Category: Devotionals

Less problems. More money. Less pain and sickness. A better job. More property. More connections. People doing what we want them to do. Subtle manipulative behaviors. Blatant manipulation. A sense of having control over our lives.

Peace. It cannot be bought, created, or found in any of the ways mentioned above. Temporary periods that are absent of quarrels and worry can be achieved through such means. However, lasting peace is available only through the absence of trying to control what happens to and around us. Surrendering our efforts to maintain control is a very scary thing.

Surrender is directly tied to trust. We only allow ourselves to be vulnerable to those we trust. Can God be trusted when we are faced with circumstances or relational issues that could lead to dire consequences? That’s the underlying, burning question when we face difficult times in our lives. Many people would balk at the idea that they might struggle to trust Him. Many of us have been taught that we should never doubt and always trust. “Fake it until you make it”, we are told. Therefore, we dismiss such possibilities because we are afraid to admit failure when it comes to trusting Him. But we do. Life is just too difficult for us not to face a wrestling match with our faith. Admitting our struggle is okay. God desires that we acknowledge it to ourselves, to Him, and to others that can walk with us through those times. Authenticity is crucial if we are to break free and experience peace. This step of faith is synonymous with humility.

It is impossible to surrender our self-efforts to control our lives without first considering what’s necessary for trust to ever take place. Trust is a product of being loved, but not just the idea of love…or knowing that I am loved. Trust is the product of love that is experienced as freely given in abundance when we don’t do a thing to earn it.  If being loved is a reality for me, I will be prone to trust…to surrender control. Does my Father in Heaven love me? Truly love me? Unconditionally? Is He proud of me? Even though I mess up….a lot!? Is He concerned about my daily life…even those little things that seem to throw me completely off course? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes. Our identity in Christ is founded on being loved. We are loved. He is trustworthy. As we embrace His love, we trust Him. As we trust Him, we live loved, free, and surrender control in favor of experiencing peace.

-Neil

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Prayer is a wonderful thing. It is communication between us and God. It is amazing that, by His grace, we have direct access to such a loving Father who actually wants to hear from us. He wants to speak to us, too.

Why do we look up?

I have noticed that I often tend to look up when I am talking to Him. I notice this especially when I am alone. There is nothing inherently wrong with me doing this. It’s possible that when we look up in prayer, we are doing it out of worship and praise. However, I have caught myself looking up because that’s where I think He is. Wait, He IS in heaven right? Yes and no. He’s omnipresent, or “present everywhere all the time”. The most important place to know and believe that He is……..is right here with me (and right there with you). When we look up, let us remember that He is not far off in the sky, just looking down on us. In truth, He is in and around you…all the time. The only thing that makes us feel different is believing otherwise.

Why do we look down?

I have also noticed at times that I tend to look down when I talk to Him. This happens mostly when I am with others in prayer. As with looking up, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with this. When we bow our heads, we may do it out of honor and respect of the One we speak with. However, there can be sinister lies at work that cause us to do so. If we look down because of shame (due to something we’ve done, or feeling ashamed of ourselves in general), we are believing something that is not true about God. He is NOT ashamed of us. He loves us unconditionally. He doesn’t require us to behave perfectly. He wants us to trust Him and rest in His love…even when we feel really messed up for some reason. Trusting Him includes relying on His grace and believing that we are a new creation in Christ. HE is why we are not defined by what we do or what others do to us. So, if we bow our heads in prayer, let it be a result of us believing what is true of Him, NOT based on a lie that shames us and tells us He is ashamed of us, too.

“God please be with us.”

Have you ever taken time to think about what we say to Him in prayer…or what we ask of Him? “God, please be with me” is a prayer I’ve said a million times. Its sounds good, right? We definitely want Him with us, right? The problem with that prayer is….well, it fails to acknowledge a very important fact: He is with us…all the time. He never leaves or forsakes us (Hebrews 13:5). So, why would we ask Him to be with us (or to be with someone else)? Perhaps, sometimes, we fail to perceive the truth that He is right there with us, no matter what…even if we don’t feel like He is. I think a better prayer might be, “God help me to see you in and with me right now…I am feeling like you are a million miles away”. That is an honest communication, and it’s based on truth…even though I’m acknowledging that I am struggling with a lie.

We will do, think, say, and ask for the wrong things…but let’s pray anyway.

So, is it wrong to pray this or that, or to do it in a certain way? I’d be hesitant to say ANY dialogue with God is “wrong”. If we are communicating with Him, even if we fail to say and ask the right things, He will reveal the truth to us in time. Our prayers are likely a part of that process. Plus, the Spirit will translate what we say. He will know what’s really on our hearts, even if we fail to see it and communicate it well. God loves us so much. He longs for us to talk with Him about anything and everything. He doesn’t care if we “get it right” when we pray. Proper religious behavior didn’t seem to impress Christ too much when He came to earth and interacted with the religious people of that time period. I doubt He’s changed His perspective on that. He much prefers His children (us!) to be authentic and humbly talk with Him than to rely on elegant speech and mannerisms.

-Neil

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I’m a planner. Some people might not even notice that about me. That is because most of the planning goes on in my mind. I don’t necessarily share my plans with those around me. The planning usually starts when my eyes open up in the morning. “Get up, floss, brush teeth, eat breakfast, work out, take a shower, clean CPAP mask, pack lunch (and sometimes supper), go to work”. And I usually have a time frame in mind as well. I wind up running around crazily trying to get it all done.

I’ve been told I don’t typically look stressed. I don’t readily reveal my emotional state through my demeanor. However, when my plan does not work out, people can see the effects at times: anxiety and frustration.

Planning, in general, is not a bad thing. Some of you reading this might even be saying to yourself that you wish you were a better planner. Well, while planning is not inherently bad and can actually be a really great thing, planning can also be a sign of some really messed up stuff going on inside of us…stuff that robs us of any joy in life.

In counseling others, I’ve derived a little saying that I use with myself. When I plan for a session, I will silently tell myself that what I’m putting together is “a plan to be abandoned”. While it’s important to think through my last session with someone, what’s going on in their life, and prayerfully consider where to go next, the truth is that 90% of the time when I actually meet with the person I discover they are in a totally different place than what I planned for. To truly listen and meet them where they are at, to “stick to the plan” would be impersonal and unhelpful.

I think my life, in general, outside of the counseling office might need some of this approach applied to it. In Revelation 3, Jesus says to a group of people…

‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! ¹⁶ So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. ¹⁷ For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.’ (Revelation 3:15-17)

Many times I’ve heard this passage preached in a way that appeared to be an attempt to guilt me into “working harder for the Lord”. I don’t think that’s what Jesus was pushing for here at all. Instead, I think it is more like how the Fields Brothers discuss it in their book, “Breaking the Hex” (I highly recommend this book!). When we are “hot”, we are trusting God and being led by the Spirit. The Spirit guides our thoughts, words, and actions. When we are “cold”, we are striving to do things in our own power. We lifelessly engage others and the world around us with our own plans (or rules), whether we made them up or found them somewhere else.

When we are “lukewarm”, we have a foot in each boat. On one hand, we say we are trusting God and being sensitive to the leading of His Spirit. On the other hand, we have our own plan and push hard to bring it to fruition. If we were either one of the two alone, we’d be in much better shape. If we were only cold, eventually we would see the error of our perspective and have an opportunity to surrender that failed attempt at life. If we were only hot, wow that would be awesome and freeing! But when we are lukewarm, we feel like we have it all together. We have the religious mask on AND we can try to get our way all the time. As anxiety, anger, and depression kick in while we struggle with two opposing forces, we attempt to switch back and forth according to what seems to suit us at the time. We say we are trusting Him, and fall for the lie that we are! However, we are not truly trusting Him. We are merely still trying to be in control, which leads us into more anxiety, frustration, feelings of hopelessness, hurt relationships, confusion and a host of other problems. It’s maddening!

We can’t have both. We can’t be both hot and cold. We can certainly be lukewarm, but Jesus knew He needed to clearly warn us of that hurtful path. What if we took the stance that even the best of our plans can always be abandoned? What if we trusted that His perspective is always infinitely better than ours? What if we found ourselves less committed to our preconceived plans and more open to what our loving Father is saying in the moment? Perhaps we could rest, experiencing more of the comforting warmth of being hot than cold…and finding an escape from the yucky lukewarm temperature that is never satisfying.

-Neil

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Have you ever heard the comment, “Be careful what you ask for!”? I have heard this said many times when referencing what we pray for. One example is, “Don’t pray for patience!” It usually comes across as a warning, implying that if we pray for something in particular, God will somehow give it to us in a rather uncomfortable way. For example, under this theory, if we were to ask God for patience, He would purposely withhold things from us…not so much to lovingly help us learn something we need, but to prove a point that we are stupid for asking for it in the first place.

Over the course of his childhood, my son sometimes asked for things he did not need to have, for one reason or another. Sort of like the parents of the kid in The Christmas Story movie who asked for a BB gun (“You’ll shoot your eye out kid!”), I had to really think about whether or not to give my son certain things. Sometimes he would ask for things he was ready for, other times he asked for things he was not. Out of my love and concern, I had to consider all the variables and make a decision I thought was best for him.

Why would God be any different with us….His beloved children? Why would He viciously slap us across the face with something, just because we asked Him for something we wanted? Would He do that just to prove a point that we shouldn’t have asked for it, in some sort of a condescending way of saying, “I told you so!”? That doesn’t sound like a loving Father.

But, oh, He IS a loving Father…a perfect, loving Father. He promises to meet all of our needs (Philippians 4:19). When we ask for things that line up with His will (His understanding of what we really need), He gives abundantly (Matthew 7:7-11). He does not give us stones and snakes when we ask for our needs to be met (Matthew 7:9). And when we ask for things that we are not yet ready for (possibly unbeknownst to us), He does not get angry. He knows what we really need and when we need it, and works it out patiently, accordingly, and lovingly in our lives as He walks with us (Romans 8:28, Psalm 103:8).

So, let’s not be scared of our Papa in heaven. He loves us and invites us to seek Him. We will never be perfect in how we go about doing that, and He is perfectly okay with that. He expects it and loves us anyway!

-Neil

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About 13 years ago, I was in the middle of one of the hardest struggles that I have experienced in my life. I felt like I was drowning in overwhelming anxiety and panic attacks. My wife, Melissa, looked at me and my situation, and she only wanted to relieve me of the suffering. I looked to her often to do things I no longer felt I could handle. Trips to the grocery store, visits with friends and family, and church services were mostly off limits if I wanted to avoid one of the dreaded attacks.

We typically attempt to fix problems when they bug us enough.

I wanted to be back to normal, more than anything. Over and over, I pleaded with God to fix it. Until I could get the fix I wanted from Him, I tried to settle for temporary bandages that would make my life feel easier. It didn’t work, but I tried! I got into the groove of allowing Melissa to handle the growing list of things I avoided out of fear. That was my way of asking her to fix it for me. And she obliged, hoping her efforts would offer some sense of relief.

Sometimes we run up on problems we cannot get fixed.

Despite my pleading with God, He did not remove the anxiety and panic attacks. They continued, and they got worse. Despite my seeking temporary fixes from Melissa and others, I only briefly, if at all, felt the weight lifted off of me. When it would, it would slam back down on me later with more heaviness than was there before. It led Melissa and me to feel a sense of hopelessness about the situation. We had no control over what was happening.

After a season of attempting to alleviate the signs of anxiety in my life, I realized there was no use. It was not working and apparently never would. At the time, the reason was unknown, but God was just not doing what I wanted Him to do, and Melissa’s best efforts were not enough to make me feel at peace.

I had become a problem to be fixed. I assumed that identity. Everything was wrapped up in trying to get someone to fix the symptoms that were bugging me…to take away the disorienting and debilitating dizziness, racing thoughts, pounding heart, and feelings of terror. I was angry at God and anyone or anything that did not offer the escape I craved and demanded.

We are missing something important if all we want is a fix.

I was missing something important due to being blinded by my attempts to get what I thought I needed the most. I believed that if my circumstances were changed, if the way I felt could be directly altered, I would be okay. Nothing could be further from the truth. What I was seeking, unbeknownst to me, was a temporary fix at best. There was an underlying issue that needed to be addressed, and it would take time and a much more potent healing device than a fixer-upper. If that deep wound was left unaddressed, no fix would ever have given me the freedom I was created to experience.

Good counsel and healing relationships with trusted friends and family members would be a necessary part of the period of restoration that followed over the course of many months. As I think back today on that time in my life, I would say three things about searching for a fix: it prevented true healing, it never satisfied, and it did not hold a candle to love.

Instead of only seeing something to fix, perhaps we can embrace someone to love.

While seeking God to do what I wanted Him to do, I failed to embrace His love for me. I equated Him doing what I wanted to proving that He loved me. While looking to Melissa to make me feel better, I failed to receive the love she had for me. I would, instead, think, “How could she love such a weak and broken man?” There is a powerful truth present in 1 John 4:18. Love is not only the antithesis of fear, it actually casts (or drives) it out. There’s no room for fear in love.

While it may seem all too simple, and not much help, I can assure you from experience that when we are suffering, if we can find a way to let others truly love us (including God), it will help a great deal. It may require a great surrender of attempts to get the fix we want in the moment, but it is worth the risk. Likewise, when we have someone in our life that we care deeply about, there is NOTHING more helpful and precious than to offer them a loving ear to listen to them vent or tell their story. It may not remove all the pain and suffering, but love will provide shelter from even the most torrential downpours of life. Love is the great reminder that we are not alone, that we are accepted, that we are significant, and that we are more than worth time and attention. Those are things that are quickly forgotten when going through the valleys of life.

-Neil

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“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:18 ESV)

We do not have to be ashamed anymore. Our loving Father’s grace has the power to resolve the shame that leads us to fearfully covering and hiding our faces. As we experience His grace through entrusting ourselves to Him, He causes our lives to be more and more real and beautiful as we enjoy our relationship with Him and others.

-Neil

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This past Sunday, the following passage of Scripture was read and discussed at the church we attended:

As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. (John 9:1-3, ESV)

Jesus and his disciples are walking past a blind man, and the disciples are curious as to why he is blind. They assume, probably due to beliefs held by most at the time, that someone’s sin was the cause of the man’s blindness. They wanted to know who was to blame. Jesus surprised them by saying that the man was not blind due an act of sin by him or his parents.

We often ask the wrong question when we face valleys in our lives.

Years ago, anxiety and panic attacks warred against me. Fear reigned in my life. I felt crazy most of the time, as if I was actually losing my mind. I struggled to find a cure…something…anything to ease the suffering. I wrestled with what in the world could be causing me to go through such a difficult time in my life. And to add to the misery, I went a prolonged period of time in which I could not find anything to make me feel better. I felt hopeless. The question that the disciples asked Jesus in John 9:2 came to my mind. “God, what have I done?!?!!? What have I done to deserve this? What sin have I committed that you would punish me like this?”

We often make the false assumption that God is out to punish us.

I was desperate and the answer did not come to me. Therefore, I moved forward for a while thinking my question was not only the right question, but that the answer was key to me escaping the struggle I was in. I wanted so badly to know what I had done so that I could try to fix it, or at least never do it again! Just like with the disciples, I was also asking the wrong question and making false assumptions about God.

A better question to consider might have been, “What if this has nothing to do with God punishing me for some sin I’ve committed?”

We need to revisit the original Good News often in order to challenge and tackle false assumptions that trip us up.

For those of you who, like me and Jesus’ disciples, believe misfortune is always punishment for sin and that God is out to punish us (his children)…here’s some really, really good news…

God is not punishing us. He is not asking me to atone for my sins. Christ took on all of our sin and the punishment for it on the cross. When we trusted in Him, our relationship with God was solidified in a way that can never be broken. We are in His loving hands, now. Everything is about His grace. Grace is the foundation. Our walk with Him is not about performing well for Him to avoid His wrath. God loves us, unconditionally. He is not angry with us. Sin is not His focus when He looks upon us. He loves what He sees in us! He actually likes us! Is there discipline? Yeah, sure there is…but His motive is never punishment. Rather, His motive is always love and a desire to direct us to be everything He created us to be… in order to fulfill the destiny He has planned for us.

The Good News is hard to embrace when we face hurt, loss, pain, sickness, and other sources of suffering in this broken world.

Despite the freedom we can experience in the Good News laid out above, there will be times in which we will find ourselves far from resting in the truth of the Gospel. There are no cookie cutter answers to how to handle each and every time that we struggle with this (if you find one, please know that that particular “fix” will probably fail you at some point). From my experience, trusting myself with those who love me during those hard times is the best thing that I can do. When I am unable to see clearly, I must trust those who can see more clearly than I can. Their perspective and their love for me will become the caveat for God’s love and direction.

-Neil

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