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Key Bible Verse: As they were walking along someone said to Jesus, "I will follow you no matter where you go"(Luke 9:57). Bonus Reading:Luke 9:58-62

Steven Curtis Chapman sings, in "Dive" (in his 1999 Speechless album), about a rushing river and being faced with the decision of whether or not to enter into its powerful flow. As he reaches the chorus, he practically shouts with enthusiastic determination: "The river's deep, the river's wide, the river's water is alive, so sink or swim, I'm diving in!"

The message behind the words, he explains, was inspired by a story Pastor Scotty Smith told about "an awesome fishing trip with fellow pastor Scott Roley. They had gone trout fishing and found a stream that produced a day of fishing that was a dream come true. They were standing chest deep in this stream catching trout left and right and at the day's end had caught 200 fish …. He said the interesting thing was all the people standing on the shore watching them. Nobody was catching fish from the shore because you had to be out in the deep water where the fish were.

"Scotty related this story to the Christian life by saying it's not a spectator sport, it's not something we just sit on the side [for]; we've got to get deep into the living water to experience what it is. It's dangerous, it's scary, it's frightening—but that's where we're called to live our lives."

—Steven Curtis Chapman

Thought to Apply: The giants of the faith all had one thing in common: neither victory nor success, but passion.

—Philip Yancey (writer)

My Response: I'll move beyond "spectator" faith by. …

Adapted from Sparrow Records press kit by permission.

Copyright © 2003 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.
Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity.

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Prayer for the Week

You abandoned heaven for me, O Christ; give me the resolve to pour out my life for You.

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