Wednesday, March 13, 2013

A CALL TO INTIMACY

ALOHA:

Today I celebrate Gods sovereign gift of earthly life and eternal life in Jesus Christ. 29yrs ago, I was born in Honolulu, Hi and 29yrs later I'm preparing to head back to my home state to plant a church that plants many churches.

I walked into my office today and my staff overwhelmingly blessed me with gifts, and encouraging words. As I received their blessings, one thing stood out to me, my personal relationship with them because of Christ.

As a young Pastor one thing I struggle with is my performance to God. That ultimately over flows into the way I view how the people I Pastor should be as well. I struggled with basing spiritual growth on how we are committed to church stuff and activities. This is a easy temptation to get influenced by; however God has not called me to my performance for Him, he has called me to be with Him and let Him press His life in and through me. Christianity is not about doing good things for God and others, it's about a genuine love relationship with God through Christ.

I served as a youth and worship Pastor in Tennessee for a little over 2 1/2 years. I got caught in the temptation of legalism. I would constantly preach on commitments and base our youths and adults spiritual growth on weather or not they were committed to the Lords work by their involvement, and if they weren't, I would throw a self righteous act of affliction on them. No different from the Pharisees of the bible. FORGIVE ME LORD!

Thank God for His Grace!

If I could go back in time and redo my ministry all over again in TN, I would teach my congregation on how to walk intimately with God. The main goal in the life of a believer is to KNOW GOD! Our daily goal is to SPEND TIME WITH HIM!

John 17:3 says "this is eternal life, that you may KNOW HIM, Jesus Christ, whom God has sent"

John 15:5 says "apart from me you can not do anything".

GOD CALLS US TO BE INTIMATE WITH HIM! He then presses His life out of us in such away, that the overflow is being connected in what He is doing through his church globally. Hear me correctly, GOD DOES THE WORK, NOT ZEKE. Our participation in His kingdom work is us living out of the overflow of our intimate love relationship with Him.

To my Pastor friends, encourage your people to walk in intimacy with Christ. Beware of the lie of thinking that their personal commitments to the church is the goal. Let Christ press His life in and out of them.

To my friends, don't let ministry commitments be your focus. If so, you will fail. Focus on walking with Jesus, and let Him mold you into the masterpiece He plans to make you (Phil 1:6).

6 months from now my wife and I will jump on a plane and move our lives to Hilo, Hi to start Ohana Church. It is my goal not to try and make a big church with a packed out room in Hilo. It's my desire to teach people how to walk with God intimately, through His word, in the powerful name of Jesus!

To Gods Glory ALONE!!!

Pastor Zeke