I'm being humbled

My last blog was stupid and I'm sorry for that and if I offended anyone. This is an excerpt from the book I'm working on. I hope it may bless you!


CARELESS CHRISTIANITY:

This one evening a few of my brothers and sisters in Christ decided to attend a banquet dinner/fundraiser for a local Christian homeless shelter that we had gotten tickets for. We honestly didn’t know what to except, so of course we showed up in tattered hoodies, jeans and worn out shoes. We definitely thought we should have dressed up a bit, but then we realized we don’t really have dress up clothes. They’ll just think some of people who lived in these shelters decided to join with us. It was easy to distinguish between the nicely dressed, over prepared folks from the long matted hair, casually out of style dressed kids. The only think thing that kept us in that common circle is the fact that it was solely based on raising money for the homeless, which we currently were. I felt as if we were the display for the type of people who they needed money for, but I was even fine with that. The part I wasn’t fine was the next part.
Recently, I felt the Holy Spirit put on my heart to write a challenging excerpt and pass them out to anyone that the Lord put in our path. When the Holy Spirit gave me this piece, I remember sitting down to type it and not remembering anything until it was sitting in the printer, finished. I can’t take any credit for it because they aren’t my words, but just reiterating the scripture. Here is the piece that was written:



Stop going to Church…
Before anything, I just wanted to apologize on behalf of the Church that myself and many others have turned her into. It grieves my heart to know that I have put money, popularity, status and my own agenda before Jesus Christ. I’m sorry on behalf of any Christians that may have turned you away, treated you without love, didn’t serve you or has been a hypocrite. I am included in this. When I compare the Church that it is today compared to what it was like in the Bible, I see perversion. I see failure. I see that we have taken what the Bible says and put our own agenda to it and our own desires instead of God’s.
The reason I’m writing this is because I pray that every pre-conceived ideas or pasts pains you have against the Church that you would forgive. I still have so many pains, offenses and grief about the Church I created, but instead of having these feelings toward the Church I feel we must be the Church God has called us to be. Gandhi said, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” I agree with him. We call ourselves Christians, but we look nothing like Christ. When I read the Bible, it shakes my bones and puts a fire inside of me that makes me crave for a Church that is pure like the book of Acts.
If you desire this same thing, if you feel you’ve perverted the Church like I have or most importantly, if you desire to worship the God that is alive and saves those who are lost, please join me. Let us call ourselves Christians because we look like Jesus Christ. Let us live for something! Christ has given us eternal life if we repent of our sins, be baptized and follow Him. Let us follow Him together, because we can’t do it alone. Christ had His disciples and so we are called to be disciples and make disciples. (Matt. 28:19)
Stop going to Church and Let’s start being The Church!

This piece is interesting because so many different people gave different reactions. From passing this out we got people emailing and thanking us for the honesty. Some people said, “Wow, that’s convicting.” And others were offended and said, “How can you talk that way about the Bride of Christ?” This night at the banquet we had about 200 of these papers with this challenge on it in the backseat of the car. My sister Anna and I started folding them up because what better place to challenge the body than at a gathering for ministry? We wanted to be polite and sensitive to the event so we decided to first ask some that looked of importance (nice dress clothes, name tag and a head set like the awesome people at old navy or star bucks) and asked if we could pass these out. So I showed her the piece of paper and before even giving me a second to explain she said, “NO! You can leave right now. We don’t want you in here.” I tried pleading with here because the title can seem very offensive and opposite of what the event was saying, but if fact we were completely on the same page with the same motives as them. I told her, “I’m sorry Ms. I think you’re mistaken, we actually want to….” But again she said “NO! You can leave right now. I don’t have time to read that or talk to you.” This night was so beautiful because of the heart these people were sharing for the homeless and for the community, but this broke my heart and made me look at the whole event completely different. She may have thought we were coming to crash the event or lead people away from Christ, but I look at it this way:

Even if I was coming to crash their event or to lead people away from the church, why wasn’t I more of a reason to show the love of Christ to? Maybe she couldn’t asked, why I wanted to pass these out or why I felt people shouldn’t go to church. I don’t feel that way at all, but what I did feel after that was a complete turn off to “Christians”. If I wasn’t a follower of Christ and this occurred, I would be completely turned off to the gospel and that would take a lot to turn me back on to it. I am a believer in Christ and I couldn’t understand why that happened, can you imagine if I wasn’t a believer? She didn’t even take the time to ask me why or read the paper.

On the drive home I found myself crying. Not because this lady said this stuff to me, but because that was me at one time. I didn’t give anyone the time or even the acknowledgement to show them Christ. I didn’t want to be like that lady. I was angry with her, but then I kept seeing myself in her. We can never put anything at all above Christ and being Christ like. Never! We should drop everything to show the love of Christ.

Conviction after the Contusion

As mere men and mortals we tend to blame our fleshliness for our fallacies. As yet it is our flesh's fault we sin, but we tend to forget that when we blame our flesh we actually blame ourselves. It seems we blame our flesh like it's some overly angry midget who forces us to be the failing factor to our demise or he'll take a bite out of our leg. Who else must we blame? After all, God can't tempt us nor cause us to over indulge in the sickness, like swine flu, we choose. 

With that being said, I must confess....I suck! Like everyone else at some point, I have also justified my sins to make me feel "ok" or at least "accepting" of it. I have tended to point the finger at those whom seem to wear sin on their sleeve and I follow it by an indirect rebuking. I've portrayed myself to be some sort of Joel Osteen minus those ridiculously perfect looking fake teeth, but along with my rotting teeth is a rotten heart. I've not only inside not looked like Jesus, but not even anything close, I mean, come on! I at least could have looked like the next best thing...Elvis or Will Smith, but no....I look like satan. Could I very well have been the reason for the verse Romans 6:1,2(read that right now.)? Am I alone in this feeling? 

Then I read this.... "And those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with it's passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit."

Good God am I convicted after the contusion! Why did I not read this earlier or how is it that I usually don't care until after the contusion "an injury, as from a blow with a blunt instrument, in which the subsurface tissue is injured but the skin is not broken; bruise.(websters)" Has taken place?

Read this: Matt. 26:41

Conclusion: Let's pray for each other as brothers and sisters to be in the spirit and take the time to just stop and pray for each other, because being in the flesh is like bottling up hell and being in the spirit is like sweet fellowship with Jesus! Pray for me if you will, cause how can I minister to the lost when I sometimes feel more lost?

p.s. my teeth aren't rotten

Prelude

This first blog is probably my first blog ever because I could care less about talking about myself, but what I can get use out of modern techonology and internet community groups is an encouraging note and a discouraging note that needs to be addressed and assessed and turned into productivity. This marks blog 1.

Also, I've started working on a new book entitled "The Ship. The Sea. The Storm." In which I'll put pieces of it on here so I can get some brutal criticism. I've worked on a few books in the past in which I have abandonded and dismantled because of the redundant approach I took. That, and because I was an idiot. I hope these writings may move you, encourage you, offend you, make you laugh or cause you to know Jesus more. I'll be posting also stories from tour and on the road(aka the mission field or satan's play groud). I'm excepting alot of spiritual warefar and lots of pliability.



Come tell me your story at one of the shows:


06/13/2009 Wilmore, KY Ichthus Farm

06/26/2009 Louisville, KY Headliners

06/27/2009Pontiac (Detroit), MI The Eagle Theater

06/28/2009 Buffalo, NY Xtreme Wheels

06/29/2009 Poughkeepsie, NY The Chance

06/30/2009 Allentown, PA Crocodile Rock

07/02/2009 Bushnell, IL Cornerstone Farm(Main Stage)

07/04/2009 Indianapolis, IN Emerson Theater

07/05/2009 St. Louis, MO Fubar

07/06/2009 Tulsa, OK Flytrap

07/07/2009 Albuquerque, NM First Family Church

07/08/2009 Phoenix, AZ Marquee Theater

07/09/2009 Pomona, CA The Glasshouse

07/10/2009 San Diego, CA Soma(Mainstage)

07/11/2009Orangevale (Sacramento), CA Club Retro

07/12/2009 Reno, NV New Oasis

07/13/2009 Salt Lake City, UT Salt Air

07/14/2009 Denver, CO Cervantes Ballroom

07/17/2009 Mokena, IL The Pearl Room

07/18/2009 Nashville, TN Rocketown

07/19/2009 Raleigh, NC Lincoln Theater

07/20/2009 Douglasville, GA The 7 Venue

07/21/2009 Jacksonville, FL Murray Hill Theater

07/23/2009 Houston, TX Java Jazz

07/24/2009 San Antonio, TX The White Rabbit

07/25/2009 Dallas, TX The Max

07/26/2009 Little Rock, AR The Village

07/28/2009 Dayton, OH The Attic

07/29/2009 Toronto, ON, Canada The Opera House

07/30/2009 Montreal, Quebec, Canada La Tulipe

07/31/2009 New York, NY Gramercy Theater

08/01/2009 Gilford, NH Gunstock Mountain Resort

08/02/2009Baltimore, MD Sonar