12-7-13 What I've been learning...

Last week we studied through the book of James.  Here's what God's been showing me..

The whole book of James is centered around a couple things.  Well, there's more than just a couple things, but this is what I pulled out of it: Faith & Works, and Eternal Perspective.  James stresses how important it is for their faith to also have works.  They can't just go around saying they believe something without actions backing it up.

James goes to the Old Testament for an example.  Abraham was told by God to go sacrifice his son Isaac.  This was huge.  This was the son God had promised him for a long time.  This was the son that was gonna be his line.  Abe was old, his wife was barren, and they had this son.  Isaac was a miracle.  He shouldn't have been born.  And after that miraculous act, God told Abe to go sacrifice him. 
(James 2:18-26)  If Abe only had faith without works, he wouldn't have done anything.  He would have said, "Yeah God, I believe that you would be able to raise Isaac from the dead if I did that, but I'm not gonna do it."  His faith required action.  His faith demanded a response.  If he wouldn't have responded, how would we know that he had faith?  We would have to rely on just his word, and his word would be hard to believe if he was saying he had faith and wasn't walking it out.  Same goes for today.

Faith demands a response.  And how could we not respond? 

Let's look at what we have today...

Jesus saved us when we were actively rebelling against him.  We're justified by faith (Romans 5:1).  Saved by grace (Ephesians 2:8).  We're undeserving, unworthy, yet we're declared righteous (Romans 8:10).  We're called Sons and Daughters of the Most High God (2 Cor. 6:18). 

That's a pretty sweet list.

Consider this: How can we have this eternal, everlasting, perfect hope in Jesus and live knowing that other people aren't experiencing this? How can we ever be content with knowing that our eternity is secure, and other people haven't secured theirs yet? It breaks me.

Luke 19:10 - For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.

My heart breaks for the lost.  I physically ache thinking about the people who don't know Jesus.  Where do I run when everything falls apart?  What do I go to?  Who do I turn to?  When nothing is going as it should, where is my focus? 

My only hope is Jesus.  The only thing I have to hold onto is Jesus.  It's crazy to think that there are people who don't know this hope that I have.  What do they run to?  Where do they go if they don't have Jesus?

We take our eternity for granted sometimes.  I take it for granted.  We get so caught up in what we're gonna do in this short time on earth.  It's like that one Francis Chan video where he has the rope across the whole stage that represents eternity, and then the tiny little red part that represents life on earth. 

The challenge (for me) is this: stop caring about the awkwardness of it and share your faith with people.  Don't let the thought of an awkward conversation stop you from sharing Jesus with them.  It may just change their life.  Drastically.  They may find the same hope that you have, this eternal and everlasting hope.

Of course, they may reject you and throw it in your face.  That's not any of your concern.  You're the messenger, God's the master.  You're the child, he's the Father.  You're the servant, he is sovereign.  If you want a cool story about God using you and radically changing someone's life through you, you gotta step out in faith and do it.  Faith in Jesus demands a response. Go, and share the hope that you have.