Don't lose perspective and miss your moment!  A clip from our Make War series!!!

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Are you a risk taker or play it safer?...

I’ll never forget El Dorado, 4th grade classmate TJ Morton. He was the kid in elementary school that everyone wanted to be friends with for the summer because he had the olympic size swimming pool @ his house. And while all the kids were jumping off the diving boards and swimming around, my mom made me wear floaties around my arms and I had to stay in the shallow end of the pool. I know she was worried about me, but the solution wasn’t to cover up the problem, but fix it. I needed to learn how to swim. That and I didn’t want to be the only one in middle school still with mickey mouse floaties, so I taught myself to swim.

I didn’t want to limit myself and keep playing it safe--I had my sights set on the diving board--I was determined. By the 5th grade i was launching off the diving board into deeper dangerous waters.

What has to happen in your life to get you out of your safety zone and become a risk taker for God? I don’t want to tell my great grandchildren about all the times I played it safe, I want to talk about big dreams, and big faith.

But it starts on a personal level.

Where’s your eyesight? the diving board, or the baby pool? You’ll never do the high dive spending all your time airing up your floaties.

Most people will only dream of doing great things for God, but the difference between the risk takers and the play it safers is their sights are set on Jesus and their faith isn’t a just a word to make them look religious, but it’s a way of life.

Going all out... Is it worth it...

I was watching some Michael Jackson concerts a while back at the prime of his career. An amazing dancer no doubt. A great song writer, among the best. Great performer, you can't argue...but what I saw that captured my attention was the amazing, all out, no holds barred worship that I saw going on...

Mobs of people in the hundreds and thousands glued to his every move. ON every continent they gathered waving hands in the air, some fell to their knees, others reaching hoping for just a touch...It was some of the most intense worship I’ve ever seen; anywhere...and for what??..Theres no denying Michael Jackson is a legend in entertainment, but he’s not a great god...not even close, yet the worship was phenominal, Demonstrating the very thing thats rooted in every person.. But you can’t blame them for worshipping... They were people doing what they were created to do...

In the same way you and me worship something all the time

Think of it this way..Worship is about value.... Worship is our response to what we value most...

Thats why worship is that thing we all do..Regardless of race, gender, spiritual, religious, or even atheistic preference, it’s what you and me are all about on any given Sunday, Monday, Tuesday or any day of the week...

Because worship is about saying this person, this thing, this experience, (this whatever) fill in the blank... is what matters MOST TO you!!! and whatever is worth the most to you is -What you worship!

As a result Worship determines your actions! Its the driving force for what you do..

So how do you know where and what you worship?!?

Its easy. You simply follow the trail of your time, your affection, your energy, your money, and your loyalty. At the end of your trail you’ll find a throne... and On that throne is what you worship...

Who or what is on your throne? Is it worthy of your worship...your life?

Jesus willingly came to the earth to connect us with God and awaken us to the possibility of centering our worship on who and what matters most... forever....

Paul said... in Acts 17:28 For in Him we live, move and exist.

In John 7:37,38 Jesus said "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.

Bigger than me...

I can't believe I'll be 30 this month! 30 years ago I came into existence. Not only me though...@ some point in history you also came into existence. We call it a birthdate. The fact is that everything in existence began at some specific point in time.

That is...Everything, except God. He’s always been. Before there ever was an earth, a galaxy, or a universe. God exists outside of time, and since we live within time there’s no way we can ever grasp that concept.

I don't know about you but I have to have directions, a map, something concrete I can figure out. I have to be able to wrap my mind around whatever I'm working with...But no matter how hard I try, I can't figure God out. IT frustrates me everytime I attempt to go down that road.

But if I can be totally honest with you, I’m glad I can’t wrap my mind around God... because If I could, would He really be that great? Think about it, If you could describe God in a few words and had Him all figured out, He really wouldn’t be all that Amazing and Awe inspiring. The bible says He is an Awesome God and I’m glad I worship a God that’s bigger than what I can comprehend.

For example: If God is the size of all the oceans and my mind is the size of a glass of water, it would be foolish and ignorant for me to say that God is only the small amount of water I can fit into my glass. TO limit God because I’m limited. He's unlimited and He's all powerful.

Gives me confidence to know where I've placed my life, my trust, my everything.

What's your trust in?

THE GRAMMY APPROACH...

There’s a lot of people who say they know Jesus, but their life represents something different. There’s nothing personal about it. I’ve heard people say “I believe in God”. I hear it a lot, But James 2:19 says even the demons believe in God and tremble at His name. We hear people say “I believe in God” and that’s a great thing, but God doesn’t want some sort of a shout out when it’s convenient to pull Him out of our back pocket and talk about Him. I call this the grammy approach to God.

You ever see someone at the Grammy’s go and accept their award. Their album had 35 F words, 17 songs about sex and they’ll get up and thank their producer, their mom, their drug dealer and then they end the whole speech by trying to give a shout out to God.

Let me just say, God doesn’t want a shout out if it’s not personal. You can’t pimp God out like he’s just another trophy on a list.

If we know Jesus It’s Personal. It's Relationship. It's More, but Nothing Less.

Appreciate The Process...

Some of the best memories I have with my dad are building stuff. We built houses for the dogs, for my pet mice that would get out occasionally, we had to modify that one, fences, we redid the roof, all kind of home improvements stuff. I look back and think, it probably would have been easier to just buy a dog house @ home depot, or an escape proof mouse cage @ the pet store, or hired someone to do all the home improvements. But then I never would have learned to work with my hands, hammer a nail, replace a roof, or build a dog house.

I’m proud to say that about Two months ago I built my own dog house from scratch. I got all my wood from a construction dumpster. It's amazing how much good material they throw out. With the material I got, I built a massive dog mansion, that's what I like to call it. You can’t buy a dog house that big @ the store, I know because I looked for one. 4ft tall 6ft wide. I put house siding, solar board panels to reflect the heat in the hot summers and slapped a roof on top of that bad boy. Once I finished it, I took my wife out back to look @ it. I tried to explain the custom design and said, amazing isn’t it? SHe said yeah, it’s a dog house... AND I know it’s just a dog house. You stand back and look at the finished product and it might not be great to you. But to me it’s so much more than that, BECAUSE I see it and think of the years my dad poured into me, molding me, teaching me and giving me the skills I would need to create things with my own hands.

The end product isn’t everything. It’s not all about the destination, the graduation, the promotion, or some ultimate goal in life. Make goals, but appreciate the process, learn to live right now in the journey because if you don’t, you’ll miss the good stuff in life.

IN THE ZONE...

One sport I got into a few years ago with sandra was Tennis. We were starting to get the hang of it, but then she got pregnant with Lilly.

I remember the first time I went out to play tennis, I was probably 11. Had no idea about the concept, rules, whatever. What I did know is if you hit the ball just right, that sucker would launch. If you've hit a tennis ball you know what I’m talking about? I remember being at Mccallister park and my friend was on the other side of the net on the tennis court and I was serving, didn’t even know what I was doing, but I hit it just right on my first try, It was perfect, My friend didn’t think so, but it Went clear over the fence right onto loop 410. I loved it.

With a tennis racket, if you hit the ball just right it’s effortless. It’s got something in it called a sweet spot, because of the way it was created. The intertwined strings on the racquet make a platform to hit the ball AND The sweet spot is usually at the center. Its where you want to hit the ball, EVERYTIME. It’s the right spot, its the zone. You hit anywhere else on the racquet and the ball might not make it back over the net in a game, but the zone, the sweet spot is where the pros aim for.

But the zone, the sweet spot takes skill, an understanding of the game, action to move. You gotta pivot and juke and have mad skills on the court.

In the court of life there is also THE ZONE, THE SWEET SPOT.

Fact is, God designed you and me with the intent that we spend our time on earth in the sweet spot of His success- Not in the worlds terms, but God’s definition of success in every area of life. He custom designed us to be zoned in, not zoned out.

It works out perfectly when we do it according to Ephesians 5:1 where it says "Be imitators of God.” WHich boils down to seeing God for who He really is and mimicking His character in your life.

It's challenging, but it's worth every drop of dedication and it's the only way to live life IN THE ZONE!