A story of losing...

I think back to my freshman year of college. I think way back... almost 4 years ago to when I was moving into my dorm in the heat of summer, I was meeting new friends, I was doing new things, I was a freshman in every sense of the word. I was a freshman in college. I was a freshman in life. I was a freshman in my walk with Christ.

I'd given my life to Christ back in high school. As a sophomore at a Younglife Fall Weekend at Rockbridge I laid on the cold grass and looked up at the stars and finally believed that God loved me. However, I was a slow flame. I went to campaigners, I went to club, yet I didn't really get it. I just didn't understand the Gospel completely.

Fast forward to college.

I came to JMU with the understanding that I was going to do two things. I was going to major in Integrated Science and Technology and I was going to be a Younglife leader. Check and check. End of story.

Well, not exactly.

As I went to Younglife Beyond which then morphed into Leadership Training, I began to realize how fresh I was in my faith. I didn't really know anything about God. I didn't really know anything about faith. I didn't really know much at all. Being in a position where I was unable to help myself, I was in the position God wanted me most--I was beginning to rely on him.

You see, in high school, I was comfortable. I was in a daily routine. I was in a couple clubs with my friends. I played high school golf. And that was essentially my life. It was predictable, it was structured, it was normal... I was in control.

When I got to college, I quickly began to realize that routine wasn't quite as routine. I began to realize that my worth doesn't come from me.

Fast forward to placements. I got placed on Team Elkton. Being from Harrisonburg, I knew at least one leader on every team... except Elkton. Being involved with Beyond and Leadership Training from the beginning, I knew almost every freshman... except the one placed with me (Ellie). I was thrown on a team I didn't know, at a school I didn't know, with another freshman I didn't know at a time where I was quickly learning I didn't know how to lead Younglife!

That was kinda scary.

To make things more fun, in July between freshman and sophomore year, I got a call from Bobby (the other guy leader at Elkton). He told me that he wasn't going to be able to go to camp in August (about 3 weeks away) and that I was going to go. To be honest, my first emotion wasn't excitement. It was fear.

You mean I'm going to camp with a group of guys I hardly know? You mean I am leading a cabin of guys by myself? You mean I have to take two twin brothers who fight constantly (yes, constantly) to camp? Yeah, definitely fear.

Fast forward to camp trip. I was forced (kicking and screaming) into a position where I was completely reliant on God to get me through that week at camp. I learned more about Christ than I think my guys learned. I needed that camp trip as badly as they did. I read a chapter of Philippians each day at camp and looking back through my first attempts at journaling, it is amazing some of the things I wrote. In reference to Philippians 3:8-9, I wrote, "[These verses] have so much power and devotion in them. Paul has discarded EVERYTHING as garbage so he can become one with Christ. I want this kind of devotion in my life and this is something I want to live for and strive for."

I needed to lose my life in order to gain it. I needed to count all things as a loss. I needed to discard all my wants as rubbish. I needed to lose.

Looking back now at how much I had changed from just a year before blows my mind.

I was slowly but surely beginning to realize that life isn't about gaining and achieving and winning... it's about losing.

Fast forward to sophomore year. I decided I was going to Israel. Talk about a step outside my comfort zone. I'd never been out of the country before besides, I don't think I'd ever been away from home for more than two weeks. As I looked back through my journal from sophomore year, I found it funny that on April 9th, my twentieth birthday, I wrote down the scripture that we were memorizing for our trip... Deuteronomy 6:4-9. The funny thing is, I now have part of that tattooed on my arm.

Anyways, God really began preparing me for this trip months before our plane even left Dulles. God was using my fear of the unknown and my anxiety about traveling to bring me closer to him. He was showing me how desperate my daily need for him is. It was one thing for me to hear a leadership talk about spending time in the word, but it wasn't until I felt that need that it became a real thing to me. He was preparing me for time where it all began, he was preparing me for time in Israel where I would learn so much more about my faith.

While in Israel, I learned so much. I learned history, I learned facts, I learned information, but most importantly, I learned about myself and I learned about Christ. I learned more about how I must lose my life.

A distinct memory I have was while we were serving at Bethlehem Bible College. Some people were pouring cement, some were cleaning off roofs, some were washing windows... I was dusting book shelves. To be completely honest, when I found out that was going to be my job for the day, I wasn't happy. My thought was, "I'm a strapping young man, why should I be kept indoors all day dusting off book shelves? Why can't I go do 'fun' things outside?" Ah, my pride. My inability to make myself less. My inability to lose. As I dusted shelves for hours and hours, I got to know the people (Joanna and Ginny) I was working along side very well and it was some of the best conversation I had on that trip.

That trip will stick with me for the rest of my life and I am so happy for you all who get to go in the next month! For those of you who don't get to go, please don't see it as a missed opportunity or that you are missing out. If there's one thing I've learned in my life it's that when I think I'm missing out, I'm usually getting something so much greater... which brings me to another story from the summer between sophomore and junior year.

After a brief time at home, I got asked by Goody to program tech for him at Northbay for two weeks. I figured any time spent with Goody was going to be awesome, so I quickly said yes. About five days later, I drove up to Baltimore and then on to Northbay with Goody and Mike. While tech-ing for them, I continued to learn about losing.

If you've program tech'ed before, you know that typically, nothing ever goes according to plan. If you haven't program tech'ed before I will tell you now: nothing ever goes according to plan. It is stressful but it pushed me into a deeper relationship with Christ. It forced me to surrender my plans to God and trust that his will was and is much higher than mine.

While teching, I was approached by Dave at Rockbridge and he told me to consider interning the next summer.

Fast forward to the next summer. I applied, and that flopped. I prayed hard about it, I pursued it, I jumped through all the hoops but... I didn't get the job. What seemed like the exact door the Lord wanted me to go through just slammed in my face. Granted... Dam got the job and I know he is way more qualified than me, so I guess I'll let it slide. Instead of interning at Rockbridge, I had the awesome opportunity to intern with a non-profit in Charlottesville called Least of These International.

It was super spur-of-the-moment but it ended up being wonderful. Once again, I found myself in a position where I needed to rely on the Lord. I all the sudden had a job in a city an hour from home. Amazingly, God provided me a place to stay (for free!) in Charlottesville with some Younglife guys in exchange for cleaning. It was during my stay there that I learned a lot about serving. A lot about making myself less. A lot about losing.

Once again, I was in a place where I was uncomfortable. It was in this, that I learned so much about the bond we share in Christ. I was able to connect with my new roommates on such deep levels because of the work Christ is doing in us. However, the biggest thing I learned was humility. When I agreed to clean their house in exchange for a free place to stay, I didn't know what I'd gotten myself into. Little did I know how messy this house really was.

At first I resented it. I was frustrated. I was angry that I could be so easily duped into agreeing to clean such a mess. In fact, in one room in the basement, as I was moving some boxes, I saw a rat run up the wall and into a hole. However... while I was cleaning and sweating and coughing up dust, I learned humility. I realized I was in a wonderful position to share Christ with the guys I lived with and so I took on a new attitude. Instead of being prideful (like I so badly wanted to be) I tried to be humble. I made it my goal to leave their house better than before I came. I learned that I needed to lose my life. I needed to lose my pride. I needed to take up my cross.

Fast forward to senior year. It's been a whirl-wind of a year. I encourage everyone to take it all in while you can. It's funny to joke about how fast the time goes by, but it really is true. The time has flown by.

To continue the theme of being thrown into situations where I had to rely on the Lord... I became team leader at Elkton. It was the logical progression. Ellie is the busiest person I know and to try to make her team leader would just be too much, thus, being the only other senior... ta-da. I didn't feel qualified to lead my team. I still don't. But, in it all, I've learned that to lead, you must serve. I've learned that the best leaders are the ones most deeply rooted in Christ.

Fast-forward to today. I am learning more and more about being uncomfortable. I'm about to move two hours away and start a real-life job. Not a fun summer job. A real life job. A job I will likely spend the next several years of my life at. I'm excited to see the way God continues to bring me to himself. I'm excited to continue surrendering my life to him.

I am excited to keep losing.

I have an index card taped to my ceiling right above my head that reads, "Win yourself to Christ today!" Every morning I try to remember to do that. I try to remember that I need to die to myself, take up my cross, and follow Christ. I need to lose my life... daily.

Life is not a check list...

I find it interesting how natural it is for me to unconsciously organize my day into a list of tasks to be completed and checked off.

6:30 AM - Wake up
7:15 AM - Go to middle school
9:05 AM - Environmental Hydrology
11:30 AM - Lunch
1:25 PM - Remote Sensing and GPS
2:30 PM - Ecological Sustainability
6:00 PM - Dinner

It's almost sad how easy it is for me to think through my day when I wake up, develop the list I need to do, and then begin working--one item at a time--until the list is done.

I don't think this is how it's supposed to be. I don't think life should be a check list.

I had a conversation recently about using a planner. As my friend mentioned that she couldn't live without a planner, I pridefully thought to myself, "I don't need a planner, I got all that up in my head."

I don't think there's anything wrong with using a planner. As a matter of fact, I don't think there's anything wrong with having a list of daily tasks. The problem enters when we no longer see individual tasks or events as what they really are--we instead see them as the next thing to do, the next thing to check off.

This is what I really struggle with. On my busiest days, I lie in bed just before getting on with the day and think through each event that is going to happen. I give myself time-frames to work in and I begin my day not focused on what I'm currently doing, but on what is next. How quickly can I finish what I'm on to get to what is next?

This, to me, is the tragedy.

I think it's good to have a vision of the future. Running blindly leads us into walls (figuratively and literally). I think it's good to have a plan. I think it's smart to be organized. Failing to plan is planning to fail as I've often heard. However, the key is this: how do I view my plan?

Do I view it as concrete? Do I view it as absolute? Do I view the individual tasks as check boxes? Do I focus more on the "next" than on the "current"?

I am trying to make a point of not viewing the things I have to do as things I have to do but as things I get to do. Every day is a gift, a new opportunity to serve the Lord. If this is the case, shouldn't I view everything I do as just that--a gift, an opportunity?

Absolutely.

I've been praying to focus more on where I am rather than where I am going. I don't want to miss this. I recently had the opportunity to hear a friend share about her four years of school. She shared (paraphrased), "I was so caught up in feeling like I was missing out that I was missing out on what I was doing."

I don't have a lot of time left here at JMU. I want everything I do to be as special as if it were a gift... because, that's what it really is.

The desert...

The people who survive the sword will find favor in the desert.
I will build you up again. You will be rebuilt.
I am the painter making this mess a masterpiece.
I will rebuild you up again.
--Meridian by August Burns Red

More precisely, the words above come from the book of Jeremiah. Most precisely, the words above come from God.

I have been really blown away lately by God's hatred of sin. The book of Jeremiah tells of the destruction of Jerusalem because of their inequities. God used Jeremiah to give His people a chance at redemption. They rebelled again and again.

However, He didn't give up. He held fast to His promises. He didn't turn His back on His people.

He gave them a promise that if they survived the sword--that is, if they survived His judgment--they would find favor in the desert. The favor they would find is the grace of God. The picture of favor in the desert reminds me of the Exodus. All the Israelites had during that time was God. The only constant in their lives was the Pillar of Fire by night and the Pillar of Cloud by day.

The thing that has really blown me away the most throughout this book is the love that God still has for His people even after they defile Him, mock Him, ignore Him, and forsake Him. They make offerings to idols, they don't keep the commandments, they ignore the teachings of the prophets... the list goes on and on. The scariest thing, is they really aren't very different than me.

On a daily basis I don't give God what he requires. I am so ultimately thankful that when He looks at me He doesn't see my shortcomings. He sees Christ. He sees perfection. He sees righteousness.

All God asks is our repentance. He wants our sincere desire to give up our sin and to embrace His grace. It's so simple.

Don't go changing, trying to please me...

Well I effectively missed February. It's only 3 days shorter. I have no excuse. Bonus points if you can identify the song reference in the title.

Anyways, to update you, my loyal readers, with what I've been learning lately, I figured I would see if I couldn't muster up a little post action. So, without further ado, here goes.

I've been learning a lot about myself lately. I've learned more and more about my shortcomings. I am not perfect. I am so helplessly far from it. Anything I try to do will not be perfect because I am not perfect.

I am so thankful I am not perfect.

It puts me in a wonderful position. It puts me in the best place I could ever be. Being so imperfect puts me in the place where I am so desperately in need of a perfect savior. A.W. Tozer writes of God in his book The Pursuit of God:

"He is immutable, which means He has never changed and can never change in any smallest measure. To change He would need to go from better to worse or from worse to better. He cannot do either, for being perfect He cannot become more perfect, and if He were to become less perfect He would be less than God."

There is so much comfort in that. I am so thankful that God cannot change. I change daily. I change my mind, I change my motivation, I change my clothes, I change my facial hair style, I change my plans, I change nearly everything.

I am so thankful God does not change.

Malachi 3:6 says, "I the LORD do not change. So you, the descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed."

That's it. That's all. That's what I need. That's all I need. God is not my first on a list of... He is my first and only.

Apocalypse...

I'm not sure what direction this post is going to take, so bear with me as I stumble my way through this.

I just finished reading the book of Revelation for the first time today. I had a strange, yet hard to define feeling come upon me as I finished the last chapter. I'm still not sure what that feeling was but it was something I haven't felt before. It was almost like seeing the future... like knowing what was to come. I guess that makes sense, trusting that the Bible is God's word does imply that the events outlined in Revelation are going to happen.

Maybe that is it, maybe that's what that bizarre feeling was... a feeling of foreknowledge. A feeling that I didn't know when these things were going to happen, I didn't know exactly what was going to happen, but I knew that it was going to happen. Strange feeling for sure.

Along the same lines, I think I experienced this feeling while at our Younglife Prayer Overnight over the past weekend. It's a pretty special time where about 900 Younglife leaders from all over the state of Virginia come together to fast and pray and worship. As about 900 of us were singing songs proclaiming God's glory, I stopped for a second and just listened to the thundering chorus around me. It was something awesome. It's not often I've had the privilege of worshiping in a room packed shoulder to shoulder with nearly a thousand fellow believers.

I think that was just a tiny glimpse of what John saw in Revelation 19. He writes, "After this I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, crying out..."

900 people isn't really a great multitude but I will tell you it was something special. I hate how much the word awesome is overused but in the true sense of the word... it was something awesome.

Mountains, walls, other large objects...

It's a good thing I'm reading a book because otherwise I don't think I'd have anything to write about.

Regardless, I'm still reading Too Busy Not To Pray by Bill Hybels which if you haven't read yet, you need to, it's that good. In one of his chapters, Hybels writes about God's ability to answer prayer. It's elementary. We pray, God hears, God answers... how hard is that?

Apparently, it's really hard.

I don't know about you anonymous reader, but I have a hard time praying for big things because I don't think God can do it. Maybe I don't verbalize that, maybe it's not even a conscious thought, but I think deep down I believe he can't do it.

Where do I get the idea that something is "too big" for God?

What kind of nonsense is that?

I was watching a program on the Science Channel the other night (yeah I know, I'm awesome) and it was an episode of Steven Hawking's Into The Universe. In this particular episode, they were discussing the vastness of the universe and how unimaginably big it is. While I was watching this, I began to think about how small I really am. I began to think about how small some of my problems really are.

I realized how big God really is.

Hybels writes a particular section on how we need to stop focusing on the mountains in our life. When I encounter an obstacle or a struggle, I often forget about God and focus on the problem. I stress out. I think about it 24/7. It's all I see. His encouragement is to step out of the shadow of the mountain and look at God. Look at how big he is. Look at how able he is.

When we focus on God, we believe that he is able to move that mountain. When we focus on the mountain, we believe that it will never move.

Another example of this is the famous Battle of Jericho (Joshua 6). Joshua is instructed by God to surround the city and blast the walls with trumpets for seven days. I for one would be pretty skeptical. I would see those huge stone walls and think, "Well, this is not going to work." Instead, Joshua saw God. He saw his ability to tear down those walls. He knew how big his God is.

In case you were wondering, "the observable universe is a sphere with a diameter of about 546,700,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles" (Wikipedia). That's pretty big.

Busy as a beaver...

I for one never understood that statement.

What makes a beaver busier than any other animal? I guess it's just alliteration that makes it so popular, but still, busy as a bee, busy as badger, busy as a black bird... there's other options.

Regardless of that pointless tangent, I write to say that I have been rather busy. You'd think with 3 weeks of no classes, no homework, no readings (required), and no projects I'd find some time to write a measly little blog post. And that my friend, is where you would be wrong.

I've visited friends, I've slept in till noon, I've played basketball, I've played Starcraft 2, I've watched movies, I've traveled, I've sat on the couch, and I've read.

The things I've read are what I'm most interested with sharing. I bought a Kindle with some of my Christmas money and then bought a couple books for it. The first one I bought is called Too Busy Not to Pray by Bill Hybels. I figured it would be the perfect book for me, a man who thinks he is always too busy, to read.

This book has been just what the doctor ordered. I'm only seven or so chapters in, but I've already made some pretty big life changes as far as my prayer life goes. I quickly realized how superficial I am when it comes to praying. It is so easy for me to do. I often just don't pray, but when I do, I often just breeze through it without much thought. This book has really opened my eyes to the power of (and need for) prayer.

Most days, I start off by praying something like, "Father, be with me today as I do... x, y, and z." How silly is that? God tells us multiple times in his Word that he is with us always. Hybels says to instead, try praying, "Father, make me aware of your presence..." How much more effective and necessary is that!?

This book is loaded with little bits of application that have already began to take root in my life. I'm excited to keep reading and keep learning how to become a better pray-er.

I encourage you, if you are looking for something to read, to read this book. I encourage you, if you are not looking for something to read, to read this book. It's no secret that prayer is a powerful tool that God has given us (just read Acts). Knowing how to use it effectively is the key.