A Courtroom

I want to share something with you that Christopher Hopper said at a Fearless gathering this past week  He was giving his sermon on identity and what it means to be a follower of Jesus and at the end, gave us this scene.

Imagine you are in a courtroom and you are on trial for ________.  Maybe it's adultery, maybe it's lying, cheating, anger, lust...you put in your own word(s).  And the jury right now is deciding whether or not you are guilty of this crime.  There is no more chance of defense for you. It's obvious it's you- your DNA is all over the crime scene.

It's time. The Jury is filing back into the courtroom with that little piece of paper saying your verdict.  You hear "For the count of  ________ this jury finds you guilty. 

You know it's over. You're going to die for this. You are about to be Capitally Punished for this. You hear the Judge say "Bailiff, take them away" and you know it's over.  As the handcuffs are being put on your wrists, someone raises their hand and asks permission to approach the bench.  The Judge grants them permission and you watch the Judge and this stranger talk.  You see the Judges head snap up at one point and at last you hear "Bailiff, take this man here in front of me away instead. He has offered to take the place of the accused."  After the man is led out of the courtroom, you hear everyone whispering "Do you know who that was?!"  Interested, you strain to hear the answer.  "It was the Judge's son."

This scene changed my life.  In my mind, I saw myself sitting there for anger and bitterness toward one of my parents.  I had allowed it to fester and grow and get infected and in the end, the only thing this anger and bitterness did was to hurt every other relationship I had.  I don't know about you, but for me, living life like that SUCKS. 

I want to challenge you. Imagine it's you in that courtroom being accused of a crime you know you committed and you know you're about to die for.  What is that crime? Is it worth dying for? If not, I challenge you to let the Son's death be something big in your life.  Follow him and don't let His death on the cross be for nothing.

Breath

Okay, I know, I know, it's been over a month so here it goes...

I have learned  this past month or two what it is truly like to be surrounded by Christians. And I don't mean those people that say it but don't live it. I'm talking about people who I can wake up, walk down the hall, and first thing I see is them on the couch. And the first thing out of their mouth to me is "Jill! Listen to this!" and they proceed to tell me about a sermon they watched online from Mars Hill Church, or about what God is doing and how He is moving, or even what they hear from God. And I know that these people are the people who have had, in the past few weeks, a bigger impact on my life than friends I have known for years.

It's amazing to me that sometimes, we wake up and go about our daily lives and forget that God is there. For a day, a week, a month, even a year or more, we forget and ignore Him. Leaving Him to stand knocking. And eventually, maybe we stop feeling Him knock or we have done something in sin that has caused Him to turn His back on us (or spit us out of His mouth).  Maybe we have turned our back on Him.

I was in chapel the other day, and the speaker was a doctor in Africa.  He made us hold our breath and put our hands in the air.  When we couldn't hold our breath anymore, we were supposed to lower our hand.  Well, I didn't last much longer than 30 seconds. And by the end of 2 minutes, every hand was down.  And then he said this and it has stuck with me ever since.

"We can't go more than two minutes without the need to breathe, so why do we think we can go days, months, years without God? He is the breath of life."

So this made me think. Why DO we think we can go for more than 30 seconds, minutes, days, months, or years without God guiding our way?  Is it because we don't want to give up our independence and we're afraid of stepping out from behind our sin and manning up? Or is it because if we lose our sin, we will lose our identity? I don't know about you, but for 17 years, I was afraid of who I would be without my sin. I was afraid to take of the mask and let my life be defined by something...no, someONE else.  But there is good news, God will and has placed some amazing people in each of our lives to help build us up and hold us accountable for our actions. You just have to wake up and notice.