Reminders for The Storm

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Sometimes you’re in a good place in life and everything goes right and people all like you and all your traffic lights are green at just the right time. Be thankful.

Sometimes you’re not in such a good place. Those old self-doubts creep back in and people you thought were friends are suddenly nowhere to be found. Nothing goes right and it takes all you have to make it out of bed in the morning. Remember these things.

1) God has not forgotten you. It may seem like it. It may feel like it. Everything you see may seem to indicate it. But God’s promise to never leave or forsake you is more real than what you feel or what you think. It’s as good as done.

2) God knows where you are and what you’re going through. He sees the other side of the pain when you can’t and He is with you when it seems no one else is.

3) God’s arms are still long enough to reach down to where you are and strong enough to carry you through. He’s for you in this. Don’t forget that.

4) Everything you go through will  make you stronger and will enable you to help those who are going through the same storms. Your pain becomes your ministry and you will be able to speak into people’s lives in a way that someone who has led a storm-free life never could.

5) Don’t think that just because your storm isn’t catastrophic and earth-shattering, it doesn’t matter. God uses the small inconveniences and the wearying days just as much to shape and mold you into His image.

6) Above all, remember that God’s goal is not your happiness, but your holiness. It’s not comfort and ease, but Christlikeness that He wants for you.

7) Know that you are not alone. You have people who will walk beside you through your storm.

8) As hard as it seems, if you keep a thankful spirit and a worshipful attitude, your storm won’t seem so bad. There’s always something to be thankful for. Always.

I hope this helped someone. I know for me personally, I had to remember that each new morning is a new start. I have to remind myself that all storms come to an end. God’s love will outlast any storm and He won’t ever quit on you. Ever.

 

 

Neediness is Good

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I as a recovering codependent can tell you that neediness is not a bad thing. In fact, it can be a very librerating and good thing. It all depends on where you take your needs to.

Other people can’t meet my needs all the time. Maybe some can meet some of my needs some of the time, but never all the time. Only God can meet every need every time.

So God, I’ve made a list of all that I need from You, because You said that if I lack I should ask from You.

1) Wisdom – life is hard and complicated and weird sometimes and I can’t navigate my way through all its unpredicable twists and turns without constant dependence on God for each step.

2) Relationships- I need so much help from You so I won’t say the wrong thing or put my foot in my mouth or generally be goofy and awkward. I can see how far You’ve brought me, but I know I still need You to speak through me and love people through me.

3) Witness- I can’t say enough how much I need You to shine through me every day so that people see You in me. I confess that if anybody has seen anything good in me ever, it has been You and only You.

4) Blogs- I can tell when a blog is from me and when God is in it. My blogs tend to be random and pointless. The blogs You give me always seem to speak to a need and help begin the healing process. I am still amazed that anything I write can do anything for anybody, but when You’re in it, it does.

I need God. I need my brothers and sisters in Christ to hold up my arms when I can’t. I need so much, but I am finding out every day that God is more than enough. Chris Tomlin, I think you should write a song about that. It would probably do well on the radio and get sung a lot in churches. Just sayin’.

Oh, and thank you for still reading these blogs. It means the world to me.

Still Amazed

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I had a good conversation with a friend of mine at Starbucks recently. During the conversation, I had two thoughts.

1) I’m amazed that the person I’m talking to wants to have a conversation with me. I’m even more astonished that this person wants to be my friend. After overcoming a lifetime of low self-esteem and codependency, it’s still hard to grasp that I was who God was talking about when He looked at what He created and said, “It is very good.”

I have an even harder time believing that God wants anything to do with me, much less wanting to use me in any way. It blows my mind that He can take my meager offerings, like the two fishes and five loaves of bread, and use them to bless so many (usually in ways that I am completely unaware of at the time).

I’m astonished and amazed and grateful every single day.

2) If I can come from pretty much hating myself and thinking most everybody wanted nothing to do wih me to being able to hold normal converations, anyone can. If God can use me, He can use anybody. The God who heard the cries of His children in bondage in Egypt heard my cries in the middle of the night when I felt alone and abandoned. And He hears your cries, too.

I love this testimony and I’ve borrowed it for my own. I am just a nobody trying to tell everybody about Somebody who can save anybody. That really is all you need to know about me. I’m just a vessel that God uses. Many times, I’m amazed at what God can do through cracked vessels like me.

Remember tonight that your Abba is very fond of you. He knows where you are and what you’re going through. He hears your cries, even when they have no sound. He heard you calling His name even when you can’t speak. He has His everlasting arms underneath you and He is singing over you. I hope you can hear it.

Mostly, I hope you never will cease to be amazed at what God does in and though and around you. I for one never will.

What Do I Know?

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What do I know? Apparently not much. I wake up every day and feel like I know less than I did before. It seems like I find out on a regular basis that there is so much more that I had no clue about. But I still know a few things. None of them are new or original, but I think I needed the reminders today.

1) Jesus still loves me like no other and thinks that I’m still to die for.

2) God’s not even remotely close to being done with me.

3) Sometimes blessings do come in disguises and answers to prayers rarely look like what you expected or come when you expect them to.

4) Cats are funny animals. Especially mine. She cracks me up all the time. She probably looks at me and thinks, “Dude, you seriously need a hobby or a girlfriend or something. Go away.”

5) Friends are the best. I never cease to be amazed at how Jesus speaks to me though my friends and how much of Him I see in them.

6) Family is good, too. Gotta give ’em props since they gave me life and all.

7) It’s still impossible to mess up so badly that you are beyond saving and too broken that God can’t fix you. God is still the best at making brokenness into something beautiful.

8) I don’t have to apologize for who God made me or for the way my life is unfolding. I don’t ever have to be ashamed of who I am or what I believe. I is good people.

9) Life is short. If you don’t stop every once in a while and look around, you could miss it. Ferris was right.

10) No matter how crappy the day was or how badly and how often you screwed up and put your foot in your mouth, tomorrow is a new day. It comes fresh with new mercies and the the faithfulness of God that just won’t quit. You never run out of second chances.

Words of Advice to Myself

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On the WAY-fm morning show, they were talking about something that caught my attention. The question came up: What would you say to your 16-year old self and what advice would you give? I immediately had some answers.

First, I would tell my younger self this. The next time you decide to go strutting around the mall thinking you’re all that and a bag of Doritos, remember to check your fly first. Because walking around with your fly wide open tend to lose you cool points. And no, the earth won’t open up and swallow you just because you really want it to.

Second, have better taste in music. I mean Wham, really? What were you thinking?

Most of all, I would say to myself, “You are ok. You are going to be just fine even though sometimes that seems impossible. You are good enough just the way God made you and you don’t have to pretend to be anybody else or be ashamed of yourself.

“Learn to laugh at yourself and take yourself less seriously. Take what others think and say of you with a grain of salt, but don’t believe everything. Know that you don’t have to always be so worried about what others think of you, because they are wondering what you think of them. They are scared, too.

The best thing I could tell you would be to love yourself as God loves you. He sees you and doesn’t see awkward, shy, and sometimes klutzy guy, but He sees someone worth dying for. He sees someone He would rather die for than live without. He looks at you with undying love. He’s very fond of you and wants you just as you are, right where you are, right now.”

Oh, and those parachute pants? Not a good idea.

 

Growing Young

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I love the movie Big, with Tom Hanks. I can so relate to the premise. I have felt like that 10-year old who one day wakes up in a grown man’s body. Some days, I have the fear that I am that kid. I fear someone’s going to finally catch me and send me back to 4th grade English class.

But maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

I look at the Gospels and I see where Jesus says things like having the faith of a child or how we must be like a little child to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

The people who stand out to me the most are the ones who still have a child’s wonder at the world. They never stop being amazed at what they see around them and especially at what God is doing in and through them. They have escaped the cynical spirit of the age and still believe that the good side will win out and the good guys beat the bad guys in the end.

It’s not being childish. It’s not about throwing tantrums when you don’t get your way. That’s not it at all.

It’s about not forgetting what it first felt like when Jesus found you and rescued you. It’s about not letting all the other voices drown out the one Voice that whispers your name at night. The one Voice that tells you how precious you are and how very fond He is of you.

Most of all, it’s about dependence. A child knows that he or she is needy. Children don’t worry about whether asking is right or wrong, approrpriate or not. They just ask. For anything and everything.

You and I must come to that same place where we’re helpless children totally dependent on our Abba Father for every single thing. The independent, self-sufficient spirit in us must die and we must recognize our own poverty of spirit. We have absolutely nothing to bring except broken lives and broken hearts and broken dreams.

That’s what God wants. Just us, asking for what we need. Just us, crawling up into Abba Daddy’s lap, confident that He will provide.

By the way, I think I may be in need of a can of silly string. If you know where I can get some, I would be so thankful. I have some fake sneezing to do in my near future.

 

An Apology From An American Christian

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I am an American and I am a Christian. That being said I have a few apologies to offer on behalf of me and all my fellow believers.

I’m sorry that we’ve shown you more anger and hate than love. I’m sorry that all you ever see from us is what we’re against and what groups we hate more than what we are for and who we love.

I’m sorry that we’ve complicated something that is really very simple. God loves you and wants you to know Him through Jesus.

I’m sorry that we’ve put barriers between you and Jesus, telling you that you need to get your life strightened up or get rid of your sins or start living right before you can come to Jesus. The truth is that you can come just as you are, no matter how messed up or broken or lost you are.

I’m sorry that we’ve turned God into a political platform and a means of getting our people into office and getting our laws passed. God is beyond Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives, and is more concerned with the “the weak, the vulnerable, the useless” and the least of these than those with deep pockets and political connections. God loves and blesses those who know they have nothing to offer in return.

I’m sorry that I didn’t go out of my way every day to show you Jesus and just how amazing He is and how He changed my life. I was afraid and ashamed and silent.

I’m not sorry that we profess that Jesus is the way, the only way, to heaven. I will proclaim that every other religion is about getting to God, but Christianity is how God came down to us in Jesus.

I believe that God loves and uses imperfect people. He pours out His love through broken vessels. Ultimately, it’s not about me showing you how strong I am or how great my faith is, but being a living example of how God’s strength is made perfect in my weakness and how He can move mountains with my mustard seed-sized faith.

God, we need you every day. We are hopelessly lost without you. Only You can make our lives shine and turn our brokenness into beauty. God be God in us.

My 400th Blog (Yippee!)

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“If you wait, your heavenly Father will pick you up, carry you out into the night, and make your life sparkle. He wants to dazzle you with the wonder of his love” (Paul E. Miller, A Praying Life).

It took 400 blogs, but Ive finally come full circle. I started out wanting to write blogs about the amazing love God has for His people, how He is very fond of you and of me.

Then somewhere along the way, I had a blog or two that caught on with more people. I think I realize now that blogging became too much about how many people were reading my posts each day.

I’m now back to the point where I blog for me, to remind myself of the goodness of God. It’s one thing to know it in my head, but to see it all in black and white on a computer screen makes it more real to me for some reason.

I may be redundant and I may be that one-note symphony, but I don’t care. What I do care is that you really know down to the very fiber of your being that Abba God loves you, is in love with you, gave up everything for you, and wants you. That’s all.

It may not be clever or witty or original, but it’s true. It’s probably been said better in other places, but I only want to say it again in my own way.

Max Lucado said that Jesus would rather die for you than live without you. He did. He died for you rather than choose a comfortable life as a carpenter, unknown to the world and free from misunderstanding and hatred and torture and death.

He did choose the nails. He chose to bear your pain and carry your sins and die for you.

If I write 400 more blogs, I hope to keep saying just this: Jesus thought you were to die for and still does.

A Prayer from a Grateful Heart

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“We’ll never again say ‘our god’ to something we’ve made or made up. You’re our last hope. Is it not true that in you the orphan finds mercy?” (Hosea 14:3)

God, in You the orphan finds mercy.

In You, the widow finds comfort and Your everlasting arms around them.

In You, the outcast find a Home where they belong.

In You, the broken find healing.

In You, the unloved and unloveable find themselves overwhelmed by a Love that won’t quit or let go.

In You, the failures find clean slates, second chances, and new mercies every morning.

In You, the lost find their way and the blind see and the deaf hear.

In You, salvation has come and His name is Jesus.

I thank You because I was once one of those outcasts whom you now call son.

I was a nobody who You now call Yours.

I was unloved and unloveable but You now call be Beloved.

I was broken beyond repair but You now say I am beautiful.

I once was lost, but now I’m found.

Thank You.

A Prayer on a Good Day

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God, I had a good day today. Thank you. I found myself tuning in to Your voice more and in to my fears less.

Even on days like today, I realize that I need You just as much on the good days when everything goes right as on the bad days when it feels like I’m falling apart. I need You every waking moment, especially in those moments when I feel like I’ve got it under control and I can handle everything.

I read that self-discipline doesn’t lead to a continous prayer life nearly as much as realizing that I am poor in Spirit. I have nothing without you. I am helpless without You.

I know without You, my life will turn into a first-class fiasco.

Help me to remember that You are so much bigger than my little world. The truth is that You have invited me to be a part of something that is way bigger than me. Your plan involves people from every part of the world calling on the name of Jesus.

I am absolutely desparate for You. Fill every part of me with every part of You and use me however You will. Show me where You are working and help me to be the hands and feet of Jesus there.

Most of all, show me again how to come to You as a child, holding back nothing but bringing my messes to you. Remind me to come just as I am and not worry so much about cleaning myself up or polishing up my vocabulary or choosing what I think You want to hear.

On the days when I still listen to my fears, remind me that You have already conquered them. Help me to hear Your still small voice whispering my name. Remind me again that I am Your Beloved.

Lord Jesus, have mercy on me, a sinner.