A Year to Grow...

this morning i finished david platt's book "Radical". i've been reading it for most of the summer and honestly, i must say that until today i would have said it's good, but not life changing. each chapter i read i would agree with what he was saying, but i just couldn't seem to see why i needed to read it. i thought to myself, "chelsea, this is a book for those people who haven't been on mission trips. this is for the Christians that just show up on sunday and don't love God the way you do." sometimes i am disgusted by my own ego. the good news is whenever that nasty pride manages to creep up, God knocks me down a peg or two.

i read the last chapter today. it was all about taking a year to devote completely to God. there were five commitments that the reader could make for the next year to begin to show them how to live their lives radically. as i read the words i realized that i need this challenge so desperately. most days i use my job and my family to hide behind.

i lived in africa, so it doesn't matter that i spend more time at the movies or watching TV than i do at the feet of my Savior.
i work at a church, so i don't need to find a place in my community to serve- i am serving!
my money is mine, so i can spend it on whatever i want.
God gets my weekdays- so the weekends belong to me.

these are lies that i tell myself, maybe not consciously, but i tell them nonetheless. the thing is that God asks for so much more of me. He asks me to leave my mother and father, pick up my cross and follow Him. How have i let the devil convince me that those words are tepid? i have grown comfortable and it's made me lazy. so, i'm taking david platt's challenge. i've decided to spend the next full year following the steps below. my hope is that each one will help me turn my eyes off of myself and put them back on the Father. my greatest desire is that i will live my life in such a way that brings glory to God.

i'm sharing the specifics so that you dear blog, can help keep me accountable. ask me how it's going! also if you want to join me, i think that would be great!

1. Pray for the entire world: for the next year i will spend time regularly in prayer for the world. i'm going to get a giant map of the world and put it up in my room or office and i'm going to spend time praying over each country.

2. Read the entire Word: the only way to truly know what God wants from us is to listen to His words. the best place for that is the Bible. this year i will start in Genesis and work my way through to Revelation. although this is something i've done before, i want to use each day's reading as a way to listen. i want to see what God has for me in these words.

3. Sacrifice your money for a specific purpose: this is going to be hard. not to toot my own horn, but i am pretty good with my finances. i like to think that because of that i am allowed to "treat myself" from time to time. this is how i end up with more clothes than i could possibly need or a new book when i still haven't finished the last one. but i also think that this is the challenge where i will learn the most. so... i'm making a commitment to look over my budget, anywhere that's not deemed a "necessity" is going to get cut. OUCH! i'm going to pray about a cause or non-profit and i will donate that extra cash for the next 12 months.

4. Spend time in another context: when i read what was in this section, i felt like i was already accomplishing this. basically this just means to serve. serve locally, and serve internationally. platt encourages his readers to find a way to get their hands dirty. and again i immediately went, "yes! i've got this covered!" but just because my job has service woven into it doesn't mean that there isn't more of me to give. i can't remember the last time i visited the elderly in the hospital or served at a soup kitchen or went on a mission trip just because God asked me to and not for my job. so i'm going to find a way to give this year. not because i have students who need to see how important it is but because I AM A STUDENT WHO NEEDS TO SEE HOW IMPORTANT IT IS.

5. commit your life to a multiplying community: translation: get involved in a local church. done and done.

so that's it. that's how i'm spending my year. i want to end with a quote from this book. i think it sums up everything with words i just don't have:

"You and I have an average of about seventy or eighty years on this earth. During these years we are bombarded with the temporary. Make money. Get stuff. Be comfortable. Live well. Have fun. In the middle of it all, we get blinded to the eternal. But it's there. You and I stand on the porch of eternity. Both of us will soon stand before God to give an account for our stewardship of the time, the resources, the gifts, and ultimately the gospel he has entrusted to us. When that day comes, I am convinced we will not wish we had given more of ourselves to living the American dream. We will not wish we had made more money, acquired more stuff, lived more comfortably, taken more vacations, watched more television, pursued greater retirement, or been more successful in the eyes of this world. Instead we will wish we had given more of ourselves to living for the day when every nation, tribe, people, and language will bow around the throne and sing the praises of the Savior who delights in radical obedience and the God who deserves eternal worship. Are you read to live for this dream? let's not waver any longer."