This thing rules! Buy it... seriously, buy it.

Daily Bread

I have a rule that I employ with every new piece of music that I buy… (unsolicited advice coming at you) and if you utilize this rule with your new music, you’ll be a much happier person. The rule goes like this: When I get new music, I pop it in the CD player and listen to every track, beginning to end, in order, from first to last, four times in a row. No matter how I feel about the music, I have four unhurried and uninterrupted listens. The rule is that I do not let myself make a judgment on the record either way until the four listens are over. Now, don’t let the seeming legalism fool you… this is a great way to give every record its due.

Well, Jill Phillips just released a new record called Nobody’s Got it All Together. I popped it in my car on Monday and today is Friday and this is a great record! I am always encouraged and strengthened by listening to anything that Jill and her husband Andy Gullahorn produce, and they didn’t let me down this time around… Well, last night Christy and I were driving to Lenoir City to speak and play at a Young Life banquet and listening to the song “Daily Bread” while she held my hand… Jill sang, “There’s a restlessness in the soul of man, nobody’s tamed it yet. You never fail to keep any promises, but somehow we forget… that You’re always right on time.” Christy squeezed my hand as our hearts silently and simultaneously swelled with praise and thanks.

The song goes on… “You feed us all with a silver spoon, and like Your foolish kids, we start worrying about what we’re gonna do when the hunger comes again… But You’re always right on time with an open hand. You have exactly what I need, daily bread.”

It’s been rough for us lately, but our Father knows right where we are and He just keeps providing everything we need… right on time. Christy looked at me and said, “This is our song, baby.” I was about to say the same thing. He has graciously rescued us out of so many troubles that His faithfulness has become the refrain of our lives. As we kept on listening to Jill and Andy sing our anthem Christy said, “It’s amazing… He has forced us to live a life of miracles.”

A life of miracles… a daily-faithful Father… this is the good life.

Hail to the Victors!

How Sweet it is!

Alan Branch slams the arm of the former Heisman hopeful Brady Quin which ended in the Notre Dame quarterback's third interception of the day as the Wolverines handed the Irish their worst loss at home in 45 years... Go Blue!

The "Triple C" crew after tubing the Little River

Head Start

Okay, something crazy happened to me when I turned 27 this past May, and everyone said it would. I don’t know if I really believed them, but they were right. My metabolism slowed down and out of nowhere I gained 20 pounds… I’m not kidding. Now, I’m not a freakily obsessed person when it comes to body image or anything, but all of a sudden I realized I was carrying around the equivalent of all of my football pads from high school. The really weird thing is that I can’t really find these twenty mystery pounds… they’re just there, somewhere, giving me the general feeling of unidentifiable blah…

Well, I didn’t want to do it, but I have started jogging in the morning… …yeah. This is really tough for me because I have always hated running. I hated it in football and I hated it when I ran track. I tried to jog to stay in shape in college and only ran twice. But this time is different because I have discovered something awesome… even if you hate running, it’s a great way to get your day started. Running wakes you up, energizes you and gives you great time to think and pray. It gets the blood flowing and the mind going. I still don’t enjoy running, but as soon as I finish my daily laps around the civic center, I am really glad I did it and really ready for the day. I guess running is kind of my head start to get my body and mind geared up for whatever the day has for me.

This morning I was reading Psalm 59 and saw something that could be another awesome way to have a head start on the day… In verse 16 the Psalmist says, “But I will sing of your strength, in the morning I will sing of your love…” What better way to start your day than praise?! If you start your day singing and rejoicing in God’s strength and love then you are waking up your faith and circulating your trust in Him! If you sing of His strength and love in the morning, you are going to be fortified against whatever problems, worries and doubts that come because your heart and mind will have already confirmed that God is able to handle your stuff and that He cares about you. Give yourself a head start… start your days with praise… you’ll be glad you did.

My girls...

Present Tense

One of the coolest things about being a parent is that you get a front row seat to something that is absolutely incredible… watching a person acquire language. Anna is almost three and is very verbal. She has been speaking for a long time now and becomes a better communicator every day. It started early… I guess from the time she was born. She listened to us, watched our mouths move, tried out sounds and then mimicked us. At some point she started to associate sounds with meanings and before we knew it she was speaking English… it was crazy. One thing that is really cute about watching a baby learn to talk is that they try on big words before they really grasp the concepts behind those words and it comes out sounding a little off and pretty funny. For instance, Anna heard us using the word ‘because’ all of the time and decided she would start to fit it into her sentences… she would say, “Mom, I not eat that carrot because, I eat it.”

At this point, Anna understands what ‘because’ is all about and employs it quite successfully. It is utterly amazing to watch her grow and correct her own linguistic mistakes just by listening to us talk and without even being told. And as amazing as it is to hear a two-year-old put together a coherent sentence, it is weird to hear an educated adult who can’t. The other day I was reading Psalm 52 and something about it looked funny, (and I know what I’m reading is a translation from Hebrew, but something seemed to stick out like a sore thumb) like it didn’t belong. See if you can catch it… “But I am like an olive tree flourishing in the house of God; I trust in God’s unfailing love for ever and ever.” –Did you catch it? Maybe it’s just me, but it seems weird that the Psalmist said, “I trust in God’s unfailing love for ever and ever.” Since ‘trust’ is an action that carries on from now into the future, shouldn’t he have said, “I will trust…” instead of just “trust?”

Now, there are two possibilities going on here… either I am just behind on my grammar (highly possible) or the psalmist is teaching us something cool about trust in God. Maybe trust is something that must exist in the present tense. Maybe you can’t say, “I will trust God tomorrow.” You don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. You are stuck inside time and the only thing you know about with any certainty is that which has gone and that which is. We live inside what is. Obviously we have enough information about God’s goodness and provision to want to say, “I will trust you for ever and ever…” but can we know that we will? I think trust has to be in the present tense because trust concerns the moment you are in. Trusting God is about making up your mind and heart to believe what is true about Him right now in this moment. I think the Psalmist is longing for a heart that will make that decision to believe, and to do it in each moment as it comes, knowing that it is a decision that will have to be remade with every coming moment. That’s the heart I want to have too… one that says, “I trust you right now. I trust you tomorrow. I trust you for ever.”

Joe Pendley is a beast...

Theme

Quick, try to think of the guitar riff at the beginning of the classic rock anthem Ironman. Now, how about AC/DC’s Back in Black, or Purple Haze by Hendrix… what about Day Tripper by the Beatles? How about movie music… can you hum the music to Indiana Jones or Star Wars? How about the beginning to Beethoven’s fifth… “Ba Ba Ba BAAAAA, Ba Ba Ba BAAAAAA.” Now surely in that vast list of classics some music just flooded into your mind, maybe even against your will as you read those words… you know what that was? Those memorable, hummable, singable little snippets of music that will now be stuck in your head for the rest of the day are known by musicians as the ‘hook’ or the ‘theme.’

A theme is just a musical idea… a melody or riff that keeps popping up in the music. It’s the signature of the piece… the part that let’s you know what you’re listening to… the thing that makes a song “catchy.” It’s the part you can’t shake out of your mind. Classical composers used to write pieces of music where the theme would appear a bunch of different times right in a row, but every time would be a little different. Maybe a different set of instruments would play the theme, making it sound different, or all the surrounding rhythms and harmonies would be varied so that you could barely recognize the theme, but the skeleton of that original, catchy little musical idea was always there right under the surface. The theme was the centerpiece, and no matter how crazy and dark the rest of the music got, the theme would always be there supporting and guiding the piece, and the theme would always come back in the end.

I have been reading the book of Job lately and one thing I have noticed is that pretty much everyone in that book (including Job) said a lot of stupid stuff. None of these guys knew why all those terrible things happened to Job and they all thought they knew. They took turns running their mouths for 37 chapters and most of what they said was a mess… Especially the young guy right at the end named Elihu. He is quite possibly one of the most arrogant people who appears in the Bible! He ran his big mouth like the rest of them, having no idea what was really going on behind the spiritual scenes. But as I was reading his egotistical rants the other day, I saw something good and true. It’s like my dad always says, “Son, even a blind hog will find the trough every now and then.”

In Job 33, verses 27-28 Elihu said, “Then he comes to men and says, I sinned, and perverted what was right, but I did not get what I deserved. He redeemed my soul from going down to the pit, and I will live to enjoy the light.” Wow! That is awesome… when I read that I decided to make that my theme… the on-going, varied, but always-there hook of my life… I have sinned, but I didn’t get what I deserved… He redeemed me… I have been rescued because of Jesus. The days may get dark and stormy and everything in my life may have seemed to change or fall in around me, but this will be at the center… this will be the guiding, supporting melody of my life… that I have not gotten what I deserve, but have been mercifully saved and outrageously loved by Christ.

Norah's teething and we're sleepy...

Do You Have Eyes?

Whoa… we’ve had some tough nights lately! Our seven-month-old Norah is teething… bad! She is usually the kind of baby that just sits around cooing until someone looks at her, at which point she smiles like crazy. She is always so happy and full of giggling energy… or at least, she was like that. For the past few days she has been taking terrible naps, screaming a ton and not eating, which leads to more bad naps, tons more screaming and less eating which leads to… well, I guess you get the point.

So, the other night Christy and I were up with Norah way after midnight trying to figure out a way to get her to calm down enough to go to sleep, and I was getting pretty frustrated as each little baby screech brought my alarm clock closer and closer to the present. Then it happened... my sweet wife (who by the way had not yet freaked out, even though I was shaking and twitching like a crack-addict) said something which changed the whole situation for me… She said, “Can you imagine trying to go to bed with a toothache?” I stopped my own whining long enough to think about it and realized that I have never really had a toothache. I don’t even know what that feels like. I can’t remember my own bouts of teething, but I’ve never really had a tooth go bad. I know from Looney Tunes that it looks pretty painful, but I don’t really know what it feels like. Norah was experiencing all kinds of pain that I knew absolutely nothing about…

I have been reading the book of Job lately and boy, I’ll tell you what, that is one frustrated brother! Of course, he did lose all his property, wealth, livestock and children in one really crappy day (you just know it was a Monday). And in defending himself, Job complained to God… a lot. In chapters nine and ten he starts to form an argument against God that basically goes like this… “I haven’t done anything wrong, and if I have, show me what it is. You sit up there picking on me and I guess you think it’s easy to live life down here, but you know what, you don’t know what it’s like! You have limitless power and resources… you don’t know what it is to be weak and tempted. You’ve never been a human and you don’t know how hard it is for us.” In Job 10:4 he says, “Do you have eyes of flesh? Do you see as a mortal sees?”

The amazing thing about our God is that he answered Job… and all the rest of us. God’s answer was wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger in a little suburb of Jerusalem called Bethlehem. When Jesus was born, God had eyes, just like us. God became a human baby to identify with all our weakness, endure all of our temptation, (only without sin) and then bear all of our wrong in His own death. God had to go through sleepless nights of pain and crying because He was teething. My Jesus knows how Norah feels because He has been there. He actually became one of us and He knows what it’s like down here.

Anna, my little theologian...

When Lightning Strikes

My Anna is the happiest kid I know… she gets so excited about everything and runs around dancing and laughing uncontrollably most of the day. She doesn’t just like stuff… she LOVES every simple little thing! From stickers to peanuts to our shoes… she is pumped about everything! Everything; that is, except machines. She is scared to death of machines. Whether it’s the vacuum cleaner, the cake mixer or the hair dryer, if it has moving parts and makes some kind of motorized buzzing sound, she is crying for protection and comfort. The funny thing is that as scared as she is of the blender, she is not all that scared of storms… I think the first few times she heard thunder it freaked her out pretty bad, but Christy and I told her that God made the storm and since then, she is okay with storms, knowing that God is in control.

For a little while now, I’ve needed to take faith lessons from my two-year old. See, a couple of weeks ago our house got struck by lightning… no, I’m not kidding. Christy and I had just made it out of a financial crisis due to the gracious and surprising provision of our Father in heaven when she called me up at church to say, “Hey, you know that storm that’s been raging all this evening? Well, lightning just struck in our yard and knocked out our air conditioning and phones.” I have to admit that I was shocked... (no pun intended) I mean, the Lord had just gotten through saving our tails from one thing only to let us get struck by lightning! Are you kidding me?!

My buddy Joe from church told me that the board was fried on the A/C unit, so we called our heating and air guys. They came out the next day and told us that the board would cost almost $500. Great… We don’t have anywhere near five hundred bucks laying around for anything, so we just prayed. The heating and air guys figured out a way to get the thing to blow cold air until we could pay for the board, which they told us we would have to replace before winter. Check this out: Yesterday they called Christy and said, “Mrs. Younger, we need to set up a time to come replace that board.” Christy replied, “Uh… I was told we could wait to replace it until we could find the money…” The lady on the phone said, “Mrs. Younger, the payment has already been taken care of. Someone in your church loves you… So now we just need to come out and replace it.”

Christy called me at work and told me the story. She ended by saying, “Can you believe it?” To which I replied, “Yeah. I can. He’s been doing this so much lately!” My Father loves me. He sees me and He knows what I need. He hears us when we cry out to Him and He cares for us like the Dad He is. So, if you find yourself in the middle of a downpour with thunder rolling and lightning flashing, just remember what Anna always says to me… “It’s okay Daddy. God made the storm.”

Are you ready?

Water Breaks

Well, the field will soon be painted, the helmets will soon be striped, tickets will soon be selling and that marvel of ingenuity, ‘the hill chair’ will soon make its first appearance as the entire town shows up to cheer on the Oak Ridge Wildcats! That’s right folks, it is football season once again… I can still remember what it was like to strap on the pads, lace up the cleats and march down the stairs onto the field to the deafening cheers of thousands. It was awesome! At least, it was awesome on Friday night… Putting on pads and cleats the rest of the week for practice was a whole different story.

I hated football practice… especially in the sweltering heat. We were so hot and tired that sometimes the grass started to blur and ripple like green water. (I guess that was heat exhaustion) The coaches wanted us running everywhere we went… even for water breaks. The only word they seemed to know sometimes was “Hustle!” We invented a hundred and fifty ways to slack off and avoid detection. One of our tricks was to unbuckle our shoulder pads on the way to water breaks and push them up and down with our hands making the pads sound like we were jogging when we were only walking. And the coaches never knew…

In Nehemiah chapter 4, the Israelite workers who had been in captivity for seventy years were back in Jerusalem, rebuilding the wall around the city. It was hard work on a grand scale that probably seemed impossible some days. This problem was made worse by the fact that these workers were absolutely surrounded by discouragement! Some messed up dudes named Sanballat and Tobiah along with a bunch of hateful people slammed them with smack talk all day long every day. “You call that a wall? My kid’s tree house looks stronger than that!” If that wasn’t enough, even the men of Judah (their own people) said it was hopeless. Then the Jews from the surrounding counties came and said, “Because of you we’re going to be attacked! Thanks a lot!” The work was hard, the sun was hot, morale was low and a fight was coming…

But Nehemiah didn’t get discouraged. He told everyone to grab their weapons and get back to work. From that day on, half of the men worked while the others stood by them, swords and spears in hand. They were working and they were ready to fight. Nehemiah said that they even wore their swords and armor when they went on water breaks. In verse 14 he told them, “Don’t be afraid of them. Remember the Lord who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your homes.”

We are in the middle of a war that is happening all around us. We cannot see it or smell it, but we can feel its effects. And the worst possible thing we can do is to pretend we’re not in a battle. Our enemies are after our discouragement and if we rest from fighting, we will be beaten. We need to live every day and all day long knowing that a fight is coming… knowing that discouragement is right around the corner. We need to be ready to meet this foe, remembering the Lord, continuing the work, and standing beside our brothers, encouraging each other and fighting together, even when we break for water…

Matthew Broderick back in the day...

Old-school Movies and Real-time Answers

A couple of weeks ago Christy and I were flipping channels and found “War Games.” Do you remember that Matthew Broderick classic from the 80’s? It’s a movie set in the extreme paranoia of the Cold War in which a high school computer hacker finds his way into what he thinks is a computer game but is really a simulation program for nuclear war. The kid signs into the ‘game’ as the Soviet Union and initiates a nuclear missile strike on the U.S. What he doesn’t know is that U.S. military defense tracking systems show eight incoming Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles from Russia! This kid playing around on his computer had no idea what his hacking was setting in motion…

I think that prayer is like “War Games” for lots of us. We don’t rely on prayer… we don’t pray any where near as much as we ought because when it gets right down to it, we don’t really know what prayer is and what it does. Do you know what actually happens when you pray? David did… In Psalm 18 he said, “In my distress I called out to the LORD; I cried to my God for help. From His temple He heard my voice; my cry came before Him, into His ears.” First thing’s first… when you cry out to Him, God hears you! But look what happens next… “Smoke rose from His nostrils; consuming fire came from His mouth, burning coals blazed out of it. He parted the heavens and came down; dark clouds were under His feet. He mounted the cherubim and flew; He soared on the wings of the wind…” David goes on to say that God thundered form heaven blasting his enemies with lightning like arrows and then rescued him because God delighted in him. Isn’t that awesome?! Did you know all that was going on when you pray?

This morning I was reading Nehemiah 2 about the exiled Israelites who got to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the wall surrounding the city. Well, before they got to go back, they had to get permission from their captors. It just so happened that King Artaxerxes’ cupbearer was Nehemiah who had been praying that the exiles would get a chance to go back… He showed up at work one day holding the King’s cup but looking long in the face because he was thinking about Jerusalem and how it was in ruins… The King looked at Nehemiah and said, “Hey Mr. Grumpy Gils! What’s your problem today?” Nehemiah told him about Jerusalem and how its destruction tore him up so much. Then the King said, “What is it you want?” Chapter 2, verse 4 says, “Then I prayed to the God of heaven, and I answered the king…”

Did you catch that? He had about 2 nano-seconds to shoot up a little pistol prayer to heaven and then he had to tell the King what he wanted, and God heard him! He thundered down from heaven, riding angels and clouds like a couple of water skis and gave Nehemiah the answer he wanted! He got to go home and rebuild the city he loved. It doesn’t matter if you pray for days on end or just two seconds… He hears you, and He busts open the sky to come down and rescue you right when you need Him. Cry out to Him, He’s waiting…

My beautiful bride five years ago...

Learning the Steps

Christy and I celebrated our fifth anniversary yesterday and whoa… I sorta can’t believe it’s been five years. It’s gone so stinkin’ fast! Now here we are, with two little kids and us more in love than ever, laughing more than ever after five trips around the sun. The other day I was thinking about our wedding and how much everyone danced afterwards… I was pretty much tearing up the dance floor, having a blast and feeling totally free. Now, these facts are pretty amazing considering that most of my life I have been drastically afraid of dancing… especially in front of onlookers. But I wasn’t scared that night, and do you want to know why? I had spent the previous semester in college taking a course called ‘ballroom dance.’ That’s right… I learned to swing, tango, cha cha, rumba and waltz, and I wasn’t too bad either.

All her life Christy has wanted dancing after her wedding. She wanted to be swept around the dance floor in her beautiful gown by the love of her life on her wedding day. Before proposing to Christy, I have to admit that I had never really given any thought to what my wedding would be like, but I soon learned that I would be dancing. That was pretty much the most intimidating thing in the world to me! I was scared to death, but I wanted everything to be perfect for her. I wanted to give myself completely to her. So, what did I do? I learned the steps. I learned how to dance so that I wouldn’t be scared to do what she wanted most from me… so that I knew how to move and wouldn’t feel like an idiot in front of everyone there. On that night, I knew the steps and though I was nervous, I just started moving, and pretty soon, I wasn’t thinking about it… I was just dancing with my bride.

Way back when God’s people were going to the temple or the tabernacle to worship God by offering sacrifices over an altar of fire, there were many different kinds of offerings. The book of Leviticus tells us about all of those different offerings and the very first one it describes is called the whole burnt offering. This was an offering of consecration in which the whole animal was completely burned up… nothing was left. It was a way for people to say to God, “I am yours completely. Take all of me, I hold nothing back. Burn up all of my plans, desires and will and fill me with Your will.” In 2 Chronicles 29:27-28 when King Hezekiah gave the order for the whole burnt offering to be sacrificed, he also ordered the temple players and singers to bring the praise! It says, “The whole assembly bowed in worship, while the singers sang and the trumpeters played. All this continued until the sacrifice of the burnt offering was completed.”

I think the idea of the whole burnt offering is so intimidating… are we ever really ready to offer God all of ourselves? Are we ready to say to Him, “Take all of me?” Yet, this is what He most wants from us… to give Him all. And this is why we need praise in our everyday lives. Singing praise songs teaches us the dance steps of consecration. As we sing the words of some great worship song, we teach our spirit step by step how to let go. Sing the words of some great old hymn like, To Christ the Lord by Samuel Stennett… “Since from His bounty I receive such proofs of love divine, had I a thousand hearts to give, Lord they should all be Thine…” and before long, you won’t be merely singing, but actually offering yourself completely to Him. You may forget your steps and yourself and just find yourself dancing.

me and my girls

Authority Figures

Have you ever been pulled over? Ever gotten a traffic ticket? If you have, you know the feeling I’m about to describe… you know, when you’re driving too fast around a curve and then out of nowhere coming toward you in the opposite lane is a cop… Isn’t that one of the worst feelings ever? As soon as you see that black and white car, you know you’re driving too fast, you know you probably deserve a ticket and your stomach flies into your throat as you attempt a discreet reduction in speed without looking too obvious. As the police officer drives past you, what do you do? You check the rear-view mirror to see if those brake lights come on… is he going to stop? Is he going to turn around? Just keep going, just keep on going…

I remember the first time I was sent to the Principal’s office in school. I was in seventh grade life science and I was acting like a total stooge. I was always loud, but this particular day I was in rare form. I interrupted the lesson again and again and was doing anything and everything to make the other kids in the class laugh at me. My teacher had put up with my ridiculousness all year long and was now over it. She sent me out of her class and to the Principal… Whoa. I had always heard of this form of punishment, but didn’t know it actually existed. That walk down the hall was one of the longest I’ve ever taken. I had been an idiot and I was on my way to the school’s ultimate authority figure. Once again, my stomach was in my throat.

I think the thing that seemed so scary about facing the police officer and the principal was that I was guilty. I wouldn’t have any problem facing some authority figure if I hadn’t done anything wrong, but I had! I was in trouble and I was going to get what I deserved! I was thinking about worship and reading God’s word and how, if you think about it, those could be the scariest things to do in the world… You see, worship and reading the word are basically all about meeting with God. When you worship, you are meeting with God, inviting the Holy Spirit to show up. When you spend time in God’s word, you are facing Him… facing His very words to you. Is there anything more frightening than that? Getting a ticket is one thing, and going to the principal’s office is another, but to face the Holy God… the Creator and King of the universe... who can stand this?

Now, it wouldn’t be so bad if we weren’t guilty, but we are! Every one of us has an immeasurable debt of rebellion and disobedience that we can’t pay. To meet with God ought to be the scariest thing we could ever do in our whole lives! I was thinking about this the other day when I read something Paul said in Romans 8:15 “For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship and by Him we cry, “Abba, Father.” What Paul is saying is that although we are guilty, God has done something about it… He sent His own Son to pay for our guilt with His death, giving us the right (by faith) to become God’s own children! We are not facing some angry, spiteful God full of fiery vengeance, but our very own Daddy. When we meet with God, we meet with one who loves us like a Father, but like no father we’ve ever known, because this Father has perfect, infinite love and He governs and guides our lives with perfect, infinite wisdom. His Son has taken on, paid for and removed our guilt. There’s no need to fear. He’s not a cop or the principal, He’s our Dad.

My Martin... still bringing the heat

Guitars

Eight years ago I took an insurance check from a car wreck (not my fault) and cashed it. It was for a thousand dollars. I was nineteen and about to start college, so I probably should have saved it, but instead I took the money to Ciderville Music and bought a Martin guitar. It wasn’t very flashy, but it was a good, solid, handmade guitar that was perfectly intonated and had a great sound. It was the first really nice instrument I had ever owned. I was in a band at the time and after playing my new guitar, the other songwriter/singer in the band went down to Ciderville the next day and used his savings to buy the exact same model Martin, two serial numbers away from mine. These two guitars were like twins in every way. They looked, played and sounded exactly alike. It was awesome. Now, our guitars may have been the same, but we were not. This friend of mine plays with incredible finesse and a soft touch, bringing the sweetest tones out of the instrument; while I play my guitar like a hammer, slamming a strong, low end.

Two years ago I got together with that friend after not seeing him in around five years to play some music. The really interesting thing is that after six years of being played by two completely different types of guitarists, these two instruments didn’t sound anything alike. I have always heard that a Martin guitar ages and changes with its owner, but its really true! It’s almost like my guitar was made for me and only for me, and it may have taken a few years, but you can tell it was made for me just by the sound of it. It was made for me and it was made that way by me.

I was reading the other day in 1 Chronicles 23 about when David was old and ready to die. He appointed his son Solomon to be king over Israel, and he was getting Solomon all set up for office by making sure that everyone was in the right place doing what they were supposed to. He was telling all the Levites their jobs and in verse 5 he said, “Four thousand are to be gatekeepers and four thousand are to praise the LORD with the musical instruments I have provided for that purpose.” David had specifically ordered the building of musical instruments for the purpose of praising God… that’s the only reason they were made. Did you know that you are like those instruments? You were made for praise! Isaiah 43:21 says that God formed you so that you would proclaim His praise… that’s why you exist!

I think God is building a symphony orchestra to proclaim His praise, full of all kinds of different sounding instruments. Now, everyone is different, with different personalities, gifts and abilities, and as we go through life, God takes us all through different things. Your life may be harder than another person’s but maybe that’s because God is looking for a certain timbre of praise that can only come from you… you trusting Him and praising Him through the tough things in your life. When it’s all over, we’ll all be there together joining our praise to the praises of those who have gone before us and we will all be His opus… His work of praise. When your heart is full of praise no matter what you’re going through, He has the instrument He wanted… made for Him and made by Him.

Anna and Norah kickin' it, yo...

The Guest List

Have you ever done that thing where you really thought you knew something for sure, (I mean, you would take it to the bank) but then, something out of nowhere made you doubt it? You know, like driving the same road to work or school every single day for years, and then one day the road sign’s been knocked down or blocked by some unruly tree branch and you just miss the street… you know where it is, but you just drive right past… Or picking up the phone to dial that number you’ve called seven hundred, ninety thousand times, hearing the radio station call numbers or something and then drawing a blank on the phone… ever done anything like that?

The other day, I did… but it wasn’t missing a street sign or forgetting a phone number. I had a friend who died at age fifty from brain cancer and many of us around here cried from missing him and celebrated the fact that he is now at home in heaven. I couldn’t stop thinking about how jealous I was that he was in a place of no more sorrows, sins, tears, worries or cares… jealous that he has now seen Jesus face to face. I have been waiting on that moment for years, and I’ve always been sure about it. From the moment I understood the message of the Gospel and trusted Christ, I have been ready to go home. I was always so sure about where I was going. Then I read Psalm 15…

It hit me like a Mack truck. The Message says it like this: “God, who gets invited to dinner at your place? How do we get on Your guest list?” Do you know what the answer is? Check this… “He whose walk is blameless and does what is righteous, who speaks the truth from his heart and has no slander on his tongue…” It goes on and on about this person who does everything right and keeps all his promises even when it hurts… who gets to go to heaven? Only some perfect guy! When I read it, I freaked for a second, because I’m not like that and by the way, neither is anyone else! If that’s the requirement for getting on this guest list, then not even David (the guy who wrote Psalm 15) is going to be there! I was so sure about heaven, but according to this, only a perfect person gets to go… it seems as if the only person with an invitation is Jesus.

Then something else hit me… He’s the only one righteous enough to go to the party and that’s why He left heaven, became a human being, and died for us. 2 Corinthians 5:21 says “God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” God put our sin on Jesus and Jesus died to pay our penalty so that He could put Jesus’ righteousness on us. That means that if you believe in Him, it is as if you have lived a life that is just as righteous as Jesus’ perfect life, which means that you are on the list… you have an invitation to that heavenly banquet with your name on it! For a second there I was losing it, but then I remembered Jesus and what He went through to get me on that guest list… Who gets invited to dinner at God’s place? I do!

Men in Black... me and charlie at the Young Life Halloween party

Brothers

When I was in college, my friend Charlie and I not only roomed together, but ate every meal together. We took Tae Kwon Do together, worked at the same grocery store (for a while) and even had a class together. We watched, and were in to all the same dorky comic book stuff together. We even had the same haircut and facial hair most of the time… maybe it sounds a little weird, but it was one of the best times in my life. It was the first time I had ever had a best friend who knew, could understand and help me in my walk with Christ.

Everyone we knew in college thought we were brothers. For me, that was the highest compliment. The only thing better would be if that were actually true. I don’t have a mansion, ‘phat’ cars, a bloated bank account or a ton of investments, stocks or securities, but I am filthy rich… in friends. I have friends that would do anything for me (and have)! I have my wife who has been my sweetest and dearest friend for the past nine years. I have countless high school friends and graduates who support and encourage me in ministry. I have a church-full of sweet brothers and sisters who have loved and accepted me since I was in high school. I have my dad, with whom I have walked through the toughest moments of either of our lives, and the list could go on and on.

When I first started dating Christy, I lived in Knoxville and she lived in Cookeville (an hour and a half apart). During that two years, Christy’s sister’s boyfriend let this young punk come crash his apartment every weekend so that I could spend the weekends with Christy. Once, when Christy and I were driving from Cookeville to Oak Ridge on a Sunday morning for church, my car broke down in Crossville. My friend Tom (also the pastor of the church) drove over 50 miles to come get us and 50 miles back so that we wouldn’t miss church. One time Charlie stayed up till 4:00 AM putting a CD player in my old car just so that I would have some tunes. Now, 5 years later, he stole my car and (in secret) installed an unbelievable system in it! He has spent countless days off building and plumbing our bathroom, leveling and tiling our floors, installing light fixtures and helping me chop down and haul off unwanted holly bushes.

Everyone needs good friends, and I am rich in them, but more than that, I have friends like my boy Charlie that I can talk to. I have friends that are there when I need them, there when I’m struggling. Proverbs 17:17 says, “A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.” I have friends that love me at all times… who are there when my car is making weird sounds and my ceiling is cracking and falling down. But more than that, I have brothers who were born for adversity… so that when hard times come up and I really need someone to help me see God and keep me encouraged, they are there in those tough moments saying, “I’m here man, I was born for this.”

Who else? Beethoven...

For Them and Us

In 1798, Ludwig Van Beethoven began to notice a drastic decline in his ability to hear. Over the next couple of years he struggled to come to terms with the fact that he would soon be deaf. By 1802 he was. He kept notebooks with him at all times so that people could write down their half of the conversation. Can you imagine a composer of music who can’t hear? That’s like Tiger Woods losing an arm and still being among the world’s greatest golf pros. Almost every piece of music written by Beethoven that you could name or sing along to off the top of your head was written after he lost his hearing… Included in this list is Beethoven’s ground-breaking 3rd symphony (Eroica), his enchanting 14th piano sonata (Moonlight) as well as the incredible 5th and 9th symphonies.

In 1806 Beethoven published three string quartets as Opus 59 that he dedicated to the Russian ambassador in Vienna named Count Rasumovsky. Two years later they were premiered in Vienna and audiences were appalled! The critics called it “music by a madman.” The pieces were unlike anything ever written for a string quartet and the listening public rejected them outright. But Beethoven didn’t care. When confronted with the unpopularity of the Opus 59 quartets, the composer responded by saying, “It’s not meant you, but for times to come.” This deaf man was actually so far ahead of his time, that anticipating where the art form would go, he wrote pieces that would appeal to the future listeners and performers of music… And by the way, he was right! Beethoven’s Razumovsky quartets are among the most beloved pieces in the genre and are still performed worldwide.

Tons of things that were written in ages past are still beloved today, but Opus 59 was written with the future in mind… almost as if he was composing them for us. Did you know that the Bible is like that? In Romans 15:4 Paul said that “Everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” The Bible is unlike every other book in the world because it contains the actual words of God, the Creator and Sustainer of the Universe! These words written thousands of years ago were written for those who first heard them and they were written for us. God had you in mind when He breathed His words into Scripture.

When you read Shakespeare, Chaucer or Dickens you can learn a lot about the times in which those guys lived and you might even learn some cool things about human beings in general or society in general, but when you turn to the Scriptures, God Himself is speaking to you. He is speaking directly to you, right now, in your situation about the condition of your heart and what He is doing in your life. Isn’t that amazing? That means that when Jesus said God has numbered the hairs of your head, He was talking to Peter, James and John 2,000 years ago in Palestine, but He has also numbered the hairs on my head, right here in Oak Ridge Tennessee in July of 2006! G. Campbell Morgan said, “We come not simply to delve among parchments and musty history, but to the consideration of truths that are fresh as spring; new, as God is new.” When you go to the Scriptures, you are not just reading a book, but meeting with the Living God!

Norah... almost as shocking as what you are about to read!

Whoa… That Was Close!

Okay, you’re not going to believe this… If I hadn’t seen it with my own two eyes I probably wouldn’t either, but it happened. First though, check out these verses from Psalm 91…

"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the LORD, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart… If you make the Most High your dwelling— even the LORD, who is my refuge- then no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent. For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone…"

Now, I have always been confused by these verses because I, like you have stubbed my toe plenty of times, but friend, this week I found myself unmistakably covered by His feathery wings… He delivered me from the snare and from a huge stinkin’ insurance premium!

Okay, here goes… Christy and I have been going through a tough time lately and have had trouble making the ends meet, ya know? Well, on Tuesday I was getting in my car to leave the church parking lot. I let down the emergency brake and instead of putting the car in reverse, I just took it out of gear because there was this envelope with “The Youngers” written on it. Our knowing Father had used some sweet servant of His to meet our need, and just in time! I was floored and came back in the church to ask Tom if he knew anything about it, which he didn’t, and when we came back outside the office, my car was gone… and then I remembered… car out of gear, e-brake down, Oh No!

I looked across the street to the little yellow house owned by our sweet neighbors, the Ramsey’s, and there was my car. It had rolled down the church parking lot in reverse, crossed the street and straight down their steep little sloping front lawn into their house… Tom and I ran over to inspect the damage, but something looked a little off… The car had not hit the house! In a perfectly straight line it had rolled over fifty yards backward and then three feet in front of their house my car made a 90 degree reverse left turn, missing the house, and then hit a concrete flower pot slowing it down just enough to keep it from hitting the Ramsey’s car in their driveway… whoa! I am not even kidding!

When Mrs. Ramsey came out, I apologized and told her that I didn’t know how it was possible, but my car had not really hit anything. She said, “Well, honey, I’d say the Lord was driving.” I say, “Amen!” He met our need and saved our behinds and I am a witness that He is good, faithful, mighty, and as the Psalmist said, He is my refuge! Is He yours?

Saturday Dinner at Sharp Top Cove

Keys

As I type this, thousands of kids are sleeping in their cabins at Young Life Camp all over the country. It is Saturday morning, which means that there are hundreds of sleepy heads who are alive for the very first time having been spiritually dead their whole lives… Today they will wake up to maybe their first or second day of new life in Christ. My friend Bill is in Minnesota right now with a cup of coffee and his little black Bible praying for his new brothers and sisters at Young Life’s Castaway club. My friends Abbey and Becca are washing the towels, sheets and toilets of their new brothers and sisters at Windy Gap in North Carolina. My friend Andy is at Crooked Creek Ranch in Colorado making his new brothers and sisters laugh. My friend Emily is at Windy Gap preparing high school kids to serve their new brothers and sisters as well as sharing her story with them and my friend Ryan is there as well, singing into the hearts of his new brothers and sisters about how Jesus is our family.

It’s happening every week this summer… at various places throughout the country something like 40,000 high school kids will hear the message of the Gospel and experience it in various ways at camp. Tons of money, time, prayer, organization and arduous preparation goes into this outreach and the greatest thing about it is, those of us who are a part of it are not responsible for changing lives! Camp speakers plan every word they will say, musicians plan every word they will sing and leaders pray over every name for months, but we have absolutely no control over who responds to the Gospel.

This morning I was reading Acts 16. Paul was in Philippi and went by the city gate to a river where he planned to pray, but there were some women gathered, so he started to talk to them. This is verse 14: “One of those listening was a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message.” See, Paul couldn’t save Lydia, but salvation does not belong to Paul. Some of us plant and some of us water, but God makes things grow and He does it whether we are asleep or awake and in ways we can’t explain.

Praise God that He lets us be a part of what He’s doing! He doesn’t need us. In fact, He could do this a lot better and cleaner without us anyway, like when a two-year-old helps their mom make cookies… He calls people, He draws them to Himself. He holds the keys to their hearts and only He can turn those keys. He drags us kicking and screaming into new life and we wouldn’t have wanted it if He hadn’t caused us to. He has said “Let there be light…” inside dark hearts and for some reason He has allowed us to have some little part in it, whether praying, playing or paying. The great thing that this means is that success in ministry is not about results or numbers, because that’s God’s deal. Success in ministry then, is all about faithfulness and holiness. Are we walking with Him? Are we keeping at it? Success means to stick with it, stick to Him and leave the keys in His hands.

norah rose @ 5 months

Learning to Wait…

The other day my oldest daughter Anna told me that she wanted oatmeal for breakfast, so I started to fix it. It was really cute too, because when she says oatmeal, it sounds like “oh-milk.” I put her in her high chair, put her bib on, and gave her some milk to drink while we waited on the oatmeal to cool off. After a while I got busy doing some other things and sort of forgot about Anna’s breakfast… oops! It’s okay though, because she reminded me. As I walked by her high chair she started to sing a song... an original composition that went like this: “Oh-milk, oh-milk, I’m having oh-milk…” It was awesome because she wasn’t screaming or crying but just patiently waiting and singing a song about it.

It wasn’t always that way though… When Anna was Norah’s age and still nursing, she didn’t patiently wait on food, and neither does Norah! Before babies are weaned, they absolutely freak out about eating! When the hunger pains start, Norah lets us know with heart-breaking, ear-splitting, blood-curdling baby screams… as if Christy hasn’t fed her exactly what she needs eight to ten times a day for the past five months! I don’t know what happens in their little baby minds, but they haven’t learned from all the other times their sweet mommy has provided for them. They don’t really know the ins and outs of nutrition, caloric intake and what their little bodies need. The only thing they know is that they are hungry and for some reason they think, “Okay, this is it… this is the end. It’s been fun, but I guess it’s all over!”

After Anna stopped nursing and started eating big people food, she learned over time that we are going to come through for her and give her what she needs. Eventually sweet little Norah will learn this as well. She will be able to relax and trust that we know what we’re doing and that she’s not going to starve. Now, if only I could learn this lesson… So often I don’t know what’s happening in my life or understand why God is allowing certain things and I throw a fit. I stomp my feet, clench my fists and lose my grip, hardening my heart in worry and anger. I act as if He doesn’t know what He’s doing, as if He hasn’t provided for me everyday, all day long all these years! In Psalm 131 David says, “But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me. O Israel, put your hope in the LORD both now and forevermore.”

So what’s the secret, David? How did you learn to be weaned and to wait patiently like my Anna singing her Oh-milk song? Verse 1 in Psalm 131 says this: “My heart is not proud, O LORD, my eyes are not haughty; I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me. But I have stilled and quieted my soul…” We don’t understand all that God is dong in this world and in our lives and even if He explained it to us, we still wouldn’t get it. He always knows what we need and He never forgets about us! We need to let Him sort out all the stuff and just trust Him. He knows what to do and He controls it all. We probably just need to sit back and sing more.

At the top of Sharp Top Mountain

A Well-earned View

I think I am finally starting to recover from my trip to Sharp Top Cove… Last week we took around 50 folks (high schoolers and leaders) to the Young Life camp in Jasper, Georgia and we had an amazing time! I say that I have finally recovered because summer camp can be taxing, especially if you’re over ten years older than the campers… I had tired feet, sore muscles, a sunburn and nowhere near enough sleep, but I think I’m just about back to normal. It was all worth it though, because I was able to stand back and watch as God did amazing things in the lives of our high school friends.

One of my favorite aspects of Young Life summer camp is the hike we take mid-week. Now the hike at Sharp Top is not an incredibly difficult or long climb, but for some folks it is first time in their lives they have ever even thought about hiking. When we got to the top, the camp speaker had everyone sit down and get completely quiet for a whole minute. It was amazing. I know that in my life in this 21st century there are very few times when everything is truly quiet (especially with two babies), but for high school kids, that is an even more rare occurrence. Their lives are bombarded with noise and confusion from every direction. I am always a skeptic when we start that minute of silence on top of the mountain… I usually think, “Yeah right, there is no way hundreds of kids will sit silent for a whole minute.” But they always do. It is absolutely breathtaking to look out over what our God has made and just be in awe of His abstract art. That day we all heeded the sons of Korah who wrote, “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10)

For me though, this hike was special because of a girl named Heather. She is a girl who has had a hard life, made some bad choices like all of us and has quite the reputation, but God has started to bring about amazing changes in her heart… I have watched Him draw Heather to Himself over the last two years through the love of her friend and leader, Emily. And this week I watched her stand up and tell over three hundred people about how she gave her life to Christ. It was awesome. Well, Heather had been dreading the hike all week long because she didn’t think she would make it up to the top, but we stayed with her and beside her all of the way up and she did make it! Several times on the way up she stopped and wanted to quit, but we didn’t let her. Then, when we could finally see the end in sight, she just got really quiet and hustled right up to the top. It was after that hike that Heather really opened up to everything at camp and started having a blast. She rappelled, rode mountain bikes and even conquered the ropes course! In all my days, I’ll never forget that hike and what God has done and is doing in Heather’s heart and mine. It kinda makes you wanna be still, doesn’t it?

Throwing the CCC Gang Sign at the '06 Retreat

Is That You?

Last weekend we took our annual high school Bible study retreat and it was a stinkin’ blast! Our old Young Life guy, Bill Reazer came all the way out from St. Louis to bring our kids some sweet and hard-hitting talks about why we do the things we do and how to really change from Romans 7. We stayed at Don and Judy Sharp’s outrageously beautiful lake house while Kim Reid fed us amazing food until we busted and her son Nater took everyone skiing and tubing on their boat. It was a ton of fun and a great time for our high school friends to be away from the normal routine and focus on being together and hopefully growing closer to the Maker of that beautiful place.

We spent the weekend living inside this question, (and I’ll never again see or say these words without thinking of Reazer’s face) “What are you doing… I mean what…what are you doing?” The Apostle Paul nails us all with his penetrating and transparent self-examination of this person who knows what’s right, wants to do it, and yet doesn’t… whoa. Why do we do the very things we hate? Doesn’t it just feel like being trapped? Reazer guided us through Paul’s thesis about the sin inside us dismantling our desire to do God’s will and took us to that last plea at the end of the chapter, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God- through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

See, our only hope is in Christ. This isn’t behavior modification. It’s all about relationship. It’s not that we’re supposed to try, try again… it’s that we need to be rescued, and we need the Rescuer everyday. Bill ended on Sunday talking about Jesus healing the man who was blind from birth in John 9. He pointed out that when the man returned with his sight to his home, no one recognized him. Being rescued by Jesus made him totally unrecognizable and all his friends were saying, “Is that really you? Are you the one who used to sit here and beg? No way… what happened to you?”

That’s what I want in my life… I want to be rescued everyday from myself and my own heart and I want to be changed by Him. I want to be unrecognizably different so that people look at me and say, “Lee? Is that really you? No way… what happened to you?”

Anna at Easter

Comfort

So yesterday was one of the greatest days ever! It was a Thursday, which meant the day was already full of promise because Thursday is my one full day off in the week… 24 hours with just my wife and daughters. I slept in like crazy, slammed some delicious homemade banana bread for breakfast and ran errands with the girls. After lunch everyone had a nap and then for dinner we went to our favorite restaurant, The Stir Fry Café on someone else’s nickel (praise the Lord for gift cards). After dinner we got Anna some strawberry ice cream and took her to look at a fountain, which she thinks is more fun than just about anything. It was such a great night… the food was great, and the girls were perfect angels at the restaurant… we are so blessed!

Well, on the way home we were listening to this awesome John Williams CD of film score highlights that Patrick and Patty gave me for my birthday, and the piece, “Dry Your Tears, Afrika” from the movie Amistad was playing. When the song first came on, Christy and I were instantly transported by that melody back into that unbelievably poignant true story. Anna asked Christy if she was sad, to which Chris said, “Some very bad things happened to a lot of people in Africa and it makes me sad.” Then I told Anna that all those bad things were the reason Jesus came, and that one day He would come again to make everything right in the end. Well, as we kept driving, that song kept crawling deeper and deeper inside me and breaking my heart over the wickedness and evil of slavery… I could just see Djimon Hounsou’s character standing in that courtroom with shackled hands screaming, “Give us Free!”

Before the song ended, I had tears of my own to dry… that’s when the coolest thing happened. My little two and a half year-old asked me from her car seat, “Dad, are you sad? Are you crying?” And I said, “Yeah babe, I am.” Then my little girl said, “Its okay, Dad. Jesus is coming back.” Whoa… I can’t describe what that moment did for me. This little keyboard doesn’t have the keys… to be comforted by your child, to have your faith strengthened by the words coming from that little heart… it was awesome. Later that night before we drifted off into sleep, closing our eyes on the most awesome of days, I thanked God for comforting me with my own words… for letting me hear the simplest and deepest truth in the sweet timbre of my toddler.

A Stradivarius Violin

Belonging To Skillful Hands

A few weeks ago I got a CD out of the library of Itzach Perlman’s greatest hits. It was absolutely ridiculous to hear the music that dude can make. People often say that the violin is the closest sounding instrument to the human voice, but there is no voice that could ever do the things Perlman can do with that violin. He can play so fast and so high that your brain can’t even keep up with the stream of sonorities he produces… but he can also play so heartbreakingly slow and with such depth of feeling that you have to pull the car over and just let it get inside you. Contained in the liner notes of the CD is an interview of Perlman where he explains the different pieces of music he chose for the record and why he chose them. After discussing all of the music, the interviewer asks Perlman to talk about his violin. He said that he plays a Stradivarius violin that was handcrafted in 1714. He ends by saying, “What I can tell you is, it’s a great fiddle!”

In his description of this 292 year-old instrument, Perlman said that he considers himself very lucky to have acquired it. I have to disagree. That violin is lucky to be in such gifted and capable hands! Although it is true that there is no violin quite like a Strad, it is also true that many of the ones that are still around these days are in glass cases in museums or owned by outrageously wealthy people who can’t play a single musical note. Violins were made to make beautiful music, and no matter how good the instrument is, sitting in a case or in tone deaf hands is not where they should be. Ah, but to belong to Itzach Perlman… to be owned by a musician like him… if violins could dream, they would dream of Perlman.

Psalm 107 says, “Give thanks to the LORD for He is good; His love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the LORD say this…” The word redeemed means ‘purchased’ or ‘bought back.’ People who have believed in Christ and received His free gift of life were bought by Him and the price He paid was His own precious blood. Paul says that because of this purchase, we no longer belong to ourselves, but to Him. He owns us because He paid for us with His very life. Sometimes that idea causes people trouble because they believe true freedom means belonging to no one and having control over your own life, but the truth is that no one belongs to themselves or has any real control. The Bible says that people are either owned by sin which causes misery and despair and ends in destruction; or they are owned by Christ… the tender and Good Shepherd whose “love endures forever.”

Before Perlman’s Stradivarius was a violin, it was a spruce tree, a maple tree and some random pieces of metal. Then it was crafted into something with the potential to make beautiful music; and in the right hands, it has made some of the most stunning and gorgeous music ever imagined. We have been redeemed and now belong to the most skillful hands there are… the hands that crafted us and the hands that were wounded for us. They are the hands of Christ, who is able to create with us the beautiful music we were made to make. It is good to belong to Him, for He is good and His love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say this!

He's back...

Mild Mannered Reporters

Can you feel it? June 30 is coming! Are you pumped? Wait… you do know what happens on June 30, right? The new Superman movie is coming out! I’m pretty sure it’s going to rock all of our faces off! You know, as far back as I can remember, I have loved superheroes… in fact, I bet that’s true of most guys. Jerry Seinfeld said that one huge key to understanding men is just to realize that most of the time we are trying to be superheroes… and that when men think about superheroes, these are not stories; these are options. Really, that’s kind of true of people throughout humanity. Comic books were not the start of superheroes. They have been around since the dawn of time. The Greeks talked bout the Titans and Hercules and every culture has tales of heroes of great strength, power and ability.

So why is this? Why do we love to create, listen to and tell tales of these extraordinary people? I think the reason is that we all want to be more than we are… I know this is true for me; I have always wanted to be a person that’s off the charts. As a kid I would climb trees or stand on really high things and just talk myself into being able to fly. The reason is that I didn’t want to be just regular old ‘me’ anymore. I know it’s nerdy to want to be a superhero, but this desire to be something more than ordinary is not. In fact, I think this is a desire that God has put into every human heart. One thing that I am starting to understand more and more as I walk with Christ is that the Gospel fulfills this desire… Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not that if you believe in Jesus you become bulletproof or have heat vision or anything like that… but an incredible change does take place.

When a person believes that Christ died for them, the Bible says that a lot of cool things happen… they are born all over again and born from above. That person is completely cleansed from all unrighteousness and seated in the heavenly places with Christ. When you believe in Jesus, the Holy Spirit comes to live inside your heart as a down payment guaranteeing God’s promise. You get a whole new heart, new affections and a new power. It actually says in Ephesians 1 that the same power that God used to raise Jesus from the dead is coursing through your veins if you are in Christ! Whoa! If you know Jesus, you really are extraordinary! You are brand new, and actually have new strength, real power and amazing abilities. In fact, when the believers in Corinth weren’t really living up to their new selves, Paul confronted them by saying, “Are you not acting like mere men?” -1 Corinthians 1:3

Now, it’s not that you can all of a sudden leap over buildings in a single bound, (who says ‘bound’ anyway?) but now you have the ability to please God with your life, whereas people who don’t know Jesus absolutely cannot. You can now face trials and suffering full of joy and trust. You can go through frustrating and difficult situations with mean and hurtful people and actually not complain! You can face devastation and tragedy with a heart absolutely full of peace! And the great this is this: that doesn’t even scratch the surface of the things you can do if you know Him! If you are in Christ and He is in you, you are extraordinary and there’s no one quite like you… Check out this beautiful verse in Deuteronomy 33… “Blessed are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the LORD?”

Some of our high school folks hiking in a cave way back in April 2004...

Our Guide

Man, our weather here in East Tennessee has been so crazy lately! It feels as though the only thing consistent about it is its inconsistency… There have been outrageous storms and tons of rain out of nowhere for days at a time. You never know when you can do yard work, when you can leave the windows down, and you never know when you can go out and enjoy the day with a nice walk without getting caught in a deluge! Although, did you know that there is one outdoor place you can go and hike anytime… rain, snow, sun, hail, thunder and lightning, hot or cold? Know what it is? A cave.

You can go hiking in a cave in any weather at anytime of the year and it will always be around 58 degrees, dry and dark. About two years ago my boy Joe was our guide as we took the high school folks here at church hiking in a cave in Sparta. It was huge, dark and around 58 degrees even though it was fairly warm and rainy outside. When we were pretty deep into that cave I realized that if anything happened to Joe, we were toast! We had already gone through several tunnels and into and through different “rooms” so that I had lost all bearings. I had no idea where we were or where to find light. The good thing was that the quiet dude in the front with the light on his helmet was there, guiding us. He knew where we were, he knew where we were going (well, most of the time) and he was with us.

Deuteronomy 31:8 says, “The Lord Himself goes before you and will be with you; He will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” Sometimes walking through life is like walking through that cave… it’s dark, cold and full of creepy bats! We don’t always know where we are and we pretty much never know what’s coming. This can lead to confusion, anxiety and all kinds of fears, but we don’t have to feel that stuff! We have a Guide, and our Guide is the Lord Himself! This verse tells us two things not to feel and it gives us two great reasons not to feel them.

It says that we don’t have to be afraid and we don’t have to be discouraged, and the reason is because we are promised two things about our Guide: He goes before us and He will be with us. He goes before us… He is outside time and sees everything in the next five seconds and the next five years. That is called providence. He holds the future! I shouldn’t be discouraged, I should be encouraged because He’s already seen what’s coming and knows everything about it… not only that, He’s in control over everything that’s coming. But not only does He go before us, He promises to be with us! No matter where I go or what happens to me, God is with me! How can I be afraid if God is in my corner! You see, not only does He hold the future, He holds you! He’s with you. He knows where you are and He knows what’s in store. We don’t have to be afraid or discouraged because our Guide, our God has promised us His providence and His presence.

Christy and our new nephew Josiah

Namesakes

I just got a new nephew… his name is Josiah and he is beautiful. He is the son of two of my heroes: my wife’s sister, Patty and her husband, Patrick. Before they got Josiah they had Abby, who was born almost four months too early and spent six months in the hospital before she was able to go home. Patrick and Patty are everyday and all day long the most incredible example of trust in our Father and faithfulness in the midst of outrageous difficulties, confusion and trials. When I think about what a scary world this is to bring children into I rejoice for Abby and Josiah because they get to grow up in a home full of faith in and love for Jesus no matter what the world outside is doing.

I love the name Josiah. It reminds me of the Civil War… Josiah was a popular name back in those days, in fact; I have an ancestor who fought in the Civil War who had that name. I think the reason ‘Josiah’ was a such a popular name back then was that people read their Bibles more and watched Fox News less (or rather, not at all). See, Josiah was the name of one of the Kings of Judah in the Old Testament. You remember your Old Testament kings, right? First there was Saul, then David and after him Solomon. Then the nation of Israel had their own Civil War and split into two kingdoms. There was Israel, (in the North) and Judah (in the South). Israel had nineteen kings who were all total disasters. If they had been graded, they would have all gotten “F’s”. Judah was different. They had their share of “F’s” as well, but they had a few “C’s” and even a couple of “B’s”. There were only two solid “A’s”. One was Hezekiah and the other was possibly the only “A+”… Josiah.

It says in the book of 2 Kings 22 that Josiah “did what was right in the eyes of the LORD and walked in all the ways of his father David, not turning aside to the right or to the left.” There was absolutely no one like him! He became king of Judah at the age of 8. He had responsibility and leadership before some kids lose their front two teeth. He turned the nation’s heart back to the Lord, destroying their idols and celebrating Passover for the first time in centuries. He didn’t learn it from his dad either… See, Josiah had a granddad named Manasseh who was described as one of the worst people who ever lived… and Josiah’s dad, Amon wasn’t any better. So, how did he become so awesome? I don’t really know. It was probably some mystical and unknowable combination of God working in his heart, him loving the Lord, some advisors and counselors who had a heart for God, and some great Aunt Lulu who prayed for him everyday. Paul says none of us really knows how growth happens… we plant, they water, and God makes things grow. Somehow Josiah grew strong in the Lord.

Then when he was 26 (my age as I sit here and type this out) something happened. He ordered that the temple of God be restored and renovated. It was a huge project to restore the beauty and grandeur of God’s house, and it was going great when Josiah’s secretary ran into the throne room breathless… “My Lord,” he said, “We were cleaning out this closet up at the temple, and I found something…” “What?” The secretary looked at Josiah and said, “I found the Bible.” See, it turns out that for years and years (who knows how long) the entire nation was going about its business as usual while no one was reading God’s word! The Bible was covered in cobwebs in some closet! When Josiah heard this he said, “Well, come on… read it.” When they read the words of God to this young man, he lost it. He was completely distraught. That was the moment when all of God’s groundwork in his heart and his advisor’s godly counsel and Aunt Lulu’s prayers came to a head when combined with the word and Josiah became God’s man to cleanse the nation and lead them into repentance and worship. He was awesome!

I just got a new nephew… did I tell you? And his name is Josiah. I think he’s going to be awesome too… just like his namesake. But this Josiah has amazing parents living beautiful lives and he has sweet and godly grandparents as well. And he might not have Lulu, but he has Aunt Christy and Aunt Connie and Uncle Lee and we’re all praying. And this Josiah will never have to dig in some closet to find the words of His God, for they are written on the walls of his house and they are alive in the music on his Mommy’s lips and they are hidden in his Daddy’s heart. I don’t know what all it takes to grow, but God does, and I think this kid is gonna be awesome!

Ryan Long (drawing by Tom Job)

He Watches Over Me…

Last night Ryan Long played a concert here at Christ Community and as always it was great. I have always liked Ryan’s songwriting ever since I first heard the CD that Aaron Jenkins brought over to my house three years ago, but there is nothing like seeing one of Ryan’s shows. There is an intimacy and genuine yearning to his songs and heart when you get to watch him play and sing one of his songs. Last night’s show was great, but I was pretty discouraged by the number of people who showed up. I think we ended up having a little over 75 people, which isn’t bad unless you’re sitting in a room that can hold 220…

It turned out that the reason we had so few folks there was that there was a huge storm, (complete with tornados) tearing through Middle Tennessee and heading our way yesterday evening. Some family and friends out there actually had the siding ripped off of their homes and their cars slammed with hail damage as they hid in their bath tub… Well, that storm system, which had already claimed lives in Middle Tennessee was headed straight for us at 7:34 P.M., and the concert was supposed to start at 7:30. Now, in the past couple of weeks, the buzz about the concert has been great! Everyone and their hamster was planning on being there, but as the storm rolled in, the people did not.

We waited the worst out and started the concert a little late and it was everything you want out of a Ryan show… Everything from subtle to slammin’ guitar, flawless, scratchy and sweet vocals and the wide open heart of a guy who loves Christ. It was awesome. My favorite moment though was right at the end … The rain was beating down hard on the roof, the thunder was rolling heavy and deep outside and Ryan was leading us into deeper trust in our sovereign Father with a lullaby…

He clothes the flowers of the field
The fortune of the sparrow’s sealed
No worry, no vain care have I
That escapes His guardian eye

From a distance, and from very near
Yesterday, today, and tomorrow never fear
No need for me to fret or cry,
Safe beneath His wings am I

‘Cause He watches over me,
Every night while I’m asleep
And He watches over me,
Yes, He watches over me

Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms
Leaning, leaning, on the everlasting arms