Praying At A Pole

I saw God work in a very powerful way today.  Someone encouraged me to lead SYATP (See You At The Pole) which is an international day of prayer for schools.  On this day every year students gather around the school's flagpole to pray before school starts.  The students pray for things going on around the world like for the soldiers overseas and for their school campus.  SYATP has to be student led event so I decided to lead it.

I sent a forwarded message out about the event a couple days ago, since it was such late notice I didn't think a lot of people would show up.  Well my dad and I showed up early at the school.  My dad bought doughnuts  on the way to school so people had an extra incentive for coming.  Only five people showed up, so I decided to do some last minute advertising.  The school hadn't opened it's doors yet so I told everyone waiting outside the school doors what SYATP was about, one person came, but after dissing the doughnuts my dad bought he decided to leave.  A couple minutes had passed and the school doors opened so the early risers could go inside twenty minutes before class started.  I sprinted in the school with another student and we told everyone what it was about.  Then one of my friends (who had a very high influence among her peers) yelled "I think we should do it!", and just like that about twenty-five kids stood up and walked outside to the flagpole.

When we were all flocked around the flagpole we had to start immediately since I had already wasted five precious minutes herding people outside to the flagpole.  First we read some Bible verses to introduce the prayer, then we formed a circle and held hands.  Almost all of us prayed at least once, it amazed me at how personal some of the prayers were.  I could feel the Holy Spirit warming our hearts in the cold morning as we prayed.  Even some teachers stood silently outside the circle with their eyes closed in prayer.  God brought about 30 people together before Him today.  I had almost lost hope and I honestly thought that nobody would show up.  I feel ashamed.  It's as if I had forgotten we were praying to a God with unlimited power and glory.  God performed a miracle today.

This also brings me to another point I have been meaning to write about for a while.  A lot of people didn't care about praying in front of the flagpole this morning.  Sure, they believed in God, and they were thankful for Him, and that's all that matters in the end, right?  Wrong.  It happens all over the world, especially in America.  People except that there is a God, and that Jesus died for their sins, and they just assume that gets them a free pass into Heaven.  I am not writing this to criticize people at my school that didn't come to SYATP, lots of people couldn't come because I didn't let a lot of people know in advance and because lots of students aren't used to getting to school early. 

Back to the point, God wants us to take action for Him.  That is what about thirty people did this morning, they took the opportunity to show their love for Jesus.  Jesus gave his life for us and I had some kids staring at me like I was stupid for even mentioning the word prayer.  Jesus gave his life so I could have eternal life with God, praying by a pole is the least we can do.  All we can do to spread the glory of God is all we should be doing.  It makes me sick that some people think they are entitled to a God that loves them.  God could have just given up on us when Adam and Eve bit into the forbidden fruit, but He didn't give up on us.  I will never understand that.

It's Worth The Wait

I have written a post about resisting sex before but I think it needs more elaboration.  I am going through the trouble of writing this post because I feel it is very important.  We live in a society that can't talk enough about sex.  I hear mentions of sex everyday, and from what I have heard, it seems that a lot of people have a twisted view of it.

Sex in a relationship outside of marriage is a big deal.  The New Testament cannot stress enough that sex outside of marriage is horrible.  It has a good reason for saying so.  I am not saying that sex itself is bad, God made sex and God is obviously good.  Sex is a wonderful thing in marriage, without it the human race wouldn't have made it farther than Adam and Eve. 

When there is sex outside of marriage then nobody wins except Satan.  Lets say there is a teenage couple, they have only been dating a little over two weeks and they have sex.   Since they haven't been dating long they don't know as much about each other as a couple that has been married for 10 years.  Sex is all they have in common now, so to keep their new relationship in tact they do it again.  This relationship obviously isn't going to last very long because neither of them had the chance to have a normal relationship to find out what they have in common and what they don't have in common.  All they had in common was sex.  Now they break up.  Both of their hearts are torn.  Sex has serious emotions involved that are special inside marriage, but both of them just threw away those special emotions because of their own selfish desires. 

In this sense sex is like a sticker.  You can put a sticker on many things but once you put it on something and then put it on something else then it is a little less stickier than before.  If someone exchanges sex with several people then by the time that person get married then sex with their partner won't be special at all.

Now lets say that a couple of friends that have known each other for years decide to date.  They figure its okay to have sex because they say they are going to get married someday anyway.  They do it only every once in a while because they think it reduces the chance of producing a child.  Sex is a risk like any other risk, lets say sex is like standing in the middle of an interstate.  You may dodge a couple cars but you are going to get hit eventually.  So the girl gets pregnant, both of them are scared and they go to the hospital so the girl can get an abortion.  Neither of them expects to feel guilty about it, but they do.  When you take away a life you remember it for the rest of your life, even if that life isn't out of the womb yet.  If you don't believe me then listen to the song Lucy by Skillet, its about a man that got his girlfriend pregnant and his girlfriend got an abortion.  They talked to a counselor because of the overwhelming guilt they both felt.  The counselor told them to have a funeral for the baby and name the unborn baby.  They named the baby Lucy.  Its a very sad song. . .

Anyhow, I will use one last example.  Lets say that the couple I just mentioned  decided not to have an abortion, but to raise the child and be parents.  Now they have to quit school to take care of the baby and one of them needs to get a job to support  sed baby.  Now they are very poor, they either bought a cheap apartment or they are living with a family member.  They both had dreams of what they wanted to be.  Maybe he wanted to be a singer and maybe she wanted to be a professional dancer.  Both of those dreams are ruined.  They don't have an education and they can't go to college.  Their child will grow up poor and will have to carry the shame of knowing that he (or she, whichever you prefer) was an accident.  His parents didn't want a kid, they wanted pleasure. 

Premarital sex isn't worth the risk, one moment of pleasure isn't worth ruining your life over.  It's one of the stupidest things anyone can do.

God doesn't want you to have sex outside marriage, not because He doesn't want you to enjoy yourself, but because He loves you.  Without the sturdy foundation of marriage for sex to rest on then it's a major safety hazard for everyone involved.  It seems that isn't taken into account when people joke about sex.  If you truly love your boyfriend or girlfriend you will wait to have sex until you get married. 

God knows what we deal with.  He wouldn't judge us if we were perfect.  God knows what we are going through, Jesus was tempted in every way that we are.  Resisting sex is a big deal and can feel impossible at times.  I would like to include a great quote from C.S. Lewis:

"...those who are seriously attempting chastity are more conscious, and soon know a great deal more about their own sexuality than anyone else.  They come to know their desires as Wellington knew Napoleon, or as Sherlock Holmes knew Moriarty; as a rat-catcher knows rats or a plumber knows about leaky pipes.  Virtue - even attempted virtue - brings light; indulgence brings fog."

The more you resist your desires, the more you know how to resist them and overpower them.  God knows what He's talking about when He tells us to wait until marriage to have sex.

Yelling At People Doesn't Help Jesus (Or Your Throat!)

Last weekend I saw a man yelling on the street.  I was ignoring him until I heard the loud words "sinners" and "Hell".  He was yelling into a megaphone at people telling them to get saved.  He had a bible in his hand but he didn't open it.  I think if he had actually opened his bible he wouldn't have been yelling at those people.

Witnessing is very important to do, that's why we need to know how to do it and do it right.  Witnessing is sharing the love of God with others.  We are so in awe of our relationship with God that we want others to have a relationship with Him too.  I didn't feel a lot of love from the person on the street, in fact, I didn't feel any love at all.  If I didn't have a relationship with God and I saw that guy yelling at me, I would actually be repelled from Christianity.  I would have asked myself "This is what Christians are like, hateful and judgmental?"  That's not what God tells us to do at all,  He tells us to be loving and humble.

In Paul's letter to the Corinthians he wrote:

Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men of courage; be strong.  Do everything in love.
(1 Corinthians 16:13,14, NIV)

The Yelling Dude probably had good intentions.  He wanted to save people.  He wanted to be a man of courage and he stood firm enough in his beliefs enough to tell people about them. It wasn't enough, if he didn't witness out of love nothing he said mattered one bit.

If you rewind a couple chapters in Paul's letter to the Corinthians you will run into these verses on love:

If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  If I give all my possessions to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
(1 Corinthians 13:1-3, NIV)

Love is the basis of witnessing.  The Yelling Dude could tell people they are going to Hell all he wants, he can yell his head off, but nobody will be saved.  The harder he hurls insults at people the harder they bounce back.  You could pray with one of your friends during school lunch and that could bring ten times more salvation than Yelling Dude was trying to dish out.  Witnessing without love is in vain, Yelling Man is just a clanging cymbal.  Nobody can bring salvation but Jesus.  Jesus knocks on the doors of our hearts and witnessing is just asking, "Hey, are you going to open that?".  If we yell at people to open the door they are going lock it for good, which beats the whole purpose of witnessing.  On the other hand, if we ask them with love then the odds for their salvation are suddenly a lot higher.

Since love is the basis of witnessing, how do we witness?  The best way to witness is with your actions.  Keeping love the basis of every choice you make.  Instead of asking yourself how you can benefit from choices you make, ask yourself how you can help other people benefit from the choices you make.  If you do use words to witness, just share your own journey with God and the ways Jesus changed your life.  Never witness because you are "better than someone else".  We are not better because we are Christians, just better off.  Witness because you truly care for their salvation, witness because you can't imagine where your life would be without Jesus and you want them to live their life the way they were born to; to have a relationship with their loving Creator.

Love others like Jesus loves you, that's all witnessing is.  Believe me, it's a lot more efficient than yelling your head off on the street.

A Message For All You Blog Readers

Hey blog viewers!  This post is for all of you.  I would like to thank all viewers everywhere, thank you for taking time out of your busy day to get on my site.  For those of you who don't know me  I especially thank you for your interest in my blog.  For those of you who have commented, I thank you all for any kind of feedback.  Your comments lift my spirit and I always love to hear anything anyone has to say.  I love criticism, but I love constructive criticism.  If you don't like what I have to say, please leave a comment stating why you don't like it and what I can to do improve it.  If you are still itching to give me an earful or if you would like to argue a point, then please send it to my email address which you will find at the bottom of the About Me page. 

I would like to have a relationship with all of you.  I always love chillin' with my brothers and sisters in Christ, so if you want to talk about whatever, just email me.  Book recommendations are welcome with open arms as well as (clean) Chuck Norris jokes.  I cherish your opinions to help me improve my blog so it can attract more awesome people as yourself.  So if you like this blog (or think I'm a nutcase), then please share this blog with your  best friends or your local complete stranger. 

If you look to the left of your screen you will see a box that asks "Do you look at the Christian Bands gadget below?", then below that is the said Christian Bands gadget.  The Christian Bands gadget is a bunch of you tube videos of different Christian bands and singers.  I have it so I can introduce different tastes of Christian music to you.  Christian music has evolved a lot in the past several decades.  I always try to connect with people my age and this is one of those ways, I created the Christian Bands widget to show that Christian music can be awesome, it's not just Hymns.  I have always wondered how many people actually use it or if I should have a better method for sharing music.  This is what the survey is for, so please fill in one of the three bubbles and click Vote.  If you have a better way for my to share Christian tunes on this blog or if you have some Christian music artists to recommend, please email me.  Before I end this post, I want to let you know that I try to publish a post every seven days but sometimes I am busy with school work or I haven't had the time to write.  Have no fear, I will eventually post as soon as I get around to it (. . . or whenever I feel like it :P).

I thank you all for reading this, now you can go back to walking your internet and surfing your dog.