Is life an adventure? Does G-d write boring stories?

[Andrew77]

So a week ago, I was listening to a sermon in which the pastor was talking about how every person has a story, an adventure to live.

He then went on to say something that I have a really hard time believing. I don't see where this is in the Bible, so maybe this was just his opinion.

His statement was "G-d never writes a boring story".

I'm over 40 now. I can't think of any better word to describe my life, than 'boring'. And maybe I'm missing it, but that seems the defacto reality of everyone. We all get up, go to work, come home, and go to bed.

When I talk to other people, I don't get a sense of 'adventure', I don't get a feeling of an 'exciting story'.

What else do you do in this world? You get up at a crazy time in the morning, to go to some place you don't really want to go, to do work you don't really want to do, then you go home exhausted, and go to bed.

Now I'm speaking generally. This isn't universal of course. My parent for example, at least loved their jobs. Both were public school teachers.

But even then, they got up early in the morning, went to work, came home, had dinner and went to bed.

I'm not seeing this 'adventure'.

So you tell me. Is everyone having an exciting story? Is everyone's life an adventure? Am I just the lucky guy that has the 'boring story'?

 

[childeye 2]

So a week ago, I was listening to a sermon in which the pastor was talking about how every person has a story, an adventure to live.

He then went on to say something that I have a really hard time believing. I don't see where this is in the Bible, so maybe this was just his opinion.

His statement was "G-d never writes a boring story".

I'm over 40 now. I can't think of any better word to describe my life, than 'boring'. And maybe I'm missing it, but that seems the defacto reality of everyone. We all get up, go to work, come home, and go to bed.

When I talk to other people, I don't get a sense of 'adventure', I don't get a feeling of an 'exciting story'.

What else do you do in this world? You get up at a crazy time in the morning, to go to some place you don't really want to go, to do work you don't really want to do, then you go home exhausted, and go to bed.

Now I'm speaking generally. This isn't universal of course. My parent for example, at least loved their jobs. Both were public school teachers.

But even then, they got up early in the morning, went to work, came home, had dinner and went to bed.

I'm not seeing this 'adventure'.

So you tell me. Is everyone having an exciting story? Is everyone's life an adventure? Am I just the lucky guy that has the 'boring story'?

Well, concerning the man and according to scripture, God said cursed was the ground for your sake, in sorrow you shall eat of it all the days of your life. So I'm not seeing where life is an adventure either except in that tribulation builds character. Anyway this is partly why my hope is in the kingdom of God.

 

[thecolorsblend]

Adventure? Excitement? A Jedi... um, a Christian craves not these things.

 

[Andrew77]

Adventure? Excitement? A Jedi... um, a Christian craves not these things.

So anyone that doesn't like a boring life, must not be a Christian?

 

[mama2one]

Andrew77
from one of your posts:
"I trust G-d. If I thought he'd make my life miserable, why would I do that?"


your life is not miserable, correct?

 

[mama2one]

we can see, hear, taste, touch, smell

last night child and I were amazed at the huge moon
when I'm out w/o family and see a rainbow or beautiful sunset, I call home and say go outside
we've taken pics of the raccoon that lives in the hollow of a tree behind us
happy to see the formerly pregnant mom carrying her newborn while picking up her child at school
the fish at the fish fry last week was delicious
hearing the birds sing after winter was pretty cool
we've gone in middle of night to look at meteor showers
we threw snowballs this wtr and walked in the rain
went to a short film festival recently and laughed

if one appreciates/thankful for daily experiences with the senses God gave us, everyday can be an adventure

 

[Andrew77]

we can see, hear, taste, touch, smell

last night child and I were amazed at the huge moon
when I'm out w/o family and see a rainbow or beautiful sunset, I call home and say go outside
we've taken pics of the raccoon that lives in the hollow of a tree behind us
was happy to see the pregnant mom at school carrying her newborn while picking up her child at school
the fish at the fish fry last week was delicious
hearing the birds sing after winter was pretty cool
we've gone in middle of night to look at meteor showers

if one appreciates/thankful for daily experiences with the senses God gave us, everyday can be an adventure

yeah, can't really relate to any of that. I'm not sure what daily experience I ever have, would even compare to what you listed.

Nevertheless, I recognize that if this all that you desire to have an interesting life, then I guess your story is not boring. And that is all you need, isn't it?

 

[Andrew77]

Andrew77
from one of your posts:
"I trust G-d. If I thought he'd make my life miserable, why would I do that?"

your life is not miserable, correct?

No my life is not miserable. It is not. But it is most certainly boring. Given the option, I would choose to not live it. That isn't an option.

But you are correct. It is not miserable. I have food. I have a place to live. Is that all that life is? Then I have achieved everything in life.

When I say the above statement you quote, I do in fact believe that. It is a matter of perspective. The Coptic Christians of Egypt were beheaded by ISIS. The Chinese Christians are tossed into communist prisons for decades.

Compared to that, by what measure can I say my life is miserable? Of course not.

Nevertheless, I am not sure that merely not being miserable, makes life worth living. Perhaps it does, and that is in fact why I am still living it.

Am I wrong?

 

[Anthony2019]

This past year alone has been quite an adventure:-
1) went with friends to a Center Parcs resort for a week, went on a fun (but scary!) water flume ride, had a go at segway and a pottery class
2) went on a retreat to a Fransiscan Order which then led me onto joining a new local church where I have had great fellowship and feel I've been able to serve in new ways
3) I do CPR as part of my job. I had a situation where I had to do it on a friend and he recovered.
4) I've met new friends around the country and around the world through social media. This would have been very difficult a couple of decades ago before the widespread use of the internet.
5) Also through the internet, I've managed to uncover some of my family history.
6) Went to see the World of Hans Zimmer in Birmingham last night in a huge packed concert hall - amazing orchestra and performance.
Life - boring? Not for me anyway!

 

[Carl Emerson]

Andrew,

The Jesus I have met is beyond words in His compassion, Creativity, Wisdom, so the centre of my life is filled with awe of Him. Read the thread -htttps://www.christianforums.com/threads/jesuss-ministry.8074191/
to get a taste of my life.
Sure there have been desperately difficult times but these are essential for growth.
I fell in love with Jesus at a young age and wanted nothing more than to be like Him and do what He did.
I have made it my life's priority to do just this.
As a result of this I have enjoyed extraordinary experiences as He has worked along side me and touched folk through prayer.
This is the way He means it to be - walking with Him as in Acts is full of Drama and excitement and trails and suffering as He promised.
Satan wants us to be closed down and in-effective.
If you press in to Jesus - signal through fasting that you mean business - surrender completely to His plans - immerse yourself in prayer - seek Him to light a fire in the centre of your life.
Unless you kinda feel comfortable with where you are at?
There is another life waiting.

Blessings,

Carl Emerson.

 

[Andrew77]

Andrew,

The Jesus I have met is beyond words in His compassion, Creativity, Wisdom, so the centre of my life is filled with awe of Him. Read the thread -htttps://www.christianforums.com/threads/jesuss-ministry.8074191/
to get a taste of my life.
Sure there have been desperately difficult times but these are essential for growth.
I fell in love with Jesus at a young age and wanted nothing more than to be like Him and do what He did.
I have made it my life's priority to do just this.
As a result of this I have enjoyed extraordinary experiences as He has worked along side me and touched folk through prayer.
This is the way He means it to be - walking with Him as in Acts is full of Drama and excitement and trails and suffering as He promised.
Satan wants us to be closed down and in-effective.
If you press in to Jesus - signal through fasting that you mean business - surrender completely to His plans - immerse yourself in prayer - seek Him to light a fire in the centre of your life.
Unless you kinda feel comfortable with where you are at?
There is another life waiting.

Blessings,

Carl Emerson.

Nice story sir. Very interesting read. Clearly blessed by G-d.

Couple of things you said I found curious. You referred to the Book of Acts, full of drama and excitement. You think that all Christians have lives the reflect the book of Acts? In fact, do you believe that the people of Jesus day, who were alive when the Apostle Paul was preaching, were all living lives like Paul?

Were all Christians driving demons out of fortune teller girls, and striking people with blindness? Or just the select few mentioned in the Bible?

You said...

If you press in to Jesus - signal through fasting that you mean business - immerse yourself in prayer - seek Him to light a fire in the centre of your life.​

None of that has any meaning to me. Press in to Jesus.... what does that mean? I have no concept of what that means. Signal that you mean business? What does that mean? I've been meaning business for as long as I've been a born again Christian. Immerse yourself in prayer? I have no idea what you are saying. Is not prayer, prayer? My mother recently had surgery on her eye. I prayed about it. A co-worker had some problems, and I prayed about it. I don't have any idea what the meaning of those statements are. BTW, he answered all of those prayers.

You said....

surrender completely to His plans
​

Yes. Of course. That's why I am where I am. I gave up trying to improve my life, because none of those plans were working and clearly G-d was not with them. So I gave up, and just surrendered to his plans. That is how I got to where I am.

 

[mama2one]

@Andrew77
here's advice that you gave back in nov:

"If you want more in life than what you have, pray that G-d can lead you to something more.
I'm pretty content with my life, and it is no more than what you describe. So some people can be happy where they are. But if you are not, then pray for that something more. G-d isn't trying to smash you. Just ask G-d for some direction, and then start walking. Find something to walk towards. If it is good for you, he will help you do it. If not, walk towards something else. But start walking towards something."


YOUR advice is good, so take it and start walking towards something.

 

[Carl Emerson]

Nice story sir. Very interesting read. Clearly blessed by G-d.

Couple of things you said I found curious. You referred to the Book of Acts, full of drama and excitement. You think that all Christians have lives the reflect the book of Acts? In fact, do you believe that the people of Jesus day, who were alive when the Apostle Paul was preaching, were all living lives like Paul?

Were all Christians driving demons out of fortune teller girls, and striking people with blindness? Or just the select few mentioned in the Bible?

You said...

If you press in to Jesus - signal through fasting that you mean business - immerse yourself in prayer - seek Him to light a fire in the centre of your life.​

None of that has any meaning to me. Press in to Jesus.... what does that mean? I have no concept of what that means. Signal that you mean business? What does that mean? I've been meaning business for as long as I've been a born again Christian. Immerse yourself in prayer? I have no idea what you are saying. Is not prayer, prayer? My mother recently had surgery on her eye. I prayed about it. A co-worker had some problems, and I prayed about it. I don't have any idea what the meaning of those statements are. BTW, he answered all of those prayers.

You said....

surrender completely to His plans
​

Yes. Of course. That's why I am where I am. I gave up trying to improve my life, because none of those plans were working and clearly G-d was not with them. So I gave up, and just surrendered to his plans. That is how I got to where I am.

Excellent questions...

Regarding what we read in Acts - first off what we read of Paul happened over many years so the outstanding miracles were not constantly occurring. I do believe however that reading the first 5 chapters of Acts it is clear that what we accept as 'normal' Christianity today, is light years away from how these early believers walked with Jesus. There was a strong community and many meetings were home based. Mark said " Jesus appeared to the Eleven as they were eating; he rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen.
He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

OK this is what Jesus said his followers would do. This is a far cry from what is considered normal now, yet His word remains true for all time.

I don't believe however that all individual believers do all these things, rather He was referring to them collectively as a body of believers with different gifts.

It remains however that most sermons today leave out large portions of the first 5 chapters of Acts as they are an embarrassment... Mostly we are light years from this mode of living and sadly will only return there under persecution.

For those who do desire this life of faith, however, the door is still wide open and the life although not easy is available just as He said. Note that this ministry was not just for apostles but for all believers.

Press into Jesus - language is a bit limiting but I mean determine with all your heart to make Him top priority in your life. Set time aside for Him, He waits for you to sit with Him every day.

Signal that you mean business - Fasting is a sure way of letting Him know that you are for real... You are by this means choosing the spirit over the flesh. Ask for a deeper apatite for Him.

Immerse yourself in prayer - seek out mature believers and share your intent to be deeper with Jesus and ask them to pray for and with you. The more prayer you get the better as it will accelerate your journey.

Forgive me if I have struggled to express some of these issues accurately - it is much easier face to face and kneel together with Him.

Blessings,

Carl Emerson.

 

[eleos1954]

No my life is not miserable. It is not. But it is most certainly boring. Given the option, I would choose to not live it. That isn't an option.

But you are correct. It is not miserable. I have food. I have a place to live. Is that all that life is? Then I have achieved everything in life.

When I say the above statement you quote, I do in fact believe that. It is a matter of perspective. The Coptic Christians of Egypt were beheaded by ISIS. The Chinese Christians are tossed into communist prisons for decades.

Compared to that, by what measure can I say my life is miserable? Of course not.

Nevertheless, I am not sure that merely not being miserable, makes life worth living. Perhaps it does, and that is in fact why I am still living it.

Am I wrong?

Perhaps look to do some volunteer charity work?

 

[Andrew77]

Perhaps look to do some volunteer charity work?

Yeah worked at the homeless shelter. Cleaned up, and processed new clothing.

Not exactly an adventure, but I did it.

 

[Andrew77]

@Andrew77
here's advice that you gave back in nov:

"If you want more in life than what you have, pray that G-d can lead you to something more.
I'm pretty content with my life, and it is no more than what you describe. So some people can be happy where they are. But if you are not, then pray for that something more. G-d isn't trying to smash you. Just ask G-d for some direction, and then start walking. Find something to walk towards. If it is good for you, he will help you do it. If not, walk towards something else. But start walking towards something."


YOUR advice is good, so take it and start walking towards something.

I have. Thanks.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

So a week ago, I was listening to a sermon in which the pastor was talking about how every person has a story, an adventure to live.

He then went on to say something that I have a really hard time believing. I don't see where this is in the Bible, so maybe this was just his opinion.

His statement was "G-d never writes a boring story".

I'm over 40 now. I can't think of any better word to describe my life, than 'boring'. And maybe I'm missing it, but that seems the defacto reality of everyone. We all get up, go to work, come home, and go to bed.

When I talk to other people, I don't get a sense of 'adventure', I don't get a feeling of an 'exciting story'.

What else do you do in this world? You get up at a crazy time in the morning, to go to some place you don't really want to go, to do work you don't really want to do, then you go home exhausted, and go to bed.

Now I'm speaking generally. This isn't universal of course. My parent for example, at least loved their jobs. Both were public school teachers.

But even then, they got up early in the morning, went to work, came home, had dinner and went to bed.

I'm not seeing this 'adventure'.

So you tell me. Is everyone having an exciting story? Is everyone's life an adventure? Am I just the lucky guy that has the 'boring story'?

I think your both right. Your friend is right on the long term end of things, but you are right on the day to day end of it.


But anyway I also have to say much of life is boring as far as day to day. But I submit that sort of thing is true even to the Bible if you pay attention. The Bible records great highs and victories, but often those things are achieved after decades, or even centuries of waiting. The problem is that truth does not really get preached! Preachers often focus on the sensationalistic since that is what sells well, leads to big offerings etc.

 

[Andrew77]

Excellent questions...

Regarding what we read in Acts - first off what we read of Paul happened over many years so the outstanding miracles were not constantly occurring. I do believe however that reading the first 5 chapters of Acts it is clear that what we accept as 'normal' Christianity today, is light years away from how these early believers walked with Jesus. There was a strong community and many meetings were home based. Mark said " Jesus appeared to the Eleven as they were eating; he rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen.
He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

OK this is what Jesus said his followers would do. This is a far cry from what is considered normal now, yet His word remains true for all time.

I don't believe however that all individual believers do all these things, rather He was referring to them collectively as a body of believers with different gifts.

It remains however that most sermons today leave out large portions of the first 5 chapters of Acts as they are an embarrassment... Mostly we are light years from this mode of living and sadly will only return there under persecution.

For those who do desire this life of faith, however, the door is still wide open and the life although not easy is available just as He said. Note that this ministry was not just for apostles but for all believers.

Press into Jesus - language is a bit limiting but I mean determine with all your heart to make Him top priority in your life. Set time aside for Him, He waits for you to sit with Him every day.

Signal that you mean business - Fasting is a sure way of letting Him know that you are for real... You are by this means choosing the spirit over the flesh. Ask for a deeper apatite for Him.

Immerse yourself in prayer - seek out mature believers and share your intent to be deeper with Jesus and ask them to pray for and with you. The more prayer you get the better as it will accelerate your journey.

Forgive me if I have struggled to express some of these issues accurately - it is much easier face to face and kneel together with Him.

Blessings,

Carl Emerson.

"what we read of Paul happened over many years so the outstanding miracles were not constantly occurring"​

Right, and that is similar to what I have experienced. A few moments, over decades, where it was clear to me that G-d had moved.

"I don't believe however that all individual believers do all these things, rather He was referring to them collectively as a body of believers with different gifts."
​

That is my assessment as well. I wager the vast majority of Christians just live out their lives, without having anything like a book of Acts experience. But collectively as a body, yes.

Press into Jesus - language is a bit limiting but I mean determine with all your heart to make Him top priority in your life. Set time aside for Him, He waits for you to sit with Him every day.​

I've tried that.... it was just me sitting there, and wasting time. So I don't know what that means either. Generally G-d has always been my priority in life, as best I know how to make G-d a priority in my feeble ways.

Immerse yourself in prayer - seek out mature believers and share your intent to be deeper with Jesus and ask them to pray for and with you. The more prayer you get the better as it will accelerate your journey.

Forgive me if I have struggled to express some of these issues accurately - it is much easier face to face and kneel together with Him.​

Don't worry about it. I went to Church for counseling years ago, and it was a massive mistake. Praying over me did nothing. I was given counsel which I followed, and then spent years regretting it. Instead of accelerating a 'journey' it was more like misery and torture. There was nothing wrong with the people at that Church, and perhaps the counsel I got would have worked for someone else, but as for the covering in prayers, that has never worked. Several times I have come forward at the Church, and asked the Elders to pray me. Nothing going.

I just got to the point where I assumed that this is the plan G-d has for me. Obviously after these decades, if there was some other plan I was supposed to be on, then surely all my efforts to find that plan would have succeeded at some point.... right? If all that covering in prayer stuff, was to be answered, then the plan for my life should have been revealed.

So I have to assume that this.... where I am now.... is in fact the plan for me life, and I need to accept it.

Do you disagree?

 

[vinsight4u]

/nvm

 

[Andrew77]

Why do you go home right after work? If you want adventure, then go where that is. If you want someone special in your life, then be where
other people are.
skating rink, a park, the pool, amusement park, tennis courts, basketball courts, shows, restaurants, join a group, go to the gym...

I'm curious. What do you do for adventure? Do you do all those things? You must have lots of free time.
None of those things seem interesting to me.

Home is where I feel most at peace. Not to mention I'm usually dead tired. I'm totally wiped after work. I go straight to bed.