Son Number One: Reuben

In the Old Testament Jacob, that sneaky younger brother, was blessed by God and given a new name, Israel.Though we may be familiar with some of his sons, maybe Joseph, Benjamin and Judah, perhaps even Levi, I thought it could be interesting to do snippets of some of the lesser known sons.

Reuben.

Reuben is the first-born son of Jacob. His mother is Leah. Now if you recall the marriage of Jacob and Leah was . . . well Leah's dad, Labon, really worked one over Jacob. Jacob was beshnooked by Rachel the first time he saw her. And like any rational young man, Jacob agreed to work for Rachel's father, Labon, for 7 entire years in order to gain Rachel's hand in marriage. But Labon, being an honorable scum bag, tricked Jacob. After Jacob's 7 years of working for Labon the wedding was at hand; the party ensued and the veiled bride was brought into the marriage chamber. After consummating the marriage, morning broke and revealed a terrible truth the Jacob: he had married Leah, Rachel's older and uglier sister. Oops. (In some way though, Labon was doing his fatherly duty; sorry Jacob).

Needless to say, coming from Leah, Reuben was not the most favorite of Jacob's sons. Leah had put all her hope in her son, hoping that because of Reuben Jacob would like her; in fact, the name Reuben means 'See, a son.' So she is saying to Jacob at this time, 'Look! Look what I've given you; won't you love me now?'

In Chapter 35 of Genesis we see Reuben take his elder brother privileges a bit far, for he sleeps with his father's concubine. That's right, he sleeps with the one whom his father has made children with--more about that alter.

You remember when all of Josephs older brothers were jealous of him and wanted to kill Joseph? Well remember that Joseph was not actually killed, rather he was sold into slavery? That change in plans was because of Reuben. So some of the brothers were sitting around plotting Joseph's murder and Reuben walks up with a staff in his hand and asks, 'What's up guys? Just tending to some sheep or what?' They reply, 'We are going to kill our young brother. That's what's going on.' Reuben, a bit taken back, 'Ugh, I don't think that's a fantastic idea like y'all do. I hate him too but if he I don't want that blood on my hands. Let's sell him in a pit instead.' (Reuben actually wanted to throw him in a pit so he could save him later.) So there you have it, Reuben came in (sorta) for the rescue. And when, I guess when Reuben was on a smoke break (?), the brothers sold Joseph to some passer-by and Reuben found out about it he tore his clothes--which was what they did in distress back then--and took Joseph's old robe and dipped in blood and telling his father that Joseph, unfortunately, was eaten by wolves.

Reuben never forgot about this incident and years later when the famine came and Joseph, who was in disguise, wanted to make his brothers nervous in Egypt, Reuben looked back and said, 'See!! I told you God would not let this go!' He, apparently, was backing-packing this guilt the whole time.

Well when ole dad was gettin up there in years he decided to go ahead and bless all of his boys. At this time and place in the world the oldest brother would receive almost, if not, all of his father's inheritance, along with all the power. So Reuben should rightly be thinking to himself, 'This is it, this is when I finally get all the blessing my father received from his father and God.' And when Jacob began, it seemed like it would happen that way. But it didn't turn out so good for Reuben. Jacob said clearly that because Reuben slept with Jacob's concubine he would not receive his inheritance normally due him. This would have rocked the socks off of Reuben in the worst and most disappointing of ways. In addition, it was said in that Reuben's line would be small--not a lot of people in comparison--this coming from Deuteronomy 33.

In the end, in Revelation, Reuben is still favored by God and blessed along with most of the other tribes of Israel.

It is important, I think, to see that sin has some very real and very lasting consequences. But we can also see that God's grace and love fulfill his promises and desires to do good to those who love him and repent.

helping others? I need help!

Have you ever had this thought: ‘I can’t help; I don’t have all my ducks in a row either’? Well I have. You’ve, no doubt, heard the saying, ‘I’m just a beggar showing other beggars where to find bread.’ We should accept this, realizing that the beggar is still begging. I’ve often wondered if Peter felt like an idiot saying anything after he betrayed Jesus and left his leader and friend to be killed all by himself. If I’m honest, if I were Peter I might not say anything ever again in public. Mess-ups and failures and sins are not the end; they are not what define those who are God’s children.

Take it from one who has, messing up in life does not disqualify you from helping others. Actually, if we are smart, we look to older people who have messed up but kept going. Wisdom fears God and within that idea is repentance, courage, hope, accepting God’s forgiveness, proceeding. If we are tagged only by what we’ve failed at we will be of no help to others. 

We sin. I hate sinning. It sucks the life out of everyone. But it isn’t the end. Jesus said so when he woke up from the grave. Life together with God is the end. Though all may be against you today, God is for you. And that gives us reason to help out our co-beggars. The bible doesn’t say we must be without fault before we can give a parched person some water; God doesn’t say, ‘You better have all your spiritual ducks in a row before you forgive that person!!’ No, the sinning and screwing up does not need to be our life pattern anymore and if we have a way of encouraging another who is walking this difficult path we should use it, for ‘we all have gone astray, everyone to his own way’ and ‘there is no one who is righteous, not even one.’ 

So do you have that friend who you can help today? Don’t grow your past faults by withdrawing, go and help. We must not want others to experience the fire as we have. This is to love others more than yourself.

how often can you fail?

Failure is a word I hate. Not that I infrequently encounter it, rather that it and I are too acquainted. For many, failure is associated with 'losing,' with 'not measuring up,' with 'not good enough,' with 'others are better,' with 'messed up,' and so on. And with some, it quickly unravels to the thought of 'no one, not even God or my closest family likes me.'

Failure is a field where lies can grow. Failure is also a pause in time where, if it is not met with goodness, can harm for years to come. I've felt many many times. Whatever arena it is found--sports, morality, relationships, writing--it can crush a soul.

But we don't have to live in the presence of our past; we don't have to wake up and live in the memory of yesteryear. It is not some magical mind trick; it is Jesus. 

All the times toy have not failed will never satisfy you. You can do 1,000 things perfectly right and the one thing you failed in will ruin it all. And if you did 1,000,000,000,000 things right you'd feel even WORSE about the one failure! You can't escape the imperfection of who you are. But we can go to Jesus in our imperfection and know that we are forgiven, we are loved, our existence is worth maintaining.

We are all going to fail in a multitude of magnitude and type. But if we are walking with Jesus our failures don't win; he wins. Death won't sting, it'll open a big door entering Jesus' brothers and sisters into an eternity without the torment of those mistakes we all have made.

God is good in his grace he grandiosely provides. If we are his, our failure loses, not us.

forgetting your memory

We sometimes like to use Paul's words in Philippians, where he says, 'forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,' as a reason to never ever be thankful or delighted to be the Christian God has made us. We reason that if Paul is ditching everything in his past to go hard after more and more of God then, by golly, so should we!

The over-the-top people always offend everyone else because they tell everyone how terrible of a Christian they are by not being like them; but then there are others who are all about some self-abasing-but-I-actually-pride-myself-a-lot inner thoughts kinda folks--it's easier to harbor my feelings of arrogance than manifest them. But both run with Paul's words of forgetting what's behind.

Is this past-neglecting really a commendable mental exercise?

No.

In the Old Testament God often told people to make memorials. This usually happened after God did something to save the people or fulfill a promise. The purpose of these, usually, mountains of rocks was for the purpose of remembering what God had done, how God blessed his people. When a family was traveling or exploring and they came across, say the monument built after the Jordan River crossing, it was to be used as a reference for a story; a story of how God, the YHWH they still worshiped, freed them and brought them, after 40 years of chasing their tail, to a Promised Land.

I personally, like some red-faced and sweating boss, want results immediately--YESTERDAY!--and it better be new and exciting. I have a hard time soaking in what God has done already. And Paul isn't saying Be unsatisfied with your worship; be unsatisfied with God; be unsatisfied in your walk with Jesus! Paul goes on to say Let us hold on to what we have already attained.

So let's remember what God has done. Let God's acts of time past give faith for today.

Jesus needed help

The Gospel according to Luke has some different perspectives than the other Gospels, especially with regard to Jesus' last days. So in Luke 22.43 we read that an angel from Heaven appeared to Jesus in his distress and strengthened Jesus.

Don't miss that: an angel from Heaven strengthened Jesus! 

I think it would be far too easy, though helpful, to summarize and say, 'If Jesus needed help, so do we.' But there is something bigger and better going on! God the Father knew that his son needed strengthening and the Father provided that strength for his son.

I don't know what the Greek word translated into 'strengthen' means, except strengthen; meaning, there was a lack or a need of provision form without. The Man needed God. God needed God. And God provided what was needed.

I'll be the first to admit that I also don't understand all the intricacies of Jesus' manhood and divinity at play here, it's all as clear as mud to me. That isn't the point though. This doesn't mean that God will give you everything you think you need. We can't take one story and mean it will happen for everyone.

But, as the children's song goes, 'when we are weak he is strong' because God loves us, his sons and daughters.

I'm not listening!

A silly strand of reason exists in some minds: if someone is wrong about one thing, they are more than likely not accurate in most. To believe such a farce is foolishness at its brightest.

You know what I'm talking about, right? Say you are listening to your new favorite broadcast. You have been learning interesting little facts about whatever and boom, the speaker says something you completely and from your core disagree with. Suddenly you've not only personally boycotted the now formerly new favorite person, but your tweets and Facebook status bemoans the individual (and if you are from the American South, you may add a 'but bless his heart' at the end.)

But I don't do that at all, you say. Oh yes you do, we do it all the time. A reason why we often think we don't fall into such a thing is because we do it to book writers. I will briefly give some reasons why you should read authors you know you don't agree with:

1. They may say just something helpful. Sure, you think they are snide, arrogant and better off living in Antarctica but who knows where something helpful might come from.

2. They may be more than their phrases. I know that often I can hear one thing come from someone's mouth (or pen) and assume ten thousand things about that person. How dumb is that? That's like meeting someone for the first time; they sneeze in the first five minutes and you assume their body is devolving and they are gonna die soon. Yea, doesn't make a lick of sense, so let's not do it with people's words.

3. We are arrogant and prejudice and opinionated ourselves. We assume that we are not only correct in our opinion--which we may or may not be--but that the other person is a little lower on the respect chain than the apes in Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

4. We could be wrong... (gasp)....Ahem, I said we could be wrong! I know, I know; it is a terrible thing to think that our thoughts are not divinely inspired, beating a golden path of righteousness as we go, but...

5. We need to learn to familiarize and respect contrary opinions. Many resist the counter (I'm not talking about running away from table-tops), they plug their ears when they smell something different. We need to learn how to walk into uncomfortable arenas of thought; shut up; listen; learn and not dismiss everything as asinine or sophomoric or from the Devil. Respect does not mean aqueous, get trampled on or accept everything. It means understand the idea and not resort to sophisticated belligerence and name calling.

There is an old saying: Learn to eat the meat and throw away the bone. When you eat a chicken wing you eat the meat, not the bone. This saying is applied to listening. If you willingly listen to someone who might think upside down from you and not immediately discount them, you will learn!

I thought this was a biblical blog? It is. Because of what Jesus did in dying for sins and coming back to life, sticking it to sin and death, we don't have to be right all the time. That doesn't mean we should ignorantly live and be okay in our stupidity; rather, we can know that ultimately God's truth will always, in the very end, be revealed and win out. We can be humble enough to listen to other people and not tune them out because those who have been saved completely by someone elses doing are already humbled (we just forget it most days).

Any thoughts or additions? Please comment.        

puppy joy

I have a puppy. She is almost 5 months old. There were often times when I would go to let her out of her crate and notice that she had peed everywhere and, apparently not caring too much, laid in her own mess. But when I came to the crate door she would go crazy! Her mouth was open; her body was grooving; her tail whipping around. She didn't seem to remember how gross she was. In her joy of seeing me--and probably anyone else who would let her out--she disregarded her mess and stinky odor.

We should be more like her. We are constantly screwing up and making significant messes. But God continues to come; God continues to love. I am not at all saying we should be cool with our sin; but because of repentance and what Jesus has accomplished on our behalf we should not refuse joy. 

For some reason, I have a meter in my mind: if I sin I have to wait a certain time limit before being okay with God, before I can crack a smile. This is a lie, though. There is not a word in the bible about mortifying yourself for God, for repentance. John Owen, a long-time dead guy, said that we have to be killing sin or sin will be killing us. This is true. But we are not to be like the priest in The Scarlet Letter who would wound himself after committing sin. No, Jesus died for our sin; we need to add nothing. I don't want to sin and I don't want you to sin but, as the end of the book of Jude reminds us, it is God who will keep us from stumbling and who will present us without blemish and in joy before the Father. 

We should be quick to remember our Savior's strength, not our sinful succumbing. Because of Jesus' life, death and resurrection, sin is no longer a gateway to wrath; Jesus has tread on sin and unplugged its power. 

So we have the opportunity for joy, even in our messes, for God has done what we could not; he took a three-day trip where we would have been obligated to live; he undid all that we made and gave all that we could never earn. So we could wag our tails in his presence.

How can God work this out?

How many times have you said or thought some form of this: I just don't see how God can do anything with this situation or I don't see how God can work this out!

For me, it is easy to quickly conclude God a bad planner when my life stinks. I'll have a problem and see no solution in front of me so I naturally think God has abandoned me and humanity altogether. Maybe you are not so untrusting, but I can be. God, I don't see your solution; and if what I am living is your solution, it stinks. Often entrusting yourself to God feels like riding on a new roller coaster blind folded: you have no idea what to expect and where you'll be thrown and sometimes you wonder if this new, untested coaster is going to break your neck or come off the tracks.

Well, in this uneasy water of God's control we read Isaiah 55.8, 9. It explains that God's thoughts are altogether different and better than all of humanity's collective wisdom!

This is amazing! It is not as though we are speaking Japanese and God only speaks French. No, the difference is more like comparing an ants ability to reason with Albert Einstein: God is just better; his thoughts are more and other compared to ours. Our thoughts are glimpses into his whole understanding; sparks compared to his universe of wisdom.

You may say, who cares? If you are a Christian, you should care. If you are not a Christian, you should care. If God is fashioning a plan superior to ours than we can (again) entrust ourselves to his care. Through the disobedient child, the tooth ache, the car that broke again, the lost pet, the broken relationship, the joblessness, the whatever your hard and frustrating life circumstance, through all of these things God is weaving a brilliant story that will ultimately end in making God look good and his followers being loved and cared for.

Remember how the in the Bible we are told that each human's life is so short it is like a breath or a vapor? All of time is a story, your chapter may look like total chaos but the end is coming. Heaven and the new earth are waiting to burst on the scene; God is ready to release the goodness and grandeur of his glory, for they are being held back like a race horse chomping at the bit ready to go do its thing.

Where we cannot see or conceive God gave us faith to believe.

you're a cannibal too

When I heard about some guy in Miami caught on camera literally eating another living person, I wanted to throw up. I thought to myself, ‘Welp, here we go; we are at that level now in the states’ (knowing fully that crazy, stomach turning occasions have been going on for as long as sand has existed). My vomitous reaction was quickly overcome by a sense of brutal, hot anger when I heard that people were cheering this flesh eating druggie because they thought it was cool that there was someone who acted like a zombie. (Please, if you are one of the foolish morons, don’t tell me.) I mean what is WRONG with you!? Do you realize that is a soul-filled human being who was created in the image of God—both of them? And the cannibal—induced by some weird drug—was shot to death like a rabid dog. After my blood vessels receded back to invisibility I trembled at a startling reality: nothing prevents me from being the homeless victim, the frightened policemen, the cheering video watcher, or the human eating deceased, except God’s mercy and grace.


I have amazing parents and family; wonderful friends constantly surround me; our cities—for the most part—are ruled with some order and some sense of justice—especially compared to some countries I’ve lived in. But to understand sin is to understand the evil which can become anyone. Sin is as toxic as Chernobyl.

Most of you won’t try and believe that you could eat someone’s face, that’s okay; it is a super disturbing thought. But know that you are not exempt from the terrors of becoming, of doing horrific acts against God and man. The ONLY thing which prevents you is the mercy and grace of our sovereign God restraining you. Nothing else. Not your little self-help, motivating books or sayings; not your smile; not your good nature (cause you truly don’t have one); not your logic; not your morals; not your focus; not your family; not your friends; not your church; not your devotions; not your prayers; not your teaching; not your learning; not your activities; not your good marriage; not your charity; not your yoga; not your ‘soft-heart;’ not your ‘sweet spirit;’ not your good kids; not discipline; not your discipleship; not your go-get-it attitude. Without God you have no hope at all. So stop pretending you do apart from him. Stop pretending ‘Oh I could NEVER do this or that’ because you could. The only thing restraining you is God’s grace and mercy.

I remember a part of Jesus’ life where he met a crazy guy who had demons inside of him. The man was living in a cave, exiled from his home-town. He was naked with broken chains still clinching his body; he had scars and festering wounds where he would cut himself—relieving his pain by destroying himself. Jesus healed him. Just like that. No one is outside the reach of God’s salvation, beyond the reach of true hope, of love. Not a cannibal, not you. In the disturbing and smile-dropping reality of life there is a hope greater than the gloom. Death and destruction do not have the final say, God does and he his kind and loving; wise and good; sovereign and just.

no problem solver

'my job is not to solve people’s problems or make them happy, but to help them to see the grace that is operating in their lives.' [[Eugene Peterson]]




I have often viewed Jesus as some life-riddle solver: I’ve got all these issues and if I follow Jesus they will disappear like magic. But in many ways I have found the opposite true. Sure, the burden is easy; the load is light; but the road is rough and small.

I like to carry my own pack. I like to put more burdens on myself. I like to say, ‘more is better.’ And I wonder why I don’t seem to experience God, I don’t seem understand him, I don’t seem in tune with what he is doing—because I’ve done my own Spiritless mission for God.

I am not called to save the world—nor are you—and I am not called to fix people’s problems—neither are you—but we are called to point out that God is doing something. We are to be the arm that picks up a fallen companion on our narrow little road of following our Savior. We are to be the one administering the balm to our wounds and woes. We are to be the ones saying, ‘I know it doesn’t feel like it, but God loves you in the most meaningful ways.’ And we are the ones who need to receive all of it too.

Jesus has not solved my problems; he’s exposed how many I have. Every time I try and tidy up one area of my life he breaks down a wall exposing worse things than before! (dang it!) I’ve got more holes in my theology than a piece of Swiss cheese! I start and fail before I finish. I give up. I’ve done this poorly while neglecting that.

But then there is his grace. He keeps giving it because it is my life support. When God is out of kindness I’m out of hope. One has said something along the lines of ‘we do not know we need Jesus until he is all that is left.’ And Corrie Ten Boom is accredited with saying, ‘When I try, I fail. When I trust, He succeeds.’

Let’s stop trying to change one another with silly means, for when we do we are like a child pretending he is accomplishing something real when he is just playing the old game Operation. But let us point out what our Helper, God’s very Spirit, is doing in and around us all.

trust in him at all times

‘Trust in him at all times, O people;


pour out your hearts to him,

for God is our refuge.’ from Psalm 62




From one man to a people, there is a cry to trust God at all times. David was learning that HE could trust in God at all times, and therefore was telling everyone he could to do the same.


I do not think that trust dismisses doubt, but trust embraces what is true.

Since Adam, God’s people have always forsaken God and disobeyed God’s commands and ordinances; David of all people knows this, for he himself was familiar with Israel’s long story and he himself was an active part in it. But he also is very aware who the key ingredient to the nation of Israel was: God.

If we look at the whole of Psalm 62 we see that David owes many things to God alone: soul-rest; salvation; security; protection; sturdiness; safety; hope; honor.

So what does it mean to trust in God here? It means that God will be these things for his people, that he already is these things.

David goes on to tell everyone, ‘Pour out your hearts to God, because God will protect you.’ Sometimes we view God as a mean great-uncle who is ornery all the time and has no time for our imperfection and idiocy. As if God is going to blast us out of the sky as soon as we cuss or something. But David gives a very different (and right!) view of God. He is a hiding place for our soul. We can pour out our heart’s content to Him because, as he says at the end of the Psalm, he is strong and loving.

Israel, as said earlier, is a great picture of what not to do. Yet God, again since Adam and Eve, has been kind and gracious and faithful. And we, today, can hear David’s words to trust God; to pour out our souls to God; and to know that God is our refuge.

Paul's confidence

'You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody.'

Paul said these words. Paul is openly and with confidence saying these words. He is saying them without shame. But he is saying them to people who are full of sin and confusion and idiocy! He wrote this in his second letter to the church in Corinth. In the first letter he brought out some pretty bitter sins, sins that if ever came to light about us would drive us to the nearest airport with the intent of never coming back. But Paul says these folks are his letter, these people, sins and foolishness included, are his accomplishment that he is happy about. 

Why is Paul not ashamed to say, 'Hey, these people are a direct result of God's mercy through the ministry God called me to'? We see it a few sentences following: 'Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for our competence comes from God.' 

Somewhere along the line we came to think that when we become followers of Jesus we instantly become resistant to sin. When this impeccable resistance doesn't happen we want to wait until the sin goes away, THEN we can be help others. And then our  dilemma is that we think we need to be fixed of whatever it is we are 'not right' in--our pet, besetting, dark cloud, seemingly inescapable sin or problem--before we can glorify God in ANYthing or be of use to God and others. But this idea is insane and crazy and not found in the Bible anywhere. 

Paul is proud to bring these people on the world's stage with excitement because God saved them and God, in his wisdom, is loving them and using them for his purposes of good. Do I wish to be rid of sin? Absolutely and always; but day-to-day sinlessness on our part as a Christian is no more a qualification to follow God and glorify him and honor him and bring a bigger smile to his face than our works were to make him love us; we don't have to be perfect, Jesus is. (again, we shouldn't be cozy or comfortable with our sin, we are to kill it and hate it and be rid of it)

A lie I consistently believe is that I must be flawless and having every little thing in my life in order before I can help someone or lead someone… this is a lie. No one would ever be able or qualified to do anything, no missionary or pastor or counselor or elder or leader; if that were the case Paul would never have left Arabia or Damascus if that were the case. 

God continues to advance his kingdom by way of using imperfect and unlikely sinners, and it shocks the watching world. Remember that it is God who has the power, and he uses us; he does, not us. He uses, not us. He makes happen, not us. We are to only follow him in obedience directed by his love, his Spirit, his Word.  

God spoke in human words

God spoke in human words. Think about that for a moment…






God created everything that is; he holds the power to make what isn’t yet; he orchestrates the atoms and atom bombs; he knits babies in their mommy’s tummy; he guides the hearts of dictators. Adam and Eve did not obey him and so he kicked them out of the wonderful Garden he had given them. He could have stopped. He never had to create in the first place and then when he did his snot-nosed creatures flicked him off…



But then God spoke. He could have spoken in some Heavenly tongue that was unutterable to humans. He could have babbled in the language of humans but with logic and ideas that would cause our little pea brains to explode like a peep in the microwave! But he didn’t. God spoke kindly and gently and understandable and clearly to us.



He could have told us useless things like why the sky is blue or why gnats exist. He told us that we have sinned and need him; he told us the story about how he loves us and will redeem us; to eventually make us all unscrewed up.



Words can hurt; words kill. But sometimes words make alive and give hope. God spoke and the amazing thing is he didn’t have to.

we: individualism and the loss of us

I just finished reading the books Ezra and Nehemiah. Wonderful and easy reads, I recommend them. Two things stuck out to me: the ‘gracious hand’ of God and ‘we.’



‘Gracious hand’ This is referenced to God in both books. As the book of Nehemiah draws out in a spectacularly sweeping narrative of Israel’s history—good and bad—he highlights that throughout, God has been gracious to his chosen people. The people of Israel and Judah were exiled, taken captive, explicitly because of their disobedience to the God who not only made them but saved them! And God, making good on his promise, is restoring his people and bringing them back to his promised land. So God is being over-the-top gracious with these people who keep turning their backs on him (see even the last few chapters of Nehemiah and how the people still disobeyed right when the wall was finished). But this term is not merely applied to the big, clear, abundant mercy which God had on his chosen ones; rather, the ‘gracious hand’ of God was intervening in the kings palace, with the faithful who peered over the rubbled walls to prevent the enemy from attacking, the many builders of both the Temple and the wall, and even setting God’s enemies against themselves. The hand of God was clearly gracious in big AND minor day-to-day ways. This hasn’t changed with those who are his today.



‘We’ I don’t much like the concept of we and frankly, it ain’t American…. I hope that sounds really stupid to you because it is… but I still believe too much of the statement to be proud of. In Ezra and Nehemiah the leaders, the real, good, actual, for the good of others, leaders knew this reality of ‘we.’ When the leader would confess his sins he would say all the sins everyone committed. ‘Oh he is saying that because he did all the sins in his heart.’ No he isn’t! He is saying that because he is so connected with his people that their sins are his sins—in a sense—; their failure his; their successes, his; their happiness, his. We don’t have this today. It is so foreign to us we would laugh at it if it knocked on our front door. The idea of ‘we’ is how the people of God work. Described as a body and bride, branches, etc… it us the Modern reader who is off, not the NT or OT people. When the people of God see themselves as a ‘we’ instead of a me and them things change; people are cared for; sins are forgiven; God is worshipped; the world drools at our peace and laughter. True love reigns, not some dumb rainbow, unicorn, weird guy with a `fro holding a neon John 3:16 sign at sporting events… no, love is where hurt is because love, from God, is the only thing which heals. It should not be a surprise that many of the minor prophets were prophesying against injustices against those whou had no power to protect themselves: the leaders were seeing opportunities to forward themselves and not help their brothers and sisters; remember also the beginning of Proverbs 31, to speak out for those who have no voice--'we' is in play; 'we' are all filled with eternal souls and 'we' all need our God.


God is a ‘we,’ an ‘our’ and if we are his, so we become.

psalm 73

(My apologies for the weird format, I cannot get it set right. Chrystal is not a weird formater. brian mcdaniel)

“Then I realized that my heart was bitter, and I was all torn up inside.
I was so foolish and ignorant – I must have seemed like a senseless animal to you.
Yet still I belong to you; you hold my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny.
Whom have I in heaven but you? I desire you more than anything on earth.
My health ma fail, and my spirit may grow weak, but God remains the strength of my heart; he is mine forever.
Those who desert him will perish, for you destroy those who abandon you.
But as for me, how good it is to be near God! I have made the Sovereign LORD my shelter, and I will tell everyone about the wonderful things you do.”
Psalm 73: 21-28 (NLT)

The temptation is not to trust.
        A simple temptation.
        Dissatisfaction, "is it for nothing, I am keeping my heart pure?" (v. 13)
Not the prosperity of the wicked as the psalm says, but the lack of my own satisfaction, this is bitterness, this in an impure heart; the temptation not to trust, to imagine that providence and sovereignty are others gain and not wait on the Lord, or to wait with bitterness.
        I recluse to my own sanctuary where I am right and righteous judge of my circumstances.
        My mind works its deceptions, imaginations, and devious musings. It is not the right place to go.
                 I must go to the Lord's sanctuary (v. 17). It is where He reveals destiny; the destiny of the
                 wicked and of the righteous.

Quickly, I realize:
I am bitter, I am the fool, I am the ignorant one.
          I am torn up inside, I deceived myself, I trusted in myself; I do not wait on the counsel of the Lord,
          I rush.
          BUT!
          I still belong to the Lord, even unto my animal instincts - to fight, to flee, to survive.
                   What must survive? What am I surviving?
                            My flesh will certainly fail.
                            My spirit will certainly grow weak.
                            Do I flee or fight only to abandon and perish?
                   Let my heart not fail! Let God be the strength of my heart - Lord lead me to a glorious
                   destiny! Let my heart be pure that I may see you.

Dissatisfaction and bitterness are easy temptations. I may be quite laid back, seemingly content in most life situations, appearing to be calm in turbulence, yet do I really have contentment and calm, am I really satisfied and free of bitterness? If you believe I am content, that I am always calm, you don't know me very well. I wouldn’t say I'm the type to burst or blow up...I mull things over, and over, and over...you get the point. As I mull over my life, I do ask "is it for nothing?" I also ask, "is it for everything?" Between the two questions, I find the answer. It is not for nothing, but I alone cannot attain to everything. IF it is for nothing, I perish deserving of the full wrath of God for abandon. IF it is for everything, I perish deserving the full wrath of God for not attaining. IF it is for Christ, I live. So I must trust. I am satisfied in Christ's satisfaction and in that satisfaction there can be no bitterness.

I must go to the Lord's sanctuary to meditate on his sovereignty and be reminded that He judges the secrets of man by Christ.

(post by Chrystal Bate)

'Jesus came to undo what Adam so disastrously did...'

Grace. John Newton called it amazing. He was right. But sometimes I forget why. What makes it amazing? It is almost like good health: I don’t, with awareness, appreciate it all the time, but when I finally get over that cold or the flu finally breaks THEN I see how great my good health is.

Saved from what? This is a book title but also a great question. Sin is deteriorating our world like time rots an apple. I realized yesterday that I forgot how bad, gross, grotesque, wrong, deadly, dark, painful, hurtful and harmful, haunting and horrifying, sick and unsavory sin is. One sin. Just one sin and the entire universe was thrown off kilter and everything suddenly had an expiration date. When I was younger I often thought of how many shin-kicks Adam would receive in Heaven: ‘I made it to Heaven, no thanks to your efforts, Adam’ Whack! Think of this. Each individual sins–goes against God’s way he ordered things or commanded them to be–many times in one day; each ‘little’ sin has the power to kill the universe; no wonder we are a mess!

All of society and humanity is not one big happy Brady bunch family chillin on earth like some continuous beach vacation. We are killing each other. Sin affects everyone and everything around you. You think you are keeping it to yourself; you think you are containing it so it only affects you? That’s like what I use to do when I was three: if I close my eyes no one can see me. Sorry, but you trying to be sovereign over your own sin isn’t working. It isn’t working for me either. We all see it. Adam and Eve tried hiding behind some trees after they sinned; they tried containing and running away from their disobedience, avoiding it like it didn’t happen. But sin literally killed everything.

Funerals are so hard because death, though normal, is unnatural. Sin did that. It made something beautiful into something gross. It pained what once was jubilant and happy; it distorted good; it high-jacks righteousness. We think, like many characters in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, that we can control sin like they thought they could control the ring. But it always ends up controlling us. We become ITS slave and sin OUR master.

What’s so amazing about grace? It saved us from all of this. We are no longer under that realm; there is something more real than that: Jesus Christ. From all of this he saved us to walk with him eternally in what the Garden of Eden was supposed to become. Only in Jesus can the consequence of sin be unplugged and powerless.


‘[Jesus] came to undo what Adam so disastrously did, and lead us back through the jungle to the garden. He crossed the ravine, the unbridgeable gulf between sinful man and holy God.’ [[Sinclair Ferguson]]

something far more interior: faith expressed in love

There is much in the book of Galatians but the paramount issue is what the Gospel of Jesus Christ is and isn’t. Paul is furious in the letter and a big part of his wide-eyed name calling is that some scum bags were trying to be extra spiritual and say you weren’t a Christian if you didn’t follow their lead. Pious Christians can easily read this now and be appalled at those who demanded circumcision as part of salvation... yet we do the same thing all the time. There is always the, ‘If I had Jesus plus ____’ then I’d know I’m REALLY saved; or the, ‘She does [or doesn’t do] _______ so she MUST not be saved.’ We like outward indicators. All of us do, no exception.

But Paul says in Galatians 5 that the Gospel has something to do with a far more interior issue: faith working through love: the issue of the heart. (I hear you mumbling your counter arguments of citing James and Micah 6.8 and so on, hold your britches and listen). The Message puts a section of Galatians 6 very clearly: ‘[Those who would try and add to the Gospel] want an easy way to look good before others, lacking the courage to live by a faith that shares Christ's suffering and death. All their talk about the law is gas. They themselves don't keep the law! And they are highly selective in the laws they do observe. They only want you to be circumcised so they can boast of their success in recruiting you to their side. That is contemptible’

No need to cut things off. Jesus is enough. There is not some secret spiritual key that if you do God has to love you more (remember that whole Jesus dying for you and raising from the dead thing?). No more hoops to jump through. Jesus did it for you. You want to memorize Romans? Okay. You can’t use it to leverage against God though (and this should free you that if you sputter and forget about it for a week or year you can start up again, no condemnation [chapter 8]).

I think it is easier for us to control our outward actions and appearance and so we make those things the standard for salvation or justification or sanctification or our standing with God (or someone else’s); outward actions are easy to compare and I like comparing myself–wrongly–to other people so I can make sure I’m okay with God. A lot of the Pharisees and these bozos in the Galatia region and our own hearts are living in fear when we attempt to lower God’s standard of perfection into a few simple rules. We are terrified that Jesus isn’t enough. But he is.

What seems most wild and elusive, like trying to ride and untamed stallion, is our own heart. Yet this is where the magic happens, this is where God brings the change. We are told that God exchanges the old heart and gives a new one that actually wants to follow his way.

People were always asking Jesus if he was the One and as proof they always wanted signs. Jesus was usually pretty ticked at the interrogation. Salvation is here. It comes through what Jesus did. See it. Bask in it. Don’t you dare water it down with your rules either, for if you steal a Christian’s joy by confusing the Gospel with your rules God will crush you.

the years of silence

Hi. I’m impatient. I was told once that the amount of patience contained in my body wouldn’t be able to fill a thimble, but I don’t have time for such comments (see what I did there?). This past weekend I heard about am album by Eric Church, so when I went to the bathroom during the wedding reception I was attending I started the download and it was done before the brand new couple jumped in the back of the limo. I like that if I have questions I can look them up on my iPhone or someone else’s iPad or in general a computer if you’re not trendy enough. I need groceries? I’ll either steal my roommates or go immediately in my car and get them, no problem.

But I have this little problem. It is between me and God. And I may not be the only one. You see he doesn’t run off my time. Actually, according to me, he’s always late and has changed the plans. (If I was more emotional I’d rip my hair out.) But, like I said, I am not the only one who had to wait on God.


Lets look at some folks in the Bible:

We shall first look at Abram.

God: Leave your country.
Abram: Where are we going?
God: I’ll let you know when we are there.

And God was silent for a few years.... nothing....no words...no further confirmation to Abram that he STILL was doing the right thing.


Second we have Joseph.

Joseph spent his teens and early adult life pretty much a slave who’d continually get screwed over by people. He spent considerable time in prison looking as if his God couldn’t give a rats about him. When things looked promising his dreamed were crushed.


Third we have Moses.

Moses was a rich kid who killed someone and then ran away from it all. For something like 40 YEARS he did not hear from God once but lived a normal Middle Eastern life walking sheep around all day... kinda like he’d do later I guess.


Finally we have Naomi.

God strangely showed Naomi how much he loved her by causing a famine and killing her husband and two sons. For YEARS she remained bitter at God–she asked her friends to call her Bitter because she felt God demolished her. Years!! Years, people!! That is everyday I wake up and it is the first thing I think about: ‘God, what are you doing?!’ Or just coming to ignore God.


With all of these examples, though, God showed up. Where he promised he made good on the promises. Where he seemed to be unkind he unfolded time to reveal how he had been affectionately loving the whole way through.


Often we get the wrong idea of examples like these four. We look at them and wrongly conclude, ‘Well, dang it, if they can do it so can I!’ I hope your bootstraps break today. Seriously. We need to look at examples of people like this and be blown away at God. How he remains true to his word. He doesn’t need to constantly remind: he speaks and it is forever true. But he DOES constantly remind us that he is there, if we will see with faith and not feelings or visible manifestations.

Are you abandoned, confused, hurt, in the dark, feeling alone, feel like you just aren’t gonna make it another day, sensing that you can’t add up?

Cheer up, you’re worse than you figured.
But cheer up, God is greater and more good than you can imagine.

He is still with us.

Jesus went through the annuls of eternity and ate up all the records for those who would believe in him. But while he was doing that he was under God’s real silence and real abandonment. On our behalf Jesus willingly went through the worst absence of God’s goodness we could ever imagine. Now we get all the benefits of being God’s child. Jesus was struck brutally like a pinata in every way–spiritually physically, mentally, emotionally and psychologically–and what came bursting out of him was eternal life and present joy for all who’d fall on his grace in need.

you have only to be silent

‘The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent’


upon hearing this statement I expect to hear a stream of caveats, some hoops to jump through, a ton of prerequisites I’ll never do... Instead, the people are and the LORD does.


This verse comes from the book of Exodus, 14th chapter, verse 14. The scene is God just delivered the former enslaved people, the Hebrews, out of the hand of the Egyptian Pharaoh. Then Pharaoh has an ‘Oh crap!’ moment as he realizes he just lost all of his manual labor for his country. So Pharaoh gets all his warriors and they chariot-up and pursue those Hebrews like they just made a ‘yo momma’ joke about Ra or something.

The Hebrews see the cloud of furry with angry faces and swords poking out and deduce that it is coming for them. So naturally they whine and throw some sarcasm at God, ‘Were there not graves in Egypt for us to die in?’ But instead of obliterating his chosen people, God says, ‘Sit down, find your pacifier and watch me work!’

The conclusion is familiar to most. God parts the red sea; the people of Israel make to the other side free of harm; the people of Egypt get eaten by the water.

Wait. So God actually did what he said? Yes. God did what he said.

Sometimes (not all the time or every time) we want to do so much for God because we want to control our lives and destiny so badly. We ask how we can make the best use of the time...... so we do and do and do and do until we run out of energy and die and people praise our legacy for how great we were at being efficient and hard working and dedicated and standing up for Jesus! When sometimes God was saying, ‘Shut up. Sit down. Watch me work.’

‘But GOD!’ we reply ‘Me. I. My. I. Me... you need me in your kingdom!!’

That noise is God laughing.

‘What can we do for salvation?’ The people of Israel cried. Nothing.

‘What can we do for salvation?’ We all cry. Nothing.

It is a great thing that God says to Moses as he did to Adam as he did to Abram as he does for us, ‘I will save you; sit back and enjoy me.’

you. are. clean.

The grace of God should really weird us out. We should find God’s kindness appalling. Some words often used are scandalous and audacious, shocking and not making much sense. God’s grace should leave us dumbfounded and confused! If it doesn’t....I don’t think you get it. Maybe you have forgotten how powerful his grace is; maybe you have forgotten you need it and live on it.

Think of the most terrible immoral act you can and realize God has forgiven people who have done such things. Many of us have gone through some stomach wrenching things in life, things which we would rather forget. I once asked my grandpa, who is a World War 2 vet, what the War was like–I wanted some cool stories!!–but he thought a moment, looked at me and said, ‘Some things should be forgotten.’ But even these things which ought to be forgotten God can forgive! Yes, the child molester, the rapist, the murderer, the spouse abuser, the dictator, the adulterer, the pimp and prostitute, the child trafficker, the legalist, the terrorist, the politician, the liar...and yes, YOU! God, through Jesus’ work, can clean even you! He can say, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ And it be true! Getting blown away by God’s grace is a natural reaction to it because the math equation is unfair! But God did it, his love secured the Cross where Jesus died and defeated death and God’s love secured Jesus’ resurrection so we can get lost in the wilderness of love for all eternity starting now.

There is a song by the duo Shane & Shane, it is called ‘Embracing Accusation.’ It is a slow song that has a sinner being reminded via the Devil of his failures and sin. ‘He’s right’ the singer says, and he is! The Devil accuses us of our past sins and our potential to continue screwing up; ‘he is singing the song of the redeemed’ the songs goes on. The whole song is building until the crescendo which gives me goose bumps typing this out:

‘The Devil’s singing over me an age old song/
that I am cursed and gone astray/
Singing the first verse so conveniently over me/
He’s forgotten the refrain.
Jesus Saves!!’

That’s how the song ends: Jesus Saves!! Don’t you worry how it is all gonna be fixed, how you’ll put your life back together, how everyone else will react. God, through Jesus, has saved you. In the Father of all things, in the ruler of all, in his eyes you are not guilty anymore, no more shame, only grace!

Monday is for Morons: 02-20-2012

The Gospel is for you!

Do you believe it?

It is a fact, so.... deal.


Let's pretend for a moment you have a best friend, he or she is THAT person. You are two peas in a pod, you know each other more and better than anyone else. You don't have to finish one another's sentences because who wants that, really? You WOULD do anything for this person. You've experienced much of life together, gone through the fun and the easy and the tough and terrible.

What if the hardest situation and circumstance came two days ago. Your amigo in arms needed you the most, more than ever before.... and you completely abandoned them; you left your best friend in the whole world out to dry. They needed your presence and you were not where on the map; they needed your words and you were silent; they needed you and you were purposely running away?

Let's pretend your best friend is God.

The Apostle Peter didn't have to pretend, he owned this scenario; he lived it. He is the reality of this idea, its fulfillment. Peter--the rock!--told Jesus, 'Everyone else may leave you when the crap hits the fan but not me, not this guy.' It was not long after that Jesus was taken capture, tortured and killed and Peter was found in the dark, cold night writhing in bitter weeping and feeling like he betrayed the world in leaving Jesus' side. Can you imagine the thoughts that might have run through Peter's head? He confessed earlier that Jesus was it, that Jesus was the son of God, the long awaited Messiah who'd save the world! He heard the voice of God affirming these facts too. And he did not have the moxie to say he even knew Jesus, let alone die with him.

You may have a sense of this in your own life as well. You feel that your sin is another spit in the face of God. You think, 'If I REALLY loved God I would not keep failing and sinning!'

Sometimes I'm surprised that it was Judas and not Peter who ended up killing himself. To think of the guilt and depression which engulfed Peter....too much it seems.

Some days later Peter and the boys came to shore from sailing. As Peter stood on the cool sand, the smell of his lineage flowing through his nostrils he heard his future... his present; Jesus made sure that Peter knew that the God whom he betrayed loved him.

This is for you. This is the Gospel. Your sins are many, God's grace laughs at them because the punishment for those sins has already been paid for in Jesus' death on the Cross.

How Do You Categorize Yourself?

I am presently employed by a law firm here in Downtown Macon, Georgia. My first couple of weeks working I was terrified of breaking the imagined barrier that stood at the threshold of most of the Senior and Junior partners’ office doors. In their presence I felt less. I felt less than them by a lot. It wasn’t that I knew their salary, but I knew mine. Especially since I’ve watched far too many episodes of Boston Legal, in my mind there is a certain glamor and immediate status uppage when you’re a lawyer. And I am not.

We all do this in some ways. I still get slightly stressed out if someone comes through the doors wearing chic clothes. My thoughts: ‘Man, that’s so cool. I wish I could afford to dress like theat. I bet they are makin some serious cheese! Why can’t I do that?’ and the thoughts drain out in like manor.

For awhile in college I wanted to be Dr. Greg House from the TV show House. He dressed in a relaxed way, typically with a band T-shirt and a sweet blazer. Or the new James Bond... aside from a dumb sweater he wore in one of the films, he has class. Pierce as Bond was a shmuck in comparison.

Maybe it is just physical, God-given looks. I don’t want to see some pretty gal come out of the same office that I’m about to go into to have MY interview. I know how this works, especially if the interviewer is a guy. I want some loser to come out of those doors so I can feel better about my chances to nab the job I’m hoping to fill.

A lot of us care about cars. We have the ‘If I had a billion dollars to spend I’d have a ____’ idea already in mind. We care about our houses and what they convey about us. I walked into a house a few months ago that can be categorized as nothing less than a mini-castle. Everything was awesome. Nothing was broken or warn (unless it was designed to look that way). Again the thought inched into my mind, ‘What am I doing with my life. This is incredible.’

The issue is we perceive status by our eyes and ideals.

John, in one of his wordy letters, says that all that is in the world is the desire of the eyes and pride in life. Don’t get hung up and hear what he is not saying. He is not saying this earth we live in is a burning piece of fire with nothing good or redeemable. RATHER, he is saying that the world, the way that is not God’s way, is dictated by our eyes and tainted desires. John gets it. He is old at this time. He knows how things work. After infancy we do not suddenly STOP seeing then reacting with an internal ‘Oooooooo, I want that!’ We just hide it better now. And it is not always bad either!

I’m a Gentile. How Ya Doin?

Last night I taught a few willing listeners about some of the things the Apostle Paul is talking about in his letter to the Saints in Ephesus, specifically the second chapter, verses 11 through the end.

There is a lot going on in this passage and I’m not starting it all up. One point, however, stuck out to me, it glared and glistened as it dribbled out of my mouth last night: I’m doubly undeserving of God’s grace.

The Jews, as Paul talks about in Romans 3, were some privileged dudes. They had all the oracles and promises of God; they had the Temple; they had–for good and bad–the whole history; they had Abraham and Isaac and Jacob; they had their promised land and their circumcision (yikes!). The Gentiles (this includes myself and probably most of you), by contrast, had nature... boom! Yea. That is about it. Paul talks in Romans 1 that the Greeks had nature to reveal to them the God of the Universe and even that truth we all suppressed....umm....I think with their divine inspiration the Israelites had a leg-up in this case.

So thinking about the fact that no human being had the right to be called God’s children (first part of Ephesians 2), we can throw some more impossible into this cake and say that Gentiles (non-Jews) were not even a consideration for this dance.... we weren’t even a name that had been crossed-out, we were not even written down in the first place!.... or so it seems.

In Romans 9 and onward Paul discusses how Gentiles were the most unlikliest of unliklies to receive the blessing and mercy and grace of God’s salvation. No one deserves God’s mercy. But if anyone did it was the Jews. And here I am, as Gentile as a pork sandwich on Passover Day, receiving daily the full benefits of Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross and the glory of his resurrection. This is amazing! Now go ponder how great you are in light of that (pour me some sarcasm, please!)

mutable minds

Every time I hear the positive thinking idea–think of good things and you’ll feel better about life and yourself–I want to lash out, shake the person and say, ‘Life is really hard! Wake up!’ I don’t and probably won’t ever actually do that. But I am a realist (back off on calling me a pessimist, you always-hopefulls), and I work in possibilities, not probabilities: so if it is not outside the realm of happening–though perhaps unlikely–it is a legitimate concern, idea, potential, etc.

Now as a result of having this mind of mine which entertains every option, I see the world as a flaming mess with little hope for saving. This is sad. There is a great deal of truth in my conclusion but there is equal folly, for God is able to literally do anything within his power–which is limitless–and that includes remaking and redeeming all things... which he actually is planning on doing.

This is where something the Apostle Paul said is interesting, namely, we can change the way our minds think. In his long letter to the Christians in Rome, Paul said that our minds could be ‘renewed.’ Obviously this does not mean that we get our old brain taken out and a new one put inside. But it DOES mean that we can change the paths our thoughts usually tread, the ways and perspectives we think through life.

Oh my, you’ll be ‘fixed’ in a jiffy. Not even close! This does not mean you must hit your spirituality in to hyper-mode, be a monk and sing in solitude while you eat Haggis around honey bees and brew beer. It does mean that as we further realize who God is, what he has always been doing and understanding what we and this whole world were made for, the more that stuff ‘clicks’ and sinks in, the more we think in a way that says, ‘God is my reality and his words are the supreme truth.’

The mind is renewable for everyone. You do not have to remain in the old and poor patterns you always used; you don’t have to use the same bad logical of your past; you don’t need to be who you were–which is not how God made you to eternally be.

Jesus not only died for our sins, but he died for our minds as well.

Nothing means nothing

I was visiting a church one morning with a friend. We decided to go to Sunday School (we were in college so I think it was only because we both miraculously woke up earlier enough to go). I have no recollection of what the lesson was about. But one ending comment has remained ingrained in my thoughts: ‘Now the end of Romans 8 says a lot of things, but it does not say WE can’t squirm out of God’s hand.’

As I picked my jaw off the ground I was wondering if what I heard was actually said. So I asked my friend and his reaction was similar to mine. This ‘teacher’ was trying to ruin people’s lives!!

Paul, at the end of Romans 8, spouts off a list of things which do not have the power or authority to undo what Jesus said was done. The list is not meant to be exhaustive but to encompass everything and anything, things which we do not even perceive or understand to believe. Particularly to this situation I’d highlight Paul’s words ‘anything else in all of creation.’ This Sunday School teacher got it dead wrong. Nothing, no power, no entity, no other will is able to mark out Jesus’ words and statement of fact and reality ‘It is finished!’ No, lowly and down-on-yourself individual, not even you can slide out of God’s promise.

When God does it we can, in this instance, with relief say, ‘What’s done is done and nothing can change it.’ When we think we can unravel God’s plans and promises we must not know the God in the Bible and we must not know the power of Jesus, both then and now.

We sin a lot. Sin is despicable and deplorable and wicked and counter-good. God has completely forgiven his children though our eldest brother’s payment for us: Jesus really pay it all, it is not just a song.

God owes us . . . nothing

I'm recently discovering (or rediscovering) the fact that God owes us, needs to give us, is obligated to provide . . . well nothing.

What do I mean when I say nothing?

God does not owe us:

1. Life: Here is the reality: we are not promised one more breath, one more heartbeat, one more blink of the eye. We are not promised that our cancer will miraculously (or by science) go away, that we will be saved from car wrecks, that we won't be the one who has that 'freak' accident in the safety of our own home. Just because you believe in God and follow Jesus--or not--does not make you invincible nor exempt from the reality of life, which is that people die a lot.

2. Laughter: No one is promised a 'good life.' It is hard for me, as an American, to get my head around this because I've assumed I am somehow due a good life, but find that in the Bible for me then I'll change my mind. What does this mean for day-to-day life? It means no one is promised good feelings . . . ever. No one is promised that we will laugh when something funny happens, that we will cry for joy, that we will get that job (let alone any job), that we can sing songs, that we will have a spouse and kids, that we will enjoy fine meals, that we can be wowed and refreshed by being outdoors, that anything will go 'right' or the way we wanted and planned, that praying will accomplish anything, that following the rules will get you anywhere, that breaking rules will summon excitement, that following your heart will work out, that following whatever 10-steps will accomplish their aim, that doing what people say will have its hoped for affect, that doing anything will illicit any kind of reaction in your soul. No one is promised anything of the sort.

So now that you're all glum and sporting a frowny-face, what does this mean? It means that when God--yes it is HIM--provides us the capacity and gift of pleasant things and the ability to feel rightly about these gifts.... enjoy the heck out of them. Cry when your baby is born. Laugh when your friend does something stupid. Eat that delicious dessert with happiness. Go celebrate when you get your job. It is SO good to have gifts and we should take them and embrace them . . . as gifts.

And whether we get this or that is not based on our good or bad behavior.

We are promised God. For those who follow him, we are told that we will always have God. We should not say, 'in his presence is fullness of joy so that means we should be happy all the time.' No, joy is not happiness. Joy is not feelings. Joy is a faith-based sense and belief and understanding that though we may never smile one more time, and we may spend the rest of our days in tears of sorrow God is still real, we are still his children, and Heaven will be full of the most explosive happiness and joy and good times we literally cannot fathom it.

Life is hard. Life is unbearable sometimes. Life can be too much. But often it is when we have everything but don't have the feeling we hoped for, it is then that we finally see we need God. Thankfully, for most, God is very kind in his provision and gift giving and occurrences in our life and we should thank him so much! But our belief in God and HIS GOODNESS should not be dependent upon what he provides day in and day out but on what he said and the now-unseen-reality he says is true.

The book of Job points this out and Job got it right when he said that God is truly good when he provides all kinds of great things or provides all of life to cease and die and be ripped away. Naomi was right she told her friends to stop calling her 'pleasant' but to call her 'bitter' because God killed her husband and two sons; she was a broken mess who still had a glimmer of hope in God.

It is crazy to understand that goodness is known in the darkest hour of your soul. That pain can walk beside God's favor. Joy accompanies stomach wrenching agony and confusion and frustration. The reality is that though he seems to not care one bit about you, God is not far off ever and he is always loving his children when it seems like he is ruining them. Love is peculiar and when we figure out what Paul proclaims in Romans 9-11--God does whatever he wants and he is always good in whatever he does because he IS wise and IS loving more than we can understand--we believe a scary and hard truth. Love is different than we think.