I was taught this Bible Story when I was a little guy in Sunday School. I always believed this parable was about investing and utilizing whatever gifts God gave us for His purposes. If God blessed you with money, give. If God blessed you with musical ability, play and minister. If God blessed you with ability to fix cars, fix them for the needy. Etc. Etc.

Dude, that’s not at all what this story is about! I think my Sunday School teacher was a bit off…

The parable of the talents is SURROUNDED with teaching and parables about the END TIMES and the Judgment of God, starting in Chapter 24. This parable must be read within the context of eschatology (the study of the end times). We can’t overlook how this parable ends, speaking of the servant who did nothing, “And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

Whoa. Dude. Like, serious. Am I the only one who has missed the true meaning of this parable until now?

I’m quoting my NIV Study Bible because it says it best, “Being ready for Christ’s [second] coming involves more than playing it safe and doing little or nothing. It demands the kind of service that produces results.”

Christians, don’t just play it safe and do little. Only those who live whole-hearted for Christ are worthy to be called disciples (Luke 14:27). From what I can tell of the scriptures, everyone else will spend eternity in hell. “We are saved by faith alone, but faith that saves is never alone.”

Just imagine, if you get several hundred worship leaders in a room and want to lead them in worship — you can expect the worship leaders are TOP NOTCH (although they wouldn’t need to be - I mean the worship leaders should be okay with a vocalist and a kazoo… if you’re too big to be led you’re too small to lead). They have a few worship leaders here that I’ve never heard of - Joel Auge (from Canada) and Mia Fieldes (from Hillsong). There was also the guys at Lakeview Church in Indy (Eric Cooper and Nathan LaGrange), and Ross Parsley and Jared Anderson from New Life Church in Colorado Springs. All of their ministries were top notch. Mia Fildes blew my socks off; her voice is spectacular. If you’re in my worship team you can expect to see some chord charts with her name at the top.

This is a worship conference by Integrity Media. Integrity is unique because they have.. integrity. They’re the only Chrisitan music supplier that’s not owned by a secular company. I’ve been told by several people that they aren’t out to “sell me stuff,” they want to “resource me.” That’s exactly how I’ve seen it as well. Another thing that sets them apart is that they don’t generate new worship “artists.” They aren’t a label that looks for the greatest band … they’re a label that searches for churches that have got “it” going on, and then network with them. I just love Integrity. (Attention Integrity Staff: if you send me free stuff, I’d be happy to write more blogs about how great you are… HA!!)

I’ve been greatly challenged at this conference. When I came down here I was more-or-less “vision-less.” I searched and prayed, but I couldn’t see where the worship in my church was going anymore. I seemed to have ran out of this leadership fuel about 2 weeks ago. But like I said, I’ve been greatly challenged.

I’ve been thinking about a lot of different things regarding worship at New Hope. Some of them weird and diverse. I’ve got so much to think and pray about.

Give me that old time religion. <br>Give me that old time religion. <br>Give me that old time religion. <br>It’s good enough for me.

What kind of song is that? I sang it repeatedly when I was younger, but now I’m thinking about it and I can’t help but laugh out loud. If you love this song I am truly sorry, but lyrically this does not have good implications. (It’s quite possible that this song meant something completely different 40 years ago and had very DIFFERENT implications than what I will be discussing in this blog. But as everything else, this is how I see it.)

On a positive note, it’s truly important that we look at the roots of our faith. God gave instructions in the old testament for His people to look back and remember the paths that brought them to where they were. That’s still important today; no question.

But this song seems different - almost defiant. It’s almost like it could be said, “My grandfather’s expression of faith was right. Yours is wrong.” Or worse yet, “I want a religion that’s so deeply rooted in old time history that I will stay negligent to the lost world or even bother to look around and notice that my religion is no longer effective.” Wanting “old religion”can only imply that you are rejecting any new expressions.

Any song that supports the widespread belief of the world that Christianity is irrelevant is a horrendous abomination.

In case you were wondering, my random rant of this song has absolutely nothing to do with anything anyone has said or done recently. I was just brainstorming “old songs” from my childhood and I thought of this one, and then realized how unbiblical it could be taken.

We need to be cautious of the songs we sing in our churches. Choosing songs based solely on the beat or musical construction is simply a horrible idea. People are singing and experiencing their theology during a music worship service — that’s no small priority.

I’m sick of people assuming I’m Republican simply because I’m a Christian. Granted, I tend to agree more with the Republican platform but being a Christian is not the reason.

I’m sick of people assuming I hate Liberals simply because I’m a Christian. No joke - I went up to a family at a restaurant a few weeks ago because the entire family looked really familiar, I thought I graduated high school with one of the children. They asked me where I worked and when I identified myself as a Pastor the father laughed and said, “What? Do we look like a left winged Liberals?” That’s just ridiculous.

I’m sick of the reality of what Bill Maher is referring to in his movie “Religolus” … “Religious people don’t know about Religion. … None of them could even name the Ten Commandments.” I’m quite disappointed that there weren’t people to legitimately answer Bill’s questions; its quite obvious that he still has no clue what Christianity is actually about. But evidently neither do most Christians.

Control - Refusing to make room for the Spirit’s manifestations and activity. There’s nothing wrong with planning for a smooth church service, but we should be careful not the plan the Holy Spirit right out the door.

Exhibitionism - This is a lot like “control” but with a different motivation. This is when we add to the Spirit’s manifestations and draw attention to ourselves.

Neglecting the Word - This is neglecting to test all things by biblical standards. Some “trust” the Spirit’s leadership in a non-biblical way by trusting Him to uphold the Standard of the Word in our midst. 

Prayerlessness - Some “trust” the sovereignty of God in a non-biblical way by “trusting” God in their prayerlessness to do the part that He has assigned to US (prayer!). This is not trusting God, but rather it is presumption. Some people totally screw up the truth when they think if God wants to do something, He’ll just do it. But God has given us a dynamic role in determining things with our prayer and fasting. Take the farmer for example, God provides the sunshine and rain … but the farmer has to plant and pull weeds. Don’t expect the Holy Spirit to move if you’re not praying. 

Despising - We must not despise the times when God’s power is released in small measure. We walk in the tension of being grateful and faithful in the days of small things while continuing to be desperate to seek God for the full measure. We continue to pray for the fullness of revival because we see what we lack. However, we operate in faith by seeing what we have in God now.

Laziness - Some refuse the work and effort that required to regularly pray for people in need. It’s not easy, dude. 

Compromise - You can’t grieve the Holy Spirit and flow in the Holy Spirit at the same time. We should seek to fully obey God by living out the Sermon on the Mount. We must seek to live without compromise by declaring war on all known sin in our lives. Prayer and fasting are never a substitute or lack of obedience. The pursuit of full obedience is different than attaining it. There are powerful dynamics that occur in our heart when we aim at pursuing 100% obedience. Sesame Street taught me to always compromise. That’s fine if all that’s at stake is 5 minutes with a Tonka Truck, but a compromise in your spiritual life is a bummer. “You never win when you compromise.”

Just now I caught myself saying, “When God sends a great spiritual awakening . . .” and I had absolute confidence, NO DOUBT IN MY MIND, that it would happen very soon.

It’s later than its ever been. We’re closer than we’ve ever been before.

“I don’t have time to eat a meal — that’s time wasted.”

“I’ve needed to use the bathroom for 2 hours, but I can finish these three other things before I take that break. Urinating wouldn’t be the most productive use of my time - it’d be time wasted.”

“24 hours in a day - I’ll spend 8 at my office and 10 working at home. I can relax with the remaining 6 hours.”

Obviously with this pattern, it would be easy for me to have this “wasted time” mentality when it comes to my God time as well. But that’s the worst thing I could do. In the stressful times is when I need the God time the MOST.

So last Friday night God was dealing with me about this, and I just came to the conclusion that if my “God time” was wasted time, then I want to get wasted. I want to absolutely ruin and waste my life if that’s the case. All the stuff that’s “me” can be ruined and wasted if it means being closer to Jesus. I love Jesus.

Immediately after that moment, I started shouting out my prayer and promise to God. Then I began spontaneously singing it to a melody that I had actually written 8 months ago.

I want to be wasting my life seeking You. I won’t let anybody get in my way of reaching You. I want to be wasting my life finding You. And I won’t let the devil get my focus away from You.

It took me several hours figuring out how to use my new recording equipment, but I used this song to experiment with the features. I’m posting the whole deal… including a long and snazzy hip-hop keyboard solo and some very out-of-tune background vocals (sorry…). There’s some rough spots, but give me a break its the first thing I’ve ever done on my new equipment. Give it a listen, click here.

Lyrics and Recording are copyright Adam Diehl 2008…. YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST!

This past week I spent on vacation in Kansas City where I spent time at the International House of Prayer. This is a prayer meeting that started in September 1999 and has never stopped - 24/7. We’re talking over a hundred people praying all the time - even in the middle of the night. It was an incredible experience. The first day I arrived in the evening so I just spent a short hour and a half with God at the IHOP before I was tired and needed to sleep. The second day I was there for 3 - 4 hours. By the end of my trip I was so hungry to just be with God that I would stay at the IHOP prayer room for 14 hours straight. There was nothing that I wanted to do besides be with God. The more I was with God, the more I had a hunger for Him. I learned that you never really “finish” at the IHOP, you just “leave.”

Before my vacation, I would often spend my evenings doing more work (or at the very least planning for the upcoming days). Now that my vacation is over, my brain is trying to get back into my typical work patterns - I keep trying to think of another project I can work on, but I’m constantly distracted by God.

That’s right - I’m distracted by God. I guess you could say that God is bugging me right now. My brain wants to “get stuff done,” but my Spirit is so excited to spend more time with God. I need my brain to understand that spending time with God is the most important thing in the world.

Often we consider prayer the boring thing every Christian must endure. That’s not at all the paradigm of prayer (and worship) that David shared in Psalm 16, “You have made known to me the path of life; You will fill me with joy in Your presence, with eternal pleasures at Your right hand.” (Emphasis mine).

Eternal PLEASURES? Yea… pleasure.

I like pleasure. I’m going to go get me some.

It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter.

I love this verse; I can’t think of a better sentence to describe our relationship with God. The contrast is totally killer. God likes to hide from us, he actually HIDES. He doesn’t hide so hard we can’t find him, but he hides enough that we have to search for him.

Gosh, I’m such an idiot sometimes. If I need guidance or direction from the Holy Spirit I will ask him for help, and then immediately crowd my life so full of distraction (usually more work) that I wouldn’t be able to hear God if he was standing in front of me with a bullhorn. I ask God for help, but I don’t listen for His voice and I immediately start worrying about it. It’s like I expect God to physically slap me on the back of the head and say, “ADAM, I WANT YOU TO …”

That’s such a disappointment! It’s God’s glory to hide. But its our glory to search for Him.