Heavenly

"What the world needs is people who believe so much in another world that they cannot help but enact it."  Shane Claibourne  

Don’t read this guy if you want to remain comfortable.  I have a bunch of friends who tell me that I should read his books, but I haven’t yet. They say, “he will really mess you up.”  Thanks anyway, I’m already pretty messed up.  

A friend sent this quote to me (he wants to change the world too), and it really made me think.  Have you ever read something and thought, “I totally agree and yet disagree all at the same time!”  If so, you are a good postmodern.   

First, I totally disagree with it.  God changes the world.  We are just along for the ride.  Who are we to think we can enact anything of any real lasting eternal kind of value?  God does that.  And when he does, it is worth experiencing.  So, let’s be clear, God makes heaven come to earth in spectacular ways sometimes, and all we are left saying is, "thank you."   

Second, I totally agree with it.  I really think Jesus meant it when he taught us to pray, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven…” (Matthew 6:9-10).  He wants us to dream, pray and implore God to make earth look more and more like heaven.  That is what I really want and what I am working for.  

I see the plight of 143 million orphans and say, “Lord, make this reality more like your reality.  Where there are orphans who get adopted into your family and all they can remember is that they are a child of the King.”  That’s why I am doing what I am doing with World Orphans.  Because I believe this is precisely God’s dream for this planet and these children.  God’s prayer for this planet is our motivation - that all would become disciples of the one true King and forget they were ever abandoned.  That is the world I believe in.  And it sounds heavenly.