What are you doing, for heaven’s sake?
September 29th, 2008 Posted in encouragement, Harvest Crusades, questionsHeaven is the future destination of every follower of Jesus. But for now, we are on this earth, and it should be our desire to live our lives the way God intended.
To do that, we need to ask the question, “Why are we here on this earth to begin with?” “Why are you occupying space and time right now?” “What is the reason for our existence?”
Answer: We are here to know and glorify God and bring forth spiritual fruit. A lot more could be said, but let’s just begin with those two ideas.
We are here to glorify God
In heaven, the lyrics to one of the songs we will sing are in Revelation 4:11: “You are worthy, O Lord our God, to receive glory and honor and power. For You created all things, and it is for your pleasure that they exist and were created” (NLT).
There it is. We are to give God glory and honor. We are here to bring pleasure to God.
The problem is that many live to find personal pleasure. I must warn you, that will always be an empty and unsuccessful pursuit.
The Bible warns about this sort of thing: “But she who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives.” (1 Timothy 5:6 NKJV).
We exist for the pleasure of God
The wonderful thing is that when we seek to live for God’s pleasure, instead of our own, we will find pleasure! Not the illegitimate pleasure of this world, but a blessed, sanctified pleasure in relationship with the One who made us.
Our lives belong to Him!
We sometimes bristle at the thought of living for God instead of ourselves, because we think somehow our lives belong to us.
But the fact of the matter is Jesus Christ purchased you with His blood shed at the cross. You are now God’s property!
Paul reminds us in 1 Cornithans 6:19-20 that we don’t really possess our lives, or the lives of others:
“Or don’t you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.”
In my next blog entry, I will talk more about the second reason we exist–to bring forth spiritual fruit.
Let me close with two questions: “What are some ways that we can glorify God? “How do you glorify God in your life?”
Greater Philadelphia Harvest
Don’t forget to be praying for our crusade in Philadelphia all this week! For more info, click here.
Pastor Greg and family, I’m praying for your family. I’ve been so blessed by you teaching and want more of your teachings. I listen to you every day on my way to work and your voice has helped me to want to continue to live. You don’t realize how many nights I struggled with suicide thoughts but to hear your voice in the morning..helped me to hang on.I just switched to another shift and I don’t get to hear you like I need to but I feel God had me hear you when I needed it the most. I love you and your ministry so much. To even hear you you still teach with such power after you son has gone to heaven really encourages me. You all stay encouraged and focused I love you and need you. Thanks for living for God which allows others to learn how to live for God.I love you all dearly…
Greg & wonderful family, I pray for you and your beautiful family during this especially hard time. I have listened to you on the radio for several years now. I want to thank you for your love of Christ. You have helped me more than you know, through so many trials. As you have helped so many others. God is so awesome! His grace and mercy never fails.
Dear Pastor Greg, Thanks so much for reminding us of the “bigger picture” of eternity with Christ! It has been a special blessing as it ties in with what my Pastor here in NJ has been teaching as well… seeing with God’s eyes, far beyond ourselves. Lord bless you as you continue to share His Truth! My prayers are with you and your family always.
Greg, I went to the deer lease with my husband of 23 yrs this past weekend and was able to read the entire book “Lost Boy”. It was great! I can so relate in many ways, I even lived in Waikiki, Honolulu. I was about 13 and it was horrible. My parents fought and fussed and drank. My Dad was part time. Anyway, as I read I thought of your loss of a loved one. I have a son who is going to accept the calling to be a pastor and he is Awesome. He is just going to be 19 in December. I think about him and my oldest son who is a single Dad and my granddaughter who will be 11 in January. I have no idea what I would do if any of them went to Heaven before me. I need to go and make ready as the Mom I have been….always making their path as smooth as possible. Guess I don’t have to do that, huh. All taken care of and prepared by our wonderful Father, right? Right! Amen. Bless you Greg and keep up the wonderful ministering and I listen everyday as I communte to and from work on KDKR.
To me to Glorify God is to give him the credit openly in my life for all that he has done for me and to attempt to be the best representive for Jesus as possible. To be the Light of the World. To be the Salt of the Earth.
Jeff
We love you and are praying for your strength, peace, and Holy Spirit leading for the Harvest.
We love you and your family.
Rick and Linda Martin
Dear Pastor,
Your messages have blessed myself and my family for so many years and especially all the topics concerning Heaven. I was wondering if you were going to write a book with your messages about Heaven? It has helped me so much, since I have close loved ones there now.
May God Bless you and Cathe and your family. As I go through my loss it reminds me to pray for all of you everyday.
I really think that we can glorify God in all that we say and do! It can even be in the small and seemingly unimportant events of our day. For example: I try to do things as unto the Lord; laundry, dishes, fixing a meal, helping grandkids with homework, getting my husband a diet pepsi, etc. I try to glorify God with my life by being a godly wife, mom and grandma! To God be the Glory! Amen.
Pastor Greg-
Thank you for the message yesterday.. I really enjoyed it– I was encouraged and challenged~
Im praying for you and Cathe– I think of your son daily..May the Lord bless you and cover you with his Grace as you prepare for this weekend!
Sarah Denham
Dear Pastor Greg,
Good blog question- wasn’t sure if you were inviting us to post an answer, or to just think about the answer…
But here’s mine: To glorify God means I will spend time with Him, share my thoughts with Him, and just “be” with him. When I do that-His grace & gifts are felt and real. And in turn… I have His stregnth to be the best version of myself. My heart just wants to sing and please him.
But if I choose not to hang out with God, He’s still near and He still blesses me- but I’ll miss out on the joy of knowing His presence; and I’ll miss out on a chance to recogniize His “Face”, and feel His Hands touching mine.
Shalom, and may we have another Topher landscape please…
Lori