Hope Not Shaken

I recently watched the series finale of The Office. It was great. I can honestly say that there is one line that has the potential to stay with me for the rest of my life. Andy says, “I wish there was a way to know if you’re the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”

Many times it feels like our lives consist of waking up and going to bed. The days fly. There’s a possibility that the good old days are happening right now and you’re missing them.

Just like I always say, everything isn’t going to be lilly pads and rainbows. There will be some tough times. But when you have food, people that Love you, and a God that Loves you more there’s a pretty good chance you’re living in the good old days.

Let me leave you with this, so that you don’t have to be like Andy someday: You’re living in the good old days.

So live.

Soli Deo gloria

A Summer Reading List. If you already have one feel free to stop reading at any time. If you don’t have one then read on.

Summer is a great time to get some quality reading done. This post is to help and encourage you to read some books this summer. Easy as that.

Here are the three steps I use.
1. Chose number of books you want to read.
2. Try to keep a balance of nonfiction and fiction as well as old and new.
3. Read them.

Here is my list.

Five books. 3 fiction, 2 nonfiction, 2 old, 3 new. I’ve split my summer into 5 two week sections starting June 1st and ending August 10th. That gives me two weeks to read each book. It is important to plan your reading schedule out in a way that works best for you to help keep you on track (and to give you some motivation).

Of course, if you get done with a book early there’s no reason to wait to pick up the next one. Take a little break between books and read on. Make a goal that works for you, choose books that you want to read, and enjoy reading this summer!

Soli Deo gloria

What a tragedy it is when we only believe that which we can observe with our eyes.

Take this picture for example.

My guess is that very few people in 1969 would have believed that Neil Armstrong walked on the moon if NASA just made a public announcement that said, “We’ve put a man on the moon.” They wanted observable proof.

We long for evidence to the point that it becomes mandatory for us to observe something before we can believe it to be true. We’ve lost faith because we don’t think there is anything to put our faith in. Our society mocks people who believe things that cannot be observed or that science cannot prove. The tragedy.

But there are things worth believing. I’m not talking about a blind belief in something. I’m talking about looking at the evidence and believing that something could have happened, even if we didn’t see it ourself. Believing in something by having faith.

What a tragedy it is when we only believe that which we can observe with our eyes.

Soli Deo gloria

It’s safe to say that the majority of us our scaredy-cats. We are creatures of comfort. We love leisure. It is a part of our DNA. We tend to default to the road called our Christian walk that is easy for us to navigate with smooth terrain. We call this the less dangerous road.

But there’s another road. A road of uncertainty. A road of hardships and reliance. A road of pain and faithfulness. This road requires faith in God and complete surrender to His Power. This road is most feared because we must abandon our man-made support beams and surrender everything to God. The most dangerous road.

We want to be in control. We want to live in a way that honors God but we also want to not rely in Him fully. Of course, we must be responsible for our actions and be good stewards of our resources. Nonetheless, we must put our faith into action and do something that requires us to trust fully on God.

Now the irony. When we live on the road of comfort, the less dangerous road, we miss out on many of the lessons God wants to teach us. The ways He wants to grow us. Growth cannot happen without change. When we live on this road we become stagnant. The absence of growth seems dangerous.

When we live our lives on the road of pushing our comfort zones and service, the most dangerous road, we must have complete faith in God. This road is actually the less dangerous road because God is in control of our life and there is no fear, even in death, because God is in control.

Which road on you traveling?

When we push ourselves outside of our comfort zones we grow in character. When we push ourselves outside of our comfort zones and focus on God we grow in character and in relationship with our Creator. This is what happened on the wilderness challenge.

We were pushed past our comfort zones almost daily, but with good intention. We didn’t merely canoe in hail or walk down mountains in the dark with no purpose; each challenge we faced had opportunity for spiritual growth. Though the spiritual growth did not necessarily occur the moment the snow started falling, we were able to capture these moments every night as we sat around the camp fire and discussed how we can grow closer to God through the events of the day.

There is growth in the community as we all strived to be an example of biblical community, but there is also spiritual growth that happens internally. There is time for devotion everyday because there are no distractions. There is time for growth everyday because there are no distractions. And there is time for God everyday because there are no distractions. Sometimes we tend to forget these important areas of spiritual growth because we are busy or distracted. But we cannot. And going n the wilderness challenge was an excellent reminder that God must be first in my life everyday, not just when times are hard.

Soli Deo gloria

“If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of God which had been shown! But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile.”

― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature and Selected Essays

The physical battle was hard. The piercing cold and the onslaught of snow. But my toughest enemy on the wilderness challenge was the isolation.

There were thirteen of us for nine days in the wilderness with minimal, very minimal, human intersocialble interactions. We just had the people in our group.

Now I did not long for a connection with my friends from school or even my family. Of course I missed them, but I knew I would be able to talk to them after nine days. But the missed connection that nearly broke me was not being able to communicate with my fiancé in any way.

It was terrible.

Every night I would lie awake aching to talk to her; yearning for communication. But there was none. Except for leaving the trip, there was no thing I could do to communicate with her. Nine days.

It changed the way I view Sammi. Of course I already knew that I Love her, but after that experience I understand how much she means to me. When all the excess is stripped away the most important thing will remain. I did not long for Xbox, or doughnuts, or even to watch Batman; I longed for the most important thing in my life. My soon to be wife.

I pray that none of you would have to go through something like this against your will, unless it is God’s Will. Because it was hard. It was painful. It was uncomfortable. But it has changed me.

Soli Deo gloria