22 Day Challenge 20 of 22

Today’s challenge features my dude Colt McCoy.

One of the first videos I saw on iamsecond was Colt’s. A good friend knew I was a fan of his and recommended it to me. Shortly after that he suggested we start our own iamsecond group. That’s just some background on the Colt video.

As far as the content, Colts video is about priorities, sharing Jesus, and (indirectly) living in a way that Christ has called us to. When we live in communion with Jesus, our life can reflect Him in a way that is attractive to others. Everyone doesn’t have to be a NFL quarterback to seem intriguing. God has a plan to save His children, we just need to play our role; small or large, with all the heart He’s given us.

22 Day Challenge 12 of 22

Today’s video is about Jesus working in Laura Klock’s life. Laura is famous for building custom motorcycles, and holding some landspeed records. The link for today’s challenge is here.

When Laura was young she blamed herself for a lot of issues that her parents had. She then got involved with drinking alcohol for the wrong reasons. This led to having an abortion at the age of 16, which then spiraled to full in alcoholism in her life. A man she was dating at the time invited her to church and Jesus turned her life around.

The part that stick out to me about Laura’s testimony was how she went to Church and the Pastor there was preaching about Gods love. This stuck out because I listen to so many sermons, that I really want the pastor to be passing what I feel is “more important” information. Having been a Christian for a bit, and having listened to hundreds and hundreds of hours of sermons I can get bored with repetitions of stuff like Gods love. All I want is the next super secret Greek translation to uncover another amazing layer of Christ’s intentions while He was on earth. I get so caught up in knowledge that I forget how all important Gods love is, and I want to just brush over it and get to “the meat”.
It wasn’t some incredible new translation from an undiscovered tablet that saved Laura. She wouldn’t have cared about any of that. But it was world changing to her to know that Jesus’ purpose in coming to earth wasn’t to explain how to worship, or what spiritual gifts we would have. He came down to pay for our sins because He loves us. That was the point. Sometimes I get a little Pharisee, and I need to keep in mind, that every Sunday brings new visitors to the Church. Visitors that might not know that God is a good and loving Father.

22 Day Challenge 11 of 22

Today’s post featured a young lady named Shannon. It can be linked here.
Shannon didn’t have a real father figure in her life. She started looking other places to fill that gap.
I’ve listened to a good few sermons over the past couple years on this subject. It has really impressed me with the gravity of being a father. As intimidating as the idea already was to me, after hearing so many sermons, it’s even worse. The point of the sermons was that as a father, men should be serving their family the way God serves us. Children growing up can generate some real connections between their earthly father, and their Father in heaven. Its a big responsibility, and I pray that God has that as part of His plan for me. I’m really looking forward to the challenge.
It’s good that Shannon overcame her situation to discover that her Heavenly Father didn’t have the same shortcoming as her Dad here. I pray a lot for hard pressed single parents and children in those situations. It’s a rough way to start life.
The challenge today was to read a chapter in John. Coincidentally we’re also doing some work out of John at Church this month. John 3 to be specific, where Jesus is speaking with Nicodemus. So I read over it, and was just struck by how huge it is that we’re still able to communicate with God. Even though Jesus returned to heaven two millennium ago, he’s still talking to His children. Still helping us figure out our lives. Sometimes we sell it short. It’s just a service, just a Bible, just forgot to pray today; but communication is our lifeline to build a relationship with our Father. A father so infinite that he can put all of us “first”.

22 Day Challenge 10 of 22

Day Ten Challenge.

Vitor Belfort was featured in the day 10 challenge.

I like how Vitor opened his video.  A lot of Christians grow up always feeling God’s love, and the love of other Christians.  The concept of God being loving is easy to understand because it’s written on our lives.  I didn’t have an easy time in life, but it was a lot easier than Vitors.  It’s amazing that he lost a loved one like that, and overcame his bitterness to develop a relationship with God.

The challenge was to ask myself what pain I’ve been holding onto that I need to give to God.  For me there really isn’t anything.  I’ve been so blessed in my life, that I’m unable to think up an issue that I’m holding in my heart right now.

In lieu of that today, I’m just praying for Vitor, and for others that have recently lost a loved one.  I saw an arrest rolling into the ER the other evening.  Medics were doing CPR on the person as the made their way into a room.  I just immediately started praying for the person, for their family, and for Jesus to reach out for them.  If they’d spent their whole life rejecting Christ, I just prayed that in their dying moments the person would ask for Jesus to save them.

Sometimes really severe things happen before we open our eyes to the Truth that God has for us.  Thankfully God gives us the grace to recover from those things and form a relationship with Him.

22 Day Challenge 9 of 22

Today’s challenge is here.

I’m not sure what to say except maybe “Amen”. It’s a good message, and a good truth. I don’t think anyone has ever convinced another to accept Jesus as their savior. God has a plan for that to happen or not.
Not that a person should stop talking about Jesus.
Firstly anyone who’s really found Jesus is just excited and wants to share it, without even it being an assignment to disciples.
Secondly God can (and does) use our actions to His Glory. Elijah stacked done wood, and he prayed, but he didn’t light the fire.

Anyway. Great video to maybe crack the shell of someone. Very real stuff. Got a bit carried away, I just like talking about Jesus! Lol

22 Day Challenge 8 of 22

Todays video featured Bailee Madison.  Here it is.

Initially I was kinda thinking I wouldn’t gain much from a child’s testimony.  After I watched it halfway through once, prayed a bit, then watched it again, I ended up really enjoying it.

Bailee talks about having a couple acting pieces taken by another young actress. Initially she was kind of angry about it.  She later found out, that the other girl was very inexperienced, and didn’t know that what she was doing was possibly against some sort of unwritten rule.  Bailee goes on to explain that she and the girl became good friends. I’m often pretty guilty of acting like this.  Something doesn’t go my way, and I immediately assume that persons involved have malicious intent.

I’ll usually rethink it, pray about it, and work through my feelings.  But I think it’s great that Baille’s Mother is raising such a Godly young woman.  She has such a wonderful head start. My wife and I talk a lot about having children.  I really enjoyed hearing Bailee explain things in her point of view.  Bailee talks about Jesus with language she’s learning from her Mother, and that can help Bailee to be a nice Christian role model for other little girls.

I also thought it was funny when Bailee was talking about her prayer life.  My prayer life is pretty childish sometimes.  I definitely have bad days where I get self absorbed in things, and I barely talk to God.  Other days I have a wonderful time, having little prayers about all kinds of things.  I’ll pray about whether to stop for gas today or tomorrow, or even what kind of candy bar to get.  I’ll give God thanks a hundred times in a day sometimes because He’s given me such a wonderful helper in my wife.

It was a nice change up, and gave me some things to think about.  Plus it’s probably a great testimony for someone who’s a big fan of Bridge to Teribithia.

Challenge update!

A quick update. Had another hiccup with the challenge emails. I’m thinking I’ve got the problem isolated though. Tomorrow I’ll be continuing with day 7 or 8. Whichever we’re currently on. The goal being having them available in the morning so that people can actually do the challenge. Tomorrow at six AM it resumes!

22 Day Challenge 7 of 22

Todays challenge can be linked here.

I was able to personally relate a lot more to Wayne’s video than I have been able to some others recently.

I don’t have a private jet, or a million dollars, but when I was younger I feel like I was definitely trying to fill my heart with different things. Drinking too much, partying too much, etc. I thought that Jesus was something to do on a Sunday morning, but then I didn’t give much thought to Him throughout the week. I didn’t understand that Jesus wasn’t just a name and a club.

As I continued my walk with Jesus I started to figure things out a bit more. Now I actually pray everyday, and realize that being a Christian is an every day thing, if not an every minute thing!

Probably the thing that’s going to stick with me most from this video is something Wayne said at the end: Success is knowing that the ones that you love will make heaven.

That’s something I pray about a lot. I know that I’ll be able to spend eternity with a lot of my loved ones, but I’ve been spending an increasing amount of time praying that my children (when they come about) will accept Christ at an early age, and continue growing with Him after I’m gone.

22 Day Challenge 6 of 22

Getting late. Haven’t really got a break to do much with iamsecond since getting the email this afternoon. Looks like another no sleep kinda night at work.
Saw a good variety of people today. Different problems, different sicknesses.
Today’s video reminded me of that. How people come to God in so many different ways. It also reminded me of how amazing God is to save people from the situations they get themselves in to.
The days video was about Karen. The daily challenge can be seen here.

Karen came from a unlikely background, and probably had to put a lot more trust in Jesus than most people. And it’s awesome that now she’s able to reach out to so many women that are hurting.
It’s easy in today’s society to forget about how many people in our own country live in terrible pain.

The daily challenge was to listen to someone. A lot of times this is really easy for me. A lot if the patients I deal with have a lot if troubles, but not so many people to talk about them with. I tried to be more open to a couple patients today, and prayed for them as we were speaking. That Jesus might heal their bodies, solve their troubles, or just give them His peace in their hearts.

Blogging on the iPhone, and I’m too tired at this point to figure out how to spellcheck. So grant me a little grace on that issue too if you can 🙂

22 Day Challenge 5 of 22

Day five came a day late. There wasn’t any post sent out on Thanksgiving, guess I was supposed to take the day off 🙂

In any case, Day Five Challenge features baseball star Josh Hamilton. The video can be found here.

I think maybe iamsecond is having some difficulties, as I can’t get a good link from the email they sent me anymore. It actually links to Day 13, which is all off for us.
Josh talks about his life playing sports, how he sank into addictions to drugs and alcohol following the loss of his parents, and how he eventually recovered following his discovery of Jesus.

The Challenge for today was for each of us to think what our addiction is. Porn, drugs, alcohol,social media? For each person to pray about that, see what God is telling them, and to talk with a friend about it. Sit down with another brother or sister in Christ and discuss problems in your life. Ask for prayer, and ask them if you can pray for anything in their life.

I recently starting fighting an addiction to porn. It was something that I never really thought about, but after hearing sermon after sermon talk about it, I started to realize it really was an ‘addiction’. I’ve been dealing with it through close counsel with my wife. She’s a wonderful woman, and has done a great deal to help me get closer to Christ. I also talk about it with friends at iamsecond. By discussing it with them I’m giving them permission to hold me accountable. Most of all though, I’m asking them and my wife to pray for me.

Josh was gone from professional baseball for two years. I’m not sure how long I’m going to deal with my issues. It might be six months of struggling, or I might struggle for the rest of my life. I’m consoled by the fact that I have good friends praying for me, and a wonderful God who is constantly working in my life to reshape me in the image of His Son. Part of that reshaping was being honest with my wife, and my friends about my sin. I hope that today’s challenge might help push someone towards making that same end.