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I see God's hand
Wresting control from me
Sifting through grains of sand
To find the perfect one
Setting it perfectly in place
He creates a castle from the
Overlapping homogeny of the gold encrusted beaches
He kneels down, occassionally empyting
His sandles of the small specks stuck
Where He doesn't want them.
Then He take me, a static, useless
Particle. He, arranging all things,
Architects a scene of flawless beauty
To which my only response is, "Why?"
Why would God give such good gifts to such poor people?
I am helpless, in this oceanic scene of vast
Majesty, able to only to look with my eyes
And marvel a the mind-blowing, pure
Art; incapably accomplished by anyone
But He who paints with
The Master's Hand

Riding the Rumble Strips

Have you ever been driving in your car, physically exhausted and/or mentally disoriented, and found yourself riding the rumble strips on either the middle or the side of the road, not being able to get off of them? I remember I was driving one night a couple summers ago at two in the morning, and was having this exact experience. I actually got pulled over; and the policeman, bless his heart, didn't believe me when I said I wasn't intoxicated.

But that is of no consequence.

As I have been going about my day today, I've been thinking about how my life might look to someone on the outside--someone who regularly asks how my day has been and rarely receives a sparkling response. Some days I'll have a great conversation or hear a perspective-giving insight, and consequently be a bundle of joy.  Other days will feel like I'm drinking from the bottom of the three-day-old coffee carafe in hopes of finishing the sequence of daily events without melting into a puddle of semi-existence. 

I know I'm extreme. Will I excuse my extremities because of my personality type? Yes. However. If I thought that this general up-and-down pattern of life was unique to me, I probably wouldn't share it with this blog's readership. But. I can proceed with fair confidence that we are all in the same boat together. Some might be hanging out on the prow of this boat, some might be on the stern of this boat, but nobody is (yet) standing on solid ground. At one time, we all stand on the deck, bathe in a gorgeous sunrise and sing until our voices refuse to cooperate during a mind-shattering sunset. There are also the times when we will get rocked. We will get tossed. We even might get thrown overboard, but not without a life-preserver. 

I remember when I was seven or eight, watching my parents talk with their friends about theology, and God, and what they were learning, and that they always seemed to have it together. I used to think that I wished I loved God all the time. I explicitly remember thinking to myself that I couldn't wait until I was a dad and was married and had kids so that I would finally have some stability. I actually thought that. 

HAHAHAHAHA.

We are a crumbling people, whether or not you have decided to believe in the Gospel. It doesn't matter how tough you are. It doesn't matter how good of a driver you are. There will come points when you, though you can't help it, are unable to stop driving on the rumble strips. There will always be days when that three-day-old coffee carafe is your only friend in your attempt to merely stay awake.

And that's ok. You know how I know? 

I once watched a movie in which the religious leader is in conversation with a college-aged guy who is right there with me, riding the rumble strips. The religious leader advises:

Son, in all my eyars of theology studies, I have come to the harsh conclusion that there are only two truths I know for sure. There is a God. And I'm not Him.

I can run on fumes; I can be dangling from the starboard bow; I can be riding on the rumble strips; I can be ok. 

Because He's God, and I'm not.

It's a nice reminder to remember that my constant head-butting with life is (among many other things) due to the fact that I am not deity. I am finite. I am helpless. I am weak. I am poor. I am a beggar. 

And He loves me the same, not letting me fall, crying with I hurt, rejoicing when I'm happy.

As usual, there are many more things to say about this. For words' sake, I will stop here. I just want to affirm that there indeed are times when we hit rock bottom... and then we stay there... and then we can't seem to get out. The rumble strips seem much wider than we might have previously thought.

I'll finish with this quote from an ex-roommate of mine after a dynamite time of pray with him today:

That's worship: pouring out your heart before the Lord like a little helpless kid.

He's got me. He's holding me. If you're His child, He's holding you too.

Join me in the journey of recognizing our not-god-ness. It's going to be a journey that lasts until eternity ends.

.DSN.

Scary Prayers

I hear Christians (aka, me) talk and sing about how more of Jesus will satisfy the thirsty soul. But what does that mean? We sing things like, "Take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee (Take My Life)", and "Father use my ransomed life in any way you choose (All I Have is Christ)", and "God, I want to let you know, I want everything You are (Sun & Moon)", and "Lord, help me gain victory against pride/lust/judgmental attitudes. (Typical Christian Prayer)"

Do I fully know God? No.

Do I have any idea how infinitely overwhelming He is? No.

Do I sometimes complain when He answers my prayer of "God, I want everything You are"? Yes.

Why? 

Because I haven't realized that knowing God means knowing the part that you didn't know before. 

If I can't fully know Him, how am I supposed to think that He will answer my prayer to know Him more fully in a way that won't rip my heart out of my chest, shred it to pieces, and then put it back together, but with more of Himself in the glue? He might not do that. But how do I know?

He does that. In the most loving and gracious way there is to do it.

I try to avoid superlatives, but with this God, I do Him an injustice by not speaking as exaltedly of Him as I can.

I've heard some people warn me when I pray a "scary" prayer. I think I agree. There are prayer requests that are scary, because there are prayer requests that can only be answered after having experienced high levels of pain and suffering. But to me, requests like "make me more like you" are scariest because I don't even know what I'm asking. I don't know the depths of the riches of the wisdom of God. I don't know what parts of Him He wants to entrust to me. If I don't know what He wants me to learn, I will have no idea how He's going to do it.

I want to get better and more faithful at praying scary prayers, and I want to love my God enough to actually want all of Him. Not that I'll ever have all of Him. But I want enough faith to stand on the water when He's lovingly beckoning to stand with Him through the waves that shoot the shards of salt water up my nose.

With a God like that, my prayers don't get any less scary; the pain doesn't get any less painful. But I want to trust Him enough to venture through the slimy, rodent-infested cave, because the light on the other side is so worth it.

.DSN.

The Month

Some months go fast. Some months go slow. Some months are of the type of months that are comprised of individual days that seem to never end, but collectively, the month as a completed entity, flies by. 

This past month was like that.

Like most things in life: hard, but so good.

There are things I'd like to relive every moment of forever. I can't say that of many of the situations in the last thirty days.

However, as I mentioned in a recent post, I've never been so uplifted by the hand of my God who carries me through the wilderness, in the same kind of way that a father carries his son up to bed after a late-night car ride. The moments when I realize that are the ones I would like to relive forever.

Here are a few lyrics from a song that has proven true time after time in this man's (my) experience.

---

Defender of this heart
You loved me from the start, You never change
Through the highs and lows
As seasons come and go, You never fail
Day after day, Your love will remain
Faithful and true, You are good

When troubles come my way
You guide and You sustain, lead me I pray
Forever You will be the Great Eternal King
Now and always

You are God with us
You're victorious
You are strong and mighty to save
For Your word stands true
There is none like You
And when all else fades You remain

---

He is my hope.

I love Him.

.DSN.

Cries of the Lovesick

In this life, we can be sure of three things: death, taxes, and suffering. Everyone suffers. And what we need most is the love of God that secures our hope. We are lovesick sufferers.

The Lord has used passages of Psalms 32-42 to drive belief in His unmerited favor deep into my soul, reviving it just enough to sustain the breaths I breathe and the steps I take.

I wanted to share some of the morsels that have been most savory to the life of my spirit.

I hope your faith is bolstered as well.

---

Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD.

(Psalm 32:10)

Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear him, on those who hope in his steadfast love.

(Psalm 33:18)

Those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed.

(Psalm 34:5)

Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!

(Psalm 34:8)

The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

(Psalm 34:18)

Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the LORD delivers him out of them all.

(Psalm 34:19)

Let those who delight in my righteousness shout for joy and be glad and say evermore, “Great is the LORD, who delights in the welfare of his servant!”

(Psalm 35:27)           

Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

(Psalm 37:4)

For the arms of the wicked shall be broken, but the LORD upholds the righteous.

(Psalm 37:17)

The steps of a man are established by the LORD, when he delights in his way;

(Psalm 37:23)

The LORD will not abandon him to his power or let him be condemned when he is brought to trial.

(Psalm 37:33)

But for you, O LORD, do I wait; it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer.

(Psalm 38:15)

“And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you."

(Psalm 39:7)

I waited patiently for the LORD; he inclined to me and heard my cry.

(Psalm 40:1)           

As for you, O LORD, you will not restrain your mercy from me; your steadfast love and your faithfulness will ever preserve me!

(Psalm 40:11)

As for me, I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me. You are my help and my deliverer; do not delay, O my God!

(Psalm 40:17)

Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation.

(Psalm 42:5)

---

The LORD is good. He will never leave nor forsake me.

He is my only hope.

.DSN.

Beautifully Helpless

I am beautifully helpless.

I'll recap one of my days in the last week for you: 

I spent the morning psyching myself up, taking my medicine to be able to functionally work an eight-hour shift running cars for the valet company. Needless to say, the prospect of working this in a mid-forties temperature was not the most pleasurable prospect I have ever prospected.

However, the work day was good. The Lord made Himself sensibly near to me. He sustained the faint of heart. My God is good like that.

But there was a problem: I haven't taken the wide open opportunity (multiple times) to share the gospel with a friend of mine who I interact with on a daily basis. My God is good, and He also wants others to taste His goodness. Because He is good and wants others to taste His goodness, I spent most of the day in the conviction of my lack of boldness, thinking about what I should say to this person.

I drew many, many blanks that day.

But the Lord is good.

Finally, my time had come.

I bumbled my way through the entire thing. I tried to talk about how sin separates us from God and how without trusting our helplessness to His sacrifice on our behalf, we won't have any lasting hope to get out of bed in the morning.

Now, just add about ten minutes of jumbled, muddled, and confused words, and you will have construed most of my gospel presentation.

As the friend left to head home, I sat in my car thinking about where I was: I'm in the Midwest, a familiar stranger to this Minneapolis town, still very much attempting to find my own way having been separated from most of what I know and am comfortable with at home. I thought about how I wanted to testify to the hope that is in me, but probably couldn't have presented anything much more unclearly.

Also, it was pitch black outside, and bun-numbingly cold.

Oh yeah. And my gas light had just turned on.

And I probably just garbled the most important message in the world.

This sad, sad picture belonged in some movie.

Then the song "Who Am I" came on the radio.

The Lord is good, and very near to me:

I am a flower quickly fading, here today and gone tomorrow, a wave tossed in the ocean, a vapor in the wind. Still, You hear me when I'm calling. Lord, You catch me when I'm falling, and You've told me who I am. I am Yours.

I started laughing out loud, and I know I looked like an idiot. A fool for Christ, I hope they say. But I was overcome with the beautiful helplessness of my situation. I have nothing. I attempted to share what hope I have been given, and I don't think I did a great job. But yet, He tells me who I am.

I am His.

He never lets go, through the calm, and through the storm! I drove home that night feeling pretty OK about my helplessness.

Sure, I've got a lot of decisions to make in the next few weeks. Sure, life isn't easy. Sure, obedience isn't always the most enjoyable of the options, but I can tell you this in dead-certainty:

I've never felt so upheld by the hand of God in my life, and there is nothing like it.

I believe that beauty is found in anything that points to a greater reality than our own limited one. I see my daily helplessness as doing just that. I have no feet of my own to stand on. But The Architect of the universe is daily laying the next panel of metal on this suspension bridge of my life. I can only pray for the strength to take the very next step, and no more than that which He has laid before me, else I fall to my peril on the jagged rocks of pompous anxiety and foundationless self-confidence.

He truly does provide only today's grace, today. Tomorrow's grace will come tomorrow.

In my opinion, that is some of the most beautiful helplessness I could think to have.

The Lord is good.

The Lord near to the brokenhearted (Psalm 34:18).

He is my hope.

.DSN.

Which is Worse: A Bad Covenant, or a Broken Covenant?

If the Old Testament is a freezer at McDonalds, the stories hidden inside are stacks upon stacks of McGriddle Pancakes.

Let that wonderful image melt into your brain for a minute.

I found one such savory morsel in Joshua 9:1-21. To summarize, this is the story of the Gibeonite deception, where Israel was blazing through the Promised Land, slicing and dicing every person and thing, in obedience, devoting all to destruction. As any reasonable group of people would do, the Gibeonites heard about this God, Yahweh, and how His people were valiant in war and commanded to destroy everyone. In trying to save their own skins, they concocted a cleverly devised plan to manipulate Israelite sensitivities sensitivities. Though the account doesn't say, I wonder if the Gibeonite solution was based on some knowledge of Yahweh's law as presented in Deuteronomy, and the Lord's emphasis on the treatment of strangers and sojourners in a foreign land. Yahweh is a God who is kind to the helpless, and He commands His people to do so also (Read: Deuteronomy 10:17-19). Their solution was to pretend to be a poor and tired people who have traveled from afar and desired to make a covenant with the Israelites for their protection. In reality, their town was like the next town over, so they took old clothes, and "crumbly" bread as a disguise.

Not seeing the problem with this, the leaders of Israel took their own provisions and gave them to the Gibeonites, offering them shelter and protection, and they made the covenant with them. The Bible says, "...but did not ask counsel from the Lord."

Hm. When I read this, I saw an ominous darkness surrounding what was about to happen. Though the Israelites responded in kindness, they made a covenant with a foreign people and they did not ask counsel from the Lord.

Hm. Interesting.

The McGriddle continues.

After the covenant-making process was finalized three days after the initial point of contact, the leaders of Israel found out that the Gibeonites were actually neighbors, not a raggedy nation eating pizza crusts. As I probably would have done, the people of Israel "murmured against the leaders." No kidding. I would be at least mildly upset if my nation's leaders gave money that we didn't have to a cause or program that didn't need money... Oh wait...

That's another post for another time.

But here's the kicker; the leaders said, "We have sworn to them by the Lord, the God of Israel, and now we may not touch them. This we will do to them: let them live, lest wrath be upon us, because of the oath that we swore to them."

I read this and am convinced that these leaders are honorable men for a few reasons:
1) They are men that the Psalmist describes as those who dwell on Yahweh's holy hill: "[He] who swears to his own hurt and does not go back (Psalm 15:4)." The leaders see the power of the covenant and the implication that they cannot so easily extricate themselves from it.
2) They saw that Yahweh hates broken covenants far more than He hates bad covenants.

This is how I see it: in covenanting themselves with the Gibeonites, the Israelites, by necessity, disobeyed the edict of the Lord to devote all things to destruction. In not asking counsel from the Lord, they proved themselves foolish. However, though foolish, the leaders of Israel thought it safest for the nation to swear to their own hurt and not change, rather than attack the Gibeonites (in obedience and righteous indignation), which would incur the immediate wrath of God upon them.

I was taken aback at this reasoning. If the leaders were right, which they seem to be, it implies that God would be less wrathful towards them if they remained in covenant with an evil people, than if they broke the covenant with the evil people to then act in obedience to God's original decree.

Woah.

Application: This is a formative principle for me in my thinking about covenants and, God's view of them. God is a covenant God. He loves them. He loves keeping them. There have been many a book and seminary course devoted to covenants, but simply, my conclusion is that God likes them. He hates when covenants are broken. That's why He hates divorce. The most prominent covenant that we still have in America is treated like we treat trash. I can understand why God probably isn't thrilled with America right now.

However, positively, He loves covenants. And He's in a covenant with us. As children of God, we are now His covenant people! He will never leave us! He will never forsake us! If He broke His covenant sealed with the blood of His Son, well... it's just not possible. He is a good God, and He loves being in covenant with us, though it is hard to see sometimes when He doesn't feel very near.

Though this discussion deserves many more words than I am able to give right now, I want to say one more thing: have you ever heard a covenant described in the same way as a contract?

No.

This is a life or death issue: if a contract is nullified by one party's lack of fulfillment, then I am in trouble. If God held on to me with such a weak bind, I'd have been disposed of long ago. But He doesn't. As the Israelites saw in a small sense, God is a covenant God. Covenants aren't so easily broken.

I literally am and will be eternally grateful for that.

.DSN.

Marriage: Displaying the Infinite Wisdom of God Through the Intricacy of the Human Mind

DISCLAIMER: THIS POST IS BASICALLY PURE SPECULATION. I HOPE YOU AREN'T TOO SHOCKED.

As a 20-year-old guy, I do a fair share of thinking about marriage. I wonder what being married is like. I wonder how my life will change. I wonder what pieces of advice that I've heard concerning marriage have actually been blown way out of proportion. I wonder what things I will thank my parents for teaching me. That last category will probably be the largest.

In one of these marriage-philosophizing sessions with a few housemates, we began to think and talk about the depth of the human personality. Have you ever heard men and women who have been married for 25+ years say that their partner is still an enigma to them?

Think on that for a second.

If two people have been married longer than 25 years and see each other mostly every day--excepting occasional trips away from home--chances are that they have seen or interacted with each other for over 9,000 days. For two people who have been married longer than 40 years, that number is upwards of 14,000. 

That's incredible.

If you are married, you know what that means. As an unmarried person, I haven't the slightest clue. That idea of being with someone for every day that passes is mildly unfathomable to me. Not that I couldn't or won't be able to do it, but I don't have the categories in my head to try to have an understanding of what 9,000+ days entails. All I do know is that I'd probably get to know my wife really, really well. I can't imagine being surprised by anything. But there's the rub.

From what they say, I still will be surprised.

Probably not like a, "Babe! I can't believe you did/said/thought/felt that! I didn't bargain for this!" (though there might be an element of that) but instead, probably more of a, "Babe, I still don't understand you. I don't know how your mind fully works. I guess I don't know you as well as I thought I did."

It's hard to see how that response could actually happen after 9,000 days of marriage, but these married people are saying it, and they've been married for way more days than I have, so I'll take them at their word. 

Thinking on this subject led me to broaden my perspective and take into consideration my interactions with everybody. If someone has the ability to be with and observe just one other person for over 9,000 days and still not have a definitive corner on him or her, how do I think that I can rightly understand someone who I see a few times a week for a couple semesters? 

I am a fool to assume that I have someone completely figured out, when I have no idea what is going on on the inside. Not only do I not know what's going on on the inside, I wouldn't ever be able to, no matter how honest, open, or truthful they are with me. The human mind is so deep, so murky, so full of thoughts, feelings, emotions, and years of experience, that I need every second of every interaction to get a better handle on how to understand how any given person interacts with the world around them. They could tell me everything that they could possibly think to tell me, even their deepest darkest secrets. But even as a 20-year-old interacting with other young adults, I will never be able to unpack 20 years of life. Ever. And as they grow older, it only gets harder. The more life that gets lived, the more there is to that person to unearth. 

I don't mean to say that I can't know anybody really well. That's obviously possible. In living with someone for 9,000 days, I hope that I will get to the point that I will know what my wife is thinking most of the time. I hope that we will deeply be able to sense and feel each other's seasons of sorrow; I hope that we will also be able to heartily rejoice with each other in times of truly contented happiness. I  hope those things, but I am confident that they will happen, as marriage is a process of becoming one in body, mind, and soul. But, we will never attain full oneness.

But that's another blog post. 

Where's God in all this? Here He is:

As my eyes are opened to see that my God is great enough to create a person so complex and so intricate that even a lifetime of study will never plumb the depths of his or her mind, I realize how much wiser and deeper His thoughts are than mine. I can't comprehend creating something as mind-blowing as a human being.

For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust.
(Psalm 103:14)

Humans are so remarkably unique, yet we are dust to Him. I can't completely figure out a person even if I spent the rest of my life studying, but we are not a challenge to Him. He looks at us and smiles. We're simple creation to Him. I see other people as intriguing, mysterious, and often intimidating, and He sees us as lost sheep without a shepherd. I see Goliath, and He sees a helpless little zygote who He decided to let live one day.

God is one to whom my future is worth entrusting.

These people who He decided to create are worth the time. They are worth the trouble. They are worth the pain. They are worth the hurt. They are worth the love.

They are worth it because He is worth it, and whatever He decides to fashion is worth it. In learning about His creation, my understanding of His great faithfulness and sovereign hand is only expanded; my ability to see and savor my God is enhanced, the more that I see and savor the things and people that He has made.

Through knowing His peoples, I get to see Him just a little more clearly.

.DSN.