Tag Archives: Contentment

Chapter-a-Day

Fasting and Temptation

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Fasting and Temptation (CaD Matt 4) – Wayfarer

Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
Matthew 4:1 (NIV)

It is the season of Lent, a time when many followers of Jesus around the globe choose to fast in preparation for the annual memorial of Jesus’ death and subsequent celebration of His resurrection. Fasting is an ancient spiritual discipline. It is the conscious choice to deny oneself of physical appetites in order to focus heart and mind on things of the Spirit.

The first time I fasted for Lent was when I was a young teenager. It was sort of a bet with my father. My parents always ragged on me for how much Coke I drank, so I chose to fast from all pop/soda for Lent. My dad chose to fast from television. The thing was, Coke was easily replaced by other sugary drinks or even candy. My dad was a CPA and Lent always happens during tax season. So, I watched him come home and work all evening doing taxes at the dining room table rather than laying on the couch watching television. I’m not sure that either of us understood or embraced the “focus heart and mind on the things of the Spirit” part of the fasting equation.

Along my spiritual journey I have observed that people make one of two errors when it comes to traditions like Lent and fasting. One mistake is to take it too seriously so that over time it becomes an empty and impotent religious ritual. The other mistake is to ignore it completely as if it has no value. In that case, one misses out on the tremendous spiritual lessons and benefits that the traditions hold.

I have tried to strike a balance between these two extremes by approaching each Lenten season open to where I am in my journey and how God’s Spirit is leading me wherever I am on Life’s road. After all, today’s chapter states that it was the Spirit who led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted. I believe that the Spirit’s leading is an ingredient that should not be ignored. Some years I have not fasted at all as I was not led. Other years I have been prompted by God’s Spirit to seriously fast for one reason or another. This is one of those years.

Perhaps because I’ve completed almost four weeks of my Lenten fast, today’s retelling of Jesus being tempted by the Evil One resonated deeply within me on multiple levels.

I have observed over the years that people tend to think of “sin” in terms of gross immorality, obvious deviance from what is socially acceptable, and behavioral over indulgence in sex, drugs, and alcohol. It was the same in Jesus’ day. He got in hot water with the religious establishment when he feasted with “sinners” who were known for their indulgences in such “sinful” things. Jesus made clear that His religious critics were nothing more than hypocrites, for the problem of sin is far more expansive than obvious public immoralities.

At the heart of it, the Evil One’s temptations were from his basic playbook. It has been said that evil cannot “make” it can only “mock.” Evil really isn’t that creative. The Prince of this World tempted Jesus in the same way he tempted Adam and Eve. Basic human appetites.

Lust of the eyes:
Adam and Eve: “It was pleasing to the eye”
Jesus: “All the kingdoms of the world and their splendor can be yours.”
Me: “Oh, I want that!”

Lust of the flesh:
Adam and Eve: “It was good for food”
Jesus: “You’re hungry. Turn these stones to bread.”
Me: “If one serving is good, then two is even better!”

Pride of life:
Adam and Eve: “It was desirable for gaining wisdom”
Jesus: “Prove me wrong. Fall and let the angels catch you.”
Me: “I’m good enough. I will do what I want to do.”

In the quiet this morning, I find myself thinking about the things of heart and Spirit that my Lenten fasting have brought to light for me this year. I am reminded how easily basic and good human appetites can be indulged in unhealthy ways. I find myself realizing that sin is not so much about gross immorality as much as it is about simply not being content. And, I find myself struck at how Jesus’ temptation is connected to Adam and Eve in the Garden, to the Hebrews in their wilderness wanderings, and to my own personal temptations springing from the Evil One’s well-worn playbook.

Fasting in this season is teaching me about surrender, contentment, and helping me understand my own unhealthy coping mechanisms. When Jesus was done with His testing in the wilderness, He launched into His ministry with spiritual vigor. I wonder what God might choose to launch me into at the end of this season. On the other hand, perhaps this season is not about launching anything but my own spiritual health. Fasting is teaching me about surrendering my own desires and expectations. If this season is about nothing more than me relearning some valuable spiritual lessons, then I’ll be as content with that as I am with the simple portion that is all I need.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Chapter-a-Day

Dedication

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Dedication (CaD Lev 27) – Wayfarer

“‘A tithe of everything from the land, whether grain from the soil or fruit from the trees, belongs to the Lord; it is holy to the Lord.’”
Leviticus 27:30 (NIV)

Dedication is one of those words that I know its meaning but when you ask me to simply and clearly define it, it sort of escapes me. So, I looked it up this morning. It’s actually a Swiss army knife of a word. The American Heritage Dictionary actually had eight different definitions. For our purposes today, I’d like to focus on just two of them:

  1. Selfless devotion.
  2. The act of setting apart or consecrating to a divine Being, or to a sacred use, often with religious solemnities; solemn appropriation.

Today’s chapter is the final chapter of God’s instruction manual for the newly appointed Hebrew priests and the Hebrew people back in about 1500 B.C. God finishes the manual with a chapter about dedications and tithes. God has already talked about the offerings, sacrifices, and festivals that He wanted His people to weave into the fabric of their lives. He ends with instructions around acts of dedication that go above and beyond what has already been prescribed.

God tells His people that they have a choice to dedicate servants, houses, and land to God. What’s more, God tells them to consider a tithe (10 percent) of everything they have and everything their land produces belongs to Him. God has already told them that everything that they have been and will be blessed with are God’s divine and generous gift (Lev 26:3-5). In reality, all of creation, including all we are, have, and are blessed to acquire are God’s. God asks His people to gratefully embrace this truth and show it by consciously and willfully setting aside ten percent of everything as a tangible “thank you” back to God.

Why?

As I meditated on this question in the quiet this morning, my mind and heart found themselves wandering back to this pesky human problem of sin that began in the Garden of Eden. God gave everything in the Garden to them for their consumption, save one thing. They were given 99.9% of everything the Garden had to offer, but they couldn’t abide surrendering their appetite and desire to have it all.

I appears to me that God is, in effect, asking His people to turn their hearts back to Him in a way that reverses the Eden Problem. He has generously shown up, miraculously delivered them from slavery, and now promises to abide with them and bless them with life, provision, and land. As with Eden, He’s blessing them with everything. What He asks is that they recognize this and reserve just ten percent to offer back as an on-going “Thank you” card.

First, this requires a spirit of “selfless devotion.” It’s so easy to think that my paycheck is mine. It’s my job. It was my hard work that earned it. It’s my money. But, wait a second…

Who blessed me to be born in the wealthiest and most materially blessed nation in the history of the entire world?

Who blessed me to live in a place with a great educational system that taught me everything I know?

Who saw to it I was born into a family who provided for me, cared for me, and taught me everything I needed to succeed in life?

How blessed have I been to enjoy almost sixty-years of health, opportunity, and affluence?

Did I do one thing to make any of these things happen? Did I do anything to deserve the amazing lot in life that I’ve been afforded?

No.

And that’s the point that God is asking me to tangibly and metaphorically remember every day, every month, and every year of my life. Take ten percent and “set it apart” in a willful act that says:

“Everything I have is from you anyway, God. I wouldn’t have any of it if it wasn’t for you. And, it’s all yours anyway. Someday, any day now really, I’m going to die and my body will return to dust and ashes just like you said. Not a single thing I think I own or consider to be mine is going to mean anything at that point. Adam and Eve weren’t content with 99.9% of the Garden. They had to have that last one-tenth of a percent. I don’t want to live like that. I don’t want to be like that. Here’s ten percent, God. I dedicate it to you. I gratefully give it back to you.”

In the quiet this morning I am reminded of the ten lepers whom Jesus healed. One came back to say, “Thank you.” One of ten was grateful. Ten percent made a willful choice to turn around, trek back to Jesus, and offer his thanks. Jesus response?

“Where are the other nine?”

Wendy and I are consciously willful about being generous with the money and things with which we’ve been blessed. We talk about it. We practice it. We weave it into the fabric of our everyday lives. I don’t want to be like Adam and Eve, discontent with God’s gracious and generous blessing and deluded into thinking that anything (let alone everything) I think I own is really mine. I want to be a ten-percent person like the leper who came back to say “thanks.”

The further I get in my spiritual journey, the more I come to understand that the extent of my generosity is a leading indicator of the depth of both my spiritual understanding of the economics of God’s Kingdom, and my gratitude for God’s insane generosity towards me.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!

Chapter-a-Day

Best of ’24: #5 A Confession

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For two weeks, while Wendy and I are away enjoying some warm weather, I’ll be counting down the top ten chapter-a-day posts of 2024 (based on total views and plays). It’ s always interesting which posts resonated with readers and listeners. The chapter for tomorrow’s post will be listed at the bottom.

A Confession (CaD Rom 9) – Wayfarer

Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
Romans 9:18 (NIV)

A decade or so ago, I found myself in the check-out line in a department store feeling this quiet, internal, seething anger. The source of this anger? Chip and Joanna Gaines. They were everywhere. Wendy and every one of her friends were talking about them. People I know were making pilgrimages to Waco, Texas. Their “collections” were suddenly in every store. There in the checkout line, Joanna was staring at me from the covert of Cosmopolitan. So, what do we do when we get angry these days? We vent on social media!

“I love Chip and Joanna,” I tweeted, “but I’m tired of seeing their faces a million times a day!”

The next day my tweet received a reply from Chip Gaines, himself.

“I know,” he tweeted back, “I told Joanna the other day that even I’m tired of us!”

It wasn’t long after this that I noticed myself feeling that same quiet, internal, seething anger. This time it was an online author and “influencer” who was trending and I started hearing this person’s name come up in conversation all the time. I remember Wendy and her friends talking in our kitchen one day and everyone was talking about what this influencer recently said about this or that topic. I was suddenly filled with anger. I wanted to throw up. I had to leave the room my insides were seething so intensely.

The problem was, I knew that these angry reactions inside of me weren’t healthy. Anger like this always points to something deeper in the Spirit that is askew. I began to dig into what it was that was going on inside of my heart. The answer ended up being simple once I realized it. Suddenly, it dawned on me that I’ve had this anger, these feelings of irritation and animosity, toward certain individuals my entire life. And they were almost all individuals I didn’t know at all!

Here I was a 50-year-old man who had been a disciple of Jesus for almost 40 years and it had taken me that long to realize that I have a problem with envy. The commonality between all of the individuals who produced this latent animosity within me is that they were people who suddenly became famous and everyone was talking about them and being influenced by them. Why them? Why not me? I feel shame in confessing it because it feels so petty. It’s true, however. I have to own it. Over the past several years I’ve had to consciously deal with this very real sin to which I had been blind my entire life.

As I have processed and worked on my envy, I have run headlong into what, in human terms, is an uncomfortable reality: God’s sovereignty.

Jesus told a parable about the owner of a vineyard. Throughout the day the owner finds workers, negotiates a price for their labor for the day, and sends them to work in his vineyard. At the end of the day, the workers who worked all day find out that they’re getting paid the same as the guy who was hired for the final two hours of the day. They are pissed. The owner of the vineyard responds,

‘Friend, I haven’t been unfair. We agreed on the wage of a dollar, didn’t we? So take it and go. I decided to give to the one who came last the same as you. Can’t I do what I want with my own money? Are you going to get stingy because I am generous?’
Matthew 20:13-15 (MSG)

In today’s chapter, Paul addresses the truth of God’s sovereignty. God blessed Jacob, but not his older twin brother Esau. The prodigal wastes all of his father’s money on partying and prostitutes and is given a homecoming party, while the older brother goes seemingly uncelebrated for his faithfulness and obedience. God, in His sovereign purposes, raises one person to prominence while another works in obscurity.

On one hand, I can dismiss these human inequities as simply “life isn’t fair” (and it’s not), but Paul is adding to this another layer of truth that Jesus was addressing in His parable. God is sovereign, and His knowledge and purposes are infinite, while mine are finite. This is where a disciple of Jesus finds the requirement of faith and surrender.

If God is good, and I believe He is. If God has a good purpose for me and my life, and I believe He does. Then I can rest in living the life God has generously and sovereignly purposed for me, this life I am now living, and this path I am now walking. I can also surrender any desire that my path should be like the one anyone else is walking.

In the quiet this morning, I’m thinking about our kitchen. On the counter, right next to the stove, Wendy has placed the Magnolia Cook Book in such a way that Joanna Gaines stares at me every day in my own house. It’s good. It no longer triggers me. It’s a daily reminder for me to pray for Chip and Joanna and all that God is doing in and through their lives. God has been generous to them, and they have a tremendous amount of positive impact in our world. I’m also quite certain that they face struggles and stresses because of that generosity which I wouldn’t want in a million years. In dealing with my envy problem, I’ve embraced that sometimes God’s generosity is in saving us from the things our heart’s desire, but which would lead to tragedies we could never foresee.

Tomorrow’s Chapter: Acts 19

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!

Chapter-a-Day

“Luxury Beliefs”

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“Luxury Beliefs” (CaD Ezk 28) – Wayfarer

By your great skill in trading
    you have increased your wealth,
and because of your wealth
    your heart has grown proud.
Ezekiel 28:5 (NIV)

Spiritual maturity is pronounced in pain, it is arrested in affluence.

Over the past year, Wendy and I have been reading what has been an emerging theme in the news outlets we read. The theme is Luxury Beliefs and it came from the observations of a writer named Rob Henderson. We often think of the luxury wealth and affluence affords simply in terms of the tangible goods that come with luxury. Henderson argues that in the 21st century there has been a shift. The wealthy and affluent see their beliefs as much a status symbol as their luxury handbag, timepiece, car, or yacht. His essay is worth a read.

Of course, the idea of wealth affecting matters of belief was a theme of Jesus. He said that it was easier for a camel to be thread through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

Today’s chapter contains two more prophetic messages against the ancient King of Tyre. As discussed in the previous two chapter-a-day posts, Tyre was a tremendously wealthy port city, and Zeke points out in both of the messages that the King of Tyre’s wealth and affluence has affected his beliefs. It has given him as sense of hubris and pride. In his Luxury Beliefs he considers himself a god. He is wiser and more understanding than all the poor, ignorant minions under his authority. God’s message to the wealthy ruler is that what he doesn’t see is that his “wisdom” and Luxury Beliefs have been corrupted by his affluence and pride.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself in a familiar and uncomfortable place. In relative terms I am wealthy. I am affluent. I live in the richest and most affluent of nations. One of the things I’ve observed on this earthly journey is that I will always be able to point to people I know and people I know of who have tremendously more wealth than me. The insidious effect of this is that I can always consider myself humbly poor compared to the guy I ran into at the restaurant last night who lives in the biggest mansion in town. And that is just one of his many residences.

The problem, of course, is that I’m looking in the wrong direction. Jesus taught me this. He teaches all His disciples this. We’re always looking up the cultural and economic ladder at those more rich, powerful, wealthy, famous, and affluent than we are. We are obsessed as a culture with fame and fortune. But our ways are not God’s ways.

Jesus told me to turn around and look down the economic ladder. Look at the little old widow who put her last two pennies in the collection plate. Look at the lame beggar. Look at the leper who everyone shames and avoids. When I look down the economic ladder, I begin to realize just how rich I really am. I realize that I can afford to be far more generous than I have been. It begins to sow in my soul seeds of contentment rather than envy, gratitude rather than greed. As those seeds take root, they change my perspective, my thoughts, my actions, and my beliefs. Then, I might just be making some progress toward spiritual maturity.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

The Whole Crowd

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The Whole Crowd (CaD Ezk 7) – Wayfarer

“‘They have blown the trumpet,
    they have made all things ready,
but no one will go into battle,
    for my wrath is on the whole crowd.”
Ezekiel 7:14 (NIV)

It was about 25 years ago that I first heard of the “2G” principle of investing. I was speaking with one of the executives of a client of ours. This individual was not only in a high-paying position but also came from a very wealthy family and had an apocalyptic view of where current events were taking us. It was around the time of Y2K when many believed that all of the world’s computers would stop working when the date changed from 1999 to 2000. There was a lot of fear being stirred up, and my client told me they had switched their investing to the “2G” principle: Gold and Guns. Gold because when you don’t have an electronic record of the money in your accounts, then the only tangible currency is precious metals. Guns because when society breaks down like Lord of the Flies those with guns will be more likely able to protect themselves and their loved ones and survive.

Over the years, I’ve known others who have adopted the 2G investment strategy. As a natural pessimist, I certainly get the logic and the appeal of preparing for a doomsday scenario. If I had a lot of money to invest I might be more tempted to join them, but I don’t so I’m hoping that doomsday’s imminent threat will fizzle out like Y2K.

For the people of Ezekiel’s day, the prophecies of imminent doom were more tangible. The region was at a crossroads, smack dab in the middle of multiple empires, both established and emerging. The Assyrians and already decimated the area and the Babylonians were currently holding sway. Ezekiel was preaching to his people living in exile, so they’d already experienced their own version of doomsday. Ezekiel’s messages proclaimed that there was more, and worse, to come for his people.

Throughout history, those who are rich have a greater chance of riding out doomsday scenarios like war and famine. The 2G investment principle is predicated on it. What’s fascinating about God’s message through Ezekiel in today’s chapter is both his audience and his message. When the Babylonians took Zeke and others into exile, they took the best and the brightest, the rich and the powerful. It was a shrewd strategy. King Nebuchadnezzar knew that rebellion in vassal states required intelligence, power, and money. By bringing the educated, powerful, and wealthy back to Babylon, he reduced the chance that those left in Jerusalem would rebel while giving him and his people access to some of the greatest minds among his enemies from which he and his people would benefit.

One of the overarching themes in Zeke’s message was that God’s judgment was going to fall on “the whole crowd.” Rich and poor, educated and uneducated, white collar and blue collar, urbanites and farmers, there wasn’t a demographic who was going to escape the doomsday that was coming. For the 2G-type investors of their day, Ezekiel writes:

“‘They will throw their silver into the streets,
    and their gold will be treated as a thing unclean.
Their silver and gold
    will not be able to deliver them
    in the day of the Lord’s wrath.
It will not satisfy their hunger
    or fill their stomachs,
    for it has caused them to stumble into sin.”

In a few minutes, I will sit down with Wendy to have our coffee and peruse the headlines over breakfast. There’s a lot of talk about World War III and various doomsday scenarios. Both sides of the political aisle like to whip up a frenzy of fear about doomsday scenarios should their opponents win in November. It’s the same every four years.

As I meditate on these things this morning, I am also mindful of the reality that history is marked by dark periods. We are certainly not immune from bad things happening and having to live through periods of intense difficulty. As a disciple of Jesus, however, I find that His teaching was consistently about faith, contentment, and trust. He repeatedly tells me not to worry, not to be anxious, and not to be afraid. The doomsday that Ezekiel proclaimed happened just as predicted. Jerusalem was besieged and people starved before the entire city was destroyed and burned along with Solomon’s temple. But I also know the end of the story. God’s promises to the exiles were also fulfilled. They returned to Jerusalem and rebuilt the temple.

In the same way, I know the end of the Great Story. After a period of intense doom, there is a new beginning of Light, and Love, and Life. The further I get in my spiritual journey, the more I’ve come to realize that being a disciple of Jesus is about letting go of my fear, anxiety, and worry about the former while embracing my whole-hearted faith in the latter.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

A Confession

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A Confession (CaD Rom 9) – Wayfarer

Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
Romans 9:18 (NIV)

A decade or so ago, I found myself in the check-out line in a department store feeling this quiet, internal, seething anger. The source of this anger? Chip and Joanna Gaines. They were everywhere. Wendy and every one of her friends were talking about them. People I know were making pilgrimages to Waco, Texas. Their “collections” were suddenly in every store. There in the checkout line, Joanna was staring at me from the covert of Cosmopolitan. So, what do we do when we get angry these days? We vent on social media!

“I love Chip and Joanna,” I tweeted, “but I’m tired of seeing their faces a million times a day!”

The next day my tweet received a reply from Chip Gaines, himself.

“I know,” he tweeted back, “I told Joanna the other day that even I’m tired of us!”

It wasn’t long after this that I noticed myself feeling that same quiet, internal, seething anger. This time it was an online author and “influencer” who was trending and I started hearing this person’s name come up in conversation all the time. I remember Wendy and her friends talking in our kitchen one day and everyone was talking about what this influencer recently said about this or that topic. I was suddenly filled with anger. I wanted to throw up. I had to leave the room my insides were seething so intensely.

The problem was, I knew that these angry reactions inside of me weren’t healthy. Anger like this always points to something deeper in the Spirit that is askew. I began to dig into what it was that was going on inside of my heart. The answer ended up being simple once I realized it. Suddenly, it dawned on me that I’ve had this anger, these feelings of irritation and animosity, toward certain individuals my entire life. And they were almost all individuals I didn’t know at all!

Here I was a 50-year-old man who had been a disciple of Jesus for almost 40 years and it had taken me that long to realize that I have a problem with envy. The commonality between all of the individuals who produced this latent animosity within me is that they were people who suddenly became famous and everyone was talking about them and being influenced by them. Why them? Why not me? I feel shame in confessing it because it feels so petty. It’s true, however. I have to own it. Over the past several years I’ve had to consciously deal with this very real sin to which I had been blind my entire life.

As I have processed and worked on my envy, I have run headlong into what, in human terms, is an uncomfortable reality: God’s sovereignty.

Jesus told a parable about the owner of a vineyard. Throughout the day the owner finds workers, negotiates a price for their labor for the day, and sends them to work in his vineyard. At the end of the day, the workers who worked all day find out that they’re getting paid the same as the guy who was hired for the final two hours of the day. They are pissed. The owner of the vineyard responds,

‘Friend, I haven’t been unfair. We agreed on the wage of a dollar, didn’t we? So take it and go. I decided to give to the one who came last the same as you. Can’t I do what I want with my own money? Are you going to get stingy because I am generous?’
Matthew 20:13-15 (MSG)

In today’s chapter, Paul addresses the truth of God’s sovereignty. God blessed Jacob, but not his older twin brother Esau. The prodigal wastes all of his father’s money on partying and prostitutes and is given a homecoming party, while the older brother goes seemingly uncelebrated for his faithfulness and obedience. God, in His sovereign purposes, raises one person to prominence while another works in obscurity.

On one hand, I can dismiss these human inequities as simply “life isn’t fair” (and it’s not), but Paul is adding to this another layer of truth that Jesus was addressing in His parable. God is sovereign, and His knowledge and purposes are infinite, while mine are finite. This is where a disciple of Jesus finds the requirement of faith and surrender.

If God is good, and I believe He is. If God has a good purpose for me and my life, and I believe He does. Then I can rest in living the life God has generously and sovereignly purposed for me, this life I am now living, and this path I am now walking. I can also surrender any desire that my path should be like the one anyone else is walking.

In the quiet this morning, I’m thinking about our kitchen. On the counter, right next to the stove, Wendy has placed the Magnolia Cook Book in such a way that Joanna Gaines stares at me every day in my own house. It’s good. It no longer triggers me. It’s a daily reminder for me to pray for Chip and Joanna and all that God is doing in and through their lives. God has been generous to them, and they have a tremendous amount of positive impact in our world. I’m also quite certain that they face struggles and stresses because of that generosity which I wouldn’t want in a million years. In dealing with my envy problem, I’ve embraced that sometimes God’s generosity is in saving us from the things our heart’s desire, but which would lead to tragedies we could never foresee.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Coffee and Contentment

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Coffee and Contentment (CaD Php 4) – Wayfarer

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength.
Philippians 4:12-13 (NIV)

Wendy and I have acquired a plethora of coffee mugs along life’s road. There are at least large drawers full of them, plus a cupboard with more. That’s just the kitchen. There are more downstairs in the pub and of course there’s a bunch at the lake. We have mugs from different plays we were in. There’s a mug from the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and the Pella Opera House. We have one coffee mug emblazoned with quotes of love from Shakespeare and another one with Shakespearean insults. I have diner mugs with various iterations of our company’s logo across the years. There’s a mug from a coffee shop in Kauai and others from various places we’ve visited. Far-side mugs, hobbit mugs, and flower mugs. Small mugs, medium mugs, and huge mugs. I believe Wendy and I could have the army of Guatemala over for coffee and still not be in want for mugs.

Come to think of it, I can’t think of one mug in our warehouse of coffee mugs that has a Bible verse on it. It’s possible that there’s one buried in there somewhere, but if there is I can’t picture it.

I’ve always had a bit of a love-hate relationship with popular Christian culture. All through my high school and college years I worked for a chain of stores that sold pretty much anything on which you could print a bible verse. There were frisbees that “rose on the wings of eagles” and flashlights with which to be “the light of the world.” There were pewter bread trays branded for “the bread of life” and water bottles for your personal “spring of living water.” Of course, there were coffee mugs to help believers praise God “from the rising of the sun.”

Hawking the Christian tchotchkes helped put me through college, and for that I’m grateful. Even then, however, there was a catch in my spirit with Jesus junk. Part of my personal hesitation has to do with the fact that Jesus Himself said He wanted His disciples’ love, kindness, and servant-hearted acts to mark them as His followers. Walking around in my “saved by grace” t-shirt feels a bit like a shortcut that cheapens the whole thing.

The other thing that bothers me is the fact that reducing the Message to a pithy painted trinket sometimes profanes it. I’m sure theres a power band or set of dumbbells you can buy that comes with “I can do all this through him who gives me strength” printed on them to inspire your holy workout.

When Paul wrote “I can do all things through him who gives me strength” he wasn’t talking about lifting heavy weights, running a marathon, or even doing spectacular miracles like raising the dead. He was specifically talking about being content whether he was living in wealth or poverty, whether he was healthy or sick, whether he had full pantry or didn’t know where his next meal was coming from. I know, contentment isn’t as inspiring as moving mountains, but to my mind it might be more difficult. After all, we live in a world that is fueled by discontent. What Paul was really getting at by saying “I can do all this through him” was about walking away from the end-cap full of exercise gloves with Philippians 4:13 stitched on them. I don’t need them. I can be content with plain black ones I have at home.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself contemplating contentment. I’m still shocked by the fact that I never hear it discussed in a serious way. I wonder if discontent and the desire for more is so embedded in our cultural DNA that we can’t even fathom the contentment that Jesus expected of His disciples when He sent them out in pairs to neighboring towns and told them to take nothing but the cloak on their backs. Somehow, I think that I need a lot more contentment and a lot less of everything else. It’s at least worth some serious conversation over a cup of coffee.

Feel free to stop by. I’ve got a coffee mug just waiting for you.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

“What’s it to You?”

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"What's it to You?" (CaD John 21) – Wayfarer

When Peter saw [John], he asked [Jesus], “Lord, what about him?”
John 21:21 (NIV)

I grew up fishing with my dad, though I never acquired his love for it. I am too impatient, and was especially so when I was a kid. As a young man, both my body and imagination were too active to sit in a boat for hours waiting for fish to bite. Nevertheless, I do have great memories of doing so.

There is one day in particular that stands out. I was around eleven and Dad and I were fishing on the Canadian side of the boundary waters. We fished a couple of coves on an island we’d never fished before. Oh man, the fish were definitely biting that day. It was unlike anything I’d experienced fishing. It felt like every cast of my Johnson’s Sprite pulled in a fish. In a couple of hours we had our limit, including two or three of the largest fish we’d ever landed. And, we’d thrown a lot of them back. I’ll never forget that day.

I think of that day whenever I read about one of the miraculous catches Jesus facilitated, as in the one in today’s chapter. Jesus told the disciples to go to Galilee and wait for Him there. So they did. And, they waited, and waited, and waited, until Peter couldn’t handle waiting and decided to go fishing. All night they fished, and didn’t catch so much as a minnow. Then the dude on the shore frying up some breakfast yells out to try the right side of the boat. “Voilà!” Suddenly there’s 153 lunkers in the net and the net is too heavy to pull into the boat! I remember that shot of adrenaline and the rush of dopamine flooding through my brain that day dad and I had our big catch.

The boys know in the moment that it’s Jesus on shore cooking breakfast. Peter abandons the boys with the net, dives in, and swims to shore (Did he, perhaps, think for a faction of a second of trying to walk to Jesus on the water?).

John chooses to end his biography with one of the most interesting conversations recorded in the Great Story. Jesus asks Peter to go for a walk, and John follows. Three times Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?” and three times he commissions Peter to “Feed my sheep.” Peter probably didn’t even understand what Jesus was doing in that moment.

Three affirmations cover the three denials Peter uttered the night of Jesus’ arrest. “Leave your shame behind, Rocky. The Good Shepherd is heading home. You’re the shepherd in charge now.” Jesus then tells Peter to plan on a rough end to his earthly journey. He will be forcefully taken where he doesn’t want to go. He will be stretched out. As the appointed shepherd, they will crucify him, too.

Then Peter does something so human. He looks over at John and asks Jesus, “What about him?”

Along my life journey, I’ve observed that we humans have a thing with equity and fairness. I love the idyllic fantasies of everything working out the same for everyone. I so easily fall down the rabbit-hole of envy and jealousy cleverly disguised as political and social righteousness. I so easily grieve when looking over at the grass that appears so much greener on another person’s lot in life.

As a follower of Jesus, I’ve had to submit to the reality that my notions of equity and fairness are not part of the Kingdom economy. That’s why Jesus responds to Peter, “What’s it to you if I have different plans for John? We’re not talking about him, we’re talking about you, Peter. You each have a part to play in this Great Story but the roles are different, your lives and experiences will be different, and your deaths will be different. Peter, you’ll die about thirty years before him. The Romans are going to crucify you. John will live to old age, be exiled to an island, and pen the visions given to him of the final chapters of the Great Story. What’s it to you?”

One of the most important lessons I’ve learned as a follower of Jesus is that my focus is to be on God’s Kingdom, even on this earthly journey. Not checking-out and biding my time, but rather bringing a Kingdom perspective and mission to all that I am, think, say, and do. Jesus said to “set my heart on things above,” which means my earthly perspective has to change.

Like Peter, I have a journey to walk and a mission to accomplish, but I’ve had to let go of the notion that everyone’s journey looks like mine, or that my mission is going to look exactly like someone else’s. My father was beautifully and wonderfully made to be a gifted accountant, artisan, and patient fisherman. I’m not anything like that, so what’s it to me if dad’s journey looks different than mine, or mine looks different than his?

The good news, Jesus promised, is an equitable eternal homecoming where there is no more sorrow, or pain, or envy, or jealousy. Until then, like Peter, I’m called to contentedly walk my own journey and allow others to walk theirs, even if it appears to me that their journey is better, or easier, or more fun, or [place your favorite envy descriptor here]. I have come to believe that when I look back from eternity, I will see how wrong our human perceptions were with regard to what a “good” life looked like on this world, and also believe my eyes will be opened see all the “good” I experienced but never really saw or appreciated.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

My Core Weakness

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My Core Weakness (CaD Jer 45) – Wayfarer

“Should you then seek great things for yourself? Do not seek them. For I will bring disaster on all people, declares the Lord, but wherever you go I will let you escape with your life.’”
Jeremiah 45:5 (NIV)

One of the things I’ve experienced as an Enneagram coach is that it’s is common for people, upon reviewing their Enneagram Type, to say, “I don’t want that to be my Type!” In fact, there have been people I’ve encountered who insisted on mistyping themselves, whether consciously or unconsciously, because they were uncomfortable with embracing their true selves. This is, I have discovered, sometimes part of the self-discovery journey for people.

Every Enneagram Type has its core fear, core weakness, core desire, and core longing. These may manifest themselves differently in different individuals. As an Enneagram Four, my core desire is to be “special and unique” while my core weakness is the sin of envy. It’s easy for me to feel that others have something special or unique that I lack. Without realizing it, I sometimes feel an intense antagonism toward people I don’t even know that’s rooted in my envy. It’s taken a long time for me to recognize that in myself and address it.

Coming in at only five verses, Jeremiah 45 is one of the shorter chapters in the Great Story, though there are a handful that are even shorter. When the messages of Jeremiah were compiled into what we now know as the book of Jeremiah they were compiled thematically. The final chapters of the book are a kind of appendix. Today’s chapter is a fascinating, personal message that God gave Jeremiah for his friend and faithful scribe Baruch.

I saw shades of myself as I read Baruch’s lament in the quiet this morning. Baruch’s brother occupied an important position in the administration of King Zedekiah. Baruch was Jeremiah’s scribe, writing down the prophets dictated messages and then rewriting them all over again when the king burned the original copies in his anger. Let’s face it, the doom-and-gloom of Jeremiah’s prophetic works are bit repetitive and depressing. Add to that the fact that all of the anger, hatred, and animosity of Jeremiah trickled down to Baruch. When Jeremiah was banned from speaking in public, it was Baruch who got the job of proclaiming the words no one wanted to hear. Baruch sometimes got blamed when an accuser was afraid to confront the prophet himself.

“Why am I stuck doing this my whole life?” I can hear Baruch muttering to himself. “Why didn’t I get a cushy, high-profile job in the King’s administration like my brother?”

Jeremiah hears the muttering of his friend and scribe. God tells Jerry to tell Barry: “Don’t seek great things for yourself. Believe me, your brother’s story is not going to end well, but I will protect you and your life as the scribe of my anointed prophet.”

We don’t know what happened to Baruch’s brother Seraiah, though it was likely either captivity or death. Baruch, on the other hand, was still alive with Jeremiah in Egypt after the fall of Jerusalem.

In the quiet this morning, I confess that it’s always been easy for me to feel a certain level of discontent with my life. I was called specifically to do what I’m doing, and I trust that with all my being. Nevertheless, whenever I go through a tough stretch of the journey, my core desires and core weakness make it hard for me to stay in my lane without some dramatic and pessimistic brooding, and Wendy can tell you that I excel in this.

But that’s where God’s words to Baruch really resonate with me in all my “Fourness.” I can focus on obediently and faithfully fulfilling that to which I’ve been called, or I can waste a lot of time pining away in envy for what others have been called to do. The reality is that I have been and continue to be extremely blessed, and when I focus on that blessing, and the Source of that blessing, then I find contentment is soon to follow.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

When to Say “Enough”

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When to Say "Enough" (CaD Jer 5) – Wayfarer

They are well-fed, lusty stallions,
    each neighing for another man’s wife.
Jeremiah 5:8 (NIV)

Wendy and I have been listening to a really great podcast of late that explores the Bible from the perspective of the original Hebrew language. I know it doesn’t sound like everyone’s cup of tea, but it is actually very fascinating.

There was something that was mentioned in the very first episode of that podcast that has stuck with me ever since I heard it. After creating the universe in six days, God rests on the seventh. The commentator pointed out that God rested, not because He was tired, but because “God knows when to say ‘enough.'”

The point is that the problems of humanity, beginning with Adam and Eve’s original bite of the forbidden fruit, are really about appetite control. We don’t know when to say “enough.”

I have a natural appetite for food for survival, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” it turns into gluttony.

I have a natural appetite for sex for procreation and intimacy, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” it turns into destructive lust.

I have a natural appetite for the things I need to survive, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” it turns into greed.

I have a natural appetite for justice, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” it turns into wrath.

I have an appetite for rest, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” it turns into sloth.

I was designed to live in harmony and community with others, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” I become envious of them, their possessions, and/or their lives.

I am made in the image of God and designed to live in communion with God, but when I don’t know when to say “enough” my pride leads to me wanting to be my own god.

In today’s chapter, Jeremiah describes his idolatrous people as “lusty stallions” (btw: Am I the only one who immediately thought of Bill and Ted?) in reference to the overtly sexual nature and practices of many of the pagan gods his people didn’t want to give up. The metaphor points to humans being driven by their appetites like an animal in heat, instead of controlling them. Instead of being able to say “enough.”

In the quiet this morning, I was reminded of the “fruits of the Spirit” – the qualities that are supposed to be increasingly evident in my life as I follow the path of Jesus. The list of character qualities begins with the preeminent love and it’s anchored with the quality of self-control. In other words, as I grow in my relationship with Jesus (the Alpha through whom everything was created), I should increasingly exhibit the very quality He expressed from the beginning of creation on the seventh day: knowing when to say “enough.”

And with that thought, I believe I’ve written enough this morning.

Have a great day, my friend.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.