Furious Love Is Over - What Do We Do Now?



Worshiping at Furious Love

 Our "Furious Love Event" is over. I am physically tired, and began to get a sore throat yesterday. I slept ten hours last night! But spiritually I am doing very well.

So what am I going to do this week? What should we do? If you were at FL and don't know what to do now you weren't listening. Here's how I see it.

• Be Jesus-dependent, not conference-dependent. What you need is Jesus, not another conference. Of course God can come into a conference and reveal himself to us, like he did at Furious Love. But God can do the same, even more, with just you. It's just You and me here now, only You and me here now... (Did you notice how a few of the FL speakers spoke about "conferences," especially Heidi Baker?)
• Abide in Christ, now, like a branch connected to the True Vine. The sustenance of Jesus is yours, now. Remember how Phillip Mantofa visually demonstrated this for us on Saturday evening. To take many "quiet times" with the Lord, daily, for all the rest of the days of your life. That is, for me, the deep well out of which I drink from. DO THIS! Do not try to "make something happen." No striving, please.
• Saturate yourself in the Scriptures. We all know this. Few Christians do it. So, God sent Phillip Mantofa to bring us back to this. I already know of some Redeemer people who are in Genesis today, reading through the entire Bible. I invite others to swim around with me in 1 Corinthians, which Josh and I will be preaching out of for the next 25 weeks.
• Listen to God. Out of the abiding, Scripture-saturated heart comes direction and vision. Expect God to talk to you and be with you as you Abide + Saturate.
• Be obedient to God. Don't go off to a bunch of meetings and try to invent some "programs" that will keep the fire burning. You don't need another program. You need a relationship. With Christ. He is in you, the hope of glory. Remember all the many stories we heard at Furious Love? Stories of unknown people who sought after God and heard from God and were led to do great things from very small, even bleak, beginnings. This can be you. Why not? Remember - you're not to do anything to try to be "great" or be "somebody." Remember that God's idea of "great" is not the dark kingdom's idea of "great."
• Get in a small group. Tomorrow night Linda and I go to our Home Group get-together at Val & John Fowler's home. We'll do some FL-afterglow! We'll read and talk about the 1 Corinthians verses I'll preach on this coming Sunday. The fire inside me will burn...
• Don't try to get others to share your inner fire. Just tend the fire within you by ABIDING + SATURATING.

When Darren Wilson heard from God that he was to make a movie and call it "Finger of God"  a couple of things happened (as I remember it). Darren shared this with us. He had no money! Yet he was certain God called him to do this. We at Redeemer felt so too. So we took an offering one Sunday morning and a couple thousand dollars came in. Not exactly big-budget movie stuff! But Darren went forward. To all our amazement, look what God has done!

To summarize, now that this great God-event is over...

1. Be Jesus-dependent
2. Abide in Christ
3. Read the Word lots
4. Listen for the voice of God
5. Obey
6. Get in a Home Group
7. Tend the fire within you