Since this
is being written on a Monday, that’s a dumb question. It was a great weekend.
Lots of quality time with my wife. A sense of accomplishment in associational
church work. Great time of worship and Bible study at one of my churches. An
endearing evening with my younger son and daughter-in-law. Even Monday started
out full of joy with my favorite group of senior adults in Bible study.
Then I got
unpumped!
Why does God
allow Mondays to do this? Now I could launch into the month’s greatest pity
party and feel justified. That’s always easy when you feel you’ve been wronged,
unappreciated, or not allowed the freedom to do what you want. After all it was
God’s will!
What would
happen if I decided to get repumped but not at someone else’s expense? What if
I focused just on what I knew would be best in the long run for others all in
the effort to be more Christlike? His nature and mindset would be both guide
and judge instead of me choosing some other hard core sinner like me to try to
outdo. (Philippians 2:3-11)
If Jesus is
to be my source and example for getting repumped, then I need to imitate his
attitude toward other people. To say that’s not easy is to make the
understatement of the year. He was born innocent and free of all sin AND sinful
tendencies. I was born a sinner and that stuff just comes naturally. Even to
become a follower of Christ took an intentional decision and wasn’t just something
everybody automatically did.
Jesus was in
tune with his heavenly Father. He checked in regularly to know what the Father
was doing and wanted him to do. His prayers were prayers of submission and
intercession. (John 17) His prayers and with them his life reflected the
relationship he had with his Father. If I am to be revitalized through an
imitation of Jesus, my prayers must be offered in the same light.
Getting
repumped means getting into the manual. With all the self-help books on the
shelves, there remains only one true manual for life, the Bible. To get
repumped is to know the written word. To get repumped is to get the written
word into the head and into the heart. (Psalms 119:11) Transformation! Too many
Bible scholars know the Book but live like the devil. Getting yourself repumped
doesn’t work that way.
Serving
others gets you repumped. It’s hard to focus on your own problems when you’re
giving your best to help someone else deal with their headaches. That may be part
of what the Apostle Paul meant when he said we should bear each other’s loads.
(Galatians 6:1-3) Serving others makes our path in life a little, maybe a lot,
easier to tolerate. Hardly anything gets you repumped like seeing someone else
with a big smile on their face realizing it’s not the end of the world after
all.
Love others
like God loves me. I can’t. Not that I don’t want to love others like God loves
me; it’s just impossible for this sinful mortal to do the divine! I can,
however, make the effort. It makes you feel good, pumped up, closer to Christ,
when you realize you are accepting those other individuals with all their
sores, rough spots, social stigmas, and rejectable ways for one reason. Jesus
loved you and you look just like that other person. If he can love you, then
you can make the effort to love others in your same condition. (John 13:34-35)
The Church
had better act the same way! The world is watching the Church, its image and
its actions. The Church needs to get pumped, not because it’s looking so good
in the eyes of the world, but because it’s walking up a path to a hilltop that
Jesus has already traveled.
At the top
of that hill is a cross. It’s got our name on it. Beyond that are an empty tomb
and an eternity in the presence of our Father. If that doesn’t get you pumped,
NOTHING WILL!
