Gentle Evangelism
Something in me says that evangelism shouldn’t be a divisive topic. And yet, over my years in ministry and my wide background among different denominations, opinions can be so strong that it almost seems like something folks would come to blows over. It’s not that the need for evangelism is questioned. Even liturgical churches want to see people come to faith, while others insist that it must be done by a specific prayer. An altar call for salvation is not something you’d see very often in several church groups and you’d see it every day in others. If you’ve read my book, then you already know that I’m not sure when in my Christian life I crossed the line to becoming what the scriptures consider a saving belief. Maybe that’s why evangelism is so uncomfortable for so many of us. We don’t want to face people and tell them that they are sinners and going to hell if they don’t repent and ask Jesus into their hearts. Don’t get me wrong, the fear of hell can be a perfectly legitimate motivator as long as that’s not the end of the Christian walk. After all, God is a God of love and relationship. I don’t mean relationship when we walk through the pearly gates, but I mean relationship right here, right now in our daily lives. As Christians, I hope we want that as much as He does. Yes, I know, because I have heard, all the many reasons that its scary and uncomfortable for people. And at some point, we need to accept that God is bigger than our fears. I need to get back on track before I digress too far. Evangelism is something that can seem big and scary. But, I contend that it begins with being real. It begins with being a Christian. It begins with living out our faith because we have accepted the raging fury that is the love of God. As we let it embrace us, it will flow through us and make us genuine, loving, Christians. Whether we are hoping to help our loved ones come to know Christ or a total stranger, the beginning is the same. And it doesn’t matter if we’re taught a memorized prayer or we just walk it out and confess our belief through reciting creeds in church. It’s being a Christian that matters. One of the best-known names in recent history is of course, Mahatma Ghandi. He had decided to visit a Christian church in Calcutta and was turned away at the door because the church was for the higher castes and whites only. That is what caused his famous saying, “I would be a Christian if it were not for the Christians.” We don’t have to be that segregationist to shove people away. People, especially those close to us will see our hypocritical actions and attitudes. Gandhi also believed that “A virtue achieves its potential only in its application and it ceases to have any use if it serves no purpose in daily life.” So what do I mean then by “Gentle Evangelism?” What I’m getting at is that sometimes the best way to make a difference is to simply live what we say we believe. If we do that in front of others and love them as Christ loved us, then we will be doing the best thing possible. God will convict people of sin and He will enable them to love. We have the simple (not always easy) job of just living in front of them and showing them love.
A Wonderful Ministry
I’ve recently become acquainted with author and podcaster, Amy Connell. I don’t think that Amy would ever call herself a minister, but that’s who she is and what she does. She’s a nutritionist and personal trainer by trade but in reality she is a minister. I had the amazing opportunity of being interviewed for an upcoming episode of her wonderful podcast, “Graced Health.” Her perspective is wonderful. She teaches that there is no standard that you have to adhere to and pressure to stay there. Instead, be who God made you to be! Now admittedly her target audience is Christian Women over 40. I meet 2 of those three criteria and am loving what she puts out. I strongly encourage the women over 40 in my audience to check out her book. It’s called, “Your Worthy Body: Find Freedom in Health by Breaking All the Rules.” you can find it on Amazon, the link is below. I also encourage you to listen to her podcast. Her guests all bring amazing perspectives on issues that are important to all of us. Again. her target audience is Christian Women over 40, but the ministry she shares is wonderful and I hope to be a long time friend and ally of hers. There is also a link below to her podcast. She also has a plethora of free resources including an amazing 14-day devotional There’s no BMI Chart in the Bible. As Amy would say, “Have a Graced Day!” DevotionalAmazon link for “Your Worthy Body: Find Freedom in Health by Breaking All the Rules.”Graced Health Podcast
The Holy Spirit Today
I was recently asked through the survey about the function of the Holy Spirit in the world today. Now, personally, this really excited me because the person that asked started out in a liturgical background just like I did and believes in the power of the Holy Spirit just like I do. I say, just like I do, but I don’t know that we’re exactly in line completely, but in my many years of ministry, I’ve found that there are a number of denominations that don’t really pay the Holy Spirit much attention at all. When I became a pastor in a denomination of one congregation, I quickly was challenged in some of the things I believed. I realized that some of the things I believed and even taught were man-made traditions. Now, I didn’t question them because they were taught by people that I respected greatly and I had heard the same things many times from many different sources. That’s no excuse however for spreading man-made traditions as truth. That was, after all, the biggest issue that Christ had with the religious leaders of His day. They had taken God’s law and probably originally to help people understand it added details that became absolutely ridiculous. Their traditions weren’t in the scriptures but were taught as “the law.” I get it, part of our nature as humans is to draw lines. We like structure, we like concrete. Throughout society, there are lines drawn, some make sense, and others feel arbitrary, especially when you get caught on the wrong side of them. But we have to draw lines somewhere to keep things fair for everyone. So drawing lines comes naturally to us. The problem is that our human lines rarely leave room for God to be God. 1 Corinthians 1:25 says that God’s foolishness is higher than man’s wisdom. We can’t box Him in because we can’t fully comprehend Him. So, how does the Holy Spirit function today, and better yet, how do we function WITH the Holy Spirit? First, we need to understand who and what the Holy Spirit is. If you read John chapter 16, the resurrected Christ is meeting with the disciples for the last time. Of course, they are filled with sorrow and don’t want Him to go. They’ve come to a point where they hang on to every word and have seen any number of miraculous things done by Him. But He tells them they need to let Him go so that He can send the Spirit of truth. This Spirit is to be a comforter and a guide. In Romans 7 and 8, Pauls talks at length about his inability to do the right things. If left to his own strength alone, he will fall victim to the desires of the flesh. That is those things that feel good and are self-serving. But he also says that with the help of the Spirit, he can be a different man. This is the same man that lists his trials and sufferings in the latter half of 2 Corinthians 16 and is the same man that says that through Christ, He can do all things (often misquoted), after He says how he can be content in easy and hard circumstances. In my second book, which will come out in a few months, Blessed Brokenness: Seeing God’s Glory in the Ashes of Life, I tell the story of a miraculous healing that happened under my hand. I’ve seen others. And maybe most importantly, me. I love my wife. I do. She knows that when we met, I latched onto her and wanted to marry her because I was lonely and tired of it and she was gorgeous. When we got along, we got along great. But I wasn’t capable of loving her (used here as a verb). By nature, I am an uptight, angry, uppity jerk. That’s the flesh. But nobody that meets me today sees that (I think). Oh, sometimes when I’m dealing with certain companies on the phone, the flesh starts to creep out and I have to lean in to the Spirit to push it back down. What I’ve found, and what I believe, is that if we make ourselves vulnerable to the Spirit, He will guide us and intercede for us. But, I think the hardest part for most of us is that vulnerability. We’re so used to doing things on our own that letting the Spirit in is scary. Romans 8:26 says that we don’t even know how to pray, but the Spirit will intercede will utterances and groanings. Verse 27 basically says that the Spirit knows both our hearts and God’s. That’s a loose translation, but it gets the main gist across. And for the person that asked the question – I believe that liturgy is beautiful and can free one to really focus on the beauty of God, which could actually allow one to let the Spirit in. Unfortunately, most liturgical churches teach that the spirit isn’t active today. A common criticism of liturgical churches is that things are laid out and many of the responsive readings are repeated so much that the congregants don’t have to pay attention to them to participate. The same criticism can fall on any church. The individual doesn’t have to pay attention. The easiest way in my mind to live a life full of the Holy Spirit is to draw closer to God. And open your hearts and minds to Him and allow Him to lead you and comfort you. It may take a little practice, we’re good at doing things our way. But, over time, it gets easier and easier. Be blessed, my friends. If you’d be willing to answer a 4 question survey that helps me make sure I am serving relevant content, please click here.
Connection with God
I sent out a link to a survey a week or two ago and a few answered the four questions. I’m trying to find a way to address the concerns that came up in the survey through my blog posts. After all, I want to know that these posts mean something to you, the reader. (I have journals for things that only mean anything to me.) One of the things that I struggle with is that the answers to several of the questions are really very closely related. Sometimes we feel alone, as though even God has abandoned us. Sometimes we feel like that’s what we deserve! And if we’re honest, that’s probably actually what we do indeed deserve. The Bible says that if we have hatred for our brother, we might as well have already committed murder (1 John 3:15). There are others, but this is a blog post, not a book and if I pile it on, I have to dig us back out of it. The point is that no matter our outward behavior, it is our heart that really matters. Yet, we humans find it so hard to truly be loving all the time (especially on the inside). I’m not immune, as a caregiver and advocate for my wife, she congratulates me when I hang up the phone after a call with a difficult office and she had listened to me catch myself halfway through the call. My voice and my words would be getting harsher, then I would remember that the person I was talking to was not to blame, at least not completely. But, by nature, I am an angry, uptight person. I’m not the guy that says, “Listen, I know it’s not your fault, but I really need you to help me fix this.” No, by nature, I’m the guy that gets hung up on! That’s by nature. Our human nature is so broken. Whether you believe in Original Sin (that even infants are born into sin) or not, if you are reading this, you live the battle. Paul starts in Romans 7:15 and continues well into Romans 8 (let’s call it verse 4 for now) talking about the battle between our flesh (us by nature) and the Spirit. When we live in the flesh, God will feel very distant, and being a ‘good Christian’ will be nigh impossible. Now I admit, this passage is among Paul’s most wordy and convoluted, but it is, for me anyway, one of the central passages that provide direction to living in Him, which includes knowing we’re in His presence. I hope you read it on your own in your favorite translations. Go ahead and do it now, I promise not to go anywhere. The essence of this is that the only way to get this unruly flesh under control is to LEAN IN to the Spirit. Now, some people cock their heads when I say that, but it’s the best way I know how to convey the message in any concise manner. As we do (and yes, it might take a little practice) we will find the strength to be who we want to be and we will do so because we have put ourselves in His presence. One of my pastor buddies likes to say, “God is a gentleman, he’ll never force Himself on you.” But, just as He won’t force Himself on you, He is always right there. Toby Mac, during a concert monologue years ago, said that all that stuff that was separating you from God, well you don’t have to walk back through it all to get to Him. It’s so true. There is a point I must concede though. Our world, including many of our friends within the church, encourages a very different life. We value the ‘self-made man’! He’s a hero, an idol, in our culture. That’s the complete opposite to leaning in to the Spirit. I had a young teenager in my counseling office once. On my intake paperwork, she had checked the box next to “Fear of men or women.” When I asked her about that, she said she didn’t like old men, There I was, sitting there with my fat belly and silver beard and hair. It was all I could do not to burst into laughter. I think I did grin a little when I said, “Well, what about me, I’m an old man?” She replied, “Yeah, but you’re chill.” I know that if I met my natural self on the street, well I probably wouldn’t like me very much. But then, it is in that weakness that I allow Him to be strong on my behalf. And that is when I can rejoice that I am in His presence. I never want to use these posts to plug my book. But I do address these issues in much more depth in “How to be a Christian in Today’s World: Shame or Fear of Failure vs. Living Confidently in God’s Love.”
Why Do I Feel So Alone if He Has the Whole World in His Hands?
Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Remember the song we learned as children, “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hand?” Well, it does have a basis in scripture. In Isaiah 41:10, we see God encouraging the Israelites by telling them that he will hold them up with His righteous right hand. Later, in Isaiah 49:16, as Zion is fearing that God has abandoned them, He tells them, “You are engraved on my hands.” In John 10 verse 28 and 29 Jesus says that His sheep can not be plucked from His or God’s hands. I wrote, “How to be a Christian in Today’s World: Shame or Fear of Failure vs. Living Confidently in God’s Love” originally thinking just about how our culture encourages the feelings of being alone and far from God. Of course, the book grew to be much more, hopefully helping to provide a path to or back to comfort in God’s love. But I thought I would share with you today a story of a woman who taught that to me in a very real way. In my teen years, I was drawn to Christianity. I grew up in a family that claimed Christianity, but we never went to church and I never had any guidance in faith. I went to ministry school and met my wife. She was a dedicated Christian and encouraged me in ministry. I worked full-time but kept busy in the church in one way or another. That was our life. We studied and were taught pretty much the whole Bible. And we loved classic hymns, praise choruses and even scripture memory songs. We raised our daughter to sit through “big church” and taught her scriptures as part of a parenting method intended to help kids not just obey rules, but make good decisions based on a solid framework. That was our life. One Christmas when my daughter was still a toddler, we felt like God was calling us to move across the country to be near my mother and grandmother. They had been living together for a number of years. My mom was doing all she could to work and keep house. As my grandmother aged, not only did she do less, including giving up on church altogether, but she became bitter and angry. As she did, it wore on my mom. I tried to minister to my mom and help her have a better outlook on life than the one that my grandmother was putting into her every day. It rarely made much of a difference and when it did, it didn’t last long. After a couple of years, we were drowning financially as the income to living expenses ratio was way off. Then when my wife’s dad was called to pastor a church just 300 miles from us, we made the move too. I became the leader of the boy’s program and the alternate preacher, and my wife ran the sound booth or was on the worship team. A few years later, Mercy Me came out with the song, “I Can Only Imagine.” The song really struck me as the lyrics questioned how the singer would respond when he got to heaven. We’d sung so many songs about going to the glory land, etc. I even had a line in the radio version of the hit book series “Left Behind.” Heaven and eternity were things we’d thought about for so many years. Shortly after my grandmother finally passed away, my wife started taking my mom to Christian women’s conventions and with the negative influence stopped, we were able to make some ground with my mom. When she moved to be near us and started going to church every weekend, she became excited about maybe getting into women’s ministry herself. This was such an exciting change. When the worship band started singing “I Can Only Imagine,” something made me look over at my mom. Strangely she wasn’t singing. There was this strange look on her face as she listened intently to this song she’d never heard. I realized suddenly that this was a new concept to her. Here my wife and I had become so familiar with the concept of going to Heaven that we had different ideas and pictures in our heads. But, here, my mom was suddenly putting two and two together. She was coming to try to imagine Heaven. I’ll never forget the look of wonder on her face. That night, as my wife and I talked in bed about that morning and how excited we were for my mom, we listened to her and my daughter, now a teen, talk and giggle from the other side of the house. If I didn’t know one was in her mid-sixties, I would have thought I was hearing girlfriends during a sleepover. None of us knew yet that my mom’s body was betraying her. Yes, normal skin cells were morphing into cancer cells. It was a cancer that normally should have been easily treatable. But with each treatment and cut by the surgeon, the cancer had more fresh skin to work with. She called me from the hospital 100 miles from our home and told me she wanted to come home, I contacted her oncologist. After pressing him, he finally said, “We can’t do the surgery your mom needs until the cancer stops growing.” Then I got him to admit that he didn’t believe that would happen. So, I got her transferred to our hospital at home. A male nurse at our local hospital, a former military medic, called me to let me know she had arrived. I asked him how she was. He didn’t go into details but was obviously not happy. He finally said to me, “Mr. Hogan, we didn’t treat our enemies this badly in Iraq.” In retrospect, I strongly believe that what he saw was that the cancer was spreading so quickly that all it did was make a mess that they couldn’t keep up with. But
He is Risen!
He is Risen Indeed! I did not intend to send anything out over Easter weekend. But tonight, I can not not share with you. (I say tonight because I will schedule this for Easter morning.) My wife found another amazing series and I have to recommend it to you. It’s on PureFlix and it’s called “Eyewitness Bible – Easter” Each episode covers a first person account of the days leading up to and including Resurrection Sunday. The episode that triggered this post was “Maundy Thursday.” Understand that Maundy Thursday was the last supper and the walk to the garden. (By the way, my beautiful bride and I got married on Maundy Thursday, but that’s for another day.) This episode is told by the apostle Phillip and he was particularly touched by the parable of the vines and branches found in John chapter 15. He describes what it is like in September as the harvest is nearing for the vineyards. The large brown vines coming up and spreading into branches holding the fruit yes, but what you see are big beautiful leaves of different colors. There is a balance required between leaves and branches. The grapes won’t grow without leaves, but too many leaves will steal nutrients from the fruit. The vine keeper prunes the branches to keep this balance. Just as we too must keep balance between the distractions of life and bearing fruit. My wife caught the point that he made that the fruit is hidden under the leaves. The vine and the branches that bear the most and best fruit aren’t showing it off, they are simply just growing. This passage talks also about how we must abide in Him. This is so important. We try to do in ourselves and we may look good for a while, but eventually the truth that we can’t produce fruit on our own will become only too obvious. If God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit are all one, then when we abide in Christ, we abide in the Father. When as I so often refer to, “Lean In” to the Spirit, we are abiding in God the Father and God the Son. That is where we get the ability to bear fruit. That is where we get the strength to love. That is where we become people whose lives bring glory to God. When I ask people why God made us, a common answer is “to glorify God.” This is true, I can’t argue that. Although, I always point out that we’re made because He wants to be in relationship with us. When most people say that we are to glorify God, I suspect that the first thought that comes to mind is singing His praises around the throne. But how much do we bring God glory by simply and quietly bearing fruit? But again, we can’t do that apart from Him! 1 John 4:19 says, “We love, because He first loved us.” I am so humbled that some of you have trusted me with the things that weigh heavily on your hearts and trusted me with your questions. I don’t consider myself to be a Bible scholar, just a simple country minister. But on the blessed day that we celebrate His resurrection, I invite you brothers and sisters to draw near to the empty tomb. Remember that it is for YOU! Allow yourself to feel the love of the God that knew you before the beginning of time, knew who you would be and still made you and still sent His son. Christ emptied Himself to be like sinful flesh, for you. What an incredible, tremendous, blessing of love from the very creator of our great big universe! And remember, Jesus loves you, and so do I! Facebook Twitter LinkedIn
How Do You Keep Faith in God?
I’ve received some very compelling questions to the short survey I sent out. It was just four questions, but some of the answers have made me think, and others have broken my heart. If you haven’t taken the survey, you take it here. Your answers will help me shape the bog so that I deliver content that doesn’t matter to me, but to you. That said, one question that was asked of me directly was, “How do you deal with your disability and have great faith??” Now, I want to avoid a spoiler as I have a book that is essentially done, but I’m sitting on for the moment. It will be called Blessed Brokenness: Seeing God’s Glory in the Ashes of Life. (If you’ve been paying really close attention, the title has changed multiple times, but I think this is a winner.) That book tells the story of how my wife and I have accidentally been an inspiration to many and how I finally found peace as my wife suffered great pain. But I want to answer the question. Yesterday afternoon, my wife’s pain was so great that my daughter called an ambulance. We got back to the house at around 3:30 AM. I finally was able to go to bed around 5:00. And I still had to be up before 8:00 to let my wife’s caregiver in. So, after just over two hours of sleep, I’ve been awake for three so far. And I feel compelled to write instead of sleep. I don’t tell you this for pity or how great a hero I am, I tell you this because I am weak. I’m used to going on these adventures by myself but my daughter went along last night and helped, which was a great blessing. But from the moment that it became a question that we might call an ambulance, I was not in a great place. I’ve done this so many times, I’m sick of it. I hate seeing the ambulance in front of my house. I hate sitting in the ER. It’s a time when I am at my weakest in myself. My disability causes weakness, pain, fatigue, and spilled coffee throughout the house. Yet, I am still the one person that can do certain things for my wife that nobody else can. Because of my natural temperament and my formative years, I can be pretty good at just not noticing or at least being bothered by my own disability. My wife and daughter? Well, that’s another matter entirely. I guess the best way to explain the solution to this natural problem is this: I’ve learned that I can either be miserable or I can trust God. Being miserable isn’t any fun, so the latter becomes my preferred choice. The hard part for most of us is when God’s solution or at least what we perceive as God’s solution isn’t what we want. I admit it, I want my wife pain-free. I want her paying her piano, I want her cooking. I want to not need caregivers anymore. That’s what I want. God just doesn’t seem to be willing to get with the program. So, first I have to remember who has what role. He’s God, I’m not! Secondly, if I’m going to trust Him then I need to learn to do that. What I’ve found personally and through the Word, is that I get what I want when I want what He wants instead of trying to change His mind. Job knew that he wasn’t suffering because he had sinned despite the admonitions of his friends. And he refused to curse God and die as his wife suggested. He retained his faith in a just and righteous God, But he felt like God had betrayed him. That is, until God reminded him of his place. Abraham is recorded as arguing with God and ‘winning.” The difference between Abraham and others (Moses) is that Abraham approached God from who God is. “Far be it for you to _____.” Abraham was saying, “Wait a minute, that doesn’t make sense with who I know you to be.” He wasn’t trying to get God to see it His way, he was arguing God’s nature. In other words, he was asking God to be who He knew him to be. So, no I didn’t enjoy yesterday through this morning. I don’t care for my eyes not focusing properly or my headache that isn’t going away even after taking migraine medicine. I know these are both likely induced by a lack of sleep. But my wife is sleeping, not crying. We know a little more about how to prevent repeats of yesterday. And most of all, I know we are in God’s hand. I won’t make the mistake that Job did (and I have) of thinking that God is against me or the source of my pain. I won’t think He is betraying me because he hasn’t fixed things the way I want. It’s too late in this post to tell the whole story, but when my mom was dying, I was angry. She took my hand and said, “God knew. He knew.” At the time I didn’t know what she meant. Now I know that she knew that God knew what was happening and that nobody and nothing could pluck her from His hand (John 10:27-29). Her focus was on the eternal, not on the temporal. I have to let the Spirit help me in my weakness to follow her example. Anger comes easily to the natural, fleshly Matthew. The Spirit must be strong in those moments of weakness. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn
Rain
I woke this morning 2 hours before I needed to be up to let my wife’s caregiver in. That’s been happening more and more lately. I don’t know why, but usually, I don’t mind it. It’s quiet in the house. As I sat up I heard the sound of rain on the sheet metal covering where the swamp coolers used to be. Unfortunately, this morning, as soon as she saw me sit up, my wife asked for a pain pill through quiet tears. I gave it to her then moved to the front of the house to heat a cup of coffee and water the plants. The last part of that routine is to open the front curtains. This morning I sat and watched the rain come down as now it was loud enough that I could hear it on the roof. Over the rain, I could hear my wife crying from the bedroom at the other end of the house. I laid down beside her, my body on the bed and my backside on her power chair that was conveniently parked up against the bed. I held her and prayed for her. Every time I thought she was drifting off to sleep, I could hear the rain. I opened the curtain a crack to let some light in as the sun began to rise over the mountains behind the house so that I could read the medication bottles. Finally, I gave her the rest of her morning medication as the rain stopped and she pulled down her sleep mask and drifted off to a noisy sleep. I’m alone again as I pray that God and the meds will help her rest. Ahh, the sounds of rain come back. And when it’s not raining, I can hear the finches outside wake up and the wind is blowing the raindrops from the pine tree outside my window onto the house. So, I still have the rain. We love the rain. I think about my daughter driving an ambulance in it. But her dad’s harping when she was learning to drive and her awareness of the importance of what she’s doing keeps her careful. When we lived in the Midwest, we would sit on our porch and watch the rain. Here, I would push the motorcycle out of the carport and set out the chaise lounges and we would lay under the cover of the carport and watch the rain until we got too cold or one of us fell asleep. Rain means many things to many people. For much of the world, it means food. In the high deserts of northwest Arizona, it means flooding, and weeds that will be fuel for fire come summer. I’d much rather maintain a Midwest lawn than desert weeds. But whatever it means to people, rain is universal. It’s cleansing (don’t look at my car now). It brings life, even if that’s weeds. Much of Matthew chapter 5 as Jesus is just getting cranked up in what we call the Sermon on the Mount, is talking about attitude. Verses 43 through 45 could be interpreted as saying, get along, we’re all in this together. Whether you have the luxury of just listening to the rain or you have to drive an ambulance in it or whatever else it means to you, let it be a reminder. Rain is universal. It falls on all of us. Like many of life’s challenges, nobody is immune. By nature, we are self-centered (our brains naturally are focused on our agendas and issues and struggles). But let the rain remind you that we are all indeed in this together and a little awareness of your neighbors and the compassion to go with it, will go a long way. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn
Your Words, Not Mine
This was a number of years ago in a moment of silliness. But today, this woman has tolerated me for 32 years and is grateful, can you believe it? Especially when I post pictures like this? I certainly haven’t deserved 32 years with her. For far too many of them, I was me. I mean the natural me that tried to do the right things in my own strength. She will tell you she doesn’t deserve me, blah, blah blah. Don’t get me wrong, I’m beyond blessed! It’s just that my memory is stuck on how I behaved and what she really needed. The blessing is she thinks about how she behaved, etc. Now, if you stop and think about it, that’s exactly the opposite of the way our culture trains us to function. I got a call last night from a husband seeking counseling for himself and his wife as their previous counselor told him, “Get out now. She’s too messed up.” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard such distressing stories from people. And yet, it fits. That’s the way our culture trains us to think. Marriage is typically “Contractual” as opposed to “Covenant.” As I said, for far too many of our 32 years I was me. But before anybody gets the wrong idea, I need to throw a wrench in the spokes here and stop this hard. Narrowing a wonderful passage down to just one verse for our purposes, in Isaiah 55:9, we are told that God’s ways are higher than our ways. Well, last time I checked, I’m pretty far from being God. So that verse must apply to me too. Yes, I hold up our marriage as something my counselees should look forward to (much to my bride’s chagrin). But, there is so much that had to change from when we were in crisis on the counseling couch until we developed what we have. And in all honesty, what had to change was me. If you even remotely follow the belief that the man is to lead, then read on. A disclaimer: I have very strong beliefs about what this does and doesn’t mean and frequently contradict what people believe, but I base my teachings not on doctrine or tradition or cultural morays, but on scripture and scripture alone. I have a hunch that will never make it into this blog, but we’ll see. It is intended for a future book however. But if you hold that a man should lead, then this may make sense to you. I had decided it was time for a change. Since I couldn’t change her, I had to change me. But every time I tried, I ended up back where I always ended up. I was stuck with being me. That was when I remembered some advice I used many years ago. The story of the burning bush runs from Exodus chapter 3 into chapter 4. Starting at Exodus 4:1, we see Moses begin to show a little nervousness. Obviously, the awe of the spectacle before him and all that he had been told already just wasn’t enough to convince him. By verse 10, despite a couple of shows of God’s proofs that He will send with Moses, the man said that he had a speech impediment. Surely that would get him off, right? God replied (according to the modernized translation by Matthew) “Mo, who do you think made your mouth? Do you seriously not trust me to handle that? Just go and open your mouth and I will give you the words to say.” Moses said, “Umm, no thanks, send someone else.” Now God saw this coming and had already called Aaron as right at that time, he appeared within view. Now, understand please, that the only reason anything is in the Bible is for you. Seriously, not because you’ll have to take a test at some point, but because you can use it. Exodus 4:12 is what we call a conditional promise. You do this, I will honor it and respond. Moses refused. God already knew he would, he had called Aaron to go to Moses, about 3 days earlier for him to show up at that precise moment. (Simple distance and speed equation) So why on earth would God have Moses include this in his telling of the story? I won’t go back 30 years to when God taught this to me, but just to when I was trying to be a better husband. The first real step I made was when my wife was not responding as I would have liked and I would quickly pray, “OK God, this one’s on you,” and allow Him to take control. This is a strange and foreign idea, I know. And it didn’t fix things immediately. But it changed me, and eventually, she started to catch on. She will now tell you that I gave her room to change and grow. She feels that because I eased up, she could relax and not be on the defense so much and have more time to respond instead of react, etc. There’s so much more, but that’s a good first step. After all, I was, as Paul would put it, allowing God to be strong in my weakness. And now, this beautiful woman and I are just crazy about each other! I pray our story will help others. Oh and by the way, you can tell her I used the picture below for this post, OK? Facebook Twitter LinkedIn
The Genesis of a Message
This picture is from a memory notification to my phone. First, it was Facebook reminding me of every post or conversation that its algorithms thought might be significant. Then it was One Drive (which I don’t remember telling to back up my photos, but it did.) Now, it reminds me of memories too. But recently I had a new one. Google reminded me of a trip. I knew I was sending the coordinates periodically to a server that would preserve the trip for me. But apparently, in doing so, Google did me the favor of remembering the trip for me too. Why does all this matter? Well, 29 years before this post, my bride and I were missionaries at a Christian drug and alcohol rehab facility. We saw a young man there, who was about to graduate from the program, fearing for his future. You see, he knew he had already made a huge mess of his life at the tender age of 19. He figured he had made such a mess that God would never use him. But when he graduated from the program, he could only see two futures, working for God or returning to the gang life he left behind. And God using Him was inconceivable because Dale was sure He didn’t deserve a life with God. Dale, like so many, didn’t really understand how much God loved him and that Christ’s death on the cross was for Him personally. I won’t spoil the whole story, but Dale’s mind was changed one Sunday morning. Google reminded me of this special young man because the map it showed me the other day was of a trip I took with my dear friend Pastor Carlos and his lovely wife Alicia. Of all the people on this planet, they are two that hold great affection from both my wife and me. Carlos, at the time, had a house in the states just around the corner from me. He was going back to his hometown in Mexico to the big ten-year anniversary celebration for the rehab center he had opened and gotten going. In the time since, he opened a second farther south and an orphanage. But I went with Pastor Carlos and Alicia for this special occasion to give the message for the Saturday chapel service at the rehab center. He translated, which was a series of hilarities that I wish belonged here. But, the message that I brought was based on my experience from so many years earlier with Dale and from the people that I was seeing in the counseling ministry. Not only did I relish every moment of this trip, from experiencing Mexico that was intended for American tourists and Mexico that was intended for Mexicans in a beautiful area that is the Napa Valley of Mexico, and have some of the best food I’ve ever tasted, but I preached the message for the very first time that eventually became “How to be a Christian in Today’s World: Shame and Fear of Failure vs. Living Confidently in God’s Love.” The overall book continued to develop in my wife’s and my heart as God worked on us. It wasn’t until the beginning of 2022, when I was sitting in a hospital room, that I realized it could no longer be held back. While writing, my intention was to follow God’s plan instead of my own. By doing so, many different people are now hearing the message that they so desperately need. In following God’s leading, I was prompted to share much of my story, including more about the young man, Dale. Using my personal experiences and lessons learned in my ministry, readers have reportedly been able to better relate and hear from God than with a dry, intellectual text. Since the book was published, numerous people have shared with me how it has helped them to believe that God loves them and that they belong. I am humbled to see that the book has even reached people I didn’t expect, and I pray that it continues to do so. Do you or someone you know struggle like Dale? I would like to invite you to consider purchasing my book for yourself or someone you know who is hurting. We never know how God will use it, but it is my hope that it will bring comfort and encouragement to those who read it. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn
