I preached in chapel last week, and I used the guys in the picture as my illustrations. Do you know them? The guys in the picture are Wario and Winnie the Pooh. You probably know Pooh. He has an insatiable love for honey. He regularly gets stuck in Rabbit’s window because he goes after honey with his whole heart.
Wario, on the other hand, is a villain from Mario Brothers. If you know our family, you know we love Super Mario Brothers. Wario has a great desire to get as many gold coins as he can. He runs around with a bag of gold coins and collects more and more. Keep reading to find out what they have to do with my sermon…
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Tomorrow I’m speaking at a youth event at our local church. It’s called “Epicentro”, and my talk is about a “Spiritual Seismograph.” I’m talking mostly about our commitment level to Christ and what that looks like on a daily basis.
As I was researching seismographs, I found it interesting that a seismograph always must be attached to bedrock. Otherwise, there will be false readings in the reports that it generates.
For example, in our house in Mexico, we have a giant window that rattles like crazy every time a truck goes by, which is several times a day. What sounds like it could be a giant earthquake is usually just a gas, garbage, or water truck, making it hard to detect when a real earthquake is happening.
The spiritual life is the same. We often feel as though we are being moved by something, but if we are not deeply rooted in the bedrock of our faith, which is Jesus, we will be shaken by all sorts of things and get a false reading.
What moves us needs to be Jesus moving from deep within our hearts. It has to do with Peter’s response in Mark 8:29 when he responds to Jesus with a strong conviction that He is the Christ.
Please pray that tomorrow I can lead students to a greater understanding of who Jesus is and how He should move them throughout their lives so that they can have a strong commitment that guides them to where they need to be in order to make an impact for eternity.
Our teammates Edgar and Karyna moved into a new apartment this past weekend. Since I’m pretty experienced at moving, they asked me to help them. So we road around in a friend’s van all day on Friday taking furniture and appliances to their new apartment.
When I posted the following picture on Instagram, my friend Luke commented, saying, “Moving is Evil.” I pretty much agree with him about that, since I’m not much of a fan of lugging heavy stuff up and down narrow stairways (why are stairways always so narrow?).
We had fun while moving them, though, and hopefully the next time they move it will be to Ecuador. It’s interesting because we were saying that all day as we were moving their stuff from the Seminary to an apartment about 15 minutes away.
Moving isn’t evil if it is God who has moved you. I’m praying that God moves Edgar and Karyna again fairly soon (they are raising funds to be in Ecuador by 2015). I pray that they will still have the courage to move because He has moved them.
I recently bought the Audio Adrenaline album, “Kings and Queens” (You should get it…if you do, use our affiliate link), and there is a great song on there called, “He Moves, You Move.” The lyrics are great, and it reminds me of why we do what we do. It reminds me that I must listen to God and see when He is moving. It’s not easy to move, but it’s a whole lot easier to do when you know that He is the one moving you.
Watch the video:
What is God moving you to do?
We have a little princess in our family. Our little girl loves princess things, and her bedroom wall has princesses all over it. She puts on her princess dress, her tiara, twirls around, and sings, “I’m gonna be a princess.”
This also means that she’s a big fan of Sofia, one of the latest Disney Princesses that has a show on the Disney Channel called “Sofia the First.” We watch it at least once a day.
Sofia and her mom live in the village of the kingdom until, one day, Sofia’s mom marries the king, making Sofia a Princess. They move to the castle, and of course this means that she has to learn all about how to act like a princess. The whole show is about how she messes that up but learns in the process.
To understand what the show is about, read the lyrics to the (as always) catchy Disney theme song:
I was a girl in the village doin’ alright
Then I became a Princess overnight
Now I gotta figure out how to do it right
So much to learn and see
Up in the castle with my new family
In a school that’s just for royalty
A whole enchanted world is waiting for me
I’m so excited to be (Sofia the First)
I’m finding out what being royal’s all about (Sofia the First)
Makin’ my way it’s an adventure everyday (Sofia)
It’s gonna be my time (Sofia)
To show them all that I’m Sofia the First!
As I was walking to work this morning, I couldn’t get that song out of my head. It really is catchy (Click to watch it on Youtube). I was also thinking about how Sofia’s story is like our story.
We are just ordinary people who God chooses to bring into His family through Jesus, making us heirs to the Kingdom. We are now in the process of learning to live according to our new position as His children. We struggle, there are things we don’t understand, but our loving Father the King is right there to guide us through it all.
We truly are adopted into the Royal Family.
We should be like Sofia:
- Excited to be part of God’s family
- Exploring what it means to be children of the King
- Making our way daily in the adventure that God has for us
We ought to be living like princes and princesses today.
It’s not everyday that I get a brilliant idea, so when I do I need to write about it here. I’m not sure that it’s so brilliant, but it’s something that I am happy about, so I wanted to share it.
We’ve never been very good at “family devotions.” You hear the stories of the families that spend hours praying together and studying the Bible, but since we have three very active little kids, it’s not been something we’ve been able to perfect as a family.
Sure, as we are going along, we talk about God and the Bible (which might be one of the most important things to do), but we’ve not made a whole lot of progress of being intentional about those conversations so far. Our family is young, so we have some time, but not that much. Like everyone says, “They’ll be grown before we know it.”
A few weeks ago, we I (Dennis) had a crazy idea to paint one of the walls in our house with chalkboard paint. It’s fun and the kids get permission to draw on a wall. We use it for home school and other things. Then it hit me: Why not post an intentional question on the wall and let the kids answer with a word or a drawing? The parents can play along, too, answering the question each day as we pass by the wall.
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We were in Orlando this past week, but I was still working on my Bible memorization that I mentioned last week. The verse for this past week was 2 Chronicles 16:9 – “For the eyes of The Lord run to and for throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward Him.”
These last few weeks have been reminders that God is with us and that His support is there when we need it. Makes me wonder what’s in store for 2013.
Regardless, I’m standing on these promises.
