Jesus always sees people through the lens of anticipated redemption. Seeing them for who He intended them to be, rather than seeing them for who they really are.

The Russian writer and philosopher Fyodor Dostoevsky said, “ To love someone means to see him as God intended him.“ It’s this idea of seeing every person and treating them as kingdom contributors before they even know what the kingdom is. It means treating people as if they are already functioning in the body of Christ, giving them a picture of what could be and should be.

God has expanded my view of prayer beyond a verbal exchange between God and I. This idea of anticipated redemption is living out a prayer for people far from God. I believe that God sees the faith of our anticipation for people and answers it by drawing these people to himself. It’s prayer with feet. It’s living out our prayer life with anticipation.

It’s not our job to arrest people with our judgment, but rather by grace. Being arrested by judgment produces guilt, shame, hostility, and hopelessness. Being arrested by grace produces repentance, hope, worth, and redemption.

Try seeing and treating those far from God as already followers of God, as to win them through anticipated redemption.

God is sanctifying us daily. He’s at work, setting us apart for His special use and special service. Our level of contentment often stands in the way of our sanctification. For many years I was discontent with where God had me and content with where I had God.

A major shift happened in my life about 7 years ago. I began to have contentment with where God had me and started to have a discontentment with where I had God.

This shift was a game changer for me. God was sanctifying my contentment so He could take me to where He wanted me to go. Sanctifying contentment leads us to a God alignment.

Godliness with contentment is great gain. 1 Timothy 6:6

Are you ready to make the shift?

I decided to start a new weekly series on MistakeMaker.com called “Confessions”. Every week I’ll be confessing the junk in my trunk… mostly for me, but hopefully you’ll find some encouragement in it as well.

So I thought I would kick off this series with my first confession. I’m a middle-aged out of shape fat guy. There I said it. Whew…I feel better already.

So here’s the deal. God has been kickin’ my butt in the area of discipline. Particularly with the idea that our physical life is interconnected with our spiritual life. I blogged about this here a few days ago. I feel like God is telling me that one way I can grow spiritually is by shaping up physically. I am 38 years old. This is half time. Time to regroup, refocus, and reprioritize for the 2nd half. The 2nd half is when most of the action happens. I want to be ready. I want to be able to run the race hard and I want to finish well.

I’m about 25 lbs. overweight and I’m completely out of shape. I imagine that my blood pressure is on the high side. And I’m sure that my Cholesterol is high. At least it was the last time that I had it checked which was about 2 years ago. Since I’m confessing, I blew off the follow up appointment, the-one-where-I-was-supposed-to-come-back-after-eating-healthier-to-get-rechecked appointment.

I said all of that to say that on Monday, training for the 2nd half begins. My wife and I will begin the P90X training program. Man, I’m excited and pumped up to get started. It’s gonna be tough. But, I’m determined to finish the program. I’ll journal my progress each week on the blog. Please keep me motivated by letting me know that you’re following my progress. We do what’s inspected, not what’s expected. Inspect away…please.

Confession done.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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This video got me thinking…As followers of Christ, we need to play hard until the whistle blows. God holds the whistle and no one else. We play to please Him. When we stop playing before the whistle blows, we risk one of two things.

1) We risk celebrating a false win. Or…

2) We risk giving up just short of a win.

Anytime we celebrate the win before the whistle blows, we are celebrating a false win. Our spiritual enemy loves to deceive us into celebrating a false win. If he can get us to celebrate early, we let go of the ball and take our eyes off of the goal. He tries to steal our victory. When the enemy tempts you to celebrate, keep going until the whistle blows.

From a different perspective, there are times when we are tempted to quit…to give up. When everything looks bleak. While everyone else is celebrating a false win. You be the brave one. Risk looking foolish. Pick up the ball and run!  The game is not over. It’s not over until you hear the whistle blow.

No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us. Philippians 3:14-15

Is there a connection between our spiritual fitness and our physical fitness? Why do many Christians(including myself) often devalue physical discipline? Every major Eastern Religion connects spiritual discipline with physical discipline. This is true in Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Shintoism. But, when it comes to Christianity we don’t connect the two. Christians that do value both physical and spiritual discipline usually don’t connect the two. Now, I’m not suggesting that we should come up with our own physical exercise system akin to Yoga, Aikido, or Shaolin Kung Fu. I can see it now, it would probably have some cheesy Christian name like “BibleThighzer” or “BodiCor619X” (after 1 Cor 6:19). No…please NO!

Paul said this in 1 Timothy 4:8…

“For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come”

Some Christians will use this verse as their excuse for devaluing physical discipline. But Paul is actually acknowleding the value of physical discipline, not devaluing it. He’s not devaluing physical discipline, but rather increasing the value of Godliness. Christianity in the West is good at compartmentalizing everything that we do. So it makes sense that there would be a disconnect between spiritual and physical discipline.

But, I wonder what would happen if we started to connect the two. What if we started to look at our physical discipline as a form of worship? What if we started to ask God to give us a spirit of discipline in all areas of life? I wonder how we would see life differently as we find the connection between the spiritual and physical.

Yesterday I posted the reasons why I hate Facebook. Today, I’ll give you the reasons why I love Facebook.

Reason #1 – It helps me to pray for people more.

I find myself praying for people as I read their status updates. When I see someone post something exciting that happened in their life, I find myself thanking God and celebrating with them in their blessing. When someone posts a something that they are struggling with, I pray that God will give them strength and reveal Himself through the difficulty. It can be a great tool used for knowing how to pray for people.

Reason #2 – It’s been a great tool to reconnect with old friends.

It’s been such a blessing to be able to reconnect with people that I might have never crossed paths with in life. I’ve been able to reconnect with college roomates, old neighbors, high school buddies. I recently reconnected with a college roommate that I haven’t seen in 20 years. We got together for dinner and a concert and had a great time! It probably would not have happened without Facebook connecting us. So, I’m thankful for this great tool!

Reason #3 – It’s been a great way to meet new friends.

I’ve been able to meet several new people that have led into face to face meetings. I’ve met several pastors through Facebook that since then have met face to face. We now keep in touch regularly.

I have met several people through Facebook that live in my community that have turned into friendships. We meet up from time to time over a cup of coffee. I wonder if I would have ever met them if it hadn’t been for Facebook?

So, my love/hate relationship with Facebook continues. For now, I’ve decided to keep my account open. The love for Facebook outweighs the hate.

What do you love about Facebook? Who have you been able to connect or re-connect with because of Facebook?

I have a love/hate relationship with Facebook. I think Facebook can be a great tool, but can also be a dangerous tool. There are times when I’m thankful for Facebook and there are other times that I consider shutting my account down.

Today, I’ll share the reasons why I hate Facebook, and tomorrow, I’ll give you the reasons why I love Facebook.

Reason #1 – It’s stalking at it’s finest!

We live in a voyeuristic society that likes to know about people for all the wrong reasons. When we want to know because we care about people, that’s great. But when we care to just know about people, it’s not so healthy. It’s a modern day version of peeking in someone’s windows only we have opened the blinds wide open for everyone to see in.

Reason #2 – It’s a HUGE time waster.

Just a quick look at Facebook can quickly turn into 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours. Wow…where did the time go?

The World Wide Web is appropriately named. It is a web that is so easy to get tangled up in and sometimes hard to get out of.

Reason #3 – It’s become more about applications and less about connections.

It started out as a great way to connect with friends, and it’s turned into a cluttered mess of applications. It reminds me of MTV. You’re hard pressed to hear music or see music videos on MTV anymore. And Facebook is becoming more about Applications than it is about connections with people.

I don’t really care which Disney character you are most like, or what kind of lover you are, or what movie star you are most like. But, I do want to know how you are really doing. What’s going on in our life…I truly want to know. I joined Facebook for connections and relationships not applications.

What about you? What do you hate about Facebook?

I had an opportunity to see U2 a few weeks ago. As always, it was an incredible show. The stage, the lights, the showmanship…all very good. The stadium was sold out. In fact, it was the biggest crowd ever assembled at Giant’s stadium.

80,000 fans came to hear songs that they love from a band that has been together for over 30 years. But they heard more than songs. They heard a deeper message. They heard about the urgent need to put an end to poverty. They were asked to take a stand against tyranny and oppression. They didn’t come to hear this message, but they did…all 80,000 of them. They came to hear the music, but they got the message.

For Bono, music is a means to accomplish his life mission, but is not the mission itself. He’s using his leverage as a musician to fulfill a greater mission. In other words, music is what Bono “does”, but a humanitarian is who he “is.” He uses what he does to fulfill who he is.

As a follower of Jesus, you are called to leverage your influence to spread the gospel. That means whether you are a carpenter, electrician, salesman, stay at home mom, or a teacher. You are to use what you do to accomplish who you are. Don’t keep what you do and who you are in separate buckets. Use one to fulfill the other.

The better that you do whatever it is that you do, the more influence you will have to accomplish whatever it is that you were called to be.

Paul says in Colossians 3:17, “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus…”

U2 can leverage your influence for the sake of the gospel. Use whatever measure of influence that U have been given! They are coming for the music, but use your influence to give them the message.

Tomorrow is the release of Fee’s new album “Hope Rising”. I’ve been listening to it for several weeks now and it is an amazing collection of songs that will bring you into the presence of God. Every song is filled with passion and energy.

I am giving away an autographed copy of this CD along with a $5 Starbucks gift card. I’ll mail the goods right to your doorstep.

Here is how to enter…

1. Tweet this… Click here to ReTweet this contest.

2. Leave a comment letting me know that you want to enter the contest.

3. Subscribe to MistakeMaker.com if you haven’t already.

That’s all there is to it! On Friday (Oct. 9th) I’ll pick a winner using…Random.org and post the winner here. Thanks for entering!

WINNER!!! The winner of this contest is Jon Damon. Congrats Jon!

If a movie was made about your life today, what kind of movie would it be? Would it make it to the box office or would there be like one copy of it somewhere on the bottom shelf at Blockbuster? Would the movie be full of twists and turns, risks and triumphs, or would it be humdrum, boring, and safe? Would your life story cause people to stand up and take notice or fall asleep in the theater? Donald Miller was faced with this same question. After writing a best-selling book, he found himself in a funk that had him depressed, lonely, and unmotivated to even get out of bed. After two movie producers approached him about basing a movie on his life story, he is confronted with the reality that his life’s narrative is dull and lackluster. Faced with this reality, he sets out to edit his life story and turn it into a story that is filled with beauty, meaning, and passion. Be prepared to walk with Don through a raw, messy, and intimate journey of his life transformation.

I read a lot of books that are ok. I read a few books that are good. Even fewer that are very good. And every few years I find a book that I can’t get out of my head. It stays with you. It forces you to change. Not in a pushy way, but in an incredibly challenging way.  A Million Miles In A Thousand Years is a “once in a few years” kinda book. It just might be the book that will push you to do something with that dream that has been laying dorment inside of you for years and years. Run, don’t walk to the book store to buy this book. Better yet, just click this link to order it. You won’t be dissappointed…trust me.