God, don't you care?

There's a bible story I can't get out of my head right now. It's in Mark, chapter 4, and the disciples are trying to cross a lake with Jesus. Somewhere along the journey, winds of hurricane caliber (according to the original Greek translation) start whipping up the waves until they crash over the boat, and it actually starts filling with water. I've read this story a hundred times, but somehow I have never noticed that detail before - the disciples weren't being dramatic as they panicked. Their boat was literally beginning to fill! Meanwhile, Jesus is SLEEPING on a cushion in the stern. The disciples go to rouse Him and plead - "Lord, don't you care that we are perishing?" I'm sure the undertone of the disciples' question was more like: "How could you be sleeping at a time like this?!"

In the midst of the frightening, threatening storm, they didn't want to know if Jesus was capable of saving them - they had witnessed His miraculous habits and probably guessed that He was. What they wanted to know was whether or not He even cared that they were in this perilous situation!

Jesus stood up and commanded the storm to settle down, and it did (because even the wind and waves know Who is speaking.) He then looked at them, quivering and soaked as I'm sure they were, and asked, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?" I dug into His question a bit by looking up the Greek translation of each word, and I discovered that His question could be phrased a little more like this: "Have you not yet been persuaded?"

The disciples ask: "God, don't you care?"

And Jesus responds: "Have you not yet been persuaded?"

Right now, it's easy for me to feel like Jesus in sleeping while I'm weathering a pretty significant storm - not just because staffing is a new and challenging experience, but because meanwhile, I feel that I'm undergoing some serious "heart surgery" in regards to where I find my security, where I find my peace. And I think this story resonates with me so powerfully because as I cry and fitfully sleep and fight through waves of fear, the question I want answered most is: God, don't you care?

And He asks me, in a tone of voice full of the gentleness and peace of a newly-calmed storm: "Have you not yet been persuaded?"

Have I not yet been convinced that His love for me is deep enough and sure enough and powerful enough for me to take heart in the middle of a storm - even when the waves are crashing over the boat? Can I look back over the short course of my life, identify His trademark faithfulness, and choose to trust that He is deeply invested in me? Can I allow that trustworthiness to persuade me beyond my circumstances, and choose to rest with Him while the waves are raging?

It wasn't carelessness that allowed Jesus to keep sleeping as His disciples panicked. It was confidence. He knew He could shut down the storm if He needed to, He knew how things would turn out.

When we acknowledge the kind of love we are loved with, when we really believe we are valuable enough to God that His quietness in a frightful time doesn't equate to carelessness (!), we're invited to mirror the peace He displayed in the stern of that storm-rocked boat. Peace that doesn't make sense circumstantially (perhaps the "peace that surpasses all understanding" the Bible talks about.) Peace that, instead, makes all the sense in the world when you consider the magnitude and forcefulness of His love towards you.

So right now, I'm challenging myself to be more intentional about reflecting on His past faithfulness... And I'm challenging myself to be more intentional about envisioning it in my future. Such a confronting, and then comforting, question: Have I not yet been persuaded? Looking back over our life together so far...haven't I?

"Do you trust Me?" // Starting Simple

"Do you trust Me?" Isn't that always the question?

I feel like that's always the question, with the Lord. In big things, in small things, we are continually given opportunities to respond to this gentle, stubborn question which harbors a thousand implications - "Do you trust Me?"

Last winter, this question stirred in my heart in the form of a YWAM acceptance letter, an open door to Australia and discipleship school and...? And what? What guarantee did I have that my time away from everything I know would be justified, that it would be worth it to commit six months to something which provides me with no concrete benefits, by the world's standards? "Do you trust Me?" Both then and now, sometimes the best response I can muster up is: "...I think so?" That's the less-than-impressive answer that was richocheting around inside my head as I booked a flight for Brisbane and stuffed shirts into a big red backpack...

And just like that, it's over. The little "yes" morphed into a six month gift of precious friendships and unexpected adventure and whatever it was, exactly, my spirit needed when I started the school six months ago: Something like a combination of healing, invigoration, reassurance, general growth.

I've been back on Texas soil for almost two weeks now, officially a graduate of YWAM Brisbane's Pathfinders DTS. I'm in the middle of processing the transition and it is sometimes overwhelming, sometimes underwhelming, kind of weird, and overall good. Trying to communicate everything the Lord did while I was away, in my own heart and in the hearts of those around me, feels like trying to pour a gallon of water into a teeny tiny glass. So it's tempting for me not to pour out the water at all, to keep the gallon safely untouched... But I think it's important for me to take the time to sit down and chew on what happened, to work it out into words and in so doing, empty that gallon of water one teeny tiny glass at a time. I want to be faithful to share with others what He was so faithful to share with me.

So. Where do I begin?

I will begin simply, because if I don't I will overwhelm myself and freak out and drop the entire "glass filling" thing and start reading a book instead...

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So if I had to pick an overarching theme, a lens through which every other lesson was learned throughout these past six months, it would be this: That God is always, forever, and foremost a RELATIONAL God. Meaning He loves me, individually and specifically - not the work of my hands, nor the rate of my progress.

I actually had this revelation four years ago, and it kickstarted my faith in ways that no guided bible study or youth event or worship song ever had. There is so much power in realizing - really realizing - that God's heart is for YOU. Because when you recognize that the God of the Universe is in the middle of loving you with a pure and powerful love, something in you gains the confidence to say "no" to shame and doubt and begin receiving the wild abundance of grace that He has always been extending to you. That grace allows your heart to rest in being truly, honestly forgiven, and that release gives you a transcendent freedom, completely separate from your circumstances or past or weaknesses. That freedom gives you boldness, and that boldness propels you to step out and grow in the faith that got the whole process originally rolling... It's a beautiful, incredible, supernatural domino effect.

But as I matured in my relationship with the Lord, I recognized that I wasn't a "baby Christian" anymore, and I allowed myself to adopt certain responsibilities and expectations. The idea of "I should know better" permeated the way I looked at every single situation. And, sure, there are several situations in which that could ring true - but the problem was that the "I should knew better" mentality crowded out the free gift of grace that is so foundational and pivotal in walking with God. It replaced deep forgiveness with shame I thought I deserved (because "I should know better," right?) and the longer I let myself operate from this perspective, the more burdened and incapable I felt, and the less I believed that His heart motivation really was His love for me.

Patiently, carefully, the Lord used my time at YWAM to re-work into my heart the original revelation that had sent me falling in love with Him in the first place: He hasn't come to place additional burdens or standards or expectations upon us, like the rest of the world does. He hasn't come to critically review the works of our hands, to add to our productivity tally, our performance review. He has come to LOVE us. To LOVE me. That's the beginning, the middle, and the end of the gospel: God reaching for us, not because He needs us, but because He wants us - out of love. Most of the time, I don't even know what that means, because I'm so wired to scan for benefits and outcomes and you couldn't possibly just love me for me, could you, Lord? There's something you want me to achieve or obtain, some standard you want me to uphold, and THAT'S what keeps me in your love, right?

Nope. He loves me for me. And it doesn't make any sense at all, but it's just as true as it is fantastical. It's a pure love that frees you from "you should know better," and beckons you into a greater, sweeter freedom of "I love you, period."

God is a relational God. He loves me, you, us, individually and specifically; not the work of our hands, or the rate of our progress. He loves us with a love that extends a transformative, declarative grace, and we cannot receive His love without also grasping that grace. If this isn't the context of our learning and growing, our roots won't get very deep, we won't get very far. This has to be the ground on which we let the Lord build in our lives.

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"Do you trust Me?" The original question. The recurring question. I'm learning to - bit by bit, through lessons like this one. He's teaching me how, and I'm learning to.

In the absence of wild revelation

[if you receive my newsletter, this is just a slightly meatier version of the lesson I shared about learning]

A few days ago, my DTS returned to base after a week-long backpacking trip through Fraser Island. Fraser is the world's largest sand island, and it hosts a confusingly wide variety of gorgeous landscapes: We trekked alongside the bluest shorelines, through thriving jungle-y interiors, across dreamy (and challenging) sand dunes, and splashed around in glittering freshwater lakes. The trip was beautiful and difficult and exhausting and freeing and full. I developed hip blisters and saw exactly 3 huntsman spiders and learned what I smell like when you subtract soap. I also got to fill up my lungs with clean air and take the time to observe the exact hue of early morning sunlight and rejoice in freedom from text messages and mirrors. It was a good, hard pause from the normal rhythm of life.

To be completely honest, I expected a grand revelatory experience there among the clutter of trees and electric yellow birds and crystalline (sometimes red) lakes...and I didn't have one. I kept waiting to be smacked in the face by spiritual understanding, or brought to my knees in unprecedented awe, and I never was.

And I'm learning how okay that is. I want to cultivate a sense of awe of my Creator; I want to continually desire breakthrough in my relationship with Him; I don't think it's wrong to look forward to those revelatory moments with the Lord. But I think God is teaching me that friendship with Him doesn't look like this perpetual stream of overwhelming emotional encounters. My earthly friendships involve emotional moments, but the bulk of the friendship is composed of casual conversation, laughter, comfortable quiet, small gestures. And I think those relationships - like so much else in this life - were created to echo how things should/could work in our relationship with the Lord.

So I spent last week chatting with God on the trails about my dreams and my fears. He sat next to me as I pulled my knees up to my chest to listen to each morning's lecture, as I stirred the bubbling camp oatmeal, as I unrolled and re-rolled my sleeping mat each morning and afternoon. He laughed with me (kindly) when I tripped over a root; He breathed refreshment into my tired body when I plunged in the cold lake water each night; He wrapped His arms around me when sunlight poured through the leafy ceiling and warmed me up.

And being comfortable with Him in those ordinary moments, having the confidence that He is casually and tenderly and perpetually present in our lives, is what positions our hearts to be transformed, and frees our minds to understand, and opens up our hands to receive. Believing that He is near to me and involved in my life, not just as sovereign Lord but as my close friend, is what creates space in my life for Him to come and move. That's what stirs my affections and prepares the way for growth. Because acknowledging Him in those unremarkable moments helps my little heart grasp that He loves me in simple, tangible, profound ways; it closes the gap between heaven and earth because it exercises the reminder that the Holy Spirit has taken up residence in my heart, in the nitty gritty, in the dull or sluggish, in right now. When I'm struggling or feeling particularly unworthy, I revert to thinking of God on His throne in heaven, straining to hear my prayers... But that distance is just a barrier made up by my brain, and it can be taken down by my brain when I practice acknowledging God as a present and careful and real friend.

So I'm here, back on base, learning what it means to be friends with the Lord. It isn't a series of mountain top experiences, but it's transformative. What powerful, sweet relationship He offers to us.

As near as you want to be.

This week, my DTS is learning about "The Nature and Character of God." The speaker kicked off the lecture series by saying: "You are as close to God as you want to be." My pride immediately bowed up at that, because it means I have to take responsibility for how near I am to God. "That's not fair," I thought, "What if God doesn't want to show Himself to me in abundance right now? What if He's being quiet, even when I'm pressing in?"

But the more I thought about it, the more I agreed with the speaker. God sent His Son, the only one who is fully innocent, the only one who never transgressed against God and therefore never deserved death, to die a painful, shameful, drawn-out, bloody death...just so that the price of our sin could be paid, and we could draw near to Him as sons and daughters, washed whiter than snow. He paid the highest price so that we might know Him intimately and personally, not having to draw near through the means of sacrifices or priests. He died for relationship - real, moving, breathing, dynamic relationship - with us. Romans 8:32 says: "He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?" If He allowed His Son to die an unjust death so that I might draw near to Him, why do I think He would be unwilling to reveal Himself to me, to grant me revelation of His character, to allow me to draw near to Him?

This is the God who didn't wait for the prodigal son to walk down the path, didn't even walk to meet him - this is the Father who RAN to meet him (Luke 15:20.) This is the God who went looking for the one sheep, despite the effort it required and the fact that there were ninety-nine sheep that were just fine (Luke 15:3-7.) This is the God who comes for us, even when we're stupid, even when it makes no logical sense to be valued by Him - why would I allow myself to believe that He might withhold Himself from me?

I know that God revealing Himself to us looks different in different seasons - I have gone through seasons where the Lord felt silent despite my efforts to draw near. The fact that you can determine your nearness to God isn't supposed to bring shame or heaviness. It doesn't mean that if you're moving towards God and you don't feel God moving back, you aren't doing enough; those are the initial thoughts that made me recoil from the speaker's statement. What it means is that God is present and available, and we get to direct our will to either invite Him in and enable Him to move in our lives...or not. Even in the quiet, hard seasons, we get to determine whether we're going to keep pressing in and hold out for the intimacy that will result when the tough season is over, or whether we're going to let go and see a different outcome.

"You are as close to God as you want to be." That has become an encouragement to me, and I'm sharing it because I hope it becomes an encouragement to you. If you want to know God as father, healer, friend; if you want to know what God thinks and how He feels; if you want to know what makes Him smile or cry or laugh...you get to. If you want more intimacy with God, you get it! The means and the timing of the lessons taught to bring that intimacy might look different than you expect, but the bottom line is that He's ready and available and in love with you, desiring intimate relationship with you more than you could ever possibly desire relationship with Him. There is no scheme of the devil, no outside force, no internal shortcoming or weakness that can prevent you from knowing God more.

You are as close to God as you want to be; take heart.

College + beyond

And so begins my last week in the cracked house with the overgrown lawn. It is so wild to stuff my stuff into boxes and realize my time here is closing. Who knew this sprawling, sleepish, maroon city would break and build so much in me. These past three years have dragged/stumbled/sprinted by, and looking back from the tail end of it, I can't believe the things the Lord has done. Coming to college, God prompted the end of my long-standing high school relationship. He ruined my plans to join a sorority. He refused to help me to connect to the church I originally envisioned myself at. He created a rift between me and my very best friend. He let me spend half of my freshman year ambling around campus in the dark, crying because I didn't understand why moving towards Him made everything else start falling apart.

And then. Then, He brought me into the most dynamic group of ragtags who taught me what love and emptiness and hope look like. He broke down so many fears and idols that I didn't even realize were crushing me until I was free from them. He restored the friendship I almost lost, making it deeper and more full than before. He let me exchange my small plans for big ones. He gave me friends who raised money to pay for my broken car, who have asked me to stand by them on their wedding day. He gave me so much more than I would have known to ask for. He revealed to me how every disappointment has the potential to give way to something incredible, if you hold on long enough to watch Him work.

I don't really know what happens post-college, and I don't really care. I've got the safety net of a loving Father who time and time again has proven Himself faithful to me. He's taught me that it just takes holding on long enough to watch Him work.
So, cheers to whatever comes next!

Goodness.

“Are You really a good God?”

The question is small, but heavy. I carry it with both hands, and lay it down as the solid foundation on which I build fear, uncertainty, discontentment. This unsettled question welcomes doubt like a houseguest, provides footholds for all the lies that come parading in at the scent of insecurity.

“Are You really a good God?”

It reverberates off the spaces of my heart where it feels like there’s lack; it bounces off of the obstacles looming before me, the ones that cast shadows that sometimes skew my vision.

“Are You really a good God?”

It’s a bulky question, dense by nature; it crowds out my peace and my assurance. It’s slippery, too, loosening my grip on the only Sure Anchor I know.

Why am I unhappy with the season the Lord has placed me in? Why am I afraid to re-up my commitment each morning to say “Yes” to wherever He leads? How does fear seep through the shield of promises He’s made me, causing my grip to reflexively tighten and give “control” my allegiance once again?

The answer is in the questions.

“How benevolent is my God?”

“How fully can I trust Him?”

“Does He really have good things for me?”

“Is He really a good God?”

When these queries bubble up (or rather, come pressing in with crushing force,) it doesn’t feel like I’m calling God’s character into question. I might defensively tell you, “Of course I think He's good!” But that declaration simply can’t share brain space with the question: “Are You really good?”…because believing in His innate goodness (and, consequently, His intentional goodness towards me,) is a natural result of taking Him at His word, of believing in this crazy love that doesn’t fit into any of my frames or boundaries. As far as I know, faith and doubt cannot coexist. I’m either believing He’s good because He says He is, or I’m not.

What does it even mean for God to be “good,” anyways?

We throw around “good” like it’s little more than an antonym of “bad.” It rings of a mild positivity, nothing really substantial or impressive. “God is good” usually holds no more meaning than “God isn’t bad,” and while I suppose that’s a basic sort of comforting, it feels like a thin and vague place of reference for building trust.

More than that, if good does mean something significant, how could God possibly be good towards me? I don’t feel like I deserve it yet. Or, you know, ever. Salvation is almost “easy” to grasp because I’ve heard about it, and God’s willingness to extend it towards me, my whole life. What’s harder for me to grasp is the way that redemption would work itself out in my every day life… That He would be good, and desire to be good, towards me. That "everyday" kind of grace embodies the heart behind redemption; it makes salvation more than some obligatory offering He’s promised to extend to anyone who says “I believe.” It clarifies: "I redeemed you because I love you. Not because I need you, or because I want to use you, or because you earned it, but because of love. The kind of love that desires your good." See, it makes His relational nature, His father’s heart – the heart that ran towards the prodigal son while he was still a long way off, the heart that ran after the one sheep when he had ninety-nine that were just fine, the heart that craves love instead of sacrifice and our hearts instead of what we have to offer – so evident.

I once heard Graham Cooke point out the link between God's glory and His goodness, and it helped me begin to understand how powerful "goodness" really is. In Exodus 33 (verses 18 and 19,) when Moses asks to see God's glory, God's response is: "Alright then, I'll cause all My goodness to pass before you." God Himself deliberately links His glory with His goodness. Think for a second about what "glory" means in association with the uncreated God.
His "goodness" is not a sideshow or an afterthought, a vague hope or a nice trait; it composes the very fabric of His glory. It is real, it is potent, and it affects things...you, for instance.

One of my favorite quotes (also originating from Graham Cooke) reads: “There is no security in what God is doing. There is only security in Who God Is.” Having faith in His goodness does not mean anchoring your hope in a specific outcome, in whatever your idea of "good" is. It means rejoicing in whatever comes your way, because you perceive it in the context of a faith that believes that everything that reaches you has first passed through an unchangingly good God.

Let that usher you into (real) rest and (joyful) expectancy.

[Some scripture references that helped me as I worked to wrap my mind around the goodness of God: Psalm 31:19, Psalm 84:11, Psalm 34:8, Romans 8:28, Psalm 119:68, Psalm 145:9, James 1:17, Psalm 23:6]

What the twentieth year taught me

I like birthdays; they're like little checkpoints. You don't really realize the days you're surviving are swelling into months and seasons of trial and grace and growth until something prompts you to look up and acknowledge that you're in a completely different place than you were a year ago.

I turned twenty recently, which is mostly surreal. I feel like a child.

But this annual celebration of my first breath is drawing my eyes up off of today and back onto the past 365 days that have earned me my twentieth tally mark; these days that have cut and pressed and stretched me into a shape different from the one I resembled this time last year.

I've been sifting through all these days, picking out the most pivotal moments - some are heavy and sharp, some are buoyant and dreamlike. All of them are now rolled up under the title of "Past," I can breathe steady for my present distance from them, and stretch out my fingers to mine for the gold held in these unexpected vessels.

That's one of the things I enjoy most about walking alongside the Lord - there is something of value to be drawn from most every experience.

Where have I gone in this past year? Physically, I haven't strayed much from Texas. Emotionally, I've sank into oceans so deep, the waters run black. Spiritually, I've walked across deserts, sweltering and barren. I've run so hard I couldn't see straight; I've laid down in defeat; I've moved in circles and ovals and abstract shapes of no real progress, forward and backward and forward again. Right now, I'm catching my breath.

This year I learned that life - even life with God - is messy.

In tandem, I learned that God is sovereign, even in the ugliest of messes. Even when I feel like He has forsaken me because I am pleading and seeking and striving and being met with silence... Even when I am certain that I have earned myself an exception to this suffocating grace of His because, as it turns out, I am absolutely awful at maintaining any worthiness Jesus bought for me... Even when I am the worst version of myself, broken and full of broken things... He is unchanging. Still present, still invariably good. Still in love with me, still excited about me. Still the God who turns everything on its head and gives purpose to every seemingly meaningless infliction we weather. He is still, against all reason and justice, crazy in love with me. And you.

When I gave my life to Jesus - honestly laid everything out before him and said "You can have it all, I don't want to figure this out alone anymore" - I thought I had earned myself a higher standard of living.
I thought I was exchanging dense pains for diluted ones, and difficult circumstances for quick wisdom with hard lines that could be cleanly wrapped up into "lessons learned." But life with Jesus goes deeper than that.

Instead, I got true comfort where I used to have cheap distraction; I got full healing for the gaping wounds I used to patch over with bandaids; I got a real hope that painted every circumstance a shade brighter and more meaningful. But that doesn't remove the need for comfort, the wounds that are inflicted, or the circumstances that need some hope-painting. Life is still hard and weird and misshapen. I didn't earn a higher standard of living - I had just found the higher ground that would always be sufficient refuge.

We are clumsy, fumbling, slovenly creatures of selfish tendencies, well-versed in the practice of making mistakes. The wonderful part is that, as Christians, we're new creations that are being continually transformed to look like this most gentle, most patient, most kind-hearted man named Jesus. The reality of these two truths colliding is that there are things to be ironed out, a process to undergo. The ironing process involves deep creases being met with hot pressure: As it turns out, this is not a painless or effortless process. (And if it were, would any powerful, impactful change really be happening?)

My twentieth year taught me a lot about this process; about how life unfolds when you're a broken vessel walking around with the living God taking up residence in your heart. It taught me that "Christian" is not synonymous with "exempt," that life with Jesus doesn't mean you can't slip into depression or be crushed under pressure or have moments of strangulating hopelessness...it just means you have the all-sufficient solution.

In the coming months, I'll be examining the lessons I've learned in less-vague ways. But in the meantime, I wanted to offer assurance to the weary and question-laden heart, to those who are walking through the darkest valleys and the driest deserts, to those who are suffering under the weight of their own inadequacy, or under the weight of the silence of God:

That, even after the hardest year of my little life thus far, this twentieth cycle towards eternity, I can say with full assurance that God is unquestionably still worthy of all I have to give. I am convinced now more than ever of His innate goodness. It's who He is, and you are, blessedly, not the exception. Whatever it looks like right now, whatever it feels like right now, He is good. Because He wants to be, because that's what He's like. Please don't do yourself the severe disservice of believing anything less. Truth is truth no matter how you feel, and the truth is that He has called you His. His child, His beloved, whom He is jealous for, whom He has promised to never forsake, whom He has promised to work all things for good.