Boot Camp for Wannabe Christians
Too late! You already walked in the door. You’re here, and there’ll be no pampering. Listen! You may have skimmed over other chapters to see if they’d agree with your thinking. You may have read some of the scripture quotes, but have you even bothered to open up a Bible and check it out for yourself?
Get with it! If you want to do something useful, you’ll need the right tools. And here’s one of the main tools you’ll need: a brand-new translation of the Bible! Yeah! You’ve got an old Bible tucked away somewhere. Haul it out so that you’ll be able to compare it with one of the new ones you’re going to buy.
Don’t be so cheap! You think nothing of spending $20 to $50 just to eat out at a restaurant somewhere. So use that money to buy a nice Study Bible that uses a modern translation, such as the New Living Translation (NLT) or the Amplified Bible. Better yet, get both of them! You pay a fortune for textbooks when you go to college. Loosen up and get the right tools!
If you’ve already depleted your savings to buy a computer and pay for Internet access, you already have more than 30 English language translations of the Bible at your fingertips without spending another cent! Aren’t you glad you came here?
Take a lesson from competitive athletes. They spend hours daily in exhausting exercises to keep in shape. Stop whining and revamp your schedule! You can dedicate ten percent of your daytime hours to “exercise” your mind on Christian living. And I don’t mean just sitting and reading the Bible for 1.6 hours each day. You’ve probably already tried that. You started with Genesis, which you may have found quite interesting, then Exodus. Leviticus got a little tedious, and in Numbers you gave up completely. Welcome to the club! Millions have tried that over and over.
Listen up! I’ve got an assignment for you. Take your NLT and read the entire Gospel of St. John, all 21 chapters at one sitting. It doesn’t take that long. If you overstep your 1.6 hours, so what? Isn’t Christ worth it?
But, don’t just read it. Read it looking for something. Here’s what to look for: Anything that defines Jesus or says Who He is! And mark it down. If you’re using that new Bible you just bought, underline every verse that defines or describes Jesus ... every one of them. After you’ve finished the whole book, then go back and just read what you’ve underlined. You’re bound to learn something!
If you’re a cheapskate like I am, using the Internet to read the Bible, jot down chapter and verse each time you find a definition or description of Jesus. Then go back and read just those verses again.
You weren’t bored silly reading the Bible with a purpose this time, were you? And you learned something very valuable. You learned more about Jesus than you thought you knew before. And you learned that reading the Bible is not a chore.
Next time you read the Gospel of John, you’ll already know about its main character. Then you can concentrate on what He’s saying to you! One more exercise and you’ve completed Boot Camp. Watch what you think! You are what you think! If your imagination is full of garbage, your life will be the same. “Garbage in, garbage out” applies not only to computers but to your mind as well.
We spoke earlier of how hard athletes train. Their rigorous activities require lots of good food. You, as a Christian are a spiritual being, and your mind needs to weed out the bad input and go for the good input, the Word of God. That is exactly how you feed your spirit.
You can imagine how an athlete would perform during a competition if he went without eating three or four days prior to his competition. You, as a Christian, are constantly being tested. Therefore you’ll need lots of the best food for your mind: God’s Word. If you mix that “good intake” with “garbage”, then you won’t be able to perform adequately.
So work constantly on renewing your mind with the Word of God, and filtering out all garbage. Don’t allow your mind to spend time on questionable thoughts. You can control your thoughts, and the more you work at it, the more success you’ll achieve.
Depend on the Lord. Pray without ceasing. You’re probably in the habit of saying “Amen” when you pray privately. The word “amen” is too often used to indicate a cessation of talking with God. God is your constant companion so you don’t need to indicate that you’re temporarily done talking to Him. Treat Him like He’s there with you, because He is always there with you.
Follow that advice and consider yourself a Boot Camp graduate. Congratulations!
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