Facing Fear after God Speaks

In the last post I began telling you about how God began telling me that He wanted our family to move back to "the land of your father."  This was just the beginning of what turned out to be a pivotal week spent with the Lord where He spoke so clearly, so distinctly, and so sweetly into my life.  I will continue sharing the details of that call here so that you may recognize Him speaking directly to you about something.

Where we last left off God had very clearly told me to go back to Texas, the land of my ancestors.  I was very excited to hear from the Lord like this, but over time my initial enthusiasm began giving way to anxiety and even fear.  I woke up the next morning feeling like I needed to fast and pray that day, even though it would be a full workday.  That I did, although I was very distracted that day and am certain that our staff could tell.  It was hard to focus on anything work-related.  My anxiety was turning to fear of many things at once:  fear that I was actually hearing God, fear of the unknown, fear of abandoning everything and starting over yet again, fear of not knowing what the new ministry would be like, fear of letting our current church down, fear of letting our new church down, and fear of letting my school and the Northwest down. I had to go to the Lord again and again about that all day long.

At the end of my workday I went home and sensed that I needed to be alone with the Lord.  The weather was decent so I decided to walk through our neighborhood to one of my favorite spots that overlooks Puget Sound and the harbor.  As I walked there I prayed to the Lord about all of the anxiety and fear I was experiencing.  I told Him I was scared about many things and didn't know which way to go.  I didn't know what to do with it other than take those things to God directly, which scripture tells me is the way to go.  As I walked, the Lord suddenly brought James 1:5-8 to mind.

⁵ If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking. ⁶ But when you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waver, for a person with divided loyalty is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind. ⁷ Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. ⁸ Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do.

One of my favorite places to sit and pray near our house.  This spot is a real blessing!

The Lord in His goodness told me what to do right then.  He was telling me through this passage that I needed to ask Him directly about this call to confirm it, and to bring my fears to him.  I believe in that moment He was emphasizing that I should not run to people to get their thoughts, as I tend to do.  He was telling me to come directly to Him and that if I did that, He would not rebuke me for asking and that He would tell me what to do.  But it was also clear to me that I needed to be alone with God so I could hear what He was saying.  I needed to get away from all of the people around me to hear His still, small voice in my life.  I needed to put away my phone and resist the tendency to call friends in ministry to see what they thought. 

Frankly, it is a lot easier to run to people around me to see what they think than to go to the Lord about a situation.  People are right there, sometimes in person and sometimes a phone call or text away.  And while I believe people can speak into your life a message from the Lord, they also are subject to their own motivations and motives, passions, feelings, and opinions.  And many times those things are not from the Lord and can simply create confusion as you listen to them.  Talking to many people to get their opinions only compounds the matter further, making us a "wave tossed on the sea."

I continued to ponder things in that moment by the bay.  The Lord reminded me that my journey in life has many similarities to that of Abraham.  Abraham was asked to move "to the land I will show you," and Abraham did.  He was asked to sacrifice his son on a mountaintop and made preparations to do so, only to have God stay his hand at the very last second before he carried it out.  It made me wonder if God might be asking me to move back to Texas to see if I'd do it, only to stop me at the last second.  Of all of my uncertainties that still existed in that moment, I was sure God would tell me what to do.

I went home that evening and talked with Amanda about things.  We both felt strongly that we needed to be in prayer about this for the remainder of the week.  God was clear on that.  So we made an agreement not to talk to each other about this for an entire week.  Instead, we would both listen and pray independently and would compare notes at a later date.  But the interesting thing out of this is that both Amanda and I felt strongly that the Lord wanted to tell me directly what He wanted us to do.  And we both had decided that we would do what He told us to do.

Meanwhile I was still stuck in the middle of the week with the knowledge that I needed to keep listening as I could, even while going back and forth between work and home that week.  The next day I woke up and read Romans 4 about "the faith of Abraham."  I cringed a bit because I remembered the previous evening where the Lord reminded me of the parallels between his life and my own.  Then I flipped back to Genesis 32 and read this:

⁹ Then Jacob prayed, “O God of my grandfather Abraham, and God of my father, Isaac—O Lord, you told me, ‘Return to your own land and to your relatives.’ And you promised me, ‘I will treat you kindly.’ ¹⁰ I am not worthy of all the unfailing love and faithfulness you have shown to me, your servant. When I left home and crossed the Jordan River, I owned nothing except a walking stick. Now my household fills two large camps!

This described us.  We moved to the Pacific Northwest thinking we were going to be giving up nearly everything, and instead God blessed our family richly during our entire time in this place.  This simple reminder in that moment was a reminder that God has been with us the entire time we have lived away from our homeland.  He has never left us alone here, and this provided me more reassurance that what He was calling me to do would be the same.  He would not leave us.  In fact, He would go with us!

How to hear God in circumstances like this

You may be wondering about the actual mechanism that helped me to hear God's voice in this moment.  I'm sharing our story because I believe you will see these same patterns in your own life.  But the Bible also gives us some insight on listening to the Lord.

A theme in the Bible and a theme of this story is that God tells people what to do, the person responds by thinking about it, praying, and taking action.  Then the person becomes fearful of what happens next because God almost always only revealed the next steps and not the entire picture.  Then, the person would pray about those fears and as they are brought to the Lord He deals with them one by one, sometimes simply bringing peace, other times providing a way out.  At times the way out made sense and at other times it did not.  Judges 6 chronicles the story of Gideon, and his life follows this pattern.  Gideon is threshing wheat in a wine press to hide out from his enemies, a cowardly act.  An angel appears and tells him that Israel will be rescued through Gideon.  Gideon asks for several signs to confirm that this will happen, and the Lord responds with some amazing circumstances to confirm what He has said.  Gideon then obeys the Lord, but falls into a pattern of fear and questioning each step of the way.  The Lord always answered at that time and told him what to do next. 

What should you do when you face similar circumstances?  If you are following Jesus I do believe He will intercept you at particular points in your life and ask you to do something different, something crazy, something that others may see and scoff at.  So how do you listen for His voice in those moments?  How do you recognize it?

• Daily reading of Scripture- Open the Bible each day prayerfully asking God to speak directly to you.  What you read in that moment is what He is saying to you!  This does not involve randomly opening some place in Scripture and reading that.  Instead, find some Bible reading plan that works for you.  Perhaps it is one chapter in the Old Testament and one chapter in the New Testament each day.  Perhaps it is reading in 3 or 4 places each day, or maybe just one.  There is no magic formula;  just read!  If you really want a plan on paper that you can follow, here are some ones you could try.  The point isn't necessarily that you look in particular places in the Bible.  Instead the point is that you should be regularly reading it and applying what it says to your life!  
• Prayerful reading of scripture- Once you read, pray on what you read, asking the Lord to reveal to you what He is saying in that moment to you.  If you haven't done so, consider starting a journal about your thoughts on your daily reading.  For me this has helped me to process what I think God is saying.  Journaling helps you to slow down a bit and listen more.
• Prayers while alone with God, followed by silence- This is crucial step for you and me.  It is unfortunate that prayer in church often models that we should talk endlessly at God in great and flowery detail by using "churchy" sounding words.  I have come to understand that prayer should involve me talking to God followed by moments of silence, listening to God.  It has been my experience that in those moments of silence, a thought will pop into my head, seemingly from nowhere.  Often these are scriptures I have read, which I will then open to and meditate on.  This is God speaking to you!  But you will never hear it if you talk at him endlessly.

Spend time today examining your prayer life, remembering that prayer is our time of communicating directly with God.  Prayers need no intermediary, have no filter, and impose no wall between you and the Lord.  This is about you and God only. 

If you find that your prayers have fallen into a pattern of talking at God rather than with God, go be alone with him today for a time.  If you need to, leave your phone somewhere else so you won't be distracted.  Leave your house so you can be away from people.  Go for a walk, or just go sit in a nice spot away from others.  Pray to Him, telling him what is on your mind, asking for guidance on whatever situation is bothering you now.  Then, when you feel the time is right, stop talking.  It is okay to look around if you need to, although you may find that to be distracting.  If it is, keep your eyes closed and wait, simply asking the Lord to speak and focusing yourself on Him.  Pay attention to a thought that pops up from something you have read in the Bible and see what He might say in those moments.  You may be surprised!  Remember too that God will not tell you to do something that contradicts something in the Bible.

I am praying for you as you walk with Jesus, that your walk would be closer, sweeter, more real, and more vibrant than anything you have ever experienced to date.  Remember, the Lord considers you to be very special and desires this kind of relationship with you, no matter who you are.

God Speaks to You: Hearing a Call

I have been going to church for a while now.  During my church experience I have seen pastors come and go and have gotten used to that happening.  It is just a part of church life.  However many of the pastors I have been around don't share anything about how they knew God was telling them to go somewhere else.  Usually they stand up during a service and announce that they had been "called" to go to another place, and that they are resigning, and they announce their last day at the church.  At times I wondered how they knew that God was telling them to go somewhere else.  The cynic in me said they were going to a larger church and were going to make more money, but my heart tells me that that doesn't happen each time.  I believe many pastors do hear God telling them to go somewhere else.  But how did God talk to them?  What did He say to them?  How did they know it was Him telling them to go?

With those questions in mind I plan on laying out for you how God spoke to me to tell me to leave my "boat" and move back to Humble, Texas.  I will include a lot of detail for you because the details are important.  I'm doing this so that perhaps you will be able to recognize the Lord speaking to you in your own life.  After all, He speaks to us all.  Too many Christians out there believe in their heart that God speaks only to certain people like pastors or priests.  They have never recognized God's voice in their own life so they assume He never speaks to them.  Yet the Bible tells us that the Holy Spirit resides in us.  Are we really to assume that this Holy Spirit would take up residence in our bodies and NEVER say a word to us throughout our whole life?  That would be like getting married to someone and living with them for many years without any communication whatsoever.  It just doesn't add up!  There is no question that the Holy Spirit speaks to us;  the real question is this:  are we listening? 

In my experience as I've gotten to know the Lord better, He begins speaking to me through the Bible.  I wake up each day and generally read from 3 books within it just for the variety.  In March I was reading from Genesis, Ezekiel, and Romans.  I've always enjoyed doing this because I recognize the alignment in what God says in scripture.  Sometimes I'll read a prophecy from the Old Testament and then read its fulfillment in the New Testament.  In March this was no different.  I woke up on the morning of Sunday March 18 and read this passage from Ezekiel 3.

4 Then he said, “Son of man, go to the people of Israel and give them my messages. 5 I am not sending you to a foreign people whose language you cannot understand. 6 No, I am not sending you to people with strange and difficult speech. If I did, they would listen! 7 But the people of Israel won’t listen to you any more than they listen to me! For the whole lot of them are hard-hearted and stubborn. 8 But look, I have made you as obstinate and hard-hearted as they are. 9 I have made your forehead as hard as the hardest rock! So don’t be afraid of them or fear their angry looks, even though they are rebels.”

I have read this passage before and really have not thought anything of it.  However for some reason on this morning, I had this deep-seated feeling that this was God's message directly to me.  It was like reading a letter that had been written to you.  Nobody needs to tell you that the message in it is for you because...it's a letter written to you!  That's the way I felt that morning, and I even shared it with our church that morning as an encouragement to them that they needed to be reading God's word each day so that they know what He is telling them to do.  But I was uneasy.  What was the context here?  For me, did it mean some new work was going to begin in Everett?  Did it mean I would be ministering to some new people in our community, an English-speaking culture that needed a persistent hand?  Or, did it mean He wanted to send me somewhere else?  I pondered that off and on all day long.

The next day I began to get a suspicion that God was doing something wild and different and crazy.  I spoke with our pastor back in Humble, Texas and he mentioned a new position they had that he wanted me to consider.  I couldn't believe it!  In my heart my first reaction was that I shouldn't consider it.  God Himself had moved us to the Pacific Northwest, after all.  We are now well-established here, we have friends, we are deeply embedded in this community and deeply vested in it.  Things are on-track at my school and going well.  Why would God even consider moving us away from all of that?  However, I agreed to go to the Lord about it and see what He thought.  

Later that evening as I was pondering this conversation, I felt the Lord speak to me in that moment.  I sensed Him telling me that He had a message for me tomorrow morning, so I'd better pay attention.  Was the voice audible?  No, but I had certainty in my heart that no matter what I'd better pay attention to scripture the next morning as something important was about to be said.  So I woke up with great anticipation that morning and encountered this passage from Genesis 31.

 ³ Then the Lord said to Jacob, “Return to the land of your father and grandfather and to your relatives there, and I will be with you.”

I was shocked to read this.  I was also excited, but my first reaction was utter shock.  I think this was one of those moments where I probably stared at the floor in wonder.  Did this just happen?  Lord, is this really what you are telling me to do?  I read on to Genesis 31:13:

¹³ I am the God who appeared to you at Bethel,^[a] the place where you anointed the pillar of stone and made your vow to me. Now get ready and leave this country and return to the land of your birth.’”

  

And I continued reading in Romans 3:31:

  ³¹ Well then, if we emphasize faith, does this mean that we can forget about the law? Of course not! In fact, only when we have faith do we truly fulfill the law.

So here, apparently, God was telling me exactly what He wanted me to do.  He was telling me where to go, when to go, and that I needed to have faith to truly please Him.  He told me he was sending me to a people who speak the same language I do, and that he has made me persistent so I can do what He is asking me to do.  Probably the best and most encouraging part, though, was His statement that He would be with me as I went.  Wow.

My next step after hearing this message was pretty crucial.  I did not immediately rush out to let everyone know that I had heard from the Lord.  I spoke to Amanda about it privately and we both agreed that we needed to pray on this.  One of my greatest fears at that time was that I had only invented this and that the Lord wasn't actually talking to me.  I needed to know for sure, and I'd only get that by being alone with Him, seeking him through prayer and more scripture reading.  I was absolutely convinced that if I were to do those things, He would confirm it.  So I made plans to go off to be alone with him later in the week, and I'll describe that journey in my next post.

What about you?

I want you to think about how God speaks to you for a few moments.  Yes you.  Maybe you are one of those Christians who would never voice it but who believes God doesn't speak to you.  You think you might have heard His voice but were never sure so you just disregarded it because you were not confident in your ability to hear.  Or He asked you to do something crazy and outlandish and you thought "God doesn't ask people to do stuff like that!"  You kept moving in life and things were sure and safe and secure, but you've been eaten up by the thought ever since.  Was that really Him?

Still others of you don't believe in God at all.  You are interested in a life of faith and in "spiritual" matters but haven't had any spiritual being speaking to you, or so you think.  You may remember back to times where you felt peace or "centeredness" in a particular moment but never feel like you got a specific word or direction from anyone.  Yet you are interested.  This kind of thing sounds exciting and intriguing.  This doesn't seem to be the "churchy" thing you think you know about church-going folk.

Here are a few things I have come to learn about how the Lord speaks to us, and each of these applied in this situation.

• He speaks through the Bible directly to us.
• He speaks very specifically and tells us what to do next.
• He rarely tells us what will happen after the initial command.  He expects us to follow what He told us to do and to trust Him.
• When He speaks and directs us, He promises to go with us.

As I continue to tell our story, I'll try to unpack all of these things for you as each of them are things I have experienced personally.  It is my hope that in unpacking them and giving you examples of how this applied in my own call back to Humble, you will learn to hear God in your life more and more, and that you will learn to obey what He is saying.

I'm excited to share the rest of the story with you.  And I pray that God would speak to you and take you to new, exciting, and deeper relationship with Him as we share what He has done. 

Praying Uncomfortable Prayers

It has been a long time since I have shared anything new on this blog, but God has been stirring my heart for some time now regarding a new thing that He wanted to do in my life.  That's worth sharing because you may read about it and recognize God's stirring of your own heart.  And that is something worth considering and doing something about!

Last summer I read a great book by John Ortberg called "If you want to walk on water, get out of the boat!"  Occasionally I will read a new book and will see that it makes my heart sing and my stomach to churn, and this was one of those works.  In it, Ortberg unpacks in great detail the story from Matthew 14:22-36 where Jesus meets the disciples in the middle of the night in the middle of a lake while he is walking on water and they are struggling to control their boat.  Once they recognize Jesus, Peter, who is in the boat, says to the Lord "Lord, if it’s really you, tell me to come to you, walking on the water.”  And Jesus immediately replied with some really challenging words: "yes, come."  Peter then proceeds to get out of the boat and walk, but soon afterward he began to see the wind and the waves around him and began to sink.  The frightened Peter cries out for Jesus to save him, and Jesus lifts him up out of the water while commenting that he had so little faith.  

Boats are safe places to be in generally.  They keep us afloat in large bodies of water that are sometimes freezing cold, full of hazards like tree stumps or rocks or fish that will eat us.  They also keep us safe from storms that would drown us if we tried to swim on our own.  It is good to stay in the boat at all times until our journey is over.  So why get out of one?

I think for most people "boats" can take many forms.  First for many are their careers.  Careers are great in that you are able to excel, take on more responsibility, and make an increasing amount of money doing that.  Careers are safe and provide security for yourself and your family.  Careers give many people meaning in their life as they find joy in pursuing them and in making a name for themselves out of it.  For others, their boat may be their financial situation.  In America many Christians are particularly afraid of getting out of this boat.  Bank accounts and savings and investments give us security and insulation from the storms of life.  In America we take pride in being able to buy ourselves out of many uncomfortable situations.  Other boats can include where we live, whether it is a particular neighborhood or particular state or particular country.  There is safety in the familiar confines of the place where we live.  For others, their boat is living daily life with extended family.

I sensed in reading this that God was laying down a challenge to me to get out of the boat.  I had a very strong sense of this, but knew that I wasn't in the middle of a lake in a boat.  What could this mean?  What boat was I in that I needed to step out of?

This was the spot in North Cascades National Park where I began praying about getting out of the boat.

As I was reading and thinking and praying last summer, I began praying a prayer that made me cringe a little bit at the time because it was so open ended and so unsafe.  I asked the Lord, as Peter asked the Lord, to command me to get out of the boat.  I asked him to show me what my boat was and to tell me to get out of it.  I told him in that moment that if He did that, I would get out.  In those moments I sensed that my career path could possibly be my boat, so I prayed for many days and acknowledged that my job and career were the Lord's, and if He wanted to take those from me then he should do it.

Prayers like this can be scary because the leave so much open for the Lord to do, and that's why most of us, myself included, rarely pray them!  It has been a recurring joke in churches I have attended that you should never pray for two things:  more faith and more patience.  Why?  Because no matter how fervently you pray, you are not going to wake up some morning and suddenly have great faith that can move mountains and trust Jesus in anything and everything.  It would be nice if it worked that way because we could then pray "Lord, make me fit and in shape and strong," and could wake up the next day with superhuman strength and energy.  But it doesn't work that way in fitness and it won't work that way in praying for faith or patience.  You won't suddenly have patience for people and circumstances that will endure through any circumstance.  Instead, what will happen is that you will be placed in more situations that will require faith.  And you will find yourself among people and circumstances that require a greater measure of patience.  In those conditions, faith and patience have a chance to grow because they are required in greater measure, and we have to rely on the Lord to provide them.  That's part of God's plan!

As it turns out the boat that the Lord intended to get me out of is my career.  He has challenged me to step over the side, place my foot into stormy waters, and to stand up and walk.  This represents a deliberate movement toward him and an equally deliberate movement away from the sure and certain of a career in public education, a career that I enjoy immensely.  The walking on water begins with stepping into full time Christian ministry, something that I have never done before and have no experience with.  Sure I have served in various capacities in churches, including right now, but it has always been done in addition to my career instead of being done as just part of what I do.

I will begin more regular postings here once again in an effort to show what is happening on this journey with the Lord.  I'll first lay out the case for how I knew God was telling me to "go."  I'm doing this for the same reason that I have always posted:  I'm hoping you can learn something from it and apply it to your own life.  I strongly believe that the experience the Lord has called me and my family to is not unique.  Search the Bible if you don't believe me!  Look at the sheer number of people in the Bible whose lives were interrupted and took a turn they did not expect.  Look for people who heard the Lord tell them to do something frightening, challenging, or crazy and see what He did in their lives as a result.  Water walking isn't just part of the Christian experience.  It is the Christian experience!  So pray that the Lord will open your eyes to the boat that He wants you to step out of, and pray for the courage to obey.  You'll never be the same, and you'll never go on a better adventure or learn more about the character of Jesus than you will in those moments.

Lonely, Yet Not Alone

One thing that never was really emphasized in any of the training I've experienced or in books I've read about living on a mission is the loneliness associated with it.  I'm not sure if there is an underlying assumption in those resources that you are well connected with other people or if you are doing this work in your own community.  Regardless, going to a new place that God told you to go to is a lonely experience.  While our family is not overseas as other families we know are, we might as well be.  Washington is about as different from Texas as you could ever imagine.  That isn't a bad thing, but it is not what we have grown up with and has required a lot of adaptation.

When you move away from everyone and everything you know, in a sense you start over.  One of the more painful realizations I have come to is that life goes on in the place where you left, something I witnessed firsthand on my recent trip to Texas.  People move on.  They make new friends and they get older.  Their kids grow up.  Things are very different, and every time you go back to that place it is as though you've skipped forward in time with a time machine.  In your mind things are the same as they were when you left, but reality hits when you step off the plane and see the city you once knew has grown larger.  Then you run into people you know and they have changed, with new friends, spouses, or children.  Kids that you remember to be small are now almost as tall as you are.  Everything has changed right under your nose.  None of this is bad, but it is a reminder in the moment that things are no longer as they were.

When I have talked to others about moving to the Northwest or some other station that God would post them to, the most frequent reason I've heard for not doing it relates to family.  Most people can't imagine moving away from their family, and doing so is a hard thing to do.  For us we've also experienced the death of many loved ones early on in our marriage.  Amanda has already laid to rest both of her parents, and I have lost my mom.  All of our grandparents are gone.  This has at times heightened our feelings of isolation.

I have found that the holidays are particularly hard times for those who have lost beloved family members.  For some reason that I will never understand, many people seem to die around the holidays.  But even if they don't, holidays are times in which you would have normally gotten together with them, so you tend to reminisce about them and slide into sadness.  And it happens every year.  This happened to me yet again on Christmas day.  While my kids were opening presents and overjoyed at things that they received, I made a gradual slide from anticipation to disgust to anger and finally to sadness.  I had to get out of the house.

As I ran and walked toward Port Gardner, which has become a place of solitude for me during tough moments, I asked God why it had to be this way.  I don't like reliving the death of loved ones or wistfully reminiscing about holiday experiences from long ago.  In those moments it feels like you are at the funeral looking in the casket all over again.  Like the main character from the movie "Groundhog Day," no matter what you do you seem to wake up again and again in that same space.

I found my usual rock to sit on overlooking the water. The harbor had a hovering fog that day with a few breaks into blue sky.  It is always a beautiful and ever-changing spot where I can see the works of the Lord firsthand.  With tears streaming down my face I told the Lord that I missed those times with my family and friends.  I missed the way things used to be and the life we used to have.  And all was still in that moment.  The water was almost perfectly flat and there was barely a breeze.

The view over Port Gardner in Everett, looking toward Whidbey Island.

In that moment, some things popped into my head that I think the Lord was helping me with.  First and foremost, the gentle reminder that those things I remember were wonderful and beautiful experiences with family.  I will have those memories as long as I'm alive.  Yet those moments won't come back no matter what I do to make them come back.  Move back to Houston?  Nope.  That doesn't change the fact that many of the people in my memories have passed away.  Nor does it deal with the absolute fact that the Lord wants our family here.  Fly back for a visit?  While that is always a wonderful experience, if I have the expectation that things will be the same as they were I will be crushed with disappointment. 

Several other things were established in my mind during that quiet time by the frigid water.  The Lord reminded me that while I'm away from many loved ones and feeling lonely, I am not alone.  I have never been alone.  Everywhere I have been and everywhere I'm going to be is where He is.  Psalm 139 captures it beautifully:

I can never escape from your Spirit!
    I can never get away from your presence!
⁸ If I go up to heaven, you are there;
    if I go down to the grave,^[a] you are there.
⁹ If I ride the wings of the morning,
    if I dwell by the farthest oceans,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
    and your strength will support me.
¹¹ I could ask the darkness to hide me
    and the light around me to become night—
¹²     but even in darkness I cannot hide from you.
To you the night shines as bright as day.
    Darkness and light are the same to you.

In John chapter 1 Jesus also gave voice to his ability to be in all places at all times.  He was walking with one of the disciples, Philip, and they were approaching a man that Philip had talked to about Jesus, imploring him to come meet this unique individual.
 
⁴⁷ As they approached, Jesus said, “Now here is a genuine son of Israel—a man of complete integrity.”
⁴⁸ “How do you know about me?” Nathanael asked.
Jesus replied, “I could see you under the fig tree before Philip found you.”

In that moment, I needed to know that I was seen while sitting on that lonely rock.  And I was seen, and heard, and seen through like a pane of glass in that moment.  

Many people here would probably explain this away by saying that, yes, many places in Puget Sound are beautiful and can help you to clear your head.  While I don't disagree with that statement on the surface, it tends to spotlight the blindness that so many people here have.  They worship the created rather than the creator.  What I experienced on that day was the presence of the Lord Himself, just like I experienced that same presence in India on a rooftop overlooking a very dirty city, and similar to what I experience in my own study at home during morning quiet times.  It isn't necessarily the place that is special.  Rather, it is that I went off to a place to be alone with the Lord, and He was there.

1 Kings 19:12b-13 And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper. ¹³ When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.
And a voice said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

What I can easily forget is that the Lord is not only present, not only accessible, but is extremely personable.  The One who sees me as I go from place to place knows me fully.  He sees through my exterior and knows me better than I know myself.  And knowing someone like that requires incredible love.  Life-changing love.  Earth-shattering love.  One person can't study another to that great a depth without loving them. 

It isn't easy or fun for me to share these things openly, but I do that for a purpose.  Some of you may be experiencing the same things I have.  You've lost loved ones and find yourself grieving over them with every birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, or other holiday.  Or, you may feel as though you are all alone in this life, knowing many people but not really having friendships with them.  You may have had a bad experience from your past that took you off the narrow road leading to the Lord and you've been on the wide road to destruction for some time, cynical about God, angry at life, hurt by others, and unable to move on.  

The best news out there is that the Lord loves you still, waits for you with open arms, is compassionate in forgiveness.  No matter where you go, He is there watching you.  Not as a security guard or a stalker or thundercloud ready to zap you with a lightning bolt when you do wrong, but as one who loves you more than anyone has loved you and who wants above all things for you to live in relationship with Him.  You are His beloved all of the time.

With this in mind, I encourage you to do as I was able to do.  Go find a quiet place away from people and pour out what is on your heart to the Lord.  He will listen and will not condemn.  Previously I have made the mistake of taking things like this to my spouse, but that is wrong.  While they might be able to listen, they can't deal with things like the Lord can.  There's a reason the Bible implores us to "cast our cares (anxieties) on him."  It's because He wants us to do that.

Know that just because you are loved like that does not mean things will be easy in life.  Loved ones will still die.  Tragedy will still strike.  People will disappoint you.  You will experience frustration and failure.  While He wants what is best for you, He knows that what is best for you isn't always comfort.  In fact, it frequently is not comfort that He will bring to your life.  But each of those situations can bring you closer to the One who loves you, and can be used to give you a life of fulfillment, joy, and excitement in Him.  

As you experience those things in your life, remember that you have not been abandoned.  You don't walk on an empty road by yourself.  

You may feel lonely in that moment, but you are not alone.

Sharing the Message in a Sophisticated Society

Our society is one of sophistication.  We know a lot of things, we own a lot of things, we investigate a lot of things, and we believe a lot of things.  We are rich beyond the wildest dreams of most people in this world.  The things we construct nowadays are amazing monuments to human ingenuity, including buildings and bridges and extending to powerful computers we can put into our pockets.  We have it all.

In a society that is so sophisticated and is learning all of the time, it is not easy to be a witness for Jesus.  It isn't that the message has changed.  Rather it is that the message falls on more and more deaf ears.  Why do I need Jesus when I can purchase my happiness in periodic chunks?  Why do I need Jesus when I have so many things to do that I can do on my own?  We are wealthy, insulated, and above all things cynical.  And ultimately our society is both blind and deaf spiritually.

The Apostle Paul lived in a sophisticated society when he wrote both of the Corinthian letters in the New Testament.  Corinth was a city of sophistication which was a major point of world and regional trade.  Paul was a guy who worked to support himself, bragging at one point that no one else supported his ministry financially.  He considered sharing the message with others a privilege and loved that he was able to do it for free.  To do this, however, he likely had to work long hours making tents, awnings, and perhaps even sails for ships.  I imagine him having a space in the marketplace of the time, which put him right in the middle of all of the activity in his city.  He likely used his space to share the Gospel message with many in the marketplace.

But Paul lived in a skeptical society just like we do here in America.  Sharing the message while living among people who think they have things figured out can be a very tough road.  Paul understood that, and he commented on it this way:

2 Corinthians 4
³ If the Good News we preach is hidden behind a veil, it is hidden only from people who are perishing. ⁴ Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.

That means that we need new methods, right?  Perhaps a new way of sharing the message.  More training perhaps.  Maybe the ways in which the message about Jesus and what He did for us is no longer relevant, or needs to be dressed up a bit to make it appealing to our society.  But Paul continued his earlier thought by stating that in the midst of all of this, his message stayed focused on Jesus.

⁵ You see, we don’t go around preaching about ourselves. We preach that Jesus Christ is Lord, and we ourselves are your servants for Jesus’ sake. ⁶ For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.

It is unfortunate that so many churches and ministers have gone the opposite way, spending huge chunks of time making the message about themselves, and making their church into self-help seminars.  It isn't supposed to be this way, and Paul called out those in his own time who were doing that same thing.  The churches that did things that way were plain to see, much like the churches that advertise themselves now by using the pastor's name or picture.  The message became the person and not Jesus.

So if it isn't about any new method of sharing, how do we do it?  Paul gave us his usual keen insight.
 
⁷ We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure.^[b] This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.

Here are some things I know from my limited experience in making things made out of clay:

• It is made up of tiny particles of dirt and materially has no value.  You or I could go to any river and find more clay for free with nothing but our hands to work with.
• Clay pots can't be recycled as glass can.  If you break a coffee mug, for example, it is forever broken.  It is good for nothing other than to be thrown away.
• Clay is easily replaceable.  

So Christians are just like clay pots.  By ourselves, we are ordinary.  We are cracked and chipped, and ultimately on our own have no real value.  We are more like a Solo cup than a gold goblet.  Yet we contain in us a treasure of monumental value.  Why would the Lord choose to put His amazing treasure in such a container?

The treasure is placed in this fragile, worthless, and ordinary clay pot of me and you because the message is about the treasure, not about the pot.  The treasure shines more brightly out of the ordinary container.

One great secret of the Christian life that few Americans seem to understand these days is that the life is not at all easy.  Your life is improved with Christ in it, but it is not made easier.  Amazingly, your circumstances make less sense as a Christian than they did before you believed.  There are more pressures, more testing, more difficulty and more moments of anguish.  Each of those moments develops cracks in us, the ordinary clay pot.  And as more and more cracks develop, the treasure shines through the cracks and becomes more and more evident.  

It isn't that we become stronger over time.  Instead, we may become weaker, which paradoxically allows Jesus to shine more brightly than ever before.  And with time it also becomes more obvious that the clay pot is only being held together by God's Spirit.  When this becomes evident to everyone around you, there we find the point of it all.  Jesus uses the weak, the unable, the impossible person, to shine His light through that person.  The message is about the treasure, not about the pot. 

2 Corinthians 4:7b- This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.
  
I believe that the most effective way to share the message in our sophisticated society is by living as the broken and ordinary vessels we are and allowing the treasure of Jesus to shine out of our lives.  People should see us living in radical obedience to the commands of Jesus.  They should see His love and His life shining out from us, even in difficulty and in spite of difficulty.  What I'm describing is not a joyless existence where the person is frowning all of the time, crushed by their burdens.  Instead what I'm describing is a person who is only held together by the Lord's Spirit, who presses on because the Lord Himself is empowering them to trudge with one foot in front of the other.  The person doing this is doing it because they love the Lord so very much and have complete understanding that He loves them to a degree that could never be measured.  Knowledge of such love always seeps out of us in our actions and words.  It can't be faked.

So live your life in front of others in this kind of radical devotion.  Let the light of Jesus shine through your cracks.  Let others see you as ordinary and weak.  Then, the treasure within will undeniable.  The message is about the treasure, not the container that the treasure is in.

What if?

  

Recently I was reading a book that asked a pretty insightful question about our churches today.  If a spy were to enter your church just to see what was going on so that they could report back to someone else, what would they be able to report back?  Would they comment on the type of music, how the people sit and group themselves, how they talk to each other, or what the message was about?  Or would it be something else?

Apparently back in the ancient Roman times, a certain emperor was nervous about this new "Christian" movement so he did just that:  sent spies out to see what these people were doing.  One of the spies reported back to him with this simple comment:  "Behold, how they love each other!"

Would that same thing be said about us today?

We live in an age where countless people are searching for answers following events such as the massacre of police officers in Dallas.  It is even tempting as Christians to question why events like that happen, and to an extent, why we have to live through things such as this.  Yet people around us do examine how we respond to things such as this, along with normal difficulties in life.  What makes the Christian response different from the world's response?

Many people are familiar with the story from John 13 regarding the time when Jesus washed the feet of his disciples.  His guys had been walking all day in sandals and were reclining at the dinner table with him on the evening before he was to be murdered.  Probably with some dismay, he noticed that no one had washed their feet nor had they volunteered to do that for others.  The feet, after all, are the dirtiest part of the body.  So being Jesus, he simply stood up without a word, grabbed a towel, and one by one, went around the table to wash the feet of each of the disciples.

After doing this, he commented:

 12 “Do you understand what I was doing? 13 You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because that’s what I am. 14 And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. 15 I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.

He also said in the same chapter:

34 So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. 35 Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

How his words should challenge us!  While you and I tend to look for things we can do, projects to complete, visible, tangible activities in our communities or among peers that we can do to point to Jesus, the man Himself was pointing at something else.  He said that our love for each other will prove to the world that we are His disciples.  Our love.  The way we love.  The actions we do to each other that are tied to that love.  The way we serve one another.  The way we provide for each other's needs.  The way we care and show regard.  The way we treat each other equally no matter what.  So while the observer might not choose to believe in this Jesus guy, our actions should tell the story to them that we believe He is who He says He is, and that we are followers of His.   In fact, our love and its associated actions should be radical compared to what the observer has seen in the world.

What do your actions toward others say about your beliefs regarding Jesus?  Could someone accuse you of showing radical love to other Christians, or to people in general?

The Apostle Peter later expanded on this idea by saying:

22 You were cleansed from your sins when you obeyed the truth, so now you must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters.[d] Love each other deeply with all your heart.[e]

All too often these days, the Church doesn't meet the standard that Jesus and Peter described.  And to my own shame, I realize that many times I have not met that standard either.  We have become too adept at forming factions, fighting with each other, or criticizing each other.  And perhaps even worse, we've taken the step of isolating ourselves from others even when we go to church.  We may attend and listen to a message, but we avoid talking to others and avoid anything resembling community.  When we go home, we stay at home and don't go out.  When we do go out, we only spend time with those whose beliefs match ours, not with people who don't believe.  Many nowadays don't even frequently attend anywhere because they feel they can worship the Lord anywhere, yet when they are out there, they don't worship!

Several years ago I had a Sunday School teacher who asked all of us to turn to look at our spouses and tell them plainly "you are not my enemy."  Church, your enemy is not a fellow believer!

You may be thinking that you don't participate in arguments in the church.  You don't criticize others and you aren't part of some group.  But what does your Facebook wall, Instagram or Twitter feed say?  What story would your text messages to others tell us about you?  If we overheard your conversations with others, what would their content tell us?  So many of us have taken to social media now to criticize each other incessantly.  Like it or not, there are Jesus followers on both ends of the political spectrum, yet some of us will give an intense critical rant online regarding feelings about Trump, Hillary, Bernie, the political Left or Right, while at the same time remaining silent on the things of Jesus.  Others have posted incendiary things regarding the incident in Dallas.  I've seen numerous posts recently proclaiming something to the effect of "if you don't believe like I do, then go ahead and unfriend me now."  That blanket statement appears to apply to everyone including fellow Christians.  Brothers and sisters, it isn't supposed to be this way!

What If?

So what if it were different for us?  What if Christians as a whole were to take these ideas to heart and were to truly act differently?

Peter continued his earlier thought by stating:

 So get rid of all evil behavior. Be done with all deceit, hypocrisy, jealousy, and all unkind speech. 2 Like newborn babies, you must crave pure spiritual milk so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation. Cry out for this nourishment, 3 now that you have had a taste of the Lord’s kindness.

There is a lot buried in this small passage.  What if we chose to no longer be deceitful to anyone?  Deceit involves concealing or misrepresenting the truth.  Have you ever done that to a neighbor or coworker?  Your kids?  Have you withheld facts to lead someone to a conclusion you wanted them to reach.  That is deceit.

What if we chose to get rid of all unkind speech? People are going to disagree with your political views and your viewpoint regarding Dallas, guns, political leanings, sports teams, and even what kind of food is the healthiest.  Your online posts are highly unlikely to change their minds on any of that stuff.  While my personal stance is to not wade into those things at all because they lead nowhere, you may feel differently.  But I challenge you to weigh your words against the standard of kind speech.  Is what you are saying helpful, gentle, tentative, and respectful?  Does it convey love for the recipient, or does it place blame or condemnation?  The one and only important issue at stake in this world is this:  how does that person feel about Jesus?  Are you, in posting or saying something that is incendiary, shutting someone off from listening to your message about Jesus?  Think about that for a minute.

What if each day Christians as a whole "craved pure spiritual milk?"  That seems to me to indicate a daily practice of prayer, reading the Word, and thinking on the things the Lord is saying to you.  If you're spending that kind of time with the Lord, I believe you and I can face just about anything the day throws at us.

The Apostle Paul gives us perhaps even more sobering words for this generation that you and I need to consider here:

Philippians 2:3-4New Living Translation (NLT)

3 Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. 4 Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.

What if the Church were to regularly, actively do these things, particularly in thinking of others as better than ourselves?  What effect would it have on an America that is now deeply divided?  What effect would it have on an American culture that is suspicious of organized religion and is reluctant to commit to following this Jesus guy?  I suspect that if we regularly thought of others as better of ourselves, we would speak differently, act differently, make social media posts differently, and probably spend our time differently.  We might even hang out with a different group of people than we currently do!  What if we embraced our role as builders and peacemakers?

One way to view the role of a Christian in this world is that of an ambassador.  Ambassadors represent the interests of a country and ultimately a king, and they live among another people and do that every single day.  You and I are people of another country, and our homes and businesses are the embassies of that country.  What effect would it have if we all were to start thinking of our daily work and the places where we spend the most time in those terms!

Would it then be said about us "Behold, how they love each other!" or "how they love people!"  Like it or not, this is our work in this world, and it is hard.  We are called to love our fellow Christian brothers and sisters, and we are called to love the people in this world, our neighbors, meaning literally everyone around us.  In fact, I believe the Lord will keep us here to do that very thing until He determines that it is time for us to go.  We have been given a job, and that job is relatively simple but extremely challenging:  love people with the same love that Jesus showed.  Now we have to go do it.

It has been hammered into me over and over again that the only way to proclaim the Gospel is by sharing the Good News about Jesus with those around us, and we should do that.  But we can't forget that Jesus lived the Good News.  And the Good News is that people, all people, all undeserving of grace, are freely given forgiveness for sins and aren't subject to the consequences of them if we will just believe that Jesus took the punishment for us and rose again.  While Jesus's death on the cross fulfilled it once and for all, He lived it day to day during his 3-year ministry when he healed the sick, forgave the sinner, counseled with those on the wrong path, and taught the way to life.  What would be the effect on this country if you and I would just do that, and stop our coarse, foolish, and unhelpful talk?

I hope this makes my fellow believers think about their actions and words this week.  It is time for us to stop acting like the rest of the world.  It is time for us to begin acting as Peter described in 1 Peter chapter 2 as "living stones" and "holy priests."  Let's fully embrace the role of ambassador this week.

Cynicism and its Antidote

To become cynical is to experience a poison that runs through your bloodstream and sucks the very life out of you.  Joy is gone and replaced with sadness and hardness.  Excitement and anticipation are replaced with depression.  Anger sets in and the person tends to withdraw from others.  When it is at its worst, it seems that all hope is lost.  For a Christian this is probably one of the sorriest outcomes because it can affect everything that the person does.

The last few months I have lived out this type of cynicism which seems to have set in from a constant barrage of things in my life which have gradually sapped strength and left me feeling empty.  There have been plenty of things to include in the list:  things at home with the kids, things from work, things through our church, broken relationships, dysfunctional relationships, too much to do, being unable to meet the expectations of others, and being unable to achieve the expectations I have for why we are in the Pacific Northwest.  These things have come in a steady stream, wave after wave, and have helped me to realize that while I used to think of myself as a rocky cliff being battered on the seashore, I'm really a sandcastle being washed away.

The reason this has set in with me begins with my relationship with the Lord.  Everything begins and ends there for the life of a Christian.  When we are walking in relationship with Him, life isn't easy by any means but it is bearable.  When we are not walking in close relationship, the strength we think we have is sapped.  Some churches out there seem to teach that as you get closer to the Lord you yourself get stronger, more invincible, more powerful, and even more prosperous.  That has not been my experience and isn't supported by the Bible.  What I see is that the further you go down the road with Him, the more you need Him.  One could even say you become weaker because He becomes the source of life in you, that "bubbling spring" that Jesus talked about whose source isn't in yourself but in Himself.  While that source is everlasting, you have to drink from it constantly and continually or you will find your strength gone.  That is God's way:  to put to death all of yourself as you live the rest of your life.

Recently I had to take a break over the weekend so that I could just be alone with the Lord.  I went off to the mountains by myself just to sit with him and to talk.  Those moments are always very powerful because I'm removed from all of the noise of life.  And if there is one major criticism I have with American culture is that there is too much noise in life.  We will devote every waking moment to getting things or achieving things or doing things, bringing ourselves to utter exhaustion.  And as we go deeper into this pattern we rarely look up to see that we are only building a sandcastle that will be washed away by the rising tide.  We are blind.  And so for me my cure for blindness and deafness is to go away to the mountains to just listen to what the Lord has to say.

I reached the peak of a mountain that gave perhaps the best panoramic views of the North Cascade mountains that I have ever seen.  For a while I just sat there to take it in, remembering that all of these things were created by the Lord's own hand.  It is magnificent when you think about it all.  You examine the ridge of a particular mountain, looking at the seeming randomness of its shape, the plunging cliffs, the spotty trees on its side, the snow and glaciers, and think about it being all part of a grand design.  And not just that!  It was designed for our use and enjoyment.  Man is unable to make anything so beautiful as I saw on that day.

On the mountain I confessed to the Lord that I had become cynical.  I saw it in my attitude.  I heard it in my voice as I talked to people around me.  I recognized it in my morning quiet times which had become little more than a time of sitting and anticipating all of the problems of the day.  I simply asked the Lord to draw the cynicism out of me as poison is drawn from a wound.  I know that if you are bitten by certain snakes or spiders, the venom has to be literally pulled from the wound, and I believe cynicism is that way too.  It has to be pulled out, removed, and discarded.

The Lord brought to me a few passages from Psalms on that day which brought healing and were a reminder of who He is.  Here they are.

Psalm 145:13-19
The Lord always keeps his promises;
    he is gracious in all he does.^[b]
14 The Lord helps the fallen
    and lifts those bent beneath their loads.
¹⁵ The eyes of all look to you in hope;
    you give them their food as they need it.
¹⁶ When you open your hand,
    you satisfy the hunger and thirst of every living thing.
¹⁷ The Lord is righteous in everything he does;
    he is filled with kindness.
¹⁸ The Lord is close to all who call on him,
    yes, to all who call on him in truth.
¹⁹ He grants the desires of those who fear him;
    he hears their cries for help and rescues them.

Psalm 146:5-8New Living Translation (NLT)

⁵ But joyful are those who have the God of Israel^[a] as their helper,
    whose hope is in the Lord their God.
⁶ He made heaven and earth,
    the sea, and everything in them.
    He keeps every promise forever.
⁷ He gives justice to the oppressed
    and food to the hungry.
The Lord frees the prisoners.
⁸     The Lord opens the eyes of the blind.
The Lord lifts up those who are weighed down.
    The Lord loves the godly.

 Psalm 147:3
He heals the brokenhearted
    and bandages their wounds.

Psalm 147:10-11

 ¹⁰ He takes no pleasure in the strength of a horse
    or in human might.
¹¹ No, the Lord’s delight is in those who fear him,
    those who put their hope in his unfailing love.

So here I read about the Lord helping those bent beneath heavy loads (Psalm 145:14), that He is close to those who call upon him in truth (v 18), that he rescues (v 19), that He frees prisoners (Psalm 146:7), opens eyes (v 8), lifts up those who are weighed down (v8), heals the brokenhearted (Psalm 147:3), and that he delights in those who put their hope in His love (Psalm 147:11).  Each of those were nuggets of truth that I needed at that moment.  Each of them provided an antidote to the poison of cynicism.

I don't know what burdens you are carrying at this moment.  What I do know and what really matters is that you were not meant to carry your burden by yourself.  And I also know from experience that many of the burdens on us are things we have laid on ourselves due to expectations of American culture, our workplace, or others around us.  If you will just come to a place where you realize how weak you are and how unable you are to carry that burden, you are on the path to genuine healing from the Lord Himself.  He is mighty and He is powerful and He knows all things.  But He does not usually assert himself on someone who doesn't want help or outright refuses it.  He will allow us to discover our need for Him and then, only then, will He come to the rescue.

I came down the mountain that day on a road to being healed from a cynical attitude.  Had you been with me on that day you would not have heard a voice from the clouds, and you wouldn't have seen someone who looks like a person but had the appearance of lightning.  Even so, I know that the Lord was there in that moment, and He will do the same for you if you will just stop and take the time to talk and listen to Him.

A church planter here once advised me to have a quiet place I can run to in the tough times to go be with the Lord.  I think that advice rings true for all of us.  You also need a quiet place to go and be with the Lord and to hear from the Healer and the lover of your soul.  So if you find yourself in the middle of a busy time and feel as though your life is being choked off, or that you are drowning in all that you have to do, take some time to go be alone with the Lord.  Get to know Him in those moments.  You will find a God who won't condemn you, drive you further into the ground, or further hurt you.  He is the one about whom it is said "will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle (Isaiah 42:3).  To the weak reed and flickering candles out there, go to him to be restored!

Psalm 46:10New Living Translation (NLT)

¹⁰ “Be still, and know that I am God!
    I will be honored by every nation.
    I will be honored throughout the world.”