Thursday, July 23, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
"Crazy Love" Chapter Three
Chapter Three: Crazy Love
In chapter three, Francis compares God's love to the love of an earthly father. For many, including Francis, this Fatherly love is foreign because of the lack of example from their earthly fathers. My family was so blessed because our daddy's love for us made it easier for us to identify with our Heavenly Daddy's love for us. About six months after our dad died, one of our cousins told me he had never known another man who loved his children as deeply as our daddy loved us. (So others saw it too.) Even so, recognizing God's great love for us is not always easily done: we know that we are so unworthy. But His love for us is not based on us and our worth, but rather on Him and His character.
Francis says, "For years I 'got' God's love in my head, checked the right answer on the 'what God is like' test, but didn't fully understand it with my heart. ... Most of us, to some degree, have a difficult time understanding, believing or accepting God's absolute love for us." He goes on to say that a major turning point for him came from being a father himself. "Nothing compares to being truly, exuberantly wanted by your children."
John Eldredge says in the book Wild at Heart, "I am convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt of this: God wants to be loved. He wants to be a priority to someone. ... As Tozer says, 'God waits to be wanted.' " Francis adds, "His being is utterly complete and perfect, apart from humanity. He doesn't need me or you. Yet He wants us, chooses us, even considers us His inheritance (Eph. 1:18). The greatest knowledge we can ever have is knowing God treasures us. ... The irony is that while God doesn't need us but still wants us, we desperately need God but don't really want Him most of the time."
Discussion Questions:Question 1. Share the moment you felt like you "got" it; that "aha!" moment when you realized "I am in love with God!"
Question 2. The Bible tells us in Matt. 22:37 - 38 to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." Francis says, "this is how God longs for us to respond to His extravagant, unending love: with true love expressed through out lives." How can you make the cross central in your life?
I hope some of you will take the time to post comments this week. During this next week, let's remind each other and others to "remember the cross."
Anita
In chapter three, Francis compares God's love to the love of an earthly father. For many, including Francis, this Fatherly love is foreign because of the lack of example from their earthly fathers. My family was so blessed because our daddy's love for us made it easier for us to identify with our Heavenly Daddy's love for us. About six months after our dad died, one of our cousins told me he had never known another man who loved his children as deeply as our daddy loved us. (So others saw it too.) Even so, recognizing God's great love for us is not always easily done: we know that we are so unworthy. But His love for us is not based on us and our worth, but rather on Him and His character.
Francis says, "For years I 'got' God's love in my head, checked the right answer on the 'what God is like' test, but didn't fully understand it with my heart. ... Most of us, to some degree, have a difficult time understanding, believing or accepting God's absolute love for us." He goes on to say that a major turning point for him came from being a father himself. "Nothing compares to being truly, exuberantly wanted by your children."
John Eldredge says in the book Wild at Heart, "I am convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt of this: God wants to be loved. He wants to be a priority to someone. ... As Tozer says, 'God waits to be wanted.' " Francis adds, "His being is utterly complete and perfect, apart from humanity. He doesn't need me or you. Yet He wants us, chooses us, even considers us His inheritance (Eph. 1:18). The greatest knowledge we can ever have is knowing God treasures us. ... The irony is that while God doesn't need us but still wants us, we desperately need God but don't really want Him most of the time."
Discussion Questions:Question 1. Share the moment you felt like you "got" it; that "aha!" moment when you realized "I am in love with God!"
Question 2. The Bible tells us in Matt. 22:37 - 38 to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." Francis says, "this is how God longs for us to respond to His extravagant, unending love: with true love expressed through out lives." How can you make the cross central in your life?
I hope some of you will take the time to post comments this week. During this next week, let's remind each other and others to "remember the cross."
Anita
Sunday, July 5, 2009
"Crazy Love" Chapter Two
Chapter Two: You Might Not Finish This Chapter
Francis encourages us in chapter two to give some serious thought to how we approach each day of our lives, and our lives as a whole. Quoting him from page 39: "it's easy to think about today as just another day." ... "On the average day, we live caught up in ourselves. On the average day, we don't consider God very much. On the average day, we forget that our life truly is a vapor. But there is nothing normal about today."
Francis goes on to give us an example of uncontrolled, 'justified' stress in his own life, and the alleviation of that stress when he surrendered all his worries and stress to God. We seem to tell ourselves that our 'burdens' are just a little too unimportant to bother God with; at the same time, they are so important that they command too much of our focus and often bring us to a state of ill health; and we allow them to steal our joy. Francis relates worry to lack of trust and stress to lack of balance. "Both," he says, "worry and stress reek of arrogance." Worry and stress are also symptoms of misdirected focus: Life IS all about God and not about me at all. Francis suggests that we get over ourselves and focus on giving glory to God. "The point of your life is to point to Him." I really like that statement. I think it's time we get the point.
Discussion Questions:
I'm looking forward to hearing from you.
Anita
Francis encourages us in chapter two to give some serious thought to how we approach each day of our lives, and our lives as a whole. Quoting him from page 39: "it's easy to think about today as just another day." ... "On the average day, we live caught up in ourselves. On the average day, we don't consider God very much. On the average day, we forget that our life truly is a vapor. But there is nothing normal about today."
Francis goes on to give us an example of uncontrolled, 'justified' stress in his own life, and the alleviation of that stress when he surrendered all his worries and stress to God. We seem to tell ourselves that our 'burdens' are just a little too unimportant to bother God with; at the same time, they are so important that they command too much of our focus and often bring us to a state of ill health; and we allow them to steal our joy. Francis relates worry to lack of trust and stress to lack of balance. "Both," he says, "worry and stress reek of arrogance." Worry and stress are also symptoms of misdirected focus: Life IS all about God and not about me at all. Francis suggests that we get over ourselves and focus on giving glory to God. "The point of your life is to point to Him." I really like that statement. I think it's time we get the point.
Discussion Questions:
- How can you refocus your life in a way that will help you remember "the point of your life is to point to Him"?
- Think about people in your life who have died abruptly. Think about their achievements; and about their regrets. Perhaps you were in a relationship with them in which they shared this information; perhaps you have to imagine what the answers might be based on what you knew about them.
- Frederick Buechner: "Intellectually we all know that we will die, but we do not really know it in the sense that the knowledge becomes a part of us. We do not really know it in the sense of living as though it were true. On the contrary, we tend to live as though our lives would go on forever." What's your response to this quote?
- Read Philippians 4:4. Are you obeying that command? What steps will you take to ensure that you do? Philippians 4:5-9 offer us help.
- What if today was the day you came before God? What regrets might you have? Think about things you can change to day to avoid those regrets.
- What was your response to the quote from A. W. Tozer? "A man by his sin may waste himself, which is to waste that which on earth is most like God. This is man's greatest tragedy and God's heaviest grief."
I'm looking forward to hearing from you.
Anita
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