How Being Judged Hurts

A lot of people think that John 3:16 is the most ubiquitous and well-known verse in the Bible.  I disagree.   It may be the most well-known Bible reference, but in spirit I believe there is one that is far more ingrained in the minds of mankind.   

Check this out…

Matthew 7:1 “Judge not, that you be not judged” ESV

Every human knows this.  Heck, dogs probably know this.  We just can’t hear them in their minds saying, “Don’t judge me, okay.  The cat did it.  Okay?  You don’t know me.  Don’t act like you know me.”  If an atheist knows ONE verse it is this one.  It is everyone’s way of saying, “How dare you point out my sin to me!”  

There are two Biblical definitions of the word, judge.  One is to discern.  The other is to condemn.

We know that we are supposed to admonish one another, that discernment is good.  We will know one another by our fruit.  Yes?  The idea that Jesus was saying, “Don’t see other people’s sin ever.  If someone is stealing something, just let it go.  If your loved one is showing destructive patterns, how dare you admonish them.  How dare you reveal what you see that they might stop.”  We all deep down know this.  None of us live out the opposite either.  We all say something when we see our loved one about to put their hand into the fire.  We all say, “Stop!”   To let that person touch the fire unwarned is not even remotely loving.  No one let’s their kid wonder into the street for fear of judgment, nor allows their kid to keep lying.  Both are very dangerous, and to leave it to that person to just figure it out is silly, and no one does that.  We all share what we’ve learned, and discernment is part of that.

So what is the issue if it isn’t discernment? 

Condemnation. 

One of the greatest pieces of wisdom outside the Bible I’ve ever read was on the difference between condemnation and conviction.  Both sting at first.  Being told we are wrong ALWAYS hurts.  It is a practiced skill and sign of maturity to get better at hearing that you are wrong.  The difference is that conviction always promises life, and there is a sweetness behind it.  It is about freedom.  There is now therefore no condemnation in Christ Jesus.  We are free.  However, sin hurts, and we need to be shown from time to time that we are hurting ourselves.  On the other hand, condemnation brings about death.  It keeps us trapped in our sin, focused on the past.  It is a tool of satan.

Until this last year, I had never really felt the sting of condemnation so heavily, nor seen how destructive it can be.  It makes since to me now as I read that the number one reason for the rise of the “Nones,” those no longer affiliated with any church, is judgment.  I don’t think I ever really saw that judgment goes beyond words.  It isn’t just proclaiming, “You are going to hell.”  It is a posture of the heart and spirit, one that overflows into our actions.

A year ago my wife left me.  I have no desire to go into detail.  I have worked hard to preserve a relationship of some kind, however trivial, with my ex-wife.  All I care to say is that I did not deserve to be left.  She had no Biblical right to leave me.  I did not want her to leave.  I did not want to be divorced.  Beyond that, I am not going to say much.   

Since then, I have experienced a whole new side to the church I have never before known.  Note that when I say church, I mean the church greater, the body of believers, not one church in specific.  What I have experienced is judgment, and hear this, it has hurt me worse than I can possibly admit.  There just are not words. 

As I said, I have learned much about judgment.  Let me go back to what condemnation is versus discernment.  The main element of condemnation is not speaking words to people.  That is the overflow.  It is in the heart.  In order to judge someone in the verb sense you must first become a judge the noun.  In order to become a judge you are placing yourself as a dispenser of the law.  Think about that.  It is an act of self-elevation.  One doesn’t have to elevate to be a part of admonishing and conviction.  Who better than a former thief, or someone who still even battles the desire to steal to tell see the pattern in another thief and say, "Don't do it.  I know.  This road only leads to pain."  Is not the lustful man or woman the most qualified to warn of the false promises lust brings?  It surely is. Notice that the fellow criminal is still aware of the law.  There is an acute awareness, a discernment, of the law and can see when someone else is breaking it, and still warns to obey it.  I say that to again show that discernment and admonishment are not bad.

I want you to think about this...  Being judged, condemned, has given satan so much power for lies in my heart it is amazing.  I have never felt so useless, so unloved, or so dirty in my life, and I wasn’t even the one who left.  I was wronged, and yet I have been made to feel like dirt, like I am not pure, not true, not a real Christian anymore.  I have become a second-class Christian.   

Ultimately, that feeling is my own fault.  No one controls my heart.  These are lies that I have believed.  That is on me.  I should have been stronger, more faithful.  How many times has the Holy Spirit reminded me that Jesus was an outcast by the religious institutions of the day?  Many.   

Yet, I have struggled like never before, and in doing so I now see the power of condemnation.  If I, someone who has devoted their life to Christ, has struggled so mightily under the burden of condemnation from the church then what effect does it have on someone just peeking through the door?  We already know the answer.  Unfortunately, sometimes you just have to experience something to really understand it.  I never understood how I could condemn people with my actions, with my looks, with my posture.  I never saw how my feeling like I was better than someone would pervade through my mask and show in a hundred little ways, or come back around through gossip.  How many times have I heard mean things said about me by my brothers and sisters in Christ.  Even an amplified sense of pity can be a part of it. 

I realize there are a ton of trails and loose ends to be discussed in this.  For now, I just want you to meditate on the devastation a spirit of condemnation has.  Even though I have suffered it’s burden, I still struggle to not think myself better than others, to go beyond lovingly and gently calling someone out, and instead wreak havoc upon them, making them feel awful and unloved.  Perhaps that is the key.  Perhaps we forget that Jesus loved us BEFORE we were clean, BEFORE we loved Him.  Yes?  Maybe?  We too ought to love others BEFORE they become clean, as we are not clean either, really, not in action.  That is the beauty of the gospel, to be seen as clean when we are not.  God takes those weights and measurements of judgment and tosses them away. 

The counteraction to this has been the redemptive, the restorative, the understanding love of so many others.  It has been through the tenderness of those who have not condemned (but have sometimes admonished).  They gave counsel.  They hurt with me.  They reminded me that I am not somehow less of a person, that divorce is not a super sin, that it doesn’t define me.  I may be someone has been divorced, but that doesn’t make my definition the divorced guy.  It is not my label for life.  I am the redeemed guy, the Christian, the mess of a man made Holy only by grace, the guy that keeps screwing up and keeps getting taken care of by Jesus anyway.  

They helped me move past my own condemnation of myself.  It is amazing how when people start to treat you a certain way you struggle not to feel that way.  It is through the guidance of others I am reminded that I did not do wrong.  I didn’t leave, that you can’t make someone else obey, or love you.  I have been reminded constantly that good parents have children go astray, good spouses get left, and good people suffer.  Job was innocent yet suffered.  I remember Tim Skaggs, senior pastor at Coggin Avenue Baptist in Brownwood reminding me that Jesus stood outside of Jerusalem and wept because he had called them to Him and they would not come, that if Jesus couldn’t make them come how could I believe I could make Kathleen come to me?  I couldn’t.  We as the church can help or hinder so much.   

My prayer is that we can all see ourselves as we are, sinners redeemed by God.  May we not condemn.  May we not remember we are fellow criminals all coming together in praise of the fact that the actual judge decided to let us go free despite our criminal action.  May we not make a mockery of the court, and as criminals, climb into that judges chair, grab the gavel, and start waiving at the other criminals just like us, lest we be held in contempt of court.  All glory be to God.  Amen.

Are Short Lives Incomplete Lives?

"He left us too soon."

"She was robbed of life early."

"His story was cut short."

Almost every time, maybe every time, someone young dies some form of the above notions get tossed about.  Death is always hard for us mortals, as it should be.  Death's permanency is surely horrifying.  Yet, we seem to have formed some sort of unspoken gradient by which we feel we can measure the completeness of a person's life, and thereby we can also judge the level of tragedy that goes along with that death. 

If someone is a hundred, and they die, we don't even bat an eye.  We marvel at their age.  We say, "Well done."  Some might even say, "I hope I don't live that long."  Most of us nowadays see the eighties as expected.  Reach eighty and all bets are off.  We'll shed a tear for you, but you've gotten your due.  Sixties are when things start to hurt, where the questions start.  Someone dies in their sixties and we can't help but wonder why they didn't make eighty.  There is a sense of loss, of tragedy, but at least there is the notion that they lived somewhat.  Children were probably had, maybe grand kids.  Not a total loss.  If someone is thirty and dies, we are floored.  Twenties, we're gutted.  Teens and below, forget it.  Our minds don't even know how to handle it.  

When people die young, we feel they have been robbed.  So short was their life.  So little did they experience.  So much more was left for them to do and see and feel.  The loss is overwhelming to us.  It is not just for ourselves we mourn, but mostly for them.  We view their lives as tragedy.

Question is, "Is a short story an incomplete story?"

 Absolutely not.

Go read the story, "To Build a Fire," by Jack London.  It is a literary masterpiece.  You will be moved.  You will torn.  You'll feel elation.  You'll feel loss.  All of that, and the story is only fifteen pages long.  That's it.  

Compare that with a Harry Potter novel or one of the Lord of the Rings books.  Those are hundreds and hundreds of pages each.  Thousands of pages to complete the story of each series.  Yet here we have "To Build a Fire" at fifteen pages, and it is a masterpiece.  It does not need anything else to tell it's story.  As a matter of fact, more might even ruin the story.  It's brevity is part of it's power.  We've seen it again and again, particularly in movies, where a beloved short film is taken and extended, only to show us just how perfect the story was in it's short form.  Adding things simply ruined the story.

Now, let's read this:

All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
(Psalm 139:16)

Do you see what I see?  Our days are ordained.  For those who don't know what ordained means, it means numbered, given, set up.  Not only that, but they were so before we even were! With that in mind, there is no such thing as a life cut short.  No one has been robbed of life early.  There is an author, and he doesn't make mistakes.  Every life ends exactly when it should.  

This doesn't mean we don't hurt.  We do, but for us.  We hurt because we miss those who have gone before.  BUT, the beauty is that we are now free to see the beauty in those lives.  We need not feel they were robbed of life. There lives were masterpieces, written by the ultimate author.  Sometimes those stories leave us sad, much like "To Build a Fire," but they are still masterpieces.  They still move us.  They are still complete.  There are long lives that end sad too.   Long life is a good thing.  We know this.  But, let us no longer judge the lives  of those whom have lived briefly as lesser works.  It may feel like we are sticking up for them, like we are for them, but we disrespect their lives.  It would be like judging "To Build a Fire," not based upon its prowess as a literary work, but simply for its length. 

This way we get to revel in the beauty of a short life.  We get to take it in.  Yes, it leaves us wanting more.  All stories do.  Yet, we will be revering the beauty of the work, and respecting that life as we should.  That is the real way to honor those whose lives have ended in youth.

My Soul at Hazard

“I was sheriff of this county when I was 25 years old. Hard to believe. My grandfather was a lawman. Father too. Me and him was sheriffs at the same time, him up in Plano and me out here. I think he’s pretty proud of that. I know I was.

“Some of the old-time sheriffs never even wore a gun. A lot of folks find that hard to believe. Jim Scarborough never carried one. That’s the younger Jim. Gaston Boykins wouldn’t wear one up in Comanche County.

“I always liked to hear about the old-timers. Never missed a chance to do so. You can’t help but compare yourself against the old-timers. Can’t help but wonder how they’d have operated these times.

“There’s this boy I sent to the electric chair at Huntsville here a while back. My arrest and my testimony. He killed a 14-year-old girl. Paper said it was a crime of passion, but he told me there wasn’t any passion to it. Told me he’d been planning to kill somebody for about as long as he could remember. Said if they turned him out, he’d do it again. Said he knew he was going to hell. Be there in about 15 minutes.

“I don’t know what to make of that. I surely don’t. The crime you see now, it’s hard to even take its measure. It’s not that I’m afraid of it. I always knew you had to be willing to die to even do this job. But I don’t want to push my chips forward and go out and meet something I don’t understand. A man would have to put his soul at hazard. He’d have to say, ‘OK. I’ll be part of this world.’”

—   Sheriff Ed Tom Bell from No Country for Old Men

I’m just going to shoot straight here and tell you that life has been pummeling me as of late.  It’s not just one thing.  It’s a general barrage of first world hardship and disappointment.  Now, when I say first world I’m just giving some global context, not saying that my pain hurts less because of it.  It’s been hard.  Job’s been hard.  People’ve been hard.  And as usual, I've been less than stellar at making things better myself.  It’s just the times for me. 

And I have to say, that because of it my fingers have been slower to flip through the word of God.  Haven’t even wanted to say His name out loud much.

It isn’t that I’m angry.  If anything I am disturbed by how calm I’ve been, how easily I’ve turned over.  No.  It’s fear.  There’s a caution inside me when I start reaching for the Bible, a catch in my mouth for words of praise towards Him.  I’m just so tired of being pummeled that I’m downright scared to shake the hornet’s nest anymore.  I can hear inside me being whispered, “Just keep it to your self.  You can love God.  Just hold it inside you.  The Gospel is great, but let other people share it.  Take a breath.  Focus on getting by.  Don’t put your soul at hazard any longer.”

Each passing day has seen pieces of me flake off out of necessity.  Shed that optimism in order to cope with the disappointment.  Slough off that hope.  It just leads to more pain. 

The whole thing has just about shut me up.  There doesn’t feel to be a whole lot left of me in there.  But… there are some things, some good things, no, great things, things too good, that keep rattling the cage that seems to surround my heart.  They shout inside me, “Wake up!  Fight!” 

So fight I must, for I cannot bear to disappear any further.  Hope must be and grow.  And, my passion to share the gospel will not be curtailed.  Stopping telling people about God?  Might as well die.  What’s the point otherwise?  That’d be like never saying I love you to those you love ever again, and that just isn’t going to happen.  

I'm going to double up and believe it'll be okay, that there is a purpose to this mess.  After all, I was warned by God himself.  Shame on me for ever thinking it was going to be anything other than hard.  God didn't let the cup pass from His own son, Jesus.  Why would I think he'd pass this cup, an infinitely smaller one, from me?

Strength may not be there.  Right now it’s mostly bark, but I’m swinging.  I’m swinging for hope, for a life that’s more than just okay.  This weight need not crush me, nor will it… in Jesus’ name.  I invite anyone who feels moved to do so please pray for me in this, that my heart would not fail, that dreams would not cease, that disappointment would not overrun me.  Like the Psalmist, may I press on in faith, trust, and hope.  I will pray the same for you.

Psalm 84:8-12

8 O LORD God of hosts, hear my prayer; give ear, O God of Jacob! Selah

9 Behold our shield, O God; look on the face of your anointed!

10 For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness.

11 For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor. No good thing does he withhold from those who walk uprightly.

12 O LORD of hosts, blessed is the one who trusts in you!

Where was God in Aurora? ...and other Questions.

Nicholas L. Laning

Where was God in Aurora?  So big has this question been that the other day cnn.com had an article with that question as it's main story.  So many people wonder, "what happened?"  And I understand the question.  Everyone has wrestled with this question, and we don't come up with the same answers.

Where do we get the idea that God is good, loving?

I am going to lay one truth down.  God's being loving and evil's existence is not incompatible at all.  Think about the fact that you got the idea that God is loving from the Bible.  You may think it is universal.  It isn't.  It is Judeo-Christian.  Most eastern religions don't have a god at all.  There is either illusion, or nothingness, or something else, but no god.  Hinduism has millions of gods, but they are all a part of the illusion of life.  They aren't a loving supreme being.  So, you are getting your idea of God being loving from Judaism and Christianity.  It is not an innate belief.  If it were, it would have played itself out in other cultures.  God being loving is very unique, not common.

Must a supreme being be loving?

No.  A supreme being doesn't have to be loving.  I am not talking about the Bible.  I am simply saying that something could have created everything and not be loving.  They do not have to go hand in hand at all.  That is illogical.  That is like saying that everyman that walks through the door will be able to whistle Dixie.  What does whistling have to do with walking through a door?  Nothing.  A man CAN walk through a door and whistle Dixie, but it isn't necessary.  Neither is necessary for a being be able to create our universe and have to love.  It is simply that Judeo-Christian influence you have if you feel that way.  You may not like it, but it is true.

So, we get our idea of God being loving from the Bible.  Does it then say suffering isn't real?

Umm, no.  Not even close.  You could pretty much take a Bible in your hand, close you eyes, open the Bible to a random page, and you will find suffering, probably a lot of it.  Read Job.  Job didn't even do anything wrong, and God allowed him to suffer.  Moses, David, Noah, Adam, every prophet, everybody in the Bible suffered.  Matter of fact, most of the Bible is about how to deal with suffering.  Think about that now.  This is the same book that gave you the idea of God being loving.  So, the same book says that God is loving also says that suffering is very, very real.  So then, God's idea of love includes allowing suffering.  Is that illogical?  Nope, and we know it.  Suffering can exist with love. 

Is it possible for suffering to exist with a loving God?

It isn't illogical for God to be loving and allow pain.  It is simply unpleasant.  We just don't like it, and as much as we like to think of ourselves as rational, we are prone to believe with our feelings.  If we don't like it, we don't WANT to believe it.  This is why when a MAN goes into a room and shoots people we get mad at God.  We don't want it to be about man.  If it is about man, it could then be about us, and we want to believe we are awesome.  We ain't.  All of history speaks volumes about how not awesome we are.  We think that because we haven't killed someone that we are good.  Never mind that we are selfish, greedy, prideful, arrogant, etc. etc.

Even if it is logically coherent for suffering to exist in world created by a God who is loving, why did that God choose to do things this way?

I don't know.  I have about eight different theories as to what the answer could be, but they are just that... guesses.  In the end, what we take heart in is that the God of the Bible, unlike any other deity ever put forward, took part in our suffering.  Think about that.  God allows evil, allows suffering to exist, but He did not stay up in the heavens and laugh from a distance.  He became man, and took on more suffering than you or I have.  He was tortured on our behalf.  That is loving.  He delved into the pain, and thus proved that pain can exist, and that He is still loving.

 If not God, then what?

This is where most people I have seen fall short.  We don't like what God has chosen to do, so we choose to reject Him.  However, it is very rare to ask the question, then what?  Judaism and Islam both have suffering and a loving God.  You can't get away form that there.  Eastern religions don't have a loving god, usually not a god at all.  There is justice.  Most run to atheism.  Question... if matter is all that is, then what is evil?  The answer is nothing.  Evil is just another chemical reaction.  Your "life" is nothing but matter trying to stay in a certain form.  There is nothing transcendent, nothing eternal about evil.  The shootings in Aurora, Colorado are nothing more than a chemical and physical reaction.  Does that sound better?  Does that comfort you?  Is that freeing?  It is truly awful.  It is the death of anything transcendent, the death of justice.  The death of love.  All is simply chemical.

How do you come to peace with God and evil?

Read the Bible.  If you read the Bible, you will cease to be surprised by evil's existence, as it is everywhere.  You will see that judging God on being hypocritical can only be done by rejecting His own description of Himself.  If you do that then you have to realize that you are getting your ideas of God from somewhere else, and you cannot judge the God of the Bible with the Bible.

Here are two pieces of scripture to leave you with...

Job 7:1-21

1 "Has not man a hard service on earth, and are not his days like the days of a hired hand? 2 Like a slave who longs for the shadow, and like a hired hand who looks for his wages, 3 so I am allotted months of emptiness, and nights of misery are apportioned to me. 4 When I lie down I say, 'When shall I arise?' But the night is long, and I am full of tossing till the dawn. 5 My flesh is clothed with worms and dirt; my skin hardens, then breaks out afresh. 6 My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle and come to their end without hope. 7 "Remember that my life is a breath; my eye will never again see good. 8 The eye of him who sees me will behold me no more; while your eyes are on me, I shall be gone. 9 As the cloud fades and vanishes, so he who goes down to Sheol does not come up; 10 he returns no more to his house, nor does his place know him anymore. 11 "Therefore I will not restrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit; I will complain in the bitterness of my soul. 12 Am I the sea, or a sea monster, that you set a guard over me? 13 When I say, 'My bed will comfort me, my couch will ease my complaint,' 14 then you scare me with dreams and terrify me with visions, 15 so that I would choose strangling and death rather than my bones. 16 I loathe my life; I would not live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are a breath. 17 What is man, that you make so much of him, and that you set your heart on him, 18 visit him every morning and test him every moment? 19 How long will you not look away from me, nor leave me alone till I swallow my spit? 20 If I sin, what do I do to you, you watcher of mankind? Why have you made me your mark? Why have I become a burden to you? 21 Why do you not pardon my transgression and take away my iniquity? For now I shall lie in the earth; you will seek me, but I shall not be." 

Romans 5:12-18

12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned-- 13 for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. 14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come. 15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man's trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. 16 And the free gift is not like the result of that one man's sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification. 17 For if, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. 18 Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. 


Hopefully this has found you well.  I am not perfect.  I am fallen.  My heart's desire is to share the love of Christ with you.  If I have not done that, then please write me and admonish me. 

Key West, Fun, Purpose, and the Matrix...

Nicholas L. Laning

Just a couple of hours ago I did something incredibly uncool.  One day back from family vacation snorkeling the reefs just off the Keys in Florida, I couldn't help myself.  After doing some recon to make sure the pool was empty, or at least close to it, I broke into action.  My contraband was hidden underneath the towel hung gently over my arm.  There, in the middle of my Uptown Dallas apartment pool, I broke out my Darkfins (rubber gloves with webs between the fingers to help you swim faster, and my dive mask, and I swam.  

The differences between snorkeling in my glitzy apartment pool and the ocean were stark.  The water being sans salt meant I couldn't float anymore, and the water that bubbled into the nose part of my mask did not burn.  There was no swaying of the tides.  And, most obviously, there is nothing interesting to look at.  No ethereally painted fish or eels that remind one of some far away planet in a sci-fi movie.  

And yet, despite all of that, I found myself very, very pleased.  My pleasure has nothing to do with my pool or anything outside really.  The truth is, as great as vacations are, there is something incredibly unnatural about them after a while.  It hit me that, while on vacation, you are prone to think of yourself even more than you already do, which is quite a feat for such a self centered lot as we humans.  The name of the game is pleasing yourself.  At first this sounds great, but inside, the more we indulge, something dies.  What dies is purpose and love.  We are not meant to think of only ourselves.  God calls us to love others.  


All day I have been meditating on Corinthians 13.

1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.  

2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  

3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant  

5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;  

6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  

7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  

8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.  

9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part,  

10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 

11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.  

12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.  

13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 

Don't skip a single line.  Read that and be amazed.  We are nothing without love.  Nothing!  We are to be kind, not arrogant or rude, to have hope, to endure!  What wonderful, incredible words!!!  Amen!!!  So much fun was had on our trip.  I saw things that I will never forget.  It was wonderful.  Yet, I am excited to stop thinking about myself all the time, and get back to the truly great things, and start loving God, and loving people.  I love to travel, and when I have thought about my travelling in the past, I have imagined it as a means of self indulgence most often.  Now, I still long to travel, but as a means to love others, to share things, to connect with those whom are spreading the gospel around the globe.  Hopefully, God will see it fit to allow me to love in this way.  If not, then so be it.  

Something that my brother shared with me really helped me in my seeing this world for what it is.  As we flew back home, he told me this analogy... believing in the Bible, or at least saying you do, and then getting so caught up in the minutia and tedium of this life, is foolish.  Imagine that you have been brought out of the Matrix.  You have been shown that your life in the Matrix is a lie.  You are a slave to this trick.  You decide you are going to fight the machines and bring about truth and freedom.  Then, when you get put back into the Matrix for your mission, instead of remembering your charge, you get caught with the minutia of the life you once had in the Matrix.  None of it ultimately matters in comparison to the truth, yet you are completely absorbed in rearranging your CD collection while the battle rages on.  Now, I am not saying this life is an illusion.  This is an analogy, and all analogies are limited.  This life is incredibly important, but it is not important in and of itself.  It is only truly important in light of eternity.  And yet, we live as if this is it.  That is not Biblical at all.  According to God's word we are to live for that which is eternally good.  That may mean not having everything go your way here and now.  It may mean next to nothing going how you want it to here and now.  It changes our view on money.  Having a ton of it, while comfortable, may be your downfall eternally, a distraction from duty (though not necessarily).  You may end up marrying someone who is not the person who makes you the most happy here and now, but in light of eternity, is the person God chose for you to glorify Him.  You may not be healthy.  You will only get to not experience everyone in your life dying if you die first.  If you believe what the Bible says, if I believe what the Bible says, then our eyes will see world completely differently.  We will be less likely to get caught enjoying what is temporary to the point where we stop fighting for the eternal.  


My hope and prayer is that God would give us fresh eyes to the truth, that we would fight for what is eternal and good.

Stupid Things Married People Say to Single People

Nicholas L. Laning

Just last night Kathleen told me of a friend who was sharing her feelings to her about her life.  The subject came about to men, and where she was at as far her heart was in the process of being single and looking for a mate.  She told Kathleen about she told her small group leader, a married woman, about her frustration with being single and guess what happened.  


Come on. You all know what happened.  The small group leader reproved her.  She told her her she needed to get over it, that she needed to stop thinking about guys and just be content.  

This is like a rich person telling a poor person they shouldn't want money... via skype from their Bahamian beach house, with paradise glowing in the background.  I can just hear it.  "No.  Rick.  You should stop trying to earn money.  You need to be happy where you are.  Hold on a sec.  (Yells off screen) Cookie, watch the lobster.  I don't want it overcooked like last night.  Overcooked lobster makes me bloated and we're going skydiving later.  I don't want it to be like our trip to Hawaii last week.  (comes back to the screen)  So, yeah, you need to just chill out.  Rice and beans are all you need, man."

There is obvious truth to this.  Rice and beans are more than enough to sustain.  There really, really are people dying around the world right this very second from starvation.  You should be thankful for whatever you have.  Period.  However, being thankful for what you have is not equivalent to not having future dreams, hopes, and desires, is it?   It isn't.  Every single one of the men that we look up to in the Bible had desires and dreams. 


I guess, in the end, my concern, between writing for the Abyssic and this, is that I have come to see that we lack in our ability to empathize and sympathize with people.  We want to much to fix people.  Perhaps it is our Texan individualism that makes us say, "Buck up," instead of, "I'm sorry you're struggling."  


I know I have done it too.  I used to be infamous at camp for being cold to kids who cried when they fell.  It wasn't that I didn't have sympathy, I guess.  I thought I was doing them a favor.  You know?  Most of the time they were just looking for attention, and would waste time they could have spent playing nursing a fake wound because we big people were coddling them.  Here's the thing though.  There were quite a few times where I said get up to kids that were actually hurt.  Who's an idiot now?  (Points thumbs at self)  I should have had room in my heart for actual pain, for the real deal.  We all should.  Let's recall Jesus' reaction to the pain of those mourning the death of Lazurus, a man he would raise from the dead...

John 11:35 ESV

Jesus wept.

(BTW, I am not saying that being married makes you rich and single poor, the analogy is supposed to show someone wanting something that someone else has attained, and the person with it telling the person they don't need it while enjoying it.  In this case, the person wants to be married.)