Are You Ready?

Chapter 2 is titled: You Might Not Finish This Chapter

If you just popped over and don't know why I am talking about chapter two you missed that I am doing virtual seminar: HERE

I loved this chapter. It was a gentle slap upside the head that I needed.

The emphasis on selfishness, stress and simply "getting over yourself" is frankly something we all need to hear.


I loved this:

"In about 50 years (give or take a couple of decades), no one will remember you. Everyone you know will be dead. Certainly no one will care what job you had, what car you drove, what school you attended, or what clothes you wore. This can be terrifying or reassuring, or maybe a mix of both." Crazy Love by Chan pg 46

So, why is that so comforting?  So, reassuring?

For me it just helped me realize I do not want to live this life to be immortalized in the story of "me"! The story that matters is God's story.

So, evaluating the importance of where I fit and how I align my life up with HIStory and who I am before God is what really matters.



This weeks Questions for discussion:
1. On page 40 Francis Chan quotes Fredrick 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.”

Why do you think we live as though our lives will go on forever?
This may sound strange: but I don't.  I live with an ever present thought that I will be dead.  As a matter of fact at the table this morning I was joking with my husband about the type of picture I wanted in my obituary.  I think I decided on "Thumbs in ears, fingers raised, tongue sticking out, doing the nanny-nanny-boo-boo face" and I haven't worked out the exact wording, but I told Trent I would; but something to the effect of "I am getting to see Jesus before you...Are you ready?"  and this was before reading the chapter--and I LOVED that! I'll have to work on it though... :)

I don't know if it because I have experienced parental loss, expected death, accidental death, eminent death, and faced the reality that I should have died several times.  The kicker for me: facing my own potential death by stroke at age 35. Life is fleeting...

While I may understand the reality of death I do miss the necessity of living a life of greater worth.  I loved that A.W.Tozer quote "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."
 
2. On page 42, Chan says the following:

“Worry implies that we don’t quite trust that God is big enough, powerful enough, or loving enough to take care of what’s happening in our lives.”
“Stress says that the things we are involved in are important enough to merit our impatience, our lack of grace toward others, or our tight grip of control.”
“Basically, these two behaviors communicate that it’s okay to sin and not trust God because the stuff in my life is somehow exceptional. Both worry and stress reek of arrogance.”

Worry and stress are big deal things that affect virtually EVERYONE. What would it take for you to dump worry and stress completely?
 Win the Lottery!  Well, I guess I'd have to actually play for that to happen.  So, I'll choose death as my answer.  I know a more appropriate, church answer, would be to truly trust God. However, I only have seasons of success and moments of pure faith.  While I would say I truly trust God it is only moments that the worry and stress abandon.  I trust God, scared and shaking in my boots, hoping it will not be for loss and what I lose will be for gain.  ...and USUALLY that is the case; increasing trust...but I still worry :/ ugh!