They’re not who you think they are..

Doesn’t it seem like skepticism is ingrained in us? It always seems easier to expect the bad or watch for the other shoe to drop than it is to see the good from jump street. 

We treat people no differently.

How many times have you said to someone, heard someone say or thought: They’re not who you think they are.

You can see it in people. We all can. That person on the stage, on TV or sitting across the room from you right now is probably not who they say they are. As humans we want to project who we want to be. You’ve heard the old saying, ‘Put your best foot forward’? Part of this is true. We need to strive to be the best people we can be, but, often times we begin to realize that we can’t keep it up and our ‘best foot forward’ becomes a front. It turns in to something that is at it’s core insincere. It’s not who we really are.. but it’s who we want to be. We have a hard time believing we’ll get there and so it’s best to just put on the face.

The fact is that if you’re looking at other people like they are a glass that’s half empty, chances are, others are sizing you up in the same way.

In Proverbs 16:18 it says “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.”

In our pride we unfairly size up others. The result? We are sized up as well and the fact is that you will never measure up that way. At some point you will give reason for them to believe that you are not who you say you are either. We all will.

What if we changed our thinking? What if we put away the mask? What if we owned our shortcomings, celebrated our gifts and strived to bring the two on to a level playing field? What if putting our best foot forward meant we allowed God to rise underneath our shortcomings and let Him be the one who defines us? What if people looked at you and said, they are who they seem to be.. messed up, loved and loving? 

Want people to see that in you? See that in them first, then see what happens.

Know your ‘Role’

What is your role? The term ‘role’ makes me think of a part you play in some plot right? If you’re not a great actor you’re a bystander or a walker-by. If you’re a decent actor you may be the hero or even the villain. We all, as people trying to figure out their own role in life, are one of these or all of these given different periods in your life. Let me clear the air.. Let me help you out.. Let me tell you your ‘role’.

The word says in John 1:12

“Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”

What does that mean? It means that if you find yourself in Christ that you are His. You are not relegated to any role that anyone in this world might assign to you. You are a child of a living God. What an amazing and sobering ‘role’. It should humble us beyond repair. It should rise up in us a sense to being not worthy. It should also give us a confidence that doesn’t make sense. 

Here’s the deal. There are a lot (and by a lot I mean A LOT) of people in your world that want to label you. They will label you with things like meaningless or bystander. They will slab a sign on you that says villain and maybe even at times a hero. The fact is that in the world we are all these things some of the time. Remember, however, that this is by the world’s standards or labels. In God’s eyes, we are simply His. What a sobering thought. We are His babies. People that He has created from the beginning with hopes, dreams, vision, goals and giftings. Will we fail? YES! More than we succeed? Probably, but it’s those times that we do succeed, the times that we are living out our calling that we are most alive. It’s because we are living in the beauty of who we are. God’s created children, formed in His image.

Take heart in this. If you have people in your world or sphere who are ready to label you with villain, bystander or even hero.. Remember who you are. You are God’s. You are created purposefully and these naysayers have nothing to interject in to the person you are.. which is God’s. 

In the word’s of the great Jay-z, “Go and brush your shoulders off” and don’t worry about these people who are ready to tear you down. Your God is bigger than naysayers or anyone sent by the enemy to steal your joy. 

You are God’s… Don’t forget it.

Uprooted

You’ve been abandoned.

You’ve been cut off.

You’ve been uprooted.

Sound familiar? At some point in everyone’s lives we run in this scenario. Life seems to be falling apart. Attacks from every side. Nothing seems to work. I’m sure you know the feeling.

My family and I have been attending Victory Church and we recently heard Pastor Mark Crow’s illustration using a severed branch. His point was that at some level we count ourselves completely cut off from God, his grace, his mercy and his reach because of our bad choices, or sin. Once we’ve cut ourselves off we see us lying there in the grass waiting to wilt and die. Some of us assuming that God will add insult to injury and send a curious dog by to pee on us while we’re down. Right? I mean when we think we’re at our worst, when we’ve jacked it up the most, we expect God to burn us down and then finally send something to smash our face in the dirt like a bully saying, “I told you not to try and get up!”. 

Can I be honest? Self pity won’t help you. In fact it will hinder you from allowing God to come in and heal you. When I was listening to Pastor Mark talk I personally kept envisioning us as living trees. Stay with me, I’m not dropping some Lord of the Rings stuff on you! What I mean is just as a tree we are rooted in the ground. For some of us, the roots run really deep. As we begin to allow the enemy to come in and lie to us about our past we systematically reach in the ground and begin pulling up our own roots. God isn’t doing this! He is the gardener trying to keep us green, healthy and alive. We keep pulling and pulling until finally we’re left with a few larger roots that pulling with our own strength won’t get out. They are thick. Finally, we go for the gusto.. We grab those sheers, we make some epically bad decisions and we cut those lines. We literally pull ourselves out of the soil.. lay ourselves next to the hole that was our life.. and wait to die.. and for a dog.

Here’s what we need to understand. The only way to uproot ourselves is if we do it on our own! God isn’t in the business of pulling us out of the ground. We seem to be great at it! We must also understand that it is our decision alone to plant again. The soil is always there. It is rich in mercy. The gardener is waiting to allow us to be watered again. He’s waiting on us.. to make the choice, to plant roots again.

My prayer for us all today is that we would not believe the lies of the enemy, or those around you being used by the enemy, to drive us to such a place of pity; that we put our hands in the dirt and start pulling. If you find yourself out of the soil, plant. Allow yourself to be watered and to be loved. Your roots will grow again and deeper than before. 

   ”Cursed is the strong one
   who depends on mere humans,
Who thinks he can make it on muscle alone
   and sets God aside as dead weight.
He’s like a tumbleweed on the prairie,
   out of touch with the good earth.
He lives rootless and aimless
   in a land where nothing grows.

 ”But blessed is the man who trusts me, God,
   the woman who sticks with God.
They’re like trees replanted in Eden,
   putting down roots near the rivers—
Never a worry through the hottest of summers,
   never dropping a leaf,
Serene and calm through droughts,
   bearing fresh fruit every season.”

Jeremiah 17: 5-8

A blessed former life

In Galatians 1 Paul’s main focus was on who he was and who he is now; and how THAT being the evidence of Christ living in him and through him.

Here’s one of the many things I love about Paul. He embraces his past as a testament to his future. It’s easy to look at our past mistakes and with good intentions try to forget them or sweep them under the rug and try to convince others of who we are now. What we forget is that it’s the past that has created who we are now. 

Listen… I get that this is a very small point to all that Paul lays out in Galatians, but, this is a very important point none-the-less. There is an absolute blessing in having a former self. There is an incredible witness in having had skeletons in a closet. Where people get hung up is trying to hide those things and act as if these have never happened. 

You’ve heard the saying, “where ever you are, there you are also” right? Well it’s incredibly true. Why do we as Christians hide from this so much? A short answer could be insecurity. We are afraid of what our past says about us. I’ll take it a step further. We are terrified of how our past will define our future.

Here’s a beautiful truth. Our future is defined by how we respond to our past. Here is Paul saying, “Look! I’ve been the worst of the worst. I tried to kill the church! Not only that; I received great advancement because of it. I was even surpassing those who were older than me.” Wouldn’t it have been easier on Paul to leave that part out? For me, it would’ve been enough to know that this guy hung with Jesus personally. I would’ve been sold from that point on. Paul finds his past important. It’s a validating argument of his transformation, of his journey and the beginning of his legacy. It’s paramount. He spends most of Galatians 1 talking about it.

Your past is equally as paramount to your legacy. Don’t be afraid of it no matter how dark or how defining you’re afraid that it is. Great stories are full of moments of heartache and triumph, struggle and courage, opposition and victory. Your story can be great. Your story can be better than great; it can be life changing. Not just for you, but for those around you. 

Don’t hide your former self.. Embrace it and let the life changing power of Christ be a testament to your journey. That’s a great story. It’s a story worth telling and a story worth listening to.

A blessed former life

In Galatians 1 Paul’s main focus was on who he was and who he is now; and how THAT being the evidence of Christ living in him and through him.

Here’s one of the many things I love about Paul. He embraces his past as a testament to his future. It’s easy to look at our past mistakes and with good intentions try to forget them or sweep them under the rug and try to convince others of who we are now. What we forget is that it’s the past that has created who we are now. 

Listen… I get that this is a very small point to all that Paul lays out in Galatians, but, this is a very important point none-the-less. There is an absolute blessing in having a former self. There is an incredible witness in having had skeletons in a closet. Where people get hung up is trying to hide those things and act as if these have never happened. 

You’ve heard the saying, “where ever you are, there you are also” right? Well it’s incredibly true. Why do we as Christians hide from this so much? A short answer could be insecurity. We are afraid of what our past says about us. I’ll take it a step further. We are terrified of how our past will define our future.

Here’s a beautiful truth. Our future is defined by how we respond to our past. Here is Paul saying, “Look! I’ve been the worst of the worst. I tried to kill the church! Not only that; I received great advancement because of it. I was even surpassing those who were older than me.” Wouldn’t it have been easier on Paul to leave that part out? For me, it would’ve been enough to know that this guy hung with Jesus personally. I would’ve been sold from that point on. Paul finds his past important. It’s a validating argument of his transformation, of his journey and the beginning of his legacy. It’s paramount. He spends most of Galatians 1 talking about it.

Your past is equally as paramount to your legacy. Don’t be afraid of it no matter how dark or how defining you’re afraid that it is. Great stories are full of moments of heartache and triumph, struggle and courage, opposition and victory. Your story can be great. Your story can be better than great; it can be life changing. Not just for you, but for those around you. 

Don’t hide your former self.. Embrace it and let the life changing power of Christ be a testament to your journey. That’s a great story. It’s a story worth telling and a story worth listening to.

The Father lives in you

Today has been a long and blessed day. My wife had a terrible case of strep throat all night and through today so I was mr. mom all day. For some that doesn’t seem like a big deal assuming that you have 2.3 kids. I, on the other hand have 19; and by 19 I mean 6, which most times feels like 19! So tonight we sat and watched the Lion King and there was a part in there that really spoke to me.. Yes, God can use anything.. even Disney! Track with me.. Remember that part when Simba runs in to Raffia, that weird baboon, and he tells him that his father is really still alive and to follow him and he’ll show him? Of course Simba runs to see him and is shown his reflection in a pond. 

‘You see, Rafiki says, your father lives in you.’  

Then comes a great exchange between the two. Simba is afraid to return home because of his past. Then Rafiki smacks him on the head (which the kids died laughing at.. don’t you love those laughs?). Simba asks why he did that. The response? I don’t remember, it was in the past. Simba says that really hurt and Rafiki agrees that the past can really hurt. Then he swings again and the lion dodges the next shot. Then Rafiki says, ‘but see, you can learn from your past!’. 

Allow me to humbly be a weird baboon for you for a minute.. 

I believe we are all held prisoner by our past at some point or another. We made some seriously bad decisions as kids and those things haunt us today. Maybe you allowed some sin to come in later in life and it wrecked so much of what you’ve worked for. It’s possible that the things that haunt you were not your fault at all. You were victimized in some way and you’ve fought how that defines you most of your life. 

We all have a past. We all have those secrets and we are all seeking the same thing. How do we overcome our past so that we can become all that we believe ourselves to be.

YOUR FATHER LIVES IN YOU
The answer is incredibly simple and incredibly hard, but it starts first with remembering one vital thing… Your father lives in you. He is alive in you and you are alive through Him. Even if you can’t bring yourself to see it. (2 Cor 5:17, Gal 2:20)

THE PAST HAS SHAPED US
Our past has formed you in to who you are today or tonight as your reading this. It is those dynamics that have helped to dictate to you how you handle everything. Some of these things are great and some not so much. But the end result can always be beautiful. The damaging parts of our life can move us to one of two ends.. 

Well, that’s just how I turned out and how I responded.. It’s just who I am. 
OR
This is where I am today; but this is NOT who I am and where I’m going to stay.
(Phil 4:6) 

YOU’LL HAVE MANY PASTS.. BUT ONLY A FEW PROGRESSIONS
Assuming that you’d prefer to be on the ‘This isn’t where I’m going to stay’ track; you must also realize that you’ll have many pasts. Every day brings new memories, new hurts, new joys, new transformations and new opportunities. Each day adds to the overall past. That’s inevitable. But are we progressing? That’s the question. Each day brings a new variation of the past. It’s the progression that sets us a part from our past and turns our past in to a legacy rather than something we’re running from. What if it were the progression that made our past great rather than the highlighted failings? You have that choice.
(Eph 4:23, Rom 6:13, Col 3:9)

MY PRAYER FOR US ALL
Lord help us to make the right choice. To make each day’s past a progression. Help us to not be afraid of how our past will affect us; but rather help us to use our past and our progression as a testament to your grace, mercy and calling. 

Night friends.

Is faith really enough?

What does faith mean? Is it enough to simply have faith in something? Or is something else required?

In church growing up you’ve heard that if you will just believe.. just have faith.. then you will be saved. I understand that there is more to it. There is repentance and so on, but don’t you agree that most church conversations come down to faith? How do you practice faith? How do you faith?

I’m in a faith moment today. A big faith moment. My wife and I have been praying for some time for a clear direction and God provided it today. Here’s the problem. It requires a lot of faith in order for the outcome to be what we’ve hoped. So, in typical God fashion, this verse is presented to me while listening to some preachers today:

James 2:14-18-

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if people claim to have faith but have no deeds? Can such a faith save them? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

But someone will say, “you have faith; I have deeds.”

Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.

Seems to me that in this passage, FAITH is an action word? It is a verb. So, it is enough to simply just have faith period? The answer is no. There must be action.. There must be movement.. There must be deeds. You have to do something! Not because you won’t have faith if you don’t… but because your faith will move you to action! 

Are you facing something today? Is there a situation in your life that requires faith for you to get through it? Please do not sit on your butt and rely on lifeless faith. Get up; get moving; call your faith to action. See if God doesn’t bless your faith that is alive and active.

That’s my plan. I hope it’s yours too.