Soul Winning Beyond Acts 2:38

"If someone asks about your hope, be ready to explain it in a gentle and respectful way."

1 Peter 3:15-16

[abridged]

In my youth I had hope without realizing it as it was part of the personality tool kit I was born with. This beautiful hope was further strengthened by my safe upbringing. People were attracted to my hope and lust for life, but when they'd ask me about it I didn't know how to answer them. I had no explanation for my radiant life outside of telling them about the power of the Holy Ghost. While that's the complete bottom-line answer, it wasn't necessarily the most enticing of answers.

In my adult years I experienced the natural knocks and bangs of life. In the process of being shifted around, and knocked about I lost that all-purpose, perfect little tool called, "hope." I found myself utterly hopeless. I saw no reason to raise my kids when I could point to several other people in their lives that I felt could do a better job than I could. I saw no reason to work in my calling of worship leading because singers are a dime-a-dozen. I saw no reason to write because I'm an uneducated wannabe. I saw no reason to fellowship with friends because either I would end up dragging them down with my life-reality, or I was too weak to help them carry their burdens. I was truly hopeless. I asked God many times a day (for many years) to take my life. Proverbs 13:12 talks about how a lack of hope makes the heart sick. Boy, he wasn't kidding. Out of the heart come the issues (the flow) of life. A sick heart infected with hopelessness affects the whole body.

But, "when the desire cometh," Proverbs goes on to read, "it is a tree of life." Whereas its true that obtaining what we hope for is a really great feeling, DESIRE itself is a tree of life! I've experienced the difference in receiving what I wanted, and desiring something. While receiving is a win indeed, the thrill of that newness fades and I'm back to needing another "fix." But DESIRE wakes me up every day with anticipation. If my mood is down, or if I'm ill, or if I'm weighed down with present reality-of-life, DESIRE makes me get dressed, go for a run, breathe deep and chill, read a book to pass the time. DESIRE for certain things (not exclusively material possessions, sometimes it's a desire for situations, relationships, accomplishments) is a tree with roots of stability.  Hope deferred makes the heart so sick, in turn the whole of life is sick. But DESIRE is a tree that produces fruit. A special fruit called, "LIFE!"

I started looking for my hope tool because it was becoming obvious that God was ignoring my plea for The Next Life. He was definitely hearing me pray, clearly. Because he was  answering all of the other prayers I'd pray. He was just stubbornly refusing to answer "that" prayer. 

After some books (and prayer asking God to help me want to live) I began some deliberate outward behaviors in efforts to trigger inward desires. I called these exercises my "happy habits." Every hour (my phone alerts were set) I'd stand from my seating (usually at a desk) and I'd stretch, or do some push-ups (uh-hem. I closed my office door as I didn't want to intimidate my fellow workers with my great might.) I'd smile-for-no-reason (Yes. I just smiled into empty space) And I would speak aloud something I was thankful for. It took about a year, but I started to feel a difference.

It's been about two and a half years now, but I definitely have hope! I must be honest with you, sometimes the desire hurts. Wanting what seems impossible aches to my bones. But, I'm aware that these aches are growing pains, whereas my old ache was due to hope being deferred. 

But here's the really cool part about my present state of hope; I'm a better witness for Christ now. 

NOW when people are attracted to me I am ready to give them a more thorough answer. I'm able to guide them to the source of my tree of life; Christ. 

Christ's love for me enables me to trust that goodness is in store for me.  When I'm in a blue mood it doesn't feel like the end of the world because I know He's going to work things out for my good.  He has my best interests at heart. He has plans for me that have a beautiful outcome.

Soul winners need more than that perfect and beautiful Acts 2:38 experience. Souls winner need to exhibit HOPE in our hopeless world. 

Get Back Up

I remember when knockdowns and setbacks were a mere annoyance, as simple to remedy as a pesky bug buzzing around. It was laughable to think that getting back up would be hard! Getting back up required no forethought, no energy, no emotion. I just popped right back up as if I were still a kid on the trampoline in my backyard, propelled to soar to tree limbs with such little energy.

Not so now.

I'm not sure if it's physical age, or the depth of devastation, or why it's different now. But it is different now. 

Every.

Single.

Day.

Each day I plan how to live victoriously in that day. Each day I PURPOSEFULLY live happily. Each day I have to get back up.

When this new method of living was my reality I was so angry at God for not taking me out of this earth to Heaven. If "to live is Christ, to die is GAIN," then what kind of cruelty kept me here? Give me my "gain," for goodness sake! Every plane takeoff where I was on board I'd send texts of love, forgiveness, and mercy before we had to power down our phones. THAT'S how confident I was that God was going to answer my prayer and take me to The Other Side. In the old days I prayed safety and protection over the plane and flight, but I stopped doing that since it seemed like a quick and easy way for God to answer my prayer. I didn't talk about this line of thinking to anybody because I wasn't trying to be dramatic and get attention. The last thing I wanted was for anyone to pay attention to me. I wanted to be left alone to die. But neither God nor man were in sync with me on this one.

"To live is Christ."

I've always seen this activity of living-is-Christ as being very jubilant, therefore very fluid, natural, and easy. But that was from my perspective of youth and fairy tales. What about Christ's life was easy? From his first year of life the government was hunting him down to kill him. While travel is sometimes fun when you're headed to Disney World, a road trip in the dead of night because you're being hunted down certainly turns up the volume on the phrase, "Are we there yet?"

Living-is-Christ puts us in a position to participate in the miraculous, to have power over death, hell, and the grave, and to be surrounded by followers. And as long as these people and situations are helping us accomplish our goals these moments are ecstatic. But let us not forget that Christ was run out of town, was continually in one argument or another with the religious, was rarely with his family, was a 24/7 teacher. Not to mention the final hours of his life; the excruciating crucifixion. 

Dying is gain because it puts us across the finish line. Dying with a clean conscience toward God is gain because we've run a good race and we've finished  our course. But LIVING is necessary to accomplish the victory of death. 

There is no victory in hiding in a hole waiting for death. The will of God is that we get out of the hole and LIVE as Christ did. It is the will of God that we have HOPE. It is the will of God that we experience JOY. It is the will of God that we produce all of the fruit of the Spirit. We are cheating God if we do not get back up and strive to fulfill His will of pursuing these things. 

Why does he ask this of us? So that we are a testimony of His strength and involvement in our lives. If after our devastation we live in a hole we are telling the world around us that God is a liar. Holed-up behavior is exhibiting that God is nowhere to be found, that there is no hope, no joy, nothing to rise again for. 

Christ got back up after his devastation. He got back up because there was more to do. You need to get back up yourself because there is more to do! To die will NOT be "gain" if you do not do the will of God and LIVE AGAIN. 

I personally have chosen four verses that I read EVERY morning. I have alerts set up on my phone to smile EVERY hour. I have a life vision that pops up on my phone EVERY morning; To live in the reality of Faith, Hope, & Love.

My feelings tell me every day that life is not worth living. My logic shows me every day that I should not expect my hopes to come to pass. My present shows me every day that after all these years I STILL have not obtained the desires of my heart. 

BUT GOD'S WORD TELLS ME TO NOT BE DICTATED BY THESE THINGS.

I'm suppose to walk by faith, not by sight.

That's why I fight each and every day to get back up again. I smile because the REALITY of life is not what I feel, or see, or think. The REALITY is what I can't see: Faith, Hope, and Love. Christ is not my Fairy Godmother, giving me my whims. He sees the end from the beginning and He's going to give me the desires of my heart based on all He knows of what's to unfold. His top priority as my Father is to protect and defend me. If I'm allowing him to protect me from my desires that will hurt me, everything will work out for my good! If I live every day angry at Him for "making" me live... well, how sad and unproductive is THAT!

Whatever has knocked you for a loop, has left you flat on your back... I'm truly sorry you've gone through those things. But, get back up. It may feel like "fake it 'till you make it," but in fact it's "FAITH it 'till you make it."

Proverbs 24:16 (KJV)

For a just [man] falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.