Project Change Weekly Messages

WM6 Spiritual Growth February 11, 2017

Club Members:
Hissince2013
Jesus_Freaks_Unite
CupCakeQueen11
LiaDanielle
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apostolic_girl_7603
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Astrither
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Tests That Matter

What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith
without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.
James 2:14‭-‬18 KJV

Senioritis- "noun. A crippling disease that strikes high school seniors. Symptoms include laziness, an over-excessive wearing of track pants, old athletic shirts, sweatpants, athletic shorts, and sweatshirts. Also features a lack of studying, repeated absences, and a generally dismissive attitude. The only known cure is a phenomenon known as Graduation."
-Urban Dictionary

I have a problem. I hate school. I mean, I hate it even more than you do.
Probably.

Whenever we have an assignment, I'm the worst at doing it. I'm not too lazy to do my classwork.. most of the time. Well.. some of the time. But whenever there's a project? Whenever there's homework? I don't ever want to do it. You could give me thirty years to do the assignment, past remind me every single day, and I might not find the motivation to start until the day before. Just to show you how bad I am, I have 3 different projects and a book report to do right now that were due last week. And this is me putting forth an effort. Before I just smiled and waved goodbye as opportunities to get decent grades sailed past, far, far away.

Needless to say, this makes my life a little more difficult. It's not that I don't know how to do my work; I just... don't ever get to it. It might be in part because the teachers in my school are so disillusioned that they've practically given up on us, so due dates aren't that concrete of a thing.. until now, of course.

Anyways, I'm not exactly a role model academically. I'm trying to get better about that, but the effects of my malignant Senioritis are finally catching up to me, as I now have way too much to do, and not enough time to do it. So... As a warning to my younger readers... Don't ever catch Senioritis. No matter how easy school seems, don't lose the work ethic, don't lose that competitive spark that drives you to get an A, or even to do your work on time. It's a lot harder to find it again.

There seems to be a spiritual version of Senioritis. There's a lot of things spiritually that we know how to do, and don't do it. And sometimes we treat God like a disillusioned teacher that shouldn't expect to get anything from us, in the same way, that my math teacher is not getting my Pg. 138 problems that were due on Tuesday.

But what does that mean? What homework did God assign?

What I mean by that is that we all can easily get distracted by stupid things and get a big fat "F" in our Christian lives. We forget to study His Word and we forget to do His work. While millions around us are dying lonely and unknowledgeable about God's love, we fail to notice because we didn't take God teaching us seriously. And then we're like, "Why haven't we had an opportunity to do something good? I haven't told anyone about Jesus or helped anyone in forever."

The central idea of the weekly mission I put at the end is to show how changing our lives, changing our attitudes, and changing where our desires are can help us to change the world. But the missions are useless, completely useless if you don't act them out. There's no point in reading my sermons if you don't act them out, they don't make you a better person just by reading them! I'm not hilarious or witty or clever or half as entertaining as whatever's on Netflix right now, so I assume that if you're reading this, you're probably interested in Jesus Christ and how to live for Him.

But we cannot live for Jesus Christ without a sacrifice of time. Maybe a sacrifice of a hobby or some amount of time spent on it. Maybe we have to call off some things at work and events and with our friends in order to have some real time with God, some real time to study.

If the test really matters, you can't pass without studying. I pass "quizzes" with my eyes closed. Multiple choices? I don't have to know the subject if I can figure out what words fit together. But the serious tests? I flunk comically unless I start putting the words in the book into my mind.

If there's a "quiz" in the spiritual world, I haven't found it. The Bible never once says "quiz", that I know of at least. But there are "tests" in the Bible, and in our spiritual lives. Our lives are just a complex system of choices, a series of surprise exams and unexpected tests.

*The test of how to survive when things turn rough, and how you're going to either grow or die spiritually.

*The test of your character, faith, and love for God when temptation, greed, lust, fear, slithers into your mind and tries to lead you down the wrong path.

*The test of the amount of love you have when you decide whether to remain comfortable and live obliviously or go out and reach to others and change the world for the better, even though it can ( by can I mean will) be painful.

And you aren't gonna pass these tests without studying. You have a lot of study tools available if you take the opportunity to use them. Here are some studying tips.

*You always have to study before a test. You can go over your Holy Textbook, The Bible, with the Teacher Jesus Christ.

*You can have discussions with your Teacher, you can ask Him questions and let Him tutor and strengthen you and let Him relieve your test anxiety in one-on-one tutoring in your own house if you just ask.

*You can memorize the facts and answers. You can surround yourself with music and movies and entertainment that reminds you of the right things instead of clogging your mind with wrong answers.

And if you study, if you fill your head and your heart with righteousness, faith, and love from the Teacher, you will ace every test, every struggle. You will forget some answers sometimes, but you will persevere. You will have trials, but you will endure and win over them.

And when you study and pass the tests, you can help someone else who's struggling to understand. You can guide them to see what the right answers are. You can invite them to tutor with the Teacher. You can lead them to get help from the Testmaker.

Don't get lazy and try your luck. These aren't quizzes that won't last into the future.

These are tests that matter.

Your Mission:
I just stated your mission, didn't I? Resist the natural desire to slack off. Study. And by study, I mean pray. Fast. Read the Bible. Move your busy schedule around to get some real time that you can put all in.
And if you study, you will become smarter, wiser, stronger, and you will become closer to Jesus, that He can use you to teach others.
And then.. you already know what I'm going to say.. then you can change the world.