Crazy Love - Chapter Five

This chapter is how you know Francis Chan is a pastor. It's about giving. Now I'm not being fair, it's a lot more than just giving, it's about loving God so much you'd be willing to give up anything. It's just funny that a bulk of it is about giving/tithing and we had the same sermon this past week (a great sermon by the way which can be found...HERE)

Anyways, this chapter is basically backing up the previous chapter - God doesn't want lukewarm Christians. You look at all of these passage where people claim to want to follow Jesus but first they have to _____, or the book of Revelation that shows all of these great churches who still think they're great but they lost their way. "Jesus’ call to commitment is clear: He wants all or nothing. The thought of a person calling himself a ‘Christian’ without being a devoted follower of Christ is absurd"

Like I said this chapter just emphasized a lot that I heard last Sunday. Especially this example. Malachi 1:8 says "When you bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice crippled or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?" says the LORD Almighty."

"The priests of Malachi’s day thought their sacrifices were sufficient. They had spotless animals, but chose to keep those for themselves and give their less desirable animals to God. They assumed God was pleased because they had sacrificed something.

God described this practice as evil.

Leftovers are not merely inadequate; from God’s point of view (and lest we forget, His is the only one that matters), they’re evil. Let’s stop calling it “a busy schedule” or “bills” or “forgetfulness.” It’s called evil. (ouch)

God is holy. In heaven exists a Being who decides whether or not I take another breath. This holy God deserves excellence, the very best I have. “But something is better than nothing!” some protest. Really, is it? Does anyone enjoy token praise? I sure don’t. I’d rather you not say anything than compliment me out of obligation or guilt. Why would we think God is any different?"

But Craig you sound like a preacher, I thought this whole study was about love, what does giving have to do with love? Did you not see it!? Do you love your spouse? Would you eat the best food you could find and give your spouse whatever money is left over to go eat at McDonalds? Of course not! But we do that with God. We fill ourselves up first and then give God what's left over once we're comfortable. That's not crazy love that's just crazy!

But if you want to talk about love check this out:

"But Paul writes that even if “I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor. 13:2-3 ESV). Wow. Those are strong and unmistakable words. According to God, we are here to love. Not much else really matters."

I LOVE this exercise Francis describes when it comes to the most famous passage about love (that we often skip over because we've heard it so many times)

"Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.... faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love."

-1 Corinthians 13:4-8, 13

"I was challenged to do a little exercise with these verses, one that was profoundly convicting. Take the phrase Love is patient and substitute your name for the word love (For me, ‘Francis is patient…”). Do it for every phrase in the passage.

By the end, don’t you feel like a liar? If I am meant to represent what love is, then I often fail to love people well.

Following Christ isn’t something that can be done halfheartedly or on the side. It is not a label we can display when it is useful. It must be central to everything we do and are.

If life is a river, then pursuing Christ requires swimming upstream. When we stop swimming, or actively following Him, we automatically begin to be swept downstream."

Great closing thoughts:

"But the fact is that nothing should concern us more than our relationship with God; it's about eternity, and nothing compares with that. God is not someone who can be tacked on to our lives"

"Like the parable of the sower, don't assume you are the good soil; don't assume you are one of the few on the narrow way."

Crazy Love - Chapter Four

"It is not scientific doubt, not atheism, not pantheism, not agnosticism, that in our day and in this land is likely to quench the light of the gospel. It is a proud, sensuous, selfish, luxurious, church-going, hollow-hearted prosperity."

Frederic D. Huntington Forum magazine, 1890

Remember how I sound I love harsh truths, and I love how this book is full of them. Ok do you also remember the part where I said I don't like harsh truths if they apply to me...yeah so I hate Chapter Four

It's an entire chapter of harsh truths for the lukewarm Christian (aka me)

I can't post many notes without posting the entire stinking chapter (and thus running into copyright issues I'm sure...) Fair to say, Francis makes a giant list of characteristics of a lukewarm Christian and just about all of them hit a little too close to home. He talks about how Jesus talked in parables so the people who WANTED to hear it would get it and those who were only half-hearted wouldn't understand what he was talking about. Jesus didn't have time for the half-interested, "The fact is, He just wasn't interested in those who fake it."

"Lukewarm people are moved by stories about people who do radical things for Christ, yet they do not act. They assume such action is for ‘extreme’ Christians, not average ones. Lukewarm people call ‘radical’ what Jesus expected of all his followers."

But doesn't this always happen? We hear a great speaker or read an amazing passage that reminds us (and guilts us) to not live a lukewarm life. And we say "amen"! I'm going to make some changes in my life! I'm tried of living like this! And then......nothing. Monday comes a long and it's business as usual

How in the world do we stop talking and start doing!?

I love Craig Ferguson. If you don't know what is, do you remember the Drew Carey show? He was his Scottish boss. Well he's hilarious. Potty mouth but hilarious. Anyway, last night on his Late Night talk show he did an entire show about Black History month with the AMAZING Dr Cornel West (quite possibly the smartest man alive). I must say huge props to Craigy Ferg who as a Scottish national takes his America citizenship so seriously he takes an entire day to NOT do corny jokes and interview boring celebrities but instead uses his resources to hold an honest discussion about some of the darkest times in American history

Wow where am I going with this? Well when asked over and over how do we move past the wounds created by our ancestors Dr. West said one thing over and over. Courage. Courage to move on from past mistakes. Courage to love one another regardless of our differences. Courage to love one another in spite of how others will see it. And I first I thought "that's a cheesy, flowery, answer". Courage isn't an actual act to help cure intolerance. But the more I thought the more I realized...he's right. Whatever act you choose to take to counteract intolerance...it took courage. It took the guts to get up and just do it.

That's how we stop being lukewarm. Courage. Have the courage to just do it! Have the courage to live a CRAZY God-like love no matter how "radical" or "extreme" the world will call you (and more importantly how weird other comfortable Christians will call you). Just do it!

Francis has a great illustration about when he wanted to join the Marines:

"When I was in high school, I seriously considered joining the Marines; this was when they first came out with commercials for “the few, the proud, the Marines.” What turned me off was that in those advertisements, everyone was always running. Always. And I hate running.

But you know what? I didn’t bother to ask if they would modify the rules for me so I could run less, and maybe also do fewer push-ups. That would’ve been pointless and stupid, and I knew it. Everyone knows that if you sign up for the Marines, you have to do whatever they tell you. They own you.

Somehow this realization does not cross over to our thinking about the Christian life. Jesus didn’t say that if you wanted to follow Him you could do it in a lukewarm manner. He said, “Take up your cross and follow me.”

God give me the courage to just do it. Let me love you with a crazy love.

Crazy Love - Chapter Three

This was a chapter that would seem hard to comprehend if you weren't a parent, but I love how Francis explains it. This whole chapter is about seeing God as your father. He talks about the bad relationship he had with his father built on fear. And a lot of the times we think we have the same relationship with God - don't make dad mad.

But everything changed when Francis had his first child:

"For the first time I got a taste of what I believe God feels toward us. I thought about my daughter often. I prayed for her while she slept at night. I showed her picture to anyone who would look. I wanted to give her the world."

That's EXACTLY how God feels about us! He's our dad! He's always thinking about us, He's always praying for us, He's running around to all of the angels saying "did you see what they did! Those are MY kids! Look at them!" Just beaming with pride!

I think we have to unpack the concept of "reverent fear" (but that would be a whole different post entirely) and understand it's place, but NEVER forget this image of a loving father.

"My own love and desire for my kids’ love is so strong that it opened my eyes to how much God desires and loves us. My daughter’s expression of love for me and her desire to be with me is the most amazing thing. Nothing compares to being truly, exuberantly wanted by your children.

Through this experience, I came to understand that my desire for my children is only a faint echo of God’s great love for me and for every person He made. I am just an earthly, sinful father, and I love my kids so much it hurts. How could I not trust a heavenly, perfect Father who loves me infinitely more than I will ever love my kids? "

And there we go again focusing on how it makes us feel to have such a loving father, but think about how it makes God feel! How amazing it is as a parent to feel wanted by your children. And again, we're talking about God here, THE CREATOR OF EVERYTHING! He actually longs to feel wanted by His children!

"God knew you and me before we existed [Jeremiah 1:4-5]. When I first digested this, all of my other relationships seemed trivial by comparison. God has been with me from the start - in fact well BEFORE the start."

That's all well and good Craig but He's still God, he can't care THAT much. Read Jeremiah 1:6-10. Go ahead go do it now. You look it up and come back here...

"When Jeremiah voices his hesitation and fear, God – the God of the galaxies – reaches out and touches his mouth. It’s a gentle and affectionate gesture, something a loving parent would do. Through this illustration I realize I don’t have to worry about not meeting His expectations. This is the God we serve, the God who knew us before He made us. The God who promises to remain with us and rescue us. The God who loves us and longs for us to love Him back."

You're right He is God. He doesn't need us. But he WANTS us!

“The very fact that a holy, eternal, all-knowing, all-powerful, merciful, fair and just God love you and me is nothing short of astonishing. The wildest part is that Jesus doesn’t have to love us. His being is utterly complete and perfect, apart from humanity. He doesn’t need me or you. Yet He wants us, chooses us, even considers us His inheritance (see Eph. 1:18). The greatest knowledge we can ever have is knowing God treasures us.

That really is amazing beyond description. The holy Creator sees you as His “glorious inheritance.”

Do you get it yet? Do you see how much God loves YOU! That's the crazy part in crazy love. But how do we respond. The absolute minimum. We think going to church or having a quiet time is an equivalent amount of love in exchange for this amazing, crazy love God shows us.

"Most Christians have been taught in church or by their parents to set aside a daily time for prayer and Scripture reading. It's what we are supposed to do, and so for a long time it's what I valiantly attempted. When I didn't, I felt guilty.

Over time I realized that when we love God, we naturally run to Him-frequently and zealously. Jesus didn't command that we have a regular time with Him each day. Rather, He tells us to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. He called this the first and greatest commandment (Matt. 22:37-38). The results are intimate prayer and study of His Word. Our motivation changes from guilt to love.

This is how God longs for us to respond to His extravagant, unending love: not with a cursory quiet time plagued by guilt, but with true love expressed through our lives. Like my little girl running out to the driveway to hug me each night because she loves me."

Yes, this is what conviction feels like. The all-mighty, all-powerful, creator of all things doesn't need us. No. He wants us, He longs for us! We can't even wrap our tiny minds around that! Doesn't that deserve a crazy love on our part?! More than a church service, more than a quiet time, heck more than insanely awesome prayer life. That kind of love deserves nothing less than the same from US!

*mind blown*

Go dwell on that... preferably with Him...

SIDE-TOPIC:

Hopefully you took some time to worship God for His love for us. But I just had to share this last thought from Francis. He talks about a student that asked him why he should love a God that forces us to love Him (with the threat of hell and punishment if we don't)

"Now that I've had time to think about it, I would tell that student that if God is truly the greatest good on this earth, would He be loving us if He didn’t draw us toward what is best for us (even if that happens to be God himself)? Doesn’t His courting, luring, pushing, calling, and even “threatening” demonstrate His love? If He didn’t do all of that, wouldn’t we accuse Him of being unloving in the end, when all things are revealed?

OK so let's say God JUST gives us all these amazing things that we love (and He does) as His way of showing love to us:

"Are we in love with God or just His stuff? Imagine how awful it would feel to have your child say to you, 'I don't really love you or want your love, but I would like my allowance, please.' Conversely, what a beautiful gift it is to have the one you love look you in the eye and say, 'I love you. Not your beauty, your money, your family, or your car. Just you.'"

Harsh truth'd

Our First Real Dinner

So I mentioned earlier I'm going to be blogging 2 journeys - 1) Reading Crazy Love for my Sunday School class and 2) Starting the E-Mealz dining schedule (see 2 posts below for more)

Tonight was night #1 and the menu was Ranch Chicken Tenders with Green Beans and Rolls.

The ranch part consisted of soaking the chicken in milk and ranch dressing mix and then dredging them in flour. This was our first attempt at frying anything so it took a little longer than we expected.

It started to look a little dodgy at first

But then things finally started to crispy up

Now when it came to the green beans we don't have a steamer...so we improvised with a strainer and a pot. They started taking a little too long so I nuked them for a minute and then we were good to go!

Just throw in some HAWAIIAN ROLLS and you got yourself one great meal.

Overall I think was a great first meal! Certainly took a little more work and time than warming up a frozen pizza but I think it was worth it! Best part was I didn't have to think about it - there was the menu, here are the parts, mix and enjoy!

Tomorrow - Enchiladas (...with cream cheese?)!

Crazy Love - Chapter Two

I love harsh truths. I just love it when people don't hold anything back and tell it like it is. Unless they're talking about me of course...

Anyway this chapter is one giant harsh truth. In the grand scheme of things - you are nothing.

Ouch

Obviously we don't mean this is the - "you're nothing as a person, you're a waste of life, etc." We as humans are such selfish beings. All of us. Don't believe me? Have you ever worried about something? Ever been stressed?

“Worry implies that we don’t quite trust that God is big enough, or powerful enough, or loving enough to take care of what’s happening in our lives. Stress says that the things we are involved in are important enough to merit our impatience, our lack of grace toward others, or out tight grip of control.”

Ouch. I have never thought of it like that. I've heard that about worry before, but stress - "the things we are involved in are important enough to merit our impatience." Yup - that pretty much nails it. What do we have to stress about! Bills, relationships, work, etc. Is that really important enough when looking through the filter God sees - lost, dieing, hurting people?

And it hurts even more when we read this:

"But then there's that perplexing command: "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!" (Phil. 4:4). You'll notice that it doesn't end with "...unless you're doing something extremely important." No, it's a command for all of us, and it follows with the charge, "Do not be anxious about anything" (v.6).

That came as a pretty staggering realization. But what I realized next was even more staggering.

When I am consumed by my problems - stressed out about my life, my family, and my job - I actually convey the belief that I think the circumstances are more important than God's command to always rejoice. In other words, that I have a "right" to disobey God because of the magnitude of my responsibilities."

HOW MANY TIMES HAVE WE HEARD THIS!?!? We hear it in church, we read it in the Bible, it's everywhere and we always say AMEN. And then Sunday afternoon around 1pm rolls around and we start stressing! Maybe we're worried about the next week at work, maybe we're stressed about someone or something at church, maybe we're stressed about what restaurant to eat at!!

WE HAVE NO RIGHT TO DO THAT! We are COMMANDED to REJOICE! "Oh but I've got *insert your current struggle*" Doesn't matter - compared to the lost dieing souls God sees and the amazing power he gives us you have no reason NOT to rejoice. We could lose our jobs, our families, everything and if we just had God - rejoice! These are all earthly things!

Harsh? Absolutely! I love my things, I love my family, but we are still thinking so narrowly. In heaven are things going to matter? Nope. Are family going to matter? Sorry but no. As great as families are (God gave them to us!) compared to the eternal, compared to a life in heaven praising and just being in the presence of God, they mean nothing.

"Basically, these two behaviors [stress and worry] communicate that it’s okay to sin and not trust God because the stuff in my life is somehow exceptional. Both worry and stress reek of arrogance. They declare our tendency to forget that we’ve been forgiven, that our lives here are brief, that we are headed to a place where we won’t be lonely, afraid, or hurt ever again, and that in the context of God’s strength, our problems are small indeed."

Francis gives the example of picturing the Bible as a movie. Start from Genesis and go all the way to Revelation, picturing the settings, ALL of the actors (if you see a name or even a pronoun that person is an actor in the story), and then figure out how much "screen time" you personally get in the movie.

"We have only our two-fifths-of-a-second-long scene to live. I don't know about you, but I want my two-fifths of a second to be about my making much of God. 1 Corinthians 10:13 says, 'So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.' That is what each of our two-fifths of a second is about."

So when we say you are nothing - we're saying our personal opinion on how important we are (our life, our problems, our successes, our failures) means absolutely nothing when you compare it to the entire picture that is God. You know what the means? You've got nothing to worry about. NOTHING. What's not to (crazy) love about that? How much should we (crazy) love the person who made it possible?

Here are some more harsh truths from the book:

"Frankly, you need to get over yourself. It might sound harsh, but that's seriously what it means."

"The point of your life is to point to Him. Whatever you are doing, God wants to be glorified, because this whole thing is His. It is His movie, His world, His gift"

"The truth is, some people waste their lives. This isn't meant to bash those who are gone, but rather to warn those who are alive."

"His work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person's work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames (1 Cor. 3:13-15)

Perhaps that sounds harsh, but harsh words and the loving truth often go hand in hand

Friends, we need to stop living selfish lives, forgetful of our God. Our lives here are short, often unexpectedly so, and we can all stand to be reminded of it from time to time. That's why I wrote this chapter, to help us remember that in the movie of life, nothing matters except our King and God.

Don't let yourself forget. Soak it in and keep remembering that it is true. He is everything."

Crazy Love - Chapter One

So this month in Sunday School (did I mention I'm teaching now? Yeah...it's kind of nerve wracking) we're looking at love. After all it is February so we're going to look at what true love looks like. And we get to read one of my favorite stories - Hosea and Gomer! Oh those crazy kids...literally...

And wouldn't you know it our lesson recommends you read...Crazy Love by Francis Chan! One of my favorite books! Who knew!

So I'm kind of taking this personal journey to re-read the book, tie it in with our Sunday School lesson, and share it with you :) (WARNING: I'm pretty much summing up each chapter and then posting my thoughts. All the "smart stuff" comes from Francis Chan *copyright*)

Today I managed to get through the introduction and chapter one and it's just kind of setting up what we're going to learn through the book (you know....an introduction....). And of course on page 1 I get hit with one of my favorite quotes ever

"We need to stop giving people excuses not to believe in God. You've probably heard the expression 'I believe in God, just not organized religion'. I don't think people would say that if the church truly lived like we are called to live. The expression would change to 'I can't deny what the church does, but I don't believe in their God' At least then they'd address their rejection of God rather than using the church as a scapegoat"

It doesn't really have much to do with love (except that what the church should be doing is LOVE) but I just love it. Anyways back to love

Chapter One

One of the key things about loving God is we forget why we should. We get so used to being a Christian and God just becomes another "thing" in our lives. Instead of I don't know THE CREATOR OF EVERYTHING.

And one of the things I love about this book is that it has an internet companion (SYNERGY!!!) Francis posted a video on just how amazing God is.

If you've got 15 minutes check this out

If you've only got 3 check this out

And if you've got 30 minutes CHECK THIS OUT! (saw it live - amazing)

If there's one person who deserves to be loved it's God. But like I said we just forget that way too easily. Francis says:

"There is an epidemic of spiritual amnesia going around, and none of us is immune. No matter how many fascinating details we learn about God’s creation, no matter how many pictures we see of His galaxies, no matter how many humongous white clouds we see in His vast blue sky, and no matter how many sunsets we watch, we still forget. Most of us know that we are supposed to love and fear God; that we are supposed to read our Bibles and pray so that we can get to know Him better; that we are supposed to worship Him with our lives. But actually living it out is challenging. It confuses us when loving God is hard. Shouldn't it be easy to love a God so wonderful? When we love God because we feel we should love Him, instead of genuinely loving out of our true selves, we have forgotten who God really is.”

He gives a great human example. His wife. He talks about how people are always amazed that his wife married him. And then he looked at a picture and realized - yeah! What is someone as beautiful as that doing with me! That's pretty awesome! (I hear you man)

It's the same thing God. Someone SO AMAZING has chosen to be with US! That's pretty awesome! We just keep looking at everyone else and forget about what we have already. THE CREATOR OF EVERYTHING.

So he says let's remember what God is like. He's holy - we don't get to define Him. He already did. He's holy. The end. He's eternal - God exists OUT OF TIME. Wrap your mind around that nugget *head explodes*. "Not being able to fully understand God is frustrating, but it is ridiculous for us to think we have the right to limit God to something we’re capable of comprehending." He's all-knowing - Don't think of it as a scary "he's all knowing" but think of it as a caring "THE CREATOR OF EVERYTHING took the time to know EVERYTHING about me". He's all-powerful - Harsh truth #1. Technically he doesn't have to answer to us for anything. But...he took the time to. He's fair and just - Harsh truth #2 "Because God hates sin, He has to punish those guilty of sin. Maybe that’s not an appealing standard. But to put it bluntly, when you get your own universe, you can make your own standards. When we disagree, let’s not assume it’s His reasoning that needs correction."

After ALL OF THAT we should literally be in awe. Dumbstruck at the awesomeness of God. And this is just a HINT of who He is. Wrap your mind around THAT! This is just a HINT!

Doesn't this sound like someone we should love?

One Giant Leap for Vinson Kind

OK so I'm embarking on 2 journeys this month and you know what that means! I finally have a reason to blog again! Huzzah (or BOOOO if you hate me and my thoughts - it happens)

So one journey is I'm re-reading the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan. Our Sunday School lessons for this month are focusing on love (get it - February - love - clever) So my class and I (hopefully) are going to embark on this journey on learning what it really means to love God, why He deserves our love, and the whole crazy thing.

More on this journey later

My other journey is about FOOD! Surprise Surprise!

For those of you who don't know - I love to cook. And we eat crap. I may love to cook but I have no idea WHAT to cook. We've got about 50 cookbooks but they're all so complicated or they're so simple but they require ingredients that we hate, never use, or use to much. We eat about the same 5 meals (or slight variations) all month long and most of them come pre-packaged. So thanks to the internet I stumbled across E-Mealz

This is a service that plans out a week worth of meals for you. All you do is shop and cook. Takes all the guesswork out of it. It was mainly made for big families and moms who never knew what to make for dinner every night. BUT they also have meals plans for 2! They even have some tailor made for grocery stores like Wal-Mart and Publix.

They claim you'll save money because you won't be impulse buying, buying ingredients you'll only use once, etc. It's really cool. If one meal calls for 4oz of cream cheese but you can only get it in 8oz packages, then look 2 meals later and you've got another recipe that calls for 4oz of cream cheese! Awesome! They say each week will cost around $40-$50, which is close to what we spend anyways.

So all month look I'm going to be journaling our culinary adventure (hey it's not all frozen pizzas this is a big deal for us!)

Join us won't you?

*EDIT*

So I should mention since we had some groceries left over we're actually starting our first meal Tuesday.

This week's menu:

Monday - Chili (left over groceries)

Tuesday - Ranch Chicken Tenders (with fresh green beans and rolls)

Wednesday - Fast food :( (because of Courtney's crazy church schedule we don't have time to cook)

Thursday - Fantastic Enchiladas (with chips and salsa)

Friday - Cheesy Chicken and Spinach (with rice and rolls)

Saturday - Fish (left over groceries)

Sunday - WHO KNOWS