed felt the strong emotions associated with dread. Jesus, in the garden before His arrest, was almost overcome with anxiety while praying over what was ahead of Him (Luke 22:39-46). Jesus was dreading the temporary disconnection from His heavenly Father that He was about to experience while on the cross. Jesus did not want to be separated from God the Father, but willingly did so on our behalf. We all battle anxiety over small and large things in our lives. Jesus tells us in Matthew, chapter 6, not to worry, as the Father in heaven is in control. Jesus had to put this into practice Himself as He faced the cross.

The two final hurts that Jesus experienced before the physical and spiritual pain of the cross were betrayal and loneliness (Luke 22:47-48 & Mark 14:66-72). Yes, Jesus knew that Judas Iscariot would betray Him, yet Jesus spent approximately three years with Judas and developed a friendship with Him. To have one of Jesus’ twelve closest friends be the one to bring armed soldiers to arrest Him was the ultimate betrayal. Following this betrayal, Jesus experienced loneliness, as His arrest prompted the disciples to flee. John stays in the vicinity and observes the trial from afar, then rejoins Jesus at the cross, but Peter actually denies Jesus while cursing emphatically. Jesus went through the most terrifying experience any of us could have in our lifetimes – an unfair, completely biased trial founded on trumped up charges, followed by torture, all by Himself. We go through periods of loneliness and trials, but none of us can claim to be as lonely as Christ was as He went through the last hours of His human life prior to death and resurrection.

Jesus overcame all of these human struggles, as well as defeating death for the atonement of our sins. He was not required to do this on our behalf, but chose to make this journey to earth to suffer and die (Phil. 2:5-8). So as you battle on your journey through whatever challenges you face, remember that Jesus has traveled that road as well. He is there by your side, even if you can’t see or feel Him, and He will be waiting at the end of the journey to greet you with arms open wide if you hold fast to Him on the ride we call life (Psalm 84:5-7).