Christian Lifestyle

For many Christians there are two separate aspects of life: relationship with God and relationship with the real world. Unfortunately, the two seldom mix. I want to figure out how a relationship with God translates into a lifestyle that can serve as a contrast to the lifestyle created by the world. Unless I actually take the risk of practicing and discovering if what I believe is true, I do not have the right to preach it to someone else.

In part this is motivated by the irrelevance of the Christian lifestyle enjoyed in Suburban America. When I saw the poor people in the countryside in China, I knew that the gospel I carried was not good news to them. The gospel their country preached to them was a big house, plenty of money and no problems. My message was no different, except that I could promise a happy ending (a nice house, plenty of money, and no problems in a perfect world called heaven). Oops. Why would my message have any more pull than the other one? The only reason? Fear of a place called Hell.

While salvation is key to the gospel, the goal of salvation is restoration. Jesus is the second Adam, the reset button, the second chance for mankind to walk with God in this experience of life. If walking with God is my objective, then the standard of value by which I engage with life will be different. My value comes not from economic productivity. My Christianity is not part of my career. My career is my Christian life. What I do in the process of walking with God is irrelevant. If I walk with God as a server at a restaurant, a street sweeper in China, an executive in Ireland, or a gas station attendant in Minnesota, I am successful. I do not have to have a fancy house, a nice car, plenty of clothes, expensive food, or even a good reputation. I do not have to be distinguished as a Christian among those I serve. I simply have to love God in response to His love for me – and as I come to know His love, I will find myself loving those around me.

When it comes to a career, I no longer play that game. My career is my faith. When it comes to a retirement account, I no longer invest in dollars. My reward is incorruptible. When it comes to success, I have a new definition. My boasting is that I know God. When it comes to money, I am no longer a servant. My Father created the world and owns all its money.

I am setting up my life in a way that requires God to be real. Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs shows religion near the top of the pyramid as part of self-actualization. Christianity is meant to be the pyramid. If I cannot trust God for my basic survival needs, how can I trust him for my identity, love Him in relationship, or depend on Him for my future?

Even as I think about this, I realize that I still trust in my own ability and intelligence to care for myself. I know these are gifts from God for me to use. For the past several weeks, I have devoted these to investing in the kingdom of God without really thinking of how I can use them to care for myself. It may be that this is the way I give these to Him. I still presume that if God does not come through in the way I expect, I can use them to somehow get by. Every day that I submit these to the service of His kingdom, I show my trust in Him as my sole provider. He is everything that I need.

Why Minnesota?

May 23, 2012

One of the questions that I expected on my return to Minnesota after setting out with LA as a destination is “why didn’t you go all the way there?” It was a question that I had to deal with before I made the decision to go to Minnesota. I was half-way between the two places. There were a couple key factors that drove my decision

First, even before I reached Colorado, I recognized that the trip was not about my destination, but about my relationship with God. I needed to begin my post-graduate life by recognizing my role as both a child of God and a representative of His kingdom. I had been raised to serve, but needed to encounter love (1 Corinthians 13). After days of prayer, I recognized clearly that I did not have to do anything to make God happy with me. He accepted me as His child while I was still His enemy. Now that I am His child there is nothing I can possibly do to change that. Thus, I was completely free to do whatever I wanted with my life.

Second, even though I am completely free to do anything I want, my greatest desire is to know God. One of the best ways I have found to discover Him more fully is through loving and serving other people. For this reason, my call to pray and to love remained the same even after I realized my destination didn’t matter so much to God as my heart. He wanted to be my only focus, but as I ran after Him, I was distracted by the possibility of doing something for Him. Now I wanted to see Him do something through me as I sought to know Him in the way I lived my life every day.

Third, my life has always been about ideas. I love ideas and concepts, and watching them materialize. However, it is only recently that I have been given a love for the people that make these ideas worth anything. Travelling to California was about an idea. The idea was good, but I had no clue who the people were that I was going to serve, worship, and enjoy life with. At the same time, I knew several people in Minnesota who I desperately wanted to show the work that God was doing in my life. One direction was an idea, the other direction was an individual (specifically a church).

Fourth, along the way I received three challenges from the believers I spoke with. The first, was to determine where I was going, the second was to prepare for what I would do there, the third was to follow God wherever He would lead me. The first, I recognized was completely up to me. I have wanted and still hope to go to LA at some point in the future, but right now I have some things to do in Minnesota. The second was advice that I am currently following: developing a plan for when I do begin to minister in LA. The third was probably the most helpful advice for two reasons. It drew my heart in a direction that God had been calling me for some time, but it also removed the fear of people that has often kept me from responding to this call.

Fifth, I have always wondered why so many people who spend their lives serving the kingdom wind up with ruined families. One of the qualifications for a leader in the church is excellence in fatherhood. Christians often take Jesus call to love him and be willing to leave family behind as an excuse to avoid serving those closest to them (who are admittedly some of the most difficult to love). I do not want to be the person who succeeds at sharing God’s love with a world of nameless strangers, but fails to do the same to those that are most invested in my life. One cannot sacrifice love in the name of ministry. It is inconsistent to act in an unloving way toward one person in order act out of love for someone else. The tree cannot bear both good fruit and evil. Either I love God and all others, or I don’t. This was ultimately, my greatest reason for driving north instead of south when I left Colorado Springs.

Finally, I knew all along that the call to follow God would lead me to an unknown destination. I never expected it would be to Minnesota and struggled hard against my desire to start a fresh life in another state that I have always wanted to live in. However, as I came to understand God’s love for me more fully and the opportunities I would have to share that love with people I care about, I began to desire to go to Minnesota more strongly than I had ever desired not to go there. I realized that the journey I began in Indiana on May 10 would not simply end when I had reached a destination. It would continue every day that I turned my heart to seek God and offered my life to see how He would reveal Himself through me. So far, it has been an exciting adventure. 

Thinking Through life

I wrote this a few weeks ago and posted it here since it plays a role in the decisions I made over the next several weeks. There will be more to come.

April 22

This night at the end of the prayer furnace meeting, I found myself once again in the position of letting go of everything and completely trusting in God for my future and my present. My prayer was to live in the present, each day, one day at a time, one moment at a time asking Jesus for what to do next, following His voice and loving other people. I have a feeling that I will be doing something in Chicago that I don’t expect at the moment. I don’t know what it is yet, but it has something to do with my desire for the church to be free from religion.

Then I asked when that was to start and how I was to begin my work in Chicago and He said that I had several interesting things I was working on that I should continue to do until I was told that it was the right time to start something else. However, I need to hold on to my projects loosely and always be ready for the opportunity that will present itself when I don’t expect it.

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I have been challenged to commit to something and believe I have not yet embraced that challenge. Tonight, God spoke through a man that ‘I had to talk to’ who had spent much of his life avoiding commitments and was sad because he had never accomplished anything. However, he is now committed to one thing: his relationship with Jesus. That is what I once again committed myself to.

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In any case, I believe I am called to something big, but my focus is to be on something little. My call is the kingdom, my mission is love. Simply living honorably, acting justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with my God.

At this moment, I am perfectly at peace with my future because I know who has planned it and who will take care of me through it. Even though I don’t know the first steps, I know what will take me the right direction. Lord, give me the courage to walk that way even when no one else will join me. God will change the heart of His church through prayer. Through time spent with Him, through people who will give up their lives to Him. If I can live a life following Jesus example, I will be satisfied.