REAL LIFE

In my almost fifty-year Christian walk, I have seen and been the participant of countless blessings.  I have seen hundreds of lives positively changed by the gospel of Jesus Christ, had the immense honor of teaching the gospel to children, youth, college-career age and adults in five different churches, write an encouraging blog that’s based on Christian principles for over ten years now, and see nature defying miracles where people stood up healed from the confines of their wheelchairs, broken bones healed, diseases disappear and financial needs met along with countless other physical, spiritual and emotional healings.

But in that time… because of stands I’ve taken for or based on my Christian faith… I have also been called naïve, stupid, reckless and irresponsible and at times, even spoken to as if I was the local village idiot sitting in the room… to name just a few!  I’ve told before of how Piper and I decided that we weren’t satisfied sitting in the stands in our Christian walk, but wanted to be actively playing in the game.

We committed to each other to take Jesus at His Word, and to the best of our ever- increasing knowledge and ability, to live our lives like the Word of God was just as true and powerful for us today as it had been in the days of the first church written of in the book of Acts.  I guess you could say that we wanted to be among those whose stories are being written about in the 29^th chapter of Acts… that is still being written today!

In I John 5:20 the Apostle John, nicknamed the Apostle of Love, wrote to the early church saying, “And we know that the Son of God came so we could recognize and understand the truth of God—what a gift!—and we are living in the Truth itself, in God's Son, Jesus Christ. This Jesus is both True God and Real Life.” (MSG) 

In many ways, this verse sums up the entire gospel message.  It tells us why Jesus came, who He is and what kind (or Whose kind) of life that we are to live once we’ve accepted His message of truth and redemption. But it would seem that there are forces in this world that don’t like it when Christians set out to live their lives with the understanding that Jesus is not only the TRUE GOD, but also the only way to living a REAL LIFE on this earth, and then continue in heaven.

The problem… or maybe better said, the challenge… for Christians is to understand that the miraculous nature of an all-powerful, loving and grace-filled, forgiving God does not fit in with the intellectual, scientific and so-called sophisticated ways of the world system.  Anything that doesn’t fit into their neat package of life with its constantly growing lists of Do’s and Don’ts is seen as total fantasy and many times as pure ignorance!

With that understanding in mind, it is easy to see why Moses emphatically told his successor Joshua to “Be strong and courageous! Don't tremble or be terrified, because the LORD your God is with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9 God’s Word ©) just before Joshua led the Israelite people into the promised land, where they would face all kinds of physical, mental and emotional battles.  It’s kind of like the things that we face on a daily basis when we take a stand of faith based on the TRUTH of God’s Word… in defiance to the world’s definition of truth... or REAL LIFE! 

In speaking of the so-called sophisticated ways of the world, it is interesting to me that the definition of “Sophisticated” according to Dictionary.com, is “A person altered by education, experience, etc; so as to be worldly wise.”

Well… if that be true… then as a Christian, it would make perfect sense, that if we want to live the REAL LIFE spoken about within the pages of our Bibles, then we have to humble ourselves before the Lord so as to be taught and study the Word on our own, in order to ALTER ourselves (away from the world’s limiting standards) and thus become SPIRITUALLY wise and thereby set-free to live God’s REAL LIFE in the face of the crumbling world system!

I’ve often-times heard that the signs, wonders and miracles that Mark 16:17 speaks of, that are supposed to follow those of us who believe (in the gospel of Jesus Christ), act as a calling card (a floodlight, a Bat Signal in the sky) to the unbelievers in the world… to those who are caught up and bound by that system. 

If you’re anything like me, then you want to live the REAL LIFE that shines like the flood light in the sky that draws hungry souls to inquire about Christ and what He has done for you!  RIGHT?

So yeah… it’s kind of like the Dukes of Hazzard where you fight the system by living a life that defies the world and causes a blessing to all!  And with the way things are going in the world today… I believe that it is rapidly coming to the point where all of us are going to be forced to make a decision… to live bound by the world’s way of doing things… or living the REAL LIFE of Christ.

Which will you choose?

Have a great weekend, and as you do, keep EXPECTING God’s best for your life today!