Have you ever seen the movie, Men In Black? If you haven’t, go out and rent it, it’s pretty good. Anywho, I love the end of the movie. It starts off with two people standing at a street corner in downtown New York City and it zooms out to where you see the whole city, then the state, region, country, continent and world. But then it keeps going! It zooms out further so you can see the planet, then the other various planets, followed by the galaxy and finally, we see the galaxy become a single marble mixed with other “galaxy” marbles and two weird alien creatures are playing a game of marbles with them.
I imagine that’s a pretty good picture of how God views His creation. I’m not saying God is a weird alien creature nor is He ignoring us while He is concentrating on an intense game of marbles. But to God, life is far bigger than me. It’s bigger than any of us. Look at Ecclesiastes 1:3-11 where Solomon illustrates this with awesome pictures to show us just how big God and His creation is. We are mere specks in His eyes.
Yet we always tend to look at life like it’s centered on us.
It’s easy to look at life through a first person perspective because that’s how we were created. Of course we see other people all around us and they have their own view on things because they are the ones living it, but there is no way to view things from their perspective.
So as we strive to become more like Christ, we should make every effort to view things as God views them. And when we do that, we are able to meet our full potential that God originally intended us for.
Not only is God big enough to look at things through His perspective, but He’s also able to look at things through ours as well. So as we struggle and endure all of life’s ups and downs, know that God is not only big enough to handle it, but He also knows exactly what you’re going through because He sees it as you see it.
The difference?
He can see a little bit further than you.
-NW
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
7.13.07 "Choices"
Party. Dictionary.com defines it “to enjoy oneself thoroughly and without restraint.”
Society teaches today’s teenager to “live now, regret later.” Today’s teenager has no consequences because there are no rules, and there are no rules because there is no authority. There’s no authority because it’s all been left up to the individual to decide what’s best for them. It’s all about having the ability to choose. The thing is, today’s teenager hasn’t been taught to make the right choice.
Everywhere you go today, you have choices (If you don’t agree, just walk into any neighborhood Starbucks). My job, is to teach young people to make the right choice—especially when attending social gatherings where peer pressure and temptation reign supreme. But before teenagers can make the right choice, they need to know about authority. In order to know about authority, they need to know there are rules and consequences.
The Bible specializes in these subjects. Jesus is our authority as He claims this in Matthew 28:18. His tag team partner, the Holy Spirit, is our “rule book” as it helps us live a life that shows others that Jesus is our authority.
Check out Galatians 5:19-23: “The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity…jealousy, selfish ambition, drunkenness, orgies and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”
Well I guess that whole bit about enjoying yourself thoroughly and no restraints doesn’t pan out after all. By making Christ your authority and treating God’s word as your rule book, you can know how to make the right choice.
-NW
Society teaches today’s teenager to “live now, regret later.” Today’s teenager has no consequences because there are no rules, and there are no rules because there is no authority. There’s no authority because it’s all been left up to the individual to decide what’s best for them. It’s all about having the ability to choose. The thing is, today’s teenager hasn’t been taught to make the right choice.
Everywhere you go today, you have choices (If you don’t agree, just walk into any neighborhood Starbucks). My job, is to teach young people to make the right choice—especially when attending social gatherings where peer pressure and temptation reign supreme. But before teenagers can make the right choice, they need to know about authority. In order to know about authority, they need to know there are rules and consequences.
The Bible specializes in these subjects. Jesus is our authority as He claims this in Matthew 28:18. His tag team partner, the Holy Spirit, is our “rule book” as it helps us live a life that shows others that Jesus is our authority.
Check out Galatians 5:19-23: “The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity…jealousy, selfish ambition, drunkenness, orgies and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”
Well I guess that whole bit about enjoying yourself thoroughly and no restraints doesn’t pan out after all. By making Christ your authority and treating God’s word as your rule book, you can know how to make the right choice.
-NW
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)