Lit.

We were meant to be lit from within.
Inside you there is something that yearns to burn.
You stoke your fire,
You choose your desire,
And your choice defines the quality of your light.

The dark of an evening can be enchanting,
But even the splendor of the starry night depends on light.
Total Light is Heaven.
Total Darkness is terror.
The Shadows sulk, unable to create.

So they distract.  So they destroy.

You, you soft speaking absence,
You, you quiet eroder,
You, you comforting corrupter,
You, you inflamer of a fire
That gives no light,
That gives no warmth,
That consumes good and produces ash.
And that ash layers upon itself.
Sediment over sediment of depravity.
Buried.
Inside, death.
Outside, the apparent stability of a useful structure.
After all, a tomb, washed white, still serves a purpose.

Jesus, don't let me fade.

Pouring out brightness upon the tombs pristine walls
Is not enough to pay the cost for the lost.
His spirit must decide,
His spirit must provide.
The ember remains,and his breath makes it glow.

Rise and Shine!

Racing to the high hill,
I burn with a new fire.
Fueled by the eternal,
My light will not die.
This is my purpose,
Not to make my own light
But to allow him to consume me,
All of me.
I choose to burn with the glory of the Creator,
The very light born at Creation.

A light on a hill,
Burning and Alive.
It is a Joy to tell of what Jesus has done for me.

Isaiah 60
“Arise, shine, for your light has come,
    and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
    and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the Lord rises upon you
    and his glory appears over you.
3 Nations will come to your light,
    and kings to the brightness of your dawn."

Perception.

"I wish that was my first thought..."  This was the response a young man had as I was talking with about the wonders of creation.

 I have a small group of young guys I meet with on a semi-regular basis.  All have worked for me and with me at some point.  Somewhere along the way they have responded to a few things I've said, maybe asked a few questions and generally let me speak into their lives.  They are young men in their early 20's just starting to figure things out.  It is probably my love for my precious nephews, all now in this age range, that made me want to connect with these young men and I owe a debt to my precious nephews for being ability to connect.  In addition, I live with 4 women and have 4 sisters, so I am depleted of testosterone and this allows me to recover some.  Also, my humor works well in this demographic.  For my part, this is a cherished opportunity to explain things that never got explained to me: to talk candidly about life and relationships and disappointment and fear and work.  They let me talk about important things, about what it looks like to be a man in this culture.  We laugh a lot.  Most importantly, they allow me to speak at length about what it means to be loved by and serve our Savior, Jesus Christ.  In a way, this is about me reaching out, not only to these boys, but trying to reason with a 22 year old, lost version of myself.  I am certain that this is more rewarding for me than it is for them, but also I recognize that they value my age and experience and a few of the things I have to offer.  Of the 6 of us, 3 are professed Christians, one is wrestling with what he cannot escape as the truth of Christ, and the other two are just peaking into this Jesus thing.  I classify the last 2 as seekers, intrigued by this new explanation of who Jesus really is.   They know somethings missing, but they aren't sure that Jesus is the answer.  It was one of these last two that had the response above.

On this particular day, it was this seeker and the three professors: one Catholic, two Protestants.  I began the session talking about the wonder of creation.  I expounded on the vastness of the universe and the miracle of life on Earth, of the unbelievable sequence of events that made it possible for life on Earth.  I described that if even a few things had gone in a different direction, life would not be possible.  From there I drilled down to talk about how Jesus is the center of it all, that he is the expression of this Vast and terrifying and marvelous God becoming personal.  If God is person, then he can be personal to you.  Three of us went on to talk about the redemption of our broken world through Christ and how beautiful it was.  After a while, this seeker, when we pressed him for response admitted in his humorous and dry confession, "I can't believe that is your first response (That God is good and is in control of everything) to the Universe."  What he was referring too (and I'm taking liberties here with what he actually expressed) is the fact that this universe I was describing, the incredible work of God that made me feel so special, actually made him feel so small.  We had completely different perspectives.  I thought I was laying out a proof of significance, yet to him it felt like just the opposite.  This has been a crushing realization for me and has haunted me all week.  It does no good to go on about the wonders of Gods love to someone who is not yet able to feel it.  This is no fault of my own abilities or deficiencies of the seeker.  It just is what it is.  As I reflect on this, I am remembering what it feels like to be on the outside looking in.  It is extraordinarily frustrating.  For me this outsider feeling was devastating.  As a child I watched men and women walk to the altar, in response to the pastor, at Church every week, being saved and accepting Jesus as their savior in dramatic fashion.  No matter how many times I went forward, I was never convinced of anything.  I did not have the reaction they did, I did not have a flash of light.  Instead of feeling saved, I felt unwanted.  God clearly did not choose me or I would have felt it, right?  This is an all too frequent story for people who are raised in the Church.  Somewhere along the way, our caretakers forgot to give us a real explanation of what it means to be saved and what it means to believe in Jesus Christ.

I wonder if this young man looks at me and thinks, "He was chosen by Jesus."  But instead of feeling encouraged by this truth, he feels discouraged and lonely.  He thinks, perhaps, that kind of love is not meant for him.  I don't have the answers for him.  I do remember that feeling though.  It was a feeling that fueled my own rebellion.  I could never be good enough for this God who doesn't want me, so I will do my best to self destruct and distrust those who love me the most.  It's been a long road back for me.  What I know now is that of course God loved me then and he loves me now and always, just like he loves these boys.  But we are using our own messed up relational skills to figure these things out.  The ability to love and feel love is a delicate thing.  Truthfully, this statement he made "I wish that was my first thought.", both scares me and excites me.  It scares me, because it is out of my control.  No amount of my good explanation or testimony can make the case for a Loving Savior.  That has to happen in a personal way between the seeker and his redeemer.  On the other hand, the seeds of faith are being sown.  "I wish that was my first thought..." speaks of a hunger.  It is a statement that points to truth.  He wants goodness and he wants to be a part of goodness, yet as he looks at himself and looks at the world he doesn't know how it is possible.  But for right now, the want of goodness is enough for Christ to go to work in this young man.  The ringing of truth in his soul, the reaction to injustice, the ache for Love is a call that will not go unanswered by Jesus.  That much I know.

My perspective now is that God is good and that all things make sense because of who he is, what he has done and what he has yet to do.  It is a truth that has been slowly revealed to me as I responded to the call of my soul.  I worked out my salvation with fear and trembling (Phil 2:12) and Gods response has been to give me pieces as I am able to understand and receive them.  It doesn't happen in a ray of light, but it does happen in the light. Go! oh seeker, seek the light and seek the truth and your quest will not be in vain!

Ask, Seek, Knock

7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

9 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! 12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

Free Will?

Does Free Will actually exist? What can we do versus the will of God? Is Free Will merely a matter of perception? The choices we make cannot circumvent the intentions of God, so why does it feel like we have the power to direct our own lives? Maybe that is the point entirely, that we feel like we are in control without actually imposing our own will. I think it ties in directly with the notion of submission. Submission is letting go of our own desire for power and control and bowing before and gladly accepting the total authority of God. 

As a clever parent I can make my children think that cleaning their room was their own choice. They feel better about the chore when they feel like they are making the choices that lead to a clean room. The feeling is real, but the reality is that the room was going to get cleaned regardless of my children’s desires. They aren’t really fooled by my rouse. Instead they have made the choice to go along with my will for their own contentment. It feels good to do what is right, what needs to be done, especially if you can do it before someone asks you to do it. They certainly have a choice to fight the process and make themselves miserable and waste an enormous amount of time. The bigger point is not that I can get my kids to do what I want them to, but rather that both their lives and my life is better when we are of the same will. They have to be able to trust that I want the best for them. Is this simplistic view a good analogy of our free will with God? I certainly don’t want to make God out to be a cosmic taskmaster. He in fact loves us and wants only good for us. All good things come from God and if we are in line with his will, goodness can flow to us and through us. Contentment can be found in difficult circumstances because we have chosen to submit our will. Free will is not a matter of changing fate, but altering our resistance. The Law was given to Moses to give a clear example of the expectations of God. However, there comes a time when we choose to follow the will of God and the Law becomes irrelevant because we are in tune with what is good and right. As Jesus said, he came not to abolish the Law, but fulfill it. When things are right, God has written the Law on our hearts and we obey without effort, because it was our choice and desire to do so. It is God’s desire as well. 

I picture God standing in water up to his chest. His arms swing and direct the water into waves, channeling the waves where he wants them to go. We are tiny creatures in the wake of the water. If we resist the wave we will struggle and gasp and possibly drown, but still end up where God intended. However if we recognize that God is in complete control and go with the wave we can flow with God. We can actually ride the crest and enjoy the process and end up exactly where God wants us.

Adam and Eve lived in Gods immediate and personal grace. They made a choice. It wasn’t the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge that changed everything, it was the decision to eat it that did. It was the decision to turn from God. That was a choice of will, to turn away from what you know the will of God to be. Eating the fruit sealed the deal and gave them nothing but doubt and toil. Doubt may be the resulting reality of Free Will. Love is God’s method of getting us back on the wave. Faith is the representation of our belief in that Love. Salvation is the mutual goal for God and Humanity (whether through our own Free Will, we accept it or not). 

Mustard Seed.

Matthew 13

³¹ He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. ³² It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.”

Jesus illustrates that the size of faith is not as important as the decision to carry faith, to sow it.  Furthermore, the decision to carry faith is not as important as the object of the faith.  Indeed the object of that which we have faith in trumps all.  When we carry this mustard seed, as small as it may feel, we must carry the vision of the towering tree and have faith in that.  Even this small remnant can establish roots in the places where we have the courage to carry it.  Your own faith is important, but it is the object of your faith that matters.  God will choose the smallest of vessels to make his will known. Your seed may remain a seed forever, but that will not prevent a forest from flourishing if it be God's will.

A tree, of course, starts as a seed.  Take that seed and dissect it.  It is impossible to make the logical leap from the apparent nothingness inside the seed to a thriving, nourishing forest.  But because of what we observe, we can reason that this is so.  That shouldn't take away the wonder and the mystery.  We can explain the process, but we can really never get to the "how?".  A fossil of possible million year old bacteria on Mars is enough to make the world gasp at the possibilities and ramifications.  Yet, right under my foot is more life than is evident in the entire solar system.  Under my daughters dirty fingernails is LIFE (lots of it).  We haven't even discovered all of the life here on our own planet.

"Earth is the only planet we know that has a biosphere. This thin, membranous layer of life is our only home. It alone is able to maintain the exact environment we ourselves need to stay alive." Edward Wilson NGM

We should all collapse in awe at the wonder and the mystery of this unthinkable multitude of life on this planet.  As broken as we are, man and woman are the apex of this creation.  The capacity to ask why and how is a privilege and the Joy given to us by a loving God.  Our ability to create and discover are an expression of his very nature, his image.  Our actual physical likeness in God's image is less amazing than the things that really matter: Love, Justice, Mercy, Forgiveness, Joy, Wisdom.  God hasn't given himself the choice of loving us, by creating he loves.  This is how we are different, we do have the choice, even if it means our decay, we have the option of not choosing God. 

The seed remains.  My faith was torn and tattered.  I questioned the goodness of God and thought that if he really did exist and really did love me, then he was a fool.  I came to the end of myself though and found that I still carried this seed.  As low as I was, I could not shake the awe and wonder of the universe, or of life on earth.  Or a tree.  The simple beauty of a tree has as much to do with my faith as anything.  The vastness of the universe and the immensity of persistent beauty should have made me feel insignificant.  However this seed that I could not shake, this evidence of a God that was seeking me (more accurately, was waiting for me to seek him), made the universe feel personal.  If there was order to the universe, to a tree, to a seed - then it must have been intentionally created.  If it was created, then there must be a creator.  If there is a creator, then there is a possibility of order in my life...that would seem consistent with the universe.  That made it personal.  I'm using some reasoning here to explain, yet faith of course isn't really about reason.  It is about observing what we see and feel and how we interact: what delivers and what remains silent.  I believe in Jesus Christ, not because of a blind leap, but because he has delivered.  His words live and those words make sense of why things are the way they are and more importantly why we should hope in him to make things right.  Holding on to the the possibility that the creator of the Universe came to Earth for me and loves me may feel like the tiniest of seeds.  But I sow that seed and I hope and I hold the vision of the full grown tree: Heaven on Earth, Jesus living with us.  Redeemed!

Distinctions.

Distinction 1.
The body is not "A" Temple.  It is not "Your" Temple.  Your body is "His" Temple.  This is the distinction that matters.  Fitness or fatness, it doesn't really matter if you do not understand who you belong to.  It is Christ the Creator that means to use you for his glory and your joy.  In the Temple of your body, if you prepare a place for him, he will prepare a place for you.

1 Corinthians 6
19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.


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Distinction 2.
It is not the bright and flashy things that tend to lead us astray.  There will be no warning signs that say, "Be Careful, this is the road to your destruction.", it simply looks like an easier path.  The things that slowly pull us away are comfortable, familiar and feel good.  They look good and are easily justifiable.  The counterfeit is effective because it acknowledges authenticity, yet fails to deliver.  When our rebellious days are gone, rebellion seems silly.  However we are still tempted to stray. In our maturity and "wisdom" we make a case for the counterfeit.  When we rebelled we were merely fools and stubborn, now we are more sophisticated.

Matthew 7
13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

Sons and Daughters

In my house, I am the last to go to bed. Sometimes it’s because I am working late. More likely, it’s just the way I am wired. I avoid going to sleep in a way that my wife will never understand, it is the complete opposite of how she is wired. When I finally do make my way upstairs I pause midway up on the landing. There on a shelf my wife has pictures of our 3 daughters, current and toddler pictures. I like to sit on the step in the dim light, in the heart of the house, in the quite and I pray as I look at these pictures. I pray for our home, that it is a warm environment meant for bringing others in. I pray for my wife and our marriage, that it is warm and meant for serving others and providing guidance for our children. I pray for my daughters, that they would learn just how much Jesus loves them and that that fact would be the guiding light of their existence. My mind wanders in this time of prayer to both relevant and good things, but also distracting and selfish things. I worry. I fret. I hope our 100 year old home can keep from falling apart. I hope my wife will continue to be patient with me. I wonder what my daughters lives will be like. I wonder for what things they will resent me. I wonder what my son-in-law will be like. Afloat in this mental drift, God gently brings me back to his heart and his mind.  Sometimes I wonder if there is another Father out there, watching over his son, praying for him as he sleeps. As he stands outside his Son’s room, he marvels at the man his son is becoming: how funny he is, how stubborn, how tender and how thoughtful. Is this other Father praying that he can raise a Godly son, who will learn how to lead and care for his future wife? The other Father’s heart gallops for a moment as he glances ahead and wonders if there is a young girl out there that can appreciate his son. What does he hope for in a daughter-in-law?

Is it my protective parenting that kicks in when I hope for a strong man to marry my daughter or is it a recognition of the nature of things. I believe in a Biblical worldview of how men and women should relate, what marriage looks like and how men and women should compliment each other. I believe men should be the leaders of their family. In our culture, many bristle at this type of thinking and if you bring up the phrase “Wives submit to your husbands…“ you may be in for a fight. I can’t deny my own bristling as we consider the roles of men and women. But as I mature I have come to understand things differently. As I hope to lead my family and also lead young men and women in my career it means that I serve them. God wants me to serve others, not lord over them. This decidedly puts me in a position of submission. I submit. In order to do this, I need support and I need the nurturing of a partner who understands this. The one I serve, supports me. In the many women in my life I see this amazing strength, and often I struggle to understand it. It is not a lesser nature. To be a helper is not a lesser role, it is a compliment. To submit means we both agree that we each have different roles. This does not look the same in every marriage and there are a variety of ways in which this relationship of mutual compliment will play itself out, but my mind and my heart lean towards (gulp) a traditional view of marital roles.  However, now I feel I have a more complete understanding of what that means.  Men and Women are different in nature and purpose.  When lived out with understanding, the strength of one lifts up their partner, it does not push them down.  Our strengths make each other more, not less.

I pray for a man that can lead my daughter. I pray that she can support him. I pray that in leading, this man will acknowledge and bring out the very best and strongest qualities of my daughter. I pray that my daughter will give him confidence and build him up when he has been crushed. . I cannot escape how my own life shapes these things and how I view them. I have four older sisters and a mother. These are strong women, leaders to a great degree in the professional fields they have chosen. They lead companies, divisions, offices and each one is a highly valued and trust leader in their work. They are each a picture of success. They are strong women, but they are also a very traditional nurturing sort. These women raised me. They are all completely different, valuing different things and living their lives in unique scenarios. As I consider these women, and my daughters, and my aunts, I don’t consider them less than any man. Probably quite the opposite. Because of their value, my heart desires that they would have a good partner to lead them.  My Christian beliefs shape how I view things, but more than cold hard doctrinal beliefs I am guided by what I observe and what my heart longs for. I want great things for my daughters. These women are world changers. They possess qualities of strength, compassion, joy, reasoning and counseling that the people in their lives will depend on in great measure.  It is not because I want less for them that I want them to submit to a husband, it’s because I want more.  I want them to teach the men they have married how to be husbands and fathers only they way a wife can do.  And if both parties submit to following Christ and give their marriage to him, then they have access to a divine power that gives them access to the endless patience that is required to make a marriage work.  Not to mention: Forgiveness, Joy and Comfort.  If the two participants are forced to figure things out on their own, with no role models, no set of guiding values but only their own emotions and desires to guide them, then I fear they will fail.  Sadly, I can guarantee this failure.  And, alas, my beloved daughters may do everything "right" if there is such a route in this tricky endeavor,  and still have failed.  In this too, there is submission, a beautiful submission to a loving God who means to pick up the broken pieces of our failures and forge something more glorious than we could have chosen for ourselves.  

Freedom 1.

Freedom is over-rated. To be free is a blessing. To have unlimited freedom is a curse. We tend to cry for freedom at all costs, focusing on the concept of freedom itself and rarely think about in what context. (I realize I sit here in a place of privilege, a point in time and history of unbelievable freedom. I’m not speaking of politics and policies, but more of the human heart. ) Freedom without tethers, without boundaries, without discipline and without direction is enslavement. You are in a sense giving an incredibly powerful weapon to a person or a generation or a culture that has no sense in how to use it. Choice without consequence breeds destruction. (our hearts are incredibly depraved, that left to our own devices we will only consume more and more and never give.) If a child is given complete freedom from a young age to choose whatever they wish, they will slowly but surely shape themselves into a selfish, insufferable monster. They will only know how to please themselves and that will be their only driving thought…gaining more pleasure, more freedom with no sense in how to use it: enslaved to their own freedom.

If freedom is told as a lie, Love is the truth. Love, at it’s best is binding and it is full of choices soaked with consequence. Freedom tells us to only be concerned with ourselves, our choices. Love tells us to only think of others. Love is most useful, most powerful in the context of sacrifice. Many fight for the freedom to Love whom they wish, but ultimately they are aching to be bound to someone or something. While freedom focuses on the choice, Love focuses on the object of that choice. Choose wisely.