The With God

 “I am with you” seems to be a recurring theme in my life as I grapple with what it means to live well in this world as a man, a dad, a Christian, a leader, etc. The word “with” seems to be the missing skeleton key for everything I’m trying to understand and it is surprisingly missing in the books, sermons, and podcast that try to teach me how I should live. I notice it now more than ever. I keep hearing descriptions of what it means to be happy, humble, holy, free, loving, and powerful all by myself. But most people seem to silently believe this comes through some kind of boot-strapping self-actualization. God provides the narrative framework, or worse; a set of non-relational principles we can use to help ourselves.

Actually, I wonder if in fact I cannot self actualize by myself. Maybe the point is relationship. It’s like… how do I do this with God? Or more like…. how do I let him do it with me?

Sometimes I wake up from a Sunday nap and I hear the voice of Jesus say, “let’s make coffee together.” I feel a warm presence around me and I say, “sure, let’s do it!” I imagine Jesus holding the porta-filter with me as I grind the beans. Our movements are slow and deliberate. We watch together as the creamy espresso drips into the cup, we cut it with hot water, and I sip happily, feeling it warm my body and wake up my brain. It is so much more fun to do things together, to have someone to share beautiful experiences.
It is one thing to “know” that God is with me (because duh, God is everywhere). It is another to feel Him moving through my thoughts and movements, to really feel open to Him.

We have a relational gospel; a gospel of reconciliation, a gospel of intimacy. Relationship with God means becoming one with him. It’s a crazy thought. But it happens as we learn to do everything with him. This is why “gospel” means good news. Let me give a couple examples of how this works:
God seems to have impossibly high standards for people. Forget the law of Moses. Have you read the Sermon on the Mount? He literally says, “be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.” So how does that work? The problem with the law wasn’t that it was a bad idea. The problem was people tried to keep it all by themselves. They built rules around the rules so they could feel secure that they might not break a rule and become “unclean”. 

But Jesus’ invitation is that if we do stuff with Him, we will hit the nail on the head every time. Yes practice is required. But the heart of God thrills in every earnest attempt to partner with Him. Not because he loves our effort but because he put that idea in my heart and he loves that I let the idea bear fruit in co-laborative action. David’s confidence to kill a giant wasn’t birthed by self-will or desperate desire but by the burning fire of indignation God gave him along with a certainty born of intimacy and experience that God would certainly be with him.

How do you understand God’s power to heal for instance? Why do some people experience miraculous healing while others continue to suffer? I’m no expert but my working theory is that Jesus wants a deeper relationship with people and that may give us a clue. Belief is relational and it can manifest in both suffering and breakthrough. Unbelief is non-relational but it can also manifest in the same things. What is the tension between radical acceptance of my circumstances and radical belief that God can and will do amazing things on my behalf? I’m not saying that intimacy guarantees results. But I am saying that intimacy with God shows us which way to point our attention because we know that value system of the one we love. So if I know God’s main goal is to love me and to love others through me, then I won’t spend time protecting myself from Him. Instead I’ll get curious about what He is doing because I have a good taste in my mouth about doing His will. This morning I prayed with a friend who suffered from sciatica. It wasn’t because I felt I had any healing to offer or because it was her greatest need (there were probably more pressing needs in her life) but because when she was talking, my mind wandered to God and I got curious about what he might want to do. I felt His beautiful willingness to heal not just her nerves but her heart as well. After I prayed there were tears in her eyes and she told me about some emotional challenges God had been addressing with her and a desire to go deeper with God to find healing in those areas. Healing is God’s playground: it is where he creates and recreates things for better connection to him whether it is bones, nerves, or hearts.

On the other hand, if I am not healed, He is still good. Things get in the way of our healing, but those things are never connected to God’s good heart for us. I’m convinced His desire is for healing (otherwise Heaven would be full of a bunch of really sanctified sick people) but he knows how to work with illness, suffering, and death so that even those things work in our favor. I can accept the mystery of pain, and even appreciate the good things it is doing for me only because he is with me in it. The goal of my life is not to escape pain. It is to be wherever Jesus is. That’s why Paul even wanted to know the fellowship of sharing in Christ’s sufferings. He was not a masochist. He was just a sucker for doing stuff with Jesus. I suppose that is where he felt the most meaning; the most indescribable love in the universe.

I once invited a group of Indian leaders to picture Jesus being with them right now. It was a total experiment but to my surprise, a number of people had powerful physical and emotional encounters with Jesus, describing a warm and cathartic sense of His closeness and love. One woman came up to me later that day looking radiant. She said, "you know for so many years in ministry, I have been working hard for Jesus. I never once had the idea that I could work WITH Jesus!"

I think it is good news that everything comes back to relationship with the Father. He is “With” . The world is a confusing and disorienting place. I never know how I will be treated and often I’m not sure if I’m doing the right thing. Should I even be writing this right now? But when I picture the face of Jesus, and say “okay Lord, what’s up?” I get the overwhelming sense that He loves me, that he is delighted to do this with me, and the he is taking care of all the heavy complicated stuff. 

What drives me nuts about Jesus

I want to say that sometimes Jesus drives me absolutely bonkers. The more I get to know the guy the more exasperated I get. But something has shifted in me over the years. Now when I think about Jesus, I don’t just think about someone sitting in heaven waiting for me to figure things out or someone who did lots of cool things long ago. I think mainly about the guy who sits with me in my living room with that knowing look in his eye, listening to all my thoughts and feelings. I think about the wrinkles around his eyes, about the way he cryptically quotes scripture to me or pithy little phrases that carry an ocean of meaning. I think about the way he sometimes invites me to do uncomfortable things, the way he helps me examine my heart without ever condemning me, the way he sends people and circumstances into my life with a smile and a nod just to remind me that he is here. Almost every day I accidentally glance at the clock exactly at 11:11AM. When I do, Jesus just smiles and says, “I love you.”

So I guess what is driving me nuts about Jesus isn’t his judgments or his harsh demands. It isn’t his seeming distance or hesitance to act. Actually what makes me the most crazy right now is his patience with my flaws and the flaws of others. I wish Jesus would just rip the cancer out. I only have one life to live. Doesn’t he know that I really really (read: kinda sometimes) want to live fully sold out for him? Sometimes my mind is shouting, I need you to shoot straight with me Jesus! What am I missing? Hit me. I can handle it. And then Jesus says something insane like, “I’m working it all out. You are doing a good job. I will show you everything you need to know in time. Don’t be afraid.” I suppose he knows I’m trying to medicate that bit of insecurity in our relationship with something I can control (i.e.. “doing my work”). Actually I take it back. I think he just likes me too much to do anything that would hurt me. And I suppose on one level that is extremely healing to me. But the fine print is this: If I believe Jesus offers limitless grace to me, then I must believe that he is extending the same grace to others. That stings. Sometimes it is hard to forgive others. Gosh, sometimes it is hard to forgive myself. But radical grace teaches that both are possible... and required. Jesus alone gets to define your lovability. Spoiler: the outlook on that one is extremely good. But I think right now what is really eating at me isn’t just his patience, or even his grace, but his pursuit. Here, I can prove it with the bible.

After the resurrection, Jesus carefully folds his laundry (Jn 20:7), maybe takes a stroll in the garden or chats with the angels. It seems right that after paying for the sins of the world and securing the keys to death and Hades, he would enjoy a relaxed sunday morning. I would have had a mimosa. Then some of his friends show up. Mary came first. She is someone I imagine he was happy to see. After all, she stuck by his side the whole time, right up to the end. Even in death, she comes to tend to His needs. Here is what I would have said:

“Ah Mary! How good to see you. You are my one faithful disciple. Come sit with me and enjoy this beautiful day. Then let’s talk about what to do with my other unbelieving disciples. You know they really let me down. I warned them they would be tempted and look what happened. Do you know how traumatizing it was to be sweating blood while my best friends slept? But you know, I’ve been processing it a lot and I’ve decided to forgive them. In fact I’m going to give them another chance. I’m going up to Mount of Olives to pray for them. I also just want to make sure I’m in a good place emotionally. When they are ready, just let them know where they can find me. But I hope to God they work through their issues first. I’m not sure how I can trust them again otherwise. You know, I’ve been thinking about the mission I have for them. It is a really big job. And honestly I’m worried they will do the same things to others that they did to me. Please make sure they take a good long look in the mirror before they come find me. I really want this to work out.”

Thankfully, Jesus has a different response. He sends Mary ahead of him saying, “Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Without a shred of repentance from the 11 disciples, Jesus calls them His “brothers.” He goes so far as to assume that His Father is still their Father and his God is still their God. It gets better. That very night, Jesus comes to dinner. His disciples are huddled up in fear, wondering if they are next. There is no mention of remorse or a change of heart. This whole crazy week didn’t grow them. It terrified them. They were triggered, on edge, probably snapping at each other and making anxious plans to save their own skin. But Jesus literally walks through a wall to be with them. When he shows up he has one thing to say to them: “Peace be with you” (Jn 20:19). No mention of their weakness or betrayal. It doesn’t seem to matter. Instead, Jesus reiterates what he had just said. “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” Those trembling, preservation-minded disciples don’t just get a pass. They get a proclamation Peace from Jesus himself. 

The Bible says Jesus, “came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near” (Mph 2:17). This means Jesus didn’t just figure out a way to be “okay” with us. He went to the ends of the earth and walked through any wall to get to every weak and trembling heart to speak a message of Peace to us. There are no locked doors Jesus can’t go through to offer his Peace. As the angels prophesied about Jesus, “on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests” (Lk 2:14).

Here is the crazy part: Jesus sends the 11 disciples to offer the same unconditional Peace to others that he is offering to them. He thinks they are ready. Well, almost. The only thing they still need is the Holy Spirit. In other words, Jesus knows that when they have a relationship with him through this indwelling Presence of God, that everything will work itself out in the context of that relational connection. That drives me nuts. I suppose it betrays that bit of insecurity in me: do I really trust my simple, relational connection with Jesus to do the heavy lifting when it comes to the quality of my spiritual life? Can I really receive his Peace as an unconditional gift? Will I let him say “I forgive you” before I can even get the apology out of my mouth? If I can accept that, how would that change my internal realities? Maybe I would relax more. Maybe I would pursue people more. Maybe my relational circuits would be resilient even when people hurt me. Maybe my need for other people to “do their part” wouldn’t feel quite so urgent. If I’m honest, I suppose grace still bugs me a bit. Maybe it just doesn’t make sense to me. But the more I think about it, the more it sounds like freedom.

A Happy 5th Rebirthday!

 Today is a special day: my 5th rebirth day! 5 years ago today, I stepped into a healing experience that forever rewired my belief system about God’s availability. Since then my spiritual life has gone from a rollercoaster of mountains and valleys to a steady upward climb into His heart. Man, Jesus is way better than I ever thought. I haven’t missed a day in the last 5 years of physically sensing His presence. Just now, I closed my eyes, and felt warmth go down my head and legs as though love were a liquid substance. The voice behind me says to my mind, “I never left you. You just didn’t know that I was here.” Sometimes the words are wild and uncomfortable. But usually he just says, “I love you. Don’t be afraid.” Sometimes he just sits there, knowing me. But always, always He is there.

Now I’ve done some thinking and listening about this strange experience and I’ve realized it is not all that strange if you talk to right people. Many people have tapped into a tangible interactive friendship with a God. Once they taste it they never want to go back. But many people DO go back to the dry trudging of spiritual aloneness. They do this for a million reasons. But the reasons all boil down to an attack on our willingness to be known in this way. It honestly gets uncomfortable, life gets stressful, we believe so many lies about ourselves and God. We drift away. In the process of drifting, we assign meaning to our deserts: Maybe God is teaching us something by pulling back our ability to experience Him. I don’t think so.

Here is my 5-year assessment of what this experience is, what it means, and what it doesn’t mean...

In my layman’s definition, we experience God’s presence when through a combination of environmental factors, true knowledge, and the practice of our will, our bodies and minds experience the resonance of alignment with our spirts which are connected to Jesus. This alignment might be called surrender. I like the less militant term, “willingness”. When I become sufficiently willing for God to be there (which usually involves the significant removal of false belief systems through emotional healing), I automatically experience him. Worship, which is just the practice of intentionally appreciating God through beauty, often creates a perfect environment for God’s Presence to be felt. The assertion of true facts about God does the job too. Brother Lawrence, the 17th century Carmelite monk who first coined the term “The Practice of the Presence of God” had the simplest practice of thinking about God as often as possible. This constant meditation on the person of God brought him (and countless others) into profound and consistent ecstasies. Maybe you’ve felt it before: someone says something so true it literally gives you chills. You can feel the resonance on the word. God loves that stuff and He wants to give you a life full of it. When I speak warmly about him, I’m sometimes so moved by Him that I physically shake.

I’ve known I can have this experience for a long time. What I didn’t know is that I could intentionally apply my will through specific habits that cause me to experience God pretty any time I want. Well I guess I did know that. What I DIDN’T know is just how simple and rewarding these habits could be. Let me give you a couple examples of easiest exercises that take almost no time but now consistently yield results.

*Taking a deep breath and imagining I am breathing in God.

*Picturing Jesus sitting across from me and sometimes seeing something in His hands for me or just watching how He interacts with me.

*Saying true things like, “I know I can’t get to you in my power, but I bet you would love to be here with me right now. You love me. Your power is perfect in my weakness, etc…”

*Looking, hearing, smelling, touching, and tasting beautiful things and and then mentally appreciating God for them.

*Picturing my mind as a chasm into which God’s thoughts fall gently

*Reading and thinking about the Bible.

*Walking slowly down a hallway or down my street.

*Imaging God’s thoughts towards a person while they are talking.

Of course I do the harder stuff too and I love it. But my bread and butter is the moment-by-moment experience of God’s loving Presence. This, I firmly believe, is not a gift to certain individuals, but a birthright to every person who trusts Jesus with their lives.

What this DOESN’T mean is that the circumstances of life become easy. Some do: for instance, I’ve probably been sick a total of 5 days in the last year. My mental clarity is better. My diet has improved. I don’t entertain grudges or pity parties. So naturally I’m not as susceptible to the things that plague many people. But in the last 5 years I have experienced death, loss of relationship, betrayal, money stress, busy schedules, boredom, distraction, and the pain of raising 3 kids. Some of these things have stretched my capacity, but I’ve never missed a day of experiencing God at least once and sometimes for hours at a time. And in the hardest parts of the dry and painful season, I would describe my life as deeply happy.

In the last five years, I’ve also been dealing with significant areas where I am not yet fully submitted to Jesus. Some of these areas have been profoundly healed. Others he is still chipping away at. At the forefront: I still hate looking stupid and I still hate talking to strangers. Chip, chip. I also struggle with the idea that God’s acceptance of me is truly unconditional. Chip, chip. Could God really love all of me? Is he really as good as I’ve seen Him to be? Am I deceiving myself? Chip, chip. He uses friends and family to bring me along. This week, one of my friends has been hammering away at me, exposing lies, and helping me find new layers of profound growth and healing. But I no longer feel I’m a broken mess waiting to be made whole one day. I AM whole, and there will always be new and increasingly beautiful layers of wholeness when I partner with Him. This doesn’t preclude humility. In fact it takes humility to embrace the reality of what He thinks of us, because none of us did a darn thing to deserve it. The picture I get is of me stepping into the front door of Father’s house. I’d be happy to sit in the security and beauty of His front entryway for the rest of my life. But there are so many hidden little rooms and interesting things to do here if I want to explore.

These last few weeks, God has been tearing down pride and old mindsets in my life. Like shedding scales from my eyes, I find myself thinking in a way I never thought I could think. I’ve cried a lot, felt the deep value for other people (especially the women in my life), loved more than I thought I could… I’m embracing tenderness but can also feel intense power flowing through me when I interact with people. The work is more intense (I almost want to say savage) than usual, as though someone is tossing up my brain like a tossed salad. God is giving me step-by-step instructions throughout my day. He is giving me intense prophetic words through people I’ve never met. People are having dreams about me and waking up in the night to pray. It all points to a really good future in which the healing I’ve experienced these last 5 years will be powerfully used for the healing of many many people. I’m excited! But I’ve learned the strength of a ministry is largely determined by how deep the person in ministry is willing to go in their own personal formation. I’m submitted to the process, because it is far more joyful than painful and I’m so curious about where this is all going.

I think the next five years will be as much outward as the last five were inward. I’m grateful for a lot of space to do my own work, but now I think I’ll find more opportunity to share this gift with others. God will keep doing his thing, challenging my definition of a “normal” life. But every step of the journey will be good because I am certain that I will sense Him right next to me, loving me, carrying me.

Prophets, Presidents, and the Post-Election Reckoning

In November I cast my vote in the Presidential election. My vote was based on a mashup of values and opinions about what is wrong with the world and who was better equipped to address the greatest number of problems while doing the least harm in other areas. But throughout the election season right up to moment I put my finger on the touchscreen to cast my vote, I had nagging thought that bothered me. I wonder what God thinks about all this. I wasn’t asking myself this because nobody had an answer to that question but because everybody seemed to have an answer to that question. On the conservative side, countless high-profile prophets came out of the woodwork to declare the inevitable reelection of Donald Trump. For them, God’s choice was clear and they were willing to stake their reputations on the outcome of this election. It turns out it was a bad gamble.

Over the last month, some of these prophets have dug in or pivoted. Others have apologized. Perhaps the best-known of these prophets was Kris Vallotton of Bethel Church, who publicly apologized on social media saying, “I was completely wrong… there’s no excuse for it. I think it doesn’t make me a false prophet but I think it does create a credibility gap.” Likewise prophetess Kim Mass apologized after prophesying Trump’s reelection in a public letter saying, “When all the prophets began to prophesy a Trump re-election, I allowed their voices to be my confirmation. Not God. That is what I truly and humbly repent for.”

So on January 25, Dr. Randy Clark hosted a public conversation with Vallotton and Maas along with others to discuss not only the failure of so many prophets to accurately predict the election but the future and credibility of all prophetic ministry in the light of such a high-profile failure. I tuned in and found it valuable for many reasons. If you’ve scratched your head with me about the operation of Christian prophesy in this election, I highly recommend you check it out. It is relatively unfiltered and very educational.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhs0Fol-oX8&feature=youtu.be

Here are a couple things I took away from the conversation...

1. Prophetic involvement in a national election is serious business. The influence of these prophets can not be understated. Because I respect some of these people’s ministries, I was admittedly influenced by their prophesies. Other friends were entirely swayed by them. In some ways I think the fevered pitch of manifest destiny this created contributed to the January 6 capital insurrection. So Vallotton is right when he says this creates a credibility gap. This should not be glossed over.

2. Nevertheless, the willingness of Vallotton, Maas, Shawn Bolz and others to publicly apologize is healing to some degree and is a significant step towards repairing the credibility gap.

3. Wrong prophesies don’t equal false prophets. We should judge prophesies. But when we judge prophets on the merits of one prophesy we are in dangerous waters. Not only do we miss the blessings of legitimate prophetic ministries, we risk the judgment of Matthew 5 associated with quick condemnation. I don’t know these people personally, but I follow their ministries closely enough to appreciate their hearts. I may disagree with their politics but I can still learn from them.

4. Prophets are human. Go figure. Many of them are feelers. And often they run in a pack. We should honor prophetic gifts but we should not put prophets on a pedestal of infallibility.

5. Wrong prophesies don’t equal NO prophesy. Paul commands the church not to despise prophesy (1 Thes 5:20). Prophesy is a legitimate gift. Many people steward this well. It is designed to build up the church. Dealing well with false prophesy is part of the job description of the church. We don’t do this by shutting down prophesy altogether. We do this by weighing each word carefully against scripture, circumstance, and corporate discernment (1 Cor 14:29). This is only difficult if nobody in the church has a robust knowledge of scripture, the character of God, and what His voice sounds like. If this is the case, then you have a much bigger problem.

6. Fear is a killer. Kim Maas observed that she found herself feeling a little scared about the trouble she believed our nation would be in if we did NOT reelect Trump. She allowed this fear to inform what she thought God was saying. This helps me understand how so MANY prophets got it wrong. Fear has been the soup d’jour for a long time. We’ve been dogged with countless conspiracy theories and worst-case scenarios designed to make us afraid. If millions of conservatives sincerely believe that Biden = some version of doomsday, then it makes sense that their prophetic barometer would be thrown off by the fear in the air. In my own conversations with the Lord, I found it very difficult to hear from him accurately about this election for this very reason.

 
7. Operate in your own discernment. This is what Maas regretted most in her experience. She let other people confirm what she thought God was going to do instead of God himself. This is the very reason I didn’t base my vote solely on other people’s prophesies. I considered them but then I had my own conversations with God. While God never told me who was going to win, I DID hear him say, “I will never ask you to go against your own conscience.” He assured me he had a plan. He helped me understand His values (which as it turns out are a bit different than mine) but at the end of the day he was gentle and encouraged me to vote my conscience. So I did. I suppose this is a bigger lesson on discernment for all of us. It’s not bad to ask others to help us listen to God. But God’s goal is to have a personal conversational relationship with every one of His kids and not to constantly have to speak to them through others. When we trust-fall into the prophetic words of other human beings, we shouldn’t be surprised when we hit the ground sometimes.

8. It’s okay to swim in your lane. Maas reflected that she had never given a political word like this before. Her calling was to strengthen the gifting of other believers, not to divine elections. This is also the observation my mentor gave me in 2016 when I began dabbling in political commentary on Facebook. On reflection, I might have been spot on in my observations but it didn’t really matter because I was operating outside of my calling. My calling is to promote Jesus and strengthen believers through discipleship and healing. But at some point I was more interested in being right and speaking truth than I was in doing what God told me to do. I had to course correct. I hope many many prophets are doing the same thing right now.

Kudos to Randy Clark, Kim Maas, Kris Vallotton and others for hosting the conversation. As Randy observed, this a critical moment for reflection, even reformation within the prophet movement. All prophets need accountability. They need best practices. They need to work in community while not just relying on the discernment of others. They need to recognize together that Jesus’ Kingdom is not of this world. I am certain that God cares deeply about politics and I do think Christians should participate in government. But we need to guard against the temptation of Christian nationalism and Christian dominionism which make the world the servant of the Church instead of the other way around.