Family Prayer

Life is a gift.  I think this is something we would agree with, but I am not sure that we fully understand it all of the time.  We have the opportunity to learn and build, to try new things and succeed, to share ourselves and love each other.  These joys make life fun, but they’re not the end of it.  I believe that even the struggles are a gift.  Our trials and failures almost make life worthwhile.  They prove that there are things worth fighting for, and make the successes even more sweet.  And I think that all of this illustrates a God who intimately cares for us.  He desires joy for his children, but gives us the opportunity to learn from the pain about needs that we have that cannot be filled aside from His intervention.  He is present—he is the God of life—and His passion is walking alongside of us and guiding us through our search for life here on earth.

By no means is this easy.  There is so much pain, so much brokenness that so often we find ourselves utterly incapable of fighting.  Our very desires are at war against what we know is good and right.  Our hearts are constantly breaking because there’s something wrong with the life that we have here.  It is incomplete, not because God is not good, but because this is not the end.  This world is broken.  Most of the time the pains of life are almost tolerable, and the reality of the brokenness around us can be pushed aside; however, there are moments of clarity where our need for full life cannot be ignored.  At these times, we cannot help but be honest with ourselves, and God is there, too.

Death is a gift.  Not one to be taken, but one that is given at the right time, when our work is done.  After all, this world is broken and incomplete.  All of our striving comes to nothing as things decay and we run out of strength, unless there is some sort of renewal.  As much as we try to put our joy on display, we cannot ignore the reality that there is pain here that we cannot outrun.  Burdens only get heavier, and our struggles pile on as we throw ourselves into more and more, seeking reprieve.  God wants us to be with him, but no matter how hard we try, we will never trust Him perfectly.  We will always strive for wholeness apart from Him, because this brokenness is the only reality that we have ever known.  Even if our lives are full of good things, we are just not meant to run apart from the Lord of life forever.

Our perspective right now is that this life is the end.  That all of our goals and hopes for ourselves need to be accomplished here, or we miss out.  Why do we find ourselves striving so hard for things that we are not ready for, or do not really desire?  Why do we worry so much about missing out on experiences?  We cannot see the full picture.  We do not trust the Father’s goodness.  We do not understand that all of these things that we desire are meant to illustrate the characteristics of God, and that in our rampant desire for things, we really need Him.  This world, as wonderful as it may seem at times, is really a prison.  It is padded, dressed up to seem livable, but we are not free here.  God gave us a time to learn what we need here, to serve Him and love His people, and then to pass on into His comfort and restoration.

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:

A time to be born and a time to die,

A time to plant and a time to uproot,

A time to kill and a time to heal,

A time to tear down and a time to build,

A time to weep and a time to laugh,

A time to mourn and a time to dance,

A time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,

A time to embrace and a time to refrain,

A time to search and a time to throw away,

A time to tear and a time to mend,

A time to be silent and a time to speak,

A time to love and a time to hate,

A time for war and a time for peace.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

What I have been most challenged with recently is trusting God to sustain me and make this life worthwhile.  I am tired.  I have been striving to live with purpose, but I am still broken.  I run the wrong way, knowing full well that life is with Jesus, but wanting the quick satisfaction that the world promises and never provides.  I want to be known and loved, but I am afraid of being passed over or let down.  I want to make a difference, but I so often feel like I am not needed—in the way, even.

These times of suffering force us to be honest with ourselves.  We want so much of life, but we are faced with the truth that these things—our accomplishments, relationships, possessions—do not solve the problem.

Our perspective is faulty, but if only we could see that Jesus is what we seek.  He is the life that we so desire.  He is the wholeness that we try to portray.  He is the one worth striving for.  He is the artist behind the beauty that we are drawn to.  He is the one worth working for, serving, even sacrificing for.  He is the only one that can really provide rest.  We have been given good desires that point to who our Father is, and aching desires that show us how much we need Him.

I believe that he is actively working in and through our lives, and I trust His promise of the joys of this life and a future restoration that will dwarf even the greatest joys that we will experience on this earth!

Rocket Science

On Christmas this past year my grandfather died. It was a weird, difficult holiday, my family was all together, and everyone was on edge. In ten days we said our goodbyes to him, learned of his passing and performed his funeral, and it was hard. It was also really encouraging. My family asked me to speak at the funeral, so I told them exactly why there is joy even in this. Afterward I was asked to try to write down what I said, so here is my best attempt. Hopefully this gives you joy as well!

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Death is a hard subject.  Forced to confront it face-to-face, especially planning for it, seems unnatural and strains everything.  My family this past week has seen the full effects of this; we were pushed to the limits of our emotions and relationships while we experienced my grandfather’s last days here.  We often throw out phrases like, “He was ready to go,” or “Death is just a natural part of life,” but those are difficult to believe.  Here is what I believe:  we were not made for death.

God created us to live with him forever.  In the beginning, God was so full of love that he longed for a creation to share it with.  His love is perfect and complete.  It is not lacking anything, but overflowing into everything.  He created us in His image to enjoy all of His goodness.  We are created more intimately than all the rest of creation, and given the ability to choose to love God in return.

This seems like a simple decision, but we could not pull it off.  Adam and Eve chose to ignore God’s goodness, and sought their own justification, and we continue to do that every day.  We are all sinners, and consciously decide to turn away from Him.  Without God, there is no blessing, and the disease eats into everything we touch, yet we try to bandage our lives with other things.  How can we have joy apart from the One that is joy?  In response, God gave us death.  This is physical death, designed to conquer our sinful selves.  Rather than allow us live forever apart from Himself, God frees us from this prison we have created for ourselves.  We have earned death, but even from the beginning God begins His work to bring us into full, complete life that lasts forever.

His plan has never changed.  He has never been surprised by our response to Him.  He gave us a promise--that He would enter this world as a man and pull us out of this misery we have gotten ourselves into.  God was born into earth, through the supernatural, virgin birth that we so often hear about.  Jesus lived a complete life, subject to the same torments as us, but he never once sinned.  Unlike each of us, Jesus always trusted the Father, never seeking anything but His identity in the love of God.  He was not a slave to this sinful nature that we feel, because He is God.  He and the Father are one.  So Jesus lived the life that we were meant to live, as an example, as a teacher, as a counselor, and above all as a substitute.  We could never do this, because our entire world is tainted by sin.  The joy is that we do not have to!  This is where the hope begins:  “...to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (John 1:12).

I think my grandpa understood this.  A lot of what I know about him, and all of the stories shared this week point to the idea that he was a servant.  My grandpa loved people well, investing heavily in his family, friends and the church.  He knew that he did not have to justify himself--he just loved to serve and strived to understand the love of Christ.

It does not end there.  This debt of sin has a cost.  As our substitute, Jesus lived a perfect life in our place, and died an unjust death to cover the cost of all of our sins.  God could not simply ignore sin--it had to be destroyed if we were to be restored, and that is what Jesus accomplished.  He broke death, and gave us the opportunity to accept His life in exchange for our own.

Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?  We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.  For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his.  For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin--because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.  Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.  For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him.  The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God (Romans 6:3-10).

Jesus died, but He is not a dead god.  To seal the deal, the Christ had to rise from the dead.  Rather than succumb to death, Jesus overcame it.  He destroyed our old selves, so that we might receive new life in Him.  Christ is alive, and that is where my hope lies.  Because of Him, I believe that I will have the opportunity to see my grandpa again.  My grandpa followed Christ through to the end, and his death broke the last remnants of the chains of sin that kept him from God.

My hope is in Christ.  Everything that God has ever done has been because of love.  Every freedom and every law, every gift and every loss:  these are the ways God reveals himself to us.

For Jess Galley

Times like this polarize people.  Everyone who knows what’s happened will respond in some way.  Whether it is grief, or joy, shame or love, hope or hopelessness, anything... we see them all.  And they are all valid, as are the condolences, the arguments for and against; those are real questions.  What is this life anyway?
These reactions are striking to me.  I am an outsider in this—I did not know her long or well, but I do know those who did.  For a few, her death shakes their very foundations; some may even crumble.  For others, their reactions will pass.  The significant difference being how much is invested and where the remainder of their hope lies.
Hope is a tricky thing though.  A phrase that keeps coming into my mind is, “You win some and you lose some.”  A portion of me has been wondering about the purpose behind this—why the loss now?  It never makes sense for someone so young to be cut off.  What could she have done with the rest of her life?
But that is not it at all.  For starters—this is not a loss.  I firmly believe that, especially now.  Today at the reunion I heard story after story of how Jess was a light to so many people.  Each of them saw her joy and love, that she truly “lived life to the full,” and so many knew that it was based in a love for Jesus.
John 3:16, one of the most commonly known verses says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”  Jess loves Jesus because of her belief in Him and because of His power over the grave.  She had no fear of life because she knew that life was her gift from the Father who gave everything to ensure it.
This is no true loss.  For a time, this will sear her family and closest friends, but Christ the good doctor can repair the damage.  It may, however, take a lifetime.
These few are the true victims.  Her family can never fill that spot again, and her friends have also lost so much.  Their recovery will take time, friends, and God.
Jess was not perfect—she struggled as well, falling some and succeeding some—but she lived well.  Complaining that she had so much left, in the end, just discounts the time she did have here.  God has his timing set, and works through everything that happens to us.  I am full of joy for how much I did know Jess and for what she meant to so many of you, and sorrow for how little I knew her and for what her loss leaves you with, but overall I have hope and excitement for how much more you and I will know her in eternity!

I sincerely hope that these words can help—death takes its toll on us all, even while we still live.  I believe fully that God uses times like this for absolute good, but we are definitely not going to understand that right away.  Seek the great Counselor for comfort first (John 14:26) and try with all your heart to trust God through this.  He really, truly, knows what he is doing.

Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching.  My Father will love him, and we will comet o him and make our home with him.  He who does not love me will not obey my teaching.  These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.  All this I have spoken while still with you.  But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.  Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.  I do not give to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid”  (John 14:23-27).

https://www.facebook.com/jess.galley.5?group_id=0

The Fall

It’s 10:30, and I will be awake by 5:30 tomorrow morning, yet I cannot sleep.  The past couple months have been strange.  I will never have a summer off again—either work or school will continue, until I retire or fall asleep.  I live more or less on my own, with friends, but still independently.  I make my own decisions about dinner, time spent, money, boundaries...

I am in a new era of life.  It is crazy to think about, but I am an adult.  Not even a teenager anymore.  It does not happen as fast as you are told, I have been taking steps toward this for some time, but looking back I could easily be fooled about the passage of time.

Here’s the deal though:  many things have changed a lot—there is urgency where I once desired to wait in love, fitness, different adventures and family—and sometimes I am overcome with anxiety about my past, present and future, but always I find comfort in my relationship with Christ.

This may be super cliché.  I have known a lot of people who talk big about God, but never seem comfortable with him.  But I have also known people who are unmistakably in love with Jesus.  There is a reality there that we all seek in something—some objectively know the answer but never really come to understand the love of Christ, and many will never come close.  Regardless, there is no denying the need for something constant, faithful, powerful and personal.

I cannot honestly say that I found all that though...  nobody really can.  One does not simply discover truth—it is only revealed.  Our thoughts are too self-centered; even at our best, we only think of what think we need or want, it is impossible to truly separate from ourselves.  Truth must find us.  God reveals himself to those with whom he finds favor.  Not because of virtue we hold, but because of his virtue.

That is what I missed for so long; I thought that I had to be good, or prove myself valuable for God to work in me.  Truth is—all I was doing was denying him access to my life.  I barred Christ and all his goodness from my life even while I sought goodness with which to please him.  Inevitably I failed, exhausted myself by seeking light in the darkness of myself.  There is no goodness within—the sick do not become healed by rejecting the cure.

All it took was my lowest point.  When I could dig no deeper, introspect no further, He found me.  I had given up, and that’s all it took.  I resigned myself to my own wretchedness—I am incapable of being a friend, a servant or a leader.  I have no power, love or joy.  The cup that I had guarded for so long was actually empty.  I accepted help, and instantly he began to recreate me.

I have not gone instantly from empty to full.  There is so little to work with, and God is patient.  He is the potter, who takes pride in his work, and I am the vessel, designed solely to glorify my maker.

Selfishness falls away when you realize that life is really about bringing glory to someone else.  It is not about me and what I can do, but how great the Heavenly Father is and what He has done!

Yet I forget this constantly.  I reject his capable hands and once again try to guide myself through the darkness, abandoning the light.  Of course I fall, walking on unfinished limbs.  I am injured not because of any curse from God, but because I have not allowed God to finish his work in me.  I am not able to help others, or even to keep myself safe.

Eventually I allow Him to take me back, and he brings me back to the light of his workshop where I am safe once again.  Being fixed hurts—as does a bone being set.  The pain is necessary or else I will never be whole, and in reality it is self-inflicted.  So I seek to trust God.

Only he knows what I will be when finished.  Though I deserve to be left broken, empty and dishonored in darkness, I will be something incredible, if only because God is glorious and everything he makes reflects his beauty.  This is the hope I have.

Father, I want to remain with you.  Help me to remember this always, and settle for nothing less than all you have in store for me.  Give me the strength to withstand the pain of healing, and the patience to see your work through to completion.  Father, you are incredible for choosing me, the lowest.  Do your work, Lord, for your sake and your eternal Glory.  In Jesus Christ’s name, Amen.

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Congratulations on making it through this whole narrative.  It’s been about a year since I started this blog thing.  I’ve been fairly lax about writing lately.  If you know me, encourage me to be faithful to Christ and in writing.

Hopefully I don’t ramble in later posts nearly as much.

Thanks!

To Be Sent

Context:  I lead YoungLife at Mason High School.  This is a relationship-based youth ministry that depends on volunteer leaders.  One of the greatest roles of leaders is to spend time in the community living life with students there, what we call “Contact Work”.

I was placed at Mason on January 13, 2012, so I’ve been leading for about 9 months now.  So far I’ve had a lot of awkward moments, some rough transitions, and a few really rewarding experiences.  All of this is expected—I’ve just been waiting for my role to become clear.

So far I know that I need to be present in the community doing contact work and spending time in the word on my own.  Last week was huge for the former—God led me to spend several hours with a couple of awesome guys playing disc golf, and it was fantastic.

Originally my intention was to get up to Mason in time for the dismissal bell and hope to see some guys I know on their way out of school.  Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it up there in time, but I was hoping that I could still spend time in the community or with some friends in Mason.  I was confident that God wanted me there, but had no idea what he was going to do—always a fun time.

It was fairly awkward.  I had no idea what to do, so I just sat in the parking lot and thought about who I could talk to about hanging out.  I also figured my time would be constrained by a YoungLife leadership meeting in a couple hours.  My texts were mostly unanswered; one guy I did get into contact with was more interested in hanging out in a group of friends rather than just meeting up with me, which I expected, but that left me with no real leads.

This took awhile, so I figured I’d have to leave soon, which was a really disappointing thought.  And at the same time I felt really awkward sitting in different parking lots waiting for people to text me back—I was a little afraid people would start noticing me...

I find it difficult to differentiate between voices on the phone, so when I decided to call one of my friends and I started talking with him, he awkwardly handed the phone off to my intended recipient.  Amazingly enough, however, he invited me to meet up with him, so I did.

I ended up driving him home, meeting his parents, taking him to get a haircut and finally playing disc golf with him and a couple of his friends.  At first I was really nervous about the time—by then it was almost time for me to leave for my meeting.  Nine holes of disc golf don’t go by quickly though.

I ended up missing the meeting, but I met a couple great guys who I had the privilege of eating dinner with and getting to talk to.  They invited me to join them in Ultimate practice and seemed excited about coming to YoungLife stuff, even though I didn’t really mention it.

This whole day blew me away.  I felt God wanting me in Mason, but I figured I blew it when I was late.  I just got disappointed trying to text people and felt like I shouldn’t be there the whole time, but it ended up being incredibly encouraging.  I have no idea what was talked about at leadership that day, but I was where God wanted me, and I got to experience a taste of God’s faithfulness that afternoon

When Jesus had called the Twelve together, he gave them power and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases, and he sent them out to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.  He told them:  “Take nothing for the journey—no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra tunic.  Whatever house you enter, stay there until you leave that town.  If people do not welcome you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave their town, as a testimony against them.” (Luke 9:1-5)

Speechless.

What do you say when you can’t think of anything?

It has been a couple months since I have posted, which is disappointing.  Not for lack of trying.  I have multiple partially written drafts, but I just can’t think of what to write.  Not that God has been absent from my life lately—I do not believe he does that.  I just have not been given written words lately.

God is good, even in the quieter times.  Between Mason, my family, and seeing old friends graduating, I am incredibly encouraged constantly.

One of my drafts is regarding a concept called “generational memory”, which I will not expand much on here, but is essentially partnering with your family with God at the center.  I recently felt led to call a “family meeting” to talk about the different ministries and paths the individual members of my family are involved in, with the hopes of encouraging and partnering where appropriate.  This is something we have never really done before, and it took nerve for me, as well as a blind leap, but I think it is worth it.  My family is fairly close, but there are areas of our individual lives that we just have not shared much, and it was awesome to see priorities, dreams and struggles laid out.  Above all, God presented me with the opportunity to pledge support to my family, and I am even more excited about the future than I was before.

Mason YoungLife is incredible.  This school has been blessed with great leaders and fantastic students, all of whom have a passion for both Christ and this ministry!  These few months since placement have been a little weird; coming into a well-developed ministry hoping to find a place is tricky, for sure.  However, I am having my expectations blown away.  Camp this past week was literally comparable to months of regular Mason YoungLife.  The amount of time spent hanging out with students was awesome, and I am excited to continue to get to know students.  Not only that, but I am pumped to see guys who want to step up—guys who have seen leaders develop through YoungLife, or simply feel called to live actively pursuing Christ.  I am absolutely overwhelmed.  In high school it took me a long time to really understand “following Christ” like these guys are, and even being involved as a leader I had previously been blind to a lot of the work God has been doing.

And now, guys I have known for years are about to go through the same kind of thing that I just passed through this year.  My brother and friends from high school just spent the past year stepping into leadership roles as students in YoungLife, and now they are all gearing up for college and the changes that are about to take place.  Through this, I hope to continue to be a part of their lives, as possible, helping to equip and serve them, or just be a supporter.

This is the future that I am excited for.  God is moving in and taking his own, piece by piece! 

Thank You.

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On Mortality

There are many potential fears to have, some silly, some profound.  One of the most common, I believe, is the fear of death.  Perhaps you do not fear death, perhaps you would if threatened, it is difficult to predict.  However, none can deny the reality.

Unfortunately, death is not only inevitable, but unpredictable.  Both aspects of this have been explored:  defeating death through medicine, technology or magic, and knowing the future and how you will die, probably because of this fear of death—the final frontier.  At the same time, sacrificing life is considered the “ultimate sacrifice.”  What reason is there for that, except the fear of death?

Unfortunately, I cannot help but fear death as well.  I have tried to overcome this, but without fail, the perception of real danger brings my immediate response for self-preservation.  This is normal, so why does it bother me?

To many, death is the end, or else a vast unknown.  It is difficult to think beyond the physical world, and what is there to see?  But I believe in a resurrected God.  Christ faced death head on, fought it and won.  Now he offers this victory to us:  “I write this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life”  (1 John 5:13).

This is the issue then; my trust is in the Lord, the Son of God who died in my place and was resurrected in a glorious victory over the grave.  Not only did he pay the price for my life, but then he returned to prove his conquest and cement the faith of his followers.  I need not fear death any longer, because I will never have to taste that pain.

1 Corinthians 15:55-57
“Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.  But thanks be to God!  He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

There is no longer any room in my life for fear.  “There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.  The one who fears is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18).  My fear is an indicator of my imperfection, but this is something that I no longer need to hold on to.  In fact, I cannot retain it any longer if I seek to grow in Christ.

What is left then?  If Christ has beaten out death then the end of my time on earth is simply the beginning of my time with Him!  “Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm.  Let nothing move you.  Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:58)

Just do it.

“I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life” (John 5:24).