Sometimes kids say it best. The following is a reimagining (or more accurately a paraphrase) of the Lord’s Prayer. It’s the best example I can think of as to what it looks like to have the faith of a child:

“Sometimes we experience a terrible dryness in our spiritual life. We feel no desire to pray, don’t experience God’s presence, get bored with worship services, and even think that everything we ever believed about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is little more than a childhood fairy tale.

Then it is important to realise that most of these feelings and thoughts are just feelings and thoughts, and that the Spirit of God dwells beyond our feelings and thoughts. It is a great grace to be able to experience God’s presence in our feelings and thoughts, but when we don’t, it does not mean that God is absent. It often means that God is calling us to a greater faithfulness. It is precisely in times of spiritual dryness that we must hold on to our spiritual discipline so that we can grow into new intimacy with God” (Henri Nouwen).

I always remember what I heard a long time ago. What you think and feel can and will lie to you, so you go with what you know. You cling to all the promises of God as declared in Scripture.

That’s why it’s so vital to know God’s word inside and out. The more you know, the less likely that doubts can steal your joy. Not that you won’t still have doubts, but you know better how to doubt your doubts and hold fast to what is true.

Spiritual dryness can be a good thing if it leads you away from trusting your experiences and your emotions rather than trusting in the person of God as revealed in Jesus. Just know that seasons come and seasons go, but the faithfulness of God lasts forever.

I’m thankful for Friday. I’m blessed to have a good job with people I like working with. I’m blessed to have a good life where I get to do a lot of things that I enjoy. But I’m still thankful for Friday.

I’m glad that God established a day of rest because I generally need one by this point in the week. We all do. No one was ever designed to go 24/7 without a break of some kind.

So I hope you enjoy your weekend. I hope you can rest and find some kind of hobby or activity that brings you joy. Or I hope you can know the freedom of doing nothing without feeling guilty about it.

And happy Friday in advance!

More and more these days, I love mercy.

As I have heard it defined, grace is getting what we don’t deserve, while mercy is not getting what we deserve. Those qualities don’t really mean much to a culture where right and wrong and truth have morphed into what feels right for me and what my truth is.

But I know in my own life that there have been times when I deserved to be cut off in relationships. I deserved to be dropped. But I saw grace and mercy instead. That’s why I love those things and want to show them as much as possible.

You can’t really have grace and mercy without truth. Otherwise, you just end up with enabling and enduring. But in Jesus, we get 100% grace and truth. We get kindness that leads to repentance and discipline that leads to joy. We find mercy in times of trouble when we’re able and willing to admit that we’re in trouble.

May we always have softened and merciful hearts.

May we be that hungry for God.

May we be more hungry for God than for actual food.

May we be more hungry for God than for the next streaming series.

May we be more hungry for God than for our own spouses and significant others.

May we be more hungry for God than for any of our political causes.

May we be more hungry for God than the next new car, new house, new job promotion, or new pay raise.

May we be more hungry for God than for our own lives.

May we be so hungry for God that we confess that nothing else in all the world will satisfy but God and God alone.

“…everyone you meet today is fighting a battle & needs courage.

Needs help to live ‘in courage.’

Needs someone to encourage with words that give strength for their battle.

‘Gently encourage… & reach out for the exhausted, pulling them to their feet. Be patient with each person, attentive to individual needs. And be careful that when you get on each other’s nerves you don’t snap at each other. Look for the best in each other, and always do your best to bring it out.’ 1Thess5:13MSG

Because the thing is: Every breath’s a battle between grudgery & gratitude. Give thanks — & you win joy today!

#PreachingGospelToMyself#GiveThanks#LookForTheBest” (Ann Voskamp).

Really that’s it. Everyone is fighting a battle you know nothing about, as are you. In this life, no one is completely whole. We are all broken in some way, but some wounds and scars are more visible than others. So be kind.

Remember it was the kindness of God that first led you to repentance. Not brow-beating or stern lecturing. It was kindness. Not passive acceptance or permissiveness, but kindness that leads people to be better than they were before. Kindness that brings about a change of heart that leads to a change of behavior. Kinda like repentance.

If you live in grudgery all the time, people around you know. If you live in a constant state of gratitude, people around you will also know. One turns people away from God, while the other leads them to want to know Him more.

So be kind and live gratefully. That’s all.

“The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of his love” (Julian of Norwich).

It’s not living right in order to win God’s favor and approval but because we already have it. It’s not about living gladly in order somehow to earn God’s love but because we know that He loves us already.

For those who belong to God in Jesus, we can say that we are truly and deeply loved. We can live gladly out of the knowledge of that love. We can inspire and compel others to want to know this love by how deep our gladness is over God’s love.

May we never take for granted that this God, Maker and King of the Universe, has set His affections on us and is truly in love with us.

Some of you thought your life would look different by this point. Maybe you thought you’d be married by now. Or still married at this point. Maybe you dreamed of having children and haven’t yet. Or maybe you thought you’d be settled into a lucrative career inching closer to retirement.

And then you wake up and look at the life you have.

You have a choice to be bitter over what could have been or to be thankful for what is. You can lament all those might have beens or rejoice that you are still alive and blessed with so much that you take for granted. And yes, I am preaching to myself.

You can’t go back and redo the past. You can’t go forward and manipulate the future. All you can do is live in the here and now, trusting the God who was and is and is to come to lead you through paths of righteousness to a good destination.

Bloom where you’re planted. Instead of always wondering why the grass is greener somewhere else, try watering your own yard and making your own life better. Maybe get God out of that co-pilot seat and let Him lead. And trust that He knows what He’s doing.

“Dear Lord, you are the first of the just. You lived the righteous life. It is because of you that your heavenly Father keeps this world in existence and shows his mercy to us sinners. Who am I, Lord, to expect your love, protection, and mercy? Who am I to deserve a place in your heart, in your house, in your kingdom? Who am I, Lord, to hope in your forgiveness, your friendship, your embrace? And still this is what I am waiting for, expecting, even counting on! Not because of my own merits, but solely because of your immense mercy. You lived for us the life that is pleasing to God. O Lord, you are the just one, the blessed one, the beloved one, the righteous one, the gracious one.

I pray that your Father, the Father of all people, the One who created me and sustains me day in and day out, may recognize in me your marks and receive me because of you. Help me to follow you, to unite my life with yours and to become a mirror of your love. Amen” (Henri J.M. Nouwen, A Cry for Mercy: Prayers from the Genesee).

It’s not your job to bear the burdens of the world. I think it’s a timely reminder in an age where we are bombarded with news from all over the world literally nonstop. It can be overwhelming if you let it. But you don’t have to.

Jesus didn’t say for you to fix every problem that you see or that you become aware of. He didn’t say to protest every wrongdoing at every possible opportunity. Your shoulders aren’t big enough to carry all the weight of all the suffering in all the world. But His are.

That’s why He said for you and me to cast our cares and burdens on Him and take His yoke of obedience and trust, for His yoke is easy and His burden is light. He said through the Apostle Paul to be anxious about nothing but to pray about everything. Then live as though the answer is already given and the victory already won, because it has been and it is.