Sunburns are not fun. I should know with as much experience as I’ve had with it. On my recent outing to the lake, I got nice and toasted. Think extra crispy.

I remember that first night was miserable. I could hardly lay down it hurt so much. I don’t think I slept much at all.

But I came home and found my old bottle of Panama Jack Green Ice. There’s nothing like some good ol’ 100% Aloe Vera Gel to soothe and treat sunburns. The bottle may be old, but it still works magic.

In my own life, I’ve notice that when I’m in the midst of pain and suffering, whether literal or figurative, my immediate cry is for relief. I want it over A-S-A-P.

But God often has a different idea in mind. He wants my transformation. He wants my renewal. He wants to grow something in me that wasn’t there before: namely, Himself.

I think it was Dan Allendar who said that as long as your cry for relief is stronger than your cry for a changed heart, you’re never gonna grow up.

That’s what I want. A changed heart. Even more than I want relief, I want a changed heart that moves from selfish to self-less, from prideful to humble, from anxious to peace-filled. I want to be more like Jesus. No matter what.

“When the Son of Man comes as King and all the angels with him, he will sit on his royal throne, and the people of all the nations will be gathered before him. Then he will divide them into two groups, just as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the righteous people at his right and the others at his left. Then the King will say to the people on his right, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father! Come and possess the kingdom which has been prepared for you ever since the creation of the world. I was hungry and you fed me, thirsty and you gave me a drink; I was a stranger and you received me in your homes, naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you took care of me, in prison and you visited me.’ The righteous will then answer him, ‘When, Lord, did we ever see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you a drink? When did we ever see you a stranger and welcome you in our homes, or naked and clothe you? When did we ever see you sick or in prison, and visit you?’ The King will reply, ‘I tell you, whenever you did this for one of the least important of these followers of mine, you did it for me!’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Away from me, you that are under God’s curse! Away to the eternal fire which has been prepared for the Devil and his angels! I was hungry but you would not feed me, thirsty but you would not give me a drink; I was a stranger but you would not welcome me in your homes, naked but you would not clothe me; I was sick and in prison but you would not take care of me.’ Then they will answer him, ‘When, Lord, did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and we would not help you?’ The King will reply, ‘I tell you, whenever you refused to help one of these least important ones, you refused to help me.’ These, then, will be sent off to eternal punishment, but the righteous will go to eternal life” (Matthew 25:31-46, GNT).

“One day we took the children to see a goldsmith refine gold after the ancient manner of the East. He was sitting beside his little charcoal fire. (‘He shall sit as a refiner’; the gold- or silversmith never leaves his crucible once it is on the fire.)

In the red glow lay a common curved roof tile; another tile covered it like a lid. This was the crucible. In it was the medicine made of salt, tamarind fruit and burnt brick dust, and imbedded in it was the gold.

The medicine does its appointed work on the gold, ‘then the fire eats it,’ and the goldsmith lifts the gold out with a pair of tongs, lets it cool, rubs it between his fingers, and if not satisfied puts it back again in fresh medicine.

This time he blows the fire hotter than it was before, and each time he puts the gold into the crucible, the heat of the fire is increased; ‘it could not bear it so hot at first, but it can bear it now; what would have destroyed it then helps it now.’

‘How do you know when the gold is purified?’ we asked him, and he answered,

‘When I can see my face in it [the liquid gold in the crucible] then it is pure’” (Amy Carmichael, Gold Cord). 

“But he knows the way that I take;
    when he has tried me, I shall come out as gold” (Job 23:10, ESV).

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived” (Henry David Thoreau).

In my case, it was a trip to the lake (although something like a Walden experience where Thoreau went back to basic in the woods does sound very appealing at times).

The whole family got together for a weekend at the Kentucky Lake. We didn’t go shopping. We didn’t go out to eat. We just hung out at a cabin in the woods and on the nearby lake. It was glorious.

There’s something therapeutic about getting back to nature. In fact, I’m sure I read that one of the most underutilized anti-depressants is nature. Or maybe it’s exercise, but exercise is always better in a nature setting rather than in a gym.

As I type these words, I am sore and sunburned. But the sunburn comes with me being foolish with sunscreen and forgetting to apply it to my shoulders after we got to the lake. The soreness is from my brain still thinking that it’s 25 (and my body being all like, “Yeah right, buddy. Watch this!)

Still, it was restful and relaxing. I needed to get away from the world for a while. Being near a body of water has a calming and soothing effect in a year when just about everybody could use a little less stress.

I’ve also decided that lake sunsets maybe my second favorite, just behind beach sunsets. I could take either one of them (or both) at regular intervals for the rest of my life.

You need both.

I have a confession to make– I didn’t start drinking coffee until a few years ago. Back in the beginning, I’d mix coffee and hot chocolate into a concoction that helped me wake up when I was working at a job that required me to be there super early.

But you ask, “How did you manage during all those years before coffee? Did you get enough sleep?”

Heck, no. I had Diet Mountain Dew. Lots and lots of Diet Mountain Dew.

Looking back, they were way worse for me than any amount of coffee. All that carbonation, plus whatever evil ingredients they put in that artificial sweetener.

But now I’ve discovered coffee. My preference is light roast, but I’ll take just about any kind, just as long as I have creamer and sugar to make it palatable.

Now I’m one of “those people” who look at people who don’t drink coffee as weirdos. Do they really get the recommended daily amount of sleep? How does that even happen?

Even if you’re not a fan of Doctor Who, you’ve felt this way. Every other adult in the world is successfully adulting and you’re over here still singing the alphabet song to see what letter comes next and counting with your fingers.

Don’t lie. You know it’s true.

I confess there are times in a situation where an adult is needed where I’m thinking, “I’m an adult, but what we need is an adulty-er adult to really take charge. Someone who’s REALLY grown up.”

I also think that some of the best grown ups I know are the ones who are childlike in their outlook and disposition. Not childish in the sense of throwing tantrums when they don’t get their own way, but childlike in the sense of never losing their awe and wonder at life in general.

I will say that if I had to do it over, I’d be far less enthusiastic about rushing through my childhood to get to being an adult. It’s WAY overrated.

In case you’ve forgotten, God says that you are fearfully and wonderfully made. You are unique and the world wouldn’t be the same without you. Just you being you brings something into that world that wouldn’t exist if you didn’t.

Honestly, I’m a little fuzzy on the definition of miracles, but I’m pretty sure that the fact that you’re still here, alive and breathing, is a legit, for real miracle. And don’t you forget it.

In Kairos, Chris Brooks talked about Joshua 4 and how God commanded the Israelites to collect stones from the Jordan River to commemorate how God had parted the river so the entire nation could cross in safety. I suppose in this day and age, Moses and Aaron would simply have taken a selfie, but selfies weren’t a thing back in ancient times.

The idea was to build a monument to mark the occasion of the miracle. It was to remind the people of God every time they saw it of how God had once again provided in time of need.

Let’s face it. We are a forgetful people. At least I am. Whenever I get into trouble or face adversity, I’m prone to selective memory. I remember previous troubles but forget how it was God who guided me through. Sometimes I even forget about God altogether in the midst of my anxiety.

God knows we need reminders, both individually and collectively. We remind ourselves individually by steeping ourselves in God’s Word and prayer. We remind ourselves collectively by gathering in worship weekly and in smaller groups regularly to encourage and inspire each other to not forget what God has already done and promised yet to do.

We’re more prone to spiritual amnesia when we go it alone. When you or I try the Lone Ranger approach to faith living, we can easily lose who we are or why we’re here. All the distractions of the world and the media and life in general can derail us from our true purpose and passion.

So we gather together to remember. We intentionally set aside time not so much to remind God of our problems but to remind our problems of God and His goodness and faithfulness.

I’m thankful for all the daily reminders I see from God through fellow believers through social media and in face to face conversations. I’m grateful that more and more believers are coming together again to worship and waken each other to remember God’s goodness. I’m thankful most of all at how patient God is with me when I forget time and time again and need those reminders still.

I believe Matthew 7:1 the most quoted verse in the Bible, surpassing even John 3:16. What most people who throw this verse around mean by it is that they can do whatever they want whenever they want, regardless of the consequences to them or others, and no one can hold them accountable for their actions.

That’s not what the verse means.

On the other side, I see people who take actions that may or may not be isolated, i.e. not wearing masks, voting Republican (or Democrat), and use those to make an assessment of that person’s character, intentions, and motives.

I do not have the right to decide what kind of person you are what I see you doing. I don’t know your context. I don’t know your history. I don’t know that I might have done the same or worse if I had walked in your proverbial shoes for a day or so.

I do believe the Bible calls us to hold each other accountable for our actions, especially those that don’t line up with what we profess to believe. I don’t have the right to determine your eternal destiny based on those actions if I don’t know you.

The Bible does say that we will all have to give account for our actions some day. We will ultimately be held accountable for all the good and bad we’ve done. That’s God’s job, not mine.

The best way is always the way of compassion. That does not mean that we automatically endorse every action, but we choose to be kind even in the face of things we don’t agree with. We may disagree or rebuke, but it is in love and kindness.

The best example I learned recently is when Jesus washed the feet of Judas, the one He knew would later betray Him. Was that an endorsement of the betrayal? Of course not. Was that showing love? Absolutely.

We can dislike a person’s actions and still love the person. God does that with us all the time. Look at the supreme act of love when Jesus forgave His enemies when they were in the very act of murdering Him.

I think if we took more time to make sure our lives matched our words and our actions matched our professions of faith, we’d have way less time to judge and condemn others.