The Power of an Impactful Event
Aug 5, 2015

Introduction :BLOGGITY BLOGGITY BLOG

I have been asked many times to write a blog, and I always seem to get stuck–once classes start my head is usually off preparing, or thinking about my next up-coming meeting, whether that be one-on-one with a person, or a group.  However, as I sit here pondering this “bloggity bloggity blog” mid-July (to me “bloggity bloggity blog” sounds like “blah blah blah…” which I often think my writing a blog may turn into–me just rambling on as if I have just had five cups of coffee… And as I ponder that thought I have a picture of our old Husky dog who, if he would ever escape the backyard would just wonder off in a happy daze for days—tongue hanging out sideways, tail wagging incessantly, as he pretended to pull an imaginary sled over the tundra like his ancestors —that dog was never as happy as when taking a 45km walk…I feel for me writing whatever I want in a blog may be the same tongue hanging out exercise) But having said all of that, getting to write something fresh, something new, things that I feel God is either just speaking to me about, or things I am working through in my own spirit…that sounds quite fascinating. So like my old Husky dog, maybe it is time to jump the fence, stick out my tongue, and just see where my feet (or in this case my keyboard) may take me.  I have a feeling I will probably begin with writing about what I am pondering about, and then work on a dream, as they do tend to just show up without any given notice, and hopefully anyone wanting to follow along as I meander my own inner tundra with questions or dreams can just jump on the dog sled of bloggity blog and we can go off on this journey together!

In the Beginning

What I am inserting right here is actually not the beginning, more like the ending of the next section…what I mean by that is I wrote what is forthcoming first…(the wandering dog phenomena is already occurring I see).  The reason I am inserting this little clip right here is that what is below is really about personal development. Whether you realize it or not we all experience God ordained seasons in our lives—and in those seasons we are to learn different things, and that being the case we need to learn how to respond to what God is doing in the right way. For example John 15 tells us there are seasons of fruit-bearing and seasons of pruning…try bearing fruit when you are being pruned, or try to prune while the fruit is still on the branches—both will have devastating results. Therefore to know how to walk with God requires a true inner knowledge of what God is not only doing through us, but in us. And it is these very things this blog will traverse—but being a blog it will probably very much traverse what season I am in, things I have learned walking the journey  with Jesus, and trying to build context around that. That brings us to the first blog below. I am going to begin to build some context for all of you reading this blog to understand season and journey—for that to happen the first thing you will need to know is how to read the roadmap of your own life journey with Jesus, and for that to happen you will need an understanding of “Impactful Events.”

The Power of an Impactful Event

He we are, blog #1. What an auspicious occasion. I think this calls for a celebration—finally something is happening—a new beginning!  And that brings me to my topic today, “journeys,” (which in actuality will probably be our topic for years—I’m just introducing it in a sneaky way).

Walking with Jesus is a journey, if any of you have not read “Pilgrim’s Progress,” or “Hind’s Feet On High Places” I would really suggest you find a little time over your summer break to read them. (both Christian classics that I bet you can find online for free — http://www.ccel.org/index/title/A).  “Why?” you may ask. (at least you better be asking that or this blog is failing badly!)  Christianity, in the early days, was known as, “the way,” in fact even Paul compared following Jesus to running a race, (1 Cor 9:24). Following Jesus is a journey, a journey which changes you. Here is how some of the early church writer’s thought on Christianity:

“There is no arrival unless there is a plan to go.”
St. Cassian (360-445 A.D.)

“The Creator is always the same, but those who are created must pass from a beginning and through a middle course, a growth, and a progression. And it is for this increase and progress that God has formed them.”
Bishop Irenaeus (130-202 A.D.)

“On earth we are wayfarers always on the go, this means that we have to keep on moving forward. Therefore be always unhappy about where you are if you want to reach what you are not. If you are pleased with what you are, you have stopped already. If you say, “It is enough,” you are lost. Keep on walking, moving forward trying for the goal. Don’t try to stop on the way or to go back, or to deviate from it.”
St. Augustine (354-430 A.D.)

(St. Augustine’s quote may come off as a bit of a downer so let’s throw one more in here.)

“It’s a dangerous business Frodo, going out your door, You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
Gandalf

All these quotes (except for maybe Gandalf’s but really, can we leave him out?) sum up the thinking of the gospel writer’s. Take for instance:

“…and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.” (Hebrews 12:2a)

“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize.” (1 Cor 9:24)

“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” (2 Cor 3:18)

(the word “transformed” in the above passage is the Greek word “metamorphoo,” we use this word in the form of “metamorphosis” when describing the journey a caterpillar makes in changing into a butterfly).

To sum up all of the above into a pre-morning coffee sentence: Walking with Jesus on the journey of life is going to change you—get ready for it.

How do we get ready for it? We learn to read the road-markers along the way of our own journey of life. And that brings us back to what I wanted to actually write about (remember my opening commentary about this blog—yes, you have just experienced the wandering dog). As we journey with Jesus, He has plans to author our faith and perfect it, Jesus has plans to change us into His image. (The old saying is “Jesus loves us exactly as we are, but He loves us too much to leave us as we are”). In this regard let me see if I can help you learn to read your roadmap of “the way” by helping pick out some of the road-markers on your journey with Jesus.

Impactful Events

When God speaks His word over our lives, change happens, we begin the journey of moving from caterpillar to butterfly—but again, that is another metaphor in regards to our inner journey of personal change. This journey begins when God releases His word over our lives from Heaven—this release of His spoken word over our lives is a road-marker, and we can discover this road-marker as it comes as a personal “Impactful Event:”

“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.  As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” – Isaiah 55:9-11

When God speaks-stuff happens. But it is progressive, like a journey. The verse in Isaiah above says the effects of God’s word are like the effects of water on the earth—things change over time. As water causes a seed of wheat to bud and flourish so does God words spoken over our lives—we begin to “grow -up” in God. This is followed by the next stage in the plant’s developmental journey–to produce seeds which are sown to grow even more wheat—in other words– to reproduce. And we too, on our developmental journey, because of what God has spoken over our lives, want to share what we have learned and “give it away”—we naturally want to reproduce.

The final stage of the flourishing wheat plant is to take that seed and make it into bread—to develop the seed to it’s full potential.   This is exactly the process that occurs in us and through us as the word-seed of God takes effect upon our lives and belief systems. This may show up with us maturing into spiritual mothers or fathers for example, we have walked to the full extent of what was imparted by the touch of God’s word upon our lives.

Let’s try to break this process down a little slower. When God speaks His word over our lives, “stuff happens,” we are impacted by His nature and ways and we begin to change into His image (2 Cor 3:17). We can discover where God has spoken His word over our lives by looking at an “Impactful Event” with God that we have experienced—this dropping of His word-seed inside of us.

Think of an “Impactful event” that God has touched you with, this could be: hearing His voice for the first time, Learning God was a good Father, discovering healing, salvation, forgiveness, dreams, healing of memories and the heart, God’s manifest presence in modern worship, a hunger to understand scripture, loving the lost, learning to be still, etc… When God introduces us to His ways He drops a seed into our hearts and that word-seed begins to grow God’s life inside of us, which will take us through all of the above stages of the journey of the growing seed: as the years go by, first we bud and flourish—we just enjoy this new found freedom in hearing God’s voice, in healing, His presence in worship, etc…new life is growing in us!  But that is not all, as we live in this new belief system we begin to learn and mature, we begin to understand God’s ways in what He has imparted to us—and we begin to produce seeds!  The DNA of the Lord (being changed into His image 2 cor 3:18) has impacted us to a point we want to be around others who have been touched by God in the same way, and we want others to experience God the way we have too! We want to give the seeds of life God has produced in us away. But this will not be the end of the journey, as the years go by, maybe many years of walking with God in this area of life He spoke His word into our lives (again that could be: Getting to know Him as Father, being sensitive to His manifest presence, walking in the spiritual gifts, hungering to understand scripture, loving on people, etc…) there comes a time we are not just sharing seed, we have learned to walk in the ways of God in this area of life—we have learned how to worship, we have learned how to pray for people, we have learned how to understand our spiritual sensitivity, we have learned about how the Father’s heart is moved in certain situations, etc.—and we now know how to help others through the same process, or we walk in a depth of maturity in these abilities we could not have realized when we first started the journey– we understand how to function in this heavenly ability enough to help others navigate the same path—we have become spiritual mothers and fathers in the area of life we have allowed the Lord to touch us in by the initial “Impactful Event” of His word upon our lives. (and you may not be there yet…but not to worry, you are not the “author and perfecter” (Hebrews 12) of your faith, Jesus is—it is His job to bring you to maturity, your job is to just grow (John 15).

This blog is getting a little bit long for today, but I want to leave you with some thoughts. I want you to think about some “Impactful Events” that God has impacted you with. Finding the Impactful event will be finding a road-marker on your journey along the road of life, but there is more!  As you can tell from our breakdown of Isaiah 55:9-11 an impactful event is just the beginning of the journey—it’s just a sign along the road of life pointing to where you are going.  Let’s see if we can learn to observe these road-markers of how our inner journeys are developing. Let’s see if we can discover where is the Lord taking you, what He is developing in you.

An impactful event given by God produces in us faith for a spiritual principle that God holds dear, which in turn establishes a core value that we will live out of for the rest of our lives, which if we understand this process that God is working in us helps us form our personal goals and vision for our life message as we journey with Jesus.

So the process of the seed forming into a plant inside of us goes like this:

Impactful Event
Spiritual Principle
Core Value
Life Message

These above steps begin to unfold inside of us as we journey with Jesus through this life with what He has imparted inside of us by His word-seed. In the next blog we will break down “Spiritual Principle, Core Value, and Life Message.” In other words we want to discover what this seed of God has been doing inside of us, and how it has moved us along our road of life…But for now I want you to take some time and ponder four life changing Impactful Events that occurred in your life—they could be recent, they could be from when you were a child… Any area of life is good, but I am mainly thinking here of your connection to God. How did you discover God was good, healed, spoke, loved the broken, used scripture to speak into your life, worship, wanted you to know Him more, etc… what do you believe about God that is unshakable? That will have come from a word spoken from heaven, a seed dropped into by your Father, to propel you along your road of life—that seed is a road-marker for you on your journey—and by discovering that seed we can figure out what God has been growing in your life, where you are going on your journey with Jesus, and what your life message is.

How do you find these impactful events? Sometimes we can look back over our lives and see forks in the road—where did you keep pursuing God where some friends of yours or people you knew didn’t? Why did you keep going forward? That is evidence of the effects of the seed of the word of God in you—it may have come in a moment of just “knowing in your knower” what to do—but your friends maybe didn’t “get it”– why did you keep going? What was propelling you inside? It will be an Impactful Event, a spoken word of God over your life that is real enough to you to that you may have had to change friends, churches, etc…

You could possibly find the Impactful Event in this way as well: Do you have a hunger for more of God? New music, to understand scripture, attending conferences others don’t, etc…that is a sign of a seed working in you. When did that hunger start? Where were you, what were you doing, what occurred?

You can find an Impactful Event as well by looking at where you are willing to make sacrifices for the Lord by putting time into church, meetings, ministry, etc… because there is a passion inside of you. (for worship, youth, kids, etc…) Where did that passion come from? An impactful event. Go back and ponder where these started and you will find a place the Lord dropped the seed of His word into your life and your new journey down your road of life with Jesus began.

If some of you would like to share your impactful events on this blog for others to read that would be great—we will try and figure out how to post some of them.  As well questions are welcome.