I have a couple of close friends whose children are in the military. They volunteered; no one coerced them or talked them into it. They went off to battle for our country of their own free will. How foolish it would be for them to then sit down and whine that they never realized that being in the military meant being in a war, meant fighting all day and often all night, meant having the potential of being wounded. No. All the brave men I know have met the challenge head on and, although it has been exceedingly difficult, they have been heroic in their strength against their enemy and in their defense of those they are called upon to protect.

Those of us who are believers are warriors in the army of God. We may not have known exactly what conditions would be like when we entered this army, but we are ordained to fight and we are well able to answer the call. God called you and you accepted the call; that is all you need to know to be assured of your ability to fight the battles that the enemy launches against you. This does not mean we go about whining that the enemy is attacking us all the time, but we stand up and (as Joyce Meyer puts it) get on the attack!

The greatest truth about our battle is that it is Jesus Christ Who is the Ultimate Conqueror! And we get to simply ride on His coattails – if we will but line ourselves up with Him! That is why Romans 8:37 tells us that we are more than conquerors. Why “more”? Because the battle is the Lord’s and He has already won it for us! Now this doesn’t mean that we don’t fight, otherwise, what on earth is our spiritual armor for? But we do fight differently and with confidence that doesn’t accompany the earthly warrior. We know we win. It’s just a matter of enforcing a law that has already been established.

We must put on our spiritual armor (see Ephesians 6:10-18) and remember that we do not fight with the same types of weapons that our earthly counterparts do (2 Corinthians 10:4). Our fight is largely over our soul (our mind, will, and emotions). We must fight by lining our soul up with what the Spirit says is truth and by casting down everything that tries to usurp God’s authority in our lives. Know the weapons in your arsenal. It is the well-trained, perpetually ready warrior that stands the greatest chance in battle. Know the Word of God and be adept at wielding it against the enemy and his lies. As we battle, it is also essential that we be tuned in to our Commanding Officer, able to hear His direction at every moment – it will save our lives.

Yes, it may be easier to just lay wounded on the sidelines. It may sound almost relaxing when you’re in the heat of battle. But no warrior is content to lay back and do nothing. You are of no benefit to yourself, others, or the advancement of the Kingdom of God when you choose to remove your armor and get taken out of the battle. A soldier fights, not just so that he won’t die, but so that those in his unit will be safer. It is those close to you who will suffer when you refuse to stand firm and fight. Soldiers also fight for those they don’t even know, those their Commanding Officer has charged them to protect. Likewise, there are many people who are dependent on you. Will they see Jesus in you or just another defeated Christian?

I know I must stop wishing that my battle will end. It won’t. Yes, there are ways that I can make each one shorter and be more decisively victorious, but as long as I am on this side of the ground, I must remember that I have an enemy and that it is my job everyday to exercise the authority over him that Jesus won for me.

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.” Ephesians 6:10-11

So anyway… Here’s my theory: Music is like food. (I know! Deep, right?!)

Yes, my theory is that music is like food, and this is how:

First of all, I believe it is important to realize that when you listen to music, you ingest it like food and it becomes part of you. It affects the way you feel and behave. Because music affects what you dwell on and what you think about, it works its way into other aspects of your life and has the power to shape your thoughts and emotions. Ever experience overhearing a song that was popular during a bad patch in your life? How did hearing it affect how you felt? What about a song that was popular at a point you consider a great time?

I know that for me, there was a time in my life when I struggled with depression. I gravitated to listening to my parents’ old Carpenters records and before I knew it, I was practically suicidal! The Lord convicted me that if I was to change the way I was feeling, I needed to change what I was ingesting. Does that mean I must run with my hands clapped over my ears every time I hear Karen Carpenter singing “Desperado”? Of course not. Why not? Because it isn’t my regular diet.

The second aspect of my theory is this: Music is like food in that you must have a healthy diet. To my way of thinking, there are three types of music: the healthy, the popcorn, and the toxic. Some music is really good for you; it’s almost like eating lean meat and healthy fruits and veggies. Most Christian music is what I would call healthy fare.

Some food is what I call popcorn. Popcorn is unique because it is fun to eat, but really offers no value. If you ate popcorn exclusively, you would not be a healthy person, but there is really nothing wrong with having it every once in a while. Popcorn music is the same way. It’s fun! It’s entertaining, but it will add little to nothing to your wellbeing. There is actually quite a bit of Christian music that is popcorn, it’s not just the secular stuff. It’s not that it’s bad; it’s just that it’s rather pointless. Go ahead and enjoy it! But don’t let it fill you up to the point that you no longer want the real food.

Other food is toxic. It will actually cause you harm if you ingest it. It may look like simple shellfish on the surface, but beware the reckless consumption of it. Some music is just the same. It is shaping your mind in a way that is contrary to the Word of God and you begin to buy into its faulty philosophies more and more.  Believe it or not, there is even some Christian music that falls into this category. If it runs contrary to the Word of God, why are we consuming it?

The other way that music is like food is this: Few of us are skillful enough to make our own music all the time, so we end up “eating out” often. We are depending on other people to make our “food” for us. Having had a friend or two in the food industry and hearing their horror stories, this always gives me pause. Have those who are preparing what you’re about to eat washed their hands? Are they sick? Can you trust them not to spit in your soup? Oftentimes, with music, we gulp down whatever is put before us without consideration for who is behind the music we are taking in.

So there you go! That’s my music theory! Bon Appétit!

“Continue to work to reject the form that this world tries to sculpt you into and experience the metamorphosis that happens when you allow God to sculpt your mind and make it like His.” Romans 12:2 (paraphrased)

This Christmas season, as I turned a corner in the mall, the sign bearing the motto of a large retailer stared me in the face. In bold lettering (and even bolder wording) it offered, “Real Joy: Guaranteed!” Really? Really? Real joy? Guaranteed? My mind reeled with the audacity of such a slogan! What kind of a desperate shot must the advertising exec who proposed this slogan have been making? What kind of a head trip must the retail exec who accepted this as a viable slogan have been on?

“Real Joy: Guaranteed!” The phrase kept ringing in my ears like a par-um-pum-pum-pum. “Real Joy: Guaranteed!” And who, I wondered, am I to demand justice from if I reach January without my “Real Joy“?

How tragic to even consider that one might find “Real Joy” in a package under the tree. And though most of us would hope that our Christmastime is spent enjoying the love and closeness of family and friends, how equally tragic it is to place our hope for “Real Joy” in human beings.

Yet, this is so often precisely what we do. We place our hope of a happy season in experiences and people. That is why so many of us end up a bit disappointed and disillusioned after all the noise dies down. It isn’t usually that our Christmas has been horrible that gives us the doldrums in January, it is that our reality didn’t measure up to our expectations. It is disappointed expectations that cause the biggest challenge.

So is the answer to lower our expectations, become Scrooge-like cynics, and sabotage other people’s Christmases with our dull attitude? Of course not! Only a cursory read of the Bible should tell us that God encourages, even commands, us to be joyful and celebrate! But our focus does need to shift. And I’ll volunteer as the first to admit that a) this is no easy task and b) I personally struggled with this this year as all my children were going in different directions and trying to get everyone together was like trying to herd cats! Most of my beloved traditions went out the window this year.

So where is the “Real Joy” in Christmas? If I am to find “Real Joy: Guaranteed,” to where am I to turn my focus? I find the answer in the pronouncement of the angel to the shepherds. He too promises great joy and tells me where to find it before being joined by the multitude of angels and breaking into their own irrepressible exaltations of joy:

“Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord…. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” Luke 2:10-11, 13-14

I think we are all pretty well versed in the adage that “Jesus is the Reason for the Season” so it may sound trite to say it again. But my challenge is that if I have not experienced the “Real Joy” I was hoping for in December, perhaps my focus hasn’t caught up to my words. Christmas is obviously not about what is under the tree for me, but neither is it all about giving or even cherished time with family. Perhaps what I really need is to spend more quiet moments in worship, thanking the God Who became a man because He so desired peace with me that He was willing to do the extreme to acquire it. Perhaps I need to give glory to God as the angels did, for His theretofore unimaginable plan of glorifying Himself through His outrageous demonstration of love for His own creation.

It may be January, but it is not too late to truly celebrate Christmas and experience “Real Joy….. Guaranteed.”

Did you know it is impossible to communicate with ants, to tell them you mean them no harm? It’s true. In fact the more you try, the more they are likely to think you are attacking them and they will fight back! If only I could temporarily become like one of them, I’d be able to communicate to them! I could tell them that we mean them no ill will, but that they must live in another part of the yard in order to be kept safe.

This got me to thinking about the history of humanity and God’s attempts to communicate with us. From the beginning of time He desired connection and communion with mankind. He walked with Adam in the Garden. He communicated to Adam His will, love and plan for his life. He met each of Adam’s needs and desires. But when Adam elevated his own reasoning above the wisdom of God, their communication became limited.

Yet God still desired to communicate His will, love and plans to mankind. He found a few men who would devote themselves to hear Him. He founded a system of Tabernacle worship to attempt to communicate that He desired people to come into fellowship with Him. Yet often they only see with a skewed perspective. Instead of seeing all this as God’s attempt to reach out to them, they saw a list of do’s and don’ts that they thought were a means of perfecting themselves enough to be worthy of God.

Still God’s desire continued and He sent prophets, His mouthpieces, to communicate His love and passion for the people and His desire that they would see Him as He is: The Only True God.

From the Garden all the way through the Old Testament, Jesus was there communicating His love, demonstrating His desire for communion and shouting out His mercy and compassion and righteousness through the prophets. Like ants hearing a human speaking to them, most of mankind could only hear the voice, but they never perceived what He said. And interwoven in all He said was the promise that He would one day do the unthinkable: become one of us.

And that’s precisely what He did. As extraordinary as a human becoming a puny ant, Jesus chose to lay aside His glory and become a man. He came to communicate His love, His holiness, His desire for intimacy with mankind. And when He had sufficiently communicated this, He made it possible that we could exchange our moral ineptitude for His holiness and commune with Him as Adam did in the Garden. He did this by surrendering His life and becoming the payment for all our moral failures.

He did all this with one solitary purpose in mind: A renewed Garden, a new place of communion together, a new era in which man and God could meet with one another. His desire from the creation, a desire for an intimate relationship with mankind, is finally possible through His own plan and sacrifice. And all we have to do is accept it by faith.

What an extraordinary God. He chose to shed His divinity in order to meet with us on our lowly level and demonstrate His vast love and then to bring us up to His level. It is truly astonishing and astonishingly true.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning…. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:1-2, 14

In a similar way, a farmer waters a field, believing that the seed he has planted will spring forth and grow. He has faith that there are sufficient, unseen nutrients in the soil to partner with him to cause the plant to grow.

That’s what faith does. It believes without seeing. And it goes beyond believing to acting. It takes action based on what cannot be seen. If the fisherman waited to see evidence of fish, or if the farmer waited to see seedlings, nothing much would come of their waiting except more waiting.

I know there have been times when I have been unwilling to step out in faith, unwilling to risk, until I see some indication of potential success. But that’s not faith at all. Faith does not rely one bit on the senses, not one iota on seeing, hearing, feeling. Faith goes out on a limb and trusts only in what God is saying. Nothing but God’s Word is necessary for faith.

What if we, the “people of faith,” exercised our faith more completely? What if we didn’t wait to see a change in our finances before we developed in generosity? What if we didn’t wait to hear interest in God from a co-worker or stranger before we followed the prompting of the LORD to reach out to them? What if we didn’t wait until we felt improvement in our physical condition before we started praising God as our Healer, regardless of whether it happens for us today or not? What if we put aside our flesh and followed the Spirit?

Do you think Jesus tested the waters before He stepped out on them? Did He taste the water that He turned into wine – just to be sure – before He sent a taste to the master of the banquet? Did He marvel when the fig tree withered at His rebuke? After He had prayed and blessed the loaves and fishes, did He fret about it being enough, or did He sit down with the others and enjoy eating His fill?

Faith is not faith if we are only hoping for the outcome we’ve petitioned the LORD for. That is hope. Faith is believing in a reality that has yet to materialize. Faith is not denial of what we are experiencing, but it is knowing that there is a reality that is more real than what we experience. It is quiet trust that that reality will become our experience. If your experience is telling you something that boldly contradicts the Word of God, it is your experience that is wrong, not God’s Word.

I’m challenging myself as well as you to believe God’s Word above experience, to honor His Word more than we honor our “reality.” As we boldly declare His Word in our lives, we may be casting our nets into a dark and seemingly empty sea, but faith casts the net until the fish fill it.

 “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Hebrews 11:1

As I reached the store, I groped the abyss of my purse for my phone to get my list of items to purchase… oh yeah… it’s not there! Once inside I realized I had forgotten to check the ingredients for a pie I’m making and thought, “I’ll just call my daughter and ask her for the recipe.” No dice. If I can’t call, maybe I can text her … DUH! – no phone! I knew I was short on time and I wanted to check to make sure it wasn’t getting too late, but alas my timepiece is my…. PHONE!

All this dependence got me to thinking, thinking about a much more important lifeline I have. My Abba is my true Lifeline. I can call on Him anytime. Whether I’m in trouble or just want to chat, I call on Him. In fact, I try to always leave our conversation open and set to “speaker phone,” talking to Him constantly and hearing His voice always on the line. If I’m in another conversation with someone and I need wisdom, I shoot Him a message and get a reply – all without the other person knowing or being interrupted! He gives me directions if I’m off course, He notifies me of what’s important that’s coming up, He even plays music for me! He also calls me at random times – some of which seem inconvenient to me. We can even continue chatting while I drive without me getting a ticket!

Some people don’t own cell phones and some who do aren’t taking full advantage of all the bells and whistles available on them. Likewise, there is so much more that the Father has for us than we even realize. (That’s why it is so important to sit down with the owner’s manual – your Bible – to discover all that He promises to give you.)

Other people keep their cell phones around only for a major emergency, but they are usually turned off. And some people’s relationship with Abba is sadly just the same. But Jesus didn’t die for you so that you can contact Him in emergency situations only. He died and rose again so that you can have a continual, vibrant, talking relationship with Him at all times! He longs for a two-way intimate relationship with you that can only be developed through times of deep communion and constant contact. Don’t ignore His calls to you; answer His call and set it to “speaker phone.”

“I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” John 10:10

I think that is often how we look at each other – and sometimes at ourselves. We see the surface of people and disregard them as someone God can’t use.

I’m so glad God doesn’t look at us like that! I would have been tossed aside long ago! But if I’m not careful, I still see myself and others only from the outside instead of seeing each and every one of us as we truly are: “crowned with glory and honor,” “the righteousness of God,” a “mighty man [or woman] of valor,” “a treasured possession” to God.

The surface of any individual never tells the whole story. We must trust that no matter what it looks like on the outside, God whispers plans for each of us that far surpass the story the outside screams. We all have the potential – just like the verdant mid-west – of being the ground through which the food that will feed multitudes is made available.

Sometimes all we need is someone to come along and see our potential and cultivate higher expectations with words that speak hope and promise in our hearts. It’s an unfortunately rare experience. Most of us have been more wounded by words than we have been encouraged. May I suggest that if you are feeling like dry uncultivated earth, you adopt a new mission? Who knows, perhaps you have felt the lack of encouragement most pointedly because your mission is to speak encouragement into others. Perhaps you are just the person to speak the words of life into another’s heart that will one day spring up into life-giving bread on the tables of others.

As we begin to speak life into others, we can trust that God will allow us to receive the words we desperately need to have spoken into our hearts. As we pour out, He pours in. He will fill you with what you need as you focus outward and on the needs of others.

And just in case no one has ever told you: You are a glorious creation of God and He has a specific plan for everything that He creates. He loves you immensely and longs to see you blossom and grow into that which He created you for. Furthermore, if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you haven’t been called into the family of God randomly; God called you with a purpose in mind for you. Cultivate your purpose. Speak life to yourself and others and watch what grows.

“But the LORD said to Samuel, ‘Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.’” 1 Samuel 16:7

Consider how it must have felt to live in the time of the Divided Kingdom of Israel. Imagine living in Judah during the reign of the evil queen, Athaliah. You’ve been told your whole life that God has made a solemn vow to the great King David that he will always have a descendent to reign on the throne in Judah. Nevertheless, this evil woman, the daughter of the notorious King Ahab and Queen Jezebel in the Northern Kingdom, has married her way into the family of David, has killed all of the royal family and now sits on David’s throne.

Has God’s Word failed? Has He changed His mind? Did He forget His promise? It sure looks that way. But little do you know that a few key people have hidden a little infant away in the Temple of God. He is the lone survivor of the royal family. All the six long years that the evil Queen Athaliah reigns on David’s throne, it looks utterly hopeless; it looks like God’s promise has failed. But we are never privy to all that is going on behind the scenes.

And behind the scenes, God is always at work. He always has a plan and He is always in the process of making His plan a reality. God is actively working on your behalf to make His promises a reality – it is irrelevant if you see it or not.

There are three things God does, often without us even realizing it during the times we feel nothing is happening. He is preparing; He is testing; He is developing our trust.

God is preparing by bringing all things into perfect alignment behind the scenes, so that when it is time for the curtain to lift, everything will be in order. He needs to prepare us, the people around us and our circumstances. There have been so many times that I thought I was prepared, only to go through further preparation and realize how much further I had to go! As it would be unkind for a parent to send an unprepared adolescent out into the world, God is not about to put you at risk by sending you out unprepared.

Testing can sound like an unkind and frightful prospect, but testing is essential to our growth. It is as a metal is heated that it begins to show what is really in it. It is as it shows what is in it that what is not good can be removed. So it is with us. We need this time of testing to remove what is impure or superfluous. This testing also serves to strengthen us as we experience God through this time and are solidified in our belief in His goodness.

All this preparing and testing has the ability to form a trusting heart within us as we yield to it. God needs us to have that trusting, dependent heart so that He can work through us. If fact, you really can’t be ready to do or receive much of anything until you are fully trusting the One Who knows what you need so much better than you do.

Lord, if I am not seeing the fullness of a promise You have given me, I trust that it is just not the right time. I know that You give me everything I need exactly when I need it. Help me to wait for Your promise in faith and trust. And if there is more preparing or testing of me that You need to do, I invite You to do it.

“Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” Genesis 28:16

To read more about Queen Athaliah, read 2 Kings 11.

I learned to realize that though I may not always be in pain, the people I walk among everyday are often in uncontrollable pain. Perhaps that person who cut you off in traffic has a child on drugs. Perhaps that woman who is doing everything wrong in the check out lane just learned that her husband is leaving her. Perhaps the guy who told you off suspects his cancer is back.

Through my blog, I can see what people type into their search engines that steers them toward my blog. It breaks my heart to see entries like, “Lord, please help!” or “Lord, help me out of this pit!” or “Nothing to live for.” How desperate and hurting do you have to be to type that into Google?

At the coffee shop where I study and write, a man just sat down at my table because he saw I had a Bible. He poured his heart out about his impending divorce and custody battle, his severance from his company last Tuesday and his foreclosure notice last Wednesday. Yes, hurting people are everywhere.

As I pondered this after the man left my table, I heard the Lord say, “Give them a cup of water.” Indeed. People need to be given something refreshing to drink, some living water from those who are to be overflowing with it. As Colossians 3:16 says, we must be so full of the Word of God ourselves that when a hurting person comes we can encourage them with the true wisdom of the Word. Lord, let my tongue be ready to point people to You and give you glory! Let me be so immersed in Your heart that I operate from that foundation, from the place of my union with You and Your love!

As I prayed these things, I began to ponder the fact that the Lord had specifically said, “Give them a cup…”  “So what’s the cup?” I asked. I felt Him say that the cup was my availability, my time. Without it the water cannot be handed over from one person to another. This has been a more difficult lesson for part of me to learn at the practical level. We all have plans and schedules and responsibilities and expectations for our day, but whose time do we think we are using anyway? If we have really given our lives to God, isn’t our time really His? And shouldn’t we let Him do with it whatever He needs to do?

People are hurting and we have the answer. How heartless it would be to not prepare myself to give that answer, to not live prepared to give an answer and to not make myself wholly available to God to send people my way. Lord, prepare my heart and mind to be the help to those around me. Help me to live ready to give “my” time and Your love to whoever You bring my way. I’m ready Lord and I trust You to speak through me. Use me, Lord.

“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in.” Matthew 25:35

When I was a child, we moved a lot. And by a lot I mean thirteen times in ten years. And it almost always involved a change in schools as well as homes. Each time we were faced with a perspective choice: Am I going to view this as the end of all I hold dear and familiar or am I going to view this as an adventure?

I think the prophet Daniel looked on change as an adventure – and it turned a tragic situation into an opportunity to glorify God. Imagine being torn away from your home and family and all you hold dear to serve in a foreign land – the land of your captors and murderers of your people. Imagine being forced to leave the place you’ve always believed was a blessed land to live among those you knew as cursed. You’ve left the Temple of the one true God to serve in the land of paganism.

In this place, Daniel submitted to the change and adapted. In wisdom, he refused to alter his moral and religious convictions. He stayed remarkably true to YHWH, but he served these foreign kings as if he was serving God Himself. Everything he did, he did with excellence and integrity, learning and adapting to the Babylonian ways.

As a former dancer, I learned that flexibility is a great source of strength. The more flexible you are, the stronger you are. We need to stay flexible, pliable in the hands of our Potter – God. Willing to have Him bring whatever changes He sees necessary to mold and change us into the vessels that will be best able to do the task we are predestined to do, to bring Him glory, to bless those around us.

We aren’t here for our own interests only. We aren’t here to get ourselves all nice and comfy-cozy and wait for Jesus to come get His little immature baby Christian. We are here to grow and learn, to become more like Jesus and to bless and encourage as many people along the way as we possibly can. All the changes that come into our lives move us nearer and nearer to those goals. We can even go so far as to invite the Lord to examine and change us to that we might fulfill everything He desires for us as David did when he said:

“Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts, and see if any wicked way is in me; and lead me in the way everlasting.” Psalm 139:23-24

The next time you get uptight looking in the face of impending change, decide instead to welcome it with all the sense of adventure you can muster! Declare that this change is for your good and not your destruction! Proclaim that with every change, you are growing stronger, more flexible, wiser and more able to help others! Announce to yourself (and anyone who cares to listen) that you are willing to change and that you have made a decision to glorify God throughout the shaping process!