Monday Morning Memo: Discipleship 101: Love Jesus

I happen to love the old hymns…AND the newer choruses.   I know this has been a “hot topic” in many churches over the years and unfortunately has split many congregations.  I believe they all have their place in our daily lives along with our time of corporate worship…and God can use both to speak to us as we worship Him.

 

One of my favorite hymns is “My Jesus I Love Thee”.  Let me share the words with you:

 

My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine;
For Thee all the follies of sin I resign;
My gracious Redeemer, my Savior art Thou;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

I love Thee because Thou hast first loved me,
And purchased my pardon on Calvary’s tree;
I love Thee for wearing the thorns on Thy brow;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

I’ll love Thee in life, I will love Thee in death,
And praise Thee as long as Thou lendest me breath;
And say when the death dew lies cold on my brow,
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

In mansions of glory and endless delight,
I’ll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright;
I’ll sing with the glittering crown on my brow,
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

 

Reading through these words made me conclude that we often make discipleship training too difficult.  As a result, we have many Christians going through life not having a clue as to what a truly devoted follower of Christ should look like.   To me this is tragic and very disturbing.  We have Christians who look no different than those who do not profess to have a relationship with Him.   They are attending the same movies, watching the same television shows, telling the same jokes, cheating on their spouse and backstabbing at work to move up the ladder.  With their mouth they acknowledge their Savior, but their actions don’t back up their words.

 

What we need to emphasize to followers of Christ is that their responsibility is to concentrate on their relationship with Him.  If the relationship is not where it should be, then fruit will not be seen in their life.   Now at this point you may be thinking, “Well duh, LuAnn, everybody knows that!”  Do they?  Do you?

 

Let me explain.  If we really believe the words to the song I included, then our walk should prove it.  If we truly love our Jesus and desire to turn all of our sin over to Him, then that should be our guide as to how we live.  When we get up in the morning, if we truly love our Jesus, then there should be no place for mistreating our spouse or our children.  If we truly love our Jesus, then we should never desire to step on other people in our workplace just to obtain a higher status.  If we truly love our Jesus, then we should never desire to attend a function where we know Jesus would not approve.  If we truly love our Jesus, then the thought of cheating on our spouse should never be an option.  If we truly love our Jesus, our priorities and our schedule should be an outgrowth of our love for Him.

 

What we fail to realize is that the choices we make each day, make it obvious to others what condition our relationship with Him is in.  No one has to be a rocket scientist to see whether we truly love our Jesus or not, just by listening to our words and watching our actions.   Not only does it show others whether or not we love Him, it also refutes all the excuses we can muster.  No longer can we blame our parents, our children, or our friends for our behavior, because they are not responsible for our relationship with our Jesus; only we are. 

 

I’m wondering if maybe Discipleship 101 could just be:  Love Jesus.  If we truly love Him, then how we live every day should be an outpouring of that love.  It really is as simple as that.

 

How much do you love Jesus today?  Maybe a better question would be, “Do others know how much you love your Jesus?”  If they don’t, then maybe you need to re-think your priorities and make some changes in your schedule this week.  When the right choices are made, we can then sing without reservation, “If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, ‘tis NOW.”

 

“If you love me, obey my commandments.”

John 14:15

Monday Morning Memo: How Comfortable Are You?

Fall has arrived in Indiana…much to my chagrin.  As I’ve shared before, my favorite season is summer.  I really enjoy the warm, sunny days when you don’t have to bundle up in 20 layers of clothes just to step outside.  And even though I know I usually don’t have to do that in the fall…I’m smart enough to know that the next season will require it if I don’t want to freeze!

 

But I must admit that there is one thing about the cooler weather that I look forward to and that is Sunday afternoons.  The reason is because I love to come home from church and put on my sweatpants and sweatshirt and relax.  Now I can come home and relax on most Sunday afternoons regardless of what the weather is outside, but there is just something about being able to wear those clothes that make it even more appealing.

 

Why do those clothes make my afternoon better?  Because they are so comfortable.  They are soft and baggy and don’t bind me anywhere.  They’re warm and cozy and I don’t have to worry that they will wrinkle if I kick back in my recliner and take a nap in them.  When I have them on, I don’t care if I make a fashion statement and honestly, I really don’t even care if they match!   To sum it up…they are easy.  I know when I am wearing them, I can just unwind and not expect too much from myself.

 

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every moment of every hour of every day were that way?  Complete relaxation.  Never have to push ourselves to do anything.  Never have to care if we accomplish anything or do anything to impact anyone else’s life.  Never have to worry that something or someone will come along to put a “wrinkle” in our day. 

 

This may sound wonderful…but if we were honest…a life like this would be rather shallow.  It would be a life centered on us and what makes us comfortable.  We would miss out on the blessings which are received when we stop dwelling on us and do something to make someone else’s life a little easier.  We would surely become stagnant in our walk with Christ because our focus would be inward instead of outward. 

 

I think the statement in this graphic is convicting.   “Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.”  If we are only willing to do what makes us comfortable, we will miss out on the life Christ has planned for us.  He has more waiting for us than we can ever imagine and even though it may include some hills and valleys and detours which we don’t expect…it will be much more fulfilling than any afternoon in the recliner.

 

So, my question to you is, “How comfortable are you?”  If you are really comfortable day in and day out…you just might want to reevaluate your walk with Christ.  Are you listening to Him and following His directions for your journey?  Or are you content to just kick back and only do what is the easiest and makes you feel the best?

 

Life is so short and today is the day we need to step out of our comfort zone and begin living for Him instead of us.  If we don’t, we just might fall asleep and miss out on the adventure He has planned to make us look more like Him!

 

“Then, calling the crowd to join his disciples, he said, 

“If any of you wants to be my follower,

 you must give up your own way, 

take up your cross, and follow me.  

If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. 

But if you give up your life for my sake 

and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it.

Mark 8:34-35 (NLT)

Monday Morning Memo: Are You Praying...or Wishing?

When I was a child, I used to love to use flowers to play a common game.  If there was a particular boy that I liked, I would take the first petal off a flower and say, “He loves me” and then as the next petal hit the ground I would say, “He loves me not”.  This would continue until I got to the last remaining petal and if I saw that this petal would inform me that he didn’t love me, I would cheat and only pull half of the petal off to make sure I could say he loved me with the final half of a petal.  Yes, I probably should have gone to counseling for this 

Oh, the joys of being a child.  This was really nothing more than a wishing game; a game where I “wished” for a happy ending.  When I was young this was a harmless game of make believe.  I knew my wish wasn’t going to change anything or make someone love me and I really don’t think I expected anything more.

I think what is sad is the fact that many of us carry these same thoughts into our prayer life as adults.  Oh, we pray and ask God for this or that; but we consider our words to be more wishes than true, heartfelt requests.  

I have this tagline at the bottom of my emails, “If answered prayer surprises you, your praying may be more wishing than believing”.   How often do we pray, never really expecting God to answer?  Do we believe that our God is big enough to handle our requests or have we diminished God to be our size?  Are we so in tune with Him that our requests are what He would want to hear?

Too often I think our fears get in the way and we neglect to step out and be bold in our prayers, asking for those things that have been laid on our hearts.  I wonder what would happen this week if each of us would fervently pray and believe that God will answer us.  Not just throwing wishes up in the air, but heartfelt, specific prayers said to the One who is more powerful than any other. Our God is able.  Our God is powerful.  Our God is waiting for us to approach His throne.

I would love for you to join me in being intentional this week in praying and believing that He will answer.  Will He always give us the answer we are expecting?  Probably not.  But I am confident that as long as we trust Him…His answer will be exactly what we need.

“So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. 

There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace

 to help us when we need it most.” 

Hebrews 4:16

Monday Morning Memo: The Dreaded "C" Word

I asked for prayer last week in my Monday Morning Memo…because I was speaking this past weekend at a church retreat and for their Sunday morning service.  I was so blessed to have several of you contact me during the week…letting me know you were lifting me up to our Father.  God heard your prayers and showed up among us in a mighty way and I just can’t thank you enough for your amazing prayer support!

It was probably one of the most organized events I have ever been a part of, because Teresa and her crew made sure to do everything with excellence for God’s glory.  But (and there is always a “but”!) not everything on our agenda this weekend thrilled me.  You see, something that referred to the “C” word was listed on our itinerary and that word always makes me cringe.

What’s the “C” word?  Crafts.  Right there in black and white…on our schedule…was a time slot for learning how to paint a picture.  Now reading that may make some of you giddy with excitement…but I had feelings that were quite the opposite.  I am not a creative person and just about anything that falls under the title of crafts…makes me feel just a little nauseous 

But as I reflected on this as I drove home yesterday, I came to the realization that the reason I don’t like to do things like this just might be because of my pride.  I must have missed the day when artistic genes were handed out because it just isn’t my gift. So when I know that, more than likely, others around me are going to do a much better job than me…I tend to not want to put myself in that situation.  When I compare my creative talent to the other dear women who were there…I fall painfully short…which just might bruise my pride a little bit.

Comparisons can be brutal, can’t they?  I think too often we compare our weaknesses…with other peoples’ strengths…and as a result we can feel inferior rather easily.  Therefore, that makes us not want to put ourselves in situations where we might not be perfect…OUCH.  Oh, I’ve got a lot to learn in this department.  I know I need to work on facing times such as this as opportunities to grow as a person as I fellowship with those around me, knowing that the end product probably won’t be award-winning…and that is entirely ok.

So, I came home and put my newly painted picture of a sunflower in my library so I will see it as I study and write.  I’m going to have it as a reminder that I’ll never be a Picasso…and that’s ok!  Life is short and I need to work on not taking myself so seriously and be willing to take part in things just for the fun of it.   

In hindsight, it was worth every stroke of my brush to have the opportunity to spend those precious moments with these daughters of the King.  So, I’m going to do my best to remember this, the next time I begin to waste energy worrying about my pride getting bruised over a piece of canvas.  My artwork won’t be going into eternity (thank goodness!)…but those around me will…and I need to focus much more on making them feel my love, acceptance and encouragement.  And who knows…maybe if I do this, they will offer to paint my picture for me next time   

^“So encourage each other and build each other up,

 just as you are already doing.”

1 Thessalonians 5:11