There is very famous martial arts actor who made some very popular and successful films. In addition to his fame, he has earned an infamous reputation as an egotistical bully who is difficult, if not impossible, to work with. He apparently has gained a long list of fellow successful actors who will not work with him or speak any kind words about him. They tell that this actor demands that all others on the set bow and give place to his egotistical demands. Failure to meet the egotistical demands are met with a variety of responses from physical to emotional, and all vicious.

I began to realize that this professional warrior, a highly trained and skilled martial artist, has failed in his first true war. His first true war was with himself. He was conquered and made a slave to his own ego through his humanity and the enemy of humanity. The ego not only rules over him, his relationships, his career, but it also continually tries to force others to obey it. The ego had become a power in his life almost like a character in his movies. It had become so powerful that it (if it could be treated like a personality) moved to rule, not only him, but all around him.

Failure to conquer his own spirit has been having a horrendous effect. His movies have dropped out of the mainstream. The people willing to work with him have become far less. His career has entered a slide and appears to be continuing. His reputation, covered by his early successes, is now fully exposed as to its true quality. The destruction has arrived. The call to repentance could not be more clear. The most frightening part of this story – from the perspective of those of us who examine the health of our own souls – is that every one can see the condition of his life more easily than he can himself, even if the clues seem overwhelming.

Salvation is an individual experience. It only becomes an influence to others after it has taken effect inside the individual. The first territory salvation conquers is the self, and that conquering is to free us from the very kinds of destruction this actor is facing – pride. It is one thing to be enslaved by the failings of others, but I think it far worse to be enslaved by your own. Who can you blame? Where can you hide? Where can you go? Who can have an objective view of your condition when your perspective is corrupted within you? There is only one true source of rescue – Jesus.

Jesus sees the truth, reveals the truth, but with the compassion it takes to get us from brokenness to health. His goodness and love bring us to repentance, the kind of love that takes us from bondage to freedom.

“Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death. Whoever is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city.”

Proverbs 16:18, 25, 32 ESV https://bible.com/bible/59/pro.16.18-32.ESV

Snape is one of my favorite characters in fiction. He is phenomonally faithful, sacrificial, courageous, and so much more, in all the worst places without any recognition until the very end. He loved Lily Potter from childhood on. He hated James Potter who married Lily, and, by circumstance, their son Harry, except that Harry had Lily’s eyes. 

Snape had to rescue Harry though the course of the books despite Snape’s frustration because he was faithful to Lily. He became an insider spy against the most dangerous criminal of all time, facing untold dangers and terrors, protecting far more than Harry through his courage. Dumbledore challenged Snape regarding all his continuous and unstinting sacrifice being for the love of Lily. His entire life had been sacrificed out of his love. Was Snape still in love with Lily. Snape said, “Always.” 

I wonder what JK Rowling was thinking when she developed this character. I wonder if she was creating an image of a sacrificial love that this planet needs, we all need. I think of the word, “always.” For Snape it meant every moment, of every day, to the end of his life, and the last words he spoke. He was consumed. It truly challenges me as to how superficial I am. I wonder if I could be as sacrificial for another. I don’t think I have ever suffered to that extreme, for anyone. It is an amazing example to consider. 

There are two parts of this image, loving like that and being loved like that, through everything, thick and thin, highs and lows, danger and safety, going well or going terribly, “always.” I may never grow to a point that I can love like that, but I am learning to realize that I am loved like that.

The New Testament tells us that Jesus says “always” regarding His love for each of us. He has gone through far more than we could understand or imagine to say that to us. He has often done it when we are fighting Him and failing to understant His motivation. Harry blamed Snape for many of his troubles. We often blame Jesus when we don’t understand what is happening, or, more devastatingly, why. 

Snape is not a “Jesus” character. The stories share a natural and fictional example how much someone can suffer for the love of another. We have other real examples on our world of people who have endured amazing things for the love of others. The greatest example of all examples is Jesus, and He is not fiction. He loves each of us “Always.” The Bible tells us from the first chapter of Genesis to the last of Revelation that God’s plan has never altered or veered from the love He has chosen to give us. We are loved, completely, “Always.”

Jokes, cartoons, and various human lampoons are filled with the traveling anecdote of people saying, “Are we there yet.” It is obvious that if we were there, we would not have to ask the question. People are impatient. I am a people. I am impatient. I love the idea of going somewhere, but I want to be there and not on the way. Quite frankly, the Star Trek ability to beam you somewhere in seconds is absolutely appealing to me. I think I would jump on the transporter, even though my molecules might be scattered through space, just to get somewhere instantly.

We, as Christians, live our lives in the gap between what we were (and were glad to leave) and where God is taking us (a place we really want to go). We go through every state possible during the journey while God is driving us to where He wants us to go. Consider all of your experiences in a car on a long journey and use them as metaphors for your journey with Christ: freaking out if you don’t get to a rest area in the next 20 seconds, fighting with siblings, carrying on a rousing debate, playing games like I spy, being amazed by the scenery, filled with anxiety or exuberance or anything in between regarding where are you are going and/or what you are doing, being hungry or thirsty, spilling food or anything else all over you, being hot or cold or comfortable or uncomfortable, enjoying the people on the journey with you, being frustrated and angry at the people on the journey with  you, being car sick, enjoying extra naps and rest, and so much more.

All those traveling experiences are transitory and express the fullness of human experience. They will all pass as the scenery around the car will pass. The only thing that doesn’t pass is that the Lord is taking us somewhere. We are all safe in His transportation. We can have absolute confidence that He will get us there. 

We may forget the car we are in and the driver because we become so preoccupied with what is going on in the back seat. Each moment occurs in the presence of Jesus, and we can intentionally share them with Him. We can learn to see Him in all of the experiences we have along the way, whether we are happy, mad, sad, or glad. He is in the car with us, working to get us to our destination. His process for our growth and development incorporates every state within which we might ever find ourselves, good or bad. He transforms all, good, bad, and indifferent. 

No, we aren’t there yet, but thank the Lord, we are on the way. The transformer of our lives is in the driver’s seat, even when we think we have taken over during times of sad behavior on our part. He is using every moment to teach us how to live with those on the journey with us. He is using every circumstance to deepen our knowledge of Him and His love and plan for us. He is a father like no other, perfect in all His ways. It is not 2022 which will meet the needs of any. Our needs are met by the Father in Heaven, through His Holy Spirit, who is transporting us through all times, events, and experiences to His plan for our lives, the location we all want to go. We are on the way. We will know when we get there.

I am currently undergoing a fast the church has called for 21 days.  (Undergoing is how I speak of remodeling the house. It is so full of wreckage while everything is being upgraded, and so joyful when the upgrade is complete, even though you are exhausted.) A fast is a time of inviting the Lord into all the rooms, nooks and crannies you’ believe you have hidden in the dark from the Lord.  For me it’s all about discipline colliding with indulgence. Jesus has the discipline, and I have the indulgence. However, a fast often ends up with me going in to a room I believe I kept dark only to find that the Lord has been in there with the lights on.

I think of  life and humanity very much like addiction. Life is a constant war with the human reality of failed virtue. I’ve been addicted to alcohol and tobacco and other things. There are a lot of little things I’ve tripped over too. Stopping those things is where discipline and indulgence collide. It is where Jesus meets my worst self.

Weakness, frailty, indulgence, seem irresistible. They intimidate to the extent that even the consideration of change is intimidating and painful, even without any movement toward change. Any effort to change feels doomed from the start. The craving inside to give in seems larger than any strength, mental, emotional, or physical I have available to stand firm. The mind and emotions attach themselves to the addiction/failing to the point of justifying my entire life in the direction of my weakness. Failings become repetitive and habitual.

“Poor me” is a constant mental and emotional refrain, which hides behind denial of the facts. Looking at the pain and sorrow caused by the world and people around me seem overwhelming and beyond fighting. I often cannot comprehend the way through or imagine having the strength to walk through it, even though I daydreamed the victory often. I find myself more committed to failure than success.

You can’t say that the Lord does not have compassion, but you can say that he has no respect and no regard for these thoughts and feelings of failure. They are not His thoughts and feelings, and He does not want them to be ours. He is not opposed to stepping in with one of the most frightening words in my vocabulary, “Accountability.”

Accountability is a stunner. It is the terrifying scrape of the key that enters the lock that opens the gate to my freedom. Bit by painful bit, accountability began to tear down the room I had built to accommodate alcoholism. It was no one else’s fault, but my choice. I had no reason for self-pity, but open ended opportunity for joy. It was not about my strength, but about the Lord’s. Learning to trust Him where I could not walk alone was the order of the day. The room was destroyed. Alcoholism had no place to stay. It left. And so the Lord has worked on other addictions, shortcomings, and failings in my life. I expect his efforts to continue as long as I live, and I am grateful. When I think I am on the verge of giving in to failure, I find myself walking over the bridge He has created in my life to His success. I am surprised by joy and His ability in my life.

The greatest comfort in my life is that the Lord has faithfully promised not to leave me, forsake me, or give up on me. I know that I’m in life over my head, beyond my depth. I know the Lord provides the possible in the impossible. I have seen Him do it over and over again.  I am grateful.

My pastor delivered a sermon on fasting and prayer Sunday, he referenced Matthew 17:19 where the disciples questioned Jesus because they failed at casting out a demon. Step back and consider their situation. They were mirroring Jesus actions so that they could be good followers, but this time they failed. Why?

The disciples had seen Jesus cast out demons, heal lame people, and perform other miracles. So, what did they miss? They noticed the great things but overlooked one smaller thing that seemed less important. They overlooked the times Jesus slipped away in solitude to worship His Father and pray. You have to think, at this time the Holy Spirit hadn’t been sent to man. The disciples were raised in a time when you were separated from God by a curtain, and only the High Priest could enter His presence. They were taught prayers by the religious teachers. They didn’t fully understand the power of intimate prayer.

The reason the demon didn’t flee at their command was because they were mimicking what they saw Jesus do, but they weren’t plugged into the power source that He was. They had seen that power at work and knew it worked. The problem was that they hadn’t learned how to plug into it yet through intimate prayer. We’ve all been there. You watch HGN t.v. and decide to do one of the DIY ideas you saw on there. Fifteen minutes into it, we realize we’re in way over our head!

All of that leads up to this question for me. What is stopping us from seeing spiritual growth, seeing lives changed, seeing demons flee, seeing healing? We now have the Holy Spirit indwelling. We have Jesus’s example on how we should live, how we should pray, how we should love. A question for self examination: Are we living like we have the authority of a Spirit filled disciple, that we have the ability to speak Jesus and see life changing results. Or are we living like God is locked away behind a curtain, and we need someone else to approach Him for us?

Reciting quick prayers of thanks over our food and maybe a bedtime prayer because it’s what we were taught to do isn’t enough. My prayer is that, starting now, we seek a more intimate relationship with our King, that our day is filled with time to pray and seek, that we become Christians who plug into the power source that brings help, hope and love to those we meet.

I wonder if we should consider it a miracle that for centuries/decades men have been putting a razor to their own throat’s and have continued to live. That thought caught me off guard this morning.

Consider all the things that we do, large and small, every day that are completely destructive to us individually and to our environment, both as individuals and as a world community. We are busy cutting our own throats. Yet, we live. There must be purpose!

Consider how the planet has suffered humanity’s polution. We have warred, leaving bombs and destruction everywhere. We have used radioactive bombs and power, which have destroyed land and ecologies for extreme lengths of time. We have created trash which destroys, creating acid rain and so much more. We have stripped the earth of its own resources, which it uses to replenish itself, like forests, watersheds, aquifers and more. We have eaten, created food, hunted and fished, to a point that we have damaged the world we live in like a blight or plague and caused animal and plant extinctions around the world. Yet, we live. There must be a purpose.

We have created kingdoms to our own glory and personal kingdoms around our individual lives, consistently devasting others and consistently failing over time. People have invaded God’s churches and turned them into something to serve themselves instead of the Lord they proclaim. Yet we live. There must be a purpose.

In the midst of all these devastations, and all the ones overlooked in this short blog, there has been mercy, love, compassion. The Lord has offered us choice, and many have chosen Him. He has invaded a corrupted earth with a plan that is so much better. He has given us visions of a life that He intended, a life that does not destroy or consume. He has given hope in times and locations in which hope would seem unreasonable. He has loved us continually when all human logic would call His choice unreasonable and impractical. He has done what only a true God can. He has been superior to all that mankind has to offer, good and bad, and offered Himself as an alternative choice. He has given us Himself, personally and intimately through Jesus, and all the communications He has used through the centuries. 

We, humanity, in our absolute worst, are loved. We, in our absolute best, are loved better that we can create or understand. We are loved by a God who takes time to communicate to us through the Bible, personally, in revelation, through others, in our circumstances, and in our history. His voice is clear to anyone who wants to hear it. We only fail to hear His voice by denying it and reveling in the less that we create for ourselves. The purpose – God wants us to have more and better, the more and better of His intention, not ours.

So how do we rest in the midst of the devastations of this world? We can rest in the knowledge that God has never been without a voice and has never failed to reach out to us throughout all the generations. He has used our own behavior to teach us right from wrong. He has given vision of life, love, truth, hope, and His many other attributes that are better than we can create or duplicate without His presence to make it happen. He has given us choice so we can love because without choice love doesn’t exist. There is a purpose. 

Recently I went to a men’s Bible study gathering. The theme of the conversation was in taking charge of our thought life. “Thoughts are like birds flying overhead. We may not control those  thought flights, but we have power to choose the ones that want to build a nest on our heads,” said one of the men.

Some of the verses were extremely positive and encouraging like Ph 4:8, the prescription for good mental health. However, by the end of the meeting, I was already frustrated. I had turned inspiration into condemnation. 

There is a razor’s edge in perception between seeing what can be done and seeing what you haven’t done. What can be done is inspiring. What you haven’t done is easily condemning, followed by its best friend – shame. In an extremely short moment, the qualities of God are replaced by the realization of Satan. Humanity knows its own death and limitations.

I realized that I had gotten off track pretty quickly and began to pray. The condemnation had arrived because I was considering only what I could do, were I god or in total control – the viewpoint of pride. Scripture tells me that my best on my best day, with everything going my way, isn’t good enough. It is not about what I can do, but what the Lord has done and is doing. 

For me, it means surrender. Surrender in this instance is the realization that bringing my thoughts under control isn’t going to happen by my efforts alone. My success depends on my surrendering to the Lord and realizing that my best isn’t good enough. He is what I need. The work and ministry of the Holy Spirit is what I need. There is no area in my life in which I am capable of saving myself. I need a savior. I need Jesus. 

Jesus has been turning my condemnation back into inspiration where He intended it in the first place. My reliance on Him can give me peace during the process of my growth, before I get to the goal destination. Today is a day of inspiration, not because of the life todo or get better list, but because of the person of Jesus.who walks with me each minute, despite my inabilities. He is the more I need.

Heather Jewell

Well, I found this little composition last night that I wrote in  late November 2020.  Even though its over a year old, I almost find it more applicable to my family, my close friends, and myself than it was last year.  2021 wasn’t a cake walk for a lot of people around me.

Maybe this will be a blessing to someone (someone patient enough to read 500 words in a Facebook post LOL!).    

Merry Christmas, friends.

We Wait In Wonder

 November 20, 2020

The whole world waits, holding their breath, for something wonderful.  Something to fill them with awe.  The anticipation and hope of coming joy, salvation, the promise of things being set right.  

The year is 1 AD (ish).  The birth of the Messiah takes place while the created world watches in wonder.  Most people are completely oblivious because the coming did not fit into their expectations.  Yet, He came just the same.  To seek and to save.  To rescue and restore.  To heal and forgive. This is why we celebrate.  This is why we try to fill the season with awe and wonder and “magical” moments.  What our souls are really after is the supernatural reality of the coming of our Lord to live with us and meet us in our sin-sick state.  Not just to live alongside us, but to choose to die that we might be set free from the things that tangle and tie us up like long neglected strings of Christmas lights that are easier to throw away than unravel.  

The year is 2020 (now 2021).  This year is pivotal for our society collectively.  It has been hard.  It has been strange.  It has been unsettling and full of fear.  It has been discouraging.  It has been disappointing.  It has brought mourning and sorrow and changes we never thought possible.  So, as we sit on the cusp on the Advent season, there is a collective breath of hope.  There is a desperate need to believe that something about this season…anything…will make the year better, worth surviving.  We want something that will save this year from being a total disaster on every level. Even those who don’t realize it are longing for the real reason the Christmas season exists.  We are all longing for Jesus.  

Friend, there is good news.  He came. He dwelt.  And He still wants to dwell with us.  With you.  Emmanuel – God with us.  God with you.  Amid the ribbons and bows, trees decked out in all their festive glory a month before usual, gifts and giving, family, food, and friends…He is what we are really searching for.  He is the only thing that can fill our hearts with wonder and leave us standing in awe the way our inner man desires.  We know, in our souls, what we are looking for.  We just often miss the source in favor of the glitter and lights.  

The parallels are striking to me this year.  There is such a need for something to believe in.  Someone who won’t let you down.  Something you can count on.  Some way to make sense of the life we’ve been living this year (and every year).  This is how God’s people living in the first century felt.  Living under unfair and harsh rulers.  Praying for a promise to be fulfilled.  Seeing hardship after hardship.  Not hearing from God for 400 long years.  They were desperate for hope.  Hoping for joy.  Pleading for salvation from this life they didn’t understand and which was so hard to live.  And then came Jesus. And He changed everything.  

Will you take this Advent season to consider the wonder of Jesus…who He is…why He came…and why this miraculous, supernatural event should matter in your life?

This morning was a blue morning. Sadness crept around like dust bunny soldiers gathering in every corner and stealthily floating out to take over the mental flooring of my mind. It was like a hoarder who only has the smallest of trails from one place to another in the house remaining. The sadness closed everything but the trails.

Sadness was an army in miniature. Little soldiers isolating and surrounding every thought and feeling. They began to throw light on all the weight of all the things kept hoarded in my mental home, the emotions swept under rugs, the unsorted and unresolved stacking of life-thought and feeling, threatening to collapse and cut off all movement, intimidating me. I began to feel alone and powerless, disjointed, disconnected, and without purpose or value, adding to attack of the army of sorrow.

It seemed the battle was lost for a while. Self image was dying. Motivation to move forward was ebbing toward immobility, and strength to do anything was being drained. I was in retreat and on the edge of surrender. However . . . .

I was not being swallowed by a hoard of my own failings or being devastated by my own inability. I had turned my eyes to the world around me and entered my weakness and its. Light had grown dark in its presence. But I am not alone. 

The Spirit of God, given by grace, is not prone or subject to my weaknesses. He may reside in my life, but is not subject to my failings. He may wait on me, but He will not fail me. He stirred the resources, the battalions in readiness for such a time as this. In my surrender to Him, I had prepared as best I could, and had given Him authority to do what I could not.

Scriptures and promises began to take the field. Testimonies fired the big guns of promises already kept, fortifying the scriptures and promises to come. The cloud of witnesses the Lord had choreographed to surround my life began shouting praise and reminders of the Lordship of Jesus, raising standards and calling battle cries. My thoughts and feelings began to reconnect, and the soldiers of intimidation went from being on their guard, to backing up, to full retreat. 

There is peace and joy in the presence of the Lord. Separation from Him is the misery of life in its worst. Prayer, fellowship, scripture, and time with Jesus heals that sorrow and runs off the sadness in the life of this world. The Lord is deeper than my deepest fear and greater than my greatest enemy – even and especially when the worst is me. Jesus is Salvation.

Being overwhelmed is really scary. I remember being caught in a wave as a young boy. I was being tumbled, pushed, rolled and held under. I didn’t know which way was up or down, and I could not control my movement. The really frightening part was that I felt like I was running out of air, and I couldn’t get to the surface to get more. Recently I experienced an overwhelming life event.

I went to the home of a former student, a young person, who had suffered many severe, life-threatening illnesses during her life. Her husband and family were amazing throughout the battles she fought, in and out of the hospital. They truly expressed the love and hope and support you would hope to have if you were in a similar situation. The young woman herself was an amazing gift of caring, packaged in a small frame. She had been my friend since she entered my class as a high school student. Her family also became my friends through her. I arrived at her house shortly after she had died.

The dimensions and power of this event where overwhelming and years in the making. The cost of keeping her alive and giving her life was an expense paid in time, sacrifice, and unrestrained giving at every level. She left behind a husband and two children. All of the commitment, all of the love, all of the sacrifice, all the hopes and dreams, and life and death seemed to be tumbling like a giant wave, larger than any and all of us, carrying us along beyond any of our abilities to control it, grasp it, or reestablish any sense of normal. We were overwhelmed. Uncontrollable death had shattered the city of illusions we had built in our hearts and minds.

There was a thread within this physical, emotional, and psychological tsunami, God’s thread. God’s life and love is a thread which can not be severed by death or any other force. His presence only becomes stronger when we surrender the boundaries of physical life on this planet. The sad thing is that we often do not realize how strong and present He is, always and everywhere. We can see Jesus and His life in moments like life tsunamis because we are overwhelmed and have to surrender our ability to create order to His ability to rule over heaven and earth. We come to an end of ourselves and find that the thread of His love is more than enough to keep us tied to Him. The wave will pass over and around us, but His love will never fail and never be overcome.

The best in life is not waiting for the tsunami. The best is to grow in Jesus now, before being overwhelmed, allowing Him to build a protective cover around us with His thread, converting the threat of death to the promise of life. He transforms the giant suffering of this life into temporary discomfort which is experienced in the presence of His greater joy. Jesus is life, now and eternally. This world threw all the horrors humanity has to offer at Jesus. He was not overwhelmed or overcome. He paid for and gave us that gift – His victory. We are loved beyond our greatest understanding. Jesus is life.