Gospel Invasion

I got this update from Desiring God's daily e-mails. It's a powerful look at how the Gospel compels us to live and to view our lives. May we find freedom and we surrender our lives to God's kingdom plan as we relinquish our own.


In his new book, Gospel Wakefulness, Jared Wilson writes,

One of the attendant aims of missional evangelicalism is to challenge the compartmentalizing of the Christian faith that we see within the Western church. We are fantastic at itemizing our schedules, and even if we don't assign God a very large bracket, we are constantly remorseful that we "haven't made much time for him." While such compartmentalizing — as if "time with God" can or should be hermetically sealed off from everything else — is a natural symptom of our culture and environment, it also reflects a bad theology.

The truth is, the day does not belong to us. It is not our day to do with as we please. We serve a sovereign God. He created the end from the beginning, knows our future exhaustively, and is firmly in control. He made our days and they belong to him. As such, isn't it a bit arrogant to begin with the idea that each day is ours and then worry about fitting God in? Instead, we should work at the humble awe of knowing all of our moments, every millisecond, waking or sleeping, are perfectly accounted for within the economy of heaven.

Let us stake the flag of Christ's kingdom into the soil of our first waking moment. Drink your coffee when you get up, of course, but drink it to the glory of God. Then carry on in this way all day, no matter the task, be it menial or notable, so that each day may be a living prayer that God's will will be done on earth as it is in heaven. This is what it means to live a gospel-saturated life: it means being so conscious of the greatness of the gospel that changing diapers or cutting the grass is as much an act of worship as singing a praise chorus in a church service….

Jesus Christ is Lord over my heart, and he is Lord over my hands, and he is Lord over what I do with these hands, and he is Lord over what I say in my heart while I'm doing it. In submitting to the lordship of Christ, then, I do not treat washing dishes as wasting time I could be spending doing something "meaningful," but rather as a service to those who eat in my home, as a service to those who would have to wash the dishes if I did not, and as an offering of thanksgiving to God that I have food to eat, dishes to eat it on, and running water inside my home to clean with.

To paraphrase C. S. Lewis, there is not a square inch of our lives that is not claimed by God and counterclaimed by ourselves. If we believe God is sovereign, however, we will see all of life as mission and be led to submit the square inches we otherwise hold so tightly to the Maker of inches and hands.

Gospel Wakefulness, (Wheaton: Crossway, 2011), 90–92, paragraphing added.

Thankful

Today I am thankful.

Thankful that sometimes God says no.
Thankful for a husband who's faith outlasts my own.
Thankful that that same husband buys me a pumpkin latte not because it solves anything but because it makes me smile.
Thankful for a home where we can entertain and see God work.
Thankful for struggles that lead us to truth.
Thankful that home is simply where we are as long as God is there.
Thankful that one day home will be permanent.
Thankful for a dad who prays and a mom who encourages me.
Thankful that God speaks through others.
Thankful for a random note of encouragement from my uncle.

Today I know that prayers aren't always answered in the way I imagined but I also know that we are not abandoned and that because the Son of God died there is a future and a hope. Today I'm finding thankfulness behind closed doors.

A thankful heart is a free heart. May you be thankful today!

A look at suffering

Let's admit. We all have struggles. We all have suffering in our lives. Maybe it's bad health or a bad relationship or job rejection or just unexplained sadness that keeps us up at night.

I've had my fair share of what I would call suffering. I've had health issues, relationship struggles, family trials and sadness that came with moving and getting married and watching life change suddenly. There have been moments when I could swear to you that no one cared and no one really loved me, yes, even Jesus.

I remember dark nights of the soul, nights not that long ago. I was promised that things would get better, that I would "make it". And then one night I realized that things weren't better, at least not in my time, and I wasn't sure that while in fact I would, "make it", I really wanted to. What's the purpose of a life where suffering is inevitable and where it seems like no one could understand?

Mark 14:36 is a powerful portrayal. In it we see Jesus knelt before the Father saying, "Abba, Father, all things are possible for You. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will but what you will." And here suffering is met with the greatest love we can know. In suffering I don't need to hear that I'll make it or that things will get better. I need to hear the words of my Savior as He willingly suffered for me. "Not what I will, but what You, Father, will". And because of those words, the Creator of the universe laid down His life for me.

Freedom is not found in looking at our circumstances and trying to overcome. Freedom is found in looking to Someone greater and trusting He who has already overcome. May you rest in that freedom today.
"In all things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. Romans 8:37