Jesus is a revolutionary, and it is a revolution of life.  He alone is the source of the most full life, and as followers of Christ, we not only have access to full life here on the earth, but we have hope that life will continue into the future, with a new heaven and a new earth and new resurrected bodies.  We have hope that when the time is right, Jesus Christ will return and establish the fullness of His reign.

German Theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer puts it like this…

“the kingdom of heaven descends, the face of the earth will be renewed, and it will belong to the flock of Jesus.  God does not forsake the earth: he made it, he sent his Son to it, and on it he built his Church.  Thus a beginning has already been made in this present age.  A sign has been given.  The powerless have here and now received a plot of earth, for they have the church and its fellowship, its goods, its brothers and sisters, in the midst of persecutions even to the length of the cross.  The renewal of the earth begins at Golgotha, where the meek One died, and from thence it will spread.  When the kingdom finally comes, the meek shall possess the earth.”

Our future as followers of Christ is better than we could ever imagine.  We are not headed toward some condo in a cloud as my pastor often says.  Our souls are not flying up to some super spiritual existence.  Continue Reading…

Every now and then, you read a book that changes your life.  This has been the case for me over the course of the last two weeks.  The book is called “Wisdom & Wonder,” and the author is dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920). Although his “big words” can make it grueling to read at times, it is worth wading through with dictionary close by to mine out the gold he offers.

A major emphasis of #LiveFully is to rediscover a Christian theology that integrates into all of life, resulting in followers of Jesus that are impacting (not escaping) mainstreams cultures of the world. Kuyper was a brilliant mind that lived with the same conviction. Continue Reading…

Teal is the official color of #LiveFully.  Besides for being a nice color, it’s very significant to the purpose of the #LiveFully project.  There is a lot of theology packed into it. Seriously.

As you know, teal is a blend of the colors blue and green (welcome back to Kindergarten).  Because it’s the color of the sky, blue often symbolizes the heavens.  Green, on the other hand, symbolizes the earth (no explanation necessary).  Put them together, you have teal – or symbolically, the unity of Heaven and Earth.

#LiveFully seeks to rediscover a Christian spirituality that integrates into all of physical life on the earth.  Just like Jesus prayed that God’s will be done “on earth as it is in heaven,” we believe that biblical Christianity is not about escaping the physical earth to go to spiritual heaven.

Instead, Christians are called to engage in God’s project of redemption on the earth today, as they eagerly await the second coming of Jesus and the New Heaven and New Earth, when God will make all things new (Revelation 21:1-7) . Continue Reading…

In starting #LiveFully and writing more, I have been confronted with fears, doubts, and anxieties along the way. My assumption is that many artists and creatives deal with similar emotions as they seek to create art. As silly as it sounds, just posting a blog online can bring a bit of self doubt, as you become vulnerable to the critique of others. Thoughts pop up like, “No one cares what you are trying to say” or “there are way more gifted people who can say this better”.

In these months of creating, I’ve felt kind of like a hamster on a wheel, spinning around the same 4 step cycle over and over again. The breakdown in the analogy is that the process is moving forward, unlike the wheels that stay stationary. Perhaps it’s more like being a hamster in one of those clear plastic balls. The cycles are constant, but there is productive, creative movement forward.

Here are 4 steps in this creative cycle:

1. Inspiration – whether it’s during a run, sitting on the toilet, or driving somewhere, the inspiration comes. All human beings have creative potential because all human beings are made in the likeness of the ultimate creative- God the Creator of all. Beyond that, all followers of Christ are empowered with the very Spirit of God, which reveals thoughts of God and inspires with ideas from God. (1 Cor. 2.10-12) Continue Reading…

The first half of the vision for #LiveFully is “to unite a global community that believes following Jesus is the most full life.”  Before anything else, we view Christians coming together in unity as first priority because Jesus himself held it in such priority. In his prayer to God the Father on behalf of future believers, Jesus said,

“I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity.” John 17:22

History has taught that the way to reach this unity is not by all Christians coming into perfect agreement over extensive doctrinal statements.  We are not all going to agree on what it means to be “baptized in the Holy Spirit” or whether or not God’s sovereignty means there is a “double predestination.” If we are waiting for this kind of unity then we are waiting for a moment that is not going to come, at least not in this present age. Continue Reading…

Hey guys,

We are taking this week off for Spring Break and will be back next week with new #LiveFully posts and stories.  Thanks for checking in and even more importantly, thanks for building this community with us.  We look forward to continuing down this journey with each of you.

#LiveFully