Helping God

I was reading in Matthew 8-9 this morning. I was watching how many times Jesus responds to someone's faith. Like God doesn't move in their lives until he sees their faith. And so my instant reflex, is, "Okay, what am I going to do to show God my faith, so he will respond to it?"

So I start thinking of ways I can help God answer my prayers. How can I help Jesus act in line with what I want him to do?

But when I looked more closely, the faith he responds to isn't necessarily an act of faith, it is a heart of faith. Like with the Centurion, he came to Jesus to ask him to heal his paralyzed servant. Jesus says, "I will go and heal him." And the Centurion is like, "No, don't even worry about coming all that way, just say the word and it will be done. Just like when I give orders to the soldiers under me, I know they will do it." (paraphrase)

And it says Jesus was astonished at his faith. "I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith." He didn't do anything to help Jesus, he just asked for Jesus to speak a word and he knew it could be accomplished. And so Jesus says, "Go! It will be done just as you believed it would.' And his servant was healed at that very hour." Matt 8:13

One interesting thing is that the Centurion didn't see the result of his faith until he got back. All he had for his journey home was the words of Jesus, telling him that it would be done. But he didn't know how Jesus would do it, he didn't know when Jesus would do it, and he didn't the see result right away.... even though it was accomplished that very hour.

Sometimes when we pray, he is working it out at that very moment, but we don't see the result right away. We just have a promise and his word to hold onto. Maybe he is responding to a heart of faith, but we just can't see the how, when, or result right away.

Right after I studied this passage, I read this in a devotional called, "Streams in the Desert":

"I once believed that after I prayed, it was my responsibility to do everything in my power to bring about the answer. Yet God taught me a better way and showed me that self-effort always hinders His work. He revealed that when I prayed and had confident trust in Him for something, he simply wanted me to wait in an attitude of praise and do only what He told me."

With the Centurion, the only thing Jesus told him to do was to "Go!" To go back home and there he would see the answer. Jesus didn't tell him to do anything that would help him accomplish the healing. On that journey home he just had to trust it was being accomplished.

"Sitting still, doing nothing except trusting in the Lord causes a feeling of uncertainty and there is often a tremendous temptation to take the battle into our own hands... Spiritual forces cannot work while we are trusting earthly forces."

Sometimes the greater act of faith is to do nothing rather than to do something that we think will help God out. And maybe in our doing nothing to help him, it forms a greater heart of faith.

An easy thing in the eyes of the Lord

When I run at the gym I watch all the people lifting weights. Whenever I see a really muscular person, my first thought is not, "wow they are so strong" my first thought is, "wow they have been through a lot of weakness."

I have 2 gym memberships (ha, I like them both, I couldn't pick just one!) In other words I pay money each month to become weak. I pay money for discipline. I pay money for exhaustion. I pay money to break down my body. After running an hour I sprint at the very end, it's really hard. When I'm done running my shirt is drenched in sweat, my face is red, my hair is wet, my body is weak. I do this to myself almost every day. Not what I would call pleasant.

I was thinking about this in relation to spiritual weakness. Nothing makes me feel more weak than an impossible situation before me. Nothing makes me feel more weak than waiting on God to do something that feels impossible.

God says to endure these hard seasons as discipline, as training. "God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness... No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful." Hebrews 12:10-11. I wouldn't describe that last sprint or that last rep or that last push up as pleasant.... but painful. Yet again, I pay money for it.

So I was thinking, why do I resist God's discipline in times of spiritual weakness? Why do I resist entering into the pain, suffering and weakness of trusting him when it's so hard? Is God not using that to tone, define, mold and strengthen my spiritual self? Isn't this of more value than what I am doing every day at the gym? On top of that.. his discipline is free ha.

I was reading about an impossible situation today in 2 Kings 3. And here is what God said about it through his prophet Elisha, "This is an easy thing in the sight of the Lord..."2 Kings 3:18. I just fell in love with this verse and read it over and over.

What you see as impossible, God sees as easy. And that is so comforting to know and believe in the midst of those kind of trials.

But maybe the reason God waits to do this "easy thing" for you is to allow you to become weak, to break you down, which in turn builds you up and makes you stronger than before. Even though these moments are painful. "Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it." Hebrews 12:11

If we can see from God's perspective, we see that there is more going on. That God cares about how he is molding us. And that really it's for our good and that we may share in his holiness. Though it's not pleasant now, it produces peace later.

If we can see from God's perspective we can endure AND we can rest in the difficulty of our situation, because "it is an easy thing in the eyes of the Lord."

Savoring

Some people eat. Some people taste.

Some people endure life. Some people enjoy life.

I don't want to endure, I want to enjoy. We can choose goodness in life, of life. We don't have control of anything that happens to us, but we can control the perspective we choose to view life by.

To savor means, "to give oneself to the enjoyment of."

I want to savor life. I want to savor moments. I want to savor God. I want to choose to see all the things in my life as something that is a gift and give myself to the enjoyment of it. For example, I can choose to see my job as something I have to do. Or I can see my job as something I get to do.

And it's true with every other area of life. Even the problems. I can either see it as a gift cause it's shaping me into the image of Christ, so I will rejoice in my sufferings. Or I can see it as a burden, so I will complain and wish it away.

To enjoy, to experience to the fullest means to finalize and seal the enjoyment with PRAISE. To savor completely is to praise God. To see the beauty in situations, in experiences, and in other people, in the now, in the moment, in the present and thank God for it.

CS Lewis says, "All enjoyment spontaneously flows into praise... You, see we love to praise things we enjoy because praise is not just the expression of that joy, but also the completion of it. Our praise for God must overflow out of our joy in God. To praise God is to enjoy him to the fullest."

I can enjoy, savor, and delight in God when I believe that he delights in me.

We see this is true when we look to the cross, where Jesus exchanged his place of enjoyment in God for a place of suffering apart from God... for us. So that we could have the free, yet costly gift of salvation. And with that comes the choice to delight in, to enjoy and to savor life in Christ with God.

The story behind the launch

Tuesday night, March 26, 2012 I broke down crying in the parking lot of El Porton to my friend Wade. I felt like the Young Adult Community, the ministry that I started and invested my life in was dying. People were leaving, leaders were leaving, people were burnt out, and I felt like it was near dead and time to give up on it.

The next morning Wade gave me the passage Luke 13:6-9. It's about a man who didn't find any fruit on this one fig tree. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard to cut down the tree. The man said back basically, give me another year with it, I will dig around and it and fertilize it. If it bears no fruit then next year cut it down.

This was kinda my prayer for the ministry, God give me another year to work on it. I spent the next few months really praying and wrestling with a new vision and ministry model. I had a hundred million ideas of what to do...

But God wanted me to get to the heart of ministry first. He showed first to stop focusing on a ministry model, but on people. Then he showed me how our vision was out of order. Our vision at the time was centered on being a community and our hope was that spiritual growth would be a by-product. But God showed me how Jesus said, "Go into all the earth and make disciples." He didn't say, "Go into all the earth and make community."  I sensed him saying, if I would first focus on making disciples then fruit and discipleship would be the product, and community would become more of a by-product.

Once I got the new vision, "To reach young adults and develop disciples" then I began to look at and research what God was doing with young adults around the country. I found that God was moving in big ways in other cities. If he was doing such great things there, could he do it here?

This is when he gave me the vision to create Tuesday Nights at Hope for young adults all around the city to gather, worship, and hear God's word in a passionate way that would ignite and re-ignite their faith. To really reach out to the city and our generation and then from there create discipleship opportunities.

I spent 6 months with my girls Bible study, preparing them to lead and disciple others. I told them our group wasn't going to just end, it was going to multiply. And that is what we are about to do!

In September, Hope got behind the vision and put so much support, resource and money into it. I got a core team of 16 people together to help plan, pray, invest and run it. And tomorrow we launch this new endeavor to reach our city and our generation and make disciples who will bear fruit for God's glory (John 15:8). TEN months of praying, wrestling, planning, and praying for this. And tomorrow is the day! So much anticipation right now :)

God brought me to a low place, he let the ministry get to a low place last year in order to bring us to this new place and new season. And I just really believe we've spent this past year "digging around it and fertilizing it" so that God could bring new fruit and new life from a once dying tree.

Me and 2pac

I LOVE 2PAC!! His music is so good!!

I listen to him almost every day on my runs... along with Spanish music, Elevation worship and Drake!

I totally identify with some of his lyrics and then there are other lyrics I don't come close to identifying with. He talks about dying a lot, gangs, shootings, gangster parties, jail.. etc. I don't really identify with that haha! But I've noticed that a lot of it is about death. (Side note: I just thought of this, Hope is doing a series on "Living Well" and they will be talking about facing death in a few weeks... they could totally use some 2pac songs. ha)

But here are some lyrics that I relate to spiritually and in ministry:

"Some say the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice, I say the darker the flesh then the deeper the roots." (song: Keep Ya Head Up)

This totally reminded me of Jeremiah 17:7-8. There is this imagery of a person who trusts in God and how they are like a tree planted by the water. And how it sends it's roots out by the stream. It doesn't fear when heat comes, it has no worries in a year of drought and it never fails to bear fruit.

And I just felt like one morning when I was praying God spoke to me through a play on words from those lyrics and those verses and said, "The deeper the faith, the sweeter the fruit." The more we have to trust God, rely on him and have no other provisions, he comes through, and the fruit that he produces through our faith is so much more satisfying, richer, and sweeter for having had to trust and watching him bring it about.

"Driven by my ambitions, desire higher positions, so I proceed to make G's, eternally in my mission is to be more than just a rap musician, the elevation of today's generation if I could make 'em listen, prison aint what we need, no longer stuck in greed, time to plan and strategize, my family's gotta eat." (song: Unconditional Love)

I listen to this verse all the time over and over. I identify with the phrase, "Driven by my ambitions." I have such high hopes and big dreams to see God do a great work in our city and our generation... I love the phrase, "The elevation of today's generation, if I could make them listen." If we would really listen to God's word and what he wants for us and live by it, we would be a generation who rises up and reaches people with the Gospel and makes disciples. "Time to plan and strategize" makes me think about how all the planning and strategizing that we are doing in ministry truly is about an eternal mission. So far greater than what 2pac was rapping about.

And then for obvious reasons, I just really like this chorus: "Though things change, the future's still inside of me, we must remember that tomorrow comes after the dark, so you will always be in my heart, with unconditional love." (song: Unconditional Love)

"Even in darkness light dawns for the upright.." Psalm 112:4

"God lives in us and his love is made complete in us" 1 John 4:12

My life goals at 21

Sometimes I'm just so glad I write things like this down! I was reading over my goals at 21 years old and it's challenging me to reinstate them!

August 17, 2005:

"A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones." Pr 14:30

• To be at rest in God's thoughts of me, to be satisfied and at peace in Him, so instead of competing with others I will want others to win.
• To help encourage others to think more highly of themselves (in Christ) not to get them to think more highly of me.

"A cheerful heart is of good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones." Pr 17:22

• To be cheerful for others and about others.
• To find what is enjoyable in others and express it.

"For the Lord will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being snared." Pr 3:26

• God says I am worth the cross, to live like I am worth it!
• Confident enough to consider others better than myself.
• Confident enough to take the nature of a servant.
• Confident enough to know I am loved ultimately so I can love in actions and in truth.

"Better is an open rebuke than hidden love. Wounds from a friend can be trusted but an enemy multiplies kisses." Pr 27:5-6

• To be a friend of truth and gentleness.
• To tell the truth when it hurts though helps.
• To look at how Jesus is the perfect friend to me, so I can extend true friendship with care and wisdom.

"Let love and faithfulness never leave you, bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart." Pr 3:3

• To be so bound by God's love that I will be free to lavish it on others.
• To not give love to get love, but give love because I have already gotten it abundantly.
• To dwell on his love and write it on my heart so I will extend it to others.

"The path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, shining ever brighter til the full light of day."

• To live and be strengthened by grace rooted at the cross.
• That my life would communicate the gospel.

Lessons in Ministry

My mom and my dad have been in ministry for most of their lives. They have so much experience and have worked in a few different churches and they have impacted hundreds and hundreds of lives overs the years.

The past three years I have gotten to work at the same church with them. I am so thankful to have two of the most experienced leaders to go to for leadership and ministry advice any time I need it. I have learned so much by watching them lead, watching how they work in a church, and watching how they work with people. I have gone to them for so much advice and gotten to hear their mindsets and perspectives on ministry. Here are some of the lessons I have learned from them:

• "Ministry is about people not programs." ~ Mom

• When looking for leaders, look for F.A.T. people. Faithful. Available. Teachable. Look for people who are willing to serve and do whatever. When people ask for a high position or for the spot light, see if they are willing to serve with something simple first. Take time to observe people.

• One time in ministry I kept reaching out to certain people with not much response. My mom said, "Invite less, pray more."

• One time I was in my dad's office and he pulled out his trash can and showed me that he had just thrown away this thick notebook filled with a small group strategy that he had spent years and years developing in Charlotte. "This thing, these plans that I had sleepless nights over, is in the trash now, but you know what is left from it? The relationships." And he started listing off names of people. This was a good visual that ministry is about people not programs.

• My mom leads out of prayer. She teaches her leaders how to pray, she leads everything from seeking God in prayer. And so when people ask, "Why is your ministry so successful?" She says, "We pray." "Yeah but what's your strategy for growth?" "We pray." Everything she does begins and ends with prayer.

• "If you are going to work in a church, you have to REALLY love Jesus." ~ Dad

• In a small group setting, ask people history-giving questions in the beginning of your time with them. People feel comfortable talking about what they know, everyone is an expert on their past.

• Don't attach your identity to the ministry.

• Discipleship is SO important. They gave me the book, "The Master's Plan of Evangelism" that they used in their early days of ministry. This book has shaped my value for discipleship.

• Don't implement a huge change all at once. Try something once or twice, give your self room to test things before officially implementing it.

• There is an art to asking good questions in small groups, this takes time and practice to develop.

• When I'm scared about loosing my job cause not enough people are coming to things, my mom tells me I just have to rest in the fact that I'm following God, I am giving my best and then to trust God with the results.

• Take a day off to NOT work, keep it the Sabbath and let yourself rest from your work. They've never said this, I've just watched them do it for 28 years.

• The importance of keeping your own relationship with God strong and healthy by spending time alone with him every morning. Again, they don't talk much about this, I've just watched them do it for 28 years. And I believe their effectiveness in ministry stems from the vitality and richness of their own relationships with God.

Thank you Mom and Dad for these lessons and so many more through your words and your example. I love you guys and I'm thankful to learn from you!