Anyhoo, I taught at FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes in case any of you didn't know. I'm not trying to insult your intelligence or anything) the other day. Well, yesterday actually. But it was INCREDIBLE. I felt like I had actually gotten through to a group of middle and high schoolers. Not an easy task. I felt...well, spiritually enriched. It was like a burst of even more Faith into my veins. Faith Adrenaline...haha.
But I'm going to post my lesson on here for you lovely people because if I can make a group of students (and two adult teachers, I was proud) have this face :o (for the record, this is not a shock face. This is an "oh my gosh I totally get this and I can relate to this" face), then certainly something in here can reach you...hopefully. Maybe not, who knows? Maybe they were all zoned out. But throughout the day, several people came up to me telling me how awesome I did and how they learned from what I said. It felt pretty fantastic. I'd rather have a few people be really jazzed about the lesson than have the entire room passively accept it, to be honest.
This isn't exactly what I said (I put a ton of extra stuff in there as it came to me), but this is the gist.
Good morning, guys. I want you to take a quick second to count how many televisions you have in your household. How many of you have just one? Two? Three? Four? All right, how many of you own an iPod or other mp3 player? How many of you own at least four pairs of shoes? How many of you have less than that?
Let’s switch up the questioning a little. How many of you have access to clean water? How many of you live in a house, an apartment, or any other form of shelter? Unless I'm severely mistaken, every hand in this room should be up.
Let’s switch it up one more time. How many of you worry about if your internet is working? How many of you take comfort in a warm bed and a hot meal?
Last question: how many of you take comfort in the things you own? Go ahead, be honest. I admit that I do. I admit that I like waking up from an alarm clock and listening to my stereo as I get ready for school. I like that I have access to clean water and running water. Now, I like all of those things. I take comfort in them, but everything I just mentioned is temporary. It’s a strange thought isn’t it? All of that could be taken away by God in just one second. One instant is all it takes to lose your comfort if you instill your comfort in material things.
Some of you may be thinking, “God wouldn’t do that to me. He loves me.” Now, this is very true. God loves you, but He’s done worse things in order to shake someone up. God can turn your life upside down in a snap.
Everything you own, every scrap of food, every drop of water, every piece of clothing on your body could be gone. Just like that. Snap. Your house is gone. Snap. Your clothing is gone. Snap. You begin to starve. Snap. You begin to lose hope. Snap. Your hope is restored by God. I’m going to be honest here, if I lost everything like that right now, I wouldn’t feel too great. I would feel like I couldn’t survive without my stuff. That’s because materialism has become so socially acceptable. These days, it’s okay to go to the mall and spend 40 dollars on a pair of shoes, it’s okay to spend 5 dollars on a frappuccino from Starbucks, it’s okay to spend over 100 on school supplies, it’s okay to go out and get an iTouch even though your old iPod works just fine.
Let me tell you this: life isn’t money or materialism. Now, I could sit here and tell you that I had this huge revelation and that materials mean nothing to me anymore, but that would be a bold faced lie. I know that in our society, you’re expected to have stuff or the value people place on your heads decreases. If you’re a business man, you’re deemed more valuable than a homeless man. It’s not right, actually it downright cruel, but this is what many people do. But what if that homeless man had a heart full of God and nothing else? Does he need anything else? No. The value of the spirit is infinitely larger than the value of a big house or a nice car.
I know that living a life without surrounding yourself with materials seems hard. I know that. I’m not telling you that it’s easy, but I am telling you that if you place your comfort in materials, you will get burned. Plain and simple.
Story time! Two men are walking down the street. They’re almost complete opposites. One is a business man, the other is a homeless man. The business man pities the homeless man because it appears that he has no comfort in life. However, the homeless man is walking with a skip and his step and a smile on his face. The business man is angry because his cell phone gets bad reception in that area and he wanted to ask his wife to bring his coat to his work because it is so cold outside. The business man takes another look at the homeless man and waves him over. He pulls out his wallet and tries to give the homeless man 20 dollars. The homeless man smiles and says, “Thank you, but I don’t need this. I appreciate your generosity.” Perfectly polite answer right? Well, the business man gets angry. He says, “Take it. I don’t need it. I have plenty more where that came from.” The homeless man still smiles and says, “Really, I don’t need it. I’m just fine.”
The business man’s anger grows. Why won’t the man just take the money and leave? He says, “You’re homeless. You’re dirty. And yet you smile at everyone you see. Why? I pity you so much because you have no comfort. Please, just take the money.” The homeless man’s smile never falters as he replies, “Oh sir. You’re blinded by your possessions, aren’t you? But you pity me because I have no material claims in this world? My friend, I pity you.” He continues, “You say that I have no comfort, but this couldn’t be any more untrue. My comfort is my God. My God feeds me when I’m hungry. My God shelters me from harm. My God clothes me with His spirit. My God gives me gifts every day. I am privileged to enjoy sunrise and sunset. I am grateful to feel the wind on my face. I am appreciative of the rain that cleanses me. I have all that I could ever ask for and more, but I do not ask, because I know that God will provide. There is never a time more surrounded by possessions than when those possessions come from Heaven and not from the Earth.”
The business man scoffed. “It’s so cold. Feel that breeze? That’s not a gift, that’s the making of Hypothermia. Your God can’t keep you warm. You foolish man, the jacket on your back warms you.” At this, the homeless man laughed with a gleeful expression. “Here,” he said. “Take my jacket. I see that you don’t have one. Take it. I have no need. You have bumps on your flesh because you have no Faith in the Lord. Take Faith, and He will provide. I have Faith that if anything were to happen to me, the Lord would reward me for my Faith in Heaven.” The homeless man placed his jacket on the back of the business man. As the homeless man walked away, with a huge grin on his face, he’d never felt warmer.
Scripture directly falls in line with everything I'm saying. Matthew 6: 25-34. 1 Peter 1: 18-21. 1 Timothy 6:3-10. Matthew 7: 7 and 8. Colossians 3: 12. Ecclesiastes 2: 1-11. I could read all of this off to you, but then you wouldn't take the initiative to dive deeper into what I'm saying. If you want, you can come up to me at any time and I'll read it to you. Just say "Janie, I want to learn." Seriously, I don't mind and I'd actually really enjoy it.
Pleasures mean nothing. Our souls are hungry, but not for materials. Our souls are hungry for satisfaction though God. God gives us more than we could ever need and things we never even knew we wanted.
We have to let go of our comfort to satisfy our hunger for the love of God. We have to lose our control over our lives. This next statement may sound odd, but know you take comfort from God when you’re uncomfortable. When He calls you to do something out of your comfort zone and you actually do it, that’s when you know that you take comfort from God and only God. Again, that may sound convoluted, but when you’re truly uncomfortable, God is your comfort. Materials are worth nothing in Heaven. You can’t take them with you. When your comfort is in God, you become okay with giving up what you used to hold onto; you become okay with having nothing material. It’s not easy, but it’s possible.
We have to go as Jesus went. We have to go deeper. Jesus wasn’t rich with gold, He was rich with love. He didn’t surround himself with kings; He surrounded himself with prostitutes, lepers, the homeless, those who had nothing to hold onto except Him. So to live in comfort, our only comfort can be from God. That means making tough decisions and being essentially uncomfortable.
Here’s the most important and most convoluted statement out of all of this: You will become comfortable with being uncomfortable if your comfort comes from God. I’ll say it again. You will become comfortable with being uncomfortable if your comfort comes from God.
Materialism has twisted society like a slinky. We get knotted together and it appears as though we have to cut the whole apart to create the smaller pieces. It's never the same. In reality, we're all so caught up within ourselves to let go and make the whole again. Underneath the knot, we're unified. Not just as Christians, but as brothers and sisters. Every person comes from God and that makes them a part of you. But as Christians, as the Followers of the great I AM, we can rise above the comfort of materials and we can spread the message. “Take Faith, and He will provide.”
I love you all :) Thank you for reading.
That's awesome. It was good to hear you preach than in FCA yesterday. :)
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