Chapter 40- Life Purpose Statement

Chapter 40 - Living with purpose is really the only way to live

Verse - For David…. Served the purpose of God in his own generation. Acts 13:36

Question - When will I take the time to write down my answers to life's five great questions? When will I put my purpose on paper?
What is a Life Purpose Statement?


A statement that:

points the direction of your life
defines success for you
clarifies your roles
expresses your shape



Life's Five greatest questions:

What will be the center of my life?

The center of my life will be for me and my house to serve the Lord. To be doers of the word and not mere spectators in the game of life. In order to keep the Lord at the center of our lives I have to keep myself from being distracted by the things of this world. The things of this world bring temporary pleasure and happiness but no lasting peace or purpose.


What will be the character of my life?

The following is my perception of the character attributes in my life as I understand myself.

Love - to truly love others we must be willing to serve them above ourselves. While we were yet sinners Christ died for us. In the same way we should show love one to another through service. I sometimes love myself more than others because I can be selfish.

Joy - (cheerfulness, calm delight, gladness)- I struggle with joy during times of trouble. I am not always glad about trials or tribulation. I sometimes worry about things that I have no control over.

Peace- (quietness, rest) - Externally I appear to have it together or under control. Sometimes I struggle with the unfairness of my circumstances which causes me to have inner turmoil. Ultimately I find peace when I release it to God.

Patience- (forbearance or fortitude, longsuffering)- I have been learning patience the hard way. My nature is to be spontaneous and make gut feeling decisions on the fly. Through the consequences of these decisions I have made some mistakes and through those mistakes I am learning patience.

Kindness- this is not my strongest character attribute. I struggle with compassion and mercy and kindness

Goodness- (virtue or beneficence, benign, soft winning, tender either in temper or behavior) this one does not come easy to me either. It is easier for me to be critical and harsh than to be soft or tender. Maybe this is reflected in the struggles I have with having a relationship with my children.

Faithfulness- (credence, moral conviction, reliance upon Christ for salvation) on many occasions I have thought that being a Christian was more difficult than I could handle. I have wanted to take the road of least resistance. God has given me the grace to be an over comer.

Gentleness- (usefulness, moral excellence in character or demeanor, good or kind) I am as gentle as an 800 lb gorilla by nature. I have to work at this attribute.

Self Control - (temperance, not only abstinence from harmful drinks or food but control of the temper, the tongue, the desires, the passions for money or power)
Through Gods grace I am able to engage this most of the time.


What will be the contribution of my life?

I have been blessed to have been allowed to do the following in service for the kingdom.

Street ministry
Children church pastor
Evangelism Team
Royal Ambassador leader
Mens Fellowship Director
Sunday School teacher
Lay Minister preacher
Audio/video/sound
Internet Ministry
Freelance writing - Christ and family oriented


What will be the communication of my life?

Street ministry
Peaceful demonstrator at Abortion clinic
Working with homeless people
Preaching and teaching God's word


What will be the community of my life?

I find myself being the one to pursue others and engage them in relationships that are beyond superficial day to day chit chat. I have been accused of getting too close to people to quickly. I am supposedly too up front and personal in my approach with others. How else can I get to know people other than to discover who they are beyond the surface? I believe that my life should be transparent and an open book so that Christ in me can be glorified. That also means letting people see the good and the ugly. That means that I need to be open, honest and vulnerable. Most people do not return that level of fellowship. Most people do not trust others where they are willing to be vulnerable.



The following statements will be a part of my life purpose statement.

To serve God with all my mind heart and soul
To love my neighbor as myself
To allow the Lord to be MY LORD
To study Gods word and be a workman that needs not be ashamed and allow His word to change me from the inside out
To be an exemplary husband to Katy
To be a father who does not invoke wrath in my children
To be a father to my son and daughter who lives Jesus in front of them so that they can learn the character of God
To bring up my children in the knowledge and admonition of the Lord Jesus Christ
To serve the community God has placed me in and point them to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ
To define and exercise my SHAPE for ministry every day


My life purpose is to glorify Jesus Christ in my thoughts, actions and motivations. I will be successful in God's eyes when I place my life in his hands and allow him to mold me and shape me into his image. My role is to serve God , church and family before myself. My goal is to exercise the spiritual gifts and talents God has given me both in personal ministry and my mission to the world.





James Moffitt
http://www.jesus-connect.net/jcmoffitt
moffittj@bellsouth.net

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Day 40 of The 40 Days of Purpose Devotional book

I am on day 40 of the Order this book now and invest 40 days of your life 40 days of purpose devotional by Rick Warren

I can not tell you how blessed I am by having invested these last 40 days in this devotional study. I actually took a bit longer than 40 days to do this study. That is ok though, I believe that my doing it the way I did it did not take away from the message in the book. Now that I am finished I have some homework to do. There are some questions and/or drills in the book that I need to go investigate and spend time meditating and writing these things down. I am telling all of my friends and associates that I have contact with to get THE BOOK. Atleast one of my friends that I know DID actually get the book and is working through it. Praise God for that. I am so excited about it too. I am so convinced that this book is going to bless others that I am going to try and buy atleast one book per pay day to give away to someone that might need it or want it and can not afford it. Before I go any further with my thoughts below I want to say that I believe that this book is written to an audience of people that already know who Christ is and have embraced GRACE and are walking the walk of faith seeking Jesus Christ as Lord. That does not mean that a non believer could not SEE the character of God portrayed in this book. The book does not examine the consequences of NOT accepting Grace nor does it highlight the fact that we as believers were once sinners and that we are required to REPENT of our sins (change our minds and turn away from our old sin nature and life style) as an integral part of our salvation.

Where do I go with this now that I am done? I have been compelled to change things in my life. The question is WILL I CHANGE those things in my life that need to be changed? I will say that this book has certainly broadened my thinking with regards to my "views" on church tradition. There are biblical facts that we know because we have read, studied and meditated upon Gods word. Then there are traditional views that we hold because we were taught those things over the years without having investigated their validity for ourselves. These ideals or precepts have been engrained in us because of years of church practice and tradition. For instance the thought that we listen to Christian music at church and call it Worship music. The only way that we can tell that worship music is worship music is because of lyrics that give God praise , honor and glory. Without the words the music would be MUSIC. Another thing I learned is the difference between worship and ministry. I used to think that ministry equated to teaching bible studies , preaching or reaching out to the community. This book tells me that anything that I do that involves any type of spiritual fruit, spiritual gifts or natural talents for the betterment of the church and its people is ministry. Ministry is doing acts of service to the body of Christ. When I do those acts of service no matter what they are I am worshipping God through my deeds. This book has helped me to define and re discover my SHAPE for ministry.

Ok, that is all you are going to get from me on the "content" of this book for now. Now to switch gears for a bit with posing a question to meditate upon. How many bible studies, sermons or seminars do we need to attend to become more like Christ? Has our religion become the pursuit of knowledge or is it our acting out that which we already know to be truth? Is our religion and relationship with Christ emotionally driven where we must feel good in order to validate our faith and be obedient? We are ambassadors for Christ sent out into the world to preach the good news to the lost , sick and dying of this world. Jesus did not come into this world to save the religious people. Jesus came to this world to save the sick and dying people. Jesus knew that without him and his gift and ministry that we were doomed for eternal separation from God. Jesus Christ had a MISSION to fulfill and he fulfilled it when he died on the cross for the sins of mankind , past present and future. The bible clearly states that Gods mission should now be our mission. Instead of pursuing material wealth and being wealth builders we should be busy at being KINGDOM builders. I have been compelled to examine my purpose for living. It is NOT about me but it IS about God. It is not about the messenger it is about the MESSAGE. Jesus Christ crucified and resurrected to give us life. My purpose is not to just figure out HOW to pay the bills and live from one day at a time. Life is more than mere survival. God came that we might have ABUNDANT life and the only way we can have ABUNDANT LIFE is to fulfill Gods purposes in our lives.

I have to say that all of this is some what overwhelming to me. I look back at what I have read and am learning with regards to this book and I have to say that you should probably study and meditate on the book and its 1200 scripture references over a much longer time period than 40 days. I know people who are on their third reading and are still getting new nuggets of truth from it. Am I implying above that we should abandon our responsibilities of going to work and paying bills or take away quality time from our family responsibilities. No, I am certainly not saying that. One of the things that this book talks about at the very end is about prioritizing our lives in such a way that we remove the JUNK from our lives. Junk that has not eternal value and only momentary value for TODAY. We live in a feel good society and the world says if it FEELS good do it. As Christians we no longer do what FEELS good because we have been taught that our hearts are deceitfully wicked and that there are consequences for acting out to make our flesh happy when it wants to FEEL good. I am like you in that I have TIME that could be better prioritized and spent in ministry and worship. That means that I will need to change some habits and my thinking ABOUT those things.

You can follow my 40 Day journey as I discovered Gods Purpose for my life by reading my blog here. I published my devotional notes so that I could share what I am learning and now going to attempt to DO in my life. Please pray for me as I meditate and PURPOSE in my heart to CHANGE. Through the pain, onward to battle and victory!!!

God bless

HOW DIRTY IS IT?

I started to title this blog "Wet T Shirt Contest" but I did not want the server that this is sitting on to be overwhelmed to the point that my blog would no longer be available. Not only that but I was the only entry to the contest and quite naturally I did win. LOL....

Yes, I got wet but not for the sake of having a wet t shirt contest. I had a date witht he power washer thanks to yesterday being much warmer than the last time I did it. I almost froze off part of my rear end that day. It is amazing what one will do to fight off depression I guess....

Well, the OTHER side of the double wide is now clean. One side of my neighbors trailer is white again and not algae green. Wahooooo! I spent atleast 2 hours washing the deck between my place and "the other trailer". Did I tell you how horribly filthy it is? Every time it rains I kept slipping on something slick. That something is years and years of grime and dirt. I can actually see the original wood color now. I still need to figure out what chemical I will need to use to break the dirt up to make it EASIER to get it clean. You would think that the power washer would just knock it right off but alas it does not. I tried something my friend next door gave me and it just sat on top of the grime and did nothing other than make it wetter. I finally broke out the Clorox Bleach and that seemed to help a little bit.

Last night I out did myself on the bowling alley. Our team name is Four Play.... Alrighty then... How did we come up with that team name?? I will plead the fifth on that one folks... I bowled a 165 average last night. Wahooooo
My 180 game is the highest game yet for me at this bowling alley. Last week I bowled a whopping 121 average which is 7 pins BELOW my 128 average. Our team is in 10th place BEFORE last night but since we took three out of four games we should move up a notch or two.

Chapter 38 & 39

Chapter 38- The Great Commission is my commission


Verse to remember- Send us around the world with the news of your saving power and your eternal plan for all mankind. Psalm 67:2

Question to consider - what steps can I take to prepare to go on a short term missions experience in the next year?

In reality that happening in the next year is slim to none. Once Katy and I have full time jobs with vacation time after one year of service then we could think about this.

Chapter 39- Blessed to be balanced

Verse to remember- life life with a due sense of responsibility, not as those that do not know the meaning of life but as those who do. Eph 5:15

Question to consider- Which of the 4 activities will I begin in order to stay on track and balance Gods five purposes in my life?

The 5 purposes were:

Practiced by the first Christians in Acts chapter 2
Explained by Paul in Ephesians 4
Modeled by Jesus in John 17
Summarized in the Great Commandment and the Great Commission by Jesus

Gods 5 purposes for your life are:

Love God with all your heart (worship)
Love your neighbor as yourself (ministry)
Go and make disciples (evangelism)
Baptize them into (fellowship)
Teach them to do all things (discipleship)


"A great commitment to the great commandment and the great commission will make you a great Christian"

Practice the following four habits

Talk it through with a spiritual partner or small group
Give yourself a regular spiritual check up
Write down your progress in a journal
Pass on what you learn to others


I need to start doing habits 1 and 3 on a regular basis. I already practice habits 2 and 4. I need to email Rick Warren at free@purposedrivenlife.com and ask for ALL of the free resources listed on page 324.