From Living Loved • Winter 2013
Shelly in Colorado
Thank you for stunning the religion out of me and speaking in a tone of absolute love that gave me the freedom to leave employment at a church and find real community with the body of Christ. Last week a friend of mine was asked to leave children’s ministry because her husband did not come to church. It destroyed her. Then I read in the final chapter of So You Don’t Want To Go To Church Anymore where a group of angry church-goers are equally hurt by church leaders. I realized that what happened to my friend is just a chance for her to encounter real intimacy with Jesus. In the last three years, I have fallen so deeply in love with Father. I have found him in every hurt and blessing. I count my trouble as waters gone by. What I love most about you both is your biographies. They weren’t filled with degrees and accolades but just a journey sharing the love of God with others. I want my bio to be the same. I have put so much attention on my career when my job is loving as Christ loves.
Ingalill in Sweden
He loves Me…. Well, here is one more I am reading it slowly, as I don’t want it to end – The message of the book is transforming my life and bringing a freedom I always have longed for. I said to my husband, that it feels as if old mindsets are crashing down as the truth of Gods fatherly love for me is invading my mind and heart!
Carolyn in Canada
I’ve listened to Transitions and I can say that it sounds like “home” to me. You have a wonderfully soothing voice and the God that you know is a God that I want to know. What you speak about speaks to my spirit and I can hear the Divine Amen.
Alena in Canada
I can’t thank you enough for sharing your experience, your journey and your insights! You’ve introduced me to a God I’ve never known but always wanted and given me hope that I can know Him as you know Him.
Tom from Wyoming
Your Living Loved article, “Betrayal, Forgiveness and Reconciliation” is a God-inspired piece of work if ever there was one. Your understanding of the issue of betrayal and God’s method of handling it is nothing short of a revelation, and you have a real gift for expressing your thoughts in a clear and relevant manner. I am one of the legion who have struggled mightly with betrayal for many years with not much hope until now. Thank you for showing me how I’ve mishandled it, and then revealing God’s path out of the darkness.
Sharon from Australia
I appreciated latest newsletter. Thanks for taking time to distill what you have obviously learnt from life experience on this important topic. I felt relief and peace reading through it. Succinct, sensible, logical and easy to understand. I have waded through a number of books on this topic and felt overwhelmed with information and rules and processes that I have never been able to apply or remember when required. I am grateful.
Alan in Missouri
Re: “Betrayal, Forgiveness and Reconciliation”. This is just beautiful! Wherever the Lord has had to take you to write such things which are living I applaud Him, and you for choosing to stay the course when so many other ways were open to you.
Jill in Texas
I am being transformed by the reading of the book He loves Me. As the wife of a minister for some 33 years, I’ve walked many years with the Lord. One trial after another sent me into a tailspin of depression and anxiety. I am coming out of it, slowly. With the guidance of a christian therapist, I bought this book. I looked through it thinking, “Eh, it’s okay, but I know God loves me.” It has taken me reading it a second time to “get it” and boy am I getting it. I have finally convinced my pastor husband who is weary in well-doing that he must read it. He has just begun…
Judy in Canada
My old friend and I spent 3 days at a hotel with your The Jesus Lens DVD and she was so blessed. The weekend ended up being a spiritual retreat that really fed us both and strengthened us. I received added blessings by my being able to listen to more of your super disk on the 8 hour drive to see her. I have just ordered another copy for her and two more for friends. You have really led many of my friends to liberty in Christ and onto a different road where they seem to be pretty well ‘dancing’ along their spirituals way now. Our spirits have really been revived.
Lauralee in Australia
I really wanted to tell you how much your writing has brought healing into my life. I had recently lost a baby boy plus previously twin girls. Anyway, through your encouragement I have come through the depression, finally I ‘get it’ Jesus loves me, God does exist and there’s nothing that can separate me from Him! I love your books and have passed several copies around to friends. My favourite is He loves Me. God has gifted you with such insight into the freedom found in just being loved. I am so tired of church people that have agenda’s, create issues, praying against this & that. If we all just loved and be loved this ‘junk’ that they are praying about/against would fade away!! I feel most peace when I read your books/newsletters so if peace is my guide then I am convinced your teaching is spot on. In fact I know it was through reading He loves Me over & over that has quite literally saved my life!
Kent on the blog
False belonging is trying to find meaning and peace that is outside our true belonging inside the circle of Father Son and Spirit. When that is out of whack all our external longing gets malformed and we spend our lives trying to scrape meaning and affirmation and happiness from others and from things. It’s a destructive enterprise. When we come home to ourselves and learn to be at peace in that solitude…our inner world…the kingdom within….then all our outward activity isn’t of the needy kind… it’s of the giving kind. It redefines what healthy relationship is and what healthy individuality is. The false belonging all has to do with the malforming effects religion has on us. It leaves us attempting to scrape meaning and affirmation from a god that does not exist. It’s made up from within the dark fallen mind. And it is completely self centered and self serving.
Kate in Belgium
I was given a copy of He loves Me by a dear friend. It has so blessed me and set me free. I can hardly believe the difference between before I started reading it and now. Thank you so much for sharing what the Lord has indeed revealed to you. I sense a freshness inside and a new trust in him like I had when I first came to faith.
Steve in Indiana
Nearly every time I re-listen to the “Jesus Lens” I think about sending you an email to thank you. So… here it is. Thank you. I am grateful to have been one of those in attendance and passed along DVD’s of the “Jesus Lens” to friends.
Valerie in Virginia
In addition to being eternally grateful to Papa for the love he has shown through lives of men such as yourself and how sharing that love with those who read your books and listen in to your teachings and podcasts… I absolutely love hearing about your love for your family, your daughter and son… and your precious grandchildren. Having grown up with a dread of my own earthly father, and seeing how that has impacted my ability to rest assured in the love of my Papa… I find it heartwarming to see that there are men out there who openly adore their children and grandchildren. For those of us looking in… and catching a glimpse of your life, it makes your message and the sharing of your life’s journey more credible. Have a wonderful, and wonder filled day!
Sharon in Australia
I am learning a lot through Lifestream Journeys just looking at how people respond to each other on your website. How they resolve conflicts before they escalate and how they empathize with those in some sort of trouble or pain. I like the way many of them don’t preach. They seem to come alongside and stick to sharing from their own experience of God. So they don’t come across as if they have all the answers. That is a refreshing and honest way to go about things. Some don’t have any advice at all, just empathy. I am changing the way I respond to those around me too as a result of what I have learned from your website. More honest, less know it all.
Tim in California
I am writing to say thank you for your incredible work. I have instinctively known that there are problems with institutional church for many years, but could never quite verbalize them. I began to discover others outside the box about two years ago, (during a time that included) a near fatal automobile accident, a divorce, and receiving the left foot of fellowship from my church. I have been detoxing for about eight months and discovered your ministry only about six weeks ago. In that time I have read The Shack, So You Don’t Want To Go To Church Anymore, and The Naked Church; listened to the Transition audio recordings repeatedly, along with many episodes of The God Journey, and am now about 2/3 of the way through He Loves Me. The past 72 hours have seen some of the most profound revelation I have ever received and I think I finally “get it.” I realize that this is merely crossing a threshold into a whole new journey, but I am overjoyed to have finally reached this point in the process.
Claire in Holland
Your book He Loves Me is so life-giving and clear about misconceptions in thought patterns and I am only at 30% of it. I can’t wait to finish it. DaRon in Tennessee God has put within you the ability of a “locksmith”. You have an uncanny ability to put language to what may be stirring around in the hungry heart, and unlock a confirming peaceful assurance that God indeed is still in the “business” of loving people to a place of rest & wholeness! Thank you for all you do. You’ll never know how much it means to us. I couldn’t have imagined when I was a young “buck” in my thirties, that living loved and walking with Jesus could be so incredible and so full of wonder! Keep slingin’ that freedom!
Jimmy via email
I just listened to the early and middle letters of The Jesus Lens. It reminds me of when I first got saved, when I just loved Jesus read the Bible and grew without fear.
Tricia from Illinois
I just want you to know how thankful I am to you for the books you have written and your website. I have downloaded many of your teachings on to CDs and I listen to them when I drive to work or drive my kids around. I cry almost every time because I can’t believe what you say, but when I hear it , it rings true with my spirit and then when I check it out in Scripture, holy cow! It’s true! I always thought and read the bible as rules to how I should live and God would punish me if I didn’t follow them. I only started to question what I thought was true about 8 months ago after reading The Shack and So You Don’t Want To Go To Church Anymore. I just sat and cried for probably an hour after reading He loves Me!
Becky via email
Thank you for So You Don’t Want To Go To Church Anymore. I seriously think it saved my sanity. After attending a church with my a Christian friend scary thoughts entered my mind. The church always made me feel more scared after walking out of it, rather than loved. I felt God was mad at me every second of every day. I had the urge to search on the web and that led me to your book. I wish I could write enough to express to you what it did for me. I was trying to check off boxes in hopes of getting my salvation. I was being smothered and I started to feel there was no way I could ever keep up with all I had to do. Please just know this book is amongst my favorites. it signifies the return of my life. You don’t even know me, but your words brought me back from the deepest, darkest most frightened state I had ever been in, in all my life. Who wants to live every day feeling damned, even though they love Him so much?
