Encouragement

Connecting with the Jesus and his Father as he makes himself known to you was meant to be the simplest thing in the world, until our religious approaches got us all twisted up in our own performance and we felt we had to try and make “it” happen on our own. Many people miss that revelation because they are looking for something far more complicated or spectacular than how God draws us to himself.

Most people seek God with their physical senses hoping to see him or hear him in supernatural manifestations of his glory. While God does that some times, he is far more interested in helping us learn how to recognize him with the eyes and ears of our heart and to awaken those senses that engage the Eternal. God is always active around us—always moving, always speaking; it’s just that we miss him because we haven’t learned to recognize or trust our spiritual senses that engage him.

Over the last twenty-five years I’ve had the joy of helping many people find their way out of the religious jungle of self-effort to the trailhead of a growing relationship with him. Unfortunately time does not allow me to do it with all that write me or even that I visit, so a few years ago I put the key things I think help people the most to a set of videos. There are twenty-four of them, only about 5-8 minutes long designed to get people thinking in the space that makes it easiest to see how God is making himself known to us. We called the series Engage as a way of helping people see how God is engaging them.

We affectionately refer to this as the anti-discipleship approach because so many people have the idea that discipleship is building a relationship with God. In truth, discipleship isn’t about you building a relationship with God; it’s recognizing how God wants to build one with you.

Last week I got this email from Ed, as he is sorting this process out in his own life. I love the journey he’s on, and even though his hunger is satisfied yet it is obvious that the relationship he desires with God is growing in him. Yes, it takes time and it doesn’t happen the same way for everyone. All we can do is make ourselves avaialbe to him and then learn to recognize where God nudges his thoughts into ours and pours his strength and power into our struggles.

I honestly don’t even know how to relax into the relationship as you put it in the Engage series (currently going through those for the third time). I am so trained to be on the treadmill of religious performance that I feel anxious and nervous when I’m not doing something. I can’t ever remember a teacher or institution that wasn’t prodding me to do more, be more, give more, etc. Relationship with God has been modeled and taught to me as an exercise program. I seem to have been (religiously) born into an endless state of panic about how God views me and I’m driven to chase a never ending list of dos and don’ts in the hope that one day I’ll finally arrive at a state of “acceptable”. Honestly it’s exhausting just to think about it.

When my wife and I first left the our congregation I thought the joy I felt was me learning to walk in relationship and really experiencing the love of Father. Now I know that I was just so glad to be out from under the oppressive religious system we grew up in that I mistook that sense of relief for everything else. Now I perceive that the religious system was off of me but not out of me.

I’m listening to the Engage podcasts again (but being the religious performer I have to listen to more than one a day lol) and this morning I listened to #18 on the way to work. I had to listen to it twice because there was so much in it that spoke to me right now. Your relationship with Father is a present reality and you seem to just live out of that. I suppose that’s why my wife and I keep listening and reading your podcasts and books, because we truly want to see what a life lived in real relationship with Father looks like. We don’t see you as a “guru” but an example of the kind of life we hope for. I hope this makes sense but just your being (verb) is as significant to us as anything you talk about on the podcast.

Yes, it makes sense, Ed, and I do think that’s how life in this kingdom gets passed on. I’m glad not to be your guru; I only hope to be a brother pointing the way to a trailhead that lets you discover with increasing clarity how God is making himself know to you. Obviously that is stirring in you and in time you will become more comfortable listening with your heart.

Recognizing God in your life is not difficult because it’s complicated, but because it is simpler than we dare to believe.

When we live by religious rules and traditions we unwittingly shift into achievement mode, trying to do the best we can to live up to our standards and most days falling far short and bashing ourselves. That, however, is living by the law.  The new creation offers us a new way to live, not by meeting the expectations of law (or even New Testament principles), but the joy of learning to live by his Spirit will draw us into Father’s reality and shift the way we live as the fruit of a growing relationship of love.  Transformation is a journey, not an achievement. While perfection is the long-term hope, it is never a daily expectation to be disappointed.

It is such a joy when that reality sinks into a heart.  I got this email the other day from a friend and it so touches me to see how this shift has happened in her and her compassion for others still lost in the world of achievement and performance:

I had to write and tell you that I loved, loved, loved reading your book, In Season.  It just helped solidified so much of what is going on in my life.  It’s helped me to stand strong through the trials I’ve gone through lately.  However, I can actually say that I feel like I’m coming into my harvest time.  I loved your book He Loves Me, but people really need to read In Season! I think, just my opinion! I’ve given away many copies of your book, He Loves Me, but, now I’m doing it with, In Season.

You know, I’m realizing there’s a lot of people out there that are hurting in institutional religion, that would probably love to walk in a journey like ours, but are just too afraid.  I love my journey with the Lord and I would never go back.  I’ve given my yoga instructor your book, He Loves Me. She loves it and talks about it all the time… she’s a believer!  She says she can’t wait to read In Season.

I use to regret so much in my life, but I don’t any more.  I’m the person that I am today, because of the things I’ve walked through.  I’m stronger, steadier, and less afraid!  I know that trials will continue to come, but, my responses are and will be so much different.

Isn’t that what’s great about a journey?  You don’t have to waste time in regret for the past. Yes, we all have things we wish we hadn’t done, or spent more time trying to get something to work that was never meant to, but even those things become part of our journey as he draws us into himself and shows us how we can live freely in him even in the broken world that can cause so much pain.

That’s why I wrote In Season, to help people see that instead of trying to accomplish something for God by our own efforts, we can relax into the rhythm of his work in us realizing that each day holds the possibility of new discovery and greater freedom.  Since I grew up on a vineyard, this is a farmer’s view of John 15 and Jesus’ encouragement to learn to live in him like a branch lives in a vine. We get to enjoy the relationship and in doing so our lives are transformed with better ways to think, live, and love in the world. Spiritual growth is organic, a response to the circumstances and challenges in our life and the joy of walking in them with him and his strength.

And I love her compassion for people still lost in the world of religious performance. Having been there ourselves, who better to realize how lost and blind you can be even as your patting yourself on the back for being a ‘radical’ disciple of Jesus?  They need our love, compassion, and friendship, not our judgment and anger.

And as a reminder, most of our books are available at bulk discounts so you can share them with others affordably or start a study if you want. And individual copies of In Season is available for less than $10.00.

I couldn’t resist sharing this thought above. I love it and it’s a great reminder every day that we live.  There is far more about God that we don’t know, than what we think we know. That’s especially true when we add in the conundrum of how much of God we think we know about him that isn’t even true. We just think it is.

It’s from a book I recommended a couple of months ago, called Paradox Lost.  The whole book is designed to help us settle into the reality that our Father in heaven could never be cataloged in a book and just about the time we think we’ve figure him out. It’s a book I know many of you will enjoy.

That’s why we will find more joy in following him as he reveals himself, rather than following concepts of him that often disappoint us.  I had a friend who often referred to God as Jehovah Tsdnikki. You’d have to be an old King James reader to fully appreciate that moniker. The way he shows up unexpectedly and the things he does to touch our lives defy our imaginations. That’s why trying to follow a God that meets your expectations will be horribly frustrating. I know, I did it for decades and spent a lot of time wallowing in the anger of disappointment. And there I missed so much of what he was still doing around me.

Realizing God is so much more than we can sort out at any stage in this life can set us at rest from trying to do so. Fortunately we have a God who wants to reveal himself to us in the smallest bits every day. I find greater joy walking in what he has revealed about himself than frustrating over what I don’t yet understand. When I pray, “Father I want to know you as you really are,” I find he answers that in the things I most need to see in the circumstances I’m facing. That often comes in conversations with others who are seeing things about him I haven’t discovered yet.

Figuring him out is an adventure we’ll never complete in this lifetime and our awareness of that can create a humility that doesn’t try to force our view on others. And we’ll not sort it out here. I’m hoping eternity will last long enough to maybe get to the end of him there, if getting to an end is even possible in eternity.

For a book that was never meant to be a book I am amazed at how the story keeps traveling. So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore started as a website and a story serialized over four and a half years by two of us who wondered what the Apostle John might think of what Jesus’ church had become in the 21st century.  We made it up as we went along to help people think past the pain of the religious games many of us get caught up in and discover what it is to live as his beloved son or daughter alongside others in the world.

I never thought we’d print it, since it has been free on line since the beginning. We printed it only because friends said they would never read it on line.  Hundreds of thousands did, however, and still many also bought the book.  It showed up in Walmart and Costco and a thousand other stores.  I get to hear testimonials all the time about how people found that book and what it helped identify in their own hearts about God’s working.

A few days ago I received this from a man today who has just finished leading a thirteen-week book discussion through So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore. Here’s what he wrote:

Well, after going through Jake at least 4 times, plus going through a 13 week study of Jake with our Bible study group, I am finally done with Jake (at least today).  I can’t thank you enough for your efforts in writing this life changing book.  Since first reading The Story of Jake about a year ago my relationship with Father has changed dynamically. The guilt of leaving my church of 25 years and the understanding that Father loves me, even with all my faults, has changed remarkably.  It would take me 30 pages to tell you of all that has happened in the past year, but just know that Father and I are doing GREAT!  I didn’t say perfect, but GREAT!

Thanks, Carl. Dave and I were blessed to hear how much this story helped you on your own journey.

I still love this story and being in it a lot over the past couple of years as it quietly marches toward becoming a feature length film titled, Out of the Game. I’ve had a lot of fun helping to re-tell this story for a different medium and see if it can continue to help people discover life and freedom in him.

Opening my email every day is like going on a treasure hunt. I have appreciated the stories people have entrusted to me as they hold a longing in their heart for a more vital walk with God than they are yet experiencing. I get to be with them in the darkness and encourage them as best I can to lean more deeply into God’s reality. Learning to do that always takes longer than people hope or want. It is easy to get frustrated as their options narrow and the fears begin to rise that maybe he is not there and is not drawing them toward himself. My heart breaks for them knowing they can’t yet see what is right in front of them, but I know Father is working and one day that work will surface in a way they can see, too.

Yes, it would be easier for us all if he would work faster, if he would function on our time instead of his. But he does not delay to make sport of us, only because he is doing something far deeper and far more profound than we can possibly imagine. He’s not just making the outside better, but liberating us from the inside so that we can live differently and more freely in him. He seems to enjoy that process. I thought about that last night as I waited endlessly for our new puppy to take care of business before we put her down for the night. It’s painstaking raising a puppy. It would be far easier just to get a dog after it’s already grown up a bit, but loving a puppy is so worth it, even for all the accidents and damaged shoes and furniture. Sara and I love the process of helping a puppy grow up into a treasured part of our household.

Would it be so strange that God would enjoy our growth, too? Yes, he knows the pain we’re in, but he’s not about alleviating the pain, he’s about transforming us so the pain no longer destroys us. I got an email the other day that spoke to the glorious way God works, and hopefully sets us at ease to let him do it, rather than living in the frustration of our own timeline:

Thank you for responding to my several emails throughout my journey.  Your “work” (podcasts, books…) has been instrumental in my growth.  When I first contacted you a few years back I was inquiring about how to find a fellowship of like-minded believers so I didn’t have to feel so alone.  You told me to ask God.  I did.  Nothing happened.  This confirmed my inner less-loved outlook (actually “Esau complex”) at the time. So I went into another downward spiral, one of hundreds if not thousands.  The interesting thing is that I have not been able to quit God, though, I’ve tried.

Why would I want to keep coming back to a God whom I feels kicks me down and then kicks me when I’m down? It makes no logical sense whatsoever as I don’t have a victim mentality.  Yet, it has all been part of a process of God answering my prayers. Looking back, you and Brad and your online community have been for a time those “bigger brothers” (and sisters) that I prayed about.  I was not left totally alone.  I have a “sister” in Christ whom I’ve shared my journey with since 2000.  She lives in another state but we communicate frequently and have the kind of conversations you and Brad have.  So, while God didn’t answer my fellowship prayer in the way I wanted, He did answer it.

I know you’re familiar with the book Tattoos of the Heart. In it, “G,” made a comment about “trusting the slow work of God.”  Google informed me that it is a poem, which has brought me great comfort.  I don’t feel like God’s cast-away any more. I don’t feel like Esau (I shared this with you once before), and while I still don’t feel “LOVED” not feeling hated is AMAZING.  I trust that one day I will be able to feel the Father’s love because I am now able to recognize that He is doing this work in me, and He will complete it.  Here is the poem.

Trust in the Slow Work of God
by Pierre Chardin

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) was a French philosopher and Jesuit priest. This poem speaks to the sometimes excruciating experience of waiting on God. 

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way
to something unknown, something new.
Yet it is the law of all progress that is made
by passing through some stages of instability
and that may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually. Let them grow.
Let them shape themselves without undue haste.
Do not try to force them on
as though you could be today what time
— that is to say, grace —
and circumstances
— acting on your own good will —
will make you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new Spirit
gradually forming in you will be.

Give our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.
Above all, trust in the slow work of God,
our loving vine-dresser. Amen.

Amen indeed!  No matter what evidence you think you have to the contrary, he is at work in you and he will complete what he has begin and fulfill every longing he has put in your heart. It will go so much better for you if you can relax into his timeframe instead of trying to force your own. Remember, he’s not doing what is fast, but what is right, real, and enduring.

I’ve had many a pained email by those on the verge of giving up, thinking that God isn’t there or if he is, that he doesn’t care about them. Then months, sometimes years, later I get the triumphant email that comes when they finally see what he has been doing all along. It takes an amazing heart to hold a longing before God until his glory makes itself known. But the joy that follows knows no bounds.