What's God Saying To You?

Aaaaahhhhh The Mix Blog. It's definitely been a while. We've gotten away from posting updates here for far too long and the Lord sort of shook me by the collar last night and...well...here I am. Lots has happened at The Mix since we last posted and rather than try to catch up, let's just start right now. We've been looking at a teaching series for the past few weeks that we've called "Yeah...But How?" It has basically been a VERY practical look at VERY practical things we can build into our lives to help grow our faith. We've looked at various different aspects of prayer, Bible study and sharing our faith with others...specifically, trying to share some tips and ideas as to how to build these things into our lives and stay consistant with them so our relationship with Christ can continue to deepen. We've shared some great ideas over the weeks and as a conclusion to the series, I asked the students to come this week to The Mix prepared to share what God had been saying to them and showing them over the past week...sort of 'put it into practice'. It could be a verse they read, a situation they found themselves in where God revealed Himself, a Word from God, etc. The night was amazing to say the least!!

We had lots of kids freely share what God has been doing in their lives. It's great to know that God still speaks and kids still listen! After several students shared their insights (of which I benefitted from greatly!!), I asked Kelcie to share some things with us...

Kelcie has been going through a rough time. But unlike many of us when we go through difficulties, Kelcie has turned TOWARDS God and not AWAY from Him. And God began to show her some things for her life that she wanted to share with the group. So with her permission, I've included below what Kelcie had to say Tuesady night at The Mix...

"God has layed some things on my heart lately that I really felt like He wanted me to share with everyone else as well. It has to do with God's will...His plan for our lives. God has amazing plans for each and everyone of us. And God wants to see to it that his plan has every opportunity to happen in our lives. God allows things to happen in our lives for His plan to work out...but this requires lots of trust and faith. Because sometimes God uses the good times...but He also uses the bad times, to help His plan happen in our lives. Its as though God says sometimes, 'Something was going wrong in your life, so I changed it.' Check out these verses from Job. (Job 5:18-19). When God allows you to go through hard times, it's your decision...it's up to you...to turn toward Him and allow Him to have TOTAL control of your life and everything in it. When tough times come, the only way to do this is to pray about it and get into His Word so He can talk to us and show us what He wants us to do.

But we have to WANT to learn about God...we have to WANT to get close to Him...we have to WANT to follow in His path. Why wouldn't you want that? If you think about it, when you follow your plan, your just setting yourself up for failure. But if you follow God's plan, He will never fail you. I've decided I don't want to be like all the other people. I don't want to live life one way at church and a different way at school or around my friends and family. I want to be the same person all the time...when I'm byself with God or when I'm with my friends and family...or even the 'popular' crowd.

If you're not following God's plan, if you're walking on a path you want...or even if you're not sure...I encourage you all to talk to God, ask Him, get in the Word, get excited about what could be...and ask Him to show you the right path, and then accept that path. God gave up His One and only Son to die for us, what are we willing to give up for Him?!!"

WOW!! Nothing else for me to say! Kelc hit it right on the head! I truly believe that God is and will continue to use youth to say what He wants to say to our world...and I'm excited to hear what that is!! When we begin to interact with God regularly...having discussions with God and just hanging out with Him as friends do...it brings an excitement to our faith that we can't find any other place. I have a suspicion that as long as these students continue to hang out with God and hear what He has to say, their faith will be life-filled and they will stand a much better chance of staying on the 'path' the Kelcie talked about. Thanks for listening to God, Kelc...and thank you all for checking out the blog this week!

-Bob

Recognizing God

How noticeable is God? Do we always see Him when He's working and moving around us? How much of what God does around us goes un-noticed? How often do look right past the "God-Stuff" that is right in front of us? This week finds us in-between teaching series at The Mix so this week's discussion falls into our "One Hit Wonder" category...a stand alone discussion. And it all has to do with 'Recognizing God'.

There's an interesting story told to us in scripture about an encounter Jesus had with 10 men who had leprosy. You can check out the story here. The interesting thing about this story is the way the Jesus responded to the circumstances of the men and they way they responded back. If you read the story, you know that Jesus healed them all of this dreaded disease. You also know that they all got pretty excited because Jesus had intervened in their circumstance. You also know that after the fact, 9 went about their way while 1 came back and "threw himself at Jesus feet and thanked Him" (Luke 17:16). There's some interesting things I think we need to recognize about this whole situation...

First...They all got healed. They came to Jesus with a particular need and Jesus met that need in every one of them. They all got what they wanted...they all got to experience Jesus...even the ones that did not return to thank Him. I don't believe that Jesus, having noticed that the other 9 didn't return, re-nigged on His healing! "Psyche!!! Just kiddin! You guys aren't thankful enough so I'm going to take it back!" No--they all got healed...they all experienced Jesus. The end result of their physical circumstance was the same. Interesting that Jesus had a level of experience for the general populace, regardless of their response to Him...

Second...The Bible specifically points out that the one who returned to thank Jesus was a "Samaritan" and a "foreigner". The Samaritans were second class citizens to the Jews (and of course Jesus was a Jew). Jews wouldn't even walk on Samaritan soil, let alone interact with them. They were the epitome of "vile-ness" because their ancestry was not purely Jewish and that was absolutely unacceptable to the Jews. And yet, the Bible specifically recognizes the fact that this man...the one who returned...was NOT a Jew but was a Samaritan. Why? Why does the Bible point this out? Of course, God wants us to know that His love is open to everyone. But I think there may even be a deeper meaning here. You see not only did the Jews hate the Samaritans, the Samaritans knew it. They knew they weren't accepted or viewed as equals by the Jews. And therefore, there was no sense of entitlement that this man felt that he "deserved" to be healed by Jesus. Sometimes, we can confuse believing in faith for God to move and act in our lives with a type of spiritual arrogance or entitlement. The only way we are "entitled" to anything God might make available to us is because of our relationship with Jesus and that alone. We are not entitled to anything...Jesus is. And because we know Him, we are blessed with the fringe benefits of that relationship. God "owes" you and I nothing. Anything He chooses to bestow on us is purely out of His grace and mercy on us...and for that, we should be very, very thankful. When we recognize that there's nothing we can do to deserve God, we stand a much better chance of recognizing when God moves and acts in our lives...and being very thankful.

But maybe the most important issue we need to soak in from this account is this: There's usually a deeper level of experience for those who recognize what God is doing around them. You see, this man recognized God at work. And because of it, he had a much deeper level of intimacy with Jesus and he received a deeper blessing than the other 9. Notice that in Luke 17:19, Jesus announced that this one man that came back to worship Him was made "well". Remember, he was already healed of his leprosy...as were the other 9. Jesus was not referring to the superficial circumstances of his leprosy, even as serious as it was. Jesus was basically helping this man to understand that there is a deeper level of "wellness" than his physical well-being...which is what the man initially asked for and thought he needed most. God is willing (and actually desires) to move us to being "well" in our souls and our spirits. This is primarily eternal life through salvation in Christ, but its so much more than that. God wants to help us become "well" in our souls...to think beyond our immediate circumstances and realize that God wants to touch every part of who we are. If we get good at recognizing God and what He is doing around us, we might have the opportunity to go beyond just having God change our circumstances. He might actually make us "well" at every level.

Maybe a good start to moving towards "well" is the realization that we should want to please God, not just get what we ask for from Him. I don't about you, but I want to get better at noticing God at work around me. I want to be "well".

Thanks for reading!

-Bob

Dating, Love, Sex-part 2

We don't like boundaries. I guess it's sort of a "human nature" kinda thing. We don't like to be told what to do and what not to do. Maybe it's arrogance, or pride...or maybe just plain o' stubborness. But we humans definitely do NOT like restrictions being placed on us. Unfortunately, we need boundaries. Actually we need them very badly. Maybe we just need to change the way view boundaries...

I've noticed people tend to fall into two different categories when it comes to thinking about boundaries. Many people view boundaries like this...

Unfortunately, when a lot of people think of Christianity, this is the image they get...a prison cell that we are locked inside of. God won't let us out and His entire purpose is to keep us from experiencing anything fun or enjoyable. We are locked away from life and there's no getting out. Pretty dismal state of existance. Thankfully, this is NOT what God has intended for any of us. Let me show you a different type of boundary...

This is a picture of the mesosphere. The mesosphere is one of the layers of our earth's atmosphere. Compared to the others, it's actually a fairly thin layer. It's about 50 miles above the surface of the earth and it sits at about -150 degrees F (which means I would be very comfortable there). If we were to jump into a rocket ship (which would be really cool by the way...) and took off for outerspace, it's sort of the "in-between layer" as we would leave the earth's atmosphere and just start to enter space. But the mesosphere serves a really important purpose. First of all, it serves as sort of a filter for the sun's UV rays. People like me (who have fair skin and red hair) are very thankful for the mesosphere because without it, we would look like a bunch of giant fried chicken legs running around all the time (there's an image you didn't plan to see in your head today I'm guessing). Anyway, it keeps the UV rays of the sun from burning down full force on the earth. But even more importantly than that, it keeps the earth (and us) from being pounded into a pulp. Experts tell us that around 40 tons of meteors enter our atmosphere every single day. That's a lot. And as these meteors hurl towards the earth and enter the mesosphere, the gases that are there cause lots of friction...which burns up the meteors and keeps them from ever actually striking the earth. Oh a few every now and then get through...we call them shooting stars and they eventually burn up anyway before they hit the earth. But the mesosphere protects us in a major way from being burned up and getting the crud beat out of us. I've discovered I'm thankful for the mesosphere.

What does this have to do with Love, Dating & Sex? Well God has put boundaries in place for us concerning sex. And these boundaries are not a giant prison cell that keeps us locked up from enjoying life and doing anything fun. These boundaries are more like the mesosphere...they protect us in a major way.

God tells us all throughout the Bible that ANY sex outside of marriage is sin (regardless of age by the way...you're not off the hook if you're an "adult".) That's a boundary. And its a boundary that He put in place to protect us. God knows us very well (He should...He built us) and He knows that if left to ourselves, we very rarely make wise decisions...especially when it comes to something as tempting as sexual activity. He also knows all of the pain and guilt that come from sex outside of marriage...not to mention the possibility of STD's and unplanned pregnancies. He understands the consequences WAY better than any of us do. He knows the painful consequences of sex outside of marriage and because He loves us so much, He wants to keep us from experiencing that pain. So He established boundaries...a huge mesosphere to keep us from getting pummeled.

So if God establishes boundaries for us...and we are supposed to imitate Him as Christians...wouldn't it be wise to estblish personal boundaries for dating? If we claim we don't need them, we can be described by only one word...stupid. We all need them. So here are some thoughts to help us establish some dating boundaries:

• Putting our trust completely in ourselves is unwise
  
• "Alone" removes self-restraint--Self-restraint is usually good


• We were built to need accountability


• Boundaries are easier to abide by if everyone involved understands them


• Boundaries are only effective if we commit to them whole-heartedly

So with that, here are some dating boundaries that our high school students came up with...

1. Make sure you only date Christians who share the same convictions and morals that you do.


2. Don't date alone.


3. Don't end up in a house with your date with no one else home.


4. Establish conservative physical intimacy boundaries.


5. Talk about those physical boundaries with your girlfriend/boyfriend ahead of time.


6. Establish an accountability partner who will ask you often about the temptations you face while dating and how you dealt with those temptations.


7. Have a proper attitude towards dating (keeping my future marriage in mind and the fact that I and my date are both temples of the Holy Spirit).
   

Pretty wise for a bunch of high school kids if you ask me. Dating is an exciting part of being in high school. But it also holds so much potential for long-term consequences of bad choices. We have to take it seriously and we MUST establish boundaries as we date in high school...otherwise we might end up looking like giant friend chicken legs running around...

Hope to talk with you next time. Thanks for reading...

--Bob

Dating, Love, Sex-Part 1

Well its February and that means 2 things. First, it is FREEZING COLD in Southern Illinois right now! And Valentines Day is right around the corner. I have a remedy for the 1st one...I'm leaving Florida in 6 hours and 45 minutes (not that I'm counting). But the second one is a real conundrum (yes that's the right spelling...I had to look it up.) Anyway, Valentines Day has always been kind of a waste to me. My wife likes flowers and chocolates and all that stuff and I like to give her things she likes but does it really mean anything if its expected?...if its SUPPOSED to happen then? Where's the feeling and emotion in that? "Here honey...here's some flowers that I bought you because every other husband in the entire world is buying their wives some this week so I thought I should buy you some too." See what I mean? (Alright...I realize that is a really lame excuse for NOT buying flowers but its the best I've got right now. If you have something better, let me know.) So Valentines Day isn't really that big of a deal at our house. But it is a big deal to me for another reason. Every year at this time, we take some time at The Mix to talk about the HUGE topic of love, dating and sexual issues. And this year is no different.

In my 18 years of youth ministry, of all the conversations I have had and counseling I have done with kids, BY FAR the most frequent topic has something to do with dating, boyfriends and girlfriends and sexual issues. Probably 85% of the time when a student comes to me and wants to talk, we end up talking about their dating life in some form or fashion. It's a big deal because the stakes are really high and the potential for long-lasting damage is enormous. And the thing I've noticed is that many times, students have unrealistic and very wrong attitudes and ideas about dating, love and sex, before they ever get to a point in their lives when they begin to think about dating. Check out these quotes from grade school kids concerning love, marriage and dating:

HOW DO YOU DECIDE WHO TO MARRY?

• Alan-age 10--"You got to find somebody who likes the same stuff. Like if you like sports, she should like it that you like sports...and keep the chips and dip coming."


• Kristen-age 10--"No person really decides before they grow up who they're going to marry. God decides all the way before and you get to find out later who you're stuck with."
  
  

WHAT DO MOST PEOPLE DO ON A DATE?

• Lynette-age 8--"Dates are for having fun and people should use them for getting to know each other. Even boys have something to say if you listen long enough."
  
• Martin-age 10--"On the first date they tell each other lies and that usually gets them interested enough to go for a second date."
  
  

WHEN IS IT OK TO KISS SOMEONE?

• Curt-age 7--"The law says you have to be eighteen, so I wouldn't want to mess with that."


• Howard-age 8--"The law goes something like this: If you kiss someone, then you should marry them and have kids with them. Its the right thing to do."
  
  

HOW WOULD YOU MAKE A MARRIAGE WORK?

• Ricky-age 10--"Tell your wife she looks pretty, even if she looks like a truck."
  

Now obviously these little guys and gals will have their ideas changed for them as they get a little older! And its easy to see where they get these ideas from in most cases. But its important to realize that we all start to form ideas and attitudes about dating and love and marriage and even sex, from a very young age. And kids carry those ideas into high school with them and right into dating relationships. So what ARE the right attitudes for students to have about dating? Our goal at The Mix is not necessarily to come up with hard and fast rules for our students to follow. Obviously, their parents have a lot to do with all of that for them. We are more concerned that they have a right attitude towards dating and that starts with some realizations about why God cares so much about their dating and sexual life. We came up with 3 big reasons why God cares so much about the dating life of high schoolers:

1. God sees the big picture--You don't! (God always sees how our choices and decisions right now will affect our future. We don't always see that. So by depending on God for our wisdom, we are depending on the One who really can see the future for us!)


2. God always looks out for your well-being--You don't! (God will ALWAYS lead us into what is best for us...His plans for us are not to harm us but to give us a hope and a future, according to Jeremiah 29:11. We don't always have our best interest in mind. We get caught up in the moment and make bad choices that lead to harmful things for us...it happens all the time. We don't have to ever worry about God doing that to us.)


3. God always has the purpose of dating, love and sex in mind--You don't! (Again, we get caught up in the moment, give into temptations and allow or focus to shift all over the place. God never gets caught up in the moment and always has His focus exactly where it should be. He knows the real purpose and intention behind dating and eventually marriage...He should, He invented it! And He can help us to do the same if rely on His direction and operate within the guidelines He has established for us.)
   

So what is God's purpose for dating and eventually even marriage? Well I think God seeks to accomplish a lot of things through our dating processes and eventually our marriages. But the one thing I want our high school students to understand is this: God allows us to experience a lot of things in the physical sense here in this life on this earth that are representations of deeper, spiritual truths He also wants us to experience. He gives us a physical picture we CAN understand of something spiritual that is much harder to wrap our arms around. Dating and marriage are part of this. Its hard for us to understand the intimacy that God wants to have with us in our relationships with Him. He longs to love us and experience deep, intimacy with us. But that's sort of a vague concept to us because we can't see Him with our physical eyes and touch Him with our physical hands. So He gives us marriage...something we CAN experience in the physical. And as we experience a God-honoring marriage, it helps us to understand the kind of intimacy God wants to have with us on a spiritual level. Might sound weird to you...but I believe there's more truth to it than any of us understand. Check out Ephesians 5 for more insight on this.

SO...as we date, we have to keep in mind that some day, God wants to allow us to experience a marriage that will mirror our relationship with Him. And how we date as high school students DOES AFFECT our future marriages!! Even though we may have a long time before we get married and we have no idea who we will eventually marry, we are training ourselves as we date in high school and shaping how we think about marriage someday. So here is a good goal as we date in high school:

Our dating experiences in high school should help our future marriages to be...

-God-Honoring

-Healthy

-Life-long

If we have the future in mind as we date (especially because we don't know who we will eventually marry down the road), we take big steps towards having a marriage with our future spouse some day that will be God-honoring, healthy and life-long. That's a good attitude to have towards dating in high school!!

In Ecclesiastes, God talks about a triple-braided cord that is strong because it has three cords wrapped around each other...the husband, the wife and God. When a marriage is set up like this, it is strong and God-honoring. So as high school students who are dating, we have to ask ourselves this:

Are my actions, attitudes and behaviors concerning dating going to lead to a triple-braided cord-type marriage down the road that isn't easily broken?

OR

Am I destroying the cord before it even starts?

How we date matters to God...and it should matter to us. Over the next few weeks, we are going to talk about some practical things we can build into our lives to help us date in a God-honoring way. Hope you check back in with us! Now I have to go figure out if my wife is getting me anything for V-day so I know if I have to get her anything...and we wonder where our kids get their ideas...

Thanks for reading!

-Bob

What's Love-Part 3

Hey everyone! Thanks for checking out this week's entry of The Mixblog...the best way to find out what's happening at The Mix (Whittington Church's high school youth ministry) outside of stopping by and hanging out with us. We are starting to wind down a teaching series that we have been calling "So What Exactly Is Love?" and this week's discussion focused on 'Sacrificial Love'. Sacrificial Love is a lost art in our day it seems. Unfortunately, most of the 'love' we know about is totally based on whether someone else deserves our 'love' or not and what we might get in return. News flash...THIS IS NOT SACRIFICIAL LOVE! So...

IF...

• Love is a choice


• Love is OUR choice


• Love is OUR choice regardless of what the object of that love does

THEN...

Love is going to involve sacrifice!

King David in the Old Testament seemed to understand sacrificial love a little bit. Check out this story from 2 Samuel 24:18-25. King David wasn't going to express his love to God unless it cost him something! Why? Why not just take the threshing floor and the ox and the wood for the fire for free and promise Araunah he'd remember him during tax season? Or just promise him a 1st class tour of the palace sometime? Why did David insist on paying for everything? Why did he want it cost him something? Maybe it was to prove to God he was serious but God knows the thoughts and intentions of a man's heart so God would have known either way (by the way...I think even God has trouble knowing the thoughts and intentions of a woman's heart but that is another discussion). I think David wanted it to feel to himself as though it really meant something. He wanted there to be no doubt within himself that this act of love wasn't based on convenience or the pressure of those around him...he wanted to be sure he didn't do it because of what he would get out of it. He wanted it to be very clear to everyone but most importantly to himself that this act of love towards God was genuine sacrificial love...it cost him something and he was more than willing to pay it. So that brings us to big question of this discussion...

WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF LOVE?

Have you ever thought about that? I mean, I don't think it was created to be fodder for 1000's of songs. I don't think it was created so Blockbuster could have another isle in their store. I don't think it was created so rose bushes would have a place in the world and nasty little heart-shaped candies would actually be used for something. If God created it and he wired us to be able to feel it and give it, what's its purpose? Love defitinely leads to pain many times. So why create it all? Well I think the answer can be found in God's ultimate act of sacrificial love...the sacrificing of His Son Jesus. Romans 5:6-8 tells us that Jesus showed us sacrificial love not only by the amazing act of giving up His life for us but also by the circumstances surrounding it. He didn't wait until we deserved it, or until we did something to give Him a little bit of hope that we might turn out ok. He didn't wait until we proved how "good" we could be. He didn't wait until there was some indication that He might get something back in return. While we were absolutely helpless and hopeless...still sinners...Christ died for us. No gaurantees, no "deserving-factor". That's sacrificial love. And by doing so He revealed His own character and nature. Afterall, God IS love. And as His kids, He wants us to allow His nature and character to be revealed in us. God created us with ability to give and recieve love so that we could be with Him and be like Him! And the best part is that through Christ's sacrificial love for us, we have the opportunity to be with Him (see Colossians 1:13-14).

As Christians, we have to ask ourselves (and God) 2 questions...

• How can I show true sacrificial love towards God?
  
• How can I show true sacrificial love towards other people?

By doing this, we immulate God and stand the best chance of reaching people around us for Him. The greatest evangelistic tool we have is not any program or plan...its not a pamphlet or brochure...its not a tract or an event...its not even how many worship songs we know or how many Bible verses we can quote or how much we pray. The greatest evangelistic tool we have is love...loving God and loving each other. Jesus said Himself that people would know we are His disciples by the love we have for each other. People notice that and it has the potential to change their lives. It might just change ours too.

So I'm on a mission: How can I love sacrificially? I have a sneaking suspicion that if I really want to find ways to love sacrificially, God is going to provide them for me. I just have to keep my eyes open. I also have a sneaking suspicion that it won't be easy...but it WILL be worth it. It always is. And hopefully it won't involve those nasty little heart-shaped candies...

Thanks for reading. Hope you check back with us next week!

-Bob

What's Love-part 2

Hello everyone! Thanks for checking out this week's The Mixblog entry. Today we have a "guest writer"...Sheri Hargis fills us in on what was discussed this week as we continued our current teaching series on "What Is Love-Really?". Here are Sheri's thoughts...

This week Shon Hargis spoke about love and how Jesus loved. He talked about people often use the catchphrase "WWJD". Shon said that instead of WWJD, what we should be saying is "What Would Jesus Be Doing"...WWJBD. : ) Jesus is the ultimate example of how we are to love and there are many examples of His love throughout the Gospels.

Mark 1:40-42... A man with leprosy came to Jesus and begged ot be healed. Jesus was "filled with compassion" and immediately healed the man. Jesus saw his need and looked for a way to meet it. He does this with us too...He looks for our needs and looks for ways to meet them--because He loves us !

Mark 5:18-20... After Jesus cast the demons out of the man, He told him to go and tell everyone what He had done for him and how merciful He had been. Again, He met his need and showed mercy.

Mark 8:1-3... For the 2nd time (that was mentioned in the Gospels), Jesus met the needs of the people who were following them and fed them. He felt compassion for them because they "stuck by Him" for three days and He knew if He sent them away, they would faint before they made it home to eat...so His compassion prompted Him to feed them.

Mark 10:13-16... When the people were bringing their children to Jesus, the disciples tried to send them away so they didn't bother Him. But Jesus let them know that the children were very important to Him and that they were always welcome. He loved the children because He knew the kind of faith they had. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we all had the faith of a child? Isn't it sad that as we get older we become jaded and lsoe that faith? And think about the way that children love others...unconditionally, like Jesus. If only we could love that way...

John 11... This is the story about Jesus' friend Lazarus who gets sick and dies. Jesus does not immediately go to his side to heal him and Lazarus's sisters blame Him for their brother's death. Jesus goes to Lazarus' grave and when He sees Mary and the others weeping over Lazarus, He becomes "deeply troubled". Then the scriptures state that "Jesus wept". This is one of the most loving examples in the Bible...Jesus crying over the death of His friend. We know what happens next, when Jesus raises Lazarus form the dead and gives glory to God for that. But it is such a human characteristic of Jesus to be so saddened by the death of someone He loves...even though He knows what is going to happne next. He showed love for that family by sharing in their grief. Jesus does that for us too. We should remember that the things that sadden us also sadden Jesus too. When we lose a loved and we feel so alone in our grief, just remember that Jesus is with us and He feels sadness too. He is the great comforter and will help us deal with our pain and loss.

John 13:1-5... Jesus washes His disciples' feet. This was the ultimate example of servanthood. Feet washing was a job that nobody wanted to do and only the lowest of servants got stuck doing it. But Jesus His love for His disciples by getting down on the floor and washing their feet...right before He was to be crucified on the cross for their (and our) sins!!! He loved them...and He loves us...even though we are all sinners.

So how did Jesus show His love...what was He doing? He was serving, He was meeting our needs, He was showing us His mercy, He was constantly giving of Himself. He was showing us the way God loves us. He is our example of love and He is who we should aspire to be like. So...I guess the question for discussion or pondering is this: How do we love like Jesus?

Thanks for reading!

--Sheri

And thank-you Sheri for sharing your thoughts with us! I think we all probably need to let God show us how to love people more like Jesus loved them. I know I do. Hope to see you back here next week for The Mixblog.

What's Love?-part 1

Hi everyone. Thanks for checking out The Mixblog this week. We are starting a new teaching series that will take us through the rest of January. We are calling it "What's Love?". No...there is no "Got To Do With It" on the end (that's Tina Turner) or "How Do We Know When It's" at the beginning of it (that's Van Halen). I tried to crack a joke about this at The Mix this week and about 2/3 of the way through the joke, it dawned on me that none of these high school kids were born yet when either of those songs came out. Almost daily I'm reminded in some way how old I really am. But on to "Love"...

First of all, how do you really define love? I'm talking about all kinds of love...romantic love, love between friends, love between parents and their kids, love for God, love for other people in general. It really does depend on who you ask. We hear about love all the time, see movies about love all the time (although I do have an anti-chick flick gene that keeps me from being able to enjoy these), listen to music about love all the time, see "love" thrown about on TV all the time...you get the idea. Love seems to be everywhere and yet we have a really hard time explaining what it is. Some would say its an emotion...some would say an action...some would say a feeling...a choice...a commitment...a destiny...a tennis score. Does it happen "at first sight" or after lots of "sights"? Can you choose to love someone, then not love them...then love them again? How do I know if I really love someone? How do I know if I really love God? Well before we can dive into the 'love discussion', let's establish a couple of really important things first:

• First, most of the good things that God allows us to experience in our lives are symbolic pictures of spiritual things He wants us to experience as well. For example...marriage. The Bible seems to indicate that one of the biggest reasons God invented marriage (which He did invent by the way) is to give us a physical picture here on earth of what a covenant relationship is like...the kind of relationship God wants to have with us. Its hard for us to understand things that we can't see, smell or touch (like a relationship with God). But marriage helps us to have a deeper understanding of what a deep level, intimate, covenant-based relationship is like. Its a physical symbol of a deeper spiritual understanding. This is also true of love. God allows us to experience 'love' so we will understand just a little bit, how He feels about us.

• Second, since God designed the concept of love, built us to be able to experience love, and showed us the first example of what love looks like...it only makes sense that we look to Him for the correct definition. We get lots of definitions of what love is from lots of different places. The best definition of something always comes from the inventor of it.

So what is God's definition of love? Lets check out the instruction manual: 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.

So how often do you love someone like this? I mean, the 'love' that I show to people a lot of times is more of a "love is usually patient when they do things my way, love doesn't envy unless I deserve it more than they do, love doesn't boast unless I'm really better than they are, love isn't rude unless they seem to really want me to be rude to them based on the idiotic way they are acting, love is not easily angered unless its those certain people...you know who you are, love keeps no record of wrongs (except all the people I deleted from my Facebook account and the ones I stopped sending Christmas Cards to this year...but they deserved it)...sometimes protects, rarely trusts, occasionally hopes, and actually perseveres sometimes"...kind of love. Anyone else in my boat? I think probably if we all got honest, we're all in the same boat if we are trying to love anyone in and of ourselves. In the flesh, Biblical love is absolutely impossible.

And then to make matters worse, God throws another log on the fire by saying that 'love' is more important than alot of other things. Read 1 Corinthians 13:13. God says strengthening my faith is important..but not as important as love. God says trusting in Him for amazing and powerful things is important...but not important as love. I gotta get this 'love thing' right!

So this causes me to ask some really tough questions of myself. Why do I love Jesus? Really...why do I love Him? If I'm not careful, here's some wrong reasons I can love Jesus:

• He's a good luck charm. If I keep Jesus around, good things will happen.


• He's a vaccine against 'bad stuff' in my life. If I love Jesus, he'll make sure life is a little easier for me.


• He's a Spiritual Walmart. If I keep Jesus around I'll be able to get everything I think I want or need all the time. One stop shopping...Always Low Prices-Always!


• Because someone else told me I should. Everyone thinks I should love Jesus so I do.


• Because someone else expects me to. I need to love Jesus because others will be disappointed if I don't.

Some of these are things that can definitely happen as a by-product of loving Jesus but if my love for Him is based on these things, I'm going to decide I don't love Him anymore when He doesn't do what I thought He should.

OR...I could love Jesus:

• Because I realize who He is and what He has done for me by dying on the cross and allowing me to have a relationship with God forever.

All too often, I think we decide to love Jesus based on what we hope He will do for us in the future. Instead, we need to love Him because of what He has already done for us. Our love for Him is based on the fact that He loved us first by taking the punishment for sin that we deserved. He rescued us from a spiritual death! And for that, we should love Him!!

If our love for Jesus is based on what we want Him to do for us in our lives, we will eventually turn our backs on Him. Sometimes He does what we want Him to...but sometimes He doesn't. He never stops loving us and He never stops showing that love to us. But He also doesn't always do what we think he should. What then? Unfortunately, I know way too many Christians who only loved Jesus because they thought He would always make life easier for them or give them everything they wanted or keep bad things from happening to them. And when it didn't happen this way, they tossed their faith out the window and turned their back on God, who loves them very, very much...and decided they didn't want to love Jesus anymore.

Please don't misunderstand. We should definitely believe for God to do awesome things in our lives...and He wants to. BUT...if He chooses not to, we must make sure our love for Him is based on what He's already done for us. I love to study the Apostle Paul. Paul was a guy who was an absolute jerk before he knew Jesus. He was more than a jerk...he was evil! He was basically the 1st century version of Osama Bin Laden. He wanted to kill as many Christians as possible and see to it that Christianity died off. Then when Jesus got a hold of Him, everything changed. But the thing I like the most about him is that he never forgot why he fell in love with Jesus. Here was a guy that God used in miraculous ways...he wrote 13 books in the New Testament, started churches everywhere, healed the sick, saw 1000's saved...God used him powerfully. But his life was anything but easy with Jesus. He also got beat with a cane, flogged with a whip, stoned until they thought he was dead, thrown in prison several times and eventually was beheaded for his faith. That's not exactly the path of least resistance. That's not the easy road. But it is the path of most fulfillment. The path of most purpose and destiny. And in Romans 7:21-25, we see Paul remembering all over again why he loves Jesus. It wasn't because Jesus made his life easy, its because Jesus gave him life to begin with by exchanging the sinful stuff inside of Paul for the perfect-ness of Jesus. That's a good reason to love Him!

Next week, we are going to look at what God has to say about loving people. I have a feeling I might need to work on that part too... Thanks for reading! See you next time.

--Bob