Tuesday, February 02, 2010

Get a Life... An Abundant Life

In too many ways to count or give an adequate discussion here, Christianity has become this… thing, a system or even a world view. I know the tired adage, “…it’s not a religion, it’s a relationship”…but even that has become a thing we do and a system we manage. It’s one of the ways too many of us have manipulated conversations into a “witness”. Some poor unsuspecting soul might say to us, “I’m not a religious person” and all of our evangelism training snaps to attention and our mouth parrots the aforementioned phrase … yawn…

Jesus promised life… that’s our witness… being truly ALIVE! One version of that promise says, “…I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance -to the full, till it overflows” (John 10:10). While this is a popular verse to quote, preach and sermonize from, I’m not so sure we are actually living from it as it was truly intended. Jesus promised life! He is saying, “While you are alive, get a life…abundant, dynamic, animated, actualized, vibrant, radiant, happy, healthy, contented, cheerful, satisfied and even exciting.”

He also warned that there is a thief out there stealing, killing and destroying. It seems to me that this boils down to two options: Be alive or be dead. And here I do not mean in the shallow sense of “when you die, do you know if you are going to heaven or hell?” I mean, if you keep dragging air into your lungs, consuming calories and continue to occupy space on this planet are you living and contributing life back out of your consumption of these free-bees? Otherwise, it seems to me, you are offering yourself as a contribution to the thief…a reason for the thief to pursue his stealing, killing and destroying.

Being truly alive means being known for living, being, doing and making others alive as a result. Yet, how many Christians are more known for what they do not do or believe as opposed to what they really are? Living means actualizing the world around us with the energy to create and think. Too often we’ve allowed ourselves to be trapped in the noise of being against others, opposed to their lifestyles, not in favor of a list of laws and governing policies, in a snit about devalued world views and victimized by our perceived or real loss of influence on society. Is that abundant living? NO!

Abundant life is creative in the face of decaying imaginations. Abundant life is solution oriented as opposed to sniveling about problems. Abundant life prophesies answers and never prays the problem. Abundant life plays and prays. Abundant life even plays when it prays and prays when it is playing. Abundant life loves when love is completely unexpected. Abundant life loves love because love never fails.

Abundant life longs for change, longs for a fresh idea, longs for a new sound, longs for the reach of a new day. Life has no room for the shrunken notion of disgust with the past because life knows that the past was once the future. Life celebrates the past while courageous enough to stretch for a completely new day. Yet, while all of this is true, life lives now, not in yesterday, not in tomorrow. Today, this moment, is when life matters.

So get a life… and get it NOW.