Chapter by chapter

God wants relationship - seeks.

God cares for his people - provides. 

God uses his people - purposes. 

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He sent Jesus to call us - sought us.

He sent Jesus to free us - provided for us.

He sent Jesus to teach us - he gave us purpose.

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The Spirit plumbs our hearts and souls - He is seeking us. 

The Spirit works in our lives daily that we might die to Sin - He is freeing us. 

The Spirit enables us to walk in the righteousness and power of God - he is giving us purpose. 

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Everything works together for God’s glory

Jesus served the Father. 

The Spirit sent by Jesus empowers the Church to it’s fullness - manifesting God’s glory on earth. 

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This kinda gets me excited. 

Only for the King

Jx

Here’s a fact that I think a lot of Christians forget, now get ready for it - it’s gonna blow your mind -

You don’t need to be Jesus, to be like Jesus.

Uh…?

In church, too many people think that in order to do something good - you have to be Jesus. You need to be amazingly great - before you do something amazingly great. If you want to preach, you need to live a spotless life. If you want to lead evangelism, you need to have lead 127 people to Christ and started 3 separate churches from your own living room. If you want to be in the worship band, you can’t be seen drunk on weekends. 

Now to some degree this is true - BUT ONLY TO SOME DEGREE! There’s a big difference between someone messing up constantly, and someone slipping up.

What happens is the fear of judgment (from the church) or of being unworthy to do God’s work can paralyse people from stepping out into what God has for them. This idea that people need to be perfect can have the opposite effect - it leads people to stop trying from fear of failure. 

We’re called to be like Jesus, we can’t be Jesus himself. 

(Yes, I understand and know that we’re also called to be perfect because God’s perfect, but this is in a heavenly perspective of God sees us as perfect and as Jesus)

You can’t be Jesus. Jesus lived the life of God on Earth - you can never be Him.

So stop trying to be someone your not and do what God has called you to do. 

An example from the Bible is good old King David. He did EVERYTHING that God commanded him to do - and gained a LOT of favour for doing it. Yet he still murdered, committed adultery, lied, cheated and made a general idiot out of himself at times. God didn’t need David to be ‘perfect’, God needed David to do what only King David could do - be King David. 

We need to be liberated from our selves, our own expectations and the fear of judgment from others. If you have conviction to do something - do it. If your conviction is to lead a single’s ministry yet you’ve never been single for more than 2 months at a time and have had 8 partners in the past 2 years - if it’s God’s call - do it. If your conviction is to lead worship or take worship in a new direction yet you can barely play 3 chords on the guitar or sing - if it’s God’s call - do it. If your conviction is to lead an evangelism group yet you’ve never spoken to anyone outside of your intensely close friendship group about God - if it’s God’s call - do it.

Jesus was obedient. We (and I totally include myself in this, I’m writing this for me) need to stop looking at our selfish worries of what others think, or what qualifications I need and start looking to what God has for us, and what He wants Me to do about it. 

We’re called to be Jesus-like - Christ-ian, not Christ. 

God doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the called.

Only for the King

Jx

The way we perceive the Christian faith affects the way that we view evangelism and our practices (state the obvious).

But here´s how it plays out in real life:

If you think that the Christian Faith is one of many faiths, all of which end up the same way - then you will have little urge to share your faith, and urge people into following Jesus - because it doesn´t matter who they follow, as long as they´re following someone (what a real celebration of independence eh?).

If you think that Christianity is a case of knowing and understanding the Bible - then the way you approach evangelism will usually include explaining biblical words like Transgression, or Sanctification, or daiokosune(?) and encouraging people to read more. And if they get to a point to take part in a discussion about unlimited limited atonement, Calvinism and Armenianism - they obviously know their stuff!

If you think that Christianity is purely about helping out at the church then evangelism will start by inviting people along to church ´gathering´ or even worse a church ´social´ with quiche, tea and cream scones, and awkward small talk. And improving your walk involves filling your time with more things at church.

Now, I know not many people in Evangelical circles think of the Christian life as such - but it is possible for thoughts such as these to enter into practice - sometimes even without realising. 

For the majority of people - the Christian walk is one of relationship. You walk with someone else (Jesus), you have the ability to deepen the relationship and it´s a thing of mutuality. With this in mind with Evangelism - you start off by having a relationship with someone - an actual relationship where you do things like ´share´, ´encourage each other´ and maybe even ´tell someone when they´re doing something stupid´.

If we don´t have this relationship with those who we want to show the Love of Jesus to, they will never understand how to start off on this relationship with Him themselves.

We need to practice what we preach.

Only for the King

Jx

Jesus. 

Like, seriously. It does. 

Loads of times people say that the problem is something else: lack of vision, lack of perspective, can’t control emotions, too much money, wrong priorities, bad parenting, overly caring parents, bad decisions, doing too much, fear of man issues… You know the story. 

The thing is that even these have a root issue - Jesus. 

Because, you see, when you get Jesus - everything else falls in to place, although not necessarily at first. 

Problems with fear of man issues dissipate because your worth comes from who Jesus tells you who are. A lack of vision is fulfilled because Jesus becomes your centre of focus. Wrong priorities get re-shuffled as you realise that you love spending time with Jesus and see his blessing for doing so. Emotions become controllable as you submit them to the almighty creator. 

We can spend a lot of time focusing on the problem instead of the solution. We read the bible in the hope it will make us feel that Jesus is our priority. Go to church seeking a plug for the awkward feeling we have at times. We go to debt management classes. I worry about where my thoughts are going. I get confused when I think about my emotions.

What happens when we focus then on the solution? We realise that he’s bigger than the problem - at which point the problem disappears. 

All the courses, all the knowledge in the world, all the friends, all the books can only get you so far - because in the end it all comes back to Jesus. 

Only for the King

Jx

I was in an ice cream place last night with a friend from my small group. Today she’s going to Sao Paulo for a young leaders conference (secular, not christian), and she was complaining that she already knew what they were going to say, already knew the people there, already knew the training they were giving etc…

And whilst she was giving the list I said to her - Yes, but you don’t know how you’re going to Live there.

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Every situation we find ourselves in is another opportunity to discover more of ourselves, of other people, and of God. 

I don’t know what tomorrow has, I still don’t know what today has for me! So, instead of fighting against my situation, I can choose to live WITH, and choose to learn THROUGH the situation.

Practically every story in the Bible is a story of going through a process - refining ourselves, purifying ourselves, sanctifying ourselves - to get to a point where we’re more usable for God’s purposes, i.e. we’re where He wants Us. 

Only for the King

Jx

Get a sofa. Get a lamp (one of those old ones with the frilly lamp-shade). Get a coffee table. Get a few magazines/newspapers. Get a small generator. Get a coffee maker. 

Set all up in the middle of town. 

Invite people to sit with you and talk to them.

Tell them about Jesus in a natural way - because you love them, and Jesus is ace.

Get their number or contact details if the opportunity arises.

Smile.

Pray.

Love.

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Pega uma sofa. Pega uma lampada (com uma pantalha - o tipo com as coisas de babadas). Pega uma mesinha. Pega as revistas/jornais. Pega um gerador. Pega uma maquina de cafe.

Arruma tudo isso no centro da cidade.

Convite pessoas la sentir contigo.

Diga elas sobre Jesus - porque vc ama elas e Jesus é massa.

Pega o numero delas ou detalhes - se a oportunidade vem.

Dá um sorriso.

Ora.

Ama.

Only for the King/Só pra o Rei

Jx

One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.”

John 5:5-7

This question that Jesus asks to the man is a closed question, which means it’s a simple ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ answer. The question is about being healed - having his problems removed, being renewed, having vitality. These things are all things that we want in our lives - not just ‘good’ people, but everyone. The whole world wants these things - a better life, a sense of ‘newness’ and good health. 

But what’s interesting is this - the man doesn’t answer the question. It might just be me, but nowhere does the man say if he does or does not want to be healed.

He missed the point.

Instead what the man did was give an answer to the question which he thought he heard, which seems much more like ‘Have you managed to get into the pool?’. The man focused on a method rather than the problem. He was more focused on how he thought he could get healed, which was getting into the pool, rather than opening up his eyes to other possible methods and inevitably the solution.

We can often do the same. For example, Jesus could be asking ‘do you want to see more of me?’ - and we can respond with ‘But I can’t read my Bible like I want to’, or ‘I don’t enjoy the worship’ or even still ‘God I want a new job/new house/girlfriend/to win the lottery’.

Sometimes we focus on what we think will get the outcome we want - we focus on the method - and miss other opportunities or ways to get the outcome that God desires for us. We worry about Bible reading plans, evangelism programmes, life problems whilst forgetting that we should be having a conversational relationship with Jesus.

We just need to answer the question. Jesus will do the rest.

Only for the King

Jx

Jesus went to parties.

Jesus ate and drank.

Jesus had fun.

Jesus had a close bunch of 12 friends.

Why?

For the glory of God.

Therefore - partying can be done for God’s glory. So, we need to find someway of redeeming this from the ‘party to excess’ attitude.

Us Christians have more of a reason to celebrate and party than anyone else. Fact.

We need to party for God, and show the world what it is that’s so amazing.

We need parties that show the love of Christ. I mean, proper parties - not these silly ‘finger food’ and ‘fruit juice punch’ parties where people are scared to dance, laugh loudly, tell risque jokes, or worry about offending someone. I wanna party for the King - because when I go to Heaven, it’s gonna be a massive party. A party where everything is open, where people can be themselves and be accepted, where jokes are funny, where people show love instead of lust, where there’s more dancing than a nightclub with the music pumping and lights flashing.

Party Hearty cos my heart’s a party.

Only for the King

Jx