Will anyone live out your prayers?

22 Mar

My beautiful daughters, Amber and Madelyn, have a lot going for them—and it’s not just their cuteness and sweetness. They might not realize it yet in the middle of their addictions to soccer and the Hunger Games, but they are running through life before a ferocious wave of prayer.

Jessica and I have been praying our guts out for them since before they were born, and their four grandparents have probably been praying even longer than that. In fact, Jessica’s grandparents, Arnold and Jean Steele who passed away several years ago, started praying for Jessica’s future family when she was just a little girl.

It kills me to think that before they knew me personally, that precious couple was praying for me. And after Jessica and I swept each other off of our feet, their prayers through the years only intensified.

The Bible refers to our prayers as incense that ascends before the throne of God (Psalm 141:2; Revelation 8:4), and it’s pretty humbling for me to think that some of the incense of Arnold and Jean’s prayer had my name on it.

I wonder how well I’m doing at living out those prayers? I wonder if I’m being the husband that they prayed Jessica would have? I wonder if I’m fathering their great-grandchildren the way they prayed that I would? I wonder if the fragrance of my life matches the incense of their intercession?

And while I’m wondering all of this, and thinking about myself, I wonder if my prayers are tracking anyone else down. I hope they are. I hope, like Jessica’s grandparents, that I’m contributing to an incense-laced, prayer wave that will propel people toward their destinies.

Sea storm with rainbows in Pacifica, California

Sea storm with rainbows in Pacifica, California (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Mid-season trades

13 Mar

Well, it’s that time of year again—the time when the NBA shuffles its talent pool through some mid-season trades. Even though it’s a little weird to watch players get traded away to other franchises like human poker cards, the trades usually don’t bother me unless they involve one of my favorite players (I still don’t think the Lakers will move Pau Gasol). They’re usually just fodder for endless sports gossip and speculation.

However, as this year’s trade deadline approaches a persistent thought keeps running through my head, and I find myself wondering if I need to make any trades in my own life. I wonder if I’m still on target to hit the goals of my life and calling, or if I’ve gotten too comfortable in the status quo. If championship teams are willing to make tough trades to stay competitive in something as temporal as basketball, shouldn’t you and I be willing to trade or sacrifice in our pursuit of Jesus Christ?

Hebrews 12:1 says, “Let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” Are we in competitive shape–ready to run God’s race for us–or do we need to make some tough, intentional trades? Are we carrying any baggage that will bog us down, or are we on track to say, “I have done the will of Him who sent me”?

Los Angeles Lakers

Los Angeles Lakers (Photo credit: RMTip21)

Where is God?

8 Mar

Sometimes angry or hurting people will give voice to their discouragement by asking an oft-repeated question: “Where is God anyway?”

Understandably, they ask the question when He appears to be absent in an important area of their lives. And they’re not alone in asking it.

  • Gideon asked it in Judges 6:13 when he said: “If the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us?”
  • Moses asked it in Exodus 5:22-23 when he cried out, “O Lord, why have you brought trouble upon this people? Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name…you have not rescued your people at all.”
  • In Psalm 42:3 the psalmist’s critics questioned him all day long asking, “Where is your God?”

I’ve asked the question, and it’s likely that you have too. Where is God anyway? If He is so loving and powerful, why is it sometimes so hard to see His evidence in the world?

I think we can stumble over the question when we limit our search for Him. Sometimes we  only look for Him in dramatic, miraculous places, and when we don’t find Him there we start questioning His very existence.

What would happen  if we broadened our search?

What if we reminded ourselves that He is the God of “all comfort” (2 Corinthians 1:3), and that “every good and perfect gift is from above” (James 1:17)? What if we remembered that since “God is love” (1 John 4:8) every act of genuine, holy love in the world is a reflection of His nature?

I might not see Him in a cloud of fire today, but I will quite possibly see Him in the simplest acts of kindness and compassion.

God is evident in Creation…He is evident in His miracles…He is evident in His answers to prayer…He is evident in the dynamic and the dramatic…but He is also evident when a child shares his lunch, and when a mom tirelessly serves her kids, and when people do their best to reveal His love to a hurting and broken world.

As a young prisoner in a violent South African prison once said, “Of course God was already present in the prison. We just had to make Him visible.”1

1. http://www.prisonfellowship.org/new-this-week/interviews/16048-how-to-make-god-visible-an-interview-with-philip-yancey-part-2-of-2

What Super Mario Bros. is teaching me

29 Feb
New Super Mario Bros. Wii

Image via Wikipedia

In recent months my daughters and I have become addicted to the Wii version of Super Mario Bros. My wife laughs at us as we alternately cheer, scream, and groan while our respective characters, Mario, Luigi, and Lemon-head face off against giant mushrooms, poisonous fish, and nasty snapping turtles. We’ve gotten pretty good—we’re more than halfway through the entire game—and we’ve also learned an important lesson along the way.

Heroic fights can seldom be won alone.

Through our Mario Bros. exploits we have discovered the incredible power of synergy, and we’ve learned to rely on one another during the tougher parts of the game (Amber is the best at dodging falling rocks, and I’m the best at jumping on the giant frog at the end of each level). When we pool our strengths, and guard each other’s backs we progress much further than we could ever do on our own.

That sounds almost biblical doesn’t it? :)

The Bible makes it clear that life’s adventures should be tackled in community. Jesus never sent His followers out to do great works alone—at the very least he sent them out in pairs so that the power of unified synergy would accompany them. Leviticus 26: 8 says, “Five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand, and your enemies will fall by the sword before you.”

The principle in that verse has proven repeatedly true in my life–and it will likely be proven again tonight when Amber, Maddie, and I attempt to conquer level 5.

How can a loving God send someone to hell?

16 Feb

In recent weeks I’ve been posting essays from the book, One-Minute Answers to Skeptics, in our Sunday morning ministry guide (church bulletin). This week’s essay contains some thoughts on the troubling question: “How could a loving God send someone to hell,” and I thought the sentiment expressed in it was was worth re-posting here.

“How can a loving God send someone to hell?”[1]

The last thing God wants is for anyone to end up in hell. The Bible says that God is “not willing that any should perish” (2 Peter 3:9) and that He “desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). God did more than simply proclaim His desire that none should perish. He actually proved His desire to save people when He left the glories of heaven in the person of Jesus and came to earth to die on the cross for our sins (John 3:16; Romans 5:8). Having paid the penalty for mankind’s rebellion, God now graciously offers forgiveness and everlasting life as a gift (Romans 6:23) to all who will put their trust in Jesus.

If people reject God’s grace, turn away from the testimony of their own conscience (Romans 2:15), the testimony of creation (Psalm 19:1-6; Acts 14:16-17), and the wooing of the Holy Spirit (John 16:8), and say, “I will have nothing to do with God,” God will, in the end, allow them to have their own wish (2 Thessalonians 1:9). As C.S. Lewis said, “The damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end…the doors of hell are locked on the inside.” In the end, those people who end up in hell will have only themselves to blame. Hell is the end of a path that is chosen to some degree in this life, here and now, day by day.

Thy Will Be Done:

“There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says in the end, ‘Thy will be done.’” C.S. Lewis (1898-1963), professor and author.

[1] This article is taken in its entirety from Charlie H. Campbell’s book, One-Minute Answers to Skeptics (Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2005/2010), pages 37 – 38.

A barefoot Moses in Sinai

8 Feb
Moses before the Burning Bush

Image via Wikipedia

I’ve discovered the answer for how to succeed in life, relationships, leadership, and ministry.

However, before you write me off as either delusional or presumptuous, let me quickly say that I didn’t originate the answer—I just heard it and wrote it down. I was in a pastors’ training seminar with Pastor Jack Hayford (an esteemed author, teacher, and pastor to pastors) when I heard it. Jack was coaching a roomful of pastors on how to succeed in life and ministry, when he made a statement that has forever lodged in my heart. He said, “Leadership that succeeds walks softly, like a barefoot Moses in Sinai.”

I loved that statement!  And it resonated with me on multiple levels. As a student of the Bible, I’ve always loved the imagery of Moses slipping off his sandals and kneeling on holy ground, and it’s always inspired me to pursue my own moments of barefooted worship and surrender. As a church leader, that statement reminded me that the safest place in the world is the place of reverential devotion and the fear of the Lord.

I think Pastor Jack nailed the essence of successful leadership. Leaders who succeed for the long haul never lose their dependence on the power and presence of God. They never walk in self-sufficient arrogance, and they are quick to discern when common ground turns holy.

A barefoot Moses in Sinai—I hope that’s descriptive of you and me. And I hope it always continues to be.

Time is my friend

31 Jan

Have you noticed that time keeps passing by, regardless of what we do with it?

Mickey Mouse Watch 1959

Image by Wasabi Bob via Flickr

In the middle of this crazy, fast-paced world of ours, I seldom hear people expressing gratitude and respect for the gift of time. More often than not, time seems to represent something that we are fighting against or that we have too little of. We’re stressed because we’re out of time, or we’re fighting to make the most of our time.

I get all of that—I am huge in to time-management principles, and, having lost a loved one in her childhood, I am all too aware of how fleeting our time here on earth really is. Even so, I sometimes think that we approach the concept of time all wrong.

Time is our friend.

  • It allows our failures to fade in to the sunset, and it gives us the hope of redeeming things that have been lost.
  • If we squander it today, a fresh twenty-four hours will greet us tomorrow, and we’ll have a chance to spend it more carefully than we did the day before.
  • If we use it wisely today, it will compound and pay great dividends in the future (in MANY more areas than just finances).

When Bill Philips, author of Body for Life, is urging people to take his twelve-week physical fitness challenge, he says: “At the end of twelve weeks will you say, ‘I wish I would have’ or ‘I’m glad I did’?”

What will we say at the end of our life? Right now, time is our friend. Let’s treat it as such so that when it’s over we won’t be wishing we “would have,” but instead will hear the words “well done” coming down to us from heaven (Matthew 25:21).

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