BIGSTUF

I haven't posted in a while but I've been in Panama City at BigStuf for the past five days (BigStuf was a camp my youth group went to).

Ok well, the last five days have been simply amazing! There aren't words to describe how great it was! First off, the guy in charge of the whole thing, Lanny Donoho-- is brilliant! He was crazy, smart, funny, passionate, zany, and the list goes on... Then there were other amazing speakers-- Stuart Hall and Jeremy Herd. You could almost taste the passion for God in these great men!

The theme of the camp was "Wired." Like God wired us a certain way for things and if we do things the way He made us to do them we will get more out of them than we have ever imagined!

One thing that was talked about was that for us to live a life for Christ we must change our prospective. Now I figured that little fact out not too long ago and I really wish someone had told me that much sooner! I had really been struggling with living so that people could see Christ through me and living in a way that God could best use my life.

And it's not a checklist like those charts we had on the fridge when we were eight. You know what I'm talking about, that list of chores and other things your parents wanted you to do. Like clean your room, wash the dishes, feed the pets, brush your hair, etc. And every time you did them you got a little star sticker beside that activity. As fun and competitive that was when we were eight, our relationship with our heavenly father isn't meant to be like that. It's not supposed to be a check list of things like read my bible, have a 30 minute quiet time every morning, pray five times a day, go to church, and if you want to get really froggy-- talk to my friends about God.

No! You can't have a relationship like that! And so many times we leave camps like BigStuf saying to ourselves those very things! "When I get home I'm going to get closer to God! I'm going to pray more, have a 30-minute quiet time twice a day, tell my friends about Christ, and read the whole Bible in a year! Yea!" Not that those aren't good things to do but it’s a bad way to do them.

Our relationship with God should be a lifestyle, not a checklist. If we look at every decision we make as how it will effect God's plan, not ours. What we should do to best reflect God's glory back to Him not anything else. If we live our lives like that the checklist of things will get done but will be done because we want to-- because we long to! Because we are so in love with our Savior that we want to tell everyone about Him, that we want to read and learn about Him, and that we want to spend time and talk to Him! Isn't that so much better?! Since I started doing it that way I have gotten so much more out of my life and hopefully so has God.

-- 1 Corinthians 10:31 --

Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.