But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day (2 Peter 3:8, NAS).
A Thousand Summers and a thousand more,
Your bride has waited and anticipated
That “blessed hope” You spoke in the language of forever.
Knowing we were born and born again for this,
We will hold on to Your promise and, if need be
Wait a Thousand Summers more.
So we wait, but never barren of Your presence,
And we hope, but never void of Your great care.
So we serve, with boldness standing on the promise
That a Thousand Summers never can compare. [click to continue…]
A lighthouse in a harbor stands on solid ground,
Declaring simple truth to all who would see.
“Here I stand,” it calls to the ocean.
“No wave formed against me will ever prosper…
I bow at the mercy of no storm or sea.”
On a firm foundation the Lighthouse in the Harbor
Refuses to surrender, sound the retreat or compromise.
It stands in simple splendor, against the tide.
Though it may show signs of wear and aging,
Though it may look unimpressive to untrained eyes,
The Lighthouse in the Harbor yet still stands upon a rock –
And you… yes, you… are that Lighthouse in the Harbor. [click to continue…]
Dani has her days and nights mixed up. She’s driven to finish her degree and excited about the possibilities of life after school, but her brain and body are also fatigued. She feels like sleeping when she’s awake, but can’t quite shut it all off mentally when she’s supposed to be sleeping. Dani has a weary soul. And her weary soul is receiving the call to Wait in the Stillness.
Allen is on the verge of something great. His ministry organization has experienced a funding breakthrough, which has made it possible to launch an entire new division overseas. He’s doing Kingdom work, and for months he has lived at the glorious intersection of waiting and working – where anticipating collides with diligence. So why does this mid-40s man, who is otherwise in such good health, find it so easy to well up with tears for no apparent reason? Allen has a weary soul. And his weary soul is receiving the call to Wait in the Stillness.
Teresa is grateful for the progress. Day in and day out, working with little Pauley, she has seen such growth in her little son with special needs. Compared to this time last year, both of their worlds have dramatically changed for the better. But driving home from the latest meeting with Pauley’s case worker, Teresa catches a heart-glimpse of how far – how very far – her boy and she have to go. And something inside her screams, “Give it up! You’ll never get there.” Teresa has a weary soul. And her weary soul is receiving the call to Wait in the Stillness.
To live in a broken world, teeming with peril and possibilities, is to shoulder a load that defies your own strength. You may look at somebody else’s yoke and feel sorry for them, or feel sorry for yourself. Either way, your own life challenges are enough. And at some point, assuming you care at all, you will find yourself pushing against your own weariness of soul. [click to continue…]
(Photo by Michelle Newell Photography, Lynnwood and Seattle, WA)
In a world where fame is measured in 15-minute increments, life declarations come in 140 characters or less, and you literally have nine seconds to capture somebody’s attention, it’s easy to assume you’re nothing special.
When it feels as though you’re in a rat race and the rats are winning, where your value is measured by your performance or the approval of others and neither is all that remarkable, it’s easy to get lost in the ordinariness of just blending in.
When life sometimes feels like that whac-a-mole game, where those who dare to appear above ground get pounded back to their place, it’s tempting just to hide what light you may have so nobody else will see it.
But those are the times – when life is a liar – those are the times to stand on the truth and receive again the message of grace. Those are the times to believe again that you are the object of God’s delight. [click to continue…]
I.
There’s a word we use to describe a person who has never experienced the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ. It’s a word that describes the human condition in primal terms – a reflection of something we once knew as a race, a description of how vainly we attempt to find it again.
The word: Lost.
To be lost is to experience some temporary goodness in this life – comforts, pleasures, and the like – and be clueless as to their Ultimate Source.
To be lost is search in vain for ultimate satisfaction in those temporary blessings and find only emptiness instead.
To be lost is to live in a material world that values life by gain and gold, and be blind to the sources of greatest joy and satisfaction. [click to continue…]
“What is the secret of your life?” asked Mrs. Browning of Charles Kingsley; “Tell me, that I may make mine beautiful too?”
He replied, “I had a friend.” -William C. Gannet
It was 18 years ago this month that I came to this place… this place of tumbleweeds and dust and amazing sunsets and more amazing people.
It was nothing short of surrender. I had given up on me – the “me” of my own making or imagination, that is.
My friends in Atlanta asked, “Where are you moving?”
“To hell,” I replied. “If the world was flat, Lubbock would be on the edge of it.”
But oh what I discovered when I showed up as a shell of the man I once was. Most importantly, I discovered that God was here all the time, waiting so patiently for me to get here. [click to continue…]
“You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself” (Exodus 19:4, NIV)
Here is a place.
An experience.
An image used to describe the powerful grace of a loving God.
Here is a birthright.
An invitation.
A metaphor for flying swiftly above the dangers and dead-ends into the loving arms of a Heavenly Father.
And where you can’t go on your own and when you lack the strength to survive, that’s when He meets you where you are and brings you to Himself… on eagles’ wings. [click to continue…]
The language of a Judge is to execute and liberate.
“knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin” (Romans 6:6-7).
The language of a Father is provision.
“God will provide for himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son,” (Genesis 22:8). [click to continue…]
Love…
Such a simple word in English,
made complicated by the fact
that it can mean and refer to so many things.
It’s often cheapened
by reducing it to something resembling selfish pleasure…
It often generates cynicism
among those who gave their hearts to someone or something,
and were crushed by the experience…
It creates confusion
because the same word can be used for
Readers Digest,
Mom’s lasagna,
old movies,
and your newborn infant.
Yet even in the face of the frustration of finding the right way to express ourselves,
I still believe in the promise and the reality of a Perfect Love… [click to continue…]
We’re in an interesting season and it has me thinking a lot about – and working a lot on – home. In a couple of months we’ll be moving from this…
To this…
At times the process has felt a lot like David’s famous whine: “How long, O Lord?” At other times we’ve found ourselves wondering how in the world we’ll get it all done.
All the details.
All the work.
All the thinking and buying and selling and meeting and planning and more meeting…
To prepare a place called Home.
In between all those details, plus the daily joys of work and service which go on regardless, I’ve been thinking about another kind of Home. One that’s more lasting. One where I have a place, but don’t have the task of preparing it… I just have to partner with the Lord to prepare me for the place.
Sometimes, like the Whiner-in-Chief, I look at this hope and ask, “How long, O Lord?” And sometimes I get this sense that it’s sooner than I think. [click to continue…]