Be More Than You Think You Can Be

Sometimes I have to stop listening to the radio preachers and "family focused" shows on the Christian stations because they make me angry. Sometimes I tune in for the last 4 minutes of a sermon and God blesses me with exactly what I need to hear to encourage me in what I'm going through. Other times I just get mad. I caught the tail end of a talk between what I gathered was a married couple who had written a book or had a ministry or something. I guess the husband had an affair and the wife had forgiven him or something like that because they were talking about forgiveness and how their marriage was better than ever. But then the wife said this comment: "I once heard someone say, we're not what we should be, and we're not what we could be, but we're not what we were."

This was supposed to be an encouraging statement. Like, 'I'm not living all that I think my life could be, but thanks to Jesus my life isn't as miserable as it used to be.' Does anyone else find this to be a dismal and self-defeating statement? Does that make anyone want to jump in line to receive the bountiful blessings of knowing Jesus and having him in your life?

Here is a good moment to update people on the conference. The conference I just went to was awesome. The people there, Heidi Baker, Leif Hetland, and Shawn Bolz, to name a few, are on the cutting edge of living for what is possible to do in a person's life. Though all of their ministries are different (from Heidi Baker who serves as a missionary in Mozambique and takes every orphan she encounters to Shawn Bolz who goes to celebrity parties in L.A. and prays for Hollywood stars), all of the messages were empowering. I heard "Be yourself" so many times in 4 days. Only you can bring to the world the amazing gifts and abilities that God chose to equip you with. Leif Hetland did a prayer for God to restore the lost and dormant dreams of the people in the congregation. Their testimonies of the amazing things God has done through miracles and extraordinary provision in their lives served as an appetizer to whet our appetites to dream of what God could do in our lives. During prayer times they challenged us to ask God what He has specifically created us to do.

Have you ever stopped to really believe what the Bible says about what we should expect from our lives?

1 John 4:17 says that "In this world we are like Jesus."

Ok, so we all go to church to find out how to be Christlike. But that has looked like trying not to sin, loving others more than ourselves, and knowing what the Bible says. But have you ever truly let these words of Christ sink in?

John 14:12

"Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do EVEN GREATER things than these, because I am going to the Father."

Hello people, what works did Jesus do? He taught with amazing authority that made everyone take notice that he said way different stuff than the religious authorities of his time. He spoke with POWER. He healed people. He delivered people from demons. (Yes demons people, not just psychological problems or epilepsy that the people of their day mistook for demons because they were not as educated and scientifically advanced as us.) And he raised the dead!

Do you realize that Jesus had the expectation that we would do GREATER things than that because his time on earth was limited? In short, we have more time to teach, heal, and deliver than he did. So let's make good use of our time!

Come on people, why do we bother to read the Bible if we don't take these words seriously?!

Romans 8 says we share in the glory of Christ, we are more than conquerers, and nothing can separate us from God's love. That is just ONE CHAPTER! What could we do with our lives if we believed that 1 chapter alone? This just happens to be my favorite new testament chapter, so I'll continue... It also says there is NO CONDEMNATION in our lives. We are set free from the law of sin and death by the Holy Spirit and our minds have life and peace when we are in agreement with the Spirit.

Romans 8 continues... We are co-heirs with Christ. What is an heir? Someone who receives an inheritance. An inheritance is a bunch of stuff you get because someone had the misfortune of dying and can't use their stuff any more. This means you- who just has the privilege of being alive- get a bunch of someone else's stuff because they have the misfortune of being dead. So we get to share in receiving CHRIST'S STUFF because he died and we are living in him. Think about what kind of stuff Christ has people... power, glory, wisdom, authority, ENDLESS provision...

But the people on the radio are just happy to be forgiven and that means they are not quite the miserable sinners they were before they knew Christ. Don't get me wrong. I am glad they applied the forgiveness of Christ to their marriage in a way that saved and restored it. That is an extraordinary thing that testifies to the grace and power of the resurrection of Christ in their marriage. We all have to start the journey with Christ where we are, and the beginning of that looks like receiving forgiveness and letting Christ bring restoration to the broken areas caused by our failures and wounding. But why stop at that?!

I want to live a life that is worthy that the calling Jesus put on me. (Ephesians 4:1, Colossians 1:10, 1 Thessalonians 2:12) If Jesus expects me to do greater works than him, I want to do greater works. Jesus, of all people, would know what we are capable of doing because He had a part in our creation.

Now let's not let him down!