My Cat

We recently found out that our cat has cancer. We don't know how much longer she will live, but this news has made us sad and a little nostalgic.

About 16 years ago on a walk around our neighborhood, we heard the cries of a kitten. Since there were no houses nearby, we concluded this kitten must have been dropped off (basically, thrown away) there. Although we already had one cat, we decided to "adopt" this kitten. I remember that first day. Every time I tried to pick her up, she hissed at me. She was a little toughie. She did everything she could to escape, fight, hiss, growl - anything to show her displeasure. I thought, "Here we are trying to feed you; give you a warm and safe place to sleep - and all you can do is try to bite me?" She fought us every step of the way. Even so, we loved her and decided to call her Annie, after Little Orphan Annie. I would open the cage to feed her and she would arch her back and hiss. Finally came the day when we could trust her (and she could trust us!) enough to let her out of that cage. She tried to escape. She never would let us pet her...at least at first. Slowly...I mean, S-l-o-w-l-y she began to trust us.

Annie has never been into people that much, but somehow over a period of years, she has connected with me. Now, she greets me every morning. I pet her and she purrs then licks my hand. I say, "Sweet Kitty" and she says, "I love you." Well, not really (Annie has never learned to talk)...but I can tell she would say it if she could.

It is going to be tough losing her.

Annie also reminds me of...me. God came after me. I tried to escape - even bite...but God kept on loving me - despite my protests. He called me by name, He adopted me into His family...and as time went on I found myself loving Him more and more. I find myself saying, "I love you." What a change!

We are so much like Annie. One day we are hissing the next we are licking the Master's hand. We love Him. Why? "Because He first loved us." (1 John 4:19)

On Being Missional

Being Missional means that we take Christ seriously when He says to be fishers of men. (Matt. 4:19)
Being Missional means that we are actively seeking to fulfill Christ's Great Commission. (Matt. 28:19-20)
Being Missional means that we seek to think and act like missionaries.
Being Missional means that we follow Christ who said He came to seek and to save that which was lost. (Luke 19:10)
Being Missional means that we pray for the lost. (Rom. 10:1)
Being Missional means that our hearts are moved by the lost. (Matt. 9:36)
Being Missional means that we can say with George Whitefield, "Unless the Lord gives me souls, I believe I would die."
Being Missional means that we set priorities and evaluate everything we do in light of Christ's Mission. (Luke 15:1-7)
Being Missional means that we contextualize...that we "become all things to all men that by all means we might save some." (1 Cor. 9:22)
Being Missional means that we take the road less travelled, that we become an outgrown rather than an ingrown church.
Being Missional, really Missional, means that we embrace discipleship - that we place a higher importance on spiritual mulitplication than spiritual addition. (2 Tim. 2:2)
Being Missional means that we risk being unpopular. (Gal. 1:10)
Being Missional means that we pay the price and that we persevere. (2 Tim. 4:7)

It can seem so difficult...but when I think of the starfish, it is all worth it.

Heard the story?

An old man was walking his grandson on the beach when they came upon many starfish that had been stranded on the shore. Discovering that a lot of them were still alive, the granfather started picking them up and throwing them in the ocean. The boy said, "Grandpa, there are so many - what difference can you make?" The old man picked another up and said, "For this one, it makes all the difference!"

There are a lot of stranded starfish all around us. The person who cuts your hair, pours your coffee or checks you out at the supermarket. Your banker, lawyer, doctor, neighbor, coworker - faces you see every day. How many do not know Christ? How many are hungry for what we have?

Lord, Help us to see that the fields are white for harvest! (John 4:35) Help us to be Missional!

From Christfollower to Treasuring God

You may have noticed, I changed the name of my blog from Christfollower to Treasuring God. I would like to say this was the result of deep prayer and Bible study. I would love to say that God spoke to me and told me to change the name of my blog. But it was not that. I changed the name of the blog because we are going to create a link from the church website TresureGOD.org...and we wanted it to match.



But...come to think of it, I like the new name better. Christfollower focuses more on action, on performance, while Treasuring God focuses on the heart. The problem with the church at Ephesus in Revelation 2:1-7 was not that they didn't do enough. Verse 2 says they did many good works. Their problem was not bad doctrine (again, see verse 2). Their problem was that they didn't Treasure God. They had left their first love.



Somebody recently told me that they have been having a "grace awakening". As they have been learning about God's unconditional love for them, and as they realized that because of the imputation of Christ's rightousness they are "dearly loved" (Col. 3:12), "the apple of His eye" (Zech. 2:8), "their name is written on His hands" (Is. 49:16), and He "rejoices over them with singing" (Zeph. 3:17) - something has happened. Revival is going on. They said that they are finding themselves loving and treasuring God as they once did.



That is what we all need. Because when that happens, everything changes.



Thy mercy is more than a match for my heart,

Which wonders to feel its own hardness depart.

Dissolved by Thy goodness, I fall to the ground

And weep for the praise of the mercy I've found.

-John Stocker (1777)

The Red Squiggly Line

One of the hottest new words to describe churches that are on the cutting edge reaching people for Christ today is Missional. Go ahead, type it into a word document and you will see it: The Red Squiggly Line underneath telling you that what you just typed is not a word. Well, maybe it is not officially a word (although I am currently reading a book by Ed Stetzer, "Breaking the Missional Code: Your church can become a missionary to your community") - but Missional IS a concept...a very important concept for all of us in the church to "get".

What does it mean to be Missional? It literally means to think and behave like a missionary. The reason the word (and concept) are so hot is that the church in the US has been so lacking here. Outgrowing the Ingrown Church by Jack Miller sums up the core problem: we tend to focus our energy and resources inward rather than outward. We do not think or act much like missionaries and the results and been disastrous. Randy Pope gave a major address at the PCA General Assembly two years ago on this subject because while the PCA - one of the fastest growing denominations ten years prior - in 2006 had grown by less than 100 nationally! I recently read an aricle that unless something changes, the Southern Baptist Convention is expecting to be cut in half by 2030. Statistics show that 80% of the churches in North America are either stagnant or dying. What is the answer? Maybe it is not all the answer, but certainly a big part ...is that we need to become Missional...and misionally effective!

I will be writing more about this in the weeks to come but let me say this: Being Missional does not simply mean that we support foreign missions. That is important, very important...but that is not really what being Missional is all about. Being Missional does not just mean that you support missionaries...it means you view yourself as one. Do you?

Let me ask you to do a little exercise. Pretend for a few minutes that you are have been called to be a full time missionary. You ask where your assignment is and they tell you Valdosta, GA...or wherever you happen to live. Everywhere you go for the next 24 hours, think about it as a missionary would. If you do that, you will understand better what it means to be Missional.