Deny, Take Up, Follow Me

Today was H.O.T.  Nearly every crew drank all of their water from the coolers and received multiple Popsicles to keep hydrated and cool(er).  Almost all crews have their first house nearly completed, most started another house today and then will finish both tomorrow.  8 crews will successfully complete 12 roofs in 1 week, many of which required large amounts of re-sheeting.  Our youth have really stepped up and worked hard this week, they've nailed, they've sweated, they've stank, they've shared, and they've loved.  Most importantly they have served.  Tomorrow is our final wrap up day to complete everything we started this week and we'll end with a big celebration tomorrow night.  

One of the houses has a young boy named Avian who is 13 years old.  He is not in the best household situation with his parents, it's not the type of house you want to see a young boy raised in.  It is not a great household and it appears he doesn't have much positive influence.  But Avian has chosen a different path.  He doesn't approve of his parents choices, language, lifestyle or issues.  From the very first day, he came out and met the crew and ever since he has been on his roof working side by side with them - he has truly become part of the crew.  The past few nights he even came to worship with us and stayed to have devotions with another church before getting picked up to go home.  Tonight, he accept Jesus as his Savior!  Tonight we went out and bought Him a special gift bible to help him in his journey.  We pray that he would continue walking with Christ and remain strong despite his surroundings and that he may be a light in the darkness.

 Worship tonight was a little different than usual.  On Thursday nights we have a special service called The Concert of Prayer; it has a lot of music and guided prayer time.  It focused on Matthew 16:24; deny self, take up your cross, and follow me.  There were 3 times of guided prayer.

1. Pray that God would reveal to you what you need to deny, what is in the way of you being committed to Him?

2.  Ask God to give you a desire and pas simon to be filled with Him and focus on Him.

3. Ask God to fill you up with Him so that you can passionately follow Him every day for the rest of your life.

When it was clear to us what we in our way, what we needed to deny ourselves of, we were invited to write it on a paper and nail it to a cross to symbolize giving it up and choosing Christ over all.

Romans 12:1 in the message reads "So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life-your sleeping, eating, going to work, and walking around- and place it before God as an offering". We were challenged to do just that....surrender what it is in our everyday life that gets in our way and seek to be passionately filed with Him.

We had some great discussion in devotions tonight.  We talked about how to apply what we heard in the service to everyday life and how to apply what we've learned here to our ordinary, everyday life when we get home.  We talked about breaking down barriers of what is holding us back and to do so we need Courage and Commitment.  Some of us shared our fear of going home, knowing that God is going to want us to do something and we discussed how that can be scary and we can feel ill-equipped.  But we live in a fix-it society and our job is not to fix people, our job is to plant seeds and provide what they need, but only God can make them grow.  We shared how it's easy to know what to do and say what we should do when we get home, but actually accomplishing it is more difficult.  We need to let God talk while we listen and obey.  We have to be patient and take it step by step.  We have to be laser focused and all in.  It's one thing to believe in God, but it's another to be committed.  It all comes back to the question, "Is Christ worth it?"

We highly encouraged the youth to find someone older to help keep them accountable for any decisions they made this week, or things they're trying to work on or improve.  Accountability is one of the greatest, yet most under-utilized tools to maintain our faith and strengthen our walk with God.

So what about you, what is holding you back? Are you ready to get laser focused and passionate for Christ? It doesn't have to be an earth shattering change or decision to give up something, but what gets in the way of Christ being on the throne of your life?  What are you waiting for?  Surrender all, be laser focused, all in, and continually passionate for Christ....He is worth it!