What a great week of VBS! Not only did I get to wear all of my Hawaiian shirts and grill all week, but I got to connect with all kinds of people, kids through adults, as we focused on God ?s Truth. The core of the week was based on Psalm 86:11, which says: ?Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name. ?
While it was great to spend time with kids and adults from the church and to meet new people, the heart of ?Outrigger Island ? was to connect to God through his truth. The motto for the week was ?Know the Truth! Speak the Truth! Live the Truth! ? That ?s a great summary of the Christian life, and I ?m thrilled that kids, adults, families got to learn that together.
The key is making that connection to God ?s truth within our hearts. It ?s easy for us to run programs for Bible school, Adult Bible Fellowship, and mid-week Bible studies and stuff our brains full of Bible knowledge, but until we have the connection between mind and heart, we won ?t really be able to speak the truth and live the truth.
David shows us how important that connection is. Too often we find our hearts divided between the old life and the new life we have in Christ. And when we try to live with that kind of divided heart, we find we can ?t do it. It ?s like cardiac patients who have only a percentage of the full usage of their hearts; they find themselves weaker and with less stamina and with shortness of breath. It ?s not a full life. The only way to live the full life Jesus came to bring (remember Life360 and John 10:10?), is to have an undivided heart that knows the truth, speaks the truth, and lives the truth. So, by all means, continue to fill yourself with God ?s Word by listening to Mark ?s sermons and attending an Adult Bible Fellowship or another smaller group. But allow God to connect your heart, soul, mind, and strength so you can grow and serve.
I learned a valuable lesson from the scripture where Jesus tells us to love our neighbors as ourselves…the part I have been missing is that little word “as.” How well we are able to love our neighbor is going to be directly proportionate to how well we learn to love ourselves. It says to love our neighbors “as ourselves,” so we must first love ourselves, and I believe the way to finally fulfill that (Paul spent a good majority of his letters trying to get this point across) is to feel the love that Jesus has for us, and the best way to do this is to open the valve to our heart, and let all that “living water (Word)” flow from our brains into our hearts as Bruce said. If we don’t, than that water will evaporate into the air and be swallowed up. When you fly on an airplane, in an emergency case and the oxygen masks drop, we are instructed to first secure our own mask, and then help others. You can’t be of much help when you are passed out due to lack of oxygen. I constantly remind myself of this fact, that before I can truly share Jesus with others, I have to receive His love first, then I will be able to share His love with others.