Be A Lion Chaser!

LionChaser Manifesto.

Read it. Live it.

Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death. Grab life by the mane. Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention. Keep asking questions. Keep making mistakes. Keep seeking God. Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution. Stop repeating the past and start creating the future. Stop playing it safe and start taking risks. Expand your horizons. Accumulate experiences. Consider the lilies. Enjoy the journey. Find every excuse you can to celebrate everything you can. Live like today is the first day and last day of your life. Don't let what's wrong with you keep you from worshipping what's right with God. Burn sinful bridges. Blaze a new trail. Criticize by creating. Worry less about what people think and more about what God thinks. Don't try to be who you're not. Be yourself. Laugh at yourself. Quit holding out. Quit holding back. Quit running away.

Chase the lion.
An Excerpt by Mark Batterson, author of "In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day: How to Survive and Thrive When Opportunity Roars"

Thoughts Lead To Actions

Exodus 20:17 (NIV)
"You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."

What are you thinking right now? That is a very important question to ask yourself. It's a way to hold yourself accountable. We need to think about what we are thinking about! Here is why....God made one of His Commandments to call attention to our thought life!

Take a look at all the other Commandments...Other people will know if you break them, but no one but God and you will know if you break this one listed in Exodus 20:17....so why is this such an important Commandment?

It is so important, because just like all the other Commandments, God is wanting to give us freedom! These are not rules and laws to restrict or contain us, they are written in order to free us, to call attention to where we are falling short of The Glory of God!

What normally comes before lying, cheating, stealing? What normally comes before dishonoring your parents or misusing The Name of God? Your thoughts do! So God is saying don't covet or think about or lust over what does not belong to you...do not think about sin, because if you do, you will problably fall into sin, and then guess what? You are no longer free!

So, instead of coveting what is not yours or lusting over sinful thoughts, meditate on God's Word, chew on Scripture Day and Night

Take a look at Psalm 1:2 in the NIV and the MSG respectively....

But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.

Instead you thrill to God's Word, you chew on Scripture day and night.

Follow God. Listen to God. Walk in His steps. He created you and He knows best!

Like Christian says, all we need to know is Jesus Christ and Him Crucified, Everything you ever need to know... everything else falls into place!

"Exposed," Part 2 of "The Measuring Stick"

In part one of "The Measuring Stick," I talked about how we become conscious of our sin by observing God's laws. These laws are not set in place to make us righteous and to help us obtain our membership card for God's goodie-tooshoo's club, but rather they are a confirmation of our relationship with Him and they hold us to a higher standard of living.

In part two, "Exposed," I want to focus on the result of living with this higher standard. By measuring your life with Christ Jesus as your standard, your measuring stick, you will be able to live the life He has called you to live. When you measure your life against the measuring stick of culture, you will always fall short of leaving your mark on this world. In fact, following culture could lead to a life of sin, and this sinful lifestyle will make you fearful of being "exposed"

Take a look at John 3:19-21 (NIV)

19This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. 21But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God."

You know what rats do when you turn the light on in a room? They scamper, they high tail it out of the room as quickly as possible for the fear of being exposed. That is what happens to us when we don't hold ourselves accountable to living as Christ and reflecting The Image of God. We become rats and fall into sin because we say, "Everyone else is doing it." Or we rationalize and think that the only way to get ahead in business is to cheat, the only way to become popular is to have sex and get drunk on the weekends. When this happens, we hate the light, and will not come into the light for fear that our deeds will be exposed.

Follow Christ and His Teachings, allow Him to be your measuring stick and constantly compare your life with His. By doing so you will be able to live the life that honors God and you will be able to give Him the Glory that He is due...Welcome the light and Glorify God!

21But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God."

"Conscious" - Part 1 of "The Measuring Stick"

How do you know how tall you are? My guess is that you probably pull out a measuring stick and compare it to some standard, something that will allow you to become conscious of your height.

What about hard work? How do you know what work is? I bet it is because you know what rest is....what about pain? The reason you have a knowledge of what pain feels like is because you have the capacity to experience pleasure...

Up, Down, Left, Right.....Cold, Hot....Victory and Defeat....we have the knowledge to discern the differences in life because we have standards and these standards expose differences and allow us to be conscious of who we are and what we experience...

So let me ask you another question. What is your measuring stick? Who or what do you compare your life with in order to know whether or not you are living up to a higher standard or hiding in a life of mediocrity and sin?

Allow me to let Scripture answer this question.....see Romans 3:20 (NIV)

Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin

You see, we are called to a higher standard of living as we read God's inspired word to us through Romans 3:20. He is telling us that the law does not exist so that we can join the 'righteous club' and get a cool sticker that says we are righteous because we follow laws..

Instead, God has established the law in order for us to make comparisons, just like hot versus cold, in our life of righteous living versus sinful living...through His laws, our sin is exposed because we have a measuring stick that shows us how to become conscious of our mediocre and sinful lifestyle....

Andy Stanley explains it like this, "God did not establish laws as conditions for a relationship with Him, but rather a confirmation of a relationship with Him." We don't follow His laws in order to be accepted into The Kingdom of God, instead, we have laws that confirm our relationship with Him because He wants the best for us and calls us to a higher standard of living!

Imagine if you are a parent. You don't establish rules for your kids so that they will follow them, and IF they follow them, then and then only will you love them...NO, you establish rules for them because you hold them accountable to certain standards and these rules provide a framework that exposes them and makes them conscious of where they are falling short.

Here is a very important point we must make with all of this. Andy Stanley again explains it beautifully. He says, "Rules without Relationship Leads to Rebellion." Friends, we must establish Relationships with those we love, with our family, our co-workers, our employees, our teams and students, because without relationships, our rules will be lead to rebellion. Without relationships, rules become something that people follow out of spite instead of out of love, but when you have a loving and intense relationship with others, you want to follow rules because you love the ones who establish them and you understand that they are in place in order to create an ethos for Glorifying God!

Hot or Cold. Culture or Christ. What is your measuring stick. I want mine to be Jesus Christ. If I model my life after Him instead of culture, and if I allow God's laws to show me where I am falling short of His calling, then I will always be called to a higher standard......Join me in becoming conscious of how God wants us to live. Establish a relationship with Him. His Higher Calling will keep you and me from falling short!

Check into Part 2 of this series, "The Measuring Stick" called "Exposure" and you will want to step into the light instead of hiding in fear of being exposed

Everything you ever need to know...

"For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." (Paul in 1 Corinthians 2:2;NIV)

If you are reading this right now, you are most likely on the internet (unless you printed it off...but then again, you had to get online in order to print it). Do you enjoy the internet? I do! One can find out so much information on the "information highway"! I love information. We live in an information world. We can know so much about so much! However, I am about to tell you everything you will ever need to know in one sentence. Here it is: "Jesus Christ and Him crucified."

Jesus Christ and Him crucified is what, rather, WHO you need to know in life. If you know Jesus Christ and what He did that Friday on the Cross for us, that's really all you will ever need to know!

Sure, there are other things we need to be smart about and learn how to do. We need to know practical things, etc. But all that information is garbage unless we know Jesus Christ and the Cross that He bore!

Do you want to know how to be a better husband? Get to know Jesus Christ and His death on the Cross.

Do you want seven steps on better finances? I'll give you one step,not seven: Jesus Christ and His Cross!!!

How about how to win friends and influence people? Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Reduce stress and find joy/peace? JESUS CHRIST and HIM CRUCIFIED!

You see, 4 ways to raise your kids...3 ways to become a better listener are all good and very beneficial. But above all, life is knowing Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
That's all Paul wanted to know and wanted to preach about (1 Corinthians 1:23;2:2)!

The more you know God's Son and His sacrifice, the more you will know about life, marriage, finances, parenthood, purpose, love, humility, courage, health, careers,college, friendships, dating, purity, thought life, prayer life, Scripture study, etc. The more you know and love Jesus...the more you will know and love your wife, husband, friend, stranger. The more you and I are crucified with Christ (Galatians 2:20), the more we will live! "For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. (Philippians 1:21)!"

You see, life is about self-giving. That is what Jesus and Him Crucified is all about...not just giving away 'some' of yourself but ALL of YOURSELF! Jesus gave everything He was and everything He had because He loved His Father and us. Want to be a better husband or wife? Give yourself away completely to your God and to your spouse? Want to be a better employee or friend? Give yourself away entirely. Give yourself away. Lay down your life for another! That is what your life and my life is all about. It's what our Savior's life was all about. It is what Paul's life was all about!

Resolve, like Paul, to know NOTHING in this information exploded world but JESUS CHRIST and HIM CRUCIFIED! I've come to realize, we may know a lot of things...we can "google" all we want to...but until we know the Man who was murdered on a piece of wood one Friday afternoon, we know nothing.

The Affection of Christ Jesus

" God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus." (Paul to the Philippians, 1:8; NIV)

I just read my twin bro’s blog titled, ""When you come looking for Me, you'll find Me!" WOW! An AMAZING and LIFE CHANGING blog post and if you will pray through it, you will find God…He’ll even FIND YOU! Can you think of anything more life changing than that? I can’t…so get to it!

I had in mind to write a blog on suffering for Jesus tonight. I am thinking about titling it, “Chains for Christ” based off of Philippians 1:13 and some other verses in Acts that the Holy Spirit is going to use to “kung fu” you and me into action with. However, I came looking for God…I found Him and He found me in my prayer tonight. That being said, my blog post is not going to be about “Chains for Christ” but “The Affection of Christ Jesus.”

You see…I have been reading and re-reading, praying and re-praying through Philippians these past few days. Not only that, God has been reading me! He pierced my heart tonight with a love arrow for Him and for my family. I want to love the Triune God and my family with the affection of Christ Jesus.

I want the affection of Christ Jesus for God the Father and God the Spirit. I want the affection of God the Father and God the Spirit for Christ Jesus! I want to long for them! I want the affection of Christ Jesus for my beautiful wife and my precious daughter. They are what the promise of God looks like…literally! I want the affection of Christ Jesus for my mom and my dad…for my older bro and my twin bro…for my older bro’s soon-to-be wife and her children…for my mother-in-law and my father-in-law…for my brother-in-law and for his girlfriend. They are what God’s beauty looks like…literally!

I cry out to God for the affection of Christ Jesus! Paul had it…that’s why he prayed for the Philippians and thanked God every time he remembered them. He prayed with joy because of their partnership in the Gospel. He was confident that God, who began a good work in his brothers and sisters, would carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. He even goes on to say that it was right for him to feel that way about them! Why? I will let Paul answer for himself, “…Since I have you in my heart.” (Philippians 1:7)

Is God in your heart? Is your family in your heart? Are they in your heart with the affection of Christ Jesus? Can God testify to that (1:8)? The affection of Christ Jesus, in a nutshell, will cause you and me to die for the Gospel and to lay down our lives for our families! There is really NO OTHER way to love or to live.

Fill in the blank prayer for you: "Father, give me the Affection of Jesus Christ for_______________! In the Affectionate One, Jesus my Savior, Amen!

"When you come looking for me, you'll find me"

Guten Tag everyone, I decided to say 'Good Day' in German. Why? Because I thought it sounded cool! Yea, anyway, let's get back to Part 2 of our 2 part series discussing the difference between Seeking or ignoring God....

In Part 1, ("I've Reached Out To You, But You've Ignored Me.") I let Scripture speak for itself. The Passage from Proverbs showed that the reason we may not hear God's voice is because it could be that we are choosing to ignore Him...

Here in part 2, I want to allow Scripture to powerfully speak to you again as I point out verses and passages of God's inspired Word that show us how Seeking Him will Rock our world!

1. Read Jeff's Man...I don't know what I would do without... It is so rich and full of Scripture and Teaching that you will want to crave Seeking God!

2. Jeremiah 29.12-14 (MSG)

12"When you call on me, when you come and pray to me, I'll listen. 13-14"When you come looking for me, you'll find me. "Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, I'll make sure you won't be disappointed." God's Decree. "I'll turn things around for you (Emphasis Added).

3. Psalm 91.14-16 (MSG)

14-16 "If you'll hold on to me for dear life," says God,
"I'll get you out of any trouble.
I'll give you the best of care
if you'll only get to know and trust me.
Call me and I'll answer, be at your side in bad times;
I'll rescue you, then throw you a party.
I'll give you a long life,
give you a long drink of salvation!" (Emphasis Added)

Enough said!