Book Winner Announced – Niki Kelly
March 10, 2009
Congrats to Niki Kelly, who won a copy of my book, God All Around. I ordered the comments chronologically, including ones posted during the week on posts with excerpts from the book (but allowing no duplicates). Being generous, I even included someone who left a comment on my wife’s blog instead of following the link and posting here. And the random number has spoken! Congrats, Nikki. Hope you enjoy the read!
It was fun to see who all was visiting the blogosphere. There were some of you that spent over 45 minutes on my site in a single visit. And then there were some professional giveaway enterers (you know who you are), that were here only long enough to type in your names. Anyway, thanks to all of you for dropping by, and I hope you all will consider checking out my book on Amazon.com (or ask for it at a retailer near you)!
Book Giveaway – Final Day
March 9, 2009
This is your last chance to enter for the book giveaway. All you have to do is leave a comment on this post. The random drawing will be March 10 at 5 p.m. Eastern time!
Every day for the last week, I’ve been posting a chapter from my book God All Around. This last one I get to share with you is particularly meaningful to me. I’ll be speaking this week at Wildfire on this topic because it’s fresh in my heart again. Check it out, and good luck in the random drawing for the free book!
Colossians 2:2-3: My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
What a great verse for us today! It’s a classic run-on sentence of Pauline proportions, but if you take the time to dissect it, you will find amazing things!
Where I work, six children came to know Jesus in a saving way this week. One told me that he had memorized Colossians 2:3. With just a little help from a nearby adult, he proceeded to let it roll right off his lips: “In Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge!”
It’s a great passage of Scripture to memorize. Verse 3 tells us where the treasure of wisdom is hidden – in Christ. And verse 2 tells us how we know Him – through love.
That’s huge! Don’t miss that! The Message paraphrases these verses to say that it’s when we are “woven into a tapestry of love” with others that we begin to understand the mystery of God. In other words, we glimpse God’s love when we share in loving relationships with others. Wow!
What a beautiful picture! And yet, what a difficult truth! How many days do you honestly feel like you’re woven into a tapestry of love? We’re surrounded by bitterness and ugliness on all sides in this world, and we often find the church isn’t much different. While I was a student at West Virginia University, I wrote an e-mail to a friend saying I felt many things – productive, talented, useful – but I never felt loved.
Things obviously changed for me somewhere along the way since I’m now engaged. But for most of my life, I never knew the love of anyone except my parents.
I was useful to people. I wasn’t loved by people.
And so I learned to guard my heart. I figured there must be something wrong with me because I wasn’t part of their tapestry of love, so I pulled myself out completely. No loving. No being loved. Just unlovable.
That is not what God intended for us. For us to know Him, we have to know love.
One of my very favorite books is Blue Like Jazz, and one passage in particular sticks in my mind like glue. It forever changed how I think about love. Donald Miller wrote that a person who thinks he is not lovable cannot be in a relationship with God. That person can’t accept who God is – a Being who says He is love.
Donald wrote that it is other people who teach us if we are loveable or not, and that is why God commands us over and over to love each other.
As I sit and think of all the implications of my recent engagement, this must top the list. I thank God that He has brought someone into my life to show me what love is – to show me that I am lovable!
As Paul wrote to the Colossians, it is only when we are woven into a tapestry of love with one another that we can understand the mystery of God and His extravagant love for us in Christ.
FOR APPLICATION TODAY: If it is true that we learn we are lovable from other people, what are you doing today to make other people feel lovable… or unlovable? The outcome is anything but trivial. Your love is one of the clearest fingerprints of God they can ever see!
Book Giveaway – Day Six
March 8, 2009
There’s still one day left to enter for the book giveaway. Just leave a comment on this post.
For each of the days leading up to the giveaway, I’ll post a chapter from the book God All Around. Here’s another one for ya!
Matthew 6:24: No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.
There were twenty-four thousand people inside Arthur Ashe Stadium watching the four-hour battle. They say it was already the annual sporting event with the largest attendance, but this night set even more new records. Why? People love Andre Agassi. The thirty-six-year-old tennis veteran said he’s retiring after the 2006 U.S. Open tournament, and all his fans were there to cheer him on one last time. During the U.S. Open’s first and second rounds, the stadium is usually pretty empty. But when Agassi plays, the people pack in like it’s the championship match. Deafening crowd noise. Standing ovations after every set. What a sight!
At his age, it was amazing that he still played as well as he did. (In tennis years, he’s pretty ancient!) Plus, he has serious back problems. The commentators said he had to take a twenty-minute cortisone shot with a seven-inch needle between matches. Wow, that’s dedication!
The crowd loves Agassi, but I noticed something really funny during his first round match against Andre Pavel from Romania. The crowd must have forgotten that two people named Andre were playing because they still chanted, “Let’s go, Andre!” between games. Obviously, the New York crowd’s loyalty was behind the legendary Andre Agassi. But I wonder if Andre Pavel found it amusing they were chanting his name as well.
Like that crowd, how often do we inadvertently cheer for both sides in the game of life? Sure, we’re the first to cheer for God. But we also want to cheer for the world’s pleasures. We cheer for fame. We cheer for dishonest gain. We cheer for money. But Scripture says there is a choice to be made. We can only cheer for one side. We can only have one Master.
Jesus teaches this clearly in Matthew 6:24. In context, He teaches us this principle while talking about money. Many translations even capitalize the word “Money.” Why? Because so many of us make it our God. There is nothing inherently wrong with money – we need it in our society to care for ourselves, care for our family and provide for the needs of others. The problem arises when we capitalize the word and start serving Money instead of God.
Many think they can serve it and God. But no one can serve two masters. There is no “God and…” option. With that in mind, when you look at your life, what are you cheering for?
FOR APPLICATION TODAY: You should have seen the excitement on the faces of those thousands of people when Agassi won! How much more should our hearts overflow with praise for an all-powerful God who graciously calls us His own children!
We praise Him. We serve Him. We love Him. For, He is our master, and nothing else and no one else can come close enough to even win second place! He alone is worthy of praise.
Take some time today to consider what you praise, and then let this truth of God settle on your heart: “No one can serve two masters.” You can’t cheer for both sides.
Book Giveaway – Day Five
March 7, 2009
There are still two days left to enter for the book giveaway. Just leave a comment on this post.
For each of the days leading up to the giveaway, I’ll post a chapter from the book God All Around. Here’s another one for ya!
Ecclesiastes 3:1: There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven.
It was just one of those days. I could tell it from the very beginning, when I encountered a simple computer problem. I didn’t leave work until 10 p.m. because a simple task I thought would be completed by six o’clock bled over into the seven o’clock. Then eight o’clock rolled around. But by then, I was committed. I couldn’t quit. I was on a roll. Is it dark outside? Can’t be! It’s nine p.m. already? We have to wrap this up! Just a little more! One more tweak.
And before I knew it, I had let work consume my entire day, squeezing out family, rest, exercise and everything else. I violated a principle I had taught time and time again to all sorts of different groups. I know the principle. I believe the principle. I just didn’t keep it. Why? Because at that moment, deep in the task at hand, I could not see a broader perspective and ended up believing it was the most important thing. I lost sight of all the other parts of life. I may have won the battle, but that day, I lost the war. After hours of work, I was victorious over that annoying computer problem, but I had lost at everything else. Not much of a win after all, if you ask me.
Looking down at my day planner, it occurred to me just then that this little book – a record of how I spend the precious hours and minutes of my day – screams to the world what I truly believe. I may say that staying physically healthy is important to me, but if you want to know what I truly believe, just look at the day planner. I may say that spending time meditating on God’s Word is important to me, but if you want to know what I truly believe, check the book. Those pages contain the record of who I am and what my priorities really are.
The way I arrange my schedule could form a clear fingerprint of God that points other people to Him. All too often, though, all it communicates is that I just care about myself.
We have to balance our day planner
just like we balance our budget.I’ve heard it said that life is more like a pentathlon than a sprint, and I believe that’s true. You have to be skilled at running, wrestling, the long jump, the javelin throw and the discus throw to win a pentathlon. Similarly, in life, you have to be engaged in a lot more than just work to be victorious in God’s eyes. Scripture says there is a time for everything, for every activity under heaven. Work must be balanced by rest. Mental study should be balanced by physical exercise. Social times of fellowship must be balanced by devotional times of meditation spent alone with God.
Returning to the checkbook analogy, we wouldn’t want to spend money in such a way that we don’t leave anything in the checking account for the electric bill or groceries. Similarly, we shouldn’t spend our time without leaving room in the schedule for prayer, study, family, work, rest and other activities that are important to God (and thus, should be important to us too).
There’s so much to fit in! But oh, how we need to fit it all in! I’m especially thinking of ministry workers when I say this. Unfortunately, we who are in the ministry are usually the first in line to work ourselves to death at the expense of all the other areas of our lives. I recently read that four out of five pastors believe their ministry is affecting their families negatively, and three out of four have reported a significant stress-related crisis.
Surveys also show a vast majority of pastors are overweight and unhealthy, and clergy families have been found to spend less time together than the typical family and therefore lack identity and cohesion. These statistics are true. I’ve seen it all first-hand – pastors having heart attacks at early ages, pastors’ families falling apart, ministry workers driven so hard that every other area of their life falls apart.
We work and work and work, but what feels so productive at the time actually leads to drastically lowered productivity in the long run, as well as the steady destruction of our families, our health and our spiritual and emotional vitality.
So what is the solution? Three things, I believe. First, boundaries, boundaries, boundaries. We need a plan! We need walls in our life to protect our families. We need walls to protect our physical health. We need walls to ensure we remain spiritually vigorous for the long-haul. When we say we are taking Saturday off to enjoy a good book and then go fishing, that’s exactly what we need to do.
Second, we need to reaffirm our belief in the sovereignty of God. We need to remind ourselves that the world doesn’t rest on our shoulders. God is working through us to accomplish great things. We’re just containers, conduits, pipelines. While we will most certainly fail, God never fails and even uses imperfect people like us to accomplish His perfect will.
Third, we need to redefine success. In our nearsightedness, we spend a lot of energy to avoid failure in one specific area (usually work). But in doing so, we miss the broader picture, where we may be failing miserably in every single other area. Scripture makes it clear that God cares about the bigger picture! In the epistles, God talks about life as if it’s a pentathlon, with church, family, community and rest being just as important as work.
Do you believe life is a pentathlon and not a sprint? Let’s live like it’s true and make our schedules a fingerprint of God in this world!
FOR APPLICATION TODAY: So many areas need our attention! Where to start? What boundary to create first? How about beginning where each day ends? I just read a study that says each person needs seven to nine hours of sleep per night, with the average person needing eight. What happens to those who don’t sleep enough? Hypertension, heart disease, lowered metabolism, obesity, stress, anxiety and lowered productivity.
Sleep is a vital part of our existence. God made us that way. It is only the Sovereign One who never sleeps. We humans must spend a full third of our lives completely unconscious, recharging our batteries. What a powerful reminder of the real source of our strength in this pentathlon we call life!
Book Giveaway – Day Four
March 6, 2009
There are still three days left to enter for the book giveaway. Just leave a comment on this post.
For each of the days leading up to the giveaway, I’ll post a chapter from the book God All Around. Here’s another one for ya!
Galatians 6:14: May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Have you ever encountered a fraud? A fake? Last time I was in Myrtle Beach, I did. We went to the Texas Roadhouse Grill. Where I expected to find the cinnamon butter rolls I haven’t enjoyed since my days at WVU.
But when we walked in, we found out why the sign said “Texas Roadhouse Grill” and not just “Texas Roadhouse.” The extra word meant that this really wasn’t the Texas Roadhouse after all! Not only did they not have the right kind of rolls, it was the worst meal of the week!!!
What’s in a name? Apparently, a lot! By adding to the name, they changed it completely (or apparently enough to avoid a trademark lawsuit). It’s the same with our faith. If we add to it, we change it completely. Faith plus works is no faith at all.
As you read Paul’s letters to the Galatians and the Philippians, it’s surprising to note how often this theme comes up. He says it over and over again! Paul says we must keep our faith pure.
You see, some Galatians were adding requirements beyond faith for salvation. Paul wrote to warn them that adding anything to Christ’s finished work on the cross is an insult to Him. He said that when you attempt to add to the free gift of salvation, you destroy it (Gal. 5:4-6).
The apostle knew what he was talking about because at one time in his not-so-distant past, he did exactly what he warned these churches about. He relied on his own works, his upbringing, his adherence to the law, his righteousness. He even wrote that he boasted in these things! He thought they were to his profit (Phil. 3:4-8)!
In Paul’s balance sheet of life, he imagined that he had a lot in the credit column because of all the good things he had done. He thought it all added up to righteousness. Then, one day on the road to Damascus, he met Righteousness face-to-face, and everything changed. He suddenly saw that all his “righteous” acts were just filthy rags, compared to God’s holiness.
In that moment, his life took on a new purpose. No longer would he boast in his own goodness, but instead in God’s goodness. No longer would he load down people with legalistic laws, but instead lead them to freedom in Christ, No longer would he teach people to earn heaven, but instead to look upon the crucified Christ, our sin atonement, our righteousness.
He sums it all up as he closes his letter to the Galatians, Paul ends with powerful words that challenge us still today: Don’t boast in your church attendance. Don’t boast in your devotional reading. Don’t boast in your charitable giving. Don’t boast in your “goodness.”
Boast in one thing only: An ancient form of execution. A symbol of torture. A blood-stained cross that has brought us abundant life, now and forever. The cross of our Savior.
Leave all other boasting at the door. Simply come to the cross. Come poor. Come needy. Come naked. Come hungry. Come, knowing you are not worthy. And find the Savior there, arms stretched wide to welcome you to God’s family.
Come by faith, and come by faith alone.
FOR APPLICATION TODAY: If you listen to what you boast in, you’ll discover what you trust in. Read Philippians 3 and Galatians 6 today, asking God to remove from you any cause for boasting except for what Christ has done for you.
Book Giveaway – Day Three
March 5, 2009
There are still four days left to enter for the book giveaway. Just leave a comment on this post.
For each of the days leading up to the giveaway, I’ll post a chapter from the book God All Around. Here’s another one for ya!
John 12:3: Then Mary took a twelve-ounce jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nard, and she anointed Jesus’ feet with it and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with fragrance. (NLT)
I regularly speak and sing before hundreds of people, but I hardly ever get nervous. I used to be a television reporter who did live segments in front of a hundred thousand people, but I was always cool as a cucumber. But on this night, I was a bumbling, fumbling ball of anxiety.
It was the night I asked my girlfriend, Jessica, to marry me.
It was to take place on our one-year anniversary, and I put months of planning into that special night. I had a whole weekend of activities lined up for us, including a picnic, horseback riding, a home-cooked dinner and more. As the sun set, I made her believe that the day of excitement was over. We sat down to watch Dr. Phil. Little did she know that I had edited a special segment into the show featuring a message from our local meteorologist who is still a friend of mine.
I had gone to see him at the studio at four o’clock in the morning a few nights before. We taped what appeared to be a regular weather cut-in. But at the end, he wished us a happy anniversary and said an important question was in the forecast that night.
The edited version of Dr. Phil played just as planned, and as the special message came up, I brought out a tiny case containing a beautiful diamond ring.
Although I’m never anxious speaking in front of huge crowds, I felt the weight of that moment in my chest. Face to face with the beautiful woman I hoped to spend the rest of my life with, I nervously found my way through heart-felt words and asked if she would marry me. And she said yes!
Today, we dropped the ring off for sizing, and she says her fingers already feel it missing. I had to keep the details of the ring secret because a lot of people I know would have advised me against investing as much as I did in it. But here’s the thing: Love makes us do things that don’t make sense to other people. Love makes us extravagant. Love makes us over-the-top. Love makes us crazy!
Look at how Mary loved Jesus in John 12:3. She did what others considered a big waste of money. She anointed Him with expensive perfume worth a small fortune. Interpretations differ, but many scholars believe it was worth a year’s wages. Wow! That’s a lot of money to “waste.” But her love was extravagant, and the Savior did not correct her for what she did. In fact, the Bible encourages us to love just like that.
In Ephesians 5:2 Paul writes, “Learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that” (msg).
Love that’s not cautious. Love that’s not timid. Love that’s not thrifty. Love that’s not cheap. That’s the life of love God has for us. And here’s the cool part: When you’re in love, those things come naturally. Anyone who claims to be in love but keeps balance sheets to make sure it doesn’t cost too much… that person is not in love.
Thank God that His love is not like that. He gave everything of Himself to us. Everything! Let us love the same way – extravagantly!
FOR APPLICATION TODAY: Jessica and I have an on-going joke. One of us will tell the other that he or she is crazy. The other will respond, “Crazy… for you!” It’s true! Love makes you do crazy things… or at least things other people might think are crazy.
Today, will your love be so extravagant that others think you’re crazy? And when they ask you about it, will you say, “I’m not crazy. I’m just crazy for Him – the God of the whole universe who loves me even more than I can imagine!” Let the air be filled with the fragrance of your extravagant love today!
Book Giveaway – Day Two
March 4, 2009
There are still five days left to enter for the book giveaway. Just leave a comment on this post. (The original post had a typo that made it seem like the giveaway was already over, but it’s not, so what are you waiting for?!)
For each of the days leading up to the giveaway, I’ll post a chapter from the book God All Around. Here’s the first!
Luke 21:29-31: He told them this parable: “Look at the fig tree and all the trees. When they sprout leaves, you can see for yourselves and know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that the kingdom of God is near.”
“I climbed the Rocky Mountains once,” I said, squinting hard as I searched my mind for an exciting story worthy of sharing at church this week. It seemed like every other day was Sunday, and sermons weren’t illustrating themselves, after all. I had to come up with some fresh ideas fast!
My mentor chuckled a little bit as he prodded me. “Come on, Bill, you’re how old?” he said. “And you’re telling me you only have one exciting story from your life so far?”
But that’s all that came to mind. Slumped over on the couch of the pastor’s study, it finally dawned on me that my life must be very boring. I had heard a thousand exciting stories from nationally-known preachers – close calls with alligators, car chases down abandoned roads, rescue missions to war-torn countries – but all I had in my own life was one little hiking adventure. What’s even sadder is that part of the reason I agreed to go on the trip was so that I’d have an interesting story or two to use during speaking engagements.
The famous speakers I admired never seemed to run out of colorful illustrations, and even the local pastors I have worked with had an endless supply of unbelievable personal anecdotes that never ran out. I wanted some of my own.
That’s how this book got started. As a mental exercise, I began to write daily devotional material for a church e-mail list, and to my surprise, day after day, I never ran out of material. What I found totally changed the way I looked at God and His world.
God is all around! His fingerprints are everywhere!
You don’t have to lead the most daring life to find Him. I found that He’s present in metaphysical theories and on tennis courts, in the beauty of a thirty-foot waterfall and in the power of a lightning strike. No matter who you are or what life you lead, you too can learn to see God everywhere you go!
* * *
When I began collecting stories for this book, I viewed my task as a one-time brainstorm for preachers only… just a good way to create a list of sermon illustrations that would come in handy in the future. But when I finished the last page, I was convinced this process was something everyone should learn to do too.
I believe we all should go through life constantly searching for God’s fingerprints – redemptive reflections in everyday moments, concrete examples of intangible concepts.
I love that we can take something so abstract as faith and find words and images and sounds and stories that make it understandable, not just to other people, but to ourselves also.
It’s vital we do so because that’s how we learn! When I think back on all my years in school, the things I remember best are the concepts that were made the most concrete. I still remember what the economic term “utility” means because of a professor’s example using Häagen-Dazs ice cream. I won’t tell the whole analogy, but let’s just say I’ll never forget what utility is, and I’m now quite addicted to several Häagen-Dazs flavors, including the chocolate raspberry one – mmm, now that’s utility!!!
Christian spirituality can be a lot harder to understand than the most difficult economic terminology… especially to those outside our little Christian bubble. Think of all the people you interact with on a daily basis. Some do not regularly attend church. Many haven’t had faithful parents who took time to teach them about the Bible. Yet how do we often approach these people? We come at them with a few poorly produced tracts, a mouthful of spiritual terminology that they don’t understand, and Scripture in an antiquated form of the English language no one has spoken conversationally in four hundred years!
What do they learn from that kind of encounter? 1) God doesn’t speak my language. 2) Faith doesn’t make sense. 3) Christians care about me more as a project than as a person.
But that’s how we share the truth of God with the world. And it’s a shame! How much more effective would we be if we interacted with others like Jesus did? He loved people! He invested in lives! And He spoke in plain language they could understand.
For evidence, just look at the number of parables He told. He put abstract concepts into concrete stories. And look at how often he said, “Look at this!” He did it all the time, including the parable of the fig tree quoted above.
“Look at the fig tree… Look at this coin… Look at the birds of the sky… Look at the lilies of the field… Look at the bread… Look at the wine… Look at this!” He was always building conceptual bridges so that people could understand complex spiritual ideas through concrete, memorable stories and experiences. Shouldn’t we do the same?
FOR APPLICATION TODAY: The best way to start a spiritual discussion with your coworkers or classmates may be to find a good object lesson and say: “Look at this!”
Give it a try! But remember, you first have to open your eyes wide enough to see God’s fingerprints in your own life before you can point others to them!
And second, take time to praise God today for speaking to us in concrete terms we can understand. Even Jesus Himself was the ultimate “show and tell” – the spiritual made flesh and blood so we could touch and see and understand (John 14:9, Hebrews 1:2). What a great price God paid so that we could grasp divinity!
100th Post – Book Giveaway!
March 3, 2009
Well, b.dub’s blogosphere has finally reached 100 posts! To celebrate, I’m giving away a copy of God All Around. All you have to do to be entered is leave a comment on this post. On March 10, I’ll use a random number generator to find the winner!
(By the way, if you’re reading this on Facebook… don’t leave comments there. Visit the blog directly to comment.)
Good luck!
My Book at a Store Near You
July 25, 2008
Great news! My book, God All Around, may be in a store near you soon. I just got the first copy back from the publisher with the new ISBN and UPC bar code on the back. Within 2-4 weeks, it’ll appear in Books In Print, and within a couple of weeks after that, it’ll be available to stores to stock. Can’t find it near you? Ask for it, or look online at Amazon.com.
Check out this excerpt
from the book!
