A new academic year is finally here! You thought you’d never make it. Well, you did! Ah, summer! Now that’s it’s over, I want to ask you to think about . . . the end of this new school year? That’s right. I want you to fast-forward in your mind about nine months from now, when most of you will be gearing up for another fabulous and fantastic summer.

Likely most if not all of you will be given this assignment on the first day of school: “Write a 2-page essay about what you did last school year and what goals do you have for this upcoming year.”

What will you write? What will you say you did? Will you spend your new school year wasting your time with nothing to show for it? Or will you be able to say that you spent your time doing the most important things: loving God with all your heart and loving others as God loves you? At the beginning of the year I challenged you to spend this year focusing on building your relationship with Jesus. With a new school year that still has that “new” smell to it, I want to ask you: “How are you doing with that?” Have you taken the time to do just that? Or have you spent—I mean, wasted—it on other pursuits that aren’t of eternal significance?

Let this new school year be about more than just yourself! It’s been said that the best things in life aren’t things at all. Take time to improve your relationships. I don’t know how you’ll do it—only you and the Holy Spirit can decide that. I do know one thing, though. God wants you to live your life in light of all the blessings and opportunities that He has given you.

The apostle Paul puts it like this: “So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days” (Ephesians 5:15, 16, NLT). So, to ensure that you don’t live like a fool, but like a wise person, make sure that you find, connect, and maintain at least one mentoring relationship with someone who is older and wiser than you; it doesn’t have to be an adult—just someone whose character is godly, mature, whom you respect, and who cares about you enough to tell you the truth. Ttrust me: you’d rather have someone who loves you tell you a hard truth rather than a total stranger. Solomon, the wisest man ever reminds us of this truth: “Wounds from a sincere friend are better than many kisses from an enemy” (Proverbs 27:6, NLT).

The writer, Ellen White, warned youth:

Let the youth remember that all their opportunities and privileges, all the blessings bestowed upon them in innumerable ways, as these have been improved or perverted, are molding the character and forming habits for good or for evil; and in the great day an account must be rendered up for all the advantages received, and for the use made of the gifts of God. All is recorded in heaven. Page after page the history of our life experience is written, with the motives that prompted us to action. All will appear as a real life-picture, showing how much of our life was given to pleasing self, how much to blessing others, how much to honoring God, how much to answering the purpose of God in our creation. The talents intrusted to us must be accounted for, with all the improvement that might have been made on them, if time and influence and means had not been squandered on sinful pleasures.”*

So as you begin your school year, I hope you’ll decide to have something substantial to write about when school starts. It would be a shame for you to waste your school year—and your life—and have nothing to show for it.

*Ellen G. White, “The Effect of Daily Living,” Review and Herald, Jan. 13, 1891, paragraph 3. Accessed on August 15, 2026, from https://ellenwhiteresearch.com/works/RH/563

“No! No! No!” my father yelled in exasperation at the top of his lungs. “We’re not there yet! I’ll let you know when we’re there! Now, please stop asking me every 10 minutes of this trip!”

My family and I were on our family road trip from Florida to Atlanta. The five of us were traveling in our Volkswagen Bus. My brothers and I called it the “Mystery Machine,” from the cartoon show Scooby-Doo (my father wasn’t amused). Come to think of it, although we complained all the way up there, my mom made a habit of finding interesting things along the trip for us to see and do. She would read entire books to us (I don’t know how she didn’t get carsick). She would also tell us stories about her childhood or dating our father (YUCK…still). And she always made sure she had little games and activities for us to do in the car.

The Trip—Not Just the Destination

We were so focused on getting to our destination that we didn’t really see the actual getting there as part of the fun. My mother had worked very hard to plan all sorts of special things for us to see and do; she found parks, museums, and sometimes just plain weird things! Realistically, speaking, the trip itself was part of the fun—not just the destination! Looking back on it, from the perspective of a parent of two active, energetic, and curious children, I could tell my mother went to a lot of trouble to keep three boys under the age of 12 happy, contented, and busy.

You know, life is a lot like that. Many times we can get completely focused on the fact that when we get to Heaven, things will be perfect, and we won’t have any more problems. We want God to get it done right now! But God promises us: “I will never fail you. I will never abandon you” (Hebrews 13:5, NLT)—ever! He promises to give us peace, power, purpose, and, most important, His presence. If we have God’s presence with us, then we can indeed have Heaven right here on earth.

No Eye Has Seen…

But, realistically speaking, we really can’t imagine what things will await us in Heaven! God promises us:

“No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9, NLT).

God reminds you and me that this life can be an incredible adventure and that if we have God, then we really will have everything we need—even the things that we can’t even understand now; check out these scriptures that give us a flavor of what we have and what we have to look forward to:

“Ask me and I will tell you remarkable secrets you do not know about things to come” (Jeremiah 33: 3, NLT).

“By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence” (2 Peter 1: 3, NLT).

“Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely” (1 Corinthians 13:12, NLT).

“I pray that from His glorious, unlimited resources He will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God” (Ephesians 3: 16-19, NLT).

“What shall we say about such wonderful things as these? If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else? Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself. Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us. Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8: 31-39, NLT).

Heaven Here

We don’t have to wait for Heaven to walk with God and have a perfect relationship with Him; we can have Heaven here, on earth—now! While on the trip! We don’t need to be impatient, anxious, or worried, because we know that God will give us everything we need, both now and in the future; and it’s okay if we don’t understand how everything will all work out. All we need to know is that God loves us, God knows us, and God is in control. With God, the trip—not just the destination—is part of the adventure!

Hypocrite! That’s an ugly word, and nobody wants to spend time with hypocritical people, or worse still, be called one. I know that as you read this, you’ve already got a name, face, or situation flashing in your mind of someone who is the “H” word. Surely nobody excitedly tells their elementary school teacher, “When I grow up, I want to be a hypocrite!”

There’s nothing worse than spending time with somebody you know is living a lie. What’s worse still is when that person doesn’t even act as though it’s a problem.

In Matthew 23 we have a snapshot of Jesus responding to lots of spiritual leaders who should have known better. I’m not going to lie; it’s harsh stuff. Give it a read and see if you can empathize with anything that Jesus addresses—and if you get offended and feel that He’s stepping on your toes, then that’s exactly what He’s wanting you to do: Wake up! And, pay attention to the life that you’re living, and make sure that you focus on keeping the main thing, the main thing. Loving people in the name of Jesus is always the main thing!

Now Jesus turned to address his disciples, along with the crowd that had gathered with them.

“The religion scholars and Pharisees are competent teachers in God’s Law. You won’t go wrong in following their teachings on Moses. But be careful about following them. They talk a good line, but they don’t live it. They don’t take it into their hearts and live it out in their behavior. It’s all spit- and-polish veneer.

“Instead of giving you God’s Law as food and drink by which you can banquet on God, they package it in bundles of rules, loading you down like pack animals. They seem to take pleasure in watching you stagger under these loads, and wouldn’t think of lifting a finger to help. Their lives are perpetual fashion shows, embroidered prayer shawls one day, and flowery prayers the next. They love to sit at the head table at church dinners, basking in the most prominent positions, preening in the radiance of public flattery, receiving honorary degrees, and getting called ‘Doctor’ and ‘Reverend.’

“Don’t let people do that to you, put you on a pedestal like that. You all have a single Teacher, and you are all classmates.

Don’t set people up as experts over your life, letting them tell you what to do. Save that authority for God; let him tell you what to do.

No one else should carry the title of ‘Father’; you have only one Father, and he’s in heaven. And don’t let people maneuver you into taking charge of them. There is only one Life-Leader for you and them—Christ.

“Do you want to stand out? Then step down. Be a servant. If you puff yourself up, you’ll get the wind knocked out of you. But if you’re content to simply be yourself, your life will count for plenty.

“I’ve had it with you! You’re hopeless, you religion scholars, you Pharisees! Frauds! Your lives are roadblocks to God’s kingdom. You refuse to enter, and won’t let anyone else in either.

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You go halfway around the world to make a convert, but once you get him you make him into a replica of yourselves, double-damned.

“You’re hopeless! What arrogant stupidity! You say, ‘If someone makes a promise with his fingers crossed, that’s nothing; but if he swears with his hand on the Bible, that’s serious.’

What ignorance! Does the leather on the Bible carry more weight than the skin on your hands?

And what about this piece of trivia: ‘If you shake hands on a promise, that’s nothing; but if you raise your hand that God is your witness, that’s serious’? What ridiculous hairsplitting! What difference does it make whether you shake hands or raise hands? A promise is a promise. What difference does it make if you make your promise inside or outside a house of worship? A promise is a promise. God is present, watching and holding you to account regardless.

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get, but on the meat of God’s Law, things like fairness and compassion and commitment—the absolute basics!—you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you look, writing a life story that’s wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over commas and semicolons?

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You buff the surface of your cups and bowls so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and gluttony. Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface will mean something.

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You’re like manicured grave plots, grass clipped and the flowers bright, but six feet down it’s all rotting bones and worm-eaten flesh. People look at you and think you’re saints, but beneath the skin you’re total frauds.

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You build granite tombs for your prophets and marble monuments for your saints. And you say that if you had lived in the days of your ancestors, no blood would have been on your hands. You protest too much! You’re cut from the same cloth as those murderers, and daily add to the death count.

“Snakes! Cold-blooded sneaks! Do you think you can worm your way out of this? Never have to pay the piper? It’s on account of people like you that I send prophets and wise guides and scholars generation after generation—and generation after generation you treat them like dirt, greeting them with lynch mobs, hounding them with abuse (Matthew 23:1-34, MSG).

Jesus has been as patient with these folks as He can be, and He’s finally had enough! Not only are they living a lie and giving God a black eye (hey, I made a rhyme), but worse still, they are leading others astray and, by their behaviors, keeping others from getting to God. As my daddy always said: “If you know better, do better.”

Learn from the mistakes of those who have gone before you, and make the right decision to let your outsides match your insides. It’s the only way to have true peace, power, and purpose in Jesus, and to ensure that you can have living water flowing from within you to bless others (John 7:37-39).

Several years ago, early in the morning, I was startled awake, by the cacophonous chattering of birds. As I peered at my backyard through my bathroom window, I was taken aback by what I saw: my entire backyard—almost an acre—was covered by crows.

We’d just had several days of bitter cold followed by an entire day of rain. Steady, though mostly light, rain fell throughout the day, but at night, it rained hard!

We lived in a floodplain, and because of the amount of rain the day before, all of our surrounding drainage ditches, driveway, yard, and road were strewn with garbage, tree limbs, debris, and gravel.

As I began to inspect this unbelievably large group—blanket–of birds more closely, I noticed something odd: they were furiously picking at the ground. In fact, there were so many of them packed into the space of my backyard that many had begun to fight each other for rights to the space.

What could they be picking at? And with so much force and ferocity? I thought to myself, and upon closer inspection realized that they were all picking at food. As unbelievable as it was, the hard storm that my family and I had seen as such a bad thing had loosened the previously frozen and impenetrable soil, thereby allowing the hungry birds access to seeds, worms, and other “goodies” safely hidden in the ground.

It was at that moment that God brought to my mind the idea that many times what we see as difficulty, pain, or trials in our lives can be a vehicle for God to bring about an incredible harvest of blessings for ourselves or for others. He also reminded me of a passage of Scripture that, honestly, I have a conflicted relationship with:

“Always be joyful. Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, NLT).

As I stood there dumbfounded at the lesson God had taught me, I angrily wondered, how can this be possible?

How can I give thanks in all the circumstances—including difficulties—in my life? How can this be God’s will? I stopped mid-thought, went to my bedroom, grabbed my Bible, flipped it open to the verses before and after it, and read:

“God will make this happen, for he [God] who calls you is faithful” (verse 24, NLT).

It is because of who God is and what Jesus has done that I can be thankful through—and sometimes even for—the difficulties in my life. He’s in charge, and He is faithful. In that same vein, I find it absolutely fascinating that, in studying the Old Testament story of Job, the more I study, the more I’m blown away by God’s wisdom!

You see, Job was a super-Godly, righteous, and totally upstanding dude! So much so that God bragged on Him and decided to let Satan use him as a lesson to Satan—and all the other perfect, created worlds! God was going to teach everyone about His true character, by allowing everything to be stripped away from Job, and exposing Job’s true character!

After Satan, predictably, ran Job, his family, everything he owned—and basically his entire life–through the proverbial ringer, Job, in response, pleaded with God for Him to tell him why was all this really horrible stuff happening to him! And, the craziest thing then happened: God actually answered Job (Job 38 – 41)—but not in the way that he was expecting. God basically told Job that He was God and that Job wasn’t!

Then, He blessed the pants off Job! No, I’m not making this story up. This guy was a real person in history.

The ultimate point that God was trying for Job—and all of us—to understand is that: even when we don’t or can’t understand why bad stuff happens to us, that God is still in control, God knows us, God loves us, and that God has a plan for it all—yes, He even has a plan to use the cold, driving rainstorms of our lives and turn them into something good. God’s ultimate promise to us all is: “ . . . that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns” (Philippians 1:6, NLT).

Additional Resources

Debleaire Snell: “No Win Situation”

Bible Project: Job

The Real Reason Bad Things Happen to Good People

This week I’ve been repainting my kitchen and pantry. Many moons ago, in 1992, when I was in undergraduate college, during the summertime, I worked as part of the school’s skeleton-crew, crack team of painting professionals. Needless to say, I really know my way around a brush and a can of paint—however the price of paint has skyrocketed, and don’t get me started about the foolishness of many of the paint names! I don’t understand how there can actually be more than one color of white paint; it’s only and always just white—not Cloud, Ivory, Milk, Chalk, Snow, or Bone!

I digress! After I had completed the task of “cutting in”—the process of carefully and painstakingly painting all the edges and corners of the walls, which is the most difficult and time-consuming part of painting—I began to wash all my equipment. As I was scrubbing the brushes, on psychological auto-pilot, my eyes fell on what looked like a scrap piece of thin plastic, 12 inches long and 3 inches wide. I picked it up, closely examined it, and—thinking it was garbage—was about to throw it away when I quickly stopped myself and removed the tool from my hand. As I dried it off and slipped it in my pocket, I could literally hear my boss’ voice in my ear explaining that this was called a painter’s “guide” and was used as a shield for the trim while cutting in. This shield kept the trim paint from getting on the wall.

I remember him smacking me on the back of the head, as he further explained that if trim paint gets on the wall, that I, the painter, would have to repaint the affected area, thereby wasting more time, energy, of not just myself—but the entire team—and costing the school more money in fixing the problem. I remember, all those years ago, thinking to myself, Man, I should have thought of inventing that. I could have been rich!

In the midst of my selfish contemplations, God stepped in and reminded me that He has already given me, and you, our own “guide” that will enable us to paint our lives right the first time, thereby preventing us unnecessary and painful consequences.

Solomon, the smartest “smarty-pants” in all of history, went through the trouble of writing it down for us so we won’t have any excuses.

Here’s what he wrote: “Respect and obey the Lord! This is the beginning of knowledge” (Proverbs 1:7, CEV).

Everything in our lives begins and ends with whom we put into the “God-shaped” hole in our hearts. If we recognize that God is who He says He is, then chances are we’ll make choices that reflect that reality. However, in my life and in the lives of many others I’ve seen, people have decided that they, someone, or something else, will be placed in that spot, and the consequences are always bad; and significantly more serious than having to just re-paint something!

So today I hope you will make the decision to recognize God, take Him seriously, and let Him lead you. Paint your life right–the first time. You’ll be glad you did.

“Stop that!” I told my son, sharply reprimanding him for stomping on and crushing a flower during our afternoon walk. He looked up at me as if I had two heads on my shoulders.

“Why?” he quickly responded. His tone wasn’t disrespectful or obstinate, so I stopped and asked him to lift his foot off the flower he was treating with such disrespect and disdain. As soon as he did, the logic of his question became clearly apparent. He had stepped on a dandelion.

He continued looking up at me and matter-of-factly stated,

“It’s a weed, Daddy. It needed to be stepped on. It doesn’t matter how many times you step on it, or what you do to try to get rid of it, Mama says they just keep coming back!”

His rationalization made me laugh out loud. As we resumed our walk, the reality of the life lesson I’d just witnessed hit me with ever increasing clarity and weight. That week had been a difficult one for me. I had found out that a close friend’s relative had died of cancer, and there were some unfortunate and scary changes happening at work. I had felt stomped on that week. I’m sure you’ve felt that way as well. Maybe you feel that way more often than every once in a while. Unfortunately, in this world this is the reality of the human condition—even for Christians. Jesus told His disciples: “Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world” (John 16:33, NLT).

Additionally, the apostle Paul, writing to the Christians in Corinth about their present difficulties, reminded them of this reality in some very stark words. “We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed.” (2 Corinthians 4:8, 9, NLT).

Research shows that when we deal with depression and anxiety, it’s easy to quickly despair and lose perspective and hope. When that happens, some people will turn to unhealthy coping skills, such as drugs, alcohol, food, sex, pornography, unhealthy relationships, and ultimately suicide.

But you have this promise that when you belong to Christ, you will never be abandoned or destroyed.

Paul ends this chapter with these hopeful words: “For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever” (verses 17, 18, NLT).

It was hot, muggy, and wet Friday afternoon. I had been counseling teenagers all day and was drained and exhausted. All I wanted to do was come home, chill, and watch a documentary on birds. (Hey, don’t judge.)

As I—with both arms full of stuff—awkwardly inserted my key in the front door lock, I quickly realized that it wasn’t opening. Without thinking to try the knob, I pulled my key out of the lock and put my key ring back in my pocket. I let out an exasperated sigh as I trudged—now very wet—to the back door . . . but that door wouldn’t budge either. Our home is more than 125 years old, and naturally, stuff doesn’t always work as it should—but the locks were installed in 2010!

Ugh!

As I stood there on my back porch, wet, tired, and frustrated, I threw up a quick prayer for God’s guidance and wisdom to help me solve this problem. As quickly as that, He answered with “Call your wife.”

I immediately obeyed, and when I told her about my problem, I was rewarded by raucous laughter. After she composed herself, she informed me that my daughter hadn’t locked the front door at all . . . and that’s why our lock wouldn’t “open.” I laughed out loud as I realized that I had been trying to unlock an already-unlocked door.

Sure enough, as I returned to the front door, I gave the doorknob a gentle turn, and the door swung open, welcomingly.

As I entered my home, I continued laughing out loud and thanking God for the fact that my daughter had already done all the work for me—all I had to do was turn the knob and enter in.

There are many people in this world who are working real hard to try to gain their own salvation, but a long time ago Jesus already took care of that for us all on the cross and in the tomb (John 3:16-18).

The apostle Paul reminds us in Ephesians 2:8, 9:

“God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.” (NLT).

Today, make it a point to tell Jesus “Thank You” for loving you enough to ensure that you can have a forever relationship with Him. Jesus loved us enough to live a perfect life that we could never live, die a death that was supposed to be ours, and sealed the whole deal when He rose from the dead.

Jesus has already unlocked the door for us…all we have to do is open it and go in.

“Ugh! My brain is melting!” My daughter came into my bedroom office and dramatically—she was 12 at the time—flung herself on the bed, collapsing into a frustrated and matted mass of hair and pillows.

Another school year had begun, and my extroverted and creative daughter was in heavy combat with her most difficult subject: math…and she was losing. I turned from my work and was about to give her some of my fatherly “wisdom” from a lifetime of hatred—I mean, difficulty—with the same subject, when out of the corner of my eye I spotted some movement.
I turned my head to see her 8-year-old brother, like a silent, small cat, sneak up behind her, softly climb on the bed next to her, and gently put his arm around her. They both lay there—perfectly still and not saying a word. After several minutes he dug through the pillows and hair and planted a kiss on her cheek. He then promptly got off the bed and went about his 8-year-old-ness.

Shortly thereafter, my daughter got up and with a huge grin on her face—and singing to herself—thoroughly refreshed, picked up her sword (pencil), and rejoined the battle.

Love Like Crazy!

I was speechless and tearful. I had just witnessed the best metaphor for what it means to be a Christian in this world. In the midst of others’ pain, despair, heartache, disease, depression, destruction, and death, we, as Christians, are called to comfort and love others just as my son did for my daughter. Jesus calls us to literally love like crazy!

My man Paul wrote to the Christians at Rome:

Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other. Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically. Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying. When God’s people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality. Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them. Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don’t think you know it all! Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable” (Romans 12:10-17, NLT).

Living out the Messiah in Me

I have a question for you: where in your life can you do something to rejoice with those who rejoice and to mourn with those who mourn? Jesus, in announcing to the world that He, indeed was the long promised Messiah, read Isaiah 61: 1, 2:

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is upon me, for the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to comfort the brokenhearted and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed. He has sent me to tell those who mourn that the time of the LORD’s favor has come, and with it, the day of God’s anger against their enemies.”

Jesus was describing in broad terms what He would do for others, but I would like to tell you, that if you are a follower of Jesus, and seek to be like Him, then this scripture can be a model for you find a way to love others; but not just love them a little—no, decide to love them with your whole heart!

I’ve included below a link to “Adventist Community Services.” I encourage you to take some time to check out the website and then pray and consider and talk to the people in your life about seeking how you can, like Jesus, be used by God to bring good news to the poor; comfort the brokenhearted; or proclaim the captives and prisoners will be released.

In my experience, if you take the time to stop, consider, think, discuss, pray, and plan, God is willing to and will use you to bless others in a powerful way!

So, today, you can tell Jesus: “through Your Holy Spirit power, I give You permission to live out your Messiahship in me!”

And if you give Him permission, He will do it! Today, choose to be like my son and pray today that God will help you to see the world with His eyes and then be His hands, His feet, His mouth, and His heart.

Just don’t kiss any strangers!

Additional Resources

Love Like Crazy

Adventist Community Services

This month many people celebrate “St. Patrick’s Day.”
Patrick, known worldwide as “Saint Patrick,” is the patron saint of Ireland, because he spent 40 years as a Christian missionary to the native pagan Celtic inhabitants of Ireland.

You might say he took Jesus’ order to His disciples very seriously. How about you? What are you doing about it? Don’t know what said “order”…orders? Well, here are the very words of Jesus:

“ . . . ‘Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age’ ” (Matthew 28: 18-20, NLT).

Now that we’re clear on what we’re all supposed to be doing, I want to be clear on this: you don’t have to do it like Patrick and spend the majority of your life in some foreign land…although if you, like Patrick, feel strongly that that’s what God has told you to do, then do it; but for most of us, I would dare say that this is not what you will end up doing.

So what should you do? Well…God’s not real specific about how you should do it, but He is specific that you should do it. This order from Jesus to His disciples has been called by many as

“The Great Commission,” but I’m sad to say, that for many of us, it’s realistically more like “The Great O-mission.”

The reasons why people choose not to witness for Jesus can vary from not really having a real relationship with Jesus; to being afraid of someone snapping on them; to not really knowing how to do it.
But the bottom line is this: “Go!” means…”Go!”

If you’re a Christian (and I hope you are) you don’t really have a choice here. You’ve got to “Go!”

So how do you do it? It’s a simple three-step formula:

1. Share about who you were before you met Jesus.
2. Share about how you met Jesus.
3. Share about who you are after you met Jesus (in other words, how has Jesus affected your life?).

The whole shooting match should take you no more than three to five minutes. I promise, as with anything, the more you do it, the better you’ll get. But, remember that no matter how you feel it went, God promises:

“The rain and snow come down from the heavens and stay on the ground to water the earth. They cause the grain to grow, producing seed for the farmer and bread for the hungry. It is the same with my word. I send it out, and it always produces fruit. It will accomplish all I want it to, and it will prosper everywhere I send it” (Isaiah 55: 10, 11, NLT).

So what are waiting for? “Go!”

Additional Resources

Growing in Christ

I’ve heard it said that the most miserable person in the world is the one who straddles the fence, not committed to either the world or Jesus.
Pastor Francis Chan, in one of his sermons, tells the story of meeting Christians in Asia and observing their “all-in” lives for Jesus. He witnessed Christians fill an entire church until there was only standing room for a very early morning prayer meeting. Christians from the United States were very “lukewarm” and Asian Christians were all astounded and shocked that Christians in the United States would leave a church because they didn’t like a particular part of it (music, preaching, etc.). When Chan asked them why they were so incredulous about that fact, they responded in unison,

“There are no lukewarm Christians here. When we each made the decision to become a Christian, we were threatened with persecution, imprisonment, and death! Many of us have been disowned by our families and have lost our jobs, places to live, and our livelihoods. In our country, the only people who choose Jesus are serious—because it could likely mean them losing their very lives!”

Lukewarm Christians
John the Revelator warned Christians of the dangers of being lukewarm:
“I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth! You say, ‘I am rich. I have everything I want. I don’t need a thing!’ And you don’t realize that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. So I advise you to buy gold from me—gold that has been purified by fire. Then you will be rich. Also buy white garments from me so you will not be shamed by your nakedness, and ointment for your eyes so you will be able to see.” (Revelation 3:15-18, NLT).

Eternal Life Hangs in the Balance

I know, that’s pretty heavy stuff, but I want you to understand that…nothing less than your eternal life hangs in the balance!

When I think about a situation in our world that brings our focus into where it really needs to be, my mind goes to a group of people who called themselves followers of God, but who had to make a decision about whom to really serve with their lives. And the crazy thing about it was that God patiently waited for three and a half years,  but finally He couldn’t wait anymore and had Elijah, His prophet, hit them smack in the face with this question when they absolutely couldn’t ignore it anymore; I mean, God literally showed up in fire and then had Elijah go off and kill the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah!…I’m not making this up! (read it for yourself in 1 Kings 18!)

Immediately after doing that: “Elijah went before the people and said, ‘How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him’ ” (1 Kings 18:21, NIV). The prophet Elijah, when speaking to the backslidden people, was straightforward with them: it’s decision time! Fish or cut bait!

No Time To Waste!

We have reached a point in our world where there is no time to waste. If you call yourself a Christian . . . then stand up and be counted. Don’t just live it for several hours on one day or for several minutes during worship time—but live it all the time.
As this New Year begins—hopefully our last one here on earth—make a decision to be on fire for Jesus. Don’t be cold or just lukewarm. Be burning hot–all-in for Him. After all, He was all-in for you!