Forgotten

There were seven baskets of leftover bread on the hillside after Jesus fed the four thousand, and Mark tells us that the disciples forgot to take any of it with them when they climbed into the boat and crossed the sea. 

You know, when they went back to ministry as they best knew it, following Jesus around and encountering the crowds and doing their thing. 

And it's at this moment that I realize something so very human about all of us in this story. 

I'll be honest - I hold the disciples to a higher standard. I think they're pretty fortunate. I say things to myself (at least to myself, sometimes out loud) that if I had been a disciple and had had the opportunity to follow Jesus around, listen to Him speak, see Him minister, and be present for all of these amazing things, I would have a much stronger faith than I have now. No way that experience would have been wasted on me. 

Yet, here we are - the disciples are doing something so very common to all of us, something that I would definitely do today. Something that I do do today...and I'm not alone in it. 

They've just seen a miracle. Jesus has blessed, broken, and divided a very small amount of food and fed four thousand men (not to mention women and children), and His provision is so grand that there are leftovers. Not just a few scraps here and there, but seven full baskets of leftovers. That's incredible. 

But then, suddenly, it's time to move on. Jesus tells them it's time to go back to the other side of the sea, back to the ministry, back to the teaching, so the disciples climb into the boat to get on with things, and they leave the seven baskets of bread sitting on the hillside. They forgot to take any of it with them. 

They forgot they might get hungry later. That's a small problem. The bigger problem is that they forgot that God Himself just provided for them. 

Three paragraphs later, they're in the boat grumbling that they don't have any bread with them. 

Even though they still have Jesus. 

How quick are we to forget the things that God has done in our lives? How easy is it for us to go back to life as we knew it, to get back on the hamster wheel, to resume the things we used to be doing, only to discover that we have a great, desperate need for something that Jesus already provided, but we left it on the shore and forgot to bring it with us? 

How often do we leave His provision behind?

Listen, I'm guilty of this. I'm guilty of, for example, going back to fear, hilariously shortly after God has set me free from it. I can feel it in my heart that God has given me both strength and courage, and then, I walk away from that sacred space and go back to the world as I know it, and all of a sudden, I'm afraid again. I'm anxious again. I seem to have forgotten that I literally just watched God set me free from it, just felt Him do it. 

I literally just ate the bread that He blessed and broke and provided to the point that it was overflowing in my life, and then, I left those leftovers - abandoned that abundance - on the hillside on my way back to the life I was living. 

Sound familiar? Is it just me? I don't think it's just me. 

In fact, I know it's not. Because here are the disciples doing exactly the same thing. It's a common problem for all of us, this forgetfulness that we have. These oops moments that we have in our lives where we remember, suddenly, that there was bread. There very recently was bread, bread aplenty, bread overflowing...and we...forgot it. Already. Just like that. 

In the space of just a few paragraphs.... 

Forgetting the Bread

Sometimes, we read right past the things in the Bible that remind us that the biblical characters aren't so different from us after all. That the struggles we have are the same. 

Usually, these things we miss are in the transitions. 

The other day, I was reading in Mark 8, which starts with the feeding of the four thousand. You can probably recall this story - Jesus is discovered by a crowd of folks who are impressed by the reputation of Him and want to hear and see Him for themselves, but it's getting late and it's obvious that everyone is going to be hungry, so Jesus asks how much food they have lying around, and they come up with a few loaves of bread and a few fish. Jesus blesses them, breaks them, hands them out to the crowds, and then, the disciples pick up seven baskets of leftovers. In an age without refrigeration, there doesn't seem to be much use for leftover fish, so it's likely that most, if not all, of these seven baskets were filled with bread. 

Then, "immediately," Jesus and His disciples get into a boat and cross over to the other side of the sea, where the Pharisees start to harass Him (as expected), and He says to His disciples that they don't have time for this, so they get back into the boat and go somewhere else. 

Cut to another scene that we seem to know very well. Jesus and His disciples are in the boat, crossing the sea once again, and the disciples are grumbling because they're hungry. They don't have any bread with them. Jesus tells them to beware the yeast of the Pharisees... and they're like yeah, of course. The Pharisees don't make very good bread. We wouldn't want that anyway. 

But that's not what He was talking about. 

And all of a sudden, here we are, two or three paragraphs from the miracle, and we're arguing about what the yeast of the Pharisees is and whether the Pharisees can even make good bread or whether they're not very good persons or what exactly Jesus means by this. 

In the middle of all of this, there's one little sentence that changes the whole way I understand this scene...and I'm not sure I recognized it for what it was until I read it this most recent time (despite the fact that I've been reading my Bible for 25+ years). 

Here it is:

The disciples had forgotten to bring any bread with them. 

That's it. They had forgotten to bring any bread with them. 

In our world where we have cut and numbered and compartmentalized the Bible, we miss what this means. We miss the connection here. We have traveled, in our minds, across three different stories - the feeding of the four thousand, the interaction with the Pharisees, and the famine in the boat. They even have different headers in most modern Bibles over these different subsections, so we simply read them as different little stories, vignettes, unconnected parts of the Gospel. 

After all, we know there are time gaps. We know that we're bouncing around a little bit. 

But read Mark's words. Jesus feeds the four thousand, immediately gets into the boat and crosses the sea, encounters the Pharisees for an indeterminable amount of time (but probably not long), then gets back in the boat, where now we're grumbling about not having any bread. 

Just a few paragraphs ago, right before immediately, there were seven baskets of bread. The disciples forgot to take any of that with them? Mark doesn't say they ran out of bread. Mark doesn't say the bread went stale. Mark doesn't say the bread was moldy. Mark says they forgot to bring any bread with them. 

They left seven baskets of bread on the hillside. 

We are more like than I even thought we were....  

Charlie

I met Charlie at a time in my life when a lot of folks had been lying to me, I'd been taken advantage of, I was about to give up and settle for the way things were and just forget about it. I was discouraged and angry and frustrated at knowing things were broken and not having anyone to help me fix them. 

Charlie...is my mechanic. 

When we met, my car had been to the shop a dozen times in half as many months, had at least 10 different parts replaced for thousands of dollars, and still had the same problems it started with. I was being run-around and taken advantage of, and I knew it, but I felt powerless to do anything differently. No one would treat me like I had any knowledge at all about anything in the world when, in fact, I was actually pretty car-savvy (and world-savvy, but that's beside the point). 

Through a friend, I was told about Charlie and his little shop, and after a lot of convincing myself, I made one last-ditch effort to find help in the world. 

And I found it. 

Not only was Charlie able to actually fix my car, but he was super-friendly about it, did the work at a reasonable price, and stood behind it. He has since fixed my car several times, as well as taking over my oil changes. And on the occasions when I've run into weird little things that I've just needed a little help with, Charlie has always been willing to help...and not even let me pay him for the few minutes of his time. (Like just this week when he helped me change a brake light because I could not get the darned thing to come loose.) 

The thing is, I absolutely trust Charlie with my car. One hundred percent. At this point, he's proven to me that he can handle things, that he'll be honest with me, and that he's reasonable about his business practices. 

And he doesn't think anything of it.

It would be easy for a guy like Charlie, with the knowledge and tools and reputation he has, to come in and think he's the hero. To try to be a savior. To relish in the idea of being the one to rescue someone...and maybe (in my traumatic experiences in life) hold it over someone's head. Make them feel like they owe him. Make them wonder when the day is coming that he's cashing in his favors. 

But I don't feel like that with Charlie. Charlie is just a good guy. Doing good in his community and running an honest business and building up an amazing customer base because of it (it's harder to get my car in with him now, but that's just a testament to who he is). I'm thankful that I found him. 

The thing is...I want to be more like him. When I say that I know how easy it would be to come in as the hero, it's because I have a streak in me that likes to come in as the hero. I've noticed over the past few years that it's breaking quite a bit, but it's still there. I like being the savior. I like being the hero. I like being the rescuer. 

Then I think about the trust that I have in Charlie, the confidence I have in the service he provides, and I recognize what a gift to the world it is to just be a good person. 

Because someone out there is being lied to, taken advantage of. They're ready to give up and give in and just settle for less. They're ready to accept broken things. They're discouraged and angry and frustrated and broken...

...and one good person can change so much of that. 

Lord, help me to be a good person.  

Cast Out

There are some things in our lives that cannot be healed; they must be cast out. But here's the greater challenge: 

I have no earthly idea how to cast out a demon. None. 

I get that there are a bunch of holy roller types that have been on television making a display of doing exactly this, but I don't think that's the way to go. I know there are some Pentecostal types in the world who are very confident in their abilities to do this, but I'm not sure I've seen anything convincing from them, either. And then, there are those who pray quietly, from the agony of their heart, in private spaces and think that certainly, the whisper of confident assurance must be enough; I'm not sure of that, either. 

In other words, the world has a lot of worldly ideas about how to do it and some Christians have some doctrinal ideas about how to do it, but it's just one of those things that I still wrestle with, and I'm not sure where exactly the right place to stand on this is. 

I think there's a part of me that is still caught up in the fear of it all (which is, by the way, exactly what demons thrive on). When you read the stories in the Bible that involve demons, it's never pretty. You see folks thrown to the ground, seizing, foaming at the mouth, lying completely dead. And, well, who wants to do that to themselves? Can't you just make an agreement with the demons and find a way to live together? 

Ah, here we are again...making agreements with demons. No wonder we have problems that can only be cast out. 

Again, demonology is something I'm not sure I have really accepted or understood for much of my Christian life. I come from a Christian persuasion that doesn't talk much about it, and I know the perceptions of both Christians and the world about the existence of demons. But the more of my life that I live and the more of my Bible that I study, I can't really fathom a spiritual world that is much different from that in the pages of our Scripture, and if Jesus Himself went around recognizing demons among the people, then who am I to sit here and say that Jesus is real, but demons don't exist? Seems fishy to me. 

That said, I think there are a couple of good principles in the Gospels (and in the later New Testament) about how to deal with demons. 

First, you have to tell them to shut up. 

Several of the stories that we see of Jesus encountering demons start by telling us that the demons are screaming, that they won't stop talking, that they know who Jesus is and keep calling Him the Son of God. And the first thing Jesus does is tell them to shut up. "Quiet!" 

This is not because He doesn't want to be recognized and known as the Son of God. It's because in the spiritual world in which Jesus is King, demons do not have the right to speak. Perhaps because they are so good at it. I mean, go back to the serpent in the Garden and it doesn't take much to recognize that if you let the demons speak, they'll talk circles around us until we've spun a full 180 degrees without even realizing it and then, here we are again, making agreements with them. So the first thing that you have to do with a demon is command it to shut up. 

Second, you have to speak straight to the demon. With all power and authority, as soon as you've taken its voice away, you have to take your voice back and speak with courage. Because you need these demons to know that you have the authority to command them to shut up because, get this, you also have the authority to tell them to leave. Listen, you're about to do it. This is your body, your life, your loved one, whatever, and you set the boundaries, and you're done making agreements. 

Third, you have to call on the name of Jesus. They have to know that you belong to Him. This authority in your voice, the way you speak, the audacity that you have to command the demons to do anything comes from Jesus who is the King, God who is the Lord, your Father...which makes you His child...which makes you present in the throne room. And suddenly, you become someone the demons don't even want to mess with any more. I mean, take any space in your life and make it inhospitable to someone else's tastes, and they aren't going to want to stay there long. That's what you do when you declare Who the space in your heart really belongs to - if it's God's, it's disgusting to the demons, and they don't want to hang around. Much better to go somewhere less objectionable to them. 

Again, I don't know how it works. I don't know that I've ever done it in my whole life. I'm in a season where I'm trying to learn, but I still have more questions than answers. 

But what I know, at least, at this point is this: that demons must be real because Jesus spent a good amount of His time dealing with them - in public and out loud - and that there are things in our lives that simply cannot be healed; they must be cast out. 

And that means it's time I learn to start casting. 

Signs

I am a person who has had much to heal from in my life. Challenges I didn't ask for, brokenness I didn't choose, but here I've been anyway, doing my best to navigate the fallen things and try to find some solid ground on which to put my feet. 

And...healing is real. Healing is possible. Healing is necessary. There are things in our lives that we absolutely can and must heal in the most traditional senses of our understanding of what healing is. 

But, as we've been talking about this week, there are also things we can only cast out. 

As a person who has experienced my fair measure of both in this life, here's what I think the difference is: 

We can heal things that haven't gotten into our hearts yet. We can heal things that haven't changed some fundamental aspect of who we are. We can heal things that are temporary, that have an end in sight, that will respond to the things that we do to try to heal them. 

Infections respond to antibiotics. Coughs respond to therapies. Weak knees can get stronger with rehab. Addictions can break through a series of hard choices made over and over and over again. 

What has to be cast out is that thing that has changed the way our life looks and sounds and breathes. 

Here's what I mean: 

I have had some challenges. Often, they are physical challenges that require physical interventions. I have gone to the doctors, filled the prescriptions, scheduled the therapies, done the exercises, made steady progress, scored some wins, gotten some parts of my life back. This is healing. 

But in the course of a few of these things over the years of my life, including one that I am fighting through right now, something else is going on, too. 

There's a spirit of discouragement sitting over my heart. No matter my progress, my successes, my wins, I cannot shake the feeling that I am still failing. That something is still holding me back. There's a resignation in my spirit that is ready to accept something less than total wholeness because there's part of me that believes that this is as good as it's going to get. 

And then, when I open my mouth, the voice that comes out of it is not mine. 

Remember the guy who was chained in the cemetery? The whole town knew he was crazy as a loon. He was out there cursing and swearing, naked, wandering around in broken chains - broken chains. He should have already been set free; the chains that were holding him weren't attached to anything any more. But he couldn't get out of there. He couldn't stop shouting and screaming. He couldn't keep his clothes on. There was something coming out of him that was still bound to a darkness, even though the chains had already been broken. (And, let's be honest - he'd broken them.) 

Sometimes, we set ourselves free - we do the work, we do all the things, we break the chains - but there's still something holding us there, and the primal screams and the deep cursing that comes out of our mouths keeps scaring everyone away. 

Just the other day, after several days of amazing success in a row, after a great measure of healing and a little bit of release in my heart, I had a little setback. And at the very same moment that I felt that little bit of discouragement and devastation trying to creep back into my heart, I banged my hands against whatever was in front of me in incredible frustration, and I screamed (I promise you, screamed), "Son-of-a-****ing *****."

Yeah, me. 

Or...not me. Because anybody who knows me knows that I don't talk like that. I told myself I was just frustrated. That I was aggravated at having made so much progress, only to have such a hard setback completely out of nowhere. That it was only a natural human reaction to a still-broken life when I have worked so hard to put a little bit of it back together. 

But honestly? There's something else at play here. Something I have felt for awhile, but tried to ignore because, well, because spiritual warfare is messy. 

Yet in the moment that I heard those words come out of my mouth, I knew it. Without a doubt. For absolute certain. 

I've been trying to heal something that can only be cast out.  

Demons

What if the things we're trying to heal in our lives cannot be healed? What if they must be cast out?

This is the question we're asking based on the story in the Gospels of this father who brought his child to the disciples for healing, then brought the child to Jesus, and immediately, Jesus cast out the demon that the disciples couldn't heal the child from. 

Listen, I know we don't like to talk about spiritual warfare. I know talking about demons is a little troubling, at best. A little weird. A little unsettling. I mean, we don't really have to believe in all of that, do we? 

It's hard for us to fathom a real kind of darkness like a demon. A real force. A real power in the world that would be working against us. Something we come up against that we can't defeat on our own. We believe in God, sure. But the devil? 

A little harder. And that's being kind. 

But the Bible tells us from the very first pages that he is real. 

Right at the very beginning, a physical-spiritual force that was working against God was present in the world, following along in the quiet places to whisper to us that God was lying. That God was holding out on us. That life may be good, but the really good stuff is in God's secret stash and God - the God who loves you and created you in His own image - doesn't want you to have it. From those very first pages, this real physical-spiritual force has been trying to keep us from the best that God has for us. 

I don't know, Aidan. I mean, a talking serpent? Really?

And yet...

And yet, you can believe that a single man built a giant boat that held two (or seven!) of every animal on the planet. You can believe that a ram just happened to be caught in a thicket on the top of a mountain. You can believe that a man threw a stick on the ground and it turned into a snake, then he held that same stick over the waters and dry ground appeared. You can believe that an army marched around a city seven days in a row with clay pots, then yelled at the tops of their lungs and that wall came crashing down. You can believe that a man stepped out of a boat and walked on water...and that two fish and five loaves can feed thousands of hungry mouths. 

You can believe that a man was crucified and placed in a tomb, across which a giant stone was rolled, and that three days later, He rolled that stone away and walked out of that tomb. 

But the very real physical-spiritual presence of an enemy who doesn't want you to have the life you were created for is too much? 

I don't think the reality of the devil boggles our minds; I think it terrifies our hearts. Easier to keep your eyes closed than to open them and see the dark. 

But that doesn't make it any less dark in here. 

And if we have an enemy that is doing all he can to keep us from the life that God has for us, then we have to recognize that there are things in this world that we simply can't heal. 

They can only be cast out. 

So let's start doing some casting. 

Healing

We are living in a world looking for healing. Whether it's from the physical things that ail us, our broken hearts, our damaged relationships, our failures, or whatever, we're all looking to be made whole again...or at least to get a little bit of our peace, strength, and hope back. 

And we'll do just about anything to get it. 

It doesn't take very long on the internet to find the wackiest, weirdest solutions to whatever ails you...and I know folks who will try almost all of them. No matter how silly, disgusting, or potentially dangerous, anything that promises even a small measure of the healing that we're looking for is worth a shot. ...isn't it? 

We'll try anything, and then we're disappointed when it doesn't work. Wait...you mean drinking apple cider vinegar doesn't actually make me lose weight? Then what did I burn my throat for? You mean 30 minutes of mindfulness a day doesn't give me peace when I go back to my chaotic life? 

Let's face it - the world is full of snake oil, and most of us are being charmed. 

But we're desperate. We need healing, and we know it. 

One of my favorite stories in the Gospels - one I have written about at length before - is the story of the father who comes to the disciples to heal his child, who has been afflicted for quite some time, but nothing is working. 

We don't meet this father when he comes to the disciples, though. Remember, Jesus has sent out the disciples to heal the people and spread the good news, so it's only natural that someone looking for healing would come to them on their travels. But no, we meet this father when he comes to Jesus. 

"Lord, I brought my child to your disciples for healing, but they couldn't do it." They were sent out to heal in the world, with all of the authority of the God who both creates and re-creates, and they were unable to give my child their life back. They couldn't heal this one. 

Then, Jesus looks at the man and looks at the child (and, I think, looks at the disciples), and at once, He rebukes the demon in the child and forces it to flee. 

Immediately, the child is healed. 

We are living in a world looking for healing, and we'll do just about anything to get it. We'll spend all our time, all our resources, cash in all of our favors, follow every advice, do absolutely ridiculous things to our bodies, contort our hearts, bow our heads, fold our hands, open ourselves to the universe, whatever it takes...

But what if what we're trying to heal in our lives can't be healed? 

What if it has to be cast out?  

Barb

I never really knew what Barb thought of me. If I'd have had to guess, I would have said she didn't like me all that much. It was a season in my life in which most persons didn't like me all that much, or at least, the world seemed that way. 

It was middle school. 

There is no worse season to try to live through than middle school. In fact, I think the only persons who look back on middle school with any sense of positive nostalgia are the ones who were making middle school so very middle schoolish for the rest of us...and seem to have forgotten that. 

Words you will never hear anyone say: "Middle school was a great time for me!" No, it wasn't. It was a time of raging hormones, dramatic shifts in social structure, weird little dynamics nobody could describe, and the first real stratification most of us ever experienced, as we finally got to choose our way through things like band or choir or study hall or art or sports or theater...on top of finally being divided into "gifted" and "not gifted" groups. Middle school was awful. 

And yet, something about those awful years put a seed in my heart that, when given the chance to work with students in the K-12, I chose the middle school. It's where I thought I could make the biggest difference. 

I forget the exact context because it wasn't something I said. It wasn't something I posted on social media. One of my friends posted something that included a little something about me being at the middle school as a staff member, about some contribution I was making there. 

In the comments section, here comes Barb. 

"Those kids are so lucky to have you." 

Barb, who was one of my sixth grade teachers. Barb, who I never knew whether she liked me or not. Barb, who saw some of my hardest and most awkward years. Barb, who was quiet but kind and absolute loads of fun. 

Twenty-five years later, Barb took a few minutes out of her day to comment on a random post made by an intermediary, to speak to me and say, "Those kids are so lucky to have you." 

In other words, Barb was recognizing that I was good there. That I had something to offer there. That something in my own experience was going to be an asset in what I would be able to do there. She saw all of the possibilities of the season, connected to the story that she held in her head of me, and she took a moment to offer some encouragement and goodwill. 

I needed that. (Spoiler alert: I always need that.)

I think we all need that. I think we need those folks who hold different parts of our story, and who can see those parts from an angle that we can't see, who are willing to step in for a second and connect some of the pieces for us with encouragement and goodwill. 

Here we are, four years after that comment, and I still remember it. Of the millions of little things, quick sentences, few words that I have read on the Internet in the time since that comment, I remember that one. Because it meant so much to me. 

And it reminds me to be that person for someone else, even if we've been disconnected for a long time. It reminds me that I see the stories of others from angles they simply cannot and that sometimes, my perspective can be an encouragement to them if I'm just willing to step out and say it...with grace and goodwill. 

Your Story

As I think about Joseph, the man who should have been king, I think about all of the things in our lives that we don't get to choose. 

We don't get to choose what family we're born into. We don't get to choose how that family story has taken shape over the generations before us. We don't get to choose how the fallen world around us acts. We don't get to choose how the other peoples in the world respond. 

What we get to choose, to some degree, is how our own story unfolds. 

We get to choose whether we're going to live with an entitlement mindset, moping around because the world isn't what we think it should be. Grieving because this world is holding us back. Angry with those who can't get on board with what our lives were supposed to be. Abusive, trying to make the world conform so that our lives look like they were supposed to look. 

Or we can choose to become carpenters and recognize that it may not be what it was meant to be, but we're building something anyway. And it's going to be good. 

That doesn't mean that Joseph's life was without troubles just because he chose to make the best of his situation, just because he chose to be a builder. 

He still had to deal with splinters. He had to deal with pieces of wood that wouldn't do what he needed them to do. He struggled against the boards that just wouldn't lay flat or straighten out or even those that wouldn't curve just right (yes, you can curve wood). He probably hit his thumb a time or two, missed a couple of nails now and then, had to scrap some plans and go back to the drawing board. 

He had to learn to live with the frustrations of the things he was building if he intended to continue to build his life. 

And aren't we glad that he did?

Because he became the earthly father to the man who would be all the things he ever dreamed to be...and more. He was entrusted to build something greater than any blueprint he'd ever been given. Or rather, to the master blueprint he'd put his faith and hope and trust in all his life. He was faithful to his Lord, and he was faithful to his life, and somehow, his quiet little life that he chose to be present for becomes this background story to the life that shook the gates of Hell themselves. 

He didn't choose that, either. 

He didn't choose to be used by God; he only chose to let God use him if the Lord so desired. He set himself up to be part of God's story, however that was going to look. He opened himself to the possibility that God might do something with his life. Very early on when we meet him, we are told what kind of man he was - a man who didn't want to disgrace a young woman he loved, even though she seemed to have disgraced herself. 

He was full of the spirit of the Lord, and that made him a great choice to father the King. To mentor the King. To teach the King. 

To pass on the little things that he knew, about life, about the Lord, about grace and kindness and goodness. 

About the nails. 

Man, what an incredible story. All because he chose to be a carpenter instead of grumbling about not being a king. 

Of all of the things you don't get to choose in this world, you get to choose this: you get to choose how you'll live in the face of it. And when you do, you decide how God can use you.

How will you let God use you?

The King's Father

Joseph, far removed from any of his ancestors who had been king, had become very thoroughly a carpenter. He worked with his hands, built things, built for himself a life, and had a reputation. He was the carpenter. 

And then... 

And then, the angel of the Lord comes to him and tells him that he's going to be a father. He's going to have a son. That son is going to be the redemption of Israel, of all of God's people. Indeed, of the world. 

His son is going to be the King of Kings. 

Can you think for a second about what that had to awaken in Joseph? About what deep longings in his heart that had to arouse? 

My son is going to be King. My ancestors were kings. My ancestor was the best king, the man after God's own heart. The wisdom that we know as the Scriptures tells the story of my ancestors, and today, God has told me that we're about to write a new chapter of this. My son is going to be next. 

There might have been a little sting in his heart. Missed it by one, by one generation. If the timing had been just a little different, Joseph might have been the promised King....wouldn't he? Maybe he sat around and thought about this for awhile, about how it could have been him. Maybe he looked down at his well-worn hands, calloused and scarred with the pricks of a thousand little splinters, a lifetime of labor, and thought...it could have been me. I was born to be a king. 

Maybe he looked around at the things he had built, and he imagined one more thing - a throne room. Did he start planning one, like any good father would start planning a nursery? Was he drawing up designs in his head for how he was going to restore not just the title, but the place? Was he thinking about rebuilding the throne while he was looking at his pregnant wife? 

Was he thinking about adding on a parents' quarters, just for good measure? Just to get himself back into the presence of the greatness he should have had for himself? 

Maybe he was just doting on his son. Was he content to be a carpenter, having accepted his life and learned to love it? 

Maybe he was resigned to being a carpenter and had long since given up on ever being anything more. 

Maybe it never struck him at all that he could have or should have or might have been king, but he was just genuinely happy to be part of restoring his family's name, even if it was coming through his son. 

His son, by the way, who wasn't even his, but was everything he needed the young boy to be. 

Can you imagine what it's like for the man who should be king to find out he's raising one? 

Joseph could have been, but was never going to be king. 

But he was going to be the king's father. 

And that's exactly as messy as it sounds.  

Carpenter

Joseph should have been king. If things had been different a dozen generations before him, he would have been king. If the people around him wouldn't have gone so far astray, if his great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfathers could have stayed on the narrow path, he would have been king. 

But he wasn't king. 

He was a carpenter. 

By the time we get to Joseph, the air of entitlement is completely gone. Generations of not being king have sunk in, and even though the people of God have for the most part come back to their land, the social structure they once clung do is long gone. 

Maybe that first son after the exile still held onto the hope that he would be king again, when they all went home to Jerusalem. Maybe the son after him still had some hope, too. But by the time we get to Joseph, it's clear - this line of kings has died out, though they still live as regular men. There is probably not a single bone in Joseph's body that believes there will ever truly be a king in Judah again...because it's supposed to be him, and it seems impossible that it ever would be. 

He's a carpenter.

He has embraced the new life he's been given. He has taken to heart God's words spoken all the way back at the exile - work for the peace and prosperity of Babylon, for when they have peace and prosperity, you will, too. 

He has found himself a trade, a way to contribute to society, a way to make peace around him and to prosper, and he's all in. He's so much all in on it that he's known throughout the region as the carpenter. Remember when the people were scoffing at Jesus? They looked down their noses and said, Isn't this the carpenter's son? 

Indeed, it is. 

Imagine if it wasn't. 

Imagine if Joseph came from a whole line of men who just couldn't let go, who couldn't move on, who couldn't let themselves become anything else. Imagine if there were a whole line of ancestors sitting around, proclaiming they were supposed to be king. Moping. Blaming everyone around them for being so sinful that they couldn't be king any more because these dirty rats didn't deserve a king any more. Sitting on their hands and doing nothing because they had in their minds one thing and missed everything else. 

Imagine if Jesus had been born into bitterness over what had been lost. 

But He wasn't. 

He was born into the life of a carpenter, a man who had learned to make something out of nothing. A man who got down to doing the work, even if it wasn't what he should have been born for. A man who accepted that there was a good place for him, even if it wasn't the places his ancestors would have carved out. 

He carved it out and became it anyway. 

He was a carpenter. He was the carpenter. 

That's a good life.  

Would-Be King

This past week, I was reading the genealogy of Jesus. It's not the first time I've read this, and it won't be the last, but something stuck out to me this time that I have never noticed before. 

There are two accounts of Jesus's lineage in the Gospels. The first one is in Matthew, and it traces Jesus's family line back through Joseph - all the way through David, back through Abraham. As we should, we recognize that this is intended to demonstrate to the reader that Jesus was rightfully a King in Israel - King of Kings. Just look at that family line! 

But what we don't talk about is that if Jesus is rightfully king by virtue of being Joseph's son, then Joseph should have been a king, too. 

Think about that for a second. Read it through, and you should recognize the names that lead to the birth of Joseph: 

David. 

Solomon.

Rehoboam.

Abijah.

Asa.

Jehoshaphat.

Jehoram.

Uzziah.

Jotham.

Ahaz.

Hezekiah.

These are the kings of Judah. Flip back to your Old Testament, and these are the guys you're reading about. Several of them were very good kings, a few bad ones thrown in, but these were the guys. Follow down the line, and the last one we see before we see Jesus...is Joseph. 

He should have been king. 

And that should change the way that we think about this earthly father of our Lord and Savior.  

Dave

Dave never believed in me. He would say that right to my face - he thought I was on the wrong path, he wasn't sure whether my skills were a fit, he didn't know whether this whole thing was going to work out. To be honest, I think there were some pre-existing stereotypes in his own mind that blocked him from seeing what I was seeing, but there was something about my enthusiasm, at least, that convinced him to let me keep tagging along. 

To be honest, I felt a lot of pressure around Dave. I wanted to prove him wrong. I wanted to one day be able to open his eyes. I wanted him to see what I was seeing, and not just that, I wanted him to see what God was putting in front of me as a vision. In hindsight, I don't think that was ever going to be possible, but I felt a lot of pressure in that season to make it happen. 

However much he believed or didn't believe in me, though, Dave kept introducing me around. Tagging along on what he was doing, he'd introduce me to his social connections with as much plain-fact as he could - who I was, what I was doing, what I was pursing, where I was headed. 

And through Dave's social connections, I made some really good friends who do believe in me. In what God's doing in me. Friends who have become great encouragers as my journey has progressed. 

As a result, I have learned a new way to be a good friend. 

There are things in this world that I'm just not into. Things I don't think are worthwhile. Things I don't understand. There are persons I just don't get, and no matter how big their eyes light up with excitement and anticipation over whatever they're dreaming of in their life, I just can't get on board. I don't see it. At least, I don't see it the same way. 

In the past, this has sometimes led me to be a naysayer. To be a person who tells them straight-up, the way Dave always told me, that I don't see it. To become a kind of gatekeeper, trying to steer them away from the entrance to this road. Because in all my wisdom having traveled it as far as I have, I feel pretty sure it's not for them. 

But then, I am but a human being. What do I know? 

Because of the relationships I have formed through Dave's introductions, I understand better now the importance of being an introducer. Of showing someone around and helping to make connections for them, even if I don't think it's a great idea or I don't understand.

I see the value in, if I cannot be an encourager, being an introducer. Giving others the opportunities to build their own relationships that might nurture them in ways that I simply cannot (or, stubbornly, will not). 

I have learned to check my stereotypes, to check my assumptions, to try to figure out why I think what I think, why I have the impression that I have, and I also have learned to scan my connections, to check my relationships, to figure out who is a good fit for one another. 

Because everyone deserves to have an encourager in their life, even in the seasons that don't look like they make any sense. The right group around you, the right mentor, the right support can change all of that and make it a beautiful thing. 

And so, if there's a way for me to be part of that, then I'm all in.  

God of Strength

I'm a runner. As a runner, I sometimes do very stupid things to my body. And when I have finished doing stupid things to my body, I spend a few days in agony. During those few days of agony - after a long race, after a long run, after a personal best - it can be hard to even make my legs work at all. 

Then, all of a sudden, I can stand again. And then walk. And then run. 

(And then, true to being a runner, I decide that that was fun, and I'd do it all over again if given the chance.) 

In the Bible, it was common for men of God to fall down when overcome with the holiness of the Lord. They'd become overwhelmed by the presence of God, or by their own fallenness in the shadow of His righteousness, and they'd hit the ground. Face first. Unable to lift their heads or to look up. 

Such a thing happened to Ezekiel, the prophet. Then, the Spirit of God showed up and made Him stand (3:24). 

God helped him to his feet. He made the man stand again. He put his legs back under him. As Hebrews says, the Spirit made him to "stand firm on weak knees." 

But that's what the Spirit of God does. 

Like a runner who puts in the training to be able to do a long run and then somehow walk again, persons of faith put in the training to be able to lean on the Spirit of God when their own strength fails them.

It comes through Bible study, through reading God's word, through ingesting the stories, through knowing the heart of Him who wrote every word. 

It comes through prayer, learning to hear His voice and learning how to speak in your own, leaning into the silences and the little nagging feelings that you can't quite shake because you know they're God's nudgings. 

It comes through the fellowship of believers, gathering together to encourage and strengthen one another, to share in the knowledge and goodness of God, to break bread, and to build community. 

And then, one day, we're knocked down, overwhelmed by the world, by the holiness of the Lord, by the contrast between who we are (how far we have fallen) and who God is, and suddenly, we're on our faces. Unable to stand. Unable to lift our heads and look up. 

For a moment, we stay there, but not long. Because it doesn't take long for all the things we know about God - His word, His voice, His Spirit, His love - to strengthen our legs and lift us up, helping us to our feet so that we are strong enough to stand once more, even on weak knees. 

When it's all said and done, we decide...this is fun. I'd do this again if given the chance. 

And this pattern becomes our lives - falling, being strengthened, standing, only to fall again and engage it all over as the Spirit of God keeps coming back to us again and again and again. 

God of Home

There really is no place like home. 

After a long day on the job, there's nothing like walking in the door to your own private space, kicking your shoes off, and finally relaxing. 

After a few days' vacation, it's so refreshing to come back to your own place, to sleep in your own bed. 

And on the off chance that a tornado ever sweeps you to some bizarre other-world, there's something inside all of us that never stops looking for a way back because we all know - 

There's no place like home. 

God's people have always known this, too. 

It's why, when they were wandering in the wilderness, they wanted to go back to Egypt - it was the only place they had ever known. But it's also why, when they were in Egypt, they knew that wasn't really the place for them, either. It's why they struggled to accept exile in Babylon; Jerusalem was calling to them. It's why, even almost 2,000 years later, they were still looking at Israel as the place that God had for them. 

God's people know what home is, and they feel this longing in their heart to be there. 

But for those of us who live under the New Testament, home isn't a place as much as it's a presence. It's that feeling we have when we're secure, when we're loved, when we're well. When we have God inside of us, but more importantly - we feel nestled deep into His heart. That place of deep rest, where our soul is both nourished and cherished, where we are protected and encouraged, where we are known and treasured. This is home. 

Lamentations reminds us that God always brings His people back to Him (5:21), and this is why. Because He knows what home does to us. What it does for us. He knows that in our hearts, we're always trying to get back to our place, to where we are supposed to be. Ideally, it's Eden, but we'll settle for Canaan, and what we really have now is our hearts set on His heart - to feel those two heartbeats together, the warmth of His breath, the smoothness of His skin. 

After a long day, there's nothing like your own sanctuary.

After a few days' vacation, it's so refreshing to come back to your own place. 

When the twisters and tornadoes of this world take us to places we don't recognize and don't understand and don't know, there's something inside of us all that never stops looking for a way back. 

Thank the Lord that He brings us back. Every time. All the time. 

There is no place like home. 

God of Forever

There are persons in this world - not many of them, but a few - that I have told I will never forgive. The hurt they have inflicted on me and on those that I love is so great that I would be foolish to ever forgive them. And of course, when I say that, I am using the term "forgive" to also include some form of reconciliation, as most of the world understands the term. Honestly, I don't believe that you can truly forgive anyone without some measure of reconciliation because without the reconciliation, you're still holding them at a distance, and that distance is caused by something...

Anyway, we're human. This is what we do. 

That is not to say that I don't believe that God can work in anyone's heart. I believe He can change even the hardest heart if given the opportunity, and I don't put any qualification on that. Because I know that at one time in my life, I would have been considered the one "extremely unlikely" to give Him the opportunity and, well, here I am. God can change anyone at any time. Or, as my new church says, God changes everything for everybody. 

Including those persons I am not willing to forgive. 

(Okay, full disclosure - if someone shows a legitimate change in heart and character that is clearly brought about by the Lord, then I would have to consider forgiving them. To not do so would not be a reflection of who God has made me.) 

At the same time, some folks have told me I am too forgiving. This is because I understand the human condition. I understand trauma. I understand being overwhelmed by things that feel bigger than we are, being trapped by the limitations of our own understanding, not knowing what we don't know even when we think we know it all. I understand the human condition, and once I understand part of your story that you might not even understand yet, it fills me with compassion, and I can't help but have a bit of a soft spot for you. 

And I guess I get that from my Father. 

Lamentations says that God does not reject His people forever. (3:31) There are a few places in the Old Testament where He talks like maybe He will, like maybe He's just done with us, like He doesn't want anything else to do with this ragtag bunch of sinners. There are times when, if you didn't know how the story ends, you might think He's not coming back. 

Then, He does. 

Because He, too, understands the human condition. He knows more about us than we even know about ourselves. He knows He has the power to change any heart, any character, any life that He chooses, as long as He's invited into it, and that's why He just can't reject us forever. 

Rather, He's always holding out hope that our better days are coming. Because He knows they can. 

There are persons in this world who have hurt me deeply, and I've sworn I will never forgive them. But I have to confess - I'm thankful that my God is better at this than I am. 

For I am one who would have been - who should have been - rejected forever, and yet, the God of Eternity won't do that even to me. 

Praise the Lord. 

God is Right

There have been a couple of times in my life when I have struggled to do the things that my heart has been pulling me to do. 

That's the nice way of saying that there have been times in my life when I have been absolutely certain what God is asking me to do, and I haven't done it. 

There are a couple of reasons for this, usually. 

First, there are my own insecurities. Often, the things that God asks us to do go very much against the things that we're comfortable doing. Just think of all of the characters in the Bible who weren't afraid to tell God exactly why they were not the right person for the job (Moses, for example). For me, I just kind of hold that all internally and talk myself out of whatever because you know, I'm not really so sure about my abilities to do that well. I'm embarrassed about what it might require of me. I'm reminded of all of the failures I've had at that particular thing. Whatever. 

When I talk about this, what comes to my mind most notably is a handful of persons God has absolutely, unequivocally, without hesitation put on my heart to pray with. Not to pray for, but to pray with. Right there, in that moment. And I let me talk myself out of it because something inside of me felt an awkwardness that I just was not able to overcome. 

And I have regretted those moments (and I can name every one of them) ever since. 

Second, there are times when I struggle to believe God. There are times when He tells me I'm ready for something that I don't feel ready for. He assures me that He will be with me, but it's still hard to take that step and go standing out there on that ledge. 

I have no actual reason to believe that He wouldn't be with me. The entire testimony of my life is that God is with me, even when I haven't known it in the moment. If I were to write down all of the ways He has held me, loved me, protected me, guided me, etc. over the course of my 40 years, then, to borrow a phrase, all of the books in the world would not hold the story. 

Still, when He tells me I'm ready and I don't feel ready, it's easy for me to justify to myself that yes, I understand that God is ready, but I'm not quite there yet. And too often, I convince myself that that's okay. 

What's really going on, I think, is that I don't trust myself to hold onto Him. I'm not sure I have the faith to cling to that promise. I'm not sure my mind is capable of not forgetting when the real tests, trials, and moments come. 

And I have regretted those moments ever since, too. 

Because here's the truth, and the testimony of our lives and even our failures testify to it: 

God is right, whether we obey or not. (Lamentations 1:18)

He's right. Period. He doesn't call us to things we can't handle (though He often calls us to things we cannot handle without Him) and He doesn't ask us to do things we're not created for, whether we feel ready or capable or confident or not. He's right. 

Those holy moments I've missed in my life through my own hesitation, insecurity, or weakness...I'm never getting those back. And every time I think about them, about the ways that I failed and the things that I missed, I know how holy those moments would have been. I know the amazing power of God that would have been there...that was there. I know how they would add something beautiful to the testimony He's already writing in me. I know these things. In hindsight. 

That's why I regret them. 

And yet, God is still good anyway. And He is still good to me anyway. And all I can do at this point is to trust that something beautiful will come out of even this, some really cool part of my testimony, and work harder to remember in the moments that are yet to come that God is right. 

And I don't need any more regrets. 

Mary Kay

Mary Kay and I are a weird sort of friend. I think we could be very good friends, but I was majorly intimidated when I first met her and wrestling with my own sorts of things, so our friendship never really blossomed into the full nature of things. 

But I love what we have together. 

Mary Kay and I only talk for about three months a year. The same three months every year. It starts in late June when the previews and commercials start coming out, and it goes through finale night somewhere in September. 

Every year. Like clockwork. 

And I love it. 

Mary Kay and I...are Big Brother friends. 

That's not how we met. We met when her husband was the associate pastor at my church, though to be honest, I spent more time talking to him than I did to her. But he recognized that we had something in common, and while he was rolling his eyes about our mutual interest in this television show, he also kept telling us that we should talk to each other. So we started talking to each other. 

And we haven't stopped. 

Mary Kay hasn't been to my church in more than 15 years. We've seen each other a few times here and there, but it's not like our lives cross paths that often any more. Actually, exactly once a year - for three months that this television show is on.

There's never pressure from either one of us that we should be better friends, doing more things together, seeing each other more often. At the same time, there's never pressure from either of us that it's at all weird that we only talk for these three months. It's perfectly normal and natural to me, and I've never gotten the impression that it's anything different for her.  (And I'll also confess that there have been a couple of seasons that I just haven't really been into all that much, but I keep watching them anyway because I like having this time with her. I like having this connection. I don't know what it is about it, but I like it.) 

Here's what it's helping teach me, though, in addition to just being enjoyable (and a place to mutually geek out about something we both like): 

I'm naturally an introvert. I don't do a whole lot of socializing. I feel an immense amount of pressure to be social when I meet new persons, to try to make really deep connections, to be an all-around great person and friend, and on and on until really, I don't even want friends. They're exhausting. 

But every year, I re-establish this one connection for another three months, and I realize that there's a way to be social, to be connected, to be friends that isn't draining. 

See, you don't have to be into everything someone else is doing to be friends. You don't have to get into things you're not into or pretend to be someone you're not. Maybe you're just a "we share this one thing in common" friend. Maybe you're just a seasonal friend. Maybe you're someone who is rock solid for that thing you both want to geek out on together and there's not any pressure to be any more - or any less - than that. Maybe you're just friends when the orbits of your life pass through one another, and you treasure those times and let them simply be. 

I think that's okay. 

I think everyone needs that friend. I know that I do. 

And that friend in my life teaches me how to be a better version of that friend in others' lives, as God has crossed our paths. And that's good. 

Thanks, Mary Kay, for being my June-September faithful, geeking-it-out friend. And for teaching me to be the same.  

*Her husband still rolls his eyes at us. Whatever. His loss. 

A Little Messier

Nobody has ever been made a better person by having things handed to them. The only ones who have come out better on the other side of a gift are those who have known how to use it. 

That is, they've had to put in the work. 

I'm not saying that God needs our help; that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that God lets us help, the way a parent lets their child help even though they know it's going to take at least twice as long and be a whole lot messier. You know, when your dad hands you a hammer and there ends up being 400 little hammer marks in the wood around a nail that's kinda bent sideways and only halfway in. Or when your mom hands you a measuring cup but there's no way to measure how much flour ends up on the floor. (Or, because we're real about the world that we live in, maybe your mom hands you a hammer and your dad hands you a measuring cup. Whatever it is.) 

Because God is a Creator God, and we are created in His image. He wants us to create. He wants us to help in the work of building and re-building our world, restoring a little piece of it, putting one of broken parts back together, making a little wholeness wherever we can. And the only way to do that is to put the tools in our hands and let us miss a few times, make a few messes, take a bit longer. 

The world, it wants to just hand you a solution to the problems it sees. It wants you to just accept that it's done all the work for you and this is the way things are supposed to be now. But then, when things don't go to plan - because the world simply can't control everyone by force and make them comply - the world blames you for interfering, chastises you for making a mess, yells at you about taking too long, and then takes more of the control away from you and tries to hand you a smaller portion it thinks you can handle. 

Smaller and smaller until you have nothing, and then...it still isn't working. 

The world says it's better than God because it has the answers, but it would not accept the answers it's offering if they came from God. If God tried to dominate you the way the world does, the world would tell you that He's cruel, that He's not worth worshiping, that He's no "good God" at all. 

And yet, it's God's way that is the only way that has ever worked. 

It's God who has given the addict the tools, and the freedom to mess up along the way, that helps that addict lead other addicts to freedom. It's God who has given the grief to the mother with an empty womb, and all the time it takes for her to process that, that helps other mothers with empty wombs learn to cope with their loss. It's God who has given the lost a crayon with which to draw the map of the way out on whatever surface they can find, even though crayon can be a beast to get off a wall. 

It's God that has put this broken world in our hands and helped us to learn to re-create it with Him. To heal a little bit. To restore a few things. To make this world a better place. 

I don't know why those kids were shot while they were praying. In a church. 

But I know that something beautiful is going to come out of it. Something that the best of this world could never come up with...and something that the worst of this world can never stop. 

And I know that we join in that something beautiful with something beautiful that we already have right now - our prayer. That thing that connects us to our good, loving, gracious, beautiful Creator God who is patiently, tenderly, Father-ly teaching us to create - to recreate, to redeem, to restore - right along beside Him. 

Even though it takes a little longer and it's a little messier this way.

It's the only way. 

It's love. 

Prayer

And yet, the man who spoke these has a point - these kids were literally praying when they were shot. So we have to ask, does prayer even work? Is God even good?

This is what we wrestle with most in the world. In Christian theology, we call this "theodicy" - the problem of evil in the world in the face of the existence of a good God. 

If God is so good, why are our lives still broken? If God is so good, why does evil seem to win? If God is so good...

Why do children get shot even while they are actively praying? 

The God that I serve - the God that I love and the God that I know loves me - is not a talisman. He's not some good luck charm. He's not some rabbit's foot that I carry around with me, some necklace that I rub my fingers on to ward off the spirits. 

That's what I think the world doesn't understand about real faith - it's got more substance to it than the world wants to believe. It's got more soul. It's not some magic potion or some magic words or some magic place. The faith that I have doesn't build a barrier between me and the world, it doesn't change my life in an instant, it doesn't protect me from the things that everyone else has to deal with by virtue of being a fallen human being in a broken world. 

God doesn't make my life milk and honey; He takes me to a land flowing with milk and honey. 

He takes me through the wilderness, across the sea, over the mountains, around the enemies, over the river and through the fortified walls to a place where...guess what...the land doesn't just flow the way that the world taunts that we'd want it to. We still have to work for it. 

There's milk there, but you have to grab hold of the udder to get any. There's honey, but you have to harvest it. There's wine, but you have to press the grapes. There's grain, but you have to thresh it. There is fruit from these trees that give us life, but we still have to go pick it. 

God doesn't just walk His people into a life of full provision and no effort; this abundant life He's given us, we still have to live it. 

And that means that sometimes, there are mountains. Sometimes, there are wildernesses. Sometimes, the water has to come from a rock and the quail has to fall from the sky and we have to look around at the dew in the morning and ask, "What is it?" (manna) It means that sometimes, the fruit we pick will be rotten on the inside, no matter how perfect it looked. It means that sometimes, the grapes will be sour and the grain will be weak and the udder will be dry. 

Because that's the world we're living in. We're surrounded by the things God wants to give us, but He doesn't just hand them to us. 

So to claim that this God should somehow make our lives shiny and perfect and protected from all the bad stuff in the world, that's not how it works. Prayer isn't superstition. It's not magic. 

It's love. 

And that's far, far better. 

Saving Grace

The message the world wants to send when it tells us that thoughts and prayers are meaningless is that our God can't - or won't - save us. 

To borrow a phrase from way too many of the younger folk I've been hanging out with for the past several years...

Sorry, bro. 

He already has. 

And He keeps saving me every single day. 

Before He found me (for it is always we who are hiding from God and not the other way around), before He called out to me and asked me where I was, before I learned to step out of my shame and let Him love me, I was a hopeless sinner. 

Every day since, I have grown by leaps and bounds, and I can confidently say today that I am now a hope-full sinner. 

Hope-full because I know, with confident assurance, what my Lord is doing, which direction I'm moving, and how this all ends. 

I am not the person that I used to be. I am not the same person who gave my life to Christ more than 20 years ago, and I am not the same person who has been doing it over and over again. He keeps changing me. I recognize it in the ways that I don't operate the ways that I used to, when I have those moments when I catch myself and realize that there was a time in my life I would have responded in such-and-such a way, but that is so far from my mind now. Because my heart is different. Because I've been saved from who I used to be. 

Not only that, but I have lived enough days and gained enough hindsight into my life to see some of the things that He's saved me from outside of myself. Situations that didn't work out that I was devastated about at the time, I see now how they would have wrecked me. How those were not the right places for me. How one little step to the right or to the left has completely changed the trajectory of my life for the better - for the far better. I know that He has saved me from things that would have destroyed me. 

Not only that, but I know that He is still saving me from the things I don't yet understand. Things I don't see yet, don't know, don't comprehend. I'm old enough to admit that there are just days that I don't know what's going on, that I can feel it in my soul that something's off, but I can't really put my finger on it. In these times, I know that God knows what's happening, and He's leading me toward or away from something for a reason. One day, I'll have the hindsight; today, I just have the faith. But He is saving me even now from things I just don't know. 

And because of the Cross, He has saved me forever. He has invited me into the abundant life, both now and for eternity, where I will finally understand what life was supposed to be like, what we were created for, how this human thing we're doing was supposed to go were it not for sin. I will understand fully what I know now only dimly, and I cannot wait for that day. 

My God can't - or won't - save me? 

Bro, He already has. And He still is. 

My whole life tells that story. 

It's called grace. 

And the world's got nothing like it. 

Thoughts and Prayers

If you watch any news at all, you've probably seen it. If you watch certain news outlets, you've probably seen it quite a bit. If you have social media, you've definitely seen something at least acknowledging it. It is the mayor of Minneapolis in the aftermath of yet another shooting at a church, and he said, "Don't just say this is about thoughts and prayers right now. ...These kids were literally praying." 

And the culture of the world that has been trying to tell you for so long that God is irrelevant, that He doesn't matter, that He isn't real, that He isn't good, that you're delusional for being a person of faith, that you're wasting your breath thinking you're sending it toward the heavens...that culture of the world erupted in applause and loud cheers. 

It's about time that someone has the guts to just absolutely come out and say it straight like that, especially in a moment when, he's right - these kids were literally praying when an individual broken by the culture of the world opened fire and started shooting them. 

How can you possibly still claim the value of prayer after that?

In a moment like this, when the conclusion seems so clear-cut on the surface, the world thinks it has us. We are absolutely, hopelessly, completely delusional if we still cling to faith in a God who can't even save His people while they are praying to Him. 

Can't...or possibly worse, won't. 

But here's the thing - for all the bravado, all the arrogance, all the false-confidence that these types of guys have, these guys who want to tell you that your God can't (or won't) save you and that only their brilliant ideas, which they tout as "common sense," will...they can't save you, either. 

Not without eliminating your free will. 

They can't save you from yourself without restricting who you are allowed to be. Their solution to save you from gun violence is to tell you that you aren't allowed to have a gun. They have already made it so that the whole world is locked down - so that you can't even walk into a church in the middle of a weekday any more because the doors are locked for "safety." So that you can't visit your own kid at school without passing a background check and even then, having a member of school staff go retrieve your kid and bring them to you. So that you can't walk into a concert venue that you paid to have access to without proving you don't have a weapon on you. So that you can't carry your regular purse into an event because it's not see-through. 

They have severely restricted your world and are doing their best to remove your free will and your freedom because they have claimed it is the only way to keep you safe, and they still can't keep you safe, and their response to this is that they haven't taken away enough of your freedom yet to keep you safe and that you should give them more of it. 

And they're upset with God?

They're upset with God for not eliminating the free will in the world and pulling every single string like some kind of puppetmaster, but their own schemes keep proving that you can pull as many strings as you want, and you still can't save us from ourselves. 

The world is broken. It's already broken. There's nothing you can do to put all of the toothpaste back in the tube at this point. The only thing you can do is decide how you want to live with it.