Daily Journal: #87 Coming Full circle
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The Power of Books
Have you ever read the first page of a book, and suddenly found yourself transported to another time of your life? It’s a bit like how a song or smell can define an era. The smell of frying bacon will always remind me my grandma Lean’s farm house, cigarette smoke on a crisp fall day a reminder of high school football in South Carolina, and You Found Me by The Fray will forever be associated with my time in West Virginia.
Books can transport me too, although not as often, and certainly not new books. I rarely re-read a book, so transportation to the past is rare. I do have two recent exceptions, Tattoos on the Heart by Greg Boyle and When Heaven Invades Earth by Bill Johnson. I have yet to finish Tattoos because I end up in a heap of tears and snot every three pages, and I just began WHIE to similar results.
There was a time in my life when I wanted the impossible and believed it was my destiny to walk in it. My first modern “hero of the faith” was Smith Wigglesworth, and my second is Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Both of these men walked in extreme faith to different ends. They represent the breadth of God, and His holistic Love for us.
Tattoos focuses my thoughts on the power of love, what patience and perseverance produces in our lives and the people we touch. The author, a Catholic priest, has spent his life ministering to the gang-infested neighborhoods of south-central Los Angeles. The book is essentially one love story after another, some of them quite tragic. It is the kind of love espoused by Dr King, where the miracle is in the doing, in the faith for the justice to come. It is the Love Jesus commanded us to pursue when He said, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”
WHIE pulls me back to twenty years ago when I wanted my life to be full of radically changed people, miracles on miracles, and life-giving prophetic words. I experienced some of it, but eventually settled for much less. I never lost my belief in such things, but I assumed I was not qualified to live that life. It stirred a jealousy in me I refused to admit until this past summer. I am only ten pages into it, but I already know what purpose the book serves in my life- to call me back to a higher plane with Him.
Back to the Start
Since I began this blog, I wandered what’s its purpose is. Since July (and originally on Tumblr), I’ve written a blog post nearly everyday, some days more than one. Until today, I wrote whatever came to mind to write. And today, even I write this post, I see now what the purpose of this blog is. As such, I see greater purpose for myself, for my walk with the Lord. And I glimpse the future to come.
I don’t think my story is unique. Many people, especially early in our lives, are excited about Jesus. We dream and imagine the Glory to come as we consume books and stories of our heroes. “I’m gonna be like them,” we say to ourselves. “I’m not going to sink into mediocre Christianity.” But most of us do. I did. I settled for less, took the corndog when I really wanted steak.
I sense, deep in my being, I have the unique opportunity to showcase what’s possible to those who settled like I once did. My heart has always been for my fellow Christians more than the lost. There are many frustrated Christians living a life well beneath what Jesus has for them. The purpose of this blog is to document one ordinary man’s journey back to the extraordinary. I want to be a sign post to my fellow Christians “YOU CAN DO THIS!”
The goodness of God is how He used my wandering. I didn’t waste twenty years. I’m glad I learned what Love is. I'm happy I mended roofs in the southern coal fields of West Virginia, waited tables in Charlotte, and slung technology by phone in California. And I find true joy is seeing how the Lord built my foundation. I have a foot on both the Glory of His miraculous Love, and the tender Loving Kindness He has for each and every person.
He is a God of miracles and justice. We need not settle for one or the other. Jesus said we would move mountain if only we have the faith and persistence to tell it to move. Many different types of mountains exist: racism, poverty, blindness, diabetes, depression, anxiety, jealousy, addictions, climate change, etc. We need not settle for one type of mountain or another. They all must melt before Him.
I’m enjoying my morning as I think about where I am in life. On paper I am a 40 year-old, single, white guy. But, that’s the way of the world. In the Kingdom, I’ve been trained for the last twenty years to be able to move mountains and encourage others to do the same- to pick up their callings and swords, to win the victories they were created to win. I’m back to where I started, more confident than ever.
Can’t Settle For Normal
Normal sucks, mostly. Can we agree on that? It’s safe, for certain, but it sucks. I have never been able to settle for normal. As my business coach put it “you torpedo everything normal because it’s not what your heart truly wants.” This morning as I read the first few pages of WHIE I came across something I’ve felt inside of me for a long time:
“It is abnormal for a Christian not to have an appetite for the impossible. It has been written into our spiritual DNA to hunger for the impossibilities around us to bow at the name of Jesus.”
When Heaven Invades Earth- Bill Johnson
I don’t think I’ll ever be happy or content unless I’m radically pursuing Jesus. All of my other plans for business and life must bow to that reality. The rub is when I think I’ve got to make this radical life happen. I don’t. My calling is to show up everyday and pursue the Kingdom. Whatever I am, and whatever I become will be in the daily pursuit of Jesus. I was not made to be my own Savior and Lord.
To this last point, I do find myself overwhelmed but only when I think it’s about me. Yesterday, I wrote about my fear of goal-setting, and when I think about trying to make everything happen at some distance point in the future I begin to sink. But life doesn’t happen all at once. I have today, and all I need to focus on is today. The Lord told me back in July to write and love the people in my orbit. I can do that. I am doing that.
It will be my pleasure and honor to document what’s about to happen in my life. I am wise enough to know it will have sh-tty moments, but there will be good stuff too- lot’s of miracles and healed hearts. Stick around. It’s going to get interesting.
