Stuck In Borderland Series

Stuck In Borderland

The Life – part two

This is the second week in our new study that we are calling, “The Life,” a ten week series that has the very real potential of radically changing your life in ways you can’t even begin to imagine.

AND – last Sunday as we kicked it off, we said that what you do with your life, what you do with the years between your birth and your death, what you do with your dash matters. Why? First BECAUSE – your life is a gift from God (every breathe, every heart beat is a gift); 2nd because God is returning to settle accounts (and when he does he has no intention of settling for mediocrity – or accepting our excuses for burying our gifts and living life in the chair) and 3rd because God is also returning to reward you… “Well done…”

LAST WEEK – we learned that God has called each of us to live a life of risky partnership with Him.

If you were here last week for the message – let me ask you a question; Have you taken any time out to think about how you are living your dash? (remember that right hand side – the day you die is fast approaching). SO - how are you spending your dash?

The title for today’s message – is “Stuck In Borderland.”

As you all know Last month I went for a 12 day spiritual journey… The reason for this journey was that I felt that I had hit a wall in my walk with God. YOU SEE - I knew that God wants to do greater things here at Central – and I also knew that I was not yet, where I needed to be for that to happen. I was convinced that God wanted to say something to me – so I left to find out just what that something was. And a big part of that something was finding a book called , Your God Is Too Safe.”

After I worshipped at Southland CC in Lexington on Sept 15; I went to their bookstore (it sits above their food court) – YOU SEE - I knew that God had a book that he wanted me to read (he has done this several to me over the last 11 years…)

I saw a book on display right up front, but passed right by it… I began to pray as I searched the shelves for the right book… I pick up a few – one was a book for men called ‘Wild At Heart.’ I just kept praying that God would help me find the right book… After a period of time, I walked back to the front of the store…. Grabbed the book on display reread the title – “Your God Is Too Safe, Rediscovering A God You Can’t Control….” - Immediately I put the other books down because I knew that this was the very book that God wanted to speak to me through…

The very next day as I sat on a pier in Syracuse Indiana, on Lake Wawasee – I wrote these words in my journal;

“Lord the introduction to this book is absolutely amazing – it is just what I needed to hear – it is where I am. God I can see your hand in this journey… From the message Sunday at Southland, the tapes I’ve listened to, The people at the Church of Christ – This retreat center this book – it is so clear that your hand is in this – helping me find you in a deeper way… This journey is only beginning – protect me from the evil one – Give me this day my daily bread and may your kingdom come into my life…”

This is an awesome book! I just finished it this week… And when I read the last page – I was kind of bummed out – it left me wanting more… I have gotten many other people to read this book – Laurie, Lynn, Ryckie, Len, John – and my friend in Florida Simon – who got the book on lunch Tuesday, and by 3 pm left me a voice message about how awesome it was – how it was talking about him.

NOW – the major theme in this book is where I got the title for our message this morning…. “Stuck In Borderland.” But before we talk about ‘borderland,’ I want to share with you the reasons why Buchanan says, he wrote this book…. Maybe you can relate…

“I’m stuck. The impulse behind writing this book: my own affliction with chronic spiritual fatigue; my own dwelling in the doldrums of the heart; my own realization that I was spiritually stalled, held in place by a dead weight of apathy, sloth, doubt and fear…”