A boisterous crowd of more than 3,000 teenage girls, collegiate young women, and leaders were challenged July 10 to live the “Amazing Life” during “Blume,” sponsored by national WMU, in Kansas City.
Keynote speaker Clella Lee.Texas had the most number of participants, 349, followed by South Carolina with 323.
In an analogy to TV reality contest show “The Amazing Race,” Blume keynote speaker Clella Lee of Fayetteville, N.C., proclaimed, “The Christian life is the ultimate reality experience with God himself. It is the Amazing Life!”
Lee continued, “God wants you to have an amazing, fulfilling, and purposeful life. That’s why he made you, and that’s why he died for you.”
WMU’s eight 2007 National Acteens Panelists each read a Bible verse and shared their prayer or challenge for girls at Blume, and then the theme for the week, based on Luke 10:25-28, was introduced during Lee’s message.
In her message Lee asked, “When you hear ‘Amazing life,’ what do you think of? If you could describe your Amazing Life, what would it look like?”
She suggested maybe some would respond that life would be amazing if they just had the perfect body, or a list of personal accomplishments, or successful relationships. “I don’t know what you picture,” Lee said, “but we’ve been singing and talking about God. God is my Amazing Life.”
Continuing with the reality contest analogy, Lee offered four clues of how to live the Amazing Life based on Luke 10:25-28.
“First, if you want to have the Amazing Life, you must ask the right questions,” observed Lee. “If you start with the wrong question, you’ll always get the wrong answer. You don’t base the Amazing Life on what you think, or what you think you know; you base your life on Jesus Christ and ask him, ‘What is the way to the Amazing Life? Jesus, help me understand and know how I can have the Amazing Life.’ “
The second clue Lee shared was to look in the right place for the answer. “If you look for the Amazing Life in the wrong place, you will be disappointed every time,” she said. “You will always be running after the newest, latest, and greatest, because it changes all the time. Those things are part of an Amazing Life, but they aren’t it. Are you looking – really looking – for the Amazing Life in the right place?”
Lee asserted that eternal life is the Amazing Life. It is forever. “Eternal life is abiding communion with God – now in this life and in the future. Abiding means to stay or live with, side-by-side, sharing and relating. If you want the Amazing Life, you must look in the right place. It is Jesus.”
The third clue Lee shared to obtaining the Amazing Life is to face the hard truth about who we are: sinners saved by grace. “No matter who you are, whatever your circumstances, God meets you where you are,” Lee encouraged. “The Amazing Life is not way to life, it’s a way of life – and you have to choose it.”
Finally, Lee said in order to have the Amazing Life, it is necessary to focus on the right things.
“How do you focus on the right things and hone in and understand what does it mean to love God, love myself, and love others? If you can focus on those things, you can live the Amazing Life.
“It is God’s plan for you to be God’s instrument in the world to carry out his plan just as you are. He wants you to have the Amazing Life, but in order to do that, you must do these four things.”