I was having coffee with a college student the other day. He had expressed an interest in helping out in our discipleship program and I just wanted to get to know him a little better and see what he was all about. In the middle of our conversation, he said something so profound that I grabbed my journal and jotted it down right then. I mean, I literally cut him off and wrote it down verbatim. It was that good.
What did he say? I was asking him about what God was teaching him, and he had shared about how a mission trip to Asia had really impacted him, and how the faith he had seen on display at a house church in Asia had actually ignited something in him. He longed to see American Christians have that kind of passion and faith. He then said that when you really experience Christ, it “changes what you should do into what you can’t not do.”
Think about that for a second. If you really experience Christ…if you have the Spirit of the living God dwelling inside you, the Great Commission and the pursuit of Holiness no longer become things you “should do.” Prayer, Bible study, corporate worship…they are all no longer on the checklist. There’s no need for a checklist because you literally can’t think of not doing them!
You can’t help but to put others above you. You can’t help but to cheerfully give to God. You can’t help praying for your city. You can’t help being an ambassador for Christ.
That college student radically simplified what it meant to be a devoted Christ follower to me over a cup of coffee. Because, when you really think about, if God captures your heart, there really is no more “should do.” Instead, your “should do” becomes “can’t not do.”
That college student radically simplified what it meant to be a devoted Christ follower to me over a cup of coffee.
Acts 4:19-20. “But Peter and John answered them, ‘whether it’s right in the sight of God for us to listen to you rather than God, you decide; FOR WE ARE UNABLE TO STOP SPEAKING ABOUT WHAT WE HAVE SEEN AND HEARD’”
thanks for the inspiration…ended up using this concept in my message on Wed. night!
That’s some good stuff…So you brought the kid on staff as a discipleship pastor right? Seriously though, I think that expresses in words the things we often experience when our relationships with Christ are most healthy. Following him starts to look more like “life”than an exercise in discipline and self-control. I think another facet of this gem is that when we “do,” so we become. For example, the reason mission trips impact us so much is because we must discipline ourselves and prepare for the work we are going to do. When we get there, we see how Christ has been working and the experience of that is transformative.
Love the “do” to “become” progression you brought up. That is basically sanctification in a nutshell…I feel another blog coming on…
For you or me?! Ha!