May 3, 2006

And the King will tell them, `I assure you, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!' Mt 25:40 (NLT)

Going the second mile isn’t as difficult as you think! Jesus himself lived and taught the second-mile principle—that is, living a life that exceeds expectations. If someone asks for something, give more than they ask for. If someone asks for you to journey with them somewhere for a while, go further than they asked you to. (You will find Jesus’ full teaching on this in Mt 5:38-42.)

This second-mile teaching is motivated by eternal incentive. Jesus stated that we are not just serving people, but in a mysterious way, when we serve, we are serving Him. You are never more like Christ than when you are serving. Who is God calling you to go the second mile with today? Who is hurting? Who is lonely? Who needs encouragement? Who needs prayer? Who needs a secretly given financial donation to help make ends meet? Why not do what Jesus would do and go the second mile?

Last weekend Anne and I were having dinner with our friends Steve and Lori Stenstrom. They head up a ministry based out of Stanford called Kingdom First Ministries, and they have engaged in second-mile projects doing renovations in impoverished communities in Jesus’ name. They have found that hundreds of students, many of whom would never go to their weekly meeting, are coming out to serve side-by-side with followers of Jesus in these service projects.

This month, they are engaging in their most ambitious project to date, doing extensive renovations on Cesar Chavez Academy in East Palo Alto all during the weekend of May 19-21. Chavez is the primary public school in East Palo Alto providing education for grades 4-8.

The community is joining them, and this is truly becoming a Kingdom endeavor. One women’s Bible study from our church is adopting a classroom to decorate! But they still have some big needs. Here are a few: A video editor to compile the footage of the event, people with artistic skills for the Murals they hope to paint on campus, painting contractors and people to paint, landscaping needs, computers (the school will be wireless-ready through this project, and we would love to provide laptops for these kids to promote learning). Any leads for an Asphalt/Blacktop resurfacing company?

Would you pray for this project? You can read more by visiting their web site at www.2ndmile.cc. Please do visit the site because in the Fall, we hope to, as a church, completely own a project of this nature.

Whether it is joining in on this project, or some other second-mile act, enjoy the freedom of serving people in Jesus’ Name!