A good comedy…always makes me happy…
A warm afternoon, with my windows down and my roof open while listening to music loud…
Nacho Cheese Doritos…
Fishing with my dad…
Guitar solos…good ones…
Playing the guitar…
Robby Kroll’s laughter…
Japanese food…sushi…all of that stuff
Helen Keller jokes…
Chips and salsa
One thing I’ve come to realize about spiritual gifts and callings, is that a lot of people, myself included, limit ourselves to what those callings are. We’ll say “I’m called to THIS ministry…nothing else.” So throughout our whole lives we’ll do what we’re called to and do nothing after that season of ministry is over in our lives. It would be like a pastor leaving a church, and just sitting around until the next church came around that offered him a job. Or a worship leader leaving a church and not joining any church unless he/she could serve in the worship ministry only. Sitting around and waiting until something comes around that appeals to us. We waste time waiting when we could be serving in another place. I’ve played worship music for the past two years, I can play the guitar, but it’s just boring to me now. God’s going to take me out of that ministry within the church. I think we need to extend our gifts and passions OUTSIDE the 4 walls of the church. Maybe the pastor that leaves a church needs to become a teacher and get involved in a generation that so desperately needs to see something real. Maybe musicians need to quit thinking that they’re musical ability automatically makes them a worship leader, and they need to give music lessons and invest in some lost people.
I think maybe we’ve been fed this idea that using your gifts outside the church doesn’t glorify God…that’s a load of bullcrap. I commend bands that leave the world of christian music…real bands that have talent and take their message to a lost world….what an opportunity. I’m afraid that there are pastors out there who don’t even REMEMBER what it is like to be in a lost world…because they sit in their church office 30-40 hours a week, prepare sermons, and wait for people to come to them with their marital problems, lost friends, complaints about church stuff…and all that crap. Maybe they could have some more sermon illustrations of lost people getting saved outside the church walls, and maybe just some good sermon illustrations in general…you know the pastors i’m talking about…they use the same illustrations…over and over and over. Wouldn’t it be sweet if you called the church office, and the secretary said…”i’m sorry…he’s not here.” To which you remember…oh yeah…it’s tuesday…he’s out investing in lost people. I just think that to be a pastor it would be hard to be among lost people in your work place.
I was thinking about persecution today randomly. So many early Christians were beaten, scourged, burned, and all kinds of crap. I mean, I think Paul was probably wierd and deformed looking. People threw Him out side the city thinking he was dead. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that even if someone didn’t know one of the disciples, they could make a very good educated guess because of how bruised or deformed they looks. What if the thorn in paul’s side was physical pain from beatings? Man, I know if I got sick or broke my arm, I would excuse myself from a mission trip, but I don’t know if Paul would have.
I’ve been thinking about how critical I am of other people. If somebody shares a conviction in their life and I think the person is wierd…I automatically just think it is completely insignificant. God may be at work in somebody’s life and I’ll seriously judge their motives in the most negative ways…and God has just really convicted me about it. I mean, let’s face it…we all have people that we can’t stand, but we still have NO room to judge at all. I’m worthless without Christ anyway. I’m just too critical maybe sometimes, and I don’t want to turn people away from knowing Jesus because of how critical a person I am. I’ll be honest, I can be pretty pessimistic sometimes and say stuff like “oh…of COURSE!!” whenever anything bad happens, and man…I just want God to inhabit everything about me. I want every aspect of my life to be specifically sanded and varnished the way he sees fit. That’s where I’m at right now…
