Brown's Daily Word 1-22-10

Good morning,
What a way to live, knowing and serving Christ. He inflates us with His divine thrill and Holy Passion. Henry David Thoreau said, “Most men live lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.” Abraham Maslow put it this way, “A musician must make music, a builder must build, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be.”
I think we focus way too much on not doing anything wrong and way too little on doing something right. I am not convinced that the greatest tragedy lies in the things we do wrong. Albert Schweitzer said, “The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives.” I think too many of us are playing not to lose instead of playing to win. That is a great tragedy, indeed.
In I Samuel 14, Israel was held at bay by a battalion of Philistines that controlled the pass at Mikmash. While this was happening, what was the leader of Israel doing? I Samuel 14:2, “Saul was staying on the outskirts of Gibeah under a pomegranate tree in Migron.” Instead of fighting on the front lines, Saul was sitting on the sidelines, and this was not an isolated incident.
Then, along came David, a youth, with bravery, and David offered himself to fight Goliath. King Saul said, “You are only a boy.” David may have been young, but Saul was not offering to fight Goliath in place of David (nor did any of his "mighty men of valor". He sat on the sidelines while a shepherd youth fought his battles for him! Scripture teaches that Saul was head and shoulders taller than any Israelite, so he was the only one who began to match up to Goliath physically. Yet Saul was cowardly.
In his book, "Divine Appointments", Erwin McManus says that most of us are what he calls "sideliners". He says that a sideliner is “an observer of life rather than a liver of life.” He argues that most people live vicariously, saying, “We find our romance in "You’ve Got Mail", and we fight our battles through William Wallace and Maximus Aurelius.” However, there is no place for sideliners in a church. Church was never intended to be spectator sport. The way to get more out of church is to put more of ourselves into it.
Carl Jung, the Swiss Psychiatrist, was asked how he helped people get well. His response was pretty profound. He said, “Most people came to me with an insurmountable problem. However, what happened was through our work together they discovered something more important than the problem and the problem lost its power and went away.” That’s what ministry is. It’s something more important than your problem.
Saul sat on the sidelines, but Jonathan was, in effect, listening to the police scanner. I Samuel 14:3 says, “No one was aware that Jonathan had left.” Jonathan was tired of sitting and waiting. He wanted some action. Verse 4 says, “On each side of the pass that Jonathan intended to cross to reach the Philistines outpost was a cliff; one was called Bozez and the other Seneh. One cliff stood to the north toward Mikmash, and the other to the south toward Geba. Jonathan said to his young armor-bearer, ‘Come, let’s go over to the outpost of those uncircumcised fellows. Perhaps the Lord will act in our behalf. Nothing can hinder the Lord from saving, whether by many or by few’.” So Jonathan and his armor bearer climbed the cliff.
So they climbed and, by the hand of the Lord, defeated an entire Philistine battalion. This triggered a panic among the Philistines, so they started to flee in every direction. Thus, according to verse 20, “on that day the Lord saved Israel.”
The course of Israel’s history was changed by one man with the right mindset: “Perhaps the Lord will act in our behalf.” What if Jonathan had sat on the sidelines like the rest of the Israelites? What would have been the dire results then?
So, where are we in our spiritual walk. Are we passively sitting under a pomegranate tree, waiting for something good to happen? Or are we proactively "picking a fight with the Philistines"? David chased the lions. David stood against the giant. The Lord gave victory to David, and to Jonathan. If we stand firm in the Lord, somehow Jesus will come and give use the victory as well.
" Somehow Jesus came and gave me the victory".
In Christ,
Brown

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMrAafe7Mns