This past week has probably been the most refining week of the last 13 1/2 months. Never before has so much of my sin surfaced. Never before has the grace, mercy and love of God been more evident to me. Never before have I understood why it’s God’s kindness that leads us to repentance. And never before have I been humbled by my complete dependence on and desire for God.

Back story: About a week ago I thought my initial support journey had come to an end. Let me tell you, there was much rejoicing as I heard those 5 beautiful words, “Yeah, we’ll finish your support.” Mission complete. God had brought it over $350 of monthly support in three days! Crazy provision.

However, over the weekend, a few supporters dropped off and I knew I was now about $100 short of being finished. Then I talked to my support coach on Monday to find there were more miscalculations and I was really $240 a month away from being done.

Cue breakdown. I was done. All of the sudden I completely forgot all that God had done in a week and was wallowing in self-pity and bitterness. I had become stiff-necked and accusatory towards God, the One who had literally provided thousands of dollars up to this point. I didn’t care. I was going to walk away.

I wish I was being dramatic but I’m not. Faith test: Failed. I fell flat on my face and ended up with a broken nose. The next morning as I was processing with the Lord He firmly and gently prodded my heart and brought me to the story of the Prodigal Son. I’ve read over the story multiple times in the last few days and relate so much with one character: the Prodigal Son’s older brother.

The older son feels like he has been faithful to his father and therefor is more deserving of a party in his honor. Unlike his little brother, he stayed with his father, worked hard and followed through on his commitments. His brother, on the other hand, floundered his inheritance and showed no signs of responsibility or maturity. Why was his father celebrating his son who was a complete joke?

I love the father’s response to his oldest son. He says, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to celebrate and be glad for this day your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found” (Luke 15:31-32).

While these verses are a picture of the transformation from death to life in coming into saving faith and the celebration there is of one person surrendering to the irresistible grace of Christ, God used the interaction between the eldest son and the father to reveal my spirit of entitlement. The words of the father speak of the value of the relationship the older son has with the father. The older son lost sight of the priceless relationship he has with his father.

You see, I was upset about not being done with support because I felt like I had worked hard for 13 1/2 months and deserved to be done by now. It was my turn to celebrate. Bring out the fattened calf. When God told me there was more work to be done and to trust him, I threw my relationship with Him in His face and told Him I was done. I lost sight of  precious value of the relationship I have with my Heavenly Father. I was seeking the gifts, not the Giver.

Yet, what was God’s response? He still loved me. He still extended grace to me. And get this, He still provided for me. Did you catch that? He still provided for me, the daughter who felt entitled to the blessings He had given her. He was faithful. He was strong. He was loving. He was who He is because He is not able to be anything else.

I failed my faith test. But God didn’t fail me. His faithfulness endured and my position in Him is still secure because of His radical love and crazy grace. That’s the God I love, serve and know.

So support update: Turns out I missed a few monthly partners in the report I sent my support coach (thank you human error) and really only needed $120 a month support. And through God’s crazy provision (again) I’m now only $25 a month away from being able to report on campus! May this be a testimony to His glory, honor, faithfulness and provision.

And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

John 17:3

Straightforward and to the point. Eternal life is to know God and His Son whom He sent to save us.

This verse stuck out to me today not because of any profound thought or insight. It is a basic, simple truth to the Christian life that never gets old. But I think it hit me deeper today because of the season of life I’m in.

Life is good. My roommates and I just moved into a beautiful house that meets the needs of our daily life and fulfills our dream of being an open place for people to come and go. My family is loving and supportive in the direction God is taking me. I am surrounded by real, meaningful, deep friendships that reflect the character of God and the community within the Trinity. God constantly provides for me and is revealing so much of who He is through His Word.

All of these are blessings and prefect gifts from God. They are independent of me, nothing I’ve earned or deserved but stand to remind me of God’s grace and mercy in my life.

Yet, more often than not, I turn these gifts into something to make me hold on tighter to this world instead of trusting and enjoying the only true God. I lose sight of eternal life and become consumed by worldly living.

I think that’s why Jesus’ words hit my heart so deeply today. Yes, I am to enjoy life on this earth. But my joy is to be found in Christ, knowing Him and experiencing Him, living for the glory of God. And more than that, my eyes should be set on eternity, regardless of my worldly processions and surroundings, with my hope set in eternal life when I can experience unbroken fellowship with God.

The life worth living for is not found here. It is only found in knowing God. This world will pass away. But hope in and come to know God and His Son whom He sent and real life, eternal life will be yours.

The story of Lazarus is one that I have heard many times. Jesus is told Lazarus is sick yet waits two days before going to see him. Lazarus had been dead four days before Jesus gets there. Jesus weeps then brings Lazarus back to life. It’s a story I often disengage in when I read or hear it. How often does my heart grow cold to the wondrous works of Jesus in the gospels. How easily I brush them aside in disinterest.

Luckily as I read this story these past two days God has been gracious enough to give me new eyes to stand in new amazement of Him. Some thoughts I wanted to share.

My favorite verses of this story are found John 11:43-44, which say:

When he [Jesus] had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out.” The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”

Jesus commands that Lazarus be unbound by death’s dressings to be free to live. I can’t help but be amazed by Jesus’ words of life! Lazarus could do nothing to give himself life. He had been dead for four days. The only way he was brought back to life was through the grace and mercy of Jesus. Do you see the parallels with our salvation and life?

As I thought about Lazarus’ new life I was reminded of Ephesians 2:1-10. I highly recommend that you take the time to read the whole passage but a excerpt that I think illustrates how Christ calls us to life is:

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world…But God being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ…” (Eph 2: 1-2, 4-5).

Just like Lazarus, we were dead in a tomb. No life was within us. Yet through Christ’s death and resurrection we are made alive with Christ and experience true life. Jesus commands the spiritual death that binds us to be taken off and we have freedom to live.

In chapter 12 of John we see just how Lazarus is given life: he is now able to enjoy the fellowship of Jesus. John 12:2 says that Lazarus is reclining at the table with Jesus. This is significant for two reasons: (1) To recline at the table of a king was a huge honor. Now that Lazarus has life given by the King he is free to openly enjoy the company of the King. (2) When Christ returns, those whom He has given life to through His death and resurrection will get to feast at His table for eternity and enjoy communion with Him. Lazarus sitting at the table with Jesus shows a relationship.

However, as we read on in John 12: 10, there is also a cost of following Jesus into life. The chief priests did not like that Jesus had given Lazarus life and that God was using it to bring His kingdom’s plan into play. So what do they plan to do? Kill him with Jesus. They saw he was different and stood for something they were against. Following Jesus comes with a cost. It will cost you the approval of the world. It may even cost you your life.

This brings me to my last thought, which takes me back to John 11:4, 40, 42. Why did Jesus give Lazarus life? For Lazarus’ happiness? Health? To make life easy for him? No. Jesus wants to make the point clear:

But when Jesus heard it he said, “This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it” (John 11:4).

Lazarus is brought form death to life for the glory of God. It is not about Lazarus or his earthly life. It is about God and Him being exulted above all else. Our salvation is not about our health or happiness. It is about God, His glory and His work. We are instruments for God that God has predestined to use for His kingdom.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:10).

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.”

-John 5:39

Two thoughts came to my mind as I was reading John 5 this morning:

(1) The Jews in Jesus’ audience thought that life came through the Scriptures. Repeatedly throughout John, Jesus calls Himself the life and uses imagery involving water and light, both necessary to give life. The Jews in His audience focused so much on the Scripture and finding life there they missed the true Life-Giver.

This causes me to think: Where do I go to find life? Studying? Knowledge? Acceptance? Why am I filling myself with false reflections of life when the true One who gives life is offering it to me freely?

(2) The Jews in Jesus’ audience valued knowledge of the Scriptures more than to whom the Scriptures were pointing. Here when Jesus says “Scriptures” He is referring to the Torah, which are the books in the Old Testament that Moses wrote.  Jesus says later in the passage, “If you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me” (John 5:46). They know the Scriptures. They have studied them. But not to learn about God, but to gain knowledge about God. There is only a slight difference in those two statements but it is significant. They have spent all this time gaining knowledge about the Scriptures but have missed the point entirely: that God was raising up a deliverer for His people to bring about His redemptive plan.

Again, this causes me to ask myself why do I study? Is it to gain knowledge about God or to learn about His character, His will and to have Him increase my view of Him? Do I see knowledge as an end or as a means to an end of knowing God fully?

This is something I’ve thought about all summer. Paul says in his letter to the Ephesians that he prays that they would “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that [they] may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19). There is a connection between being “filled with the fullness of God” and “knowing the love of Christ”. I think it is important that Paul points out that the love of Christ “surpasses knowledge.” Christ’s love is more filling, more meaningful, more powerful than mere knowledge of Christ’s love.

Don’t get me wrong. We need to study. We need to read. We need to engage our minds with God’s Word. But the key is motivation. What is my motivation? I don’t want to get so wrapped up in gaining knowledge of God that I miss the whole point: knowing my Heavenly Father intimately, letting Him use me to bring glory to His name and be part of His redemptive plan.

Life is found only in Jesus. I pray we stop going to second things first and instead run our first Love and find true life there.

Staff conference has come and gone. What a crazy 10 days. Here are some high lights.

(1) Mountains are beautiful. Seriously.

Mountains at CSU

(2) Tim Keller is an awesome teacher. God has given him great insight on His word and such skill in communicating it. Through his talk God reawakened my excitement for the gospel and my desire to truly experience it. He reminded us that we cannot earn our salvation through any means, but instead we must see the deepness of our sin and our inability to earn the grace and mercy found at in the cross.

Biggest point I’ve taken away from Keller’s talk: Forgiveness is freedom to go. Justification is freedom to come. Thank God the gospel is more than forgiveness of my sins. It is also gives us justification to come to God.

Tim Keller

(3) Larry Crabb also has great insight. Never has God used a speaker to deepen my desire to love others through the power of the gospel. The big idea from his session I’ve taken away: Christianity is the freedom to indulge in our deepest desire: to love.

(4) Being on staff with Campus Crusade has to be one of the greatest jobs ever. It was amazing to hear day after day awesome stories of how God is working around the world to make His kingdom known on earth. It was almost overwhelming to be in one place with 5,000 people who are all united under one mission, one vision and one Love.

During a main session

(5) I have the best co-workers in the world. Bar none.

These are my people.

Part of the greatest team ever!

Staff conference has been such a time of learning and God revealing new things about Himself to me. It is such a sweet experience.

One small thing that has really changed my outlook on is something a speaker said last night as he was talking about time. He said that in Western culture we operate on linear time, meaning everything has a start and a finish and once you pass a certain event you cannot go back. However, in his culture they work in circular time, meaning nothing has a start or finish time. Instead an event last however long it may take to finish.

Now as he was talking he wasn’t saying anything about the support raising process. However, it was like God hit me with a staggering truth. I’ve been looking at support in a linear way. It started a year ago and, in my mind, the ending point has passed. By looking at support in linear time I think I should be done and have, in turn, missed something. I see still raising support as me being late to report to my calling.

And what that really means is I believe God is late in providing. What a ludicrous thing to believe!

Last night God gently nudged me and said, “Look at support in a circular way. Be in the event until it is complete. Run faithfully and fully. Forget time lines and schedules and enjoy the process. Be all in and know I’m working faithfully in my promises.”

I have said many times during this year that I want to run faithfully after support because I want to run faithfully after the Lord all the days of my life. I want to prove faithful in the small things so I can be faithful when the big, hard things come.

There is a time when Jesus will come back and we won’t be able to change things. The truth is this life, this world is traveling in linear time and there is an ultimate end. And my motivation is that when that ending time comes, I will stand before Jesus and hear “Well done.”

So in my life today I’m ask God to give me the eyes to see support in circular time. Being all in until it is complete, unhindered by thinking I’m late to the next event to come. Then I’ll know God will receive His rightful glory because it will be complete in His beautiful, prefect timing.

Is there anything you have been looking at linearly that God would be more glorified in circularly?

“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.”

II Timothy 4:7-8

I love spending time in the Old Testament for two reasons: seeing (1) how unchanging God is and (2) how God uses broken, sinful people to bring about His glorious, redemptive plan. The Old Testament is full of examples of God’s mercy and faithfulness and how in need we are of His mercy and faithfulness. I can’t read the Old Testament without God giving me a deep joy for the work of redemption and salvation He has done in my life.

One of my favorite parts of the story of the Exodus is when the Israelites tell Aaron to make a golden calf that they can worship for bringing them out of Egypt (see Exodus 32). Sounds weird, right? To love a story where God’s people practice idolatry and the covenant is broken? But when I read this story God’s mercy and faithfulness shine through in all His glory.

So what happened? What caused the Israelites to desire this golden calf? What they wanted was the physical symbol of God’s presence with them, which is interesting because that was just what Moses was getting instruction for on the mountain (Exodus 26). God wanted to dwell with His people and had given Moses proper instruction on how to construct the Tabernacle, a majestic and holy place.

Contrast that with the golden calf the Israelites had Aaron make–a brute beast.

From looking at the golden calf we see that Israel had an incorrect view of God. They wanted to worship something so they fashioned an idol to receive their worship. T. D. Alexander in his section on Exodus in The New Bible Commentary says, “Worship, to be true, must be based on a right perception of God…Exodus emphasized the importance of knowing God as he truly is and not as we imagine him to be” (116).

So, as I see it, at this point in the story God has every reason to walk away and find a new people to bring about His plan of redemption. They had been complaining the whole time as He was delivering them and now they do the unthinkable and worship another god, a false, dead god, for bringing them out of Egypt. Enough is enough.

But God does not leave them. He is true to His word and stays with His chosen people. I think Nehemiah 9 explains God’s faithfulness beautifully, saying:

“But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them. Even when they had made for themselves a golden calf and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ and had committed great blasphemies, you in your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of cloud to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day, nor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go.” (9: 17b-19)

This is a right perspective of God: forgiving, merciful, loving, faithful, just. There are still consequences for Israel’s disobedience (Exodus 32:35) but He does not leave them. The covenant is renewed and God dwells with His people in the Tabernacle. He still uses a broken, sinful nation to bring about the redemption of all nations.

When I read this story I can’t help to see the times when I have an incorrect view of God and make my own golden calf of sorts. I try to turn God into something I can understand and control and God has every reason to walk away because of my disobedience. But instead, He continues to lead me through the wilderness, by day and night. And most importantly, He continues to tabernacle in my heart and will lead me into the Promise Land after this life to live with Him forever because of the atoning work done in His Son, Jesus Christ.

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he maybe grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith–that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have the strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with the fullness of God”

Ephesians 3:14-19

Because of John Piper’s suggestion in his sermon Be Devoted to Prayer, Paul’s prayer in his letter to the Ephesians is a form I’ve been using in my daily prayers the last few days. Prayer is always something I’ve struggled with, never making time for it nor holding it in high importance. Really what that shows is my direct instinct to rely on my own strength and discernment instead of the Lord’s. I can assure you it has failed me every time.

So the past few days I’ve attempted to be “devoted to prayer.” I put that in quotes only because I am far from being devoted but am trying to trust God to grow in me in this area. I’ve read through this prayer many times this week, applying each line to different people and circumstances in life. It takes me awhile to get my heart there but once I push through the temptation to sleep an extra few minutes, it’s worth it.

I’ve only focused on this prayer the last three days and I can see the Lord changing my heart to truly desire what I am praying. This is really such a powerful prayer and has really started to sink into my heart.

Verse 17 has been on my mind almost all day. I hate singling out a verse when it is in the middle of a sentence but the verse reads, “…so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith–that you, being rooted and grounded in love,….” There are so many rich words that make up this part of the sentence. However, four words really stick out to me: dwell, rooted, grounded, love.

Dwell: The Greek word for “dwell” is made up of two words meaning “through out” and “to dwell in.” Dwell means to settle, inhabit. There is a sense of permanence in the word, something lasting. And the fact that the Greek word also implies dwelling throughout paints a beautiful picture of Christ dwelling our hearts, the Greek word meaning the middle, central, or inmost part of anything. Christ is to be the center of us, affecting and infecting everything we do.

Rooted: The Greek word for “rooted” is “to render firm, to fix.” Of course when I read “rooted” I thought of the roots of a plant. So like any good researcher I turned to Wikipedia. There I found that the “two major functions of roots are 1) absorption of water and inorganic nutrients and 2) anchoring of the plant body to the ground” (Root Info). Into order to be rooted in the love of Christ we need to be absorbing the Living Water (John 4:5-42) and abiding in the Vine (John 15:1-11).

Grounded: The Greek word here means “to lay the foundation.” It comes from the Greek word meaning, “laid down as a foundation, the foundation of a building, wall, city.” It is also the derivative of the meaning, “to set, put, place.” Again, there is a sense of stability, assurance, perseverance. Foundations are the most important part of a structure. With a bad foundation, everything crumbles. But with a good foundation, it can stand the wind, waves and fire. Being grounded in Christ’s love will comfort us and propel us through the hardships of life so that we can say confidently with Paul that we are sure nothing can separate us from the love of Christ (Romans 8:35-39).

Love: The Greek word is “agape,” or “brotherly love, self-less love.” This is often the word used in the New Testament to describe God’s love towards us. This is the love we are suppose to allow and desire to dwell in us and to be rooted and grounded in. Selfless love. Letting God’s love for us and then, in return, our love for God be the center of knowing the fullness of God, which is what our heart truly desires.

I think the entire passage points to our felt need and desire to know Christ, to love Him and experience the love He is. By raising our eyes to Christ and asking for our view of Him to increase we can truly pray with Paul:

“Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”

Ephesians 3:20-21

“Petitioning without relationship–that’s what our praying so often amounts to, even though it’s well disguised. No matter how piously we couch our requests and no matter how passionately we declare our confidence in the Giver’s generosity, we stay in a receiving mode. ‘Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!’ It’s all about us.”

Larry Crabb’s The PAPA Prayer, page 41

Today I feel like the Lord showed me that I’m trying to have a relationship with Him without having a relationship with Him. Make sense?

A prayer that has been on my heart for the last couple of months has been that my faith wouldn’t be a coping mechanism, a comfort object to help me through hard times (though comfort, hope and peace do come from knowing and trusting Christ, through having a relationship with Him).

Honestly, I thought I was doing a pretty good job, experiencing my faith as real and meaningful. But today God showed me just how much my prayer life reveals the opposite. I’ve never been more me-centered.

My prayers show that I have been seeking things more than seeking God Himself. They might have even been good things: For His provision, for deeper relationships, for life-change in my family’s lives. But I haven’t been seeking God and really, He is all that matters.

I’ve been doing rather than being relational with God. I’ve ceased to dialogue, to listen, to even take time to listen. I go to God with my laundry list of requests, lay them at His feet “for His glory,” and walk away.

Where’s the relationship in that? The relationship God gave us through His Son is the most important thing. It’s all about relationship.

Yes, we are suppose to ask God for things. We are suppose to petition Him and He delights in giving just as a father loves to give to his child. But petitioning needs to come in the context of relationship. Recently second things have clouded my view without me even noticing.

I desire that in my life Christ is exulted before everything else. And I think in order for that to happen my prayers need to be centered on seeking and knowing Him above everything else. I leave you with one more quote from Crabb’s book:

“Efforts to worship God without first getting to know Him tend to reduce worship to mere appreciation when God cooperates with our agendas. And thanking God without true worship, without first being stunned that the holy God who has every right to abandon us instead draws us closer, leaves us still thinking that at least a few things ought to go our way. But when true worship is the spring from which gratitude flows, we take nothing for granted.”

I pray we lose our spirit of entitlement and seek knowing God above all else. Then we can live in worship of our King and then ask and receive according to God’s perfect will.

Nostalgia is dangerous.

Wrote my prayer letter today. The focus was on France. That may or may not have been a terrible idea because now I just want to be there…Such a wonderful place. I think I’ve spent half the day watching videos and looking at pictures from that great summer.

Seriously. I can’t wait to go back.

Join me in reliving project by watching this  France Video.

The Fam