Men's Forum Week 3: Strength

Strength week...

As I prayerfully looked at how to write this blog about week three of the 2014 H.U.G.E. Men's Forum, I felt led to look in to my past. I know for me, a recently saved follower of Jesus, the past is where I have to look to confess things to God, it's where I look for forgiveness and it's where I look to forgive others.

Looking in to and meditating on the past for me is far and away the best way to take biblical principles and truly think about how I would have applied them in different situations to help me move forward in relationship with Jesus.

Fear, strength's adversary

This act is how week three has hit me. Pastor Aaron Thompson of Marysville New Life Church was our teacher for the evening. Aaron is a man after my heart, I can tell you that. Any man who can properly apply sports analogies to biblical principles is no doubt going to have my attention. He talked about a football game that he played at Lake Stevens High School, about how he had a great game against his former school and was named MVP that night. Sounds great and all, I've had those games, it's a great feeling to be on fire during a big game.

What he talked about next was the punch that hit me though. After all of that, he couldn't even remember the 10 solo tackles he had that night, they didn't matter. He remembered one play, where he let fear get in his way for just an instant and the opportunity of that moment was gone forever. He let fear win on that play, that's why it stuck with him. I think we can all look back and find moments where we let fear get in the way of doing something that God intended us to do.

This night was about finding that strength.

Finding the strength to overcome these fears to listen to God's plan for our specific lives and to take action on them in my life is one of my biggest hurdles. That's where the time to look in to my past comes in. I looked at things that hold me back, the things that allow fear to win, wrote them down and asked myself what could have been possible if I'd handled this the way that Jesus would have.

I looked at close relationships, ones that I've felt jaded by, I think we all have at least a few of those. I looked at those relationships that effected who I am today and applied love, applied strength to do what I know now is/was right and it felt amazing.

You see, I'm a firm believer that you can make a choice each day when you wake up to be a better person than you were the day, month or year before. Jesus gives us that hope. That through Him, all things are possible. And if all things are possible, I can certainly gain the strength needed to follow Him in any situation. We have the blueprint, we have The Gospel at our fingertips to teach us how to solve any situation.

Leap without fear!! Jump straight in to whatever God has planned for you! Don't shy away from an opportunity and NEVER, NEVER be afraid to fail. God is in our weakness and in our failure, He will lift you back up if you seek Him, we must never forget that fact.

Today I will find the strength to follow Jesus wherever He leads. 

My small group after Aaron's awesome message was exactly what God had intended for me. You see, I stopped to say hi to a friend in the aisle on the way to small groups and ended up having a deep discussion with him and with Rick Thiessen. It was unreal, I don't want to disclose everything that came of that meeting, I just want to portray to you just a little of how it made me feel.

You see, the fear that has held me back from leaping on faith is deep. It's of this world and I didn't really know where it came from. The discussion in this group, the prayer in this group made this thing that has held me back fall directly in to my lap. I felt like Wiley Coyote getting hit by an anvil while chasing The Road Runner. It was so clear, I had to dig far, far in to my past and all throughout my life and apply Jesus' sweet forgiveness, I had to let go of something that was poisoning my thoughts of strength and decide to follow a new path.

Only time will tell how significant this moment really was, right now it feels like I just threw that anvil across a calm river like a good skipping rock and have been freed.

I'm pumped for the Men's Forum, week four is upon us. Loving God with all of our mind, this should be a crazy ride.....Join us at Word of Life Church in Marysville, 7 PM!!!