NEW BLOG ADDRESS!!

just wanted to let you know that i have switched blogs...

my new blog address is:

http://www.myroadtoemmaus.wordpress.com/

effective: immediately.

let the foolish shame the wise

I was reading about John the Baptist the other day and these words stood out to me: “The voice of ONE crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord.’” I have always thought of John’s purpose in life as a noble one- as one that we should all envy. But after sitting for a few minutes and pondering his life, I was struck with reality. John undoubtedly lived a lonely life- being the “one” who was crying out for the coming of Jesus. He lived in the wilderness. He ate locusts and honey. He did not live like the Pharisees, the religious people of the day. He was probably not highly esteemed. He fasted a lot, which is the spiritual way of saying that he was probably always hungry. He looked different. He dressed different. In our day, he would be the type of believer at which the Church would probably raise their eyebrows and with which they would avoid eye contact. And yet he was the man of whom Jesus said, “Among those born of women there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist”.

Why is it that the most religious people of the day did not recognize Jesus? Why is it that the ones who did recognize the Savior were people like John the Baptist, Anna (the woman who literally lived inside of the temple and who spent her life fasting and praying), and the “Wise Men” (who offered up extravagant gifts to a baby)?

To be honest, it makes me a little nervous when I look at my life and consider the emphasis I have placed on “fitting in”. If the most religious people of the day did not recognize Jesus, who will recognize Him when He comes back again? If the Pharisees and the Sadducees were offended because their Savior entered the world as a baby, born of a virgin, in a manger, then will we be offended by the manner in which the Bible says that Jesus will return? I would love to hear your thoughts...

what's the big deal about patience?

I spent this morning doing a pseudo word study on the idea of patience. After an hour or so, I couldn't help but think, "What's the big deal about patience?" Love, sure. Joy, definitely. Perserverence? Yeah, I have heard a few talks about the topic of perserverence. But patience? I have rarely ever heard a pastor speak about it or a leader teach on it. My paradigm of patience is this: When the person in front of you is driving 20mph below the speed limit, be patient.

Yet after looking through some passages this morning, I am starting to think there is more to it. Here is what tipped me off. First, 2 Thessalonians 3:5 says, "Now may the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God and into the patience of Christ." Of all the attributes of Christ that our hearts could be directed into, Paul picks patience. Patience?!?! What about the mercy of Jesus? What about His love? Doesn't that encompass everything anyways? Second, the famous love passages' (1 Cor 13) first description of love is this: Love is patient. Hmm. Third, James says to count every trial JOY because it produces patience. He goes on to say that if we let patience have its way with us, we will be "perfect and complete, lacking nothing." A few chapters later, he continues on about patience instructing us to be patient and thus, establish our hearts... "for the coming of the Lord is at hand". Then, to top it off and further convince me that I know so little about patience, he uses Job as his example of patience.

Now Job endured just a tidge more than having to follow behind someone going 20mph below the speed limit. Naturally, I discovered, different translations of the Bible use patience and longsuffering interchangeably. I was onto something!! I had heard once that long suffering literaly means this: suffering for a long time. Genius, I know. So, Job suffered long, Jesus suffered long, and now we are called to suffer long and if we do- if "patience has its perfect way" and we seek to "establish our hearts", then we will be complete and lacking nothing.

All to say, I feel like I just opened pandora's box... all because of the word, "patience". Ironically (or not so much), I am realizing that patience has a lot to do with being poor in spirit and therefore becoming a resting place for the Lord (see previous post). Needless to say, I am excited to ask the Lord for more revelation as I continue to study this topic. To be continued...

"on this ONE will i look"

For the last two weeks, my prayer room team (the team I brief and de-brief with each morning) has been focusing on the first two verses of Isaiah 66. It goes like this:

"Thus says the Lord, Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool.
Where is the house that you will build me? Where is my resting place?
For all those things my hand has made, and all those things exist.
But on this ONE will I look: On him who is poor and of a contrite spirit
And who trembles at my word.

I imagine it this way. So, God, whose throne is in Heaven and who rests his feet on this earth is looking for a resting place. He is ruler of Heaven and earth, King of kings, Lord of lords, and He wants a place to rest. After searching through the heavens and through the earth, He decides that the most worthy object of His gaze is... a person. And it is not just any person, mind you. It is a person with a poor and contrite spirit. It is a person who trembles at His word. These two verses trouble me immensely. Here's why.

I have spent the last 23 years building, shaping, molding, fixing, and trying desperately to become someone that is looked upon. I'll be honest- I love attention. I love being the center of attention. I love when people want to listen to what I am saying. I love when people want to be around me. Here's the problem. The person that I have tried to become is the opposite of the person whom God says that He will look upon. The verse is not, "But on this one will I look: On him who tries to be cool, funny, really successful, creative, beloved by the whole earth."

It makes perfect sense, really. The gospel is simple. Jesus didn't come for the healthy. He came for the sick. He came for the ones who didn't have it all together so that in their poverty of spirit- in their embrace of the fact that they do not have it all together- they will humble themselves enough to say "yes" to needing a Savior.

So what will I do? Well, I will wake up tomorrow morning and do the same thing that I am going to do every morning until God says that it is time to leave this place and move on to somewhere else. I will sit in the Prayer Room and strive (yes, strive) to be a resting place for this wonderful God that I have the privilege of serving. What does it mean to be a resting place? Well, give me a few years and maybe I will have something to tell you!

won't you let me love you more...

I received an email from one of my best friends yesterday inviting me to the challenge of praying one simple prayer for the next six months. The prayer is this: "Lord, I pray that I would love you more than I want to breathe my next breath." I am taking her up on this challenge for one reason. I want my life to be marked by love. It is the greatest commandment and it is one that I want to take seriously. I'm not very good at it and I know this. It is hard for me to love an intangible and invisible God. And yet something in my spirit comes alive from time to time as I encounter the Lord and love starts to stir in my heart in a way that I can barely describe. It is a mystery, really!

The song playing in the prayer room right now echoes what is on my heart this afternoon... So I will end with this.

"Oh won't you let me love you more?

This is all that I desire.

Won't you let me love you more?

This is all that I require.

Won't you let me love you more?

This is my deepest heart's desire.

Won't you let me love you more, and more...

You could give to me the gift of walking on water

And maybe, maybe I will raise the dead

But I have one life to live and all I have to give to you is love.

If I never walk on water,

If I never see the miracles,

If I never hear your voice outloud

Just knowing that you love me is enough to keep me here.

Just hearing those words is enough to satisify, you satisfy,

I couldn't leave even if I tried.. I must have you!

Home sweet... Kansas City?!?!

After spending a few weeks in Charlottesville, Russell and I packed the car to the max and jumped on the road. We drove 12 hours the first day, spent the night with our friends Zane and Beth in St. Louis, and then drove the following 4 hours on Wednesday. Yesterday morning, the temperature was in the single digits. We came home to an empty fridge, lots of laundry, and an apartment that was a bit chilly. Yet for some reason, when we opened the door and stepped in, it felt strangely like "home". All to say, it is good to be back.

Russell and I have our interview this Saturday afternoon and then will look forward to New Staff Orientation that begins on February 12th. The highlight of the month, however, will be when my dad, Bob, and the woman he has been dating for about a year, Mary, will take a trek out to KC to visit. I am already counting down the days!!

Here we go again...

As if leaving our jobs, our homes, our friends, and our family and moving halfway across the country just one month after being married wasn't "enough", we have decided to add to this journey by staying in Kansas City and joining full-time staff at the International House of Prayer. Five years ago, this is precisely what I imagined myself to be doing (note sarcasm). Alas, Russell and I are thrilled at this opportunity and already looking forward to the first day of our new staff orientation which begins the first week of February.

Getting to that day, however, will be the challenge. Full-time staff requires that we raise full support which has been demanding full surrender out of this doubting heart. Sadly, this is a daily battle for me. I do not know which is more difficult- surrendering my fear of not raising enough money or surrendering my need for approval by every person around me as I find myself sheepishly coming out behind my closed door and really telling people what we are doing. "You mean, you just sit in a room and pray? But what are you really doing? Are you actually helping people? What are you doing?" And so the conversations go. Are they opportunities for me to share about the goodness of God and how worthy He is? Of course. Yet they are also "opportunities" (I say this resentfully) for the Lord to mercifully squeeze out of me the people-pleasing spirit in my life. Many of our close friends and relatives do not understand... and I do not blame them. Many not only do not understand but also do not agree or support what we are doing. Slowly, I am starting to realize that their misunderstanding and disapproval are becoming the avenue through which I am forced to get on my knees before the Lord and ask, "Are you sure that this is what you want us to do? Are you sure that it's worth it?" And then ask again. And again. And again.

His answer yesterday is not enough for my doubts today. So I have to ask Him again. And all the while, I'm beginning to think that God probably designed it this very way.

hitting the wall

I hit a wall this week. I decided that I just did not want to do it anymore. I didn’t want to go to the prayer room. I didn’t want to go to class. And yet there was nothing else to do. We were participating in a three day fast that the whole missions base participates in during the first Monday through Wednesday of each month. This time around, Russell and I were fasting our time meaning that we had turned off our computers and the television for three days and that besides eating, working out, and class, we were going to try to spend as much time in prayer as we could. I failed miserably. My passion was at the level 0. I wanted to turn on my computer and just waste time like I can so easily do... and yet I couldn’t. I wanted to go shopping and yet I couldn’t because we are broke. I wanted to go hang out with friends and yet I couldn’t because to be honest, we just don’t have many friends yet and the ones that we do were fasting, too. I wanted to go do something outdoors and I couldn’t because we live in Kansas City and there is nothing good to do in Kansas City. I wanted to eat something really good and yet I couldn’t because we had run out of groceries and couldn’t buy more until the following week. I wanted to do something... anything... and there was absolutely nothing to do.

I realized that I was staring my barrenness directly in the face. And I hated it. Being here in Kansas City, I am learning (slowly) what it means to starve my flesh. The comfort that I have grown so accustomed to for the past 23 years of my life has suddenly been stripped away. You see, it is not like any of the things that I wanted to do were inherently bad. They were all good things... and that is the problem. I have filled my life with so many good things that my appetite for the best thing has been dulled. And now, as a result, I find myself with little access to the good things and a lack of desire for the best thing.

For the first time since I have been here, I had to ask myself “Do I really believe that this is worth my time? Do I really believe that ministering to the Lord is the best thing that I can be doing in this season of my life?” And just like the father whose son Jesus healed, I find myself saying, “I do believe.... but Lord, please help me in my unbelief.”

the weight of glory

These last two weeks have been characterized by a weightiness that I have seldom experienced before. It is a heaviness that burdens me and yet it is one that I do not wish to pray away. For it is a weight of sobriety, a weight of reality, and a weight that I do not want to continue to live without. “It’s the weight of glory”, a dear friend chimed in as I was trying to explain it to her. Up until that point, I had no words to articulate it but as soon as she said it, the words resonated deep within me. I was feeling the weight of God’s glory. Without wanting to sound too abstract, let me explain some of what I mean by this.

For the past two weeks, my heart has been constantly stirred. Through a talk, a scripture, or through prayer, I find myself gripped, firmly anchored in my chair, unable and unwilling to get up, to move, or to leave the moment. I find myself seeing just a glimpse of the glory of God and it leaves me speechless. By glory, I mean the “god-ness” of God, that which makes Him God and everybody else not God, that which causes me to revere Him and to fear Him and to want to run and hide knowing that I have been living a life far less worthy than He deserves. I have seen just a glimpse and it leaves me broken and paralyzed in my response. I mourn my insufficient and inadequate response. I long to kneel down, face to the ground, and kiss His feet, but His feet are not there..

CS Lewis, in a famous sermon of his, described the weight of glory like this: “To please God... to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son—it seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is.”

I long for my response to be whole-hearted surrender and yet as quickly as I find myself overwhelmed by God, I find myself distracted, snapping at Russell, short-tempered and irritated... another paradox, it seems. The moments of intensity followed by the most carnal moments of all have taken their toll on me these past few weeks. My body is exhausted and yet I long to enter back into the presence of God, back to where I am starting to feel more alive than I ever have before.

"that i may thirst"

God pierced my heart very early in life with the firm realization that "there has to be more" to life than what I was living. Even when circumstances were lining themselves up perfectly, I would still think to myself in the quietest of moments, “this can’t be all that there is”. I can honestly say that this realization has led me to moments (some instantaneous and some lingering) of the greatest satisfaction and fulfillment. I can also honestly say that it has led me to some of the darkest areas of sin in my life. At certain times, it has allowed me to become and feel so alive and at other times, it has brought me to a place of death. Merely knowing that “there has to be more” has become the greatest paradox in my life. I will tell you why.

You know the moments that I am talking about... the moments where you find yourself in an enormous crowd of people and yet you feel so utterly alone, the moments when you accomplished what you never thought that you would accomplish and yet it still doesn’t seem like enough. There are the moments when you peel back the layers of lies and deception that society has constructed and you peer into reality as it is and you realize that there is a meaning to life that is far deeper than what the world has told you. At these moments, I find myself convinced that there is more.

At that point, however, I set out to find, to grasp, to behold, and to seize “more”. When I have that resolve, I inevitably wind up at a crossroads. There are times when I press into what is eternal and I go after it with a longing and desperation in my heart and just touching the hem of His garment makes me come alive. There are also the times when the resolve is there, and yet the hem of His garment is nowhere to be seen and the hunger inside of me is screaming out and with nothing to latch onto, I fall. And at times, I fall hard, grabbing onto everything and anything in my vision.

Augustine once said that God puts salt on our tongues that we may thirst for Him. I believe that the gift of thirst is one of the greatest gifts that we can be given on this Earth. For my biggest fear is to become complacent in life. However, the gift of thirst is rarely given by itself. As Augustine said, thirst comes after salt is placed on our tongues. That salt, through whatever form it may come, is not something that we have to ask for. It is inevitable in this lifetime. The challenge, however, is whether or not we will embrace or reject that thirst. In addition to that, if we do embrace the thirst, the challenge is in where we will turn.

This week has been a week full of salt. I have snapped at Russell far too many times. I have been easily irritated and frustrated. I have been having “nightmares” seemingly every night. I have found myself to be weak in the face of temptation. Yet ironically enough, this week is the first week that I have been here that I am starting to feel a hunger arise from within me and a subtle desperation to be in that prayer room and to sit before my God. And for that, I am deeply grateful.

posture

I have been thinking a lot about the idea of posture for the last few weeks. I am learning that I cannot control when God pours out or when He gives revelation. I cannot control when I “connect” to the Lord or when I feel His emotions. I cannot manipulate my experiences. I cannot muster up passion or fervor. I cannot control God, but I can posture myself so that when He does pour out, I will be ready. I can position myself before Him waiting (expectantly) and hoping (actively) for a revelation, for a prayer that is on His heart, or for a move of His hand. I can fast and therefore assume the posture of voluntary weakness, not to earn favor, but to develop a spiritual hunger and thirst within me. I can immerse myself in the Scriptures and pray the prayers that Jesus prayed- “that the love [God] has for me may be in them...” (John 17:24). Jesus prayed that we would be able to love Him to the extent that His own Father loves Him. Now that is amazing.

And then when God does bring revelation, it blows me away. I was starting to pray through the apostolic prayer that Paul prayed for the church in Ephesus and I barely got through the first few words when God started revealing truth to me. “I pray that out of his glorious riches....” That was all that it took. Just the words “glorious riches” captivated me and I started meditating on those two words. I started thinking about the riches of God, about how He can open up the floodgates of Heaven and how we would not even have room for it (Malachi 3). I started thinking about how every good gift is from Him, about the fullness of His love and power and knowledge, about how He can provide financially in miraculous ways... Just that first little clause had my mind reeling and my heart beating faster.

When God pours out His emotions, it is just as overwhelming. Russell was telling me about his time in the prayer room yesterday and about how he started to feel the emotions of God towards the nation of Israel. People were praying for Israel on the microphone from up front and as Russell started to read through Isaiah 30, he started to cry as He felt just a glimpse of the love and jealousy of God towards His people. Although he had read through the passage many times before, it wasn’t until yesterday that God allowed him to feel some of what He feels and the result was overwhelming.

We cannot make these things happen. But we can posture ourselves so that when they do happen, we will be able to linger there. We can ask God for the new wineskins so that when the new wine is poured out, the old wineskins will not burst (Matthew 9). Just today in class, a wave of frustration came over me as I thought to myself, “Why have I been a Christian for eight years and have barely heard Jesus talked about like this?” Allen Hood was teaching about Jesus’ relentless pursuit of us. He was painting a picture of who God really is, not who we think that He is. Apathy and spiritual boredom, which are far too prominent in the Church today, result from a lack of knowledge of who God really is. Anemic prayers result from a lack of knowledge of what God longs to and is able to do. At the same time, religious striving and legalism result from a lack of knowledge of the character and kindness of God. I am convinced of this. And yet I am guilty of them all!

just another religion class

After four years of classes in the Religious Studies Department at the University of Virginia, I found myself preparing for yet another Religion Class. This time around, the class was going to be taught by Allen Hood, the president of the Forerunner School of Ministry, here at the International House of Prayer. It was going to be a nine-day intensive study on the Excellencies of Christ. I was ready. Or so I thought.

On the third day of class, Allen started talking about the importance of fixing our eyes on Christ. “Whatever your eyes see and are fascinated by, your heart will follow”, he stated. He taught that the enemy’s plan is to dull our eyes, to dull the very faculties that God created to behold Him because by beholding Him, we become like Him. He talked about the increasing temptation in this generation to give our eyes to perversion, to lust, even to jealousy and bitterness. He led us in a time of repentance for our sin and for the sins of our generation. He invited people to rise who wanted to make a commitment to the Lord to gaze upon Him for all the days of their lives, just like David did. The majority of the 300 students rose to their feet. Many opened their palms and held their hands up at their side. A few started to weep. Many started to pray under their breaths, uttering promises to the Lord, confessing and repenting from their sin. Allen Hood began to pray on the microphone yet as he was praying, he instructed us to pray for ourselves as he was going to be praying for himself. We didn’t need one more person to pray for us, he said. We needed to do business with God.

Already, the morning was starting to feel less like a class and more like a church service. Releasing himself from the pressure that most professors live under, Allen seemed to let go of his control and authority over the class and he invited and allowed the Holy Spirit to come and minister to us. This wasn’t just for the five minutes at the end of the class. This wasn’t the ritual thirty second prayer at the beginning of a talk. This was just one hour into a three hour class and the president of the ministry school was sitting down on the stage, fully aware that if the goal of the class was to learn about Jesus, God could surely do a far better job than he could.

Just thirty minutes later, spontaneous choruses started to emerge throughout the room. Voices resounded while singing “O God let us be a generation that seeks, that seeks your face, O God of Jacob”. No instruments were needed. No worship team was on the stage. Songs were arising from within souls. A few courageous individuals, from where they were standing, quoted scripture or spoke a word that they sensed God was saying to them. One young man on the front row started to visibly tremble and then belted out an invitation from the Lord. “My chariot is coming” he said, “and I am looking for laid-down lovers who will follow me into battle”. He went on for a minute and as soon as he closed his mouth, the trembling instantly stopped, he fell forward, and he laid there, prostrate on the ground. Shortly after this, sounds of laughter erupted from the back left corner of the room. Dozens of people were caught up in this laughter. Others just started to laugh at those who were laughing because to be honest, it was pretty hilarious. Those who were laughing didn’t look like the ones who would be prone to laughing in a setting like this. It seemed as if the laughing had just come over them like a spirit. In the back right corner, a young girl was pacing back and forth speaking in a language that I could not understand. I realized that many around me were speaking in similar languages, speaking in tongues as the Bible says.

Throughout this whole time, I was astonished that Allen was sitting down, participating in but not leading what was happening. For close to two hours, the class was being led and yet there was no leader. Without a doubt in my mind, it was being led by the Holy Spirit. Colossians 3:16 says this: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God”. At the end of the class, the overarching emotion was one of gratitude. “You are a good God!” someone shouted out. “We love you, Jesus!” echoed another.

“Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity. Who knows? He may turn and have pity and leave behind a blessing—grain offerings and drink offerings for the Lord your God.” Joel 2:13-14

This morning was a picture of what Joel taught. As the students in the class confessed their sin, repented and turned from their former ways, and vowed that they would fix their eyes on Him and Him alone, God came and left behind a blessing of gratitude, joy, and awe in our hearts.

Throughout all of this, I was shocked by my reaction to the entire morning. More than shocked, I was disgusted by my reaction. After four years of being given the right to come to my own conclusions about religion and about God within the university setting, I find myself reaping the consequences of an intellectual spirit and pride. I find myself finally starting to realize that I can know nothing about God unless God reveals it to me. He is infinite. His is boundless. He is eternal. Who am I to use my human mind to try to understand God? Who am I to question how the Holy Spirit moves? Who am I to judge this seemingly charismatic environment just because I happened to come to know the Lord through an evangelical outreach? This morning, I realized what a tragedy it was for me to go through four years of college and allow my heart to become dull just for the sake of allowing my mind to be enlarged. The result is horrific. I now look at the world with eyes of disbelief until I am given reason to believe. Moreover, I look at God and wait for understanding before I give myself to worship. My judgment and skepticism has kept me a spectator and as a result, I have missed out on the entirety of what God has been willing to offer to me.

“I tell you the truth”, Jesus said to his disciples, “unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

My prayer today, as I come before the cross, is that God would humble me. My prayer is that He would break this critical spirit and replace it with the faith of a child.

"Who do you say that I am?"

Dear Friends,

It is nearing midnight as I write this. From our apartment, I can see the faint lights of downtown Kansas City. The sky is rarely dark here and I find myself reminiscing about the beauty and solitude of living out in Ivy this past year. Here, I am reminded of how I am just one of millions in this world and yet on a night like this, I am soberly aware of how I feel so completely alone.

I am grieving, as many of you are, over the death of little Jude Gilliam. I didn’t know the Gilliam family and yet a knot has positioned itself within my stomach ever since I read the news this afternoon on the website that Jude had passed. I felt like I had been punched directly in the stomach for to me, it was a crisis of faith. And here in Kansas City, one thousand miles away from everyone we know, I am forced to wrestle this out alone with God.

It would be far easier to trust in a God who desires good but who is restrained from interacting with His creation. And yet, I have found it exceedingly more difficult to believe in a God who can heal- who can break into our world from that side of eternity in order to touch a child and restore him to life- and who doesn’t. To watch a child die while believing in a God who can heal is perplexing. It is far worse than perplexing. It is paralyzing.

To me, the formula was just right. Jude had Bible-believing parents who worshipped and interceded day and night. He had a God whose desire is for none to perish. He had thousands of eyes across the globe watching, waiting, and hoping for God to perform a miracle.

The sting of death in the natural is not the same as the sting of death in the spiritual. There is no sting in the spiritual for Jude is sitting with His savior at the right hand of His King. Who could possibly argue that there is anything better for him than being where he is right now. But for us- here on this Earth- the sting that results from death is sometimes unbearable. I know this all too well. And yet Paul says in his first letter to the church of Corinth: Stand firm. Let nothing move you. And continue to give yourself fully to the work of the Lord.

And what is the “work of the Lord”? John says that the work of God is this: to believe in the one [the Lord] has sent (John 6:29).

And so I will continue to believe, as so many others are, that the sovereign God is a good God, a powerful God, a God of miracles, a God who hears the prayers of His children, and a God who delights to answer those very prayers.

Even as I am typing, the lyrics of a Jason Upton song are ringing in my ears:
“In the place of suffering, there’s a God worth worshipping
and on these wings of worship, we will fly.”

I am missing a church family to process this tragedy with. Yet I am grateful for this time to be by myself, forced to dig deep as I struggle to reconcile what happened today, forced to choose for myself if I believe that God is who He says He is and that He can do what He says He can do.

Russell and I have sensed a hedge of protection around us this week and are so grateful for prayers that you all have lifted up. We love our apartment- we are learning our way around this city- and we are excited for classes to start on Monday. Thank you for your support- for your love and for your prayers... We miss you already.