We have been teaching a series called “Going Deep” over the last few weeks and it has been an awesome experience for me because it has been shaping me as I teach it.
The thing I have been pondering is how we mostly present Christianity as a belief system instead of a way of life. Our faith was intended to be a way of life. God models this for us. We know 1 John 4:8 says “God is love.” This is our belief. But, in Romans 5:8 God Gives us His way of life, “But God demonstrates his own love for us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” We know the bible says God is kind and we believe it but Romans 2:4 says “the kindness of God leads you to repentance.” Our belief system has to always be fleshed out. It has to become for us a way of life.
In our series about “Going Deep”,we looked at Acts 2:42-47 where the believer (system) devoted themselves (way of life). They devoted themselvesto fellowship and breaking of bread which requires a great deal of humility and vulnerability. Let’s just say this is RISKY BUSINESS. I shared in our series how we will have fellowship to the degree that we are known. This means the risk of exposing ourselves, being real. It questions “If I let people know this about me, what will they think, what will they do?”
That said, I was privileged this week to be invited to lunch by a new friend. When we settled down to eat he said the reason he wanted to have lunch with me was to expose himself. He said he wanted to tell me about his life so we could know each other deeper. WOW!!! The courage it takes to let it all hang out. My experience has been, you never know how people will react when you open up to be known. I am so blessed, both as this persons friend and as a pastor. I am blessed to go deeper as a friend and like most pastors, we are blessed when people “get it.” It takes a great deal of faith to live the kind of life, but is is our reward, our inheritance in the saints.
Hang in there with me, I need to catch up the last two weeks of this series here on the blog. (Breaking Bread & Prayer)
Here are the links for the first 3 parts of this series “GOING DEEP.”
I’m going to be radically gender-un-PC and say that it must have been really hard for him. Generally girls are the kind that want to tell all, I think.
Have you read the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan?