Oh God, stamp eternity on my eyeballs! For you know if God should stamp eternity or even judgment on our eyeballs or, if you'd like, on the fleshy table of our hearts I am quite convinced we'd be a very very different tribe of people, God's people, in the world today. We live too much in time, we are too earth bound. We see as other men see, we think as other men think. We invest our time as the world invests it. We invest our money. We're supposed to be a different breed of people. I believe that the church of Jesus Christ needs a new revelation of the majesty of God. We're all going to stand one day... can you imagine it? ... at the judgment seat of Christ to give an account for the deeds done in the body. This is what - this is the King of kings and he's the Judge of judges and it's the tribunal of tribunals. And there's no court of appeal after it. The verdict is final. Listen, when you see Jesus, you're not going to go up and say, "Hey buddy, I'm glad you died for me." When you see Jesus you will be almost paralyzed with fear unless you have a glorified body and a glorified mind. You say, "Well Mr. Ravenhill I won't be in serious trouble because you know, I don't have a good memory." Well, I'll tell you what, you'll have one that day. In Malachi, it says that God has a book of remembrance. And I think it would do you good before you go to bed every night this week to ask God, "What did you put in Your book today for my life?" Did you get up this morning and thank God you are pure, huh? Did you thank Him that the devilish fever you use to have for sniffing cocaine or drugs or something, that He broke the shackles of it? Are you really glad you're not a prostitute now, you're going to be a part of the Bride of the Lamb? Are you glad He has removed from your heart covetousness and bad temper and all those creepy horrible things that use to master you? The most shattering thought I'd ever had is my personal accountability to God one day. We are not going to be judged just because of what we've done, we're going to be judged for why we did it! What motivated your giving? Why? What's the motive behind it? He doesn't just take your sins, He takes your self, He takes the government of your life. And it is not only true we live in a world of bankrupt politics, we live in a world (and this is the most tragic of all) of a bankrupt church. When in God's name is the Church going to open her heart again and open her mind again and see again? Can God forgive every sin I've ever committed? I say, He sure can. That is if you repent of your sin and you plead for the blood of Christ and you ask for mercy. That tender Christ who went about doing good and he kissed little babies and blessed people... Now, ahhh... there is nothing more beautiful than a little Lamb. There is nothing more terrible than the wrath of the Lamb! The dead, small and great, are going to stand before God in that awesome day. But say, am I just a showman? What's my secret life like? 'Cause God has not merely given us Jesus Christ, He has given us all things. And because there isn't enough joy in the house of God, we need entertainment. Because entertainment is the devil's substitute for joy. I think before we point the finger at the world, we better turn to the church and say, "Look we'd better all get sackcloth and ashes and humble ourselves and say Almighty God." When I see the church in the new testament, they didn't have a lot of money. They didn't have organization. They couldn't get on TV and beg. But I'll tell you what they did - they turned the world upside down! And I'm embarrassed to be a part of the church of Jesus today because I believe it's an embarrassment to a Holy God. Most of our joy is clapping our hands and having a good time. And then afterwards we're talking all the dribble of the world. Do you get so near to the heart of God, that you share in His grief over a world and over a backslidden church that we have today? Because if you're going to get mature in God, all the dwarfs around you will criticize and sneer at you and say, "You're trying to be holier than the rest of us, huh?" You'll discover this - the men who have been most heroic for God have been the men with the greatest devotional life. The only thing that will tie me in victory continually through the blood of Christ is my personal devotional to Him, the Son of God. My adoration that I give him, my tribute everyday. It is more than my service, it is more than giving money. That I love him and I adore him and I magnify him and I take him as it were by the feet. You know why the world is poor and sick outside? Because we really don't know how to pray, that's why. I've said it many times, so I say it again this morning - that no man is greater than his prayer life. Let me live with a man awhile and share his prayer life and I'll tell you how tall I think he is or how majestic I think he is in God. It's going to be an awesome day. You see there is no possible... no possibility of any rehearsal. And what, there's no possibility of any repetition. Because again this is the final judgment. I think again of a statement Dr. Tozer made to me once. He said we'll hardly get our feet out of time into eternity and gaze on eternity that we bow our heads in shame and humiliation and say, "MY God, look at all the riches there were in Jesus Christ, and I come to the Judgment Seat almost a pauper. Master forgive and inspire us anew. Banish our worldliness, help us to ever live with eternity's values in view," said that great man who birthed that revival - "God stamp eternity on my eyeballs." You know if we can't live as a different breed of people on this earth, we have no right to live here. And if we get back to a people who are really baptized with obedience, submissive to the total will of God, not concerned about human opinion, not asking for more to spend prodigally on ourselves... But to say Oh God, I want this life of mine adjusted. So when I stand in Your awesome presence, as James says, "We shall not be ashamed of His appearing."
Today i received, with delight, Delirious' new album called Kingdom of Comfort in the mail. Right when I got in the house I intended to listen to the CD. I unwrapped the case, opened it, and pulled out the little booklet inside. As I was listening to the songs I looked through the booklet and stumbled upon a page that read like an article. It was so well-said that I'm going to type it all out.
A Revolution That Dances And Laughs. The world is a mess. People are dying of obesity, and people are dying of starvation. Some of us are suffering from the LONELINESS OF POVERTY, and others are aching in the LONELINESS OF WEALTH. Too often, Christianity has only offered us life after death while the world is really asking: Is there life before death? We are convinced that Jesus did not just come to prepare us to die but to teach us how to live - here... now. He came to show us the narrow way to life. And that's Good News to all of us who are groaning in the ghettoes of poverty and in the ghettoes of wealth. LET US BE THE MIDWIVES OF ANOTHER WORLD. We are made to live for something bigger than ourselves - this thing we call the Kingdom of God... God's dream for the world. This is the realm where the last are the first and the first are last, where the poor are blessed and the peacemakers are the children of God. This whole Christian thing is not just about going up to heaven after we die, but it is about bringing God's Kingdom to earth. THIS IS THE GOSPEL THAT SHOULD COMFORT THE DISTURBED AND DISTURB THE COMFORTABLE. And that means REVOLUTION. It is a revolution that sets both the oppressed and the oppressors free, a revolution that dances and laughs... a revolution that aches with the world. It is a revolution not just for saints and prophets and celebrities, but a revolution of ordinary radicals who live in ways that do not conform to the patterns of this world but are transformed by the renewing of our minds. God give us a fresh imagination. Perhaps the world will call us crazy. But if we are crazy it is because we refuse to be crazy in the same way the the world has gone crazy. And this Gospel of the poor and BROKEN MAY FLY in the face of much of the prosperity preaching that has come to mark Christianity in the West, but this is the Gospel of the baby REFUGEE who was born in the middle of a GENOCIDE, who wandered the world with no place to lay His head, and who was jailed, tortured, and crucified on the cross of the empire in which He lived. May these songs lead us closer to Jesus Nazareth, where folks said, "nothing good could come." And may these songs, lead us to the poor, in whom we will find Christ in his most distressing disguises... among the least of these. In these songs, may you encounter the Jesus who did not just come as a missionary to the poor or as a CHARITABLE PHILANTHROPIST, but who came as one who suffered. HE CAME AS A TROUBLEMAKER AND CREATOR OF HOLY MISCHIEF. He came as a King who ruled with a towel and played in the dirt with kids. It is this Jesus who bids us, dares us... come and follow. SO SIT. DANCE. SHOUT. BUT LISTEN... listen to the One who tells us if we really want to FIND OUR LIFE THEN WE SHOULD GIVE IT AWAY. Listen to the small voice amid all the noise and clutter, that whispers to us that the best thing to do with the best things in life is to give them away. As we read the newspaper in one hand and the Bible in the other, we cannot help but ask: have we even begun to be Christians? Let us begin. Jesus, give us strength to live the things we preach and SING... and give us grace with ourselves and others when we fall short of who we want to be.
Amen to you Shane Claiborne (the guy who wrote this).
So I listened to the entire album, carefully listening to the words being sung... and I love their message. I love that through his songs, he's calling a generation to believe that we can actually change the world, that we were made for more than what the world says we can have and achieve. Martin Smith is saying we are the History Makers!! And so we must be! If we will not be the ones to shape our history and culture then the devil sure will. I know God is awakening his people to live exactly like the type of people the article above wrote about. People around the world are getting it! (It's exciting!) Just watch this music video and listen to the words...
This is what I'm talkin about!!!
God, wreck your church with your love so that we'll shine like we're suppose to! Yesss Lord do it!
