By Laurie Klopfenstein
I’ve been reading Crazy Love and it’s been pushing me again to be more of who I am. In America I would be called a radical but in God’s kingdom I think it should be normal.
In the book of Acts and in the early church everyone shared with each other. Everyone loved freely. People spoke the word of God boldly no matter the consequence. But it was out of love. So often as Christians we speak out of a sense of “rightness.” We have fallen into the trap that the rest of the world follows, that “our way is the right way, and that’s it.” Well, yes… but our attitude should be “that of Christ, who being in the very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant…”
How often do we make ourselves nothing? I think instead we elevate ourselves to be “gods” and proclaim our rightness to the world.
Instead, we are here to serve. How have you served, really served with complete abandon and no regard for what you get out of it, lately? Have you??
I know that until recently I had lost sight of all of that. Even now, as God challenges me and draws me closer to Him, part of me is screaming, running. See, I know what following God costs. I’ve experienced it firsthand by seeing my sister dead in front of my eyes. We call that martyrdom… Matthew came to kill Christians that day. And my sisters would have said it was all worth it. They would and are honored to be counted in that way – it was something we LIVED. Service to Christ in that way was not just words to us. And it is no longer to me. I am so well acquainted, though, with the cost, that the thought of the pain causes a part of my heart to shrink back. But “to live is Christ and to die is gain.” And I press on “to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.” I push myself past the loss, the fear, to find something so much more infinitely beautiful that I will never lose – knowing Christ.
In challenging myself out of being lukewarm, I have seen the face of God. As Martin Luther King Jr. said, “He’s allowed me to go up the mountain… Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!”
And I see it – in the face of Heidi… just one person, but I obeyed and saw God…
I will not stop. I will serve the least of these… I will go from “I” to “thou”… I will not care about my life… If my life is short it doesn’t matter… today is what matters.
Ps. Want to thank Pavel for speaking this into my life, and Bria Skalsky’s latest blog for inspiring me 
Love you Brianna! I sincerely mean that and hope you find the strength to know that even if your life may not count in the land of politics, it does in the land of people. You are a beautiful human being and I’m so lucky to know you.
