A friend shared with me something she’d read from Ann Voskamp: “God already sees you as perfect in him.” Based on my own ongoing and painfully slow transformation, I jokingly asked my friend if she ever wondered if God might need glasses. Then I was reminded of a conversation Moses had with God….

When God called Moses to go back to Egypt to lead the people of Israel out of slavery, Moses didn’t exactly jump at the chance. He questioned himself, God, and the people, and when God answered all those questions, Moses came back to himself: I’m never been a good speaker. I think his unspoken accusation was, God, you made me this way.

We live in an era in which imperfection—so-called birth defects, disabilities, learning differences, etc.—are often viewed as reasons to devalue life, even to end it before birth. Or we shake our fists at God in accusation: You made me this way! It’s your fault … I’m your fault.

When Moses said, “I can’t speak, and it’s because of you,” God replied, “you’re right, I gave you your mouth. And I gave the blind man his eyes and the deaf girl her ears. Yes, I made you just the way you are.”

And then he repeats his invitation to Moses to lead: Go, and I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.

What if, when we realize our limitations, instead of accusing God of creating something imperfect, we asked him, how will you help me in this weakness? How will you fill the gap in my abilities, my learning, my experience?

Know this: God made you just as you are. He has a plan and a purpose for you … but he doesn’t expect you to do it on your own. In fact, he made you so that you have to rely on him. And when you do, incredible things will happen.

Want to study this idea in the Bible? Read the story of Moses’ call in Exodus 3-4, or the blind man in John 9, or Paul’s weakness in 2 Corinthians 12.

We were created to be naked gardeners. (Dr. Rick McKinley)

When God created man and woman and placed them in the garden, they had everything they needed – which, at the time, didn’t include clothing. There were no thorns and no poison oak, and the weather, like the rest of creation, must have been “very good.” Most important of all, there was no shame. That all ended when they bit into the fruit. 

That evening when God came for his nightly walk with the pinnacle of his creation, they were hiding, afraid to be seen by the one whose hands had formed every curve of their bodies.

Shame and fear, covering and hiding: nonexistent and unnecessary before sin, but God offers answers.

Clothing is God’s good answer to our nakedness until the New Creation restores the perfect, unadorned beauty of creation.

Prayer is God’s good answer to our shame and fear. In prayer, we can again stand naked before God, without shame, without fear, completely seen, intimately known, ultimately loved by our Creator. Perfect love drives out all fear.

Last summer I discovered a young couple (19 & 20 years old) living in their truck in the shade of a big oak tree at our church – where I’m the still-new pastor. I talked with them a bit, learned a bit of their story, and offered water and restrooms whenever they needed. I invited them to join us in worship on Sunday mornings and was thrilled when they did. He’d been part of the church’s youth group for a time—before my time—when we’d had a guy who connected with the skater crowd; but he was there for the skating and the food, not for the God-talk. She had her own views of God, some rooted in the Bible, but many from her own mind (not unlike many of us!).

They had hopes and hurts: both were looking for work; both had a lot of brokenness in their families; both had struggles with drugs and emotions and mental health. But they were looking for a place to live, and hoped to find it within a few weeks. When she had to leave town with the truck for a few days, he asked if he could set up a tent on an out-of-the-way part of the property. I agreed. But days turned into several weeks, even after she returned; and though they took good care of the area, with the dry heat of summer and the possibility of sparks from the engine, I knew we needed to send them on their way.

I knew they’d both gotten work at a local pizza place and some time later I stopped in to ask about them. They didn’t work there anymore.

It’s been months now. They’ve crossed my mind on occasion but I haven’t seen or heard about them. Until yesterday.

Sitting alone in my office in the afternoon, I looked up when I noticed a car pull into our parking lot. The back door opened and … there he was. When we saw each other through the window, a big smile crossed his face. I walked out to greet him and we both spread our arms wide and hugged each other. “I found God!” he said. Back when he’d sat through our church service, it was pretty much a courtesy; he wasn’t much interested in God. “I was trapped in my sin,” was about how he put it.

Somewhere along the way he decided he didn’t want to go on living the way he had been. And somehow, he figured he needed God. And he found Him. He discovered Teen Challenge, too, which is a Bible-based organization that helps teens—and young adults—recover from life-controlling issues through a relationship with Jesus Christ. Yes, He’s still in the business of healing. And he—my young friend (and new brother)—is about halfway through the Teen Challenge recovery program. And seems to be doing pretty well.

They’re not together anymore, he and she. Last summer, that would have been a big blow. Now he has a relationship with Someone who has given him real life. Full life. Eternal life.

As Christians who try to faithfully and simply show Jesus’ love to others, we don’t always get to see if the seeds we’ve planted (or watered) will sprout and grow. Yesterday I got a glimpse of a small green shoot popping up through the soil.

(Note: I published this first on Facebook notes on 2/2/19.)

Whether you measure it by days, weeks, months, or years, our journey has been a long one. And adventurous. We started in August 2013 with the decision to pursue a Lead Pastor role. Today—four years and eight months later—I am sitting for the first time in my new-to-me study at The Journey Church in Sonora, California.

What began as an exciting, if not a bit unnerving, challenge took our family through the twists and turns of cancer, unemployment, loss, and death; we faced depression and discouragement.

Along the way, we also reconnected with old friends, saw acquaintances become lifelong friends, and made new friends. God pushed, prodded, and poked us, challenging each of us to lean on him more and in new ways. He continued his lifelong transformation in our lives. He showed me my pride (again) and stripped (some of) it away. I saw my attitude toward churches shift from, I could lead that church; to I don’t know if I can do this – but I can love the people and walk along with them.

And so here we are, back in the beautiful foothills of the Sierra Nevada, just starting this journey with a very appropriately-named community. And if what we’ve seen in the five days we’ve been here is any indication, God’s going to do some amazing things through us all – and I mostly need to hang on tight!

#JourneyToTheJourney

“Prisoners of hope.” It’s not a phrase you hear very often. Prison, especially in the ancient world in which these words were written, is not a place one normally associates with hope. Yet here is the phrase, in the middle of a prophecy (Zechariah 9:9-12) that held hope for the exiled Israelites and holds hope for us today. It is a Messianic prophecy—the foretelling of a coming Messiah, a savior—fulfilled in part on that first “palm Sunday” when Jesus rode into Jerusalem on the foal of a donkey.

But as is true with so many Biblical prophecies, this, too, finds its fulfillment both Now and Not Yet; it has been fulfilled, and it is yet to be fulfilled. For while Jesus the Messiah did indeed “speak peace to the nations,” his rule is not yet “from sea to sea and from the [Euphrates] River to the ends of the earth” (verse 10).

That is what we long for: peace. Messiah’s rule. We long for an end to war and the flag-draped caskets we receive in return. We long for an end to the threat and fear of more war, of bigger, badder wars. We long for an end to violence against women and innocent children, the broken homes and broken lives left in the wake of that violence. We long for an end to racism, to the wrongs done to men and women only because of their skin color or birthplace. We long to send our children to school without wondering whether theirs will be the next to be ripped apart by gunfire on national television.

Today we celebrate the hope of Palm Sunday. But just as the partying crowds some 2,000 years ago were blissfully unaware of the brutal death just five days away, so we, too, shut our eyes to the death that surrounds us. We long for peace … but just like those long-ago crowds—who wanted Jesus to throw off the Roman occupiers—we put our hope in laws and and lawmakers and governments instead of in the Prince of Peace. We are prisoners indeed, but not prisoners of hope if our hopes are set on these long-failed institutions.

And just as Zechariah’s prophecy was fulfilled in Jesus then but is still yet to be fulfilled, we can bring peace to our world now even while we wait for peace to come finally in Jesus Christ. Prayer is needed, but prayer is not enough. Laws are not enough, but laws are needed. 

Today, on Palm Sunday, if you profess to follow Jesus Christ, speak out for peace in Him – and for peace in our nation – and for peace in our world. Let your worship of the Prince of Peace not be undermined by your worship of a weapon of war.