The Way of Jesus: Following Jesus - Faith and Inertia

Paul Tournier the famous Swiss Physician and Counsellor wrote, "The greatest tragedy in life is that most people spend their whole lives indefinitely preparing to live."   I think he must have been thinking of me when he said that.  I have spent a lot of time, thinking that when I reach a certain point in my life or when I accomplish a certain amount things I will follow Jesus the way that I feel I should be.  But really we need to decide to follow Jesus and then start following Jesus.

  It has been many years since I took Physics in high school.  I can't remember much of anything, except for three things: my teachers name was Mr. Stocovaz (I thought it was a cool name), that my mark wasn't very good, and the principle of inertia.  The principle of inertia states that objects in motion have a tendency to stay in motion and the opposite: objectives that aren't moving will stay not moving.  Take a train for instance, if a train is fully stopped,  you could take a couple of wood blocks and jam them under the wheels and it would have a very difficult time getting started and moving forward.  Take that same train when it is travelling at 80 -100 km an hour, not only would a small block of wood not effect it, it would have enough momentum to be able to crash through reinforced steel.

Tim Hansel in his book Holy Sweat says this "Our lives are controlled by inertia.  If we are living life with a block of wood holding us in place, we tend to stay there.  But just as in physics, if we are put into motion, we tend to stay in motion."  God wants us to be in motion.  He wants us to follow Him.

The idea of faith forward momentum is a concept encouraged by some New Testament writers.  Paul wrote in Philippians 3:13-14, "Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."   He uses words like straining and pressing to describe his movement on the spiritual journey. Theologian Homer Kent sums up Paul's thinking with this statement: "Spiritual Progress is ever the imperative Christians must follow."    or put even simpler: Only Forward!   The Apostle Peter adds a little bit more to Paul's thinking when he talks about some of the qualities that are essential on the spiritual journey like faith, goodness, knowledge, self-control, love and perseverance. He then tells his readers in 2 Peter 1:8, "If you posses these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."  To summarize Peter, we are more easily directed if we are moving and growing.  A docked boat is hard to turn.  A bike on it's kickstand stays where it is.  God wants us to get moving.  As we move forward we are more easily directed and used by God and the skills that we a gaining on our journey are more effective.

  Oswald Chambers in his classic devotional, My Utmost for His Highest uses the phrase "reckless abandonment" to describe the life of faith we are called to:

"Faith is the heroic effort of your life.  You fling yourself in reckless confidence on God.  God has ventured all in Jesus Christ to save us.  Now he want us to venture our all in abandoned confidence in Him."

Let's not just prepare to follow Jesus - Let's follow Jesus.

The Way of Jesus - Rethink the Way You Live

On Sunday, we introduced what is going to be our theme for the next number of weeks at Callander Bay Church: The Way of Jesus.  We are looking at simple language to describe our journey with Jesus.  As a community we are endeavouring to respond to Jesus' call to "Follow Him".  We are growing in our understanding of what it means to do this.  

Like 7-strands of rope, this description is

• Simple
• Memorable
• Transferable, and most of all
• Practical to work with everyday life

As I spoke on Sunday, I left you with an assignment: "To rethink the way you live"  Most of us are quite habitual in the way we live.  We do a lot of the same things over and over again.  We are on cruise control or stuck in a rut.  The apostle Paul gave the same challenge in Ephesians 5:15-17 he tells his readers,

"Be very careful, then, how you live - not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.  Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is."

Be very careful how you live.  It seems we have an option, we can live wisely, which in this context is carefully.  Or we can live unwisely, which means to not make the most of opportunities.  Pay attention to the details, or maybe I should say, let God into the details.  Really discipleship or following Jesus is not about adding more things into your life,  it is letting Him into the things you are already doing, it's about how you live.  So, the encouragement is to think about what you are doing.  To ask yourself why you are doing it.  And probably most importantly in light of  following Jesus what should I be doing?  We are all on a journey.  It's what you do on the journey that matters.

  I shared on Sunday, a moment of epiphany I had many years ago.  God revealed to me while I was brushing my teeth, that I was more disciplined then I was admitting.  The fact that I brushed my teeth twice a day, every day, was God's reminder that I could, as Paul wrote to Timothy, "Train myself in godliness." (1Timothy 4:8).  This morning I was brushing my teeth, like I always do, and I was challenged by my own message (Don't you hate when that happens! Ha!).  I was staring in the mirror at myself and I thought how could I invite God to be a part of this moment.  The thought that popped in my head was, "pray for your kids".  So, I did.  Then the moment was gone and I continued with my day.  It was not an earth shattering moment.  It wasn't that challenging, but the message was very clear to me.  I have lots of opportunities during my day to invite God into what I'm doing, but most of the time I am too busy or too distracted or just not even thinking about it.  My challenge to you and me is: Think about it.

  It seems the Apostle Paul  thinks that if we live in this way, we will discover something.  Miracle of miracles, we will understand what God's will is.  We will know what to do as we go on this journey we call life.  Sounds good to me!

John

Getting Started

One of my favourite quotes has been from Woody Allen who said "80% of success is showing up."  Today is the day, I show up in blogging.  I have made a couple attempts at blogging in the past, but they were a little vague in purpose.  This one I hope will be a little more succinct in its direction.  It is a blog mainly for the people of Callander Bay Church, the church that I serve as Pastor.   If others get something from it - bonus.

Most weeks I preach a message in the Sunday Morning service.  But there is very little room for interaction, discussion and the developing more deeply into concepts talked about.  This is a forum for that.  It is also a place where I can help with our motto at Callander Bay Church, which is Helping Families Navigate Life.  In this confusing world we often feel like this road sign.

It is my hope that we can help people to be able, with God's help, get them spiritually through the day.

Pastor John