Category Archives: God

Why You Shouldn’t Struggle With Self Worth

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Self-DefinitionWhat defines you?

Is it how you look?

Is it what you’re good at?

Could it be your job…or how much money you have?

Or perhaps it’s your religion.

Or maybe what defines you is how you view yourself.

What about how other people view you. Is that what defines you?

The other day I was reading in the book of Romans when I found something that Paul wrote:

“The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.”

Paul says that we are defined by the one who created us and what he does in us.

Jesus makes this same point in John 15. He says that God is the vine and we are the branches. I don’t care how productive or beautiful a branch is, if you cut it off from the vine, it shrivels and dies like any other.

Your identity, if it comes from the stuff I mentioned above: money, looks, religion, others opinions…can falter and fail.

The thing about God is that he gives us some guarantees in the scriptures. One is that he doesn’t change (Hebrews 13:8). Another is that he will always be at work in us (Romans 11:29).

If we accept that who we are – our self worth – is rooted in the one who made us and loves us, nothing can affect that.

God himself, through the prophet Isaiah says this: “From eternity to eternity I am God. No one can snatch anyone out of my hand. No one can undo what I have done.” (Isaiah 43:13)

Nobody – nothing – has the ability to change your worth. If you feel that way, I encourage you to look at what God says about you – he says that you were worth the sacrifice of his own son, so that you could live the life he wants you to have.

God doesn’t change, and therefore, neither does your worth.

The Echoes of God

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echo1 Kings 19 tells the story of the prophet Elijah.

Elijah reaches a point in his life where he’s depressed and frustrated – to the point where his only prayer left is asking God to let him die.

God summons Elijah to a particular mountain and tells Elijah to prepare for God’s arrival.

As Elijah stands inside a cave, awaiting the arrival of the almight, a hurricane wind arrives and literally shatters rocks on the mountain. But the scripture says that ‘God wasn’t to be found in the wind’.

So Elijah continues to wait.

Next, a great earthquake rocks the mountain. But God wasn’t in the earthquake.

So Elijah continues to wait.

A great fire rages across the mountain next. But God wasn’t in the fire.

So Elijah continues to wait.

What happens next is that God shows up. Not in a show of force and power, but in a quiet whisper.

As soon as Elijah hears the quiet whisper, he covers his face out of great respect and walks to the mouth of the cave to meet with God.

I often have people asking me how to hear from God. I believe God is constantly speaking within all of us. It simply requires us to listen to the whispers in our heart.

This voice mixed with the essence of who we are, and it sounds very much like our own inner thoughts when it arrives.

To an analytical person, it will be analytical. To an emotional person, it will be emotional.

The secret to hearing from God is simply to listen. God’s thoughts will be found within you, if you will just look for them. If you will just listen to what is flowing out of your heart as you seek him.

This quieting down takes practice. Meditating, praying, reading the scriptures, fasting, worshiping – these practices help us to quiet ourselves down and to hear the echoes of God within our own soul.

When Jesus arrived on this planet, the scriptures say there was nothing noteworthy about his appearance (see Isaiah 53).

God is secure in his greatness – he has no need to use parlor tricks to prove himself. That’s why he will speak in a gentle whisper. That’s why he walked this earth as a simple, ordinary man.

God does not shove his greatness down our throat. Instead, he fills the background of the universe with his greatness. If we choose to ignore it, we can easily do so. But if we will spend a very little effort searching for it, we find it everywhere.

Echoes are a little quieter than the sound they come from. We can only hear echoes if we stop making noise.

God’s greatness is echoing through our universe, our world, and within our own souls. I encourage you to occasionally take time to stop what you’re doing and listen.

The day will come when we no longer live in a land of echoes, but rather in the midst of the very greatness that reverberates everywhere.

But for now, we must look past the wind and the earthquake and the fire that would distract us, and listen for the whisper of the one who is greater than them all.

Under New Management

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new mangementWho owns the Kingdom of God?

Before you say ‘God’, followed by ‘that’s a dumb question’, let me include something Jesus says in Luke 12:32.

“Don’t be afraid, little flock. For it gives your Father great happiness to give you the kingdom.”

Uh-oh.

Wait, maybe ‘give’ in the greek means something totally different. Let’s check it out at blueletterbible.org.

 to give something to someone

a) of one’s own accord to give one something, to his advantage

1) to bestow a gift

b) to grant, give to one asking, let have

c) to supply, furnish, necessary things

d) to give over, deliver

Oops.

So here’s my question to you: have you been treating the Kingdom of God like you are an owner?

I was a business owner for a period of time. I worked late, I worked weekends, I spent a lot of my own personal money to run it. I gave it everything I had.

When I went back to working for a corporation, I never, ever worked late. You couldn’t have gotten me there on a weekend with a cattle prod.

I didn’t care if that company made or lost a billion dollars. I did my job, and I did it well enough to get raises and promotions, but I didn’t really care about it.

Jesus talks about this difference in John 10:12-13 as it pertains to shepherds:

“A hired hand will run when he sees a wolf coming. He will abandon the sheep because they don’t belong to him and he isn’t their shepherd. And so the wolf attacks them and scatters the flock. The hired hand runs away because he’s working only for the money and doesn’t really care about the sheep.”

So let me ask you you again: do you treat the Kingdom of Heaven like the co-owner you are? Or are you just treating it like a meal ticket?

Is it so much a part of your life that it’s a part of your identity, or is it just something you do?

Personally, I wouldn’t trust me with God’s shoe. But God has given me so much more.

The difference between an owner and an employee is that an owner bears ultimate responsibility. There’s no one to pass the buck onto. If, as an owner, you don’t do the work – it simply doesn’t get done.

The Kingdom of God is under new management – you.

When people encounter it, are they going to want to become a co-owner with you?

Who Are You Becoming?

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FINGERPRINTFacebook changed the layout on my profile the other day, and one of the things it does is make ‘notes’ you have written somewhat more prominent.

Because of this, I found several notes I had written back in 2009 and earlier.

They were about topics like evolution, the environment, abortion, etc.

Here’s the fun part about these notes that I wrote: As I was reading them, I mostly disagreed with them.

That excites me so much.

Why? Because that means I am growing. I am changing. I’m not the same person I was 4, 5 , 6 years ago.

That’s a good thing, because I wasn’t perfect 4, 5 or 6 years ago. I had areas of my life that needed to change, and needed to grow.

I hope that 5 years from now, as I’m reading my tumblr/wordpress archive, I find some posts that I think are silly, just like I now think my facebook notes are silly.

Growth and change are so important to me because I know I’m not just like Jesus yet. In fact, I have a ways to go in order to get to that point. To be honest, I’ll probably never actually reach that goal. But I can grow closer than where I’m at now.

I find that my hard edge of theological rigor has been supplanted by humility and love.

I’m spending less time trying to be superior, and more time trying to be relatable.

I’ve learned that you can’t argue people into the kingdom of God, but you can love them into it.

Yesterday, I read this in Romans 2:4 (MSG) – “God is kind, but he’s not soft. In kindness, he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change.”

I look back at my life and I see that I’m not the same that I was. I realize that I am becoming something other than I was. And that speaks to God in my life.

Because people rarely change, but when they do, it’s almost never on their own.

If I’m different, I believe it’s because I have invited God to be a part of my life. And he loves me enough to not leave me the same as he found me.

Please forgive me for all my imperfections, and in the areas where I am getting it wrong. Because the most important thing about me is is this:

I am becoming more like Jesus.

As you open your life to him, I know you are too.

How to Receive God’s Guidance For Your Life

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S12_Blueprints I was reading the Bible today, and I found this: “One day as they (several prophets and teachers in a prominent church) were worshiping God – they were also fasting as they waited for guidance – the Holy Spirit spoke…”(Acts 13:2)

These first century believers – among them somebody who has to be considered if we ever build a Mt. Rushmore of church fathers, Paul – have no idea what to do next.

So they’re waiting, and seeking God’s guidance. How? By worshiping and praying.

It doesn’t say that were freaking out. Doesn’t say that they were starting dozens of new initiatives simultaneously to find the right one. It also doesn’t say that they sat around and waited for opportunity to knock.

These people clearly want to know what God’s plan is. Rather than going off in a random direction, they waited until they knew it so they could cooperate with God’s plan.

Imagine a builder who doesn’t get the blueprints from their architectural firm by the time they are ready to start construction. Does this builder just say, ‘oh well’, and start building whatever comes to mind? I hope not. I hope they would wait, and seek out those blueprints.

I hope they would realize that building without a plan is not only foolish, it’s dangerous. And when the blueprints arrive, the first thing they would have to do is tear down the mess they started.

Paul and the other believers realize that God has a blueprint. For their lives, for their church, for the world. And rather than just starting to build as fast as they can so that people see ‘results!’, they take the time to seek out what the blueprints say.

I don’t know why God sometimes withholds these plans from us. I do know it drives us nuts. At least it does that for me.

But this does teach me patience. It teaches me dependance. It teaches me faith.

It reminds me of the value of the Planner.

So the way to receive God’s guidance for your life is to seek them, and don’t start building until you have them. Again, this isn’t a license for laziness. Remember the story about the master who goes on a trip and expects his servants to be productive while he’s gone?

While we’re waiting for the plans, we should be productive. Meeting with other believers, having devoted prayer time, fasting – these are all efforts. I guarantee you they were also reading the scriptures and being a part of the local community of believers.

You can plant shrubs and mow the grass while waiting for the plans to build.

Don’t let your life become a vacant lot, or overgrown mess while you wait. Just don’t start major renovations without a plan.

How to Have Peace in Frustrating Circumstances

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calmIn the past couple of years, I was in a situation where I felt that God was telling me about a coming transition, but I could never find signs of that transition being imminent.

Most of my despair and frustration came from the fact that I didn’t know if I had really heard from God, so I was almost always wrestling with despair.

In situations like these, I think about the story in Matthew 8 where Jesus and the disciples are in a boat when a huge squall comes up. The disciples start to freak out, but Jesus remains asleep.

Keep in mind, several of these guys are professional fishermen. They have seen storms before. If they think they’re going to die from this storm, chances are good that they knew what they were talking about.

So in this panic, they wake Jesus up. He calms the storm, then he says something that was troubling to me: “Why are you afraid? You have so little faith!” (Matthew 8:26)

Seriously, Jesus?

We’re seriously supposed to find ourselves in the midst of deadly storms, look over to see you asleep and say ‘No worries!’?

But I found something interesting in what I was reading today.

In Acts 12, Peter has been arrested. He’s kept in jail for several days, guarded by 16 guards. The church is praying for Peter, but the day of his execution has arrived.

To be extra sure that Peter isn’t going anywhere, he has been chained directly to TWO guards!

And what is Peter doing, hours before his scheduled murder, in prison, chained to the guards?

“Peter slept like a baby.” (Acts 12:6)

Wow.

Well, maybe Peter knew God would free him, and that’s where his faith came from. Except that after an angel appears and busts him out of prison, Peter says this:

“I can’t believe it – this really happened!” (Acts 12:11) Peter wasn’t expecting to be freed. He figured the worst would happen, but he was willing to accept God’s plan.

I am reminded of a story that’s not in the bible, so take it with a grain of salt. A man named Smith Wigglesworth – a great evangelist – once woke up in the middle of the night to find satan himself standing at the foot of his bed. Wigglesworth said ‘Oh. It’s just you.’, then he rolled over and went back to sleep.

Faith isn’t about believing the best will happen until it finally does. Faith is about fully accepting that what will happen is according to God’s plan. We can certainly ask God to do things – the church was fervently praying for Peter’s release. But when Jesus prayed to avoid the cross, he accepted that then answer was ‘no’.

If God tells you something is going to happen, trust in it. Jesus wasn’t worried in the boat because he knew God’s plan. Nothing would derail it.

Peter isn’t worried because even though he doesn’t know God’s exact plan, he knows that nothing will derail it.

God is in control. That’s why we can sleep in the storm. That’s why we can sleep like a baby when our execution is scheduled the next day. That’s why we don’t need to worry about the health of our children, or about where our next job will be.

I know it’s easier said than done, but there is hope. Peter went from freaking out in the storm to being at peace in the darkest of circumstances.

Let us continue to grow in our faith until we can rest easy when everyone else is freaking out. I can’t think of many more powerful ways to point to God in our lives than that.

A Christian View of Tragedy

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BostonToday, America again experienced an attack of mass violence.

The detonations near the finish line of the Boston Marathon killed 3 people, maimed many more, and injured more than a hundred.

One of the two victims, it has been confirmed, was 8 years old. My oldest daughter is 8 years old, so this information was particularly impacting to me. I’m not sure how it would feel to lose any of my kids, and I certainly hope I never have to find out.

This comes after the terrible events late late year in Newtown, Connecticut where 26 children and adults lost their lives in another mass attack.

In the recent past, we have seen attacks in movie theaters, malls, schools and colleges.

I am of the opinion that these types of events, for the foreseeable future, will continue. (Until the depression, mental illness, anger, frustration, etc that cause these events has been dealt with, I don’t assume peoples’ actions will suddenly go in a different direction.)

Columbine, a decade ago shocked us to our core. If that event happened again today, we would shake our head and lament it as the latest event in a series of others. The 13 deaths in that event (Or 15, if you include the shooters who took their own lives) may be viewed as thankfully lower than Virginia Tech, Newtown or Norway.

How are the believers in an all-powerful and all-loving God supposed to view these events?

Are they part of God’s mysterious plan?

That would leave us in the place where we must bury our questions and our feelings of deep sadness – for to do otherwise would be to doubt God. I reject that stance completely.

I think God is just as saddened as we are by these events. I mentioned the pain I would feel if my daughter was killed.

Well, each person is a son or a daughter to God. Their loss is great to him. And also painful is the fact that one of his children committed the terrible act.

Jesus, after all, wept at the grave of his dear friend Lazarus – and he knew that he was about to resurrect Lazarus!

Jesus understands the pain of personal loss. The idea of a need to be stoic – that is, essentially emotionless – in the face of such event is foreign to the Jesus I see in the scriptures.

In fact, Jesus specifically addressed two events of mass violence and tragedy that were on the mind of people who were listening to his message.

In Luke 13, Jesus is informed that Pilate (the same one who would eventually sentence Jesus to death) had just executed some people as they were offering sacrifices at God’s temple.

You can be sure that this news hit the ears of those in Israel as hard as the news of Newtown hit mine and yours.

In response, Jesus reminds his followers of another recent tragedy, where a building fell on and killed 18 people.

And Jesus tells them this: That these people were no better or worse than anybody else.

They didn’t die because they were bad or evil. They died because Pilate was cruel. Or they died because a building was poorly constructed.

Jesus doesn’t go into a long explanation about mankind having free-will, and therefore at fault. He doesn’t  start talking about how God works in mysterious ways, or that it was ‘just these people’s time’.

He says “Unless you turn to God, you, too will die.” (Luke 13:1-5 The Message)

In other words, the only thing you can control is whether or not you are ready to stand before God.

Jesus says as plain as day that we will have to deal with tragedy and pain in this world. (John 16:33) There is no way around it. Following Jesus isn’t insurance against pain.

But here is what he guarantees: That he’ll never leave us. He’ll never forsake us. (Hebrews 13:5) He also guarantees that he’ll make something beautiful out of the mess (Romans 8:28)

C.S. Lewis said that God “whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains.”

You don’t need to believe that God causes pain, but I encourage you to believe him when he says that his kindgom is overtaking us, and that he brings with himself the healing and peace that we all long for.

I don’t know when or where the next act of mass violence will occur in our nation. And I can’t tell you that it’s part of God’s plan.

But I can tell you that it won’t derail God’s plan.

And I can tell you that he invites all of us to be a part of his plan to restore this world.

In the second to last chapter of the Bible, God says he is making all things new.

We’re not there yet, but I assure you that God fulfills his promises.

Why Easter?

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tombWhen Jesus made the greatest sacrifice – willingly dying to accept the penalty for the sins, one of the last things he said was ‘it is finished.’

In other words, what he wanted to accomplish on the cross was done. For all time. No further sacrifice for sin would ever need to be made. When you or I screw up, Jesus doesn’t have to get back up on the cross to take care of it.

So why Easter?

Why raise from the dead?

Sin has been paid for.

Because Jesus didn’t just come to forgive our sin. He came to give us a new life. He came so that once sin was no longer anchoring us, we would then be able to unfurl our sails and start a journey, an adventure of living.

If Jesus was still laying in his tomb today, it means our sins would be paid for, but that there would be no power available for us to take advantage of that.

In John 10:10, Jesus says that he came not only so that they work of the enemy would be broken in our lives, but that we may have a more abundant life.

God doesn’t want you to solemnly sit around and acknowledge that he died for our sins. He wants us to understand that, then start to LIVE.

We’re not sitting around waiting to get to heaven. God has placed heaven inside of us. And it’s the job of believers in Jesus to give it away!

We don’t just serve a God of forgiveness and mercy.

We serve a God of rebirth and resurrection and renewal.

What was broken isn’t just fixed, it’s been completely overhauled and restored to it’s originally intended glory.

As you celebrate Easter with your family, know that God is for you, God is with you, and God won’t let anything stand in the way of you connecting with him. Not even death.

Whispers in the Deep

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lava_tube_cave_lava_beds_national_monument-normalI love how Anne Lamott describes God in Help, Thanks, Wow: Way beyond us and deep inside us.

God is a being far beyond our comprehension. I mean, seriously, how am I supposed to understand a being for whom time and place are not limitations? Whose existence fills both without effort? The God who describes the whole of planet earth as a footstool (Isaiah 61)?

Yet this same God says the place he most wants to dwell is not within grand structures of stone, marble and gold. He says he wants to live within us. Humanity. His creation. (1 Corinthinans 6:19-20)

But instead of some process where God ends up destroying us by his overriding presence, he desires to live alongside us. To be a wellspring of life that does not diminish us, but rather increases us. To give us fuller life – a life “more abundant” is how Jesus describes it. (John 10:10)

I love that God is willing to be a ‘whisper’ within me. So that I have to seek it out. To quiet myself to hear it.

God, who could make it impossible for me to ignore him, makes it easy and effortless to disregard him.  The most valuable things in life are available in an unlimited supply (love, hope, faith, joy, etc), but they are not gained without pursuit.

I love that God is the same. His presence is in infinite abundance, but it is in no way common. Taking it for granted will ensure that we are never able to find it.

Walls

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800px-Concrete_wallWalls are built for a purpose.

That purpose is either to a. keep something in or b. to keep something out.

An example of keeping something in would be the Berlin Wall. It was erected to prevent people in Eastern Berlin from emigrating out. The leadership there had created an oppressive government and had to resort to building a wall (along with mines and guard towers) to keep the citizens from leaving.

An example of a wall being built to keep something out would be the Great Wall of China. Built (originally) by a Chinese emperor circa 200 BC, it was rebuilt by the Ming Dynasty largely for the purpose of keeping Mongols out of China.

We (humanity) naturally want to build walls. We like to carve out our own place and protect it.

Those of us who have chosen to become members of the Body of Christ must resist this temptation.

We have often succumbed to the temptation to keep ourselves safe from the elements of the world that are less than savory. Elements that we can’t imagine could ever be sanctified. More specifically, to keep out the “wrong kind” of people.

And in doing so, the walls we built to keep ourselves safe and sanctified have become the walls of our own tombs.

Walls, as I have pointed out, are designed to keep people in and/or keep people out. The church should be in the habit of neither of these efforts.

Show me where Jesus built walls around his ministry. He had infinite grace to be among these “disreputable sinners” and “scum” (Mark 2:15-16 NLT). The only people who found themselves on the outside looking in were the very people who had built walls in the name of God: the religious leaders. The people who filled God’s temple with con artists.

Even then, Jesus did not lock them out. They repeatedly came to him, and had access. It was their own choice to ostracize Jesus. To build walls attempting to keep him out.

You should note something in common with the famous examples of walls I listed at the beginning of this article: they both failed. The Berlin Wall fell. The Great Wall failed multiple times at preventing invasion.

Our churches must not become stale and stagnant like water in a bottle. They must remain free and alive like a river.

By accepting everyone and empowering members to go out into the community, we build ties with the community. We become integrated, and we have the opportunity to make an impact. Just like a guy I read about: wait…what was his name? Oh, right. “Jesus”.

Our purpose is not to carve out a safe, secure, comfortable area in this world. It’s to expand the borders of God’s kingdom. A kingdom of grace, peace, acceptance, justice, forgiveness and healing.

Look at Revelation 21:25 – at the end of this age, when the New Jerusalem comes upon the earth, it’s gates never close.

If ‘keeping people out’ isn’t a priority in God’s eternal kingdom, is that something we should practice in our churches here and now?

I, for one, don’t think so.