Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Outliving your life

This is a bit different for me, but I'm going to do a book review per agreement with Max Lucado's publishing company.

It is a priviledge, actually. I've had a long history with Max's writings. Some even compliment me by saying I sound a lot like Max. If so it is because he writes in a pleasant every-man type of writing that encourages and lifts even those of us who still see the world as half-empty.

His latest, published just the other day, is called Out Live Your Life, and it is an excellent premise, to begin things. His idea is that the world has a gazillion problems, but if the body of Christ would simply be the body of Christ, as it was in the beginning when God took every-man types and changed the world, we too could make a huge difference.

It's a collection of what if's, really.

What if we took in the world's orphans?
What if we fed the world's hungry?
What if we cared, truly cared, for the lost, the least?

We could make that difference.

This book is a continuation of the more mature Max writing, thematically. The book before this, Fearless, was a complete theme, looking at how we get rid of all those fears we have to admit we have. Out live your life is complete thematically as well.

Each chapter is another look into the world we live and the world we could live in.

Being a United Methodist whose very motto is open minds, open hearts, open doors, I particularly like the chapter Open your door; open your heart. In that chapter, Max points out that the early disciples were so together, they ate in homes, shared in homes, worshipped in homes.

Today? Why we're so scattered we can't even agree on how to meet in homes. Because of our own inadequate behavior, Max resorts to a pont-by-point how to be hospitable. Oh, don't we need that today?

Bottom line is this book is another double, if not a home run. I like the endorsement that says Max's compassionate words have encouraged us in the past. This time he guides us toward compassion.

It's worth noting that the proceeds from this book, 100 percent of them, go to benefit children and families through World Vision and other ministries of faith-based compassion.

It is time we make that difference, friends. We've been given so very much, particularly in this country; we should acknowledge our God by giving to others. Pay it forward, as it were.

Max says: "it's a story of hillbillies and simple folk, net casters and tax collectors. A story of movement that exploded like a just-opened fire hydrant out of Jerusalem and spilled into the ends of the earth: into the streets of Paris, the districts of Rome, and the ports of Athens, Istanbul, Shanghai, and Buenos Aires. A story so mighty, controversial, head spinning, and life changing that two millenia later we wonder."

It can happen, again.

We can change the world, again.

We can quit our bickering and find peace not like the world offers but as the Christ, this Jesus of Nazareth offers. It can happen, again.

What we need is more writers, preachers, leaders, caring persons like Max Lucado to step forward and show us the compassionate needs of the world. The world needs to be loved into submission, rather than burning holy books or flying airplanes into towers.

Max closes by pointing out that one day the clutter will all fade away. We will recognize the fact that we never noticed the beauty in the midst of the business. "From the perspective of heaven, we'll look back on these days -- these busy, cluttered days -- and realize, That was Jesus playing the violin. That was Jesus wearing the ragged clothes. That was Jesus in the orphanage...in the jain .. in the cardboard shanty. The person needing my help was Jesus."

Max says thee are many reasons to help the people in need. "But for Christians, none is higher than this: when we love those in need, we are loving jesus. It is a mystery beyond science, a truth beyond statistics. But it is a message that Jesus made crystal clear: when we love them, we love him."

Buy a book. Help an orphan, or someone without clean water, or someone without proper food. Then read the book, and prepare yourself to be moved to help an orphan, or someone without clean water, or someone without proper food. When did we feed, visit, clothe or comfort Jesus? When we did so to the least of these.

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