30 Days to Live: Living with an Eternal Perspective (2 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

Why is it that we live in the “when” and have good intentions instead of living in the now with good actions? 

 

Because we’ve confused the urgent for the important. 

 

For example, you get home from work, heat up some Chef Boyardee for the family, and rush out the door because of little league.  We stress out because our premium channel cable bill is due the day before payday.  We get all bent out of shape because we come home to find that your kids have wrecked the living room, leaving it in worse shape than a steel cage triple threat death match.  All of these things are urgent. 

 

But are they really important?

 

What happens when we confuse the urgent for the important?  It snowballs on us—we get grumpy when we’re late, we get stressed when a bill is late, and we blow up at the kids.  We lose perspective.  We forget the difference between the urgent and what’s truly important.  Don’t get me wrong, a lot of the urgent stuff still needs to get done—we need to pay our bills, keep appointments, etc.  But some of the urgent, when we step back, isn’t so urgent.  And when the urgent becomes the focus of life, the important soon becomes unimportant, unnoticed, and undone.  Our lives get out-of-whack, and we wonder how and why everything unraveled.

 

We need to turn our whens into nows, our intentions into actions, and our whole hearts toward Jesus.  But it’ll never happen until we live with the right perspective—the eternal perspective.  It helps us to differentiate between the urgent and truly important.

 

30 Days to Live: Living with an Eternal Perspective (1 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

I know it’s not exactly on the top of your “Things I Do For Fun” list, but take a stroll through your local cemetery and read the epitaphs:  the last words that someone saw fit to describe the deceased. 

 

 

 

 

Some are pretty common:  “At Rest.”  “Gone But Not Forgotten.”  Every once in awhile, you’ll come across some rather peculiar ones.  In Nova Scotia, one Ezekiel Aikle’s tombstone reads, “Here lies Ezekial Aikel.  Age 102.  The good die young.”  In New Mexico, the tombstone of Johnny Yeast reads, “Here lies Johnny Yeast.  Pardon me for not rising.”  It’s good to know that some still have a sense of humor, even when they’re passing from this life.  But there are some epitaphs that are tragic.  In England, Tom Smith’s stone reads, “Tom Smith is dead, and here he lies.  Nobody laughs and nobody cries.  Where his soul’s gone, and how it fares, nobody knows and nobody cares.”

 

Chances are, we haven’t given any thought to the words that will be engraved on our memorial stone.  We’ll probably end up leaving that to someone else.  Chances are, most of us haven’t given much thought to what the direction of our lives will be beyond the rat race—sleep, eat, work, rinse, repeat.  Forever and ever. 

 

Well, until we die.

30 Days to Live: Living in the Moment (5 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

 

The Bible tells us that Jesus summed up God’s law in essentially four words:  Love God, Love People.  Take a moment to ponder that:  do we really love Jesus with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, and with all our strength? 

 

We tend to be like Janis Joplin with Jesus:  we’ll give him a little piece of our heart… but we want to control the rest. 

 

Jesus didn’t die on the cross to be our spiritual assistant.  He didn’t die so that we could tell Him what to do.  Jesus died to be the Lord—the leader—of our entire life:  heart, mind, soul, and strength.  If God rarely makes you uncomfortable, chances are that your whole heart isn’t turned toward Him.  Jesus is either God or He isn’t.  Jesus is either Lord or He isn’t.  Jesus is either worthy of our whole lives or none of them.  Why?  Look at the cross.  He gave everything He had on the cross—He took the punishment that should have been ours, He suffered in our place, He took God’s wrath off of us and onto Himself, He took away our sin, our guilt, and our shame.  And yet, how do we usually live?

 

• I’ll go to church, but I won’t stop having sex with my girlfriend/boyfriend.
• I’ll pray when life is tough, but I won’t seek God daily.
• I’ll read the Bible when I have time, but I won’t make it a regular habit.
• I’ll accept God’s love for me, but I won’t take a risk to show it to others who need it.
• I won’t commit actual adultery, but I won’t deal with the issue of porn.
• I’ll be thankful for what I have, but I won’t be generous.
• I’ll thank Jesus for being my Savior, but I want to be the Lord of my own life.

It’s no wonder that we tend to have a weak faith, that we turn from God when life gets tough, and that the church as a whole has a bad rep with those outside it. 

 

All the while, people are dying to know if God is real. 
People are dying to get rid of their guilt and regret. 
People are dying for a purpose that’s bigger than themselves. 

People are dying, period. 

 

Without God.  Without Jesus.  Without hope.  Their 30 days is up. 

 

The only way we can turn the tide is if we allow Jesus to take over our entire life—to give him our entire heart, messed up and selfish as it is.  The wonderful thing about God is His love and grace.  It’s never too late to let Him change you.  He’s ready, willing, and able to forgive us and to change our hearts.  But we must let Him do so now.

 

If we’re to live in the moment, we must:

• Turn our “whens” into nows…
• Turn our intentions into actions…
• Turn our whole heart towards Jesus… now.

 

 

30 Days to Live: Living in the Moment (4 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

We tend have good intentions to do something, but they tend to evaporate quicker than a fart in a hurricane.  We phrase those intentions in “oughts”:

 

• I ought to read my Bible more…
• I ought to communicate more with my spouse…
• I ought to pay better attention to the kids…
• I ought to pray more for others than myself… 
• I ought to pray more, period…
• I ought spend more time with my friends who don’t know Jesus…
• I ought to stop and enjoy moments in life, because they’re gifts from God…

And yet, we let life get in the way.  But if Bible authors David and James were right—that life is transient and nothing but a breath—then why do we live in the intentions of tomorrow instead of taking action today?  Remember what the Bible says in James 4:17—whenever we know the good we ought to do, and don’t do it, it’s sin. 

 

So…

• If you’re with your spouse, be fully engaged:  turn the TV off, talk, and make love (just put the kids to bed first).  Remember, your spouse is a gift from God.
• If you’re with your kids, then give them your full attention instead of being distracted with several other things. Remember, your kids are a gift from God.
• If you’re enjoying a cup of coffee on Saturday morning, take a minute to take a deep breath, smell the coffee, and breath deep.  Enjoy the moment, because it is a gift from God.
• When you have vacation time, take it.  Leave work at home.  Take time to relax—no hectic Clark Grizwold type schedules that leave you needing a vacation from your vacation.  Remember, rest is a gift from God.
• If you see or know of a need in your community, and you and your church are capable of meeting it, then meet it.  You are God’s gift to that person at that moment.

In order to live in the moment, we must:

• Turn our “whens” into nows.
• Turn intentions into actions.

 

30 Days to Live: Living in the Moment (3 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

 

What is that one thing that you’re waiting for life to be perfect before you do it?  Maybe it’s something financial or material—when I get out of debt, I’ll get this; when I get a raise, I’ll pay off this.  There’s no area of life that we do this more than in our relationship with Jesus. 

• When I get some things straight in my life, I’ll become a Christian…
• When I clean up my act, I’ll follow Jesus…
• When I have more time, I’ll read my Bible…
• When work slows down, I’ll teach my kids about Jesus…
• When I have more money, I’ll live more generously…
• When my friend specifically asks about God, then I’ll talk to them…
• When my life is more stable, then I’ll get serious about God…

Let’s be honest about this type of reasoning:  the “when” never comes.  There’ll never be more hours in the day, work will always be busy, we’ll always want more money, we’ll always be waiting for that other person to approach us, and life will always be hectic.  Not only that, but when we say those things, we’re arrogant enough to believe that we have more time.  Look at what the Bible says in James 4:13-17,

 

Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.”  As it is, you boast and brag.  All such boasting is evil.  Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.

 

James calls this “when game” boasting because it is both arrogant and ignorant to assume that tomorrow will come for us.  James calls it sin for us to put off until an uncertain tomorrow the good we must do today.  We must stop waiting for “when” and start acting now.  That means not waiting for life to slow down to get serious about God, to start living generously, to start serving others, to start mentoring your kids about Jesus, or whatever it is we know we need to do.

 

Think about Jesus.  The Bible tells us that on His way to Jerusalem, where he knew that he would die on the cross, that Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem.  He knew that his time had come.  He could have easily have turned around and walked away.  When he was so stressed out in the Garden of Gethsemane that he was sweating blood, He could have copped out—Oh, when I’m feeling better about getting the hell beat out of me and being nailed to a cross, I’ll do it.  But when the time came, He did it.  No excuses, no delays.  He went to the cross and took our sin upon Himself.

 

We can’t afford to wait for “when” to get serious about loving God and loving people.  In order to live in the moment, we must turn “when” into now.

30 Days to Live: Living in the Moment (2 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

The author of this Scripture, David (who was the most respecting king of ancient Israel in the Old Testament–the first half of the Bible), was going through some sort of crisis that caused him to think about the brevity of life, and to go as far as to ask God Himself to remind him of how short and transient life is. 

 

Our culture isn’t nearly as brave as David.  We have an oxy-moronic relationship with mortality. We hate to think or talk about it, yet we spend billions of dollars a year and countless hours trying to postpone it:

• We spend nearly $20 billion a year on plastic surgery, all to get a Joan Rivers face, J-Lo butt, 6 pack abs, and porn star boobs. 
• We spend $22 billion annually on makeup. 
• Many countries and cultures elsewhere in the world celebrate age and honor the elderly.  We run from it–we stop freely acknowledging our age at 29, and we send our elderly away to “retirement villages”. 
• We cut, pluck, shave and dye grey hairs.  We use wrinkle cream, moisturizing cream, masks, peels, sugar, sand, facials, and other such products to ward off the signs of aging.  
• Everywhere you look, there are more and more 40 year olds trying to dress like they are 18 again.

We are trying so hard to run from our mortality.  But no matter what we do, it’s always just a breath or a heartbeat away—and no amount of denial can change that fact.

 

Chances are, most of us will live for several more decades.  We’ll work hard, hopefully save enough to retire, and get to see our grandbabies.  But what if there were no next month for us?  What if we only had 30 more days to live—guaranteed?  How would we live differently?  How do we make David’s words in Psalm 39 a reality in our lives?  How can we start living for the things that really matter?  How can we turn the corner and realize that life is short, and start living in the moment?

30 Days to Live: Living in the Moment (1 of 5)

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the extent of my days, let me know how transient I am.  Behold, You have made my days as handsbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight, surely every man at his best is a mere breath.  Psalm 39:4-5

 

Years ago, when I was in middle school, I had my first brush with death.  My granddaddy George had died.  He had been ill for quite some time; it was expected.  But it was still unreal… until a few days later when I walked into the funeral parlor and saw him lying in his casket.  It was as if he was only sleeping, and that all the noise might wake him up. 

 

But I knew it wouldn’t. 

 

There have been many more brushes with death since; there will be many more.  All have served to remind me of one painful truth…

 

Life is short.

 

Most of us have already experienced a brush with death due to the passing of someone close to us.  If you’re one of the few who hasn’t… you will.  It’s hard enough when someone dies and we’re prepared for it and are expecting it.  But, at least for me, it is much harder to process death that shouldn’t have been:  my friend Mike Lease (who helped start our church) died in a plane crash at the age of 24, just one month shy of the birth of his son; my uncle died from adrenal cancer in his 40’s—he lived for 9 weeks after his initial diagnosis.  Many of us could list our own encounters with death that shouldn’t have been.  When we’re directly involved, it takes time to cope with and process our loss.  But let’s be honest—when it’s the loved one of a friend or the loved one of a co-worker, we feel sadness for awhile… but then it’s usually back to life as usual.

 

If you had 30 days to live–if you knew that  June 5, 2008 would be your last day of life on planet earth–how would you change your life?  What would you do and say differently? 

 

Now… what are you waiting for?

New Next Week: 30 Days to Live

This month, our church will be going through a message series called “30 Days to Live”.  This isn’t a “DCC original” series.  It’s been done by many churches over the past year or so, and I was so blown away by it that I decided to include it in the ‘08 message schedule, and do it up DCC style.  So, for the next three weeks, I’ll be posting on the series.  There will be links to the videos that we’ll be watching in our micro-churches. 

If you call Discovery your church home, I want to encourage you to read the blogs each day (they’re short and to the point), and (if you’ve got a high speed connection) to view the videos before your church watches and discusses them so that you can be “warmed up” and prepared to talk about the subject matter.

Open Up and Say, “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh”…

My six-year-old is having her tonsils taken out today (yes, the picture is of swollen tonsils.  No, they aren’t hers).  So we’ll be at the hospital all day.  My little girl’s like her daddy–she doesn’t have a high tolerance for pain, and this will be the worst sore throat of her life (I still remember when I had mine taken out).

In exchange, she gets a week off of school, all the ice cream she wants, and (for being so brave) a new MP3 player filled with her favorite tunes (stuff from Hannah Montana, lots of Bob Marley, The Jonas Brothers, Queen, The Naked Brothers Band, a little Elvis, some Beatles, some Barlow Girl, a few tunes from the Dixie Chicks, some of the Enchanted soundtrack, and one tune from The Marshall Tucker Band–she has a pretty eclectic ear). 

Not too bad of a trade…

Teach Your Children Well

Psalm 78

There’s this old saying, “Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.”  I think there’s a ton of truth in this statement.  The survivors of the Holocaust had a saying, “Never Again.”  Yet, while the Holocaust took place (and afterward), Stalin was busy murdering 20 million of his own people.  There were the killing fields in southeast Asia, the “ethnic cleansing” in eastern Europe, and now the genocide in Darfur. 

Seems like we really do forget…

Psalm 78 is a psalm that was written to help people not forget about their past–specifically their history, their sin against God, God’s judgment, and God’s compassion.  Look at what the author writes in Psalm 78:1-8,

Listen, O my people, to my instruction’ incline your ears to the words of my mouth.  I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old, which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.  We will not conceal them from their children, but tell to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and His strength and His wondrous works that He has done.  For He established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers, that they should teach them to their children, that the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, that they may arise and tell them to their children, that they should put their confidence in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments, and not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation taht did not prpare its heart, and whos spirit was not faithful to God.

For those of us who follow Jesus, we are our children’s “youth ministers”, whether we know it or not… whether we want to be or not.

It seems like the youth ministry paradigm in the American church is broken.  We’ve entrusted our children’s spiritual development to professional staff.  We’ll teach our kids how to drive a stick shift, hit a golf ball, and bake cookies, but we’ll leave the spiritual formation to the pros.  When people shop for a church (which is completely loony), what do they do?  They choose the one that’s “best for the children.”  I believe in student and youth ministry, but student and youth ministry should suppliment what’s going on in the home.  Youth ministers and student ministers should be freed up to mentor kids who don’t live in a Christian home.  But what’s happening?  They’re stuck baby sitting the Christian children.

Our children aren’t morons.  But we sure are.

They can see right through that kind of crap reasoning.  They ask themselves, “If it’s good enough for me, why isn’t it good enough for mom and dad?”  It’s no wonder that most kids bolt from the church the minute they’re out of the house.  They grow, see their parents “play church” while seeing no evidence of Christ-empowered transformation.  They conclude that the church is old-fashioned, out of touch, and full of hypocrites.

Something’s gotta change…

Instead of turning our kids’ spiritual formation over to the pros, we need to proactively take action at home.  Like the writer of this Psalm says, we need to teach our children about God, about Jesus, and what it means to follow Him.  It’s way more than reading the Bible and praying with them (which is vitally important).  It also includes modeling for them what it looks like to follow Jesus–living the life, not just believing the belief.  It’s looking for teachable moments, it’s spending quality time with them, it’s exposing them to the plight of those in need (we just took our kids to the homeless shelter; it was amazing to see how my 6-year-old reacted).

Having said this, I’m not one of those annoying ”super Christians” who forces their kids to memorize entire books of the King James Version of the Bible, who shelters them from the evils of the world, who expects perfect behavior because of what others will think, etc.  That’s legalism, which will either produce a religious jerk or a total rejection of Jesus.  That approach is void of forgiveness and grace.

I simply have made my goal as a dad this:  to help my kids love Jesus.

And that’s not a professional’s job.  It’s mine: to (as the author of this psalm writes) “tell to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and His strength and His wondrous works that He has done.”