A CALL TO DIE-DAY 2

Day 2-Hard Words

The scripture verse that goes along with this topic is John 6:60, 66

60 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, "This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?"

66 From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.

Jesus had become fairly popular in the middle of his ministry. Thousands had come to see Him, to listen to Him, and be healed by Him. So many thousands in fact that they needed food and he fed them, 5000 men (and more women and children). He fed them with nothing more that 2 fish and five loaves of bread...and had left overs.

This made Him even more popular. However, Jesus wanted to make sure that there was no misunderstanding. He was God. When He told the people that, they were outraged. Miracles is one thing, but God? Come on!

But He was, and He is. He taught that they must eat of His body, and drink of His blood, to have eternal life. This was the hard teaching. So these thousands of people who so adamantly followed Him were no longer amazed, or entertained. The excitement of the miracles had faded, and they were left with a choice; accept His teaching or reject it. That's really the same choice all of us have now a days. Accept Him or reject Him.

Well, by the thousands, they rejected Him, and left, never to return. And then there were 12. The 12 professed they had no where else to go and believed in Him, and continued on with Jesus.

The point! God points out what He wants from us in His timing. At that time, in the height of His fame, Jesus pointed out what the people must do, and they couldn't handle it. How often does that happen with us? Jesus tells us to accept Him...and we turn away. Or maybe we are saved and he tells us to go tell someone about Him, and we turn away. God points out to us all the time things we should do, and also things we should not, and just as the thousands were, and the 12 disciples were, we are left with a choice.

Accept God's commands or His chastening. Chastening is a fancy word for punishment, because God punishes or chastens those He loves. Or, reject what He says.

Part of A call to die is accepting the hard words that come from God and changing your life accordingly! I pray you do the same! Stay tuned for Day 3!

-Brian

A CALL TO DIE-DAY 1

A few things as I start this blog.

First, as part of the A call to die 40 day study, we are supposed to fast from something time consuming. I chose to give up facebook, as it MONOPOLIZES my time. However, having started the fast yesterday, I realized I did not disconnect the feed from this blog to my FB page. So, if you see this and read it, know I am not actually on facebook, and this is not cheating as I cannot see anyone's comments. However, I would encourage you to follow me on here! www.uthpastorb.com

Alright, I am leading my youth group in this study, and we officially started yesterday. The study is from David Nasser, and A call to die has been around a long time. We went through it in my youth ministry when I was a junior in High School. I started my Junior year 9 in a half years ago...crazy!

I am going to blog once each day about this study, with today being the exception with two, because I did not post yesterday which was Day 1. Here it is now...

Day 1. Take up your cross

Day 1 deals with a call to die to our selfishness. This is a tough one for me right out of the gate. Point blank: I am a selfish person. This has become more evident to me as I have been married. It is important as a Christian, to realize selfish tendencies and work to correct them. The passage for today's study is Matthew 16:24 which says, Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me."

This is a verse I have heard and read many times in my life, and it takes on new meaning for me in the issue of selfishness. Really, to take up one's cross is the epitome of self-LESS-ness. It is letting go of you, and all that you hoard, or crave, and giving ALL of you to God. Does this mean we don't spend time with family because we give our ALL to God? Does this mean we should never have stuff, or hang out with friends, or go to stores, et cetera? NO! However, if those things keep you from, or replace God as number 1, then priorities need to be shifted.

Dealing with selfishness, and defeating it, is a matter of not feeding it. Like anything else, if it starves, it dies. If there are activities you watch or participate in that breed a selfish attitude, remove them! If you are doing something nice for someone(s) to get recognized...you need to check your motivation. I'm not saying stop being nice, haha, but I am saying check your heart.

There are many references in the book to avoid these traps like not listening to music that makes selfishness the norm, or not hanging out with people that drag you down and enable an intrinsic selfishness in you.

I think, being honest, there isn't going to be one topic in these 40 days that either were not a previous struggle or aren't a current one. The purpose being to challenge on convict of the sin or transgression, and to right the wrong by being proactive in putting God first.

I ask for prayer as I endure this journey, and I wonder, do you struggle with selfishness? Would you like prayer in this as well!

Day 2 later today...hope you will join me for the Journey. I promise to keep the subsequent posts a tad bit shorter.

-Brian