"Community Speaks": Danielle Cody

This past weekend we had a blast on the Veritas Retreat!! Danielle Cody shares a little about what she learned…

Truth. 

1 Peter 3:15-16: "But sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you..."

Why do we pursue truth? In order to expose the truth to those who oppose it, we must understand truth. Our worship is affected by our knowledge and understanding of who God is and who man is in light of God. As we seek the truth, our worship becomes more meaningful and glorifying to God. 

We first took a look at the characteristics and nature of God. God is three divine persons that make up one divine being. This is also called the Trinity.  Each divine person has unique characteristics and different responsibilities.  Our Father is all-powerful but all good and loving at the same time. Jesus is the perfect example to believers of humility as he became fully man and walked this earth just as we do.  The Holy Spirit convicts, empowers and strengthens believers to live as Jesus did. Each one is God, yet each one plays a specific role. Christians tend to emphasize only one or two forms of God without giving full recognition to all three. It's important for us to recognize each divine being and the role that they play in our lives. 

Next we took a look at who man is in light of who God is. Genesis tells us that man is made in the image of God. What does this mean exactly? Well it can mean a lot of things. Being made in God's image affects our desire for community, our ability to reason and choose good over evil, it causes us to take on the qualities of God. Most importantly, being made in God's image means we were created sinless. Because of the Fall through Adam and Eve, suddenly we were faced with the inability to not sin. We became sinful--in need of a sinless Savior.  Through Jesus Christ (taking on the role of our Savior and Redeemer), we suddenly are given the ability to not sin. You may ask why, since even as Christians we still fall into sin and you're right. Just as we have nothing to do with our salvation, we have no ability to overcome sin--at least on our own. This is where the role of the Holy Spirit comes in. Essentially if we aren't taking full advantage of the Spirit, then we aren't fulfilling our purpose. How do we walk by the Spirit though? 

Our desire and purpose is to live in obedience to God and live a life imitating Jesus. Ultimately we're created to glorify God and enjoy him. This is accomplished by walking by the Spirit, BUT first we must know that we are children of God. How do we know this? 1 John 5 tells us that in order to be born of God, we must believe that Jesus is the Christ. Not only that, we must love his children. How do we grow to love God's children? We already know it can't be done on our own, yet it IS possible. This passage also tells us "by this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe his commandments". In order to love the children of God, we must love God first. In order to love God, we must grow in knowledge and understanding of who God is. This brings us full circle. This is why we pursue truth. Not only does knowledge of our Lord make us ready to make a defense and give an account of the hope that is in us, but also it develops a love for God.  As we grow in love for God, we grow in love for his children and observe his commandments by walking in the Spirit. This is how we know we are a child of God. This is how we "overcome the world" (1 John 5:5). Understand your faith. Understand the God you serve. Pursue truth.

By Danielle Cody

"Community Speaks" - Bobby Anderson

Occasionally, we hear stories from within the Awakening that allow us to see God's hand at work within the community.  This is a great opportunity to hear the "Community Speak." This post is told by Bobby Anderson who has been attending the Awakening for a couple months and works in the financial industry.

It was the week after I heard Phil speak about living life with purpose.  What especially hit me was when he was talking about doing your job with purpose even if it is something that you don’t particularly want to do.  Friday that week around 4:30 in the afternoon I was on a conference call with my boss and he told me that I needed to change the format of our internally prepared screening memo that our committees use to make decisions.  The kicker was that I had to completely re-do the entire document by Monday morning. 

What this meant was I was going to have to spend my whole weekend re-doing something that I had already created six months earlier.  Needless to say I was not looking forward to it.   As I started to work on this project I found myself angry with the fact that I was given this task and had to give up my weekend for something I thought was pointless.  Then I looked up and saw the posted note that I had put on my computer screen that read With Purpose.  It hit me that if I was to follow God with purpose I needed to follow through with this project and do the best possible job that I could.  I worked through the entire weekend only breaking for sleeping, eating and going to church.  After I completed the new screening memo I was very proud of what I did and it was honestly some of the best work I have ever done.

The next week I was very excited to show my boss and our committee what I created over the weekend.   To my surprise when we were going through a couple of transactions using the new screening memo our committee and my boss informed me that they were going to scrap my screening memo for another one that our team on the East coast was working on.  Their news completely deflated me and I was very discouraged.  Here I was pouring my heart and soul into my work and truly doing it was purpose just to be told it was for nothing.
At the same time I had been interviewing for a new position outside of my company.  The guy recruiting me asked me to provide two writing samples and a financial analysis document I had built in excel.  I ended up sending him the new screening memo and the two transactions that I had worked so hard on over the weekend and that my company scraped. These documents were exactly what the new company had been trying to develop internally and were one of the main reasons that they offered me the job.

Following God with purpose and applying that to everything we do is done whether or not you know what his plan is for you.  His plan for me in this situation was completely off my radar and unexpected.  Point being that is I am not always know what his plan is for me or why I am put into certain situations.  The only thing I can control is that I continue to do things with purpose and trust the God ultimately has plan for me.     

 By Bobby Anderson