"I Died Today"

A Sermon by Steve Whipple (Link)

I found that message on the church's computer last night, and found myself listening to the whole thing. It was from a series we did about a year ago about the launch of our church's capital campaign called 'The Wild Goose Chase." I love this part of the message:

"I've died so many times in my life, I can't even count how many; it's not even funny how many times I've died. I really have a hard time dying. Every time I do, I struggle with it... What I'm talking about is the sense of dying to myself. The key to dying to myself is not so much that part, but what happens after I die."

Then, he goes on to tell about a High School guy that used to attend 'The Ridge.'

"It's been nearly three years now since we launched [The Church at the Ridge]. God's been doing some amazing things here in three years, and it wasn't too long after we started, there was this High School kid came to one of our services, and I don't even remember what we talked about, but I do remember he came walking out, and he took me by the hand, with tears streaming down his face, and he said "I died today.""

Wow. "I died today." Such a powerful thing to say, and such a hard thing to actually do. I totally understand what my Pastor was saying when he said "I've died so many times in my life, I can't even count how many; it's not even funny how many times I've died. I really have a hard time dying. Every time I do, I struggle with it." That's extremely true with myself - I think every Christian goes through it, too, at some point or another. Dying to ourselves, and pursue with intentionality the Holy Spirit with passion and excitement. We leave ourselves behind, and we are totally passionate about God's plan and his work - a friend of mine once described this as a 'Jesus-High.'

"Then Monday comes," like my Pastor says. Monday and the ordinary come back around, and you're no longer dead to yourself - you're living for yourself again, and are dead to the Holy Spirit. How scary is that, huh? Trusting yourself instead of the one who created, redeemed, and saved your life. I've gone through it many times. Starting over and over again on this spiritual journey that should be a one-time deal.

Starting over. New life. What am I, a cat? Do I have these nine lives I have to go through to get to where I need to be? What does the Bible say?

This is one of my all-time favorite passages in scripture. You can feel the hope and love radiating off of these words as you read them.

¹⁷ This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! ¹⁸ And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. ¹⁹ For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. ²⁰ So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” ²¹ For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.

(2 Corninthians 5:17-21 NLT)

'A New Creation!' 'A New Life!' 'COME BACK TO GOD!' What powerful words. There's never been a point in my life, even when I was a kid, that I didn't believe in God. I consider this to be a good thing and a bad thing. It's good because my parents raised me like they should have - teaching me the Bible and who Jesus was, etc. It's bad because it took 14 years for me to see the difference between knowing about Jesus and actually knowing Jesus. In fact, that is what Steve, my Pastor who did the message I linked to at the top, has been talking about in Church.

Besides that, though, my question remains. 'How do I die to myself and stay dead?'

I think this is where I'm heading these next weeks. For a while, I was concerned with what God wants me to do with my life. I discovered, through the counseling of friends, through messages taught by several Pastors, and studying the scriptures that sin, indeed, is a hinderence.

That might seem obvious. I mean, everyone goes around saying that. But what does that really mean? I believe the sin in us is keeping us from God. Not that we're our old sinful creatures, but the sin that lives in us is trying to control us - the Enemy is trying to control us.

He, the Enemy, would love nothing more than to make a bunch of spiritually dead, Christian zombie drones out of all of us - living for ourselves rather than living a life 'fully alive' (as John Eldredge puts it)

I have sin in my life that I just can't seem to shake... and that's my problem. I'm trying to shake it myself, instead of relying on the Holy Spirit to shake it for me. It seems all this time I am allowing the Holy Spirit to work through me when I feel like it. I'm not relying, counting, on the Holy Spirit to move me. I've been looking at Him more like an aid, rather than a 'counselor.' In Summer camp, what does a counselor do? He directs the paths, places, and activities his campers participate in, right? That is what I want to allow the Holy Spirit to do! Direct my paths like it says in the book of Psalms.

"Show me the right path, O Lord; point out the road for me to follow! Lead me by your truth and teach me, for you are the God who saves me. All day long I put my hope in you." -Psalm 25:4-5

Pray for me as I pray for the Holy Spirit to be a supremely active part of our lives. Through him, God can do amazing things through us! What an amazing thing.

Thanks for reading!
-Matt

Pray for Chile, California, and Hawaii

This morning an earthquake shook the grounds of Chile - the South American nation on the far west side of the continent. The magnitude was 8.8, which is incredibly strong. To put that into perspective, the recent earthquake to nearly destroy the island nation of Haiti was a 7.0. That's 64 times stronger than the one that hit Haiti. However, it was much deeper in the Earth, so the causalities to hit Chile will probably be far less that that of the Caribbean.

The real problem is that the earthquake has caused a tsunami to form in the ocean that is sweeping across the Atlantic toward our home in the United States. California's coast and the entire state of Hawaii is under a severe alert state the is asking everyone to evacuate and get to the highest points they can.

We're praying that God does something that only he can do - that the people of Chile, California, and Hawaii are protected from the dangers of this earthquake and this giant wave headed their way. Keep these people in your prayers, everyone.

-Matt