I think Jesus is my favorite person. Really. I’m not giving you a Sunday School answer. You know, when you were little and no matter what the question was, some kid would inevitably yell out “Jesus!” This time I mean it. And the reason is that I know some really awesome things about Him.

1) Jesus is God. Period. He’s not just a really great teacher or moral example. If you take what He said seriously, either He’s psycho or He’s God. And I think He was telling the truth (and still does!)

2) Jesus always saves the best for last, like the wine at the wedding at Cana (see John 2:1-12). You can count on the fact that no matter what’s going on in your life, if you’ve trusted Jesus for salvation, He’s got some pretty amazing things lined up for you.

3) Jesus wins in the end. Read the Book of Revelation. It’s not even close. Jesus wins by a blowout landslide and we who are with Him get to share in the victory.

4) His arms are long enough to reach you wherever you are and strong enough to keep you safe and secure from anything and anyone who is against you.

5) He is bigger than your politics or religion. Jesus never calls you to a better morality or political platform or religion, but to a relationhip with the Father that surpasses relationship you could ever have and truly fulfills every longing you’ve ever had.

6) Jesus will push away anything that keeps you from God. He called His Church a house of prayer (not of preaching or worship or miracles or anything else) because He wants you to know Him and the Father and have the same joy He has in His Father.

7) Jesus would rather hang out with sinners who are truly sorrowful than the smug self-righeous churchgoers who look down their noses at everybody else and carry picket signs that say who God hates.

8) Jesus is the only way to heaven because only He is good enough to die for His enemies and strong enough to bear all our sins and reach down into hell and pull us out. Nothing and no one else is good or strong enough.

9) Nothing in heaven or earth or even in hell will ever stop Jesus from finding you. Nothing you’ve done or said or nothing that’s been said or done to you will stop Him. No matter what you’ve called yourself or what others have called you, Jesus has a new name for you written on the palms of His hands and He can’t wait to share it with you.

Those are some of what I know to be true about Jesus and if I focus on those things, I always fall more in love with Jesus. I hope you come to fall in love with this Jesus, because He’s fallen in love with you and is crazy about you. May that be the song of your heart, the same song He sings over you in the night while you sleep. May that be your testimony: I am My Beloved’s and He is mine (and He calls me beloved, too!)

Amen and amen.

3)

I’ve always heard that there’s no such thing as a dumb question. Ask any question and don’t feel foolish. For the record, there are dumb questions, such as the classic “When is the midnight buffet?” for example. Perhaps, we need to worry more about asking the wrong question.

The question isn’t how can you meet my needs, but how can I meet yours.

The question isn’t how can I make you see how you’ve wronged me and make you pay for it, but how can I seek to forgive you just as God in Christ has forgiven me.

The question is not how can I find the fulfilled life or my best life now, but how can I start giving my life away daily for the cause of Christ.

The question is not what will I get out of this Bible Study or service or event, but how can I give to someone else and share with them what God has shared with me.

The question is not how can God bless me, but how can God make me a blessing to someone else that I run into today.

The question (for single folk) isn’t how can I find the right person for a marriage partner, but how can I be the right person.

The question is when will sugar-free chocolate ever taste like real chocolate (and the answer to that one is the day after never!)

The question is not what plan does God have for my life, but how does He want me to be obedient and faithful and surrendered and available for Him to use right now in this moment.

There are probably many many other questions along these lines. The point is not about me, or my life, or my problems, but about God and His Kingdom advancing in the world and His glory displayed and His love winning the hearts of His people. The main question is how can I be a part of that and how can I be Jesus to someone in my world wherever I am.

Amen and amen.

Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of “the brightest and the best” among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these “nobodies” to expose the hollow pretensions of the “somebodies”? That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. Everything that we have—right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start—comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That’s why we have the saying, “If you’re going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God” (1 Corinthians 1:26-31, The Message).

This  blog was inspired by both Bill Wellons and Mike Glenn. Thanks to both of them for being faithful stewards of God’s Word.

Back in Jesus’ day, most other disciples were men who were the cream of the crop, so to speak. They were the very finest, brightest. Those who were the elite, those who survived when many did not and went back home to learn their fathers’ trades. They became the rabbis that everyone looked up to, the who’s who of their day.

But not so with Jesus. He chose people like Peter. Peter, the uneducated fisherman who had been eliminated for the possiblitiy of discipleship long ago. Peter, who when He saw Jesus’ authority over nature and, in this case, fish, fell down and declared himself an unworthy sinner. Jesus chose a tax-collector, two zealots, and other fisherman, among others. No one that had any of the credentials to be a disciple.

What Jesus essentially told Peter (and what He tells us his children today) is that He wants us just like we are. Who you are right now is good enough for Jesus to use and you admitting your sinfulness qualifies you best for a relationship with Him. He wants your mess to become your message (taken from another pastor who faithfully preaches God’s Word).

Jesus saw you struggling with your chains and bondage and saw your broken heart. He called you and loved you as you were right then. He took your place, took your chains and your bondage and sin, and bore them to an instrument of torture called a Cross where He paid your debt once and for all, making  you forever free.

So, I’m thankful Jesus chose me. I’m equally glad He chose you. Neither one of us deserved to be called or had earned it, yet here we are due to the grace of God. Let our response, our worship, be to give our lives back to Him for Him to use however and whenever and wherever He wants. Let the only song we sing be one of a heart that’s been set free! Believe that Jesus loves you and His love is changing you. Believe that God looks at you and sees Jesus. Let your life from here on out be a living hymn of gratitude and thanksgiving.

Amen and amen!

I personally think knowledge is way 0ver-rated. All that book learnin’ so you can learn to speak English good and to spell korrectly. Who needs it? Have you ever met one of those people who are so stinkin’ smart that they have gone past common sense and being able to tie their own shoelaces? Seriously.

I do think that there’s a whole lot I don’t know. You could fill entire libraries with all the stuff I don’t know. I’m okay with that. After all, it’s not what you know but Who you know that will get you where you need to be in life. And God knows everything (including all my junk, yet He loves me still).

I don’t know why God loves me like He does or why He still loves me when He has had many reasons to quit. I don’t know why He blesses me like He does. I certainly don’t know why He chose me out of all the people in the world, but I know He did. I don’t know where I am being led in this life, but I know and trust the One leading me (thanks, Oswald Chambers for that one!)

I don’t always know what to say or how to act in social settings. I have created many awkward moments with my lack of social grace. But I know that when I most need it, the Holy Spirit puts the words in my mouth just as He did for the early leaders when they spoke before kings. And He gives me very gracious and forgiving friends who look past my sometimes social nerdiness.

I do know that Jesus is madly in love with me and won’t let me go.  I know God looks at me and sees Jesus and thinks that’s pretty awesome. He sees all the perfection of Jesus when He sees me. I do know that no matter how rocky or winding the road I’m on can be, it will get me Home. I know that Jesus won’t just just me the way; He is the Way.

I don’t know whether 2 or 500 people will read this, but I know that I have to share what God puts on my heart, even if it’s only for me. I know that when my blog is long gone, when I am long gone, when my name is forgotten, God will still be faithful and true. And that will end the day after never.

Amen and amen!

Remember the dream where you show up to class and find out there’s a test that day that you haven’t studied for? Remember how glad you were to wake up from that dream? That actually happened to me in my college Spanish class. The sad part was that I probably did better on that test that I didn’t study for than all the ones I actually prepared for.

Are you like me in that most of the time you walk around your world thinking that everybody else is so organized and has all their stuff together and has all figured out. That everyone else has secret knowledge that you’re missing? Like there was a class that every single other person went to, but you overslept because you were too busy dreaming about unexpected tests?

The truth as I am learning it is this. You aren’t nearly the only one who doesn’t have life figured out. Not even close. Some may be better at hiding their dysfunctions and confusions, but every single person struggles with their lives and what they’re doing and why they’re doing it.

The sad part is that we’re taught to project our best self. We have it instilled in us to never admit weaknesses, but pretend like we’re always strong, always brave, always calm. The result is that we never see anyone else struggling and think we’re all alone in our mess. We never get the joy of sharing in each other’s burdens and lifting each other to God in prayer. Most of all, we never get to find out how strong Jesus can be in us if we never boast in our weakness as Paul did in 1 Corinthians.

No, you are not alone. You are not a mistake. You may feel like you’re hopelessly messed up and broken, but God sees a place where He can shine brightest. God sees what you’re becoming (and what you already are since He’s declared you to be holy and perfect and blameless). He looks at you and sees something precious, worth dying for.

So be strong enough to admit your weaknesses. Be brave enough to show your fear. Be honest enough to confess the sham you’ve lived and all the masks you’ve been wearing. Love people as they are, not as how you hope they will be. Let the love of Christ fill you and spill out into your world. Because His love alone can heal and make whole and set you free. His love alone can transform the object into something like Himself. And that’s what we’re all hoping for. To be like Christ.

Amen and amen.

I haven’t done a book report in a really long time. For the record, this isn’t going to be a book report in the strictest sense of the word, but I was feeling nostalgic when I came up with my blog title.

I’ll be honest. I wasn’t overly impressed when I started the book. There wasn’t much I hadn’t read before, but the further I went in, the more I liked what I read. Pete Wilson is open and honest about his own struggles and admits with equal frankness that he doesn’t have all the answers or even that there are always answers to be had.

I think the main takeaway for me is this: when life detours from your plan and when your dreams die and your own plans fail, God is sufficient. He only takes away when He’s about to give you something better. His silences are a way of saying that you’re not ready for what He’s getting ready to tell you.

My own life has felt like a plan B at times. My life is nothing like I thought it would be at this point when I was younger. I’m not married, or even close. I’m not in my dream career. I’m definitely not in my dream home. But my view of God is much bigger now than it was then and my gratitude for all He has done is so much greater. I am way more awed and amazed at His grace now and at how much I deserve hell, but get mercy instead.

I am finding out daily that God is faithful and true and that His promises are as good as done. God has put people in my life that inspire and encourage and bless me every time I see them. And the best part of all is that He’s changing me daily to look moore like Him. Partly I know because I can see it and because others tell me they can see it, but mostly because God tells me He’s doing it and He can already see the final result.

So go buy Plan B by Pete Wilson. Here’s the link (see how easy I’m making it for you?)  http://www.amazon.com/Plan-What-Doesnt-Thought-Would/dp/0849946506/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1301971062&sr=1-1

And then read it. I can almost guarantee you won’t be disappointed. And you’ll fall love with the God who is sovereign even in the plan Bs of your life. Praise Him because He’s has given you His word that He will finish what He started in you and He won’t EVER give up on you.

Amen and amen.