pain

Friday Is a Good Thing

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I don’t think Fridays will ever get old for me. Knowing that the work week is over and that I have a few days of my own is a good feeling. Especially after you have one of those no-good, very bad days that you’re lucky to survive with most of your hair and wits still about you.

I like to think of Heaven as one long Friday, knowing that all the hard stuff and the bad stuff is over and the good stuff, the best stuff, begins and never ends.

C.S. Lewis in his Chronicles of Narnia described Heaven as the the feeling you get on the first day after the school term is over and vacation has begun. That has always resonated with me more than any imagery about Heaven.

Sometimes, the only way you can get through a trial or an ordeal is the knowledge that at some point it will end. It won’t last forever and you won’t be consumed by it.

Take heart. That day is coming, even if you can’t see it or feel it. Even if you’ve all but lost any hope for an end to your pain and suffering and tribulation.

As certain as every week has a Friday in it, the end will come. Again, C.S. Lewis made it come alive to me when He described all of history as the title page and preface to the book, and Heaven is the actual story where each chapter is better than the last and there is no ending.

It’s not an end, but the true beginning that goes on forever.

Heaven’s not just some far away place in a distant time, but it’s wherever God breaks through and shows up in power. It’s wherever God is truly present in His people and where two or more are gathered in His name.

So, I say without any hint of sacrilige, “THANK GOD IT’S FRIDAY!”

Hugo: Finding the Key to Life

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“Maybe that’s why a broken machine always makes me a little sad, because it isn’t able to do what it was meant to do… Maybe it’s the same with people. If you lose your purpose… it’s like you’re broken” (A quote from the movie Hugo).

I really liked the movie Hugo. It’s about a boy who lives in a train station and who is extremely adept at fixing things, trying to figure out how to fix one particular machine and retrieve his father’s last message to him. It spoke to me on a deep spiritual level, which is rare for anything that comes out of Hollywood.

If you believe the Bible (and I do), then you’ve read the part where we’re called sinners. All of us. It means we’ve missed the mark. We’ve set aside God’s agenda for our own. We’ve lost our purpose and we’re broken.

We each have a hole we’re trying to fill. Almost like the machine man in the movie Hugo that required a heart-shaped key. We need something (or someone) who can fill the hole and turn our hearts right-side up again.

Only the Creator knows His own creation and how best to fix it. Better yet, the Creator became one of His own creation to be the Key that fills the empty space inside all of us. Only the One who made us can truly name our future and call our purpose out of us.

I know I’m still broken and on some days, it shows. I also know my Creator is fixing me and restoring my identity and my purpose. I love that I get to be a part of Him fixing and restoring the broken lives of other people and helping them find purpose and meaning.

I still believe that no one is too broken for God to fix and there is no one that God can’t redeem and use to do amazing things. Look at me. Look at you. Look at any of the works in progress the Bible calls saints.

It’s not too good to be true. It’s too good not to be true. Believe it.

The Sick Blog

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Yes, I’m sick. I came home today from work and Kairos and took my temperature and it was 101.6. I am one sick puppy.

I feel achy and have chills and overall blah-ness. I feel like death warmed over and served on a stick.

This little bit of sickness has helped me to form a kind of solidarity with those who stuggle through worse illnesses than mine like cancer or other diseases and who live in a state of constant pain.

Compared to what some of you are going through, my little fever is like a walk in the park.

I will get over my litle illness. Some will deal with theirs in some form or another for the rest of their lives. Some will only see in this life the promise of Ultimate Healing in heaven.

Lord, be with all those who suffer tonight. Comfort them with Your everlasting arms around them. Let them rest in You tonight.

You have a special message for such as these. Help them to hear Your sweet words of love to them and bring them comfort, so that they in turn may comfort others who deal with suffering as well.

I know You do all things well. Whether You choose to heal or whether You choose to let the thorn in the flesh remain (as in the Apostle Paul’s case), You are holding them near to Your heart.

Let them hear the rhythm of Your heartbeat and may their hearts come to beat in tempo and tune with Yours.

And Lord, help me not to whine. Even with a fever, I am still so blessed, more than I could ever hope to deserve in this or any lifetime.

Thank you that one day there will be no more pain or sorrow or sickness or death and You will wipe away every tear from our eyes.

Lord, we long for that day.

Come, Lord Jesus, come.

Strange Songs to Get Stuck in Your Head

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I have songs running through my head all the time. It’s better than listening to the radio. I never know what song will be next or where it will come from or what will inspire it. Like the one that’s in there now. It goes like

“My God is so big, so strong, and so mighty. There’s nothing my God cannot do for you.”

That’s the whole song. It’s deceptively simple and easy enough for toddlers to sing, but profound enough to blow the minds of the most seasoned believers.

There’s so much truth here if you let it sink in. If you dismiss it as a simple children’s song, you miss out on some very deep truths.

God is so big. He’s bigger than you, bigger than your dreams, bigger than what you’re afraid of, bigger than what you’re facing. He’s bigger than what the world says you can’t do or be or overcome. He is so big.

God is so strong. He’s strong enough to reach down to wherever you are, no matter how low, and pull you out. He’s strong enough to break through any barrier or stronghold or even the hell you’re in to find you and rescue you. He is so strong.

God is so mighty. He’s mighty enough to keep you safe and secure from all alarms. He’s mighty enough to finish what He started in you and make you into the person He created you to be. He is so mighty.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that God cannot do for you. What’s impossible for you is not even remotely difficult for God (yes, I stole that from a good sermon I heard, but I don’t think he’ll mind).

If you had these words running through your mind all day, imagine how much more confidence and courage you would have. If you believed it enough to step out off the ledge in a leap of faith. If you went to the dangerous and messy places that Jesus went to in order to bring a cup of cold water and a message of hope to the lonely, the broken, the hurting, the outcast, and the thrown-aside.

My God is so big, so strong, and so mighty. He’s stronger than cancer. Stronger than divorce. Stronger than unemployment. Stronger than moral failure. Stronger than addiction. Stronger than the death of a child. Stronger than depression. Stronger than chronic pain. Strong enough to get you through anything and make you stronger on the other side.

There’s nothing my God cannot do. For you.

Speaking Life

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A bit of a conversation I had earlier today is still ringing in my ears. A well-turned phrase won’t let go of my mind.

We speak into each others’ lives. As believers, we call life out of each other and bring out the best in each other.

I can see in you what you can’t see in yourself. I can speak beauty and faithfulness into your life and you can speak the same into mine.

The best example I know of this is a man who married a woman many considered unattractive and plain.  Over the years, he spoke beauty into her life, telling her she was more lovely and telling everyone he met how beautiful she was. Eventually, she became the beauty he always said she was.

Only God can speak creation out of nothing. Only God in us can speak hope into hopelessness, love into apathy, courage into fear, and life into death.

What are you speaking into the lives of those around you? Who is speaking into your life?

I know many times people saw things in me I couldn’t see in myself and helped me to see myself through God’s eyes.

One of the reasons for this little blog is so I can hopefully speak life and hope and peace and love into your lives and more importantly, help you to hear what God is speaking into your life right now.

May He speak beauty into your ashes, a testimony into your trials, compassion into your pain, and a minstry into your scars. May you ever hear the voice of your Abba singing over you nightly, calling you Beloved.

And may we encourage each other daily and spur each other to love radically, serve sacrificially, and be no less than Jesus to everyone we encounter wherever we go.

Amen.

Who’s the Greatest?

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Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven? That’s the question that got the disciples all hot and bothered and mad at each other? It’s a question that we ask today, though none of us ever admit it.

Is it the one with the golden voice and the great oratory skills who packs in the crowds with his great speaking ability? No.

Is it the one who can sing like an angel and who can hit notes other mortals only dream about who inspires fervant worship from the masses? No.

Is it the one with all the leadership skills who has read every John Maxwell book ever written? No.

Who is it then?

According to Jesus, the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven is the one who is like a little child.

Not our westernized romanticized idea of children as sweet and innocent and perfect.

When Jesus said we should be like little children, he meant the children who can’t do anything for themselves and who are dependent on others for everything.

Only when we get humbled like that can we see God do great things in and through us.

Only when we trade in our ruler mentality for a servent mentality. Only when we like Paul see ourselves as the worst of sinners saved by the best of God’s grace.

Only when we become like Jesus, who thought equality with God nothing to be clung to, but Who made Himself nothing. Who became a slave obedient to the point of death. Who died a criminal’s death on a scandalous cross for you and me.

That’s what it means to be the greatest. To lay down your life for your friends and become the slave of all and count others as better than yourself and love till it hurts (and past that point) and take up your cross daily.

It’s the opposite of what sells books and what you see in a lot of leadership positions in churches and Christian organizations.

But it’s the only true way to greatness, according to Jesus.

 

For Those Who Have Doubts: From Kairos Tonight

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I love the question John the Baptist asked. He was in prison for speaking the truth against Herrod and he send his disciples over to Jesus to ask, “Are you the One or should we look for someone else?”

I love that question because that’s somethng I’ve wanted to ask at times but never been brave enough or honest enough to admit it.

I’ve had my doubts. So have you, probably. Jesus is big enough to handle our doubts and answer the questions we have.

His answer to John the Baptist was this, in essence: “Yes, I’m the One. I’ve made lame people walk, blind people see, given poor people hope, and raised dead people to live.”

I think His answer to you and me would be something like this

“For those who have staked their very lives on Me, I prove Myself to be the Supply to your every need, the Comfort to your every pain, the Deliverance in your every trial, and the unquenchable hope in each and every circumstance you have ever or will ever face.

I am the God’s YES and AMEN. I am the fulfillment of every one of His promises. I am the One who holds you together and keeps your hope alive. I am your Hope.

Your doubt doesn’t negate my Sovereignty. Your weakness doesn’t negate my Strength. Your failings don’t negate my ultimate victory.

I am the Ultimate Promise Keeper and my ultimate promise is to complete what I started in you, to make you whole and healed and free, to see you become all I meant for you to be when I made you.

Trust in me when circunstances tell you not to, when common sense tells you not to, when your own senses and feelings tell you not to. They may lie to you, but I never will.

I have set My affections on you and My love for you is stronger than your weakness or doubt. It’s stronger than your fear. It’s stronger than any foe you will face or any obstacle that blocks your way. My love for you is even stronger than death.

I will get you Home.”

 

Voted Off The Island??

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For the record, I have never watched a single episode of Survivor. Not even part of one. That may be what goes on my tombstone. “Here lies Greg Johnson. He never watched even a single episode of Survivor. What was wrong with him?”

I do have days when I feel like I got voted off the island. You know, those days when you post something clever or witty or profound on facebook and the only response you get back is the sound of crickets chirping in the field?

Or the days when you feel like you’re the odd man out in a gathering of people?

I’ve had days when I felt invisible, when it seemed like people looked through me, but never at me, and never saw me. It is true that you can be in a crowd and be alone, because I’ve been there plenty of times.

I keep coming back to the words of Jesus: “I will never leave you or forsake you.” Those words are just as true on the days when you are cracking the jokes that make everyone laugh and on the days when you have trouble forming complete sentences.

The words are true whether you feel them or not. Whether you feel Him or not.

The old footprints in the sand poem is a bit corny, but true. Even when you only saw one set of footprints in the sand, it was not because you were ever truly alone, but because you were being carried.

People are human beings (wow, what a revelation) with human frailties and with problems of their own. They may not see your pain because they are too busy dealing with their own. And everyone I have ever met has secrets and scars and shame. No exceptions.

Remind yourself when you feel alone that you’re not alone, for God is with you.

Oh, and by the way, I prefer Gillian’s Island to Survivor. I like my television as unrealistic as possible. But you would think that if the Professor could make a radio out of a coconut, he could fix a hole in the S.S. Minnow, right?

Death and Taxes

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 4 Comments

Today’s blog is by a special guest, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. As far as the taxes are concerned, good luck. I got mine done early this year and I’m grateful to have that behind me.

Here’s what Bonhoeffer had to say about the subject of death, expressed better than I’ve ever heard it or read it before:

“No one has yet believed in God and the kingdom of God, no one has yet heard about the realm of the resurrected, and not been homesick from that hour, waiting and looking forward to being released from bodily existence.

Whether we are young or old makes no difference. what are twenty or thirty or fifty years in the sight of God? And which of us knows how near he or she may already be to the goal? That life only really begins when it ends here on earth, that all that is here is only the prologue before the curtain goes up – that is for young and old alike to think about. Why are we so afraid when we think about death? … Death is only dreadful for those who live in dread and fear of it. Death is not wild and terrible, if only we can be still and hold fast to God’s Word. Death is not bitter, if we have not become bitter ourselves. Death is grace, the greatest gift of grace that God gives to people who believe in him. Death is mild, death is sweet and gentle; it beckons to us with heavenly power, if only we realize that it is the gateway to our homeland, the tabernacle of joy, the everlasting kingdom of peace.

How do we know that dying is so dreadful? Who knows whether, in our human fear and anguish we are only shivering and shuddering at the most glorious, heavenly, blessed event in the world?

Death is hell and night and cold, if it is not transformed by our faith. But that is just what is so marvelous, that we can transform death.”