Weekend #5

It is hard to believe that weekend number 5 has now come and gone. (I'm not posting this until Tuesday). The weekend has been wonderful, yet again. I've spent time relaxing around the house, got to talk to a friend on her birthday for a while, went out to see a movie.

Church this morning was interesting for me. We were at St. John's Lutheran, here in Northfield, and I'm not used to the way that a Lutheran service is held, with so many different congregational responses and songs that were sung in response to things. So of course I was flipping through the bulletin and the hymnal most of the service, trying to keep up. The message was on Jacob and his dream of the ladder from heaven.

Also, I wanted to give you an update from the post I made on the 13th (http://mcsc2c.blogspot.com/2008/07/acts-189-10.html). I'm not going to go into details in case the person I'm referring to reads this blog, but I did have the chance a couple times to witness to people in my host families and a guy a met on the road one day. Basically the question arises, why are you doing this ride and of course my answer is, ultimately so that teens around the world have to opportunity to receive Christ as Savior. "Well, what does that mean?"

It means that you have recognized Christ as Lord and that only through his sacrifice do you have any chance at forgiveness of sins. It means that the Holy Spirit has begun to work in your life to make you like Christ. All of which will be evidenced by a burden on your heart to do the things that Christ did. It means that you no longer have an acquaintanceship with him, but a relationship through which you want to please him.

For those of you who have 'significant others' (I don't particularly like that term, but it prevents me from listing all the different possibilities of relationship status), this might help you understand what I mean: When there is someone you love, you do things simply in order to please that person. Not to win points so that you can have some advantage later, or so that the 'love' is returned (that is in fact only loving yourself), but simply because you want to please that person. Love and relationships are a two way street, I understand that. But ultimate love is done without thought of the return benefits.

Christ loved us in the ultimate way, by giving his life in payment for our sins even before we loved him. Without requirement for us to love him in return. Remember what DC Talk said, "Luv is a verb." So, today's challenge is simply to love.