por Youth First Team
Do you know what it's like to be in the middle? To feel stuck? In between? To be in a place where you're not where you used to be, but you're not where you want to be? You're in the middle. But there's Good News! Jesus is in the middle, and you don't know what's in you until you are in the middle. You don't know what will come out of you until you are in the middle. You don't know how faithful God is until you're in the middle. It's in the middle that you find out what you're made of. It's in the middle that you discover there's more.
According to the Bible we are made for more, and God wants to do far more than we can ask think or imagine. Because God doesn't just want us to have enough, He wants us to have more than enough. There's more to your life than just getting by, status quo, business as usual. You are more than a job, you are more than a 9 to 5, your are more than a dollar amount, you are more than likes, comments, views and follows. You are made for more!
Pain has many different names: suffering, agony, affliction, torture, torment, discomfort, hurt... But one thing it does that we may not realize is that it helps. That's right! Pain hurts, but it helps. See life can be painful, but pain has a purpose, and we don't want you to waste your pain. We want you to use your pain. Why? Because it's inevitable, unavoidable, and unescapable so instead of going through pain, we might as well grow through it. God wants us to be long-suffering, to have endurance, to be patient, because your greatest purpose will come out of your deepest pain.
Your thinking matters. It is believed that the average person thinks anywhere from 12,000-60,000 thoughts a day, and 70% of those thoughts are negative. 95% of them are the same repetitive thoughts as the day before. Your thoughts matter. Therefore, if you want to change your life, we must let God change our mind. Because you will never truly know who you are until you know Whose you are.
You're not normal. Nothing about you is regular, ordinary or basic. You are extraordinary, you are an original, an anomaly, a deviation, you aren't just different, you are different different. There's nothing wrong with being different because we're not called to be normal. We are called to become more like Jesus and unlike anyone else He created. We are not better than anybody, but we are different from everybody. Why? Because average is not optional, ordinary is not enough, normal is unnecessary, God is allergic to basic, and He has called us to be different!
God is such a storyteller, He loves stories so much that He wrote a book and it's called the Bible. However, it isn't just a book of stories of what God has done in other people's lives, the Bible is filled with examples of what God wants to do in your life. We're obligated to share our story, to share our faith, to share our hope, to share the greatest story ever told that's hardly ever told. Your story is God's modern-day parable and you don't even know it. It is a key that will set someone free. Because your testimony is when your story becomes God's story.
Often times we think in the abundance of choices there is more freedom, but we have found that in the abundance of choices there is actually more bondage. The average person makes 35,000 decisions a day. As you can tell, life is consisted and made up of choices, and we want you to realize your decisions dictate your direction in life. Besides, the wisest choice you could ever make is to follow Jesus. So make a decision today that will change your life forever.
Porn is typically something we don't hear about at church, but this is something that God talks about clearly so we wanted to approach this directly, delicately and biblically. In a way that's helpful and not hurtful, in a way that leads from fantasy to freedom, in a way that helps you become Pornogra-Free!