Miles Past Normal: Principles for the Journey

By Tim Cooper

At each turn in life we are bombarded with the idea of normal. Normal finds a job he hates so it can pay for things he doesn't need while he wishes he was doing something else. Normal believes that creativity, imagination, innovation, and dreaming should cease after the fifth grade. Normal goes to church for an hour on Sundays but doesn't get carried away or allow her faith to truly intersect her life any other time of the week.
Each day of normal becomes a tedious, hard-pill to swallow. But each day of normal also swells our thirst for something more. Have you ever wondered if there was something beyond normal? Have you ever craved adventure? What about purpose? Wished for meaning? Longed to know that what you do really matters? Maybe you've just longed to know that you matter.
What if you could unlock the secrets to an abnormal life just like those men and women in Hebrews 11? What if God's design for your life is so much more than the trappings of this world? What if there is a life up ahead that could be meaningful, adventurous, and most of all, matter for eternity? What if God is not done altering the course of history? This is your invitation to travel miles past normal.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Jun 7, 2010
• ISBN: 9781498272759

Tim Cooper

Dr TIM COOPER is an experienced historian who has lectured in History and Archaeology at the Universities of Sheffield, Manchester and Hull, and has had several books and articles published on history and archaeology. A Student Support Officer, he currently conducts local history walks around Sheffield for international students at the University of Sheffield.

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Miles Past Normal

Principles for the Journey

Tim Cooper

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Miles Past Normal

Principles for the Journey

Copyright © 2010 Tim Cooper. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

Resource Publications

An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3

Eugene, OR 97401

www.wipfandstock.com

ISBN 13: 978-1-60899-673-5

EISBN 13: 978-1-4982-7275-9

Manufactured in the U.S.A.

All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Acknowledgments

Preface

Chapter 1: A Faith Worth Discovering

Chapter 2: A Faith Worth Giving

Chapter 3: A Faith Worth Living

Chapter 4: A Faith Worth Building

Chapter 5: A Faith Worth Going

Chapter 6: A Faith Worth Testing

Chapter 7: A Faith Worth Leaving

Chapter 8: A Faith Worth Identifying

Chapter 9: A Faith Worth Believing

Chapter 10: A Faith Worth Shaking

Chapter 11: A Faith Worth Transforming

Chapter 12: A Faith Worth Mentioning

Chapter 13: A Faith Worth Enduring

Chapter 14: By Faith You . . .

To my wonderful wife April,

without whom, my journey would be lacking and incomplete.

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for.

Hebrews 11:1–2

Acknowledgments

I’ve been blessed with wonderful people in my life. There is not enough space to begin to tell the stories of inspiration around me.

April, I could never have dreamed of a better wife, mother to our children, or best friend. Thanks for telling me to write. I love our journey together more with each new day.

Makayla, Trace, and Lilly Grace, our prayer is that your journey of faith will be long, lasting, and meaningful as you discover God’s grace with each new day.

My parents, Joe and Pam, I hope I’m as successful in displaying faith to our kids on a daily basis as you were to me.

Jim and Janet, thanks for having the faith to accept me into the family.

John Presko, thanks for teaching me to love people.

Jim Bird, thanks for teaching me to love grace.

Phil Ling, thanks for teaching me to love leading.

The AGAPE Class, thanks for restoring my love for teaching. There is so much left for our journey together.

The churches I’ve had the pleasure of serving, thanks for loving me and forming friendships that will last an eternity.

Preface

My journey began on the beach on a hot, sunny Florida afternoon. My wife was asleep in the chair next to me, the kids were playing in the sand, and I was watching the waves. As I watched countless waves crash the shoreline I couldn’t help but be impressed with the brevity of life. I began to wonder if my life was really making a difference for the glory of God. I began to wonder if my life mattered. I began to wonder if I mattered. I began a journey in search of meaning and significance that day.

I came to find a self-diagnosed mini crisis of faith. I knew God was there. I knew He cared. I just couldn’t see my journey amounting to much. It seemed like I was traveling warp speed to cover inches. I realized that I was attempting to process my faith by the normal standards of the world around me and that God desires me to be so much more than normal.

I turned to a familiar favorite passage of Scripture. It used to captivate me as a kid when Dad would preach from Hebrews 11. I rediscovered principles for my journey. I rediscovered a challenging faith. I rediscovered a desire to be anything but normal. This is my journey to travel miles past normal. I hope it helps you rediscover yours.

1

A Faith Worth Discovering

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

—Hebrews 11:1

I love road trips. There is something exhilarating about piling into the car, cramming stuff we’ll never use into every available crevice, rolling the windows down, and heading out for adventure. There is the smell of the open road, the wind in your hair, and that thing you do with your hand outside the window that uses the air flow to simulate the feeling of riding a wave. I love road trips.

It all comes from one trip. My dad carefully packed the Pontiac. He was one of those puzzle piece packers where every piece has its place and every place has its piece. When the car was packed, the lights in the house were off, and the kids were buckled, we set off on our adventure.

It’s a long way from southern Indiana to Dallas, Texas, but it didn’t seem like it. We played the license plate game where you look for all the license plates of the various states. I had a definite advantage since my sister couldn’t read yet. We stopped at restaurants we didn’t have in our town. We traveled through states I had never visited.

My favorite part of the trip was trying to find someplace to stop for the night. My only requirement was a swimming pool. We didn’t have the internet, smart phones, or navigational devices. All we had was a giant atlas the size of our car and the interstate exit signs. Each exit would bring the same questions. Is this the best we’re going to find? Could there be something better up ahead? Should we stop here or should we push on further?

Sometimes I think the journey of life is a giant road trip. Which exit should I take? What’s up around the bend? Is there a normal way of doing this thing called life? Which way should I turn? Could someone lend me a giant atlas or a GPS unit with turn by turn navigation for life?

At each turn in life we are bombarded with the idea of normal. I’m quite sure that normal is the last thing I want to become in this journey. Normal finds a job he hates so it can pay for things he doesn’t need while he wishes he was doing something else. Normal believes that creativity, imagination, innovation, and dreaming should cease after the fifth grade. Normal does things the way she does them because that is how everyone has always done them. Normal goes to church for an hour on Sundays but doesn’t get carried away or allow her faith to truly intersect her life any other time of the week.

The end result is that there is little difference between the followers of Jesus and those that have never met him. Jesus did not die so that we could be normal. He did not suffer through torture, exhaustion, and cruelty on the cross so that our lives would look just like everyone else. I don’t want to be normal.

Part of the problem is that we are living in an age of a faith crisis. We don’t really believe God can move mountains. We don’t really believe God can alter the course of nature to work miraculously in our lives. We don’t really believe God wants us to be uncomfortable just to follow him. Catch the problem? We don’t really believe. Our lack of faith has narrowed the difference between followers of Jesus and the rest of the world.

You can’t help but be startled by recent statistics found true in the western Church. 85 percent of churches in America consider themselves in decline. 3700 churches will close their doors this year. 95 percent of Christians in North America will never lead someone to Christ.¹

Peter and John believed. They met a lame man on the way to pray at the Temple one day in Acts 3. They were arrested and brought to trial for healing the man in the name of Jesus. They were ultimately released to go free in Acts 4 after the rulers took note that they had been with Jesus. People don’t take note that we’ve been with Jesus very often. I don’t want to be normal.

I want to be like Peter and John. I want people to take note that I’ve spent time with Jesus. I want his Spirit to alter mine. I want his ways to become mine. I want to believe.

Even in the midst of our faith crisis we are crying out for so much more than a normal existence. Each day of normal becomes a tedious, hard-pill to swallow. But each day of normal also swells our thirst for something more. Have you ever wondered if there was something beyond normal? Have you ever craved adventure? What about purpose? Wished for meaning? Longed to know that what you do really matters? Maybe you’ve just longed to