In sixth grade there was a boy who decided I was going to be his punching bag. He bullied me on a daily basis. One day I had enough. I don’t remember exactly how it all went down, but when the dust cleared he was on his back looking up at me. I had my fist cocked ready to pummel him. Lots of people saw it. I didn’t get picked on again.
I’ll never forget that moment because in that surge of adrenaline I realized I was no longer helpless. I could fight back. Fast forward twenty years.
I’ve been getting pounded with endless breakers of bad news lately. It can be disheartening. But since I’ve started my one-hundred hours of prayer campaign I’ll tell you something – I don’t feel helpless anymore. When I pray I am fighting back against the tide of bad news. I know the One who can change anything. And when it comes to a fight – He never loses.
Don’t just sit back and take all the bad news you are hearing. Get on your knees and start fighting it with prayer.
I awoke with a sharp pain in my chest. Within about one minute I had convinced myself I was going to die of a heart attack right there on my bed at the ripe old age of thirty-three.
I received an email with some bad news. By the end of that day I was certain that the worst possible scenario would come from the situation and I would be left living on the street.
Enter Isaiah 26:2-4
You keep him in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on You,
because he trusts in You.
Trust in the Lord forever,
for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.
Amigos, that’s not just some quaint verse to slap on Christian paraphernalia. No.
Them’s fightin’ words.
You see my mind is a wild stallion that needs to be constantly broken into submission to God’s ways. If I want peace in my mind and heart there’s only one way to truly have it: I must fight to keep my mind constantly focused on God. I must fight for the peace only He can give.
Easier said than done you say? No argument from me on that. For more tips let’s check back in with Isaiah:
I will recount the steadfast love of the Lord, the praises of the Lord,
according to all that the Lord has granted us. (Is. 63:7)
I don’t stand a chance in this crumbling world if I don’t constantly remind myself of God’s goodness.
So this week I choose to trust in the Lord. I choose to remember His goodness. I resolve that regardless of what happens I won’t let anyone or anything steal my peace.
Last night I dreamed I was the captain of a ship. A crew member made me mad so I threw him overboard.
I went down to the galley to make some Indian food. I was adding spices but couldn’t find the turmeric. (It’s a root with a bitter, pungent flavor.) You can’t make Indian food without turmeric. I was getting frustrated. One of the crew members told me the guy I just threw overboard had it. I felt like an idiot.
When I woke up I had these two thoughts:
- The anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. (James 1:20)
- I should never be too hasty to throw people overboard, they might just offer some spice that I need in my life.
Selah.
Somewhere out there today is the world’s second-best assassin. He’s honing his skills and sharpening his aim. He may be bothered that he’s only the second best assassin in the world, but he’s not going to let that stop him.
You will never be the best at anything you do. There will always be someone better.
My brother got all the smarts in my family. He gets stuff. I don’t. I have to work hard to learn things that come to him naturally.
You know what? There’s somebody out there that’s sharper than my brother. So we have two options:
1. Sit back and moan and complain that we are not first-best or
2. Do the best we can and trust that God will do something great with our mediocre abilities.
In option 2 God gets the glory and that’s the way things are supposed to be.
Whether you work for Sears or the CIA, be the best you you can and trust God to use you in big ways.
I think the best sign that someone is really bad-to-the-bone is when they say they can do something really hard and then do it without anyone realizing what happened.
God promised for centuries that he’d send a Savior to defeat sin. Then he showed up, changed the world and hardly anyone realized what was going on until it was over. People were left scratching their heads. That’s pure awesomeness to me. Jesus was like a ninja.
I’m convinced he still works that way. Regardless of what it looks like around me I always find Jesus is at work in the shadows kicking tail and taking names for his glory and my joy. He’s so clandestine that I rarely ever see him in the problem until he’s got it all worked out.
Fear not, Ninja Jesus has your back.
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. -Romans 8:28
It only took me sixteen days to fumble on one of my New Year’s resolutions. I was supposed to blog yesterday – but I didn’t. We went to San Antonio to visit some friends who are in from Africa. Excuses, excuses.
On the drive home I was rebuking myself and my first instinct was to say: You can’t blog every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Just do it when you can.
I’m guessing that all of us are prone to that kind of response. We set out to stop a bad habit, change our diet or get some spiritual discipline then we mess up early on and decide to just throw the whole plan out the window. I eat the piece of pizza then decide since the diet is blown I might as well eat cake and ice cream too. Please tell me I’m not alone on this…
It’s Tuesday. I’m blogging. I refuse to give up on this resolution just because I slipped up once. The lies in my head won’t win. I haven’t lost until I quit. I raise my fist in the air and waive it violently. “Take that sucker! I’m still in the fight and you are going down!”
Don’t throw it all away because you slip up. Press on. You can do this.
I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13
When God offered him anything he wanted King Solomon asked for wisdom. Bad call dude, everyone knows you always ask the genie for unlimited wishes!
But Solomon may have been on to something. Simply put, wisdom is the correct application of knowledge. Some of the best marriage counselors I know are divorced. They have the information; they just haven’t applied it to their lives. Wisdom gives you the power to live with mad skillz.
Solomon wrote things like:
The borrower is slave to the lender. (Pr.22:7) Ever feel like a slave of an invisible task master who is beating you down, trying to keep you from succeeding? If you are drowning in debt – you are. Want to feel free? Don’t spend money you don’t have. Pay off the debt and get out from under that nasty slave driver.
We all know that. (I think) But do we actually apply that knowledge when we are staring at the 72” flat screen at Best Buy?
Wisdom will help you avoid many of life’s problems, at least the one’s you have control over. It will help you navigate the other kinds of problems with boldness.
So how do you get wisdom? I had a feeling you’d ask. If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. (James 1:5)
Troubles at work? Ask for wisdom. Relational struggles? Ask for wisdom. God wants to give you the power to live skillfully. A good place to start is reading one Proverb per day. There are thirty-one; just enough to get you through the month.
I said the statement below on a TV program and a guy hunted me down on Facebook and wrote a diatribe about my heresy for the entire world to see. Actually every time I say it I take some heat. No matter – I still believe it, because I’m convinced the Bible backs it up and so does personal experience.
Here it is: I believe God’s most effective tool for sanctifying us (making us who we need to be) is suffering.
Exhibits A,B and C:
We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God. (Acts 14:22)
Although [Jesus] was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. (Hebrews 5:8)
… because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. (1 Peter 2:20)
Jesus learned obedience through suffering. Why would we be exempt?
Now for the personal experience: If I’m honest with myself I have to admit that the times I’ve grown the most spiritually have been through times of intense personal suffering. I’m not going to venture into whether God caused that suffering or not, but I’m certain he allowed it.
I’m not encouraging you to go out looking for suffering like a self-flagellating monk, but I am saying that if you are in the middle of suffering (even if you caused it) you can rejoice because God is at work sanctifying you. Philippians 2:11-13 (below) is alive and well in your life.
Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation [sanctification] with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.
Every Sunday I get up and play my guitar and sing for a bunch of people. Here’s what’s going on in my head:
I get nervous – Even though I’ve done it hundreds of times, sometimes right before we start I get nervous. It happens a lot less now that I have the choir. I know the small army behind me has my back. It’s comforting.
I’m really insecure about my voice – I’m a musician. Not a singer. I sing out of necessity. (This isn’t me fishing for compliments. Please don’t write me and say, “Oh Joel you have an amazing voice!” If you do it will show that you really don’t know what you are talking about.) I sing because that’s what you do to lead worship. My crummy singing actually turns out to be a good thing though. As soon as I start to feel fairly confident about myself my brother will show me the video of the previous week’s service. Ouch! It keeps me humble. J
I often question the value of what I’m doing - I look out. Some people are singing their hearts out. Others are standing with their arms crossed looking miserable. Some cry. Some raise their hands. Some play Angry Birds.
I know the stories of lots of folks in the congregation. Many of them are in the middle of tough situations. How can singing some words on a screen to pounding bass and distorted guitar really do anything for them? To be honest, I don’t know. But I do know this: We were made to glorify God. Singing is one simple expression of that. So I regularly remind myself that in some tiny way me playing guitar and doing my best to keep my voice on pitch can help people connect with God. Then he steps in and does the supernatural part. That’s humbling and it’s a real honor that I get to do it.
Whatever you do you are going to get nervous and insecure at times. You’ll probably even question the value of what you are doing for the world. Know this: If you are doing it to the best of your ability to glorify God – that’s enough. You do what you can and he’ll do what only he can.
“…whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” (1 Cor. 10:31)
I read Mark Batterson’s new book The Circle Maker and felt the Lord told me to spend 100 hours in prayer over the next five months. That’s a lot of hours, so I started praying for things to pray about.
I felt like I needed to pray for my wife’s chronic dry eye problems. It gives her a headache nearly everyday.
I started praying but this thought came into my head: Joel, her grandma had dry eyes, her aunt has dry eyes – it runs in her family. It’s just the way things are.
I nearly crossed that off my list rather than face disappointment, but today I was quoting Psalm 103 to myself. I got to this part:
Bless the LORD, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits-
who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases
Will God give my wife’s dry eyes more tears? I don’t know. He gets to decide how he gets the most glory. But I’ll tell you this: He can do it if he wants. So I’m going to pray like heaven for the next 100 hours and trust that God knows what he’s doing.
I started thinking (and maybe you should too) – Are there any areas in my life where I’ve resigned myself to things being as they are? Maybe it’s time to get on your knees and start fighting for some change…
