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Introduction by Carolyn Slaughter
 We come
here tonight because we take this new relationship with
Christ seriously. And in the third chapter of Colossians,
Paul tells us that if we take it seriously, we are to act
that way. Here is what he says, so if you’re serious
about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act
like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides.
Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed
with the things right in front of you. Look up. Stand and
see, and be alert to what is going on around Christ. That
‘s where the action is. Seeing things from his
perspective and following his lead.
 If
we are perfectly honest with ourselves, we would confess
that we often build our lives on things and feelings
instead of God. And as a result, we develop a numbness
toward God and our spirit goes to sleep. God as a Father
awakens us and teaches us that we are to live our days in
Christ. Please pray with me: Father we’re done with
that old life. It is like a filthy set of ill-fitting
clothes you stripped off and put in the fire. We have
awakened and are dressed in a new wardrobe. Every item in
our way of life is custom made by you, the Creator, with
your label on it. All the old fashions are now obsolete.
Words like religious and irreligious, insider and
outsider, uncivilized and uncouth, slave and free, heavy
and scrawny mean nothing. From now on every one is
defined by Christ. We are all included. Father, we are
chosen by you for this new life of love, so dress us this
evening in the wardrobe you’ve picked out for us.
Compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength and
discipline. Let us be even tempered, content with second
place, quick to forgive an offense. Let us forgive as
quickly and completely as you have forgiven us.
Regardless of what else we put on, we will wear love, it
is our basic all purpose garment. May the love and peace
of Christ keep us in tune with each other. It is in the
power of your spirit we pray. Amen.
Testimony by Carolyn Slaughter
When I was, a little girl in third grade, my family moved
from our home in Illinois to Omaha, Nebraska. That meant
leaving behind our family, aunts and uncles and
grandparents were all left in Illinois and Indiana. That
meant that we took a lot of trips across the state of
Iowa. Now I’m told that Iowa is a pretty state. It
has sections of hills, rolling pastures and farm land.
Back then we didn’t have interstates we had two lane
highways winding through all of this beautiful scenery.
To tell you the truth the only thing that I remember
about Iowa is the gravel beside those winding roads as I
puked my guts out every half hour. I tried to overcome my
car sickness, I really worked at this and my parents
really encouraged me. I sat in the middle of the front
seat, I sat where my mom sat, I sat in the middle of the
back seat, I laid in the back seat, I ate before I left,
I didn’t eat before I left. Nothing worked until I
finally realized that the only time I didn’t feel
car sick was when I was asleep. So I taught myself to go
to sleep whenever I got into a car. Now most of you would
not want to ride with me today. Is this true? What I
realized was when I was asleep I didn’t experience
that dis-equilibrium where you start getting nauseated.
And I found my comfort zone. Every time my equilibrium
became unbalanced, every time I started to feel
discomfort I would slip into sleep. Looking back over my
life, I realize how very well I transferred this lesson
to other areas of my life. After a tough day at college
where I’d come from class facing exams, papers and
demanding professors I’d think, this is going to
look a whole lot better after a nap. Anytime, anyplace I
would try to zone out. The problem was that zoning out
never helped and things weren’t any better in the
morning. I would get up and everything would still be
there. So not only physically, but I used that
emotionally and spiritually as well. And without
realizing it, I was living a life of avoidance. I just
went on auto pilot and was not feeling or experiencing a
whole lot.
In
a relationship, that starts taking a toll. My marriage
went flat because every time we hit a challenge that we
needed to deal with head on I tended to withdraw and
avoid. I was afraid of not measuring up, of not being
good enough. Basically my perfectionism and my
performance orientation ended up having the exact
opposite effect than with most people. I just shut down.
I experienced years of slumber and loss. Now what does
God do with a slumbering child? He does what any good
parent would do when they think that their child has
slept enough, he gives them a wake-up call, says time to
wake up. I experienced two great awakenings, the first
was dealing with the whole issue of significance in my
life. My life was based on feelings of inadequacy and
inferiority. Jesus woke me up to the reality of who I am
in him. It didn’t matter what other people thought
of me and it didn’t matter how well I did things.
The important thing was that I mattered to him. I was the
precious person that he sacrificed himself for
personally, that I could have life. And that life was not
intended to be numb and void. That life was intended to
be full and overflowing and fulfilling. And I realized
that he had gifted me. In this church we talk a lot about
spiritual gifts and those are things that God gives each
one of us as believers in order to do ministry for him
and help advance his kingdom and to reach other people. I
never thought that he could use me, especially not the
way he uses Michael. For years I compared myself with my
husband and God hit me up side of the head and said why
do you think I created you different from him? You
don’t want to be a clone of him. You want to be who
I created you to be. And what I realized was that for all
of those years that I was asleep, I was squandering those
gifts that God had given me. He doesn’t want me to
be compared with anyone else. Just me. |
