Running, Dying, and My Church Planting Journey Pt. 2

After a good night sleep, Starbucks open, and a shower I have recovered enough to write the promised part 2 to last night’s blog. I mentioned one of the songs I listened to was “It’s My Life” by Bon Jovi. Now although I enjoy running to the song it got me thinking, it’s not really my life anymore. The day I acknowledged that Jesus is Savior and Lord of my life I gave up that right, it’s now His life to do with what He chooses. In fact it got me thinking about us as a church, and I mean all of us who claim to be Christ-followers, especially here in America. I wonder where we get off sometimes. What right do we have to expect comfort, or the easy path? That spits in the face of everything Jesus taught us about the high cost of following Him. The problem is that we who claim to be Christ-followers all too often live as if it is our life. We pamper ourselves in every way we can think of and we forget, it’s not about us. It’s about something much greater, the cause of Christ in this generation.
This is where it gets more personal for me. My wife and I with our small daughter left friends, family, and the land we love to answer God’s call to be a part of what He is doing in Tucson, AZ in April of 06. Simply put if GA was the land that I loved, Tucson, is the extreme opposite, I just didn’t know it yet. In April of 07 we started a church, and last month in November of 08 we closed its doors, metaphorically since we never owned a building, forever. God has led us to lead a merger of this church with another and overall the idea has some hints of insanity to it, but we are 100% sure God is leading it. People ask, “So do you think it will work?” I don’t know! What’s work? I know God called us to the church plant, and in normal human terms it failed miserably. The thing is though, I believe it was God’s plan for it to fail, for us to merge, and for…well that part is not written yet. You see when it’s our life we get wrapped up in how others will perceive what is going on, but in Jesus’ kingdom a cup of cold water in His name has eternal reward. So here we are not because we want to be or this is our dream, but because this is where God has placed us to be a part of the most important cause of my generation, the generations that came before me, and all the generations to come and that is the cause of Christ! This is not my doing, this is not the way I would do things, but this is God getting a hold of one guy, and getting him to step out of the way and let God work through him. It’s not what I can do, what I want to do, or how I think it should be done, but it is Christ working in me and through me. You see since I am a Christ-follower it’s not my life, but His.