Purpose

Purpose. That word rings in so many people's heads all over the world. What am I doing here? Though many have attempted to answer this question there still has been only one with a solid backing to it. A pastor named Rick Warren (most have heard of him) wrote a book on this very topic. His book, The Purpose Driven Life, took the best-seller's list by storm. Just seeing the reaction to the book reveals what many people have on their mind. Why am I here?
For me the answer is so simple yet so hard to imagine or fathom. God.
I did not come to this understanding so easily. Probably the thing that struck me most was a sign. By now I am sure there are quite a few churches that have these signs. I was at Gateway Central Church of the Nazarene and on my way out of the property when I saw a sign that said, "You are now entering the mission field." It was there then that I began to truly grasp my purpose. I am surrounded by my purpose at this very moment. I am here because of God and for God, therefore my purpose is my mission field. My purpose is to live for God in the pitch black world that surrounds me, to live for Him in every moment good and bad, and to serve Him by sharing His message to those around me.
Currently, what surrounds me the most is the city (more like really large town) of St. Louis, Missouri. There are a lot of jokes about St. Louis relating to crime rate, food, sports, and even its water. Having one year where the city had the highest rated tap water and highest crime rate people would say that the water was literally "to die for." I get tired of the crime rate stuff eventually. St. Louis is really a great town but most people do not look past its reputation to see it. I have had many opportunities to see the need in my community, school, and church. This, currently is my mission field.
I will be honest with you, I do not have a clue what God has planned for me in the future. I may be in St. Louis the rest of my life or in Fort Kent, Maine. Who knows? I do not even know where I am going to college. I do know this: I am not just a teenager meant to sit in my comfort zone because I am not yet "at the age" to break out and be the person God wants me to be. God did not design me to wait eighteen years to serve Him. He set me here to be his warrior and servant. I love St. Louis with all of my heart. I love my friends with all of my heart. I love my family with all of my heart. I love God with all of my heart and I will serve Him wherever He sends me and I will show His love to everybody.
I challenge you to serve Him with absolutely everything. It is the most difficult task. There is so much riding against those who serve God. Persecution, Pain, Discouragement. Yet there is so much support. "Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain" (1 Corinthians 15:58).

Questions

You know it is rather interesting how much people think they know something about someone or something but could end up being completely wrong. I have been on the wrong side many times and have definitely been surprised on many occasions. People have thought some things about me that are wrong. The most recent was someone asking why I don't like hugging people. Where they got that I have no idea. My family would laugh if someone told them that. The truth is I have absolutely no problem with hugging people as long as they are a good friend or family member. I am aware that hugging can be awkward so I definitely don't push the matter. One would, however, judge correctly by saying I am an introvert and that I don't like country music. Most likely taking a scripture out of context, "The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought know" (1 Cor 8:2). Naturally how I act could easily lead a person to believe something about me that is completely wrong. So I was wondering if how I act hurts how I represent Christ. Do people see how I act and make assumptions about what Christians are like? I certainly don't want to misrepresent Him. But I do know that if I live for Christ and give Him control of my life people will see Him through me. His sacrifice has given me life and I do not want to waste it.

(this thought was not apart of my systematic thought process, but i mean every word)

Builder

I am a builder. A good one. My specialty is walls. Big walls with the most support possible. They have to be tall, but they are never tall enough. They have to be thick. But they are never thick enough. I am building to hide from something. It is scary. If it is revealed it will break down everything. Everything I built to support and protect myself will come down at its feet. It reveals more than I ever want to know. In reality, I actually do know it...but i don't want to. Thus the reason for the walls. They hide me from it, for a while. But eventually those will fall so I have to build new ones. I am good at this because of my experience, but it is coming faster and with more strength. It is an overpowering force that takes the sheer limits of my skill and strength to hold back. My walls require more effort each time to stop it.
It has been almost 18 years. It won. It broke through and shredded every ounce of my flimsy foundation. It was the truth.
I am a sinner. A good one. My specialty is hiding the fact that I am a wretched sinner. Why? It tears down everything and makes me feel useless and hopeless on this earth. It condemns me to a pit of unimaginable pain and suffering. But something else came through that wall that I did not expect.....
Hope. God, the guy I turned my back against, sent His Son to earth, a place reeking of sin. His Son lived a perfect life. Not to show off, but to do this: Die for me. God put Him where I should have been and slammed all the weight of my sin on His shoulders so that I would not be condemned to the such pain. His sacrifice conquered my sin and gave me a way, gave me hope that I might be with God one day. Then, He rose from the dead and ascended into heaven.
I have accepted this fact. His Spirit lives in me. I rejoice in Him with all of my heart. Though my life is rough at times, He NEVER fails. He is moving in me every day. His love surpasses any temptation thrown at me. Nothing else, Nobody else, can take away or overtake his love for me. I live for Him. My life is His.

The world is going against me
Evil is working its plan
But this is my prayer:
That Christ will shine through me
And into this darkened world.

He died for you too. He does not care what you did. He loves you with all of His heart. Stop building walls and help build His kingdom.

Until Heaven Takes Us Home

Death is easily the largest fear of anyone and perhaps anything on earth. Our instinct tells us to survive. Our mind tells us we don't want to die. I just watched a video clip by Frances Chan, a pastor and author of Crazy Love, who talked about the difference between a Christian's funeral and a non-Christian's funeral. He talked about how there was joy in a Christian's funeral and not so much in a non-Christian's funeral. The day before I saw this video I was at a wedding in Brentwood, Tennessee. My cousin Karen her husband Dan had an interesting end to their vows. The end was not "Until death do us part." It was "Until heaven takes us home." To attempt to make clear what I am trying to say I am going to start at the beginning. Why do we fear death? In my opinion it is because it is the only thing that can completely take us away from our little planet. (With the exception of Enoch and Elijah who were taken up by God without dying.) Death originated from sin. God told Adam and Eve they would surely die if they ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And, a long time later, they died. Even Jesus feared death. He asked the Father if there was any other way to save the sins of the world and was stressed and worried to the point of sweating blood. We know when Jesus is sweating blood over the thought of death that death is most definitely the scariest thing in the world.
Should it be? Shouldn't we be looking to where death is taking us instead of where it is taking us from? I am not saying we should live to die. I don't want to go jump off a cliff and die because I want to go to heaven. I am saying that if we are saved by the grace of God (For those of you who don't like churchy words: we were really messed up but God gave us forgiveness we didn't deserve) we should not wallow in fear of death. We should live to give God all we have and leave our life in God's hands.
It is easy to forget about the love of God that set us free from perhaps the scariest death of all. To me, seperation from earth is very scary, but seperation from God is absolutely terrifying. I find that God's love is best described this way: Say you lived in Russia in the early 20th century. Joseph Stalin, one of the most wicked men of all time, has killed your entire family. He also killed your friends and blew away anything you ever knew. He took away any reason for you to live. Then, one day, you get to meet this guy. You walk up to him (now keep in mind that you are supposed to hate this guy) and tell him, "I forgive you and I will love you no matter what you do." Why would you do that? In reality, neither you or me would ever think about doing that. Most would probably want to kill him. But that is what God does. We take all the love He has shown us and we stomp on it. We disregard His love. We leave Him absolutely no reason to love us at all. But what did He do? He says to us (now keep in mind that He is supposed to hate us for what we did to Him) , "I forgive you and I will love you no matter what you do."
By now your mind is probably not following anything I am saying at all. Bud Taylor was probably one of my favorite people on earth. He was kind, he was a servant, and was a follower of God. He had hard times in his life. I do not know when he accepted Christ but I do know he did and lived for Him the rest of his life. He was a coal miner--tough to the core. He served in the military. He served in his church. When he moved from the hills of West Virginia to the flat town of Portage, Indiana, he served the Lord. When his wife died. He pressed on and continued to serve. He married again and continued serving the Lord in Mustang and Stillwater, Oklahoma. Anyone who knew him would tell you of his service and hard work. Bud Taylor was my grandpa. He survived bypass surgeries and colon cancer, but esophogal cancer took his life in December of 2004. His funeral was one of the most joyful funerals I have ever been to. Yes, there were many tears, but the joy of knowing that God's love had given him life in heaven overtook those tears. Because of God's love, the sin that has existed since Adam and Eve was not able to conquer him. Heaven took my grandpa home.
Will we still fear death? Definitely. But we will have peace. The Bible tells us to "Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful." (Colossians 3:15 NIV) I am determined to give God all I got. His love is greater than death. Nothing in all of creation, including death, can seperate us from the love of God. I give Him all of my life. I strive here on earth with all of His energy, as we all should until heaven takes us home.

Okay

What a tough week. School, work, and more school can put a lot of pressure on my mind. By now, all of the schools have probably started; so those of you who go to school may know what I mean. Whenever I have a rough week or two, I tend to not get enough sleep and end up at school, work, or other things extremely tired. And, based on the looks I would get, I look tired. People will also ask stuff like, "Are you okay?" Now a lot of people will get offended by that question, but I make sure I don't. They are just making sure everything is all right. Sometimes with me everything is all right and sometimes it definitely is not. Though, unless it is my friends or family, I will probably say I am okay every time. Those phrases, "I'm okay," "I'm good," or "I'm fine" come out of our mouths almost automatically. Even sometimes when it seems like the world is crashing down around us we will find that answer coming out of our mouths or sounding off in our thoughts. Okay is defined in many dictionaries (I use definitions a lot if you haven't noticed) as "satisfactory or under control." So when can we truly answer "I'm okay (satisfactory and under control)."? We often are in the middle of all of this stress and all of these problems. A lot of times we forget why we are here and what God wants to do in us. We get lost trying to sort everything out on our own. I think the biggest thing that gets me is worries. A lot of times when I am worrying about school, church stuff, or my health I just lose myself trying to find my way out. But here is something that struck me recently. God wants me. He wants everything. He wants my entire life. He wants to take on my worries. Recently, a band named Leeland (I love this group!) came out with a new album called Love is on the Move. The album has a song called "Holy Spirit Have Your Way in Me." The chorus gave me something to really think about:

"As I lay down my life and pick up my cross, what a joy it is to give my life away to You. All that I need, All that I seek is You here with me. Holy Spirit have Your way in me."
"Holy Spirit Have Your Way in Me." Leeland-Love is on the Move 2009

My favorite part is "what a joy it is to give my life away to You. In everything you go through remember that God is with you. Everything you have, good and bad, give it to God. Dedicate your life for his glory. Let God work wonders in you and through you. If you joyfully give your life to God, you won't only be "okay," you will be alive for Him.

"Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about what happens to you."
1 Peter 5:7

Wait

Wait. A word I have heard over and over again. The District Superintendent of the Missouri District Church of the Nazarene talked about waiting on the Lord. I heard my pastor mention that word. Just last Wednesday I heard that word in a message I will never forget. It was a small message in length but God was speaking through this guy that night. Without a youth pastor we have been having what is called "Wednesday Night Live" led by our pastor. But since pastor could not be there last Wednesday somebody else spoke. The guy who spoke has earned my respect in the three or four years I have known him. God used him to speak to me that night. He compared our youth group's situation to the disciple's situation in Acts. For instance, he compared how the early church was without a designated leader such as our youth group was without a youth pastor. He showed how both we and the disciples were both challenged with the impossible task of going into all the world and preaching the gospel. But what did the disciples do? They waited as they were commanded to by Jesus. ("Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised which you have heard me speak about.") The disciples waited and the Holy Spirit came upon them. They were speaking in tongues and people from all over who had come for the Day of Pentecost heard them in their own language. With the Holy Spirit working within the disciples, the task was not impossible anymore. Our speaker challenged us to wait for the Lord.
Now that I think about it there are many times in the Bible where people had to wait for the Lord. Noah had to wait 40 days in a big boat with stinky animals who probably pooped all over his boat. Abraham had to wait multiple times for the Lord. Joseph waited in prison. The Israelites waited for years in slavery plus 40 more wandering in the desert. Esther waited. David waited. Job waited. Daniel waited. Jesus even waited. How we wait is another important thing. The disciples stayed in Jerusalem as they were commanded and prayed. If you look back. You would find that these famous Bible characters didn't just sit around doing nothing. They were praying and seeking God's will. To me, stopping and listening to God should be a big part of waiting. (Here is where I might get slightly blunt.) Today, I don't see people waiting for God's guidance. A lot of us are definitely guilty of that. Definitely me. We are seeing churches who are being infected with all sorts of worldviews. Christians are accepting some things because the world says it is okay. Large denominations of churches are beginning to be drawn into the world. I believe that is because we are going in blind. We are going into the world to preach the gospel by ourselves. We aren't waiting and we aren't letting God carry us through. Without God guiding us and working in us, we may blindly walk into a trap. God wants us to go into the streets, He wants us to show his love and compassion to EVERYONE, but without Him inside of us, guiding us, we will lose our focus and fall.
Wait. Listen. Talk with Him. He has a plan far beyond the highest point of our imagination. His foolishness, His weakness, is stonger than our wisom and strength. He will show you what He wants you to do. Wait. Don't go into the battle alone. He is here. He is with you and me right now. He wants to talk with you. Listen.

Psalm 27:14 "Wait for the Lord. Be strong, take heart and wait for the Lord."

Living...All of the time.

Have you ever tried to write down everybody that you can remember meeting on a piece of paper? It is pretty hard. You don't realize how many people you actually have met until you look back on it. I tried to do it and it took up a quite a bit of paper. I gave up after a couple pages and that is just people I have met. This is not counting the guy at the register or people in the grocery store that you walk buy. You don't realize how many people come in contact with you on a regular basis or how many people were affected by your attitude or actions. People you may have never met in your life can be influenced by what you happened to do when you were around them one time. So what reaction would people get from how you act. As representatives of Christ, we should be representing Christ all of the time. We want people to see something different in us. We want them to see Christ in our character. Psalm 89:8 (NLT) says faithfulness is God's very character. The gospel of John says our actions are consistent with our character. We should be reflecting our faith in Jesus Christ. God wants us to have a faith in action. He wants our faith to be evident to those around us. This doesn't mean wearing bright yellow shirts and running down the street proclaiming our faith. Sometimes all we have to do is pray and ask God to use us to be a light in the world. And that may just be doing everything to the best of our abilities, with joy, and an attitude which reflects our character, which reflects our faith, which reflects Christ. It is hard. Very hard. But even just a good attitude can show something different in you to someone around you.