Jesus Prom: Life Gets Fun When You Love People Like God Does

by Jon Weece

Overview

Jesus loves people. 

Wouldn't it make sense that those who claim to love Jesus would love the same people Jesus loves? 

Nouns need verbs, a requirement that's more than just a grammatical truth; it's a spiritual truth. The noun Christian and the noun church require action verbs to fulfill their purpose. That's why Jesus invites Christians and churches everywhere to perform the greatest action of all: loving people.

Jesus Prom is an extravagant party that celebrates the very people Jesus died to love. You will laugh and cry as you move through the pages of this book, and by the end of it, you'll want to join the dance.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781400206919
Publisher:	Nelson, Thomas, Inc.
Publication date:	10/28/2014
Sold by:	HarperCollins Publishing
Format:	eBook
Pages:	208
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Jon Weece is the lead teaching pastor at Southland Christian Church, a community of 14,000 Christ-followers in Lexington, Kentucky. He is the author of Jesus Prom. Prior to Southland, Jon was a missionary to Haiti for four years, where he met his wife, Alli. They have two children.

 

Read an Excerpt

Jesus Prom

Life Gets Fun When You Love People Like God Does

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By Jon Weece

Thomas Nelson

Copyright © 2014 Jon Weece
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4002-0691-9

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CHAPTER 1

love (v.)

It was a Saturday morning. When I lived in Haiti, that's when I went to the open-air market to buy my food for the week. I was standing in the middle of the street holding a bag filled with oranges, rice, and beans. And that was when I saw him. It was as though a page had been torn out of a National Geographic magazine, then framed for me to stare at.

His legs were disproportionate in size to the rest of his body, bent at angles unfamiliar to a healthy torso. His head was bowed in shame, but I could tell he was blind because his eyes never really fixed on any particular object. Rather, they danced from side to side and followed the noises around him. He was barely clothed, and his body was caked with dust and dirt. His hair was matted down from sweat, and flies took up residence on his skin.

His hands were outstretched. He was holding a small bowl. He was begging.

I watched as one person after another passed by him ... ignored him ... pretended he didn't exist. Then he pulled a small board from his bag and placed it in the sewage that ran beside the road. Blocking its flow, he did something I wish I could scrub from my memory. He placed his hands in the raw sewage and began to sift and search as if looking for something of value. While living in Haiti, I had watched a woman drink from a mud puddle and had caught two men eating garbage, but this was a new low.

My heart broke and scattered into pieces I will not recover this side of heaven.

I watched as he pulled out an old battery. He cleaned it off as if it were a rare artifact missing from a prestigious museum. He slid it under his leg like someone might come looking for it.

With tears streaming down my cheeks, I knelt down in front of him and took his dirty hands, placed them on my face, and in Kreyol said, "My name is Jon, and I want to be your friend."

That's all I could get out. I couldn't talk, but he could.

"Thank you," he whispered.

As much as he needed me, I needed him. Love is never independent. Love is always dependent. Someone always gives. Someone always receives.

"My parents broke my legs when I was a baby so that I could beg and bring in money for our family," he said. I filled his empty bag with my bagful of food. I filled his pocket with my pocketful of money. Love empties itself, because love emptied Himself.

Jesus asked a blind man named Bartimaeus, "What do you want Me to do for you?"

That's always the question love asks: What can I do for you?

* * *

I have a friend named Donnie. When Donnie was six years old, he watched his dad beat up his mom. The trauma of that episode locked Donnie into a permanent state of childlikeness. Though he is fifty-two years of age today, Donnie thinks and acts and communicates like a six-yearold. Donnie loves me, and I love Donnie. He has taught me a lot about love.

Donnie washed dishes at a local restaurant for two decades. Each Friday he would cash his paycheck, and each Saturday he would ride his bike from one garage sale to the next buying albums and paper novels and costume jewelry. Donnie has a Christmas gift list with 385 people on it. Donnie loves people, and people love Donnie—so much so that he spends his entire year Christmas shopping for all the people he loves.

One of my prized possessions is a ring that looks as if it came from a gumball machine. Maybe it did. I don't really care where it came from because I know who it came from. I know it came from Donnie. I know it came from Donnie's heart.

Donnie understands Christmas better than most people do. Donnie couldn't tell you where Jesus came from. But Donnie does know who sent Jesus. And Donnie knows why the Father sent Jesus: love.

Donnie doesn't know a stranger. When he meets people for the first time, he hugs them. And he doesn't let go! When Donnie hugs people, he holds on! And it doesn't matter who you are; once Donnie learns your name, your name finds its way onto his Christmas list. From the mayor of our city to the homeless men in Phoenix Park, Donnie knows a lot of people by name.

Donnie looks a lot like love.

Love holds on.

Love gives.

Love knows.

Donnie is on a fixed income. But God isn't. He never runs out of anything.

The Bible teaches that God is love, which means He never runs out of it. No matter how great the demand for love is, God is never in short supply. And what I love about God is He doesn't love things the way people love things. God loves people.

More specifically, God loves you.

He wants to hold you, give to you, and know you. And He wants you to do the same for others. John wrote, "Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love" (1 John 4:8). John referred to himself as "the disciple whom Jesus loved" (John 21:20).

How do you refer to yourself?

If you don't feel loved, it's not because you aren't loved.

One of the ways to get love is to give love.

Most Tuesdays I stand on a corner in the downtown district of my hometown with a sign that says Free Hugs. I've done it for more than a decade now. One man looked at my sign for a while, shrugged his shoulders in a disappointed tone, and said, "I thought it said Free Hogs!" Only in Kentucky would someone be sad that I wasn't giving away free farm animals!

My favorite street corner is across the street from the courthouse. As part of sentencing, a local judge sends those he convicts to me. And as part of their punishment, they have to hug me. I get a lot of side-hugs from the men.

One lady rode up on a bike not too long ago and said, "What does your sign say?" She couldn't read. So I told her what it said. She cocked her head to the side and took another drag from the cigarette she was smoking. Then she squinted and said, "Are you for real?"

"Come a little closer and find out," I said.

So she got off her bike, and I went in for the kill. When I tried to pull away from her, she pulled me in tighter. She buried her head in my chest and said, "Nobody's hugged me in a long time."

When nobody hugs you, you begin to feel like a nobody.

Nobody is a nobody to God. Everybody is a somebody to God.

One of the ways we experience His love for us is by giving His love to others. And there's no way to give love away without getting closer. God doesn't try to love us at a distance. God came down, and love came with Him. And God doesn't stiff-arm anyone who needs to be loved.

God doesn't give side-hugs.

One weekend after preaching, I went into the bathroom at one of our campuses. As I was standing there, I felt two arms wrap themselves around me from behind. Someone was hugging me while I was going to the bathroom.

A man is defenseless in that position. And speechless. There is an unwritten code of conduct in a men's bathroom. you look straight ahead, and you don't talk to the man next to you. you can talk once you get to the sink or on your way out the door, but not at the toilet. It's all business there. For women, a trip to the bathroom is a social function. Women share fashion tips and parenting ideas in the bathroom. (Or so I've heard.)

Someone wanted to share a hug with me ... in the bathroom ... from behind. Then I heard the voice.

"I love you, Jon."

As if the hug from behind wasn't awkward enough, now I had a grown man telling me he loved me. Every other grown man in the bathroom laughed out loud—though not in a mean way.

"I love you too, Tim," I said.

Tim is one of the many people in our church with special needs. Every Sunday our conversation is the same. After he tells me he loves me and after I tell him I love him, Tim says, "you look nice today."

"you look nice too," I say back.

Tim then says, "you're my preacher."

And I say, "And you're my friend."

Then he smiles from ear to ear and gives me a huge hug. But this time, the hug came first.

Is there a sequence to love? The Bible says there is: "We love because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19). God loves us. And because of His love for us, we are then able to love Him and others in return.

God initiates. We reciprocate. That's the sequence.

I believe the answer to all the world's problems is love. Some have called me naïve for believing that, but I've been called worse things. My problem is, I can't think of a problem that can't be solved by love.

I can't think of a problem Love can't solve.

Bartimaeus was blind. Most people would say blindness is a physical problem. Or, blindness is a medical problem.

I agree.

But like all other problems, blindness creates other problems too. No problem is an island to itself. When Bartimaeus asked Jesus for help, the crowd told him to be quiet. That's a problem. What gave the crowd the right to tell a man in need to be quiet? If Jesus could solve Bartimaeus's problem, why didn't the crowd want Bartimaeus to get the help he needed? The selfishness of the crowd was a bigger problem than the blindness of Bartimaeus.

Selfishness is the opposite of love. Love is selfless.

My problem is, I'm not. I'm not selfless. I'm selfish. I can say it's my problem, but I know how selfishness works. My selfishness doesn't just affect me. My selfishness affects others. It can't be contained. Selfishness is toxic to my heart. If I try to bury it, if I try to hide it, it always leaks—and it always poisons my relationships.

My selfishness hurts others, and it hurts me. But when I am selfless, it helps others and it helps me.

I can never love people too much. My wife. My kids. My friends. My coworkers. I haven't met a person who needs to be loved less. I have met people who need to be loved differently. What some people receive as love, and perceive to be love, is not love. But what echoes in the chambers of my heart is, "Love never fails" (1 Cor. 13:8).

Love never fails?

Ever.

That's why Jesus said, "Love your enemies" (Matt. 5:44). When we love our enemies, they become our friends. Just like love, everyone needs more friends.

I had a woman tell me one time, "you preach too much about love." I didn't know that was possible. So I thanked her for letting me know. But she wasn't done!

"You need to preach about deeper things," she said in a demanding tone. I didn't know there was anything deeper than God's love. I've been exploring God's love for years, and I've yet to get to the bottom of it.

My friend Gary started mentoring an at-risk boy in a local elementary school. The first time Gary met the boy, the boy said, "I want to stab you."

"I want to love you," Gary said.

No one had probably ever said that to that boy.

Years later, they were walking down a hallway together and the boy said, "I want to hold your hand."

From "I want to stab you" to "I want to hold your hand." From knife-in-hand to hand-in-hand.

Love never fails. Ever.

Jesus didn't listen to the crowd. Jesus listened to Bartimaeus. Jesus helped Bartimaeus because Jesus loved Bartimaeus, and He cared for Bartimaeus by asking Bartimaeus what he needed.

Love asks. Love never assumes. One of the best questions we can ask people is, how can I love you? Too often we assume we know how people need to be loved or want to be loved.

One day, I picked up a hitchhiker who was barefoot. After buying him some shoes, I told him he could borrow my car anytime he needed it. He laughed. "I like walking," he said.

I had assumed he needed a car.

"But I do need to see a doctor," he added. I couldn't tell from looking, but his back hurt. So I called a friend of mine who is a doctor, and he was able to help him.

Don't assume. Ask.

I was driving down one of the busiest roads in Lexington when I saw an older woman seated on a bench near a bus stop. Because it was raining and because I had an appointment to make, I didn't stop. As I drove past her, the Spirit reminded me that Jesus put His life on hold to give life to people like me. So I turned around, drove back to the bus stop, and got out of my car. As I walked toward her, she got a scared look on her face and put her foot up as if I was going to tackle her.

Seeing she was terrified, I gently said, "Can I give you a ride somewhere?"

"No thanks," she said.

So I asked, "What can I do for you?"

"I'm hungry and I need to get my prescriptions filled," she said as she looked down through fogged-up glasses. Across the street were a pharmacy and a fast-food restaurant. It's not always that easy. But that day it was easy. She was easy to love, even if she didn't receive love with ease.

The more I love people, the more I fall in love with God. The more I fall in love with God, the more I love people.

Bartimaeus got more than his sight from Jesus. Bartimaeus got a friend in Jesus. Bartimaeus learned what love looks like. Bartimaeus stared Love in the face.

What a face to see ...

* * *

Several years after watching the Haitian man pull the battery and pennies from a sewer, I saw him again. I was cleaning up a beach with some of our students when I heard a familiar sound in the distance. As the noise drew closer, a young man walked around the corner with a rope tied to his waist. He was pulling a makeshift wheelchair. Seated in the wheelchair was the man I had encountered on the side of the road years earlier.

He had taken a piece of PVC pipe and fashioned a flute from it, and he was playing the children's song "Jesus Loves Me." I set my shovel down.

I gave some money to the young man who was leading him, and he whispered something to the old man. I knelt down beside his chair, and he smiled and said to me, "Can I pray for you?"

"Please do," I eagerly said.

He removed his straw hat, raised his eyes to heaven, and said, "Father, help my brother to see you the way that I see you."

Sometimes we don't need our sight to see Jesus. Sometimes we see Jesus in the faces of those who have been loved by Him and those who love like Him.

CHAPTER 2

be (v.)

One evening after work, I turned onto our street. As I was driving toward the cul-de-sac where our house sits, I saw a little boy—maybe five years of age—throw open his front door and burst out. It was the dead of winter, and all he was wearing were his Superman Underoos and a bath-towel-turned-cape tied around his neck. He ran parallel to me on the sidewalk, and as I glanced out the passenger-side window, he locked eyes with me and smiled. (Did I mention that his mom was chasing him with a wooden spoon yelling, "Stop! Stop!"?)

It was like a Norman Rockwell painting set in motion.

The grin on his face said, Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty I'm free at last!

Later in the spring I saw him buried in a mud puddle up to his neck. My kind of boy! A few weeks later I watched him jump his bike off a massive pile of dirt, still wearing nothing but his Underoos, an oversize motorcycle helmet, and a pair of winter gloves. It was like watching Evel Knievel jump the fountains at Caesar's Palace again.

"I have to meet this kid!" I told my wife, Allison.

The very next night, I was at the neighborhood park with my two children when I saw him. He was swinging on the swings as high as they could possibly carry him. And as I walked toward him, he jumped at the height of the upswing—arms flailing, legs kicking. All I heard was "Geronimo!" He hit the ground like a stuntman, rolled through the mulch, and jumped to his feet.

"Son, what is your name?" I asked.

He put his hands on his hips and with a superhero's pose, he said, "My name is Christian."

I nodded my head and said, "Oh, how fitting."

At the heart of being a Christian is being a child. As adults we've become a culture of human doings, when we were designed to live as human beings. And when we deny our design, we run the risk of destroying our design. The verb to be is a verb that flows from the blueprints of our Designer.

God was.

God is.

And God will always ... be.

And God has invited you to be His child.

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be [v.] called children of God. And that is what we are!" (1 John 3:1).

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Jesus Prom by Jon Weece. Copyright © 2014 Jon Weece. Excerpted by permission of Thomas Nelson.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

Contents

foreword By BOB GOFF, xi,
start (v.) here (adv.), xv,
PART ONE: Christian—the person (n.) who loves (v.) people, 1,
ONE: love (v.), 3,
TWO: be (v.), 15,
THREE: see (v.), 27,
FOUR: die (v.), 41,
FIVE: talk (v.), 51,
SIx: rest (v.), 67,
SEVEN: turn (v.), 77,
PART TWO: church—the people (n.) who love (v.) people, 89,
EIGHT: dance (v.), 91,
NINE: give (v.), 103,
TEN: go (v.), 117,
ELEVEN: suffer (v.), 131,
TWELVE: remember (v.), 145,
THIRTEEN: receive (v.), 155,
FOURTEEN: verbatim (adv.), 167,
EPILOGUE: add-verbs, 173,
acknowledgments, 175,
about the author, 179,