Kiefer's Story (Part 2)

 Kiefer Partridge, who's story was featured yesterday, shares his thoughts on the Ripple Effect in a paper written by him a couple years ago. I received it in this really cool pdf format, but unfortunately, Blogger does not seem to like pdf's. So, here is just the text.

 "Billy’s absolutely on fire. He gave his life to Christ this summer at a teen rally, and
he meant every word of it. Billy loves to make funny YouTube videos, and he’s
getting good at it — so when he accepted Jesus as his Savior this summer, he
immediately knew that there was nothing he’d rather do than make Christian
movies.
No one at school knows it, though. His friends can tell something has changed,
for sure, because he used to hang out with them. Now he’s taking advanced
filmmaking and video production classes, along with photography. He’s joined
the young writer’s club, and he spends all his spare time reading or watching
DVDs about filmmaking. He simply doesn’t have time for them anymore, and
they can’t figure it out.
Meanwhile, his parents are getting frustrated, too. They were thrilled when he
told them he accepted Christ, and thrilled when he realized he should be using his
moviemaking skills to tell others about Jesus — but he doesn’t seem to have time
for his family anymore.
Aren’t we all a bit like Billy sometimes?
so heavenly minded…
We’re all a little prone to becoming, as the saying goes, “So heavenly minded,
we’re no earthly good.” It isn’t surprising. After all, God’s a God of God-sized
dreams, and He usually gives us a vision that’s just a little too big for us to handle
alone. But we often take it too far, and the result is sometimes very short of
disastrous to the people around us.
Take a look at this:
“The most important [commandment],” answered Jesus, “is this:…. ‘Love the
Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind
and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
There is no commandment greater than these.”
Mark 10:13-16 [NIV]
We’ve all read the parable of the good Samaritan, and we all know that
“neighbor” includes everyone around us — but I’m afraid we all too often
overlook the fact that “neighbor” also carries with it the idea of starting with
those close to us.
This is exactly what Jesus did:
People were bringing little children to Jesus to have him touch them, but the
disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them,
“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of
God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the
kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” And he took the children in
his arms, put his hands on them and blessed them.
Mark 10:13-16[NIV]
Let’s face it, little children were not Jesus’ target audience. Certainly the gospel is
meant for them as well, but if Jesus were simply concerned with making the
biggest splash He could on the political scene of His day, He wouldn’t have
bothered to waste His time on kids.
So why did He? Because the best way to impact people is not by what we do, but
by how we live. Unless we are actively engaged in blessing those immediately
around us, we can never have a big impact on those who are far away. Blessing is
like a drop of water; the ripples will spread across the entire pond, but they must
start from that one single drop. And if we are to reach the very edges of the earth,
we have to start at our own front door."



Beautiful words. Thank you Kiefer :).
Rissa Crowe will be featured tomorrow. I look forward to sharing her beautiful story.


And, on a side note, the Ripple Effect is now a Facebook group!