Solving My Problems

My kids have a chronic condition where they refuse to eat their meals and then will later complain about how badly their stomachs hurt.  I will say, "You are hungry, you need to eat your food".  They of course will protest my assessment of their predicament.  After I have convinced them to eat they will magically feel better.  But they won't admit that my assessment and solution were accurate.  What fun would that be?

We can laugh at kids and their stubborn insistence in pretending that it isn't really their own choices causing their problems.  But adults are actually even worse at this behavior.  My grandfather was a life long smoker and whenever he would go to a doctor with a health complaint they would bring up his smoking as the most likely culprit...so he would find a new doctor.  

Our lives our full of self-imposed pain and suffering.  But we never want to look in the mirror and wrestle with the reality that the source of our discomfort is deeply rooted in what is inside of us and not what is outside of us.  There is this tendency our culture loves to promote that while on one hand we should be autonomous agents of our own destiny, we apparently cannot exercise any personal agency when we are facing difficulties that are the natural consequences of our "freedom"..

A pernicious and common mythology that our modern era loves to throw around is that self-love is the key ingredient to finally being happy.  But self-love is nothing more than the dressed up and socially acceptable version of narcissism.  I don't mean you should go around hating yourself and beating yourself up.  But the popular concept of self-love and self-"acceptance" is deeply coloured by the idea that what is limiting you and your happiness is not that you are selfish and destructive, but instead that you haven't repeated the mantra "I'm special" enough.  

As long as we persist in the lie that I, all on my own, am good enough.  I will forever find myself surprised by the degree to which my issues remain.  

Scripture is very clear.  You and I are not made for our own self-centered selves.  We are made to know and be known by God.  The fullness of who we truly are is only found in the context of a relationship with our creator.  He who knit us in our mothers wombs knows what it is we need to fix that which ails us.  

And what ails us is our distance from God.  A distance that is self-imposed as we spend more time worshipping at the altar of self-love instead of the altar of Christ love.

Luckily God has given us a straight forward guide to addressing the distance we feel and we see it laid out with clarity in James 4.

7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.- James 4:7-10

In an attempt to make this helpful I am going to just quickly break it down with its application:

Submit Yourself To God - The very start of all of this is that you have a heart position that says, "not my ways but yours".  If you are unwilling to go where God is going to call you.  Unwilling to be obedient in an area that is hard.  Then you might as well give up because you are going nowhere.

Resist the devil - Are you fighting against sin in your life?  Not that you are sinless, but are you continually fighting against sin??  Your closeness to God is going to have a powerful interconnectivity to your fighting sin.  God is Holy.  Sin and God do not co-exist.  If you have made peace with your sin and either are no longer resisting, or, even embracing and celebrating it, do not expect closeness to God.  It is impossible.

Come near to God and He will come near to you - In the middle of this passage is a promise.  Not a maybe.  A promise.  If you are truly seeking after God He WILL come close.  Even when you stumble and do not get as far as you want.  If you are trying, He is there. 

Wash your hands - Here is a simple, yet challenging statement.  What does it mean to wash your hands?  To reveal and have it cleaned.  You can't clean your hands hidden in your pockets.  You need to expose them.  You aren't dealing with sin if you are hiding it.  Expose it to the light.  This is confession and repentance.  If you aren't confessing your sins, know that they will not get out of your way as you try to get closer to God

Grieve, mourn and wail - If distance from God, if sin, do not grieve you, I promise you that your heart doesn't actually desire to get close to God.  Until your distance from God grieves you the motivation will be lacking

Humble yourself - And finally, in summation.  Be humble.  This means, it's not about you.  It's about God.  It's not about what you want.  It's not about what you can get, its not about your ideas and plans.  It's all about God.  God alone.  

So friends.  Get off the endless hamster wheel of self-improvement narcissism as you attempt to finally fix that brokenness you can't ignore when the night creeps in and the noise of a distracted life fades away.  You have a true condition that lies at the root of all your problems.  The answer isn't finding more affirmation, but more worship and obedience to your creator.  And when you love Christ above all, you will know you are loved beyond imagination.  Because only He who died for you can love you in the way your broken heart desperately wishes for.   

Freedom and Obedience

What it looked like when my friend started our fire

Like most red blooded American males, I love starting bonfires and burning stuff(legally!!).  The bigger the bonfire, the better.  One of my favorite memories is a big party I threw at my parents house in college and we had built a giant pile of wood and rubbish...then we doused it with gasoline....I know terrible idea...and my friend Matt did the honors of lighting it on fire.

He was being "safe" by lighting a long stick on fire and slowly getting it closer and closer to the gasoline soaked pile.  There was a moment of delay as he touched the burning end of the stick to the pile where nothing happened, and then...

WOOOSSSHHHHHHH

A giant fireball exploded AROUND Matt as the gasoline fumes and the pile all lit at the same time.  There was an audible boom that could be heard a few houses away.  Luckily Matt only lost some arm hair.  Do not try this at your own home though.

The woooosshhhh and the boom were the sounds of the oxygen being rapidly consumed from the surrounding area and the collapse of air to fill the void left by the hunger of the fire for air.

Which seems so contradictory on the surface.  If you ever tried to light a candle while a kid keeps blowing at it, you know that the air puts it out.  Yet, if you place a flame in an airless vacuum it will immediately die.

Air might seem like an enemy to fire, but without it, there is no fire.  It was actually one of the saddest discoveries of my youth that all the amazing explosions in Star Wars were completely fictional because there wouldn't be a fiery ball of death in the airless vacuum of space(not to mention no lightsabers possible either)

In the same way freedom only truly exists where it is balanced with obedience.

There is this idea that rules or standards are by definition limiting on freedom.  If you tell me "no" it is in some way directly conflicting with my autonomous free will and squashing my freedom.  So much of our western civilizations rot today is the outflow of the idea that my own personal feelings, desires, "truth", is all that matters and anyone who gets in the way of that is oppressive in some capacity.  When the truth is that doing whatever you want is the most oppressive life you could imagine.

Let me easily prove it.

Every choice that you make has intended and UNINTENDED consequences.  It doesn't matter what you intended, you can't help but be faced with the multiplying effect of unintended consequences of every choice you make.

Example 1:  I am "free" to jump off the top of a tall building.
Intended Consequence: I want to feel the thrill and rush of the wind.
Unintended Consequence:  I am now dead.  Freedom is completely gone

Example 2:  I am "free" to cheat in my math class
Intended Consequence:  I get a better grade
Unintended Consequence:  I either get caught and get kicked out/flunk, OR, I simply never learn the actual material and limit my future self from all that I could have been capable of.

Example 3:  I am "free" to steal something from you
Intended Consequence:  I get something for nothing
Unintended Consequence:  You got jail and lose a whole bunch of freedom.

While those might seem like overly simplistic examples, think about it just a bit.  When we operate in a way that doesn't take into account the world around us, often what feels initially like freedom becomes the swinging door of the jail cell we have constructed for ourselves.

To truly maximize freedom is not about doing as much as we could possibly imagine we should be "allowed" to do, but to instead understand the reality of the world in which we live and operate within the bounds of what is true.

In Galatians 5:1 we are told,

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.   

Perhaps you are tempted to say Jesus WANTS me to be FREE.  What is this all about obedience Adam??

When Paul closes this statement with, "a yoke of slavery", he isn't talking about people giving you rules.  He is talking about living a life for sin.  Jesus came to give us freedom, not to do whatever we can come up with, but to instead experience the freedom to do what we are actually made for in this life and for eternity.  When we live according to sin, in opposition to God's word, it often feels free at first, but it is ultimately a yoke of slavery that slowly removes the freedom from your life that you thought you were getting.

Jesus came to give us hope FOR obedience, and it is an obedience that provides FREEDOM.

James puts it this way in James 1:25

But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it--not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it--they will be blessed in what they do.

The LAW(God's word) GIVES freedom.  Not just the hearing of it, but in the DOING of God's word.  Without the oxygen of life that is breathed into us that is Godly obedience we are left with a false freedom, one that ultimately enslaves and takes away any hopes we might have to be truly free.

God's law is good.  And it isn't a bunch of arbitrary rules because God is a killjoy, but because God made you.  He knows you better than you know yourself.

And He knows that you are made for more than what you see in front of you today.

But the choices you make today impact not just tomorrow, but all your tomorrows.

Exercising your freedom in conflict with God's truth is like ignoring gravity because you think you deserve to feel the wind blow through your hair after jumping off a tall building.  It WILL be thrilling at first.

Yet that freedom ends in a fall that will end in a markedly unfree sort of way.

One of the joys of parenting is seeing this principle play out in small ways with children.  They often do not want to trust you when it comes to certain tasks or skills.  As if they, after 4 years of age, know much better what it takes to ride a bike then their ancient parent does.  They WANT to ride the bike, they want to have that fun.  And you want it for them too.

But they struggle with trusting you.  Just like we struggle with trusting God.  They struggle believing you.  Like we struggle believing God.

And then, they accept your help and they do things the right way, they follow the steps.  And you can see the joy that overtakes them when they whip down the driveway the first time on their own and realize a whole new world of freedom has opened up before them.

Too bad they don't remember that life lesson the next time you are trying to help them with something difficult ;)

Our freedom as people, image bearers of God, is like that.  We want to resist God's truth.  We say, no, that can't be freedom, that sounds too restrictive, too overbearing.  Yet, when we truly and fully let God have his way and trust him, a whole new world of freedom opens up before us.

There is no fire without oxygen.

There is no freedom without obedience.

Exhausted by Holiness, or, Why Can't I Do Enough

Actual footage of me trying to save myself

Have you ever felt your value is measured in what you do, or, what you can produce?  That every relationship you have is in some way transactional?  If you do "this", then you will be valued, if you can behave just a little bit better than you will receive the love/care/respect/etc that you desperately are desiring?  

To add to that, there is also the powerful sense that we are in a "what have you done for me lately" world.  Maybe I was valued yesterday because I did great that day, but today, I didn't do so hot, so I am no longer someone worthy.  

Exhausting.

Human history is shaped by this constant grasping after feeling "ok" knowing that at any moment we will still mess up, fall short, and be cast out.  Even when you observe religion you see a list of tasks that must be perfectly completed or you will be out! 

And this religious impulse through history is even put into practice in all our new modes of "religion" today.  Think about all the social movements that exist.  Whether BLM, Me Too, Political parties, Eco Justice, etc.  It doesn't take long for the group that you desperately tried to be accepted by to turn on you because all your previous good work is cast aside when you mess up on one area.  

Your best is never going to be good enough.  

Our spiritual struggle is the deeply internal acknowledgement that something is wrong.  Wrong with the world around us, wrong in our relationships, wrong in ourselves.  Even at our best, there are the hidden parts of ourselves(and sometimes not so hidden) that shout out, "This is not ok, this is not right, there is something wrong".  

Most of the time we are quite capable of stringing together enough obvious "good" in our lives that we can hold at bay the thoughts of inadequacy.  In the West, we are almost experts at this.  We can fill our lives with so much entertainment and comfort that we can stave off these feelings almost indefinitely.  But it always comes due at some point.  

It shouldn't come as a surprise that in an era of the greatest prosperity and material comfort and "ethical" living we have an ever increasing, at record levels, mental health issues of depression, anxiety and hopelessness.  

How is this possible?  The external world is improving, yet our internal lives are falling apart.  

It IS possible because we are a people desperate for absolution.  And all our comforts and self-pleasing behaviors offer no such thing as forgiveness and absolution. We intrinsically see that our internal and external realities are at war with the state and condition with reality.  The Apostle Paul points out in Romans chapter 2 that even those who claim there is not God, fall short of their own standards.  Entertainment and distraction just shoves the problems down deeper where they fester and rot. 

And when we fall short of what we hope for and there is no hope for absolution, we are left anxious and depressed.  

We pursue an exhausting form of "holiness".  The rules are constantly changing, the judges are arbitrary and often capricious in their verdicts. 

But why is this so?  

In God's Word we see where it started, but are also pointed to where it is going.

Genesis lays out our ultimate issue that started in the garden.  Adam and Eve did not just want to disobey God, they wanted to be the ones calling the shots.(to be God ourselves free of consequence-Gen 3:4-5).  At that moment in history the heart of all of our issues that we struggle with today are painted in stark fashion.

We are made for God.

We are made with a purpose.

We rebel and break the vertical relationship with our creator and it ricochets to destroy our horizontal relationships with each other and the rest of creation.(Genesis 3:12-19)

And we are incapable of truly fixing it all.  

So we get on the hamster wheel and think if we can just run a bit farther, a bit faster, a bit more passionately, then, then we can see and feel our desperately desired absolution.  And we are tired as we see as much as we have worked, we are still in the same spot.

But God.

But God, loves us.  He created us for Himself, with a purpose, to have a relationship with Him. 

When Jesus, God the Son, saw His people tired, beat up, worn down, he looked at them with compassion.(Matthew 9:36)

When Jesus went to the Cross his compassion was an active work of healing and restoring as he declared "It is Finished"(John 19:30)

Not, lets get started, here is all the work to do.  It. Is. Finished.  

But Adam(this is you talking here)..But Adam, if it is finished, what are we supposed to be doing to make sure we are loved by God???  Are you saying we can do whatever we want??????

So let me double down with what Paul says in Galatians 3

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. 2 I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? 3 Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh? 4 Have you experienced so much in vain—if it really was in vain? 5 So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard? 6 So also Abraham “believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

What Paul is dealing with is that after starting off their relationship with God based on the love of Christ and His finished work, they are now trying to reverse engineer their salvation and absolution of sins through all the works they can do to look good enough.

Stop it.

Jesus said IT IS FINISHED.  He meant it.

So what DO we do about sins in our lives and in the lives of the people we love.

This is how John puts it in 1 John 3

2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. 3 All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

What makes us like Christ according to John?  What purifies us?  

John doesn't say, "you will be like Christ and purified when you start doing the right stuff".  He says when you place your hope in Christ and look upon Him and truly see and know him THAT will be what changes us.

So here is the false bill of goods we are often sold that is directly contrasted from what God's Word actually says.

FALSE NARRATIVE:

1- There is a problem in you and the world

2- You better do do do do to fix it or carry around guilt

3-  If you do enough good stuff you MIGHT be ok, hopefully

4- And if you want to be right with God in all of this don't forget all of those rules too

GOD'S TRUTH

1- There is a problem in you and the world

2- You can't do better by doing more, God will take away your guilt and shame

3- When you experience that and look to Him in hope you WILL be ok

4- Because you are right with God already, your natural behavior changes because of God in you as your place your hope in Him as you look upon Him in truth

Stop trying to make yourself ok.  Lay down your burdens and look on a savior who perfectly did for you what you could never truly accomplish.  Give up the exhausting lie that you can absolve yourself and achieve holiness.  You will never be holy.  But Christ is.  And he calls you to enjoy Him forever.  

Who's The Boss, or, the Heart of Sin

This is the snake my son saw, can someone
identify it exactly??

As many of you know, I am an avid indoorsmen.  Do not let my rugged features and unkempt beard fool you.  My comfort with literature and feelings is significantly greater than my skills with tools and a trek through the woods. 

Recently the family and I went on a nature walk at a park by the Maumee river and my 10 year old discovered a very large snake in a large pile of rocks.  As most 10 year old boys would be he was very excited and could not wait to GRAB AN UNIDENTIFIED SNAKE THAT WAS 6 FT LONG!!!!!!!! 

This created quite a fun little argument between us.  As previously mentioned, I am not someone who is well versed in the things of nature, let alone which snakes are friendly and love being picked up by 10 year olds and which snakes will kill you with venom.  Firmly I told him to not try to poke him with a stick so that it would move close enough to grab.  He did not appreciate me "babying" him.  Because, obviously, at 10 years of age he is an expert on snakes and totally knows he will be fine.  I asked him to name the snake with 100% certainty and to tell me about its bite and venom. 

He could not.....

Teaching moments abound with children and their choices.  When you can't be certain about the danger of something, the risk of dying, or being seriously injured is far too great to just do whatever you want to do I told him.  Like most kids, he did not respond well to my wisdom. 

In the end I forced him to move on and he spent the rest of the day being angry that I just wouldn't "trust him".  I had taken a picture of  the snake and later was able to identify it as a poisonous snake that COULD HAVE KILLED HIM.  He was slightly apologetic. 

My sons reaction that day was a microcosm of our human condition.  Specifically, that we want to be the lords of our own lives and we want to believe that doing so will be consequence free.  In Genesis chapter 3 the serpent entices Eve with two powerful and attractive lies:

1- You do not need to listen to God and His standards, you can know for YOURSELF what is good and bad

2- You will not die(suffer consequences for rebellion)

Our world is in the constant state of pain and destruction that believing those two lies.  Each of us wants to believe that we know better than God.  I know what is true for ME.  God, my creator and sustainer, is WRONG.  We have set our eyes on such narrow and limited pleasures and hopes.  God has created us for much more than we can even see, yet we turn our backs on Him and scream "MINE". 

And then as pain and shame and guilt pile up we act surprised.  The response to rebelling against God and His word was shame and destruction and a distance between themselves and God,

"The woman was convinced.  She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious and she wanted the wisdom it would give her.  So she took some of fruit and ate it.  Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he at it too.  At that moment their eyes were opened and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness"- Genesis 3:6-7

It looks so good when we are staring longingly at the idea of being our own personal god.  To be wise.  To be in control.  To shake our fist at the world and demand it conform to our own will.  We reach out to pluck it from its branch to indulge our self-centerdness with the hope and expectation that this will finally be the answer to all our questions. 

And then we know shame.

And guilt.

And separation. 

There is a quote from Ravi Zaccharias that I think on often as I struggle with my own propensity to demand that my will is greater than Gods remind me of the truth that lies try to hide.

“Sin will take you farther than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay. –”

― R Zaccharias

You can claim all you want that the snake won't bite.  But it will. 

Trust God.  He alone is good.  And even when it is hard.  He is the only one who knows what you truly need. 

What IS the Gospel?

We throw around a lot of words in our day to day lives that we do not always have a complete grasp on its meaning.  One of my favorite movies, The Princess Bride, we see one character constantly yell "Inconceivable" as the event he is stating is inconceivable is actually happening.  Which leads another character to plainly state "you keep saying that word, I do not think you know what it means".

As Christians, there are a lot of big and fun theological words we like to throw around to prove our bona fides with other believers, and hopefully appear quite smart to outsiders.  But the most important word we say, and often do not grasp fully, or explain totally, is "Gospel".

The straightforward answer to what IS the Gospel, is, Good News.  Specifically that Christ died for sinners.  And that is the greatest good news of all the good news that could have ever been news'd.  But there is a lot to it that we miss.  And when we miss the details, we are missing a richness and a power that is the engine that drives the good news.

Jesus starts His ministry in Mark 1 with this proclamation.

 15 “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”

"There it is" you shout.  Jesus does use the word Gospel here which is often rendered as "good news".  Do not miss though that there is a powerful context that can't be skipped over to shout "Good News".

First Part:  The time has come--The Bible describes all of creation groaning(Romans 8:22) in anticipation of God's redemption of His creation.  Jesus is announcing to those of us who are desperately waiting on redemption and healing that the promised time has come.

And what is the important context of that time arriving??

Second Part:  The kingdom of God has come near---  Jesus does not say, God has come to help you out in your life.  This is IMPORTANT.  God is KING.  And it is HIS kingdom that is coming to bring about that which creation has been groaning for.  And our first HONEST response should be FEAR.

All of Romans 2 explains why.  God is Holy and will judge all people.  There will be no place to hide.  No excuses to be made.  The kingdom of God is His and all those who are in sin will be eternally separated from God.  By God's very nature His holiness will not fellowship with sin.  When the kingdom of God comes, you are either His, or in sin, and those in sin will face what the Bible calls Hell.

Third Part:  Repent--- The Biblical word Repent is another one we often misuse.  It isn't simply a statement of "I'm Sorry"  It means an active turning FROM sin and going TOWARDS God.  This part of Jesus's call in Mark chapter 1 is that all of creation has been waiting for the Holy and Righteous King to come and establish HIS Kingdom and therefore, you and I, need to run to God and away from sin.

Fourth Part:  And believe the Good News--- Here is what the good news is really all about.  You and I are DEAD in our sins(Ephesians 2).  But Christ enters into death on our behalf, and defeats it.  In our sin and death we CANNOT run from Sin, but the good news is that Christ dives into our sin, pays our price and carries us towards the Father.

The Good News is never about what we have done in response to the coming of a Holy King who will Judge all, but it is about our inability to save ourselves and, by faith, believing in the work of Christ that has been done on our behalf.

See, no matter where you are at right now, God IS coming to establish HIS kingdom.  He is not coming to fix some stuff up for you and clean up our messes to make things more palatable for us. The Good News is that redemption is coming, and YOU can be a part of it BECAUSE of Jesus.

That is the Gospel.

Laundry and Marathons

This would be a great holiday

There are some things in life that I hope to only do one time. 

Get tonsils removed, go to high school, have braces, and.... do laundry. 

When I was in college and the task of keeping my clothes decently wearable fell upon me I would stretch out time between cleaning as long as possible.  Practicing the old "sniff" test to verify that I indeed had a few more days to go.  And honestly it wasn't even that hard to do then.  I barely cared if it was wrinkled and we had a washer and dryer in the house I shared with my friends.  After the dryer would ding I could just throw it in a basket and grab clothes straight from there without even needing to put them away in "drawers".

Getting married and then having kids really changes a mans perspective on what constitutes "clean" clothes.  It's one thing to look like a slob as a 19 year old college student, but you can't send your children off to school with stains on their shirts.  And your wife won't go out with you in an embarassingly wrinkly smelly ensemble. 

And here is the terrible thing about laundry with a family.  It is NEVER FINISHED!!!!

As fast as I get it done there is still a pile of it ready to be started.  The washer and dryer could be on literally 24 hours a day and I don't think that it would be overkill. 

Whether it is an overwhelming task, or a simple part of the day, has been directly the result of my chosen consistency with it.  The amount of work laundry for 6 people takes is always going to be exactly what it is.  The way it impacts and controls me has nothing to do with the amount of it, but my approach.

If every day I take steps to keep it moving, it almost becomes a task that takes no thinking or effort.  There is no "all day" laundry day that everything else has to be put on hold to deal with.  When I put it off until "I have the time", the time that it piles up to needing to confiscate from my life is overwhelming. 

Laundry is not a sprint.  It is a marathon.  It requires a constant moving forward.  Not in a furious cacophony of limbs swinging wildly, but a deliberate daily discipline of one step in front of the other knowing that it will not be a task that is over anytime soon. 

All of our life.  Or, at least the things that matter.  Are like that.  We are so good at putting off that which we should be doing.  To save it for "some day".  When there is "enough time".  When that other stuff is "taken care of".  And drip by steady and reliable drip it piles up the little issues until we are overwhelmed and consumed by a mountain.

The Apostle Paul gets right to the root of our problem as he addresses our spiritual malaise,

24 Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 25 Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. 26 Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. 27 No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.- 1 Cor 9:24-27

We run our lives so aimlessly so often.  Then we are surprised when our relationship with God feels so distant and bleh.  All week long we put off who God is calling us to be, to do those simple steps with the hopes that we can save it all up for a marathon spiritual connection on Sunday mornings. 

And we get farther and farther behind. 

Are you living your life like you are after a prize.  No, there is no trophy for a caught up laundry room.  But a person who disciplines themselves to run hard after God every single day will not regret it.  But we will always regret letting it slip and fall farther and farther behind.

This plays into all areas of our life.  Think about the many important things that God has given you responsibility for.  How many of them have you avoided the daily work of working towards the goal that is set before you.  Instead we avoid and deflect always telling ourselves that later we can do that work when we are really ready for it.  And far too often there is never a later. 

Stop running FROM what God has for you and start running TOWARDS God.  One day your race will come to an end.  Don't be found never having even started. 

Testing Wet Paint by Touching, or, What is Good Grief?

Thomas did not practice social distancing

Obtuseness is a genetic condition that runs in my family and has lodged itself quite deeply into my DNA.  What I mean is that I have a preternatural gift for making things much harder on myself than they needed to be.  When I come upon a sign affixed to a wall labeled "Do Not Touch, Wet Paint", I will be soooo "careful" and touch it with just a little tap of a finger just to be sure it really is wet paint. 

I so do wish that I was able to hear the instruction the first time, to heed the warning at its first cry.  But there is something deeply woven into me that only trusts what I can see, touch and experience in a practical(and sometimes hurtful way).  Like the Disciple Thomas, who had spent 3 years of his life at the feet of Jesus.  He had seen the miracles, heard the words, experienced the power and majesty of the Son of God, yet even as everyone else was able to celebrate the resurrection he just had to touch it with a little tap of his own finger to just see for himself.

Perhaps in the years to come he thought back to that moment that Jesus didn't rebuke him for his doubting, but instead invited him to touch and see for himself.  Even though we call him "Doubting Thomas" today, Jesus was gracious and let Thomas do what he needed to do as he struggled in his own heart to grasp what was right in front of his face. 

I wonder if knowing Jesus loved him enough to let him "find out for himself" was what gave him the confidence to travel as a missionary to India where he would be killed for his faith.  A man who had to touch to believe, believed in that hope to the point of dying for others far from his home. 

Even though I am slow to learn, here is my good news, God is very patient with me.  And He loves me enough to do whatever it takes to help me grow.  This is good news for you as well.  God will let us go through what we need to for the sake of finding Him there at the end of our desperate attempts to try to be in control and figure it all out for ourselves. 

Often our obtuseness leads to heart ach, but the Apostle Paul presents it to us this way,

"Fod Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death"- 2 Corinthians 7:10

I think Thomas was grieved over feeling doubtful in the presence of Jesus, but it was a Godly grief.  It was a grief that drove Him TO Jesus for help.  And Jesus met him there in his struggle and doubt.  And it changed the trajectory of his life to live with boldness, and without regret. 

Worldly grief is a grief that drives us away from God.  Instead of a heart willing to cry out, "Help me God", it says, "I won't let that happen to me again". 

God lets us test and see and experience grief and heartache SO THAT we turn more fully to Him.  But far to often, we do not bring our grief to the cross, we hold it up as a wall and a shield to keep out more risks and possible pain.  And then our grief never meets its healer and will eventually consume us. 

The love God has for us is such that He will let us touch that wet paint, make that stupid choice, wade through the consequences of sin and pain.  He invites us to come to Him WITHOUT all those stupid detours, but He is patient with us when we jump into the mud.  He wades right in with us and carries us out.  And He lets that grief drive us closer to Him. 

Sometimes the grief is because of what we have done, and sometimes the grief is just because life is really hard.  But we choose if it is Godly and will lead to life, or, if it is a grief that will lead to death.