God’s first commandment was to multiply and subdue the earth.

Christ’s last commandment was to go into all the earth and make disciples.

These to commandments go together like chocolate and peanut butter.  What better way to make disciples than to raise your own children to love and obey God, and to teach them to teach their children and their children’s children and everyone they come in contact with?  If Christian parents would model the perfect love of God for their friends AND families, that whole Great Commission thing would be a snap.

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Hey Church!  I have a bone to pick with you.  Yeah you–the whole Church–all you people who claim to be followers of Jesus Christ.  Do you remember what Jesus prayed for you before he was crucified?  He prayed that we would all be ONE–just like he and the Father are one.  And do you remember why he prayed that?  So that the world would KNOW that God sent Jesus.  Well guess what?  You have fractured the church into so many opposing groups that the world looks at you and says, “Ok, so which one of these factions should I believe in?  They all seem to disagree.  So why should I believe in Jesus, if his prayer for his church didn’t even work?  How can I be any worse off by not believing in what any of these groups say?”

Real nice job church!  You’ve made quite a mess of Christ’s prayer.

So how about working on that problem?  Why don’t you start living like Jesus did…in PERFECT unity with God.  Don’t let there be even a hint of immorality and sin in you.  Let the world see a body of believers who live pure lives from pure hearts made pure and kept pure by cooperating with the power of the Holy Spirit.  Do you remember how upset Jesus was by those who claimed to be “religious” but were really just religious hypocrites?  Don’t be anything like that.  Let your life be lived the way your Lord commands it to be lived–RIGHTEOUSLY!

I guarantee if every person who claimed to follow Jesus actually lived like Jesus, that the world would have no choice but to understand exactly who Jesus is and that God sent him into the world.  And, if the church (the whole church) lived in perfect unity with Jesus and obeyed all of his commands, she would automatically live in perfect unity as the “body” of Christ.  The church would be ONE.

Read John 17 and think about it.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 46:33 — 21.3MB)

Happy Mother’s Day!

Ok, so this is from awhile ago.  But it was fun.

Any day is a good day to hug your mom.  Why not do it today?

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When you pray, do you pray to a gumball machine, or a magic 8 ball, or a living Lord who cares about you?  How do you treat God when you talk to him?  Do you talk to him or at him?  Do you ever listen–really listen–to what God is trying to tell you?

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There’s a song that goes:

My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
but wholly leaned on Jesus’ name.

Refrain
On Christ the solid rock I stand;
all other ground is sinking sand,
all other ground is sinking sand.

I think some people live that out.  Their hope is truly in Jesus and not in the world.  And because of that they take the mission Jesus gave us, of making disciples, seriously.  But there are plenty of others who might say they stand on Jesus when they really just stand on their own opinion of Jesus.  And many of the people like to keep their religion indoors and just have a country club kind of church where only people who fit in already are welcomed.  And there are tons of individual churches who keep themselves safely hidden behind their closed doors and cut off from everybody else and there isn’t even a chance for unity in our mission to save the world.

Any church that is an island to itself is missing the point:

Ephesians 4:11-16 [Jesus] is the one who gave these gifts to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.  Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ, until we come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature and full grown in the Lord, measuring up to the full stature of Christ.

Then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe because someone has told us something different or because someone has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like the truth.  Instead, we will hold to the truth in love, becoming more and more in every way like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church.  Under his direction, the whole body is fitted together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.

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I always think it’s funny when grownups tell kids not to run and play in church because they’re in the “House of God!” As if God is getting upset that kids are playing. “Hey you kids! Stop having so much fun, or you’ll make God mad! He’s trying to take a nap like the rest of the people listening to the sermon, and if you wake him up he’ll be as grumpy as I am!” What a goofy thought, that God’s house is a church building–as if God was sitting all by himself during the week, and finally got to see everybody on Sunday morning. “So how was your week everybody? Did you do anything fun?” People come to church thinking they’ll get something from God there. They pray and sing, and sometimes they dance and talk like crazy people. Others just sit there and act like scarecrows in pews. But so many of them transform into completely different people as soon as they get back home. All the ‘God’ stuff seems to evaporate like drops of water on a hot skillet as soon as they leave the church building.

But everybody (even non-church people) know that Jesus is supposed to live in your heart. So shouldn’t the life of any Christian be consistent whether they are at home or church or work or school or wherever? If we have God in us at church, we ought to have the same God living in us when we walk out the door. Right? God’s house isn’t a church building. It’s the pure heart of a Christian. And if God is really living in somebody’s heart, it ought to show through–all the time. If you say you have God in your heart, but he doesn’t show through in how you live your life all the time, maybe it’s because you don’t have God in your heart. Maybe what you really have in your heart is your own made up god. So when you go to church and act like he’s in there on Sundays, is it just a show?

I know these are pretty harsh questions, but don’t you think they are important ones to ask? Do you really believe you can have God in your heart and live like the Devil? I would think this is one thing you’d want to make sure you had right. What else in life really matters compared to whether you’re really following God or just following your own evil desires? Jesus asked the same question…”And how do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul in the process? Is anything worth more than your soul?” Matthew 16, Mark 8, & Luke 9

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 47:09 — 21.6MB)

What’s love got to do…got to do with it?  Ok, if we have an idea of what love really is…if you have a basic understanding of what it means, how do you apply it to religion?  Because Christians are always talking about love.  “Jesus loves you” and “I just love God so much” and “Christianity is a love relationship,” what does all that mean?  How does it apply to real life?  Because that’s what really matters.  Isn’t it?  I mean, people can talk about love all the time, but if it doesn’t make a difference in their behavior or how they treat people, then it’s not really love.  Right?

In the last talk I kind of hit on how love can be expressed in different degrees that build onto each other.  We can have friendships and a bond of kinship with people, and we can add commitment to basic friendships, and stick by somebody’s side through whatever.  Then, when we’re ready to make the ultimate commitment and put someone else’s needs above our own, we get married and love just continues to multiply as commitment and intimacy grow together.  Like adding fuel to a fire, our compassion and passion combine and a man and woman come together in the kind of relationship that begins to reveal the depth of what God feels toward us.  When we are willing to sacrifice and commit everything to benefit another person, we get a glimpse of what God feels and does for us.

And like any relationship, it takes work.  You can’t even have a good friendship unless you are willing to contribute to the health of your relationship.  But the really cool thing is how we benefit from giving our love to other people and back to God.  It’s mind blowing to see how our love grows even n the midst of sacrifice.  The people who really understand love, who have really figured it out, find the secret that giving in a relationship is the only way to get the real benefits of love.  And when we discover that secret we find out what we were made for.  If God made us in his image, and if God is love, then it just makes sense that we were built to give and receive love.

Ever wonder what the secret of life is?  It’s loving.  That’s just the way God designed us.

PS. In the very beginning of this talk I spend a minute talking about making it though hard times and how God is with us through the trials we face, and how God  even takes advantage of the tough things we go through to help us become better people.  Sometimes love means just being around for comfort.  And sometimes it means helping a person get up and keep walking, even if it means pushing outside of our comfort zones so we can grow.

My wife and I lost a child through a miscarriage, and it was one of the most difficult experiences I have ever felt.  But God really showed me his peace through the whole ordeal.  And God has used our tragedy to help us be able to comfort others who have suffered similar loss and to encourage people going through infertility and we have even grown closer to each other in the midst of that painful trial.

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Baby don’t hurt me…

No, this isn’t about 80’s music.  But I think it does deal with the questions that Haddaway brought up in his lyrics and the questions that a lot of people have about love.  Did you ever wonder why so many marriages fail?  Did you ever wonder why God said that sexual immorality hurts people more than anything else?  Maybe you remember when Jesus used the connection of a husband and wife as an example of the connection that God wants to share with all of us.  Did you ever wonder what that means?

True love does have a mysterious quality to it because of how powerful it is and how deeply it affects us.  But it’s also something that is meant to be understood.  In fact, I don’t think anybody can really experience love to it’s full, powerful potential unless they understand it on a basic level.  Too many people ruin love by replacing it with selfishness and greed and hunger and lust and things that have nothing to do with real love.  And I think so much of the confusion and pain that people deal with in relationships and romance and marriage come when we lose the meaning of what it means to love.

What do you think?

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Have you ever tried to switch the kind of milk you drink?  Like from 2% to skim.  I used to be a pure 2% milk drinker.  That’s what I grew up on, and the skim stuff was just way to watery.  I would never drink skim.  Or maybe you switched from drinking regular cola to diet.  It’s weird getting used to the different flavors or textures.  I did end up switching to skim milk because I figured I didn’t need that extra pat of butter in every cup.  I also tried switching to diet cola for awhile, but my body didn’t like that at all.  The Aspartame did nasty things in my digestive tract.  I don’t know if it was the aspartic acid or the phenylalanine or what, but after feeling sick every time I drank diet cola I did some research and found that Aspartame can have nasty effects on your bod.  I guess that’s why all the products that contain it have to have a warning label now.

Anyway, the point is that making any kind of change to your diet or routine can be difficult to get used to at first.  But there are some things that are well worth making a change for—like the benefits of regular exercise…and even talking about religious stuff.  Have you ever felt like you ought to change something?

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This is a little clip that talks about a couple analogies for what spiritual life and living as part of the church ought to be like.  I always like word pictures that help explain complex concepts in down-to-earth ways.

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