Would Jesus be welcomed into your house?

Candice shared a youtube video with me a couple of days ago that was sent to her. It was a poem (rap) written by a young man who was highlighting, in his opinion, the difference between Jesus and false religion. He said I hate religion but I love Jesus. In it he said at it's core Jesus' gospel and the good news of the Cross is in pure oposition to self-righteousness/self-justification. Religion is man centered, Jesus is God-centered. His poem highlighted his journey from porn, alocohol abuse and being an non-believer to today having a personal relationship with Christ.

In his poem he said some things that were very polarizing and for most mainstream Christians might be some difficult chunks of reality for us all to swallow. One comment he made was "If Jesus showed up at your church (I'm going to use my house) would He be welcomed? Think about this for a minute....Do we openly welcome all children of God into our churches, our homes, our businesses or our lives? Probably not. Do we have a tendency to take other peoples inventory and judge them by their appearance before we know their story, where they came from, what they have been through or if they are a follower of Christ or not? Probably not.

His comments really made me uncomfortable and caused me to question if I need to do some work in this area of my life.

If Jesus showed up at my house or in my life today, would I know it was Him in the form of a mail carrier, a UPS man, a trash collector, a neighbor, a auto mechanic, a abused wife or a alchoholic in need? I'm not sure, but I do hope because I took the time to view this blog and have spent time thinking about his challenge to me to view everyone I come into contact with as a child of Christ, that maybe the next time Jesus shows up in my life He will say son because you are a believer and have faith come with me.

Check it out. I hope it will move you like it did me and cause us all to view the people that come into our lives from a new set of lenses.

The title of the youtube video is "Hate Religion, But Love Jesus"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IAhDGY1pqY

Hope I have that address right. I'm not the best internet guy in the world.

Keep it in the fairway.

I have seen much of Christmas yet

I know it is very hard sometimes to slow down and allow the spirit of Christmas to enter into our busy lives. It's sad, but true. Yesterday I watched a youth soccer game where one team demoralized the same team two weeks in a row, at work today I had an upset client that could not get $1,500 out of the ATM over the weekend, next I received an email from a usher at church that was "shocked" to see their name listed to serve on Sunday (even though the 2011 schedule was emailed to all in February and ushers serve one month at a time), tonight I saw a lady at dinner, celebrating her 74th birthday share she is trying to catch up on all of the beer she did not drink the first 30 years of her life in front of her two teenage grandsons and then I saw a very grumpy man run a lady off of her table while she waited for the server to bring her the bill.

All of these are minor examples of individuals who should have so much to be grateful for. Grateful to be a good soccer team and recognize when they have superior talent, grateful to have $1,500 in their checking account, grateful to be able to serve at church, grateful to have lived a full life and grateful to be able to have dinner with their family. But yet, gratitude seems to be the last thing on their minds this Christmas.

I'm grateful my daughter enjoys soccer, that we have money in our account, that I get to serve others, that I recently celebrated a birthday sober and that I do not sweat the small things in life anymore.

These are all things I get to be apart of and get to share with my family and friends. So my hope is I will see Christmas tomorrow and be able to enjoy the spirit of Christmas for the rest of my life.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

Keep it in the fairway!

For God so loved the world

Nothing I'm about to post is original material. Most comes from a sermon I heard last Sunday that nearly moved me to tears of joy. The sermon was on the first part of John 3:16 "For God so loved the world" (stop). When Tim Tebow posted John 3:16 under his eyes in the NCAA Championship a few years ago 92 million people "googled" it. There is approx. 330 million people in America. There is approx. 6 billion people on Earth. These numbers are even hard for me to wrap around my little mind.

So How big is the world? The world that God created in 7 days. The pastor contiuned...he held a golf ball in is hand (that got my attention) and shared that the sun, a star, is 1 million times the size of Earth. He kept going to the largest star ever see by telescope in the universe, named VY Canis Majoris. I guess this means one BIG ASS STAR. To give us an idea of its circumpherence, the pastor said a plane travelling 900 miles per hour can fly around the earth in 1 day. In order for this same plane to fly around VY Canis Majoris it would take 1,100 years. WOW.

I have been practicing meditation for a few weeks. It was suggested to me to begin by setting a timer for 7 minutes and just talk to God. Well that lasted for about a week and now I'm up to 15 minutes. This time with God is helping my peace and serenity. Since I heard this message on Sunday I have had a different perspective on how big God is and how big this world really is and just think there may be other universes out there that human technology will never find.

To think for God so loved the world and little old me. What a deal.

May we all try to improve our personal relationship with God and the next time you talk to God try to visual the God that created and loves the world!!!

Keep it in the fairway

Rainy Days

There was a time in my life, let's just say most of my life that I cursed mother nature when I woke up to rainy days. Especially on a Saturdays when I had important things planned like golf, yard work or a football game. Pretty selfish huh? Well today was one of those rainy Saturdays. Soccer got cancelled but that did not mean we did not have plenty to do. There was a Easter egg hunt at church, a UK blue white game, Keeley had a birthday party and then errands to run. Never a dull moment.

But before we got going this morning I did get a chance to do some extra reading and with Easter being tomorrow I have really beefed up my Bible reading the last few weeks. It's pretty cool. For the first time in my life the words in the Bible are coming to life. This week my Bible AP was updated and now has a feature with audio, real cool. Using this feature, here is one of the scriptures I read and had read to me this week.

Romans 8:5-6. "Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace".

There sure is a lot of good stuff in that Bible. I can't wait for our next rainy day!!!

Keep it in the fairway.

Chris

March Madness

It's that time of year again. It seems all of North America is coming out of the winter thaw and looking for a good excuse to get out of work early and this excuse comes in the form of March Madness. Millions of dollars will be wasted on worker productivity and millions of dollars will be spent on wagering on these games. I get it and will even participate in it, but what I do think is sad is that for many people they will spend more time studying the NCAA brackets over the next few weeks than they will trying to improve their relationship with God for the next 9 months of 2011 or for that matter the next several years.

Can you imagine how different this world would look if all 300 + Million of the people living in the United States would place as much emphasis on improving their relationship with God as they do analyzing their NCAA brackets. I'm not going to sit on my soap box and preach, but I will present this challenge, how about we all try and put March Madness into proper perspective and spend a little more time talking to God during March Madness than we will spend chatting it up about how well we are doing in our pools.

Keep it in the Fairway!

NO PAIN NO GAIN

I had a basketball coach in high school that used to say this to me a lot. Of course I can reflect back now and in looking back that coach was right. Anything in life that I have ever tried to accomplish came after experiencing some pain. I had a friend say to me today that we live looking ahead but we learn looking back. Today, when I reflect back on my life I can say with full confidence that I have been transformed into a new person. I'm trying everyday to grow in this new life. I'm trying to think of spiritual things more often and trying to consciously grow my personal relationship with God.

But yes you guessed it. It seems to me the more emphasis I place on my spirituality and becoming a better Christian the more growing pains I feel like I'm experiencing. I was recently reading Job. Job really did experience some rough times and he often questioned God. In chapter 3:16, Job said "I wish I had been born dead and then buried, never to see the light of day". In verse 20 he says "why does God let me live when life is miserable and so bitter"?

I have in grey seasons of my life had some of the same thoughts as Job. But today I try to consider myself lucky and even Job says in chapter 5:17-18 "Consider yourself fortunate if God All-Powerful chooses to correct you. He may cause injury and pain, but he will bandage and heal your cuts and bruises".

I pray today that I may see signs of my growth in my new life. I pray that I may always keep trying to grow. I realize there are still going to be grey seasons in life, but the good news is today that those grey skies do not get as grey as they used to and they do not stick around as long as they used to.

I have an attitude of gratitude and know that God is not going to put more on me than I can handle.

Keep it in the fairway!!!

Golf mirrors Life

I never thought I would hear myself saying this, but one of the most exciting things that happended to me this week was a friend introduced me to a new "Bible App" for my Iphone. My old one stunk. I was so excited that I helped Candice put it on her Ipad and Keeley on here Itouch. I especially enjoyed having my new App this morning at church. This App allows for bookmarks and community comments on just about any scripture. It is so cool to receive another person translation, perspective, etc. on the word of God right there at your figure tips.

Golf and Life. When you hit the golf ball all over the place like I do, several times per round I'm left with choices. Punch out? Lay up? Go for it? Pitch it? Putt it? Everyday in life we all are given the freedom of choice. Sounds great, but free will can cause some folks lots of issues. In some cases, our free will choices are the difference in life and death.

Our minister talked about this today and I liked how he used Deuteronomy,Chapter 30. Verse 11 - "You know God's laws, and it isn't impossible to obey them". Verse 15"Today I am giving you a choice. You can choose life and success or death and disaster".


Man I wish Life was that easy. I wish I would have made better choices 25 years ago. In golf you make a bad decision and go for it and maybe you end up with a double bogey. You go for it in life and put the wrong substances in your body or allow jealously, anger and greed to make decisions for you and the next thing you know (maybe 10, 15 or 25 years later) your sitting in jail or rehab and banging your head against the wall saying how the hell did I get here.

I know my bottom was not as low as you can go and maybe my bottom was not as low as yours, but let me tell you, you have a choice today and that is to choose life and success or death and disaster. I have experienced enough of the later and today I choose life.

Keep it in the fairway,

Chris