Category: Uncategorized

“Look! I am standing at the door and knocking. If any hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to be with them, and will have dinner with them, and they will have dinner with me.” 

Revelation 3:20 

How many of you have uttered the question, “God is really supposed to be this hard?” I would wager that a good number of people would admit that they have asked God this question. This Christian thing that we are all doing was not supposed to be this hard. If God really cared about us he wouldn’t make it so hard right? Well absolutely not! 

Being a Disciple of Jesus Christ was never meant to be perfect and rosy. It just doesn’t happen. 

When things in your spiritual walk with Christ don’t go the way that you intend what do we naturally do? 

We try to work through and will ourselves to do better. 

As an american I was told like many of us were that when life gets hard that we just need to pick ourselves up by our bootstraps and will ourselves to work hard to be successful. This is why “self-made” men and women in the business world today are so admired. Because they came from humble backgrounds to making millions. That is something Americans admire. It’s also something that we try to do in our spiritual life as well. When things are going like we hoped and we naturally question God as to why this is so hard we are actively thinking: 

“Ok. I can do this. I just need to work through it.” 

This is sometimes true, but at other times its……

A load of crap. 

I would imagine that sometimes God is smiling at us and saying, “Hey! I’m knocking! Are you going to open the door?” 

This may seem strange but sometimes we can’t will ourselves to do it. We are human beings and we are limited. Very limited at times. Sometimes what we need to do is give in and open the flippin door! 

I’ve always thought that God was the perfect example of a gentlemen. He will never force himself on his children, he gives us the choice. 

Seriously though. 

We just need to open the door. 

Forget our pride of trying to do it on our own and recognize that WE NEED JESUS! We need to open that door and be with God, and feast on his holy word and allow him to heal the brokenness in our souls that we are feeling. 

Forget your bootstraps. 

Open the door. 

So, I was reading Google Reader earlier and I ran across a statistic that I found on Jonathon Acuff’s “Stuff Christians Like” Blog. I was reading a post called “Stillness isn’t Sexy” which of course caught my attention because that was why he chose that title, to get my attention. 

It brought me back to my previous post about waiting and how if we don’t allow ourselves to wait then we don’t allow ourselves to become the people that God designed us to be. We don’t allow our soul to grow. 

Stillness isn’t Sexy. 

No it’s not. It’s not even normal. Well the world’s definition of normal anyway. 

For the last nine or so years I have been working towards a bachelors degree. I went to several different colleges. Which has led me to graduating from Texas Wesleyan University in less than four weeks. 

I have imagined for the last 5-7 years what graduating from college looks like. It’s been a dream. 

That dream is slowly becoming a reality. 

Imagine senioritis after working for something for almost a decade. 

Do you think I like waiting or even close to being still. 

Heck no. 

It’s a challenge. 

One thing that Jon Acuff wrote in that post was a stat that scared me. 

We spend an extra month at work more than people in past generations did. Let me repeat that.

You and I found a way to work an additional month every year. I put that stat from a Harvard economist in my book Quitter because it’s terrifying.

 

Our lives are so busy that we have somehow, someway found it possible to work an additional month every year!? Stillness or waiting is not normal for us. We down right don’t like it, not even a little. 

What I’ve learned this semester is that when we allow ourselves to be still and wait we embrace God in a way that is so real, so genuine, and so awesome that its like we are experiencing God for the first time all over again. Wow. 

Experiencing God for the first time all over again? 

That’s something worth working towards. 

That’s a challenge worth trying to beat. 

Embrace the stillness. 

“Be still and know that I am God.” 

So, here is a question for you. 

How can you be still and wait for the Lord today? 

My girlfriend Amy Forsythe sent me something that I feel shows a lot about the issue of waiting for the Lord or waiting for things in life to happen. I hope this encourages you as it encouraged me greatly. 

 

Winter lumbered towards spring. Outside in my yard, the little cocoon hung in silence. Wait, God seemed to whisper. But another voice rose up in me and around me, a sensible, collective voice insisting that waiting was a huge procrastination, an anachronism, a nice idea, maybe, but something misplaced in the fast-paced, demanding world of today. 

Besides, I didn’t want to wait. Waiting seemed the rawest kind of agony. I wanted God to simply whisk away the masks I had spent most of my life fashioning, to hoist up from my repressed well the lost and neglected parts of myself, to solve my problems, heal my wounds, and alleviate the inexplicable sense of discontent and pain I was feeling. And mind you, I wanted all of this now, immediately, or at the very least soon. 

I was a typical quickaholic. We are, I suspect, one of the fastest growing populations around. 

It was at this point that I traveled to St. Meinrad Archabbey for a retreat. One day after morning prayers, I walked to the edge of the pond and sat on the grass. I listened to wind sigh over the water and tried to be still, to simply be there and wait in the moment. But almost instantly my inner chaos rose up. The need to keep moving, to act, to solve everything overpowered me. I got to my feet. 

As I returned to the guest quarters, I noticed a monk, ski cap pulled over his ears, sitting perfectly still beneath a tree. There was such reverance in his sillouette, such tranquil sturdiness, that I paused to watch. He was the picture of waiting.

Later I sought him out. “I saw you today sitting beneath the tree – just sitting there so still. How is it that you can wait so patiently in the moment? I can’t seem to get used to the idea of doing nothing.” 

He broke into a wonderful grin. “Well, there’s the problem right there, young lady. You’ve bought into the cultural myth that when you’re waiting your’re doing nothing.” 

Then he took his hands and placed them on my shoulders, peered straight into my eyes and said, “I hope you’ll hear what I’m about to tell you. I hope you’ll hear it all the way down to your toes. When you’re waiting, you’re not doing nothing. You’re doing the most important something there is. You’re allowing your soul to grow up. If you can’t be still and wait, you can’t become what God created you to be.” 

-Sue Monk KIdd, When the Heart Waits

My favorite verse is Psalm 46:10. It’s my favorite because I think it is the foundation to where our faith begins. 

“Be still and know that I am God.” 

This verse commands you to be still and wait. 

It’s excruciating to wait, but if we really do wait our very soul grows in the Lord. 

So, what is holding you back from letting your soul grow? 

I encourage you to embrace the activity of waiting. 

Recently I have been listening to a lot of worship music. This is not entirely out of the ordinary seeing as every week I choose five songs to have for Fusion Sunday Night Worship, but recently there has been one song that really has resonated with me. 

The song “Rescue” by Desperation Band is a short song, but it is very powerful. 

Here is the chorus

I need you Jesus

To come to my rescue

Where else can I go

There’s no other name by 

Which I am saved

Capture me with grace

I will follow you 

 

Today when I was walkin around campus I sat down on a stone bench in the Texas Wesleyan Lawn and I was struck with a new meaning to this song. At first glance of course it is about Jesus coming to our rescue, but in what way? 

How often do we let meaningless things consume our worries or our lives? 

How often do we not worry enough about the poor? 

How often do we really not buy into what Jesus really said and commanded us to do and be? 

Ever feel that you get in the way of Jesus speaking the gospel to someone through you? 

So, that prayer doesn’t seem so strange now. 

So I pray that in my life today and tomorrow and forever how long I am blessed to live in this world that God would rescue me from myself and that He would bless others through me and in spite of me. 

Ultimately I pray that God would place himself so present in my soul and heart that when people see me they don’t see me, but they see the glorious love and grace of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. 

Because as the song says where else can we go but to the glorious presence of the Savior, who loved us enough to save us, even though we didn’t deserve such a love. 

Yes, Father God capture us with your Grace. 

Now, that means something. That could change the world. 

For the last week I have been reading a devotional every morning. My girlfriend Amy was reading one called, “Jesus Calling,” and from time to time she would read me entries from it so I bought and started reading it daily. I know you have probably heard this before about the bible most definitely and about some daily devotionals, but it never fails to tell me exactly what I need to hear. I would like share the one for today with you. 

Here is a little blurb from it: 

NO MATTER WHAT your circumstances may be, you can find Joy in My Presence. On some days Joy is generously strewn along your life-path, glistening in the sunlight. On days like that, being content is as simple as breathing the next breath or taking the next step. Other days are overcast and gloomy; you feel the strain of the journey, which seems endless. Dull gray rocks greet your gaze and cause your feet to ache. Yet Joy is still attainable. Search for it as for a hidden treasure.

That last sentence is what caught my attention and really what ties this paragraph all together. Sometimes it’s so hard to find the joy in our lives. We have some many things that need our attention, our concern, and ultimately our worries. Life is all too much like a blur. We don’t experience life sometimes we try to figure it out. 

I realized that after reading that today that experiencing life is what Christ is all about. He came and died so that we could experience the best life possible. He came to take away your worries. He came to be the representation of God, the being that we could talk to through our worries and even our fears. He is always by our side helping us experience life. 

So, in the words of Proverbs 2:4

…and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure.

Let’s search for JOY as if it is our only concern. I think it really comes down to waking up in the morning and asking yourself the following question: 

Are you sold out for Christ? 

Cause if we truly are sold out for Christ then our only concern would be to experience the best life possible that Jesus desires for us. 

SEEK JOY!