Try a Litle Kindness
We were lost.
Foreign country, foreign language, and no idea how to get where we were going.
Tensions were rising. Frustration was palpable. I was ticked and getting “tickier” as time went by.
We were in Lausanne Switzerland, on our way to visit the YWAM base on the outskirts of town. Benjamin was planning to attend the Discipleship Training School at this base a few months from now, so we thought we would take a tour of the base and meet the leaders so we could all feel a little more comfortable with Benjamin’s big adventure. I had arranged this tour with the staff. The directions they provided seemed effective, but when we got to the end of the rail line we ran into problems.
None of the local bus drivers had heard of the street name the base was on. My pigeon French was not getting us very far. I decided to phone the base, but the nearest pay phone was a block away on the other side of a busy thoroughfare. The only way to get to it was underneath the intersection in an underground tunnel system. Numerous expeditions to the pay phone resulted in further frustration due to the fact that I kept getting voice mail.
We tried getting maps at the convenience store and the grocery store – more frustration attempting to explain myself through gestures and high school French. As I was getting more amped up, Benjamin was getting more passive. My way of dealing with stress began to clash with his way of dealing with stress.
Why am I doing all this work? This is his future school. When he comes over to go to school he’s going to have to figure this out on his own…so you figure this out.
More frustration and conflict.
It didn’t help that this scenario came midway through our trip after spending copious amounts of time together in close quarters. Everything just seemed to add up to bad attitudes, anger, frustration, disappointment, self-pity and a motivation to call it quits. I was so worked up I was ready to write off YWAM and pull the pin on Benjamin’s entire adventure.
Do you ever find yourself knotted up like that over something, that in hindsight, wasn’t that big of a deal?
We decided to take a bus in the general direction we thought we needed to go, but stop at the local police station and ask for directions. A local woman got off at the same stop we did. She could sense we had no idea where we were going, so she asked if she could help. We told her our dilemma. She knew where the school was and pointed us to the bus stop we needed. We thanked her, the bus came and we were at the base in 5 minutes.
In spite of her kindness, we arrived at the base in a bit of a black cloud.
That’s when it happened…I experienced the power of kindness.
As we dragged our sorry selves up the driveway, the staff were all outside on the patio having lunch. One of the staff called out to us, “Hello, welcome here. How can I help you?” She intruded herself, then proceeded to extend kindness by offering us seats at a table, drinks, and lunch, all the while introducing us to a shwack of people – after she has shown genuine interest in us by asking a series of inquiring questions to find out who we were and where we had come from.
I got emotional.
Her kindness almost brought me to tears. I was shocked at the impact it had on me.
I learned a powerful lesson that day. Kindness is a profound way to demonstrate love. Jesus talked about the significance of giving a thirsty person a cup of cool water. Through kindness we love. Simple acts have powerful impact: letting a car merge in front of us, giving someone the last cookie, sharing your lunch with someone who doesn’t have one, giving someone a ride home when it’s out of your way – there are innumerable ways we can show kindness. And, therefore, there are innumerable ways we can love.
Never underestimate the power of kindness. You don’t have to be gifted to be kind. You simply need to try a little kindness.
Galatians 5:22,23
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”
Colossians 3:12
“Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.”
Mark 9:41
“Truly I tell you, anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to the Messiah will certainly not lose their reward. “
Without Him You’re Toast
Are you a bread guy? Do you love bread? Piping hot, just out of the oven with butter smothered all over it?
How about toasted with peanut butter, honey or jam? Whole wheat, sour dough, rye, raisin, herb, cheese, garlic, focaccia, pumpernickel, sesame seed, poppy seed, multi-grain…whatever kind of bread, it’s all awesome. Gluten allergies aside, bread is pretty spectacular.
I am a huge bread fan. I have enjoyed a long rich relationship with bread. Warm or toasted is definitely better. Cold bread or cold buns are ok, but you pop that bun in the microwave, or cut it in half and put it in the toaster, and now it is heavenly, begging for butter and then either peanut butter or honey spread all over it. Unless it’s a croissant, then it’s butter and strawberry jam.
Do you put butter on your toast with peanut butter? I do. I know, I know, it’s redundant, but bread without butter (or a reasonable low fat, cholesterol free substitute) is like a kiss without a hug. A kiss is great, but it’s way better with a hug.
Anne used to bake bread regularly in one of those automatic bread makers. Have you seen those? They are amazing. All the machine does is bake bread – all different kinds apparently. You simply measure out the ingredients, dump them into the upright pan, put the pan in the machine and press the button. Four hours later you have an awesome, piping hot loaf of bread.
The first slice off the top is always mine. I cut off the crust, when it’s still warm, pop it in the toaster, then smother it with butter – spread very evenly and completely over the entire slice – then add peanut butter and chase it down with a glass of milk.
Oh man, that’s good eatin’.
I say “Anne used to make bread” because she quit doing it a couple of years ago when she got busier with her work. So, as of last week, I became the bread man in our house. I am baking bread on Saturday mornings. It is incredibly easy. Seven ingredients in the pan, pan in bread maker, push button, pull out pan when beeper sounds, shake bread out of pan onto cooling rack – voila! The house is filled with the scrumptiously enticing aroma of freshly baked bread.
I am so glad Jesus said that He is the Bread of Life.
Can you imagine what a bummer it would be if Jesus said, “I am the brussels sprouts of life.”? I hate Brussels sprouts – I threw up on them once when I was a kid and now that’s it for me. No more Brussels sprouts.
But Jesus said He is the Bread of Life. Delicious and delightful. And don’t worry about the gluten thing for those of you who have a gluten allergy – Jesus is good for everyone to consume.
That’s what thinned out the crowds who followed Jesus if you recall. He fed them bread – remember the loaves and the fish? That spiked his popularity, but mainly with people who were simply looking for a free meal. People who just wanted Him to provide for them, to give them what they wanted. He got to the heart of the matter when He said that He is the Bread of Life and that we need to eat His flesh and drink His blood to have real life – that’s when people hit the road thinking He was off his rocker.
Jesus was saying that He is the only real source of life. Anything other than Jesus is an unreasonable facsimile – not the real deal, not real life. Sadly, we often try to find life outside of Jesus: success, money, cars, trips, promotions, big houses, tools, toys, power, sex, lust…the things of this world.
The reality is though, Jesus is the Bread of Life. We are only truly alive when we feed on Him – when we go to Him for life. When we commune with and consume Him.
Where do you go for life? Do you feed on the Bread of Life, or are you feeding on that which does not lead to life?
Jesus – the Bread of Life – without Him, you’re toast.
John 6:53-57
“Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.'”
Who Are Your Stretcher Bearers?
Click for Video about friendship.
They wouldn’t take no for an answer. They weren’t dissuaded by the crowds. They were on a mission and they were going to get it done. It was their commitment to each other that kept them going. In fact, their primary motivation was the commitment to their injured friend.
You see one of their friends was paralyzed – he had no control of his legs. He depended on them for a number of things, and was more grateful than he could communicate for their willingness to not only help him out, but do life with him.
If it weren’t for the support of his friends he would be in a really tough place. He appreciated them more than they could ever understand, but he also felt guilty for being “the needy one”, “the weak link” in the friendship chain.
His friends didn’t see it that way though. They simply recognized he had a physical disability which meant he couldn’t do everything they did unless they gave him a hand. And they were more than happy to give him a hand – they were friends after all. And friends help each other out.
One clarification though: friends help each other out only if they share their needs with each other. His need was obvious, but most of the time men don’t tend to share their needs with their friends. We tough it out and don’t tell anyone what we need, when if we shared our needs we would probably find that our friends would be more than happy to help out.
Wouldn’t you be willing to help out a friend who asked for your help? Of course you would.
Back to the story of the guys…
They were on a mission to get their friend the help he needed. They couldn’t get in the front entrance, so they improvised a different way to get in. They were now on the roof pulling tiles off, then prying off the supporting structure in order to create an opening to lower their friend down. They had put him on a stretcher, tied four ropes to each of the corners of the stretcher and were now very carefully lowering him down in front of Jesus.
We all know what happened next – Jesus healed him. He came in on a stretcher and he walked out carrying his stretcher. However, what got him there were his friends. Friends who were willing to carry his stretcher.
So, who are your stretcher bearers?
Who are the friends that will help you out when you need it?
Who are the friends that you share your needs with?
Whose stretcher do you carry?
If we want to benefit from good friends we need to become a good friend. I have learned that friendship grows when we give friendship to others. When we choose to be authentic, open and giving we gather friends.
You want to know how to get people to like you? Show genuine interest in them.
We all want to have friends, but we are not always willing to invest time in other people. It’s only as we choose to invest in others that we will find others investing in us. In addition, if we want help from others we need to be willing to share our needs with others without overwhelming them with need. If all we offer is our neediness, we will probably find ourselves friendless. Conversely, if we never share our need we will only have shallow relationships.
No matter what, friendship takes time and effort, and it begins with our realization that we need friends. Life is a team game – it’s not meant to be played alone. Sure we all have different social needs, some need more than socialization than others, but we all need friends. Sadly some of us only recognize our need for others when we are in significant difficulty – when it may be too late.
Be a friend to others and you will find yourself with friends. Be willing to share your need with others and you will have friendships with depth.
Who will carry your stretcher? Whose stretcher will you carry?
Luke 5: 18, 19
“Some men came carrying a paralyzed man on a mat and tried to take him into the house to lay him before Jesus. When they could not find a way to do this because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and lowered him on his mat through the tiles into the middle of the crowd, right in front of Jesus.”
The One Word
He sat there on the flight staring out the window, still fuming from the fight he had with his wife. His body position shouted “keep away” to those who sat next to or near him. He didn’t want to have to speak with anyone – he wanted to be alone. The dark cloud that surrounded him was almost palpable to those with any degree of awareness.
He had just had the worst fight ever with his wife. This was his second marriage and it didn’t seem to be starting off very well. He hadn’t dealt with the issues that led to his first divorce. In fact, he really hadn’t dealt with many of his issues.
He had a well-developed fight and flight mechanism. When things got rough he would first fight, then he would run away. On this occasion he was running to Chicago to go golfing. He had the financial means, so when he wanted to run away, he went far away.
When the meal was served he had to swivel around to face forward and the woman beside him attempted to engage him in some conversation. He, reluctantly, participated. She could sense the darkness in his soul and, being the perceptive person she was, began to chip away at his hardened exterior to get to a softer inner core. He participated for a while, but then shut her down to put an end to the soul excavation.
She caught his attention with a final simple question. She had already demonstrated credibility and accomplishment on a few fronts, so she had earned the right to ask him this one final question:
“Would you be interested in knowing one word that would lead you to a healthier, happier, and potentially wealthier life?”
He thought for a moment and said, “Sure.”
She then slowly and deliberately, with a dash of the dramatic, pulled out a small piece of paper. In very small letters she wrote the word on the paper and then folded it up into a tight little bundle. She handed him the bundle.
The man next to her said he wanted to know the word as well. And the man sitting behind them came around to their row, apologized for eavesdropping, and said he wanted to know the word too.
The troubled man unfolded the paper and read the word. It landed on him like a ton of bricks. He slowly passed the paper to the man at the end of his row. He unfolded it and read the word with a deep sigh of acknowledgment. He then passed it to the man from the row behind them, who responded similarly.
Would you like to know the word? Of course you would.
Forgiveness.
Yes, forgiveness. There is great power in forgiveness. Conversely, there is great power in refusing to forgive.
It has been said that refusing to forgive someone is akin to holding them captive in your soul – they will always have a hold on you. In addition, not forgiving someone is like drinking poison and hoping it kills them. Sadly, it really kills the person who hasn’t forgiven.
We have been called to forgive others as we have been forgiven. Scripture also tells us that if we do not forgive another’s sin against us God will not forgive our sins. Forgiveness is the very essence of the Christian message. Through Christ we have been forgiven and brought into right relationship as God’s children.
If we have been forgiven by God through Christ, how can we then not forgive those who sin against us? How many times must we forgive? Seventy times seven Jesus said. In other words, way more than you think. This is a lifestyle to which we have been called – forgive as we have been forgiven. That doesn’t mean that we don’t have to draw parameters and put in place ramifications for those who “sin against us”, but we must always choose to forgive.
It is our choice to forgive or not to forgive. We even need to choose to forgive ourselves.
So, who do you need to forgive so you can be forgiven?
Matthew 6:14-15
“For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”
Colossians 3:13
“Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.”
I John 1:9
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”
Go On Without Me
168 – wow, that’s high.
Let’s see, maximum heart rate is 220 minus your age. That makes my maximum heart rate 169, and I’m at 168…
We were on the side of Goat Mountain, having just hiked up and over Dam Mountain on our way to Mount Crown. Feeling the overwhelming nature of this arduous act of physical exertion I needed to stop regularly to regain my cardiovascular composure. My heart would routinely spike to 168 beats per minute, I would rest to get it back down to a manageable level, and then we would continue hiking.
My sons and I were away on our annual men’s getaway. We call it our “testicle festival”. I had made the unwise suggestion to climb Mount Crown. David and Benjamin leapt at the chance for another conquest of Crown. We had first made this epic hike years earlier when the boys were somewhere around 10 years old, and I was in far better shape. I had completely forgotten how difficult this hike was.
What makes it so difficult is the fact that you actually climb 3 mountains to get to the top of Crown – Dam, Goat and finally Crown. So, no matter which direction you are hiking you always have to go up and down. Some sections of the hike are so steep you need the assistance of climbing chains that are anchored into the rocks. One the final descent down Goat and the final ascent up Crown you are often climbing with all four limbs due to the steepness of the grade.
Needless to say, the mountain was beating me in this battle to the top. Not only my cardio vascular system, but my legs were starting to give out. My sedentary lifestyle had not prepared my legs for the exhausting nature of this “hike”. It slowly began to dawn on me that I may not be able to finish this hike – and that would be a first.
It also began to dawn on my sons that Dad – who has always been the one leading the charge – is not the man I used to be. They had been gracious in setting a slow pace, but now they were genuinely concerned for my wellbeing.
We agreed to part.
They would scamper to the summit and I would continue hiking for another hour and then turnaround if I had not reached the summit. We would meet back at the Grouse Nest restaurant.
The hour past and I had still not reached the summit – I pushed it for another 20 minutes. For 80 minutes I wrestled with the thought of having to quit and turn around. What does that say about me? What would it say to David and Benjamin? Am I a quitter? Am I a wimp?
It became painfully obvious to me that if I made the summit, I would certainly not get back down on my own. My legs were already starting to give out on me, causing me to misstep. If I kept going I would probably collapse somewhere on the mountain and become a liability for my sons.
I turned around. Exhausted, defeated and embarrassed.
The whole climb back down I was asking the Lord what He wanted to show me – beside the fact that I need to take better care of my physical conditioning. I thought of the boys up on the top of the mountain alone, without me. This was the first time in their lives I wouldn’t be there with them, leading the charge.
This is the lesson I learned: our desire is for our sons/children to exceed us. We want them to go places in Jesus that we haven’t gone. A good and right progression in the journey of life is for our children to go farther than we have gone. In order to do that we need to pass the baton to their Heavenly Father and trust that He will lead them and guide them; He will Father them far better than we can.
They must trust God and journey with Him. They must find their way in Him. We will always love them and be there for them, but they must follow where the Lord is leading them. God has no grand children.
It’s good and it’s right for them to “go on without me”.
Proverbs 22:6
“Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.”
Luke 2:49
“Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”
The Overload Principle
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Many years ago, in a former life, I was a P. E. Teacher.
Yes, I have heard most of what they say about P.E. teachers, including: “Those who can’t do, teach, and those who can’t teach, teach P.E.”
Many aspects of the work was very enjoyable, but what I enjoyed the most was seeing young people stretch themselves by trying something new. The greatest compliment I received from a student was a very simple comment made by a grade 10 girl. She was new to the school and hadn’t necessarily had a positive experience at her previous school. She came up to me at the end of the year and simply said, “Mr. MacLean, I used to hate P.E., but after this year I really like it.”
My objective was to, as best as possible, create a positive encounter with physical activity for the students. To somehow help them discover the joy of being active. And of course, to recognize what a privilege it is to be able to be physically active and participate in physical games, sports and recreation.
Actually, the best part of the job was the coaching. The young people who come out for competitive sports, typically, are keen to challenge themselves, to learn, and grow. Coaching is such a powerful means to have a profound impact in a young person’s life. Through coaching you can help a person push themselves beyond where they believed they could go – beyond where they could have gone by themselves – and accomplish some great results.
It is a great privilege to see athletes you have coached accomplish things they never thought possible, which has a powerful impact on how they view themselves and the world around them.
There is a very important principle to understand when training in sport or athletics. It’s called the Overload Principle. The principle of overload states that “a greater than normal stress or load on the body is required for training adaptation to take place. The body will adapt to this stimulus. Once the body has adapted then a different stimulus is required to continue the change. In order for a muscle (including the heart) to increase strength, it must be gradually stressed by working against a load greater than it is used to. To increase endurance, muscles must work for a longer period of time than they are used to.”
I believe this principle not only applies to our physical bodies, but to all of life.
God understands the Overload Principle – He created it.
Perhaps you may be feeling overloaded right now. Life’s demands, concerns and issues may feel heavier than you are able to carry. You may feel overwhelmed by what surrounds you and lies before you. You may find yourself wondering if you can handle what is going on and your cry may be for the Lord to take it all away – to set you free from what is overloading you.
I want to suggest a different perspective that you may not have considered. Perhaps your Heavenly Coach is training you. Perhaps your Coach is helping you to see that you have more strength in you than you realized. Perhaps Jesus sees far more in you than you see in yourself and He is implementing the spiritual Overload Principle to help you grow.
Perhaps He is actually answering your prayer to become a better, stronger man. He is inviting you to press on to all that He has for you. Perhaps He is training you through discipline.
Not every difficult situation in life is the Overload Principle in operation. However, I believe as we turn our hearts to our Heavenly Coach in the midst of any difficulty, and submit to His truth and His training, we will find our faith grows.
He is our Sovereign Coach in the midst of all of life’s trials and tribulation. As we surrender to His leadership and His training we will grow stronger in Him. In fact, it is not merely about you discovering that you have more strength than you thought you had, but that He is far stronger in and through you than you ever thought possible.
Yes indeed, the Overload Principle is a necessary part of life and growth.
Philippians 3:12
“Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.”
Hebrews 12: 11
“At the time, discipline isn’t much fun. It always feels like it’s going against the grain. Later, of course, it pays off handsomely, for it’s the well-trained who find themselves mature in their relationship with God.” (The Message)
Ephesians 3:14-17A
“My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit-not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength-that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in.” (The Message)
With All Your Heart
When was the last time you did something with all your might?
And what exactly does that mean? The Canadian term for this is “give ‘er”.
I recently read the account of King David bringing the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. There was a big procession of the people of Israel celebrating with shouts and the sound of trumpets, and it said that David “danced before the Lord with all his might”.
Wow. What would that even look like?
King David was worshiping with all his might. Have you ever seen that in your church? Somebody really “givin’ ‘er”? I don’t think I have ever seen that, but I’d like to. I can only imagine that King David was loud, boisterous, and he was moving with significant vehemence and commitment.
When I think of doing something with ‘all your might’ there are a few pictures that come to mind: one is sports. Watching athletes train and compete is a great example of doing something with all your might. Passion. Devotion. Exuberance. Commitment. Sacrifice. Blood, sweat and tears.
And, you can even see an example of that in the fans. Have you ever seen those select few fans who seem to be cheering on their team with all their might? They have painted themselves up, made up a sign of some kind, and they are screaming at the top of their lungs in support of their team. It sure looks to me that they are cheering on their team with all their might.
Music is another area where you can see people doing something with all their might. If you have ever been to a live concert and seen the way some musicians give themselves to their performance, you know what I mean. We saw Coldplay live in Vancouver last year and I would definitely say that the lead singer performed with all his might. He had to change his shirt part way through the concert because it was so soaked in sweat.
I know men my age who have hired personal trainers to help them get into shape. From all the accounts they have told me, one of the goals of the trainer seems to be to motivate you to exercise with all your might – to really give ‘er.
Sports, exercising, performing – either musically or dramatically – all provide typical and appropriate venues for doing something with all our might, but there are many other arenas that we can give ourselves with all our might.
I would like to suggest, that the term ‘with all your might’ is synonymous with ‘wholeheartedly’. We are encouraged in scripture to work wholeheartedly like we are working for God and not for men. We are also encouraged to love the Lord with all our heart, soul, and strength – that sounds pretty ‘wholeheartedly’ to me – or ‘with all our might’.
Scripture also tells us that physical discipline is of little profit, but training in godliness brings eternal gain. What would it look like to train ourselves in godliness with all our might the same way that men train their bodies with all their might? I think if we were that committed to godliness we would be very different men.
So what’s stopping us from doing something – anything – with all our might? Fear, passivity, pride, resignation, complacency, unbelief? Who knows… but I wonder, if there was even just one area in our lives in which we were engaged wholeheartedly, if we might somehow be predisposed to give ourselves to training in godliness with all our might?
I want to ask you a question: what is one area of your life that you are willing to choose to step into with all your might? Pursuing your wife’s heart? Fathering your children? Prayer? Meditating on scripture? Walking in the light in community? Praise and worship? Giving? Serving? Studying and learning? Loving? Working? Being grateful? Forgiving others?
Let’s give ourselves wholeheartedly to one of the aforementioned areas. If we do we will indeed grow in godliness. It all begins with a commitment made to Jesus – our Personal Coach, “Lord, I’m in. Please help me follow you with all my might.”
We can either give ‘er, or give up. Let’s do like King David and give ‘er for God.
I Timothy 4:7b-8
“…train yourself to be godly. For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.”
II Samuel 6:14, 15
“Wearing a linen ephod, David was dancing before the Lord with all his might,while he and all Israel were bringing up the ark of the Lord with shouts and the sound of trumpets.”
Deuteronomy 6:5
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”
An Important Lesson from Shaving
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Do you ever get sick of shaving? Man, I do.
Every day you get up, take a look in the mirror and realize you got to do this shaving thing all over again. I know some of you have such thick beards that you even have to shave again at the end of the day if you are going out that night. Some of you may have the opposite issue, you don’t grow much facial hair – or maybe it grows in patches. Whatever the issue, if we don’t shave regularly we are not going to look our clean shaven best.
Many guys like to sport some facial hair of all shapes and sizes: mustaches, goatees, soul patches, beards, chops (A.K.A. sideburns) and any combination thereof. I’ve had sideburns, a goatee and currently sport a soul patch – my wife is not into beards or mustaches. Regardless of the kind of facial hair that you may wear, you still need to trim it regularly or it’s going to go Duck Dynasty on you.
Are you a blade man or a razor man? It’s pretty hard to beat a multi-edge blade with some sweet shaving gel to give you that smooth clean shave. In fact, there is an art to shaving. There are old style “manly shaving shops” springing up at various locations around North America. Like the days of the old west, you can go in and pay to have a shave done with all the fine accoutrements. For a bit of a chuckle, click on the link to see a video from the “Art of Manliness” on how to shave like your Grandpa.
So, here is the significant lesson I learned from shaving: no matter how good you are at shaving, or how often you do it, your facial hair keeps growing back.
When I was thinking about this I noticed that facial hair is a lot like pride. Pride keeps coming back. No matter how often I think I have dealt with it, pride is always there. As long as I keep it in check on a regular basis I am going to be ok, but I have to keep “shaving” it.
Now don’t freak out if you have a beard and think I’m saying that you must be proud. No, that’s not it at all. All I am saying is that dealing with pride is like shaving, we have to keep cutting it back – we have to keep choosing ‘humility’. We are predisposed to being proud, it’s part of our sin nature. We have to choose humility.
We have to learn to recognize pride so we can choose humility. How do we do that? Well, it is a lifelong lesson we learn with God’s help, but there are a few emotions that will be clues for us that pride is potentially in operation. When we feel those emotions we can then choose humility:
Anger: when you get angry it could very well be because you feel disrespected, disregarded, undervalued, demeaned, diminished, etc. Pride can often be at the root of that. People aren’t treating you the way you think they should. I am not talking about letting people walk all over you, I am simply saying that often the anger you feel can be based in pride. It’s been said that you can tell if you have a servant’s heart by how you react when someone treats you like one.
Resentment and bitterness: when we do not forgive we feel resentment and bitterness. Who are we not to forgive, if God forgives? It’s pride that elevates their sin against us over how we have sinned against others and against God. All of us have sinned and fallen short.
Those are just a couple of emotions amongst many others, but we must be willing to acknowledge that pride is far more pervasive than we realize. It is our pride that keeps us from turning to God for forgiveness, strength, hope, faith, love, and life. Pride can also keep us out of relationships because we are unwilling to open up and authentically share our need for other people.
The only way we can keep on top of pride is to ask the Lord to help us recognize it and then to help us choose humility to keep it in check.
A close shave of humility will help cut down pride – and Lord willing, that’s an ongoing choice we will be willing to make.
Proverbs 11:2
“When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.”
1 John 2:16
“For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world.”
Matthew 23:12
“For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”
Committed, but Clueless.
I sat there watching it all transpire. I could see what was going to happen before they did. They couldn’t see me, but I could see them and what was about to happen was not looking good…
I was sitting on a bench perched up in the woods above the ocean at Deep Cove in North Vancouver. It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining and warm. The ocean was calm, and the cove was filled with people of all sorts, in boats of all sorts, enjoying this spectacular summer day.
I was watching a group of beginner kayakers in the midst of a lesson learning all they needed to know to enjoy the pleasures that kayaking has to offer. In fact, there were a number of groups of kayakers taking lessons to develop some degree of comfort in this newly discovered recreational reverie.
In the midst of this enjoyable and serene moment, like a bull in a china shop, entered 3 young ladies in a canoe. They were clearly on a mission to get through this scattering of kayakers as quickly as possible and make their way out into broader waters. They were moving at a pretty good pace – a frightening pace for some of the more senior beginner kayakers. But what made them particularly dangerous was the fact that they really had no idea what they were doing.
All three of them were paddling at break neck speed, but they didn’t know how to steer. The paddler in the stern of the canoe not only did not know how to do a J-Stroke, but she didn’t even know how to hold the paddle properly. No life jackets, and no clue how to turn, stop or steer.
Committed, but clueless.
This became very apparent when they began yelling, “Sorry, Sorry!” to an elderly kayaker whom they were careening toward at ramming speed. The paddler in the bow pushed her away just prior to the moment of impact to avert a nasty collision. And all the while the other two kept paddling in a very committed fashion.
As I watched this scene unfold I thought that this scenario is reflective of how some people live their lives. Oh they are committed alright, but a little clueless in regard to the impact they are having on people around them. Or perhaps they are clueless about the deeper things of faith and walking with Jesus.
To be mature followers of Jesus we need to add knowledge to our faith. Yes, commitment and perseverance is critical, but we also need to add knowledge.
When these young ladies rented, borrowed or bought that canoe they needed only to ask someone to teach them some canoeing basics, or search out instructional videos on YouTube, in order to increase their efficiency and effectiveness in the canoe. Likewise, all of us have the opportunity to add knowledge to our faith to deepen our understanding and grow in maturity. There are so many resources available nowadays that we can access to grow our faith.
However, that requires humility.
It takes humility to ask for help, to ask for input, to communicate that we don’t have all the answers – to learn and grow. Is it any great surprise that we don’t possess all knowledge? No, of course not. Then why do we often balk at the thought of asking for help?
One word: Pride. And we all know that God resists the proud.
When you find yourself balking at asking for help, input, advice, or prayer, choose humility and ask for help and it will kick pride in the head. We must choose to get training in the deeper things of God. We must choose to learn.
We are not meant to walk alone. Following Jesus is a team game. And, we are not meant to live in ignorance. Let’s make sure we are not “committed, but clueless” – let’s ask for help, input, advice or prayer. Let’s get the training we need to grow in God. Let’s choose to learn and grow. Remember, you don’t know what you don’t know. We all need input from others.
Let’s be committed and clued in, not clueless.
II Peter 1:5-8
“For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Hebrews 5:11-14
“…it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. … But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.”
Walking In The Light
I woke up in the hospital bed after the 8 hour operation, my leg wrapped in gauze, with a transparent tube coming out of the top of the gauze just below my knee. The tube terminated into a small transparent vacuum canister. The canister was partially filled with some kind of bloody fluid.
The operation had been a success: the bone graft from my hip had been implanted in my tibia, and the stainless steel surgical plate had been bolted up the length of my shin by a series of 12 large screws. The long surgical incision had been stapled up and now I lay there with this suction device coming out of my leg.
I was told the suction device was necessary to remove the fluids that build up due to the violence of the injury and the surgery. If these elements of the ‘weeping wound’ were not removed I could suffer infection which could lead to some very nasty outcomes. I was also on a steady diet of antibiotics to ensure there was no infection.
All this reparation work was needed due to a violent break I suffered on my right leg while playing soccer during university. My lower leg has broken in 3 places to the point where it was bent at right angles – it was horrific, excruciatingly painful and took 3 years to heal.
What does this have to do with walking in the light?
Well, think about the transparent tube sucking all the harmful fluids out of the inside of my leg. That’s a picture of ‘walking in the light’. We get beat up and injured in life on a regular basis – not necessarily physically, but emotionally and spiritually.
In the midst of life’s struggles and strains, worries and wonderings, failures and fears our hearts can get filled with potentially deadly elements. Discouragement, despair, depression, self-loathing, resentment, anger, bitterness, worry, fear, faithlessness, sin – these are all toxic to our emotional and spiritual health. If we don’t get them out of our system they can cause significant damage.
Walking in the light is simply bringing all these out in the open. It’s sharing with God and with man what is going on inside our hearts. It’s choosing to get out that which will kill us if we choose to keep it inside.
Conversation and confession is critically important.
When we retreat into ourselves we begin to spiral deeper down into emptiness and lifelessness. Walking in the light is making the choice to open up to the Lord and trusted friends. It’s sharing fears and failures, worries and wonderings, struggles and sins with others.
The only way we can do that is if we begin by choosing humility. You don’t have all the answers. You don’t have it all together. You aren’t the perfect man. Great – join the club. We need God and we need each other. Refusing to walk in the light is simply arrogance. It takes humility to walk in the light, but that choice will open up the grace of God to you.
And that leads to life.
Refusing to open up and talk about what is going on inside you will simply cause you to waste away even more – and that leads to death. Even King David said that when he kept silent his bones wasted away. Refusing to walk openly with God is rebellion. It’s a belief that, ‘I can do this on my own and don’t need God.’ That approach to life doesn’t end well.
It’s not manly to be quiet and refuse to share what’s going on inside you – it’s foolish. When we choose to walk in the light with God and with other men we not only get the crap out from inside us, but we allow the light, life and truth of God to get into us. It is a manly courageous decision to walk in the light, and that decision begins with humility. We must realize that we need each other, and we need the Lord.
Don’t let your pride keep you from the life you are thirsting for. Choose humility and walk in the light with God and with other men. Confession and conversation are critical for the life God has for you.
I John 1:7
“But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His son, purifies us from all sin.”
Psalm 32:3
“When I kept silent my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.”
Psalm 68:6
“God sets the lonely in families, He leads forth the prisoners with singing; but the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land.”
Who Says “No” to You?
“I don’t think you understand, nobody says “no” to Mr. Smith.”
And the meeting summarily ended.
The background to this encounter involved a high profile, high-powered televangelist who was invited to take his show on the road to Britain. The two British church leaders hoping to work with him had flown to his headquarters in the US. They were ushered into a private room to await the arrival of the famous preacher. Amidst much posturing and bravado the televangelist entered the room and outlined how he was going to bring his road show to the British people.
At the end of his high energy monologue he finished by stating, “Ok, so that’s how we’ll do it – we’re good to go then.”
His guests responded by saying, in effect, “No, we’re not good to go. It may work in your culture, but it won’t work in ours.”
With that the televangelist left the room. His assistant then indicated that “no” was not a word you said to “Mr. Smith”.
Clearly I have changed the name of the televangelist to protect his identity, but needless to say, pride came before the fall and his ministry suffered a major blow when it was discovered he had repeated, significant moral failures.
It would appear that ‘pride’ was a significant issue he needed to deal with. Anyone who isn’t willing to have someone tell them ‘no’ clearly has an issue with pride.
“I’m right – you’re wrong.” “I know what’s best – you don’t”. That is arrogance. That is being unteachable, uncoachable, unleadable. God resists the proud, and you don’t want to live there.
Humility is the only antidote.
We can humble ourselves, or God has humble us. It certainly is far less painful if we can choose to humble ourselves, but God loves us enough to know that the short term pain of Him humbling us creates long term gain.
My question to you is simply, “Who says “no” to you?”
To whom have you given permission to confront you and tell you that you are off base, off track, or off your rocker? This is an initiative that we need to take. Nobody can force this on us – we must invite people to give us this kind of input. We must choose humility in order to walk this way.
I know that getting the kind of input that cuts across the grain can be very aggravating. It can be like petting a cat backwards – it rubs you the wrong way. Don’t get offended when people point out to you where you may be off-base. Thank God that you have people in your life who love you enough to help you see your error. The input you receive may not be totally accurate or even worthy of implementation, but it is worthy of consideration and submission to the Lord and to your trusted advisors.
I have discovered that it is oftentimes flawed people who give us this kind of input. It’s easy to get angry and write off what they say because of how they may have said it, or the timing of their input. Well you know what? The only kind of people God has to work with are flawed people, so don’t write off what they have to say because it wasn’t done exactly the way you would have wanted it said.
Get over it and take the input to the Lord – “Lord, what do you want to teach me in this?
I am utterly convinced that the prerequisite to freedom, hope, healing, strength, love and the life we are looking for, is humility. Humility unlocks the grace of God and the work of God. One powerful way we can choose humility is to invite people in our life to share truthfully with us. And, be big enough (read ‘humble enough’) to not get offended by someone disagreeing with you, but graciously receive their input – no matter how ungraciously it was given – and take it to the Lord for His perspective.
Thank God for friends who are willing to speak the truth to you. Friendship without truth really isn’t ‘friendship’, it’s ‘bullship’.
It is a wise man who chooses humility and invites others to say “no” to him.
Proverbs 18:12
“Before a downfall the heart is haughty, but humility comes before honor.”
Isaiah 66:2b
“These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word.”
Proverbs 19:20
“Listen to advice and accept discipline, and at the end you will be counted among the wise.”
You Are Not Good Enough
“Hey Dad, I got the silver medal!”
I had just come running through the door after returning from my first high school wrestling competition. I won the silver medal at the provincials so I was excitedly waving my medal around telling Dad about my conquest, hoping to get some affirmation. What I received was not exactly what I was looking for…
“Why didn’t you get the gold?!”
Ouch.
It was an innocuous enough comment though. My dad wasn’t being harsh or critical; he simply asked a fair question. When he saw the dejection on my face he quickly said that silver is really good too.
However, the damage had been done. Not so much from his comment, but from the work of the one who is at war with those who bear the image of God. The lie that went deep into my impressionable heart was that I was not good enough. Second place was not good enough. I had to win to be acceptable.
This incident set me off on trajectory that led me to being a driven man who had to win. And, if I didn’t know I could win, well then I simply wouldn’t participate – I would withdraw. I became a ‘puffer fish’ and a ‘chameleon’.
Now I know that my story is not unique. I am willing to venture a guess that 100% of the men reading this e-visional have all heard this lie and swallowed it hook, line and sinker. “You are not good enough.” “You are not smart enough.” “You are not strong enough.” “You are not successful enough”, etc., etc. – you get the picture.
This is a strategy sent to keep us from offering who we are. To keep us from offering the man God has created, crafted and called us to be. These lies are meant to convince us that who we are and what we have to give isn’t up to standard, so just don’t bother to offer yourself – you’re not good enough.
Sit down, shut up and disengage.
There is a secret to getting free from this debilitating lie: agree with it.
Yup, agree with it – you are not good enough. But keep in mind, it’s true but it’s not the Truth. Is it true that we are not ‘good enough’ in God’s eyes – that we fall short of His glory and His standards? Yes, or course. We have a disease called sin. We are broken. We are imperfect. If that was the end of the story we would be hooped. But it’s not the end of the story. If all we knew was that we are infected with an incurable disease called sin then we would be hopeless indeed.
But Jesus is the cure.
Our ‘not good enough’ is trumped by His ‘I am enough’! Jesus is enough and that changes everything. We will only be truly free when we can in humility admit our brokenness, our shortcomings, our sin, our failures and offer them to Jesus. Our ‘not enough’ is transformed by His ‘more than enough’.
When we are weak, then we are strong. We can learn to boast in our weaknesses, just as Paul did, so that we can know the strength of Christ even more. What is impossible for man is possible for God. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.
So, the next time you get those condemning and debilitating thoughts that you are not good enough simply say, “I know I am not good enough. I know I am flawed and broken. However, that isn’t the end of the story. Jesus is enough. What is impossible for me is possible for God. I boast in my weakness because when I am weak Jesus can be my strength. God loves me just as I am and He’s not done with me yet. The fact that I am not good enough – and recognize it – qualifies me for the grace of God.”
God doesn’t help those who help themselves, He helps the helpless who know it. He helps those who know they aren’t good enough and come to Him who is more than enough.
Yes, our ‘not good enough’ is replaced by His ‘I am enough’ – and that’s good enough for me!
II Corinthians 12:9
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.”
Philippians 4:13
“I can do everything through Him who gives me strength.”
Mark 10:27
“Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.’”
The ‘Look at Me’ Syndrome
“Wow, she is a beauty. Stunning even. And, she’s Italian. Lookin’ very good Dave!”
‘She’, was a 1968 850 fiat Spider convertible sports car – my first car. I bought her for $100 from my youth leader when I was 15. Her name was Brigid, named after the Italian actress Gina Lollobrigida. She was all rusted out and her engine was in dire need of a rebuild, but her leather interior was beautiful.
It was love at first site. I bought her and all the extra parts that came with her.
She was a project car that required countless hours to see her transformed from a rusted out, multi-colored body panelled, barely running piece of junk into the gorgeous exotic sports car I knew she could be. And so, for months on end, I tirelessly worked to make her into the beauty that I wanted to be seen in, and the car that would represent the kind of young man I wanted to be – bold, distinct, exotic, rare, cool, attractive and very popular.
When I was finished she looked incredible. Her rusted body had all been fixed, sculpted and then painted a deep, rich burgundy with white racing stripes running along the bottom of the doors from the front wheel well to the rear wheel well. A chrome and black bumper strip ran the length of her sidelines, a tinted sticker with the word “FIAT” ran the width of the windshield, and her chrome bumpers shone brightly from hours of buffing and polishing. My favourite part was the leather gear shift knob with the ceramic FIAT logo on the top.
Wow, she was stunning! She looked good and so did I when I was driving her. When I drove her she shouted, “Look at me!” And the girls did. I loved it. The only problem was, I didn’t get to enjoy the copious amounts of attention and adulation for long – Brigid’s frame was rusted out and I had to junk her. Yup, she was a beauty, but she was rotten on the inside.
This little story is an illustration of a powerful issue that can cripple us and lead to our spiritual demise. I call it the ‘Look at Me’ syndrome. It’s that need for attention and recognition. It’s the need to be noticed and affirmed. It’s the need for people to know what you do; your significance and importance. It’s the need to look good.
I am very aware of this syndrome, because I had a bad case of it – and still have to fight it.
The ‘Look at Me’ syndrome is based in insecurity and causes us to desire and seek out our own glory. We want attention.
However, God tells us that He will not share His glory with anyone. When we seek out our own glory and not God’s glory we miss His heart and become trapped in pride and the fear of man. Our pride will separate us from the grace of God, and the fear of man will keep us from obeying God because we are more concerned about what men think than what God thinks.
Ultimately God loves us enough to not leave us in this state. He will begin to lovingly and relentlessly humble us and affirm His love for us as beloved sons. The only cure for the ‘Look at Me’ Syndrome is to choose humility and surrender to God, and shift our value and worth from the things of this word and the words of man to a deep core belief that our value and worth is only found in our sonship – the truth of who’s we are as God’s son.
Man or God, who do we love? Praises from men or our Father above? Vanity, will it be our delight, or can God’s love be our song in the night?
We must be about God’s glory, not our own. We must build God’s kingdom, not ours. If we are to walk wholeheartedly in the purposes of God we must repent from our need to be noticed, our ‘Look at Me’ Syndrome, and receive our Father’s love for us as a son in whom He delights.
Our “Look at Me” needs to shift into I “Look to Thee”.
Luke 16:15
“He said to them, ‘You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.'”
I Samuel 16:7
“…The Lords does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”
John 7:18
“Whoever speaks on their own does so to gain personal glory, but he who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him.”
Empty
Empty 
It took over 4 years and 225 editions of How’s The Viz?, but it has finally happened…
I don’t have anything to talk about.
That’s right – I’m tapped out. I have sat here for a couple of hours and I can’t come up with anything that I believe the Lord wants me to give to you.
I have been asking the Lord for a number of days what He would have me give to you this week, but I wasn’t hearing much of anything. “Oh well, I will get something close to the day.” But it’s now the wee hours of the morning prior to when I have to load up this week’s visional and I am coming up empty.
I looked back at my week and realized that in the midst of all that filled my time, I didn’t really set aside any time to study God’s Word. Sure, I walked with Him and prayed throughout the days, but I didn’t intentionally set aside time to focus on His Word and ask the Holy Spirit to help me understand the Father’s heart through scripture.
As this realization began to dawn on me I thought of the scripture in Jeremiah 2:13:
“My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me the spring of living water and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”
What the Lord is saying about His people is that they have not gone to Him for life and they have gone looking for it somewhere else. They have turned their backs on the source of real life – the spring of living water – and instead they have tried to find life for themselves. And what they are looking to for life and sustenance ‘can’t hold water.’
Have you ever found yourself wondering why you feel so empty? So lifeless?
Perhaps like me in the busyness of life you have neglected the source of your life, the spring of living water. Perhaps you haven’t been feeding on the Truth of God’s word and you have been going elsewhere to find life – none of which can satisfy. Anytime we go looking for life outside of God we’ll come home hungry. Perhaps not at first, but eventually it always ends the same…feeling empty and lifeless.
There is only one source of life and that is God Himself. Jesus said that He is the way, the truth and the life. He also said that anyone who trusts in Him will have a river of living water flow up within them.
I remember years ago late one night, during a difficult time, sitting alone on the floor with the lights off thinking about how I would be better off just leaving all this God stuff – it was too hard. In the midst of my plotting how I could ‘run away’ from God’s refining, He whispered into my heart, “See, you still believe that you will find life outside of me.”
I needed to come to the point of believing, of knowing, that there is only one source of life – Jesus. The very life we are thirsty for, and perhaps looking for in myriad places, is found in only just one.
Jesus.
So my emptiness this week, my inability to come up with an encouraging Word for you, has helped me to recognize my need to continually drink deeply from the spring of living water so that I can offer life to you.
Perhaps this can be an encouragement for you to keep choosing to continue to seek God for your source of life and do not neglect time with Him in the midst of the busyness of life. If you are feeling empty, perhaps you are seeking life from the wrong source.
Jesus is life, and He has plenty for you.
John 14:6
“I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
John 4:14
“but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
John 7:38
“Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.”
Don’t Throw Away Your Confidence
“That’s it – I’m done! I can’t take this anymore! This is way too much for me to handle. I don’t have what it takes to do this. I am through.”
Have you ever had those thoughts? Have you ever spoken those words?
I wouldn’t be surprised if every man at some point in time has come to that point of resignation. Perhaps it was a work issue. Perhaps it was a relational issue. Perhaps it was the Lord leading you into or through something that was overwhelming. Or perhaps it was an accumulation of these things all at one time. Whatever the circumstances that were the precursors to your scenario, the result is the same – feeling completely overwhelmed and unable to meet the challenge presented.
Have you ever taken a good long look at who you are, or more accurately who you aren’t, and been profoundly discouraged?
Again, I have no doubt that every man has taken a prolonged look into the virtual mirror and deemed our self to be unworthy, unfit, unable, incapable, and been basically supremely bummed out about who we are.
If you have, join the club. Sometimes I feel like I am the captain of that club. Dang, I wish it wasn’t like that…
This last week was one of those times of massive self-doubt for me. “I can’t do this anymore…this is too hard…I don’t have what it takes to do this…pick someone else Lord, a better man than me.”
So where do we go in those times when we despise ourselves for who we have not become? Where do we go when we are in the midst of the ‘now’ and ‘not yet’? – which is everything this side of heaven. How do we live with hope in the midst of the brokenness?
I was walking through a bird sanctuary wrestling with these issues – no, ‘agonizing’ with these issues – when I stopped and looked at a family of ducks. There were 3 little ducklings and an adult female sunning themselves on a log in the pond. The ducklings could not fly – their wings were tiny little stubs that had not grown into wings capable of sustaining them. They were awkwardly stumbling over each other and falling into the water, all the while their mother stood strong and true beside them.
I thought that this was a good picture of ‘now’ and ‘not yet’. The adult duck represented the not yet for the ducklings, their immaturity represented their now. It would be silly for the ducklings to despise themselves because they weren’t like their mother. They will be like her one day, but not today. There is an appropriateness to who they are now, and an appropriateness to who they will be ‘then’.
Be content in the ‘now’, and live in hopeful expectation of the ‘not yet’.
We can often condemn ourselves for who we are (the now), and lose faith for who we are becoming (the not yet). We can lose heart and give up because of the difficulties we are facing, and lose confidence in who we are becoming.
Losing heart is throwing away your confidence. The writer of Hebrews encourages us to not throw away our confidence. However, that begs the question, “What do you put your confidence in?”, or better still, “In whom do you put your confidence?”
Self-confidence can only take you so far. God confidence will take you much, much further. Sometimes the whole reason we come to those points of crisis when we want to throw it all away; when we feel overwhelmed by life and become profoundly discouraged with who we are; is because God is offering us the opportunity to shift from self-confidence to God confidence. To trust in Him, and in doing so discover a whole new strength and perspective on life.
Apart from Christ we can do nothing, but we can do all things through Him who strengthens us.
So what is our confidence? I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it.
Yes, Jesus is our confidence. He will complete His good work in you. The crisis or the difficulties you are facing are providing you with an opportunity to shift from self-confidence to God-confidence. Surrender to Jesus anew and ask Him to lead you and guide you, counsel and watch over you.
Don’t throw away your ‘God’ confidence – it’s in Him that we really learn to fly.
Hebrews 10:35
“So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.”
Philippians 1:6
“Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
Psalm 32:8
“I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you and watch over you.”
The Tools of Truth to Set You Free
The tropical afternoon rains were thundering down onto the corrugated roof of our little rented rainforest cottage. We watched in gobsmacked amazement as the water poured off the roof in torrents unlike anything we had seen before – and that says a lot for someone who had grown up in North Vancouver, and experienced the power of prairie rainstorms as well.
This was rainy season in the Costa Rican rainforest.
Every day sometime between 1:00 and 2:00 the rains would come. And oh, would they come. Any outdoor activities would need to cease as we would scurry inside to hunker down for the afternoon until the rains stopped.
It was wonderfully relaxing. We had to be inside doing very little. No pressure to be outside conquering creation and adamantly adventuring. Nope. We would simply chill as a family and enjoy our time together. It was during these quiet and simple afternoons that the Lord helped me to understand some profound truth about getting free from the spiritual opposition that stalks us.
Earlier in our Costa Rican holiday the Lord had used the Strangler Fig as a powerful metaphor to show me the strategy of the enemy to plant lies into our hearts that then begin to choke the life out of us if we do not take them captive with the Truth. I have written about this in my visional called “The Lies That Bind”.
However, how do we get free from the lies that have been planted in our hearts over the course of decades of life?
This is what the Lord showed me during those rainy Costa Rican afternoons…
We have 5 tools of truth we need to utilize to get free from the lies of the enemy:
- Repent
- Renounce
- Rebuke
- Receive
- Rejoice
1. We repent from believing the lies instead of the truth. Lies like: “I can’t trust God”, “I am all alone”, “I have nothing to offer”, “I am insignificant”, “God doesn’t care”, “No one cares”, “I’ll never be enough, have enough, do enough”, etc., etc., etc. We have chosen to believe the lies that the enemy has planted into our hearts in the midst of wounding. We need to confess that and ask the Lord to forgive us.
2. We renounce the agreements we made with those lies. Basically we agreed with what the enemy was saying. We need to tear up those spiritual agreements – they are no longer valid, we don’t believe them anymore.
3. We rebuke the enemy and tell him to leave. Scripture tells us to submit to God, then yell a loud “no” to the enemy and watch him scamper. This is no time for being ‘nice’ – be vehement and violent in commanding him to leave.
4. We receive the truth of God into our heart – His rema Word and His logos Word. In other words, His spoken Word and His written Word. We need to begin to believe the Truth and not the lies of the enemy.
5. We rejoice. Rejoicing in the Truth of who we are in God, who He is to us and the freedom we have in Christ. To rejoice is a choice. We have been given the garment of praise instead of the spirit of heaviness.
Amidst the glory and splendor of the Costa Rican rainforest, trapped inside our little cottage by the afternoon rains and graciously bound by the cords of stillness and quiet, the Lord was able to reveal these simple tools of truth to help set us free from the lies of the enemy. When you see a lie that has taken root in your heart – sent from the one who wants to steal, kill and destroy the life Jesus has for you – walk through the 5 tools of truth to appropriate the freedom and life Jesus purchased for you.
This is a profound and powerful way to live and pull out the roots of the spiritual strangler fig sent to choke the life out of us, the life that Jesus gave His life to purchase for us.
Practice the 5 tools of Truth to set and then keep yourself free. It was for freedom that Christ has set us free.
John 1:9
“If we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
James 4:7
“So let God work His will in you. Yell a loud “No!” to the devil and watch him scamper. (The Message)
Philippians 4:4
“Rejoice in the Lord always! I will say it again – rejoice!”
This is a Test – Do Not Adjust Your Screen
Click for scene from Evan Almighty
Do you remember when you were a kid they used to do that emergency testing screen on your TV?
It was the Emergency Broadcast System black and white logo on the screen and a voice-over that would say, “Do not adjust your screen. This is a test of the emergency broadcast system. In the event of an emergency you would be instructed what to do.” Then there would be a high pitched single tone for a number of seconds.
I am sure there may be many of you who are not old enough to have experienced that, but for some reason it has stuck in my mind for all these years.
It came to my mind this week again after I read some scripture on “testing”.
You see, God tests us.
Now, when you hear that “God tests us.”, I’ll be that you have a very negative perception of what that means. I know I did. We tend to think it’s the pass/fail kind of test. Somehow God delights in pointing out our deficiencies and telling us that we have failed. He writes an “F” in big red letters on our foreheads for all to see. Failures. Losers. Cast offs. Also rans. The unneeded, unnecessary, and unworthy ones. Disqualified.
That’s not true though and that’s not what God’s testing is all about.
God’s testing is meant to make us stronger; to provide us with an opportunity to choose Him. Testing can reveal those things in our heart that we need to get rid of, what we need to lay aside to journey deeper into what God has for us. Testing can also help us realize how far we have come – how we are stronger that we were previously. Or perhaps how we have not grown in strength, but have weakened.
Testing can also be a means to make us stronger. When we find ourselves in difficult situations we can whine and complain and ask God to get us out of them. Or, we can embrace the opportunity to choose to persevere under trial and grow our strength of character and faith.
Yes, we have a choice. In the midst of difficult situations we can try to gut it out in our own strength, and cry out to God to get us out of this situation. Or we can cry out to God to help us find His strength, embrace the situation and persevere in joy knowing that God is strengthening us and making us more like him.
An illustration of this is found in the movie Evan Almighty. There is a beautiful scene in the movie when Evan’s wife is leaving him because she thinks he has lost his mind believing that God has asked him to build an ark. Earlier she had prayed that God would bring their family together, and now she finds herself with exactly the opposite thing happening.
Is this scene from the movie she is in a restaurant with the kids after having left Evan to go to her parent’s house. The kids go to the washroom and God shows up as the waiter to speak to her. (Incognito of course.)
They chat a bit and then God says, “If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does He give them the opportunity to be patient? If someone prayed for courage, does God gives them courage? Or does He give them opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the family to be closer, you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings? Or does He give them opportunities to love each other?”
It then dawns on her that the very thing she prayed for is being answered in the difficulties from which she is fleeing. She wants the family to be closer and love each other more, so God tests them with difficulty to find out if they will press through the difficulty to discover a deeper level of love and unity.
Wow.
What’s the lesson?
Well, the difficulty you may be resisting, and from which you may be fleeing, could be the very thing meant to “test” you, to bring you closer to God and deeper into His life and purposes for you and through you.
James 1:2-4
“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters,whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”
Judges 3: 1,2,4
“These are the nations the Lord left to test all those Israelites who had not experienced any of the wars in Canaan (He did this only to teach warfare to the descendants of the Israelites who had not had previous battle experience)… They were left to test the Israelites to see whether they would obey the Lord’s commands, which He had given their ancestors through Moses.”
Man Your Battle Stations
The story of your life, the story of life in general, can be difficult and frustrating to understand. The story we believe we are living determines how we respond to what is going on around us.
Gary Barkalow of The Noble Heart Ministry has a very powerful metaphor to help us understand our place in “the story” of life. He paints the picture of a “cruise ship” versus a “battleship”.
Some people picture life like being on a cruise ship. Those people who see life through the lens of being on a cruise ship believe they are entitled to a vast array of comforts and conveniences. They expect the food to be exceptional, their needs to be catered to and the overall experience to very pleasant. When the food isn’t the way they expect it to be they whine and complain. “This isn’t what I paid for.”
When the entertainment isn’t to their liking, or the activities are not what they were hoping for, they demand or expect changes to be made. If there are people staying in the cabin next to them that are acting unruly or inappropriately they will ask the authorities on the ship to deal with them, or ask to be moved to a more pleasant location on the ship with better ‘neighbours’.
When things get difficult – perhaps the seas get rough, people get sick and some hardship sets in – they are quick to declare, “This isn’t what I signed up for!”
All of this is a ‘rights’ oriented perspective. “I have paid for this, so I better get what I want.” “I do this, so you do that.”
However, those who picture their story like they are on a battleship have a completely different perspective. They expect difficulty. They expect hardship. They expect food and conditions to be adequate, but do not demand them to be exceptional. The purpose for being on the ship is not their self-gratification, their personal happiness or their personal pleasure. No, the purpose for being on the ship is the mission – to fight for freedom from the oppressor.
Those on a battleship do not expect to be served, they expect to serve. They do not expect to give orders, but to take orders. They are not demanding comfort and convenience, but are choosing courage, character, commitment and conviction. When they are called to “man their battle stations’ and take their place in the conflict, they are quick to do their duty out of a love for each other, their commander and the mission in which they are engaged.
Those who have responded to the call to serve on a battleship do not have a ‘rights’ oriented perspective. No, they have a ‘responsibility’ oriented perspective. “I am called to serve, so I will inconvenience myself and lay my life down for the greater good.”
What drastically different perspectives on the story of our lives.
Sadly, many people in the church have bought into the cultural deception that life is supposed to be a cruise ship. When, in reality, we have been called to take our place on a battleship to continue the fight that Jesus began. We are called to “man our battle stations”, and continue to fight for the freedom that Jesus purchased for us through His death and resurrection; to see God’s Kingdom come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven – in us and through us.
I know I have been guilty of wanting a cruise ship life, a life of comfort and convenience, but that’s not the nature of our call, of our mission. Not that life is about the battle. No, life is about God’s kingdom of righteous, peace and joy. But Kingdom life is opposed and surrounded by battle, and the life God has for us and through us is worth the fight.
A true warrior can’t love war. He must love peace, because that’s what he’s fighting for.
Let’s resist being ‘Cruise Ship Christians’ and choose to be ‘Battleship Believers’ manning our battle stations on God’s Kingdom battleship called “Freedom”.
Psalm 144:1
“Praise be to the Lord my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle.”
Romans 14:17
“For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit,”
Matthew 10:38, 39
“Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.”
Iron Sharpens Iron
I got an email from a friend the other week asking if I wanted to get together for a coffee in the near future. I am not particularly close with this man – we have gotten together on a few occasions. He has taken me out for lunch a couple of times to discuss parenting and other issues pertinent to men. He is a good man who is very intent on moving forward in his journey with Jesus.
There was a different tone in his invitation this time. Nothing overt, but I sensed that he didn’t want to get any input on a particular issue, but he wanted to share something with me. “Something that would be helpful for me to know.”
Hmmm. Something is up.
We set up a time and tried to meet, but I ended up having to forgo our meeting because a meeting went longer and I lost my window of opportunity. So, I called him after my meetings, apologized and asked if he wanted to get together another time, or chat on the phone.
He said “no problem – let’s talk now.” He gave me an update on some of the issues we previously talked about. He then encouraged me, thanked me for how I am walking with Jesus to fight for the hearts of men, and shared a simple, gentle correction.
During our last lunch meeting he felt I was distracted and seemed more interested in the people walking past our table than in him. He encouraged me to not be so distracted by others and focus on the person I am talking to at the time.
Good point. I agree. In fact, those kinds of guys really tick me off. You know the guy at the business networking event, Chamber luncheon, men’s event, and after church foyer talk time where they are talking to you, but their eyes are looking past you to see if there is someone else more important to talk to?
Man, I dislike that, and I never want to be that guy.
According to my friend, I had become that guy during our lunch. Bummer. I apologized and thanked him for his courage to share, and the care with which he offered it. I received the heads-up and we moved on. No issues.
It would have been easier for him not to say a thing – which we often choose to do. However, I would have missed the opportunity to embrace humility and experience some personal growth. His ‘correction’ was very easy to receive because I know he cares for me, he respects me and he is ‘for’ me. He wasn’t venting, he was sharing something to help me. He wasn’t criticizing, he was correcting. There is a big difference – criticizing tears down, correcting builds up.
I could have gotten my back up and gotten all knotted up. “Who does he think he is?” “Do you have any idea how intently I listen to people and focus on them?” “That’s the last time I’ll agree to get together with him – I’ve got plenty of important things to fill my time with.” All of that is just pride, bravado and the ranting of an insecure man.
Iron sharpening iron is one man helping another man to see an area for growth that he may not be able to see himself. It’s done in respect, within relationship and with a healthy dose of encouragement if possible. It is correction meant to build up, not criticism which tears down. Being a good friend to someone is not telling them what they want to hear, it involves treating them like a man and ‘on occasion’ respectfully sharing what would be helpful for their personal growth.
If you have a friend in your life who loves you enough to respectfully, graciously and lovingly share some correction with you, don’t get offended! Embrace humility and thank God you have someone who loves and respects you enough to speak into your life.
And, if you are that guy who sees the need for change, make sure you are respectfully bringing correction for your friend’s benefit, not criticism to make you feel better.
Iron truly sharpens iron when respectful, Truthful correction is offered to and received by a humble, hungry heart. And that leads to life.
Proverbs 27:17
“As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.”
Proverbs 27:5,6
“Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.”
I Timothy 4:2
“Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.”
What is a Wholehearted Man?
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Click to hear a powerful song “Rise Up O Men of God”
I had a good friend of mine ask me a simple yet profound question:
“So what is a wholehearted man?”
Wow, good question. It really made me think…
“Wholehearted” is defined as being ardent, authentic, committed, dedicated, determined, devoted, fervent, genuine, passionate, steadfast, true, unreserved, unwavering, and zealous.
Wholehearted men live out of a deep sense of passion, purpose, commitment, conviction, identity and life. But, what does it mean to be wholehearted in relation to God?
I think a wholehearted man is wholeheartedly following God and has been made “whole” by God.
Let me explain. It is not enough to believe in Jesus. It is not enough to know about Jesus. It is even not enough to know Jesus. Even Satan believes that Jesus is real, knows about Him and knows Him personally. No, the mark of a true believer, a true ‘follower’ is just that – they follow Jesus. They obey Jesus. They have surrendered their will to Him and are obeying Him instead of doing what they want.
Jesus said that if we love Him we will obey Him.
Wholehearted men have turned their backs on sin and doing things their way and have wholeheartedly thrown themselves into God’s way of doing things. God’s will, God’s way on a daily, moment by moment basis. They give Him all they have.
Wholehearted men are not “half-hearted” in how they walk with Jesus – a little bit of God when it’s convenient. Be God’s man on Sundays and then my own man the rest of the week. Call out to God when things are bad, but go silent when things are good. Keep one foot in the pleasures of the world, and one foot in the purposes of God. Count the blessings, but not the cost. Desire the life, without the death. Savor the salvation, without the sacrifice.
No, wholehearted men have hearts that are wholly His. All in. Men who have gotten out of the driver’s seat of their life and handed the keys to Jesus. Drive on Lord – I’ll go where you want, not try to talk you into going where I want to go.
Sure, no one is perfect, and I am fairly confident that is not what the Lord is looking for – that’s what His grace and mercy are all about. However, we have been given a will with which we can choose to surrender to God’s will or not. We have a will with which we can embrace humility and repentance when we mess us.
And, as we wholeheartedly pursue our Heavenly Father’s heart, through the redemptive work of Jesus, empowered by the Holy Spirit, we will have our hearts made whole by God’s work in us and through us. God’s overwhelming love – His great goodness and His good greatness – heals our wounds and sets us free from the ravages of sin.
Oh the great redeeming work of Jesus bringing God’s beloved sons and daughters back into an extraordinary relationship with our Father God. Hope, healing, freedom, favour, vision, blessing, victory, comfort, beauty, gladness, love – all part of our inheritance as children of God. Will we ever be completely made whole this side of heaven? I don’t think so, but there is far more wholeness for us than we can imagine.
It is certainly not easy to be a wholehearted man. It takes dedication, discipline, desire, determination and delight. God is looking for men who are wholeheartedly His. Men whose hearts are fully His. Men who are fully committed to Him. I think wholehearted men are continually praying, “Lord I believe, please help my unbelief.”, and then they keep moving forward with single-minded determination into more of God’s heart for them and through them.
We never arrive; we are always on a journey. It’s only by God’s grace we can walk wholeheartedly with Him with an iron will to obey, and a bended knee to surrender. Let us continue on. Let us press forward to be the wholehearted men that the Lord is seeking so that we might experience all that is in His heart for us. It’s not perfection He wants, simply a man who continues to pursue Him – wholeheartedly. To give him all that we’ve got.
Rise up oh men of God – give heart and soul and mind and strength to serve the King of Kings! Let’s give Him all that we’ve got!
Romans 6:12-14 (The Message)
“That means you must not give sin a vote in the way you conduct your lives. Don’t give it the time of day. Don’t even run little errands that are connected with that old way of life. Throw yourselves wholeheartedly and full-time – remember, you’ve been raised from the dead! – into God’s way of doing things. Sin can’t tell you how to live. After all, you’re not living under that old tyranny any longer. You’re living in the freedom of God.”
II Chronicles 16:9
“For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him.”
Deuteronomy 1:36
“…except Caleb son of Jephunneh. He will see it, and I will give him and his descendants the land he set his feet on, because he followed the Lord wholeheartedly.”
It’s Not All About Jesus
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OK, before you think I am a heretic, let me explain.
We often hear that “It’s all about Jesus.” A favourite song of mine from many years ago was, in fact, “It’s All About Jesus”. Yes, salvation is found only in Jesus. Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Jesus is God. Jesus is the only way to the Father. But that’s just it – He came to reconcile mankind to the Father.
Mankind’s sin had alienated us from the Father. Jesus came to make a way for the sons and daughters of God to be in right relationship with their Heavenly Father. He came to reveal the Father’s heart. “If you have seen me you have seen the father.” “I and the Father are one.” “When you pray, pray like this, ‘Our Father who is in heaven…’”
My point is this: Jesus came to connect us with our Father and demonstrate the heart of the Father to His children. Jesus was about the Father and the Father’s business.
Here’s how it applies to men in a profound way. Most men suffer from a performance-based mentality. In other words, we have grown up believing that our value and worth depends on how well we perform. This is a value system that was instilled very early on in our lives. Get good grades – you’re valuable. Excel in sports – you’re valuable. Succeed in work – you’re valuable. Make lots of money – you’re valuable. Achieve, accomplish, acquire and you are significant and valuable.
Sadly, with this belief we are never validated. We are never at rest. We are always trying to prove ourselves. How much is enough? Just a little more… Or, we have resigned ourselves to never being able to prove our value, worth, significance or manliness. Regardless, whether we are trying to prove our significance, or have resigned ourselves to never being significance, we will always carry a question mark over our lives instead of an exclamation mark.
The only thing that can settle the issue of our value, worth, significance and validation as a man is the revelation that we are beloved sons of our Heavenly Father. Scripture is very clear that we are beloved sons of God, and that is the source of our value and worth. Even Jesus needed to hear His Father validate Him. At His baptism and His transfiguration His Father said the same things, “This is my son whom I love and in whom I am well pleased.”
Basically, He was saying, “I love you and am so proud of you.”
This is what every man needs to hear from his Heavenly Father. This is the only thing that settles the issue of our value, worth and significance – it’s the Father Heart of God. It’s knowing that God delights in you as His beloved son. He rejoices over you with singing.
It’s imperative that you seek and discover God’s heart for you as a beloved son. To know that you have nothing to prove. You are loved and delighted in by God. You have been adopted as a son – born again – into the family of God by a Father who thinks you are awesome. Your Father longs for a deep intimate relationship with you as His son, a relationship so intimate that you call Him Daddy.
When you truly experience the Father Heart of God, and the deep heart revelation that you are a son He loves, your question mark gets turned into an exclamation mark. You settle the issue of your significance and you don’t have anything to prove. Now, your accomplishments are an act of worship out of love, instead of an attempt to prove your significance.
Discovering the Father Heart of God is a journey, it’s doesn’t happen through a quick prayer or instantaneously. It takes time. It’s a relational journey that begins with you asking God to reveal His Father heart for you and then watching, listening and experiencing what He begins to do. He can speak to you through myriad ways. Keep your heart open and listen.
Jesus came to make a way for you to be in relationship with God as His beloved son, and the revelation of that will change everything.
Jeremiah 3:19
“I myself said, ‘How gladly would I treat you as sons and give you a desirable land, the most beautiful inheritance of any nation. I thought you would call me ‘Father’ and not turn away from following me.’”
II Corinthians 6:18
“I will be a Father to you and you will be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”
Galatians 4:4-7
“But when the time had fully come, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law that we might receive the full rights of sons. Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, ‘Abba, Father.’ So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir.”
Jerry McGuire Got it Wrong
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Click to see the infamous scene…
Have you seen the movie Jerry McGuire?
It’s not a fabulous movie, but it is an interesting tale of failure, betrayal, brokenness, humility, integrity, loyalty, courage, love and redemption. Jerry is a great example of a poser. A puffer fish extraordinaire. He is also an example of someone who walks through brokenness and comes out the other end a humbler and better man.
A fairly prevalent theme on many fronts throughout the movie is “redemption”, including a very moving scene when Jerry returns to his wife after she had suggested they separate because of his seeming lack of for her. He comes back early from a road trip to profess his love and his need for her. He then utters a very simple line that has become a popular belief within North American culture as an indication of a fabulous relationship:
“You complete me.”
This romantic turn of phrase seems profound, powerful and a sign of true love, but it’s not true. Not only is it not true, but it is a dangerous belief. Your wife doesn’t complete you – Jesus does.
Does your wife add another dimension of life and the heart of God that you may not have experienced without knowing her? Sure. Are you joined together with your wife as one – no longer two? Yes.
However, you and I are only made complete in Jesus. We are made whole in Jesus alone.
It was first said by Blaise Pascal in 1670 that, “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every person, and it can never be filled by any created thing. It can only be filled by God, made known through Jesus Christ.”
If we buy into the Hollywood lie, “my wife completes me”, then we will look to her for life. We will look to her to meet our needs. This is not a good basis for a relationship. We end up bringing our needs to our wife and take from her instead of giving to her. We will look to get instead of give. She will inevitably let us down, resentments will begin to grow, divisions will appear, relationship will suffer and if not dealt with, marriages will break apart.
That deep place of need we all have, that relentless inner longing for life and love, can only be filled by Jesus. Can your wife express aspects of the life and love of God to you? Definitely. Is there much you can receive from your wife? Absolutely. Are you overwhelmingly grateful for who your wife is and how she gives to you? Hopefully. But you cannot look to her to meet your needs, you must go to Jesus. Will Jesus work through your wife to touch your heart? Yes, but your expectation must be in Jesus.
We have been called to love our wives in the same way that Christ loved the church and laid down His life for her. We are called to love our wives with a love marked by giving and not getting. If we will consciously shift our hearts to look to Jesus to meet our needs, and love our wives by giving selflessly, then we can simply receive whatever love our wives have for us and not measure their responses by some deeply felt expectation that inevitably they will not meet.
Look to Jesus to meet your needs. Allow Him to complete you, and out of His love working in you and through you lay your life down for your wife. Lay down your expectations of her to love you the way your expect her to. Lay down your expectations of her to be the wife you were hoping for. Surrender your expectations to Jesus and look to Him to work in you, then through you in a way that enables you to love your wife selflessly.
If you are able to live and love selflessly you will realize you wife’s love in a way that previously you couldn’t. Release her from the expectation that she somehow needs to complete you. Love her with a love marked by giving, not by getting – and the only way you can do that is through Jesus.
Jesus completes you, not your wife. He is your source of life.
Ephesians 5:25 (The Message)
“Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church-a love marked by giving, not getting.”
John 14:6
“I am the Way the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
Philippians 4:19
“And my God will meet all your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”
John 4:13
“Jesus answered, ‘Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.'”
Got Grace?
Click for Scottish version of Amazing Grace
I went to a crazy event recently. It was an art show about “grace”. All of the art in the show depicted what the artists wanted to communicate about grace.
There was live music. Live poetic readings with background music. There were videos and slide shows. There were potters and painters. There were pots and paintings. And there were lots of people walking around experiencing this multisensory artistic extravaganza.
When we first arrived I was almost giddy with the revelry of the moment – it felt like we had arrived at some hip beatnik slam poetry event. I must say, I felt a little out of my element. I was having flashbacks to Mike Myers Beat Poem in the movie “So I Married an Axe Murderer”.
But then I started to settle into the moment and drink in what was going on, and the depth of what was being communicated. Wow. I was overwhelmed on many fronts. The art was amazing, but what was more compelling was what the artists were saying through their art. One “painting” was a blank canvass – totally white. The plaque underneath it simple said, “Grace is…a clean slate.” Another was a rock surrounded by the waters of a rushing stream, “Grace is…a river.”
Another display was a number of logs of various lengths standing upright with what appeared to be a random gathering of candles on top of them. You were encouraged by a sign to go up to the balcony and look down on the display. When looking from above you could clearly see the candles spelled “grace” – your change in perspective completely changed how you perceived what was going on.
Perhaps what spoke more to me about grace, than the art displays, was the walking art of people’s lives. I had the opportunity to connect with many people I hadn’t seen in quite some time, only to hear of difficulties they had or were still encountering, and how God’s grace was getting them through.
I learned a couple of lessons that evening: 1. Only broken people understand grace. 2. Grace cannot so much be defined, as experienced.
If we don’t know at a deep heart level that we are broken, we never understand our need for God’s grace and how incredibly amazing it is. Grace is poured out on the humble – those who are broken and know they need help.
It’s ok not to be ok.
We’ve probably all heard the standard definitions of grace and mercy as “grace in getting what you don’t deserve and mercy is not getting what you deserve.” There is an element of truth to those, but they are incomplete and simplistic as well. Grace must be experienced to be understood…
Grace to me is akin to a divine enveloping of overwhelming love flooding our being, whispering deep into our hearts, “Everything is going to be ok.” It may not be easy. It may not be pain free. It may not be finished. The resolution may not be quick. But we are not alone. God is with us. God is enough, and because of that everything is going to be alright – we are going to make it through.
So, in the midst of your brokenness; in the midst of your failures and shortcomings; in the midst of the overwhelming circumstances of life, God’s grace is available to you. God’s grace can see you through. God’s grace can envelope you with the love and strength you need to keep going and experience His peace in the midst of the storm.
However, the key that opens the door to grace is humility. God gives grace to those who confess their brokenness, lay down their own agenda and declare their need for Him; then put their trust in Him knowing that He is who He says He is.
Choose humility, turn from insisting on your will your way, cry out to God and then believe He is who He says He is. You will experience His amazing grace in the midst of the storms you are facing. He is enough, and that changes everything.
You are not alone – walk with Him and everything is going to be alright.
Got grace? Only the humble get it.
I Peter 4:5
“…’God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.'”
Matthew 11:28-30
“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me – watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” (The Message)
II Corinthians 12:9
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.”
What is your freedom worth?
Statue of Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn
“In the year of our Lord 1314, patriots of Scotland starving and outnumbered charged the fields of Bannockburn. They fought like warrior poets. They fought like Scotsmen, and won their freedom.”
And so ends the movie Braveheart – a not-so-accurate portrayal of the Scottish fight for freedom led by William Wallace and Robert the Bruce. Don’t get me wrong, I love the movie, I just wish it was accurate.
The historical reality of the life and times of Wallace and the Bruce is quite different than how it was depicted by Hollywood, but the outcome was the same. The Scots did win their freedom from Edward II on the battle fields of Bannockburn.
In fact, on the fields of Bannockburn there stands a statue of Robert the Bruce and a memorial with this engraving on it: (Said to be the Scots rallying cry on June 24, 1314.)
“We fight not for glory, nor for wealth, nor honor, but only and alone we fight for freedom – which no good man surrenders but with his life.”
Freedom from oppression has been the rallying cry for many, many people throughout the course of human history. The Scots were willing to lay their lives down for the sake of freedom. They weren’t fighting for money, glory or honor. No, they wanted freedom. Freedom from oppression.
Someone once said that “freedom is not the license to do what you want, but the liberty to do what you ought”. Paul said that it was for freedom that Christ has set us free. We did not have to fight for and make great sacrifices to obtain our freedom. No, Jesus fought the battle for us. Perhaps that is why we so often surrender our freedom so easily.
So what is it that imprisons us? What is it that takes our freedom?
Sin. It’s sin that we can be in bondage to. We become enslaved to fear, insecurity, timidity, lust, anger, selfishness, pride, hopelessness, despair, apathy, greed, coveting, faithlessness, lying, idolatry, etc. And, it’s the lies of the enemy that we choose to believe. Of course, believing the lies of the enemy instead of the Truth of God is sin as well. By believing the lies of the enemy we do not appropriate the life that God has for us. The Truth of God actually sets of free – if we choose to believe it.
Jesus surrendered His life so that we might live in freedom. Are we willing to surrender ours to appropriate that freedom? Salvation is free. It is a gift of God that we receive by faith. Salvation is the change of our citizenship from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. Following that we need to live according to the constitution of this new “Kingdom”, this new government that we are part of. We must believe the Truth of God and not the lies of the enemy. We must also wield our will well and resist temptations of the enemy, resist being enticed into all manner of disobedience to the constitution of the Kingdom of God.
Jesus calls us to surrender to Him. To surrender our life, our sin, our brokenness, our pride, our expectations, our will, our fear, our weakness, etc. so that we might live in freedom in Him. It was for freedom that Christ set us free. Free to live, free to love, free to give, free to laugh, free to rejoice – free, period. And yet we can easily surrender our true freedom by choosing sin and the lies of the enemy.
Men, let us have a similar resolve to Robert the Bruce and resist the temptation to surrender our freedom. May we fight well – wield our will well – and not so easily surrender our freedom by choosing sin and the lies of the enemy. Remember the battle cry of the Bruce; resist the temptations of this world to obtain the freedom that Jesus has for us.
Jesus paid a great price for our freedom, let us not so quickly surrender what it cost Him so dearly to obtain.
Galatians 5:1
“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.”
John 8:31-32
“…Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
James 1:14-15
“…but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.”