Live with God

Several years ago, I had the misfortune to have my house hit by a tornado. The good news is that my family was not harmed, the house had a good bit of damage, but it was nothing that could not be repaired.

The day of the tornado was a rainy stormy day. I remember one of my neighbor’s dogs getting out of their fence and coming to my house to eat the screen off my front window.

The sky had an eerie green tint to it. I recall there were several severe thunderstorm warnings issued, as well as tornado watches. Hail fell several times throughout the day. And one other thing I remember, and you will understand why, is that I had left my clean and folded laundry out in our room, instead of putting it away.

At about 10:30 that night, despite tornado watches in our county, Laurie and I went to bed. I recall thinking, what are the chances something will hit us, Gwinnett (our county) is a BIG county.

At about 11:45 PM, I awoke to flashing lights. My first thought was that this was the most spectacular lightning that I have ever witnessed. Then, a little voice in the back of my head said, “this is not lightning, this is transformers blowing up.” About that same time, I heard it. The most common description of hearing a tornado is it sounds like a freight train; my recollection is that it is more like those dryers at the end of a car wash. In any case, it was time to leave and get down to the basement!

My pregnant wife was getting our 18-month-old son Bennett, while I was in charge of getting my visiting Mom down to the basement. In the rush to get the humans, we failed to get Thelma the dog. About halfway down the stairs in the basement, Laurie shouted to me to get Thelma. I turned back, forced the basement door opened and yelled for her. A surreal scene of rain blowing through the house was quickly enhanced with Thelma sliding around the corner with a very determined and scared look on her face. We all made it to the basement, as the tornado hit us directly.

The aftermath was one of shock and dismay. We lost most of our wooded back yard. Garage doors were gnarled and tangled messes. Windows were completely blown off the very tracks. The house had leaves, mud and water throughout. In looking at the back yard devastation, I saw a pair of my underwear. Odd. A little further, there was a shirt. Before long I was picking up all my laundry from mine and my neighbors back yard, the same laundry that just the night before I had procrastinated and did not put away.

So, what is the purpose of this story?

In our spiritual life, I wonder how many times we are given warning signs and ignore them?

…a rainy stormy day

…the sky had an eerie green tint to it

…there were several severe thunderstorm warnings issued, as well as tornado watches. …Hail fell several times throughout the day.

I had all the warning signs that something was going to happen, but I ignored them. In our spiritual life, the signs may not be as clear cut, but we need to get better at seeing them and not ignoring them. Unrest, lack of peace, an overall uneasy feeling, these can be signs. Notice them, listen and pray.

Luckily for me, a small voice in the back of my head told me a tornado was upon us. I listened and acted.

How good are we at listening to that voice from the Holy Spirit?

Don’t go to that website.

Respond as a loving husband.

Reach out to that person in need

Be patient

Don’t…. ______ (fill in the blank with whatever you shouldn’t do).

When the Holy Spirit is present in our lives, we hear the voice….it is up to us how we choose to respond to Him. When we choose differently than what we heard, we have guilt. Sometimes as Christians, we like to say I am struggling with whatever, but what we really me is that I am struggling with the fact that I feel guilty about not listening to what I know is right. Listen and obey.

I don’t want to be in a situation like my dog Thelma. She barely made it to the safe place; she almost missed out on the protection of the basement. Maybe just like I called Thelma, God is calling you. How are you going to respond? Thelma knew what she needed to do. She had a very determined look and ran until she accomplished the goal. Are we prepared to run To God and accomplish His goal?

Finally, while ultimately the family was safe, because of procrastination, I had to go through the humbling experience of searching for my underwear and other garments in my neighbor’s backyard. Is there something that you are putting off? Are you prepared to be humbled if you keep putting it off? Even so, the good news is that even if we are humbled, God can and will use that experience when we allow Him.

Heavenly Father, please let me be aware of the warning signs that you provide me. Let me hear the voice of the Holy Spirit and answer your calling. If I should fall short and be humbled, let me fall on the Grace you have provided through your son Jesus Christ.

I am a compulsive rambler, not speaking (well maybe that too) but driving, walking, moving.  I love to tool around with no particular place to go.

Side roads are big adventures for me, my curiosity gets the best of me and I wonder what new things to see can be realized by just deviating from the path.

I have found cool restaurants, seen great scenery, stumbled upon some unique stores and spent a lot of great time with friends because of taking the side road.

The other side is that I have hit dead ends, been in scary places, and even once found a road that ended straight into a river.

Each time I had to backtrack out of these situations to get back to the main road, a place I knew.

Each time I felt like I had wasted time and energy only to have to go back to the place I started.

Life is full of side roads; we will take some good ones and some bad ones.

We will find some really cool things, and we will at times hit dead ends and scary stuff.

One solution is to decide to never take the side roads….but that doesn’t seem much like a solution at all.

It seems boring, rote, and unspectacular and I don’t think God wants our lives to be boring, rote, and unspectacular.

I think he wants us to take Him with us on the adventuresome side roads of life.

He wants us to explore and find His will in our lives. I don’t think that comes by waiting, I think it comes by doing.

We will surely be enriched by the good stuff, but when we keep God with us, the cool thing is that we are enriched by the bad stuff as well.

I have a friend that laughs at me for all the mental games I have to play on myself to do things that I need to do, but maybe don’t want to do.

Running is a big one for me.

I actually love running, but there are times that I just do not want to be out there, so I have to trick myself into doing it.

Today was one of those days.

I was tired, work was busy, and it was windy and rainy.

It was very easy to justify why I shouldn’t or couldn’t go, but I made myself.

But here is the thing, even once I start, I struggle.

The rationalizing begins and my run can be cut short if I listen to it.

I had limited time today, which is always good for the evil lazy me to use against the healthy me…. but I know the evil guy’s tricks, so I had a plan for today. I decided I would run hard for 16 mins, getting as far away from my car as possible, that way I would have no option to cut the run short, I had no option but to cover the distance back to the car as well.

I really only had 32 minutes to run, so I knew that I couldn’t even slow down on the second half and ideally, I would try and speed up.

It worked; I covered the distance in less than 32 mins.

So, I know that I am a mental case that I must trick myself to do the thing that I want to do.

Strange.

It got me thinking.

In our pursuit of Christ, do we go all in and commit ourselves to going the distance, or do we sometime take the easy way out and not risk too much.

We stay close to our comfort zone, so we can get back to it without problem.

We dip our feet in the water and expect to be cleansed head to toe.

God is great, and that never changes, but our ability to experience His greatness is directly proportional to how willing we are to commit to Him.

It’s not easy, and there is always the evil side that will want to tell us not to commit.

We may have to trick ourselves at times, by doing something bold and audacious that commits us to see it through.

I don’t know what that is for you, for me it was going to Nicaragua on my first mission trip and going to Walk to Emmaus in the same year.

Because of those two actions, that got me going, I knew I was committed to seeing it through and building my relationship with God.

Don’t get me wrong, I still struggle, I hem and haw and I want the comfort zone, but I know that I am on a journey that is not finished, so I have to keep moving forward.

Philippians 3 12-14

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.  Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus

I have a friend that laughs at me for all the mental games I have to play on myself to do things that I need to do, but maybe don’t want to do.

Running is a big one for me.

I actually love running, but there are times that I just do not want to be out there, so I have to trick myself into doing it.

Today was one of those days.

I was tired, work was busy, and it was windy and rainy.

It was very easy to justify why I shouldn’t or couldn’t go, but I made myself.

But here is the thing, even once I start, I struggle.

The rationalizing begins and my run can be cut short if I listen to it.

I had limited time today, which is always good for the evil lazy me to use against the healthy me…. but I know the evil guy’s tricks, so I had a plan for today. I decided I would run hard for 16 mins, getting as far away from my car as possible, that way I would have no option to cut the run short, I had no option but to cover the distance back to the car as well.

I really only had 32 minutes to run, so I knew that I couldn’t even slow down on the second half and ideally, I would try and speed up.

It worked; I covered the distance in less than 32 mins.

So, I know that I am a mental case that I must trick myself to do the thing that I want to do.

Strange.

It got me thinking.

In our pursuit of Christ, do we go all in and commit ourselves to going the distance, or do we sometime take the easy way out and not risk too much.

We stay close to our comfort zone, so we can get back to it without problem.

We dip our feet in the water and expect to be cleansed head to toe.

God is great, and that never changes, but our ability to experience His greatness is directly proportional to how willing we are to commit to Him.

It’s not easy, and there is always the evil side that will want to tell us not to commit.

We may have to trick ourselves at times, by doing something bold and audacious that commits us to see it through.

I don’t know what that is for you, for me it was going to Nicaragua on my first mission trip and going to Walk to Emmaus in the same year.

Because of those two actions, that got me going, I knew I was committed to seeing it through and building my relationship with God.

Don’t get me wrong, I still struggle, I hem and haw and I want the comfort zone, but I know that I am on a journey that is not finished, so I have to keep moving forward.

Philippians 3 12-14

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.  Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus

Jesus’ first words in the book of John are “What do you want?”. Wow! The king and creator of the universe just asked the future disciples what they wanted right from the get-go! That’s incredible! Their response: “Do you have a place to stay?”. Ugh… That’s really the best they can come up with? His lodging? What a letdown.  

The question What do you want is incredibly powerful, but also contextual. If a hairdresser asked you what you wanted, you’d know there were limits to what your answer could be. There’s context there. But when the creator of the whole universe asks you that question, the context is everything! It’s like asking a 6-year-old to choose a dessert from the ice cream aisle at the grocery store. When I read this I had no idea how to answer! I went through all kinds of options that simply felt flat. 

• I want to be rich
• I want my kids to be happy and healthy
• I want this virus to go away
• I want world peace
• I want a 6 pack abs

Even though some of my wants were noble they still didn’t feel like the right answer and the reason is that I wasn’t thinking in terms of eternity. I came to realize that all these wants were only good for a small portion of my existence which meant they had little significance for eternity.  

At first glance, the disciples’ response seemed quaint, but what I’ve come to realize is they had great wisdom. They knew that a relationship with Jesus, even for one night was better than any of their earthly desires. They just wanted to get to know him more.  

Jesus’ first words to us and the disciples in the book of John are “What do you want?”. He chose those individuals to become his disciples for a reason. I believe in part because of how they answered this question. Jesus wants you, as much as you’ll give. What do you want? 

I was working on some boring spreadsheet today and my mind began to wander. Generally, it will find a comfy place in some past road trip or maybe on an adventure in the woods. For some reason today, it went to something bad. I thought about a time when Sammy was lost in the woods in a park for what seemed like hours, even though it really was less than 15 mins. He was about 8 when it happened, he did not have enough wisdom to have good sense but was old enough to be mobile – a bad combination. Some strangers that had heard all the commotion found him and brought him back to Laurie. I was still in the woods looking when another stranger came and told me that he was found. Wow, what a great feeling. I was so overwhelmed I hugged the stranger as if he were Sammy. What seemed like hours of terror were overcome with the joy of Sammy being found and ok.

I then thought of all the hours, days, and lifetimes of terror we cause for God (that is right, He is God, but we cause Him pain and break His heart), being lost and without Him. How we don’t have enough wisdom to have good sense, but yet we are mobile and trying to live life on our own – a bad combination. How we intensify the level of breaking His heart because it is not as if we just got lost by accident, but that we choose to be lost, and wander the woods without Him. I then thought of God rejoicing when we are found, and no matter how happy I was to find Sammy, it has no comparison to God’s rejoicing when we come to Him. I am thankful to be found! I am grateful to have grace when I choose to wander the woods on my own, knowing that all I must do is ask and I can come home. What an awesome God!

Luke 15

4 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.