Gotta roll up the sleeves and get a little dirty

Thunderstorms used to scare me. I would be terrified of the loud noise and hope that when I came up out of the covers the noise would be gone. Right now as I look outside my living room window, the sun is brightly shining in all its glory. But I also see rain drops falling and I hear thunder... but its completely sunny outside! How pretty.

I've been trying to gather all the things floating around in my head from messages heard within the past month and Bible verses or chapters read from certain books to make some kinda sense out of them. Sometimes there's just so much going on in my head I need a couple weeks to figure out exactly what I've been reading or studying. Over the past month and a half, I've walked into the book of Jeremiah in the Bible. In the midst of this I've also placed aside my usual reading book and started a separate book titled One Thing You Can't Do In Heaven by Mark Cahill (which I highly recommend). I feel like I have reading ADHD! I don't usually put aside one book to start another but for some reason I did this time. Throw into it the mix of messages I heard at a Christian conference in July and it all starts to get a little confusing and a bit jumbled up in my mind, well, until I started thinking about it all. These past couple of weeks following the conference, I've been thinking about these questions that someone posed: "What if Jesus really meant what He said? What if God is serious about what He says in the Bible? And what are we gonna do about it?" Now of course, the obvious answer is certainly God is very serious about every single word He authored in His Word, the Bible!! But even knowing that, I know I don't live as if I know this oh-so-obvious truth.

Now with constantly having that in the back of my mind, I've been reading Jeremiah. I've come across this repetitive situation (literally from chapters 34 to 47 so far) between God and the people of Judah. God tells them that if they do a certain thing, there will be bad consequences such as being conquered by King Nebuchadnezzar. But the people of Judah, knowing this obvious truth spoken from the mouth of God himself through the prophet Jeremiah, refuse to believe God's words and instead, they regard God's truth as a lie. They do exactly what God told them would bring them bad consequences (like being conquered) and then they blame God for the consequences! Reading this has made me really think about the fact that- what God says He will do, He does.

When God says He's going to do something, He does it!

Now with constantly having that in the back of my mind, I've been reading the book One Thing You Can't Do In Heaven. Mark goes through various practical ways to witness and actually do what we Christians are commanded to do-spread the Good News! The way he uses real life witnessing examples are very encouraging to someone like me who rarely witnesses to strangers. I mean if what God means what He says about His ability to make us fishers of men, then I should be letting out my net for a catch right? Sometimes reading Cahill's encounters make me wonder why I am so timid when it comes to sharing my faith. Even last week at work a coworker asked me about my belief on a certain faith based issue and I felt timid sharing my Christian view fearing rejection or being rebutted so hard I wouldn't be able to answer. But I was really being scared of nothing-I feared a lie the devil uses constantly to keep us Christians afraid and shy away from boldly stating what God says as truth. But something Cahill said about witnessing made me think in a way that I never did before:
[start of excerpt from Cahill's book]
"What are the only three possible things that can happen when we share our faith?
1) the person can accept Jesus Christ
2) the person can reject Jesus Christ
3) we can plant a seed
After we talked about these possibilities we came up with a chart that looked like this:

ACCEPT	PLANT SEED	REJECT
Good	Good	Bad
Winning	Winning	Losing

We determined that accepting Jesus was a good situation, planting a seed was a good situation and someone rejecting Jesus was a bad situation. Another way to look at it was that accepting Jesus was a winning situation, planting a seed was a winning situation and being rejected was a losing situation. We concluded that 66% of the time that we share our faith it is a winning situation. Aren't those pretty good odds? Two-thirds of the time that we share our faith, we literally can't lose! But the next day, God spoke to my heart like never before. I was reading 1 Peter 4:14 which says, "If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye: On their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified." Just think about that for a moment. If we ever got rejected in the name of Jesus, we will be blessed and the glory of God will rest upon us. If you could have the glory of God shine in your life and be reflected onto others, would you want that? We all would as much as possible! One way that will happen is if we are rejected in the name of Jesus. God wasn't done with me yet. Luke 6:22-23 says, "Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in Heaven: for in the like manner did their forefathers unto the prophets." After God showed me these two verses, I realized I had been mistaken about my previous chart. I'd said we had a 66% chance of a winning situation when we share our faith. Now that we know those two verses, let's see how the chart changes,

ACCEPT	PLANT SEED	REJECT
Good	Good	Good
Winning	Winning	Winning

." [end excerpt from the book]

Wow right??! Every time I share my faith, it's a winning situation! I never thought about it like that before.
I've actually never thought this intensely on these three things before: the fact that God regards what He says in His Word seriously (things heard from conference) so I should do the same also. I'm also thinking about the fact that when God says He will do something, He does it (things seen in book of Jeremiah). I'm also considering the things God has been convicting my heart of as I've been reading Cahill's book.

As I got ready this morning to go for a hair cut appointment, I decided to bring my One Thing You Can't Do In Heaven book along with me to read while I got my hair cut. While driving in the car, I prayed that God would give me a spirit of courage and not timidity (2 Timothy 1:7) to either place tracts on the cars parked in the parking lot of the mall or even be able to bodly share Christ in a conversation with the hairstylist who would cut my hair. I remember thinking in my head, Lord I'm not really sure how I would even start a conversation about you...I don't want her to be freaked out if the first thing I asked her when I sat down in the chair was, "If God-forbid you were to die today, where do you think you would be?" So God, it would be pretty cool if the hair lady started a conversation with me about my book, that would actually give me a way to talk about you and share my faith. As I arrived in the parking lot five minutes late to my hair cutting appointment, I ran from my car to the mall, past all the other cars that I had hoped to put tracts on. I sat down in the waiting area where I saw the hair dresser working on another client. So I thought why not read my book? Ten minutes later, a young woman came up to me and told me she would be washing my hair today. I remember praying God, help me. So I followed her to the chair and sat down with my purse and book in hand. We talked about hair products and how the business for the day was going. Before I knew it, the wash was done and she said another lady would be over to cut my hair. I remember thinking, well way to blow it Jerry, you didn't say a word to her! The hairstylist came over and asked me what I wanted done to my hair. So I focused my attention the next couple of minutes on explaining to her exactly what I wanted done to my hairs. She started separating my hair and started cutting and I resumed my attention to reading more of my book. Moments later...
"So uh, what kinda book ya reading there? Any good stuff in there??"
I was stunned and as I had a smile on my face I lost words for a second while praying Oh dear God please help me...and oh boy, Lord, are you good!
I replied, "It's a great book! It's making me think a lot about heaven. Especially after the whole Colorado incident- crazy right?"
She agreed "I know right, even scarier thinking how that could happen just about anywhere." After looking for a way to start, I decided to take the dive, so I asked, "Hey, lemme ask you something, let's say you and I were in that theater that night, and if we weren't one of the survivors, where do you think you would be?" She stopped to think for a while and said, "Hmm, well I don't really believe in a hell but I would hope I would be somewhere like heaven!" So I asked her, well you believe in God right? She replied, "Yes, I mean did you see the huge cross tattooed on my arm? And I went to catholic school when I was younger but with all the different religions out there like Catholicism and Christianity even though they're similar they're very different, so how can ya really know which one is right?" I remember thinking wow God, you're really opening doors here! So I asked her, "Well, let's say you weren't a survivor and now you're facing God and he's asking you, "Why should I let you into my heaven?" That made her think for a while and she replied, "well I would hope to say I've done the best with the life I was given." So I asked her if she was familiar with the Ten Commandments and she said "ofcourse!" So I asked her, well let's see if by God's standards if you and I would be good enough to get into heaven. "Have you ever lied?"
"Well, yeah of course I have." She replied.
So I asked, "Well what does that make you and me?"
"Sinners" She said
"Well, let's not go that far, we're liars right?" I said
"Yeah, we're liars" She replied.
"Well have you ever stolen, even if it's a small pen?"
She replied, "Well yeah! TD bank has some awesome pens and I take a couple every time I go in there!" We laughed and I got back to the next question, "Jesus said that if we lust after a person in our hearts we are committing adultery with them, have you ever lusted after a person?"
She replied, "Yeah of course I have done that, who hasn't!"
So I said, "Well, by you and I right now by our own...(here is where I lost the right word and she actually finished the sentence for me!)
"By our own admission...." she said
I replied, "Yeah! By our own admission, we just said we're lying, thieving, adulterers. Now when God looks at you after you die where do you think you'll be going?" She stopped cutting my hair and said, "Wow, I guess I wouldn't have much to say."

We had a wonderful conversation about what the Lord did for the both of us on the cross of Calvary 2000 years ago when Christ divided history! (B.C. and A.D hehe) I could tell she was really listening because every once in a while I would lose my train of thought and she would remind me what I was saying! After my hair cut, I handed the her a tract and the lady said she really enjoyed the conversation! She had even told me that her roommate in college was a believer who had been converted from being a Jehovah's witness and she remembers her roommate not being persuaded to do wrong things! What a great testimony her roommate left even before I was able to mention Christ to her!! I'm not sure what she will do with the words that were spoken to her but I am comforted by knowing that whatever happens, seeds have been planted- it is a winning situation!

Boy, what a wake up call. I'm reminded to stop sitting around and to roll up my sleeves and get in the ring. I remember thinking wow that was truly something! But I shouldn't have been surprised- it really was proof that God is serious about His word and when God says He'll do something, He really does it! He supplied me with words and an opportunity today to do what I should be seeking to do everyday. Praise God! He really backs up His Words with His mighty deeds!