Beware of The Shadow Mission

We were made for a mission and God has instilled it deeply into us. Our lives are designed to make a difference and when we miss that realization, we all too easily settle for a cheap substitute that has been called a ‘shadow mission’. A shadow mission is what is played when we aren’t living out our God given calling. The shadow mission will not be silent and loves to scream at us especially when the real mission becomes difficult and it always does because we have to keep counting the cost.

There are patterns of behaviour that betray us to our very core of our God given design. We easily slip into that mode when we let our lives drift on ‘auto pilot’. Our shadow mission is the activities that we gravitate to when we choose not to choose. Intentional living is where we want to go. It is the place of conviction that we believe that we were born, ‘for such a time as this’. We will look at the story of Esther contrasting the pursuit of the shadow vs the real mission set before us.

Setting Up The Scene

Can you imagine being part of a 180 day banquet?? That is some serious partying and revelling. King Xerxes was definitely into himself and showing off his vast wealth. Following this banquet, there was one for 7 days for everyone in the kingdom, rich and poor alike.

Esther 1
6The garden had hangings of white and blue linen, fastened with cords of white linen and purple material to silver rings on marble pillars. There were couches of gold and silver on a mosaic pavement of porphyry, marble, mother-of-pearl and other costly stones. 7 Wine was served in goblets of gold, each one different from the other, and the royal wine was abundant, in keeping with the king's liberality. 8 By the king's command each guest was allowed to drink in his own way, for the king instructed all the wine stewards to serve each man what he wished.


So on the final day he decides he wants to show off his wife like another one of his fine catches except one problem, she has no desire to play along to his shadow mission of shameless self promotion. So , what happens, well his top officers tell him that he needs to send a strong message so other wives don’t get the same idea to stand up to their husband’s foolishness....’ There will be no end of disrespect and discord. ‘ So, she gets the boot out of the palace and the beginning of beauty pageants has its official start with the winner becoming the Queen of Persia!

The Pathway To Greatness
Esther 2


We are introduced to Esther through her cousin Mordecai who sets her life in motion. He recognizes the opportunity that is being presented and ushers her into a whole new world. She is a beautiful young lady who lost her parents and was raised by Mordecai.

Esther 2:12 Before a girl's turn came to go in to King Xerxes, she had to complete twelve months of beauty treatments prescribed for the women, six months with oil of myrrh and six with perfumes and cosmetics.

12 months of beauty treatments...needless to say that is some serious pampering! Only the best for this king. However Mordecai made it very clear to her to not reveal her nationality and family background. In fact he forbid it... So she wins favour with everyone in sight and most importantly the King and is chosen to be the queen.

Now at this point Esther’s could have defaulted to a shadow mission and totally be absorbed in her position, her perks of life as a queen, everything you could ever imagined served to you on hand and foot but she doesn’t have too much time to settle into that before her ultimate mission is set before her.

As all this is happening, Mordecai lives with incredible intentionality, and uncover a plot to assassinate the King and gives Esther her first test. Inform the king of the nature of this very plot. She does just that and gives credit where credit is due, to Mordecai.

The Ugliness of A Shadow Mission
Esther 3

For whatever reason following these events, Xerxes decides to promote Haman and give him the best seats in the house next to Him and all the royal officials bowed down to him and gave him honor. When Mordecai refused, his nationality was revealed and it so incensed Haman, he decided to request of the king to destroy this entire race because they shouldn’t be tolerated and it was done.

13 Dispatches were sent by couriers to all the king's provinces with the order to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews—young and old, women and little children—on a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods. 14 A copy of the text of the edict was to be issued as law in every province and made known to the people of every nationality so they would be ready for that day.
15 Spurred on by the king's command, the couriers went out, and the edict was issued in the citadel of Susa. The king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was bewildered.


A shadow mission in life seeks to elevate oneself in position, status and in wealth. It demands its own way to accomplish this and has no sensitivity to the needs of others.
The reality is that search for significance cannot be found in a shadow mission. It never has and it never will.

The High Calling of a Missional Life
Esther 4,5

Mordecai hears of this terrible law that has been set in motion and tears his clothes, weeps in sackcloth and ashes and cries out in the city streets for His people and it is brought to Esther’s attention

14 For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father's family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?"

Esther responds with incredible resolve and recognizes the severity of the matter, calls all the Jews to fast for three days and is ready to give her life to her mission....if I die, I die.

After 3 days Esther puts on her royal robes and treads very lightly in the king’s presence. Being very wise, she knows the king’s love language! She calls him to what else... a banquet of course and invites Haman as well. The king is very eager to hear from Esther but she doesn’t make any requests and just asks for the opportunity to do it all again the next day and in the process builds anticipation for her question.

Haman on the other hand is still living out his shadow mission, still boasting of all his accomplishments, being the only invited guest invited to sit with the king and queen. He completely revels in his own glory. Unfortunately, he is full of vengeance and cannot get Mordecai off his mind so his wife encourages him to build a 75ft gallows to hang Mordecai on.

A missional life leaves recognition to God.
Esther 6

So in the midst of all this, God bring Mordecai to the king’s attention one night when he can’t sleep and he realizes he has not done anything to thank him for his loyalty in saving his life.
A life lived on mission doesn’t seek out its own glory but entrusts itself to God.

The humour in all this is played out as the king asks Haman how someone who honors the king should be recognized. Haman obviously thinks that this must be him

Now Haman thought to himself, "Who is there that the king would rather honor than me?" 7 So he answered the king, "For the man the king delights to honor, 8 have them bring a royal robe the king has worn and a horse the king has ridden, one with a royal crest placed on its head. 9 Then let the robe and horse be entrusted to one of the king's most noble princes. Let them robe the man the king delights to honor, and lead him on the horse through the city streets, proclaiming before him, 'This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor!' "

Well, Haman is chosen to lead Mordecai through the city...wow, talk about the sweetness of justice.

A shadow mission always thinks about everything in first person. It is discovered in questions like, ‘what’s in this for me?’ or ‘what have you done for me lately?’ They never take the bib out from their neck and love the banquet lifestyle!

Unfortunately this is the beginning of the end for Haman and even his wife and friends can smell it out...
V13 you will surely come to ruin.

Esther makes her request known to Xerxes and reveals the sinister plot of the vile Haman and the king seals his fate after he is found begging for his life at the feet of Esther. He is hung to his death on the very gallows he set up on his own property for Mordecai. Mordecai would ultimately be raised to the position of honor that was given to Haman...

Leave recognition to God!

The trap you set for others ultimately will come back to destroy you. If you haven’t learned that already, just watch Wile. E. Coyote and the roadrunner.

A shadow mission in life withholds forgiveness and is eaten up by its own bitterness.

A shadow mission in life tries to find fulfillment in self and all its pursuits when it is not found there.

A shadow mission is all about your timeline, your preferences, your status, your strengths etc....

My shadow mission is to __________________ watch TV, do things in my own strength....fill in the blank.

What you need to learn about a God given mission.

1. Your mission is now. You don’t get to choose your time. You are where you are right now for a God given purpose.

Only few people allow themselves to be chosen. They would rather be commendable. We would rather have a concrete plan in front of us but that is not how God works. He just enables us with enough to step out and trust Him in this great adventure. The ability to see things unfold is from God and when we only focus on what we can see, those things which ‘keep us grounded’ than we will only focus on our own self confidence and we will stay just that...grounded and our faith will not take flight.

He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed, miracles that cannot be counted. Job 5:9
He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end. Ecc. 3:11

2. Your missions does involve your position. It involves your job, your family, your marriage and friendships. Discover your God-given awareness in all of them because it is there to be discovered. However it is not about you as much as it is about the people that God placed around you.

Sometimes we are quick to say, God you don’t know the people that I live with. I really don’t know how to reach out to them, to love them, to bless them. The answer in all this is that is OK because God loves to use weak people.

God loves to use us in spite of our limitations because the more we depend on Him, the more He will see that we seek His strength in all situations.

2 Corinthians 12: 9But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.


3. You need a Mordecai. Who knows you well enough to help you identify what God is calling you to be and do.

Timothy had Paul, John Mark had Barnabus. Who do you allow to speak into your life?

4. You will not be given a map but an inner compass and He is the Holy Spirit. Listen to Him.
Imagine setting up a discipleship program like Jesus. We couldn’t create one better. It was 3 years with Jesus 24/7 and even Jesus couldn’t disciple the disciples. They needed the Holy Spirit


Jesus had a shadow mission and it was to be the Messiah without the pathway of suffering. In all of his temptation in the desert, he was challenged to go without hunger, without pain,(His angels will lift you up) go without opposition (I will give you all the kingdoms of the world).

Even Peter tried to persuade him that dying was unnecessary and that he wouldn’t let that happen to him.

Even Jesus in His greatest desperation in the Garden of Gethsemane said Father if you are willing, take this cup from me. He cried out in desperate Father hunger, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’

Matthew 10:39

Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it...

in a nutshell that is the difference between your shadow mission and your real mission.

Humility...

Check out this great video which really sets up this message

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z40KT8yzZak

A Life Lived Inside Out

We will study one of the greatest teachings on the humility of Christ. Humility often is seen as compromise or having no conviction, lacking passion and yet it is a most powerful attribute of Christ that we are called to imitate. Humility is laid out for us in contrast to its complete opposite, pride.

Pride is our greatest enemy and humility is our greatest friend. Pride rears its ugly head especially when it doesn’t get its own way and the way of humility is beautiful because it demands that we step back and place others in clear view.

Does it look like compromise and weakness from the natural view and often the answer is yes because your sinful, selfish tendencies will tell you that you will be forgotten, you will be left behind, you will drop out of the picture.

Lonliness can often be a great friend to humility because it isn’t that easy to embrace and it is for this reason that it is Christ like and Spirit enabled.

Pride is the encouragement to compare ourselves to someone who is ‘less’ than us.

Humility is the encouragement to compare ourselves to Christ.

Pride covets the success of others; We will critique people when they succeed.

Humility celebrates the success of others, how they feel, what they deserve

Pride is about me, it is about my rights, what I feel, declare, deserve

Humility is selfless, it champions the rights of others

Pride is about my glory, do you respect me, do you like me?

Humility is about the glory of Jesus Christ, At the end of the day do you respect Him, do you love Him more?

In pride, I am God; Humility is celebrating the loving God that I serve

Pride leads to arrogance, cockiness, it is repugnant, foolishness

Humility doesn`t lead to arrogance, it leads to confidence in what I believe

The point of pride leads to independence

Humility is dependent on Christ and learns dependence on others.

Pride is pregnant with all kinds of sin; it is the root sin

Pride is something we can achieve in this lifetime

Humility is something we will always be vigorous in pursuing

We live in a world that encourages nothing but selfish pride, calls us to self actualize, shows us self help

However as you read from Ken Blanchard’s quote, ‘Humility does not mean you think less of yourself. It means you think of yourself less. We hold on to the high view that God has given us that He has crowned us with glory and honor. However we don’t go looking around for people to acknowledge us.

John Piper states it this way, ‘Humility is the opposite of a sense of entitlement.’

Do you walk through life believing that people owe you, do you walk through life with the kind of expectation? You owe me a certain look when you walk down the street, you owe a certain kind of behaviour, you owe me a response to my email...right away! ...and I get mad when you don’t pay. If we have that kind of orientation then we are not humble.

Paul in Romans 1:14 said ‘I have a great sense of obligation to people in our culture and to people in other cultures.’ Basically he was saying I owe everybody! Nobody owes me.

Jesus put it this way, ‘But many who seem to be important now will be the least important then, and those who are considered least her will be the greatest then. Mark 10:31NLT

Some of the disciples were getting wrapped up in this sense of entitlement. They wanted the prime seats in the new kingdom and Jesus just sits them down and makes it real clear that the pathway to true greatness is to serve others.

Philippians 2

It’s not about your rights, your vision, your calling – this is really counter cultural

v1-4 Nothing builds a church stronger than humility

Also realize that nothing breaks a church faster than pride and we can build a false sense of strength when we start talking about our accomplishments, achievements

This is the very reason that the tone starts with us as leaders in the church and how we handle controversy and conflict

Conceit in the church looks like this, ‘I want to vote, I want control, I want information, I demand to know and have access to the senior leadership and what I declare to be important must be heard.

Unfortunately what happens in this context is that pride so overwhelms the wisdom that we can`t even hear the good that is being said.

Humble people have a broader perspective beyond just my gift

It doesn`t mean that you always agree with the leaders, but that your message, motives, tone, tactics, action are in the right place.

If you have a good cause, you need to have a good approach as well. The end doesn’t justify the means

The question we need to ask is, ‘are we pursuing humility or not?’

V3 I want my default posture to be others oriented. God is blessed and longs to pour out his wisdom and understanding especially when we are living this truth out in this place!

Look not only to your own interests – the word interest here is a broad statement. The NLT states it this way, ‘your own affairs’ In its place you could put financial affairs, health, family – don’t just look here but look out, spy out for the needs of others like one couple I know did last week. They saw someone on their own and they simply asked, ‘hey are you going anywhere for thanksgiving?’ and the answer was no and they invited him over.

We are not just by nature outgoing like that, but we are called to be just that!

V5-8 Jesus is the perfect example of humility

V7 the Greek word here is kenosis and the best way to define ‘made of himself nothing’ is that He relinquished His rights to His status as God.

Jesus set aside his rights and his divine attributes so that He grow from a boy to man and learn to read and write, but chose to live like us in full humanity.

He wanted to teach us how to be fully dependent on the Father.

V8 No one is more humble than Jesus and it was seen in His incarnation

Carne – meat – It means God with meat on. Jesus is God with skin on. He is the Spirit of God

The hypostatic union – He is fully God and fully man

One of the reasons you should know that the Bible is true is that you and I would never have created a humble God.

Jesus’ death on the cross was the most humble act in the history of the universe.

The fact is that the realization of this incredible act of love from our Father through the Son should really overwhelm us! God owes us nothing but hell and Jesus went to hell for you and until we are completely overwhelmed by that we will have a sense of entitlement.

Know this, that your basic orientation in life will be ‘you owe me’ until you really discover what Jesus has done for you.

Practically what does that mean...I murdered God. Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

God left being worshipping by angels to be disrespected by self righteous people just like me

My condemnation, my pride goes on Jesus and His acceptance, humility goes on me.

I was owed hell but I received heaven at the cost of God’s Son...so much for your sense of entitlement!

V9-11The Name of Jesus is the most beautiful thing.

It is the name that we should sing, exalt, proclaim... not just the humble incarnation, but the glorious exaltation

Will you do it today for salvation to be a friend of Jesus for your joy or will you do it later when you are forced to do it as a foe at the beginning of eternity as part of your judgment.

My name, your name doesn’t matter that much, our church name really doesn’t matter because it’s Jesus, that name, matters MUCH! Jesus is sinless, He died, He rose again, He is worthy of us speaking His name constantly!

What will exalt the name of Jesus? What will make Jesus look good because Jesus is good.

Jesus is our example of humility and we also need Him to enable it

God has two plans that we can track

Plan 1 – humble

Plan 2 - humiliate

God hates the proud in people - Proverbs 6:16,17; James 4:6; 1 Peter 5:5 God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.

No one wakes up in the morning and says God I want to fight against you

God humiliates people who are proud

God wants to bless, YES, He wants to give grace, but the question is what is your posture?

A sense of entitlement or the realization that I owe Him everything I am, but not only that but I owe it to others.

I owe it to others because to serve is to really live.

Here’s the thing, proud people can’t laugh at themselves...they take themselves way too seriously.

How is God teaching you to take on the very nature of a servant with your wife, your children?

We need to fight pride constantly with humility.

This week could have easily been a very discouraging week for me. Early in the week I was confronted with my blind spots, my inadequacies and places where I had fallen short. My natural response would have been to get defensive and fight for my name, but the crazy thing was God was preparing me for it because I had been spending the morning up to that point studying for this message on humility.

Later that night God just continued to speak as Sharon read me a devotional which said basically, ‘refuse to give in the spirit of discouragement’. Not only that but God gave me verses like 2 Corinthians 12:9...My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in your weakness. And Mark 8 when Jesus told Peter specifically to not look at things from a human perspective – look at them from God’s..and if that wasn’t enough my devotional in ‘Streams In The Desert’ stated this, ‘The Devil has two very masterful tricks. The first is to tempt us to become discouraged, for then we are defeated and of no service to others, at least for a while.’ It then went on to speak of how discouragement leads to discontent and doubt. A spirit of sadness produces in us mental paralysis.

I am here to confidently say I want to cultivate a spirit of joy!

As your pastor, I want you to know that I am here for you, I am not here in the position for myself. I am only here but by the grace of God.

Now having said that, my number one job is to hear from God and let Him speak into my life and into the life of this church.

Please let me know if you would like to connect with me, talk to me after the service....much better than before as I really focus on the service ahead. You can also check off the card, send me an email, call me.

Questions for Discussion

1. Can you recall a time when you were humbled? What were the circumstances that lead up to that event?

2. In what area of your life are you most vulnerable to a sense of entitlement?

3. How can you train yourself to have an ‘others centered’ posture?

4. Take time to consider the acts of love that will bring greater unity in your family and our church

5. Spend time reflecting on the incredible debt of love you owe to Jesus.

Play With Gratitude

Happy Thanksgiving! We focus this weekend on gratitude because in part it is a great tradition that started here in Canada as explorers like Martin Frobisher and Samuel de Champlain celebrated their safe arrival across the ocean. They had lived the great adventure and although they didn’t exactly find what they thought they were looking for, their lives were opened to a world of opportunity.

On January 31st, 1957, Parliament proclaimed...

"A Day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed ... to be observed on the 2nd Monday in October....Wow, if everyone did that?! It is easy to lose sight of the harvest when everything is always at your fingertips at the grocery store.

As believers we can all too easily forget the journey that God is taking us on or realize the incredible harvest of blessings He has flowed into our lives. In many ways we need to recognize the ‘larger-than-life existence God has for us involves incredible risk and be willing to be put in to the deep like the early explorers. We will focus on what leads us there and how gratitude keeps us there!
The absence of gratitude in our lives makes us spiritually sick

A grumbling spirit is like a toxin that spreads through your body and it is not only poisonous to you, but to all those around you.

How serious is a sin of discontent? Without it, our lives degenerate into envy, dissatisfaction and complaining and taking what we have for granted.

It happened to the children of Israel and it was a serious offence.

Numbers 14:2 – 4
Numbers 14:10 - 12

I believe God is taking us on a journey as well and yes, it will cost us to move into His preferred future for us. He in continually

1 Corinthians 10:6 - 11

It probably shouldn’t surprise us that idolatry and sexual immorality provokes God’s anger, but what about grumbling? Are you surprised that it is right here condemned in the same place as these other ‘blatant sins'?

Here’s the thing. When we complain about our circumstances, we are actually grumbling against God’s provision in our lives at this very moment and treating his care with disdain.

Also, when God’s people murmur against His appointed leaders – whether Moses or Aaron – God takes that personally as grumbling against Himself

When was the last time you gave thanks for clean water, heat in your home, that you don’t have to go outside to go to the bathroom? It only takes a trip to a third world country to realize how blessed we really are!

The highway of praise is the gateway to gratitude

Go through, Go through the gates, Clear the way for the people; Build up, Build up the highway, Remove the stones, Lift up a standard over the peoples (Isaiah 62:10)

As you read the Psalms, you read about entering his gates with thanksgiving! The gates here are referring to just that, praise!

When the people of God give God praise, something happens in the atmosphere. The obstacles of ideologies, culture and spiritual strongholds are confronted. Continuous praise, that is both sacrificial, and a lifestyle eventually removes the inferior and establishes a Heaven-like realm over geographical locations. It happens wherever the people of God gather to worship, but eventually it has an effect on entire cities. This heavenly atmosphere changes people’s perception of reality. This process is called building a highway. A worshipping community changes the atmosphere over the city and actually gives those who don’t know Christ a place of easy access to know Him!

Bill Johnson in Inheriting the Supernatural.



Gratitude to the Lord rejects a spirit of discontent.

Philippians 4:8ff

Gratitude is one of the strongest ways to build up your spiritual immune system from the invasion of a virus like a disgruntled and discouraged spirit.

What is your threshold of gratitude? What will it take for you to get to the place of gratitude? You can’t make yourself more thankful but what you can do is open the window of your heart to it so that when it comes through your neighbourhood, you will more easily able to embrace it.

Here’s the thing. The most sure fire way to dull a child’s sense of gratitude is to give them whatever they want.

Gratitude is also an act of humility. One of the things that I admire about Pastor Jung and the Korean church here is their heart of gratitude every time I see them from watching them bow their heads to each other to constantly expresses their thanks to me every time I see them.


A spirit of gratitude brings spiritual, emotional as well as physical healing.

In Numbers 15:37, the children of Israel were commanded to make tassels on the hem of their clothing and attach tassels at each ‘corner’ with a blue cord. corner = kanaf

(Rob Bell in Velvet Elvis)

Malachi 4:2...under your wings (kanaf) The Sun of righteousness will rise with healing in his wings.

Mark 5:21 stories of healing – the woman who was haemorrhaging for 12 years touches the fringe of his robe and she touches it believing there there is healing in Jesus!
The Takeaway

This morning I want to challenge you to create a living tassel that will not only bring healing in you but serve as a healing work in the life of another.

1. Declare His praises!



2. Write a letter of thanksgiving!

Select one person from your live who has been instrumental in bringing you to the Lord, drawing you closer in your walk with the Lord and write their name in the next few minutes as you prayerfully consider who they might be. If you can, take the letter with you and read it to them in person.

3. Take time to write out 10 things that you are thankful for! It might even start with the gifts from God that you take for granted to the people that God has placed in your life.



C.S. Lewis states that there is a thin line between pretending to feel something and beginning to feel it. There is a reason that this holiday is called ‘Thanksgiving’ not ‘thanksfeeling’!
One writer correctly points out that we need to learn to be grateful for even flawed or imperfect gifts. We need to express thanks when our child attempts to make the bed. To the wives, be thankful when when your husband’s express affection, even if it is awkward. To our teenagers, always hug your mom even if your friends are watching!

Diligence Like An Ant

Diligence Like An Ant

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-5ifOUkxto

There is a place of direct effort that must be applied to our faith and when we go there we find that we move to places we could never go by direct effort much in the same way that one ant with one grain of sand has no idea what is happening until the die has been cast and we are changed forever.

Proverbs 6:6-8

As believers we often can easily become discouraged at the first sign of difficulty or disappointment. Just imagine the thought that must have been going through some of the heads of the ant.

What is the blessed point of this back breaking work? This doesn’t feel terribly exciting today! What is the point of all this anyways?? I need a massage therapist for my back!

WOW, you thought your life was a daily grind, a monotonous routine and then someday, someone discovers an incredible masterpiece, a life full of richness and you realize wow, God has taken me places I never dreamed of and it is a steady diet of faithfulness.

The Christian life is both easy and difficult. It is easy in the sense of where we go in appropriating our strength, our hope and resolve. It is quite another thing to really understand what it means to go there. Character transformation does require a lot of hard work and at the same time we are completely dependent on God for His enabling grace and the power of the Holy Spirit’s inner working.

That tendency is that we think we should be proficient with spiritual power, moving with agility and endurance, wisdom and purity, able to conquer long established habits right now! However, we need to know that any move towards becoming more like Christ comes with a cost.

The cost is opening up our lives to the very personal working of the Holy Spirit and being ready for wherever that will take us. It happens every morning when we wake up and we make that first decision to either enter in to His presence or ‘have at it scattered brained’.

We need to breathe in His presence, live in His fullness and listen to His wake up calls!

Many would refer to this part of our lives as our ‘spiritual disciplines’.

I WORK OUT YOUR FAITH

Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling

Working for your salvation, that is heresy, but working out your salvation, that is where we need to go.

With any good workout, the goal is to accelerate your heartbeat and that being said, it is not about everyone having the same workout, God was certainly creative in making each and every one of us and His designs for us are the same way.

A great workout is any activity you do by direct effort that will help you get to the place where God meets you and where you could never go by direct effort!

God-sized workouts include prayer in its various forms, meditation, silence, solitude, simplicity, service, giving, fasting and my wife Sharon has really connected with the Lord through dance in worship to Him.

A classic book that has really enriched me in this way is Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline.

Unfortunately these disciplines don’t just show up in your life, you have to purposefully make the decision to go there and that is what Paul is telling us when he says ‘work it out, work out your salvation, let it become more real in your life

Luke 13:24 He said to them, "Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.

Romans 14:19
Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.

Ephesians 4:3
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

Hebrews 4:11
Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.

Hebrews 12:14
Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.

2 Peter 1:5
⁵For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; ⁶and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; ⁷and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. ⁸For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ

2 Peter 1:15
And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things.

2 Peter 3:14
So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him.

The fact is that we possess everything we need to live the joyful, abundant life, but we still have to work it out!!

Now, in the pursuit of your holy habits, something is definitely wrong if you become more arrogant, self-righteous, irritable or judgmental, it is very likely, you’re on the legalism track and you are missing the point of why you are exercising. The point of exercise is not the exercise, it is the end result. What do I look like at the end of the day???

What we want is to experience more of His divine presence and enabling, now and here!!!

II ‘GOD SIZED RESULTS AWAIT YOU!’ for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.

This is the place where we want to go. This is the place where we discover our greatest significance, our most satisfying moments, to know that the living God is fulfilling His purposes through me!

However it takes incredible perseverance – the examples laid out before us – Heroes of faith – Hebrews 11

Stamina, endurance, tenacity, long-haul. The Christian life is best defined as a long distance run more than a sprint! Everyone has the same goal – to finish this race and we do not race against each other, but against time!

To pray well is to cultivate holy patience and perseverance. It is about our will being conformed to His, becoming more like Jesus.

2 Peter 3:8,9

God is not slow; He accomplishes His purposes right on time, but He’s not in a hurry. Look at King David, He had been anointed king, but his route to kingship took about 12 years while he hid for his life. God is definitely more interested in the shaping of our character that in our comfort.

Daniel...we looked at his life two weeks ago and we never got to the point of eating all those vegetables...his 10 day challenge turned out to speak for itself, they were 10X better when it came to wisdom compared to those with earthly wisdom....hands down, make no mistake about it, they stood head and shoulders above all the rest. When they stood up for their faith and beliefs, others recognized it.

III CHOOSE YOUR WORKOUT!

¹⁴Do everything without complaining or arguing, ¹⁵so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe ¹⁶as you hold out the word of life—in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing.

The fact is that temporal pleasures will always crowd out eternal ones. We are told to resist the urge to fulfill our appetite with cheap substitutes for the same reason our parents told us not to eat cookies before supper. If we are truly going to be satisfied spiritually we need to learn the patience that comes in waiting and getting hungry for God to reveal Himself and show up in our lives instead of running for ‘sin substitutes’.

Name a sin and you can always find its ‘holy’ opposite. Examples are learning to give instead of stealing, encouraging others instead of gossiping about them, sacrificial love for others instead of lust, reaching out to others in need instead of self absorption

Here’s the truth. We are all going to go through a workout, the decision is whether we want the pain to be a self destructive one or a redemptive process.

Our human nature is always calling us to be lethargic here, don’t get too radical for God, go easy on yourself and this is where we need to draw the line and say ‘no more’.

Character transformation is not easy; it requires a lot of hard work, vigilant oversight, rigorous thought, self discipline and a life marked by repentance. Gary Thomas

God is more interested in our character than our comfort

We are watching a new neighbourhood grow around us and every day something changes, one week a foundation, the next a floor is framed and before we know it, there will be town homes in the backyard of the church separated by a privacy fence.

We want to see progress, results, SO where do we begin?

PRAYER

As you pray:

Ø be encouraged and get support from the examples that have inspired us to run. First and foremost, our Savior…who has been instrumental in moving you forward. 1 Corinthians 11:1

Ø Small Groups – The essential 3 C’s of small group life are Connect – provides care; Change – the ongoing work of transformation together to become Christlike and Cultivate –serving in the community to express God’s love and compassion.

Ø Confess and get rid of those things that hold you back.

Break free from the sin that keeps tripping us up.

Focus on the goal – lay hold of the promises Christ has promised.

2 Timothy 4:6 – I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

Hebrews 6:11- showing diligence to the end

2Corinthians 4:7 – God’s breaking process – to rely completely on Him

James 1:24 that you may be complete, lacking nothing