I don’t know if you’ve ever had that slightly depressed feeling after finishing a really good book or book series. It almost feels like “What now?”

I’ve heard that a good book is one where you choose to step inside the author’s shoes and live in their world. A great book gives you no choice. Almost without warning, you find yourself instantly teleported into a new universe, meeting new people, experiencing new things.

I’ve been listening to all the Charles Martin novels in chronological order on Audible. Recently, I started on the most current one. The sad part is that there are no more, but the good news is that hopefully sooner than later there will be more.

I appreciate good stories. I like the kinds of book that make you want to live in the places and meet the people in the pages. I like books that I can visualize and see locations and faces. The reason that movies based on books are typically not as good is because they fail to live up to the images I’ve created in my mind based on the plot, dialogue, characters, etc.

But fret not. I have a plan.

My next dive will be into the world of Tolkien. I’m planning on starting with the Silmarillion and going into The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. After that, who knows?

“Martin Luther once wrote that evil thoughts come like birds flying over our heads. We cannot help that. But if we allow them to build nests on our heads, then we are responsible for them. We will never be completely free of temptation; we should not even expect it. Even Jesus was tempted. At one time the idea of Jesus being tempted like an ordinary human being seemed blasphemous to me. Yet there is no question: he was, although he never sinned” (J. Henrich Arnold).

I believe the Bible speaks to that. It talks about taking every thought captive. I know it’s easier said than done, but part of the discipline of self-control (which is one of the fruits of the Spirit) is to not let your thoughts run away and control you. Sin happens when you let thoughts of temptation take hold instead of capturing them. Then you’re in trouble.

It does help to have something to fill your mind to combat those evil thoughts — listening praise music, sermons, biblical podcasts, faith-based novels . . . the list goes on. It’s not only about getting rid of bad thoughts but filling that space with good thoughts.

“Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse” (Philippians 4:8, The Message).

“The battle is the Lord’s, but God says you’re going to have a part. What was Jehoshaphat’s part in 2 Chronicles 20? Praise. God says, ‘The battle is mine, but I’m not going to do one thing until you praise.’ What if they said, ‘Well, Lord, as soon as You give us the victory, we’re going to sing’? God says, ‘No, I’m not going to give you any victory until you start singing.’ Are you willing to praise God during your problems? Can you praise in the face of your enemy when you don’t have anything but the promise of God? He says, ‘I will not leave you or forsake you. The battle is not yours; it’s Mine.’ Now get out there and praise the Lord!

You see, a lack of praise is really unbelief. The Bible teaches that when we praise the Lord, we’re really expressing faith in God. Prayer and praise go together. Prayer and praise are the two wings of spiritual power. Prayer infuses us with the energy of God, and praise confuses the enemies of God. The devil is allergic to praise. When we praise God, He sends confusion into the camp of our enemies” (Dr. Adrian Rogers).

There’s something powerful about declaring God’s goodness out loud. There’s something even more powerful when you can sing the love and mercy of God. It’s not about perfect pitch but a premeditated confidence that God is able. It’s not about hitting all the notes as much as it is trusting in all the promises of God.

It’s one thing to sing from the shores of victory. It’s another when the storm is still surrounding you and all you have are the words of God to hold on to and to guide you through.

God isn’t due all of your prayer and praise because of the promise of life getting easier but simply because He’s worth it. Regardless of whether you ever see another promise of God fulfilled or not, He’s worthy because of every single promise come to pass in the past. And on top of that, He’s promised to be with you to the end (and beyond).

That’s worth singing about, whether you sound like Whitney Houston or Elmer Fudd. He’s worth it!

Tonight’s selection is from one of my favorites, C. S. Lewis. I’m too tired for original thought, so I borrowed some wise words from one of the best:

As a great Christian writer (George MacDonald) pointed out, every father is pleased at the baby’s first attempt to walk: no father would be satisfied with anything less than a firm, free, manly walk in a grown-up son. In the same way, he said, ‘God is easy to please, but hard to satisfy.’ I think every one who has some vague belief in God, until he becomes a Christian, has the idea of an exam or of a bargain in his mind. The first result of real Christianity is to blow that idea into bits. When they find it blown into bits, some people think this means that Christianity is a failure and give up. They seem to imagine that God is very simple-minded! In fact, of course, He knows all about this. One of the very things Christianity was designed to do was to blow this idea to bits. God has been waiting for the moment at which you discover that there is no question of earning a pass mark in this exam or putting Him in your debt. Then comes another discovery. Every faculty you have, your power of thinking or of moving your limbs from moment to moment, is given you by God. If you devoted every moment of your whole life exclusively to His service you could not give Him anything that was not in a sense His own already. So that when we talk of a man doing anything for God or giving anything to God, I will tell you what it is really like. It is like a small child going to his father and saying, ‘Daddy, give me sixpence to buy you a birthday present.’ Of course, the father does, and he is pleased with the child’s present. It is all very nice and proper, but only an idiot would think that the father is sixpence to the good on the transaction. When a man has made these two discoveries God can really get to work. It is after this that real life begins.”

Tonight, I participated in an art crawl in Franklin and I can testify to the fact that it’s finally beginning to feel like fall outside. I am of the opinion that it’s hard to get into the spirit of spooky season when it’s almost 90 degrees outside. Plus, pumpkin spice tastes much better when it’s colder.

I visited a haunted house — or technically, more like a haunted detached garage. This one lady goes all out to decorate for Halloween every year and it’s well worth visiting if you’re ever in the Franklin area.

But October is all about leaves turning colors, roasting marshmallows, and going to hayrides and bonfires. Again, that’s difficult when it’s hot outside.

But as I’ve mentioned before, fall weather is a kind of gateway to every happy childhood memory of mine. I can suddenly remember people long since gone and remember places I used to love.

I’m hankering to wear some flannel sooner rather than later. Some of you had already busted out the sweaters when it was still hot outside, but I have actual sweat glands, so I can’t do that.

Bring on fall, I say. Bring on Halloween, then Thanksgiving, and then my favorite, Christmas. I’m ready.

“‘I must keep praying’ ‘I feel like just giving up!’ How often has this thought passed through our minds (both yours and mine) in recent months? If I am honest, then I must admit it’s been quite often. I find myself so often in hopeless situations where I know full well that only God can deliver me but God doesn’t seem to have the same urgency as I do. Impatience and unbelief are at least a root o…(tharr be more)f all my problems, and pride isn’t far behind, along with frustration (the fruit of my sin). Deep down I know that the Lord is working in my life and that I would be better off if I waited patiently for His time and His way of deliverance, but there seems to be a constant conflict between wanting to honour my God by doing His will and at the same time worrying myself sick over things which may never happen” (From Apples of Gold).

That’s just it. Nearly all of the energy I spend worrying usually revolves around scenarios that never happen. I go down a rabbit hole of anxiety about a course of events that I think is sure to take place but never even starts in the first place.

Worrying is me trusting in my own finite and limited perspective while faith means trusting in an infinite and all-knowing God. While it’s easy to look back with 20/20 hindsight, faith means trusting in advance what will only make sense in reverse (thanks, Philip Yancey).

Faith means to trust that God’s promises are certain and then to live and obey like they’re already fulfilled. Lord, help us to believe when worry is the more natural response. We believe. Help our unbelief!

“When Digory took a minute to get his breath, and then went softly into his Mother’s room. And there she lay, as he had seen her lie so many other times, propped up on the pillows, with a thin, pale face that would make you cry to look at it. Digory took the Apple of Life out of his pocket.

And just as the Witch Jadis had looked different when you saw her in our world instead of in her own, so the fruit of that mountain garden looked different too. There were of course all sorts of colored things in the bedroom; the colored counterpane on the bed, the wallpaper. . . . But the moment Digory took the Apple out of his pocket, all those things seemed to have scarcely any color at all. Every one of them, even the sun- light, looked faded and dingy. . . . Nothing else was worth looking at: you couldn’t look at anything else. And the smell of the Apple of Youth was as if there was a window in the room that opened on Heaven.

‘Oh, darling, how lovely,’ said Digory’s Mother. ‘You will eat it, won’t you? Please,’ said Digory. ‘I don’t know what the Doctor would say,’ she answered. ‘But really—I almost feel as if I could.’ He peeled it and cut it up and gave it to her piece by piece. And no sooner had she finished it than she smiled and her head sank back on the pillow and she was asleep: a real, natural, gentle sleep, without any of those nasty drugs, which was, as Digory knew, the thing in the whole world that she wanted most. . . . He bent down and kissed her very softly and stole out of the room with a beating heart, taking the core of the apple with him. For the rest of that day, whenever he looked at the things about him, and saw how ordinary and unmagical they were, he hardly dared to hope; but when he remembered the face of Aslan he did hope” (C. S. Lewis, The Magician’s Nephew).

Lately, I’ve wished I could give that apple of youth to some people I know. I’ve read the story, so I know the apple couldn’t grant eternal life in our world, but it could — and did — work a little healing magic.

Unfortunately, there are no such apples. But the hope they represent is very much real. I’ve been around long enough to know that hope is a precious commodity. I also know it’s never too late to give up hope.

The beautiful part is that hope is not an ideal. It’s not an abstract concept. Hope is a person, and that person has a name — Jesus. And Jesus is very much still alive.

Jesus said that in this world we would have trouble. That’s not hard to see if you’re not wearing blinders. But He also said for us to take heart because He has overcome the world. He’s overcome everything His children will ever face that could ultimately destroy them.

Hope means that we survive. We might have scars, but we survive. Because Jesus bears His own scars, we can know healing and victory. Those scars are a testimony to Jesus overcoming the world. Our scars can be a testimony of how He brought us from who we used to be to who we are now to who we will one day be.

So we have hope.

“O Lord,

Life passes by swiftly. Events that a few years ago kept me totally preoccupied have now become vague memories; conflicts that a few months ago seemed so crucial in my life now seem futile and hardly worth the energy; inner turmoil that robbed me of my sleep only a few weeks ago has now become a strange emotion of the past; books that filled me with amazement a few days ago now do not seem as important; thoughts that kept my mind captive only a few hours ago have now lost their power and have been replaced by others. . . . Why am I continuously trapped in this sense of urgency and emergency? Why do I not see that you are eternal, that your kingdom lasts forever, and that for you a thousand years are like one day? O Lord, let me enter into your presence and there taste the eternal, timeless, everlasting love with which you invite me to let go of my time-bound anxieties, fears, preoccupations, and worries. . . . Lord, teach me your ways and give me the courage to follow them.

Amen” (Henri Nouwen).

As C. S. Lewis once said, all that is not eternal is eternally out of date. So why do I waste so much of my precious time worrying about what will not matter in five months or even five weeks, much less eternity?

Lord, keep my mind stayed on You that Your perfect peace may abide in me. Help me keep my eyes fixed on Jesus instead of all those things that I give so much of my time and energy to instead of You. Amen.

“Blessed be thy mercy that laid help on one that is mighty and willing, one that is able to save to that uttermost. Make us deeply sensible of our need of his saving grace, of the blood that cleanses, of the rest he has promised, And impute to us that righteousness which justifies the guilty, gives them a title to eternal life, and posession of the Spirit.”

This morning, one of my tires gave up the ghost in spectacular fashion, blowing into shreds on Nolensville Pike a block or two before the Wal-Mart parking lot. Thankfully, I was able to limp into the parking lot and assess the damage.

Said tire is definitely in Michelin heaven and I am sporting a new tire. I am also on the far side of that stressful situation, which is by far my preference. I don’t want to go through that ordeal for a very, very long time (if ever).

I probably should have paid more attention to my tires. I probably should have noticed something was off sooner. I could go on and on and beat myself up for days and it won’t resurrect my late lamented tire. And it won’t help me much.

Or I could remember that while my tire is deceased, I am not. I am still sans toe tag. For that, I am thankful.

Everything good in my life is due to grace and mercy. Anything that I have or that I do that is remotely decent is because of God’s goodness. Even my next breath is God’s gift to me that I don’t deserve.

My stomach still hasn’t quite recovered from being in knots the whole day due to worrying about my old Jeep. I thought I had really screwed up this time. Thankfully, it was only the tire and some minor cosmetic damage to my car that can be easily fixed.

Even when I choose worry over faith, God is still faithful. It’s probably a small miracle that I didn’t damage the wheel rim. It could have been on the interstate, which would have most likely been way worse to both me and my car.

I can learn my lesson about being more diligent with taking car of things like checking my tire pressure more often. Better yet, I can breathe a deep sigh of relief for another reminder of God’s never-ending lovingkindness toward me.

“The Gospel is bad news before it is good news. It is the news that man is a sinner, to use the old word, that he is evil in the imagination of his heart, that when he looks in the mirror all in a lather what he sees is at least eight parts chicken, phony, slob. That is the tragedy. But it is also the news that he is loved anyway, cherished, forgiven, bleeding to be sure, but also bled for. That is the comedy. And yet, so what? So what if even in his sin the slob is loved and forgiven when the very mark and substance of his sin and of his slobbery is that he keeps turning down the love and forgiveness because he either doesn’t believe them or doesn’t want them or just doesn’t give a damn? In answer, the news of the Gospel is that extraordinary things happen. . . .Zaccheus climbs up a sycamore tree a crook and climbs down a saint. Paul sets out a hatchet man for the Pharisees and comes back a fool for Christ. It is impossible for anybody to leave behind the darkness of the world he carries on his back like a snail, but for God all things are possible. That is the fairy tale. All together they are the truth (Frederick Buechner, Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy & Fairy Tale).

Something I was reminded of again is that we never outgrow our need of the gospel that first saved us. We never get beyond it. We never grow past it. We only deepen in our understanding of it as it reaches deeper into our lives and hearts.

When we neglect the gospel, we tend to forget it. We will slip away from it into error. As the old saying goes, no one drifts into holiness. If anything, we will drift into worldliness and bad doctrine. We will drift into thinking that actions and lifestyles are are acceptable when the Bible calls them sin. We will commend what the Bible condemns.

But when we keep the gospel first, we never get past our need of God. We will not only grow in the gospel and in grace but also in humility. We will never forget the wonder of when we first believed and the biggest desire of our hearts will be for others to know the joy we know.

The good news is still the best news ever. May we never get tired of it or get past it or get to where we don’t want or think we need it.