A tiny dirt road

“And if we want life that isn’t driven by our past hurts, we must squeeze ourselves onto a tiny dirt road and trust that it will lead us somewhere good.”- Matt Bays

“But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”- Matthew 7:14 (NIV)

In Chapters 2 (“One-sided Prayers- It’s Not Adding Up”) and 3 (“The Chain- Kicking God Out of Your Life”) of Finding God in the Ruins, Matt Bays addresses not feeling the need to protect God’s reputation and eradicating inaccurate perceptions of God from your life.

Matt voices his concern about people who resist an honest doubt or two.  Pastor Bays believes unexpressed doubt can be toxic.  Matt was drawn to finding real answers to life’s most powerful questions.

Even as a young boy, Matt realized that a part of him already loved God, although he couldn’t explain how or even why.  At eight years old, Matt said God “occupied an easy chair inside me.”  But Matt was unable to reconcile experiences at home with this loving God in an easy chair.

Pastor Bays describes his stepdad as on for whom sin would “continue to be a full-contact sport.”  Matt carried many caustic memories with him for almost thirty years.

Alcohol became his “worthless idol.”  He needed a life that wasn’t driven by past hurts, to squeeze himself on a tiny dirt road- being redeemed by finding God in the ruins.  He needed to start from scratch in his relationship with God.

Today’s question: What Scriptures have helped you return to the tiny dirt road?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Worthless idols”

 

A tiny dirt road

Redemption

“And so it seems that the very word redeemed needs its own personal redemption.”- Matt Bays

As Matt Bays concludes Chapter 1 of Finding God in the Ruins, he expresses his belief that redemption has been misunderstood.  Pastor Bays offers his own personal take on how modern Christianity has defined the term:

Redemption (n).  A state of existence in which the faithful to God receive what they expect to receive out of life (and out of God), and what ails them is converted into something fresh and new (getting the desires of one’s heart).

Matt emphasizes that when redemption is defined this way, it becomes hard to approach God, unless it is in the context of getting what we want.  This then leads either to disillusionment with God or a petty and shallow faith experience.  We may feel God owes us- that because we are chosen, He should deliver.

Furthermore, we may equate the word redeemed with the removal of pain.  We envision whatever is broken in our lives getting fixed within a specified time frame.  To correctly understand redemption, Matt differentiates between the unredeemed and the redeemed.

The unredeemed

a.  those whose lives have been neither helped not healed by the usual remedies

b.  have experienced great loss and continue to experience the residual pain of despair

c.  believe their promise of redemption seems far away from the here and now

d.  think their pain isn’t going away soon- if ever

The redeemed

a.  acknowledge the harsh reality of their broken story- to the best of their ability

b.  accept that their pain does not define them

c.  have somehow managed to find God in the ruins

d.  have the capacity to be reasonably happy despite their pain and allow God to use their brokenness for good

Matt concludes:

“But redemption will always be the most powerful when we can trace God’s hand along the way. . . . Looking back to see where God’s hands have pushed the clay of brokenness into something we never thought it could become is truly redemptive.”

Today’s question: Do you currently fit in with the unredeemed or the redeemed?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “A tiny dirt road”

Redemption

Simply being present

In Chapter 1 (“The Pen- Where is God?”) of Finding God in the Ruins, Matt Bays suggests the best approach to dealing with hurting people is simply being present.  By simply being present, you are God’s hands to hurting people.  You are willing to stand with them, even if they stop believing.  Pastor Bays offers these appropriate words of simply being present:

“I’m so sorry for all you are going through.  You are going to make it, and I’m going to be there for you if you need me.  You don’t need to be anything other than what you are in this moment.”

Matt believes we should consider another possibility why God has placed hurting people in our lives.  Perhaps they are God’s gift to us.  As we stand with them, they are teaching us how to grieve, how to plumb the depths of despair and survive, how to find grace.

Matt explains why it is so difficult for us when pain gets personal:

” . . . we have little patience for survival that looks like depression, despair, or unbelief, because if we allow others unbelief, we have to allow ourselves unbelief.  If we allow others despair, we realize that we ourselves could also despair.”

Simply being present means we must listen, not presume.  We need to listen to, feel, and hear the stories of hurting people- then take a deep breath before we speak a word.  Matt emphasizes that we must struggle to understand “what we would need if their story were our story.”

Today’s question: What friends have helped you by simply being present following your ministry downsizing or vocation loss?  Please share.

Tomorrow’s blog: “Redemption”

Simply being present

Every falling tear

David a year before failed Rice Krispies/orange juice experiment.

“When we can’t bottle our tears up anymore, God catches every one in His bottle.  God’s catching every falling tear because He won’t let us fall apart.”- Ann Voskamp

“You keep track of all my sorrows.  You have collected all my tears in your bottle.  You have recorded each one in your book.”- Psalm 56:8 (New Living Translation)

There must be a chemistry gene in the Henning family DNA.  My father, William, participated in his high school chemistry club and worked many years testing corrosion inhibitors.  While at Luther South, I took chemistry plus an advanced chemistry elective.  My fascination with chemistry, however, began much earlier- at age three.

One morning I was sitting in my high chair with my breakfast of Rice Krispies and orange juice.  I developed a hypothesis to make my breakfast more efficient and create a new taste sensation- combining the Rice Krispies (in milk) with orange juice!  The results were  catastrophic!  Unbottled tears followed.  I refused to eat my combination.  Mom was not amused.  She refrigerated my mushy concoction for consumption at dinner.

I dined in solitary confinement, the only illumination coming from the stove light.

Mark Batterson writes in The Circle Maker that each and every one of your teardrops is precious to God.  He keeps track of every one.  God remembers, honors, and collects each teardrop.  In much the same way, God collects your prayers.  Each one is precious to Him and sealed by Him.  Noted British Particular Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892) once described tears as liquid prayers:

“Let us learn to think of tears as liquid prayers; and of weeping as a constant dropping of importunate (pressingly entreating, earnestly requesting) intercession which will wear its way right surely into the very heart of mercy, despite the stony difficulties which obstruct the way.”

Pastor Batterson emphasizes that how you get there is just as important as where you end up.  It’s true in life and it’s true in prayer- the harder the better.  Throughout your life, you won’t remember the things that came easy; you’ll remember the things that came hard.  God will provide exciting answers to long and boring prayers.  When you feel frustrated by the process, Mark encourages you to stop, drop and pray.  Meredith Andrews reminds us about every falling tear:

“He is near to the brokenhearted,

Closer still than the air you breathe,

Every tear falling in the darkness,

Jesus sees.”

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

Every falling tear

God, in real life

“God, in real life, is nothing like the God we’ve been taught about in church.”- Matt Bays

Matt Bays rivets your attention and at the same time sets the tone for Finding God in the Ruins: How God Redeems Pain with the opening sentence of his preface: “God, in real life, is nothing like the God we’ve been taught about in church.”  Or, as Jeff Manion (The Land Between) wrote in reference to the Israelites wandering in the wilderness: “They had known about God’s faithfulness in theory, but now they would be called upon to know through experience.”

Matt observes that anyone who has experienced pain or devastating loss knows that in the immediate moments- as well as the terrible aftermath- of that horrific experience “hell often feels more powerful than heaven.”  Pastor Bays explains how suffering and doubt are necessary components of faith:

“What if our sufferings and doubt are necessary components- or even the very essence of faith?  [I] was told to be careful, that my questions could drive me away from my faith altogether.  Doubt is a part of life, and our faith can be strengthened when we increase our understanding of who God really is by allowing ourselves to ask the difficult questions.”

Matt has written Finding God in the Ruins so that he can come alongside you in your troubles.  He ends his preface with this encouragement:

“Together, I want to see if we might find God sitting in the ruins of our lives, shaking his head, same as us, over all that has happened.”

Today’s question: Following your ministry downsizing or vocation loss, how has experiencing “God, in real life” strengthened your faith?  Please share.

Coming Monday: the new Short Meditation, “Every falling tear”

Tomorrow’s blog: “Simply being present”

God, in real life

How to Forgive

How to Forgive (Harvest House, 2007)

June Hunt, founder and CEO of Hope For The Heart- a worldwide biblical counseling ministry- wrote How to Forgive . . . When You Don’t Feel Like It in 2007.  When June first became a Christian while in her teens, she discovered God had one standard or commandment: love one another and even love your enemies.  In other words, hate no one.  Ms. Hunt emphasizes that God does not set aside that standard based on any one person’s specific situation.  There are no exceptions.  Those who don’t grasp this true meaning of forgiveness live with embedded bitterness.  Forgiveness, then, is not something we can accomplish with our own strength.  Forgiveness is supernatural.  We need Christ’s strength.

June states that “learning to forgive is nothing short of learning to think like God.”  As we learn to think like God, we renew our minds.  Without a proper understanding of God’s unconditional forgiveness, Ms. Hunt believes, it is almost impossible to forgive someone who has deeply hurt us.  Although forgiveness begins with pain, June underscores the idea that “pain should never stand in the way of forgiveness.”  Therefore, it is unproductive and unwise to hold God responsible for our pain.  Blaming God looks back and places the focus on our pain.  Trusting God, in contrast, looks forward and focuses on His plan.

Within God’s will, suffering has a purpose.  June stresses that our understanding of forgiveness must being with this truth: “By God’s design, you are the master of your mind  (italics author’s).”  Thinking and acting like God are necessary to sustain you throughout the process of complete forgiveness.  The process of complete forgiveness consists of four stages: facing the offense, feeling the offense, forgiving the offense, and finding oneness.  Deep wounds must heal from the inside out.  Forgiveness, then, is not a single event.  Forgiveness is a way of life.

Forgiveness is a gift.  When you forgive, you are blessed in giving that gift- whether or not your offender or wounder is willing to receive it.  Ms. Hunt comes back to her central theme:

“The primary reason God wants us to forgive is because forgiveness sets us free to be all He designed us to be.”

Forgiveness is powerful, purposeful, and pervasive.  It produces a change of heart.  You get yourself back.

 

How to Forgive

A change of heart

“But by forgiving . . . I had a change of heart- I got myself back.”- Raul

June Hunt discusses the lasts four benefits experienced when we forgive as she concludes Chapter 13 of How to Forgive.

2.  Forgiveness brings improved potential.  Ms. Hunt states forgiveness has the power to set you free from the prisons of bitterness, anger, and revenge.  Forgiveness frees you to pursue your life with renewed passion and purpose.  You get yourself back.  June summarizes:

“Energy spent on anger and revenge is energy lost.  Forgiveness reclaims that energy and redirects it to make your life better than ever.”

3.  Forgiveness leads to greater Christlikeness.  Allow the Holy Spirit to produce His fruit in you- joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-25).

4.  Forgiveness points others to God.  Forgiveness is never the same when you experience it (in practice) for yourself.  Forgiveness will never again be theoretical.

5.  Forgiveness brings change to the world.  June beautifully explains this transformation:

“True forgiveness always begins in the privacy of a wounded heart as unseen yieldedness to God.  . . . The smallest act of forgiveness radiates outward, like ripples in a pond, and can change the destructive course of families, churches, communities, and even whole societies.”

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. understood forgiveness was far more than a political strategy.  In his book Strength to Love, Dr. King wrote:

“We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive.  Whoever is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love . . .”

Today’s question: Which benefit(s) of forgiving had the most impact on you?  Please share.

Coming Monday: the new Short Meditation, “Every falling tear”

Tomorrow’s blog: the latest addition to the Annotated Bibliography, How to Forgive

A change of heart