Have you ever spoken to your soul? Yes, I know it seems a bit strange at first, but lets think about this for a second.

From the moment God created us, we know that we have been more than just mere physical beings. We have longings, cravings, and innate intuitions that point to something outside of us. Rather, these things point to someone. That someone is God, and he created you to be a worshipper.

Yet, we all know that there are times that we don’t want to worship God. We drag our tired, broken bodies into the world, say the right words and sing the right songs, but our souls are cast down. Our internal fight condemns us, and turns us into walking contradictions of depression and anxiety.

This is where the speaking to the soul comes in. Martyn Lloyd-Jones expounds on this idea:

Have you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself? Take those thoughts that come to you the moment you wake up in the morning. You have not originated them but they are talking to you, they bring back the problems of yesterday, etc. Somebody is talking. Who is talking to you? Your self is talking to you. Now this man’s treatment [in Psalm 42] was this: instead of allowing this self to talk to him, he starts talking to himself. “Why art thou cast down, O my soul?” he asks. His soul had been depressing him, crushing him. So he stands up and says, “Self, listen for moment, I will speak to you.”

Rend Collective, a joyful band of Irish men and women, recently released an album called Campfire. The record starts off with a song called Come On in which the band continually tells the soul where it is to look now.

Come on, my soul! Let down the walls! [Read more...]

No one is more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do. How well are you counseling yourself?  In this short post from his blog, Wednesday’s Word, Paul David Tripp reminds us of the power of the internal conversations we will have today. He challenges us to talk to ourselves in ways that are consistent with Gospel truth and grace. If we do, our circumstances may not change, but our unhappiness will:

You are in an unending conversation with yourself. You are talking to yourself all the time, interpreting, organizing, and analyzing what’s going on inside you and around you. You may be talking to yourself about why you feel so tired. Or maybe you woke up this morning with a sense of dread and you aren’t sure why. Maybe your mind has traveled back to your distant past and, for reasons you don’t understand, you’re recalling events from your early childhood.

Perhaps you were surprised by how angry you got at the remark of that coworker. Or maybe you’re rehearsing to yourself your schedule for the day. Perhaps you are reliving a conversation that didn’t go too well. The point is that you are constantly involved in an internal conversation that greatly influences the things you decide, say, and do.

What do you regularly tell yourself about yourself, God, and your circumstances? Do your words to yourself encourage faith, hope, and courage? Or do they stimulate doubt, discouragement, and fear? Do you remind yourself that God is near, or do you reason within yourself that, given your circumstances, he must be distant?

Here’s the question: how wholesome, faith-driven, and Christ-centered is the conversation that you have with yourself every day? Do you remind yourself of your need? Do you point yourself once again to the beauty and practicality of God’s grace? Do you tell yourself to run toward him in those moments when you feel like running from him?

No one is more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do. How well are you counseling yourself? Reach out for help one more time today. Confess that you don’t counsel yourself very well, and rest in the rescuing grace of the One who is called Wonderful Counselor.

Do you agree [Read more...]

I have been to Las Vegas several times. When I returned my friends would ask, How was your trip to Vegas? Before I could answer they would say the famous line, What Happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas! Then I would disagree and say, No–what happens in Vegas never happened. I would always get a laugh and a nod of approval.

Las Vegas now has new slogan: Know The Code. The ads portray a gal who goes to Vegas with her girlfriends and posts pictures on Facebook of their first night out. Here it is:

The rest of the trip she is ignored by her friends. Why? She has broken the code. If Vegas is so great, why is no one aloud to share or tell anyone about it?

When I started following Jesus my desire to go Vegas began to wear off. He put a new desire in my heart–to tell everyone about Him. Each of the Gospels ends the same way–with a command from Jesus to tell the world about Him.

Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. -Mark 16:15

Now this is the opposite of Know the Code. This news [Read more...]

So I was driving past a gas station and saw man in a wheelchair pumping gas into his handicap-accessible van. I’m sure this happens everyday but I guess I live under a rock because I had never seen this before.

It dawned on me that I would like to speak with him. So I wheeled around and headed back. But by the time I arrived at the pump he was gone. That’s when I had an imaginary conversation with him in my head. It went something like this:

Me:             Nice van.

Him:          Gets me around.

Me:             I noticed you pumping gas and wondered if I could ask you a question.

Him:          Shoot.

Me:             Do you feel dependent or independent?

Him:          What?

Me:             It seems like you are fairly independent. Considering.

Him:          Do you think I’m more independent than you? [Read more...]

Dawn leaked through the mini blinds inside the hospital window. The pastel walls looked gray in this light. Like my mood.

My eyes scanned the dry erase board. The “Today Is” date was two days old, again. When I’d first noticed this two weeks ago, my mind had screamed to my limbs to get up and fix it, to make a simple correction. Now, I was getting used to the idea that I could not walk. I still wanted to tell my nurse to fix it, my mind not yet accepting that I could not talk.

In a couple of hours, my wife would be here. Thank goodness. These days were awkward to say the least. She’d enter the room with a burst of energy, hoping to see overnight improvement in my condition. She’d disguise her disappointment when none was evident. She’d update me on the news in the neighborhood. She’d stare at her phone and read me emails and texts from our kids. After thirty minutes or so she’d wear down and human silence would settle in the room once again, leaving only the blips and bleeps of the monitors.

I remembered writing a blog post years earlier in which I’d commented about talking and reading to my mom as she lay unable to speak or move in her hospital bed. Years before that, I would read short stories to my dad when he was immobile after his strokes. Now it was my turn. My spirit cried out to the Lord to deliver me, but nothing seemed to be changing. At times, I could hear the doctors talking with my wife in hushed tones outside the room. I was glad I could not hear their reports.

At noon, my wife would open her Bible to the list of Scriptures I’d written down after my mom died. I’d been a little cryptic, labeling the envelope, In case I can’t talk to you someday. I was glad I had prepared for this. Each would begin with these sweet words of eternal truth:

You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. . . You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me; your right hand will hold me fast . . . all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

Including this one, I’d think.

On and on she would read, sometimes two hours or more. God’s words, living and active, would refresh [Read more...]

My dad had a first cousin who lost his house in a poker game back in the 60’s. He moved his wife and six kids into the projects, got a new job, bought another house. And then lost that house in a poker game.

My dad was not a proponent of gambling.

That story takes the cake but this one from DeathandTaxes.com caught my attention:

Henry Gribbohm went to a carnival in Manchester, New Hampshire over the weekend and spent his entire life savings trying to win his kids a prize.

No, that is not the premise for an unearthed J.D. Salinger novel. It is an actual occurrence that occurred recently, according to multiple news sources. Mister Gribbohn was trying to win his kids an Xbox Kinect by winning at a $5 carnival game where you toss balls into a tub. He kept missing, and soon had spent $300. He then apparently went home and got $2,300 more. He then apparently lost all that money, too.

Seemingly blind with rage due to his poor luck and bad decision making skills, Gribbohm returned the next day to confront the owners of the stall, [Read more...]

It’s from Steve Dewitt’s blog called, It’s All About Him

Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. (1 John 3:2-3 ESV)

Theologians call this “the beatific vision.” We will call it the greatest moment of our lives—to see Christ as he is; not as he was. Not in the weakness of his earthly ministry. Not in the weakness of his sufferings and crucifixion. Certainly not in the weakness of his death. We will not see his glory cloaked as it was during his earthly ministry when God walked among us but looked like any average Joe. Thousands “saw” him with their own eyes and they were not changed by that vision. Jesus’ glory was cloaked. It was stealth glory. Off the radar. His true identity was hidden. The demons knew who he was and cried out, I know who you are—the Holy One of God! (Mark 1:24). Everyone else missed it. Certainly the Pharisees did. The crowds got glimpses through his miracles. His disciples came the closest to seeing it during what is called Jesus’ transfiguration:

And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. (Matthew 17:1-2)

For a few moments, Jesus uncloaked his true glory. It emanated from him like the sun shining in its full strength. No movie effect can come close because that light is not simply light, it is holiness and power and divine authority. The glorious Son of God. The effect on the disciples was terror at the sight of him.

His glory remained cloaked until he ascended to heaven. What is he like now? The Apostle John saw him and described him this way:

Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. (Revelation 1:12-16)

This Jesus. This fully glorious Son of God. It is he who is returning and when he does, we shall see him as he is. With our eyes. He will be visible; physical. He will return. We will see him as he is. All he is. All his glory. Some will shrink in fear. But if we abide, if we remain true, we can and will have confidence in that moment for he is our Savior and Lord.

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