The little wooden plaque was hanging on a booth wall of an antique mall my friends and I were perusing. I was stopped by it, because I am a disciple of prayer. Over the years, the Lord has made it more and more clear to me that he has gifted me with faith and a responsibility of that spiritual gift is intercessory prayer.

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen.” Hebrew 11:1

I couldn’t tell you when or how this verse came to be my favorite, I only know that it always has been. It has, all my life, felt like it was chosen for me. I think this is because God knew how I would grapple with the unavoidable reality of a Christian that is living between two worlds - the seen and unseen.

Faith, of course, is a necessary part of prayer. To pray, we must believe - in something, even if we are still defining what that is. To pray, we must hope for - hope being a sign that we have not given up on our circumstances. To pray, we must lean into what is unseen - at least, what has not been seen yet.

I was delighted to learn my spiritual gift was intercessory prayer. That will be so easy for me! I love talking to the Lord about people I love. I love calling on him to do miraculous things. I love hearing his wisdom about situations and struggles. I love the quiet moments of his presence.

And the Lord responded, “Yes, of course you do…I made you that way.”

Ha! Lest I begin to believe there is some personality contribution I have made to the design, the Lord reminds me he has gifted me with this because of the special way he first created me. Like a master toysmith, a toy with a pullstring must be given a voice box, a stuffed animal given proper stuffing for cuddles, a toy car given spinning wheels for racing. Discovering how my design fits so well into his tasks meant for me, is only further affirmation of his wonderful sovereignty.

So, I set about this seriously. When an assignment settles on my heart, I tenderly bring it to the feet of Jesus every day. I work and rework my words, wringing from them any self-piety or presumptuous language. I search for the right posture of heart, dismantling motives of certain outcomes, reliable clarity, the illusions of control. I keep turning my mind back to trusting that somewhere in the timeline of eternity, Jesus has already answered this prayer and his answer is good.

Agnes Sanford was an author born to a missionary family in China. She became a great challenger of cessationism (the theology that miraculous works have ceased after the New Testament era) and as such, was a devout student of healing prayer. In her book, The Healing Light, she offers that when praying for healing, we must close our prayers in a way that demonstrates belief that the work is already being done. Releasing ourselves of the outcome of what that looks like, but trusting that God is on the move before the words leave our lips and so every healing prayer includes some version of, “Thank you, Lord, for answering this prayer,” or, “I rejoice that you have heard me and are already at work.” For just because we don’t know how or why or when, we know that he has heard and he will answer.

I could not achieve a higher honor than the day one of my coworkers came to me with a prayer request and as she was leaving, I told her I’d continue to pray and she responded, “I know you really will.”

Her confidence in me to share in this concern with her, heart to heart, and to demonstrate knowing that I would faithfully take it to the Lord on her behalf in my quiet time with him was deeply touching and reaffirmed my commitment to doing so.

Though simultaneously, my heart was pained with the very real reality of the common nature we all have, myself included, to say with lofty grandeur, “thoughts and prayers” and yet then get busy with our lives and actually give very little thought and very little prayer to the situation after all.

But God does not share our often weak and doubtful nature. When we close our prayer time with thanksgiving and rejoicing worship, we are effectually conveying to him that we believe, “I know you really will.”

There is a question that we often ask one another,

“How can I pray for you?”

It is well intentioned. I don’t know a soul that asks that question without genuinely desiring to lift up the other person in humility.

But something about the question can be off putting. It can create a little barrier between the person praying and the person being prayed for, somehow it risks pitching them in opposing, hierarchical positions.

So, I’m taking the liberty to rewrite the question. What I’d like to ask instead is,

“How may I join you in prayer?”

Because chances are, you’re already praying. You’ve already prayed a thousand times. You’ve cried yourself to sleep praying. You’ve wrung your hands together praying. You’ve exhausted all resources and possibilities that your imagination can come up with praying. You’ve tried every ritual, every penance, every posture of the heart you can think of for this prayer.

Posing the question this way helps us come alongside another believer, which I think is what Jesus intends us to do for each other - come alongside.

“How may I join you in prayer?” honors the extensive prayers you’ve already prayed and the conversation that you’ve already got going on with Jesus about this. A new voice, a new heart invested in this prayer line joins the Holy Spirit together in both of us.

“More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of.”

“Wrought” is an archaic word which means to have been “worked.” We do not hear it much in modern time, except perhaps with a mention of “wrought iron.” Wrought iron is actually a really good example, though, of how the word is used in the biblical sense.

Iron is not a malleable metal. When we think of iron, we think of a material that is impenetrable, unbendable, unbreakable. This is what gives “wrought iron” gates their stunning appeal. Through a heavy process of heat and hammering, the iron is “wrought” or “worked” into intricate, curvy, elegant designs. Once cooled, these delicate designs take on the quality of strength that the iron material is known for: permanency.

Which leads us to a beautiful image of prayer. The ways of this world are iron. They are harsh. They are unyielding. But our prayers, infused with the power of the Holy Spirit, they heat things up. They melt down and soften. They create the conditions for the one true Blacksmith to mold and mend, to hammer and weld the rigid, bleak beams of our circumstances into delicate, beautiful, ornamental designs. And the lasting transformation of his work is permanent.

As this little plaque suggests, the prayer is the power behind more goodness, healing, and mercy in this world than we give it credit for. There is so much we take for granted. We expect sunrises, predictable weather, modern conveniences, a generally comfortable life if we try hard and make good decisions.

But so much of the blessings we are afforded were built on the foundation of the prayers of the people who came before us; our families, friends, pastors, and mentors. Whether they prayed for us personally or prayed for world peace, every prayer matters to God. That is because every prayer is inspired by God.

Do you think you have ever prayed anything that God didn’t first “lay on your heart?”

Even the prayers of the apostles and our Lord Jesus are connected to us today, they have “wrought” the very Christian faith that we live out today. Remember Paul in Ephesians 1:15-20,

“Ever since I first heard of your strong faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for God’s people everywhere, I have not stopped thanking God for you. I pray for you constantly, asking God, the glorious Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to give you spiritual wisdom and insight so that you might grow in your knowledge of God. I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called - his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance. I also pray that you will understand the incredible greatness of God’s power for us who believe in him. This is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead and seated him in the place of honor at God’s right hand in the heavenly realms.”

This prayer was not recorded in the Holy Word of God for the sole purpose of the ancient Ephesian people. No, Paul’s prayer is alive today. Paul prays this for every generation of God’s people, Paul prays this for us.

Prayer keeps us working in tandem with God. We might imagine our prayers are little embers that the Holy Spirit breathes life into, as the flames grow, the heat rises, and God, the master Blacksmith, doesn’t just use the opportunity to shape and mold the circumstances that we pray for, but our hearts are in this fire as well, and they become wrought by his goodness with each sincere word we pray. They become the permanent display of his design, that will continue to support all generations that come after us.

In light of all this, I’d love for you to tell me, how may I join you in prayer today?

I have been writing about gardens for a while. They are a lovely concept through which to communicate with God.

After all, “The Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and there he placed the man he had made.” Genesis 2:8

Our world has an incredible range of biomes. Imagine all the types of locations the Lord could have placed the man he made; in a forest, by the river, on the mountain, between the valleys, across a desert, near the sea. Though cities are manmade constructions, there is still a wealth of possibility in the natural world that God could have placed humankind.

But he chose to plant them in a garden.

Gardens are a symbol of long-term dwelling. Nomads without a home do not plant gardens, for they cannot be present to tend and harvest the land.

Jeremiah relays the Lord’s message in Jeremiah 29:5, “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce.”

Gardens are a symbol of peace and prosperity. There is no violence in a garden. Even the work of pruning and plowing is a gentle task of bringing forth growth.

The prophet Isaiah describes in Isaiah 2:4b the great transformation from tools of weapon to tools of peace, “They will beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.”

Gardens are a symbol of the paradox of balancing the brevity with the eternal nature of life. Flowers bloom and die, but the seeds left in the dying ensure the continuation of that livelihood for generations to come.

Jesus illustrates this great mystery well in John 12:24, “Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”

On vacation this summer, the Lord led me to a special garden located in St. Augustine, Florida. It is at the site of the National Shrine of Our Lady Leche. I had seen part of this park from afar about eight years ago on a previous visit. From our dolphin cruise on the bay, we could see the towering landmark cross, which at the time impressed only one word upon me,

Mercy.

I didn’t know until this year that the cross was part of an entire, visitable location. When we arrived at the site, I reviewed the map and one area stood out to me personally, The Rosary Garden.

I am not Catholic, so I do not regularly practice praying the rosary. However, I am drawn to the rosary because of my affinity for prayer. I appreciate the discipline of prayer the rosary tradition offers. It is quite a long and repetitive process.

In case you are not familiar with the rosary, here is a (very) basic anatomy lesson. Each of the beads correspond with specific liturgy that is recited in a specific order.

The crucifix - The Apostle’s Creed
The first bead - Our Father (The Lord’s Prayer)
Three beads - Three Hail Mary Prayers
The next single bead - Gloria Patri

This first section of the rosary is quite familiar to me. Except for the Hail Mary prayer, the other three recitations are a regular part of my daily and weekly worship. It has given me delight and great wonder to recognize these essential threads throughout two quite different expressions of faith - Protestant and Catholic.

I am still learning about the remainder of the rosary prayers, which include repetition of Hail Mary’s while contemplating one of the five categories of “decades,” each of which include reflection upon multiple “mysteries” of the life of Christ and his mother, Mary. There are two closing prayers that conclude the practice.

Regardless of how you view this practice, I think it must be admitted that it is a task of great devotion and faith. For many, I think the concern is that prayers structured this way are in danger of becoming rote and empty recitations. But I think it is possible for any prayer to become rote and empty, regardless of how it is prayed. The danger lies not in the structure of the prayer, but in the posture of the heart.

With limited, amateur knowledge of a Catholic rosary prayer practice, I entered the rosary garden. As I entered, I was still perceiving the present elements as sculptural or functional. The brutal representation of Christ on the crucifix was chained to a line of posts that held marble orbs, set loosely enough to spin at the touch. Even as the chain lowered to the ground, it was held by lines in the concrete that guided toward an imposing house structure that held Mary and her holy son, Jesus. I perceived what I thought were simply more stanchions lining the walkway meant to guide the patron around the garden of beautiful flowers, memorial walls, and plaques containing pertinent scriptures and stories of the life of Christ.

My youngest son remarked on the unusual stanchions that divided the entirety of the garden walkway, “why are the orbs set so loosely that they can spin?” he asked. I admitted to him I didn’t know, though I agreed with his observation that there was some greater purpose in their unique design.

It was not until I exited the garden that it dawned on me the sculptures, stanchions, chain, and marble orbs were fashioned as a larger-than-life rosary. The orbs were the beads, set loosely to allow for the way fingers might gently touch and roll them during contemplative prayer.

Call me oblivious but it truly took me a while to make the connection, and I wonder how many times in our lives that happens to us with something beautiful God desires to show us. How many times are we standing in a sacred space of our lives, but we are so blinded or asleep or guarded we see it only as functional or irrelevant or worse - as a burden or barrier?

One of my favorite poets, Wendell Berry, writes, “There are no sacred and unsacred places; there are only sacred places and desecrated places.” Meaning everyone and everything was at once worthy of being considered sacred. The places in our lives that seem wrong and unsacred have only become obscured, broken, or lost somehow. Sometimes it is our own limited understanding that obscures sacredness. Sort of like the way I could walk this entire garden before realizing its tribute in design.

I think it also reflects what is most true about living in this world. We tend to believe there is a sacred spiritual world that is set apart from our everyday secular living. In a way, that is true, there are distinct differences in the two realms, but I think where we err is when we prolong their separation instead of working our lives in a way that draws the sacred ever into the secular, that reclaims the authority of Christ over all things, seen and unseen, that ever pulls the darkness into his unending light.

Once my eyes were opened, so to speak, it almost brought me to my knees to realize the depth of devotion it must have taken to build this rosary garden. My eyes filled with tears imagining the many catholic believers who do cling to this practice and what it might mean to see their prayers brought quite literally to life by this walkable representation.

Personal prayer is so intimate and precious. Whether our prayers are made up of spontaneous words or ritualistic ones, I think sometimes prayer is the closest we can come to God because he is the only one who sees our hearts fully. He knows the memories behind each word we utter. He knows the pain behind each tear we cry. He sees the complex system that makes up our worldviews, beliefs, and what we dare to or dare not to hope for and dream for. He cradles them in his hands lovingly, like you might hold a delicate baby bird, something small and fragile that has endeavored to live in a terrifying and harsh world. He knows each one completely and each one lives under the shelter and refuge of his holy wings.

He planted them there himself, in the garden, after all.

Please know this Father’s Day, regardless of what your earthly experience of a father is or was, the Lord is Father to ALL and his fatherly love is perfect. If your earthly father failed you, the Lord desires to heal and restore that void with his unending love. If your earthly father was wonderfully loving, the Lord desires to be known for that presence of love, for he IS love himself.

And if you are a father, please know that though you can never be perfect, you do carry the image of God’s fatherly love. It is in you to give and he desires to fill the hearts of your children with his love through you. I pray you will let Him do it every chance you are given. Amen.

I once had a Sunday school teacher who told our class she did not like thinking of God as a father figure because her experience of her own earthly father was so negative. While I can absolutely sympathize with her experience and understand why she would come to that conclusion for a time, my prayer for her would be to eventually give that experience over to God to heal so that her human experience no longer dictates her spiritual experience. Of course, all in God’s time.

This is because, as we’ve earlier explored, God’s nature is to heal. God desires to rewrite any negative experiences we have here. He wants to become, himself, the true representation of whatever it is we are lacking. For whatever we are lacking, he can fulfill. Not only can he fulfill these areas for us, but also he has been known to use these weaknesses to display his most glorious works: “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9 NLT).

In his sermon titled, “A Woman, A Slave, and a Gentile,” the late pastor Timothy Keller highlights three ways that the gospel comes to each of these very different people, of very different backgrounds, and in very different circumstances. This is possible because, he says, Jesus, both adapts to us and challenges us.

Keller explains that if Jesus only ever adapted to us, we would never grow and change; we might become in danger of following our own, isolated theology. But, on the other hand, if Jesus only ever challenged us, without some sort of acceptance of who and where we are, we would shut him out, never accepting what he offers.

Finding the balance between adaptation and challenge is something a good father would do and if you’ve ever had one or the figure of one in a mentor, I’m sure you can recall the nuanced skill that it takes to first adapt to a child, understanding non-judgmentally where they currently are, and then gently, intentionally leading them forward with incremental challenges in order to help them grow and develop.

We do this for each other imperfectly though sometimes well. But for God, not only does he do it perfectly for each person, but it is, as we are finding, his nature to relate to us this way.

The LORD is like a father to his children,
tender and compassionate to those who fear him.

This, at least in part, is because God’s infinite, eternal, omnipotent being recognizes and accommodates, to some degree, our frail, finite, temporal, and limited nature as a human on this planet.

For he knows how weak we are;
he remembers we are only dust.
Our days on earth are like grass;
like wildflowers, we bloom and die.
The wind blows, and we are gone—
as though we had never been here.

As he knows us, he sees us completely, from beginning to end, and as we become more transparent about who and where we are, we find that Jesus has actually been present all along, through all of our mistakes, missteps, and misunderstandings. He accepts them, he adapts to them in order to connect to us, and he will make good of them all.

Sharing this connection and acceptance with Jesus is what liberates our growth. In the same way, a good father will first seek connection before correction, our Father who art in heaven extends his hand, and as we trust and follow his lead, our becoming the person he designed us to be is natural and organic.

This relationship is ongoing. As parents, we do not have children, install good practices, and then never speak to them again. No, we grow alongside them, introducing age-appropriate lessons and expectations that closely match the child’s capacity and maturity. Why would we not expect the same milestones of spiritual growth and relationship from our Father, God?

“Love will not be added to you.”

Ouch. Does this phrase strike heartache into anyone else?

But the words had not completely settled. They were not committed to this order. There was more movement, a shift, and then they appeared as if written in stone:

“Will not love be added to you?”

Immediately my heart recognized the soft questioning tactic, like when Jesus asks in John 11:40, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?” (NIV)

Or when he is highlighting the providential nature of the sovereign God in Matthew 6:30, “If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?” (NIV)

Or even in the old testament, the challenge to remember spoken by God himself in Joshua 1:9, “Have I not commanded you, Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” (NIV)

All of these questions are not reprimands, they are pleas that are imploring us to remember. They are questions of which our honest answer becomes the validating evidence of their truth:

Did I not tell you..?
Yes, Lord, you told me, so it must be true.

Will he not much more clothe you…?
Yes, Lord, you have and therefore you will.

Have I not commanded…?
Yes, Lord, you have commanded and so I must follow.

The Lord is unsearchable and yet he is able to open himself to the scrutiny and interrogation of even the most unworthy of creatures, because by his nature, there is no fault. There is no question of his integrity, there is only the question of us coming to understand it, which we will never be able to fully do, but even in the midst of our confusion and grappling, how good is God that he is willing to continue pointing us back to himself with gentle, honest questions such as these.

The question I dreamt about follows the same structure of uncovering a deeper truth.

Will not love be added to you?

Because God is love, because Jesus gave his ultimate sacrifice as love, because Jesus is the king of my life who dwells in my heart, I have no choice but to answer,

Yes, Lord, love will be added to me.

The presence of Jesus in my life has done nothing but deposit more love.

What does this look like in practical terms?

Because I have the satiating wellspring that is the love of Jesus, I no longer have to do things for love.

So much of our relational functioning is actually rooted in a desperate need for love. We want to be liked, we want to belong, we want to fit in, we want to receive recognition, accolades, respect, admiration, devotion. These are not bad things in and of themselves, but when they become our primary motive for action or inaction, they become dangerous idols.

When Jesus asks, “will he not much more clothe you, you of little faith?” He is asking our striving to cease, so that his love may increase.

The more we submit to Jesus as the primary source of love, identity, and belonging, the less we are victimized by the false idol, “the need for love.” Because we are secure in who Jesus has made us to be, we operate from a more whole, clear, and calm place in all of our relationships and decisions, which brings back multitudes of satisfaction and positivity that desperation simply could never achieve.

Because we are looking for love to be added, we will find it.

The questions of Jesus are given to us like a pair of glasses that changes our vision.

“Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?” This question in its context is the drumroll before Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. He could have just done it and let the dead man walking speak for himself, but he pauses to first give grieving Martha a pair of glasses that will help her receive this vision not as a one time magic trick, but as lifelong sight.

When the lifelong sight of God’s enduring love is bestowed to us, we find blessings all around us. In sunrises and sunsets, in conversations with coworkers and friends, in happy little coincidences that bring us joy, in touchpoint moments with our loved ones. Instead of seeing to believe, we become a people who believe in order to see.

Because love himself dwells in our hearts, we will add love to the world around us.

Sometimes, we are the vehicle of love that God uses.

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

Every single moment of your life is an opportunity for Jesus to add more love to the world. There is not a moment where more love cannot be added. It doesn’t matter what you are doing, it doesn’t matter what the stakes are, more love can always be added.

“Will not love be added to you?” then becomes a way to refocus on our own role in facilitating the advancement of that love. I often think of it this way, “How can I let Jesus add love to this moment right now?”

My youngest son is playing baseball, so I feel this question come up a lot while I am at the ball field. Sports raise tensions, trigger unresolved emotions, and unleash misdirected passions like no other event I’ve really encountered. Just using this secular example for a context, here are some ways I try to let Jesus add love:

Lifting up the boys no matter how they perform.
Using self control when there is a bad call.
Moving away from negative criticism happening in the stands.
Rightsizing the importance of this activity as one of one million in my young son’s life.
Maintaining my sense of peace and enjoyment no matter the outcome.

These may seem small and internal, but they make a world of difference. Sometimes they are easy for me to do, sometimes I need the power of Jesus to help me. Anytime you are part of a crowd or community, there is a collective energy that we all feel and respond to. When your team makes a big play and the crowd cheers in unison and you feel like you’re in love, that is called collective effervescence1, but that collective energy can also felt when there is a presence that is unloving.

The picture below is a note my son passed me in church written on gum wrapper. If I’d had any doubt about my dream earlier this week, this message felt like an affirmation.

Remembering the first draft of words that had come into focus, “Love will not be added to you,” feels like a human life lost and on its own. Apart from God, there is no true and lasting love in our lives, for God himself is love.

But the gospel is as simple as a shift in the placement of one word in this sentence, from the lonely devastation of “love will not,” to the hopeful salvation of “Will not love,” is the simultaneous movement of Christ’s sacrifice and our acceptance.

“Will not love be added to you?” Is the invitation, it is not a question of if he loves us. It is a question of what love we will allow him to add to our lives.

When I unfolded his note, I knew in my heart, indeed, love will be added to me.

It will be added to you, too, to everything around us, and through us to others because we trust in Love himself.

I notice feathers because they are beautiful, subtle reminders of God's love, presence, and provision.

This particular one I passed today was lodged in the branches of a bush. The image of its little, wispy tendrils tangled in the leaves, and its long, slender form enmeshed in the stems stopped me on my walk. Most of the love notes I find look lightly and lovingly tucked into the blades of grass or are freely floating on the breeze. But sporadic winds and rain have pushed and pelted the small pieces of nature and while in the throes this love note became lodged. I sighed in recognition, doesn't love sometimes feel lodged? Tangled? Stuck?

Having had my own battles with the recent bouts of summer rain and the normal stresses of life amounting to a low lying fog settling over my heart, seeing the feather lodged there made me laugh with commiseration, “Yeah, me too.”

Which reminded me of a favorite poem by Robert Frost, aptly entitled Lodged,

The rain to the wind said,
‘You push and I'll pelt.'
They so smote the garden bed
That the flowers actually knelt,
And lay lodged - though not dead.
I know how the flowers felt.

Don't the rains and winds of life have a way of pushing and pelting until we feel lodged? Christians, though we carry hope, are not exempt from heavy seasons.

The difference, I think, is that our faith helps us look for and believe Jesus is still present, though things have grown foggy for us. Reaching through the density to find him anyway becomes a sanctifying work in and of itself.

The kingdom of God often works counter to how the world works and this is no exception. Where the world asks us to build up, up, up, higher, higher, more and more, tower, tower…the kingdom of God instead asks us to dig down deeper, deeper, lower, lower, carving us out to be less and less, in order to make space for grace, establishing us rooted, rooted in his love.

“He must become greater; I must become less.” John 3:30

It isn't as depressing as if suffering is all we have to hope for in this life, but rather, suffering is necessary to life and Christ, Jehovah Rapha, is willing and able to not only make it bearable, but use it purposefully, and ultimately restore what was perceived to be lost in the process.

Beloved missionary Amy Carmichael observes if anyone could avoid suffering, it would have been Christ, and yet, “for if there had been anything more better or more profitable to man than to suffer, Christ would have verily showed it by word and example.”

And yet we see him in the scriptures suffering more than any of us ever have. We see him model lowliness and sacrifice. He who has the power to make it all go away with a word instead, endured. Why? For our benefit. There is something to our heavy seasons that he wants to use, redeem, and restore. He gives us something better than a cure. He gives us himself.

It is an unfortunate neurosis of this world to believe life should be consistently comfortable and convenient and that any anomaly to that is to be feared, dreaded, and lead to despair.

A good example is a fever in the body. Of course no one would desire their child to have fever. Alas, it is impossible to prevent germs and bacteria entirely, so illness becomes inevitable. Instead of viewing the fever as a further, inexplicable burden, we could think of it as a reassuring sign that the body is working toward healing exactly as it is supposed to, and it is actually becoming stronger in the process.

Coming to terms with our suffering is deeply intertwined with the condition of our faith. To consider anything outside the jurisdiction of Jesus is to diminish his sovereignty and authority. That is never what we desire to do, and yet, we are exposed to seasons and circumstances that we could never make sense of and that hurt us deeply. I don’t think Jesus asks us to put on a brave face and muscle through, but instead come to him and let him deal with all that we feel.

If we let it, it can become the actual means by which our bond, trust, and reliance on him grows ever deeper.

It may feel at times as if we are descending in a type of spiritual elevator, lowering level by level to hidden floors underneath, but sure as the gentle tone that sounds in the elevator as each floor is passed, we find Jesus is indeed present -ding- even here…-ding- even here…and finally to the soft landing upon the basement floor, rock bottom, perhaps -ding- even here. While we've been busy trying to make things presentable on the surface level, He has been waiting to meet us in the basement of our real lives.

There is no place where God is not. Our work is always to find him in it. Sometimes this means turning, or spiraling, or descending further than we thought we could endure but he is there if we will keep our eyes fixed.

Amy Carmichael offers a comforting image that I cling to on the darkest days. Referencing Psalm 18:11,

“He shrouded himself in darkness, veiling his approach with dark rain clouds.”

Instead of interpreting our seasons of heaviness negatively, she reminds us, “Rather, indeed, the clouds are comforting: ‘Is my gloom, after all, the shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly?’ It was when He was coming to the relief of his servant that He was seen upon the wings of the wind and He made darkness pavilions round about Him - even dark waters, and thick clouds of the skies. So clouds assure us of His presence; for where pavilions are spread, there the King dwelleth.”1

The little lodged feather and the flowers kneeling in the garden probably already understand what I am still learning. That the dark swell of rain clouds is merely the shadow of his hand over everything, the storm of a Savior who is coming to the rescue of his beloved.

The lines from another favorite poet come to mind, Mary Oliver’s The Garden,

“All morning it has been raining. In the language of the garden, this is happiness.”

Sorrowful and heavy seasons are as inevitable and necessary as the rain clouds that water the garden, though it is hard for us to accept, let alone embrace.

But our faith in our Savior reframes all that happens to us, good and bad. When we begin to speak his language, we understand, like the garden, that rain has a purpose, dark clouds become a shadow of his hand, signifying his presence, and like the flowers and the feather, though we may be lodged, we are not yet dead, for the life of Christ is alive and well within us.

As far as school violence goes, this incident pretty much marked all the boxes of the horrifying nightmare checklist, if there is one. I would say it is an event that deeply challenged my faith. If anyone is to be protected from this type of harm and devastation should it not be young children in a community of faith? The pain and the questions that emerge from such acts are complex and heavy.

But God sent a sign to the community of Covenant Christian that they were not forgotten or abandoned. It was the same sign he sent Noah after the worldwide devastation of The Flood.

“Then God said, ‘I am giving you a sign of my covenant with you and with all living creatures, for all generations to come. I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is the sign of my covenant with you and with all the earth. When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds, and I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth.’ Then God said to Noah, ‘Yes, this rainbow is the sign of the covenant I am confirming with all the creatures on earth.” Genesis 9:12-17

I find it lovely that God chose the rainbow as the sign of his promises. Though there is good, hard science to explain the appearance of a rainbow, there remains something entirely mystical about the experience of seeing one. It is otherworldly, in a way, outside of the usual behavior of our atmosphere. It takes a special condition of water and light to produce the effect, and often, it is subtle, faint, easy to miss if we are not paying attention.

I also find it lovely the scripture writes of the symbol as a remembrance.

I will remember my covenant with you.

But surely the Ancient of Days, God of the Universe, Knower of all things, Sovereign and Omniscient could never “forget?”

One definition of remember is to “bring to mind an awareness.”

The sign of the rainbow, then, becomes a place where both God and man can simultaneously bring to mind an awareness of God’s promises, his covenant, his love, and eternal plan. Though while we are living, a veil still divides us from the full reality of our spiritual life, the rainbow becomes like a bridge between the two worlds, with instant communication between them.

As shared in an original post by Christian author Karen Kingsbury, three weeks after the Nashville shooting, the first time the community returned to the school, and at the very moment they began to enter the building, a double rainbow appeared, covering them in its short lived brilliance, brought on by a brief, obscure rain shower that had passed through moments before on an otherwise perfectly sunny day.

Original post by Karen Kingsbury

Reading about that story was the moment the connection between my worship and God's promises was woven inseparably together. I knew already from my own life experiences that our faith cannot be conditioned by our circumstances. I knew from reading my bible that our faith cannot guarantee freedom from trials and tribulations. I trusted and understood that what God has promised, he will bring to full completion.

But seeing the display of his promise literally overarching the ruins of an evil we cannot comprehend reminds us of the true core of our worship as Christians - the love that endures despite the pain, that promises a future of healing and restoration. It shakes us awake to the reality that this place, though part of our spiritual journey, is not our final home. It reminds us that here, we are nomads in a foreign land.

“All these people died still believing what God had promised them. They did not receive what was promised, but they saw it all from a distance and welcomed it. They agreed that they were foreigners and nomads here on earth. Obviously people who say such things are looking forward to a country they can call their own. If they had longed for the country they came from, they could have gone back. But they were looking for a better place, a heavenly homeland. That is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.” Hebrews 11:13-16

Hebrews 11 is sometimes called “The Great Hall of Faith.” It recounts the amazing instances in scripture when men and women acted in incredible faith, despite their impossible circumstances.

To act in accordance with this type of faith is to exercise a special kind of devotion.

A devotion that believes, if God has promised it, it doesn’t matter how long it takes. Any complaints we have about a timeline is a result of our own impatience.

A devotion that believes, if God has promised it, it doesn’t matter how many things happen between now and the time it comes to fruition. Any complaints we have about the process is a result of our dissatisfied desire to control our own path.

A devotion that believes, if God has promised it, it doesn’t matter what it ultimately looks like. Any complaints we have about outcomes are a result of our own, limited expectations.

God’s promises are made on a small, intimate, personal level but also on a large, broad, worldwide level. To believe everything should work out individually for us as we see fit, is to center ourselves in the part of the story that belongs to God, and to ignore the interdependency of how he designed this world and all of the beings within it.

It is a beautiful thing that God cares for our smallest and most personal details. It is his gift to us. But it does not give us license to expect the world at large to accommodate our personal stories. Sometimes, there must be a flood, but by faith, if we cling to his promises, we will see the rainbow.

Walking through the Great Hall of Faith in scripture, I am paused by verse 11, which describes Sarah’s miraculous ability to have a child, though she was barren and old. What the text reads next, I believe, is the key to unlocking exactly how we survive the unsurvivable. It is a great way to summarize the motives for all the examples of great faith the book highlights:

“She believed that God would keep his promise.” Hebrews 11:11

This is the recipe for our continuous worship.

How do we go on in the aftermath of unimaginable tragedy?

We believe that God will keep his promise.

How do we move through the excruciating pain and disappointment of our grief?

We believe that God will keep his promise.

How do we face a problem when we have tried everything and are out of answers completely?

We believe that God will keep his promise.

How do we cope with a diagnosis, a loss, an estranged family member or child?

We believe that God will keep his promise.

How do we garner the courage to face what we know we must, to battle what seems impossible to win?

We believe that God will keep his promise.

How do we put one foot in front of the other when we are exhausted, beaten down, and defeated?

We believe that God will keep his promise.

It is no small feat, what he is asking us to do. To devote ourselves to a faith, which is defined in Hebrews 11:1 as “the substance of what we hope for, the evidence of things unseen,” requires leaning into less obvious, less provable, more felt, more numinous aspects of our lives. But he has given us every reason to believe.

From the rainbow of his covenant, to the resurrection of his crucifixion, he has made the promise with his own creation, blood, and spirit.

Through every hardship, setback, disappointment, and grief of this life, let our worship be the refrain that sustains us,

We believe that God will keep his promise.

He is almost twelve and has articulated to me before that the place he feels most at peace is when he is fishing. This is a child of many activities, so once he identified out loud the one that brings about this special feeling, as his mother, I feel it is my duty to provide and protect his opportunities to fish.

It was a cold and overcast morning, the clouds swollen with certain rain that would spit threateningly in the chilly wind periodically, just enough to keep everyone with a hand on their umbrella. Yet this did not deter the hundreds of young children and their parents, grandparents, uncles, and aunts, from braving the muddy pasture and picking out a spot to drop their tackle box for a while.

I observed many men of all ages who surely shared the same presence of peace that my son had described and that is commonly felt among those who enjoy the water sport, particularly at an amateur level. I think it no coincidence that fishing involves stillness, quiet, nature, and patience, all things that have a way of organically ushering us into an awareness of the presence of God and therefore, his peace.

Though my son is young he carries already the weight of expectations and obligations that befall any young man in the world, but while he’s on the riverbank the urgency of those fall away and the voices that chide and criticize fade for a moment, and he is able to relax into the safety of a simple task he enjoys.

Enjoy he did and as he brought me the first little brim he caught, his eyes shining as bright as its shimmering scales, there was a sudden, unexpected ache in my heart.

Seeing his joy reminded me of some of the words from my father’s final letter before he died. He was reminiscing about a place of peace, a creek from his childhood. He was dreaming about the solace it had brought him, and imagining returning to this special spot of deep comfort, once his spirit was free from the burden of his unwell body.

The tender edges of my wound in losing him became inflamed with frustration, “Why couldn’t he just go back there? Why do we let the world make us prioritize things that don’t matter? The fury and the ferocity of the rat race culture, the debts we work ourselves to death to pay, the stigmas and pressures that hold us captive in social prisons?”

But the spirit doused the angry flames until they sizzled into sadness, as a deeper knowing washed over me. The place of peace he was imagining was not a physical place at all. In fact, it is not a place of this world, at all. It was a feeling of safety, joy, presence, openness, healing, and wholeness.

And that feeling comes only from the spirit of God.

We may be more apt to find it fishing at the creek, but we are meant to carry it with us everywhere.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30

I wanted so badly for my dad to be there, with me and my son, enjoying this peaceful fishing adventure together. Though it could not be so, I am comforted by the fact that the greatest peace my dad could imagine, my son was now living fully into on this cloudy day in May.

I am certain my Dad found that peaceful resting place in his eternal home. And we remain connected to him only by the peace of Christ that extends from his authority in heaven, reaching us in the midst of our busy and painful world. The glimpses of joy we cling to, the gentle and lowly blessings of grace, the still and quiet moments of serenity, all threads of his spirit, binding our hearts to him, so that we may live more and more into the soul rest he freely offers.

Here, for a time.

But after life, for eternity.

Boy you would have loved this.
The wave of an ache that washes over me from time to time.
When he’s holding a small brim, grinning ear to ear.
It seems I always miss you most when they are smiling.
The joy deeply intertwined with the grief, tangled up together like his fishing line in the blackberry.
He will take the time to undo it, because he is fully present in this moment.
Nowhere else he needs to be.
Nothing else he should be doing.
No one he must accommodate.
Just the water, the wind, the wonder of waiting for the catch.
Reminds me of happy memories you fought so hard to get back to.
The places we dream of when we are broken, beaten, and barren.
I remember how it consoled you, the place you imagined as healed and whole
Is the creek he’s wading in right now and I am grateful.
I feel your presence in the water, the wind, the wonder of the waiting for the catch.
Happy, healed, whole.

Was it not kind of Jehovah Rapha to cover our bodies with a self-regenerating organ? I have imagined so many times, “What if our skin did not operate this way? What if every cut, scrape, break, or tear could not be healed and instead every injury, bump, and bruise compounded over our (likely much shorter than normal) lifetime?”

It would be quite difficult and discouraging, not to mention inhibiting. My wounds, which are minor and healing rapidly, are still quite a nuisance. Though I would never compare them to the suffering Christ endured, observing the shredded palm of my hands and elbows gives me new appreciation for the intensity of his wounds. And all week a famous bible verse has been reverberating in my soul:

“By his wounds you are healed.” 1 Peter 2:24

It is referencing the prophetic word of Isaiah 53:5, “He was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed.”

What is prophesied in Isaiah and confirmed by the Apostle Peter is the sacrificial love of Christ. The John 3:16 gospel that we have come to know and cling to,

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only son.”

And it is love - the most ultimate love. And I don’t want anything I write here to detract from that message, but there is something else I have noticed in the scripture while spending time with it this week.

In Isaiah verse 5, we get a very physical prediction of Christ’s crucifixion:

He was…
pierced
crushed
beaten
whipped

In Peter, we get an arguably more relatable description of the agony Christ endured:

“He did not retaliate when he was insulted, nor threaten revenge when he suffered.” v. 22-23

In our modern world, thankfully, crucifixions are not common. Most of us are not at an everyday risk of being pierced, crushed, beaten, or whipped. Not for our convictions, or for anything else.

But have you ever been insulted? Betrayed? Mocked? Wronged? Rejected? Punished unjustly? Falsely accused? We face many harsh critics, sometimes the worst of them internal. There are times in our lives that an unfair narrative runs rampant or an unfair thing happens to us. The emotional anguish of it sometimes feels worse than if we had actually been pierced, crushed, beaten, or whipped.

Though none of us can claim the same purity of having never sinned or deceived such as Christ, we have all likely experienced injustice and circumstances in which we feel vindicated to seek retaliation or revenge.

Peter is very clear that be that as it may, “God called you to do good, even it it means suffering, just as Christ suffered for you. He is your example, and you must follow in his steps.” v. 21

We know Christ set this example because of his great love. But what is it that allowed Christ to love so fully, extremely, detrimentally that he would not only lay down his physical strength, but endure severe social humiliation and undeserved condemnation without lifting the first finger to defend himself?

I believe we find it in the rest of 1 Peter 2:23:

“He left his case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly.”

It is the unwavering, indisputable, irrefutable righteousness of God that gives birth to the depth, breadth, and all encompassing measure of Christ’s great love for us. Without the ability to trust that God is in full control and that his control is fully just, sacrificial love cannot be made with full guarantee. It could be a grand and beautiful gesture, but it could not carry the power of healing without the righteous nature of God to back it up.

By his wounds, you are healed.

We hear a lot these days about competing “narratives,” versions of a story we tell that justify or condemn the actions of others or our own. I wonder what narrative the angry crowd would have told to justify crucifying Christ? What about the Pharisees? Some combination of their beliefs and experiences led to a story in their minds that their narrative was justified.

We see this play out on a small scale in our own lives. Conflict in any relationship reveals there are always “two sides to the same story,” and often, both sides contain some amount of truth. But a simple shift in perspective can position loved ones on distinct opposite sides.

When we are wronged, sometimes choosing to do the godly thing feels futile. “Haters” get to keep hating while you quietly endure. But we must let our wounds remind us of this pivotal truth:

God sees all things.

He sees into the core of every heart and discerns every motive. He sees every quiet choice and every instance someone chooses self vindication over trusting him. He sees the situation better than we do, which means sometimes we are the ones that need correction when we thought we were in the right. Other times, we must endure something that is simply unfair.

But we can be sure that even in unfair circumstance and unjust treatment, the righteous plan of God is never challenged, altered, or delayed.

Christ’s surrender on the cross demonstrates that the truth is never going to be one human narrative over another’s. Even bearing the weight of the undeserved hatred of the crowd, Christ could have retaliated, but that would have undermined the true power of the resurrection. In our own unjust circumstances, we could defend ourselves, but that would undermine how God intends to defend us or what he may be trying to work out in our lives.

So we must leave our case in God’s hands, who always judges fairly, and choose the godly thing, even if it feels futile at the time. Because he is the only one who sees and knows all things.

I love how the hymn, Stand by Me, summarizes the righteous alliance we have in Christ.

“In the midst of persecution, stand by me. In the midst of persecution, stand by me. When my foes in battle array, undertake to stop my way, thou who never lost a battle, thou who knowest all about me, thou who rulest wind and water, stand by me.”

The one who never lost a battle, who knows everything about us - good and bad - the one who rules the wind and water, stands beside us.

By his wounds, we are healed.

As a parent to two boys who simply have not yet developed the brain capacity to foresee long term consequences, I find myself taking opportune moments to explain that one can be doing everything right and still, accidents happen. No one can predict an accident, that is why it is considered an accident in the first place.

So it was not the surprise of being tripped up during a run on a route I have traveled literally hundreds of times that shocked me, but only that an accident of this type had finally come to claim me.

After what I’m sure appeared to any external observers as a comical attempt to regain my footing and stay upright, within the slow motion time capsule I had entered after tripping, my mind finally declared to me, “You're going down.”

All that was left was to brace for impact and it’s really amazing how rapidly your mind and body shifts from total resistance to what is happening to mitigating the damage. But damage was done and as I slid to a stop on the grainy concrete sidewalk, I found myself completely lowered below all dignity.

In our faith walk we often speak of humbling ourselves before the Lord, but how many of us literally lay prostrate on the broken, dirty ground while everyone else resumes business as normal around us?

I’m not saying we have to do this necessarily and certainly not with the violence of an unplanned tumble such as I had. But winding up there, in a place lower than I would ever voluntarily position myself, gave new meaning to the idea of bowing or getting down on my knees to worship our Lord.

Save for the churches that have preserved authentic use of the altar - and may God bless you in that endeavor - most of us remain in a physical posture that subtly separates us from true submission, even if we have learned a degree of spiritual humility. If you don’t think that is true, I suggest you lay face down on the sidewalk beside your local downtown Walgreens and ask yourself how familiar it feels?

Don't actually do that.

But do consider trying a physical posture for prayer or worship that is not standard. Changing your physical perspective may just illuminate your spiritual one. I wish it hadn't taken shredding my hands and elbows to pieces for me to think of that.

After recovering from my immediate humiliation, I found a second gift from this fall.

Yes, gift.

My phone screen was destroyed.

Not just shattered, but thunderously smote directly from the heavens above. Quite regularly, I attempt detachment from technology only to be quickly lulled back into its prison by the ever needy communications, seductive numbing scroll features, or sometimes simply FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out).

So it came like a poetic answered prayer when I realized my crash had completely obliterated the small dopamine device and I would be left without it for several days. Sometimes God will do for us what we cannot do for ourselves.

Since then, I have realized my understanding of our dependence upon phones and technology is even more far reaching than I had imagined. It is more than social media and email, notifications and instant gratification. The phone has become so intertwined with our everyday functions, it is almost impossible to live without one in a modern society.

For example, I scheduled a grocery pickup for a work event only to realize I had no device to call them and check-in for my order. I needed to find the phone repair shop and had to rely on the vague directions of another business owner instead of GPS and Google. I naturally wanted to photo document the gruesome injuries from my fall, but I have no pocket camera. I wanted to play my curated playlist in the car but had to settle for radio, which I have no control over and by the way, has significantly increased commercial time than what I remember.

Are there ways around these road blocks? Of course. Is it a privileged life I lead that these are the “problems” I began to encounter. Absolutely. Can I appreciate that I, too, once lived in world where these analog functions were regular, everyday life? Yes.

But where Jesus keeps pointing me in this experience is that is not the way of the world anymore. And our raft has drifted farther from it than I think any of us have even dared to realize.

And he’s got me thinking about all of the associated skills that we are not practicing on a routine basis. Is it detrimental to use GPS for navigation? Of course not. Could it be detrimental to solely rely on GPS and never consult your sense of direction or read a map or talk to a person to find out how to locate what you are looking for? 100%.

Occasional convenience has morphed from a neat little feature into the whole system structure and way of being. I don’t think any of us truly grasp what we have traded in the exchange.

But I wont disparage technology entirely. It isn’t helpful to leap to the other extreme. Had I been more severely injured in my fall, it would have taken the phone of a stranger to call someone for help. Just for you to be able to read this story requires both of our devices and the magic of the internet. I thank God for it.

And the reality is, the world is as it is. There are unspoken agreements we must abide by in order to survive here. I cannot very well denounce my phone forever and remain out of touch from say, my sons’ school which communicates regularly about important dates, things I need to prepare for, assignments and grades for my children. Not any more than I could excommunicate from the concept of currency, refusing to pay my bills or use money for what I need to buy. Unfortunately there is a level of engagement we must maintain.

But I suspect what Jesus is doing here is rightsizing. He wants to help me put the tool back in the toolbox.

Jesus does this often in our lives. It may not be that what we are doing is entirely evil or wicked or harmful. But it just may not be the best use of our energy and time, it may be taking up space he wants to use, it may be training us in ways that depart us from his path, it may be positioning us closer to the likelihood of an unexpected accident.

Sometimes he brings it up quietly and sometimes he smotes the phone right out of our hands.

But we will do well to listen and respond because despite our phones’ desperate attempts to know all things, there is only One who does.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11

Jesus comes to rightsize anything in our lives that interferes with that plan. Even if it means we have to take a fall.

Mine is in a countryside called Antioch and I suppose part of its timelessness is that it remains largely untouched. Though another family has moved there and changed things, the land remains pure and rural, wild and organic.

We drive through there when we get the chance and I can never believe how it transports me. How I can feel the curves of the road that lead there, recognize the trees that mark the landscape, though they've grown wider, taller, more unruly in their age, they are still the same trees that I know.

I'm there again, for a moment, a child in a world that knows no pain or injustice. All that is there is wonderful and sweetly fragrant, I don’t have to work for it or figure it out or understand it too much, I am just abiding there.

The metal of the carport roof is hot on my tan legs, scratched up by the blackberry bushes I just finished climbing through, gathering myself a snack of the small, tart fruit. The sun is almost blinding me off the tin roof of the house across the yard, so I close my eyes and I can hear the birds chirping and the bees buzzing, unbothered by the increasing warmth of Spring.

Everything is greening by the moment and all the gaps of the branches are filling in with sun-filled leaves. In the afternoon green, we will play baseball and my sister will crack the wooden bat, knocking the ball into the lush persimmon tree. My dad will tag her out at the dogwood third base. The bright, white, four petalled blooms resembling crosses, having just announced the resurrection, with still some threads from hanging Easter eggs waving in the wind. We will fall down laughing. We won't care about the score. Only that we're together.

In the evening, the searing sun gives way to a cooling breeze. All the greens are softer now. My mother comes outside with a few badminton rackets and we wish on all the dandelions dotted along the path to the net.

“These are the golden years,” she smiles. She is right, though I cannot fully know why.

I move over to the Lunaria, its paper thin, silvery leaves the only currency that is good here in Antioch. You need only lightly rub each “coin” to release the encased seeds that will be sure the wealth continues.

When I drive through there now, Antioch in Spring, the greens are still greening, the sun is still beaming, and I feel sure the woods are still teeming with the livelihood from my childhood.

Though I am older, more wounded now, more awakened to the brokenness of the world, spring returns to Antioch with the same pure goodness that it always had. Each time, returning to me the memories of the golden years.

Now I have two souls of my own in my charge, I feel I must show them the wonder, the beauty, the wholeness that is here, tucked away somewhere quiet from the rush of the harsher world.

My prayer every day is that I am sowing into them seeds that will return every year, what they will one day remember as their golden years. That I can be the safe, connected, and open hearted presence that reminds them of something greater than all the pain and suffering they will inevitably encounter in this world.

It would be sad to the think those places of the past that are special to us are only memories. But I think we should think of them, instead, as glimpses.

Glimpses of the kingdom for which we hope. Glimpses of the comfort, warmth, and safety that we have in abiding with our Savior. Glimpses of what truly matters amid all the noise of our current world. Glimpses of a season that will one day return, as real as the Spring in Anitoch.

Can you let that special memory be a gift that Christ has given you as a promise for all that he wants to restore? As evidence of a kingdom that he is actively bringing to fruition? Can it be the hope that you cling to in dark moments, that the source of love and safety has given you a glimpse of the light we will one day get to live with him in forever?

As I reviewed the options for the one I might most pray for in my life, I considered these virtues one by one, but one phrase stood out to me above the rest.

“Bee free.”

The word “free” felt different than any other virtue listed. The word “free” is more fundamental. It is the key that opens the door to all the other attributes listed.

If someone is having trouble being honest, humble, or kind, it is because something is preventing them from doing so. Something is standing as a barrier, feigning it is more important than the effort it takes to cultivate these qualities.

I think Christ understood this very well. His journey to the cross demonstrates that what humanity needed most was not to be corrected, reformed, or punished.

They needed to be free.

Free from the shame that eats at the core of our hearts, free from the anger that grows like a cancer over our thoughts, free from the pride that strives to conquer and control, free from the pain that skews our understanding of perfect love.

When Christ uttered the words, “It is finished,” he may as well have been saying, “You are free.”

Because Christ intimately understood that for his love and light to flow through us in this world, for us to exemplify honesty, humility, kindness, and the fruits of the spirit to grow ripe and full, for us to lean into the abundant life he desires to give, we must first be free to love this way.

We do not follow him because we feel guilty, we do not follow him because we should, we follow him because in him, we are truly free.

One of my favorite Jesus stories is in John 8, when the woman is brought to Jesus to be stoned to death for committing adultery.

The Pharisees are wild with self righteousness. They want a spectacle, they want punishment enacted, they want brutal justice, they want more than anything to force Jesus’ hand to act in alignment to the law they have come to know as security, order, and Lord.

But Jesus, in his steadfast presence and love, is unrattled. We know in this story he protects the woman and ultimately sets her free. But do you notice who he tries to set free first?

“So he stood up and said, ‘Alright, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone.”

There is only one present who has never sinned and he is obviously not throwing stones. He is drawing quietly in the dust beside them. With this statement, Jesus offers freedom to the Pharisees. Freedom to trust him, freedom from the fury of trying to uphold one another's image, freedom from the brutal punishment they seem to think only the woman deserves, but in reality all have earned in their own prideful sin.

Sin is a natural barrier to all good things in our lives. It keeps us from freedom, bound in chains.

But there is only one barrier to sin, one soul that can stand as a guard against it running rampant in our lives.

Jesus.

That is exactly what he demonstrates here for these people in this story. The sin superhighway is running full speed between the adulterous woman and the prideful Pharisees, but when Jesus steps onto their road, everything stops and he opens a detour for us to exit this highway and sets us on a pathway to a more abundant life.

Then he tells the woman, “Go and sin no more.”

Christ has made us completely free to be the best version of ourselves. The cross is our exit from a heinous humanity into abundant life. We have no excuse to cling to our pride, pain, and punishments.

All that is left is for us to decide what to do with this freedom.

What has Christ freed you from today? Can you name it? What virtues have you been liberated to live fully into?

Even in 2020, during the worldwide shutdown, I drove my children and their palms to three or four homes of elderly members of our church. We stood in their driveways and sang “Hosanna, Hosanna,” waving some type of native greenery I think we pulled up from our yard.

That period of time will always be a wonder to me and reflection over it has come up quite a bit for me lately. Amidst so many unknowns, potential dangers, and pandemic level anxieties, I admired the way the church persevered.

We found ways to stay connected.

Our VBS that summer was virtual. Our children’s ministry sent out packets of lessons and crafts and posted video challenges for our children to memorize bible verses and act out bible stories. I still remember dressing my sons in costume, one as King Herod that throws Peter (me) into prison, and one as the angel that sets him (me) free. (Acts 12)

We found ways to remain faithful to our traditions.

Waving palms in driveways, blessing backpacks in parking lots, holding up homemade tealight candle holders toward our television for candlelight service on Christmas Eve, individually wrapped servings of communion, imposition of ashes from behind a window, and drive through easter egg hunts. Sometimes I wonder if the reason these traditions have stayed with my children is not merely because we did them, but because we did them in spite of what was happening in the world.

We found ways to do our part to keep hope alive.

This positive persistence was not unique to members of my church. It was good people everywhere, in their everyday roles, adapting in their own everyday ways to keep hope alive. My sons’ school principal at the time sent out a recording everyday of his usual morning announcements, including the moment of silence and pledge of allegiance. Their PE teacher sent videos of him and his daughter doing workout routines we could follow each week. Their teachers organized zoom calls for twenty-five kindergarteners to do a live show and tell (this one was quite comical as you might imagine).

These efforts were lifelines for my children and for that I am eternally grateful. In an abrupt, scary, and strange time in history, it took many working together to do their part to ensure that as many as possible still had a link to normalcy, values, and connection. I know it wasn’t like that for everyone, everywhere, and that season also brought much pain, confusion, and loss.

But having seen some demonstration of what we are capable of in terms of connection and community, it gives me hope, honestly, for the world we live in today. Though we aren’t sheltering in place anymore, there are still many evils and dangers and much sadness and suffering among us. But instead of letting it dismantle our hope, for many, it strengthened it.

No matter how unjust, how threatening, how arrogant, how controlling, how maddening the world can be, because we belong to Jesus, we can still find ways…

to stay connected.
to remain faithful.
to do our part to keep hope alive.

Living in this world can be discouraging. We may begin to wonder, like the Psalmist in Psalm 73,

“Does the Most High even know what is happening?” (v.11)

The psalmist is noticing how the wicked prosper, they seem to live carefree, they are not plagued with problems like everyone else, people keep following them and supporting them even though they are doing awful, prideful, evil things. His worldly reality has begun to take up residence in his heart. It is shadowing over the unseen, spiritual truths he has learned. He is wondering where God has gone, he is wondering if he is absent, or asleep, or worst of all, not as real as he once believed. He can remember a time of spiritual intimacy with God, and by comparison, his days are feeling more hollow, empty, devoid, and less holy than they once were.

It is a dangerous valley, but one that we all experience at one time or another. The promises of our faith not yet fully realized, we must equip ourselves with concepts much more challenging to acquire than concrete evidence proof, we lean instead into things like trust, faith, hope, love. In ways, these are fragile, they can be tampered with and threatened so severely by our circumstances. But in another way, they are the strongest, most sure experiences we are capable of, because they are the only things that will last after all of the physical world we see and know has vanished.

“Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.” 1 Corinthians 13:13

Toward the end of Psalm 73, there is a shift.

“Then I went into your sanctuary, O God,” (v.17)

In the sanctuary, which I venture to interpret as the acknowledgement of God’s constant presence, he remembers. He remembers that all these corruptible things will fall away. That all of our ideas here that involve money, power, esteem, and destruction will be dust in the wind when Christ’s kingdom comes. That the deepest part of our knowing and truth, will be exalted and honored in a way that could never be possible in the upside down kingdom of humanity alone.

The psalmist realizes that all of his complaining and hand wringing and temptation toward disbelief is just another version of a hardened, bitter heart. And he locates the one fundamental truth that brings him back into a reverence for holiness.

“Yet I still belong to you.” (v.23)

The psalmist does what I have seen us do in our most trying times, as Christians. He finds a way to:

stay connected.
remain faithful.
do his part to keep hope alive.

“You hold my right hand, you guide me with your counsel, leading me to glorious destiny.” (v.23b - 24)

We stay connected by remembering to whom we belong, not whose hand we are holding but who is holding onto us, who is truly leading the plan for our lives.

“Whom have I in heaven but you? I desire you more than anything on earth.” (v.25)

We remain faithful by pursuing Christ and Christlikeness in all things. Despite how we may feel wronged, wounded, or wanting, we measure our choices and decisions against the desire to model them after the one, true king.

“My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak,
but God remains the strength of my heart;
he is mine forever.” (v.26)

We do our part to keep hope alive by squaring up with our circumstances not with our own strength, but with the strength of God in our hearts. The suffering here is insurmountable on our own, but when we surrender our pain to Christ, we find he carries it for us, he crucifies himself unjustly for us, we belong to him and nothing that ever happens can change this immutable truth:

“Yet I still belong to you.” (v.23)

Not every holy week of our lives will feel holy. Some years feel heavy and sorrowful, confusing and with unrest. Some feel empty and hollow, lonely and with melancholy. We cannot change the seasons that we must walk through, but we can let each of them become the tines of the tiller that turn, digging us deeper into the soil of Christ.

Whether it be pandemic, politician, poverty, or perishing, let us meet our trials this holy week with waving palms of some variety that proclaim the psalmist’s simple truth:

Yet I still belong to you.

You are loved. 🧡

He had many good questions about this situation, such as “How is this done and most importantly, why?”

As in most situations where I am not sure what the right thing to say is, I offered him my limited, but honest assessment, “So much of what we do is because we want to belong.”

This need is intense, particularly during his adolescent season, but it never really leaves us. Renowned Psychologist Abraham Maslow includes it smack dab in the middle of his hierarchical structure of our needs as human beings. In this model, the basic building blocks of survival - physiological needs and safety - are capped by the first level need that goes beyond mere instinct: love and belonging.

One might argue that “belonging” could also be considered instinctual, that in our modern world, where physical safety is mostly in tact, our social safety becomes the more common focus and it depends on a mutual loyalty between you and your “tribe.”

But if that were true, I think we would find our contentedness in the first place we find acceptance and that would be the end of the story. Instead, what we see play out most glaringly in adolescence and in more subtle ways throughout adulthood is this ongoing need for approval and achievement, which we use to ground our identity.

At least in America, our culture is oriented in a way that reinforces the concept that what we want, we must go get. If we want the house, the truck, the land, the job, the esteem, the credit, then we must manufacture it with our bare hands. We must prove ourselves worthy. There is nothing wrong with a strong internal drive and in many cases, this is a gift of the spirit to have high levels of initiative and ambition. But if it is not grounded first in a strong sense of love and belonging, then like a bad superhero/villain movie, this power can easily fall into the wrong hands and become wielded for destruction.

College fraternities are a great example. It would be easy to deduce that they are “stupid,” as my eleven year old concluded. But they aren’t, inherently. And, as I explained to him, there are many great attributes that they could exemplify. Such as, brotherhood, friendship, camaraderie and many of them manage to, even with missteps. But I think what is important to identify is where it goes wrong, and I believe that winding, twisted road always leads back to a heart that does not feel a sense of love and belonging.

I think it is why “love and belonging” are a central feature of our gospel story. If we only interpret salvation as a hero/villain story, I think we miss the main point. It isn’t like a medieval knight who enters a city and rescues its people from an evil king. When Jesus comes to rescue, it is because we belong to him in the first place.

The sacrifice he makes at the cross is our invitation to crucify anything in our lives that threatens or obscures our original sense of belonging.

Because I belong to you Jesus, I lay at your feet

my need for attention
my need for esteem
my need for productivity
my need for usefulness
my need for acceptance

Because the only one who matters is already attending to me, esteemed by me, produces fruit in my life, uses me for his good and glory, and accepts me as I am, because in him, all transgressions are forgiven, and all things are possible.

That is resurrection life.

I pray fervently for our youth, who have more challenges than ever before in navigating the ever splintering paths of belonging. I shudder to think about the early introduction to technology imposed upon our youth. What could be a wonderful tool for connection has become an isolating wedge toward fatal loneliness as we see more and more social life becoming virtual and highly anxious. Still, like college fraternities or any other thing on this Earth, it could be good and it is, in some ways. We cannot deem it evil simply because it comes with complications.

And suddenly, I am thankful that Jesus is a God who is everywhere. In the most dire situation I can imagine, perhaps a home of very young, still developing children who have been neglected and given devices as babysitters, exposed to the horrors and the rotten wormholes of the internet, barred from the freedom and the invitation to the creativity their own boredom could give birth to, lacking the natural relational learning that comes with a family unit, even a dysfunctional family unit, one that is alive and breathing and suffering and speaking and doing everything possible to figure out how to hold onto hope that tomorrow will bring good news. I know in my heart Jesus is there. That even the alluring glare of the screen cannot keep him from his child and he will continue to pursue them lifelong.

I remember during the pandemic, my children were very young. This was a blessing in many ways. What they remember most is that we had a picnic lunch everyday somewhere different outside. One day, we went to our church and had a picnic near the crosses in the open field. I heard a pastor on the radio speaking about the pandemic and its unknown long-term effect on our youth. I will never forget him saying, “We should not underestimate what God is doing in the hearts of our young people in this season.” Watching my own two sons chase bubbles around the three wooden crosses, I knew it was a gift. It was a moment that would not have otherwise happened, had we not been stripped of our normal routines, our regular social interactions, our freedom to go about town and in and out of buildings as we pleased.

I don’t want to minimize or dismiss the dangers and tragedies that occur in our world of college hazings, pandemics, and the sweeping infiltration of technology on our culture.

But I also don’t want to underestimate what God is doing at any given moment. And I never want to forget that he is near. He is near to me, to you, and to the loneliest, most isolated child on the planet.

Because we all belong to him.

Whenever we are on vacation, we try to attend a local church there. These experiences have really enhanced my gratitude for a God that is everywhere. I know that in any city in America, there will be a church holding a Sunday Service of some type. I don’t have to be a member, I don’t have to agree with all the denominational traditions, I don’t have to parse out conflicting convictions among the congregation.

But because I belong to Christ’s church, I can attend and worship and praise and pray and receive and honor his presence anywhere. America is blessed with at least one church per city, but even in places in the world where there is no church building, the statement remains true.

Because his kingdom, the one we belong to, is being built within each of us.

One pandemic picnic at a time.

^“Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” Ephesians 2:19

I take great comfort in the morning light that filters in through the windows and casts patterns across the home. It is soft, it is quiet, it is unwavering. It signals some amount of freedom in my schedule if I am present to bear witness to it, if I haven’t rushed off to work, to obligations, to activities, where the walls of my life often obscure the rich, more natural rhythms of the day.

It is warm. Even in the midst of frigid February, protected from competing elements of wind and dew and frost, the sunlight is distilled through the glass, landing in what feels like the purest form. It is here that I can appreciate most deeply the sun as energy, as life. The rays having traveled so far through the cosmos, to lightly rest upon my quilt, to nourish a budding rose bush, to warm the old dog that shifts throughout the morning, following the waning light as it moves across the room.

It is comforting. I have long battled the weight of depression though in the last ten years, by God’s grace, I’ve beaten it back to mostly only oppressing the winter months. But I can remember a time when the war was year round and some days the only peace I could manage to find was a sliver of golden light across my bedspread, laced with the shadows of the curtains in the window it must have first passed through.

It is interesting to me the things that finally reach us. They are usually not loud, obvious gestures. Loud, obvious gestures are performative, not necessarily because they are dishonest (although sometimes) but because they signal a lack of deep, personal understanding. If there is not authentic understanding of a person’s situation, they may resort to stock suggestions of how to offer support, which simply fall flat in the face of deep suffering.

Sometimes comfort can only be as simple and pure as a ray of sunlight that comes to find you in silent, supportive presence. A reminder that there is light, and it is here, and it is warming your skin with a soft glow for this moment.

When you have a lifeline like that, you keep it, so though I no longer cling to every sun ray that fills my room, I always notice them and I acknowledge their quiet power, knowing that for someone, somewhere, a sunlight pattern just like this one may be the little piece of hope that keeps them tethered here, the small comfort that breaks through the agonizing heart, the little flame that persistently glows, despite the darkness that threatens to overcome it.

And couldn’t he have made it differently if he had wanted? By our world’s standard is the sun optimally efficient? Could he have determined, “You know, this little morning light that gradually slides into view takes too long to illuminate the day. I think I will model it after man’s light switches, on and off, like the artistic engineering of the modern office, fluorescent and full, no dimming, no nuances, no gradient. Standardized. Uniform. Functional.”

No, thankfully, instead he made it beautiful. he sends the morning sun as a gift, as a renewal, as a slow moving reminder that the light of day will come, but first, we have an opportunity to practice presence.

This week I am on break, so I have had more time to spend with the morning sun, thanks be to God. But later in the day, I am noticing the growing intensity of the sunlight. The all encompassing, vast, and expansive afternoon sun that bears down from atop its seemingly direct angle over the Earth. I am grateful, in a different way, for this light, though it is more busy, more animated, more obtrusive in its presence, it is a bright burning flame that fuels the activities of the day.

It is in this comparison that I identify a quality that the morning sun and Jesus both share.

Gentleness.

I have been looking for Jesus. Though I know he is present, his felt sense has eluded me more often than not for a while as we stretch into the final weeks of winter. And it dawns on me today that I have been looking too big, too brash, too obvious, too immediate, too demandingly.

I remember that humble Jesus is gentle and lowly. That he comes quietly, small, as a whisper, as a sigh, as a baby in a manger, as a softness that you will miss if you are even halfway expecting something as grandiose as the afternoon sunshine.

Of course, he is capable of both. A light so powerful it sustains an entire cosmos and yet that isn’t often the way that he actually comes to us in moments of true intimacy.

He comes soft as the dawn that rises the mother who moves quietly around your room, turning on a nearby lamp instead of the overhead light, protecting the first moments of waking that we remember his mercies are new.

He comes warm with the comfort of a fire, drawing cold hands near and dispelling the chill from the air, creating an oasis of vitality in an otherwise barren landscape, a shield of solace against the harsh climate.

He comes quietly as tone and words that are relaxed, curious, nonthreatened and nonthreatening. As a friend that is constant, unwavering, secure with presence that blends your conversation easily, without doubt, without demand, without domination.

He comes as the morning sun, reaching through all of your walls and windows just to lay peacefully where you are, in a shape that creates just a glimpse of his holiness, a little stained glass window of his love, waiting to be noticed, an invitation to accept.

One of my favorite poets, Mary Oliver, captures what it is to recognize this light, though where it reaches her here is filtered through the trees, another favorite place of mine to find Him,

WHEN I AM AMONG THE TREES
by Mary Oliver

When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.
I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.
Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.
And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.”

I remember how he calls us, to be this light to one another.

“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” Matthew 5:14-16

We get to be the light of the world. But we are a light that gives, shines, and glorifies. Let us learn from the gentleness of the morning sun, the lamp, the low burning fire, the rays that filter through the leaves of the trees.

Gentle, soft, comforting, quiet, steady presence.

That is the only way to reach through the darkness here.

“Do you perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:19)

My bible scholars out there will note most translations actually read, “do you not perceive it?” Which denotes an almost satirical tone, but for the sake of linguistic demonstration, I am simplifying the phrase for this piece.

The phrase comes from the Lord’s declaration that he is doing a “new thing.” The Lord is at work all the time doing new things and yet he must ask us this question (and this perhaps is the reason for his satire) because very often we do not perceive it.

The humor has been in the fact that what exactly I’m supposed to write about this verse has been eluding me for a while. I sit quietly and still myself and remember Samuel's words “Speak Lord, your servant is listening.” (1 Samuel 3:10)

But he meets my quiet with his own and though I’m sure he is present, perceiving where he wants the writing to go remains hidden, cloaked in a robe that will only unfurl as it bears witness to my demonstrated patience. Leaving me to admit, “No, Lord, I do not yet perceive it.”

Patience reminds me of puzzles. I love them but not without first experiencing excruciating frustration. In the beginning of a puzzle, the colors all blend together. It resembles a chaotic mess. Even if my brain begins to decode the color combinations and sort them accordingly, there is still the matter of shape, orientation, and in what exact order do all the red pieces fit together to produce an image of a cardinal?

I am always delighted (and surprised) the moment I begin to perceive the full picture coming together. What felt like an impossible feat, now slowly coming around to the idea of something cohesive. It is a little empowering, reigning in the chaos and subduing it into order. It is also humbling, because I know no puzzle is completed by my divine arrangement, no, it is more like stumbling onto the right path only after traveling many, many failed trails.

Failed trails, my goodness, I have plenty of those. Many of them well intentioned, too. Yet no matter how many jigsaw pieces I make out of my life, edges all jagged and faded like the piece our puppy slightly chewed on one evening, there is a divine hand that works tirelessly to bring higher order, meaning, and purpose to the mess.

Whether I perceive it or not.

Perception on a surface level utilizes the awareness of the physical senses. Do you hear the birds chirping? Do you see the sunrise? Do you taste the salt in the ocean? Do you feel the softness of a touch? Do you smell the aroma left behind from the rainfall?

But a deeper consideration of perception could be contemplated as understanding, interpretation, and regard.

When the Lord asks, “Do you perceive it?” I do not think he only means, do you see the physical evidence? Are you aware of the sensation?

Let’s try the scripture using the deeper words for perception.

“See, I am doing a new thing.

Do you regard it?

Do you interpret it as such?

Do you understand?

It sounds a little like a teacher who might be checking a student's perception of content. Another way they might ask would be, “Are you following me?”

The kingdom come that Jesus prays for in Matthew 6 is not, and will not be for some undetermined time, one that we readily physically perceive.

In fact, there will be many times our physical perception actually contradicts the kingdom that we believe in.

If taken literally, the Lord's question would be difficult to answer.

No, Lord, I do not perceive it. Everywhere I look there is pain, brokenness, suffering. In my own life and worldwide. People I care about have died. People I know that want to be well are still fighting their addictions and diseases. Cruel power seems to be rewarded and standing up for what is right is punished.

But I think that is why he must ask the question. He is not asking us to identify it in the physical world. He is checking our regard, interpretation, and understanding of his work.

We regard the work of the Lord by acknowledging and professing it is happening. Behind the scenes, above our limited view of things, in the inner most recesses of the heart of man for a long-term gain.

We interpret the work of the Lord through the framework he has given us: scripture, where we find his promises that did not fail then and they will not fail now. We see him deliver the people, defeat the giants, and defend from the fire.

We understand the work of the Lord by referring to his character, who we know him to be. That he is good, sovereign, eternal, merciful and compassionate, enduring and steadfast, faithful and forgiving.

But then? A miraculous thing begins to happen.

When we lend ourselves to the deeper perception of God's kingdom, the kingdom breaks into our physical world.

Not that our troubles disappear, but that we begin to hope beyond them. We begin to notice and appreciate the small, subtle ways he is working. We see acts of kindness in our neighbors, we hear words of encouragement from our loved ones, we feel the gentle care someone chooses to take.

The jaded grief that becomes so easy to carry suddenly softens in our awareness of the presence of the Lord and we literally begin to perceive with our own senses, layers of understanding that can only be accessed through the surrender to his sovereignty.

I will give you an example.

One morning this week my son and I were on our way to school. It was cold and dark and we are both introverts so the car ride had been pleasantly silent. We stopped at a red light and suddenly I noticed he was humming something quietly from the backseat. His beautiful little pitch perfect voice was a warm accompaniment to the dawning rays of sunrise that were just beginning to radiate through the morning sky.

Then I realized the song was “Silent Night,” and this brought tears to my eyes. Here, well over a month out from Christmas, he was still finding simple joy and contentedness humming this reverent tune.

Now, I could have enjoyed this moment very much, even if only superficially. But if I am practicing perceiving God’s presence on a deeper level, then this opens me to regarding the tune as a work that has been stirred in my young son’s heart. I interpret his sweet song as an anthem of hope that continues to encourage us long after all the christmas decorations have been put away. I understand that each precious sunrise is truly, as the hymn states, “a dawn of redeeming grace.”

For the beat of one red light, I let myself be reminded of the grander story at work, of a king that desires to assemble moments just like this, small little gifts, little glimpses of joy, little bits of faith, little pieces of love, collecting them all tenderly from the jigsaw mess of our world and forming them into a beautiful, cohesive whole of the kingdom he has promised will come.

Bonus…my best friend encouraged me to write a little poem to capture the treasured moment with my son.

SILENT NIGHT

The silent night was ending.
The dawn was breaking through.
Though darkness still lingered around us
On our way to school.

A red light had just stopped us
It paused my thoughts as well
I noticed a growing awareness
Of a sound that started to swell.

Your volume had not altered
Only my attention made it grow
I adjusted my senses
To bring high what started low.

You were humming a song of hope
In tune to the sun’s bright rays
I wished the light would stay red
For the rest of all my days.

And leave me in the comfort of the
song that resided in your heart
Bringing joy to the new day unfolding
Such a simple way to start.

The song was “Silent Night, Holy Night.”
Radiant beams from thy holy face
Reaching through all of time
To fill this sacred space.

The light turned green, time to move.
Though I will carry through the day’s race.
A mother, a babe, a sweet song of your glory,
This dawn of redeeming grace.

The new year is full of promise, a fresh, new round of every month, season, and holiday of our calendar open to possibility for God to work. I subscribe to the tradition of choosing a word of intention to hopefully shape each new year. My word for this year is:

Courage.

It excites me and scares me a little because I can only imagine what types of scenarios one may have to endure in order to develop courage. It is a little like praying for patience and receiving many trying opportunities that provoke your impatience or praying for strength and finding the only way to produce this quality is by identifying and exercising all of your hidden weaknesses.

My best friend and I joke every year that we should choose “vegetables” as our word, and maybe that will bring us a lot of yummy cake in the year to come.

Of course this sort of trickery is only fodder. We both know that eventually we would get sick of cake and that an easy, superficial life is only fulfilling short term and not the depth of a life we were designed to live.

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” James 1:2-4

Therefore, though we do not wish for trials, we embrace them as an inevitable part of the developmental path, trusting that with them comes the promise of a deeper, greater maturity that only Christ can work within us.

But the most interesting thing to me about the words we choose is the belief that though it feels like something we are choosing, because of God’s perfect and good omniscience, it is also something that he chooses for us.

Sort of how the desire to know God could actually be conceived as his desire to be known, first gifted to us by himself.

Or like how “we love because he first loved us.” 1 John 4:19

Though the experience of love swells in our hearts as if born from our own imagining, the deeper truth is that we only know and recognize love because of the way God has loved us so fully, truly, eternally, forward and backward in all of the time that ever was or will be. Because he IS love, his love is what first initiates any experience of love we endeavor to own. This is the order of his ways.

If we desire to minister for the glory of God, it is because he first desires to minister through us.

If we pursue scripture to understand his will, it is because he first desires for us to understand his will through scripture.

If we endeavor to make room for his presence, it is because he first desires greater room to be present in our lives.

When we get this order of operations aligned in our lives, we become free to rely on the power inherent in God’s promises.

For what he initiates, he will fulfill.

“As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,
so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” Isaiah 55:10-11

The water cycle imagery Isaiah is inspired to write is a beautiful metaphor for God’s word at work in our lives. It comes down, as a sustaining gift, showering our lives with presence, refreshment, cleansing, and sustenance, it blooms growth in all things around us, feeding what will become our provision, setting in motion what will become our ongoing work, before returning to God as a vapor of praise, full of accomplishment, full of his glory, the success of which is measured only by his original intent and promise for the word.

Though this does mean surrendering our own expectations of how his word will come to fulfillment, we can courageously trust that it will indeed be fulfilled.

So let us set up 2026 with one single expectation, that the promise he has spoken over your life will be fulfilled - in his way, in his time, for his glory.

And if he has whispered a word to you for the year, keep returning to it not as a task you yourself must implement, but instead as a gift, as a snowfall, as a raindrop, as a promise, knowing his promises are the only ones with power.

“The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it.” 1 Thessalonians 5:24

Feel free to download and edit the blank version to add your own word for the year to this phone background wallpaper template.

That is how all good things evolve. They begin with a humble seed that needs no credit, that grows, develops, and blossoms into something unrecognizable but even more magnificent than you could have first imagined.

God has been very good to me in the way he has sent me mentors, friends, colleagues, and family for just the right seasons of my life. In fact, it is impossible to list them individually here, because I believe every person in my life is a Godsend in some way.

Sometimes it has been to discipline me, to form me, to strengthen a weakness in my character.

Sometimes it has been to comfort me, to hold me up where I was too broken to hold myself, or to make me feel loved and accepted in a situation where I am worried about belonging.

Sometimes it has been to stand in the gap of someone I have lost, to mend the broken threads of my life or help me face something that feels terrifying and unmanageable.

Sometimes it has been to alter my perspective, to help me see anew.

Sometimes it has been to teach me a practical skill, one that serves far reaching purposes.

Sometimes it has been to believe in me, when I am struggling to believe in myself, and to help make real the calling God has promised over my life.

Each of these people God has used to demonstrate his unfailing love, but it is likely almost none of them thought of it that way.

In the moments they most deeply influenced and shaped my life, it was simply a byproduct of their own pursuit of something greater than themselves.

Perhaps it was a commitment to a certain value, or a method they understood to produce a specific outcome. Maybe it was part of a mission they were working toward, to do their part to instill more of a certain quality or experience in the culture or the world. It could have been a pulling of their heart that led them to intervene in my situation. Or possibly their own hard earned awareness that has conditioned them to respond to a need without hesitation.

When I think of these people, they are not grandiose. They are steady, consistent, and yet also open to change. They are always looking beyond to a greater, guiding principle. I become so thankful to have been swept along into the movement of these principles across their lives, picking up pieces of character, integrity, and love along the way.

This mantra, Love Your People Well, has guided me especially in the ministry of my professional life. If we consider our workplaces as a collective God has grouped together with purpose, then we must begin to see that each of us plays a role in the culture established there. It is true there are variables we cannot control. But there are also variables we can control and those are given to us to exercise in a way that produces the most loving environment possible.

Work is, after all, for most of us, where we must go daily.

In my work life currently, this has manifested as being part of the “Sunshine Committee” that plans special events and luncheons for our high school teachers and staff. I am blessed to have many likeminded coworkers that are always ready to lend a hand with these events but there is one in particular I wish to highlight with this post.

American public schools are, for good reason, functional. Like their curriculums, the facilities are mostly standardized due to constraints like neutrality, practicality, and funding. This poses a challenge for someone who desires to bring a “home-like” warmth and care to the environment.

But during my time here, I have accepted the challenge. Each year, elevating events like our annual Christmas luncheon with small, intentional, inexpensive touches that (hopefully) express to our teachers and staff above all else: You are Loved.

Though I do love my coworkers, it isn’t my personal love that I hope to convey. It is the love that lives in me that I know with every fiber of my being, loves them wholly, too. It is the love that sends me mentors to plant the seed, also working in a divine design within each of their lives. It is the love that mends my broken spirit, ready to also touch each fracture of their busy, overwhelmed days. It is the love that whispers courage to me, that I know is also the voice speaking purpose, worthiness, and chosenness over their many thoughts and doubts. It is the love that transforms another cafeteria luncheon into a time of honoring the works of service they pour into the next generation.

Maybe all of my coworkers don’t see it that way. Does that matter to me? Not in the slightest. Because I remember a young professional who really didn’t “get” the “Love Your People Well” initiative that was poured into her two decades ago, but now allows it to guide her day to day decisions.

But I think many of them do, and the one in particular touched my heart this year after helping me with moving tables around, placing tablecloths, assembling centerpieces, and illuminating millions of little fairy light strings for decoration, I shared with her my “new this year” touch of intentional care, individual place settings for eighty people.

I wasn’t even sure we would have time to accomplish this final task, as it would involve stuffing almost 300 utensils into folded napkins. I approached her hesitantly, “What do you think?”

Her response was, “Of course! Let’s do it! I’m with you.”

I knew in that moment she saw the same truth I did. That small, intentional acts of care matter.

I thanked God for her openness, for my mentor all those years ago, for John Maxwell, but most all of, I give thanks for the original source for this movement of love:

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ (Matthew 22:36-40)

In other words?

Love your God, and your people, well.

One particular prompt was the word “endure.”

When I first thought of endure, it was in negative connotation, as in, enduring suffering, pain.

But doesn't Jesus always ask us to look again?

When the disciples are looking at the meager loaves and fishes with respect to the crowd of 5,000. Jesus effectually says, “Look again.” (John 6)

When the fishermen have scoured the waters all through the night and their nets have come up empty, Jesus says, “Look again.” (Luke 5)

When the man who had been ill all of his life explains to Jesus he has no one to help him and no ability to become healed, Jesus tells him to take up his mat and, “Look again.” (John 5)

When the adulterous woman cowers under the scrutiny of the lawful men, Jesus begins drawing in the dust and says, “Look again.” (John 8)

When Martha comes out to meet Jesus, blurry eyed with grief over her brother Lazarus, Jesus says, “Look again.” (John 11)

When Mary Magdalene weeps by the tomb, mistaking Jesus for the gardener, he tenderly calls her name, asking her to “Look again.” (John 20)

Seeing things within the context of Jesus almost always requires us to “look again.” Often when we look the first time it's through the eyes of our own experience, which are prone to be clouded by fears, stress, pressure, expectations, insecurities, and pride. We see what is in front of us and especially if it is daunting, our memories of God's faithfulness lapses and our human condition goes to work planning failsafes.

How tenderly he loves us to patiently, gently remind us to look again.

When I considered the word “endure” in the context of Jesus, it is true he endured pain and suffering, that conception would not be wrong. But another look revealed something else, something deeper. You could also think of endurance as long-lasting: true and steadfast.

As Psalm 136 proclaims a stunning twenty-six times,

“His faithful love endures forever.”

The photo below is the inscription on my first Bible, gifted to me on my first birthday by my grandfather, who was a Pastor.

Perhaps it was because he was a Pastor, or it was tradition, or he knew the importance of the Word of God over my life, but this gift reminds me of the way God uses us to build the faith life of one another, not just in singular instances, but in the long lasting, true, steadfast, and enduring way of Jesus.

The miracle of our faith is in every day, every moment, but it is also in the cumulative history of our lives. The enduring love of God shows up time and time again, laying little bricks that eventually become a foundation, a house, a kingdom.

Every Bible that is gifted, every VBS “Jesus Loves Me” that is learned, every youth group softball tournament, every prayer at church camp, every community service project, these all seem like isolated experiences, but they’re not.

They are threads in a great weaving of the presence of Jesus throughout a lifetime.

Because when the devastation of losing someone you love comes, or a terrifying diagnosis, an unfathomable split in your family dynamic, or an addiction that robs you of a friend, all the superficial layers of your life fall away, and what is left is only what is enduring: the love of God.

He carries you, He sustains you, He heals you. He’s the only one who can.

And when he does, you realize he’s been there all along, in those faith building experiences, preparing the way for this moment, pursuing you, fighting for you, asking others to pray over you, sending others to intercede on your behalf, weaving an unseen quilt of his presence through the scraps of your life because He knew one day He would need to wrap you in it.

Look again at the moments of your life where his love has been weaving, look again at each circumstance where first glance might believe he is absent or silent, look again believing he is there. Because he is.

And when you feel the call to show this love to someone else, respond. You never know when your actions may be laying the foundation for another believer who will one day “look again” at this moment and see God’s enduring love come to life.