Taking Stock of Life

I have been taking stock of life lately. As summer is nearing the end and I am looking toward the fall I am evaluating how I have spent my summer. This year there weren’t many trips, but there was a lot of other things going on. When we look back on our lives what is it that we remember? What is it that stands out?

Every year I could count the number of hours I sleep, work, take care of daily needs, etc. I could reflect on the trips I took, the parties I went to, the social events I attended. Those are all good things, but I am starting to look at life differently and to ask:

• How much time did I spend in relationship with God? (prayer, bible study, etc.)
• How much time did I spend serving and loving on others?
• How much time did I spend learning more about how to be a Christian and how to live well?
• How much time did I invest in helping others grow toward a relationship with God?
• How many times did I tell others about God?
• How many times did I poorly represent God through my words, actions, attitudes, and interactions?
• How many of my resources (money, belongings, etc.) did I share with others? Do I consider them my resources or God’s?
• How much of my time did I allow God to lead?
• How many opportunities did I say no to or leave neglected because my heart was unwilling to go where God wanted me to?
• How many times did I overlook what God was doing?
• How honest have I been about the sin in my life and walked in true repentance?
• How many times have I told others I would do something and didn’t do it?
• How many times have my words or actions hurt others?
• How many relationships have I left unresolved where I have been unwilling to forgive, reconcile, and love?
• What haven’t I returned to others that I borrowed from them?

Are we asking the right questions when we take stock of life? Whose life are we taking stock of……our life, or the life of God’s servant?

Anyone who has faith will do what I have been doing!

I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. (John 14:12)

I have been thinking about this verse for days now. As I searched online for others views on the verse I find most people pay attention to the second half of the verse and especially to the word greater. What stands out to me is the first half of the verse.

Are you a Christian? Do you have faith in Christ? If so, this verse says you WILL do what he has been doing. This expresses the same message that we hear from the book of James, faith without actions is dead. It leaves us asking the question, if we are not doing what Chris was doing are we really living as a believer, and if we are not living as a believer do we truly believe.

Believing in Christ is not the same as believing the light will come on when you flip the light switch, or believing that your paycheck will arrive when it is supposed to. Belief like that does not really take much effort or involvement on our side, we just expect it to happen. Believing in Christ means we enter into a relationship where there is give and take and where Christ will ask things of us. What he is asking of us is to live like he did, and to do the things that he did. He cared for the poor, fed the needy, healed, preached, taught, counseled, spoke truth, sacrificed, made God’s priorities first in his life, and much much more.

Are you living a life where you are doing what Christ was doing? If you believe in Christ and you are not living that way I guess I have to ask why and when you change. (Don’t worry, I am asking that same question about my life as there are areas where I am not living like it either. )

Do you respect your spiritual leader/pastor?

As a member of a church we are under spiritual leaders who are pastors or ministry leaders, and depending on our role they might even be our supervisor. We also have elders who are over us and hopefully leading the way. I have been reflecting lately on the characteristics of the people I truly respect as spiritual leaders, and therefore as people.

• Those whose speech and actions are about living for and glorifying God. They have such a love for and walk with God that they can’t keep from talking about him, living out the 1st greatest commandment.
• Those who place others before themselves, living by the 2nd greatest commandment.
• Those who seek to truly live by the standards given in scripture.
• Those who understand the priority and importance of prayer, both individually and corporately.
• Those whose values (seen through time, resources, money, words, blog/twitter posts, entertainment choices, etc.) are growing more and more toward God’s values, which they know through close walk with him.
• Those who live out Philippians 2:5-11 considering themselves nothing and taking the very nature of a servant.
• Those who live out Philippians 3:7-11 seeking to love Christ more than they breath, considering everything other than knowing him a loss, and desiring to know him so much that they will even suffer for him.

What causes you to respect your spiritual leaders? If your leaders do not have these characteristics are they good leaders that are truly leading you to God?

Twitter – What are we communicating?

For the past year or so I have been following a few people on Twitter. I still am not convinced about what this social networking is truly accomplishing. Often I feel like I am stalking others as I learn intimate details about their thoughts and lives that I wouldn’t know through any other means. While it is enticing and at times almost addictive I think it many ways it is like a real life soap opera as we wait to hear what next will happen in this person’s life.

Yesterday I was reflecting on what we as Christians communicate to others via this medium. You don’t have to know someone to follow them on Twitter, you just have to find them and sign up. I know of several people who have followers from all over the nation that are only vague acquaintances of the Twitter poster, so the Tweets are the only image of this person’s life that the follower has. If your Tweets were all that someone knew about you, what would it communicate? Would others see Christ in your life? One person I know is a ministry leader, but they post mostly about their frustrations and food. Is that a good witness?

I saw two Tweets yesterday. Which one inspires you?

• “We need to stop being fools for Christ and start truly living for him.”
• “teaching christians to live normally”

I guess I would rather have an extraordinary and non-normal life. I don’t know the context around either Tweet as this is all I was given, so again I wonder…..what are we really communicating to others, and is it furthering the kingdom of God? As Christians I think we need to be a lot more careful regarding what we communicate and how it might come across to those we don’t really know our heart and the greater context of our words.