Faith
The other kind of love
Ah, February. The month commonly associated with love because of Valentine’s Day.
The stores flood with food, flowers, and apparel in various shades of red, pink, and chocolate. Oddly, I think it fills more of us with dread than delight: singles feel conspicuous in a culture focused on couples, and those in relationships feel the pressure to meet a social standard for expressing affection—both financially and emotionally.
As Americans, I think we’ve become too focused on romantic love. Perhaps even our church culture has become too myopic about it as well? Affinity groups for couples… sermons on marriage… and more. Please don’t mistake me, if we are married, we should absolutely fortify those relationships through whatever resources we have. Yet an overemphasis on couple-hood creates undue pain for our single friends and—perhaps more importantly—distorts our view of the Body.
Read MoreBreaking bread instead of breaking fellowship
In the coming days (and weeks), many of us will gather with friends or family to share a holiday meal. We’ll put thought into who will encircle the table, extending invitations and setting a time to gather. We’ll put thought into the meal—possibly preparing favorite family recipes. And we might even put thought into what the table itself will look like… A centerpiece? Special plates or utensils? Candles?
But will we put thought into the conversation and the connection?
Or will we leave that to chance?
Read MoreSmall boat, big God: Weathering Life’s Storms
You’ve read the story before, I’m sure…
Jesus instructed His disciples to go to the other side of the lake.
As they traveled, a storm began to rage; waves breaking into the boat.
Jesus was sleeping through it all.
Until they woke Him, asking whether He even cared that they might drown.
His answer? “Why are you afraid?”
Reading this passage a few days ago, I nearly skimmed right over it. It’s familiar.
But I slowed because He nudged me.
What’s here for me, Lord? I know this story already.
Read MoreWhat I learned from writing out the entire book of Genesis
Yes, all 50 chapters of it.
It took 179 pages and 346 days.
I began on June 1, 2020 and wrote out between four and fourteen verses every day. Why? The short answer is that writing Scripture by hand keeps me engaged in a way that my wandering mind won’t always permit. (The long answer is here.)
I have a new appreciation (and respect!) for the scribes who painstakingly wrote out the entire Bible until Gutenberg invented the printing press. But there’s more for us here than just admiration.
Read MoreWhen “new” feels scary and uncertain
I know you’ve experienced them, too: transitions. Stepping into a new job and leaving the old one. Uprooting your household to relocate. Or just entering a new season in life (anyone else watching their nest emptying rapidly?).
All change brings some degree of ambiguity–even if it’s a change we desire. And frankly, uncertainty can be really hard to bear. Transitions are difficult for most everyone… including the people of the Bible. I think Jacob—a forefather of our faith—dealt with it often. His response in a particular instance is instructive for us.
Read MoreSeeing God in the suffering
It’s pretty easy to feel compassion for Joseph. Despite a seeming lack of emotional intelligence (telling his brothers about his prophetic dreams of ruling over them), being sold into slavery by those brothers into an unfamiliar culture, away from everything he knew and loved, seems incredibly unkind.
God absolutely redeemed Joseph’s experiences—using them to preserve His people through a severe famine. But it’s a difficult story to watch unfold on the pages of Scripture. Betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery. Framed for sexual assault and imprisoned. Helped fellow prisoners only to be forgotten by one of them for two additional years.
Once finally released, his life begins to change direction. Joseph was elevated to an incredibly high position of authority—second only to Pharoah. He ultimately married and had children.
Reading the account of his life, we naturally feel the pain of Joseph’s hardships—and might even feel righteous anger on his behalf. But Joseph didn’t languish in his own pain.
Read MoreWhen someone imposes on you unfairly
Her comment took my breath away.
I sat in a circle amongst a team of people who—for years—gave their time and talent to lead a local branch of an international ministry. The hours we invested every week in personal study, phone calls, leadership meetings, and the actual ministry activities were many. We all counted them a joy and privilege, a way to serve God and His people with the gifts He’d given us.
And then, one day, I surfaced a challenge to our team. I’d been, in my eyes anyway, mistreated and imposed upon unnecessarily by one of the people we served. I wanted my fellow leaders’ consolation and commiseration. I wanted them to validate my injured feelings and defend me, saying how much I didn’t deserve that treatment… how wrong that other person was.
Which is why her comment was so jarring to me—it was so different than what I wanted:
Read MoreWhen we’re in a season of waiting
Does anyone actually like waiting? It feels like doing wall-sits indefinitely.
And we do a lot of waiting in life. We wait…
…on hold with the airlines or for the utility installers to arrive.
…for results from a medical test.
…for an answer from the admissions office at the university we want to attend.
…for the pandemic to end.
…for whatever difficult situation we’re dealing with to resolve.
…for Jesus to come again and set all things right.
When we’re waiting, time seems to move like molasses on a winter day.
And when the resolution is so long in coming, it’s easy to wonder whether God has forgotten us (or worse).
When we know Him to be the powerful God He is—able to suspend the natural laws He put into place—we wonder why He doesn’t just part the waters of our “Jordan River” and end our wilderness waiting.
It confuses us that He doesn’t.
Read MoreWhat we’re getting wrong about social justice
Like many other politicized issues, social justice has become a divisive topic because of the differing viewpoints on how (or whether) to remedy a problem. Too often, conversations about justice issues are ripe with discord.
I’ve had a lot of those conversations because I’ve been writing about social justice issues for many years. I started by lending my time and writing skills to share the stories of young women who’d been rescued from sex trafficking by a U.S. non-profit organization working in the Philippines, Thailand and Cambodia. And I’ve written a lot about it here on my blog, too.
Whether the topic is human trafficking, immigration, hunger, race, or any other domain where unjust inequality exists, our paths usually diverge when it comes to what to do in response, to what degree, and how. We allow it to become a political issue, ascribing one another’s preferences to their leaning more to the “left” or “right.”
And that’s where we’ve gone astray… where we’ve forgotten what matters most:
Read MoreFinding faith between a rock and a hard place
Between a rock and a hard place—that’s where we often find God. Not that we don’t encounter Him other “places” in life, or enjoy His presence on an ongoing basis.
But when we feel like we’re hemmed in on all sides, we’re often more likely to look up and seek Him.
Case in point: Jacob.
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