From If I Run
As I’ve finished the last few steps of getting this book ready for publication, things have happened that have changed the United States drastically. The news about Christians being run out of business for their religious beliefs and baby parts being sold off after abortions, among other things, not only trouble me deeply but turn my stomach. It’s difficult to sleep when these things run through our minds.
In the United States, Christians don’t face the persecution that our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world face. Some of them are being beheaded because they won’t renounce their faith, and schoolgirls are being kidnapped and murdered if they won’t renounce, and even if they do, they’re married off to evil men. In America, we do still have freedom, yet many of us suffer personal issues—family issues, wayward children, health problems—things that drain the life out of us and make us feel persecuted. Part of that is due to the fallen world we live in (Christians are not immune), and part is due to spiritual attacks against us. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12).
With all that weighing heavily on me, my husband and I took a cruise to Alaska. I’ve seen some beautiful places, but I’ve never seen anything as beautiful as the mountain peaks in Juneau, Alaska, or the constantly moving and changing glaciers in Glacier Bay. We took a helicopter ride over those mountains on a rare sunny day, and every time we crested a mountain peak, I gasped audibly at the stunning majesty of what I saw. Then we landed on the Mendenhall Glacier, suited up and booted up, and walked around on that blue ice for an hour.
As I beheld the creativity of our Creator, I wondered how anyone can see such natural art and not understand the existence and power of God. Seriously, you think all this came from some cosmic explosion? Or evolution? The idea that there are so many beautiful and magnificent things working and fitting together in such a precise and elegant way flies in the face of Darwin’s theories. There is a God, and he is the most powerful force in the universe. He created those beautiful mountains and glaciers, untouched by human hands, and he created you and me. And though he controls the movement of glaciers and the forest fires that allow new growth and the earthquakes that push mountains up from the ground so that the landscape is ever-changing, he loves us enough to personally guide us if we’ll let him, enough to make a way for us to be with him in his home forever. As beautiful as our planet is now, it’s going to be even more glorious when he creates a new heaven and a new earth (see Revelation 21 and 22). He has told us in the Bible how this world is going to end, and as frightening—and familiar—as it is, we know that the end times are only the beginning of the great things God has planned for his people.
I admit I was a little depressed when I came back home after such an experience. Bad news is still being reported, and personal issues loom. But as discouragement began to sink back in, I read a prophecy about Jesus from Isaiah 42.
Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold;
My chosen one in whom My soul delights.
I have put My Spirit upon Him;
He will bring forth justice to the nations.
He will not cry out or raise His voice,
Nor make His voice heard in the street.
A bruised reed He will not break
And a dimly burning wick He will not extinguish;
He will faithfully bring forth justice.
He will not be disheartened or crushed
Until He has established justice in the earth.
(vv. 1–4)
Knowing that Jesus will not be disheartened or crushed, that he won’t feel the need to shout in the streets or rail against anything, that he will bring forth justice in the twinkle of an eye, encourages me. Things look grim, but God is still in control. Sometimes terrible things happen in our culture. Logic seems upside down, and the masses march to the drumbeat of political correctness. Our job is to stand up for our beliefs, cling to them no matter what, and wait for our redemption. Jesus will not let us down.
I hope this encourages you today.
From If I’m Found
Any of you who have read my books know that I often have characters who are experiencing terrible crises, and sometimes they’re in danger, or some horrible event has changed their lives. I think that’s partially because I have so many challenges in my own life. But there are times when I look back on years I complained my way through and realize those were really good years. I just wasn’t paying attention. Have you ever spent years thinking you were fat, then twenty years later you see a picture of yourself and think, “I didn’t look so bad then. What was I complaining about?” It’s kind of that way for me when I think about all the grumbling I did years ago, when in fact, things were pretty good.
I was recently complaining to some friends about some stresses in my life, and one of them wrote me an email that I will never forget.
The friend who wrote this is another writer—Athol Dickson, author of books like The Cure and River Rising. Athol suffered intense grief after his mother had a long, terrible struggle with cancer. He had trouble praying or reading the Bible or even thinking about God because he was so crushed. His wife took him on a road trip across the country, hoping to shake him out of his lethargy, and several days in, he says he remembers looking out through the windshield and seeing the most beautiful sunset he’s ever seen, and he began to weep. He says he was filled with gratitude at that sunset, and it flipped something in him. From that point on, he looked for God in everything, finding reasons to be thankful.
He told me, “Starting immediately, thank God for every gift He gives, from those as small as a whiff of honeysuckle or jasmine in your backyard, to the realization that you just had a few moments without back pain, to really big things like the fact that [people you love] are in the next room safe and sound.
“I’m talking about the practice of intentional gratitude. ‘Intentional,’ because it involves an aggressive effort to remain aware of God’s gifts as you move through your day, and to actively acknowledge each gift with a simple ‘Thank You.’
“. . . In a life filled with the practice of intentional gratitude, there can be no ‘Yes, but . . .’ or ‘It’s not fair,’ or ‘Why me?’ downward spiraling kinds of thinking. The two attitudes simply do not mix. Also, to focus on life’s gifts you must live in the moment. With the practice of intentional gratitude, there is no time for regrets about the past, or worries about the future. There is only thankfulness for the here and now.
“This is the secret to contentment in any circumstance that Paul mentioned. It’s also the secret to Paul’s apparently impossible commands to pray without ceasing, because every expression of gratitude is a prayer, which means the practice of intentional gratitude leads directly to a life lived in continual worship.”
He went on to say that a default setting in life is to take details for granted, when in fact almost every part of every day is a direct gift from God. He admonished me to work at giving thanks for things throughout the day. “It’s not easy,” he said, “but it’s simple and actionable, and if you do take this seriously and work at it until it becomes a routine part of life, I promise unconditionally that you will regain your joy.”
I’d love to tell you I knew this already and practiced it hourly, but I didn’t. I decided to take his advice and try spinning my thoughts around. Instead of being upset that some crisis in my life has cost me a lot of money, I think, “God provided every penny of what we needed for that.” Instead of whining that I had to do something I didn’t want to do, I say, “God gave me the strength to get through that.”
But it’s a real effort for me. The problem is that sometimes I don’t want to do it. Sometimes I’d rather cry or yell or complain, because I think I deserve to. But that only hurts me. When I started this, I realized I was going through most of my life ignoring those things that God deserved thanks for. I wasn’t looking for God, so I kept missing Him.
Once I reviewed times when God quietly worked in my life at times when I was distracted and discouraged, and sometimes when I didn’t even notice until years later, I began to see Him in the little things around me. It changed my brain. Dread became anticipation. Complaining turned into praise. As my friend instructed me so eloquently, practicing intentional gratitude for every little thing truly makes those that were unbearable before seem not only tolerable, but sometimes even blessings. But they’re not always immediately obvious.
I’m hoping that God will use this lesson He’s taken me through in my life to work in my readers’ lives, too, and as Casey begins to see God in everyday things in her life—big and little—that my readers will begin looking for Him too.
Philippians 4:8 says, “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.”
I can’t say it any better than that.
From If I Live
Do you choose to be miserable? Lately, I’ve noticed that a lot of us do. Our culture divides us, and hatred is at an all-time high. We feed our anger in multiple ways throughout each day. We look for opportunities to be offended and feel slighted. We anticipate that we will be treated badly. We shame and are ashamed; we judge and feel judged; we assign guilt and feel guilty. We blame and assume wrong motives of everyone around us. We are pessimistic, and we mock those who hope. Everything has the look and feel of smoke and mirrors, but we deny reality. We doubt truth when it’s obvious and heartily embrace falsehoods.
Over the last couple of years, I’ve been spending a lot of time with my grandson Liam, who is four as I’m writing this. The other day we were at the playground, and another child refused to answer him when he tried to make friends. It hurt his feelings, and on the way home, Liam said, “He must not know that Jesus told us to be kind to one another.”
It hit me that so many of our cultural ailments could be solved by embracing the simplest biblical principles—things that my four-year-old grandson understands. Be kind to one another, treat people the way you want to be treated, rejoice with those who rejoice, mourn with those who mourn, share what you have, don’t judge people for things you do yourself, love one another, put others before yourself, serve others, forgive those who sin against you, pray for your enemies.
If we applied these things to those who rubbed us the wrong way, our culture would be so different. Instead of slapping each other down for daring to differ, we would respect one another and be willing to listen. We wouldn’t assume people are evil just because we don’t understand them. We wouldn’t let others tell us how to feel. We would investigate things on our own and dig for truth.
We would never be convinced to trash people over social media because we’re trying to make a point or because we have a cause. We wouldn’t hammer our points home over and over under the guise of enlightening the less intelligent, because we would realize our relationships are more important than our opinions. We would consider others, not target them.
The Bible tells us many ways to combat misery. Seek God’s kingdom first (Matthew 6:33); love because you’re loved (John 13:34); overflow with hope by trusting in God (Romans 15:13). Philippians 4:8 says, “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things. The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things; and the God of peace shall be with you.”
Misery is a choice. Sometimes it’s my choice. Is it yours? What if we chose not to be miserable? What if we made a conscious effort to spend less time with the things and people who make us miserable? What if we chose to trust God instead? After all, He loved us enough to send His son to die for us, so that we wouldn’t be stuck in the mire of our sins, but would have abundant life.
We can trust Him. He knows what’s coming. He’s the one who knows the whole picture. He’s the one who loves us and doesn’t want us to be miserable. He gave us ways to find joy.
Let’s choose that instead.