Dayspring Crazy Love Blog

Chapter 3 "Crazy Love"

2011-10-28T14:40:00.000-07:00

Do you remember when you "got it"? I mean, do your remember the first time you felt his overwhelming love, mercy, and grace like you never have before?

I remember when I first accepted Christ at a Phil Keaggy concert in Costa Mesa, California, and Calvary Costa Mesa. I remember the Emcee was this guy with long hair, flip-flops, and some sort of Hawaiian/Surfer shirt and his name was Randy. If anyone knows me, you know that I am terrible with names, but I can still remember this guy’s name. I grew up in a Catholic Church where I was taught to fear God and my only forgiveness was when I went to confession and confessed my sins to a priest. To be honest, I remember practicing what I was going to say when I went in there and I used to guess on how many Hail Mary’s or Our Father’s or Act of Confessions he was going to give me as my penance. Not only did I fear what the priest was going to say or what he was going to assign, I feared what God was going to do to me since I was never completely honest in the confessional. I did not understand that He was going to love me no matter what I said, did, or was going to do. I just knew I had to complete the penance to keep in the good Graces of God.

So when Phil Keaggy and Randy shared how much God loves me, I could not completely understand. I was confused because of what I was taught and how can God love a child that did not ask for forgiveness concerning many things in my life. I remember giving my heart to God, but I still had reservations on how this could all be true.

I said the right words and listened to the right people and music for years, but I can still remember the first time I “got it”. It was at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburgh, FL. I was on the main floor sitting on the right side of the main row of chairs. I got it and I truly desired to keep it, so much I went home and told my wife about it. We were moving to a new city and we prayed diligently that God would put people, specifically men, in my life to help me keep it, understand it, and share it with others. God is a faithful God and prepared a place for me and family so that he could cultivate a confused life like mine.

Where were you?

After Reading Chapter 1, has your walk or prayer time been different?

2011-10-17T10:08:00.000-07:00

Francis challenges us to seek God and all his wonder before we read his book or even pray our next prayer. He is trying to get us to realize who we are addressing and acknowledge He is the premier God that has created everything. Are you able to do that? If your prayer life has not changed, how would you like it to be different?

On page 26, Francis writes: "I sometimes struggle with how to properly respond to God’s magnitude

in a world bent on ignoring or merely tolerating Him. But know this: God will not be tolerated. He instructs us to worship and fear Him."

Do you struggle with this? Is it hard for you to worship God, but yet fear Him? The definition of worship is, "To honor and love as a deity." How is it we can have fear for something we honor and love?

Welcome to the Dayspring Blog for the Crazy Love Book Study

2011-10-17T08:31:00.000-07:00

All,

Let's take advantage of this blog I set up specifically for this study. Feel free to post, respond, and discuss any subject we come across in the book. I will try to get in touch with Francis Chan and invite him to the blog and maybe get some comments from him. He is a very busy guy and probably get invites from his friends, family, and readers of his book, so I am not confident he will have time.

If you have any questions, comments, or simply just want to share how something from the book touched you, please feel free.

Thanks,

Richard Jackson