Get the point already?
Don’t quit. Just don’t quit. Ever.
Got it? Good.
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This Is What Your Blog Looks Like at 11:58 PM
OK, this is what MY blog looks like at 11:58 pm. Maybe you have enough sense to have already blogged and gone to bed at a respectable hour.
I had a completely lazy day today. I can’t think of one constructive thing I did today other than watch 4 episodes of season 2 of Covert Affairs.
But after all, this is a holiday weekend. You’re not supposed to to work on a holiday weekend. It’s in Leviticus somewhere.
I’ll be the first to admit that I am not the most spiritual or religious person who ever lived. I am not the wisest or most disciplined.
I am a beggar who has found Living Bread. I am a ragamuffin who found Treasure in a hidden field worth more than all that I own.
I am a saved sinner. once lost, now found. Once dead, now alive. Once far off, now near.
I don’t always look like it or act like it. But I am.
I’ve failed to tell my story many times, but that doesn’t make the story any less real or any less mine.
It’s 12:04 on a Sunday. In a few hours I will be gathered with fellow believers to celebrate what God has done and is doing in the world. How the rightful King has landed and invited us in a campaign of sabotage against the present enemy (to paraphrase C.S. Lewis a bit).
Sometimes I feel that even my own praise and thanksgiving is a gift, God’s own words sung back to Him. I can’t disagree.
Everything’s a gift. Even the faith I have is a gift. Every breath is a gift and every second I have is a gift.
So what will I do with this gift? What will you do with this gift?
Even if you just show up, that’s 90% of the battle. So I invite you to show up and be ready and expecting God to do something incredible today.
I know He will.
Happy Mother’s Day to the Best Mom Ever!
Happy Mother’s Day to Delores Johnson, the best mom a guy ever had. Of all the moms I’ve ever had, you’re my favorite!
You took me to all those recitals and practics, including that ill-fated attempt at t-ball where all I did was play in the sandbox. Not to mention that aborted disaster that was gymnastics.
You took me to piano lessons, soccer practice, Boy Scouts, field trips, and to all those bookstores and music stores. It seemed like you must have logged a million miles on all those blue station wagons.
You took care of me when I got sick and made me feel better. You gave me crackers and coke for when I couldn’t hold anything else down. You kissed all my boo-boos and made them go away.
You survived my 10th birthday party at the skating rink at East End with all my 4th grade friends. You even managed to keep most of your sanity intact.
You were with us through the loss of three dogs and one parakeet, not forgetting those short-lived sea monkeys who prematurely expired due to a badly-thrown nerf football.
I always loved opening my lunchbox on Valentine’s Day and finding those little shoebox cards inside with those Little Debbie cakes.
You made vacations fun. You made rainy days fun. You made life fun.
I love you lots and in case I didn’t ever tell you before, you’re my hero. You’re one of the best, godliest women I know and if the woman I marry is half of who you are, I will be blessed indeed.
Lucy has read all the above and gives her two paws up as sign of her consent.
Happy Mother’s Day!
I Got Nothin’
Seinfeld was a TV show about nothing. That was the premise. Today, I feel a lot like one of the characters off that show (in the mornings, I look a lot like Kramer).
I got nothin’.
Apparently, I used up all my allotted brilliance for the week (said in jest) and have nothing creative left in the old tank.
This has been one of those weeks where I was always wishing I was one day ahead. On Monday, I wished it were Tuesday, on Tuesday. . . well, you get the idea.
Sometimes, when I pray, it feels fake, like I am offering up a bunch of words to heaven with no real meaning behind them.
Sometimes, I feel like I pray what I’m supposed to pray, what a good Christian should pray, instead of what I really want to pray.
Some days, the only words to my prayers are “Help me” and “Thank you.”
Some days you feel like a nut, some days you don’t.
Some mornings, I get right out of bed. Some mornings, I keep resetting the alarm until the last possible minute.
In all of these moments, I have grace. In my strong and in my weak moments, on my good days and on my bad days, when I am living right and when I am screwing up royally.
So it’s true. I got nothin’ . . . but the grace of God keeping me alive and sane and going.
And that’s enough
The Continuing Adventures of Lucy the Wonder Cat
I discovered a way to save time. I was having to brush off my clothes after Lucy napped on me to get rid of the hair she sheds (and she always seems to shed more when I have dark pants on).
I figured that I could skip a step and use the lint roller on Lucy.
It turns out, she loved it. She purred. I guess for her it was like having one of those exotic Swedish massages.
I think that’s what they call “killing two birds with one stone.”
More exciting and thrilling adventures to come.
A Really Short Sunday Blog
I’m thinking it’s time for a few changes.
I’m thinking it’s time for me to stop trying harder and start trusting God more radically.
It’s time to really pursue the heart of God in earnest and to not stop wrestling with Him until He blesses me.
It’s time to be still and know that He’s the same God He was yesterday and will be tomorrow.
It’s time to stop praying for the promises and start claming then NOW.
It’s time for me to go to bed, cause Monday is coming up shortly and I desperately need all the beauty rest I can get (Ha. Ha.)
It’s time.
My Favorite Bible
I have to admit it. I have an addiction. Of all things, I’m addicted to collecting Bibles, particularly the pocket-sized ones. So far, I have a NASB, ESV, NIV, RSV, NRSV, HCSB, NLT, KJV, NKJV, NCV, CEV, ASV, Amplified, Pbillips, and the Message. That’s a lot of initials. And a lot of Bibles.
My favorite Bible that I own didn’t cost very much. It looks like it didn’t cost very much. But I love it.
It’s a Greek-English Interlinear Bible with the Revised Standard Version on the side margins. That means it has the Greek text and underneath each Greek word is the closest English word. It’s as literal a translation as you can get.
It takes a bit of getting used to, as the word order in Greek sentences isn’t always structured like it is in English. Often, the most important words come first, not the usual subject-verb-type structure.
For me, it is as close as I get to reading the original Greek New Testament. I can still sound out the Greek words, but I’d be lost without those little English words underneath.
The point of all that is for you to find the one you like and read it. It could be a literal translation or one of those dynamic equivalents, which are “thought for thought,” rather than “word for word.” Heck, it could even be a paraphrase, like the infamous Message version by Eugene Peterson.
Just find one that speaks to you, that makes the Word of God come alive to you and makes you fall in love with it. Find one that won’t be just mere words on a page, but words that change your life.
I heard once that if you have a Bible that’s falling apart, it usually means that your life isn’t. I don’t mean bad things never happen when you’re soaked in Scripture, but you have a solid foundation from which to anchor down in the stormy seasons of life.
By the way, my Bible doesn’t look anywhere as good as the Bible in this picture. But what matters is what’s inside. Kinda the same for you and me, don’t ya think?
It’s Wednesday
It’s Wednesday at 9:48 pm and I can’t think of a blessed thing to blog about. The more I rack my brains together, the less I get. It’s sorta like that feeling I used to get when I sat down to begin writing a term paper or essay. The page stayed blank no matter how hard I stared at it.
I could continue with last night’s thoughts about how knowing who you are in Christ will defend you against the schemes and tactics of the devil. His name means slanderer. He is also known as the accuser. But he has no power over you in you’re standing firm and trusting in the promises and the power of the Christ who defeated him long ago at Calvary.
The truth is that it’s easy to forget these things even after only one day. It’s easy to sink back into old thought defeatist thought patterns and negative name-calling. That’s why the Holy Spirit’s job is to remind us of all Jesus taught us. We’re so very forgetful.
The name I picked out for myself to remind me of who I am was FAVORED. I have been the recipient of God’s unending favor and blessing. When it becomes all too easy to focus on all that I lack and still don’t have yet, I call to mind that I am the Lord’s favored one.
If you pick just one name and hang on to that to remind yourself of who you are when times get tough and God seems distant, you will remember that He may feel far off but He is never more than one cry for help away.
By the way, Wednesday means hump day. We’re over the hump week-wise and it’s all downhill from here. Only Thursday and Friday left to go.
Also a good reminder.
When Your Brain is all Fuzzy
I had the flu a few days ago and I am feeling better. I still feel a bit weak and my brain feels a little fuzzy still.
Like tonight, when I stopped to use the gas station restroom. I went to the men’s restroom and found it locked. I went up to the attendant to ask for a key. It never occured to me that the reason the door was locked was that there might be someone in there.
I’m blaming that one on the flu.
Sometimes, you and I have both done and said things that make us slap our foreheads and call ourselves things like idiot or dummy (or other names I won’t print here ). Sometimes, you and I have whole days like that.
The good news is that those moments and those days pass. The good news is that you don’t get zapped into ashes for those fuzzy moments or sent back 3 spaces. You don’t lose $200 or go directly to jail, courtesty of Mr. Moneybags (which for those who have lived in a cave is in a game called Monopoly).
It’s not that I love God so very, very much. It’s that He loves me. It’s not my great big hold on Jesus that will keep me saved, but His very great big everlasting hold on me that will.
Religion is how I can get to God and do enough good things to make me acceptable to Him. Christianity says I can’t, but that He did.
I have a hard time believing sometimes that all I have to do is believe in Jesus and what He did for me, taking my sin and paying for it and satisfying God’s wrath against that sin. How His life and His righteousness are now mine. How I am not an idiot or a dummy or a sinner or an enemy or a stranger anymore.
I’m a child of God, His Beloved.
Every person alive gets the chance to know that grace and forgiveness. It all starts with saying YES to Jesus.
Will you?
Hugo: Finding the Key to Life
“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.
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