stitches

Every day God invites us on the same kind of adventure.  It’s not a trip where He sends us a rigid itinerary.  He simply invites us.  God asks what it is He’s made us to love, what it is that captures our attention, what feeds that deep indescribable need of our souls to experience the richness of the world He made.  And then, leaning over us, He whispers, “Let’s go do that together.”

~ Bob Goff, Love Does

There is a tree standing by a creek in the middle of one of the most magical places on Earth, Windy Gap.  One of those trees whose branches beckon to each child who walks by, crying out to be climbed.  I use to walk by the tree growing up, stare at its branches and wonder what it felt like to sit at the top.  I think too often I live my life in the same way… looking at an adventure and simply wondering what it might hold…

I just finished reading a book everyone else in my life seemed to finish as well.  Even my neighbor yelled, “Love Does, great book!” as I was reading on my back porch.  Bob Goff fills his chapters with story after story of fascinating, whimsical adventures.  And as I read each one, I found myself sitting in awe… not because of the amazing trips and encounters Bob has been a part of, but in awe of the way he holds life as an adventure.  I have been thinking a lot lately about adventure.  A lot of times we as Christians refer to our union with the Creator as a “walk with God”, and honestly the phrase serves as a beautiful image of us walking alongside Jesus.  But I wonder how our life would change if we sat out on an “adventure with God” instead of a walk.  An adventure like Peter has the night Jesus walks out to the middle of lake to meet his friends.  As Peter challenges the “ghost” on the water to prove himself, the voice calls back, “Come”, and Peter steps out into one of the greatest adventures recorded in human history.  Maybe for a brief moment, a few steps or a hundred yards, Peter experiences life beyond what he could ever imagine.  Stepping off the boat I’m sure was frightening, exhilarating, confusing and more… and lately I have been wondering if all adventure feels that way. 

Too often I am afraid to step into the adventure God longs to have with me.  The fear of sinking, the fear of being hurt, and the fear of failing hold me back.  But what I am discovering, slowly, that life at its fullest, an adventure filled life is scary and joyful and painful and confusing and good.  To steal a classic scene from the Chronicles of Narnia-  Is it safe? No.  Is it good? I am beginning to believe so…

No one has taught me more about the adventure of life with God than my sister, Lindsay.  Lindsay use to climb the tree sitting by the creek (which made her younger brother long to even more).   One day she fell.  The branches were not so kind on the way down and the drop sent her to the emergency room for a set of stitches on her eye.  Those stitches kept me away from the tree I so badly wanted to climb, those stitches kept me wondering.  Lindsay is now a mom of 3 boys- Campbell, Graham and little Huck.  Campbell and Graham are twins who live a life of adventure, like their mom, and they have the stitches to prove it.  They climb trees, run through fields and swim in the cold ocean.  The ER doctors know them by name and their GiGi (our mom) cringes each time they come home in a cast or with a new set of stitches… But at 5 years old they are beginning to understand how God created them to live in an adventure with Him, to live a life full of joy, heartache, surprises, fun, pain, laughter and more… Already they see God as the One who makes the adventure possible… Already they realize real life, life at its fullest, a life of adventure comes with some stitches. 

I no longer want to simply wonder… I want to jump into the life of adventure the Creator of the Universe is calling me into… and I am realizing, life like this comes with some stitches.

glimpse

if i find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that i was made for another world.  ~ c.s. lewis, mere christianity 

our world is full of pain, suffering, and heartache...  

whether we turn on the tv or pick up a newspaper, the world seems seems to be convincing us that this is true.  bombs, poverty, trials, hunger, racism, rape... all evidence to convict the world of its evil nature.  cars crash and so has the stock market... natasha has no home, grandma forgets, and the doctors can't find a cure.   all around us, everyday, we are bombarded with the fact that this is not how its suppose to be.  surely we were made for more?  mark driscol, pastor of mars hill church in seatle, says that life here, on earth, is the closest christians will ever be to hell.  and i think he's right.  we experience, i think its safe to say daily, hell on earth.  its easy, even as believers, to focus on the tragedy that is our world.  but i think just as we experience hell on earth, we also have the chance to experience heaven on earth.  glimpses of how the world should be.  before the fall.  when all was good.  naked and unashamed... as it was in the garden. 

im convinced that we have these glimpses... even in the midst of our broken world. 

we encounter love that goes beyond the world.  its during these special, sacred time that we are experiencing the Jesus in each other.  paul says the mystery, the secret of life is Jesus in us.  it may be through a wife's smile, a father's embrace, the beauty of a mother holding her own, a friend's words, or a stranger's help... whatever, whenever, however... we must take the time to seek heaven on earth, because if we believe paul then we have to trust that in our interactions with other followers of Christ, we bump into the same Rabbi as the bleeding woman or blind bart.  heaven is a place far greater than our thinking, where beauty trumps and life is how it was intended, and since that day in the garden, when man ate of the forbidden tree, we have lived life apart from heaven... we have lived in what sometimes must resemble hell, yet the if we look closely we can still see the glimpses of the beauty that will one day reign again...

 

harmony

jesus, wherever you need me... singing harmony...

= bethany dillon

lately i have been really looking at Jesus.

books, conversations, concerts, situations... they have all led me to the most unique, amazing person whoever lived.  and the thought that has been rolling around in my head, that i have been trying to get my arms around is that Jesus wants to be with us.  

there are so many ways to take the idea that Jesus wants to be with us and apply to every... every... every... really everything.  life.  this week i have realized that Jesus wants us to be together in ministry.  wherever we go, whatever we do, no matter where our pay check comes from, Jesus calls us to take the good news to those around us.  to love them, share life with them, and tell them about Jesus.  but thankfully he does not send us out alone.  you see the song we sing to those around us is not a solo... i don't even think we are in the lead.  we have the unique opportunity to sing harmony with the God of the universe.  and sing to the whole world.  our voice, which so often the way we live our life, should not overshadow the voice of Jesus, but be an echo, a reflection of the truth and beauty.

Jesus, wherever you need me... may i sing harmony... may i sing of your love... the way you lived and the reason you died.

free

all her debts were cast on me

and she must and shall go free

~  derek webb

freedom is the idea that no longer any body or act or thing can hold power over another being or another thing... removing power from something that once held control.  i have been reminded lately about how Jesus set us free.  he invites us to live in freedom... i believe a lot of people might understand the idea of "freedom in Christ" is the right to live however the hell you want, but "freedom in Christ" is so much deeper, so much grander, so much more valuable that living the way WE want.  that is the very thing we have been freed from.  freed from taking control of our lives, because, at least in my experience, once we do that, we begin to hurt ourselves and those around us.  we must understand that we are freed from the chains that have once held us, free from sin.  the three-letter word that makes most cringe.  not only are we free from the imprisionment sin holds in our life, we are free to live life in Christ.  a full life in Christ.  

Jesus came to set us free...  

He freed us from the control that has ruined our lives...

we must and shall go free...

enough

"i do not understand the mystery of grace- only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us" anne lamott~ traveling mercies

i was thinking of an email i received a few years ago from my sister.  i dont really know why i was thinking about it.  maybe my mind went there because it was her birthday.  i do not remember the email in its entirety.  just one reference.  to grace.  grace and its sufficiency.  grace is talked about often, so why did this email settle in my mind?  you see my sister has had some major healthy problems.  over the last ten years she has been in and out of the hospital every 6 months or so fighting a pain that continued to be unidentified and incurable to many, many doctors.  with any illness of great length, your mind and emotions experience just as much, if not more, pain as the body.  i spent most of this time completely and utterly confused.  confused at God.  confused at doctors.  confused at my sister.  confused at God.  drivingto the hospital one day in college when lindsay had to spend some times there after another attack, i remember crying out to God for answers.  an explanation of why my sister, who i love and believe God loves, had to experience such pain and for so long.  and more than an explanation, i wanted it to stop.  how could a God of love and care of gentleness and compassion, grace and mercy, allow her to time and time again sit in that damn hospital and have doctors continue to fail to bring about any real change?  i was not the one on the bed, but i was furious.  i was sad.  i was hurt.  and i was confused.  as we all do, i try to make a deal with God... as if there was something the Creator of the universe wanted in exchange for healing.  i had faith that God really did have the measures to make it go away.  my family and lindsay's friends cried out for help, for an answer and it just seemed like we were getting now response. a few weeks after she went home from the hospital, lindsay sent out an email to some people catching them up on her latest episode.  she is a brilliant writer and i'm sure the email was full of capturing thoughts, but one stuck out.  His grace is sufficient for me.  "My grace is sufficient for you" (2 Corinthians 12:9).  these words sprang of the page and pierced me in the heart.  how could this woman, my sister, who lived in either pain or the fear of pain arising, claim that God's grace was enough for her.  in the midst of a dismal picture of a life ahead that looked full of pain, she looked at the God who created her and loves her and said you are suffice.  the grace you have given me through Your Son on the cross, it is enough.  whether my insides are healed.  whether i will ever have children... Your grace is enough.  and i began to believe that His grace is enough for me.  i still doubt that and too often live my life trying to fill it with pride, success, money, and security, but remember that God loves me and He tells me His grace is enough.  He told me a couple of years ago in an email from a girl who had every right in the world to cuss God and tell him to take is sufficient grace straight to hell.  but in the midst of pain and suffering, she told me that His grace is enough.

endless

i was sitting with two dear friends today... friends you like to tell people about.  friends that stand beside you on your wedding day.  friends who, as my dad says, will carry your casket one day.  we were catching up on life and one friend was filling us in on somethings in his life that were really going well and then he continued to tell us how this one deal just was really messing with him.  i hated for him that he is having to process through this kinda sucky situation, but on the other hand i was jealous.  he is experiencing God's grace and unconditional in a way i am not even sure he knows yet.  as we was venting to us i ashamedly drifted off for a second to my own world,reminding myself how i have experienced this incarnational love and grace he is showing.  through my beautiful wife, my loving parents, a hurt sister, a life long friend, perfectly timed notes, and in so many other ways.  all of these moments that have been filled with grace came into my mind.  i finally waded back into the conversation after my selfish metal break and heard him talk about how he was not angry, but just saddened by the brokeness of our world.  i think this is how God feels most of the time. i do not believe in a God that has positioned himself on a throne with a iron scepter in hand, waiting to strike down vengeance on his children when they fall.  i believe in a God, who like any proud parent, watches while we learn to walk and picks us up and dusts off whenever we fall.  our God's heart breaks for the brokenness of the world.  the brokenness we all cause. but in the midst of us turning our back, saying no to his protection and freedom, he offers what we need most- love.  and through his dying love comes his saving grace.  grace that known no end.  

i'm very proud of my friend.  and very thankful.  you see it was through him that i was reminded of a Father who stands waiting for me with open arms... with dying love... with endless grace.

sundays

their friends' love turned out to be the sound of God at the mouth of the cave, a breeze to sustain and help guide them.     ~anne lamott,  Traveling Mercies

 sunday my incredibly cute nephews were dedicated at Lindsay and daniel’s church.  in campbell and graham’s short nine months, pages could be filled with the ways in which God has shown up in their lives and the lives of their parents and their uncle and their grandparents and everyone who has been a part of their miraculous story.  sunday was a beautiful time of remembering God’s hand in their lives as the preacher told their story and prayed for them and challenged their parents.  but for a moment my attention moved from the beautiful baby boys and Lindsay and Daniel, to the ones who circled behind them, their friends.  these few dear friends surrounding them, laying their hands on then are the people that live life with them.  it was such a blessing to see the support they have outside our family. 

i have been blessed with people, beyond my family, surrounding me.  men and women who have dared to crawl into dark places in my life and remind me of the light that still lingers on the outside.  in our lives we need these people, these friends.  the ones who show up and have a distinct, loud voice in our life, one that sounds like God.