Replacing Urgency with Urgency

                We have all heard it said that we cannot live lives full of urgency, meaning that we cannot live our lives in such a way that the deadlines are always pressing and the errands are breathing down our necks like an angry boss tapping his foot. It is said that when we live like this, we are robbing ourselves of living a full life, one in which we can cherish the moments we have with the people we love. 
 

                Unfortunately, many of us cannot seem to get out of that cycle of “deadline – rush -- relax.” I have been battling this in my own life for some time now and have had some success in this area. I have recently been reading a book and noticed an interesting concept creeping in. As I read, in that place where my mind was someplace between actually reading and mindless daydreaming, I noticed the word “urgency” and stopped. I began to think about what this word meant to me, coming in from various angles. In one way, it meant what I have been talking about -- the case where living a life of urgency is unhealthy. However, I then started to think about what this word means to me in light of the Christian walk

                I believe that we should all replace a life drowning in urgency with a life controlled by urgency. I heard it said once that 4,500,000,000 people in this world are unbelievers (and that is an optimistically low number). With almost 7,000,000,000 people in the world today, we know for sure that thousands of those people die every day, many of whom will have a godless eternity in Hell.

                God’s mission for each of our lives is urgent. He has given us a project that has millions of due dates, and they are expiring every day. This is what I am trying to say. It is true that we need to stop living lives drowning in urgency, but we need to check our purpose for the urgency. Are we doing a better job of managing our time so that we can have an easier life or a better time with our loved ones, or are we doing it so that we will have more time and energy to creatively think of ways to reach the lost? This is so important because, unlike deadlines for school and work, these deadlines have repercussions that will reverberate down the halls of eternity.

Suggestions:

·         Pray, be sure to bring it to the Lord, and He will give you His heart for the lost. As I have heard it said; “When I work, I work. But, when I pray, God works”.

·         Get creative, think of ways to break down barriers in the relationships of your neighbors, friends, and family. Think of ways to show God’s love just as much, if not more, than ways to tell God’s love.

·         Be tenacious, don’t be scared, we all have to have that moment where we come to grips with the truth of 2 Timothy 1:7 that God has given Timothy (and us by implication) a spirit of power, and not one of timidity.

Get real with the word. It is true, live like it.

In God’s Love

~Hammy Hamilton

Pray for Super Bowl

Well it is the season that we at Word of Life International like to call "Super Bowl" season. Super Bowl is a large scale evangelistic event that we put on in many different cities all accross the east coast. we see thousands reached with the gospel and hundreds saved every year.  But these events are huge and there is real spiritual battle happening when the gospel is preached. So, please pray for these events as they go on.

November 4th Binghamton NY, Springfield MA, Albany NY, Tampa FL,

November 11th Providence RI, Kalamazoo MI, Glens Falls NY, Hershey PA, Elmira NY, Cleveland OH

November 18th Rochester NY, Manchester NH, Lynchburg VA, Johnstown PA

Check out how Portland ME turned out here: http://youtu.be/WiTlRg6otak

Lessons From Psalm 119 (Part 3 of 10)

Lesson #21 v.57 The Lord is all I need. Period.

Lesson #22 v.59 Self reflection points me to your Word.

Lesson #23 v.61 Evil can be all around you and you can still do right.

Lesson #24 v.62 God's rules cause praise.

Lesson #25 v.63 All who fear Him may fellowship together.

Lesson #26 v.64 His Word changes your perspective on His world.

Lesson #27 v.65 His Word is just and fair.

Lesson #28 v.66 His statutes give wisdom and understanding.

Lesson #29 v.67 God will use affliction to bring you to love His Word.

Lesson #30 v.68 God is good.

Lessons From Psalm 119 (Part 2 of 10)

Lesson #11 v.37 Things that are opposed to God's law are worthless.

Lesson #12 v.38 It's ok to ask God to prove His word to you as truth.

Lesson #13 v.39 Follow God's word right out of reproach.

Lesson #14 v.40 "Life" comes naturally out of righteousness.

Lesson #15 v.41-42 The only answer I have for anyone who taunts me is that I trust in God's Word.

Lesson #16 v.43 God's rules give hope, embrace it.

Lesson #17 v.46-47 Talk about the Word even if it gets you killed but make sure that you do it because you delight in them.

Lesson #18 v.48 Meditate on His words.

Lesson #19 v.50 His promise is my comfort.

Lesson #20 v.51 Let no one convince you that God's law is false.

Lessons From Psalm 119 (Part 1 of 10)

lesson #1 v.6 When I stay attentive to obeying the laws God has set aside for me then I will never be put to shame.

lesson #2 v.9 A young man can stay pure, by living and obeying God’s rules.

lesson #3 v.11 If you truly believe God’s law then you will not sin against Him.

lesson #4 v.22 Scorn and contempt run when someone lives life God’s way.

lesson #5 v.23 When the whole world is falling apart around you meditating on His Word is the best thing to do.

lesson #6 v.25 God’s Word describes true life.

lesson #7 v.28 God’s Word gives strength.

lesson #8 v.30 God’s Word is The way of being faithful.

lesson #9 v.32 God set me free. I will Run in the way of His commandments.

lesson #10 v.36 God’s way is never selfish.

Dereligionization: Prayer

As a Word of Life student in second year I took a class on the theology of prayer and thought it would be a great word to dereligionize. Prayer, as far as I can tell, is a translation for the word “euchomai” which is a word that caries the idea of wishfulness and thankfulness behind it and is the most prominent word translated prayer in the bible. It shows up 54 times in the New Testament. There are other words that are taken to mean prayer as well. Words like entreating, intersession, and confession. These ones are less common in the NT but we still call them “prayer”.

                Here is what I am not saying, what I don’t mean is that we should not call prayer prayer anymore. What I am saying is that we should know what the word actually means as opposed to presupposing the meaning by our religious culture. A prayer meeting by definition is a meeting for the purpose of thanking the Lord. Now before you go changing the name to “intersession meeting” let me explain. All I do here is bring to your attention the danger of living off of presuppositions and assumptions of the meanings of words in the Christian faith.

                There are 6 word families in the Greek that are used for the idea of prayer in the bible. 1) “Euch” this is the root to the words proseuchomai, eucharisteo, euche, proseuche, and euchomai. All of these as said before carry the idea of thankfulness. 2) “De” for Deomai and Desis this is for entreating and asking a request. Found 13 times in the NT. 3) “ait” as in aiteo and aitema these Greek words is for request as well but they bring along with it a dire need from the one asking, maybe even the concept of a demand because of its strong nature, 12X in the NT. 4) “char” or “kair” gives the idea of joyful rejoicing and gratitude. It shows 7 times. 5) “Logeo” or root for word in our language the two words homologeo and exomelogeo are for confession and are found 4 times in the NT. 6) “kaleo” for epikaleo and parakaleo mean a reverential appeal or implore and is used 3 times.

                The worst thing to hear is people “praying” and saying all the Christian cliché’s and really only speaking for the ears of the audience. Prayer is simply our form of communication with God. There is no difference in the words used for talking to God in the New Testament as for talking to people. It is simply a conversation. One of the things that really makes my day is hearing people talk to God in a real way. But way to often we begin to change our voice and the way we speak. We put on this mask when we talk to God because we are not engaging in a “spiritual” act. Let me let you know something; everything we do is spiritual as Christians. “Be in the world but not of the world” Jesus tells us. We are not of the flesh any longer. Our whole life revolves around the act of “putting to death the deeds of the flesh by the Spirit” (Rom. 8:9). Read that whole chapter and you will see what I mean. There should not be any dressing up of the way we talk when we talk to God. Not only is that despicable in God’s eyes because He knows you are covering, but also it hinders other people from coming to Christ. I couldn’t tell you how many new Christians are afraid to pray out loud because they don’t know “the language”. What language?

                Christians, it’s time to get real about your faith in this area. Lets stop talking to God as if we needed to change anything, and just pray because there is great power behind it and we hold fellowship with our Lord that way. Fun fact, there are dozens of prayers in the NT but only 3 or so of them are for any physical ailments or persecution. The prominent prayer of the NT was for various forms of spiritual healing and challenging. But what are all of our prayer meetings about? Mostly jobs, ailments, social situations, and people’s needs. Those are great prayers and have their place but not without a purpose. If people are being healed just to be healed then why would God answer that prayer? God is not interested in making our lives better, read Luke 9. He wants to get His gospel out. This is his goal and that should be our prayers, to make our lives spread the Gospel in a radical way. And I pray that this will really hope you grow closer to the Lord. After all, as my friend Ray Deck III puts it “the end of spiritual growth is not achievement, it is intimacy.”

Living in Him

~Hammy

Why Christians don't Evangelize.

“Now everything is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gace us the ministry of reconciliation: that is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed the message of reconciliation to us. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ; certain that God is appealing through us, we plead on Christ’s behalf, “be reconciled to God.” He made the One who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”   

~II Corinthians 5:18-21

Evangelism is growing weaker and weaker in America. There are less and less people that are zealous to share the awesome news of forgiveness, mercy, grace, life eternal, life change, and, most of all, a relationship with God through Jesus! American Evangelical Christianity is seemingly falling apart right in front of us.

            Ponder this with me for a moment. If you are stuck in a burning house and you are unable to get out, or maybe you are sleeping and don’t know that you are in danger, then someone comes to rescue you out of that house then I am sure you would agree that you could never just walk by someone else in a burning house and not remember the fear and anguish, the torture and damage, or even the problems that still remain from the time you were in that situation. Am I right?

            The reason no one wants to share the gospel is because they do not understand it fully themselves. That is why this passage is here. It says in verse 19 he reconciled us to Himself forgiving our trespasses, THEN he gave us the message of reconciliation to give to others. Our problem is we get this process backwards. We like to get Christians to share the gospel before they really know what it means or how it changes us. What I am not saying is that we are all unsaved and need to get saved first before we evangelize. What I am saying is that we need to understand the immensely awesome salvation we have been given, and then through that we will not have to force ourselves to share the good news. Instead we will not be able to walk by people in “burning houses” of sin, death, pain, condemnation, and a live without God without being absolutely compelled to share the amazing person of Jesus!

            The solution? Now i can't say anything like "do X, Y, and Z and now you are an evangelist" but I can give a counter to what I have observed as the largest hinderance to evagelism and hopefully it will help you. What I would say for you is to wrestle with what the gospel means to you, sit down and find out just how bad the “burning house” of a life without God actually was, and better than that find out how incredible and great the true life you gain and freedom from slavery to sin you gain by being reconciled to God!!! You want help studying this? There is a great book called “A Gospel Primer For Christians” by Milton Vincent you can get it for about ten bucks at http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/1885904673/

It could be the best 10 dollars you spend in a long time. But regardless of how you do it, study God’s word and believe what you read. Find out why the Gospel is so amazing and what God has done for you! And I can promise you that your evangelism will become a lifestyle not a duty!

Living in Him

~Hammy