Make us Dangerous!
My dear friend, Richard Fredericks (pictured here with his wife Sallie), is senior pastor of Damascus Road Community Church (www.damascus.com) where I served as associate pastor before launching Grace Place. Richard recently began an email to his congregation with some incredibly inspiring words. I hope these paragraphs challenge you the same way they did me! Thanks Richard.
Jesus didn’t die on the cross to make your life safe.
Jesus died on the Cross to make you dangerous for God.
Asking for God’s protection is fine.
But when was the last time you begged God to make you dangerous and bold, for Him?
Or asked that along with staying safe, your children would grow up to be dangerous difference makers and not just mediocre materialist? God knows, the world doesn’t need more of those—folks whose only real passion is to stay affluent until they die.
Praying for your home and job are good things, but Jesus called us to pray for passion: Father, Thy will be done in me as it is in heaven—even if it leads me to a cross. I’m Yours, all in, all the time, in every way. A disciple.
We follow the One so passionate that His last days on earth are called: The Passion. Yet somewhere along life’s way we get so tame we probably bore our guardian angels! We stop pursing a holy passion and settle for a paycheck. Our greatest fear becomes the loss of our comfort instead of the loss of our God-story, and once that happens, faith is boring and not even our comforts really comfort us. I know. I’ve been there. I don’t want to live there. Being wild and free in Jesus really is a whole lot more exciting than being tame and caged by a lifestyle.
So what makes you passionate? What makes you get angry or sad or excited? Right now, maybe just an occasional movie or vacation! If so, go ahead and pray this out of the box (NON-protect my lifestyle) prayer with me:
Lord Jesus, ignite in me a holy passion—a burning vision for doing Your will; and a trust that makes me obedient to you right now, today, right where I am, whatever You say. Amen. Go ahead, say it. I dare you. I double-dog dare you. (Richard Fredericks)