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(one of the most rocking people I know, my son Michael)
Can you scream at the top of your lungs, “MY LIFE ABSOLUTELY ROCKS!!!“?
If you can (and you’re not under the influence of some drug), then stop reading this and go out and let the world bask in your awesomeness.
But….. if you’re like most of us, and don’t feel your life absolutely rocks right now, can I ask you one question?
Why?
Why don’t you feel like your life rocks?
Are you mentally ticking off things like, oh, I’m 20 pounds overweight, or I haven’t found that special someone, or I found someone and they didn’t turn out to be nearly as special as I thought, or I’m between jobs or I don’t like the one I’m in, or I don’t have any friends, or I’m struggling with this illness, or…..
Have you thought about it? Do you have your list of why your life doesn’t rock? Good, now here’s your next question:
What would it take? What would it take to make your life rock?
What would need to change on your list? Would you need to look younger, lose that extra weight? Find that partner of your dreams? Land that dream job? Have money to burn?
Let’s get specific. How about starting with that bank balance that popped in your head? Go ahead, don’t be shy, fill in the blank, if I had $______ in the bank my life would rock.
Now notice something: You just made a choice. You just decided where to set the bar for your happiness.
Think on that some more. You made a conscious, personal choice about what it would take to make you happy.
Now think on this: Could you make a conscious personal choice to revise that number up or down?
What if you said it would take ten million dollars to make you happy— couldn’t you choose instead ten billion dollars– or ten dollars?
No, no, no, you say, I couldn’t choose ten dollars, that would be silly. Oh really? What if you were five years old? Or living in Somalia? Then your world would be rocking with ten dollars in your pocket.
You say you need to win an Angelina Jolie / Brad Pitt lookalike contest for your world to rock– have you ever considered that there might be someone who would be grateful to have the looks you have right now?
You say that the place you live is dingy— but aren’t there millions of people who would give anything to live where you do?
You get the point: you really can consciously choose where to set the bar for your happiness, and you really can consciously choose to set it RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE RIGHT NOW.
Yes, you got it, you can choose for your world to be rocking RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE RIGHT NOW.
But, John, what if I really do want to find that special someone, or add another zero to my bank account balance? I would tell you, go for it, keep reaching, keep dreaming, but let your dreams be to make your already rocking life even more awesome. Do you think that Bill Gates went around in a funk, moping and sulking until he made his first million? or his first billion? Of course not! It’s people whose life is on fire from day one who end up achieving their dreams. It’s a little like Jesus once said, that it’s the people who handle things well when they have just a little who get the opportunity to handle more.
Think of all you have right now, think of what God has blessed you with. Most of all, think about how much He loves you, and how He is pouring infinite unconditional love into your soul like a fire hose this very minute, if your soul looks on Him to receive it.
So, one more time: Can you scream at the top of your lungs, “MY LIFE ABSOLUTELY ROCKS!!!“?
There, I thought you could. Now get out and let the world bask in your awesomeness. 
“I laughed, I cried, I kissed ten bucks goodbye…”
Well, ok, that title isn’t 100% accurate— I actually only laughed through this book.
If you’re not familiar with Jon Acuff, he is a wildly popular blogger who has built a reputation out of being able to see what’s comical about this crazy business called evangelical Christianity.
Never sarcastic, never bitter, cynical or critical, but playfully and affectionately he pokes fun at all of our little idiosyncracies in dozens of short essays with titles like “Ranking Honeymoon Sex Slightly Higher than the Second Coming of Christ” “Watching R Rated Movies… But Only If They’re Violent” “Being Slightly Offended that the Pastor Has a Nicer Car Than You Do” “Feeling Slightly Disappointed When Someone Accepts Our Fake Offer of Generosity”…. ok, I could go on an on and on here, just like Jon does… this guy is scary good about mixing up social commentary, hip pop culture references, and humor in a no holds barred cage match of a book.
“Seriously, why would I hire a full-time youth minister when I can get a real working traffic light for only $378?”
“I’ve never gotten a speeding ticket, but if I ever do, I want to be honest with you. I’m going to name-drop God.”
“Christianity needs to be more relevant… How can I witness to someone about the love of Christ if I can’t hang in a conversation about Family Guy?”
But what I liked most about the book is the last collection of essays, which were the “serious ones.” Jon proves that he thinks deeply and sincerely about what it means to walk with Christ in a fallen world. In the last essay of the book, he concludes that the message of Christianity is that we are sick, but we are loved, and that we must embrace both. And I think humor helps us to do that. So let’s be sick, and let’s be loved, and let’s have a few good laughs along the way.
I love books that are in your face and don’t mince words. There are few books that are more straightforward than Francis Chan’s Crazy Love. His writing and his challenges are plain:
- What’s Wrong With Christianity Is That We Aren’t Crazy About God
- We Aren’t Crazy About God Because We Don’t Really Know Him
- We Aren’t Crazy About God Because We Are Too Crazy About Us
- Lukewarm Love for God Is Good for Nothing
- If You Get Crazy in Love With God You’ll Lead a Crazy Life
Crazy Love is a quick, easy read that will impact your life. I highly recommend getting that you read the whole book, but here’s your seed pack of its core ideas:
What’s Wrong With Christianity Is That We Aren’t Crazy About God
To just read the Bible, attend church, and avoid “big” sins— is this passionate, wholehearted love for God? –Francois Fenelon
Chan writes boldly that everyone can see that all is not well with the American church— that we really seem little different than people who don’t go to church.
“The core problem isn’t the fact that we’re lukewarm, halfhearted, or stagnant Christians.”— those are just symptoms, not the core issue. “The answer to religious complacency isn’t working harder at a list of do’s and don’ts”
The core issue is getting “crazy in love” with God. Remember when you were wildly in love with someone? It changed EVERYTHING— you were consumed with the person, every thought, every moment of your life was structured around them.
That’s the passion we need to feel about God.
Until we get crazy in love with God little will change in our lives or in the church.
We Aren’t Crazy About God Because We Don’t Really Know Him
What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. –A. W. Tozer
The first step in getting crazy in love with God is to really get our minds around who He is in all His power & glory & majesty & love.
“If my mind is the size of a soda can and God is the size of all the oceans, it would be stupid for me to say He is only the small amount of water I can scoop into my little can.”
“God is holy. In heaven exists a Being who decides whether or not I take another breath.”
“The greatest good on this earth is God. Period. God’s one goal for us is Himself. Do you believe that God is the greatest thing you can experience in the whole world?”
We Aren’t Crazy About God Because We Are Too Crazy About Us
What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. –(James 4:14)
The second step in getting crazy in love with God is to get a proper perspective of who we are in relation to God and eternity.
“On the average day, we live caught up in ourselves. On the average day, we don’t consider God very much. On the average day, we forget that our life truly is a vapor.”
“It’s crazy that we think today is just a normal day to do whatever we want with. Do you live with the reality that perhaps today you will die?”
“We generally think our puny lives are pretty sweet compared to loving Christ.”
In other words, we need to step back, take a look around, and realize that—
“Life is all about God and not about me at all.”
“Frankly, you need to get over yourself.”
Lukewarm Love for God Is Good for Nothing
“Has your relationship with God actually changed the way you live?” –Chan
The third step in getting crazy in love with God is to realize that what usually passes just fine for devotion in the American church is pretty lame in the eyes of God. Chan says that just because we are saved and try to live a good life, we assume that we are the “good soil” in Christ’s parable.
DO NOT ASSUME THAT YOU ARE GOOD SOIL.
“When we want God and a bunch of other stuff, then that means we have thorns in our soil. A relationship with God simply cannot grow when money, sins, activities, favorite sports teams, addictions, or commitments are piled on top of it.”
“Most of us have too much in our lives.”
“Has your relationship with God actually changed the way you live? Do you see evidence of God’s kingdom in your life? Or are you choking it out slowly by spending too much time, energy, money, and thought on the things of this world?”
Do we really see God as infinitely more precious than anything else in our life?
“Well, I’m not sure You are worth it, God.. You see, I really like my car, or my little sin habit, or my money, and I’m really not sure I want to give them up, even if it means I get You.”
“We need to realize that how we spend our time, what our money goes toward, and where we will invest our energy is equivalent to choosing God or rejecting Him.”
“We disgust God when we weigh and compare Him against the things of this world. It makes Him sick when we actually decide those things are better for us than God Himself.”
Do we really consider ourselves as fully devoted, no holds barred, to God?
“If you sign up for the Marines, you have to do whatever they tell you. They own you. Somehow this realization does not cross over to our thinking about the Christian life.”
“Lukewarm people do not live by faith; their lives are structured so they never have to.”
“Most of us want a balanced life that we can control, that is safe, and that does not involve suffering.”
If You Get Crazy in Love With God You’ll Lead a Crazy Life
The greatest thought that has ever entered my mind is that one day I will have to stand before a holy God and give an account of my life. –Daniel Webster
The life of a Christian should be marked by the word OBSESSION. Not obsessed with a list of rules or performance or measuring up, but obsessed with loving God and loving others through Him.
“Obsessed people care more about God’s kingdom coming to this earth than their own lives being shielded from pain or distress.”
People who are crazy in love with God love freely, give freely, serve freely, sacrifice freely, take risks, are humble and honest with God and with people.
“If we really believe that if we sacrifice things on earth so that we will have an eternity of rewards, it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Dare to imagine what it would mean for you to take the words of Jesus seriously.”— & GET CRAZY!
John Piper’s Future Grace is a book so deep & yet so practical that it is certainly on my “must-read” list for every Christian. This spiritual seed pack gives you core concepts and ideas from Future Grace to plant and grow in your life. There are direct quotes from Dr. Piper, major ideas distilled down into my own words, and quotes from other writers.
Hungry for the whole book? Click here to see it on Amazon.com.
Want more depth? Click here for a series of articles going through the book chapter by chapter.
Faith Is the Key to Grace
Faith is the key, the channel, that God’s grace flows through. So to experience grace you must possess faith. Faith is absolutely central.
If you go wrong on the nature of faith, everything in the Christian life will go wrong.
So, what is faith? Here are some key concepts:
Faith trusts in the promises that God has made through Christ, and loves them, cherishes them, prizes them with all the heart.
The Bible makes it abundantly clear that faith is more than mere knowledge, more than belief, but is a joyful response of the heart to the truth of the Gospel.
Eternal life is not given to people who think that Jesus is the Son of God. It is given to people who drink from Jesus as the Son of God.
Faith, embracing the spiritual beauty of Christ, is the key to my joy and spiritual growth.
If we can look in our hearts and see God’s love within, sense a spiritual eye for Christ’s light and an ear for Christ’s voice and a taste for Christ’s living water, then we can rejoice and thank God for His glorious grace in our lives, for these are the marks of true faith.
Because building my faith is central to grace, destroying my faith is central to Satan.
Whether it is a discouraging situation, a tempting thought, or any other kind of battle, the real target of Satan is always my faith.
Whenever we turn from faith (total trust and reliance) in God and turn toward anything else, we open the door to sin in our lives.
All the sinful states of our hearts are owing to unbelief in God’s super-abounding future grace.
All our sin comes from failing to be satisfied with all that God is for us in Jesus.
Example: the heart that loves money is a heart that pins its hopes, and pursues its pleasures, and puts its trust in what human resources can offer. So the love of money is virtually the same as faith in money (trust, confidence, assurance) that money will meet your needs and make you happy. You can’t trust in God and in money at the same time. Belief in one is unbelief in the other.
Where faith in God fails, sin follows. Faith stands or falls on the truth that the future with God is more satisfying than the one promised by sin. Where this truth is embraced and God is cherished above all, the power of sin is broken.
Grace is God’s Power At Work in My Life
God’s Grace is Boundless
The reason God saved us was so He could lavish the riches of His grace on us, and it will take God all of eternity to do it. (see Ephesians 2:4-7)
We never have to worry about being beyond the reach of God’s grace, and we never have to worry or manipulate to try and win God’s grace.
God’s grace is a boundless infinite ocean. This reservoir of future grace is hidden from our eyes, but each of us can look back and see a sea of grace that has already flowed from God’s hand, and it grows broader and deeper every day.
God did the hardest thing, not only that has ever been done, but the hardest thing that could ever even be conceivable to be done, in the universe: He allowed His Son, the being He loved more than anything else in the universe, to suffer and die. Why? Romans 8:32 says it— “for us.” So Paul is saying that if God has already done the hardest thing in the universe, it is an easy thing, a simple thing, for Him to “graciously give us all things.”
Having Faith in God’s Grace Changes Everything
You must believe this or you will not thrive, or perhaps even survive as a Christian, in the pressures and temptations of modern life. There is so much pain, so many setbacks and discouragements, so many controversies and pressures. I do not know where I would turn in the ministry if I did not believe that almighty God is taking every setback and every discouragement and every controversy and every pressure and every pain, and stripping it of its destructive power and making it work for the enlargement of my joy in God.
If you live inside this massive promise, your life is more solid and stable than Mount Everest… nothing can blow you over when you are inside the walls …Outside all is confusion and anxiety and fear and uncertainty. Outside this promise of all-encompassing future grace there are straw houses of drugs and alcohol and numbing TV and dozens of futile diversions…once you walk through the door of love into the massive, unshakable structure everything changes. There comes into your life stability and depth and freedom…The confidence that a sovereign God governs for your good all the pain and all the pleasure that you will ever experience is an incomparable refuge and security and hope and power in your life. When God’s people really live by the future grace of Romans 8:28— from measles to the mortuary— we are the freest and strongest and most generous people in the world.
God’s Answer to Every Prayer is Grace.
Many of us have been taught that God answers prayers either “yes” “no” or “wait.” But in reality God always answers every prayer by giving us His grace—the grace of a blessing, the grace to endure a hardship, or the grace of patience.
Grace Gives Me a Heart for Holiness
Jesus repeatedly spoke of the importance of becoming like God—loving & holy. Jesus said that he did not come to do away with God’s laws but to fulfill them. Bottom line:
The law is so wonderful and important that part of the reason Jesus died was that we could obey it and fulfill it.
The commandments of God are not negligible because we are under grace. They are doable because we are under grace.
How does grace do give me a heart for holiness? Sin is what you do when your heart is not satisfied with God. Sin makes a promise to us, to satisfy us, just as God does. Obeying God is learning to trust and value God’s promises to satisfy us in Jesus more than trusting or valuing the promises of sin.
There is a power that comes from prizing God which leaves no nook or cranny of life untouched.
Grace Gives Me a Heart of Patience
Patience is a deepening, ripening, peaceful willingness to wait for God in the unplanned place of obedience, and to walk with God at the unplanned pace of obedience— to wait in His place, and go at His pace.
On his deathbed the 18th century pastor Charles Simeon wrote:
Infinite wisdom has arranged the whole (of my life) with infinite love; and infinite power enables me— to rest upon that love. I am in a dear Father’s hands— all is secure. When I look to Him, I see nothing but faithfulness— and immutability— and truth; and I have the sweetest peace— I cannot have more peace.
Grace Gives Me a Heart of Contentment
Faith is the experience of contentment in Jesus, the satisfaction of my soul’s thirst and my heart’s hunger. The fight of faith is the fight to keep your heart contented in Christ— to really believe, and keep on believing, that He will meet every need and satisfy every longing.
As bitterness rears its ugly taste in our soul, we can successfully banish it with the assurance that God’s justice will be satisfied and by cherishing the even sweeter taste of God’s own forgiveness and love for us.
Grace Gives Me a Heart of Endurance
The Apostle Paul uses two word pictures of the walk of faith: a fight and a race. That means it must be hard, and that we must endure to the end. Knowing that we are in a race and a fight helps us to endure when the way becomes hard.
Grace Brings Suffering & Redeems Suffering
The more you are willing to forsake trust in yourself and the things of this world, the more you will open yourself up to situations where you may experience suffering for God.
When you know that your future is in the hands of an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-wise God who promises to work all things for your good, you are free to take any risk that love demands— no matter the cost.
In regards to spreading the gospel today, we talk so much about “closed countries” that we have almost lost God’s perspective on missions— as though he ever meant it to be safe.
There are no closed countries to those who assume that persecution, imprisonment, and death are the likely results of spreading the gospel. And Jesus in Matthew 24:9 said plainly that these are the likely results.
God has purposes that He intends to accomplish through suffering:
Suffering Shapes an Unshakable Faith
Suffering Shapes our Character
Suffering Magnifies the Worth of Christ
Grace Frees Me From Fear
The aim of grace is to liberate me from fears and desires that enslave my soul and hinder radical obedience to Jesus.
Freeing me to live a radical life, doing whatever will advance the Kingdom and glorify Jesus– that’s why God gives me grace.
Grace Gives Me a Heart for God’s Glory
One thing is past all question: we shall bring our Lord most glory if we get from Him much grace. If I have much faith, so that I can take God at His Word… I shall greatly honor my Lord and King. (Charles Spurgeon)
Grace Gives Me a Heart for Ministry
The state of the heart is shown by the things that satisfy its desires.
Ministry is a lifestyle devoted to advancing other people’s faith and holiness.
But a lifestyle of ministry is costly, in acts of sacrificial love. None of these costly acts of love just happens. They are impelled by a new appetite— the appetite of faith for the fullest experience of God’s grace.”
Grace Frees Me to Pursue Joy in God
The breadth and depth of our pursuit of joy in God is the measure of His worth in our life.
God commands us to pursue joy in Him. In fact, He commands us to pursue joy with as much passion and zeal and intensity as we can. Pursuing joy is not sin, but pursuing happiness where it cannot be lastingly found is sin.
“Delight yourself in the Lord” (Psalm 37:4) is not a secondary suggestion. It is a radical call to pursue your fullest satisfaction in all that God promises to be for you in Jesus. It is a call to live in the joyful freedom and sacrificial love that comes from faith in future grace.
Live by faith. Live by grace. Live for joy in God.
 I think a Christian must have first said the words “guilty pleasure”— because sometimes we seem to be incapable of separating the two. Our understanding of the importance of fleeing sin, dying to ourselves, & focusing on God has often confused us of the place of pleasure in the life of a follower of Christ.
We seem to swing between the two extremes of rejecting any “earthly” thing that feels good or else embracing anything and everything under the justification that God loves us and wants us to be happy.
It seems that legitimate pleasure is a ground so tricky and full of land mines that few pastors or teachers will walk deeply into its territory. At most they seem to skim around it with some humorous quotes or iron clad rules.
Gary Thomas, however, does neither, plunging into the heart of the place of pleasure in the life of a Christian with a deep, thoughtful book filled with wisdom.
Well known as a thinker and writer who draws upon centuries of ancient and classic theology and philosophy throughout his books, Gary does the same here, carefully considering the topic from a variety of angles, from the place of pleasure in God’s creation and plan, its dangers and delights, how it fits into our love & devotion to God, and how it truly can be purely enjoyed in a holy life. He speaks to Christians who have tipped too far in both directions: to those who reject pleasure, he calls them to enjoy what God has given for them to enjoy as a way of strengthening their souls and their love for God. To those who have put pleasure above all else in their life, he calls them back to remember the Giver more than the gifts, and shows them a better way.
As with all of Thomas’ books, it is chock full of quotable insights. Here are a just a few of my favorites:
Nonbelievers are supernaturally thirsty because they do not know God, whom they were created to enjoy. Many believers are thirsty because they do not know how to enjoy God and the life He has given them.
It would be the height of folly, the triumph of arrogance, for me to assume I can do without what God has laid at my feet and blessed as good gifts from his gracious hand.
I walk with Christ because a life with Christ is a beautiful life, the most incredible journey I can imagine.
To the child of God, pleasure becomes the destination we reach when we walk the path of obedience.
All we can do is walk the road God lays out for us.
If you’ve ever wondered or ever struggled with the right way to feel pleasure in your life, you will love reading this book. (Just don’t feel guilty about enjoying it!)
For more information on the book click here to view it on Amazon.com.
Running a half marathon was not a single experience.
It was really a whole succession of experiences, one after another, like a necklace made of a long row of beads, every bead being different. Runners will tell you that every mile is different, and that is true.
Although every “bead” on my half marathon necklace was different, there were three basic kinds: beautiful beads, bad beads, and bland beads.
I had some beautiful beads on that first half marathon: the giddy positive energy of thousands of runners waiting to start, hearing war whoops as runners topped the first hill, running through the forested greenways.
There were some bad beads as well: frustration when my GPS malfunctioned, the really steep hill where I struggled to make it to the top, the stabbing pain in my calf that threatened to end my race.
But honestly, most of my marathon beads were just bland: not terribly bad, but not memorably beautiful either. I was just there, just running mile after mile to keep going. Most of the moments of those miles are just a gray blur to me now.
Beautiful, bad, and bland, I learned five things about the beads of that run:
- Every course has all three. Every long run is a mixture of all three kinds of moments: there will be moments of beauty, moments not so beautiful, & many moments that are pretty ordinary. Sorry to destroy any dreams of running nirvana, but there aren’t any marathons where every moment is sheer bliss.
- Every mile will pass. If it’s a beautiful moment, savor it, because it won’t last forever. If it’s a bad moment, take comfort knowing it won’t last either. Moments are just that: moments. They all will pass.
- Attitude is everything. When the bad or the bland beads come, you can curse God or cry out to God, but either way you’ve still got a race to run. Cursing or complaining wouldn’t have made my hill or my calf pain go away, but having the right perspective made them livable.
- You’ve got to run each mile, beautiful, bad, & bland, to reach the finish line. That’s a pretty obvious one, I know, but one that our minds try to trick us on. There’s no way around it: if you want to see the finish line, you’ve got to accept running every mile, through the good, the bad, and the boring. The only way for me to run 13 miles was, well, to run 13 miles, and everything that entailed.
- There’s only one victory bead, and it’s the last one. That flush of emotional splendor that makes it all worthwhile comes at the end, and only at the end, of the race. Struggling up a hill and saying, “I’m not feeling too victorious here,” should come as no surprise to you.
I bet you’ve figured out by now I’m talking about more than running. Yep, our whole life is composed of those same three kinds of beads. You don’t have to look too far to start counting out the moments of your life: there’s been some beautiful ones filled with love, joy, & peace. There’s been some bad ones filled with pain, grief, & regret. A whole lot of our moments seem pretty bland and ordinary too, don’t they?
So whether you’re experiencing a beautiful, bad, or bland bead in your life right now, you can keep in mind the same five truths:
- Every life has all three kinds.
- Every one will pass.
- Attitude is everything.
- You have to run through each one to reach the finish line.
- There’s only one victory bead, and it’s the last one.
Oh, and by the way, here’s a bonus one: God is always with you, through each moment of your life. He is with you in all times beautiful, in all times bad, and even in all times boring. God is with you, and that makes all the difference running the race.
I don’t like the taste of Powerade.
To me it’s just a disagreeably sicky sweet salty taste. I’ll drink water, or diet drinks (yes I know they’re not good for me), or even a chocolate frappacino once in a while.
But I never drink Powerade.
That all changed one Sunday morning.
A few miles into my half-marathon, I approached the first drink station. They were handing out cups of both water and Powerade. Normally, I would have reached towards the water without even a thought. But as I looked at both, suddenly my brain was swinging my arm towards the Powerade. I reached out and took a few swigs as I kept running.
Whoa. It tasted completely different than it had before. It tasted, like, really really good. It was six ounces of blue heaven in a cup.
What was going on? What happened? I couldn’t figure it out. The scientist in me kicked in, and I promised myself that I would run a test and drink water at the next station.
The next station came, and I got ready to enjoy some clean, cold, refreshing water. But instead I got this bleah stuff swirling in my mouth that I knew was water, but somehow it wasn’t refreshing. It didn’t seem to satisfy me. I was no longer thirsty for it.
Still not convinced, I decided to switch back to that drink I couldn’t stand at the next station. And once again, that revolting Powerade tasted like pure heaven to my taste buds.
What happened? Had they changed the taste of Powerade or of water? I knew the answer: the drink had not changed, but the drinker. I was losing calories and electrolytes in the run, and my body was automatically adjusting my taste buds to reflect what I really needed. Because I had changed, what I was thirsty for changed.
That little incident on a street in downtown Knoxville reminds me of one of the most sobering questions I have ever asked myself: What are you thirsty for, John?
This time, I’m not talking about a thirsty body, but a thirsty soul. I look at my soul straight in the face and ask it, “Soul, what are you thirsty for?”
The answer isn’t pretty. So often my soul thirsts for pretty useless stuff– the latest gadget, a little mindless TV, one more piece of pie. And the darker, soul-destroying thirsts of sin are ever present as well. Isn’t it strange that we so often want life out of what we know will actually kill us instead?
I know that if you take an honest look at your own soul you’ll see some ugly thirsts too. That’s part of belonging to the human race, my friend.
So what do we do? How do handle these thirsts within our soul?
There are three options, only three, open to you. The first is to try and quench your thirst with what your soul is thirsty for. Freely indulge that addiction, go for the gusto, live your life pursuing pleasure, or power, or prestige, or peace, or whatever your soul says it needs.
There’s one huge problem with that approach: your soul is not like my body was on race day: it doesn’t know what it should be thirsty for. Our souls have all been warped by our fallenness. If we are willing to take an honest look we can all see it: many foolish decisions, many mistakes, many lives hurt because of our souls being thirsty for the wrong things.
The second approach to the thirsty soul is to quiet it. This is the approach of some religions, that of realizing that soul thirst can never be fully quenched in a fallen world, and so they decide to try and kill thirst instead. If desire inevitably brings suffering, then they say we must eliminate desire.
The problem with this approach is obvious: convincing a man in a desert that he doesn’t need water doesn’t stop him from dying of thirst. Our souls are thirsty. They must drink. Pretending that we have no soul desires is both futile and deadly.
So, if our soul’s thirst can neither be quenched nor quieted, what can we do? The answer lies in what happened during my run: my thirst was changed. What my brain desired was shifted to what my body needed, and the result was a new thirst that was a positive force for my good.
So, how does that work on a soul level? What does my soul really need? What is its “Powerade,” and how can I change my thirst to match it?
Jesus answered this very question, while talking to a woman at a well…
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” ( John 4:10-14 )
It’s so simple: the thirst of our soul is meant to be a thirst for the presence of God. No other drink will do. And God in His grace gives us a new thirst for Him when He gives us a new life, and gives us a spring of water in the Holy Spirit.
Think about what the presence of God is for the soul. First, God’s presence is perfect: there is no better nourishment possible for our souls, because God created our souls to receive life from Him.
His presence is also pure: there is nothing evil, nothing harmful, nothing but good to be gotten from God. His presence is powerful: our lives are transformed as we live in Him.
Finally, His presence is permanent. As Jesus said to the woman, those who are Christ’s have a well that will never run dry. God is now always with us, always available to relieve our soul’s thirst, and we shall live in His presence for all eternity.
Perfect, pure, powerful, permanent: God’s gift of His presence in the Spirit is all these things, and a thousand more.
Since my soul is still fallen, I still have these other thirsts, other things that my foolish soul sometimes thinks will give me refreshment. But now I have an answer when I feel the thirst, when my soul asks “What am I thirsty for?”
I simply answer back, “Soul, what are you really thirsty for, down deep, in the spirit God gave you when He gave you a new life?” And I smile, and hear God say, “Drink, my son, drink deep and long of the fountain I have put within you, and be refreshed.”
“You didn’t really think I’d make this easy on you, did you?”
In the two weeks leading up to my half-marathon, I kept imagining God speaking those words to me.
It all started three Saturdays before the race, as I was doing my 2nd training eleven mile run. As I was pounding the sidewalk and enjoying a beautiful sunrise I started noticing pain in my left ankle. I knew that discomfort in an area often came and went as the miles went by, so I pressed on through the entire run. Later that morning my ankle was still throbbing, and the pain worsened as the day went on. I woke up the next morning hobbling and unable to take a single step without pain. Worse yet, we were vacationing in Atlanta, and so over the next few days I had to walk miles on an injured ankle so that my family was able to enjoy the sights.
“Well, this is great!” I thought. “Two weeks before my race and barely able to walk!” But I was undeterred: I went to see a physical therapist as soon as I got home, and with some stretching, iontopheresis, ibuprofen, and Voltaren gel I was back to a 3 mile run within a week.
“Ok, God, you gave me a little setback to teach me some humility, but I’m good now, right?”
Wrong. Tuesday before the race, I came down with a raging head cold which left me so zapped of energy that I knew if I kept trying to train I wouldn’t have any energy to run when it counted on Sunday.
More medicine, more waiting. Now I’m running thirteen miles for the first time in my life, with inadequate conditioning, recovering from a bum ankle & a cold.
“Ok, I’ve got the message now, God.”
Apparently, I hadn’t, because I also got a race morning weather forecast of thunderstorms with wind gusts up to 30 miles per hour and small hail. (No, I am not making this up!)
Oh, and for the frosting on top, I misplaced my earbuds & run strap for my iPhone that I had planned to use for my run, and realized in my hotel room at 9pm the night before the race I had not packed any running shorts (PANIC!).
“What is going on here, God?”
Have you ever felt like saying that too?
Obstacles. Problems. Challenges. Hills. Every runner faces them, both before and during a race. They take many forms: physical, logistical, mental, & spiritual. Every single one of them has to be faced & conquered before you can cross the finish line.
The same is true of life. We all face hills. Some of them are small enough we don’t even break a sweat, while others look & feel like Mount Everest. But big or small, short or long, all of them need to be faced & climbed.
Why does a loving God put hills in our lives? Why can’t our race always be on level ground?
The Bible says that part of the answer is that the hills reveal our hearts. You see, God is always focused on our hearts, our souls, because that’s the real me & you, the part that’s eternal. God’s plan is to show us our hearts, so that we can clearly see their condition and adjust our lives accordingly.
So why do hills reveal hearts? Here’s a word picture from my own playbook as a physician: If I’m concerned about the state of my patient’s heart, what do I do? I order a stress test. Why? Because the best way to assess the health of a physical heart is to observe it on a hill (or a treadmill, as the case may be.) I can see weaknesses when that heart is running on a grade that I could never see while my patient is simply sitting in my office. In the same way, you can see things about your spiritual heart when it’s “climbing a hill” that you would never realize if your path was always easy & level.
The Bible uses another type of picture to help us understand part of God’s purposes in the “hills” of our lives, the picture of gold being tested by fire:
And I (God) will put this third into the fire, and refine them as one refines silver, and test them as gold is tested. They will call upon my name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘They are my people’; and they will say, ‘The LORD is my God.’” (Zechariah 13:6)
In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith-more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire-may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 1:6-7)
In these passages the hills (trials) in our lives are compared to the ancient method of testing gold by fire. The quality of the gold could only be judged by seeing its response to extreme heat.
We can often fool others and even delude ourselves about the state of our hearts when times are good and everything’s going smooth, but let a big hill upset our well tailored plans, and just like the gold that needs refining we will be faced with the impurities of our own hearts: all of our fear, anxiety, anger, and selfish motives.
God wants us to see the state of our hearts through our trials, with the intent of us growing to be more like Christ. Are you climbing a hill in your life now? Then let God show you three things about your heart through your hill: its training, its trust, and its treasure.
First, look at how hills reveal training. Every time I run a race the story is the same: everyone starts out with gusto and excitement, but it doesn’t last. You see a runner who was clipping along just fine a few yards ago start sputtering & crashing once they encounter a steep hill. The runner becomes a walker, all because he didn’t adequately anticipate and train for the hills.
Jesus spoke of how one’s training, one’s preparation becomes obvious to all during the rough times:
“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.” (Matthew 7:24-27)
How a person’s life performs in a storm is determined by how they have trained their heart in the way of Jesus.
How is your heart performing in the storm, going up your hill? Does it reflect a rock solid foundation built on Christ? Jesus invites you to take an honest look at what your true foundation is by what your hill reveals.
The good news is that it’s never too late to change your training; that’s why God in His infinite love allows us to see our hearts. He gives us the opportunity to see so that we might turn to Christ and become a true follower, who diligently trains for that next hill they will face.
The second truth that hills reveal about our hearts is our trust. How do they do reveal trust? Simple: it’s easy to trust when everything’s going our way. The test of trust doesn’t come on the flat plains, but on the hills.
If I’m running a race and the way is flat and straight, I can easily say that I’m trusting that my path is true. Why would I even doubt? But if the hill is steep and my strength and my hope of reaching the top is failing, what then? Might I think that maybe I should look for a shortcut? A better route? A different course to run?
In the same way, it’s easy to say we trust God when our race course is flat. But when we take a hill, is our trust firm, or do we start looking around for a shortcut or a new course?
When our checkbook balance is plump, we don’t think of fudging on our taxes. But what about when we’ve lost our job and about to lose our house? When our spouse is Heaven’s gift, cheating doesn’t even cross our mind. But what about when we’ve endured years of marital conflict and disappointment, with no end in sight? How is our trust in God then?
When we hit the hill, and can’t see the top, when we don’t even know whether there is a top, what do we do? Does our heart still show trust in God?
There was one man who faced a hill steeper than any we will ever face: Job. He lost his money, lost his children, lost the respect of all his friends, and lost his health.
Why should he still trust God? Even his wife told him to curse God. But Job’s heart, though terribly hurt, despondent, and confused, still maintained an iron grip on God. In Job 13:15 Job famously states, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust Him.”
Although none of us will be tried as Job, we all will face hills, and with each hill the choice: will I trust God, or will I look for another way?
As we fight the faith to continue to trust God on the hill, we can use the 3 R’s: Remember, Recite, & Reach Out. Remember all the hills that have come before, and how God has always proven Himself faithful. Recite God’s promises from Scripture. Reach out to faithful friends, sharing your struggles to trust God, and let them encourage and guide you.
The final truth that hills reveal is the treasure of our hearts. What’s the difference between the runner who struggles and strains and sweats up the hills and endures to the finish line, and the one who throws up his arms, quits, and walks away? The difference is what he truly treasures in his heart.
How much does he really want to cross that finish line? How much does he long to hold that medal in his hands, the one that can only be held by the one who doesn’t give up, but keeps going? Hills test treasure.
The Apostle Paul, awaiting Roman execution for his faith, wrote to his pupil Timothy about the treasure he was looking forward to, the treasure that kept him going throughout the long years and the hard hills of his race:
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing. (2 Timothy 4:7-8)
When Paul faced his hills, when he was beaten, imprisoned, and abandoned, he kept one thing in His mind– how much he treasured Jesus:
Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith- that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. (Philippians 3:8-11)
How did Paul do this? How did he treasure Christ enough to actually want to suffer and die for Him? The key is that he had a new heart. None of us are born with a heart that can treasure Christ above all, and none of us can change our hearts to treasure Him like that either. But out of God’s great love for us, God can give us new hearts that can fully love & treasure & follow Him. God first foretold this to the prophet Ezekiel:
And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. (Ezekiel 36:26-28)
This is my great hope, and the hope of all true children of God. This is what makes Christianity different from all other religions & philosophies: that through Christ God grants to us a new heart that can love & treasure & follow Him.
Through God’s gift of a new heart, I know that, even though I may stumble and fall, there is no hill in my life that I cannot climb, for it is “no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20)
Are you running up a hill today? Let that hill do its work in your life. Let it show you your training, what kind of house you’ve built on what kind of foundation, and see that Christ is the only sure foundation. Let it show you your trust, who or what you are looking toward for answers & direction, and see that Christ is the only One who is wholly trustworthy. Let it show you your treasure, what prize you are seeking in your heart, and strive evermore to let your only, always treasure be our blessed Lord and Savior Jesus.
Here are my notes from the last session of the T4G 2010 conference, a gracious exhortation from C. J. Mahaney to pastors based on 2 Timothy 4:
Some pastors are remarkable gifts to the church, with massive intellects and unusual insights, but most of us are ordinary pastors with ordinary gifts & ordinary areas of spheres and abilities to serve. We’re consistently preaching average sermons Sunday after Sunday, without writing best selling books or having thousands downloading our sermons from around the world or being recognized as we walk down the street. All of us are called and gifted, but not unusually so. But ordinary pastors are predictably tempted to unfavorably compare themselves to these unusual men, and become discouraged. Too often ordinary pastors are discouraged pastors.
To combat this temptation and discouragement, we must turn to a true definition, a true charge, of pastoral ministry. It’s not about gifting or even fruitfulness: all we are called to be is faithful to this charge.
Three Ways a Pastor Can Be Faithful To His Call
One: Be Faithful to the Message 2 Timothy 4:2
Never assume your people have an exhaustive knowledge of the Gospel.
You must resolve to be UNoriginal to remain fixed on the matter of first importance, the Gospel.
The simple Gospel might not look like much, (like one pastor’s first car ( a pink 1957 Ford)), but there is power under the hood. You can say “I can do this! I can preach this Gospel!”
Once Charles Spurgeon’s grandfather remarked, “My grandson may preach the Gospel better than I can, but he cannot preach a better Gospel.”
Faithfulness to the message requires knowing your people, using pastoral wisdom and discernment. That is what Paul means by reprove, rebuke, exhort. You cannot prepare your teaching in isolation from your flock.
Pastoral ministry requires complete patience (verse 2). If we are not patient with our people then we are not being faithful to this charge. Don’t let faith in your people become frustration with your people.
How do you cultivate patience? 1. By marveling at God’s patience with you. 2. By realizing sanctification is a loooong process. 3. By marveling that people who heard you last week actually are coming back to hear you this week. 4. By realizing that many of God’s metaphors are based on agriculture, on timespans of seasons & years. 5. By not assuming you are sufficiently patient.
Two: Be Faithful to your Ministry 2 Timothy 2:5
We are called to relentless faithfulness, today, tomorrow, every day, for all your life.
One of the hardest and most crucial tasks for any ministry is just to keep doing the same things year after year, instead of being distracted by doing “new” or “better” things.
Three: Be Faithful to the Savior 2 Timothy 2:8
Look forward with an eternal perspective to your reward as an ordinary pastor.
On that Day there will be a parade of ordinary pastors, who you have never heard of, who will hear Christ say, “Well done, good & faithful pastor.”
For further reading: Memoirs of an Ordinary Pastor: The Life and Reflections of Tom Carson by D. A. Carson
This afternoon’s session at the T4G 2010 Conference was by Josh Harris, pastor & author, based on his new book Dug Down Deep: Helping Others Build Their Lives on Christ-Centered Doctrine.
Evangelical Christianity in America today is now characterized as moralistic,therapeutic deism. People think it’s all about doing good things, getting their problems fixed, under the eye of a benevolent but uninvolved God.
The question is: What are we going to do about it? What is our reaction?
Do we see the contemporary Christian landscape as sheep without a shepherd who need the truth?
As we look at luke 6, we see that Jesus faced the same sort of problem that we face today, people who call Him Lord but do not do the things He said. People do not know the Gospel, so they don’t know how to apply the reality of the Gospel to their lives.
What did Jesus do with these people? He spoke grace to them, shepherded them, and that is what we are called to do. Pastors, don’t study Barna, study your people, the individual people that God has brought to you. Here are four points as you shepherd your people in the life-transforming reality of the Gospel.
One: Tell Them Simply
When Jesus spoke to the immature, He spoke simply. Don’t preach your message for fellow pastors. You can feed a child a steak, but if you love him you will cut it up into bite sized pieces.
Two: Tell Them Why
Let them know the real benefits of a transformed life. You can do this without pandering to selfishness. Tell them why doctrine matters to real life. Tell them the storms are coming to their lives, and what they believe about God & Jesus will make all the difference. Show them that we are all theologians. Make them confront the questions: Do you see the foundation you are building on? Do you see how you will be swept away if you keep clinging to your incorrect beliefs about yourself & God?
Three: Tell Them How
The parable of the two houses in Luke 6 shows us a three step process that we should teach and model:
Step One: Come to Jesus– make it clear there is no solid foundation except in the person & work of Jesus. The point of all theological doctrine is to know and obey this Person. Not ritual or rule keeping or anything else: all else is sand. Jesus is the Rock.
What are the popular false foundations in your church, the things that people functionally stake their lives on, have confidence in, even if they would say that Jesus is their Lord? Ask people: What is special about our church? It probably reveals your false foundation. In reality, nothing makes us special, all we have is Christ. Christ is the only foundation. Are we training our people to be most passionate about their relationship with Jesus?
Step Two: Listen to His Words– We serve a God Who speaks. People want to separate doctrinal truth and relational intimacy into two tracks, but correct doctrine is relational. There is no relationship without knowing God. If you want to feel deeply, you must think deeply. The narration of the facts is history; the narration of the facts with the interpretation of the facts is doctrine.
Step Three: Put His Words into Practice– we often see people with foundations of sand as people who do not KNOW doctrine, but Jesus says it is people who do not FOLLOW doctrine.
What do people see as the word picture of sound doctrine? A fight, a trophy? Or building?
Doctrine is for building your life. It has to be put into practice. Doctrine doesn’t end when people shut their Bibles and walk out of the church building.
That’s why Paul said, “Watch your life & your doctrine closely.”. Your life must be a testimony to the importance of sound doctrine.
Four: Tell Them Compassionately
We often learn to rebuke like Jesus but not love like Jesus.
Will we gently and compassionately show them the importance of digging down deep?
Will we be an example with our lives?
My life was changed because I had a pastor (C. J. Mahaney) that not only taught sound doctrine, but lived it and showed me his life, his house that he had built on sound doctrine.
There is a whole generation of churchgoers who have not seen a life based on a solid foundation, lived with humility and integrity.
They need to see such a life, they need someone who will let them inside their house, jump on the floor and see that it really is firm, to see that it stands in the worst of storms. They need to see the value and goodness of building their life on Jesus Christ.
Will you be that person?
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