Category Archives: 4 Stream Blog

Diving Deeper – Receiving God’s Intimate Counsel

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An important part of our journey the 4 Streams.  It’s import to remember what is the purpose behind it all.  What is the offer that God has given to us through Jesus Christ?  This is restoration.  Pure restoration of our hearts as his image bearers as both men and women.  Again, these 4 Streams are key essentials to that restoration.  Isaiah 61; Jesus came to heal the brokenhearted and set the captives free.  Again, John Eldredge lays all of this out clearly his book “Waking the Dead.”  It’s all essential for growth and restoration in our brokenness.

Today, I am going to deeper dive into the stream of Counseling, or rather Seeking God’s Intimate Counsel.  This is so critical as it touches the relationship we have with the Holy Spirit learning to invite God’s Spirit into the depths of heart.  As with the other streams, this one stems from first learning to walk with God.  All the streams are interrelated in some way, but we have to be able to know how to walk with God to learn to seek his counsel, healing, and deal with warfare.  Dallas Willard says, “God created us for intimate friendship with himself-both now and forever.” This goes beyond just reading Scripture.  We have to talk to God and invite him in.

So back to counseling, I believe this is very critical for all of us.  Counseling involves seeking truth in our hearts both from God and those that God uses to counsel us.  Psalm 51 says that God desires truth in our innermost being.  If have not read Psalm 51, check it out.  This is after David had his affair with Bathsheda.  He is broken now.  This Psalm is where he lays out his whole confession.  He is seeking God for his counsel. “Restore to me the joy of Your salvation and sustain me with a willing spirit” (vs 12).  He is seeking God’s counsel and inviting into himself.  He is laying it all out for God and allowing God to come deep down into his heart to restore him.

It takes the intervention of God to get down deep into our hearts to show us what we may not know was there.  To show us things in our brokenness that we either tried to forget or with all that goes on in life probably never even recognized it.  We have to be able to allow God in so that he can bring us to the place of our brokenness and then bring us to the fourth stream of healing, which I will cover next time.

In John 14:16, Jesus said, “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever.”   This Helper is the Holy Spirit.  Our Counselor, Comforter, Strength, and Guide.  Jesus offers the Holy Spirit to those that know him and the Holy Spirit is here to take us in those place in our heart that we don’t know.  The story and journey of our life is what has happened to our heart along the way.  What has brought about our brokenness?  What have have we let define us up till now?  The Holy Spirit is hear to help counsel through that and to discern the truth in our hearts.

So what does God do to counsel us and get to the core of our brokenness?  As with the other streams, I am learning each day.  What I have learned so far, as that he will get at us in different ways. Often times, it involves taking us back to the pain of our brokenness once it’s discovered.  John Eldredge said that “Usually what has been laid now in pain in our hearts can usually only be accessed by pain.  God will take us right back into our wounds.”  He will do this in different ways, too.

One of the first times I remember God doing this was just one normal day.  I have been on a journey for these last few years, but never got after my brokenness in anyway.  I was just sitting at my computer working in my home office.  I had some worship music come on.  Actually this happened twice.  The first time, Jeremy Camp’s song “I’ll Take You Back” came on.  If you have not heart it, go listen to it.  I just listened to the words and tears just began to flow.  God was getting right into my heart with the offer to take me back.  A few weeks later, it happened again, I had music on and this time it was the song by The Afters called “Broken Hallelujah”  It hit me again.  I knew God was up to something in me.  So fast forward a few months to the Wild At Heart Bootcamp and all I can say is, WOW.  The work God was doing in me and where he was going in my heart was finally evident to me.  He went right down in my brokenness.  He showed me wounds I didn’t even recognize.  He showed me the brokenness in my sin as well that I never wanted to accept.  It was painful, but God went right back in there because that was the only way to confront it, confess, fully repent, and allow God to heal me.

Jesus did this very same thing to Peter at the Sea of Galilee in John 21 after his resurrection.  First in a playful manner, he appears to them just as he first did to Peter when they first met.  They weren’t catching anything fishing.  Jesus again calls to them to cast their nets on the other side and this time they could not even haul in their nets.  At this point when John points to Peter that it’s Jesus, in such joy, he jumps out of the boat and swims to shore to him.  Jesus hung with the guys and invited them to have breakfast.  After eating Jesus does the work on Peter as follows in versus 15-17:

So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Tend My lambs.” He said to him again a second time, “Simon, son of John do you love Me?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Shepherd My sheep.” He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John do you love Me?” Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, “Do you love Me?” And he said to Him, “Lord, You know all things, You know that I love You.” Jesus said to him, “Tend My sheep.”

You see what Jesus did here.  Peter was already broken after having denied Jesus 3 times after Jesus was arrested.  Jesus went right back into his brokenness.  It was painful for Peter, but it was necessary to bring it out and restore Peter.  This is how Jesus counseled him.  He went right back into Peter’s wounds.  He did the same thing to me when he went into my wounds.  He will do the same for if you’re willing.  You have to let him in first.  We also have to accept our brokenness for what it is.  Michael Yaconneli said, “Accepting the reality of our broken, flawed lives is the beginning of spirituality not because the spiritual life will remove our flaws but because we let go of seeking perfection and, instead, seek God, the one who is present in the tangledness of our lives.”

If we seek to walk with God this will allow him into the deepest works of our hearts and allow him to counsel us and give us back our hearts.  Proverbs 20:5 says, “A plan in the heart of man is like deep water, but a man of understanding draws it out.”  Walking with God will allow him to give us understanding of the broken places in our hearts that we not even recognize or know they are they are.  With understanding of our wounds, sins, and agreements we’ve made, we can draw those things out of the deep water, address them and allow God to heal us.

God will also use others to counsel us in different ways.  Maybe not always directly, but in the interactions we have.  If we are open and receptive to it, we can begin to see what God is telling us.  Notice how you react out people.  Do you shrink back, do you hide, do you come alive more, etc?  Maybe God’s telling you something here as well.  This is where the false self may really come out.  Go deeper into that and ask God what to do with that and what makes you react that way.  This can be added counsel as well.  Ever since the fall of Adam, something in every one of us is missing.  Figure out what’s missing.

Just know this, Jesus is always ministering to us.  Even if we can’t seek professional counseling or pastoral counseling, God’s counsel is always available.  Don’t just accept the lies that come out of our wounds.  Don’t listen to the false self.  John Eldredge added in his teaching of the counseling stream that “The story of your heart and life is the long and sustained assault by the one who knows who you are and who you could be, and fears you.”  The enemy is out to assault our hearts and plant himself in our wounds.  Seek God’s counsel through it all.  He is present throughout the tangledness of our lives.  Let him in.  Sometimes we may need the professional help, but always know God is willing and able to counsel us and through Jesus has offered his Spirit for us, and will be with us forever.

Diving Deeper – Spiritual Warfare

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I have written several posts about spiritual warfare in some sense.  About things I have encountered and have learned over time.  What do you make of spiritual warfare?  Do you find it an odd topic to talk about?  Do you even think it’s real?  For many, it can be difficult to accept that there is a battle within the spiritual realm and that we are stuck smack dab in the middle of it.  I have to admit, that up until about a year and half ago, the idea of spiritual warfare never even crossed my mind. The reality is that warfare is all through Scripture and it is still very real.  1 Peter 5:8 tells us to be on alert, “Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour.”  This is a warning to believers from Peter that this is very real.  The enemy and his demons are always on the prowl.  They don’t want to just hurt our feelings.  They want to destroy us…devour us.  Verse 9 says, “resist him, firm in your faith.”  We are too stand firm and resist the devil.  We have to stand firm.

This is spiritual warfare.  It is so real and a significant part of our everyday life in this fallen world.  If we don’t recognize it, it is that much easier for us to be taken out.   I was taken out for years.  Lost in my own sin, my agreements with the enemy, my wounds, and my passivity. I knew I was lost, I knew there was something more, but I did not know where to turn to deal with it.  The enemy had a foothold in my wounds and my sins and I never recognized it or resisted.

I’m going to dive deeper into this with some things I’ve learned through Scripture, speakers and books , and my own experiences.  As with each of the 4 Streams, I am still studying and learning to apply it more to my life so as I go along, I want to share and help you apply it to yours.  We talked about Walking with God the other day.  That’s the fundamental foundation of it all.  Through walking with God, he has helped me to accept and now recognize the spiritual warfare in my life and around us.  It’s very real and we either accept it and fight, or we let it take us out by denying it.

John Piper shared that, “There is a war going on. All talk of a Christian’s right to live luxuriously “as a child of the King” in this atmosphere sounds hollow — especially since the King himself is stripped for battle.”  The king himself is striped for battle.  That tells us something very significant.  The King, that’s Jesus, is striped for battle.  He is not here to hang around in peaceful harmony.  He isn’t, as John Eldredge points out in his book “Desire,” “quite like the pictures we have in Sunday school, Jesus with a lamb and a child or two, looking for all the world like Mr. Rogers with a beard,  The world’s nicest guy. He was something far more powerful.  He was holy.” He is striped for battle.  Exodus 15:3, “The Lord is a warrior; The Lord is His name.”  Matthew 10:34, “Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” The world was lost to Satan.  After the fall of man, this became his world.  All-out war has been waged to win us back from Satan and from the fallen world.  To restore us to who we were meant to be.  To restore our hearts.  Jesus was full of passion in his life, not apathy.  “Zeal for your house will consume me” (John 2:17).  He knew his purpose and mission in this world and was not to walk around carrying lambs.  It was an all-out war to win back the human race from the prince of this world and restore our hearts to the glory that God created us for.  He was poised for warfare with the enemy.

Let’s start with Christmas.  As I have pointed out in previous posts, Christmas was an invasion.  Christ’s coming was Heavens invasion of this world.  A covert invasion at that.  Many of the Jewish faith were looking for a king to rise up to save them.  But God had another plan.  He was going to sneak in behind enemy lines through the womb of a young teenage girl.  You think this was not an invasion and a battle, then ponder what happened next.  The “Massacre of the Innocents.”  When figuring out this was to be a child born, Herod sent soldiers into Bethlehem to have every boy child under the age of two killed.  Satan knew that the Messiah was born and used Herod to try to kill him.  An angel appeared to Joseph to tell him to take Jesus and Mary and flee to Egypt until Herod was dead and the angel sent word for them to return.

Jesus encountered warfare directly when he was in the wilderness.  Satan came and tempted and tested Jesus throughout those 40 days.  This was warfare.  Jesus, who was fully man had to endure this battle, but rather than shrink back or succumb to the battle, he stood firm.  He resisted by the power of the Word of God and faith in the Father.  There is not a single one of us in this world that could have endured the battles Jesus did and come out unscathed.

Good Friday and Easter.  Also spiritual warfare.  Adam’s passivity brought about sin and the world for was lost and given to Satan as his domain.  He was given authority over a world that was meant to be given to man.  Man, ever since, was trapped in a world of sin.  Jesus’s death on the cross defeated sin, however, being offered as the perfect sacrifice.  By his resurrection, death is defeated.  By his ascension to Heaven and the Father’s right hand, all authority in heaven and all earth was given to him.  He won it.  He warred with Satan and demanded the keys to the world.  It is no longer the enemies.  Now, by his authority, Jesus has given us authority to fight for our world and fight for our faith.

The war is not over.  Look at the world around us.  We have believers still being martyred because of their faith in Christ.  You want to look at the works of the enemy still trying to wage war on us?  Simply look at ISIS.  Look at the Islamic Terrorists, who follow their law to the letter with the goal of destroying all who don’t believe in their faith.  Look at this post-modern culture we live in now that does whatever it can to remove mention of Jesus or the Bible.  Amber and I were driving to my son’s baseball game the other day and we were behind a car with a sticker that said ‘Respect’ in all different religious symbols from around the world.  Not one Cross.  Basically the message is that Christians need to respect other religions, but the same is not required for respect for our faith.  The Christian faith has been under attack, continuously for 2,000 years.  If that does not tell you that spiritual warfare is going on, then I don’t know what will.  Satan is doing whatever he can to keep us from turning to God and turning to faith in the works of Jesus Christ.

Another example of Spiritual Warfare is religion.  We encounter the religious spirit throughout our lives.  Jesus was and is anti-religion.  The religious establishment became so bloated and were all about their own glory.  Jesus called them out directly for the hypocrites they were.  In Matthew 23:27-28, Jesus says, “What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs – beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people’s bones and all sorts of impurity. Outwardly you look like righteous people, but inwardly your hearts are filled with hypocrisy.” Jesus called them out.  He did not shy away from them, he went directly to them and boldly.

Today, the same thing is happening in our churches, world religions, and cults.  The religious spirit of the enemy has infiltrated the church and filled it with division, man made-dogmas and traditions that are not based on Scripture, and churches have skewed away from truth and trivialized the Word of God.  This is all spiritual warfare and is the enemy’s way to divide the faith.  We have to recognize that for what it is to stand more united in our faith and hope in Jesus.  As my pastor says, Jesus + Nothing = Salvation!

Spiritual warfare is very real folks.  It is on-going everyday.  We have to arm ourselves to be able to take it on and not let it take us out.  Ephesians 6 tells us to put on the full armor of God, “Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm in the faith” (vs 13).  The armor is the belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, shoes of the gospel, helmet of salvation, shield of faith, and sword of the spirit.  This is real and very necessary.  As Paul said, it’s so that you will be able to resist.  We have to resist the devil.  Going back to 1 Peter 5, we as believers are called to resist the devil and stand firm in the faith.  This is not Old Testament.  This is after the ascension of Jesus.  Meaning, the war is still ongoing and still is today.

It takes practice and work each day to be able to recognize spiritual warfare and be able to armor up to resist it.  We can stand firm in our faith in Jesus because it is by his death, resurrection, and ascension that we are restored and now can be armored through the power of the Holy Spirit.  If you are unsure of what to do to resist, start with prayer.  Learn to walk with God every day.  Talk with him and ask him to help you recognize the warfare in your life.  Invite Jesus into your heart to help you armor up.  If you are unsure of how to pray, I want to share a prayer that I have used which has helped me each day to set my mind right, open my heart to God, and enable me to stand firm in the faith.  It’s a Daily Prayer that John Eldredge and Ransomed Heart adapted based on God’s Word and is a great tool and weapon.  There is also a Daily Prayer (Head of Household), which I actually use as part of my daily walk.  Another great tool for also bring the works of Christ over you and your family.  If you’re unsure how to pray, look at these prayers.  It’s prayer that works.

Again, Spiritual Warfare is very real.  We cannot deny it exists.  Be ready to stand firm in the faith, because the enemy is going to be there to try taking you out every single day.  Look at my post from February 4, “The Realness of the War We Live.”  The enemy will try to take us out even in the smallest ways.  If we don’t resist, it can be easy to fall again.  We have to recognize the warfare, accept that it exists, and bring the works of Jesus over our lives to help us armor up for the war that’s ongoing.  Stand firm in the faith and resist.

What To Do With Our Gifts

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We are all gifted with some talents.  Every one of us.  Could be in sports, business acumen, leadership, creativity in arts, writing, speaking, or any of a number of other talents. We all get those talents from one source.  From our God.  He created us as his image bearers and gifted us with something that in some way can be used to glorify him and used to show his work in our lives and this world.  We get such an awesome opportunity to do great things with those talents.  Some gifts may not seem like a big deal, but put it to use for God’s glory and watch him work.

For many people in this life, we lose site of our gifts.  We may show those talents as kids, but through our wounds and brokenness over time, those talents may begin to take a back seat to the world, to sin, to capitulation, compromise, and more.  We either hide our talents and gifts or we just don’t make the right use of it.  We don’t walk with God and don’t seek his counsel and the counsel of others with regards to our spiritual giftedness.   For the longest time, I was guilty of this.  One of the gifts I was blessed with was to write.  I would write stories when I was little, but then stopped.  I was too distracted or too broken to bother with it.  Then in my 20s, I began to get some inspiration to write again.  I would write opinion blogs off and on, but only in short cycles.  Then I started this site and same thing, it came and went in cycles.  Then this year, God opened me up.  He led me to understand the gift he had given me and other gifts.  He used conversations I had with others to really help me to see how I can glorify him through my talents and use what he gave me the way it was intended.  Since then, the inspiration has been like a river.

I write this as I was reminded this morning of the ‘Parable of the Talents’ Jesus used in Matthew 25.  This is where the master is going away and gives talents to servants he trusted according to their ability and then left.  When the master returns, he comes to see what they had done with his talents.  Two of the servants made use of the talents to gain more and the third had buried his talents.  The two that gained were rewarded by being put in charge of many things and invited into the joy of the master.  The third servant who buried his talents was rebuked and called wicked and lazy and was cast into outer darkness where this weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Many of you may know this parable.  You see, Jesus is making a strong point here in his teaching.  We are all gifted with talents by God, the Master.  It is up to us to glorify him by making use of those talents.  If we don’t we are stuck in our sin and in our own small world and story.  By our faith in Christ, we have a tremendous opportunity to do so much for the Kingdom.  Not because we are saved by good works, but because he has given us so much as his image bearers and we come alive and glorify him best when we make the most of our gifts.  As I said, many of us lose site of that as we grow up and get lost in the small story of our own little worlds and don’t hear God or see where he is leading us.

I think of my kids as I write this.  Each of them talented in so many ways.  I can just see the gifts that God has blessed them with and pray that they will realize those gifts and use them for his glory as they grow-up.  It’s my responsibility to lead them to the Father in this way so that he leads them to fully come alive as adults and not lost in this world.  I’ll use my daughter, Ashley, as one example.  She has such a gift for writing and especially story telling.  It’s so cool to see how she writes and the creativity she is blessed with.  She loves God as all my family does, and I just pray for her growth in how she uses these spiritual gifts.  It’s so amazing to see.

For those of you with kids, encourage your kids in their giftedness.  Don’t just worry about yours, but lead them to God’s glory and watch him work in their lives in everything they do.  Seek counsel from God and others and be that counsel for your kids well.  Don’t sit by and let the world and the enemy take you or them out.  Let God lead you.  Walk with him.  He will lead you to where he wants you to be.  He will guide your giftedness to come to its full glory.  This isn’t feel goodism.  This is real.  So many don’t realize their gifts and talents and the world take them out.  So many don’t come alive by seeking God for counsel and healing to wage spiritual warfare and the world takes them out.  Don’t squander what God gave you. He wants to restore all of our hearts through Jesus.  If we we allow him too, there is so much we can do for his Kingdom.  Watch him work!

Diving Deeper – Walking With God

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Over the last couple of years since the first version of this blog, the writing and the overall goal and direction have continually shifted.  What started as a site writing about finding freedom in life and work and looking for overall purpose and direction began to really shift.  I have learned a lot these past couple of years about life and about my God and the restoration that is offered to us through Jesus.  If you look at Isaiah 61, this is the Scripture that Jesus uses to proclaim his purpose.  To comfort and heal the brokenhearted and to set the captives free.  This offer and purpose to restore each and everyone of us.  We were all captives and all have been the brokenhearted in some way.  From this I began to really shift focus in my writing.

What started as 4 Pillars has now evolved into 4 Streams.  The streams that Jesus walked in to offer our restoration.  Discipleship, Counseling, Healing, and Warfare.  I adapted to this teaching after reading the book Waking the Dead by John Eldredge.  I believe this teaching is a central part of restoring our hearts and in drawing closer to God in our lives.  It enables us to come alive.  Since coming into the 4 Streams, I have learned a great deal.  The issue now is putting that all into practice in my life.  I believe this is critical teaching and as I walk in the 4 Streams, I want to share that with you to help you apply it further in your own lives.  So what I am going to share now is deeper dive into each of the streams.  This first post will be on Discipleship, or more specifically, Walking with God.  I want to provide teaching that I’ve learned from John and others, confirmed in Scripture, and from my own experiences walking with God and building that intimate relationship.

So, what do you think of when you think of discipleship?  Many things that come to mind are around our christian growth.  Learning to be more responsible, connecting with people in fellowship, connecting with our church families, and much more.  There’s one key aspect that is often overlooked in discipleship and that is walking with God.  Conversing with him and seeking him in our lives for counsel.  Making him an intimate part of your life.  Not just knowing about him, but allowing him into  your heart on a deeper level and really hearing him and getting to know more about him.  This goes beyond just reading Scripture too, as I’ve come to find out, and includes our prayer time and learning to hear him in our hearts and discerning what is really God, the enemy, or our own selves.

John points to Mark chapter 1 and when Jesus encounters the first disciples.  His invitation to this rag tag bunch is to hang and to walk with him.  “Come, follow me, and I will show you how to fish for people” (vs 17 ).  Follow me, walk with me.  That’s quite an invitation.  ‘I will show you how to fish for people.’  That tells me that if we follow Jesus, he will lead.  Walk with God and he will lead us in our lives and on a deep and intimate level.

Again, what does Jesus offer.  He offers restoration and life.  Our hearts our made new through Jesus.  The path to life can be a rocky path, however.  We encounter so much warfare and attempts by the enemy to take us out.  Happens all the time.  Has happened to me.  Walking with God in discipleship can be key in traversing this path.  “You will make known to me the path of life” (Psalm 16:11).  If we walk with God he will reveal the path he wants to lead us on.  “For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:14).  So we have a path to life and restoration in Jesus.  It is narrow path, but God offers to show us the way.  He knows each and everyone and desires for us to lean and trust in him to lead us.  “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5).

So in walking with God a key aspect is being able to hear him.  Being able to decipher his voice when he speaks to you in your heart.  Not around you, but down deep.  You need to be able to decipher his voice from the clutter of the world and the enemy and your thoughts.  Learn to figure out what’s really from God.  This is something that definitely takes practice and I am working at it everyday.  Still don’t have it down and God still continues to amaze me in they way he speaks and leads me.  We need to be able to turn to him for counsel and ask him into everything in life.  John Eldredge used many examples in his audio session talking about seeking God with even the smallest things and the big things.  It’s important and we need to be more reliant on him and not ourselves.

In seeking his counsel though, we have to be able to accept it even when he tells us, NO.  If we don’t listen we he says no, then we are still trying to be self-reliant.  We are still trying to trust ourselves, “lean on our own understanding.”  You can’t be self-reliant and walk intimately with God.

God will definitely start to stir us in the way he encounters us in trying to restore our hearts.   What does God do to begin restoring us?  He reawakens desire.  He disrupts and stirs our lives and hearts and he intrigues, all to stir us to walk with him.  God has worked this heavily in my own life.  This started over two years ago when I began to write on the first version of this site.  Something stirred in my heart.  Didn’t know what it was at the time.  I just knew I was being called to something more than what I had been in.  I began to write, but still spent much of my time very self reliant and not opening my heart to hear God in any of it.

What happens this year? As you all know, God sent me to Colorado to the Wild at Heart Bootcamp.  He intrigued me in what would be there and disrupted my world completely unplugging me from my regular life and allowing me to completely plug into him.  Allowed him to dive deep into my heart and to hear God speak to me like I have never heard before.  He began to Father me and he was inviting me to walk with him.  Since then, he has lead me on a whole knew adventure these last few months.  I believe God is leading me to take the stories and experiences of my brokenness and restoration to counsel and help others through my own testimony and through this teaching.  It all begins with being able and willing to let go and walk with God.  Hearing God and talking with Jesus is a fundamental right of every christian.  Something that no other religion or cult in this world can ever offer you.  They just can’t.

I hope this was helpful.  I will also be dive deeper into the other streams next.  To help give you all a deeper understanding of where I am going with my writing and teaching.  I have links on the front page of this site and my About me page to will lead to some resources at Ransomed Heart that dive deeper.  I will be diving in and learning more myself as we go along.  I hope you join me on this journey.

“The dullness that overshadows a passive person is increased by the mounting number of times one doesn’t respond to the promptings of God.” –Greg Manalli

 

I Want To Be The Real Deal

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Being the real deal…Being Authentic.  What do those words say to you?

While you ponder that, I would like to take you on a journey to look down deep inside yourself.  There is something that every single one of us has had as a part of our sin nature. That is our fig-leaf.  We have all been posers in some way.  I don’t care who you are.  It’s been an inherent part of our nature since the fall of man.  Genesis 3, what do Adam and Eve do after their sin and they now realize they’re naked.  They sew fig leaves together to cover them selves.  They hide.  Ever since then, this has been such a huge and inherent part of us has humans.  We are posers!

God’s revealed so much of this to me in my life over these past years and especially the past few weeks.  Through Wild at Heart, I was able to allow God into my heart deeper to further expose the poser inside of me.  The false-self.  The Ransomed Heart guys shared the analogy of an iceberg.  10% of the iceberg is above water, while the other 90% hides below.  This correlates to our motives and behaviors.  Our behaviors are the 10% on the surface, while the motives are all hidden. I wrote last week about motives and what drives them.  We have to examine those to really get at the heart of how we act and how we portray our lives.  Do we portray a false front or are we authentic?

There’s many ways that we pose or put on the false front to hide.  For me, God pointed right to my reserved passivity.  For many years I have hid behind my quietness and not willing to take a stand and be a voice.  I would speak-up off from time to time, but often would stay back.  I hid behind that as a strength.  Of being to be observant and only speak when needed.  Someone once told me I was tough to read.  Never really let that sink in until this time when I really looked at my heart.  That really told me that I was hiding.  I was putting on a false front and not living authentic as a man.  I was always the nice guy that just got along.  Easy to capitulate and not put up a fight.  God had another way for me though and he has been working on my heart to show me all of this.

People hide in a number of other ways too.  Either way you cut it, the surface behaviors you present to the world are driven by motives that are hidden.  We have to be able to get to the heart of those motives and know what they are before we can address them and really begin to grow and shed that fig leaf.  One thing they shared with us is that deconstructing the poser in us is huge in realizing our brokenness and where we need restoration.   When we shed that poser a cool thing happens.  We lose our ability to bullshit our way through life anymore.

As for me, I want to be the real deal.  To be the authentic man.  God wants all of us to be the real deal.  To shed our false-self.  To put off the old man, our sinful nature and come alive.  To be authentic.  It can be a very difficult journey to do so.  To really get at the heart of your brokenness and seek God for the restoration that you need.  I recommend you get away from your regular life for a day or two.  Escape into solitude and just commune with God.  Go in the wilderness or somewhere and let him get at your heart.

“Christ has truly set us free” (Galatians 5:1).  Because of this freedom we have in Christ, we can shed the poser.  We can put off our old sinful nature and come alive in Christ.  Ephesians 1:4, “Even before he made the wold, God loved us and chose us Christ to be hold and without fault in his eyes.” God made us and knew us before creation.  He made our hearts to be real and to authentic and to be good.  Jesus is the picture of full authentic masculinity.  He is what each us could have been if we always put God first through everything in our lives.  And I mean everything.  “Let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. Put on your new nature, created to be like God – truly righteous and holy”  (Ephesians :23-24).

My call to everyone today is to let go.  Let go of the poser and the fig leaf that we all hold on too.  Search for your authentic self.  Let Jesus into your heart and he will restore you through all of your brokenness.  Trust me, he will restore you.  I would pray that if you have not taken a look down this path, that you try to.  Have faith the journey and where they Lord takes you.  Let him lead you.  For men, I would highly recommend you pick up the book, Wild at Heart by John Eldredge as a starting point.  For Women, I would highly recommend you pick up Captivating written by John and his wife Stasi.  My wife read this book and loved it.  Transformed her life.  Great starting points to really get down into your heart to restore it and come alive shedding the fig leaf we all hide behind.

This is not an easy journey or a quick journey by any means.  It’s been a long 1 1/2 year journey for me and now that God has really take hold of heart since the Wild at Heart Boot Camp, he has me on fast forward.  It’s a journey of restoration that Jesus has for each of us.  He came to save us from our sins yes, but he also came to restore our hearts.  To be made new and to be the people God intended us and created us to be all along.  I challenge you to take this journey if you have not.  Come alive and become the real deal.

SetFree

You Make The Choice

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Every day of our lives are filled with choices.  Choices in what we eat, what we wear, what music we listen too, who we interact with and how, whether we pray or how, and many many other things.  We live a life full of choices.  I wrote last week about motives.  I looking at the choices we make in life, we have test our motives.  Do they come out of faith or do they come from some other area in life or even the enemy?  We then have to make the choice, usually on our own, of how we will act.

This could be anything.  Here are some of my recent choices  I choose where I worship, not based on it being the right churchy thing to do, but because I believe God has drawn my family and me there for our growth together and to connect with other believers in the body of Christ.  I chose to go to Colorado for Wild At Heart, not because I just wanted to get away from home and take a trip, but because I sincerely believe God called me there to restore my heart.  I enrolled in seminary/counseling studies not because I just wanted to go to school again, who really does, but because I believe God, having now restored my heart, is now calling me to something bigger than myself and this is the next step.

We all have to make a choices and then we have to live with whatever consequences come from those choices, good or bad.  I was listening to a Ransomed Heart audio session from a previous Boot Camp and it reminded me about something we all have to face.  Defining our life and how we live through the choices we make.  John Eldredge made a good point about life.  He said, “A life lived in fear, compromise, self-preservation, and/or capitulation is not a life at all.”  I’ve realized that many of us, including myself, spend much of our life making choices based on compromise of values, faith, and principles.  We fear rocking the boat and making waves in the world around us.

I was sitting the other day and just reading through my journal on past things I wrote and even my notes from Wild At Heart.  I was reminded of something.  On our first morning, we had our first session and then given time to go be with God on our own.  During part of that time, I just put everything in backpack I was carrying and started walking.  I walked down the road leading out of camp and contemplating the question of who I had been as a man up till then.  Then it hit me while walking on that path.  That dirt road covered in snow and ice, that I nearly busted my tail on a few times.  I had spent most of my life walking the more traveled path.  The well worm path that most people find themselves on.  I had been comfortable there and could easily hide there.  God told me that I needed to get off of that path and start taking the one less traveled.  The icy, rough, and unknown path.  The path that leads to him.  “Two roads diverged in the woods, and I took the one less traveled.”

So since coming home, I have made the choice to no longer compromise. To longer live in doubt, fear, self-preservation, and capitulation.  I made the choice to take the path less traveled.  To stand up for the freedom I am offered in Christ.  To help fight for the hearts of others so they can find freedom in Christ.  To not run from the attacks of post-modern thought and the enemy, but stand-up and face it head on.  “For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline (2 Timothy 1:7)”

At Wild At Heart, John gives Jesus as a big example of someone who stood to fight.  Also looked a William Wallace in Braveheart drawing the parallels between the two.  The story of William Wallace told in Braveheart is inspired straight out of Scripture and Jesus’s life and purpose.  Jesus picked a fight with Pharisees and religion, calling them out for hypocrites they were.  William Wallace picked a fight with the English.  Jesus fought and gave his life to free the hearts of all man kind.  Wallace fought and died to win freedom for Scotland.  The point here is that we have to choose whether we are going to stand on our faith and principles fighting for who we are and for the hearts of others or if we are going to sit by and hide letting the world tell us what we need to do and think and feel.

You see, we all have to choose.  Jesus could made so many different choices through his life on earth, but then his purpose would have never been fulfilled and we would not be set free from the law, sin, and death.  Just think, what if he gave in to Satan in the wilderness.  What if he denied his deity with the Pharisees after being arrested to avoid the Cross? Wallace could have chosen to live in peace and not fought.  He could have stood by and done nothing.  Robert The Bruce could have capitulated to Longshanks later after becoming king and not fought to eventually when freedom.

Bottom line…we have to choose.  We have to a long look at our lives, our direction, our faith, and calling and decide if we are living in fear, compromise, self-preservation, or capitulation.  Spend time in prayer on this.  Ask God to show you where you are compromising and not being who you are meant to be.  This will reveal so much and then you have to make the choice yourself, he gives us the free will and choice, of whether to do something about that and follow where he’s leading.  You make the choice.

Don’t Underestimate Yourself

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Have you ever had times where your just doubt who you are as a man or woman?  Do you underestimate the impacts you can have on this world and whether or not you have the abilities or the strength to do what it is God’s calling you to do?  I’ve had many moments over the years where I have doubted myself.  I have doubted my place and even doubted who I was as a man or even I had become a real man in many areas of my life.  I questioned my purpose and direction and doubted if I could ever step out of the life I had created and truly fulfill my calling.

It was not until the last couple of years that I really started to see more of my self and in the last months when I truly realized who I was.  I let go and decided I was going to trust God to father me and lead me.  I knew that by trusting him, he would enable me to have the strength and confidence I needed to move.  I was no longer just going to float along and I was no longer going to doubt my place in this world.  I am crucified with Christ to this world (Galatians 6:14).  I no longer worry about what the world may think and I no longer doubt where God is leading.  I don’t underestimate myself.

I pray the same thing for you.  You are far more important than you realize.  Through faith in Christ, you are a child of God and by staying faithful will come into you inheritance in the Kingdom.  If you really stop to think about that, how awesome is that.  That makes everything we do for the Kingdom that much more meaningful. It gives each us much more worth than we have realized.

Trust me.  I know the spirit of fear and doubt.  Those spirits have haunted me for years.  Through my wounds and my sins.  Many of us hide behind those wounds and allow those foul spirits to overtake us.  Again, I did for years. I hid.  I feared getting exposed.  I feared making any kind of changes that would shake the security I had.  Not any more.  I go ahead with full confidence in who I am as a man and as God’s son.  Because of that, I am making changes.  Now do I live with regrets?  It would be easy to, but no.  I believe God has used me in my wounds and sins to equip me for the battles I will now face ahead of me.  He has now armed me with the power and wisdom to recognize those battles and the confidence that anything is possible through Christ.  He is sending me into Seminary studies now to move into a world of Christian Counseling and Ministry to help arm more of his children.  Before I would have never done this, but I have faith where he’s calling me now and don’t doubt my abilities he gifted me with.

We are all God’s children and we are all called to be warriors for his Kingdom.  God designed each and everyone of us in his image.  HIS IMAGE.  Don’t underestimate that.  You don’t have to live a life that is covered in doubt and sin. You don’t have to stay locked into where the world says you should be.  Again, through Christ, you have been crucified to this world and to death and sin.  Screw what the world says you should do.  Turn to the Father.  Turn to him and allow the Holy Spirit to empower you for the race.  What he says is far more important.  It’s all in Scripture and he has so much more to share with about your true identity to him and where he wants to lead you. He has given each of us gifts and talents.  The question is whether or not we will use them to glorify him or not.  We have to choose.

Bottom-line is, don’t underestimate who God has created you to be.  Max Lucado said, “You weren’t an accident. You weren’t mass produced. You aren’t an assembly-line product. You were deliberately planned, specifically gifted, and lovingly positioned on the Earth by the Master Craftsman.”  Always remember just how special you are to God through your faith in Christ.  He has a special place for each us and through our faith a special place in the Kingdom.

What Are Your Motives?

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There are motives behind everything we do in life.  Every decision and action we take.  We have motives for why we do them.  Have you ever really put much thought into what those motives were?  Were they fear of rejection, need of acceptance, to look important, anger and retaliation, or any of a number of other things?  Or were you even motivated by faith.  Whatever it is, we all have motives behind our actions.  Often times, those motives are meant to hide ourselves in someway for fear of exposure.  For me fear and insecurities in myself often result in me being more reserved and quite.  For the longest time, particularly in settings that were just not me, I would stay on the quite end.  Motives can make a significant impact on how you act in situations or interact with others.

So what about faith?  If we act from faith, are the outcomes different?  Do we find ourselves more alive and free?  I would have to say without a doubt, yes.  As my life has changed and I’ve allowed God fully into my heart, it has fully changed my motives and the lasting impacts from my decisions, how I interact with others, and how I lead my family and my life.  It’s been quite remarkable to see when I step back and just look at my life.  Acting on faith has enabled me to interact with more people in my church family and share more about my journey.  Acting on faith led me out to Colorado to the Wild At Heart Boot Camp where God just completely changed my world and my heart.  Faith has led to me being more intentional in how I father my kids and the type of husband I am.  Faith has led me to make some big life changing decisions in how I will serve my God and those around me.  You get the picture.  Motivated by faith, so many things begin to shift in a good way and a way that is after God’s heart.

I don’t have this all figured out yet and I know I have plenty more work to do.  I tell you what, though; the work God has done on my heart and my life and the people he has led me to has been just completely amazing.  He’s Fathered me through this and allowed me to see that if I just put my full faith and trust in him, he will lead me through.  I will be able to better recognize and take the spiritual warfare I  and my family faces.  I will be able to better act on where he’s leading me and accept his counsel directly and through those he puts in my life.

In “Free To Live,” John Eldredge points to the motives we have in life and why we have certain tendencies.  He explains that we need to look at our motives and begin to make our choices according to the motives we have.  Examine the motives and determine if it comes out confidence and faith in God or some other fear of insecurities we may have.  Romans 14:23 says that “everything that does not come from faith is sin.” We really need to examine why we do things and then choose based on what the motives really are.  As John states, “This is where genuine goodness is lived out. This is the real deal. The sense of personal integrity that it will give you will be profound. 

Think about Jesus when it comes to choice and motive.  Jesus was able to lead a sinless life.  Why?  It’s simple, because he chose based on faith.  Everything he did in his life here on earth was on pure faith in the Father and the purpose he was here to fulfill.  He was given plenty of chances to choose differently as are recounted in his time in the wilderness with Satan, in his time with the woman at the well, and so much more.  He chose to live on faith.  His motives were driven by faith.

God creating us was a pure act of faith and risk.  His pursuit of us and the war he has waged for our hearts even since our fall is all on faith in us and on love.  Sending Christ behind enemy lines was done on faith and love.  Now we have a deep hope in because of the faith and love that he has had for us.

I know none of us will get this right 100% of the time.  But it certainly gives something to think about when we look at the decisions we make and really examine our motives.  If your motives are based on faith, then have the faith in where God will lead you in.  It’s not always an easy road, but I promise that God will take hold of your heart and lead you.

Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Psalm 51:10

The Round Table

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I’ve learned a great deal about God through my own study and daily time in Scripture and writing in my journal.  One vital thing I did not know, or rather did not listen about until recently was that I cannot walk through my faith and life as a lone ranger.  For so many years, I did.  Because of my own wounds and insecurities, I never let anyone in, other than my wife.  I have friends and know many people, but I did not ever have anyone that I walk through my faith journey with.  Men I could do life with that would help hold me accountable and allow me to the same in our faith.

At my church, my pastor often talked about doing life in circles and not in rows.  It took a long time for me to realize this shortfall.  I wrote a few weeks ago, before the Wild At Heart Boot Camp, that this hit me hard while in our men’s ministry Bible study and I threw my hand up when we were asked if we did not have guys to walk through life with.  It was almost subconsciousness.  It was like God grabbed my hand and through it up.  He knew where I was flying to the next week and was stirring my heart to prepare me.  It was not like me, or was not like the false me, to just volunteer that.

So since then God has done a work in my heart and I’ve come to really recognize that I was doing life as a lone ranger and I needed to change this.  I needed to let others into my life. In the 5 weeks since that day, God has done a real work in me on this.  He has brought men into my life in both my church and through my connections at Wild At Heart through my band of brothers.  It has been quite a journey.  I have stayed in touch with these guys and we’re committing to continue getting together now that we’re back home.  We just had our first get together last week since being home and it was great. It is so awesome to have a group of authentic men to now do life with. Guys that don’t hide around each other and genuinely want to stay connected and be real about our lives.  Look forward to more of those.  In my church, I’m connecting with guys that are really helping my faith journey there as well and guiding me through the next stages of my life that are going to bring significant and exciting change for my family and me and in how I can serve God and extend his love to others.

This is so vital.  We need people in our lives to do life with and walk through our faith with.  None of us, I don’t care who you are, have it all figured out.  We need those knights at our round table like King Arthur to guide us along.  God called this out, specifically, to me in Colorado when I was communing with Him.  That I was being called to so much more, but needed those knights at my round table.

Who do you have to walk with in life and in faith?  I know I’m not the only lone ranger out there.  The book Waking the Dead asks the question, how can we offer counseling and gain the counseling we need “unless we actually know one other and know one another’s stories.”   You need to know people truly.  Not just know them on the surface.  King Arthur had his round table of trusted knights and knew each one of them and trusted them.  Jesus had his 12 disciples that he trusted and he knew the hearts of each man.

God puts people in our life to guide us along in life.  People that we can trust and God will use them to Father us along in life.  It must be small.  It’s hard to get intimately close and truly get to know folks in large groups.  Have a small band of people in your circles to really go through life with.  That round table, that small platoon.  As was added in Waking the Dead, “Jesus modeled this for a reason.”  It’s how you can grow fully in faith and with God.  You can gain strength from one another and help each other through the spiritual warfare that we each face.

I know this is a new realm to my faith journey, and there’s so much I will learn hear.  As I walk in this path and gain more from the Father, I will share more.  Just know that you do not have to walk through life alone.

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What Kind Of Man Do I Want To Be?

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Ephesians 5:16 tells us that we should make the most of every opportunity in these evil days.  The problem that many of us have is that we let opportunities that come our way just pass right by and we do not do anything about it.  We spend our days in our own small story and hide from opportunity.  It could be right in front of our face, yet we do nothing.  I can speak all about this, because I have certainly been guilty of this in my life.  Truth is truth and it’s not worth hiding from.

In John Eldredge’s book, “Free To Live – The Utter Relief Holiness,” he shares something we all struggle with in our life’s.  It has to do with how we hide in our lives.  We are all guilty of this in someway.  We have that fig leaf that protects us in our small story.  Here is what John shares:

One of the strangest quirks of life here on this planet is the fact that the one face we hardly ever see is the one closest to us: our own. As we move about in the world every day, our face is always right before us and always just beyond us. Somebody could write a fairy tale about that. It would be an allegory for how rarely we see ourselves, who we truly are, the good and the bad. But in unexpected moments we get a sideways glance, as when passing by a plate glass window downtown, and most of the time we don’t like much what we see.

Notice how we are in elevators: No one makes eye contact. No one wants to acknowledge that we are seeing and being seen. In a moment of forced intimacy, almost claustrophobic intimacy, we pretend we aren’t even there. The reason? Most times we just don’t know what to do with what we see. About ourselves, I mean. It doesn’t take a Nobel Prize winner to see that something dreadful has happened to the human race. So we look at the ceiling or our shoes; we watch the numbers report the passing floors; we hide. This is how most of us approach our entire lives—we hide what we can, work on what we feel is redeemable, and despise the rest.

There is a better way.

There is most certainly a better a way.  I can totally relate to this.  I ride an elevator to a 21st floor office and it has often been an awkward time.  I find myself staring up, staring at the floor counter, or my phone.  I know I’m not the only one either.  If you think about we are hiding.  We hide from opportunities to fellowship, know others, and from exposing anything about ourselves.  I’ve been coming to great terms about the false story I’ve lived in and hid behind.  I have a great deal of work to do, but the Lord has been revealing so much about who I am and who He is calling me to be.

It begs the question of what kind of man do I want to be.  Do I want to be one that stays in my hidden small story and behind my fig leaf or do I want to put off the old man, the poser I’ve been and come alive for my God and for His kingdom.  It takes a great deal of courage to come out from behind our fig leaf.  It is so easy to be stuck in that world and in that life and be perfectly content with just getting on life.  As for me, I not live in this small and false story any longer.  God has shown me who I am and I know I cannot go back.

Ephesians 4:24 says to “Put on your new nature, created to be like God.” God is calling all of us to a larger story.  He is calling us into his kingdom.  To leave our sinful nature behind and live for him and under his undeserved grace and mercy that we have through Jesus Christ.  When we learn to leave this old nature behind, the opportunities that will unfold through our faith will be enormous.  With our real identities in Christ, we can truly move forward for the kingdom.  We all have gifts and talents we’re blessed with.  It’s a matter of whether we decide to put them to us.

In now living our life through Christ, we can share our faith with others.  As my Pastor shared with us, we can extend the love of God to others.  Jesus extended compassion to everyone.  The lost (Matthew 9;36:37), the sick (Mark 1:41), the adulterous, and the demon possessed (Mark 5:19).  We all have an opportunity, through Christ to share that same compassion and love to others.  We all have a number of different ways that God is calling us to do this.  We are not saved by our good works, but since we are saved, we have the opportunity to do works that God calls us too.

So in returning to the question, what kind of man or for you ladies, what kind of woman do you want to be.  Do you want to hide behind your fig leaf, or do you want to answer the call God has for all of us?  Do you want to be on the sidelines out of the game, or do you want to be in the game?

I know this all sounds easy, but if you turn to the Father in prayer and daily communion with Him, He will Father you through this.  He is wanting to raise the fatherless place in all of us to restore us through Christ Jesus so that we are now alive and equipped for the race.  Armed with the full Armor of God and ready to get your hands dirty and into the battle. Remember, the Father is orchestrating a rescue of all of us.  You have to make the choice of whether you allow Him to rescue your heart and bring you to life.  The free will choice is always ours to make.  Will you choose God first or this world?  I used to choose the world first and hide just as Adam did.  I no longer want to be that man.  My new heart is in Jesus and my desire is come alive in Christ and walk with God in discipleship and love.