The Present Kingdom

Just got to talk to a friend from school tonight, whooo it was awesome. I haven't gotten to talk to a lot of my friends down in Austin this summer because everyone is working a freaking camp somewhere!! Haha, it's all good though, I still love them all and miss them like crazy. But it just made my night for 10 minutes to get a glimpse into what the Lord is doing in my friend's life, and share a little bit about what he's doing in mine. Man, it freakin pumps me up :). Last week I kind of went through this thing where I got a little scared to go back to school, like I'd go back and fail or something. That's probably always been one of my biggest fears, that'd I'll fail at something big, not that it's important to me but that it's important to the people I love. I think we all harbor a little bit of that fear, we put so much emphasis on how other people view us and that attributes to our success. How screwed up is that? Yet it's so hard to get away from. The Lord has really stripped me of that feeling within the past year and particularly this summer. I'll always be "successful" as long as I'm living for him, even when I "screw" up. That's just it, there's no such thing as a "successful" life, just a FULL life. That's what I want. I don't really care about what job I'm going to have (as long as I don't sit in an office), or where I live, or what car I drive, working for all those things means just that, you're going to always be working for/looking for something better. I finished Velvet Elvis last week and this week I started Rob Bell's new book Sex God (easy there), it's about relating spirituality to sexuality. Intriguing, yes, go out and buy it, really makes you think of your surroundings on a completely spiritual level. Rob Bell really tries to emphasize the whole "Kingdom of God is among you" idea, which is really more of a truth than an idea. That's just it, you can't escape the truth of that. We're in one of God's kingdoms right now, and how are we treating it? Are we just ready to move to the next one? Are we really living for this one NOW? We all fall short of that, I know I do. But I've been thinking a lot about how we step into that Kingdom now, breath it, eat it, sleep it, live it. Whooo! It gives me chills to think of the immense power we have within Jesus Christ. I mean seriously, we can rock the socks off this world right now! I'll catch myself lately just wanting to quit school and go move someplace crazy like Africa or Indonesia. Just engulf myself in other cultures and soak up their love of life, see what Christ's passion looks like half-way accross the globe. Maybe I'll just be a little nomad for the rest of my life, man my dad would love that one! Then I say to myself, wait a second, that "Kingdom" is right here too, even in little old Keller, Texas. So for now I'll fight the urge to jump on a plane and never come back :) (even though I am getting on that plane sometime soon). I don't want to always be waiting for the "next" thing in my life, Lord let me just soak up what you've put in my life now!! Don't let me waste time worrying about the next moment, but let me cherish and glorify you in the present!