god

The Ye Old Quest for a New(er) Car

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I figured out it’s been a while since I actually had to look for a car. The car that I’ve had for the past 10 years was my Mom’s old car that they sold to me when they got a new car. That was in 2013. Before that, I found out my cousin was selling his old Jeep that he had barely ever driven. That was in 2003.

Before that, I can’t really remember. I had a 1988 Ford Taurus for my very first car that I think I bought from a used car dealership. Then I got another Taurus, this one a 1993. I remember very little about the actual process. I remember looking at a few cars that seemed like a good idea to me at the time but probably wouldn’t have worked out. One was an older BMW convertible with a non-working A/C. One was a car brand that didn’t even exist anymore but looked cool and had leather seats.

I’ve learned to trust God’s timing in all things, not just in car shopping. In my experience, God usually never gives me what I ask for when I ask for it. Or it seems like my requests take a long time to reach God’s ear.

But I can attest that God’s provision is never a moment too late. I can trust that God’s denials can be as much of a blessing and a grace as God’s gifts, though they may not seem like it at the time.

Today, I looked at a 2021 Jeep Wrangler. It looked great, but there were a couple of red flags that made me hesitate. So the process goes on. But as I’ve learned, what I end up with will be better in the end. Plus, the process will be a learning and growing experience.

If you know of anyone who’s selling a relatively new Wrangler, I’m in the market. Plus, I really like the color red.

When It Seems Jesus Doesn’t Care

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Here I am with another mostly borrowed blog post. But this one spoke to me as deeply as the one I posted yesterday. Some days, God can feel distant and silent. If we trust in our feelings, we’re very much tempted to give up on God. But if we trust in the promises of God that are all Yes and Amen, we will find that God is present even in the silences and we can see Him near just as our eyes adjust to the darkness around us:

“Martha came to him Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, do you not care?’ (Lk 10:40).

Lord Jesus, when Martha called your empathy and compassion into question, thank you for giving her grace and not taking offense. Though she ‘only’ felt under-appreciated, there are times when we experience crises, stories, and heartaches that seem to contradict your compassion, care, and control.

When ‘darkness hides your lovely face’ we become vulnerable to all kinds of graceless voices:

•The devil’s toxic whisperings … ‘Where IS your Jesus now?’.

•Karma replacing the Gospel, telling us, ‘You’re sick because of hidden, unconfessed sin’.

•The narration of a cynical friend or weary family member, or nosy neighbor. Like Job’s wife telling Job, “Curse God and die” Job 2:9.

•Our own emotionally exhausted, pain-fueled monologue … ‘Maybe there is no Jesus. Maybe I’d be better off dead.’

Lord Jesus, though you don’t always explain yourself or fix things on our timetable, you will never “crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle” (Matt.12:20). The Scriptures are very honest about life between your resurrection and return: We will have days when mystery is more real than mercy, heartache is more tangible than hope, and pain is more convincing than providence. But, we will never have a Jesus-absent day.

When we’re angry like Jonah (Jonah 4:9), disillusioned like Job (Job.10:15), fearful like Elijah (1 Kings 19:3), doubt you like John the Baptist (Matt. 11:3), ‘beastly’ like Asaph (Psalm 73:21-22), despairing of life like Paul (2 Cor. 1:8)… you welcome us, and meet us right there… taking no offense, only giving us grace.

Jesus, no one cares like you. No one understandings suffering like you. No one has done more to eradicate all ‘death, mourning, crying and pain’ (Rev.21:4). Thank you. Meet us today, and meet our most weary friends through us. So Very Amen” (Scotty Smith).

True Faith Prevails

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“Christendom has had a series of revolutions and in each one of them Christianity has died. Christianity has died many times and risen again; for it had a God who knew the way out of the grave” (G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man).

It seems that in every generation, people have tried to modify Christianity to make it more culturally acceptable and more palatable to modern ears. The Bible even promises that people won’t want to hear the truth but will follow after those who tell them what they want to believe and want to hear.

But true faith has a way of outliving all those who want to change it. True orthodox Christianity will always exist because it alone has the power to transform people and truly set them free. There is only one gospel with the power to save.

I don’t claim to be smart enough to understand how true faith has managed to stay alive all these centuries, even when it was just about dead in the world and hardly any recognizable form of the gospel could be found.

But I believe that just as God promised Elijah that there was a remnant in Israel who remained faithful, so God again promises that there will always be a true remnant who will hold fast to the teachings of the Bible and of the true Jesus of the gospels. And it won’t be because of any of us who are super faithful and super spiritual, but because it is God’s truth and God will preserve His truth.

My prayer for those who have fallen into false teaching and a pseudo-faith is that they will come to THE truth — not my truth, not their truth, but God’s unchanging and unwavering truth as found in Scripture. I pray they will embrace true faith and find the true joy of salvation.

And I will trust that God is able to keep that which He has created and committed to us, the real and true gospel of Jesus Christ.

A Faith Like Betty Elliott’s

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‘Lord, I give up my own plans and purposes, all my own desires, hopes and ambitions, and I accept Thy will for my life. I give up myself, my life, my all, utterly to Thee, to be Thine forever. I hand over to Thy keeping all of my friendships; all the people whom I love are to take second place in my heart. Fill me now and seal me with Thy Spirit. Work out Thy whole will in my life at any cost, for to me to live is Christ. Amen” (Betty Scott Stam).

I want the kind of faith that Betty Elliott had. And before I go on, I do realize that she was a flawed, sometimes insecure, follower of Christ. I also realize that the only one we’re truly called to be like is Jesus, but I think it’s helpful to have worthy examples to inspire us.

After listening to most of the biography Becoming Elisabeth Elliott, I see a faith that definitely is inspiring to me. This woman of God waited for marriage for a long time. She had wait while Jim wrestled with whether God was calling him to marriage in addition to a call to the mission field. After that, their marriage lasted all of two years before he was martyred.

Then she was willing to go to the very people who had murdered her husband and take them the gospel. It’s only through the power of the gospel of Christ that she was even able to forgive them, much less reach out to them in love. It’s that same amazing grace that later saw a majority of that tribe come to know Jesus as Lord and Savior.

That’s the kind of faith I want. Not so much the dramatic, in your face part, but the quiet and steady confidence in a God whose ways I may not always understand. I want the faith that can say at any moment, whatever the circumstances, “Thy will be done, even if it means that my will be undone.”

Her legacy lives on in the books she wrote, particularly Through Gates of Splendor and its account of Jim Elliott and four other missionaries’ attempts to reach the Huaorani people of Ecuador, an unreached people group, with the gospel and how it cost them their very lives.

I love this prayer of hers from when she was 21:

“My life is on Thy Alter, Lord – for Thee to consume. Set the fire, Father! Bind me with cords of love to the Alter. Hold me there. Let me remember the Cross.”

The Bread of Life

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I ate dinner at The Cheesecake Factory with the family today. Yes, that place that has a menu the size of War and Peace. But they also have bread.

One of my favorite pleasures has to be freshly baked bread right out of the oven, covered in just the right amount of butter. The taste, the texture, and the way it melts in my mouth all make for happiness. I could live without a lot of things, but I seriously doubt I could live without bread.

And think about it. Bread is such a staple for so many parts of the world. Back in Jesus’ day, bread was a daily part of their lives and integral to every meal. So when Jesus said that He was the Bread of Life, he was saying more than He was one of the four food groups, spiritually speaking. He was saying that the more we know and love Jesus, the more we find Him completely satisfying on every level.

If I had let myself, I could have eaten basket after basket of bread and not had any room left for the entree. That would have been foolish. But when Jesus is the bread of life, we find that there’s no such thing as too much. The more we learn and the more we see, the more we want and the more our desire grows to know and love and serve Jesus. The more we want to share this Bread with others.

May the love of Jesus never grow old for any of us, but may we always savor Jesus and carry His aroma wherever we go to those around us in all the places we go.

Resting, Not Rusting

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“To wait upon God is not to sit with folded hands and do nothing, but to wait as men who wait for the harvest. The farmer does not wait idly but with intense activity; he keeps industriously ‘at it’ until the harvest. To wait upon God is the perfection of activity. We are told to ‘rest in the Lord,’ not to rust” (Oswald Chambers, The Place of Help).

I love that image. Waiting on the Lord is like a farmer waiting for his crops to be ready for harvest. He has to prepare the soil to receive the rain so that the seeds will germinate and grow. There is no amount of idly sitting by with folded hands hoping for a good harvest.

While we may not know the outcome of what we’re waiting for, we at least know something that God has placed on our hearts. We know one step of obedience to take. We also know that it’s not until we stop taking about obedience and finally obey that God reveals the next step and illuminates the next part of our path.

May we be faithful to wait well and not idly. May we learn to rest in the Lord, not to rust.

An Advent Prayer from Henri Nouwen

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I realize that we are past Advent. If you follow the ancient ways, then you are aware that this is the third day of Christmas, so it still counts. Also, this time of the kingdom of God being now and not yet feels like an extended Advent season as we wait for Christ’s return:

“O Lord,

How hard it is to accept your way. You come to me as a small, powerless child born away from home. You live for me as a stranger in your own land. You die for me as a criminal outside the walls of the city, rejected by your own people, misunderstood by your friends, and feeling abandoned by your God.

As I prepare to celebrate your birth, I am trying to feel loved, accepted, and at home in this world, and I am trying to overcome the feelings of alienation and separation that continue to assail me. But I wonder now if my deep sense of homelessness does not bring me closer to you than my occasional feelings of belonging. Where do I truly celebrate your birth: in a cozy home or in an unfamiliar house, among welcoming friends or among unknown strangers, with feelings of well-being or with feelings of loneliness?

I do not have to run away from those experiences that are closest to yours. Just as you do not belong to this world, so I do not belong to this world. Every time I feel this way I have an occasion to be grateful and to embrace you better and taste more fully your joy and peace.

Come, Lord Jesus, and be with me where I feel poorest. I trust that this is the place where you will find your manger and bring your light. Come, Lord Jesus, come.

Amen” (Henri Nouwen).

Highly Favored

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“This hit me.. Another perspective of being ‘highly favored.’

She was ‘highly favored’ but was almost put away by the man she loved the most.

‘Highly favored’ but she was rejected by every person in Bethlehem.

‘Highly favored’ but she laid on the dirt floor of a barn and gave birth to a baby she carried nine months.

‘Highly favored’ but in the middle of the night had to leave all she knew and move to a strange town because God said so.

Favor never looks like favor at first. Favor sometimes takes you through frustration, failure, and fear. You want to be favored of God? It may be in darkest night or deepest valley. But there in that place where no one sees you and you feel like no one understands whisper to yourself, ‘This is only the beginning not the end. This will turn out for my good and His glory. This is because… I’m Favored.’”

Repost Brent Carr

#thelindsaychronicles #highlyfavored

You’ve probably heard of the expression “favor ain’t fait.” I think in this case, it’s true. Mary’s life would have been way less complicated if she hadn’t been chosen and favored by God. But no one would have remembered her name. No one would have her example of faith to follow.

Because of her embracing God’s calling, she got to witness the in-breaking of God into the world as a baby. She got to hold Emmanuel, God with us, in her arms.

She also lived to see that same son crucified. She also witnessed all of His agony and weep while He was tortured to death. She saw the place where they laid Him in a tomb and saw the stone rolled in front to seal Him in.

But best of all, she was eyewitness to Jesus rising from the dead and from that tomb. She saw with her own eyes the hope of the world and how death and hell had been defeated and how the grave would no longer have the last word. She saw the true fulfillment of salvation that was to be for all people, given to those who receive it in faith.

She was highly favored. That doesn’t mean she was guaranteed an easy or a comfortable path, but she knew the glory that awaited at the end of the road. She knew God was with her on that journey and that at the end was the redemption she had hoped and prayed for all her life.

Who Is Jesus?

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Recently, I read a post that bothered me. It basically stated that Jesus was a bleeding heart liberal socialist whose sole purpose was to stand for everything that conservatives hate. To me, that’s just as wrong as reinventing Jesus as a middle-class white Republican who is all about capitalism and the American dream.

The problem with both is that they make Jesus too small. Way too small. To reduce Jesus to something that fits comfortably into your social and political worldview is to recreate Jesus into your own image the way God created us in His. It’s to pare the claws of the lion of Judah and make Him tame, as Dorothy Sayers put it.

But Jesus is far beyond and above our politics. He’s far beyond and above our likes and dislikes and our opinions. He’s fully part of the Godhead trinity just as He is 100% God and 100% man. You can’t take in the totality of His words and believe what He said without recognizing Him as no less than God incarnate in human flesh.

Jesus Himself stated that to get Him wrong is to get the Father wrong. Did you get that? To get Jesus wrong is to get God wrong. To get God wrong is to get life and eternity wrong.

Those in the Bible who met Jesus and understood who He was fell on their faces and worshipped Him as God. They left everything behind and followed Him, willing to take up their crosses and suffer the way He suffered. They were all willing to lay down their lives for Jesus rather than deny Him (even Peter who got it wrong the first time was willing to die for the sake of his Savior).

This is the Jesus of the Christmas story. Not a Democrat or a Republican, liberal or conservative, socialist or capitalist. This Jesus is the very God who made the heavens and the earth and who is Lord of lords and King of kings. This is the one who came to save us from our sins. This is Jesus.

White Stones

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“Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it” (Revelation 2:17, NIV).

I learned something interesting recently. When the Romans were building their roads, sometimes they used small white stones known as either tiger eyes or cat’s eyes in between the larger stones. The purpose was for those smaller white stones to reflect the moonlight at night to help people see where they were walking at night.

I don’t ever want to be guilty of reading too much into any biblical text or seeing something that isn’t there, but I wonder if there’s a connection. If the white stones were guideposts along the road, then someone with a white stone would be able to help others find their way to God.

I remember that Jesus told us that we were the light of the world and a city on a hill that can’t be hidden. When we live out of the overflow of God’s provision and in accordance to His will, we reflect God to those around us and help those who are lost find their bearings and their way.

Just as the moon doesn’t generate its own light but only reflects the light of the sun, so we don’t in our own strength or wisdom lead people but only so far as the image and light of God is reflected in us and through us. That only comes through surrender and obedience.

When the people of God truly live out their calling, they don’t point people to themselves or to their impressive churches or activities but to the awesome power of God who meets us where we are but doesn’t leave us that way.