This is for Them
Jake is a climber… and I'm pretty sure was born without the ability to fear.
You can already imagine my life.
Jake, get off the counter
*jumps onto couch
Jake, get off the top bunk
*jumps onto ground
Jake, get off the dresser
*jumps onto carpet
And then this… today I walk out to this…
Jacob: Help (Not screaming, mind you. Just said in a very casual yet loud voice)
Then there’s me… frantic: Jake how did you get ON TOP OF THE FENCE????
Silly question as I see the remnants of a pile of dirt, a chair, and a pallet all toppled over. Not to mention he is dangling there and I look like mom of the year to the neighbors with the second story views into my yard as I hadn’t noticed any of the commotion building up to this point.
And then Jacob calmly responds: I climbed
I CLIMBED.
This child is fearless. With or without my help this kid is going places. And whether I notice it or not, this is the very reason I am still living.
Because I am not here for me, I am here for them.
Paul from a prison cell writes to the believers in Philippi a sobering letter found in the book of Philippians. To summarize his message for them, he begins by writing that he’d be better off dead. I’m serious. He says in 1:21 “to die is GAIN.” He had Christ in his heart and heaven to gain so what was preventing him from just rolling over right there in his prison cell to die? It would have been the best thing for him. He had been beaten and chained, mocked and misunderstood. He had his motives questioned, and his friends leave him. He had been drug so low that his body wanted nothing more than death and to be with his Jesus, but he remained. He remained for them.
…for Timothy, his friend and teenage boy whom he had mentored.
…for the Corinthians and Philippians and Galatians who were struggling in their new-found faith.
…for the prisoners with him in the prison that would come to their own faith in God.
…for the believers that were among him- and the many that would come after for centuries to come.
He remained for them.
“But it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body” (Philippians 1:24) he says, “for your progress and joy in the faith” (1:25).
There comes a point in life where you realize that you aren’t here for you anymore. Faith and Christ and heaven are yours, and what’s left of our journeys are to honor and follow Christ for those around us and for those who will go after us.
So let the offenses and hurts come. Let the finances crumble and friendships fade. Let the prayers go unanswered and our health deteriorate. Let my words be misunderstood and my motives questioned. Let whatever life has to throw be thrown, and let me still stand at the end of the day even if bruised and broken and bleeding. But let me stand, nonetheless, with the boldness only one secure in Christ can muster.
Because fighting to keep my heart right and my actions pure is worth my little boy having something firm and solid to stand on.
He is going to go places, and climb great heights with or without me. But everything this world has to offer is nothing but shifting sand. Like his dirt hill holding up the chair with a pallet on top- it will fail him. If he is to climb, let it be on the top of my bloodied shoulders that fought to be Christ-like in every conversation and situation, no matter how hard it hurt. No matter how much I wanted some days to just lie down and give up on this endless pursuit.
I haven’t given him much to stand on if I am found wallowing in self-pity for what has happened to me at the end of the day.
So let Christ be strong in my weakness and give strength to my failing knees. Because like Paul I want to say “that through my being with you again, your boasting in Christ Jesus will abound on account of me” (1:26).
My life is not for me. It is for those He has given me and for the many who will come after me. My life’s pursuit is for the girls a hundred years from now to have something to stand on. If I must bear the battle for them to live in the victory, then I will gladly face each day with whatever our enemy has to meet me with. Let the giants assemble and the storms stir, I will be ready. If they take the whole world but leave me Jesus, it will be more than enough.
So, do your worst Satan. In the end, we still win.
Hold tight sweet girls with one hand in His and the other clutching tightly the sword of truth and fight on with your battles for righteousness and justice. Like Haley said last week... fight on!!!
This is not for us. This is for them.
Philippians 1:21-26 "For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ,which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith, so that through my being with you again your boasting in Christ Jesus will abound on account of me."
