A few weeks ago, the former principal and president of my high school, Mr. Joseph Clayton, went to be with the Lord at the age of 89. I remember him being a kind and gentle man with a long legacy of inspiring young minds through a long career in education. Before he died, he wrote a letter that he wanted to be read at his funeral that would serve as his last words to those who loved and knew him well. Here is that letter:

I think that’s where American Christianity in particular gets it wrong. A lot of what gets preached in pulpits in our churches is a lot of self-help with the name of Jesus thrown in here and there to make it kosher. Most American Christians don’t really know what they believe and aren’t familiar with what the Bible actually teaches. Is it any wonder so many have beliefs that go against what Jesus and Scripture teach?

We are a self-sufficient society. I’ve heard over and over again how Jesus makes me strong. The truth of the matter is that Jesus is my strength. And yes, there is a difference. One leads to me getting to the point where I can handle life on my own and have no need for God. The other is where I see more and more of my mess and my dependence on Jesus only grows deeper and more desperate.

The motto is not “try harder.” The heart’s cry of every believer should be “I believe. Help my unbelief. Here I am. I surrender to You and Your purposes for me. Do your work in and through me.”

It all goes back to how much time I spend with Jesus. I sound like a broken record, but if you and I only give Jesus the scraps of our time, is it any wonder that we sometimes walk through life feeling weak and defeated? Is it any wonder why we have so little anointing in our work and in our walk and in our speech?

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly” (Matthew 11:28-29, The Message).

“We look for visions from heaven, for earthquakes and thunders of God’s power (the fact that we are dejected proves that we do), and we never dream that all the time God is in the commonplace things and people around us. If we will do the duty that lies nearest, we shall see Him. One of the most amazing revelations of God comes when we learn that it is in the commonplace things that the Deity of Jesus Christ is realized” (Oswald Chambers).

I think sometimes when I ask God to speak to me, I feel like I’m expecting deep down for God to speak in an audible Charlton Heston kind of voice to me. I almost expect some kind of mystical magical experience to take place immediately after I say, “Speak, Lord. Your servant is listening.”

But God is so often found in those commonplace moments, and I’m beginning to see that He speaks in ordinary ways that we so often take for some other voice or maybe just coincidence. I’ve know God to speak through a friend or even through a line from a movie or a song. One thing I should know by now is to never limit God in the ways He can work in my life.

I confess that I don’t really hear God’s voice sometimes because I rush through my prayers in order to get to something else. How can I hear God speaking to me when I’m too busy rushing in and out of His presence all the time? How can I listen when so much of my prayer life is me-centered around my needs and my wants and my desires?

The best part is that even when I may not have the hunger to hear God speak, He never tires of talking to His child. He never grows weary of waiting for me to finally be still long enough to hear. He is infinitely patient with me as always until I can finally sit down and listen.

I’m thankful that Jesus was God spelling Himself out in a language I could understand. I’m grateful that He didn’t wait until I could understand things like premillennialism and supralapsarianism and transubstantiation before He made Himself known to me (which I probably still couldn’t tell you what any of those mean). He didn’t ask me to get my life together perfectly before I could approach Him.

As the saying goes, all other religions are about us getting to God, while Christianity is about God coming down to us. He came not when we were most deserving but when we were least deserving and most in need of a Savior. He came at just the right moment.

As I’ve read recently, God is not just “up there” out in the Heavens and beyond our reach. The question isn’t “Are You up there?” He’s down here with us in the daily grind. He’s Emmanuel, God with us.

Jesus is God speaking a language I can understand. Jesus as fully God and fully man is able to fully identify with me in all my weaknesses in His humanity and yet is able to do something about them in His divinity. He intercedes for me like no one else can because He’s been where I am and yet He didn’t ever sin when I sin more often than not. He is the only one who could ever save me.

Sometimes, I feel like I want to cancel my subscription to adulthood. I’ve done the 30-day free trial and thanks but no thanks this is not for me.

So until further notice, I will be in my blanket fort, eating cheez-its and coloring. You may join me if you wish (and if you know the secret password).

That is all. Carry on. Good night.

“Feelings are great liars. If Christians worshipped only when they felt like it, there would be precious little worship. We think that if we don’t feel something there can be no authenticity in doing it. But the wisdom of God says something different: that we can act ourselves into a new way of feeling much quicker than we can feel ourselves into a new way of acting. Worship is an act that develops feelings for God, not a feeling for God that is expressed in an act of worship” (Eugene Peterson).

I once heard that your feelings can lie to you. I’ve learned that truth the hard way. You can’t always trust how you feel because so many random things affect your feelings. If you’re tired or stressed or hungry, you tend more toward negative emotions. On the other hand, if I’ve just had coffee, then sometimes my feelings are inflated above what they normally would be.

I’ve also heard that if you lose the feelings of love in a relationship, the way to restore them is to do the acts of love. Even if they’re rote and without feeling at first, eventually the feelings will come. You can’t act in a genuine loving way without coming to a point where you feel love. Jesus in His humanity experienced all the same emotions and you and I face, but He was perfectly obedient to His Father because He did the acts of obedience when He may not have felt obedient.

Faith isn’t a feeling. Love isn’t a feeling. Both are acts of the will. Both are choices that we make, regardless of whether they are accompanied by feelings or not. Choosing to act when you don’t feel like it isn’t inauthentic; it’s called maturity and discipline. Choosing to believe when you don’t feel it is called faith.

“In a world where success is the measure and justification of all things the figure of Him who was sentenced and crucified remains a stranger and is at best the object of pity. The world will allow itself to be subdued only by success. It is not ideas or opinions which decide, but deeds. Success alone justifies wrongs done. . . . With a frankness and off-handedness which no other earthly power could permit itself, history appeals in its own cause to the dictum that the end justifies the means. . . . The figure of the Crucified invalidates all thought which take success for its standard” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer).

I believe the Bible talks about how the first shall be last, and the last shall be first. It also says that if you seek to save your life, you’ll lose it, but if you seek to give your life away, you’ll save it. The Apostle Paul speaks to how God chose the foolish to shame the wise, and the nobodies to shame the VIPs (or something to that effect). The mentality of the Kingdom of God is an upside down kind of thinking that doesn’t make sense to most of the world.

In fact, the very same Bible say that the message of the cross is foolishness to the world, but it is life and salvation to all who take it on faith and believe in it with everything they are. I guess you could say that it’s the world’s kind of thinking that is upside down, and the message of Christ and the cross is really turning things right-side up again.

Sometimes, you need to thank God for a provision He has yet to give. I mean that before the prayer gets answered, you thank God in advance for that answer. Thanksgiving isn’t just celebrating when you get what you wanted, but declaring that God is good no matter what. You can choose to be grateful whether the healing comes or not, whether deliverance comes or not. Your circumstances may not allow you to be happy, but joy is still an act of the will that you can grasp no matter how your circumstances play out.

Praise God if the good thing comes, but also remember that if it seems like a bad thing comes, God can work that bad thing into something good, sometimes sooner and sometimes later but always guaranteed. I think the saying goes that when a door closes and until another door opens, you can praise God in the hallway — in the midst of your waiting and uncertainty. Your gratitude might not change your world right then, but it can and will change you and how you see your world in that moment. Then you can thank God whose promises are as good as done.

If you’re not familiar with Amy Carmichael, I recommend the book A Chance to Die: The Life and Legacy of Amy Carmichael by Elisabeth Elliott. I also recommend Amy’s book, Gold by Moonlight, which deals with abiding under chronic illness and pain.

“Let us end on a very simple note: Let us listen to simple words; our Lord speak simply: “Trust Me, My child,” He says. “Trust Me with a humbler heart and a fuller abandon to My will than ever thou didst before. Trust Me to pour My love through thee, as minute succeeds minute. And if thou shouldst be conscious of anything hindering that flow, do not hurt My love by going away from Me in discouragement, for nothing can hurt so much as that. Draw all the closer to Me; come, flee unto Me to hide thee, even from thyself. Tell Me about the trouble. Trust Me to turn My hand upon thee and thoroughly to remove the boulder that has choked they river-bed, and take away all the sand that has silted up the channel. I will not leave thee until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of. I will perfect that which concerneth thee. Fear thou not, O child of My love; fear not.

And now…to gather all in one page:

Beloved, let us love.Lord, what is love?

Love is that which inspired My life, and led Me to My Cross, and held Me on My Cross. Love is that which will make it thy joy to lay down thy life for thy brethren.

Lord, evermore give me this love.

Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after love, for they shall be filled.”

I’m still not a vinyl purist, but I’m understanding the love of what we used to call records a little more. There’s just something magical about putting a record on the turntable and carefully placing the needle on the right groove. It’s an experience that you don’t get by turning on Spotify. I think my new favorite pastime will be laying in bed listening to records.

All i have to do is put on some good vinyl, drop the needle, and let all my cares go. I can get lost in the music and not think about anything else. If I can ever figure out how to connect my wireless headphones, I’ll be in heaven.

It’s nice to know that once in a rare blue moon, something old becomes something new. Something from back in the day comes back for a bit and is cool again. Even if the price of vinyl is ridiculous, it does my heart good to see stores carrying records again. I hear even cassette tapes are making a comeback of sorts. I’m not holding my breath for 8-tracks.