What replenishes your soul

As Bill Hybels continues Chapter 1 of Simplify, he surmises you’ve been empty so long, you’ve forgotten what replenishes your bucket, what replenishes your soul.  Pastor Hybels cautions, however, that before you can establish a plan for keeping your bucket filled, it’s vitally important that you understand why you’re so depleted in the first place.  For example, you may:

a.  be afraid to say no to your boss, spouse, or kids

b.  derive a disproportionate amount of your self-worth from overachievement

c.  feel guilty for spending time doing something for yourself when others are in such need

Choice C, the author notes, is backward thinking.  When you’re running on empty, you have absolutely nothing to offer others.  As Pastor Hybels observes:

“You can’t give what you don’t have.  Engaging in replenishment activities is . . . vital to the end goal of living your one and only life at its best.  Be unapologetic about it.  Prioritize and protect those replenishment streams in your life.”

Pastor Hybels states our natural human tendency is to start looking around for someone to pull us out.  He stresses with crystal clarity it’s our responsibility to fill our bucket and to keep our bucket filled.

Next, Pastor Hybels discusses five bucket-filling streams of replenishing energy that will take us from a depleted state to filled to the brim and overflowing.

Today’s question: During your desert, land between time, what replenishes your soul?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Connecting with God”

What replenishes your soul

The price of depletion

In Chapter 1 of Simplify, Bill Hybels tells of the time a few years ago when he felt so depleted for months that his wife and kids suggested he spend time at the family cottage in Michigan- alone.  God took the scales off Pastor Hybels’ eyes in a little grocery store in town when he realized he was more concerned about his timetable than assisting a wounded Vietnam War vet navigating the store in his wheelchair.

At that moment Bill realized the price of depletion.  He learned the hard way how important it is not to let oneself get completely run down.  Depletion not only harms the people around us, it damages the soul.  When we are toxically depleted, resentment and irritation can be dominant feelings.  We get scattered and lose our ability to focus, jumping from one distraction to the next, accomplishing little.

Pastor Hybels emphasizes the path to simplicity is a process requiring total honesty.  He asks us to recall a time when we were replenished and filled up.  As we strive to master the art of simplified living, those times of replenishment can become the norm rather than the exception.

The author concludes when we’re telling God what to do and we’re mad at the world, it may be time to hear God say:

“Let’s sit down together.  We’ve got some things to work out, you and Me.  You’ve lost a connection with Me somewhere.  You’ve lost your bearings on true north and now you’re just spinning.  But I have a better plan.”

Toda’s question: How have you experienced the price of depletion following your vocation loss?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “What replenishes your soul”

The price of depletion

All the Places to Go

All the Places to Go (Tyndale, 2015)

The full title of John Ortberg’s latest book is All the Places to Go . . . How Will You Know?  God Has Placed before You an Open Door.  What Will You Do?  Pastor Ortberg describes an open door as the great adventure of life, because it signifies the possibility of being useful to God.  Thus, the subject of John’s book is God’s offer of an open door and our response to it.  Faith provides the greatest foundation for the open mind-set needed to cultivate divine opportunity awareness.  As the author explains, “The open door is often more about where my insides are than where my outsides are.”  We never will be ready or know exactly what we’re getting into.  The only thing that matters is that Jesus is ready.

Open doors are divine invitations to make our lives count- with God’s help- for the sake of others.  Pastor Ortberg emphasizes God’s primary will for you is the person you become and not the circumstances you inhabit.  Prayer is closely associated with seeking and discerning.  Prayer is the primary way we communicate with God.  When faced with a choice, we need to ask God for wisdom.  John clarifies that growth is the ability to handle larger and larger problems, not avoiding those problems.  While it is wise to choose our doors carefully, when we choose to go it is imperative to go wholeheartedly!  Choice means that sacrifice is involved.  Choosing one thing means not choosing another.

Pastor Ortberg underscores the importance of accepting the truth about ourselves if we are to go through an open door.  Ultimately, facing the truth about ourselves will bring us life.  Although open doors sometimes are neither fun nor safe, open doors always are about something far greater than our own benefit.  On the other hand, at times we run into closed doors.  While we may not like or understand closed doors, some of the greatest doors are those that never get opened.  As John concludes, God has plans we don’t know:

“There is a door that is open to you.  In the mystery of divine providence it may have been opened long ago, but it remains open now . . . a divinely-opened door intentionally, thoughtfully, purposefully, deliberately opened by God himself in front of us.”

 

 

All the Places to Go

Needless clutter

“Simplified living requires more than just organizing your closets or cleaning out your desk drawer.  It requires uncluttering your soul.”- Bill Hybels

As Bill Hybels continues Chapter 1 of Simplify, he emphasizes we need to examine the core issues that lead us into frenzied living in order to stop doing the things that don’t matter and begin building our lives on the stuff that does.  Based on his own experience, Pastor Hybels has identified ten key practices vital to keeping the soul clutter-free.  He devotes one chapter of Simplify to each of these practices.

The author challenges us to go beyond reading each chapter only on a theoretical basis.  Rather than giving a mere intellectual nod to each of the ten key practices, Pastor Hybels exhorts us to apply what we read “with courage and grit.”  By clearing our soul of needless clutter, we’ll be able to hear and respond to each whisper from God (Bill Hybels’ previous book is The Power of a Whisper).

Citing Luke’s account of Jesus at the home of Mary and Martha (Luke 10:38-42), Pastor Hybels states all of us, like Mary, “yearn for an antidote to all the drivenness and busyness in our lives.”  That antidote isn’t getting a handle on our busyness.  The antidote is sitting down for an unrushed conversation with Jesus.  In all our activity, we must not lose sight of relationship.

Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, what needless clutter must be cleared from your soul?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: the new addition to the Annotated Bibliography, All the Places to Go

Needless clutter

A simple, healthy inner world

“When we fritter away our one and only life doing things that don’t really matter, we sacrifice the things that do matter.”- Bill Hybels

Simplify: Ten Practices to Unclutter Your Soul is the latest book by Bill Hybels, founding and senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, IL.  Pastor Hybels coaches and mentors leaders all over the world.  In his travels he hears the same words repeated over and over: exhausted, overwhelmed, overscheduled, anxious, isolated, dissatisfied.

The author emphasizes he has no closely held secret to overcoming those issues or has proceeded well beyond them in his own experience.  Pastor Hybels has spent most of his adult life wrestling with those same issues.  He is a serious fellow learner on the topic of simplifying our lives.  He offers his definition of simple living:

“Simple living is about more than doing less.  It’s being who God called us to be, with a whole hearted, single-minded focus.  It’s walking away from innumerable lesser opportunities in favor of the few to which we’ve been called and for which we’ve been created.  It’s a lifestyle that allows us . . . to reflect with gratitude that our day was well invested and the varied responsibilities of our lives are in order.”

Pastor Hybels concludes that if we don’t simplify our lives, our overcomplicated world will begin to feel frighteningly normal.  As John Ortberg comments on Simplify:

“No one can truly impact a complex, broken outer world if they do not have a simple, healthy inner world.”

Today’s question: Which of Pastor Hybels six descriptors apply to you?  Please share.

Coming Monday: the Annotated Bibliography of All the Places to Go

Tomorrow’s blog: “Needless clutter”

 

A simple, healthy inner world

Just enough clarity

“We don’t follow clarity.  We follow God.”- John Ortberg

“The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it.  Its gates will never be shut by day- and there will be no night there.”- Revelation 21:24-25 (NRSV)

John Ortberg concludes Chapter 10 of All the Places to Go with the fourth reason we’re tempted to give up searching for the door when the wall seems insurmountable.

4.  The way isn’t clear enough.  Pastor Ortberg observes that we may be tempted to give up looking for the door because we have not idea where to look.  John cites an old (must be really old!) travelers’ saying- a car’s headlights only shine fifteen feet, but that fifteen feet will get you home.

God knows exactly how much clarity will be good for us, even though the open and closed doors of our lives are a mystery to us.  The apostle Paul wanted to carry out ministries in Asia and Bithynia, but those doors were closed without explanation.  The Paul got a vision to go to Macedonia.  The word of Jesus came to Europe through an open door- but it first started with an unexpected closed door.  John concludes:

“God often gives us just enough clarity to take the next step in following him.”

And the final (heavenly) door is an open door- and it’s still open.

Today’s question: How has God given you just enough clarity as you revitalize and revision your calling?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “A simple, healthy inner world”

 

Just enough clarity

When we"re afraid

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.  Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength.”- Deuteronomy 6:4-5

“It’s not what’s on the other side of the door that gives me confidence to go through; it’s the one who goes with me.”- John Ortberg

In today’s blog, John Ortberg presents the third reason we’re tempted to give up searching for the door when the wall seems insurmountable (Chapter 10, All the Places to Go).

3.  The world is not safe enough.  Pastor Ortberg notes that we avoid open doors when we’re afraid.  Yet, the most important words in Israel’s life, the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) were door words.  The Israelites were to write the Shema on the doorposts of their houses and on their gates as a reminder that God was watching over them at all times.  John connects this reminder to what is most significant about open doors:

“What we want most is not what lies behind the door.  What we want most is the one who opens it.  Always, when we go through the opened door, we go with him.  He meets human beings at the threshold.  The magic of the open door is not the new circumstances or job or location or accomplishment.  It’s actually being with him that turns where we are into Wonderland.”

As we walk with Jesus through the open door, we are “more than conquerors.”

Today’s question: What are your favorite Bible passages for overcoming fear?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Just enough clarity”

When we"re afraid

The first door

“So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood.”- Hebrews 12:13

Today John Ortberg looks at the second reason we’re tempted to give up searching for the door when the wall seems insurmountable.

2.  God is not good enough.  Pastor Ortberg states we become afraid God will give up on us.  Often we feel like we’re on the outside looking in.  When Adam and Eve first were created, the Garden of Eden was a world with no doors.  Sin changed all that.  Genesis 3:24 (NRSV) describes the first door:

“[God] drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life.”

Sin, John notes, is a room with no door.  Jean Paul Sartre titled his portrait of hell “No Exit.”  But there always is a door- and that door is Jesus.  Jesus took on our “outsideness,”, as John explains:

“Jesus became an outsider so we could be invited in.  Jesus left his home so we could come home.”

God’s goodness is the only reason we need to persevere in following the wall until we find the door.

Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, have you ever felt God has given up on you?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “When we’re afraid”

 

The first door

The door of the mind

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”- Hebrews 11:1 (ESV)

“Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal . . .”- Philippians 3:13-14

In Chapter 10 of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg states that “at the deepest level . . . doors are about entrance into another reality.”  Suffering and death do not have the last word.

Pastor Ortberg asserts that life itself is a door opened by God.  We can’t force it, as Cornelius Plantinga, Jr. writes in Reading for Preaching:

“Life so often releases its gifts only if we do not try hard for them. . . . Try too hard . . . and we defeat ourselves.  Faith in God is much more gift and discovery than deliberate achievement.”

John concludes Chapter 10 with four reasons we’re tempted to give up searching for the door when the wall seems insurmountable.  The first reason is discussed today.

1.  I’m not strong enough.  We are tempted to give up when overwhelmed by a sense of our own inadequacy.  At times we remember Jesus’ words and do them.  Often we don’t.  We try to master temptation by force.  At the door of the mind, John notes, mastery comes through surrender.  We are to forget what is behind.  God’s strength will help us stand guard at the door of our mind.

Today’s question: During your desert, land between time, have you tried to force things or relied on God’s strength?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “The first door”

The door of the mind

Come to the well

Jesus said to her,, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again.”- John 4:13-14

“No matter how much we try to run away from this thirst for the answer to life, for the meaning of life, the intensity only gets stronger and stronger.  We cannot escape these spiritual hungers.”- Ravi Zacharias

I grew up on West 89th Place in Evergreen Park, IL (home on left in photo, circa 1978).  Across the street and three houses to the east lived three menacing brothers, whose mere presence struck terror in my heart.  Products of a dysfunctional home life, the middle brother of the three once attempted to run my Schwinn bicycle into a parked car.  The brothers also were the prime suspects when the trunk of the tree on our front lawn (Vicki’s 1969 Rambler American is parked next to it) was found almost totally severed.

My young mind interpreted their behavior as anger-infused bullying.  Today I understand the brothers were trying to fill the emptiness inside with temporal fixes that left them high and dry.  Just come to the well.

John Ortberg defines the spiritual life as “simply a way of referring to one’s life from God’s perspective.”  God’s intent is to redeem our life.  When a Samaritan woman came to draw water from Jacob’s well, Jesus already was sitting there.  He engaged the woman in a penetrating, theological, and personal discussion about living water and her relationship with God.  William Berry (Finding God in All Things) writes:

“Whether we are aware of it or not, at every moment of our existence we are encountering God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who is trying to catch our attention, trying to draw us into a reciprocal, conscious, relationship.”

The three brothers subconsciously sensed there was Someone present in the Henning household that sorely was missing from their lives.  Following your ministry downsizing or vocation loss, what are your goals?  Kyle Idleman (Gods at War) points out that goals of food, entertainment, success, or achievement can become gods.  We start to serve, live, and sacrifice for them.  Although God gives us the freedom to say no to His invitation to come to the well, Kyle states God “insists on giving us every possible, conceivable chance to say yes.”

Just come to the well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjnkI2xiKAw

 

 

Come to the well

Just a whole lot of small

“Many doors that look large to us are small to God, and many doors that look small to us are very large to him.”- John Ortberg

Today John Ortberg concludes his discussion of four reasons why some doors remain closed to us (Chapter 9, All the Places to Go)

4.  Doors remain closed because God has plans I don’t know.  Pastor Ortberg notes the door to a quiet life of scholarship and teaching was closed to Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  Instead, Dietrich would labor in an underground seminary and a concentration camp, ultimately sacrificing his life.  Dietrich could not possibly have known that he’d leave a legacy that continues to touch the world.

In “Think Small When You Dream Big,” Jennifer Dean writes there words of encouragement:

“No such thing as big.  Everything we call ‘big’ is just a whole lot of small.

Small upon small upon small, finally equals big.  There is no big without lots and lots of small.

Nature, as God created it, is the image of the invisible Kingdom of Heaven. . . . In Kingdom living, small matters.  Small is the key to big.”

John builds on this by exhorting us to live as though our smallest acts of goodness resulting from our acceptance of God’s open doors will, through God’s grace, count for all eternity.

Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, what”whole lot of small” have you done for the Kingdom of God?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: the new Short Meditation, “Come to the well”

 

 

Just a whole lot of small

A door marked "Grow"

“Often it may be that when the door marked ‘Go’ looks closed, it’s because there’s a door marked ‘Grow’ that’s wide open.”- John Ortberg

In today’s blog, John Ortberg discusses the third reason why some doors remain closed to us.

3.  Doors close because I need to grow.  Pastor Ortberg tells of a time he was praying for an opportunity in leadership, but his mind kept wandering away to a man he was angry with.  John realized that as long as he was holding on to his anger, he was not free to pray with open hands before God.  Anger was John’s elephant in the prayer closet.  He emphasizes:

“There is a big difference between nursing a grudge and surrendering it.”

Although the apostle Paul asked God to remove his thorn in the flesh, he eventually came to understand that grace would come along with the thorn, not in removing it.  John summarizes: “The door to thorn removal was closed so that the door to grace-strengthening could be opened.”

We simply have to relinquish door sovereignty to God as well as consider areas in our lives where we need to grow.

Tomorrow John concludes his study of reasons why some doors remain closed to us.

Today’s question: As you revitalize and revision your calling, have you encountered a door marked ‘Grow’?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Just a whole lot of small”

A door marked "Grow"

Unanswered prayers

Today John Ortberg discusses the first two reasons why some doors remain closed to us (Chapter 9, All the Places to Go).

1.  Knocking at the wrong door.  Pastor Ortberg states that sometimes doors are closed because we want the wrong thing.  Throughout the Bible we see closed doors in response to wrong requests.  As country singer Garth Brooks writes in his song “Unanswered Prayers”: “Some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.”

2.  Doors are closed because there’s something better.  John notes that sometimes a door remains closed because there is something better down the road.  The problem is that we can’t see it, as John explains:

“It is fundamental to the kind of person God is and to the nature of prayer that God always reserves the right to say no, because he knows what will lead to better outcomes than we do.  For every kind of power human beings have access to, we find a way to use it with great destructiveness.”

The author adds that while it’s good to ask God to shape the people in our lives, such requests must not come at the expense of our personal and spiritual growth.  Finally, door closings may be disappointing because we don’t get the options we want.  But door closings can lead to us finding, or being found, by God.

Today’s question: What unanswered prayers ultimately have led to blessings from God?  Please share.

Coming Monday: the new Short Meditation, “Come to the well”

Tomorrow’s blog: A door marked “Grow”

Unanswered prayers

Closed doors

“And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write, The words of the holy one, the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, who shuts and no one opens.”- Revelation 3:7

In Chapter 9 (“Thank God for Closed Doors) of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg admits that generally he doesn’t like or understand closed doors.  Closed doors discourage us.  We feel as if our lives are diminished and God doesn’t care.

Prayer is an important factor here.  Pastor Ortberg observes that the single greatest motivation for prayer is answered prayer.  Answered prayer encourages us to pray more.  Conversely, the greatest demotivater for prayer is unanswered prayer.  Yet, John emphasizes:

“Surely it must be a good thing that God alone has the power to shut in such a way that what is shut cannot be opened.”

Closed doors that frustrate us at the time often become occasions for gratitude later on.  We may never know for sure in our lifetime whether we should keep knocking on closed doors or let go and move on.  John states God has greater things in mind for us than “knowing for sure.”  Yet, gaining clarity on why some doors shouldn’t be opened helps us differentiate between knocking and moving on.

In the next part of Chapter 9 John discusses four things God may be up to with closed doors in our lives.

Today’s question: What closed doors have you been thankful for in retrospect?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Unanswered prayers”

Closed doors

Our response to God

“For I know that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.”- Jonah 4:2

John Ortberg concludes Chapter 8 of All the Places to Go by noting something about Jonah’s prayer (Jonah 4) that would have been very apparent to its Old Testament readers.  In Jonah 4:2, Jonah is quoting Exodus 34:6, where God speaks to Moses on Mt. Sinai.  In Pastor Ortberg’s translation of the verse, he states that Jonah leaves out the word truth (of God’s faithfulness and forgiveness).

By doing so, John asserts, Jonah is impugning God’s character- in effect saying that God is unreliable.  Pastor Ortberg adds: “I will never trust God to go through open doors if I think he is unfaithful.”  God responds to Jonah’s displeasure and anger by asking Jonah if his anger is justified.  Jonah gives God the silent treatment and again runs away to the east of Nineveh- waiting for God to blast the city.

God then proceeds to provide shade to Jonah in the form of a plant, meaning that Jonah was under God’s protection.  Literally, the text says the shade was to deliver Jonah from evil.  The Lord wants Jonah to see that all people matter to Him, but the story of Jonah ends with him sitting there, his anger unresolved- very similar to the Parable of the Two Sons.

John points out that the problem isn’t that the author can’t think up an ending.  Jonah’s story really is about us and our response to God.  John concludes:

There’s a door out there right now with your name on it.  Right now.  It’s open.  What will you do?”

Today’s question: What has been your response to God when an open door is right in front of you?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Closed doors”

Our response to God

Lack of love

Jonah began to go into the city, going a day’s journey.  And he called out, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.”- Jonah 3:4

As John Ortberg continues Chapter 8 of All the Places to Go, he observes that the story of Jonah is “left on a strange, unresolved, discordant note”- on purpose.  Pastor Ortberg emphasizes that the dissonant word in the story is evil– something is wrong with God’s world.

However, Jonah is quite uncooperative.  Jonah doesn’t like the Ninevites.  His lack of love has him running the other way.  As John quips, Jonah only goes up to Nineveh “when it is clear the alternative is to become a living sushi bar.”  Even so, Jonah’s message to the Ninevites is decidedly uninspiring.

“Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.”  That’s it- no illustration, no application, no edification.  Jonah puts no effort into his message.  But it works!  God is filled with compassion, but Jonah can’t take it.  Pastor Ortberg comments: “What is great to God- grace to Nineveh- is great evil to Jonah.”

The author says declaring judgment is easy for Jonah.  His lack of love for the people God’s open door leads him to makes him want to run from that door.  Pastor Ortberg applies this life lesson to us:

“Lack of love makes it easy for me to say no to the door.”

Today’s question: Has lack of love made it easy for you to say no to God’s open door?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Our response to God”

 

 

Lack of love

Going down

“And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah.  And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.”- Jonah 1:17

John Ortberg continues Chapter 8 of All the Places to Go by noting that when the sailors hurled Jonah into the sea, the Lord “appointed” a great fish to swallow Jonah.  Pastor Ortberg notes that the word appointed could be translated “commissioned.”  It’s a governing word, something a king would do.  John quips that the fish is better at taking orders than Jonah!

If the main word for God in the book of Jonah is great, the main word for Jonah is down.  For an Israelite, the sea was a low as one could go- a place of great fear and terror.  In that place of death, Jonah turns to the Lord because he has nowhere else to turn.  But when Jonah prays, good things start to happen.

We don’t have to wait until we hit rock bottom to call on God.  Even if we wait until then, however, God is there.  John summarizes:

“It turns out that when human beings are going down, down, down, God is up to something great, and from God’s perspective, death and the grave are not a problem at all.  Human rebellion and stubbornness are not a problem.  God laughs at death, laughs at the grave.”

Today’s question: What Bible verses have strengthened your faith that God is up to something great when you are going down?  Please share.

New addition to Crown Jewels: “Exulting in monotony”

Tomorrow’s blog: “Lack of love”

Going down

God"s yes is louder

The sea was getting rougher and rougher.  So they asked him [Jonah], “What should we do to you to make the sea calm down for us?”  “Pick me up and throw me into the sea,” he replied, “and it will become calm.  I know it is my fault that this great storm has come upon you.”- Jonah 1:11-12

In Chapter 8 of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg concludes his discussion of four reasons that hold us back from saying “yes” to God’s open door.

4.  Our sense to guilt or inadequacy may hold us back.  When Jonah decides to stop running, he thinks his story is over due to his mistake.  As Pastor Ortberg states, however, “God’s yes is louder than my no.”  But Jonah’s “no” is pretty loud, for he tells the sailors to throw him overboard.

To the reader’s amazement, the sailors don’t do it.  Apparently they have more compassion on Jonah than Jonah had on the people of Nineveh.  John points out there’s an important lesson for us here:

“You have to be really careful about judging who the good guys are and who the bad guys are, who is on God’s side and who is not on God’s side.”

Before the sailors tossed Jonah overboard, they invoked Yahweh’s name three times in prayer.  The ship of Tarshish became God’s temple.  God’s story is so big, it’s also about Tarshish.  Jonah thought he’d thwart what God wanted to do.  Just as with Jonah, God is at work in our lives in ways we can’t even begin to dream of.

Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, how has God’s yes been louder than your no?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Going down”

God"s yes is louder

Pay attention

Today John Ortberg discusses the third reason that holds us back from saying “yes” to God’s open doors.

3.  Blindness to the door in front of us holds us back.  As Jonah’s boat sails out to sea, another door will open for him, although that door is heavily disguised.  When a great storm arises that threatens to break up the ship, the professional sailors panic and throw their potential for great wealth into the sea.  The sailors each pray to their own gods.

Meanwhile, Jonah misses this great open door because he’s sleeping in the bottom of the boat.  Pastor Ortberg notes how ironic it is that a pagan, Gentile ship captain is calling Jonah to pray, but Jonah is doing what pagans do- sleeping during prayer time.

Now, the sailors already know that Jonah is running from the Lord, but they assume Jonah is talking about a tribal god of Israel.  Jonah tells them there is one great God- Yahweh.  It is Jonah’s failure that brings the Gentile sailors to faith.  Similarly, when Charles Colson was disgraced and sent to prison, doors to ministry were opened to him that never opened in the White House.  John concludes:

“How many open doors are all around me- someone feels alone, someone waits to be inspired, someone is aching with rejection, someone is racked with guilt- just waiting for me to pay attention.

Today’s question: How have you learned to pay attention to God’s open doors?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “God’s yes is louder”

Pay attention

Ships of Tarshish

“After paying the fare, he [Jonah] went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the Lord.”- Jonah 1:3

“Sometimes it’s hard for a prophet and a profit to coexist.”- John Ortberg

Today John Ortberg discusses the second reason that holds us back from saying “yes” to God.

2.  Having other options holds us back.  Pastor Ortberg notes that it’s a big deal that Jonah paid the fare.  Normally, bartering was used in the ancient world and money was tremendously scarce.  Money gave Jonah mobility and options.  Money made it easier for Jonah to think he could run away from God, because he had options.

Options are problematic for us as well.  John recalls that when he was in seventh grade, he had the option to befriend a girl in his class that no one sat next to at lunch or chose for their team.  Although John’s social status wasn’t as low as the girl’s, he ran to Tarshish, unwilling to sacrifice what little social status he had.

In Jonah’s day, Tarshish was a city of great wealth and a pioneer in trade.  “Ships of Tarshish” became a symbol of wealth, self-sufficiency, and greed- a delusion of security.  Jonah thought he was running to safety, but it really wasn’t safe at all.  John comments:

“Maybe the only safe place is to be in the will of God for your life, even if it means choosing the door to Nineveh, that scary place you don’t want to go.”

Today’s question: When has having other options been problematic for you?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Pay attention”

Ships of Tarshish

The Jonah complex

“I am very brave generally, but today I have a headache.”-Tweedledum, Through the Looking Glass

“Be strong and courageous . . . for the Lord your God will be with you.”- Joshua 1:9

In Chapter 8 (“The Jonah complex”) of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg notes that we long for open doors, yet resist going through them.  Abraham Maslow called this perplexing tendency “the Jonah complex.”  While we admire people who give a wholehearted yes to God’s call on their lives, such people also make us uneasy, anxious, and confused.

Greg Levoy refers to Jonah as “the patron saint of refused callings.”  In Jonah’s story we see all our evasions of God’s calling reflected back to us.  Pastor Ortberg discusses four reasons why we’re tempted to hold back.  The first reason is presented today.

1.  Fear holds us back.  Nineveh was hated so much that the prophet Nahum referred to the city as “the city of blood.”  Nineveh was hated not just for cruelty, but for endless cruelty (Nahum 3:19).  Unlike Nahum, who made his proclamation while safely in Israel, God sent Jonah to speak to the Ninevites face-to-face.  Jonah not only didn’t go through God’s open door, he ran the other way, implicitly in fear.  John comments:

“Sometimes open doors are not fun.  Sometimes they’re not safe.  Always they’re about something greater than our own benefit.”

Avoidance never overcomes fear.  The antidote to fear is God’s presence.

Today’s question: Have you experienced “the Jonah complex” when faced with an open door?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Ships of Tarshish”

 

 

The Jonah complex

My door response style

“God doesn’t demand perfect decisions, just perfectly submitted ones.”- Lysa TerKeurst

“Speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.”- Ephesians 4:5

John Ortberg complete his discussion of ways recognizing and going through open doors reveals and requires us to face the truth about ourselves in Chapter 7 of All the Places to Go.

3.  What is my door response style?  Pastor Ortberg states that our response tendencies to open doors fall into two broad categories- impulsives and resisters.  Both styles have strengths and weaknesses.

Impulsives

a.  love open doors

b.  tend to jump through open doors without thinking ahead or counting the cost

c.  great need is for discernment

d.  patron saint is Peter

e.  will want to lean into wisdom

Resisters

a.  tend to focus on danger, risk, and inadequacy

b.  tend to shrink back

c.  great need is for courage

d.  prominent resister is Gideon

e.  need most what they least want- another challenge

4.  What do I really value?  John emphasizes that we’ll never know the truth about ourselves if we don’t have some people close to us who love us and are courageous.  They must be willing to face pain in our relationship in order to challenge us to grow.  John summarizes:

“God calls us to the adventure of the open door.  We are to go through these doors for the sake of others.  On the other side, we’ll discover the hard truth about ourselves, and that truth is not often flattering. . . . When we go, we find we’re not just entering new territory.  We’re becoming new people.”

Today’s question: What is your door response style?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “The Jonah complex”

My door response style

Till the sky spills over

“Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”- Colossians 2:6-7

“When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.”- G. K. Chesterton

“The remedy is in the retina.”- Ann Voskamp

I have yet to attend one of my Luther South (Chicago) Class of 1969 reunions.  However, when I received advance word that South would be celebrating its 50th Anniversary on an August weekend in 2001, culminating with a Sunday service of praise and thanksgiving in the school gym, I dropped everything to contact them.  I wanted to express my gratitude through serving as the organist for the worship experience.

The sky spills over with gratitude as I reflect on South’s blessings to me:

a.  a strong college prep curriculum with outstanding electives that provided a smooth transition to Concordia- River Forest

b.  extra-curricular opportunities: drama club, musicals, school newspaper (mailing editor, sportswriter)

c.  opportunities to minister in worship; as senior accompanist for the A Cappella Choir and assistant chapel organist

This is not to say that high school was a cakewalk.  Socially, it was a difficult and awkward time.  For an unhealthy amount of time, I chose to ruminate on those social issues rather than focus on the greater blessings with gratitude.  The personal slights I felt infringed on my perceived right to happiness and obstructed my vision.  C. S. Lewis once commented on thinking about the world in God in the Dock:

“If you think of this world as a place intended simply for your happiness, you find it quite intolerable; think of it as a  place for training and correction and it’s not so bad.”

Joy is hiding in gratitude.  That’s why G. K. Chesterton describes joy as “the gigantic secret of the Christian.”  As Ann Voskamp points out, we can begin with one act of thanksgiving  for the seemingly insignificant, especially when things go wrong with us, and unlock the mystery of joy:

“When we lay the soil of our hard lives open to the rain of grace and let joy penetrate our cracked and dry places, let joy soak into our broken skin and deep crevices, life grows. . . . The clouds open when we mouth thanks.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rT2k5dQNf7U

 

Till the sky spills over

Face the truth

Today John Ortberg discusses the first two ways recognizing and going through open doors reveals and requires us to face the truth about ourselves (Chapter 7, All the Places to Go).

1.  What are my strengths and weaknesses?  We have to have some sense of our strengths, weaknesses, and interests if we’re going to understand which doors God is likely to set before us.  Marcus Buckingham, however, points out that our strengths aren’t simply what we’re good at and that our weaknesses aren’t simply what we’re bad at.  Marcus defines a weakness as something that drains you of energy and “something you’ve been blessed with  lots of ability to do well but cursed with no appetite for it.”

John concludes that it’s  better to acknowledge walking through a wrong door than spend the rest of your life in the wrong room.

2.  What is driving me?  We must come face-to-face with the truth about our motivations and ambitions.  Yet, Pastor Ortberg notes, if we wait to walk through a door until our motives are pure, we’ll never go through any doors. Our drive to go through God’s open doors reveals to us a mixture of desire to serve the Lord and a desire to feed our own ego.  John writes about the necessity of confronting the truth:

“The truth about me is I don’t even want to know the truth about me.  The truth about me is only God knows the truth about me.  The truth about the truth is if I face the truth about me with Jesus, the truth will hurt me.  In fact, it will kill me.  But then, it will bring me life.”

Today’s question: How does Marcus Buckingham’s clarification of strengths and weaknesses help you revision your calling?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: the new Short Meditation, “Till the sky spills over”

Face the truth

The truth about you

“The truth about you is you don’t know the truth about you.”- John Ortberg

In Chapter 7 (“What Open Doors will Teach You”) of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg writes that all of us suffer from a kind of personal blind spot.  The difficulty is that when someone has a problem, the last person to know is . . . the person who has the problem.

Not only do we have no knowledge of the truth about ourselves, we don’t even know what that truth about us is, as Fyodor Dostoyevsky observes in Notes from Underground:

“”Every man has reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends.  He has other matters in his mind which he would not reveal even to his friends, but only to himself, and that in secret.  But there are other things which a man is afraid to tell even to himself, and every decent man has a number of such things stored away in his mind.”

The key to the offer of an open door is self-awareness.  We need to be aware not only of what is going on outside but also what is going on inside us.  Self-awareness is the polar opposite of self-preoccupation.

We have to accept the truth about ourselves in order to go through an open door, relying on God’s strength- not ours.  In the rest of Chapter 7 John explores four ways going through open doors reveals as well as requires us to face the truth about ourselves.

Today’s question: What Bible verses have enabled you to face the truth about you?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Face the truth”

The truth about you

Innocent as doves

“Be . . . as innocent as doves.”- Matthew 10:16

“What the world needs is not simply isolated outward deeds but transformed character from within.”- John Ortberg

John Ortberg concludes Chapter 6 of All the Places to Go by discussing the final dimension of wholehearted threshold crossing: “Be . . . innocent as doves.”  Pastor Ortberg observes that doves are to the bird world what sheep are to the animal world.  Doves are considered quite innocent.

John emphasizes that we must allow God to work on our character.  The main thing we take into the world is who we are, not the things we do.  The author reports that when author and teacher Brennan Manning was ordained a priest, he was given this blessing, focusing on the innocence of a child:

“May your expectations all be frustrated,

May all your plans be thwarted,

May all of your desires be withered into nothingness,

That you may experience the powerlessness and poverty of a child and can sing and dance in the love of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”

Pastor Ortberg notes that on the third day Jesus went through the final open door that led to death’s defeat and the triumph of hope.  While none of the Gospel writer recorded how Jesus crossed that threshold, John believes Jesus didn’t limp or trudge wearily.  John thinks Jesus hopped, and may be hopping still!

Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, how is your character being transformed from within?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “The truth about you”

 

 

 

Innocent as doves

Wise as serpents

“So be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”- Matthew 10:16 (NIV)

As John Ortberg continues Chapter 6 of All the Places to Go, he emphasizes that Jesus wasn’t a “well-intentioned dreamer who floated serenely above human difficulties and reality.”  Jesus really was serious about getting His work done.

Pastor Ortberg notes that part of wholeheartedness is putting all of yourself in, mind and talents included.  Spiritual devotion to Jesus is essential, but we also must be willing to face up to reality- thinking about strategy, tactics, and being effective in extending the kingdom of God.  We need to be wise as serpents- a prevailing thought in Jesus’ day.

John adds that we must be wise as serpents in order to know what doors God might open up for us.  Open doors call for a high degree of learning and awareness.  To effectively discern our calling or vocation in life, vocational expert Andy Chan states we must master (a) knowing ourselves and (b) knowing the world we want to impact.  Four types of people result from combinations of these factors:

1. Hermit– high in self-awareness but low in world awareness; keeps thoughts and feelings to self


2. Chameleon– highly aware of surrounding world but low in self-awareness; just blends in


3. Clueless– low in both self-awareness and world awareness


4. Change agent– deeply aware of self and deeply aware of world around him/her; wise as serpents

Today’s question: Which of the four knowledge descriptions most accurately reflect your current mind-set?  Please share.

Coming Tuesday: new Short Meditation, “Till the sky spills over”

Tomorrow’s blog: “Innocent as doves”

Wise as serpents

Sheep among wolves

“I am sending you out like sheep among wolves.  Therefore be shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.”- Matthew 10:16

In Chapter 6 of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg writes that the sheep is not an inspiring animal, so this is an unexpected metaphor.  While many sports teams have animal nicknames, no team is called the Sheep.

Pastor Ortberg notes that Jesus’ metaphor raises this question: How does a sheep go among wolves?  Answer: very carefully and very humbly.  That means we don’t present ourselves as intelligent, strong, or impressive.  When we are sent as sheep, doors are opened to us that never would be opened to wolves.

Going wholeheartedly through doors leaves us vulnerable to failure and disappointment.  We’re vulnerable because we’re not strong enough.  Paradoxically, with Jesus vulnerability is stronger than invulnerability.

John stresses that the church always is at its best when it goes into the world like sheep among wolves- with humility.  Several centuries after Jesus, John Chrysostom wrote about the importance of being sheep:

“Let us then be ashamed, who do to the contrary, who set like wolves upon our enemies.  For as long as we are sheep, we conquer. . . . But if we become wolves, we are worsted (defeated, overcome), for the help of our Shepherd departs from us; for he feeds not wolves, but sheep.”

Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, have you gone through open doors like a sheep or a wolf?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Wise as serpents”

 

Sheep among wolves

Jesus" instructions

“As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.”- John 17:18

John Ortberg continues Chapter 6 of All the Places to Go by presenting another statement that many people think Jesus actually said: “Be in the world but not of the world.”  Pastor Ortberg states that his misconception has led Christians into a halfhearted being in the world.

John notes that as Jesus sent His disciples into the world, He was more concerned with how they would go through the door than which door they would go through.  John writes:

“When somebody is deeply committed with their whole heart- not out of guilt, not out of obligation, not out of pressure but because they are convinced this is the cause that is supremely worthy of the devotion of their one and only life- they love to be challenged about that commitment.  They love to be called to it, to be renewed in it, to be rechallenged for it . . .”

On the other hand, when people are divided, conflicted, or have compromised their commitments, they are reticent to discuss those commitments.  Again, Jesus’ instructions emphasize how we will go over where we should go, providing three animal illustrations describing how we are to go through the open doors God places before us.  The first illustration, sheep among wolves, will be presented in the next blog.

Today’s question: To what new calling do you feel deep commitment?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Sheep among wolves”

 

Jesus" instructions

Discerning wholeheartedness

“Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem twenty-nine years. . . . He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not wholeheartedly.”- 2 Chronicles 25:1-2 (NRSV)

“I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.”- Acts 13:22 (NIV)

In Chapter 6 of All the Places to Go, John Ortberg quips that he can’t imagine a coach standing before his/her team and saying, “Now go out and give it . . . most of what you’ve got.”  However, Pastor Ortberg observes, at times people try to “walk through high-challenge doors with low-level commitment.”  Just the opposite is needed- greater wholeheartedness.

Yes, there could be an expectation that we’ll voluntarily suffer loss, sacrifice our comfort, give up our time, or humble our pride.  Sacrifice is involved when we must choose one thing over another.

One hundred percent commitment really boils down to where our hearts truly are.  Finessing commitment, as Amaziah did, won’t work.  John concludes with five questions to help us in discerning wholeheartedness:

1.  Do I talk about commitment to other people to create a kind of public accountability for my actions?

2.  Do I own the responsibility to grow?

3.  Do I complain about difficulties in a way that can subtly rationalize a halfhearted involvement?

4.  Do I deal with discouragements by talking with God and asking for strength to persevere?

5.  Do I recognize and celebrate even small steps in the right direction?

Today’s question: Which of Pastor Ortberg’s five questions holds the most significance for you?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Jesus’ instructions”

 

Discerning wholeheartedness