Encouragement

I Will Miss You, Tony

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Tony Campolo passed away last week, and though I’m a bit late, I want to acknowledge his powerful contribution to Christian thought around the world and to my own life personally.

I never had the chance to meet him or hear him speak in person, but decades ago, his books and recordings challenged and inspired me. If you’ve never heard It’s Friday But Sunday’s Coming (the whole thing is sermon is powerful, but the story I’m referring to begins at 50:20) or The Kingdom of God Is a Party, don’t wait any longer. Any of his books are a great treat as well.

As you’ll see, Tony Campolo was among the most humorous speakers ever. Inside that humor was a constant challenge to be mindful of the poor and to realize that our calling as followers of Jesus is to lay down our lives for the needs of others. Many evangelicals didn’t like him, calling him a “liberal” as a way to dismiss his message. Indeed, I didn’t agree with everything he taught, but that’s true of most people. I have no problem enjoying the chicken and spitting out the bones. He coined the term, Red Letter Christians, to help Jesus followers take seriously the words of Jesus in the Gospels about visiting the sick, feeding the hungry, and reaching out to those in prison.

Since we’ve been talking about the focus of justice and righteousness on The God Journey before we had to take a hiatus, I’m freshly aware of the link between the Kingdom of God with God’s kind of redemptive justice for the broken, the marginalized, and the wounded and how skewed our preoccupation with personal holiness rather than the injustice in a fallen world.

I know no better illustration of that than how Tony Campolo addressed many chapels at Christian universities. He would often begin his talk with a statistic about how many children died the night before from malnutrition and related diseases around the world, numbering in the thousands.  Letting it sink in, he would then add, “And most of you don’t give a sh*t.”

Of course, the room would be scandalized at such a coarse word in their imagined holy place.

When the room settled, he would point to the heart of the problem. “What’s worse is that you’re more upset with the fact that I said ‘sh*t’ than the fact that thousands of kids died last night.”

He wasn’t always invited back. In my more legalistic days, I would have been more concerned about his use of a bad word than I would have been about a hunger problem that seems too large for me to fix. That wouldn’t be true today. Justice is holding a bigger heart for the poor and deprived. Policing the word ‘sh*t’ is just a misplaced, legalistic preoccupation with righteousness.

Of course, we can care about injustice at the same time we watch our mouths, but Tony was making a point here.  I hope you don’t miss the larger issue as well. People concerned with their piety are often disengaged from how their lives impact others. That’s why they can profess Jesus while viciously fighting a culture war with a moral superiority that leaves no room to love their “enemies.”  It’s why some can think of themselves as holy; they don’t use “bad words,” but they still gossip about others to destroy relationships.

That’s why I’ve come to see, “Seek first the kingdom of God and his justice…” (Matthew 6:33) as a better translation than the word righteousness. We can seek righteousness and not always get to justice, but you can’t seek relational justice and not become more godly. Treating others the way we would want them to treat us is where the kingdom of God advances in the world. Of course, they are not unrelated, but one fixates on our good, and the other focuses on the fulfillment of God’s heart by being a beacon of his compassion in a broken world.

Tony, we will miss you here, and yet the joy I’m sure you’re finding there is beyond compare. Rest in peace, my friend. You served him well in this world.

______________________

As for a personal update, my back continues to heal from fusion surgery, and though I still have to be careful while it heals, I’m almost pain-free there. I’ve been on a lower dose of chemo the last two weeks, so I have some really good days of late, but next week, they are going to be ramping up the dosage, and I’m not sure how I’ll be doing then.

Sara joins me on today’s episode of The God Journey podcast to share how our current challenge has also affected her journey. It’s called Expectations, Disappointment, and Hope.

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Featured Book: He Loves Me

1 Comment / Encouragement, Living Loved /

As we approach the end of the calendar year we thought it would be good to highlight a few of Wayne’s books available here through Lifestream, and we’re offering a couple ways to save a little bit, too. Over the next few weeks we’ll highlight a couple books per week, and offer bulk discounts on each of those, and a coupon for a 25% discount on any order over $75.

Today we’re featuring He Loves Me! Learning to live in the Father’s affection. Originally published almost 25 years ago, this book has drawn so many around the world into a deeper, more full understanding of the Father’s affection for them. For the next week, this book will be 25% off, or you can order in bulk, and save even more (Box of 10, or Box of 20). In addition, through the end of the year, use the coupon code 25off75 when you checkout to save 25% off any order over $75. Merry Christmas early from Lifestream!

Ordering Options:

Other purchasing options such as Amazon, Kindle, Apple Books (all without special pricing), are available on any of those linked pages above. And if you’d like to order more than the Box of 20 option, email us your order and we’ll get you a custom price.

He loves me!He Loves Me by Wayne Jacobsen
He loves me not!

Do you find yourself picking through circumstances like children plucking daisy petals attempting to figure out whether or not God loves you? If you find yourself least certain of his love in those critical moments when you most need to trust him, there is hope for you.

Where? At the one event in human history that forever secured your place in the Father’s heart-the cross where Jesus allowed sin and shame to be consumed in his own body so that you could freely embrace a relationship with his Father. There you will discover that what he always wanted was not the fearful subservience of slaves, but the loving affection of sons and daughters.

If your spiritual life feels more like performance than freedom, like an empty ritual rather than a joyful journey, let Wayne help you discover:

  • A Father who loves you more than anyone on this planet ever has or ever will.
  • A growing confidence in his affection for you through whatever circumstances you face.
  • A vibrant relationship with him that will free you from the torment of shame while it transforms you to live as his child in the earth.

Last week we asked for you to share something Wayne has written or said that has been particularly meaningful to you, and we’d post here. Today’s thoughts come from Katelyn, who wrote:

Thanks for this email! I wanted to share what has most helped me from Wayne’s book, He Loves Me. So far I have read parts of He Loves Me, parts of Finding Church and all of So You Don’t Want to go to Church Anymore? I am also listening to the podcast more regularly and just received the 365 reflections book you all promoted last week… but this is the quote that stands out the most to me:

“There is no one God does not love with all that He is. His love reaches beyond every sin and failure, hoping that at some moment every person will come to know just how loved he or she is. There is nothing more important for you to know.”

The reason why it stands out the most is that I just feel like it underlines the truth that “apart from love, you can do nothing.” And not in a “duty” type of way but really, I just want to live in His love and flow from that place with the rest of my life and that is becoming the desire of my heart. Therefore I’m really grateful for Wayne and his stuff and the way God’s using it to transform me 🤍

If you have something you’d like to share, please reply to this email, or email me directly at webmaster@lifestream.org.

This post was written by Greg Campbell for Wayne Jacobsen and Lifestream.

Hi, I’m Greg Campbell. Wayne often calls me “[his] Web Guy” probably because I have been helping him with all his “web things” for about 20 years now. While Wayne is recuperating from his recent surgery and taking chemo, we thought it might be a good use of this space to remind people of some of the amazing resources Wayne has made available through Lifestream. Would you like to help? Perhaps something Wayne has written or said has been particularly meaningful in your own life. Would you be willing to share it as a way to encourage others who might be in a similar place in their journey. Perhaps there is a blog series, book, podcast, or audio recording (e.g. Transitions or Engage) that Jesus used to help you on your journey. Here’s the request: Would you mind writing a paragraph or two about it? We’ll make it available here on the Lifestream website. Thanks!

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An Angel at My Door

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If you haven’t heard the podcast from last week or read this blog, you may not appreciate all that’s happening here. I’m currently battling bone cancer that destroyed vertebrae in my back, causing me to have surgery there.

But yesterday, I think I caught an angel on my Ring camera.

I had been battling nausea for three days, so I could barely eat or drink enough to maintain momentum. I was physically weak and tired of the fight. Sara reminded me that we take one day at a time.

Soon, I settled in my chair, and Sara took the dogs out for a walk. A few moments later, my phone told me someone was at the front door.  I turned to look, but no one was there. I hadn’t heard anyone out there. So, I checked the feed from our Ring camera, and sure enough, a woman came around the corner from our driveway and dropped a small package at the front door.  It was not someone I recognized because the light was so intense behind her that her facial features washed out.

As she walked away, she paused at the end of our porch, raised both hands to her lips, and blew a kiss back at our house. Then she extended her hands as if praying for Sara and me. I was undone the first time I saw it; it was such an act of tenderness and love. God’s Spirit washed over me, and I felt her extended arms, conveying her prayer and the prayers of many people I know who are holding space before God for us.  It felt like an angel had come to my door.

When Sara got home, she recovered the package from the front door, and it was a small gift from a woman we have been sharing a journey with over the past few years. She’s become a very close friend and cares for us deeply. Did the fact that she was someone we knew change my view that an angel was outside my door? It didn’t. Sometimes, angels are the closest people to us, and God works through them similarly. And I know what I felt when she was there.  It was all the richer knowing it was someone who loved us.

Call it a coincidence if you want, but later that day, we met with our oncologist, and things changed dramatically. He made adjustments to my medications due to my symptoms, and I came home from that appointment a changed man. I’ve not had nausea since and have even looked forward to meals. It’s quite a change.  I’ve felt stronger and could even do a 6/10 mile walk this morning.

And then there was this: the doctor told us that the marker in my blood they are using to track the power of the cancer has decreased 97.5% in the four weeks I’ve had treatment. He said that drop is highly unusual and indicates they may get this in remission sooner than they hoped. Another great piece of news, though we have no idea yet what twists and turns lie ahead.  We are assured, however, that we are not alone on this journey and that he is faithful.

The last twenty-four hours are the best I’ve had in weeks, and we are so grateful.

And the lady doing a simple act of love toward us had no idea at the time how powerfully God was using it.  Remember, a simple cup of cold water in his name can yield incredible fruit. Don’t despise the small acts of caring or minor expressions of love; the impact is often more significant than we understood then.

Maybe Jesus has someone on your heart to love today by simply expressing your love and caring for them.

 

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The Prayers of a Just Person

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Most of you will be familiar with James 5:16, “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”

What springs to mind when you think of this Scripture? Doesn’t it seem that our sinlessness is a pre-condition to having an effective prayer life? But that doesn’t make any sense if the process of transforming us is a lifetime adventure.

What if it said instead, “The prayer of a just person is powerful and effective.” If so, it is no longer about how good I’ve been but whether or not my heart is united with God’s purpose to restore justice on the earth. In other words, am I just praying for myself, or are my prayers inclusive of the needs of others? Am I praying for my benefit at someone else’s expense or in an attempt to co-opt their will?

If you’re following this blog or the series of podcasts titled This Changes Everything at the God Journey, you know I’ve been drawing down a rabbit hole of biblical proportions. A newfound friend from South Africa, Tobie van der Westhuizen, sent me some of his research on how the word ‘righteousness’ does not appear in Scripture. Oh, it’s in our English translation, but he argues it’s a mistranslation. The Greek word is ‘justice’ or ‘justness.’ By focusing that word on personal piety, devotion, and discipline instead, we gutted the gospel of its purpose. God didn’t want to just declare us “righteous” in Christ but to populate the world with a company of just men and women who have been converted from the narcissism of self to the joy of others-focused loving.

Sara and I have been taking this thought for a test drive in our Bible reading together. What a difference it makes if he is right, and I am quickly becoming settled that he is. This verse from James has begun to reshape my prayer life with a different tone as I think more about his justice and purpose. Why would our prayers be more effective there? Because they wouldn’t be tainted by your personal comfort or privilege but looking out for others as well. That’s where you’ll sense his heart better and engage him inside his larger purpose for all humanity.

That’s what God’s love does when it takes residence in our hearts. By filling us with the life of God, we don’t have to draw life from other people or manipulate circumstances for our survival, but to embrace kindness, fairness, justness, and generosity. Could that be what it means when Jesus wanted to justify us? He didn’t just want to declare us righteous; he wanted to transform us and make us the kind of men and women who can influence the world through the power of love. And that’s the only way this works—we experience love, then live out of that love to others. This is where the fullness of life in Christ exists in the flow of his love to us and through us.

This Saturday, we are hosting a God Journey After-Show with Tobie so others can ask questions about this. It will stream live on The God Journey Facebook page at 11:00 am Pacific Daylight Time and be available afterward for those who want to hear it. If you’d like to participate in the Zoom room conversation, please email Wayne in advance to get the link. The room is getting pretty full, so I’m sure not everyone will get their questions in, but we can use it as a beginning.

Finally, we are nearing our goal of completing work on rescuing the orphanage we built fifteen years ago from torrential rains. In the photo at left, a government inspector checks the repairs already made and is pleased with the progress.

Thanks to all who have generously contributed to this project. We still need a few thousand more if this is on your heart. If you can help us, please see our Donation Page at Lifestream. As always, every dollar you send goes directly to Kenya. We do not take out any administration or transfer fees for Lifestream. Just designate “Kenya” in the options or email us and let us know your gift is for Kenya. You can also Venmo contributions to “@LifestreamMinistries” or mail a check to Lifestream Ministries • 1560 Newbury Rd Ste 1  •  Newbury Park, CA 91320. Or, if you prefer, we can take your donation over the phone at (805) 498-7774.

Let’s see if we can find the full amount they need.  Thank you for your consideration.

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Seeing the End from the Beginning

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Many of you wrote me about the videos I shared of Sara’s new garden. It is a joy to live in the middle of this.

But there’s another story here. Sara saw this garden before we ever moved into his house and if you saw what the yard looked like when we bought the place, you wouldn’t believe it. So, I thought I’d show you in seven different before and after pictures that my grandson made into a video this weekend.

 

As various craftsmen were out doing things in the backyard from replacing the old drain pipes that were filled with palm roots to putting in lights, they would ask Sara about positioning things. It was amazing to watch her as she had already mapped out the garden in her mind. “Let’s see, that tree is there, the rose bush is here and here, so put the light there,” she would say pointing to an exact spot on a barren piece of land.

When I see this video, I think of what Father sees in us even before he begins his work. He doesn’t even see the barren places because he is already visualizing how he is going to fill them with beauty. Isaiah 46:10 says it so wonderfully, “(He declares) the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, ‘My plan will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure . . . ” 

Even better, as Sara was doing it with her garden, God was doing it with changing the barren places of her recently-discovered trauma into a garden of great beauty.  He, like Sara, makes all things new.

What does he see in you that you cannot yet see?

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May You Bloom and Grow Forever

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I never expected to be undone in the middle of a theatrical production of The Sound of Music, but I was. I tell this story in today’s podcast, Unmanipulatable, but I wanted to share it here as well for those who might miss it there. 

Last Saturday, Sara and I went to see this musical because it is one of Sara’s favorite stories, and she adores the music. I went because we’re exploring things that bring Sara joy. Three years into our marriage we bought our first video cassette recorder and the first movie we bought was Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music. For the next few weeks, I’d arrive home just as the nun was singing Climb Every Mountain. So, that became a bit of a joke in our home, as I would mockingly belt it out with her. 

But when it came up in the play, it took me back to those first years Sara and I lived alone as a young couple in love. It made me smile as I watched her enjoy the play. But then, later in the play, Captain Von Trapp sang Edelweiss, which I’ve mistakenly seen as one of the schmaltzier tunes in the show. A few lines in, I was overcome with emotion as tears pooled in my eyes. What just happened? It was the line, “May you bloom and grow, bloom and grow forever.” My body had recognized it before my mind had registered it. I wasn’t thinking about a small white flower in the Alps but my wife sitting beside me. 

If you have followed our story, you know the last fifteen years have been quite an adventure for her as she wrestled with a deep pain she didn’t understand, and battled with it for her very life, and finally in the last two years discovered in long-forgotten memories a series of horrific events in her childhood that had traumatized her severely. I am so proud of the way she has embraced her story, even the darkest parts, has leaned into Jesus to find healing from the pain, and is learning to renew her mind with new neural pathways based on who she is, not on how trauma defined her. 

As remarkable a story as this is, it has, at times, been an incredibly painful journey for Sara. Last month brought a particularly excruciating memory that hit Sara hard. Dealing with it has been exhausting, and it’s made us wonder how many more may come in years ahead. She was just finding her pace beyond it last week when we went to the play. Watching her enjoy it was particularly meaningful. That’s why my mind was on her when the lyric was sung. Sara will bloom and grow forever. No matter how long this takes her, no matter what dark bridges we have yet to cross, the day will come when the trajectory will shift from working through the pain of the past to embracing his ever-unfolding glory uninterrupted in the present. Yes, that is already happening as we experience the first-fruits of Sara’s growing freedom, but someday, further in this life or perhaps in the next, the pain will all be gone and she can bloom and grow forever in God’s garden. The thought still causes my heart to exult today, and gives me a slightly different view of what eternity might mean for her. 

You also know my wife loves gardens, and they’ve been an important part of our story. Today, we will be shooting a video to share with you her current creation, which surrounds our new home. She says this is her favorite garden. I sat in it last week with a good friend, and as we talked numerous butterflies and birds flitted about the flowers. Finally, he remarked, “This seems like a fairy-tale garden in a Disney cartoon.”  And it does!  That’s a shot of the front of it above, but there is so much more. Thinking of her blooming for eternity is a joy all its own. I know Jesus already sees her as the beautiful flower he made her to be, but she will get to become more aware of it.

And not just her, me too! And not just us, but you, too. No matter what pain and struggle you’re working out in your life, the day will come, perhaps sooner than any of us think, when sorrow will yield to celebration, pain will be absorbed in healing, and death will give way to life. From there, we will all get to bloom and grow forever in the presence of Jesus, where each one of us will get to be all that Jesus created it to be before the fallenness of the world disfigured us. 

That’s redemption! As I watched the end of the play, I Corinthians 15:42-44 (Message), kept creeping into my mind: 

“This image of planting a dead seed and raising a live plant is a mere sketch at best, but perhaps it will help in approaching the mystery of the resurrection body—but only if you keep in mind that when we’re raised, we’re raised for good, alive forever! The corpse that’s planted is no beauty, but when it’s raised, it’s glorious. Put in the ground weak, it comes up powerful. The seed sown is natural; the seed grown is supernatural—same seed, same body, but what a difference from when it goes down in physical mortality to when it is raised up in spiritual immortality! 

So, my prayer for you today, is that you will rest confident in knowing that the work of Jesus in you now means that you too will get to bloom and grow forever. Your Father already sees you as a treasured delight in his garden but when the struggle is over you will see it, too, and revel in it and him forever.

Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly!

 

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Is There Any Vengeance in God?

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Proposal:  There is no vengeance in God’s agony for the sin of the world. 

I’m putting that out there, hoping to start a conversation with many of you.

I grew up believing God was incredibly vengeful. The Old Testament writers convinced me. Their writings were full of God-is-going-to-get-you passages against Israel’s enemies, and even against Israel itself when they fell to worshipping idols or disobeying his commands. They saw every calamity as an intentional act of God, and he was angry a lot. Passages like those used to terrify me as a young boy growing up and I was extra careful to make sure I was one of the good guys, trying to follow God as best I could. But that doesn’t mean I was free of sin, or didn’t go wayward at times, following my own path. I used to be so afraid of what he might do to me because of my failures.

But, as I wrote in last week’s chapter of It’s Time, Jesus talks about his Father quite differently. “For God so loved the world…,” and “He is kind and gracious to the wicked and the ungrateful.” Jesus came to win people into his Father’s love, not scare them half to death. He painted the picture of a tender Father, seeking reconciliation with his wayward children.

How do we account for this drastic difference? What if the Old Testament writers were interpreting God’s anguish for the world through their pre-cross lens of shame and fear? The writers felt God’s agony for the  people he loved when they were seduced into sin and deceit. What if he’s not angry at all, just in pain for the suffering of his beloved?

I know we can prooftext our way to vengeance easily. We can also prooftext our way to love and generosity. But I want to know who God really is and so I’m rethinking in this arena with the God I know. That’s always my prayer, I want to know him as he really is, not how I want him to be or how religion has interpreted him to be. It is not lost on me that those most knowledgeable about the Old Testament couldn’t recognize Jesus as God’s son when he was in the same room with them. They completely misunderstood God and couldn’t understand the forgiveness and generosity with Jesus toward “sinners.”

Why am I exploring this? For the last thirty years as I’ve been growing in the wonder of living loved, instead of trying to earn his love, I’ve noticed a shift in my thinking about who he is. And, eighteen months ago I felt God’s invitation to spend some time inside his agony and lament for the world, as he had been with me in the days when Sara was gone. One day, as I was seeking some answers for how we might pray against the delusion and anger that is in the world, he seemed to say that the answers I sought were inside his grief for the suffering of the world.  Then, almost as an aside, came this hint:  “There is no vengeance in my agony.” I’ll be honest, the thought surprised me. I hadn’t realized before how much I thought his anguish was anger.

So over the past eighteen months I have looked for vengeance inside my Father’s agony. I haven’t found it. What’s more, I find less of it in my own heart. One person shared with me recently that someone was going to pay a severe price for the did wrong they did to me. My visceral response was, “Oh God, please no.” I didn’t want a drop of vengeance for them, only a pathway to freedom .

That got me to contemplate the Scripture, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” It is first recorded in Deuteronomy 32 and repeated by Paul in Romans 12, as an encouragement for us not to seek payback when we are wronged. Instead, Paul adds, feed your enemy if he is hungry or give him something to drink, if he is thirsty. Give back good instead of seeking revenge.

The instruction behind both of these passages is to make room for God’s wrath. Seemingly, he will get them in the end, so you don’t have to. I’ve banked a lot of pain into that account. When people have wronged me, especially in the “world,” I have been comforted by the fact that they will get theirs someday.  I’m not alone. The Psalmist often found solace there. So the reason I can be kind to those who hurt me is by trusting that God will hurt them worse. I have even prayed some of those prayers in days long past hoping God would vindicate me through retribution. I haven’t felt comfortable doing so for the past couple of decades.

God’s wrath, however, is not his unrequited anger doling out severe punishment to evil-doers, but his zeal to consume the destruction of sin to redeem the world. With that in mind, could this passage mean something different than God will get revenge on my enemies. Jesus doesn’t come vengeful? He doesn’t even punish those who lied about him to have him executed; he forgives them. Maybe, “Vengeance is mine” means that God takes the vengeance of humanity into himself. “I’ll take it; dish out your worst.”  Isn’t that what happens on the cross?  He takes to himself the sins of the whole world.

No wonder God didn’t answer those prayers from my old days.  Not once. I’ve never seen God take vengeance on people who have done me wrong. I’ve thought about Uriah in that context as well. The husband of Bathsheba, whom King David plunders one night while Uriah was off at war on David’s behalf. She gets pregnant, and when Uriah won’t sleep with her when David returns home to cover his transgression, he has Uriah killed. Ask Uriah just how vengeful God is when you see him someday.  Yes, the child of his rape dies, but David ends up marrying Bathsheba, who gives birth to the next king of Israel.

And what if “I will repay” does not mean, “I will hurt your enemies to the degree that they hurt you?”  What if it means, “I will repay you, for what evil others have done to you.” Now, that prayer is one I’ve seen answered many times. I have seen God pay me back for what others have stolen from me, and I am talking about more meaningful ways than money. And not having to navigate the fleshy desire for vengeance makes it much easier to sense how his Spirit might be asking me to respond in painful situations.

What’s more, can vengeance ever be redemptive? I see the parents of murdered children celebrate “justice”, whenever their child’s murderer is executed or sent to prison for life without the possibility of parole.  “We finally got justice,” they say. But did they? Did the punishment of the perpetrator restore their child?  Of course not. For justice, we need something far more powerful than revenge, and that is what we entrust to God. So, while I’m grateful when a murderer is convicted and off the street, I don’t think the family got justice. Their loss remains. Only God can restore what others have stolen, certainly not that child, but others to love and a life that is full even with the grief of their loss.

So, I’m wondering if our hope that a vengeful God will give worldly people what they deserve only feeds our own desire for vengeance, even if we don’t get to dispense it. Is that why we still can respond to the animosity of the world with a vitriol of our own? Where then do we find the secret of being “kind and grateful to the wicked and the ungrateful?”

This will obviously be a major shift in how I read Scripture. The miracle of the Old Testament is that they saw through their shame bias to discover a God that was slow to anger (if at all) and abounding in lovingkindness. There’s the miracle. They saw his true nature, even though their internal shame blamed God for every bad thing. I don’t know any other way where both Scripture and my engagement with God can live freely in the same space. When I contemplate this kind of shift, I like to run it past others to hear what they think. I am finding no vengeance in God’s agony and want to put that out for others to explore and comment on.  So, what do you think?  It would be great to have an open, honest, and generous conversation in the comments below.

Don’t just give your opinion without contemplating some of these thoughts. Then, let’s think through this together and see what we learn.

Is There Any Vengeance in God? Read More »

The Deepest Love in the Darkest Place

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It doesn’t matter how dark it is around you, how alone you feel, or how lost you think you are, God’s love is able to find you.  I have experienced the deepest expressions of his love in the darkest places I’ve ever endured.

In our worst moments, he is there, maybe not in ways we could recognize at the time, nor doing the things we’d prefer him to do. But there nonetheless to do a work far greater than the one we are looking for. I heard Fr. Gregory Boyle, of Homeboy Industries, say on a podcast recently, “If you don’t allow your troubles to shake our faith, they will shape it instead.” I can vouch for that.

In my younger days, difficulties always shook my faith. Since I was one of his, I thought God owed me a pain-free existence and immediate deliverance from all my affliction. Every trial or difficulty challenged our relationship. Either I was at fault for not doing enough, or he let down his side of the bargain. Difficulties led to weeks of personal frustration and struggle.

I now know we are all born into a broken world and were created to endure suffering with him. By finding him inside our pain, we would come to know him as he really is and find his life growing inside of us. In the darkest moment of Sara’s trauma, he was there. In my most excruciating season of loss, rejection, and disorientation, he was there. He wasn’t watching as a detached observer, he was with us inside of it and gave us the critical insight and courage to find our way through it. In doing so, he left us freer, wiser, and more tender.

Next week in Fort Mill, SC, Sara and I are going to be sharing some of our story and how God rescued us in the best of all possible ways from the worst situation we’ve ever been in. We’re calling it, The Deepest Love in the Darkest Place. Even at the moment we might feel most forsaken, as Jesus did on the cross, our Father is doing everything he can to find his way into our heart and open our eyes to his presence.

If we can stop blaming ourselves or God for causing them, our darkest moments become a portal into the wonder and beauty of God’s power and wisdom. Ask him to teach you. The next time you feel overwhelmed, turn to him and ask him to make himself known in the darkness.  Don’t look for him to fix the darkness first; he wants to engage you at your lowest place so that you will know how deeply loved you are and that he has to lead you into his kingdom of light even there.

For those following our transcontinental trip, we are now in Anniston, AL, for the next few days. Sunday we’ll been in Atlanta and then it is on to Charlotte, NC.  We’ve added some new stops along the way—Roanoke, VA, Charlottesville, VA, York, PA, and Lexington, KY, with a possible stop in Louisville, KY, after that. You can see all the stops we have planned here.

Zoey is now a week beyond her surgery for a torn ACL, and is doing very well, though she has a bit of cabin fever from being so contained. We do not have results on her biopsy yet. Mandy, the seven-month old retriever pup, is really missing getting to hang closely with Zoey, but she’s adapting too.

Sara joins me on the podcast for this Friday at The God Journey, as we talk about the Four Degrees of Love, in our walk with God and in our marriage to each other. It’s drawn from a devotional on The Love of God written by Bernard of Clairvaux back in the 1100s.  Thne, Kyle is back the week after!

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Can You Hear Your Name?

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Back in 2015, Anne, a friend of mine, sent me a poem about the Bride of Christ that had taken shape in her when reading Jeremiah. I shared it on an episode of The God Journey.

After listening to a recent podcast on prayers for the Bride and my first three chapters of my new book, It’s Time: Letters to the Bride of Christ at the End of the Age, she sent it to be again to see if I remembered. I hadn’t, but reading it again it really resonated with some of the things we’ve been seeing and sharing here.

When she sent it to me, this is what she wrote:  “How you talk about her just made me want to dance… she has been waking up and hearing her bridegroom and finding her first love again, throwing off the shackles. The days of the kings are over; they no long have sway over her.

“I have such a cry in my heart for the bride, for her to come out of the complacency we have been pressed into, I pray this adds to the sound of the call out. The world has changed beyond recognition in the last years since we talked and I feel so much that, like Esther,  the bride is called for such a time as this. He calling is wakening his bride because he is speaking to the world through her, and in these days, her voice is needed even more so.

In the meantime Hebrews 11:9-10 is my ongoing experience.  I live in a land of promise as a stranger, dwelling in these temporary residences with other heirs of the same promise (blind mostly to that promise), all the while looking for a city whose builder and maker is God. Those last words are a deep cry; I do feel so much a stranger, as if I speak a different language and struggle to connect with any of the words I hear elsewhere.  That is it was such a delight to hear your recording and your sense of God’s timing.

The bride!  Yes.  Its time!! I am so looking forward to hearing more of your words in this space and all that the Lord is leading you into.  Thanks you for speaking out now.

Here is her poem;

This is what the Lord says:
This, the Church,
She the bride, glorious without spot or wrinkle
Beautiful.
Born out of brokenness, out of grief,
bearing in her body the sufferings of her Beloved,
full of Joy and Hope and Glory

She has been quiet, unseen, her beauty hidden
behind steeples and bells
behind long winded words and hell fire with brimstone
behind false shepherds and false gospels
behind strange fire and witchcraft
behind well-intentioned but shackling care and control

It’s been a long time but NOW.
He is calling her forth;
He is saying her name.
You hear it, like a whisper on the wind.
It echoes in your dreams.
She is the this; She is what the Lord is saying.

In every moment he is sounding her name
until every rock and tree,
lamb and lion shake with the sound.
For this has been their groaning, for so long

And she is rising,
shaking off the dust and mothballs of her fear induced coma.
She is his Beloved and He is hers.
To her he makes known the unfathomable riches that are in Him.
Through her, he makes known the manifold wisdom of God
to all those who sought to keep her hidden, quiet and afraid.

Can you hear your name?
Beloved.
Hear. Your. Name.
For you are She.

Ann McGowan, 2015

_____________________

Note:  Sara and I have begun our journey east. We are parked in Wimberley, TX today, outside of Austin, preparing for the total eclipse.  This was supposed to be a cloudy day here, but the son just burned off the clouds and is shinning. Hopefully, it will stay that way until it overtakes the moon, about at 1:35 CDT.

And then we are heading to points east, so if you want to connect across the I-10 through Louisiana, Mississippi, or Alabama, let us know. From there we may curve through Atlanta on our way down to Jekyll Island and then head up through Columbia and Charlotte before heading into Virginia, either by way of Raleigh or Roanoke. That remains to be seen. Then we’ll be in Richmond, VA, Sykesville, MD, outside of Baltimore, before turning west toward home with some stops in Kentucky and Denver as well as points in between.

For us this trip is about encouraging the Bride, however we can, as well as enjoying the sights of this amazing country.

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A Life Lived in Love

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This weekend we’ll begin the fourth section of He Loves Me, where I wrote about what it means to live loved. It’s one thing to believe God loves me with our head, and another to grow in that love as the defining reality of our lives. Knowing we’re loved as a belief will only take us so far; it’s living in that love that opens up a lifelong adventure that will hold you through any storm, give you direction in every circumstance, and tenderizes your heart from the inside so you can love others without having to try.

How has it changed me? This is how I expressed it in Chapter 17 twenty-five years ago; I can assure you it has only grown wider and deeper from there:

As you grow increasingly certain that his love for you is not connected to your performance you will find yourself released from the horrible burden of doing something for him. You’ll realize that your greatest ideas and most passionate deeds will fall far short of what he really wants to do through you.

I used to be driven to do something great for God. I volunteered for numerous opportunities and worked hard in the hopes that some book I was writing, some church I was planting, or some organization I was helping would accomplish great things for God. While I think God used my misguided zeal in spite of myself, nothing I did ever rose to the level of my expectations. Instead they seemed to distract me from God, consume my life, and leave me stressed out or worn out from the pursuit.

I’m not driven anymore. I haven’t tried to do anything great for God in more than a decade, and yet I have seen him use my life in ways that always exceed my expectations. What changed? I did, by his grace.

My desire to do something great for God served me far more than it ever did him. It kept me too busy to enjoy him and distracted me from the real ministry opportunities he brought across my path every day.

I used to start my day laying out my plans before God and seeking his blessing on them. How silly! Why would I even want God to be the servant of my agenda? God’s plans for my day far exceed mine. I can almost hear him now as I awaken, “Wayne, I’m going to touch some people today. Do you want to come along?”

It’s amazing how gentle that is; but all the more powerful because it is. I don’t have to go. God’s work won’t be thwarted by my lack of participation. He will touch them anyway, but I wouldn’t miss it for the world. He does things I’ve never dreamed of and uses me in ways I could never conceive. His focus on touching people instead of managing programs has revolutionized my view of ministry. It requires no less diligence on my part, but directs that diligence in far more fruitful endeavors.

If you’ve never known the joy of simply living in God’s acceptance instead of trying to earn it, your most exciting days in Christ are ahead of you. People who learn to live out of a genuine love relationship with the God of the universe will live in more power, more joy, and more righteousness than anyone motivated by fear of his judgment.

We’ll continue our conversations about He Loves Me this Saturday, March 2 at 1:00 pm Pacific Standard Time.  We will be focusing on chapters 16 and 18—how the death of Christ gives us a basis for growing trust in the Father’s care and how we find freedom from religious performance so we can be transformed by love. Even if you have not joined us before, you’re welcome to join us tomorrow and process how you can live more freely in love as well.

If you want to join us in this Zoom conversation, you can get details and the link by liking the Facebook Group Page, or if you are not a member of Facebook, you can write me for a link to be sent each time we meet. For those who just want to watch, we stream them live now on my Lifestream Ministry Page, since a new glitch in Zoom is not allowing us to post them to my Facebook Author Page. I will, however, post it to the Author page once the conversation has ended. You can see it there as well as all the previous discussions we’ve had about He Loves Me.

My greatest passion for anyone who reads these blogs or anyone I’m in a conversation with is that they, too, would come to experience the joy and freedom of resting in the Father’s affection through the work of Jesus. There’s nothing else in this world worth more than that.

 

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