Living the High Definition Life

It is true that God intends that we live in maximum fullness of Himself and His power and that we live out our God-given potential. John 10:10, “My purpose is to give life in all its fullness, more and better life than you ever dreamed of.” (The Message)
Just as HDTV is television in all its fullness - Just as it is bigger, bolder and brighter. High definition living is life, lived in all of its fullness. Bigger, bolder and brighter life than we ever experienced or dreamed of. It’s your life taken to the next level. High definition living is higher quality at a higher cost. It’s higher quality because when you connect your life to God through Jesus Christ and allow His Holy Spirit to fill you, move in you and through you then your life is greater than you ever imagined. When you spend time with God each day, Read His word and journal (our daily reading regimen) and when you live out how God created you to live, you begin to live life in high definition. And the results are stunning. The projection of your life is greater – the sound quality of your life is clearly defined.

Luke 9:23
Then he told them what they could expect for themselves: "Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat--I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. (The Message)
· I must be willing to lay down my life and allow Jesus to pick it up and lead the way.
· I must give Jesus control of my life.
Jesus was saying to us that if we wanted to have real life, High Definition Life that you had to give up being the power source in your own life and making a real connection with Jesus, through faith and surrender and doing all you could do to follow Him and take up your cross every day. You are thinking—what does “take up your cross” mean? Taking up your cross simply means, giving God first place in your life. It is not settling for mediocrity- it is moving forward for God’s life and heart. It is giving up to the Lord and aggressively pursuing all that He has for us. Jesus can take our lives to a whole new level, but we have to be willing to give Him first place in that area, whether that area is our professional life or career, whether it is in our relationships, whether it is in our finances, whether it is in our dreams and goals, we have to give God first place.

Evangelist Luis Pulau, wrote a book by the same title of our Series: High Definition Living. In the book he says: Too often many Christians, conditioned by culture and deeply ingrained insecurities, opt to settle for less than what is God’s best for their lives. Luis, now 69, says there are 10 “good” areas of life but God has something even more excellent than what the world has to offer. Allow me to use his points and add my own comments to challenge you to move into a connection with God to live a High Definition Life.Read them and see if you are finding yourself settling in any of these areas or pursuing God’s best for you.
1. Pleasure or happiness:
“Pleasure delights only so long as it lasts; it’s great but fleeting,” says Luis. “Pleasure feels good, but joy feels better.” Joy erupts from the inside. Happiness is not based on happenings – it is an inside job and comes from the Lord. Psalm 68:3But may the righteous be glad and rejoice before God; may they be happy and joyful. (NIV)
2. Sex or love:
We all want to be loved, but many of us struggle because we confuse it with something else. “Our culture has conditioned us to equate sex with love, but they’re not the same thing,” says Luis. No one who wants true love has to settle for mere sex. While sex concentrates on the body, true love craves intimacy. Sex outside of marriage is ugly. Going outside your marriage for love, never made any marriage better. Work on your marriage, with God’s power and help. If you are not married, pursue the best that God has for you and don’t settle - wait for God’s best.
3. Popularity or connectedness:
Everyone wants to be liked, but we can easily mistake popularity for friendship. It is not easy to build real and meaningful relationships – it takes hard work and dedication and the ability to be a trusted confidant. “Friendship may be harder to cultivate than mere popularity, but it pays far greater dividends,” says Pulau.
4. Acceptance or forgiveness:
Most of us admit to feelings of unworthiness, but God wants to set us free. “Too often we settle for a substitute that doesn’t go quite far enough,” says Pulau. “We settle for acceptance but what we need is forgiveness.” God desires to free us and forgive us and release us from what we have done.
5. Relief or peace:
Getting over something and avoiding it or pretending it never happened…or having real peace from Jesus. Some people just want to move on or sweep something under the rug. But God wants to give us real peace.
6. Achievement or success:
In order to enjoy success at the highest level, we need an eternal purpose. Some people are just busy and do not have any real significance flowing from and through their lives. “True success demands something from you,” says Pulau.
7. Excitement or adventure:
Excitement causes our bodies to produce endorphins, which play a huge role in producing feelings of pleasure. Because we crave intense feelings, increasing numbers of us pursue the thrill provided by “extreme sports.” We are naturally drawn to whatever kindles our built-in desire for adventure. “The Christian life is the greatest adventure,” says Pulau. Real adventure touches the soul. Real adventure is lived out in serving others and making an eternal difference.
8. Invulnerability or safety:
Some people live without being open to others and vulnerable to God. That position is a false sense of security. Living for God and being open to God’s people will provide a safety that is essential. Being a closed system will not allow God’s best and High Definition Living to take place in you.
9. Activity or significance:
While all of us need to know that we matter, many of us settle for a flurry of “busyness.” We crave purpose and destiny but we settle for mere productivity. God offers us life, purpose, meaning, significance, but many of us turn down these astonishing possibilities. We have to lay down our desires and take up the “cross” and not forego our fabulous destiny in God.
10. Positive thinking or hope:
Many people substitute positive thinking for genuine hope. Positive thinking puts us in the right frame of mind, but it can’t do much about the problems themselves. Hope takes a stand on the unchanging character of God. Positive thinking depends on us, while hope depends on God. Jesus is our hope and the pathway to High Definition Living.
God promises us His best, but He doesn’t always make our circumstances turn out the way we think we would like them to turn out. Instead God promises to be with us completely in whatever circumstances we find ourselves.
What are you choosing for your life? How have you decided to live?

Choose Jesus, Choose Life, Go Bigger, Bolder and Brighter.