holy discontent

well...its late, but i feel like i really need to write this down.


with my brothers on the trip to utah last week, i experienced something that i have never experienced before - a group of guys getting together to unashamedly live out the gospel and share it with the people they encountered. i have never quite lived in a community that was able to pray throughout the day without feeling like it would be a christian cliche...men who blasted worship music out of the car speakers and sit in awe of Christ's love together..who were eager to share the good news with everyone they came in contact with and actually looked forward to those opportunities.

i have been dwelling on this all week - longing for more of this in my life here at corban.

one other thing has been on my mind and in my prayers - a desire to let God have his way in me like never before. i feel like i pray this often, but this is different. i find myself every day pleading with God to change my heart, to take me deeper, to move me into the world, and to truly die to myself.

wednesday night, i laid down in my bed listening to a message by francis chan (i often fall asleep to sermons). it wasn't much of a sermon honestly. he read a passage, and then he began to share story after story of people in his church that were actually living out the gospel and making huge sacrifices to follow Christ. he began to share from his own life how he has lived by faith and God has provided. i was so captured by these stories that i couldn't fall asleep. i laid awake, praying in my heart that God would really move me into living a life of faith like the people i was hearing about.

something one of the guys said at the acts29 conference has been on my mind all day. he shared a story of billy graham during college. he said that at a prayer meeting, billy and some of his friends were praying, and at some point, graham was so overwhelmed with the grace of God that he laid down and began to pound his fists into the ground, crying out, "Lord, let me do great things for you!"

and then today, ah...in every other person's eyes, today probably looked like a great day for me - got school done, played some basketball, hung out with friends, watched a movie, and even had time to pray - but i sit here tonight feeling dissatisfied, empty and convicted - wanting so much more of what Jesus offers.

there has to be more, doesn't there? i mean...this christianity thing - there's so much more than just having fun with friends and spending a little time in prayer. isn't it about giving our life away, about dying to ourselves, about living some faith-filled rollercoaster ride of a life that God is writing from above? isn't it about participating in his kingdom, about being like Christ and giving the gospel to a world in dire need of good news?

and i'm not just saying that we need to do this - that we need to hunker down and try harder to be like Jesus because that's what the Bible says for us to do. i'm saying that the grace of God that i continue to encounter in the Scriptures and in my daily life demands this sort of response. that Jesus would go through hell for me so that I might live stirs my soul and moves me to become like him. this is my longing for a proper response to Jesus' great mercy and love.


before going to sleep i picked up one of the books i'm reading for fun - total church (awesome book by the way). one of the first things i read is this:

"Eighty percent of Christians live in the top 20 percent of the wealthiest areas in the country."

is this what Christ died for? that's me...my whole life. and i barely associate with anyone that is in need of anything. take tonight - not bad, but who was i with? people that are all like me and that have already encountered the grace of God. Jesus said that whenever we have a party, we aren't supposed to invite our friends. instead, we're to invite the poor, the crippled, and everyone who could never pay you back.

i mean, come on - Jesus had a reputation of being that guy that went to parties and skipped class to hang out with the weed smokers in bush park. i don't feel like me or any of my friends have that sort of reputation. later in the chapter, the authors said, "The grace of God meant that Jesus hung out with unrespectable people...If our congregations are full of respectable people, then it may be that we have not truly grasped the radical grace of God."

i want to be like my Christ. i want to be where he would be and have a reputation like his. honestly, i'm sick of this comfortable, self-centered "christian" life that i'm living, and i'm praying that the grace of God will move me from my comfort into a life of radical sacrifice. it scares me, a LOT - but i want it so, so badly.

i've heard it said that Jesus came to comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable. Jesus, i'm praying for you to disturb me tonight...