Get off the on Ramp

The past month I've been really thinking about why Christ died on the cross? Another way to ask the same questions is why did Christ save me? These questions have led me into conversations with my Pastor which have led him to write similar blogs. As I look at most church goers in America I'm convinced that the answer to these questions have been answered wrong. I also feel a big part of why these questions have been answered wrong is because of unbiblical teaching and bad evangelism strategies. What has been taught time and time again is that the answer to the questions above is "Me" or "so I can go to heaven". At first glance these answers seem okay, but after thinking about this more I realize this is why most people are bored when they sit in church. This is also why Gandhi was able to say things like "I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” We have made the story about us. As pastor David put it yesterday, we have made the story about the rescued instead of the the rescuer. If the primary reason for Christ saving me was so I get to go to heaven then the purpose for Him saving me is complete at the moment of me accepting Him. All I have left to do is wait to die, then cash in my inheritance, and get my ticket to heaven. I believe the entire story is about God, even the cross part of the story. I believe the reason Christ died on the cross was to exalt God. I believe Christ saved me for His glory. I believe my life has a purpose, guess who the main character in my story is? It's not me, it GOD. I try to upstage the main character all the time when I make my life about me.

Let me illustrate it this way. Go back to the moment you gave your life to Christ. Might have been in vacation Bible school or after hearing some evangelist speak. Imagine that moment being like an on ramp to the interstate. The on ramp is significant in your journey but it isn't the final destination. Once you give your life to Christ you begin an amazing journey of exalting Christ with your life. For many church goers they have made the on ramp their destination and have never really began their journey. Imagine how boring life would be if our our literal destination was an on ramp. Just put the car in park and watch other cars pass you by. When we believe that the primary purpose for our salvation is to get to heaven then that is exactly what we have done in our spiritual life. No wonder we have so many bored Christians. So come on guys, lets put the car in drive and make our lives about exalting God.

How can you make your life about making much of Christ? Great questions! My answer, just open your eyes to the brokenness around you. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, seek justice, invite your neighbor over who doesn't have any family, be a giver instead of a buyer, FOLLOW YOUR LEADER!

Our Little Journey to Find Piper and How to Love

As many of you know Stacie and I recently adopted little Piper Grace Rouse. Many do not know our story however so I thought I would finally sit down and tell our tale. God has been so evident in the whole process and my purpose in this life is to make much of Him, so I feel like I must tell.

About half way through January Stacie and I started taking our MAPP classes to put ourselves in a position to either adopt a baby or to become foster parents. We knew that God was leading us in this direction but it wasn't clear exactly what that was going to look like. Honestly we were thinking more about fostering to adopt so that would mean the child would be somewhere between 2-5 years old. Two weeks into our classes God revealed that He had other plans. We were made aware of a birth mom in Lakeland that was due the beginning of April. This is the part of the story that everything just went into fast forward and God began to show us that His plans are so much better than our own. Usually when a couple is going through MAPP classes there are several other couples going through the material at the same time so it's like a classroom setting. It just so happened that Stacie and I were the only couple that showed up for the class. Other couples had signed up but never came. The class usually takes 12 weeks to complete but because we were the only couple we were able to take 2 or 3 weeks worth of material every week we met. This was neccesary to have us qualified in time to be considered. We were told that we were being considered because we didn't have a list of things that the baby could or couldn't be. The baby to be born was bi-racial and for some reason white couples seeking adoption are only looking for white babies, so there were very little profiles to show the birth mother. Under the section where you are specifying what the type of baby we would prefer we said "human", (we weren't interested in alien babies at that time). We put together a profile of us as a couple in two days, submitted it, it got sent next day mail to Lakeland and we began to wait. I felt like I was elementary school again on the kick ball ball field nervous that I wouldn't be picked for the team. We thought we would know within a couple weeks if we had been chosen but we heard NOTHING. So we waited longer. The due date came and went and we still had not heard anything so in our minds Stacie and I had moved on. On March 12th Stacie and I were laying in our living room recovering from the 9 mile river run we had run that morning when the phone rang and we were told that our daughter had been born. I can not explain the emotion that was being felt in that moment but it was like a dam had broke and this overflow of happiness and joy overcame us. We were told that we could come the next day and meet our little girl. We got up REALLY early Sunday morning and headed to Lakeland. Because this was a open adoption the birth mom was still in the room and we would meet her for the first time that we met our daughter. We were really nervous about this because we didn't know what to expect. Once we got to Lakeland we accidently met the birth mom in the parking garage and immediatly connected like we had know each other for years. After about 10 minutes of us talking we went to the room to meet our little girl. Because you've been reading for awhile here's a "ahhh" picture to give you a break.

(this was taken about 2 minutes after we met her)

So here we are a new family. I'm still trying to convince myself that I'm a dad, and laying in the bed is this girl that just gave us the most amazing gift a person can give. What do you say? how do we thank her? Here is where a lot of people get nervous with our story. Stacie and I fell in love with Piper's "tummy mommy" (that's what we call her). We felt that God did not just allow us to cross paths so she could hand us a baby. We believe there is more to the story. She is part of our family. We talk on the phone. We have recently gone to lunch together. We have played with her 16 month daughter. Many people have told us that this is NOT a good idea. "what if she changes her mind?" WE DO NOT CARE what people tell us or how they think we should feel about her, we love her! We don't know where this relationship will go but we know that God has told us to love her and her family and we are glad that He has. Luke 6:32 says "“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?" specifically it's talking about loving your enemies so it's a little different because she is far from our enemy but I think the point here is that we don't get to chose who we love and who we don't love. Even when it doesn't make sense, and even when it might be scary....LOVE. This is the journey and story God has led us to, it's a crazy one but I don't know to many God stories that aren't crazy.....so my thought of the day....if the story you are living is boring, is that God's story for you or have you traded it in for you own?

here's our family photo...