On the verge...

There is something going on in the upstate of South Carolina.  God is moving in AMAZING ways.  At FUSE* (NewSpring's Youth Group) last night we saw at least 25 students STAND UP and VOCALLY PRAY TO RECEIVE JESUS CHRIST!!!  That is absolutly HUGE.  This is becoming the norm at FUSE*.  Does that mean we are getting comfortable with it?  NO WAY!  FUSE* staff and volunteers are digging deeper than ever, just trying to grasp what it means to be leaders in this movement.  It was also parent night last night and we saw far more parents than expected.  It is like God continues to blow our mind EVERY week.  Students are going to go home and start leading their parents to Christ, they are going to go to school and start talking about what Jesus is doing in their life, and more and more names will be written in the Lamb's book of life.  Why? Because those that are far from the Love of Christ are hungry and are just waiting to find the Hope that Jesus brings, and its just around the corner for many  people.  I am just amazed that I get to be apart of this.  I pray for other people to get involved in this movement, or allow God to start one through you in your community.  We are all the body, so we are all working together for the same thing.  Let EVERYONE you encounter today be affected by the Love that Christ has for them.  It is simple as holding a door, smiling at someone, or being INTENTIONAL in your approach and meeting a need of someone in need.  Bridge the gap folks, be OBEDIENT, and Love your neighbor as yourself. (Luke 10:27) We are on the verge of something HUGE!   Are you going to take the next step?...

The Ragman...

Notice the parallel with Isaiah 42:1-9...

Ragman...

I saw a strange sight.
I stumbled upon a story most strange like nothing my life,
my street sense, my sly tongue had even prepared me for.
Hush, child. Hush now and I will tell it to you.

Even before the dawn one Friday morning I noticed a young man,
handsome and strong, walking the alleys of our city.
He was pulling an old cart filled with clothes both bright and new,
and he was calling in a clear, tenor voice: "Rags!"
Ah, the air was foul and the first light filthy to be crossed by such sweet music.
"Rags! New rags for old! I take your tired rags! Rags!"
"Now, this is a wonder," I thought to myself,
for the man stood six- feet-four,
and his arms were like tree limbs, hard and muscular,
and his eyes flashed intelligence.
Could he find no better job than this, to be a ragman in the inner city?
So I followed him. My curiosity drove me. And I wasn't disappointed.

Soon the Ragman saw a woman sitting on her back porch.
She was sobbing into a handkerchief,
sighing, and shedding a thousand tears.
Her knees and elbows made a sad X.
Her shoulders shook. Her heart was breaking.
The Ragman stopped his cart.
Quietly, he walked to the woman,
stepping round tin cans, dead toys and Pampers.
"Give me your rag," he said so gently,
"and I'll give you another."
He slipped the handkerchief from her eyes.
She looked up and he laid across her palm
a linen cloth so clean and new that it shined.
She blinked from the gift to the giver.
Then, as he began to pull his cart again,
the Ragman did a strange thing:
he put her stained handkerchief to his own face;
and then he began to weep,
to sob as grievously as she had done,
he shoulders shaking.
Yet she was left without a tear.
"This is a wonder," I breathed to myself,
and I followed the sobbing Ragman
like a child who cannot turn away a mystery.

"Rag! Rag! New rags for old!"
In a little while,
when the sky showed grey behind the rooftops
and I could see the shredded curtains hanging out black windows,
the Ragman came upon a girl whose head was wrapped in a bandage,
eyes were empty.
Blood soaked her bandage.
A single line of blood ran down her cheek.
Now the tall Ragman looked upon this child with pity,
and he drew a lovely yellow bonnet from his cart.
"Give me your rag," he said,
tracing his own line on her cheek,
"and I'll give you mine."
The child could only gaze at him while he loosened the bandage,
removed it, and tied it to his own head.
The bonnet he set on hers. And I gasped at what I saw:
for with bandage went the wound!
Against his brow it ran a darker,
more substantial blood-his own!

"Rag! Rags! I take old rags!" cried the sobbing,
bleeding, strong, intelligent Ragman.
The sun hurt both the sky, now, and my eyes;
the Ragman seemed more and more to hurry.
"Are you going to work?" he asked a man leaned against a telephone pole.
The man shook his head.
The Ragman pressed him: "Do you have a job?"
"Are you crazy?" sneered the other.
He pulled away from the pole, revealing the right sleeve of his jacket
- flat, the cuff stuffed into the pocket.
He had no arm.
"So," said the Ragman. "Give me your jacket,
and I'll give you mine."
Such quiet authority in his voice!
The one-armed man took off his jacket.
So did the Ragman -
and I trembled at what I saw:
for the Ragman's arm stayed in its sleeve,
and when the other put it on he had two good arms,
thick as tree limbs: but the Ragman had only one.
"Go to work," he said.

After that he found a drunk,
lying unconscious beneath an army blanket,
an old man hunched, wizened, and sick.
He took that blanket and wrapped it round himself,
but for the drunk he left new clothes.

And now I had to run to keep up with the Ragman.
Though he was weeping uncontrollably,
and bleeding freely at the forehead,
pulling his cart with one arm,
stumbling for drunkenness, falling again and again,
exhausted, old, old, and sick,
yet he went with terrible speed.
On spider's legs he skittered through the alleys of the City,
this mile and the next, until he came to its limits,
and then he rushed beyond.

I wept to see the changes in this man.
I hurt to see his sorrow.
And yet I needed to see where he was going in such haste,
perhaps to know what drove him so.
The little old Ragman - he came to a landfill.
He came to the garbage pits.
And then I wanted to help him in what he did,
but I hung back, hiding.
He climbed a hill.
With tormented labour he cleared a little space on that hill.
Then he sighed.
He lay down.
He pillowed his head on a handkerchief and a jacket.
He covered his bones with an army blanket. And he died.
Oh, how I cried to witness that death!
I slumped in a junked car and wailed and mourned as one who has no hope -
because I had come to love the Ragman.
Every other face had faded in the wonder of this man,
and I cherished him;
but he died.
I sobbed myself to sleep.
I did not know - how could I know? --
that I slept through Friday night and Saturday and its night, too.

But then, on Sunday morning,
I was awakened by a violence.
Light - pure, hard, demanding light -
slammed against my sour face,
and I blinked, and I looked,
and I saw the last and the first wonder of all.
There was the Ragman,
folding the blanket most carefully,
a scar on his forehead,
but alive!
And, beside that, healthy!
There was no sign of sorrow nor of age,
and all the rags that he had gathered shined for cleanliness.

Well, then I lowered my head and,
trembling for all that I had seen,
I myself walked up to the Ragman.
I told him my name with shame,
for I was a sorry figure next to him.
Then I took off all my clothes in that place,
and I said to him with dear yearning in my voice:
"Dress me.."
He dressed me. My Lord,
he put new rags on me, and I am a wonder beside him.
The Ragman, the Ragman, the Christ!

-Walt Wangerin Jr.

Isaiah 42:1-9-

The Servant of the Lord

1 "Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen one in whom I delight;
I will put my Spirit on him
and he will bring justice to the nations.

2 He will not shout or cry out,
or raise his voice in the streets.

3 A bruised reed he will not break,
and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.
In faithfulness he will bring forth justice;

4 he will not falter or be discouraged
till he establishes justice on earth.
In his law the islands will put their hope."

5 This is what God the LORD says—
he who created the heavens and stretched them out,
who spread out the earth and all that comes out of it,
who gives breath to its people,
and life to those who walk on it:

6 "I, the LORD, have called you in righteousness;
I will take hold of your hand.
I will keep you and will make you
to be a covenant for the people
and a light for the Gentiles,

7 to open eyes that are blind,
to free captives from prison
and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.

8 "I am the LORD; that is my name!
I will not give my glory to another
or my praise to idols.

9 See, the former things have taken place,
and new things I declare;
before they spring into being
I announce them to you."

Entertaining Angels...

Hebrews 13:12 says, "2Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it."  I know that you folks that read my blog are tired of hearing me scream the same thing from on top of my soapbox, but I can't help but notice God constantly putting these things on my mind.  I was reading in Judges earlier and God laid this on my heart.  Manoah's wife was sterile, but the angel of the Lord (Jesus) came to her and said, "You are sterile and childless but you are going to conceive and have a son." (Judges 13:3)  How many times has God laid something on our heart?  How many times has He told us that a blessing was coming our way?  The angel of the Lord (Jesus) continued to to say to Manoah's wife in Judges 13:4-5,4 "Now see to it that you drink no wine or other fermented drink and that you do not eat anything unclean, 5 because you will conceive and give birth to a son. No razor may be used on his head, because the boy is to be a Nazirite, set apart to God from birth, and he will begin the deliverance of Israel from the hands of the Philistines."  Now, I know we are blessed regardless of our faithfulness or not, but are there more blessings for us or for others through us if we are obedient to God?  Im pretty sure the answer is YES! The angel of the Lord was informing Manoah of a future blessing, but the news came with a demand of obedience.  When Manoah heard of this he prayed and begged the Lord that the angel return with instructions of how to raise the son that was going to be born. (Judges 13:8) When God lays something on our heart, do we go to Him in prayer to figure out the specifics?  We should!  As the story continues, God heard Manoah's cry, just like He hears ours, and the angel of the Lord appeared to Manoah's wife again.  She quickly ran to Manoah and said, "He's here!  The man who appeared to me the other day!"  Manoah went to talk to "the man."  He got the same instructions that were given to his wife, and wanted to prepare a young goat for the angel.  But in verse 16 the angel said, "Even though you detain me, I will not eat any of your food. But if you prepare a burnt offering, offer it to the LORD." (Manoah did not realize that it was the angel of the LORD.)  Did you catch that?  Manoah didn't even know that it was the angel of the Lord, JESUS, that he was offering hospitality and gratitude to, but Jesus said, "Offer it to the Lord."  This is what reminded me of Hebrews 13:12.  Manoah had an encounter with Jesus, God in the flesh, and didn't even realize it.  How many times have we had a chance to show a stranger LOVE, through hospitality or humility?  Well Manoah sacrificed the goat to Lord and the Lord did an amazing thing, while Manoah and his wife watched.  (Judges 13:19-20)  God will do something amazing with our lives when we are obedient to His call.  God is ALWAYS faithful to His word, we have to be faithful on our end and we will be AMAZED by what God does.  Jesus says in Matthew 25:40, 40"I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."  God is all around us!  Everywhere I look I see His face.  How many times do we walk pass Jesus (the least of these) in a day?  We can have a huge impact on their lives if we are obedient to God's call.  We can fall on our faces before God bc of an experience like Manoah and his wife had bc of their obedience, or we can face the reality of Matthew 25:41-43.  I pray that we can be intentional in our approach each and every day.  The people in this world are in trouble folks.  What are we going to do about it?  Are we entertaining angels when we get the chance?

Mission Impossible?...I Don't Think So...

     The missionary nature of the local church is a very controversial topic among the people in the world today.  The overall view of this topic would range from good to bad depending on where the opinion was coming from.  If you look at the local church as a whole, of course you see each one of them involved in missions in some sort of way.  How do we define missions though?  The Bible defines missions as a task that God has given us to take the gospel to the ends of the earth, so that we can all experience His love to the fullest.  The real question is, “What should that look like, or what does it look like?”  Personally, I think that Christians, as a whole, need to get up off their butts and STEP OUT of the comfortable little Christian box they live in.

     I am writing this blog as a personal opinion on the missionary nature of the local church.  I don’t want this to make me sound like I am self-righteous at all, nor do I think that I have all the right answers.  I try to read scripture and apply it the best I can to my own personal life, because in the end that is the life that I am most responsible for.  The topic of missions in the local church particularly fires me up because I have seen how beneficial serving has been in my own personal life.  The passion that flows from me about this topic is coming from the overflow of God’s work in my life.  The Bible says, “From the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks,” and my heart breaks for this very thing.

     If you took a survey of the local church’s involvement in missions, you would find that almost every one of them is involved in some way.  Their involvement may be in cross-cultural missions, city missions, or international missions.  They may be contributing by sending money, raising money, praying, going on mission trips, or getting physically involved in their communities in various ways.  If you looked at each one of the church’s missionary natures from a biblical standpoint, the facts would be startling.  Personally, I think that most churches leave a lot of things out when it comes to missions.  They pick and choose which aspects to devote time and resources to.  The problem isn’t the church; that was God’s idea.  The problem is people that make up the church.  All of us are guilty of interpreting scripture to suit our comfort levels.  I think it is time to start reading the scripture, truly understanding it, and applying it to our lives in the way it was intended to be applied.

     I personally think that today’s typical Christian is comfortable with their own salvation; thus, their focus is still on themselves.  The cliché description of their relationship with Jesus Christ is summed up with the two words, “Fire Insurance.”  After their initial salvation experience they slowly fall into what I like to call “A Christian Coma.”  Their relationship with Christ becomes centered on not doing certain things, like sin, instead of striving to do things for the kingdom.  I think there is a sense of blindness among many people in the Christian world today.  There are opportunities to serve others, by sharing the gospel or simply loving people right where they are.  This reality hits close to home for me because this is exactly what I experienced after becoming a Christian.  I got in the routine of focusing on attending church, reading my Bible, and praying a certain amount of time a day.  God finally got through to me this summer, when He revealed to me the joy that He brings when I started focusing on Him.  Of course attending church, reading God’s word, and prayer are important for spiritual growth, but when that is your focus you get caught up in that, thus, many Christians are focused on ministering to other Christians.  When your one and only focus is Christ, you realize that the creator of the universe has a purpose for your life, and it changes the way you live your life.  You start praying prayers that you have never prayed, you start taking chances that you have never taken, and God starts using you like you have never been used before.  I started to realize that my salvation wasn’t about me it was for everybody.  Now that I have accepted Christ, He has given me the power to have a HUGE impact on the lives of those around me.  I started to apply that in every way that I could and saw that God had far bigger plans for my life than I had ever imagined.  1 Corinthians 2:9-10 says, “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has perceived what God has prepared for those who love him, but God has revealed it to us by His spirit.”  That scripture really came to life to me.  I can walk in the spirit in my everyday life, because God’s Holy Spirit lives within me.  The same power that raised Christ from the grave is given to me with the intention that I use it for God’s glory.  If that doesn’t get you fired up, I don’t know what will.  

     I have been praying for God to break my heart for what breaks His, and to allow me to see every person and every situation through the His eyes.  This prayer has driven me to urban ministries working with the homeless and kids from broken homes etc...  These ministries aren’t the only things that I involve myself in, but I truly think that God is showing me that these things are looked over by many people.  My mission is not to stomp on people’s feet over these things; it is to show others the importance of ministering to these people.  Sure ministering to the least of these involves stepping out of your comfort zone, but that is what God calls us all to do.  When you start to minister to these people God shows you how you can be used in their community and He will break your heart for them.  As you continue to minister to them, God lays a burden on your heart for ANYONE that doesn’t know Him.  When your focus is on Christ you subconsciously pick up your cross daily and follow Him.  You will do things for the kingdom without even thinking about it.  I think living your life in this way is what Jesus was talking about when He said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”  The fact is you are making disciples of ALL nations, when your focus is on Christ.  Applying the Great Commission to your life on a daily basis has an impact on others that is unbelievable. 

     The church should dissect scripture to get to the exact meaning of God’s idea for missions.   When that is found, the congregation should disciple every member of its that attends, with the intention to fulfill the Great Commission.  If the church makes disciples of those within, then they will make disciples, thus, making a global impact for Christ.  I don’t claim to have all the answers, and I may come across as pushy or a “know it all,” but I feel that that God has revealed this to me.  I am responsible for my life and the way that I live it, so I intend to be involved in the things that I have mentioned.  I want to live my life to the fullest every day with the direction of the Holy Spirit and if that takes me to the city slums, the African plains, or the trailer park, I plan to be faithful.  Many think that they are unworthy to be used in a mighty way by God.  They think that the dreams they have to make a difference for Christ are just dreams, or impossible missions.  The reality is that if Christ brings you to it, He will bring you through it.  Through the power of Jesus Christ, ANY and ALL missions are possible.          

The L.O.T. Project

It all started as a "crazy idea" that I thought that I was just making up in my head, but now it is becoming a reality.  It seems that more and more God continues to show me that His hand was and is on this "crazy idea."  I just started looking at what and who was around me in my everyday life.  In a typical day we encounter many different types of people.  Some may be believers and others may not be.  Some may be criminals and others may be saints.  Any way you look at it, you are going to encounter those that don't know that Jesus loves them and wants to have a relationship with them.  What do we do about that?  Well, as the great theologian Alan Jackson says in one of his songs, "Faith, hope, and love are some good things He gave us, but the greatest is love.  LOVE.  That is the answer.  We have to love these people right where they are.  This is in no way going to be easy, but it is a must.  Personally, I believe that we will be held accountable for the people that we encounter in life.  When I see that someone doesn't know Jesus, I want to do something about that.  God has given all of us the gift of the Holy Spirit, and through that gift we can do something about it.   Some friends and I have started taking kids to youth on Wednesday and church on Sunday.  Some of their parents even come on Sunday.  I have seen five boys accept Christ in  a little over a month.  God is absolutely blowing my mind with this.  I have also been doing a lot of work with the homeless.  God has been breaking my heart for people that don't know Him, so I have to do something about it.  What if more kids show up?  What if I encounter 100 homeless people? (Easy to find in Greenville)  How can I help these people?  I really feel that God is leading me to start a non-profit ministry that reaches out to the people He loves.  Jesus said in Matthew 25:40, "Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."  I want to be able to do something for these people and I know that God wants that too.  The ministry is called The L.O.T. Project.  It is an acronym meaning the least of these.  Also in the old testament, Abraham pleaded to God to spare Lot's life, and I am pleading to God to spare the lives of those who don't know Him YET.  Give me one more month, one more week, one more hour to show these people the love of Christ, that is my prayer.  I have been praying over this for months, I have been serving with all I have, and I have been asking others for advice.  The L.O.T. Project is becoming a reality and God is blowing my mind and lives are being changed.  Feel free to donate to this cause, and know that your contributions are greatly appreciated.  You can donate money, your time, resources, advice, but most importantly your prayers.  Thank you for your support...