To Save a Life: Week 5 Message

How to Save a Life

Over the last month we have been talking a lot about the different aspects of the movie, To Save a Life. And, we have discussed how we can apply those concepts to our lives. We have learned about God’s love for us. We’ve talked about the value of people. We learned the importance of not being lukewarm when it comes to our walk as Christ followers. And we’ve found out who we really are because of what God did for us and how we can help re-write peoples’ lives.

This week we are going to put it all together. I want to talk about how to save a life. It seems like a pretty big deal, and it is, but doing it, I think, is easier than you might imagine.

When I think of savings someone’s life, I immediately picture a paramedic or a doctor. I see someone who has had years of training; someone who possesses mass amounts of knowledge about the human body and how it works. They know how different drugs and antibiotics affect the body. They know how to stop bleeding. They can perform surgery, do heart transplants, and revive people. All of this makes my head hurt. I am in awe of their abilities.

At the same time, it’s kind of funny. We can look in any of the gospels and find instances of Jesus saving people from death, or even bringing them back to life with nothing more than a touch or a word. In one case a woman just touched the tail end of his robe and she was healed from a horrific disease.

But we are neither doctors nor Jesus. So how do we go about the business of saving lives?

The short answer is…we don’t.

Thanks for coming…have a great night!

It’s pretty simple. We cannot save peoples’ lives. To think that we can is to think that we can play God. We do not get to decide who lives and who dies. We do not get to determine the course of the future. In fact, the only way to have life is to have a relationship with God. Without Him, we are all dead. What we can do though, if we are willing, is to be a tool for God.

God gave us each different talents and spiritual gifts so that He can use us to save other people. We are his toolbox. He gave some people the ability to heal. Other people have the ability to teach. Still others are good with words. Some prophecy or preach. Others can perform miracles or speak in tongues. The list goes on and on. And, in each of these cases, God works through us, using those gifts to accomplish His will.

Looking at the movie, let’s think about what Jake’s gifts are. He is an athlete. Being athletic put him in the spotlight and gave him a platform from which to speak. Sound familiar (I.e. Tim Tebow or Ben Henderson)? He derives confidence from that position so that he could, if he chooses, speak the word of God. And let’s not forget how his athleticism got him to the police car to save Jonny. Jake also has a great sense of responsibility. He puts things on himself…which is often times good, but sometimes can backfire as can all gifts if not used for God. He feels a sense of responsibility to not let his dad down when it came to school and sports. He feels responsible for his friend’s death. He also feels that same sense of responsibility towards helping Jonny, the youth group, and his girlfriend.

As a result of his gifts, God uses him to positively affect the lives of the people around him and re-define the memory of his friend for good.

Likewise, God can use each of us to reach out to the lost and the hurting. What our gifts give us is the ability to perform small acts of love in different ways. God calls us all to do two things…the top 2 commandments,

Luke 10:27 (NLT)

‘You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.’ And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’

So how do you save a life?

The answer is love. As we are out in the world we are commanded to love others. We’ve learned how much God loves us. Now it is time to spread that love to other people by being witnesses to the risen Jesus. And, in the process, God will use us to save lives. You don’t need a medical degree. You don’t need to be able to perform miracles. All you need is the ability to love, and the willingness to give that love freely, without the expectation of repayment, praise, or thanks.

So tonight, I will leave you with the last words Jesus said before ascending into heaven:

Acts 1:8 (NLT)

…you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

To Save a Life: Week 5 Thoughts

This week we will be discussing ‘How to Save a Life.’

Everything we have discussed thus far has led to this. When I first looked at the topic, I thought, “Whoa, that’s a big deal.”

But the more I think about it, the more I realize that we cannot save lives…not even our own. Rather, God can use us to save lives. Saving someone’s life is a big deal. You are, in effect, altering the course of the future. So to think that we can actually change the course of the future, like dropping a rock in a lake and watching the ripples spread out, changing the movement of the water, is to think that we have control over that future. And we don’t.

What we can do is be a willing participant in God’s plan. Once we are willing to play, then God can take us off the sidelines and put us in the game.

If that’s the case, then to save a life is nothing more than doing God’s will. We’ve got a whole book that explains how to do that so it really isn’t that big of a deal. It’s just small acts of love…small acts of love that can make a big difference.

So I am looking forward to this week’s class, and to the weeks and months to come when God will give us the opportunity to perform small acts of love in the our schools and work places.

Please continue to pray for us all. Pray that our hearts will be open and we can be willing participants to do God’s will.

To Save a Life: Week 4 Review

Group Stats:
8 students

• 0 new
• 8 returning

We had a successful night last night discussing how we can not only re-write our own story, but how we can help other’s to re-write their story.

We started with a review of last week. We spent some time talking about the various challenges the students had for the week. Most of them participated in at least one of the challenges and they were eager to share their stories.

One of the challenges involved them sitting alone somewhere around their school. In most cases, the students did not have to wait long for someone to approach them and either, start talking to them, or straight up ask them, “Why are you sitting alone?” A few of the students even met new people through the exercise. Each student that did it got something different from the experience. It was interesting to listen to them talk about it. It was also apparent that each of the students has a good group of friends and sitting alone was not normal for them.

We also spent a few minutes reminding ourselves of the message from last week. We remembered that it is typically our lack of faith that is the reason why we are not doing more/saying more to our peers about their salvation.

I prayed for the evening and went over, briefly, what the purpose of the class was. We then jumped right into the movie clip.

In the clip, Jake’s girlfriend is sitting in her car outside the abortion clinic contemplating what to do. She is in tears. At the same time, Jake is coming to the realization that he needs to re-write his life to show his girlfriend that he loves her and that he is there for her. He is finally able to find her and tell her his plans; he is giving up his college dreams so that he can be there with her through this. By this point, she has already decided not to go through with the abortion.

Jake says to her that she has spent her whole life trying to please others. She has tried to live up to everyone else’s expectation of her.

I think this is something most of us could relate to. We believe things about ourselves based on what others tell us, or what we assume they think about us. And, we try to live up to unrealistic expectations and always fall short.

These ideas led us into the activity for the evening. Each person in the class, including myself, took a piece of paper and wrote something negative about themselves at the top of the paper. We then taped those pieces of paper up around the room. These ’loglines’ described us, as we see ourselves, based on our experience. Some examples are:

“I am not man enough”
“I am a fake”
“People take advantage of me because I am too nice”
“I put too much pressure on myself to do well in school”

…and so on

Once all the papers were up on the wall, we all walked around and re-wrote each other’s story. We turned the negative into a positive. See if you can do the same for the loglines above.

After everyone was done we sat down and talked about the exercise. We discussed what it was like to read what people wrote to us. Everyone agreed that it felt good to know that we are cared for. Likewise, we also discussed how it felt to re-write other peoples’ loglines. It gave us power. One student felt ‘wise.’ And, we all liked knowing that we were helping other people.

From the exercise we transitioned into the message for the evening which discussed how we define ourselves by false impressions given to us by the world, and how we can overcome that false thinking through God. We talked about how God’s gift of salvation has washed us clean of all of those past failures, mistakes, and sins which we have used to define ourselves.

We closed with the challenge for next week which is to think of someone whose life we can help re-write, and do it.

To Save a Life: Week 4 Message

Your Life: Rebooted

Who are you? I mean, when you look in the mirror in the morning, what do you see?

A lot of people see pain. They see weakness. They see failure. They see someone who is worthless, unwanted, and not good enough.

Why are these things the first thing we see when we look at ourselves?

I think it is because that is what other people have told us to see. Our life experience in this world tells us one thing. God, as we are learning, tells us another.

There was a woman named Margaret who sought professional help from a psychologist because she was in a deep depression. After diving into her life’s history the psychologist was able to pinpoint a moment in time when her issues began.

As a child, Margret was constantly late to school for whatever reason. In order to teach her a lesson her teacher her had her stand at the front of the class and, one by one, each student walked up to the chalk board and wrote something negative about the young girl. As you can imagine, her fellow classmates did not have her feelings in mind. They wrote all kind of wicked things about her. They wrote that she was ugly, useless, and dumb. They made fun of the way she looked, the way she smelled, the way she talked, and the way she dressed. By the end of the exercise little Margret was in tears. And every day after that she thought about all the things her classmates said about her. Day after day, month after month, year after year she repeated these things to herself. She believed they were all true. And this sent her into her depression. She was filled with sadness, anger, and resentment.

The psychologist asked her to re-live that day in her mind. He wanted her to, one more time, watch every student get up from their desk, take the chalk, and write on the board. Margret had no problem doing this, as she had done it so many times before, and so she went about the task of re-living all 25 things that those students wrote.

When she thought she was done, the psychologist reminded her of one last kid in the class. She resisted. She knew for sure that she had gone through everyone.

He told her, “No, there is one more. Do you see him? He is sitting in the back of the classroom. He is standing up now, walking to the front of the room, taking the chalk from the teacher and setting it down on the ledge of the chalkboard. Now he is picking up the eraser and erasing all those things that were written. He picks up the chalk again and writes new things…

Margret is beautiful.
Margret is loved.
Margret is strong.
Margret has great courage.”

…and on and on

The psychologist explained that the little boy was Jesus and that through Him all those bad things she thought about herself were washed away. Through Him, her life story was rebooted.

Our parents, teachers, and friends have tried to convince us that certain things about us are true. And it always seems like the mistakes we make in life validate what they said. We let our screw-ups, our failures, and our sins define who we are.

But who are we really?

We are the creation of the most almighty being in the universe. We were conceived and created by the same God that created the planets, the sun, and the stars and who set it all in perfect motion. And, He made us in His image. If He is the king of the universe and we are His creation, than that makes us princes, and princesses. And, because we choose Him…because we have accepted the gift of eternal life that He has offered us, that makes us heirs to the greatest kingdom ever! We get to spend eternity in heaven, surrounded by pure love. Does that sound like a place for losers and failures, for weaklings, and people who aren’t god enough?

Yes. We will fail. Most of you haven’t even come close to the biggest mistake/failure of your life. But that doesn’t define who you are. What our failures do is help us to put more and more of our trust in God.

Romans 5:3-4 (NLT)

We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.

This says to me that the more crap we face in our lives, the stronger our character will be. And the stronger our character is, the more confident we can be in our own salvation. When we realize that we can’t stop the crap from happening, and that we can’t fix ourselves, then we find out that we must turn to God and let Him erase our failures. In doing so, we find we can endure more of the crap the world will throw at us.

When we let go of all the bad stuff on the chalk board that is our life, and let God erase it, then we begin to understand just how much we are loved. We find out that we don’t need to seek validation from this world because we have already been validated. When we seek validation from our parents, teachers, bosses, and peers, we will be let down. They are people, like us, dealing with their own sense of self-worth. When we understand that God has already given us everything we are looking for (i.e. love, affection, worth) then we can boldly move forward in our lives, confident in ourselves, and with full knowledge that God has truly saved us.

Who are you now?

To Save a Life: Week 4 Thoughts

I’m very excited to see where this week’s lesson takes us. We have bonded as a group, people are opening up to let the group help them heal, and we are all there to not just help each other, but to reach out to the hurting, outside of the group, and offer them a better way.

This week we will continue with healing for the group. We will rewrite our stories to steer them in a positive direction.

We know that with God all things are possible. Yet, when we look at our own lives we see that they haven’t quite gone the way we had hoped or expected. And many times, when we are in he midst of our own lives; our own worries, fears, and hangups, it is hard to see the positive.

Galatians 6:2 says, “Bear one another’s burdens and thus fulfill the law of Christ.”

This week we will learn how to bear each other’s burdens and give each other an alternate perspective on each other’s lives. In the process, this will help us follow the law of Christ, to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, and mind…and to love our neighbor as ourself.

So yeah, it should be a good week.

Also, if you are reading this, and you are hurting in some way, need prayer, or just someone to listen. Please feel free to reach out to me. You can leave a comment below or email me at rvanas78 at gmail dot com.

“We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.” (Romans 5:3-4 NLT)

To Save a Life: Week 3 Review

Say Something…Do Something

Group Stats:
12 students

• 1 new
• 11 returning

We had a very good class last night. More and more students are participating in the discussion and I love to hear their point of view on these topics. And, several of the students are taking what we discuss out into the world and reaching out to their peers. All credit to God for using this time to talk to each and every student that joins us week in and week out.

We opened with a review of last week’s lesson. We were reminded of Roger’s monologue in the movie and that we are all just pennies.

I was exhausted going into class. I felt like it was difficult to focus and despite writing out the message, I still didn’t feel like I was 100% confident in covering the topic for the week. I don’t know if it was lack of preparation or had just been a long day, but part of me did not want to be there. Hmmm…who could have been behind that kind of attack??

I explained to the class how I was feeling tired and not fully with it and then we prayed for the evening. Just taking that few moments to focus on God; to invite him into our class and be a part of our journey was enough to help center me. Anyways, the more we have to rely on God, the more He can do. So, if I am exhausted and out of focus, then I have to give it all over to Him which makes for a much better situation.

This week we watched a clip from the movie where the youth pastor discusses judgment. He asks the youth group to take a moment to think about who they have judged. Jake, the main character, tries to focus on the task, but is interrupted by all the talking in the room. He observes that no one is doing what Chris asked and is genuinely distraught by the situation. He jumps to his feet and grabs the attention of the youth group. He explains how his girlfriend just left the group because she felt judged (it was her first night there). He poses a question to the group; what is the point of all this if you aren’t going to let it change you? Meaning, what’s the point of going to youth group, and listening to the pastor speak God’s truths, if you aren’t going to let His word have an impact on your life? Chris asks what the other students should be doing. The group (most of them) decides that they should meet up for lunch together at school.

This scene kicked off a discussion about judgment. I hadn’t really planned on this conversation, but I figured it was something we could all relate to. I asked who in the room had every felt judged and everyone raised their hand. We began to share stories about different situations we had all faced; how we had been judged by our age, or our appearance, being in the wrong place at the wrong time or just around people where we didn’t fit their mold. Likewise, we all agreed that we had judged others. And we shared stories about that.

One of the things we concluded was that it was near impossible not to judge people in some way. We all have our ideas of how people should be and when someone doesn’t fit into that picture, then we tend to judge. That judgment may not be a condemning judgment, nor would it even affect the way we treated another human. But, it is judgment none the less and something we need to be aware that we do.

We probably could have talked for another 2 hours on the topic. They all had a lot to share. But, I was feeling like we were moving off topic and there was quite a bit of people talking over people. We were losing focus on respect for each other. So, I brought it to a close and we moved into small group.

In their ‘family groups’ I asked them to discuss the scene from the movie and talk about how they would have reacted if they had been sitting in that room. I also asked them to discuss what things they could do to “let this change them.”

While sitting back and listening to the two groups talk, I could tell they were still very much interested in discussing judgment; how they had been judged, and how they had judged others. Some of the people tried to stay on task and discuss how they would have reacted in that room. They discussed an actual situation we had happen a couple weeks ago in the main high school youth group where a student stood up and spoke out. He challenged the group to stop being such cowards about their faith (like he said he had been). It was a moment most of those kids will not soon forget, and the student received very positive feedback from his peers about being so brave.

Another thing I was able to observe was that the group has bonded over the past few weeks. This was the first night where we really felt like a group. Part of me feels that’s a great thing, especially since everyone is sharing now and everyone feels comfortable, but another part of me feels like perhaps we need to stay in that uncomfortable place and reach out and bring in some new faces. Pray on that one for me.

After 10 minutes of discussion I pulled the students back into one group and gave the message for the week.

I wanted to challenge their faith. I want them to be conscious of their responsibility as believers and followers of Christ. And so I talked about what it means to follow Christ and what responsibilities go along with that. I asked them if they truly did believe what they say they believe and challenged them to really think about that a various times in their everyday life. It’s easy to be a believer amongst believers. But how willing are we to stand up for what we believe when we are surrounded by the world?

They closed in prayer in groups of 2-3 and I was amazed at how quickly they jumped into prayer. They are being real with each other and I think that’s so great. Pray that God continues His good work in our group. Pray that he protects all of us over the next week from evil. And, as always, pray that His will be done not just in our group, but all over the world.

To Save a Life: Week 3 Message

Say Something…Do Something

Revelations 3:15-16 (NLT)

15 “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! 16 But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth!

This is a pretty hard couple of verses to swallow. It’s saying that you should either be on fire for God, or not about God at all because in both cases, God can use you for His glory. It’s saying, get off the fence and make a decision because otherwise you are trying to serve two masters. You can’t be one way around your family, school friends, or co-workers, and be another way here at church.

I think most of us in the room fall somewhere between lukewarm and hot; if we are to assume the ‘hot’ is good in this case. If we are on fire for God then He can use us to do His will. If we are lukewarm then we are sitting on the sidelines, watching the game happen, but unwilling to get in there and play. Does God still love you if you are lukewarm? Absolutely! But there isn’t a whole lot he can do with us if he is asking us to go out in the world and show His love to others and we continually refuse to obey.

We all love God. We have all made a commitment to God. We have all given our lives over to Him and accepted Jesus as our savior. Our sins have been washed away and we expect to spend eternity in heaven. Awesome! We’ve bought the insurance policy and are set. But there is more we can do.

As believers, we are His ambassadors. We represent heaven on Earth. Does that make us perfect? No. Does that mean we can judge people? No. What it gives us is a responsibility to love. We are now meant to reach out and let people know about the amazing thing God did for us when He sacrificed His son to show His love for us so that we could have eternity in heaven.

So why is it so hard to say something to those people who we see and who we know are hurting? Why is it so hard to do something when there is so much pain happening around us?

I think what it boils down to is the strength of our faith. We don’t say or do something because we don’t fully believe it could make a difference. If we did, then we wouldn’t care what our friends, or family members, would say about us. If our faith was strong then we wouldn’t hesitate to go out and do what God has called us to do. We wouldn’t justify sitting on the side lines and watching the game go on around us.

If we were strong in our faith we would let ourselves continually be changed by God’s word. So ask yourself, “Do I really believe in all this? Am I willing to let it change me?”

Don’t answer right now…not sitting in this room here at church surrounded by other believers.

Ask yourself when it is just you, sitting in your room; when the only One who can hear you is God.

Ask yourself when you are out with your friends on the weekends and you just want to have a good time, but you see someone in emotional pain.

Ask yourself when you are at work and your co-workers are talking about the crazy things they did over the weekend and you have a choice to tell them about what you heard at church, or what you read in the Bible…or will you skip over that stuff and just tell them about the fun you had?

Ask yourself, “Do I really believe in all this? Am I willing to let it change me?” when you are standing at the line, about to cross over into sin, and see what your answer is then.

And when you are ready to answer “yes” to both those questions, then it is time to figure out the next step. What changes can you make? In the movie, To Save a Life, the students decided to come together at school and eat lunch. Doing so gave them a sense of community and the confidence to reach out and find students that were hurting and give them a place where they would be accepted. That worked for them. What will work for you?

Don’t let this world make you lukewarm. Choose to say something. Choose to do something. You’ll be amazed at what God can do with you.