Guys, have you seen a perfect Husband?  I have tried to wrap my mind around why Christ has been so faithful to me in spite of my unfaithfulness to Him and I can’t quite get it.  What I can get is that He is the husband that I hope to one day be – overlooking my faults, selfish heart, self-serving attitude, and prideful arrogance.  Instead, he chooses to work on me, chipping away the rough edges, and moving me toward His cross at a constant, relentless pace.  He is truly faithful to me.

Not only is He faithful to help His people become as He is, but He is faithful to complete the mission of redemption in His world for His own purpose.  When we stare down the reality that as leaders we are not nearly as important as we think that we are, we are forced to consider how then can Christ use us?  You see, it is quite simple – Jesus is always faithful to those who are faithful to His Word (cf. John 15).  Leadership is built around the premise that it leading is necessary for significant, focused movement.  If the Army doesn’t have a General, personal battles are fought but not wars.  Wars imply one united group against another and quite clearly Jesus declares that there is only 1 true war – His Kingdom versus the kingdom of Darkness.

The good news, according to His Word, is that Christ is reigning and will reign in this war.  He is still the faithful Leader that will help us even when things seem hopeless and dim.  This fear can cause us to spend more time in the blogosphere than in the Scriptures, and more time on iTunes than in prayer.  My prayer is that might behold His faithfulness and diligently work hard alongside it, rather than expecting the war to be won while retreating to safety.

Be sober-minded; be watchful.  Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.  Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.  And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.  To Him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen. (1 Peter 5:8-11)

T Minus 2 Days…

Did you know that there are currently more than 1.3 million Collegiate Students in Texas?  That more than the total population of North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, Washington DC, Delaware, and Hawaii.  That’s correct – 11 states have fewer people.  Don’t we sound a little silly saying there are not a lot of college students here?  Our local mission fields are truly massive when you really think about it.  The average SBC church is baptizing fewer people now than it did 5 years ago, yet people are still being born. 

On the flip side, we are seeing evangelism among college students second nationally among defined age groups.  This gives us great anticipation for the days and months ahead.  How many students came to faith through your ministry last year?  Could you ask the Lord to double or even triple that number over the next year? 

Without the good news of Jesus Christ, literally hundreds of thousands of students across Texas are headed for destruction.  Will you sit on the sidelines or play your part and help us reach the next generation with the gospel?  Let us pray that we become the latter…

“As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.  And for their sake I consecrated myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.  I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me“ (John 17: 18-21)  

T Minus 3 Days…

As Collegiate leaders, the temptation is often to believe that we have the capacity, intellect, and ability to accomplish “great things” on our own for the Kingdom.  Are these things bad or unnecessary?  Absolutely not.  Kingdom work, however, is so tricky.  Students come to Christ, their lives get changed, communities get impacted.   In that progression, it’s easy to believe that we have personally engineered something great.  The problem is, our pride is always pushing back to the reality that we are merely agents through which God is ultimately working.  God doesn’t need us.  He simply chooses to let us be a part of the most incredible story in human history.  A close examination of 1 Corinthians 1 – 3 reminds us that any thoughts to the contrary should bring us to our knees.

6 Billion.  That’s 6 with 9 zero’s behind it, aka “a lot.”  That’s more than the number of light bulbs in Las Vegas.  That’s the number of estimated lost people around the globe.  The mission of God calls for us, those sent by Christ in John 17 and Acts 1, to go to them with the good news of Christ.   But do you realize that it would take the number of new believers doubling at the same rate for the next 15-20 years to reach all of them?  And what about those born during that time? You see, don’t fool yourself.  We are really a part of something quite a bit bigger than our britches. 

The good news: We serve a God who is in charge of His mission.  He will empower His people to carry out His mission.  He wants to give us a massive harvest of souls, we simply need more laborers who will commit to doing Kingdom work and submit themselves to hard tasks.   May we realize the bigness of God’s mission and ask Him to become a part of it.  How can we be of any significance if we are unaware of what we have been called to do?  6 Billion people,  let that sink in for a few minutes.  Your heart should break for our world… 

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?  And how are they to preach unless they have been sent?  As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news! But they have not all obeyed the gospel.  For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?  So faith comes by hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ (Romans 10:14-17).

T Minus 5 days…

We often find ourselves with very small pictures of God’s glory.  John 1:14 declares that God manifested His glory by way of a Son, Jesus.  If we have seen Jesus, we have certainly seen the Father’s glory (John 14:7).  Christmas time often reflects back to the days of that small babe in a manger, the Christ-child who was born to the Virgin girl that cool night in Bethlehem.  Yet, the Scriptures portray Him, and thus God, as more vast and incomprehensible than anything that our minds can grasp (cf. Colossians 1, Hebrews 1).  Everything that has been made visible declares the infinite greatness and majesty of its Creator, most significant of which are His image-bearers.  We realize how immeasurably futile, insignificant, and incompetent we really are when we truly see His glory.  May we see God in Jesus as infinitely worthy of our praise, our efforts, our passions, and our commitment.