Be intentional

We a re d r i v ing home after hanging out on the beach and surfing for 3 days. (I know, feel sorry for me.) We have been married for 40 years and decided it was something special and worth celebrating so we went to the tip of Texas where I think the sun shines all year long.

But here’s the deal. Vacation is over and I’m thinking about what people need to hear concerning Christmas. What is it that people really need to hear and what will really change their life?

One of my constant prayers is that Christians (the church) would be passionate and committed. How can Christmas motivate people towards that?

Romans 12:1 tells us that God wants us to take our “everyday, ordinary lives—our sleeping, eating, going to work, and walking around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for Him.” I think we become passionate and committed as we do that.

My prayer every morning before my feet hit the floor while I’m nice and warm under the L. L. Bean flannel sheets and the down comforter from Land’s End is that I would glorify God. That my day, my life, the things I do would bring glory, honor and praise to Abba Father.

I don’t know about your life but mine is filled with the mundane. I’ve never seen an angel that I know of, I have never walked on water and I’ve never turned water to wine. If I ever did, I would be the most popular guy in town.

The crazy good Christmas story is just that crazy good, but it’s not my story.

My story starts at 6 a.m. under those flannel sheets and down comforter, then to my grandmother’s old kitchen table for coffee (home brewed Cafe Du Monde) with the Blonde, prayer with her, shower, head to the office, deal with a lot of stuff pastors should not have to deal with, home for dinner with the Blonde, run 3 or 4 miles on the treadmill, answer a few phone calls or emails, maybe watch a rerun of Andy Griffith and then off to bed. (Did I mention flannel sheets and a down comforter?)

What I’m saying is I have to serve God in the mundane, ordinary life that He has given me. We bring God glory in this boring kind of life by being passionate about and committed to things like the Golden Rule, not complaining, looking after the interests of others, being kind, forgiving others, loving at all costs, blessing my enemies, walking by faith and not by sight, standing firm, being ready in season and out of season, being always ready to share why I have hope, letting my manner of life be worthy of the Gospel of Christ.

Hard? Not really. Do I have to be intentional? Yes.

He told me to tell you that.