Apollo 11 and My iPhone - Potential

So, yesterday was the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, an amazing moment in the history of the United States, marking the fulfillment of one of JFK's promises in his inaugural address and a significant statement about U.S. progress as opposed to the Soviet Union. Not to mention, it was an incredible feat of human daring do and ingenuity.

Something I heard on the radio about the landing caught my attention. Apparently the computers inside most of our cell phones today are more powerful than the computer used to send Apollo 11 to the moon. Seriously? And what do I use my phone for? Playing Star Wars the Force Unleashed? Checking my Facebook? Updating my Twitter status? Certainly nothing near as incredible as sending men to the moon.

Now, don't get me wrong. My iPhone is an important tool in my life and my ministry. Some of the significant things I am able to do in fulfilling my God-given mission in life happen because of that phone. I keep track of my schedule, my to do lists, organizing events, making contact with guests, setting up appointments. All of my contacts' phone numbers, addresses, and emails are in that phone. I use it to give me directions to places I need to go. I use it to keep connected with friends, family, and people in my community. I keep people posted about things that are happening in my life so they feel connected to their pastor. I use it for studying for my sermons while I am on the go, having my quiet time with my wife in the mornings, and keeping track of ideas that God is giving me for the church, my blog, messages, etc. All of those are important tasks, and my iPhone really is a tool that I use for ministry.

But sending someone to the moon? Not hardly. Locked inside that little iPhone in my hand is the potential to send someone to the moon. I think I hardly ever really put it to the limits of what it is capable of doing. I have found the same thing to be true about my life all so often. Locked inside of me is the potential to do some incredible things, to unleash the power of God's Spirit in my life and the lives of the people around me, to truly make a difference in the world, to boldly go where no one has gone before. But too often my life is consumed with the ordinary. I'm messing with apps on my iPhone, watching some pointless television show, figuring out how I can keep up with the Joneses (and I live in Texas, so the Joneses have a lot to keep up with), or a host of other things that really aren't spending my life to its fullest potential.

You see, God says that his goal for every Christ-follower is for us to become just like his son (Rom. 8:28). Jesus even said, "I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father" (Jn. 14:12). Seriously? I honestly cannot think of a time in my life where I have done anything even remotely close to the things Jesus did. Apparently I have within me somewhere the potential to do the things that Jesus did and even more. Now think about that for just a minute. What did Jesus do? He healed the sick, gave sight to the blind, caused the lame to walk, raised the dead, walked on water, fed crowds of thousands with a can of sardines and some crackers, walked on water, calmed storms, cast out demons, loved the unlovely, comforted the afflicted and afflicted the comfortable, hung out with the worst sorts of sinners, died on a cross for the sins of the world, came back from the dead defeating death and the grave and kicking the devil in the nuts in the process, and he did all that by the time he was in his mid-thirties. "He will do even greater things than these." Really?

It's like Jesus is the Apollo 11 lunar lander and I am the iPhone. I don't know that in this life I will ever live up to my potential, but I'd like to live a little closer to it. Here's the trick. It's not about me trying harder, striving more. The potential is already there inside of me. And that potential is the power of Christ living through me. The only way I can even come close to approaching my potential is as I allow Christ to live in and through me. And I want to do a better job of that. I want more of the power that raised Christ from the dead living through me and less of the power that put a Facebook app on the iPhone living through me.