Adam Hlavka prays for Ignite

This week, I’ve been blessed to have one of the young men I’ve met and ministered to during my trips to the Czech Republic at my house.

Adam Hlavka is one of those young men I connected with right away. He has an amazing passion for God, always stepping up during our mission trips to help lead outreaches, translate, drive our team around and was always available to help in any way needed. He showed up early, stayed late, went out and talked with and ministered to the youth we met. His family even opened their home to house some of our team, and continues to stay connected with students here in Monmouth.

I’ve had the privilege of seeing Adam grow in his faith over the past four years since I first met him. I’ve spoken into his life, challenged him, encouraged him, stayed connected through Facebook and Skype and always made the effort to do all I could to see him become the man God called him to be.

So when the opportunity arose to have him come visit me and see my ministry in action, I jumped at the chance.

Having him at my house has been an amazing encouragement, both to me personally and to many of my students. He’s spent time on campus, began sharing Christ with students who are as atheistic as they come (and was seeing break through in their hearts) and stayed up until 2 in the morning talking about life and ministry and hopes and dreams with me.

It’s been a great blessing.

But the thing that impacted me the most so far is what happened during our Ignite Monmouth meeting.

As we were getting ready to closed, I asked our students if we could take the opportunity to pray for Adam, and have him pray for us.

It was a powerful experience.

Adam began sharing the difference Ignite and I have made in his life and the lives of other youth in Czech. He encouraged our students to pursue God, to realize the potential within themselves and to reach out and impact their campus for Christ.

And then he prayed this:

The trips we take to Czech aren’t your typical mission trips. They aren’t about us super-awesome Americans going in and teaching these Czech youth how to minister. They aren’t about us planning all the outreaches, taking charge of every aspect of the trip and doing things are way. We don’t just go to do some outreaches, see some people saved and then move on to the next place.

These trips are about making a lasting impact.

It’s one thing to go on a mission trip and make connections. It’s a whole other level when the people you go and minister to turn around and minister right back to you.

This is why we go to Czech. This is why we raise money, spend months in prayer and planning, and travel 15 hours to a country that many people have never heard of:

To see young people like Adam encouraged, equipped and walking into the call God has on their lives.

Learn more about our trip to Czech and partner with us to impact young people, like Adam, for Christ.

Photo Credit: Evan Almighty (Universal Pictures)

Noah’s faith amazes me.

At the age of 599 (which I imagine is the equivalent of being 50 years old today), God shows up and tells him to build an ark, gather seven of every animal and prepare for a flood that would wipe out all living beings. He was given the exact dimensions, specific quantities and clear directions on how to build this boat. He was told rough timelines of when he should have the ark completed. He even knew who God would spare and who He would allow to die.

And Noah obeyed.

He set out  gathering supplies, measuring out a building location, recruiting his sons to help him build this massive ark. He measured and cut and lifted and fit pieces together and nailed and glued and remeasured and covered parts in pitch and had to think out where to store food and supplies and, eventually, what to do with the animal droppings.

This was no easy task.

It took Noah roughly a year to build the ark.
It took physical and mental and financial resources.
It took convincing his family, giving his responsibilities to someone else, and focusing completely on the ark.

Every day Noah went out and built.
Every day he poured his blood, sweat and tears into this project.
And every day Noah was pummeled with questions and mocks and jeers.

He was building an ark in his lawn after all.

This wasn’t some nice Sunday school kind of story. He didn’t just get the animals to help him build the boat like some early version of a Disney princess. He didn’t just go about his business unhindered.

Noah was mocked, taunted and ridiculed by those he used to call friends.

He was the subject of gossip and judgement and scorn.
His neighbors would have complained, asked him how he could follow some God who didn’t exist, and tried to talk him out of all his work and into partying with them.

And when he finally finished his building, gathered the animals and entered the ark, it was a full seven days before the flood started.

Seven days to question.
Seven days to doubt.
Seven days to wonder if he heard God right.
Seven days of asking God when He would prove the mockers wrong.

“Noah did everything just as God commanded him.” – Genesis 6:22

In the midst of the mocking and taunting and jeering, in the midst of the doubts and fears, in the midst of the back breaking work, Noah obeyed.

He pushed through the persecution.
Worked through the pain.
Did everything God commanded him to do.

And saved the human race from extinction.

Because complete obedience to God no only affects you, but everyone around you.

How could your obedience be a blessing to others, even if it is mocked?

Tomorrow starts the season of Lent - those 45 days before Easter where many Christians take time to reflect on the power of Christ’s death, burial and resurrection and prepare themselves to experience new life. It’s a season of introspection, a season of reflection, a season of preparation and repentance as we journey to the cross and resurrection of Christ.

As part of my mission with this blog, I want to help equip you to dig deeper this Lenten season, face the darkness within yourself, and experience a true resurrection in your life with the following resources:

“He is Risen” Lent Book
This FREE book is packed with devotions, scripture readings, artwork, poetry, activities and reflection questions that takes you on a journey from darkness to light.
Download it for FREE.

Lent Experiential Calendar
This FREE resources takes the suggested activities in the Lent book and arranges them in calendar form for easy access and tracking. Used with the Lent book or as a stand-alone, this calendar will help you “fast from and live to” various habits in your life.
Download it for FREE.

Lent Deeper Devotions
Every Tuesday during the season of Lent, I will publish a Deeper devotion focused on the themes of Lent. These devotions are different from those found in the Lent book.
Subscribe to receive Lent Deeper devotions.

Read today’s Lent Deeper post, Facing the Darkness.

Whether you observe a high-church version of Lent, or are just looking for a new resource to help you grow closer to God, these resources will focus you, challenge you and push you to become more like Christ.

Feel free to share these resources with your friends and family, and post links on Facebook and Twitter for your followers. A sample Tweet is below for your convenience:

Face the darkness within and experience true resurrection with these FREE Lent resources! http://iwww.jasonvana.com/free-lent-resources  #lent

What are you doing to focus more on Christ this season?

Photo Credit: Vik Nanda (Creative Commons)

I love the church.
I believe it is meant to be the representation of Christ on the earth.

The church has the power to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and take care of those in need.
The church has the power to heal the sick and cleanse the lepers.
The church has the power to bring hope to the hopeless, love to the loveless, and faith to those who doubt.

The church is meant to be an agent of change in the world.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t always act that way.

Don’t get me wrong, some churches are doing great things that are providing physical and spiritual change.

But I’m longing for more.

I long for the church that uses its resources to help those in need, not to put up more buildings.

I long for the church that asks how it can impact its city, not make its members more comfortable.

I long for the church that trains and equips its members to be pastors in their workplace, not just invite people to a Sunday service.

I long for the church that would rather build a community center to impact its city on a daily basis, rather than a building for its own purposes.

I long for the church that has a biblical view of the tithe, only using one-fourth of the tithe it receives for salaries and administrative duties, and gives the rest away to take care of those in need.

I long for the church that sees small groups as church, and moves out of the Sunday morning service model.

I long for the church that pushes its members out of their comfort zones, not making it more comfortable.

I long for the church that gets radical, and sees itself as an agent of change in business, education, art, communication and the economy.

I long for the church that produces disciples, not spending its resources to make converts.

I long for the church that sends out missionaries, not just throwing a few dollars every month to strangers.

I long for the church that helps its members achieve the calling God put in their lives, not just fulfilling ministry roles within its own body.

I long for the church that makes its youth, young adults and university students a top priority, even though those groups don’t typically have money to give.

I long for the church that Christ died to give us, and is waiting to come back for.

What are you longing to see in the church?

Photo Credit: Vicky Hugheston (Creative Commons)

Dreams don’t come easy.

They require hard work, dedication and a laser focus on your goal. They take planning and striving and evaluation. They will steal your time and energy and resources. They require early mornings, late nights and a lot of your free time. They are hard task managers, never taking a day off for vacation or holidays. They will push you to your breaking point, give the illusion that they will never happen and sap every bit of your mental, emotional and physical energy. They will take you on a roller coaster of emotions, from excited to frustrated to the verge of giving up and back again.

Dreams demand a lot.

It’s why so many are unfulfilled.

When we come up with a dream, when we have that initial desire to see something happen, when we want to start that new business, write that book, work in that ministry, go on that trip, mentor that kid, we think it will be so easy.

Contact a few people and the new business will be up and running.
Blog for a few months and the book offer will come in.
Attend that church a few weekends and they’ll be asking you to lead a ministry.
Put in a few hours on the weekend, make a few connections, talk to a few people and BAM!, your dream is fulfilled.

It rarely, if ever, works that way.

My dream to impact youth, young adults and university students around the world is costly.

It’s cost me vacation time (I haven’t had a real vacation since 2001).
It’s cost me sleep.
It’s cost me my nights and weekends.
It’s cost me countless evenings of meetings and phone calls and emails.
I’ve spent hours preparing documents, readying myself for mission trip meetings, and helping others fundraise.
I’ve had to deal with financial reports, web site applications and late night visits from students whose lives are falling apart.
I’ve had to raise thousands of dollars, travel over 15 hours and suffer from jet lag to spend 2 weeks doing ministry in Czech. And now Romania.
I’ve had to turn down offers to hang out with friends, come back early from holidays and miss numerous fun activities all to push my dream forward.

It hasn’t been easy.
But it’s worth the price.

Before you start out in your dream, before you finally muster up the courage to take that first step, before you dive in and start telling everyone your dream, you need to count the cost.

Figure out what you’re willing to give up.
What you’re willing to pay.

Your dream won’t come easy.
It won’t come cheap.
It will cost more than you think.

But if you go in with an idea of the price you’re willing to pay, you will be less likely to give up, and will see your dream become reality.

What cost are you willing to pay for your dream?
What cost do you refuse to pay?

Photo Credit: Stuart Pilbrow (Creative Commons)

Last week at our Ignite Monmouth gathering, one of our student leaders posed a question that challenged me:

What do you do when you’re stressed?

Answers ranged from playing video games, reading, eating chocolate to running, going for a walk, or curling up on your bed with a stuffed dog and crying (no, that one was not me). Some students punch their pillows. Others talk to friends. Some take time away and try to relax. Others listen to music. Some like to freak out, scream, and vent. Others, take a calmer approach.

We all have our methods of dealing with stress.

Me? I tend to eat.
A lot.

I find myself snacking on junk food, eating larger portions at meal times, and making less-healthy choices when it comes to food.

It’s not the best method for getting rid of stress.

It doesn’t address the cause of the stress. It doesn’t help me face the pressure and find constructive ways of dealing with it. It doesn’t push me to seek help or say no or realize I can’t do it all.

It just buries the stress until later.

While our stress-relieving methods may help us blow off steam, deal with the anxiety building inside, and keep us from breaking under the pressure, there is a better way.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” – Matthew 11:28

Christ never promises that we will have a stress-free life. Coming to Him won’t magically make us able to slide through projects and deadlines and handle all the pressures that come at us.<

But He does promise us rest.
And refreshing.
And a new perspective on the problems we face.

Christ may not take our stress away, He may not wave a magic wand and make everything better, He may not give us happy feelings and take the pressure off, but He will do something better.

He will allow the stress and frustration to mold us into better people.

He will show us how to better handle the stress.
Avoid putting ourselves in situations that give us needless stress.
And use it to draw us back to Himself.

When we put aside our methods of handling stress and come to Him, He gives us true peace and true rest.

How do you deal with stress in your life?

Photo Credit: Petras Gagilas (Creative Commons)

Last week, we looked at pursuing our dreams.

I wrote about how it’s important to take time to dream.
We discussed the act of rediscovering the gifts and passions that form our dream.
We even talked about the time it takes for a dream to form.

We love talking about our dreams.

It’s easy to sit behind a computer screen and write about these big ideals we have for our lives. We like to share our dreams with friends and family and coworkers. We get a sense of satisfaction talking about what we want to do with our lives.

There’s no work involved in sharing a dream.
No risk, either.

But sharing our ideals and thoughts and desires doesn’t bring our dream any closer to reality.

All the encouragement and insight and inspiration in the world won’t write that book, or secure that dream job, or start that nonprofit, or plant that church, or build your own business. Conferences and speakers and blog posts can spark the idea and get you inspired, but they won’t achieve your dream for you.

In order to bring your dream into reality, you have to get practical:

Count the cost.
Every dream comes at a price. It will cost your time, energy, and resources. Figure out the costs you are willing to pay, and those that are non-negotiable to you. It will help you determine if you need to rework your dream or call it quits.

Talk with someone who has been there.
Grab coffee or set up a time to chat with someone who has done what you want to do. Ask questions. Get their advice. Find out what they would do differently. And take a notepad.

Make a plan.
Once you’ve determined the price you’re willing to pay and talked with someone who has gone before you, it’s time to make a plan.

• Write out the answers to the following questions:
• What does success look like in my dream?
• What does failure look like?
• What am I trying to achieve?
• What resources do I have at my disposal right now?
• What resources do I still need?
• Who can help me in this dream?
• What is the first thing I need to accomplish?

Start with what you have.
The greatest hinderance to our dreams is getting started. We have big ideas that are radically different than what we are living, and it’s difficult to know where to begin. The solution? Start with what you have. Want to write a book? Start by writing a few pages. Want to start a business? Provide your services to your friends. Want to start a ministry? Volunteer in your church. The key is to get started doing what you can right now.

Dreaming and visioning is great, but at some point, we need to take our dreams and ideals and desires and begin turning them into reality. Otherwise, they will die within us and never be brought into reality.

What can you start doing today to work towards your dream?

Photo Credit: Alex Lomas (Creative Commons)

Dreams take time.

It’s a fact many of us acknowledge.

Dreams take time to start.
Time to achieve.
Time to clarify.
Time to vocalize.
Time to work through, pray about, and share.

But there’s another area in which dreams take time that we tend to overlook.

Dreams take time to form.

We tend to have this idea that finding our dream, receiving that call, discovering that one passion or purpose that we are willing to give our whole lives to happens overnight.

In a moment of revelation and insight and a spiritual high that rivals anything we’ve ever experienced, God will rip open the heavens, drop down the neon sign and give us a dream we will pursue the rest of our lives.

We pray that way, read stories in scripture of God giving people long-term commands, we ask God to reveal a dream to us, spend a couple of minutes waiting for His answer, and then get frustrated when after a few days or weeks or months, we still don’t have a dream to call our own.

We want the microwave dream.
God gives us the slow-cooker version.

A good dream, one that transcends our lives, impacts many and is something we are willing to spend our lives pursuing takes years to form.

We have to discover our passions.
Learn who we are and what makes us tick.
Realize our talents and abilities and in-born skills.
Find others who will point out what gives us life and energy.
Receive encouragement and feedback and process our feelings.
Take advantage of that opportunity.
Step out in faith to try that one new thing.
Go on that trip.
Take that class.
Start that bible study.
Get involved in that church, apply for that job or help that person in need.

It takes being in that right place at the right time, stepping into that right opportunity, helping with that right organization or project or group to gain a glimmer of an idea that might possibly turn into a dream.

Dreams start with an idea.
Morph into a hobby.
Grow into a passion.
And expand into a life calling.

My dream to impact youth, young adults and university students around the world for Christ didn’t start with multiple campuses and mission trips and orphanages, training centers and resources. It didn’t even start with high school youth.

My dream began by saying yes to starting a bible study at my alma mater for a friend of mine.
And it grew from there.

I went on my first exploratory trip, and gained a heart for young people in Europe.
I led my first mission trip, ministered to high school kids, and gained a heart for youth ministry.
I wrote my first bible study packet for a student, and gained a heart to produce resources.
I saw a video clip from Advent Conspiracy, and gained a heart to provide clean water for people in third world countries.
I saw God impact students at Monmouth College, and gained a heart to see the same at other schools in the area.
I walked onto a campus in Czech, and gained a heart to do college ministry in Europe.
I trained and challenged and encouraged a youth pastor buddy of mine, and gained a heart to do leadership training.

Dreams don’t come all at once.
They aren’t formed in their entirety over night.
You aren’t going to receive the big picture dream up front.

The opportunities you take, the skills you grow, the passions you develop and pursue step into all work together to form your dream.

And that takes a lifetime to do.

What skills and talents and opportunities could God be using to developing a dream in your life?

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Dreaming is vital to our well being.

It helps us focus on what is important. It gives us something to shoot for. It energizes us when life seems bland. It gives us hope, pushes us forward and keeps us from becoming complacent and stale in our lives.

We need dreams.

But sometimes, knowing our dream isn’t easy.

This past Sunday, I was talking to a young man about this very topic. We were at a youth group Super Bowl party, and the youth pastor had just talked about how our dreams won’t satisfy us without God. This young man turned to me afterwards and said that he doesn’t really have a specific dream.

He doesn’t have that one thing that’s driving him.
He doesn’t have a vision for his life.
He couldn’t pinpoint that one desire, one conviction, one purpose that consumes everything he does.

There are a lot of things he’d be willing to do for God, and if God said ‘yes’, he would throw his full being into that calling, but as of Sunday night, he didn’t have have direction.

He doesn’t have a dream.
And he felt like that was a bad thing.

Go to any church, read any leadership book, peruse countless number of blogs and you’ll get the same idea: No dream, no vision, no direction means you aren’t doing anything of value with your life.

So we push, we pray, we look for the sign from heaven to tell us what we are supposed to do with our lives. We go to conferences, talk to friends and family and pastors, and try to find a dream we can grab onto.

And typically, end up with nothing.

Finding your dream isn’t about receiving an audible call from Heaven. You aren’t going to get a neon sign in the sky telling you what to do. It isn’t about a super-spiritual moment where God’s voice is clear and every bit of your being just knows this is what you are to do.

Determining your dream is more an act of recovery, rather than an act of discovery.

Remembering those things you were passionate about.
Rediscovering those talents you gave up.
Listening to what makes your heart beat a bit more.

Your dream is in you. It’s a part of who you are. God stitched your purpose and calling and dreams into the fabric of your being when He created you.

Instead of searching for the sign-from-heaven moments, maybe it’s time to take notice of what we are passionate about, what we love to do, what gives us energy and excitement and joy, and allow God to show us the dreams He placed in us since the beginning of time.

How could your passions and talents and joys work together to form your dream?

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Every so often, I need a visioning day: a day where I gather others around me and we start visioning and dreaming about the future of Ignite. It’s a day that refreshes me, recharges me and gives me focus for the next few months.

Friday was that day.

I had a Skype call to start planning and throwing out ideas about our Romania 2012 mission trip. I went out for coffee with one of my students and talked about how to improve the Ignite group at Monmouth. I went to dinner with our Student Representative to the Ignite Board, and dreamed about what Ignite could look like 5, 10, even 20 years down the road.

We dreamed about future trips to Romania.
We talked about monthly community service projects.
We thought about training programs, a school of ministry, and mapped out some new resources we hope to have available in the next few months.
We looked over logistics, came up with some strategic plans and set some deadlines to see these dreams become reality.

It was a refreshing day.

“Where there is no vision, the people perish…” – Proverbs 29:18 KJV

We need vision. We need dreams. We need days where we put aside our to-do lists, step out of our constant need to achieve and accomplish and produce, and continue to dream.

It gives purpose to our busyness.
Energy to our souls.
And reminds us that we were created for more than just doing.

Without dreams, without vision, without that goal to push towards, plan to aim for and image of the future where things are different, we perish.

We lose direction.
We lose hope.
And life becomes nothing more than trudging along on a hamster wheel.

We were created to dream.

So let’s keep dreaming.

What are you dreaming/visioning about for your life?