This post is for mothers. Mothers, I want to encourage you. Though I do not want to elevate the role of motherhood to the highest ultimate good a woman can do (I don’t believe that’s true), I also personally know the tendency to lose sight of what we’re doing and why we are doing it, particularly if you have younger kids at home. If you have a few minutes, read on. I wish this could be a conversation together with a cozy warm beverage and a quiet, calm atmosphere. Let’s work with what we have! Pull up a chair and possibly a baby, tell the kids not to destroy the house or each other, and let’s talk 🙂

As some of you may know, I’m a stay-at-home mom. There are days when I am rejoicing in that role, and days when I question why I ever wanted to have and homeschool four children. If you could take a peek into our home, one day you might see me eagerly helping little people learn how to clean up after themselves and how to apologize after hurting someone…..then the very next day you might see me yelling in frustration at the same children because they are children and happened to spill the milk. Again. Specifically after I told them not to. Most assuredly, I am a flawed parent and a work in progress! Yet, in the rare quiet moments, when I take a step back from the busy work and consider my role in light of what’s important in this short life, I am honored and humbled to be called to such a valuable, desperately needed, hugely impactful role of raising children.

Walking through a store the other day, I noticed a sign with a quote from Mother Teresa. It said, “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.”

Do I exaggerate? Does Mother Teresa? Is motherhood really that important? Today, for example, I heard a small, nagging voice, insisting that what I was doing by staying home with my kids was not worth my time.” It is not worth the investment of your time and energy”, says the nagging voice. “No one is noticing what you are doing. Who knows how many diapers you’ve changed? This is what your college education is going toward? By the time you’re finished with homeschooling these four kids, your youth will be gone. You should not spend the best years of your life on these kids, who aren’t even grateful for the sacrifices you’re making. Wouldn’t it be better for the world if you put your time and energy and gifts toward bigger and better things? Particularly visible things, where you get some verbal feedback and praise and notice for what you’re doing? See how much effort you put in and how no one notices, or even cares? That’s not life, my friend. Hire someone else to change the diapers and clean the kitchen for the 100,000,000th time, and get on to the really important things of life before it’s too late.”

Deep down, I know the nagging voice is lying. It’s not true. Deep down, I have great assurance from God that this role he’s given me is worth it. These young ones are going to grow up, God willing, and they need someone not just to provide for their physical needs, but to actually raise them. I get to teach them what is good and right and true and beautiful. I get to teach them how to love other people, particularly those who are different from them. I get to teach them how to learn, and how amazing it is to always be learning. They get to see me struggle, so they understand it’s normal to make mistakes and not be perfect the first time you try something new. I get to hug them, read to them, be a consistent presence to them (which is a hugely valuable gift and one they may not be able to verbalize to me until well into their adult years). I get to behold the beauty and majesty of God, and invite my children to behold Him, too. I get to bask in His beauty, and show it to them again and again. I get to teach them God’s words while they’re young. I get to show them what it looks like to depend on Jesus for my daily bread over and over (and over!) again. I get to model repentance so they understand what living in dependence on the good news of Jesus looks like. Again, when I stop to remember what God says, not the nagging voice, I see afresh that this calling of motherhood is so worth it.

As an added bonus, not only is motherhood a blessing to my kids, it’s a blessing to me! How I have been shaped and molded and tried and purified in the fires of mothering! Praise God! That’s a whole other blog post.

Mothers, parents. Listen to your Creator. Take hold of those nagging thoughts, lies, temptations, and evil whispers and douse them in the truth. When the family breaks down, society breaks down. Healthy families are one of God’s gifts of grace to the world, whether the world recognizes it or not. The call of parenting is an honorable, world-changing one. Like the sermon series our church has been going through, entitled “Upside Down Kingdom”, the ways of God and the means by which he works are often upside down from what the world thinks and values. World may say what that nagging voice tells me. “If you want to change the world, get out there and do it.” A smaller, insistent, more enduring whisper tells me what Mother Teresa says. “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.”

You have been appointed by God as your child/ren’s parent. Though we need to raise our kids in a community, and we all need reinforcements, there is no replacement for you. Remember what a high and holy calling motherhood is. Teach them what is good and right and true and beautiful. Teach them how to love other people, particularly those who are different from them. Teach them how to learn, and how amazing it is to always be learning. Let them see you struggle, so they understand it’s normal to make mistakes and not be perfect the first time you try something new. Hug them, read to them, be a consistent presence to them. Behold the beauty and majesty of God, and invite your children to behold Him, too. Bask in His beauty, and show it to them again and again. Memorize His words, and teach them to your children. Let them see what it looks like to depend on Jesus for your daily bread over and over (and over!) again. Model repentance so they understand how Mommy needs a Savior just as much as they do. I will never be able to do justice in my meager words to all that a mother is and does. But there is One who keeps an account, and He knows. He will reward you one day for what you have done.

Perhaps you are not a mother, but you may relate to work that appears thankless or invisible. If you are one whose daily work or calling appears menial, less important or not as valuable, to anyone whose work is not verbally recognized, rewarded, acknowledged, appreciated, or even seen by another, I want to tell you something. Your work is not hidden. What is done in secret will be known one day. One day, the upside down kingdom of God will burst through all of the dim windows through which we currently view life, and true reality will dawn upon all mankind. It will all become clear. The upside down kingdom will seem upside down no more. It will be the ultimate reality. God’s ways is what we will ALL finally understand as right and good and holy. Every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. And those who have imperfectly but consistently held to God’s ways because He is their treasure will experience great reward. Though no one else sees, God sees you. He is watching. He is keeping an account. He will reward you. Keep on! Do not grow weary of doing good! Galatians 6:9 tells us that we will reap a harvest, if we do not give up. Whatever your unseen role is, do not give up. The same God who made you has died for you, risen for you, and given you His Spirit to empower you and equip you for your work. He is your vine; you are the branch. Abide in Him. And remember, the next time you’re changing a dirty diaper (again), He sees. He sees you. Keep going. A harvest is coming, if we do not give up.

Hebrews 12:1-2

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Luke 12:1-3

In the meantime, when so many thousands of the people had gathered together that they were trampling one another, he began to say to his disciples first, “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. Nothing is covered up that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. Therefore whatever you have said in the dark shall be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in private rooms shall be proclaimed on the housetops.”

I love talking with my friends who are in the fire. When I hear a friend who is struggling through something hard, I want to come alongside her and help in whatever way I can. In all honesty, also, my ears perk up, and I am eager to hear from them, because I have experienced that through struggle and suffering come lessons, wisdom, intimacy with God; these nuggets of gold that can only be found in the Land of Trial.

I think of the song, “It Is Well” by Horatio Spafford. Written after a tremendously painful loss of his 4 daughters (after the death of his son and a great financial loss in the previous years), that song has been of significant encouragement to Christians who are suffering. That could not have been written unless he had gone through such devastation.

I think of a friend of mine, a wiser older woman who recently shared story after story of God saving people and being at work in her own heart: “Through this last year of trials and pain, I saw God at work in a way I simply would never have seen had I not been in the fire.”

It all sounds good until you’re in the fire yourself.

I’ve been in a pit of darkness for months now, and there’s no sign of it ending. Every day it feels much easier to give up than to keep going. Sometimes getting out of bed is the biggest victory I have to celebrate. Often I am overwhelmed by my circumstances and feelings of despair. And it just doesn’t stop.

Now what? Shall I read a few more inspirational quotes? Another devotional? More of God’s truths that I know I should believe? I’ve asked for prayer. I’ve reached out to friends. I’m reading my Bible every morning. I’m praying as I’m able to. I’m going to church and community group. I’m doing what I know to do, and the darkness just doesn’t lift. Death and isolation and brokenness and pain and deep sorrow seem to be my constant companion. I don’t understand the darkness.

Yet in my darkness, I have hope. From the pit that I have desperately been trying to escape for months, I know I am not alone, and never have been. I am more aware of God’s presence with me than I ever have been. And almost every day, I have heard God telling me, “It’s okay that you are struggling.” He’s been telling me that I need to stop trying to escape the darkness, but cling to Him in it, because He is working in my suffering.

So from the pit, I want to share something God has been putting in my heart. To my friends who I know are struggling, I hope this is encouraging to you. Here’s one of my “nuggets of gold” from the Land of Trial.

God, whatever the purpose, whatever the reason, you foresaw today and you said yes to all my circumstances. Just like you said yes to Noah’s years of building an ark in a desert among scoffing of the people around him. Like you said yes to Abraham & Sarah’s life of infertility. Like you said yes to Joseph’s years of slavery and wrongful treatment. Like you said yes to Jeremiah’s life of obedience to your word causing him persecution and suffering. Like you said yes to David’s years of being pursued by Saul intent on killing  him after you had him anointed as the new king of Israel. Like you said yes to Job’s children, household, and livelihood being wiped out in a day, followed soon by his health. Like you said yes to Lazarus dying. Like you said yes to Jesus’ suffering.

It is in our fleshly nature to focus on the suffering, to get tunnel vision on what’s painful at the time. In our tunnel vision, we tend to do two extremes: 1. seek only to escape it, to make the pain stop as soon as possible, or 2. we tend to wallow in it, focusing on how we feel, what we need, how awful it is for us. I’ve done both often in the last few months. I understand. Yet the more I read my Bible, the more God is opening my eyes to see suffering in the context of the greater story He has revealed in Scripture and is continuing to write in our lives. Sin, death, destruction, wrong, and suffering feel like they have the upper hand. However, because of Jesus perfection, life, death, and resurrection from the dead, all sin and suffering are bent to do God’s will in the life of the believer. Romans 8:28 – one of the most comforting promises of God given to us this side of heaven: “And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good , for those who are called according to his purpose.” All things, friends! All evil! All suffering! All death! All wrong-doing! Consider the people referenced above. They have gone before us, their lives written down in God’s word for us. Consider their suffering, and since we have the benefit of knowing more of the story, consider also the result of their suffering. Abraham & Sarah had no idea why they couldn’t have children, why Sarah had to bear so much reproach for not being able to conceive, why they had no heir and no children to care for them in their old age. Yet now we know that God intended it. He intended Sarah to be well past menopause, physically unable to have children, with Abraham so old. God waited until it was abundantly clear that Abraham and Sarah could not have children themselves. They could not do it. God intended their circumstances and years of suffering to set up a pivotal, incredibly vital display of His glory through His story of redemption. With Abraham and Sarah’s infertility came the child of the promise: Isaac. Through Isaac shall your offspring be named. Through Isaac will come Jesus. Through Isaac will all the families of the earth be blessed. Through Isaac the Gentiles will come to believe and be saved into God’s family. None of that would have happened had not Abraham and Sarah been able to conceive by natural means. Their years of suffering and sadness were the impetus of God’s saving glory being known to the whole world.

I see it most clearly with Jesus. The ultimate worst evil, killing the perfect Son of God, was the exact way God meant to save us. It’s like God is creating the most beautiful piece of art, and every disgusting, awful, horrendous piece of garbage Satan throws at it, God takes and uses to make His piece of art look even more beautiful than we could ever have imagined. And it’s not a reaction on God’s part. God is not reacting to evil; He is orchestrating it. Satan is under God’s authority. He can do nothing without God’s permission. God is using the evil that He never brought into this world to accomplish His purpose and will, and it is glorious. He has been doing this since Genesis 3, and He will continue to do so until Jesus comes again in glory. He is doing it in my life, and He’s doing it in yours. Take heart, friend. He is using the evil in your life for your good and His glory.

Now, I want to end on the story of Lazarus. I’m sure you know it. Jesus was good friends with Lazarus and his sisters, Mary & Martha. He received word that Lazarus was sick and near death. Instead of rushing to be with him, Jesus stayed where he was a few more days. Seemingly unfeeling at the time, we know from the Word that Jesus wasn’t ignoring His friends. He was staying to ensure Lazarus had died before coming. He knew He would do something greater than healing Lazarus. He would raise him from the dead. He knew God’s glory was going to be shown and people would believe and be saved. He knew Mary and Martha would soon be rejoicing. He knew. And He stayed where He was. He let Lazarus die, because He had something better in mind.

When Jesus finally came to Lazarus’ tomb, He wept. He knew what He was about to do. He knew He had the upper hand over death. He knew tears would be turned to gladness in moments. Yet He wept. Friend, it shows no lack of faith in God as you weep through your trials and sorrows. Jesus did it. You, too, are free to weep. I am free to weep. This life is so hard, and no one knows that better than our Savior. To my church, to those of you who, like me, are in a pit and can’t see the way forward, it’s okay to weep. It’s okay to have a hard time. It’s okay to grieve. Cry with Jesus. Your tears will be turned to joy one day, but it’s still okay to cry. And a quick word to those of you who want to come alongside your grieving, struggling friends: let them cry. Cry with them. Be with them. Say nothing if you don’t know what to say. Just show up. Be present. They may not need any reminding about God’s truth at that moment. It’s not that you never share God’s truths with them, but too often we share a verse or a truth because we’re uncomfortable with their pain and don’t know how to sit with them in it, so, with good intentions, we try to rescue them from it. They may not need to be rescued from their pit. Right now, they may simply need to weep. Like Jesus wept.

Christian friends,

May I “write frankly” to you? I initially began this blog with a lengthy introduction, and 5 paragraphs later, I realized it would be more useful to speak straight. So speak straight I will. I want to talk about our intake. For this blog post’s usage, let’s define intake as what we consume on a regular basis; what we take into ourselves, either mindlessly, habitually, addictively or intentionally. We are naturally built consumers. Another word we could use is worshippers. God made us needy creatures. We need an average of 8 hours a day of sleep to function. We need food at least 3 times a day. We need water even more often and in larger quantities than we need food. Our naturally needy rhythms point us to a God who is our daily bread, our Sustainer, our Provider, the Source we are designed to depend upon. But it is not our physical intake I want to focus on. It is our spiritual intake.  What do we take in for our spiritual nourishment?

If you’re like me, you may have spent little time thinking about where your spiritual nourishment comes from. Perhaps you’ve received enough training to know you need time studying God’s words, but your quality time with God is consistently inconsistent at best. Prayer time is infrequent and short, and full of requests for your day to go better and circumstances to ease. Your time with Christian friends is okay, but it’s certainly not iron sharpening iron, striving hard to follow after Jesus together, asking hard questions and loving each other fiercely toward your Savior and those He came to save. You like the sermons you hear on Sunday, but by Tuesday, any application you wanted to carry into the week has fallen off the table. Certainly you haven’t “intentionally” strayed from God and good spiritual nourishment, you tell yourself. However, neither are you passionate for Jesus, tasting the goodness of God in your daily struggles and joys, and eager to spread the fragrance of Christ everywhere as a disciple of Jesus is commanded.

This is a serious business. Literally, not to be too dramatic, because God is perfectly clear in His word: this is life and death. We are all on a death trajectory toward eternity being punished justly for our sins, and God, not wanting anyone to perish, sent us the most wonderful gift in the world: His one and only Son, that whoever believes in him may not perish, but have eternal life. God then placed that good news in the hands of 120 followers, then gave them the Holy Spirit, and they were then equipped to fulfill their calling to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that Jesus has commanded them. Because they obeyed, I’m part of God’s family! So are millions of others throughout time. And God’s not done saving people! He is so patient, wanting all to know Him! We Christians have the same charge as our first-century brothers and sisters: to make disciples, to spread the beauty of Jesus everywhere. Personally, I have seen how entertainment, our cultural priorities and norms, and my sin have blended together to keep me inactive in God’s kingdom. And not just me. This seems to be a common tactic of our enemy. If he can’t win us to his kingdom, he’ll do everything he can to render us useless and impotent in the kingdom of God. Then we will do him no harm, but perhaps even do him good.

This is war, friends. We know who has won the war; we’re just fighting out the end battles until our Commander appears. How do you want to be found by Him when He appears? I guarantee that every one of you who has the Holy Spirit of God in him/her wants to be found fighting, working,  investing what God has given you for the good of His kingdom and purposes, and not your own. We will regret every time we chose entertainment over Jesus’ mission. We will regret our passivity. We will regret wasting our time focusing on making ourselves comfortable instead of being overwhelmed by the glory of God in Jesus and boldly going in His name, by His power, to tell the world the good news that Jesus came to save sinners.

Is Jesus your first love? Do you believe to your core He truly everything you need? Are you tasting and seeing that the Lord is good? As I have done, have you forgotten your God? Have you left your first love? Have you replaced him with other good, but unworthy things? If this is striking chords in your heart, and you have left your first love, and want to move from your passivity and enter the battle, first let me urge you to get on your knees right now and confess to the Lord whatever it is you have loved more than Him. Whatever has captured your time and attention and love. I would so prefer you do that rather than read the rest of what I have written. Go to Him! He loves you! Forgiveness is already yours in Christ. God already knows your heart. His conviction is truly a gift, so we may leave its clutches through the power of Jesus who has risen from the dead and defeated sin for us, SO THAT we are freed to obey God through His power! If you don’t yet hate your sin, but you want to, ask him for hatred of your sin, so you can cast it aside and cling to Him.

Then let me ask you this hard question that as a personal trainer I would ask my weight loss clients: take a look at your daily intake. Spiritually, look at what you regularly put in front of you for 1. entertainment, 2. comfort, 3. distraction, 4. mindless activity, 5. social media, 6. sustenance. What are you taking in? What is your “diet”? Another diagnostic question to ask in this current climate: how much time do you spend on your phone or in front of your computer unrelated to work each day? According to Shona Murray in her book Refresh, in 2013, women spent an average of 12 hours a week on social media alone, with an average of 150 check-ins on their phone a day. Let’s ask ourselves: what is the first thing I look at in the morning, and the last thing I do before I go to bed? Where do I spend my free time? What do I consume on a regular basis? Where do I go when I’m sad, angry, discouraged, or hurt?

Take the time to log what you are taking in. Remember, we all consume. We all worship. The question is who or what are we worshipping. I don’t mean to equate consumption and worship, but their relationship by nature is closely intertwined. You spend time and attention with who/what you worship. You will receive nourishment (whether it be poison or life) from who/what you worship.

Now look at what you’re consuming. What is it? Do you see any patterns? Any commonalities? How much, dear Christian friend, are you taking in the sustaining, life-giving wisdom and words of God? How much are you taking in worldly entertainment or wisdom, or just plain distraction? Does your spiritual diet nourish your relationship with God and help you grow in Christlike-ness, or is it malnourishing?

Whatever we take in is what will come out of us. I will have nothing good to offer anyone if I don’t soak myself in God’s word with His Spirit illuminating truths to me and changing me from my fleshly self. I won’t have God’s agenda unless I make it a practice to constantly set mine aside through regular repentance. I won’t love the people God put in front of me to love when I’m distracted by earthly pleasures or issues which have no bearing or weight in the eternal glory of God, and are not worthy of my time and attention. Simply put, you and I will miss out on living the abundant, fruit-producing, kingdom-building, disciple-making, Jesus-following life of good works God has prepared for us if we do not set aside our idols and our entertainment for the sake of Jesus’ name. He poured out his life so we could have ours. Would it not be an utter waste if we took His gift of life, paid for by His blood, and held onto it so we could build a comfortable life? No! May it never be! May we be moved to the very core of our being with the understanding that were it not for our beautiful Savior giving up everything He had, suffering God’s wrath in our place, we would be lost. Eternally lost. Dead in our sins. Alone. Without God and without hope in this world. May we remember our state without Christ, and our blood-bought sonship in Christ! May God’s love and grace overwhelm our hearts so that they overflow with gratitude and loving affection toward Him! May we begin to love what He loves and hate what He hates, so we can do good with our small breath of life we’ve been given!

I don’t want to waste one more minute. Will you join me in leaving the mud puddles for a holiday at the sea? Will you leave the foolish, momentary pleasures for the incomparably beautiful, everlasting, glorious ways of God? You don’t have the power to do so on your own. But praise be to God, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you!

He can do it. Ask Him.

 

 

Yesterday, without prior notice, God gave me a taste of what life is really about. It came through an errand with my kids.

We were at a Christian book store, picking out my six-year-old daughter’s first Bible. Having settled on the version we wanted, we were now faced with the choice of style and readership level. Pink or purple? Action or journaling edition? Easy reader or original text?

It had been a busy morning. As any mom of young kids can tell you: if you survive the gauntlet of never-ending questions, discipleship moments, melt-downs, cries for food and drink, potty stops, and everything in-between, with a long view of the future and a desire to pass along the beautiful, life-giving truths of God to your kids in every day life, it’s a miracle of the Holy Spirit of God. That does not happen naturally. (Side note to moms: what God has called you to in raising little humans takes supernatural strength from God every single day in every single mundane task in front of you. Brick by brick, decision by decision, God is using you and the world around you to form these little people. The little things you do each day, the norms you are setting, your demonstration of your relationship with God to them, are so important, and you need God’s strength moment by moment to build good into them. We will either build good or evil. It will be a mixture of both, but if you can show them day after day how Mommy isn’t perfect, but dependent on Jesus for getting out the door, for strength to discipline well, for wisdom to know how to shepherd hearts during another fight about whose car is whose, you have given them a priceless gift.)

So there we were, having faced some of the typical gauntlet of a Thursday morning errand run. My two younger boys plunked down on the ground and began paging through kids’ Bibles. I was thankful for the few moments of uninterrupted time with Grace, though I would occasionally check to see if they were ripping pages out of said Bibles. I began talking through some of the differences with her, as she would pick out Bibles that “looked nice”. Then came one of those glorious moments! Slowly, unobtrusively, in the ordinary of daily life. God used me to shepherd a little girl’s heart toward Him through His word, and blessed me in the process.

We had it narrowed down to three Bibles: a journaling edition, an easy reader (modified translation), and an Adventure Bible (Grace had approved all stylistic cover choices!). The conversation went something like this:

Grace: “Mom, how come the Bible is so small? I mean, why are the words so small?”

Me: “Well, honey, the Bible is actually 66 different books written by different men through the Holy Spirit. So the Bible is 66 books all put into one about Jesus. See? The Old Testament was written before He came, and the New Testament was written after Jesus came.”

Grace: “Oooh! So, how do I know where to go? Can I just read anywhere?”

Me: “Yes! It takes a long time to read the whole Bible. But let’s take one of your stories you know from our Bible time at home, and I’ll show you where to find it in the real Bible.”

Grace: “Okay! How about when Jesus rose from the dead?”

Me: “Yes! Great story! It’s actually in four different books: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Let’s go to John.” We go to John 20. “It starts here, Grace. ‘Now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark.’ ”

Grace: “That sounds familiar! I know I’ve heard that before, but I probably haven’t heard all of it, I mean the way it’s written here in the Bible.”

Me: “Yes, honey. The kids’ Bibles we’ve read to you at home are written by people who have read God’s word, and then wrote a story about it for kids to understand. But look, Grace! See what we just read in John? Do you remember John, who was a disciple of Jesus? (Grace nods). Well, honey, he wrote this book. He wrote those words, sweetie! Through the Holy Spirit! And it’s been preserved for so many years, and now we’re able to read them, too!”

Grace (eyes widening): “What????”

Here’s where I lost it. I started crying. In the middle of the bookstore, with my kids around me, with strangers walking by. None of it mattered. I remembered Jesus, how he explained to the disciples on the road to Emmaus after he rose from the dead, how everything written about Him in the law, all the prophets, and all Scriptures is about Him. I remembered the persecution of the early church. I remembered the scribes who so carefully copied these accounts of Jesus and letters of Paul and others, which became the New Testament. I remembered the martyrs who died to bring us the Bible translated into the common tongue, so everyone could have access to God’s word. I remembered the attack God’s word has been under, and yet how God’s word is not bound! I saw God’s faithfulness to preserve His words so that my six-year-old daughter could read them, and come to taste and see God’s goodness to us in Jesus Christ. I saw how this moment of discipling my daughter toward Jesus was exactly what I wanted to do with my life.

I was blessed enough at 20 years old to have an older woman, Katherine, take me under her wing and meet with me regularly. Her one stipulation: that we memorize Bible verses together. This relationship is where God showed me the beauties, the never-ending riches of knowing God through Jesus by studying His word. Memorizing was simply a way to meditate on God’s word in a culture that teaches you immediate results are the only results. It also put God’s words in my heart, so I could hear Him speak to me. His truths replaced the lies I had believed. His word is alive! It cuts to the heart! It is utterly supernatural. I’m running out of words to explain the life God brought to me as I studied His words. I want to share that gift of knowing God our Father because of Jesus our Savior through His word and the power of the Holy Spirit changing our hearts.

Let me lean on another, much wiser brother in the faith who has better words than me: George Mueller. These excerpts are from an audio podcast by John Piper on http://www.desiringgod.org, entitled “George Mueller’s Strategy for Showing God”.

The question posed here is: How shall we have such happiness that enables us to let go of such earthly pleasures and passions; vain and worthless in comparison? For example: when I want to watch movies and disconnect instead of meeting with God. I want to spend Thanksgiving in the comfort of my home rather than feeding those without homes. I want to use my money to make my life more comfortable, rather than using it to buy a single mom a car, or giving to my church so the gospel of Jesus Christ can go out to all corners of the world. How shall we have such happiness that enables us to let go of such earthly, vain pleasures and passions?

George Mueller: “This happiness is to be obtained through the study of the Holy Scriptures. God has therein revealed himself unto us in the face of Jesus Christ. Happiness in God comes from seeing God in the face of Jesus Christ through the Scriptures. In them we become acquainted with the character of God. Our eyes are divinely opened to see what a lovely being God is, and this good, gracious, loving heavenly Father is ours, our portion for time and eternity.

The more we know of God, the happier we are. When we became a little acquainted with God, our true happiness commenced. The more we become acquainted with Him, the more truly happy we become. What will make us so exceedingly happy in heaven? It will be the fuller knowledge of God. 

Now in brotherly love and affection, I would give a few hints to my younger fellow believers, as to the way in which to keep up spiritual enjoyment. It is absolutely needful, in order that happiness in the Lord may continue, that Scriptures be regularly read. These are God’s appointed means for the nourishment of the inner man. Consider it, ponder over it, especially should we read through it regularly through the Scriptures consecutively, from front to front, and not pick out here and there a chapter. If we do, we remain spiritual dwarfs.

I tell you so affectionately, for the first four years after my conversion, I made no progress, because I neglected the Bible. But then I regularly read on through the whole with reference to my own heart and soul. I directly made progress. My peace and joy continued more and more. Now, I have been doing this for 47 years. I have read through the whole Bible about 100 times (he was then 71 years old). And I always find it fresh when I begin again; thus my peace and my joy have increased more and more. I saw more clearly than ever that the first and great and primary business I ought to attend to every day was to have my soul happy in the Lord. I saw the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the word of God, and the meditation on it.”

What is the food of the inner man? How do we make our souls happy in God? By primarily reading of the word of God. And not simple reading, but considering what we read, pondering over it, giving time to let God work His way in us, and applying it to our lives.

Yesterday, I got to help my daughter take a step toward making her soul happy in the Lord through the Scriptures. I am very aware that I have no power to do so. All is in the hands of God. I was simply an instrument of His in her life. But I do know this: I have experienced, tasted, and seen the goodness of God through the study of His Word. I still do. Being able to share the riches of Jesus with another human being who, yesterday, happened to be my daughter, is the main reason I’m alive, and it’s exactly what I was made to do. God help me, I will continue doing so as long as I live.

Grace picked out the journaling version of the Bible, because, as she put it:

“I want to write down what God is teaching me, and then look back later and see everything that He has done.”

Me too, sweetie. Me too.

Hello world! It’s almost springtime in Seattle! Can you see it? This will be my seventh spring in this lovely city, and I’m starting to learn some things. First, I’ve learned what a rhododendron bush actually looks like. I saw them when I visited Seattle in May 2010 before moving here, and fell in love with the “exotic-looking” bush, but I had no idea what it was called. Now I can identify one on sight and anticipate what time of year it will bloom.

I’m also learning seasons. Seasons of growth, pruning, death, re-growth. In our yard in particular. For example, March is rose-bush-pruning season. I cut them down to basically nothing, and I usually fear I have killed the poor bushes for certain. April-May is usually full of nice patches of sunny weather with a good amount of rainy patches, leading to a season of great growth. By May, everything gets greener & bigger. Our blackberry bushes exploded, and those rosebushes are four times bigger than they were two months ago.

As the plants thrive, so do the weeds. Everything with roots in the ground has been taking off lately. As I’ve spent time in our yard (which some day I would like to call a garden), God has been teaching me parallels about my heart. I think this is a beautiful thing he does with his creation: teach us about himself and myself through what he’s made.

What’s the parallel between my heart and a garden, you ask? We both have weeds.

Here’s the deal with weeds. When small and new, they are easy to pull out, and there usually aren’t very many of them. A few tugs and they’re out, root and all. When those weeds aren’t uprooted, they grow. When I attempt to uproot the weeds after ignoring them for months, I need some serious equipment and effort & time to get them out. It’s hard work. Roots are deep and widespread, and the weeds have multiplied.

And so it is with my heart. Weeds are like sin. I am a redeemed, blood-bought daughter of Christ, who, while waiting for the appearing of my Savior, still struggles with sin on a daily basis. Because of what Christ has done for me, and because of the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit living in me, I am able to live a holy life filled with good works, as is fitting for God’s family. However, I am in process of putting my sin to death, and will be until Jesus’ return. For the sake of this analogy, let’s call this “putting sin to death” process “weeding”.

Colossians 3 tells Christians to “put to death what is earthly in you”, and to “put on” compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, and above all, love. Ephesians 4 tells Christians to put off the old self and put on the new self. I could keep going, as the New Testament is FULL of exhortation & reminder for Christians on how they are to act now that they are made new in Christ.

It is clear in Scripture what the standard of behavior is for me. Perfection. Complete, utter perfection in my behavior and my heart. Thanks be to Jesus, he won utter and complete perfection for me by his life, death and resurrection over 2000 years ago. Since I now have a perfect record that can never be tarnished, I am free to pursue perfection without condemnation when I fail in this current life while I wait for Jesus’ return.

Pursuing perfection means attacking sin when I see it in my heart and behavior. It doesn’t mean obsessively looking for it, spending the majority of my energy on sin-hunting and killing. Jesus Christ won freedom for me, and I firmly believe part of it is freedom from focusing too much on my sin. It means when the Holy Spirit highlights sin in my life, I confess and repent. Quickly. I do not ignore his promptings. I do not quench his voice by refusing to listen & holding onto the sin. I thank him for being kind to show it to me, for making a way through the cross to be free from sin, for the precious truth that I am not defined by what I do but by what Jesus has done, and I turn from my sin.

Just a note on his promptings. I’ve learned that as I listen to Jesus and seek his face, his voice becomes easy to hear. I learn it, and I know it. It’s gentle, and consistent with Scripture. When I hear his voice and refuse to go where he leads or do what he tells me to do, I am automatically listening to someone else. Myself, or the world, or the enemy. When I do this, it becomes harder to hear his voice. I experience a lot of confusion and no clear direction. God, as a loving Father, begins to yell at his daughter who is straying into danger, just as I yell at my daughter who is disobeying her mother and walking into the road.  I experience consequences from not listening to my Father, who knows best. It’s painful. It’s hard. Don’t ignore the quiet promptings just because they’re quiet. That’s the voice of your Father beside you. Listen to him. Go where he says to go. Do what he says to do. If it’s uncomfortable, do it. It may be uncomfortable because your flesh is complaining. You’re killing your flesh as you turn from your sin and obey Jesus. Do it. It’s life for you.

There are weeds I have let grow for the last two months in our yard. Today I spent over an hour digging & yanking, and I cleared about 1/20 of what needs to be cleared. There’s some serious work to do! If you have serious work to do in your heart, and you’re a child of God, there’s good news for you. Your heart is actually not your own anymore. Jesus has your heart. He is your Gardener. You belong to him. He is with you. He will help you. He has promised to do so, and he cannot break a promise. If you are serious about following Jesus and putting your sin to death, I highly recommend regularly praying David’s prayer in Psalm 139:23-24, and expecting Him to answer. “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!”

 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. ² Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. ³ Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. ⁴ Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.”

John 15:1-4

No, I’m not writing about a fashion trend, or home decor. I was reading Numbers 15, and the Holy Spirit highlighted verses 37-41 for me. God is speaking to Moses and giving the Israelites some beautiful instruction on how to remember his laws. This comes just after the spies give a fearful report of the Promised Land, and the people choose to fear what the spies reported rather than fearing the LORD. God is justly angry, says he will wipe them out and start anew through Moses. Moses intercedes for them, and God listens and relents. Instead of killing them, he tells them they will wander for 40 years in the wilderness before they enter the promised land, and that none who saw his miracles since Egypt would make it there, except for Caleb & Joshua. Such a heart-breaking story. Then the LORD begins to give laws about sacrifices & unintentional sins for the generation who will enter the land. This one is so beautiful:

Vs. 37-41: The LORD said to Moses, “Speak to the people of Israel, and tell them to make tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and to put a cord of blue on the tassel of each corner. And it shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of the LORD, to do them, not to follow after your own heart and your own eyes, which you are inclined to whore after. So you shall remember and do all my commandments, and be holy to your God. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God; I am the LORD your God.”

What jumped out to me was verse 39: “And it shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of the LORD, to do them, not to follow after your own heart and your own eyes, which you are inclined to whore after.”

He is such a loving God. I see that as such loving instruction. I’ve never noticed this part of Numbers before, and I love how the Holy Spirit highlights something for me no matter how many times I’ve read it. He knows his people are sheep. He knows they’re stupid. He knows they whore after their own desires instead of him. He knows they’ll continue in their whoring. He knows that our own heart and eyes do not lead us in His ways. He knows we can’t remember his commandments perfectly, let alone do them perfectly. He lays down the impossible command in verse 40, “So shall you remember and do all my commandments and be holy to your God.”

I can’t do that. I can’t remember and do all his commandments. I can’t be holy. But he tells me to. He told the Israelites to, and I’m pretty sure they struggled with sin just as much as we do. So now what?

Well, at that point in history, Jesus hadn’t come yet. He hadn’t fulfilled the law perfectly for them or us. But this step is crucial: we need to understand God’s law and understand the perfection to which he is calling us. If not, we’ll think we’re good enough in our own eyes. But we don’t determine what’s right or wrong: God does. We don’t decide if we’ve obeyed or not: God does. It is CRUCIAL that we come face to face with the impossible perfection God asks of us, the Law that is written & defined solely by Him. We need to understand that we don’t measure up, and that we never could. We need to know the hopelessness of our sin.

If you know Jesus, you know the story doesn’t end there. Years and years later, Jesus comes, God become man, as a baby, lives perfectly, fulfills that Law perfectly, and dies as the worst of sinners in our place. He became our sin and gave us his righteousness. Did you catch that? 2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake he made him to BE sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Jesus became our sin. Jesus became the sin of the world. That means God the Father saw God the Son, Jesus, as if he had committed the sins of the world. He became in God’s eyes the worst pedophile, the worst murderer, the most unfaithful, the most hateful, the most revengeful, the worst abusive father, the worst wandering husband. He became the one who hated God and wanted to do things his own way. He became one who wanted to be righteous on his own. He became one who wanted to please people more than he wanted to please God. He became the worst idolater. He did this so that everyone, no matter what you have done, would have no more barriers between them and God. He did this so everyone could experience saving grace in himself, Jesus Christ. He did this because we had no way of saving ourselves. He did this, and not everyone will receive it. But to those who receive it, who know Jesus as their Lord and Savior, it is now as if you have never sinned in God’s eyes. You have Jesus’ perfection, because he took your filth and gave you his perfection. That is the good news of the gospel!

The good news doesn’t stop there. We’re saved by Jesus, and sanctified by him, and called to good works which were prepared beforehand, that we may walk in them (Ephesians 2). We’re adopted into his family, and yet still struggle with sin. He knows that, and this process of sanctification is making us more into Christ’s image. We’re called to imitate Jesus. In no way are we to become lazy and familiar with our sin, because we have died to our sin (Romans 8). Our old self is dead, and our new self is in Christ, and we’re called to put our sin to death. We’re part of a new family now! We WANT to put our sin to death! We don’t want the flesh, and as a Christian, we war with it! This process will never stop, I believe, until Jesus comes back. So get your boots on, and get comfortable with warring against your flesh!

So back to this idea of tassels. The LORD knows how faithless the Israelites will be. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you’d do it differently if you were there. Ecclesiastes says there is nothing new under the sun, and I believe we struggle with the same sin that the Israelites do. We fail to love Jesus as we’re called to love him, and we fail to love our neighbor as we’re called to love them. We, too, crave our Egypt, our sins, our comfort, you name it. How absolutely loving and long-suffering of the LORD to give the Israelites guidance! He tells them they are inclined to whore after what their heart desires and what their eyes see. So he gives them a visual reminder on their clothes, something they will see numerous times a day (let’s say they see it an average of 20x a day). So 20 times a day, God gives them a reminder, which to me implies that they need reminding. They’re going to forget to keep God’s commandments 20x a day, or possibly more. They, too, are leaky vessels, who forget God. He knows we are dust, and he makes a way. He makes a way with tassels, and he makes a way with Jesus.

Modern-day tassels. For us, what are they? We’re living not pre-Jesus, as the Israelites were in Numbers 15, but post-Jesus, after his death and resurrection, after the coming of the Holy Spirit of God into his children who love him and trust in Jesus for their righteousness and salvation. Hallelujah! WE, God’s adopted children, are now the temple of the Holy Spirit! Now his law is no longer simply read to us, but written on our hearts! The perfect sacrifice has been made – once for all! No more need of blood shed to pay for sins! If you are a blood-bought child of God the Father, the law has been fulfilled for you. Rejoice and be glad! Remember any works you now do, you do from the power of the Holy Spirit in you, out of gratefulness to your risen Savior. The commandments Jesus fulfilled for us are indeed still our commandments, but instead of obeying them to become righteous, now we obey them because Jesus has made us righteous. We obey because we’ve been forgiven. We obey because we’ve been cleansed. We obey because it is the way of our Father, who loves us and who we love. There is wisdom for us in the tassel reminder, however. Our eyes and heart still incline us to evil. We still see and yearn for our idols. God, is there anything I can put around myself to remind me to keep His commandments and remember how Jesus kept the law perfectly for me when I fail?

Friends, fellow mothers of young children, business women. Did you know there is a battle going on right now, and if you name yourself a follower of Christ, you are in the midst of it?

Did you know that one of the enemy’s tactics to keep you from growing in Christ and reaching the point of dangerously living each day by the mighty power of the Holy Spirit, who raised Jesus from the dead, is to bring your focus on yourself? Subtly, with great reason and some truth mixed in, he seeks to focus your gaze on you. I know from experience.

In my current calling of life, this call to focus on myself goes as follows. Perhaps you can relate. I’m extremely busy all day long. Cleaning, training, straightening out tangles, feeding, soothing, helping, playing. Throughout the day, quietly, in the background, there’s a voice telling me, “Wow. This is such a challenging day. You really are going above and beyond what others in your situation are doing. Just wait until you get a free moment. That movie on Netflix you’ve been planning on seeing is waiting for you, and when you finally get to sit down and watch it…..well, that’s where you’ll finally get some rest.”

Sadly, I have listened to that voice many a time. The kids are finally in bed, and I have bought into the lie mixed with truth, and have become convinced that I need some quiet time. I need to be poured into now. I’ve spent the whole day pouring into others. This movie is just what I need. Everyone needs their down time. This is mine. It’s a harmless film. I just get to check out for awhile. Nothing wrong with that. I’m human, after all, and everyone reaches their breaking point sometime. This down time, watching a movie, is where I will get my rest.

Yes, it’s true that I’m human. It’s true I need to be poured into. It’s true that today has been quite the day. It’s true that a movie can be harmless and entertaining and good. But alas, I have swerved into a self-focused victim mindset, where I am the poor tired mother who needs a break, and I have determined where my rest will come from without running first to my Helper and Sustainer, my Counselor, my Friend, my Lord and my God who loves me so deeply and has a five-course refreshing and replenishing meal waiting for me in Himself and His words instead of the popcorn and Skittles I chose for myself.

Then, turning to movies or fill-in-the-blank becomes normal. It’s every night, or most every spare moment you have. It’s where you seek your rest. You begin putting in worldly junk food when your soul and spirit are craving true sustenance. You begin setting your mind on things of this earth. You begin growing dull to the voice of your Lord, because you don’t stop to listen to him. Your priorities start slowly shifting…almost too quietly and subtly for you to notice. Your appetite for rest, by the way, is never really satiated by that one movie. In fact, often you feel more tired or drawn out after watching, or feel as if you need to watch just one more episode of that show before you go to bed.

And there is your enemy, grinning in glee, because he has succeeded in drawing your eyes down from your glorious and awesome Savior, and your main concern has become filling yourself. He has you completely distracted, numbed out to a life lived by the Spirit for God’s purpose, and you are not a threat to him anymore.

Friends, there is so much more for you! There is a better existence for you! One that is more exciting, more fulfilling, more unpredictable and heart-breaking and joyous. One with eternal rewards. One that seeks to bring glory to the only One who is deserving of it. Do not worry about being fed. Jesus is the Good Shepherd. He takes most excellent care of his sheep. Do not worry about the load. His yoke is easy, and his burden is light. Do not worry about going at it alone. He will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not worry about missing out. This life is but a breath, and living for the coming life everlasting begins now. We cannot begin to imagine the glories that are awaiting us who are eager for Jesus’ return and living in anticipation of him. Have I said it clearly enough yet? It is so much BETTER to be about God’s work, God’s mission, God’s purposes than to be about our own!

A word to my fellow mothers of young ones: I have been in the above place for at least 3 years. God has faithfully and consistently been calling me out of the numbed-out existence to live by his purposes and priorities. Praise God for his faithfulness to me, and for bringing me out of it. I will still watch the occasional movie or show, but it is no longer what I look forward to when I’m tired. It is no longer my rest. It’s so beautiful, where he has brought me! I actually don’t want to watch those movies or shows anymore! When I’m bone-weary, I would rather open my Bible, or listen to someone preaching through a portion of the Bible (or nap. Naps are good. Naps are glorious, God-given gifts!). God’s words are true food. He gives living water that satisfies. His presence is where I find the greatest comfort. I’ve lost my taste for popcorn and Skittles, and have grown an appetite for richer foods. He has changed my heart. He gave me eyes to see what I was truly doing, and brought me repentance from my self-focused existence. It is still a current battle, but now it is one I am aware of and fighting by the power of the Holy Spirit.

If you are in a place where your diet has been junk food, and you are aware of it and sick of it, but do not know how to stop, if you are a blood-bought child of God through Jesus Christ, I have good news for you. You serve a God who is more powerful than our enemy, and more powerful than your flesh. He lives in you. You are a temple of his Holy Spirit. He who gave life to Jesus Christ will also give life to you. You can fall on your knees before him and ask for his help. Ask for him to give you repentance. Ask to be broken over what breaks his heart. Ask for his priorities. Ask for faith to believe that what he offers is truly better and more satisfying than where you’ve been going for life, meaning and rest. Ask and believe. Turn back to him in faith that he is who he says he is. Eat and drink – he is altogether satisfying and good! Then watch and see what he begins doing through your life.

I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

Jesus in John 15:5

To Ricky Gervais, in response to your (Atheist) Easter message (article here).

First off, thanks for The Office. I’m a fan.

Second, thank you. I appreciated hearing why you believe you’re a better Christian than most Christians. No sarcasm. I really did appreciate it. Too often I can disconnect and fail to listen to others’ opinions and beliefs, especially if they differ from mine. That’s something I hope will keep changing in me, and that I’ll be more willing to engage in honest dialogue with others.

Why am I writing a response to your article, 5 years after you wrote it? Well, I’m a Christian. 5 years late to the party, I read it a couple days before Easter this year. After reading your article, I was deeply moved. Not deeply moved in the sense that I agree with your entire perspective and interpretations, but I was deeply moved to hear you express what you believe to be true of Christians and why you, as an atheist, are a better one. I was also troubled, because I saw some major gaps in what you describe and what I believe as a Christian. I acknowledge we don’t know each other, and the chance of us sitting down to a frank discussion about our beliefs is almost nonexistent. Nevertheless, I want to put this out there so perhaps you, or someone who thinks similarly to you, may benefit from a different perspective on Christianity. My greatest hope is, of course, that you come to understand how much the God who made you loves you, but I’m sure you’re giggling at this point, and I don’t think me trying to persuade you of that is the best use of our time 🙂

So here it is from my perspective as a Christian.

You are so right on many of your observations. The main ones I remember nodding my head at while reading your article were:

• Terrible, atrocious things have been done in the name of Christianity. You put it as cruelty and prejudice. Yes. This is profoundly wrong and disturbing. I totally agree with you.
• You said one thing you would want to change in this world would be for all mankind to follow Jesus’ words: “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” Wow. I agree. Wouldn’t that be an amazing world to live in.
• Gandhi’s quote. He said, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Yes! Big head nod. I think your observation is spot on. Christians are so unlike their Christ. And this is where I’m going to camp out. Even if you take the “best”, most mature believer in Jesus Christ (however you qualify that), you’ll find they do an imperfect, if not sometimes terrible job representing him. You might get small glimpses of Christlike-ness, but glimpses only.

…And that’s kind of the point of Christianity. That’s the beginning of the “gospel”, or good news Jesus brings. This is where I think you have a gap in your understanding of the Christian faith. Honestly, this is where a lot of Christians have a gap in their understanding of the Christian faith. I did, for at least 19 years of my Christian life. I would hear that quote by Gandhi and feel terribly guilty because I knew he was right and I felt he shouldn’t be. “Darn it all, I should be more like Christ!” I would think, and I would try even harder, which would lead to me being even less like Christ. Then some lights came on. Jesus Christ did not come to this earth (by the way, I believe he was FULLY man and FULLY God) to primarily make people look and act like him, although that happens over time to a degree during a Christian’s life. We call it sanctification: a process where God is constantly making his children more like Jesus. We never reach perfection here on earth, just so you know. Christ came primarily to save sinners. At the end of John 12:47, Jesus says, “I did not come to judge the world but to save the world.” He came primarily to rescue. To heal. To restore. To bind up. To forgive.

The climax of his coming was his death and resurrection from death. His death and resurrection was the rescue. You know those 10 commandments you rated yourself by? In Deuteronomy, there’s a summation of them. Deuteronomy 6:5 says, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.” Later in Matthew 22:37-40, the religious leaders ask Jesus which is the greatest commandment, and Jesus replies by referencing Deuteronomy, saying, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

So, Ricky Gervais, let me ask you. Whom do you love the most? What do you love the most?

From your article, you sound like a fairly nice guy to share the planet with. I know you’re certainly gifted to make people laugh. You don’t kill people, or steal, or commit adultery, or lie. I have a hard time believing you have never done anything wrong according to God’s law, but let’s just roll with it and assume that you’ve done all the good and right things you believe God has told Christians to do.

Here’s the true “quiz”: Do you love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might, with everything you have? Is he your top priority? Is he the one who captivates your heart more than anything or anyone? Is he the one you live for?

I don’t know you from Adam, but I don’t think so.

I don’t love God like that, either.

I don’t believe anyone does. Or ever has. Except one.

One person has done it.

Jesus.

There’s our rescue. There’s our only hope. Only Jesus could stand before God and say, “I’m good.” We are not. I am not. As you observed, in the Bible, the penalty for sin is death. By God’s standard of perfection, we all miss the mark and deserve death.

In the greatest act of love and kindness I could ever imagine, God doesn’t just kill us, consign us to death, write us off, or abandon us. As we run from him, he runs to us. As we hate him, he loves us. Instead of judging us, which Jesus would have a perfect right to do as God’s Son, he comes to save us. God gives of himself, giving us his perfect Son, Jesus, to pay that penalty we owe, for our sake. Takes the punishment we deserve. He’s killed on a Roman cross. Willingly. For us. A perfect sacrifice, once for all. Then, rising from the dead that Sunday morning, he proves his deity and ultimate victory. Everyone who believes in what Jesus has done for them is now considered good by God, even though they still miss the mark. Christians don’t stop sinning when they become Christians. Heaven help us! Most of us don’t immediately become better people, either. You walk in to a Jesus-believing, Bible-preaching church, and it will probably be more of a hospital than a museum. A collection of judgmental, hypocritical, struggling, messed-up people. No, when we become a Christian, we gain a Redeemer and his perfect reputation, and lose our crappy reputation forever.

I don’t know, Mr. Gervais, the Christians you’ve come in contact with. I don’t know your story. It’s not worth me trying to guess, either. Just let me say this. A true Christian clings to Jesus’ death and resurrection as his or her only hope of goodness in this life. Not their own actions. As you so rightly observe, our actions condemn us. We fail often. We judge. We quickly forget how loved we are. We fail to keep Jesus’ words as we should. We hurt others. We break those 10 commandments like nobody’s business. No, we are not good images of Christ. And striving to be a better image through our own efforts only leads to less Christlike-ness.

I’m not a Christian because I’m betting that I have a 50/50 chance of life with God after death. Jesus’ resurrection is all the proof I need that I’m going to rise with him. My life is tied with his now. I’m certainly not a Christian because I’m good. I’m a Christian because I’m bad and I have a great Savior who gave me his goodness. My actions, now that I believe and trust in Jesus’ work for me, no longer condemn me or make me good. Follow me around for day, and you’ll see me do many things that God says are wrong for a Christian to do. I hate it, Mr. Gervais. I hate it when I do those things. Don’t get me wrong. It grieves my heart that I fail to keep Jesus’ words. But just like when I met Jesus and admitted I couldn’t be good on my own, 25 years later, when I covet my friend’s more comfortable life, I run to Jesus because I still can’t be good on my own. I remember he took my punishment. I remember he gave me his goodness. I remember he loves me enough to die for me. No matter what I do or don’t do. Nothing can change that. Ever.

That’s what I cling to every time I fail. That’s what I humbly need to remember when I think I’m good enough on my own. Jesus is my life. He’s my sustaining power. He’s my comfort. He’s my perfect friend. He’s my ever-present help. His love is the kind that can’t be captured in mere words. There aren’t enough to express who he is and what he has done.

No, the Bible isn’t inconsistent. The more I read it, the more amazed I am at how consistent and connected it is. It’s only open for interpretation when you decide you have the right to edit it. I assume we differ here because you don’t believe in God, and I do. I shiver even considering putting myself in the editing chair of God’s words. No thanks! I think He did it much much better than I could. And intolerant? Well, yes, in a way. God in the Bible is incredibly intolerant of sin. He hates it. It mucked up the perfect world he created for us to enjoy. But God in the Bible is incredibly tolerant of people. He’s the most forgiving, patient, loving, giving Being I could ever imagine. Well beyond my human capacity to understand.  The tiny peek I’ve gotten of God, the miniscule amount I understand of him, brings me to my knees in grateful worship of him.