Crazy Love by Francis Chan- Chapter 7 "Your Best Life…Later"

“By now you’ve probably realized that you have a distinct choice to make: just let life happen, which is tantamount to serving God your leftovers, or actively run toward Christ.”

Francis Chan started chapter 7 with this little statement. Megan and I sometimes have trouble making choices. It can take us up to 30 minutes to decide where we would like to go out to eat. Choosing something that simple should not be a difficult task. To be honest, I have never really thought about my relationship with Christ in the way Chan described. I really have to ask the question, am I serving God my leftover by just letting life happen? It is so very easy for us to fall into the trap of just living the life and trying to be good enough. Well I don’t feel called to live good enough, I feel called to something else. There are two things I know will happen during this calling. God will change not only my life but the life of others around me. And I will fail more often then I would hope, but that is the great thing about God’s grace. Chan then moves into talking about those in Hebrews 11. By faith each person took this action because God was working in life. My desire is that I will chose to actively run toward Christ and allow him to work through me.

“Having faith often means doing what others see as crazy. Something is wrong when our lives make sense to unbelievers.”

If this statement doesn’t challenge you in some way then you are either living this life already or you are giving God your leftovers in your relationship with Him. I can tell you that I fail at living this life more often then not. I don’t believe there is one way to live this life. God has a plan for each of us, so we will each live this out in different ways. I’m trying to think of a way my life didn’t make sense to an unbeliever. The thing coming to mind is going to Africa to work with churches. People understand why I go and realize it is a nice thing to do. But what unbelievers don’t understand is why I would give up my vacation time for such a trip. People also don’t understand why I put so much time and effort into teaching students about having a relationship with Christ (I sometimes wonder that myself!). The relationship I have with Christ drives me to do these things. Honestly I don’t always have time to do the things I want to do, such as watch TV or hang out with friends. I also don’t always have the time to get the things done around the house that I need to do. For example, I have been telling Megan since we moved in that I would touch up the paint around the house…and we moved over 5 months ago. Living for God means making choices about how we use the time that we have been given. Sometimes it means that we have to choose to make a sacrifice. I’m going to end this post with a statement from the book. This statement is something I would like to think about for a while.

"Christians today like to play it safe..But if we truly desire to please God, we cannot live that way. We have to do things that cost us during our life on earth but will be more than worth it in eternity"

Post your thoughts. God Bless.

Crazy Love by Francis Chan- Chapter 6 "When You’re in Love"

We all have an opinion about what the word ‘love’ really means. It could be so many things, from “I love my shirt” to “I love you”. But the crazy thing is what we do when we are “in love”. Let’s do something fun. If you are willing…post a comment to this post about something crazy you did because you were in love. I asked Megan the question, what is something crazy I did because I was in love? She came up with two things. First while I was in Colorado visiting my family for Christmas, I spent hours talking to her online instead of hanging out with family at night. Then the first summer we were dating, I went to five weddings with her. Four of them were for people I didn’t know, one of those I had to sit by myself because Megan was part of the wedding party. In this chapter, Chan is talking about how love is part of our relationship with Jesus our Savior. Chan says,

Is loving God—and, by extension loving people—what you are about?

Galatians 5:6 says, The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. This verse really makes me think about my faith. Does the faith I live out express itself through love? Often times I would say it doesn’t and that I need to work on that part of my relationship with Christ. I want people to see my faith through my acts of love. That may be the hardest thing to live up to, but that is part of being a Christ-follower. For people to see our faith through love, we need to grow more in love with God. The best way to do this is through prayer and listening to Him. Chan made a comment about the cycle we can enter with praying for more love.

Our prayers for more love result in love, which naturally causes us to pray more, which results in more love…

We have always been told this and it is much easier said than done. The more we fall in love with God the more we will love others. In the end a question comes to mind, what is something crazy I have done because I was in love with God?
Father, Help me to be more in love with you. Give me the desire to long after you in all the parts of my life. I want people to see my faith in you through my love for them. You are an amazing God that you would love us so much yet we struggle to love you. I want to love you more. Amen.