“Never let weakness convince you that you lack strength.”

That quote — gleaned from the wisdom of “anonymous,” who never seems to be short on advice — is posted on the wall of my gym. It’s strategically placed over the spot where I’m always gasping and struggling to curl that what-was-I-thinking dumbbell for one last repetition.

“Oh yeah,” I tell myself between gasps whenever my eyes catch a glimpse of the slogan — usually as they begin to roll back in my head, delirious from exhaustion.

Okay, it’s really not that bad. Even so, I need that reminder sometimes. It encourages me to draw from inner resolve, focusing not on my limitations but on whatever potential I think I have. It defines my fitness in terms of future vision rather than past progress. I like that. I’m not quite sure what psychological tricks it does to rearrange my thinking, but that doesn’t matter. All I know is that when I’m feeling physically weak, it tells me I have other kinds of strength to tap into.

There’s a spiritual principle somewhere in there. In fact, it’s a pretty solidly biblical principle. Paul told the Corinthians that God’s strength was greatest in him at exactly those points in which he was most inadequate. “My power is made perfect in weakness,” the Lord had told him. So Paul celebrated his weakness, “for when I am weak, then I am strong.”1

Paul may have articulated this principle most concisely among biblical writers, but he certainly wasn’t the only one to understand it. Abraham, Moses, and Gideon, among others, were all completely inadequate for the job God called them to do. David’s psalms are full of helplessness — in fact, the ones in which David is most helpless are the ones in which God’s deliverance is most obvious. And we get the impression that God prefers it that way. The greater the deliverance, the greater the glory.

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That concept should rearrange our lives. The more room God has to work in us, the more glory he receives.

A Strange Celebration

I don’t know many people who celebrate their weaknesses. I know some who wallow in them or derive some kind of humility merit badge by admitting them, but I haven’t seen many who truly glory in them as opportunities for God to work.

I certainly haven’t done a good job of that. I’m often embarrassed by my weaknesses and try to cover them up. I know I’m not alone in that; it’s human nature. Even when I’m not particularly embarrassed by a failure or shortcoming, I still try to compensate for it somehow. I try harder to eliminate any semblance of my humanity, forgetting the fact that God made us to be decidedly human. We were created to be limited beings who are intimately connected to an unlimited God.

The gospel allows us to reclaim that original design. We don’t have to cover up our sins; we confess them instead. We don’t have to be depressed by our frailties because we know that our finiteness doesn’t stand alone apart from God’s infiniteness. And we don’t have to compensate for our weakness because God more than compensates. In fact, he delights in it. It’s his opportunity to show off, a platform to demonstrate his goodness and power.

From that, we can even conclude that to the degree we do not delight in our weakness, we are contradicting God and resisting his glory.

Does that seem harsh? Maybe, but it’s certainly biblical.

Jesus told us to become like little children, to be great by serving and to live by dying daily. He even led the way. So if you ever want to see what God’s glory looks like in a human life, he’s the showcase. And it’s hard to argue with the results.

While the rest of the world is confined in a box of weakness, banging their heads against a finite ceiling, we who believe in the infinite God are offered an open door into all the resources of heaven. We don’t have to limit our lives to the five senses or human ingenuity. Jesus gave extravagant promises to those who ask and believe.

But Jesus gave those promises with an explanation of how branches, useless in and of themselves, draw their strength and their fruit from a life-giving vine.2 His entire ministry and all of his teaching illustrated what creatures of dust filled with divine life can do. The Son of God got up from the throne of universal power, stepped into a manger in a Middle Eastern shepherding community, hungered, thirsted, laughed, cried, and bled till he died — and changed the world dramatically for time and eternity. In light of that, maybe we should reconsider the glory of our weakness.

Jesus is our vine. As detached branches, we are weak and useless. As abiding branches, we are weak and powerful. Weakness is not a variable in this equation; we have no choice about that. But our connection to the Vine? That’s the key. And that connection requires us to be personally insufficient and more passive than we’d like.

Independent Branches

Many Christians’ lives are sad illustrations of what a branch accomplishes when it strains to bear fruit. We try to look like we thrive, pasting the best leaves on ourselves and presenting immature fruit as our best offerings. But that’s hard work, and it never gives us satisfying results. After all of our efforts at cultivation, our strength still only accomplishes two things: unhealthy produce and detachment from God.

Next time you contemplate your weaknesses — right now would be a good time — try this exercise: force yourself to thank God for the opportunity he’s created to reveal himself. Ask him to step into your weakness with his strength, and then go ahead and celebrate this platform for his glory.

If you do that often enough, it will rearrange your perspective. One day you’ll find yourself relaxed and optimistic about your circumstances, your self-perception will paradoxically grow healthier and more confident, and your God will show up in a big way.

And when he does, you’ll know this for certain: your weakness never means that you lack strength.

This article was originally published in indeed magazine, Walk Thru the Bible. Used by permission.

“How do squirrels remember where to find the nuts they’ve buried?” my lovely and curious wife wondered as we looked out the window over lunch one day.

She wasn’t really expecting an answer. She knows that (1) I’m clueless about squirrels and (2) I’ve long outgrown that masculine urge to impress a woman by coming up with explanations that sound halfway intelligent and hoping they might be true. So I did what any wise husband does these days. I asked my phone.

Turns out that squirrels are pretty fascinating in the way they find their long-buried nuts. True, they have tiny brains that struggle with a simple right-or-left decision when a car is barreling toward them — I’d venture a guess that the number one killer of squirrels is indecision, not predators — but in their search for food, there’s a lot going on between those little ears.

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According to the collective wisdom of the internet distilled into the brevity of a chatbot response:

• Squirrels organize their nuts like a filing system, burying each type of nut in a different zone. They (the internet, not squirrels) call it “spatial chunking.” That way their minds don’t have to remember a zillion locations, just a handful of spots where each kind of nut can be found.

• They use landmarks — rocks, trees, benches, buildings — as a mental GPS to remind them where they’ve stored their food. (If you move a rock or bench or cut down a tree, they’ll get confused.)

• They conduct fake burials, pretending to bury a nut by digging up the ground and patting it down again, all while hiding it in their mouths and carrying it to a different location. This will throw off any thieving scavengers who may have been spying on them through the nearby weeds.

• They rehearse their routes, sometimes even digging up and reburying the same nuts to keep their memory fresh through winter and into the spring.

Other than the fake nut-burying, for which I’m hard-pressed to find a spiritual parallel at the moment, I think squirrels are giving us a fabulous illustration of spiritual disciplines — especially that part about rehearsing their routes to keep their knowledge fresh.

Keeping Truth Alive

Have you ever heard a life-changing sermon or read a life-changing book that becomes a fuzzy memory after a year, a month, or even a few days, and didn’t really change your life that much after all? Yeah, me too. (Sadly, that applies to some of my own sermons and books as time goes on.)

Have you ever sensed a breakthrough moment in your relationship with God that you’re certain will reshape your spiritual experience and help you live with greater understanding, passion, and power — only to find yourself going down the same well-worn paths a few weeks later?

Have you ever found it easy to remember seemingly unanswered prayers while forgetting the multitude of answered ones? Or to think of life as just a series of challenges rather than a series of overcoming them?

Perspective is a powerful thing, and most of us lose it often. We lose sight of what’s true or remember it with a negative spin. We look at a glass that’s 98 percent full and somehow think it’s at least half empty. We fail to steward our breakthrough moments well. We forget where we’ve buried our nuts.

Most of us, if we try for more than a few minutes, can look back over our lives and see blessing after blessing, grace upon grace, and mercies that are new every morning. If we can’t, it probably isn’t because our history with God is devoid of these things. It’s because we’ve grown too accustomed to their negative counterparts — our guilt, shame, failures, hardships, challenges, trials, and traumas — and have unwittingly trained ourselves to see life through pain-colored lenses.

It isn’t that those pains and problems aren’t real. They absolutely are. But God’s favor and blessings are even more real, and far more lasting.

Memories that Change Lives

This is why scripture repeatedly urges us to cultivate the pathways in our brains to remember what’s true.

God told his people to write his commandments on their hearts, to bind them on their heads and hands, to talk about them throughout the day and diligently teach them to their children.1

He told them to set up memorial stones to remember the great work he did for them in leading them into their Promised Land.2

He inspired psalmists to meditate on his word day and night, hide it in their hearts, and declare his mercies forever.3

He reminded them often of the great deliverance he had accomplished on their behalf4 — apparently they needed those reminders a lot — and repeatedly called them back into true devotion to him.5

In fact, all of scripture is a record of his works, which demonstrate his nature, which is revealed specifically for us to learn, embrace, and embody through repeated exposure to who he is and what he has done.

In other words, we are to ingrain his track record deep into our souls so that his truth becomes our constant companion in every season of life. Kind of like squirrels whose lives depend on finding those buried nuts (well, that and being more decisive about running right or left, either side will do, when life’s challenges are barreling down on them).

The bottom line, for us and the squirrels, is that deeply embedded truth is the key not only to surviving but also to thriving.

Very few people’s lives are changed by passively remembering a few truths God has given them. Those whose lives will be radically, genuinely transformed by his truths will rehearse them. They will rerun the routes. They will bury and dig up and rebury and dig up again. They will eat and drink the life and words of Jesus because that’s where life and nourishment come from,6 and God forbid we neglect the eternal meal he gives us, no matter how long it’s been buried in the soil of our lives.

That’s the power of an intentional memory. When nourished well, life in the Spirit becomes an incisive internal GPS that sees us through the world’s harshest winters. Cultivate it constantly, and it will bring you into the most glorious springs.

There are two kinds of people in Christendom: those who seek God’s will and those who seek his wisdom.

Actually, that’s an overstatement; most of us do some of both. But most of us lean toward one or the other instinctively and/or unconsciously, which can lead to lots of interesting and often-fruitless discussions whenever we have to make a decision.

You know how this goes, I’m sure. You’re facing a major decision, and all sorts of questions and criteria start running through your mind. If you’re like most believers, you ask God for guidance. But, if you’re like most believers, you also start analyzing the situation to figure out the best course of action. That’s because there are two ways to approach faith-based decision-making, and both are solidly biblical. And most people vacillate between them.

The wisdom approach: I call this Proverbs Christianity because it draws from biblical wisdom statements to inform our thought processes. We assess a situation, measure the costs, benefits, and risks, and make the wisest decision we can based on the information we have and our sense of God’s leading, to whatever degree we have it.

The revelation approach: I call this “God said” Christianity because it involves listening for (or otherwise sensing) God’s voice, receiving specific direction, and following it whether it makes sense to our natural reasoning or not. As in, “Lord, just tell me what to do.”

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Bonus article: I’ve posted a review of the newly released movie A Great Awakening over on my other Substack page, The Next Great Awakening (had to with the name, right?). Rather than reposting here, which would unfortunately give dual subscribers the same post two days in a row, I’ll simply provide the above links for those who are interested. Now on with today’s article . . .

Excerpted and adapted from Unburdened: The Secret to Letting God Carry the Things that Weigh You Down.1

I’ve noticed a strange phenomenon in mainstream evangelical Christianity. I call it “yes-but theology.” In our well-meaning attempts to prevent people from misunderstanding the Bible, we focus much of our teaching on all the possible abuses and false interpretations of a verse or passage. Then we draw narrow lines around the text so people will learn precisely what the verse or passage intended to say.

But in doing so, we often draw the limits too tightly or too rigidly; or we draw the limits perfectly accurately but then focus entirely on the limits rather than what’s inside them.

The result is that with any truth or principle that seems too good to be true, we say “yes, but . . .” and then explain why it doesn’t mean what it looks like it means.

Take, for example, the passage in which Jesus told his disciples, “Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”2 I’ve heard sermons on that verse in which 90 percent of the teaching is about what it doesn’t mean. It isn’t giving us permission to “name it and claim it”; it doesn’t mean we can just ask for selfish desires; there are a lot of conditions to prayer; we have to ask according to God’s will; and so on.

And while all of that is true, by the time the sermon gets to what the verse does mean, Jesus’ words have pretty much lost all the power they had in their original form. There’s nothing inspiring left in this promise. Its truth means practically nothing when it’s surrounded by theological barbed-wire fences saying, “Don’t get too close to this one.”

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For some reason, Jesus uttered this statement in bare-naked form. He just put it out there for the disciples without any noticeable caveats around it. He did what we’re afraid to do: state a bold truth and let people embrace it and perhaps even misunderstand it.

Why did he do that without warning against its abuses? I believe it’s because of the way we fallen creatures perceive the world. We question good news readily and accept it reluctantly. In order for us to have a balanced view of his truth, he has to emphasize the extravagance of it. We’re skeptics by nature. We don’t need help thinking of reasons the good news isn’t all that good. We need help believing it.

Sometimes It’s Simply True

The same dynamic works for all those verses that tell us not to worry, that God bears our burdens, that we can trust him, and that we’re free. Our natural reaction to them is “yes, but . . .” followed by multifaceted explanations of all the possible exceptions. We have a mind-numbing capacity for making simple theological truths complex, and it usually shows up when we’re interpreting scripture through painful, real-life experience.

That’s understandable. I know, for example, the thoughts that can come to mind when we read through the benefits of trusting God above. We can think of people who don’t fit the description — people who trusted God and still died of cancer or remained unemployed for a year or two.

I can imagine John the Baptist sitting in prison with Psalm 50:15 on his lips: “Call on me when you are in trouble, and I will rescue you, and you will give me glory.” I have no doubt that John trusted God, yet he was executed anyway. And I don’t think situations like that require us to redefine “rescue” or “healing” or anything else we normally redefine when we wrestle with a promise. There are times when God chooses, for very good reasons, not to do what he indicated he would do as a general rule.

The problem is when the exceptions loom much larger in our own minds than the fulfillments do. Most of us say “yes, but” much more easily than we say “thank you, Lord.” Somehow we have to reverse that tendency and assume that, in most cases, God will do for us exactly as he said he would do. And we have to refuse to worry about the possibility that he might not.

Through the Lens of a Promise

I can’t explain the exceptional cases that cause us to question God’s assurances. Maybe there are times when God chooses not to act because the person in question really didn’t trust God, or maybe the hardship he or she went through was actually a means to something much greater or part of a much bigger plan for which, in the eternal scheme of things, God rewards his participants amply.

I do know, however, that even in hard situations, he never violates our trust in him. He never proves untrustworthy. He doesn’t tease us with false promises. If we’re told so emphatically that we can trust him, there’s a very good reason we can. He means for us to read his Word and be filled with confidence that he will behave in a way that is consistent with his character and true to his promises.

He also means for us to trust him before we see how the situation plays out. If we’re waiting to see what God is going to do in our circumstances before we trust him, that isn’t trust.

That’s why we’re told that faith is the evidence of things not seen,3 that we should fix our eyes on what is invisible,4 and that we walk by faith and not by sight.5 Whether we’re looking ahead to eternal realities or trusting God day to day, we have to learn to rely on spiritual senses and not on what our eyes see and our ears hear. We have to be able to depend on God in the midst of our crises. He generally waits until we trust him before he shows how trustworthy he is. In the meantime, he gives us his Word and tells us to hang on to it without fear.

I’m determined not to live with a yes-but belief system. When my experience and a particular promise don’t line up, I want to look at my experience through the lens of the promise rather than looking at the promise through the lens of my experience. I want to bring my understanding up to the level of God’s truth, not bring his truth down to the level of my understanding. I want to accept the extravagance of his Word without focusing on all the exceptions I can’t explain.

That’s the only way I know how to live by faith according to the words he has spoken. And I believe this is the only way we can live in the freedom he wants us to have.

For a moment, the darkness took over. The daylight hours were done, and the night brought out the worst kinds of evil. The clash of kingdoms had come to a head as the “ruler of this world”2 sought to impose his agenda against the will of heaven. As Jesus was questioned by one of this world’s human rulers, he affirmed his kingship but insisted that his Kingdom was not the kind any human ruler should fear. Pilate agreed, but the Jewish leaders and their stirred-up crowds were adamant that Jesus should be crucified.

Meanwhile, Peter denied Jesus three times, and the crowds claimed Caesar as their king — a shocking betrayal of their calling. As the horrific injustice unfolded, Pilate unwittingly prophesied the truth about Jesus in the sign he made for the cross — “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek3 — and soldiers unwittingly fulfilled Scripture by casting lots for Jesus’ robe.4 Jesus committed the care of his mother to the disciple who authored this Gospel and then died on this “day of preparation” as the sacrificial lambs were being slaughtered for Passover meals. Two men who had secretly believed in Jesus (but not openly) followed him — their positions in society made such decisions difficult — placed his body in a tomb as the high Sabbath of the holiday began.

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The morning after the Resurrection was chaotic, and Jesus’ appearances to his followers were sporadic. In those encounters, he convinced them that his resurrection was real, breathed his Spirit into them just as God breathed life into Adam, sent them out to continue his mission, and restored the one who denied him. As catastrophic as Jesus’ brutal execution seemed, his resurrection inaugurated the new creation. The seed that died in the ground would bring a harvest of eternal life.

From the foot washing of his disciples5 to the commissioning of those disciples,6 Jesus wove the Incarnation into his teaching — not just his incarnation but theirs and ours as well. Like Jesus, we humble ourselves in service, and love sacrificially; like him (and because of him), we carry eternal life and glory within us; and like him, we will die and be raised up.

Other than his deity and his being the unique, substitutionary sacrifice to take away our sin, virtually everything he claims for himself is imparted to us in some measure. We receive forgiveness and give it; we receive life and lead others to it; we hear his words and see his works and are called to speak and do them; we receive his love and share it freely; he gives us his own Spirit; and onward the Incarnation goes.

Most believers see their lives as a calling to serve God faithfully in whatever he has them do — which, in some respects, is a good definition of discipleship. But it’s also a limited vision. John gives us a fuller view to embrace: a life of embodying Jesus not only in principle but also in presence and power — a genuine union of our spirit with his, through which we become incarnations of him in the world.

He spoke of this life in his upper-room discourse before his crucifixion and imparted it after his resurrection. We not only enter into the new creation. It enters into us to multiply Jesus’ ministry, advance his Kingdom, and fill the world with his wisdom, power, and love.

Trust doesn’t come easily for anyone other than children, which is perhaps why Jesus told us to have the faith of a child. Most of us have developed some level of mistrust in God from past experiences, particularly those times when God either felt absent or perhaps even seemed to be working against us.

I know someone who refers to this kind of event as “the elephant in the room of her soul” — a big, lingering question about where God was during a crisis moment in her childhood. We all have these doubts at some point in our lives about whether God is really on our side. All of us have gone through trials and crises that left us wondering why God didn’t intervene. Where was he? Why didn’t he answer that huge, desperate prayer? Why did he let that tragedy happen? The lack of answers to these questions nags at us, undermining our trust in the one who tells us he is trustworthy.

There isn’t an easy solution for getting this deep-seated mistrust out of our hearts — if by “easy” we mean “effortless.” But the solution begins with a simple approach: we decide to trust God regardless of how things look or how little we understand him.

Ever since the fall, the world, the flesh, and the enemy of our souls seem constantly to be conspiring to convince us that God is not good, that he can’t be trusted. And listening to those voices or judging by appearances isn’t going to resolve that false perception for us. We have to choose to believe what God says about himself and what we know to be true from the ways he has worked in our lives. No matter how things look, no matter how inexplicable certain life experiences seem to be, he isn’t a hard master.

Insisting on that truth is a matter of living by faith rather than by sight, and it can be extremely difficult. We need divine help with it and lots of encouragement to fuel us. Whatever it takes, we can’t let our faith submit to the dictates of our experience.

Those who persist in the stubborn belief that God is good eventually find that their experience has to bow to their faith.

There’s a Reason It’s Commanded So Often

Trust is a vital aspect of our relationship with God. The Bible explicitly urges us well over a hundred times to trust God and implicitly teaches us to do so even more often.

In the Psalms alone, trust in God is mentioned over fifty times. We often read of David or another psalmist declaring trust in the Lord and remember only their statement of faith. But the Psalms are a virtual field manual on how to move from an attitude of fear, anxiety, and stress to an attitude of trust and rest. These writings are more than historical information. They are case studies. They show us how to cultivate this essential approach to life.

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The weighed-down feelings we have can usually be traced back to some underlying mistrust of God. And we’ve all experienced a lot of the ways we can talk ourselves out of trusting him by wondering if there’s legal fine print underneath his promises or assuming that his promises don’t apply to our specific situations. But the solution has to be more than a simple “trust God.” It begins there, but it has to be fueled by more than human willpower.

We know we need to trust him, but until we’re convinced that it will make a genuine difference in our lives and that God will come through for us, it doesn’t help much for someone to tell us to trust him. We first have to know the benefits of trusting him.

Why Trust?

Perhaps we’ve heard the instruction to trust God so often that we’ve become numb to its implications, but it’s more than an encouraging pat on the back. Though telling ourselves to trust him may feel like a mood-boosting platitude, it’s the first step in a profound change in perspective. It literally can change the quality of our lives.

Look at it this way: we’re always trusting in something. Some people choose to trust in impersonal natural processes as the overriding mechanism of how life works. Some people chalk everything up to random chance. Some place a lot of faith in their own intellect or abilities, or in the intellect and abilities of people they look up to. Most of us trust history to some degree, assuming that however things have gone in the past is an indicator of how they will go in the future.

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And considering how many of us have experienced negative circumstances and how often we’ve been disappointed, the deck is stacked against us when we try to trust God and have faith. We may even end up trusting in the tendency for things to go wrong more than we trust in God’s willingness to protect, provide, and deliver. But regardless of our focus, at every moment in our lives, we are trusting something or someone.

So the gist of the scriptural command isn’t “trust God instead of not trusting him.” It’s “trust God instead of trusting everything else you invest your beliefs in.” In any situation in life, that’s imperative. We have an opportunity in virtually every circumstance to make a statement of faith. And if we want to live with a sense of freedom, we absolutely have to shift our trust from lesser gods to the one true God.

The Unbeatable Benefits of Trust

We have plenty of incentive to do so. According to the Psalms, we can say that God has never abandoned or forsaken anyone who trusted him and sought him2 and that no one who has trusted him has ever been disappointed.3 Those who trust him will never be shamed or disgraced,4 nor will they ever lack any good thing.5 Our trust in him eliminates the need for fear,6 and all the power is somehow taken out of any bad news we might receive.7 In fact, we can know that we will never be defeated in any real sense of the word but will rather endure forever.8

One of the Psalms gives us a picture of God storing up his goodness — literally hoarding it or saving it up like treasure — in order to bless those who take refuge in him.9 Another assures us that his unfailing, relentless love surrounds — completely envelops — those who trust him.10 Everyone who trusts him will:

• be freely pardoned;11

• be rescued;12

• go in to their land of promise and possess it;13

• live in the land in safety and under his blessing;14

• be happy and blessed;15

• have ample reason to praise him;16

• thrive like an olive tree.17

God helps those who trust him,18 he gives food to those who trust him,19 and he is a shield of protection to those who trust him.20 Trust in God inevitably results in joy.21

Do you understand what this means? The Psalms are giving us a portrait of someone who trusts in God: happy, fearless, full of joy, worshipful, free, well provided for, overflowing with good gifts, protected, safe, secure, victorious, and thriving. Apparently, God responds to our heartfelt trust by pouring out his goodness on us.

One gets the impression from Scripture that the thought of a trusting soul not receiving food or protection or blessing ought to be absolutely inconceivable. It would make no sense for a loving father to observe the earnest trust of a dependent child and not respond to it with an outpouring of love. If Scripture is even remotely true, God honors our trust. He always lives up to it. We open our mouths in trust, and he fills them.

Anyone who believes that God inspired the words of scripture and that his promises in the Bible are true can’t help but be encouraged and strengthened by the clearly stated benefits of trusting God.

In fact, it may help to read through those benefits again and again, slowly and thoughtfully, letting them sink in. Look up the specific verses cited above and even read them out loud. Rehearsing the truth like that makes a powerful statement to our minds and goes a long way toward undoing the lies we’ve believed. If we can integrate these truths into our way of thinking, our burdens will begin to feel lighter.

“My given name is Benjamin Buford Blue, but people call me Bubba.”

That is Forrest Gump’s introduction to his best friend in the army. From the rigors of boot camp to the horrors of Vietnam, Forrest and Bubba grow close enough to know quite a few details of each other’s lives.

Bubba’s past experiences seem to be rather one-dimensional. His family’s business is shrimp, and he can seemingly talk forever about the multiple ways to serve it up. “You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, sauté it. . . . There’s shrimp kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo, pan-fried, deep-fried, stir-fried, pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich . . .” and on and on and on.

For his part, Forrest is genuinely interested in hearing all about shrimp. The bond that develops between the two friends grows deeper and deeper, not just over shrimp, but over the trials and tribulations of menial service and violent fighting. When both of them are injured, Forrest feels attached enough to Bubba to run into a blazing jungle to carry his friend out, even against direct orders. In the spirit of a Savior bent on healing on the Sabbath, he risks his own life and the ire of a lieutenant to save a friend.

In his dying breaths, Bubba laments the unfulfilled vision of owning his own shrimp company. Later in the movie, after Forrest is released from the army, he decides to go to Bubba’s home in Bayou la Batre, Alabama, buy a shrimp boat, and live out his best friend’s dream through the Bubba-Gump Shrimp Company. He knew nothing about the shrimp business before he met Bubba, and he knows very little about it years later. But his passion for his friend overrides all inexperience, costs, and logistical difficulties. He can’t let Bubba’s dream die because their hearts are forever connected.

That’s how relationships work. Shared experiences create bonds, and bonds deepen over time. The closer two people grow, the more they share each other’s feelings and dreams. When one suffers, the other suffers, and when one rejoices, the other does too. Their hearts begin to beat in the same rhythm.

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Hannah poured her heart out to God so desperately that the priest thought she was drunk. She explained the situation — that she had been pouring her soul out before the Lord in grief — and without knowing exactly what she was praying for, the priest simply said, “The God of Israel grant your petition.”1

How would you respond if the Lord’s representative said something like that to you? Your hope might swell. You might go home with a bit more optimism than you had before. You might think, Maybe, just maybe it’s true.

Hannah apparently didn’t respond with any such uncertainty. Her entire countenance changed. No longer sad, she got up the next morning and worshiped. In other words, she actually believed. And because she believed what the priest had told her, God gave her what she had prayed for — a son dedicated to the Lord’s service (and, as it turns out, who would change the course of the nation).

What Kind of Faith?

Faith is a multifaceted phenomenon. Sometimes we believe God can do something without being convinced that he will. Sometimes we hope he might do something, but we suspect he probably won’t, as if our prayers are a shot in the dark that have a slim chance of hitting the target. Sometimes we trust in his general goodness but don’t believe him for a specific outcome.

But sometimes we believe in a specific outcome because we’re absolutely convinced he will do what he said, and that conviction sinks deep into our hearts.

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Early in his ministry in the 1930s, Armin Gesswein had an opportunity to walk with Jonathan Goforth on the way to the old missionary’s chapel address. Here’s my chance to ask him a question, Gesswein thought. So he blurted out the most pressing one he could think of.

“Dr. Goforth, what is the greatest need in the church today?”

“The Holy Spirit,” Goforth said. “The church hardly knows the Holy Spirit.”

A few years later, Gesswein and a friend went to hear G. Campbell Morgan speak at Westminster Chapel in London. After the message, he waited in a line of people to meet the great preacher. When they came face to face, Gesswein asked him the same question.

“Dr. Morgan, what do you think is the greatest need in the church today?”

The answer sounded very familiar: “The Holy Spirit,” Morgan told him. “The church hardly knows the Holy Spirit — I don’t mean ‘second blessing,’ but the Holy Spirit.”

The South African pastor and writer Andrew Murray had written much the same thing: “The church of today is suffering for the lack of one thing only, the heavenly enduement of power that made the apostolic church triumphant — the Pentecostal Spirit.”1 Missionary John Hyde wrote in a letter in 1900 that he believed that God would restore to the church the fullness of the Holy Spirit’s power in the coming century.2

In fact, this was not an unusual sentiment in the early part of the twentieth century. There was a persistent sense of need for better knowledge of and experience with the Holy Spirit.

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It stands to reason, then, that prayers for more Spirit experiences, greater empowering, and a stronger sense of his presence would lead to outpourings of the Spirit in the next generations, and they have. The Spirit certainly wasn’t absent in the previous centuries — far from it. But the hunger of the church led to seasons of outpouring, stronger emphases, and more developed theology — as well as arguments about it, unfortunately — regarding the Holy Spirit’s work.

Christians debate which of these outpourings and experiences were (and are) on target or not. We have a disturbing tendency to “defend” the Spirit by grieving him and quenching his work. But no one can deny that there has been an exponential increase in Spirit-led movements in the last few decades. (And, it should be noted, exponential increase is itself a mark of the Spirit.)

From the words of Jesus and the ministries of the early church and its apostles, the Spirit is and has always been the most essential aspect of the Christian life. Perhaps that’s why this has been one of the most divisive topics among us. “The unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace”3 seems elusive.

My point, however, is that we are living in an age in which many people are having deep and dramatic encounters with the Holy Spirit and are moving in sync with him. And there’s a flourishing of new life that accompanies everything he does. Churches and denominations from across the theological spectrum that emphasize dependence on the Spirit and manifestations of his presence and power are among the fastest growing in the world. Clearly, God is on the move.

Jesus told Nicodemus, “The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”4 He also told his followers that “he abides with you but will be in you.”5 In other words, the wind/breath/Spirit of God (the word means all three in both Hebrew and Greek) is not only moving among his people but also in them. And the results can be wildly unpredictable.

Embrace the unpredictability, but even more, get to know the Spirit and depend on him as the church’s — and your — greatest need. Prayers from a hundred years ago are bearing fruit in our generation. We can only imagine how prayers from our generation will shape the future.

I’ve had the privilege of holding a just-born son three times, and every time I’ve been overwhelmed with a sense of love and appreciation for the miracle in my arms.

That kind of love clearly isn’t earned; an infant has done absolutely nothing in his short little life to deserve it. It comes with no strings attached; you don’t expect an infant to do anything for you, certainly not for years to come. In fact, he’s totally dependent from day one and can’t contribute anything to the family other than just being.

So where does that love come from? Other than being a divine gift, which I’m convinced it is, it comes simply from the heart of a father for his child. A loving father wants to pour out his love into that little life. It’s his nature.

That’s a small snapshot of God’s love for his children, which certainly isn’t given because we did something to deserve it or because he sets conditions on us that we’ll have to fulfill in order to continue receiving it. No, he loves because it’s his nature.

We can be overwhelmed by the love that comes from our finite hearts, but God’s heart is infinite, capable of an unimaginably greater love than any love we’ve ever felt. And to think of ourselves as the object of that love is mind-blowing.

But give it a shot anyway. Try a little experiment. Think about the most intense love you’ve ever felt for someone and let that feeling sink into your heart for a minute. Now think of what that love would feel like if its intensity were doubled. Sit with that for a minute, then imagine what it might feel like doubled again. And again.

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A farmer bought a field, determined which crops he wanted to grow, studied the best techniques for growing those crops, then prepared the field, planted his seeds, and waited for his crops to grow.

Yet the soil did not produce a fruitful harvest.

Undaunted, he kept trying, sometimes with modest success, and sometimes without much success at all. There was usually enough to feed himself and his family, and occasionally a bit more for a marginal profit, but the abundant harvests he dreamed about never seemed to come. Still, it was a way to make a living — barely — and he worked hard at it.

One spring morning, the farmer went out into his fields and found that they had been deeply, violently plowed, made ready for some other kind of crop the farmer never planned on. Apparently the king of that country had sent his workers out in the dark of night to rip the ground apart and sow his preferred seed into it.

The farmer was upset that all of his plans had been so abruptly overturned, but as a subject of the king, there wasn’t much he could do about it. It was his land, but it wasn’t his kingdom. Protesting would have been much riskier than just waiting to see what happened.

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In 499 B.C., Ionian cities along the coast of Asia Minor revolted against Persian rule. Because the cities were Greek, Athens and Eretria soon sent soldiers across the Aegean Sea to support them, aiding in the burning of Sardis. The Persian King Darius was outraged and vowed revenge.

Darius nursed his grudge for nearly a decade, reportedly tasking one of his servants with reminding him three times a day, “Master, remember the Athenians.” If true, Darius heard this reminder every day for years, stoking the bitterness in his heart and setting his mind on vengeance. Nearly a decade later, he sent his army to battle against Athens at Marathon — and lost. His bitterness accomplished nothing but disappointment.

That’s how bitterness works. It’s often said that holding a grudge is like drinking poison and expecting it to hurt someone else. It may feel satisfying to think of evening a score or longing for someone to experience the pain of well-deserved justice, but nursing an offense — even a very justified one — brings rot to the soul. Anger, grudges, and bitter thoughts hurt no one but the holder.1

Here’s why: We were designed to thrive in what scripture calls shalom — a state of peace, fullness, wholeness, and satisfaction in every area of our lives. That inner wellbeing includes the free flow of divine love and a deep, abiding joy. Bitterness interrupts that joyful, peaceful state. It functions like a cancer, eroding our spiritual health and hindering the work of God’s Spirit within us. Anytime the Spirit would fill us with love, joy, wisdom, faith, or hope, bitterness throws up its hand and says “no.”

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Nearly twenty years ago, I wrote a chapter in one of my books that addressed fallen leaders in the church and how the church deals with them.1 (More recently, in the early weeks of this Substack page last year, I wrote on the same issue from a specific angle of the effects of Pharisaism in the church.)

Perhaps I’ll post the full chapter (or even the whole book) on this site one of these days because the subject matter is still very relevant, even more so now. I can’t remember which fallen minister(s) prompted my thoughts in that chapter at the time, but we’ve had plenty more examples across the Christian spectrum (evangelical, charismatic, reformed, etc.) in recent years and especially in recent months. It’s an alarming trend.

I recently read an article proposing that we should no longer read the books of one of those communicators, an evangelical apologist, who was discovered to have engaged in serious (and serial) sexual impropriety. I assume the author’s advice would apply to any other similarly compromised communicator, and I completely understand the sentiment. There’s something very unsavory about reading the words of someone who presents an image of truth while egregiously failing to live up to it.

But I’m also a little uncomfortable with the idea of throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater, primarily because nearly every Christian I know still reads the psalms of a king who commandeered another man’s wife for his own sexual pleasure and then had the man killed to cover it all up. And we faithfully, eagerly read those psalms as Holy Spirit-inspired scripture.

We also read the proverbs of a king who allowed his heart to be led astray by an astonishing number of women, to the degree that he ended up building idolatrous shrines to grotesque deities associated with all kinds of abominations, including child sacrifices. Though he once prayed to God for wisdom and received it in abundance, he did some remarkably unwise things toward the end of his life. And again, still, we read his proverbs as scripture.

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In many ways, it’s a great picture of the gospel. Princess Aurora lies perpetually sleeping in the castle, the victim of an evil curse. Her only hope is for true love’s kiss to wake her, but her true love, Prince Phillip, is in chains in the dungeon of the wicked queen Maleficent, who will do anything she can to keep him away from Aurora’s lips. The only way he’ll be able to find her is to fight an epic battle against the epitome of evil — and win.

You probably know the story, even if you’ve never seen Sleeping Beauty, Disney’s adaptation of the Grimm fairy tale. You know the ending because, in fairy tales, princes don’t remain in the dungeon and lament the unlikelihood of finding their true loves, princesses don’t remain asleep forever, and curses don’t succeed, even when it takes an epic battle to break them.

With a little help, Phillip manages to escape. He uses a magic sword and shield in hand-to-hand combat against the sorceress, who has turned herself into a massive and very ugly fire-­breathing dragon. Over rough terrain, through thorns, and at one point leaning backward over an enormous chasm, Phillip fights valiantly. Desperation leads to such extremes. This battle simply must be won. His true love must be awakened.

Finally, Phillip’s sword pierces the dragon’s heart and she suffers an earthshaking death. Phillip runs to Aurora’s bedchamber, kisses her on the lips, and the couple dances their way to “happily ever after.”

Beyond Rationalism

Prince Phillip is, in the world of fiction, the anti-Spock. Rationalists don’t appear in epic romances unless they’re portrayed as villains. That’s because everyone is pulling for hearts to be fulfilled, and that can’t happen if logic rules the day. Great victories require great sacrifices, which in turn require great emotional investments. That’s how the world was designed.

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That’s also how God redeemed us. Jesus made a great sacrifice of epic proportions to defeat the wicked dragon who had put us under a curse. Many people miss the romance of redemption and use the Cross as an example of doing what’s right in spite of our feelings. Like Jesus, who sweated drops of blood the night before the crucifixion because he really didn’t want to go through with it, we are to say, “Not my will but yours,” and obey anyway. But that’s not the whole story of the Cross.

That partial picture looks a lot like Vulcan Christianity. The greatest example of Mr. Spock’s approach to life came in one of the original Star Trek movies — The Wrath of Khan. In the climactic scene, the starship Enterprise is a sitting duck, completely vulnerable to an impending explosion. Its disabled engine needs a quick repair to regain warp power and speed away, and all that’s needed is a crew member to enter the reactor room. The only problem is that anyone who volunteers for the job will be exposed to lethal amounts of radiation. He’ll die within minutes.

That’s a hard choice for a human to make, but not for a Vulcan. Against the protests of Doctor McCoy, Spock locks himself in the reactor room and restores the power. Dying of radiation, he looks through the window and tells his old friend Captain Kirk not to mourn. “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one,” he says. This sacrifice, though painful, was only logical.

This is how many people perceive the Cross of Christ: Jesus wrestled with his emotions in the garden of Gethsemane, but the will of God won. But that’s not how the writer of Hebrews saw it. Though Jesus offered up his prayers “with loud crying and tears” (5:7), he ultimately endured the Cross “for the joy set before him” (12:2). It may have made logical sense to go to the Cross, but that wasn’t Jesus’ motivation. He went for the joy it would ultimately result in.

Don’t miss the significance of that. It may come across simply as a passing observation near the end of Hebrews, but there’s a powerful principle behind it. Jesus denied immediate emotions of grief and suffered the cross for another emotion — one that would deeply satisfy and last forever. His sacrifice was neither a Vulcan decision of logic nor a sterile decision of willpower, though both could certainly have applied. The real factor, the deciding motivation, was joy. You can endure a lot when you know the celebration will be worth it.

The Priority of Joy

Jesus passed his emotional priorities down to his disciples too:

“These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.”2

“Until now you have asked for nothing in My name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be made full.”3

“These things I speak in the world so that they may have My joy made full in themselves.”4

“Truly, truly, I say to you, that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; you will grieve, but your grief will be turned into joy.”5

The list could go on, but Jesus’ emphasis is clear. He could have said, “Ask and you will receive, so that God may accomplish his purposes in you,” but he didn’t. He could have taught, “I have given you these instructions so you’ll know the right things to do,” but he didn’t. The salvation and discipleship he preached were not simply for the sake of getting saved and being disciples. Our redemption isn’t primarily a “do things right” issue; it’s a “have my joy” issue. The wedding of the Bridegroom and bride isn’t for the sake of the ceremony; it’s for the joyful communion that results from it. From beginning to end, the gospel points to an eternal dance à la Prince Phillip and Princess Aurora.

What does it mean to have joy? It means living with a sense of fulfillment, abundance, satisfaction, and — dare I say it? — even ­pleasure. Pleasure is almost a dirty word in some Christian circles, frequently coupled with other words that increase our contempt for it — “passing pleasure” or “guilty pleasure” or “wanton pleasure.” But pleasure is a thoroughly biblical aspect of God’s Kingdom, and he wants us to experience it. Godly pleasure is applied to the right things in the right way at the right times. Joy celebrates pleasure. In fact, joy celebrates everything good. It’s the climate of the Kingdom.

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I’ve often heard people say that God’s goal isn’t to make us happy. That statement is directed at people who act as if whatever makes them feel good at the moment must be God’s will, and in that sense, it’s a great observation. But scripturally, we can say with confidence that God’s ultimate goal for us is to make us happy. He wants us to experience the blessedness and joy of his Kingdom. He created us to share his wealth of satisfaction, and he offers us “pleasures forevermore.”6 It may not always be an immediate pleasure, and it may not come by the same means we expect it to, but that’s where he’s bringing us. It’s all about the joy in the end. “Happy” is very high on his list of priorities.

You’ll notice that though many of Jesus’ parables end with weeping and gnashing of teeth, others end with joyous celebration. This sounds suspiciously like an emotional gospel, with truth and feelings all wrapped up together. God’s ultimate goal in this gospel is the kind of festive attitude present at a wedding banquet or a party in honor of a prodigal who returns. There is much joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, and that joy surely spills over into the hearts of those on earth who are able to whoop it up — in an appropriate Christian spirit of whooping it up, of course.

As we have seen, Jesus promises quite a bit of joy to his disciples. It would be negligent not to take him up on it.

Don’t Act on Your Feelings?

The biblical portrayal of Jesus undermines our never-act-on-your-feelings philosophy of discipleship. Jesus clearly acted on his feelings. He was moved with compassion, turned tables over in anger, pronounced woes and blessings in something other than a monotone voice and likely not with a straight face, and treated his followers with great affection, inviting them into his joy. And he made the ultimate sacrifice — in spite of loud crying and tears and the deep distress of Gethsemane — because of the joy set before him. He was both purpose-driven and passion-driven, and he never told anyone to separate the two. His life ought to settle the question once and for all of whether it’s okay to act on feelings. Okay? It’s imperative! Jesus did.

If we’re being transformed into the likeness of Christ, we’ll act on our emotions too. We’ll want to make sure that our feelings line up with God’s, of course; that’s part of asking him to continually fill us with his Spirit. But when our emotions do fit the character of our Father and ebb and flow with the breath of his Spirit, we can feel free to be motivated by them and even base our behavior on them. In that light, acting on our feelings and experiencing his joy — the eternal celebration of his love — are godly things to do.

I have a theory, and I think it’s a pretty good one. I suspect that wherever the New Testament refers to “peace,” the Hebraic concept of shalom is behind it.

That may sound like a big “so what,” but the distinction is important. The Greek word used in the New Testament for peace is similar to our definition of peace in English — absence of conflict, calmness, tranquility. It’s understandable that shalom gets translated this way because there’s neither a Greek nor English word that captures the fullness of its meaning. But it leaves us with an incomplete understanding of what the text is really saying.

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The Hebrew concept of shalom includes peace but also contentment, fullness, wholeness, and satisfaction. It’s that sense that all is right in your world, that you aren’t carrying huge conflicts and burdens within you, and that your life is flourishing. It’s a robust word loaded with connotations of comprehensive wellbeing.

That meaning is obvious in references to peace the original Old Testament text, though in translation directly from Hebrew to English, we still lose the fullness of the concept. But wherever we read “peace” in the Old Testament, we can generally assume it’s referring to shalom.

But why should we think the fullness of this word is behind “peace” in our New Testament? Because even though Jesus’ words are rendered in Greek in the gospels, he ministered in a Hebraic context and spoke Aramaic. The gospels are translations of what he said, not what he actually said.

In addition, every New Testament writer (with the possible exception of Luke, who was either a Gentile or a Hellenistic Jew) was Jewish — Hebraic thinkers writing in Greek because it was the lingua franca of their day. They were translating a Jewish gospel with Jewish concepts into a common language for a broad readership.

A Deeper, Fuller Meaning

So consider how the nuances of these verses change if we keep in mind the full meaning of shalom — fullness, wholeness, contentment, and overall wellbeing — not just our translation of “peace,” as we read them:

• “And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Shalom.”1

• “To give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of shalom.”2

• “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth shalom, goodwill toward men!”3

• “Blessed are the shalom-makers, for they shall be called sons of God.”4

• “He said to her, ‘Daughter, be of good cheer; your faith has made you well. Go in shalom.’”5

• “Shalom I leave with you, My shalom I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.”6

• “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have shalom. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”7

• “Shalom to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”8

• “For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and shalom and joy in the Holy Spirit.”9

• “And let the shalom of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.”10

This is just a sampling, of course. There are some ninety-five references to peace in the New Testament, and more than three hundred in the Old.

It would be going too far to say all of these are about the fullness of shalom. Some, like Jesus’ warning that he came not to bring peace on earth but a sword (or division),11 are more clearly about actual peace in the Greek and English sense, as we can tell from the context.

But many of them are. The Greek Old Testament (the Septuagint) translates shalom as “peace” throughout its pages, which should be a big clue as to how we should read the Greek New Testament and its English translations.

Why Does This Matter?

This changes some things, doesn’t it? It means that “peace” is not just a side-effect or outcome of the gospel but that the fullness of shalom is an integral aspect of the kingdom life and mission.

Yes, the fundamental purpose of the gospel is still a spiritual salvation for our souls, but as Jesus demonstrated throughout his ministry, it isn’t limited to that. Jesus not only forgave but also healed, delivered, blessed, and taught a comprehensive gospel that changes lives and promotes human flourishing. He came teaching the gospel of the kingdom,12 not just the plan of salvation as we’ve perceived it.

It’s okay to embrace the fullness of that mission. In fact, it’s necessary. If we really want to understand God’s will for our lives, we’ll embrace the shalom of his kingdom — the culture of heaven and of flourishing on earth — as our salvation and calling. If we really want to be “peacemakers,” per the Beatitudes, we’ll more holistically become shalom-givers who seek the fullness and wholeness of others.

Or, to put it another way, we’ll seek not only redemption but also the restoration of lives (including our own) in the new creation.

That’s a more beautiful gospel, and it’s the inheritance we’re promised in scripture. We can count on it. It’s why Jesus the Prince of Shalom came.

You know the drill. You make a change in your life and commit to keep it. What happens next is absurdly predictable. Almost immediately an obstacle comes up, right? Whatever the situation, some invisible entity seems to say, “Ha! You thought you could do this? What were you thinking?”

Deep down in your soul, you know that something — some vicious force, some sadistic principle of life in this world — is mocking your intention to grow. And it decisively stuffs you back into your old routines and habits.

Making a change is almost always challenged by an immediate obstacle . . . or six or seven of them. I’ve experienced that in almost every area of life, and you probably have too. For example:

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As he did almost every night a couple of decades ago, my eight-year-old son was watching a show on Animal Planet. That’s when a segment on the courtship of elephants caught my eye.

Hmmm, I thought. I’ve always wondered how God makes them attractive to each other. I mean, he’s good, but that’s kind of asking a lot. So naturally I paid attention.

Apparently, in order to entice a mate, a female elephant will send out a series of low-frequency signals — sounds that are imperceptible to the senses of humans and other creatures of the kingdom. But the signals aren’t imperceptible to male elephants. Every virile pachyderm in the vicinity feels the vibrations in his feet and immediately heads in the direction of the female.

What ensues is a rather cumbersome competition. There’s usually no shortage of bulky males who are drawn to the sounds of an alluring lady elephant. But somehow she’s able to choose the best specimen out of the mass of tussling trunks — mainly by being able to recognize the one that’s still standing. C’est l’amour.

Maybe that’s too crude an illustration for a deep spiritual truth, but I happen to think God worked a lot of profound illustrations into animal behavior. I’m not sure how that would apply to something like a platypus, but the lesson to be learned from the female elephant is clear: If you want to attract the presence of a huge protector and intimate companion, you’ll have to get in the habit of sending out some low signals that are generally unnoticed by human beings.

To put it another way, God has made it clear from the beginning what he desires from us. He’s drawn to our “low” attitudes — repentance, brokenness, selflessness, and a servant’s heart — and he fills the holes of our need with his presence. He wants unassuming hearts that love him, that take pleasure in submitting to him, that have no need of pretense, and that welcome his will for their lives, as numerous verses about his love for widows, orphans, the poor, the sick, the repentant, the desperate, and the brokenhearted testify. He has shown us what is good, said the prophet Micah: to walk humbly with our God.1

The Kingdom’s Value System

That’s not attractive to people who strive for gold, glamour, and glory, but God has a different standard. What’s appealing to us is often worthless to him, and what’s worthless to us often qualifies as priceless treasure in heaven. Lowliness of heart and mind fits in the latter category. He looks for the poor in spirit in order to make them rich in his love.

In other words, a humble heart is like a God-magnet. When he hears the low signals imperceptible to everyone else in the natural kingdom, he comes running. He enthusiastically attaches himself to those who love him. He’ll fight vehemently to protect and care for his beloved. His tenderness surrounds them and his favor pours out on them. He never lets them down.

Seems like that ought to be simple enough, but we have a way of complicating things — especially when we want to justify a certain level of independence from our Creator. Then we develop shades of truth and shadows of sin, relating to God in complex terms he never desired or authorized. We rationalize, justify ourselves, and build up walls of defensiveness. We cultivate nuances of pride and self-sufficiency, signals that may be noticed by other human beings but won’t attract the Presence we so deeply crave. We’re masters of subtle rebellion.

A Quiet Invitation

But God’s desire hasn’t changed. He loves simplicity of devotion. He enjoys those who enjoy him without compromising him. He created us for the kind of intimacy that goes far deeper than the mating rituals of elephants — that rejoices together, weeps together, works together, and loves each other implicitly. And since we don’t start out that way in life, there’s no way to develop that kind of relationship without moving from where we are.

The good news is that God moved first. He did everything necessary for us to boldly approach his throne of grace and to enjoy his presence. He put himself in the vicinity, and there he waits.

Now it’s our turn. We “repent” by changing our minds about who he is, letting him change our hearts to truly experience him, and living accordingly. The result of that return is a God who is “abounding in love” and wild about showing us his mercies.

If you want to more tangibly experience the God who’s on your side, who will defend you, lavish his love on you, provide for you, and bathe you in his favor, try the simple approach he prescribes. Send out some low signals designed only for him to hear. Turn toward him, live in deep humility, tolerate no pretense in yourself, believe his promises, and thank him constantly for his mercies. You’ll begin to see — and enjoy — his presence more and more.

This article was originally published in indeed magazine, Walk Thru the Bible. Used by permission.

I stood in line at the bank a couple days before 2025 ended — yes, I still prefer to go inside rather than talk to a faceless speaker at the drive-thru — and when I got up to the teller, there was a woman making a transaction at the next window and a person in line behind me.

“Have any New Year’s resolutions in mind for this year?” the teller asked me.

As a matter of fact, I did. I’d resolved to read the gospel of John once a week and be much more intentional this year about asking Jesus to show up in my conversations and circumstances and then get out of the way so he can work.

Yet with several pairs of eyes and ears nearby at the local bank, I mumbled something vague about having a few resolutions in mind. Something in me didn’t want to say, “Yes, I’m going to read the gospel of John each week and focus on the presence of Christ!” — as if simply answering a question amounted to inflicting my Christianity on others.

Why? I understand not wanting to be so overtly “religious” that people view us as oddities, but sometimes a little oddity is worth embracing. What if that teller or our eavesdroppers needed some inspiration to do the same? If so, I missed an opportunity.

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I’ve listened to a several decades’ worth of our cultural influencers encouraging people to “be who you are” and “live out loud.” So why would I be reluctant to do that? Because I know, for the most part, what our cultural trailblazers mean to say is, “Not you, Christians! You just stay in your churches and keep your opinions out of the public square. Living out loud is for everyone else.”

And the fact that a vocal minority of us do live out loud — and aren’t necessarily our best examples — makes the rest of us want to be a good bit more subtle.

But It’s True

A few days after my bank experience, I came across a devotional I wrote quite a few years ago based on the story of Stephen’s martyrdom in Acts 6-7. I’ve got plenty of experience with my present self speaking to my past self in convicting ways, but sometimes my past self returns the favor:

Stephen knew his speech wasn’t going to go over well. You don’t just walk into a lions’ den and impugn the character of lions. A mob mentality is never calmed by condemning it. It only rages stronger. Stephen understood what happens when you accuse the self-righteous of unrighteousness.

From a practical standpoint, his decision to go out in a blaze of glory seems pointless. He had no chance of appeasing his rabid opponents, and his lonely, dissenting voice would never speak again. His sacrifice wasn’t going to change anything, and it ensured that he would never have another chance to change anything again. The whole event appears futile. “Such a waste,” we might have said if we’d witnessed that maddening scene.

But Stephen’s witness stands for us today, some two thousand years later. After he preached a searing message that day in Jerusalem, he preached a visual message with his death, and the latter message still moves us. We are reminded that truth is more important than life, that the Spirit is poured out through uncompromising faith, that Jesus stands and welcomes those who honor him, and that our love for God must always be stronger than our fear of human beings.

The religious leaders were convinced Stephen was a blind fool, but Stephen saw heaven opened. He had already made a decision about what would fill his gaze: the approval of God, not the approval of men. He knew where to fix his sight.

What fills your sight in this world — a vision of God or the opinions of human beings? Which has a greater influence on you, especially in moments of crisis? It’s normal for Christians to experience opposition to their faith. It’s sad when that opposition alters their stand. It comes down to a choice between the power of intimidation and the power of a bold witness. Whichever looms larger to us will dictate our choices. Stephen traded his life for truth and a strong witness, and it was worth it. It always is.1

Private, Personal, or Public?

My experience with the bank teller hardly qualifies as any sort of martyrdom — it would have qualified as mild social awkwardness at worst, and a laughable dilemma to first-century Christians — but it’s symptomatic of the cultural dynamics that have been developing throughout the (several) decades of my life. I’ve been repeatedly told throughout my life that faith is personal and private (primarily by people who don’t agree with it). Meanwhile, everyone around me seems to be loudly, stridently encouraged to be very, very public about their very personal lives.

The bad news is that we live in a society in which everybody now judges everybody else for everything under the sun, whether they have a basic understanding of the situation or not. The good news is that there’s so much judgment flying around that no one really notices it anymore, at least not for more than a minute or two. So what if I get judged for being too publicly Christian? It’s who I am. They can deal with it.

It’s also my responsibility as someone anchored in the ultimate truth of all existence — a fact non-Christians would vehemently disagree with, and which Christians must adamantly insist on. If you’re a hungry beggar who has found a source of bread, you should tell all the other hungry beggars out there where it is (to borrow a metaphor from D. T. Niles). And if you’ve encountered the eternal source of eternal life, it’s worth being vocal about it.

Add that to my new New Year’s resolutions, which I wouldn’t have shared with the bank teller anyway because I didn’t think of it until after my missed opportunity in conversation with him. I have nothing to lose — no one is going to stone me like they did Stephen — and a lot to gain. Jesus said to let our light, such as it is, shine before others.2 And he’s really the only influence we need to be listening to.

Every human being is searching for joy. Well, except those who have already given up on it perhaps, though they’d pursue it like the rest of us if they believed they could have it. It’s part of our DNA, woven into our original design. We were created for it.

So Jesus endured the cross not because he had to but for the joy set before him,1 taught so that “your joy may be full,”2 told parables about joyful occasions (at least for those who accepted the invitation)3 and entering into the joy of the Lord,4 and pictured his eternal kingdom as a place where joy abounds.5 In his kingdom, joy is a big deal.

Great news, isn’t it? God’s desire for us and our desire for ourselves are one and the same.

So why are so many people so frustrated in the pursuit of their goals in life? Why does joy seem so elusive? For one thing, we have some pretty skewed ideas about what will fulfill us, confusing temporary happiness with ultimate joy. But at an even more fundamental level, we’re so driven to find our joy that we don’t recognize it even when it’s staring us in the face.

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Sometimes life feels like a Picasso. You know it’s priceless, but you just can’t figure out how it all fits together.

That’s okay — not a single biblical promise suggests that when God directs our steps, the path will be short, straight, and perfectly sensible on the surface. On the contrary, we’re given numerous examples of people who received a wonderful promise from God and almost immediately found their life moving in the opposite direction. God’s leading is certain, but it can also be extremely disorienting.

The Detour and the Destination

One of the greatest tensions we’ll ever feel is the gap between life as we think it should be and life as it’s actually unfolding. That’s an inherent experience from living in a fallen world that, as scripture emphasizes, is subject to futility, corruption, and decay.1 But even when we’ve been born into the new creation and have a strong sense of God’s direction for our lives — even a very accurate one — the path from point A to point B is rarely what we expect.

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Even when our course takes a “detour” — at least from our perspective, though God saw it ahead of time and already worked it into his purposes — we’ll find that it usually leads back to the promises and purposes we were once given. I’ve seen seeds of direction and promises that were “lost” long ago begin to sprout decades later. That’s just how God works.

In the meantime, our disorienting circumstances serve as something like a spiritual Rorschach test. What we see in them — or rather how we choose to see God in the midst of them — will tell us a lot about our spiritual condition and the measure of our faith and hope at the time.

The Great Unraveling

Though many periods in our lives can feel like a great unraveling — a setback or series of circumstances that defies the trajectory we saw for ourselves and the people we love — it’s vital to remember that the best stories have satisfying endings. The protagonists go through enormous difficulties and, if they had a mind independent of the author, might choose to ditch the whole journey. But the plot isn’t ultimately up to them because, as plot elements themselves, they serve a larger purpose than their own pleasure and comfort. Their unraveling in the middle of the story eventually comes together to tell an enriching, transformative, satisfying tale.

Choosing to see God as the author of your story means relinquishing a sense of ownership over its purpose. Among those biblical archetypes whose journeys felt confounding and baffling to them at the time — Abraham, David, and many others, including the narrative arc of God’s people as a whole — stands Joseph, perhaps the clearest example of a faithful man whose life seemed to go in the opposite direction of the promises God gave him, not just once but repeatedly. But every step deeper into Egypt, servitude, and imprisonment was actually a step closer to his destiny. He couldn’t have predicted the outcome, but he trusted God throughout the whole painful journey. He embraced the larger purpose. Between the brutality of his circumstances and the enduring faithfulness of God, he chose to focus on the latter.

That focus enabled him to cling to an elusive, ever-fading divine promise until the promise was thrust back upon him in glorious, gratifying fulfillment. As a psalmist wrote, “Until the time that his word came to pass, the word of the Lord tested him.”2 Joseph clearly passed the test.

Press Through the Contradictions

We can learn a lot from the heroes of faith who heard God’s call and then experienced contradictions to it. They weren’t given the entire roadmap up front. The divine GPS led them in mystifying ways. But they kept going, even amidst trials, tangles, and opposition, because that’s what faith does.

Remember, faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.3 When God calls, expect stretching, sometimes to the point of extreme discomfort. His paths may defy our logic, but they always reach the destination.