Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Would You Do Anything for God?

So, I have just finished an incredibly good book.  It's right up there with A.W. Tozer's Pursuit of God, David Platt's Radical and Francis Chan's Crazy Love.  The book is Anything by Jennie Allen.  I'm getting ready to read it again and no doubt again and again and again.  Yes, it is that good. 

I wanted to share my favorite quotes but there are just too many so I will share just a couple in hopes you will not only get the book for yourself (Go to Lovely Branches  Book Recommendation page to find out how to get your copy) but that you will also get so pumped you will want to do the Jennie Allen Stuck study we are getting ready to start at the end of August at the Taste & See Coffee House. 

Here you go:

From this point on things are changing.  I am living for the moment when I will face You.  I want to get to heaven out of breath, having willingly done anything that you - the God of the universe asks... anything.

In one act God did what no amount of effort on our part could do.

It is too easy in this country for blessings to become rights, for stuff and money to become what calls the shots in our lives. And before we know it, God's gifts have replaced God Himself.

Why had I loved people more than Him? Why had I sat on every gift he had given me to make Him known? Because I cared more about being judged by everyone else but Him?

I knew if God wanted me to do something more, I would need to wait on Him to pull it off. I did not want to create something and then wonder if it had been me or God. I would obey as He revealed the next step, and, in the meantime, live as faithfully as I could through the typical stuff.

God was writing a story for my life that I never would have written.

God was in all of this... all of the chaos He was initiating in beautiful ways.

Yeah, yeah... I know that was more than just a couple quotes.  You say you want more? Okay here's just a few more:

Those of us who know Christ, we live for a different reality.  We live for things we can't see and make decisions based on that different reality.  Our reality is a cross, a heaven and a God who sees us and gives us His Spirit so we can do something while we are here. And that's not building a cute easy life for ourselves where the pros outweigh the cons.  We build for Him.

Now that I have tasted being all in, I don't want medium. We weren't made for medium.

Abandonment only makes sense if there is a God worthy of abandoning everything for.

It is this Anything book which is the foundation for Jennie Allen's Stuck Bible Study.  We are beyond excited to get started on this incredible journey. Hope you join us at Taste & See Coffee House for what might be our most breath taking study to date: Stuck by Jennie Allen