This past week I attended Passion 2013. It's essentially a huge conference for 18-25 year olds to come together as the body of Christ and be encouraged, challenged and taught.
We learned about how God can do immeasurably more than we could ever ask or imagine and about the importance of community because God IS community (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) . We also learned about having extravagant compassion and sacrificial courage, moral clarity and tenacious hope- all blessings that the Lord bestows upon us. We learned about how making disciples takes great courage, yet also brings great joy because that is what the Lord has designed and called us to do. We learned how our actions don't change God's character and that man's awe is to reflect the image of God. We learned that JESUS is the always the best definition of hope, grace, love, faithfulness and mercy. We learned that we need the spirit of God anointing us to go and fight and preach his name because our own enthusiasm will definitely get us places, but it won't change the world. We learned that above going to church and trying to be a great person, the biggest thing is that we were once dead, but now, now we are ALIVE.
Ezekiel 37.
Enough about us. We also spent time learning and reflecting on the astonishing truth that there are currently around 27 MILLION slaves in the world. More than any other time in history. I can't quite wrap my brain around this idea because that is a very large number and when it comes down to it, I'm just plain scared. The word "slavery" is also hard to put into perspective because my mind skips back to U.S. History class when we were taught about pre-Civil War days and how slaves were brought across the Atlantic to work mostly on plantations in the South. But slavery simply is the idea of people being forced to work without pay. Slavery today exists all over the world (United States included) in factories, brothels and businesses. Human trafficking and labor trafficking.
So what do we do?
1. Rest in the truths that the bible gives us.
"The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective" (James 5:16)
There will be a day when "never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away ever tear from their eyes." (Revelation 7:16-17)
2. Rise UP.
enditmovement.com
Upon entering the Georgia Dome with sixty THOUSAND fellow college students, I couldn't help but feel completely overwhelmed. A million questions ran through my mind....How do I make this personal, just me and Jesus if I'm here with sixty THOUSAND other people?.....What if I trip and fall from the nose bleed section and never live again? The flashing lights were extremely intimidating and all I could do was close my eyes and try to remain calm. Then, as I did that, a peace started to wash over me and I began thinking more rationally. As I did that, some images came to my head such as this might be a little of what heaven will look like (except maybe without all the lights). When I imagine what heaven will look like I see all of Christ's followers worshipping him radically, like there is literally nothing else more important. As the days went on, I just focused on how it seemed like we were just having one big party for Jesus. Celebrating his life. Celebrating the fact that he died on the cross for us. Celebrating our lives because we get to live them for one sole purpose: glorifying the King. And THAT was thrilling.
