From Finger Tip to Finger Tip is the Same Length as Your Height

A simple question was asked to me the other night. This simple question had a simple, yet complex answer. One of my students asked me, “Do you cry?” The simple answer was, “no,” but the reason to the “no” is very complex.

I do not think it is more “manly” to not cry, and I even think a good cry can be healthy. However, for me, I can count on one hand the number of times I can remember crying.

The only answer I could give him as to why I do not cry is that I have become numb to most things in life. Being my friend can be a very frustrating thing because I tend to keep people at an arm’s length. This is not healthy, but it is something that I began to do from a very young age.

My dad was in the air force, and that caused us to move quite a bit. I never wanted to become too close with anyone because I knew when I moved again it would be emotional and sad. My parents were always perplexed at how well I took the moves, but the reality was I did not become close with anyone in order to make the moves easier.

It is a very scary thing to open your heart up to someone. This makes you vulnerable to heart break. Let’s face it, sometimes you have very dark areas that you do not want people to know about, because you fear that if they knew about them they would run.

I guess to put it simply, letting someone know your heart is a great risk, and it is much easier to keep people at an arm’s length.

I fear that so many of us have kept God at an arm’s length. We sit in church services and attend Bible studies week in and week out, but we experience little transformation in our lives. It is almost as if we fear letting God truly take hold of our hearts.

God does not delight in the petty “sacrifices” we make for him. At least in the Old Testament they had to get their hands dirty. But in reality, our hearts are in the same place as those in the Old Testament. We feel that if we make some sacrifice of our time to attend church, or a sacrifice of our time to lead a Bible study, or if we sacrifice the “fun” of doing worldly things, that God is somehow delighting in our actions.

It is almost as if we give God this, this, and this, then we can justify keeping this, this, and this (fill in the blanks). We keep GOD at an arm’s length because we know if he takes hold of our hearts we will have to undergo some major surgery, bones will have to be broken, cuts will have to be made, cancers will have to be removed, and ultimately it is going to really hurt before it gets better. So we keep him at a distance and offer him crappy sacrifices while we go through the motions and deceive ourselves into thinking we are just fine.

Christianity has become vain repetition to us.

The imagery of a deer desperately panting for water, knowing that a quench of its thirst truly means life or death, and comparing that to the way we should thirst for God, seldom sets of an alarm in our heads. We do not thirst for God as we should, and it is because we have become numb to him.

When we run from God it will feel like freedom at first, but in the end, we will end up enslaved to something that is beyond our own will power to return from. God is most distant when he does nothing to discipline us in our sin, and this is a very, very, very dangerous place to be.

So here I am evaluating many aspects of my life and finding areas where I am attempting to keep God at an arm’s length. And here I am trembling as a pray an extremely scary prayer… “God capture my heart, lead me to repentance, and discipline me in the areas that I do not want to give up.”

I pray for all of us that God would not be distant, and that he would take action where actions needs to take place so we can escape enslavement and live in his freedom.

If you can pray this with ease, please do not pray it. Take the time to evaluate your heart and understand your condition before God. Know that the perfection God requires has been provided in Christ, and that nothing you can do can make you right before him. But also know that God does not take this lukewarm junk of keeping him at an arm’s length.

Give God your all, for her deserves so much more.

A Moment of Transparency

There was a time in life when I was really good at hiding things. I could be in the darkest place spiritually, but on the outside everything would look great. I would write songs that would be crying for help, but I guess no one actually listened to the lyrics, because looking back on them, I was desperate.

Thankfully I have had a few close friends in life that I have been completely transparent with, and these guys truly know me. I’ve written before on the importance of community (see “From Coke to Coffee”) and these are the men in my life that have walked step by step with me.

However, now I am far from all of these friends. I am living in Georgia by myself. My family is all in Texas, and my closest friends are in Texas and Kentucky. I do have my pastor who is a good friend, but do to the nature of our work relationship we just don’t talk about certain things.

Here I am being open and honest. This isn’t a blog that is a cry for help, or a cry for sympathy… it is just me trying to be transparent and human. I don’t want to fool the world. I don’t want to fool those around me. I want people to know my heart.

Here’s my heart on my sleeve…

I’m extremely discouraged right now. I feel like I’m failing at “ministry.” I want to give up on my “philosophy of ministry” and pursue something with immediate success. I’m wrestling with whether or not I am doing an injustice to the church by not appealing to the emotions and senses of this youth generation to” get them in the door.”

This youth ministry started out with a boost in numbers, which, even though I said was not my concern, was actually really encouraging to both the church and me. Then some of my youth started asking great questions about the Bible and this was also encouraging. But now the numbers are on the decline and the questions have ceased.

Am I fooling myself into thinking that my youth are growing spiritually? Is spiritual growth a false security to make me at ease with the numbers declining?

What about my friends’ youth ministries that are exploding? Are they seeking after God more than me? Maybe that’s why God is honoring their youth ministries? Is my own spiritual bankruptcy robbing the church of a better youth ministry?

I know that God can speak through the most incapable of people, and I know that God will lead people to a saving knowledge of him with or without us. But I also know that God honors those who honor him, and that he blesses our preparation.

What will happen when the church evaluates me? What tangible thing will they hold onto to decide whether or not I am doing my job? Will it be based on how effective of a trip planner I am? Will it be based on how many kids have been baptized? Will it be based on how much numerical growth the youth group has experienced? Will it be based on how much knowledge my youth have of the Bible? What will they use to evaluate how good of a job I am doing?

So what am I in this for? For the numbers? For the questions? For the number of kids getting baptized? Or for God’s glory? I pray that I would not take my focus off of God’s glory, but I battle with this on a daily basis.

I am honestly not looking for you to encourage me or tell me that things will be okay or to tell me that I’m doing a good job and to keep up the work. But I am asking for your prayers. Please pray for me and pray for my youth.

So if you’re one of the many that has asked me “are you doing okay?”, and I haven’t had a chance to actually have a deep conversation with you… then here’s the answer… no, I’m not doing okay. But I’ve been here before, and I’ll climb out again.