Love Archives : Page 2 of 5 : Life with the King

November 6, 2025November 6, 2025

Fear and Love

If you’re anything like me, it’s easy for us to leap to conclusions. Something, could be anything, irritates, frustrates, or seems to cross a line, and before we know it, we’re either withdrawing or arguing about how wronged we feel. A calm, back-and-forth conversation with a lot of listening and wisdom feels impossible; we’re totally triggered. After about twenty minutes our brains start to calm down enough to better perceive the reality of the “threat.” Sound familiar? What is a threat to you?

For me, tone is a big one. If someone says something to me in a tone that I perceive is irritated with me, I tend to take it extremely personally. I get offended. I shut down. While I want to be like Christ and follow His example of patience and grace for both myself and the other person, in these moments I feel about the furthest from Christlikeness that I can get. I often leap to a conclusion that involves fear.

I’ve described this reaction as a “quick to jump to control,” and thankfully for us, the Bible is full of examples of people who also made this leap out of a place of fear, yet received God’s grace and love nonetheless.

A well-known example is Peter, and the account of him walking on water. In Matthew 14, Jesus walks on water toward the disciples’ boat, and the disciples “cried out in fear” (verse 16), thinking He was a ghost. “But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.’ And Peter answered him, ‘Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.^‘He said, ‘Come.’ So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, ‘Lord, save me.’Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him, saying to him, ‘O you of little faith, why did you doubt?’” (Matthew 14:27-31). Peter let fear dampen his faith in Jesus’ trustworthiness.

Where are our hearts? God cares about our hearts, and like Peter’s story shows us, He cares about how much faith our hearts have in Him. The first and greatest commandment according to Jesus is to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deuteronomy 6:5, see also Mark 12:29-30). Do we have connection with our hearts and do they come from a place of love for people and for God? To love takes selflessness. God is faithful to work in us and to help us love Him so that we may obey this command.

I’ve been convicted and challenged by the verse, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love” (1 John 4:18). I’ve also been greatly comforted by it. God is in the business of perfecting His people in love. Even Peter, who walked with Jesus experienced fear. Jesus was faithful to teach Peter with patience how to trust and not doubt, how to love and not choose fear.

In my frustrations with falling into fear and struggling to love like Jesus, I’m reminded that Jesus paid the price on the cross already for this lack in me. My weakness is not a problem for Jesus. My fear holds nothing that He’s not already overcome. In Acts 7, Stephen, a man “of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom” (Acts 6:3) as appointed by the twelve apostles, rebuked those who misunderstood Jesus’ teaching as a threat, and told them point blank, “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you” (Acts 7:51).

I want to be like Stephen, praying for wisdom and the filling of the Spirit, but I know there are many times I am sorely lacking. More often I’m like the people Stephen speaks to, the ones who are triggered, outraged, stuck in rigid control, and oblivious to the work of the Holy Spirit. In these moments again, while we are still sinners (Romans 5:8), Jesus invites us to surrender to Him, for we don’t have power to change our own hearts. All we can do is be willing (see post Nothing But Willingness) and open to let God work on our hearts and trust that He has and is and will perfect us in love.

It is out of His great love for us that Jesus has already paid the debt to allow us to let go of fear and walk in His love, trusting God and caring for people. We are covered by the blood of Jesus. Our lives are entirely in His hands, and we are safe there. We are alive in Jesus Christ forever and ever.

May we let go of fear and love God with all we are. Amen.

“and said, “O Lord, God of Israel, there is no God like you, in heaven above or on earth beneath, keeping covenant and showing steadfast love to your servants who walk before you with all their heart;” (1 Kings 8:23).

Thank you for spending some of your time journeying with me. If you haven’t yet, please subscribe to Life with the King, and like & follow the Facebook page; it truly helps me continue writing this blog. Grace and peace.

October 30, 2025October 30, 2025

God’s Help

Is it hard for you to accept help too, or is it just me? It can be very difficult for me to accept help from people and from God. Pride can get in the way so easily, and that’s especially when the way of the world can seem more important than the Way of Jesus. However, it’s fundamental to Christian faith to be able to accept help and grace from Jesus, and from His people. Even when I believed they couldn’t help. Even when I felt it looked weak. For some of us, it’s not as easy as it sounds to accept help.

“I hope you have looked to God to help you with all of these things.” When I was 14, I wrote that in a letter to my “40-something” self. I pulled it out of dust today, and while I’m not quite 40 yet, that letter reminded me of how much God has taught me this past year about how to let Him help me. Even at 14, I knew it was a struggle for me. I was used to walking in the opposite direction of God for help, trying to help my own self, thank you so much. I wouldn’t have admitted that, though. But, revelation comes when we are ready to see it. God is so mercifully patient with us that way.

I was lost in the way of the world and couldn’t stop going the wrong way, like running on a treadmill with a broken emergency brake. But I didn’t know how to fix it. I needed help. God helped me first by letting me break all the way down. To the point where I couldn’t help myself even if and when I tried. “My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Psalm 121:2). It was humbling, but it was the lesson I needed. We can’t humble or transform our own hearts, we need Jesus to do that.

Part of me will probably always be prone to being tempted to earn things for myself; I think that’s normal for us human beings. But God has been faithfully teaching me a new Way, a Way of freedom from sin, including the pride that kept me from accepting help. My letter showed me that my 14-year-old self was longing for it and I’m grateful that I’m finally starting to learn. And God is faithful to teach you too. He never gives up on us, not even after many, many years. It’s His kindness that leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4). So now, though I’m sure I’ll mess up again, because hi, human, I’m looking to Him more than ever to live a life aligned with the Truth: that it is only by God’s help that we have every breath and blessing.

May we all learn to rest in the Truth of God’s help, aware of how completely we depend on Him for all we need. Amen.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:1-2).

The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore (Psalm 121:8).

October 9, 2025October 9, 2025

I Lack Nothing

There is nothing better than a fresh revelation of God’s love. It makes me feel like I’m invincible, like I’m free from the limitations of being a human in time, and like the things life throws at me that usually bring me down or make me spiral now just make me laugh at how much I was once affected by them. That’s what happened for me last weekend during a silent retreat.

I wrote about the practice of silence in my recent post, TSD: Silence. While I spent some of the time on the retreat in silence with others, the most impactful time for me was actually a time of revelation of God’s love through Scripture. I’ve studied Psalm 23 many times over the years and it amazes me how it continues to reveal new things. While it is such a short passage with only six verses, like all Scripture, it still lives, breathes, and speaks profoundly in the present moment. Verse one reads, “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.” (NIV)

“I lack nothing” is such a foreign phrase in society. We’re constantly reminded with ads and inflation just how much we (allegedly) lack on every level: health, experiences, and possessions. To say “I lack nothing” is a bold statement, and even something that could be taken as delusional or offensive by the world’s standards. David likely wrote this statement while in the wilderness fleeing from the danger of being killed. It begs the question, what standard is being used to confidently say something so outrageous?

Upon further reflection, I noticed I’d let this bold phrase overshadow what came before it, “The Lord is my shepherd.” What stood out to me was the possessive word, “my,” and that the sheep (narrator) claims the shepherd as his, rather than the shepherd claiming the sheep. If God is our shepherd, then we truly lack nothing of eternal value. Jesus says in Matthew 13:44, “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” Living by God’s direction and influence is better than having all the things the world measures our value by; it is worth everything. True wealth is belonging to God and being led by Him as our Good Shepherd.

But it goes further and deeper, still. Not only can we claim God as ours as David did in Psalm 23, but God also calls us His. Psalm 23 implies that we belong with and to God, assuring a place in His own house for us (verse 6). Other Scriptures speak of this profound, protectively possessive love: “But now thus says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine” (Isaiah 43:1). We are never too far gone for God; He formed our bodies and souls, and there is nothing that can keep His love from us (Romans 8:38-39). During my retreat time, the identity and inheritance God gave not just David or Israel, but to me (and to you) as well became so glaringly clear where things had felt muddled and a bit hazy before.

Perhaps the most beautiful and thought-provoking passage of God’s love for me and you is, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine; . . .” (Song of Songs 6:3). In line with the possessive love expressed in other Scriptures, not only is God’s love protective and fatherly, it also speaks of partnership. After all, Jesus is coming for His bride. That is where all of our stories are headed. Jesus has already sacrificed His life out of love for her, the church, of which you and me can choose to be a part.

We are not merely slaves or servants of God, but He graciously invites us to also be partners with Him in the Kingdom. He desires to work with us. He subjects Himself to us, telling us in Scripture that He is ours, even though we are the ones who don’t even deserve to be His lowest servants. Where can love like this be found on earth other than Jesus? There is real Life with the King.

Psalm 23 verse 6 says, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” We can have confidence of living in the shepherd’s own house, not as a slave or servant, but as the beloved of God, the church, belonging to God’s own family. What a privilege is offered to us to be adopted as His family, “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,” (John 1:12). God has a place for His children in His house forever! He invites us to this, because whether we recognize it or not, He is ours and we are His. What better news could there be? What else could we need in light of eternity? In the care of our shepherd, we truly lack nothing. Amen.

“And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying,

‘To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb
be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!‘” (Revelation 5:13)

October 2, 2025October 2, 2025

Lilacs in October

If you’ve read my post The Intimate Love of God, you’ll know how much I love flowers. To me, they have a kind of magical quality, a beauty that speaks to the beauty of heaven. So maybe it won’t surprise you too much to know that autumn is not my favorite season.

This week, however, something amazing happened–the lilac bushes in the area bloomed again. Typically only lasting a few weeks in spring, lilacs have one of my favorite scents. Upon walking outside in early October, I can suddenly smell the springlike, floral scent that the tiny clusters of light purple blooms are now wafting through the cool autumn air. For me, it’s a kind of small miracle.

Flowers typically signal spring, a time for singing in creation, “for behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone.The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land” (Song of Solomon 2:11-12). To see spring flowers now, when creation is starting to show signs of fading for the colder months, was such a surprising encouragement for me, whose favorite season is spring (surprised?). It reminded me that God sees us and knows exactly what will delight us, and He uses that to speak to us uniquely.

Have you ever been surprised by an image or a symbol with special meaning to you and felt God nudging you? Sometimes He uses these simple everyday things to give us encouragement to keep going, or a moment of relief in a time of stress. If you haven’t, or it’s been a while, remember He is always speaking to you, and He never stops. He won’t ever stop trying to get your attention. Sometimes all we need is a reminder to notice His nudge in our hearts.

Let this encourage you to watch and listen for God. Amid the noise around us, God knows what means the most to us and speaks to us in a language that only you share with Him. He can use not only images and symbols but emotions, Scriptures, and other people’s words too. It is up to us to notice. It is up to us to appreciate how God relates to us and to grow in our relationship with Him.

So let this be a reminder to stop and literally smell the lilacs, in whatever form they take for you in your own life. God is waiting to delight you in His deep, specific knowledge of and love for you.

“All the earth worships you and sings praises to you; they sing praises to your name” (Psalm 66:4).

September 18, 2025September 18, 2025

The Joy of the Lord is Your Strength

My first blog of 2025 was back in early June, when I wrote about driving. In Jesus’ Kingdom vs my kingdom, right at the beginning of this beautiful Maryland summer, I rejoiced in the ability to drive again, in being healed. And while that is still true, I want to confess to you that my anxiety symptoms still do flare up from time to time. In the last month I’ve struggled with them. I wanted to be honest with you to say that if you also struggle sometimes, that doesn’t mean God hasn’t healed you.

I have been starting to see the gift in the struggle. Instead of seeing flare ups as set backs, I’ve started to see them as opportunities for simply surrendering the struggle to God once again, whether it be for the 5th or 500th time of the day. Yesterday, while driving one of the most challenging routes I’ve attempted, I experienced something different in the struggle–joy.

When I felt that difference, the verse “…the joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10) popped into my mind. I experienced, for the first time in my memory, the pure joy and strength that comes from leaning into relationship with God in the midst of a moment of fear. I saw in that moment that leaning on His strength made my connection with Him stronger too in that moment, and I could experience His presence. Feeling anxiety wasn’t making me less worthy of Him or proving that I wasn’t healed, but instead it was teaching me how to connect to Him and trust Him more deeply.

God is calling us all into deeper relationship with Him. He can use anything to call us, perhaps especially the things we struggle with the most. For me, I just needed to see the fear as another way I could experience an expression of His love, instead of seeing it as some form of punishment.

In the context of Nehemiah 8, and in Psalm 20, God shows Himself to be strong for those of His people who find joy in Him. Psalm 20:5-6 says, “May we shout for joy over your salvation, and in the name of our God set up our banners! May the Lord fulfill all your petitions! Now I know that the Lord saves his anointed; he will answer him from his holy heaven with the saving might of his right hand.” I think a big mistake we tend to make is to think we are strong enough. If we just try hard enough, we think we can save ourselves. But we can’t, and we’re not supposed to.

We’re designed to lean on and trust God as we encounter struggle. We’re not supposed to chalk it up as shameful until we feel better about ourselves and try to face a challenge again. I pray this cycle that I was in doesn’t continue, and that you, friends, steer clear of it. Seeing it as the trap it is, and experiencing joy and strength from Him was all I needed to get through the anxiety I felt.

In that moment of experiencing joy, suddenly, the anxiety dissipated, and driving was no big deal again. Seeing the truth of God’s design for close relationship with Him makes the discomfort less mysterious. Our struggles are not the end, even though they may feel that way in the moment. We can taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8), and He won’t leave us to struggle alone. His desire is to heal us, and we are healed in His Presence. He’ll never stop wanting that for us, or inviting us to relate to Him more. May He use both the struggle and the joy in our lives for His glory. Amen.

“As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20).

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows” (Psalm 23:5).

“Sing aloud to God our strength; shout for joy to the God of Jacob!” (Psalm 81:1)

September 4, 2025September 4, 2025

From Death to Life

Self acceptance was never my strong suit. I focused much of my attention all my life on being “better;” self improvement was my favorite genre. Perfectionism ruled and ruined me. I knew I could never be perfect, but my actions told a different story. While I achieved, I was never content. I wanted to be better than I am at everything I cared about, like dance, academics, and yes, following Jesus.

When the initial passion wore off and these things inevitably became a box to check off my list, I’d get down on myself all the more. Sometimes I’d double down, sometimes I’d quit for months. The concept of following Jesus, living in close, trusting relationship with God, sounded great. I wanted to love God more than anything, and failed over and over. But perfectionism, or even self improvement, is fruitless when God isn’t asking it of us. It took time for me to learn that God really doesn’t expect us to be perfect.

I heard a line in a sermon recently that has been ringing True ever since: “Jesus didn’t come to make good people better, He came to make dead people alive.” All this pressure I tend to put on myself to be “better,” it is not the business of Jesus. He makes our souls, once dead to the bondage of sin, alive. There is so much to rejoice in with that! The Psalmist wrote, “For you have delivered my soul from death, yes, my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of life” (Psalm 56:13). That Jesus delivers us from death is worth meditating on, rather than our faults and shortcomings. Rather than my worrying about being “better,” I realized it was far better to focus on what Jesus has already done.

Jesus brought several people from literal death to life, including Jairus’ daughter (Mark 5:22-43; Luke 8:41-56), and Lazarus (John 11:14-44). But His legitimacy as the Son of God and the legitimacy of everything He said during His three years of ministry was confirmed when He Himself died and came back to life. “He [Jesus] presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God” (Acts 1:3). Those who saw Jesus alive after He had died on the cross then later risked their lives to tell others what they had witnessed.

Today, Jesus is in the business of bringing people dead in sin (and soul) to life. He brings people like me and you back from this death every day. I was dead in bondage to sin, which kept me tied to striving, perfectionism, and self criticism. But Jesus made a way for me off of that road of self destruction and on a path with Him and for Him in the “light of life.” We still need to take up our cross daily (Matthew 16:24, Luke 9:23) to follow Jesus, but He set us free from death when He rose from the dead. That’s the good news. And we’re not just free, either, but victorious over death with Jesus. He shares His victorious life with us.

Halleluiah, Jesus is alive, and because of Him and His love for us, so are we!

“He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you” (Matthew 28:6-7).

August 14, 2025September 11, 2025

Getting What You Pray For

We expect to get what we pay for. But what about what we pray for? I’ve questioned if something I am praying for is really God’s will, but many times I actively tried not to think about it that way and just prayed for what I wanted or needed. Knowing what God wanted seemed far too mysterious, and was something I would ignore out of frustration. I had no idea how to tell or how to walk in step with God’s will when it came to my everyday life, and it seemed like an impossible ask, and task.

Lately, I’ve come to understand this differently, in a way that removed so much more of the mystery than I ever thought possible.

Praying for My Will

The needs and wants that come up hourly in my own life and in the lives of those close to me seem infinite in number. There are needs to be met at every turn for every person, and it doesn’t take long to realize that we ourselves aren’t equipped to fill them all. We need God every day, hour, and minute. It is natural to have a need or want and pray for it to happen. It’s what I was taught to do, and there’s a good place for it. As an example, for many years I prayed that I would be able to go to bed and actually fall asleep earlier.

But as much as I wouldn’t have believed it or wanted to hear it, I didn’t know what I actually needed or wanted. I didn’t understand how God designed us first for relationship with Him and how much in our lives is a result of this Truth. I knew the sleep trouble indicated a misalignment somewhere in my life, but I didn’t realize that staying up too late was actually a symptom of not prioritizing my relationship with Jesus, or how He was calling me to live. I had prayed for the symptom, but completely missed the root cause.

God’s Restoration

Once I saw the connection of everything to my relationship with Jesus, things didn’t feel so complicated. I simply had to run to Him. I’ve had to learn many things “the hard way,” by not getting what I pray for. Those prayers weren’t focused on what was best in the long run, but what I thought would be good in the present. But God has worked in my heart to restore what I thought at one time was broken trust. God began a needed work of restoration in me that I couldn’t accomplish on my own. I prayed for it, and this time, He answered. He showed me that His will truly is what is best in the long run. Scripture clearly shows time and time again that it is God’s will to restore connection with the hearts that humbly bring themselves to Him. It’s who He is, part of His loving and faithful character. He will restore connection with us whenever we earnestly ask for it, because that is His will.

In this restoration of connection, God transformed my heart. He helped me see how things I believe, say, or do, especially when related to myself, affect my relationship with Him. He showed me through His Word and Spirit that relationship with Him is the most precious and important thing, both to me and to Him. His will is always barrier-free relationship with each one of us. Instead of simply praying for temporal improvements, I began to ask, does this affect my relationship with God? That question has changed everything.

He doesn’t want anything to come between Himself and me or you; He is faithful to help us keep our connection strong when we ask. Through His transformative work in my heart, I came to know that prayers aligned with restoring and keeping and growing trusting, relational connection with us will be answered. It has led to even deeper prayer, with a profound sense of knowing that God has already supplied every real need (Philippians 4:19), before we even ask!

Praying for God’s Will

I mentioned earlier about praying for perceived needs according to what we want or will. But things can get more complicated than that. What if it’s God’s will that a need remains unmet right now? What if His greater plan involves that need going unmet?

Jesus gave us an amazing example of praying for God’s will in the garden of Gethsemane, “And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, saying, ‘Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done‘” (Luke 22:41-42). He knew the Father’s will, but in this prayer He lets the Father know His own will, which is quite opposite. But then, Jesus says something really extraordinary. Jesus displays ultimate humility, knowing and acknowledging that God’s will is sovereign. No matter how much Jesus’ own will tried to resist against it, He had decided long before praying that prayer that God’s will would always be His choice because of His trusting relationship with Him. He had no doubt about the Father’s character of ultimate love and goodness toward Him.

I believe God is inviting us today to decide, like Jesus had done, that He is sovereign in our lives, to humble ourselves in trust, and to choose relationship with Him over our own will. God’s will is restored relationship with Him, and in that place of safety there is freedom and life to be found, sweeter than any life we could attempt to build from our own will.

When we pray for God’s will, we get what we pray for. It may not be immediate, or the way we expect, but restored and strengthened relationship with God is where all this, His plan, is heading. God is faithful and trustworthy to fulfill His will. May His will be done!

“For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother” (Mark 3:35).

“If anyone’s will is to do God’s will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority” (John 7:17).

“And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God” (Romans 8:27).

August 7, 2025August 7, 2025

Sanctification and Fruitfulness

This year, I’ve visited more farms than I can remember visiting in any previous summer. I’ve picked strawberries, peaches, and flowers. I’ve smelled the Maryland tomatoes and cantaloupes piled high in farmer’s market bins. I’ve felt the sun more than I have since I was in middle school. It’s been healing.

Stale, work computer-charged air a distant memory, I’ve been appreciating the delight of abundance this harvest season. The earth’s harvest is very symbolic in Scripture; it has so much to teach us, especially if, like me, you’ve had to adapt to measuring time by email deadlines rather than by the seasons of Creation.

The harvest season comes with a lot of opportunity to connect with God and each other. As summer yields the crop for the year, seeing the abundance of God’s provision has given me a childlike wonder and delight. A single fruit tree bearing incredible quantities of fruit in just one season has been quite a sight to behold on the farm.

I’ve been longing for the ability to make my own life fruitful to live in the beautiful ways Scripture says is possible (eg: John 15:5, Galatians 5:16-25). But I often feel sorely lacking, and in a season not of abundance but of drought. I’ve been reading about and longing for sanctification and frustrated by its slow, and at times painful, progress that takes a long time to yield fruit and a lifetime to be completed. Sanctification is hard to define, but it involves seeing the Truth to the point of no longer being deceived by selfish desires or goals to find fulfillment, and dedication to serving God and doing His will, instead of my own. This is foolishness to the world of email deadlines, profit margins, and fiscal year spreadsheets that I was entangled with for years, and the process of detangling has been a wild one.

Like the wheat and weeds grow up together, people who love Jesus grow here in the world along with everyone else and everything else (Matthew 13:24-30). Followers of Jesus are not to be removed, but to remain in the world and be an influence for good. Jesus prayed for His followers in His high priestly prayer before His arrest, “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it” (John 17:15-16) (NIV). The answer to sanctification is not shutting out all of the entanglements, temptations, and evil and hope that that makes us good enough people. We can’t escape the world, nor does God want us to. What makes us able to be fruitful among it all is utter devotion to and dependence on Jesus and His sanctifying work in our hearts.

Jesus continues His prayer, “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified” (John 17:17-19) (NIV). Jesus prayed for our sanctification. Sanctification involves abiding in Jesus. Abiding, like sanctification, is ongoing, not bound by time at all. We all live in the tension of waiting for the fullness of God’s provision and work in us. It isn’t something I can achieve or be rewarded with. It’s something I simply need to allow. Simple, yet, at least for me, incredibly difficult.

It’s worth it though, because sanctification leads to our lives bearing good fruit. As we allow God by the Holy Spirit (Romans 15:16, 1 Corinthians 6:11) to work in and sanctify us, we grow and mature. We are transformed by Him in holiness, or moral purity in our attitudes, thoughts, and actions. I’ve witnessed this change in people, and it’s simply miraculous.

The fruit that comes as a result of sanctification is loving people as God loves us, living with joy, walking in peace, caring with patience, bearing with others in kindness, and so on (Galatians 5:22-23). Sanctification involves our hearts, minds, and spirits coming to a place that no longer gives in to anything that blocks us from abiding in Him. And again, we’re on a lifelong journey to be sanctified. God is faithful to sanctify His people, even though it may feel slow and painful and impossible at times. This season of abundant, fruitful harvest reminds me of this hope for my own life.

There’s nothing we can do to earn sanctification or speed it up or work toward it. The work is allowing and completely depending on God to do the work that is needed in us, and having faith that He is, has been, and will be working. May God help us on the days we resist His work, and may our lives bear fruit as we allow Him to work through us. Amen.

“Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it” (1 Thessalonians 5:23-24).

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2).

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9).

July 31, 2025July 31, 2025

Take Heart

I hadn’t watched the news in a long time until yesterday. I don’t have regular TV and haven’t missed it. Horrors in the region, the state, the country, and the world all neatly packed into 2-minute segments, just long enough to instill a sense of fear or dread or can’t-miss-the-update-we’ll-oh-so-conveniently-bring-you-at-5. The world is full of stories, and now we know them whether we want to or not. Having peace in our hearts and minds is what we need to thrive, create, and learn new things. In such an environment, how do we have peace?

Thankfully, Jesus shows us how to break bad news to people we care about, without compromising their peace. In John 16, before His arrest, Jesus tells His disciples He’s going away, and that some scary things will happen, things they never imagined were possible. Then, in one of my favorite verses in the whole Bible, Jesus says, “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). The world and peace don’t ever seem to coincide, even 2000 years ago. Jesus isn’t telling his friends horrible things to scare them, He’s saying that no matter what comes, peace is found in Him.

Circumstances we face may be terrible, but Jesus isn’t ignorant to them. He knows about them, He is not scared by them, and He is a steady place to go when things in the world try to knock us off balance. Jesus is where we can find peace.

About 60 years after Jesus’ time, the apostle Paul wrote to the early Christian church from prison, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:11). Speaking of his imprisonment, Paul wrote to his friends with not only hopefulness but profound encouragement, “I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ” (Philippians 1:12-13). Paul knew that God was bigger than his predicament of being imprisoned, and that God hadn’t left him, evidenced clearly by the fruitfulness that came of it. You can almost hear the joy and peace in Paul’s tone when he writes, “…most of the brothers, having become confident in the Lord by my imprisonment, are much more bold to speak the word without fear” (Philippians 1:14).

Paul’s chains do not keep God from working through him, and in fact, his imprisonment may have helped the Gospel spread all the faster and more powerfully. So friends, there is no circumstance too dark or scary for God to walk with you in and work through you in. There is nothing that can separate us from His love (Romans 8:38-39).

The circumstances in the world will be difficult, yes. Oppressive, yes. Inducing of suffering, yes. But we are not left defenseless. Jesus gave us reason not to let the fear that the world can incite take over our hearts. Jesus gave us the Truth, that He has overcome the world (John 16:33). The Truth is compared in Scripture to the belt (Ephesians 6:14) in the description of the armor of God we are commanded to take up. Peace is compared to the shoes (Ephesians 6:15), needed for our sense of readiness. It is from a place of peace in Jesus that we can be ready to endure, solid as a pillar in the Truth, fully surrendered in trust that the Lord will provide all we need out of His deep and abiding love for us.

Though we will be challenged by the world daily to retreat in fear, Jesus tells us to “take heart” in the face of it all. He has overcome the world that scares, threatens, questions our identity, and challenges our faith. May we therefore take heart!

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,” (Ephesians 6:10-18).

July 3, 2025July 3, 2025

Endure Until the End

It is a heroic characteristic to endure. If we are able to have the blessing of sticking it out in this life, we endure its hardships and suffering. But movies send the misleading message that right after hardship, things immediately get better and stay that way. Reality, however, doesn’t pan out that way. Yet, because Jesus gives us hope beyond this world, we can endure, and if we have the faith, we can also trust that Jesus will make it all worth it in His Kingdom.

Jesus said of the end times, “Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved” (Matthew 24:12-12). We aren’t promised better times; in fact, we are assured that the wickedness we must endure will get progressively worse.

Love must not grow cold in us, but must be kept warm in our hearts in order to endure, and we are warned that most people will fail at this. It is love that indicates our ability to stand firm to the very end.

Love is first on the list of fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22. In my own experience, love is not possible without the help of the Holy Spirit. I am keenly aware how much my flesh opposes love, a tension I’ve wrestled hard with; the world tells us we “love” each other just fine thank you very much, but the world’s love is not God’s unselfish, uninhibited, deeply caring, unconditional, eternity-enduring LOVE. The flesh, or the desire for self-preservation and avoidance of pain, gets annoyingly in the way of that kind of love.

To die to self is the only way to let the God-given, miraculous kind of love flow through us, and to choose to live by the Spirit instead of the flesh. As far as I’ve been able to learn in my journey, to deny the flesh and live by the Spirit is what we must do to be able to endure in love until the end of this age.

On days like today, my flesh wants to enter into the world’s system and way, and fight on my own strength from a place of fear disguised as anger and a sense of rightful injustice. Today I need to work extra hard to remember the Truth–that “The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still” (Exodus 14:14). And that we are not of this world, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ,” (Philippians 3:20). We are to seek first the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33), (because isn’t that hard enough for us?), and trust that God will provide, no matter how bad things look.

A necessary disclaimer I must add here is that of course I know that there are those whom God has given the strength to work for justice in this world, even among the increase of wickedness, and they are doing good and necessary work that I admire and applaud. But anyone who works against the tide of wickedness and endure in love must be given a God-given purpose in their work, not of fear. It’s the fear-driven anger I feel that tells me that work is not mine to do. And that is the perspective I’m coming from it all with today.

Things are getting harder. But God has not let us be blindsided by this fact; He warned us long ago. And He calls us to endure. Endure in faith. Endure in love. Endure in hope. “Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted” (Hebrews 12:3). To endure, we must keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. Amen.

Remember that out of great tribulation comes a promise, “They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Revelation 7:16-17).

“Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord‘” (Romans 12:17-19).

“Therefore as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity” (Colossians 3: 12-14).