Jesus In Disguise

I received this story in my email today. I know it’s slightly corny, but I’ve been asking God a lot lately what my purpose is here on earth, and I think this was just a reminder today that He’s got it all in control and I just need to keep trusting in him until he reveals his plan more to me.

After watching the news for the last few weeks, I think possibly more than ever, this book came out at exactly the right time. As I watch oil creep towards the beaches in the Gulf of Mexico, and as the flood waters recede from Nashville, I think many people are seeing their “Plan A” going down the drain and are wondering what to do, and I think this book really lives up to it’s title when addressing our Plan B.

As you know, I work with high school students at my church. The ministry is called Vertical, and we have it at each of our three locations. We decided recently to do what we call a “Big Push.” Basically, we pull out all the stops when it comes to advertising on the radio, tv, and billboards around town over the course of a few weeks leading into a new series. We do this twice a year with our weekend services to try and reach those that don’t normally attend church. This was the first time we’ve done it for our high school ministry.

Tonight, I sat here and asked God why.

Jesus talks in Matthew 25:40 of doing things for the “least of these.” In other words, those who for whatever reason cannot do it themselves. Whether it’s to provide food, clothing, shelter, medicine, etc, we as Christians are supposed to take care of everyone. An organization that is doing an amazing job at this is Thrive Africa.

‘m tired. I’m tired of all the people I see hurting on a daily basis. Multiple people I spoke with today alone; this was one of the worst days of their lives. Maybe not the absolute worst, but it ranks up there pretty highly. These weren’t just “ah, I had a bad day” worst day, but more like a “someone broke into my house and stole my stuff” worst day.

I’m reading Wild at Heart for the second time, and I’m also halfway through Captivating. Both of these books are amazing. To be a mouse in the Eldredge household must be an amazing thing. But as I’ve read through both of these books, there are certain things that have made a huge impact on me, and so I’ve decided to take my heart out of it’s protective little box and set it on the table and write a few things from it to the females.

So, I haven’t really written a post in a little while, and to be honest, I just haven’t had the desire. I’m not entirely sure why this is, I just have really been feeling burdened lately and the last thing I feel like sitting down and doing is writing. I write in a journal on a semi-regular basis, and as I was writing the other day, I started to go back and read through some of my old entries.

If you’re not familiar with the I Am Second movement, you should definitely check it out. I love the premise of what the movement is about, and they’ve presented it in an amazing light. Recently, they sat down with both Sam Bradford and Colt McCoy, both shining examples of humility, and talked about being second.

I hadn’t really planned on writing something related to Martin Luther King Jr. day today. I don’t feel overly qualified to talk about race relations or about truly suffering for a cause. But, after watching the video posted by Michael Hyatt today and subsequent discussion of leadership lessons learned from Dr. King, I just had to write down some of the thoughts going through my head.