Notes of Faith October 15, 2022

Notes of Faith October 15, 2022

Hold My Hand

I am the Lord your God, who holds your right hand, and I tell you. “Don’t be afraid. I will help you.” — Isaiah 41:13 NCV

Remember when you were little and an adult would hold your hand when crossing the street? They would look down at you and say, “What do we do when crossing the street or walking in a parking lot?” You’d parrot what they had told you over and over in your little kid voice: “We grab an adult’s hand and look both ways.” I think that universal advice is the world’s version of Isaiah 41:13.

In everything you experience, work through, and survive, God wants you to remember to take His hand.

In fact, when you forget to take His hand, He will still hold yours and lead the way forward. Then He leans down, takes your face in His hands, looks you in the eyes, and tells you, “Don’t be afraid. I will help you. I will guide you. I will show you the way. I will never leave you. I won’t forsake you either. I am here. It is good and if it isn’t good right now, it will be. I won’t let go of your hand. I promise it will get better. Do not be afraid, I’m here.”

Is there something you are going through right now that you haven’t grabbed God’s hand through? What’s it like to know He has your hand right now and that He is helping you?

He gives you peace because He is peace.

The Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn His face toward you and give you peace. — Numbers 6:25–26

Sometimes God can be intimidating. Sometimes we may even feel a little scared of Him. He is the Creator of all things. There are some of those tougher stories we read, especially in the Old Testament, where His wrath is kind of frightening. Don’t be fooled — even in those tougher stories, God’s love, faithfulness, and grace are present.

Some of the greatest lies that anxiety tells us are that we aren’t enough, that no one cares, that no one can help us, and that we are alone. None of this is true. You have a God who loves you. You have people who love you, who can and will help you. God’s face shines on you with a grace that meets you where you are and lets you know that He is with you. Even on those tough days when you aren’t turning toward Him, He will turn toward you. And not only will He turn toward you, meet you, and sit beside you with so much love, He will also give you peace.

He gives you peace because He is peace.

Even when you don’t have peace because anxiety feels like it has stolen it, Jesus can and will be that peace.

If it is a sunny day and you can go outside, go ahead and do this exercise there. Allow your face to feel the warmth of the sun and take a deep breath. Otherwise, imagine that it is a beautiful, sunny day and you are sitting in its warmth.

Write down something you’re struggling to find peace with. How will peace ease your anxiety? Now close your eyes and take a deep breath. Ask Jesus if today, even if only for this moment, He will be your peace and help you feel peace.

Excerpted from 100 Devotions for Kids Dealing with Anxiety by Justine Froelker, copyright Zondervan.

The more time I spend with people the more I am blessed. We need to love and help others in every way God has blessed us to meet their needs. God’s blessing and reward flow through your efforts done in His name. May we serve both God and those He puts around us!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 14, 2022

Notes of Faith October 14, 2022

Jehoshaphat, Isaiah, and Job: Prayers for a Time Such As This

For we have no power against this great multitude that is coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are upon You. — 2 Chronicles 20:12

Jehoshaphat and his people were about to face a great enemy, and they were afraid. Armies were on their way to drive them out of the land God had given them, and Jehoshaphat did the only thing he could think to do: he prayed. In his prayer, Jehoshaphat admitted that the people were powerless to stop what was coming at them, and they simply did not know what to do.

Haven’t we all, at some point in our lives, prayed a similar prayer? We’ve all faced a scary situation, an uncertain outcome, or a devastating diagnosis. Just like Jehoshaphat, we’ve experienced times when — on our own — we were powerless against what was coming at us. Hasn’t each of us prayerfully uttered the words, “I don’t know what to do”?

The beauty of this prayer is that, while the people didn’t know what to do, they did know where to look. To focus their gaze on the enemy or themselves would have served only to heighten the people’s fear and despair. They knew their only hope was to fix their eyes on God.

There will be times in our lives when we feel powerless, fearful, and uncertain as to what to do. In those moments, however, we can choose to fix our eyes on the One who can calm any storm, defeat any foe, and lead us through any valley.

Father, I fix my eyes on You as You fill me with Your certainty.

O Lord, You are my God; I will exalt You; I will praise Your name, for You have done wonderful things, plans formed of old, faithful and sure. — Isaiah 25:1 ESV

God is the One who knows the end from the beginning. He is never caught off guard by our circumstances or bewildered by our behavior. He never feels pressured by the passing of time. God has always been — and will always be — in complete control of His creation.

Isaiah’s acceptance of God’s eternal nature, sovereignty, and faithfulness was evident in the way he prayed. He knew that God had a plan — a faithful and sure one formed long ago. Isaiah knew what Jeremiah knew: God’s plans for us have been prepared in advance (Jeremiah 1:5), and they are plans to prosper us (Jeremiah 29:11).

When we understand that God has a plan and that nothing about our existence is haphazard or out of control, it changes the way we pray. And when we understand that we were made on purpose and with a purpose, it changes the way we live. Each of us is intentionally and uniquely handmade by a holy God who has a plan for us.

God has proven time and again that He is able “to rescue the godly from trials” (2 Peter 2:9 ESV). He led His followers out of lions’ dens, fiery furnaces, and prisons because He still had plans for those individuals. If there’s still breath in your body, He isn’t finished with you. Trust Him to be as He has always been: faithful and sure.

Only You, God, are worthy of my trust. You know the plans You have made for me, and I can rest assured in Your promise.

I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You.

— Job 42:5

When have you felt the closest to God? For many of us, it is during seasons of sorrow and suffering that we sense the nearness of Him the most. God has promised us that He will never leave us. We can always be assured of His presence, but it is often in those moments of agony that He chooses to reveal Himself in a whole new way.

Job was a man of great faith. He was described as a man who was “blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil” (Job 1:1 ESV). He made it his practice to rise early and offer prayers and sacrifices for his entire family. By all accounts, Job was a good and godly man. Yet, in his prayer, Job acknowledged that his suffering allowed him to see with his own eyes what he had always heard to be true of God.

We can all think of times when we’ve seen God at work with our own eyes. Maybe it was in the form of physical protection from an accident or illness that should have had a worse outcome. Or perhaps it looked like provision from an unexpected source in a time of great need. Or it may have been a person who came along at just the right moment to comfort, guide, or assist us.

We have heard of You, Lord, but now our eyes see You.

Excerpted from 100 Favorite Bible Prayers by Stacy Edwards, copyright Thomas Nelson.

We have one great enemy who is also the enemy of God, Satan. His influence and deception in the world is often times frightening as all around us seem to be deluded thinking evil is good and good is evil. The governments of the world are succumbing to his influence and control. But we have a glorious King who will defeats all enemies. He is all we need to stay in the battle of life. Our faithfulness and service to our King will bring His promise and joy and blessing of eternal life with Him! Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition (prayer). Some of you will get that one.

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 13, 2022

Notes of Faith October 13, 2022

Discipleship – Life on Life

Article by Tom Nelson

Pastor, Kansas City, Missouri

The people we spend time with profoundly shape us. I was reminded of this truth recently at a small gathering of seasoned Christian leaders, focused on forming flourishing pastoral leadership.

Seated next to me was a surgeon who had spent many years training physicians in a prominent teaching hospital. We all listened with rapt attention as he made the compelling case that while the classroom of medical school was vitally important, it was inadequate to give the wisdom, skill, and competency needed for surgery. What was absolutely essential was lots of time at the scrub sink.

He went on to describe the process of scrubbing up for a surgery alongside more inexperienced surgeons. At the scrub sink, they talked through what the surgery would involve and what they might anticipate. Leaving the scrub sink, they rolled up their sleeves and did the surgery together. Afterward, as the team cleaned up back at the scrub sink, the lead surgeon would debrief with the rest what had taken place and what they learned during that particular surgery. Then they would go to the break room for some refreshments and more conversation.

The surgeon went on to say that in preparing a new generation of surgeons, extended times at the scrub sink were not optional. They were essential. In a similar way, he advocated for more intentional scrub-sink discipleship in the church at all levels, including in the preparation and formation of pastoral leadership.

Scrub-Sink Discipleship

The scrub sink is a helpful metaphor for more intentional and transformative discipleship and church-leadership preparation. For it is in a hands-on, life-on-life scrub-sink experience where needed tacit knowledge is transferred and obtained.

What is tacit knowledge? It can be defined many ways, but the basic idea is that tacit knowledge is the kind of learning gained through personal experience and relational connection. Tacit knowledge is implicit knowledge. It is a kind of knowing that goes beyond mere words. Learning to ride a bike, for example, requires a good deal of tacit knowledge. To gain the knowledge and skill necessary to ride a bike, a bike-riding manual may be helpful, but it is far from sufficient. We need to actually get on the bike, and in most cases, we need someone else there who knows how to ride a bike to guide us and cheer us on as we learn.

The twentieth-century philosopher Michael Polanyi (1891–1976) thought deeply about the important dimension of tacit knowledge. In his masterpiece work, Personal Knowledge, he writes, “By watching the master and emulating his efforts in the presence of his example, the apprentice unconsciously picks up the rules of the art, including those which are not explicitly known to the master himself” (53).

“Shared experience is the heartbeat of the tacit dimension.”

Polanyi realized that while the classroom and curricula are effective conduits of propositional knowledge, they are limited when it comes to gaining tacit knowledge. The tacit dimension of knowing transcends words and flows from personal relationships in the context of real-life togetherness and experience. Shared experience is the heartbeat of the tacit dimension.

Jesus and the Tacit Dimension

When we reflect on Jesus and his discipleship methods, we observe a strong tacit dimension. Jesus invited his inner circle of disciples to what could be described as a three-year scrub-sink experience. Yes, they heard him preach and teach great propositional truths, but they also lived daily life with him, observing his sinless life, his miracles, his skills, his wisdom, and his spiritual practices.

Following the resurrection, Jerusalem’s religious aristocracy were in awe of Jesus’s disciples’ brilliance and boldness. “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13). How do we account for the astonishing transformation of Peter and John? Clearly, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost emboldened them, but I also believe the disciples’ three-year life-on-life experience with Jesus, where a much more tacit knowledge was transferred and obtained, is a large contributing factor. Don’t minimize the profound transformation that occurred in the life of Jesus’s closest disciples as a result of their personal experience with him.

Through the words of the religious aristocracy, Luke includes the pregnant sentence “and they recognized they had been with Jesus.” Is this mere historical observation to further the Acts narrative, or does it also give us something of pedagogical importance as we reflect on discipleship?

Taking Jesus’s Yoke

In our discipleship and church-leadership development, we would be wise to emulate Jesus’s life-on-life apprenticeship model, so rich in tacit knowledge. Jesus invites all who would follow him into his highly relational, highly transformative yoke of apprenticeship: “Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke on you, and learn from me, for I am gently and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:28–29). In this great invitation from Jesus, he calls all who would follow him to take his yoke of apprenticeship. Entering his yoke in obedience and submission, we encounter a highly relational apprenticeship where we learn how to live as Jesus might if he were in our place.

“The tacit dimension of discipleship embraces both the precepts and the practices of Jesus.”

The tacit dimension of discipleship embraces both the precepts and the practices of Jesus. In grace, over time, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, apprentices of Jesus increasingly are formed into greater Christlikeness. Jesus put it this way: “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone fully trained will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40).

Emulating Jesus, the early church adopted an apprenticeship model of discipleship that was highly relational, rich in tacit-knowledge transfer, and embedded in the local-church community. Writing to his protégé Timothy, who was serving in a pastoral role in Ephesus, Paul gives this grace-filled instruction: “My child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:1–2). While entrusting sound doctrine to others has a strong propositional element, don’t miss the highly relational environment of a vibrant local church and discipleship. Paul’s description seems a lot like scrub-sink discipleship. Transforming discipleship is both taught and caught.

Read your Bible, pray without ceasing, gather together with others of like faith, and grow as the disciple God has called and made you to be. Be blessed in your obedience to do all that God has called you to do be and say.

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 12, 2022

Notes of Faith October 12, 2022

Sink Your Teeth into This

Now then, stand still and see this great thing the Lord is about to do before your eyes! — 1 Samuel 12:16 NIV

When you think about a shark, probably one of the first things you imagine is its teeth! More than 400 species of sharks are in the world, and they all have teeth! Lots and lots of them. That’s because they also lose lots and lots of those teeth... as they rip and tear into their prey. Yikes! Sharks would quickly starve without their teeth, so God gave them a unique teeth-replacement system.

Sharks’ teeth are arranged in rows in their mouths, one behind the other. Some sharks have “only” 5 rows of teeth, but others, like the bull shark, have 50 rows! These rows basically act like conveyor belts. When one tooth is lost, another tooth from the row behind it pushes forward to take its place.

"God takes care of His people, sometimes in amazing, creative, and miraculous ways."

– Louie Giglio

Be Amazed

Sharks are born with a full set of teeth, unlike humans, who are born toothless! Sharks’ teeth vary in shape, depending on the type of shark and what it eats. For example, the shortfin mako shark has razorlike teeth for tearing, while the zebra shark has flat teeth for crushing the shells of the mollusks it likes to eat.

Sharks aren’t the only creatures God takes care of in unique ways. He comes up with some pretty unusual ways to take care of His people too. Think about the Israelites who wandered and camped out in a desert-like wilderness for 40 years. Their shoes and clothes never wore out!

Then there was Elijah — God fed him by sending ravens carrying bread and meat. And the widow of Zarephath? Even in the middle of a terrible famine, her jars of oil and flour never ran out. What a miracle! Many more examples of God’s miraculous protection are in the Bible. The point of them all is that God takes care of His people, sometimes in amazing, creative, and miraculous ways. So you can always trust Him to take care of you. Just watch and see what creative ways He does it!

Lord God, You are amazing in all the different ways You take care of Your creation. Open my eyes to see how You take care of me.

Excerpted from Indescribable by Louie Giglio, copyright Louie Giglio.

There have been times when I have put to the test every possible guardian angel and without a miracle from God I should have been severely injured or died. I do not understand all that God has done and is doing in my life but it would be impossible to believe that He is not there caring for and providing my every need! You too, should be able to look back and see the work of the Lord in your life. If He has brought you to Himself through faith to salvation . . . that is a MIRACLE! Let us celebrate the work of the Lord in our lives!.

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 11, 2022

Notes of Faith October 11, 2022

Gathering Firewood

I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people. — 1 Timothy 2:1

Gathering firewood is a chore most campers are familiar with. One wise scoutmaster, when asked by a young scout how much wood he should collect, replied, “Get as much as you think you will need and put it in a pile. Then go gather the same amount and put it on the pile. Finally, go get half again the amount you have collected and add it to the wood pile. Now you have about half the amount you will need, but at least you will know where to go look for more.”

Does prayer ever feel like that sort of chore? We pray and pray and pray. We wait and wait and wait for an answer. We wonder how long we need to pray before God grows weary of listening to us. What’s more likely is that we will tire out long before He does. An elderly saint once said that he prayed an hour when he first arose, unless he had a lot to do that day. On those mornings, he would pray for two hours. Sounds a bit like the scoutmaster, doesn’t it? However much we pray, we might want to try doubling it — and then maybe doubling it again. Paul said we should pray continually! (See 1 Thessalonians 5:16–18.)

Regardless of how we might feel, we are assured that God hears us.

I call on You, my God, for You will answer me; turn Your ear to me and hear my prayer. — Psalm 17:6

God’s Word would not teach us so much about prayer if it were not important. Jesus Himself gave us the pattern of the Lord’s Prayer. The book of James also gives instructions about prayer, as well as the assurance that “the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective” (James 5:16).

It is a privilege to have God’s ear, and we must not take it lightly or take it for granted.

Thank You, Father, that You invite us to pray. Thank You for the examples and instructions given in Your Word. I am so grateful that You hear my prayers.

I call on You, my God, for You will answer me; turn Your ear to me and hear my prayer. – Psalm 17:6

Mountainside Prayer

After He had dismissed them, He went up on a mountainside by Himself to pray. — Matthew 14:23

Do you ever feel like your day is just too hectic to squeeze in time alone with God? We all have days like that, don’t we? It turns out that even Jesus occasionally had to work at it to find time alone with His Father. For instance, Matthew 14 opens with the account of why John the Baptist was beheaded. Then Jesus fed the five thousand, and later He walked on water. Those are big events, and it’s easy to miss what Jesus did in between. He went looking for solitude in order to pray — twice. The first time is in Matthew 14:13, when He had just heard about John’s death. However, the crowds heard that He had taken a boat to a solitary place, and they followed Him on foot.

Though most of us don’t have crowds following us around, we do run into obstacles to our time alone with God. Texts, e-mails, and phone calls can reach us anywhere. Kids who usually can’t be pried away from a screen suddenly need us right now. Our own minds light up like pinball machines, pinging from one concern to the next. How we need the quiet!

So how did Jesus respond when He saw the crowd waiting for Him on shore?

He had compassion on them and healed their sick. — Matthew 14:14,

and then He fed them all. He might have been tired and disappointed; He may have been aching with grief for John the Baptist. But He was tenderhearted toward the people who needed Him.

Then He tried again. He sent the disciples ahead on the boat, and He dismissed the crowd. Then, finally, He had time by Himself on the mountainside to pray.

If Jesus, who is one with the Father (John 10:30), sought time alone with the Father, how much more do we need it! We may have to try and try again. That’s okay. God is still there, waiting to welcome us.

Dear Lord, thank You for all that we learn about You from Scripture. Please help me to respond with compassion when I am needed at inconvenient times. Help me to keep trying so that I find my time with You.

Excerpted from Devotions from the Mountains by Lisa Ham, copyright Thomas Nelson.

I try to pass on to you what the Lord brings to my attention through any and all communications that I have with you. This morning, prayer is the theme. A constant never-ending communication is what I seek. I see this in Jesus as I read the gospels. No matter the circumstances, Jesus seems to be connected to His Father in prayer, sometimes more intense than others but in everything being connected as One. I want to experience this oneness that Jesus prayed for you and me in John 17. Certainly we can know this intimacy through prayer! Be blessed this morning as you pray!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 10, 2022

Notes of Faith October 10, 2022

“Dear Pastor John, I have been up until recently very happily married. I am now widowed. My husband died just a few weeks ago, and I am devastated. I believe there’s a reason for why I have been left behind. I trust God on that. I believe there’s a reason why he had to go. I can trust God on that. I believe that we can make it without him — myself, our young son, and the church my husband led. I find myself experiencing joy and longing, trust and nervousness, peace and homesickness for heaven.

“Aside from missing him and wanting the life we had back, what I can’t seem to wrap my head around are these questions. Why did God even allow me and my husband to share a love like ours on earth if this will mean nothing in heaven? Can’t I at least be guaranteed that my husband will still be my best friend in heaven? Will he even be excited to see me when I get there? In marriage, two become one. Am I just half a person left behind? I know when I get to heaven and enter God’s presence, none of these questions will matter. But they matter now. And I struggle to find wisdom and comfort as to how I must approach my remaining years on earth. Thank you.”

That’s a beautiful question, because it’s just so full of faith at the front end and then perplexity at the back end. The loss is still painful, and the questions are still real and urgent. So let me sit down, so to speak, with her for a few minutes and think out loud about three of her questions in the hope that maybe my reflections from the Bible and experience will bring some measure of Christ-honoring comfort to her.

Behind her questions is the teaching of Jesus in Mark 12:25: “When [married people] rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.” In other words, marriage as we know it will not exist in the age to come. That’s behind her questions. That very fact is raising numerous perplexities for this young widow.

Echoes in Eternity

So, first, she wonders, “Why did God even allow me and my husband to share a love like ours on earth if this will mean nothing in heaven?”

The first thing to say in response to this question is that, in this present life, every relationship of love, and faithfulness, and loyalty, and sacrifice, and care will be celebrated for all eternity in tribute to the grace of God and the faithfulness of his obedient child. The “well done, good and faithful servant” that Jesus speaks to his faithful followers at the resurrection is a well done in every fruitful relationship (Matthew 25:23). Well done for that beautiful love. Well done.

God’s gracious approval of our imperfect works of faith is not a celebrative bubble that pops at the second coming and is forgotten for eternity. There are eternal good effects to all good done on the earth. Ephesians 6:8 says, “Whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord.” Good parenting that lasts five years before a child is snatched away in a car accident; good chastity during engagement before a fiancé dies of a heart attack before the wedding; good faithfulness and intense, mutually self-giving romance in marriage that she describes — these will not be meaningless in heaven. They won’t.

“Every good and beautiful fruit of God’s Spirit in your life will reverberate forever.”

Every good and beautiful fruit of God’s Spirit in your life will reverberate forever to the tribute of his grace and your faith. That’s the first thing to say. The sweetness and intensity of the love between you and your husband will have its echo in the music of heaven. It wasn’t in vain.

God Saves the Best Wine

And the second thing to say about this question of why God gave them such sweet love is this: this world, in its most exquisite pleasures, is designed by God to show something of himself. The heavens and everything else are declaring the glory of God, the psalm says (Psalm 19:1). And all these pleasures are meant to awaken thankfulness now and strong anticipation of the age to come when the pleasures of this age will seem as foretastes of something vastly greater. They are. The pleasures of this present age, even the most godly of them, are not the point of the universe, but they are pointers to the point.

The Bible pictures the age to come as better than this life, not just because bad things will be taken away, but because good things will be seen to be only foretastes of better things — a better feast of pleasure. Jesus showed this when he said that marriage gets replaced by something better (Mark 12:25). Paul showed it when he described the resurrection as replacing this world with something gloriously better. Listen to these words from 1 Corinthians 15:42:

So is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. (1 Corinthians 15:42–44)

Now, we can’t conceive fully what a spiritual body is. But in Paul’s mind, it exceeded this present body, with all its pleasures, like the brightness of the glory of a blue sky exceeds a decaying, rotting seed in the ground.

“The happiest marriage in the world is but a head start on the joys of heaven.”

So, I conclude that the happiest marriage in the world is but a head start on the joys of heaven. It is the appetizer before the feast. It is the warm-up singer who’s really good before the great artist sings. God saves the best wine, just like Jesus at Cana, till the last (John 2:10). And in a happy marriage, even the first wine was really good.

Greater Melody of Love

Then our young widow asks, “Can’t I at least be guaranteed that my husband will still be my best friend in heaven? Will he even be excited to see me when I get there?” Now, she knows as well as I do, and she says as much at the end, that Jesus is and will be her best friend. She knows that. “No longer do I call you servants . . . but I have called you friends” (John 15:15). “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

But I think what she’s feeling is that, while her husband lived, he bestowed on her something that nobody else on earth could give — a unique kind of affection, a love that gave her a very precious sense of belonging that nobody else could give on this earth. And she wonders whether she will have that sweet experience in the age to come, which only he was able to give her.

And I think the answer is we just don’t know what the music of love on earth is going to be like when it is transposed into the greater melody of the love of heaven, where there’s no sin whatsoever. This is the great unknown about the immeasurable joys of heaven. What will it be like when she and her husband are beyond the possibility of sin — the sin of self-pity, the sin of disregard? What will it be like when we are not capable of being disappointed, when we’re not capable of being sad at any relationship that God has established? Your husband, I venture to say, will be for you, and you will be for him, all that you need each other to be in order for your joy to be full in the presence of God.

Not Less, But More

And finally, she wonders this: “Since in marriage the two become one, am I just half a person left behind?”

The answer is no, you are not only half a person left behind. It’s not that simple. Yes, part of you is gone. I’ll admit that. I think you should own that, and that’s sad. Part of you is gone. Only he could draw out of you certain desires, certain kinds of laughter, anger, peace, and countless other inner responses that you can’t even put into words. He had become so embedded in your life that for him to be absent is, yes, for part of you yourself to be absent. That’s true. Things will never be just the same again. And it would dishonor him to think that they should be.

But consider this: not all that you became by union with him is lost. You know it’s not. You became a wiser, deeper, better person because of life with him. He did not take all of that with him when he left. You know he didn’t. You know who you are. And what you became through him is not less, but more than you were before he entered your life. God has not made you less, but more.

Things will never be the same. That’s true. But God’s call on your life now is to be the person you became through love with your husband, for the glory of God.

I would just like to repeat a couple of things that John Piper said… we do not know clearly what heaven will be like. But we do understand from Scripture that it is better than anything we have experienced in this life! That should give us even greater hope for what is to come.

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 9, 2022

Notes of Faith October 9, 2022

Having an Exit Strategy

My first experience with water skiing came at the age of twenty-four. I was quietly anxious about the adventure. All of my focus was on getting up on those skis. The first attempt was over before it began. One tug from the motorboat, and the rope left my hands and took off without me. On the second try, I got up for a brief second before I face-planted and a rush of brown lake water was sent up my nose. On the third attempt I kept the tension just right to bring my body out of the water. As my body fully emerged, I leaned back just a bit and found the slot. I did it! I was water skiing. A smile overtook my entire face. I had accomplished the goal! Check.

Then it dawned on me. I had spent all my energy and focus on my entrance strategy and had invested zero time considering my exit strategy. I had no idea how to end this experience. Fear overtook me. Thoughts of my falling body skipping across the water like a smooth stone came to mind. Thoughts of my legs rising above my head as I made contact with the concrete water below elevated my blood pressure.

So, I held on for dear life as the boat continued circling the small lake. The guys on the boat began to yell out something to me, but I couldn’t quite make it out. By this time my hands and legs were cramping. How was this going to end? It had to end. I couldn’t hold on forever. I yelled for the guys to speak louder.

They screamed at the top of their lungs, “Let go of the rope!”

Let go of the rope? They must be insane. What happens to a body that just lets go of the rope and gives up? I didn’t know, because I had never experienced it before. So, I doubled down on my grip and kept skiing, completely unsure of how it was all eventually going to end.

Life is so often like my water-skiing adventure. We use all of our energy getting up and staying up but don’t have an exit strategy. We know we can’t continue the ride forever in this body — it will eventually give out — but, because we don’t know how the ride ends and fear it will hurt, we hold on for dear life.

Woody Allen said, “I don’t mind dying; I just don’t want to be there when it happens.” Boy, can I relate!

What is the exit strategy for the Christian? If I said “yes” to Christ in this life, what happens to me when I die, when I let go of the rope?

"Death is a sting.

But, the sting is only temporary."

— Randy Frazee

 The Bible has so much to say about this that will calm your nerves, loosen your death grip on life and give you hope. Consider the words of Paul in his letter to the Corinthian believers –

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. — 2 Corinthians 4:16-5:1

Daily our bodies are wasting away. Can I get an “amen”? This is just a fact of life. But as we grow in Christ, Paul says, our spirits can actually get stronger. The second-best for overcoming the effects of aging is diet and exercise. The first-best strategy is spiritual growth, getting healthy on the inside.

We should do everything we can to take care of our bodies (1 Corinthians 6:19-20), but eventually, time takes its toll. I am working hard to slow the process down, but I cannot stop it. I’m not only getting older, but I am getting shorter. Somewhere between high school and now, I have lost an inch off my height. Yikes.

Death will eventually win over these perishable bodies we inherited from Adam, but as we grow spiritually and get to know God better, we will see he has a plan for us. His plan trumps all the pain and even physical death we experience in this life. It’s a plan where love wins and we live forever. On the day of Christ’s return we will receive a new body, a resurrected body that is imperishable. When we fix our eyes on this promise it makes the temporary troubles we have in life now seem puny in comparison. Because no matter how awful our circumstances become, we know this is not how our story ends. We will receive relief from our grief one day. The believer in Jesus can cope with this hope.

That summer day when I was water skiing so many years ago, I finally did it. I let go of the ski rope. What happened? My body slowly sank into the water. The life jacket kept me afloat as the boat circled around to pick me up. Everything was fine. And the next time out I not only had an entrance strategy but an exit strategy.

Death, the Bible tells us, is a valley experience. But at some point in the valley, Jesus will meet us there and take us the rest of the way (see Psalm 23:4). Death is a sting. But, the sting is only temporary. Once it wears off and is over, you are left with eternity in the presence of God. Whenever it is time for you to let go of the rope of life, you will discover that everything will be just fine. No, not fine…better than ever.

Original blog by Randy Frazee for Devotionals Daily featuring his new book What Happens After You Die, copyright Randy Frazee.

Only believers in Jesus can have a joy filled exit strategy. Make sure that you are on the blessed and rewarded side of eternity!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 8, 2022

Notes of Faith October 8, 2022

How Great Thou Art

The Faith of Elvis

Why do larger-than-life people like Elvis do what they do?

Why do they go through the difficult process of trying to build a career? Why live with the unpredictability of fame and success on a large scale? Why put yourself out there so people can criticize your every move? Why try to reinvent yourself every decade or so?

Every artist has their own answers. Elvis loved music. He loved the audiences. He loved performing. He loved his fans. He loved the opportunity to help others because he was in a privileged position.

But there was one overriding reason he did what he did.

Elvis was a man on a mission.

It wasn’t about having a career or creating the next album, concert, or movie gig. He saw what he did as a spiritual calling.

The apostle Paul had a mission too. He laid it out in Romans 1:14–17:

I am obligated both to Greeks and non-Greeks, both to the wise and the foolish. That is why I am so eager to preach the gospel also to you who are in Rome.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”

Paul preached the gospel from every imaginable place in the ancient world. Sometimes his “stage” was a Jewish synagogue, a prison cell, a ship, or even Mars Hill in the city of Athens. Elvis shared the same mission of spreading God’s love. But he chose to share it through music.

Elvis started doing live concerts again after his 1968 TV special on NBC (the ’68 Comeback Special). That whole experience was an experiment to see if crowds would still respond to Elvis. And indeed they did! Soon afterward, Elvis booked a residency at the new Hilton in Las Vegas. He interspersed these residencies with concert tours around the country.

In 1973, Elvis performed his famous Aloha from Hawaii TV special and included “How Great Thou Art” in the set list. This was his way of showing he was a true believer.

He recognized that his ministry was his music. It was the only way he knew to get his message out.

Evangelism has always been challenging for people of faith. Even in the earliest days of the church, not every person who heard the gospel became a believer. Nothing had changed in nearly two thousand years — some believed, and some wouldn’t. Elvis knew he had a much better shot at sharing God’s love through the art form of music.

Why music? Music touches the heart directly. It goes straight to the emotions and moves people in a way that a sermon or lesson never could. Elvis was committed to using this powerful tool to reach as many people as possible.

It’s hard to step on anyone’s toes or cast a judgmental attitude when you’re singing about God’s love and grace.

Elvis also wanted to avoid the judgmental attitudes he saw in so much of the Christian world.

It’s hard to step on anyone’s toes or cast a judgmental attitude when you’re singing about God’s love and grace.

His job was to put the message out there. His audience’s job was to decide to either accept or reject the message. The funny thing is that it was probably pretty hard for a nonbeliever to reject the message of God’s love when they saw how much the gospel moved Elvis.

There was something different about him when he sang gospel songs. The gospel message had changed him. He wanted the same change for his audience. When you let God in, something miraculous happens in your heart.

Or as Elvis would say, “That’s God knocking on your door. Are you going to answer it?”

Although Elvis recorded numerous albums of gospel music, he didn’t see the gospel message as only contained within traditional gospel songs. A lot of the songs he used were not gospel songs, but they contained a message of inspiration, encouragement, or spirituality. Songs such as “Why Me, Lord?” and “You Gave Me a Mountain” all contained important messages Elvis wanted to share. If you listen to them with an open heart and an open ear, you’ll see these songs are talking about faith.

Elvis has sometimes been criticized for not writing his own songs. Many other artists of his era — indeed, most of the popular ones — wrote many if not all of their own music. Elvis’s main gift was not in writing songs, but in recognizing and selecting amazing songs that aligned with his worldview and message. Then he would put his own spin on them, adding something special and unique in the process.

For example, his rendition of Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge over Troubled Water” is very different from the original. Yet the message is the same: the singer is telling the listener to give him their troubles and woes. He will lay himself down to be their bridge so they can make it across in a time of trouble.

If you take a moment to listen to Elvis’s version, it is obvious he wasn’t faking it. He meant every word. He wanted to be like Jesus, getting people through a hard situation. His whole life was focused on helping people and sharing love. It was the perfect song for him.

These kinds of songs were not straight-up gospel songs. They were not necessarily written from a Christian viewpoint. However, Elvis turned them around and used them to express his love and faith. He wanted to get people focused on the Lord. Sometimes you have to do that in indirect ways.

Gospel wasn’t just a style of music Elvis incorporated into his concerts or used to fulfill his recording contracts. It was also his heart language and a way to unwind after the emotional high of a concert.

When Elvis came off the stage, he would be so wound up with energy that it was impossible to turn it off. He never gave a half-hearted performance. Even if he felt something could be musically a little better, or he was unhappy with some small aspect of a concert, he never gave anything less than 100 percent of his energy.

Giving out all this energy affected him. You would think he would be exhausted, but it was the exact opposite. All the love and affection he had just put out to the audience was now coming back to him, and it filled him.

The only way he knew how to come down from this high was to sing gospel. Elvis would gather with some people in his hotel suite, usually with the gospel quartet that accompanied him onstage, and one of the guys from the band would sit down at the piano and get started. Because Elvis would be there for weeks at a time, he would have the hotel bring in a piano during his stay there. Elvis was bringing in a massive amount of money for them, so they would do whatever he asked.

They would sing gospel songs until the sun came up or until Elvis said, “I’m ready to go to bed.” They would sit up there for hours, and people would come up after the show. It was almost like a second concert. After the midnight show, Elvis would invite people up and they would go on for hours. People would stand around and listen or they would mingle in the suite.

One of the songs I heard frequently in these post-concert settings was “Lighthouse.” In an unusual move, Elvis chose not to be the main singer. He did add some vocals, but his background vocalist Donnie Sumner sang the lead. If you watch the documentary Elvis: That’s the Way It Is, you’ll see Elvis and the group singing “Lighthouse.”

There is a fascinating story from 1 Samuel 16 that tells how King Saul was being tormented by an evil spirit the Lord had allowed to come upon him. Unbeknownst to Saul, young David had been anointed as the next king, and it was only a matter of time before he would replace Saul.

Ironically, David was also in the service of King Saul. One of Saul’s servants had heard about David’s ability to play the lyre and had recruited David to perform for the king. First Samuel 16:23 says,

Whenever the spirit from God came on Saul, David would take up his lyre and play. Then relief would come to Saul; he would feel better, and the evil spirit would leave him.

This story reminds me of the power of music to soothe and comfort in all kinds of circumstances. For Elvis, gospel music played much the same role. He took refuge and found comfort in this sacred music, long after the lights of the stage had faded and into the wee hours of the morning.

Excerpted from The Faith of Elvis by Billy Stanley, copyright Billy Stanley.

Did not know this about Elvis. He came to the University of Oregon while I was attending there. I saw him arrive in his limo and get out in all white leather and flashy sequins. He looked at that moment like I look today, out of shape, not moving well, but prepared to give a concert. Women in furs flooded the concert hall. I don’t remember how long I watched but certainly thought this was a moment for a selfie with Elvis. No cell phones back then and security never would have let me get close. It was still a moment to remember. I hope you can still enjoy the gifted voice singing gospel music!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 7, 2022

Notes of Faith October 7, 2022

Give Me More of God

Why Spiritual Intimacy Can Feel Elusive

Article by Jon Bloom

Staff writer, desiringGod.org

Deep in the heart of every true disciple of Jesus is a deep longing for more of God. But what is this more we desire? We might each describe our want somewhat differently, depending on how this longing refracts through our biology, history, and theological influences. To some degree, none of us has words for it. But at the core, what we desire is to really know God — to know him in the intimate ways that only love knows.

And we have this desire because, by God’s unfathomable grace toward us in Christ (Ephesians 2:8–9), he first has known and loved us (1 Corinthians 8:3; 1 John 4:19). It is his great desire, one he expresses in the promise of Jeremiah’s great prophecy (quoted in full in Hebrews 8):

This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. (Jeremiah 31:33–34)

At the heart of the new covenant is God’s great desire that we “shall all know” him.

Known by Love

You don’t need to know Hebrew (or Greek) to discern the knowing God desires. It is the knowing of relational intimacy, of deep friendship — the kind of knowing that only love knows. For to truly know God is to love God.

“To truly know God is to love God.”

The role of love in intimately knowing someone is profound. On one hand, we cannot intimately love someone we do not know. So, knowledge must precede love. But on the other hand, the deep love of intimate friendship is the door to even deeper knowledge of the beloved, because intimate friends entrust themselves and so disclose more of themselves to each other. So, there is an intimate knowledge accessible only through the deep love that results from and produces even more profound trust.

We see one illustration of this dynamic in play at the end of John 6, when, as a result of hearing Jesus say offensive-sounding things, “many of his [wider group of] disciples turned back and no longer walked with him” (John 6:66). But the twelve didn’t leave him. Why? Because, to use Peter’s words, that they had “come to know” that he was “the Holy One of God” (John 6:69).

For eleven of them, this knowledge wasn’t merely intellectual; they had come to love him and trust him, even when he confused them. And because they trusted him, Jesus disclosed to them “secrets of the kingdom” he didn’t disclose to others (Luke 8:10). To really know Jesus was to really love Jesus, which was the door to knowing Jesus more. This is what Jesus is getting at when he later says to them,

Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him. (John 14:21)

The Way Is Simple

Notice the simplicity in those words: Jesus will manifest himself to whoever loves him. And two sentences later, he says, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23). If we love Jesus, both the Father and the Son will manifest themselves to us through the “Spirit of truth” who “dwell[s] in” us (John 14:17).

These are precious and very great promises (2 Peter 1:4). The way to know the triune God intimately, to experience the relational communion promised in the new covenant, is not complex. Jesus calls us to keep his commandments, or keep his word, which is essentially what he means when he says, “Believe in God; believe also in me” (John 14:1). Jesus doesn’t give us a list of rituals, ascetic rigors, detailed prayer requirements, long pilgrimages, meditative practices, or instructions for creating special aesthetic environments to experience communion with him and the Father through the Spirit. The way is simple: “Believe in me.”

The Way Is Hard

The way may be simple to understand, but, as Jesus says elsewhere, “The way is hard that leads to life” (Matthew 7:14). The complexity and difficulty for us come not from the way itself, but from the evil we face: the internal evil of our unbelief or “little faith” (Matthew 17:20), combined with the effects of remaining sin dwelling in our members (Romans 7:21–23), and the external evil existing in a world that “lies in the power of the evil one” (1 John 5:19). Learning to overcome the obstacles presented to us by our sin-infected flesh and the devil-filled world (1 John 2:16) is very hard indeed.

But the way to more deeply knowing, loving, and trusting God is by faithfully persevering through the great difficulties, and through receiving God’s grace of forgiveness when we fail (1 John 1:9). For God uses these difficulties as opportunities to manifest more dimensions of himself to us. Through tribulations, we experience that Jesus has overcome the world (John 16:33), that his grace is sufficient in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9), and that he “is able to make all grace abound to [us], so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, [we] may abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). We come to know more of him.

Through this hard way that leads to life, we also repeatedly encounter the reality that God is true to his “living and active” word (Hebrews 4:12). And we discover that the reality we’re encountering is not merely a set of propositions, but a Person: Jesus, who is the living Word (John 1:1). We discover, in fact, that Jesus is the way that leads to him, the life (John 14:6). And when it comes to our practical pursuit of God, we discover that the Lord most often and most profoundly reveals himself to us “by the word of the Lord” (1 Samuel 3:21).

For Those Who Want More

It’s possible that this may strike you as disappointing, as if the secret to intimacy with God is “read your Bible more.” Because what you long for is something more. You want to be near God and to encounter him more personally than you seem to experience when you read your Bible or hear God’s word preached and taught and discussed. If so, your disappointment could be resulting from one or all of the following possibilities.

First, it’s possible that your exposure to God’s word has outpaced your obedience to it. A familiar and accurate grasp of God’s word is only as good as your behavior-determining belief in it. Jesus said this to some of the most frequent Bible readers of his day: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life” (John 5:39–40). Jesus discloses himself intimately only to those who keep his word. It’s worth prayerful examination.

“Jesus discloses himself intimately only to those who keep his word.”

Second, it’s possible you have a misconception of what intimacy with God should feel like, which has given rise to expectations based on a kind of fantasy, not unlike the unreal expectations we can bring to romantic love or deep human friendships. Remember, our most intimate marriages and closest friendships usually result from a few intense experiences that punctuate many ordinary times that all build trust and deepen love.

Third, it’s possible we might think that the word of the Lord is a poor substitute for the Lord’s manifest personal presence. And in a sense, of course, that’s true. But think of what makes your most intimate, manifestly present friends so meaningful. Ultimately, the words through which you disclose yourselves to each other in mutual trust, along with the promises you faithfully keep, create the intimacy you enjoy. So it is with God.

Now We Know in Part

But it’s also possible that your longing for more is your inconsolable longing to be with your Beloved, the longing all true disciples of Jesus experience. You have come to know Jesus and love him and trust him, but you are keenly and sometimes painfully aware that the wonderful disclosures God has made to you are like a splash of the ocean of joy you someday will swim in (Psalm 16:11). You’re aware that now you only “see in a mirror dimly” what he’s revealed to you, that now you know only in part, but later you will know fully, “even as [you] have been fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). There’s part of you that’s weary of the betrothal phase of your relationship with Jesus, and you long for the wedding, when the full marriage will at last be consummated.

For most of us, our discontent with our current level of intimacy with God comes from a mixture of the above: slowness to obey, misconceptions of what leads to our desired intimacy, and a longing that will be realized only when we finally see our Beloved face-to-face. But all these causes are reasons for great hope because they all point to the fact that there truly is more. There is more of God to know, more of God to love, and more ways we can deepen our trust and intimacy with him through faithfully keeping his word.

Whatever the cause of our longing, the Spirit is stirring in us a desire that comes from God. Because it’s his great desire, the very heart of the new covenant, that we all really know him. And someday, perhaps sooner than we think, God will bring to pass his precious and very great promise:

No longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. (Jeremiah 31:34)

Even if our knowledge of God is obscure we seek desperately not only to know but to share in the intimacy of relationship in Father and child, Brother (Jesus) to brother, and Comforter, Counselor, and Guide (Holy Spirit) in the temple that is our earthly body! May we pursue this relationship until it is made perfect in heaven!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith October 6, 2022

Notes of Faith October 6, 2022

Prayer Is About Love

The Bible is not a rule book or a set of directions; it’s a love story — a romantic, courageous love story we’re invited to believe. We see that whole story captured in a single scene when Jesus defends and dignifies a shame-covered woman thrown into the dirt at His feet, but we can see it just as clearly when we zoom all the way out to the metanarrative that God has been authoring since hanging the stars in the night sky.

The biblical story begins with perfect love at the center of the plot, and the conflict introduced by sin is a twisting and warping of that love into something lesser. The hinge point at the story’s center is the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The wound opened up by infidelity is mended by a love that will never give up. Jesus, on the final night of His life, says this to His followers:

As the Father has loved Me, so have I loved you. Now remain in My love.1

The whole sixty-six-book anthology becomes resolved, not in a catastrophic apocalypse, but at a wedding banquet — Christ united to His bride for all eternity.2 Human infidelity repaired by divine fidelity.

How do we remain in that love? How do we make covenant love the constant backdrop before which the scenes of our lives play out? Prayer. “If you can’t love, you can’t pray, either,” writes Johannes Hartl. “Praying is loving. And learning to pray means learning to love.”3

Love is easy at the first and at the last. It’s effortless in the honeymoon stage when you’re infatuated with each other — touchy, talkative, and smitten. And love is like breathing for the old couple who are decades into a mature love that has been aged to perfection like a fine wine. But all those years in between? Love in the midst of building a career, raising kids, establishing a life, and facing trials — those are the long years when love has to be worked at and fought for. Those are the years when early infatuation is matured into the old couple in effortless union. Those are the years when love is won and lost.

Like love, prayer comes at the first and at the last, for sinners and saints, but all the years in between are the important ones. Prayer is about relationship, and that means fidelity is the only container within which it can truly flourish.

When I was seventeen years old, a senior in high school, a waterfront park lay right along my commute home from school. Regularly, multiple times a week, I’d stop there on the way home and walk the shaded paths of that park in unhurried, agenda-free conversation with God.

I’ve got stories of prayer walking with a mission, seeing sparks of revival in the early mornings at a public middle school. I know the prayer of intensity and fire. I also know the prayer of fidelity and love. On those afternoons at Philippe Park, I did not want anything from God. I had no plans I wanted Him to sponsor, no needs I was hoping He’d meet. There was no motive; there was only love. I wanted to be with God, so I walked and talked and listened.

"Praying is loving. And learning to pray means learning to love."

— Johannes Hartl

A couple decades removed, I now imagine those afternoons were God’s favorites. There’s no way to know for sure, but I have a sneaking suspicion He preferred those meandering afternoon strolls to the early mornings with a school directory in hand and a vision in mind. Because on those weekday afternoons, it wasn’t about changing the world. It wasn’t about getting God to act the way I thought God should act. It wasn’t even about my own issues or needs. There was no function.

We “waste” time with those we love. And I was stealing time with God because I love Him.

“Prayer does not mean much when we undertake it only as an attempt to influence God, or as a search for a spiritual fallout shelter, or as an offering of comfort in stress-filled times,” writes Henri Nouwen. “Prayer is the act by which we divest ourselves of all false belongings and become free to belong to God and God alone.”4

Before prayer is about power or outcomes or heavenly armies and a righteous uprising, it’s about love. It’s the way we freely choose the God who freely chose us first. The way we express ourselves to the God who, in spite of everything, delights in us. The way we receive from the God who has endless stamina to offer Himself to a bunch of people who prefer self-sufficiency, tight jaws, and clenched fists.

The Heart of a Lover and the Discipline of a Monk

“Teach us to pray.”5 That’s the request we keep returning to. Prayer is what people noticed about Jesus more than anything else. Prayer is the aspect of his life those who got close to Him were most jealous for.

Watching Jesus pray was like watching the closing scene from the movie The Notebook. You know the one. After the twists and turns of young, passionate, infatuated love, Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams have wrinkled and plumped into any other hobbling, elderly couple. They’re in a hospital room, both nearing the end. He lies down in her bed, wraps his arm around her, interlaces his fingers with hers, and they fall asleep for good, together. Dying, but still in love, still holding on to each other.

Everyone who has ever watched that movie gets at least a little misty-eyed during that scene because it meets us at the place of our God-given longing. We all want that intimacy and companionship. Everyone wants that, but there’s a reason the writer and director of The Notebook included only the honeymoon stage and the mature love in the end. It’s the most obvious reason: all those years in between are filled with nothing but ordinary fidelity. And fidelity is boring.

When you see the fruit of fidelity though — an elderly couple still in love — a thought runs through every mind: That’s better than anything I’ve got. I want that. That’s what the disciples saw when Jesus prayed — the fruit of fidelity. And they wanted it.

“Teach us the kind of prayer that leads to that.”

1 John 15:9.

2 See Revelation 19:6–9.

3 Johannes Hartl, Heart Fire: Adventuring into a Life of Prayer (Edinburgh: Muddy Pearl, 2018), 205.

4 Henri Nouwen, “Letting Go of All Things,” Sojourners, May 1979, 6.

5 Luke 11:1.

Excerpted from Praying Like Monks, Living Like Fools by Tyler Staton, copyright Tyler Staton

After all these years, I feel like I am beginning to live an intimate love relationship with my Lord. We have to breathe to live. We must pray to experience the breath of God that gives life . . . and that eternal. What joy it is to spend time with the One who loves us unconditionally. Let us continue to learn what it means to love the Lord our God!

Pastor Dale