It’s been one of those weeks…
You know, when every 20 minutes there was another I-should-blog-that moment. And indeed, I would have posted more, had the luxury of time been afforded me.
Instead, I transformed the office into a recording studio/mastering suite and ran through life from summit to valley to next summit (every twenty minutes!) taking it all in faster than I could even journal about it.
Then yesterday afternoon it all came together.
I haven’t written a song in over a year… (Though I’ve half-written at least half a dozen)
And it wasn’t because I didn’t really want to. Just something would get me halfway through, and then drop me.
I got to the point where I was nearly convinced I’d written my last song.
Until this week.
Then I recognized a sweet little melody woven through everything…
– Through the boxes and boxes delivered by our friend the UPS man
– Through fists wrapped around a taught barbed wire while starring into the canyon, and talking to a God that’s a million lightyears away, and still within easy reach.
– Through middle-of-the-night prayers for a friend’s safety
– Through reality checks
– Through emails not so easy to read
– Through prayers for you– my blog friends. (I pray for you by name– all of you)
– Through reminders of loss
– Through conversations with my little sister…
– Through hours spent pacing over dust and rocks fighting darkness and finding light…
Here’s just an excerpt. Maybe the melody will never be published, I don’t know…
But I’ll always pray the prayer.
— 
Water Your dreams my Lord,
with tears I shed
Feed hungry children Lord,
my promised bread
Send me to darkness Lord,
teach me to pray
Through fire or freezing cold,
I’ll smile and say–
. . .
Hope is my prison Lord,
love is my chain
If I can serve You Lord,
my loss is gain
I am a soldier Lord,
called by Thy name
Let me walk worthy Lord,
worthy of Your name…
Unsatisfied By Average
The Musings of a Stubborn Believer
Category: lessons (page 10 of 12)
“The principle of the gospel is this:
The gospel always brings life to the receiver,
and death to the giver.
If the gospel brought death to Jesus Christ, why would we think that in preaching the gospel it would be any less for us?…
So the mixture of our message is life and death,
And laughter and tears…
And this is voluntary.
This is not a sentence at all…
We’re not sentenced to death.
We’re just privileged to answer His call…”
–Jackie Pullinger
lifelong missionary to Hong Kong
An excursion down memory lane just landed me on some old treasures… A few would probably make you smile, (maybe they’ll have their chance in the near future) but one in particular rivets me this morning…
The year I learned to pray.
I knew something special was going on even back then, but now I really see it. And to this day, that nine-letter word dances on my tongue whenever my friends start talking about the best years of their lives.
Seventeen.
That was a loaded year. A year of transitions… And one of the fullest and toughest of my life.
But it was pure happiness.
I still remember standing in line to register for classes at a public university… And thinking over and over again on the first day of classes: “What on earth am I doing here?”
But what I remember more is being in that treasured spot in library at the top of the hill, day after day, every time the clock in the bell tower struck 12:00, to keep an appointment…
It didn’t start there, of course. It started months and months earlier on the hillside at home. In fact, it was probably the greatest factor in my finishing 4 years of high school in a year and a half.
It was “quiet hour.”
Just me, and my God, and my journal.
And just as I had done all the year through when normal life, well meaning people, interruptions and “important” things tried to eclipse it, I had to fight to keep it. I had quite the time scheduling and re-scheduling 19 credits to keep it free.
Am I ever glad I did…
___
My life looks a bit different now.
Instead of 19 credits, it’s the joys and challenges of virtually full-time ministry with books to write, CDs to record, planes to catch, people to love, the gospel to share, and our lives to pour out… (for which we both tremble, and thank our God constantly)
And there are the duties of home to make all of that logistically possible… 2 corporations soon to be 4, (for myself and my brother) the joys and responsibilities of being family, such as helping to maintain home and property, gardens and a greenhouse, and claiming my share of the honor of taking care of a grandmother with severe dementia…
But still. Still…
My life is pure happiness.
Even though I am always facing impossible odds.
There’s just nothing in the world like shedding everything for a moment (or an hour) right when it feels like it’s going to kill you, and leaning on Jesus with your head on His knee…
Smiles against all odds…
I still call 17 the best year of my life.
But maybe that’s not really fair… For since then, they have only gotten better.
“…But I never did promise [it] to you specifically.”
“I noted that.”
“I just asked you to…?”
“Fight.”
“Mhm.”
.
.
“What am I supposed to do? Fight for someone else’s trophy?”
.
.
.
“That’s what I did.
Merry Christmas…”
______________________________________________
Thus ended the little “dialog” between the Eternal Weight of Glory and a tired soldier feeling more like a little boy in his cold, dark room on the eve of Christmas.
But not because there was no more to say.
Because there was too much to think about…
Ahh, matchless condescension.
Matchless abdication of rights.
Matchless benevolence.
To give the best and brightest of your talents, the bulk of your time, the vital force of your life for someone else’s gain, asking absolutely nothing in return other than the honor of giving…
That is the spirit of Christmas.
I have this little theory:
Remembrance is the better part of Thanksgiving.
It’s far too easy to say “thank you” for the blessings in front of our eyes,
while forgetting the sacrifices that purchased them for us.
I’m pretty sure when the pilgrim fathers sat down to that first feast,
their thankfulness for the provision was sharpened by their
memories of starvation.
(as indeed, they ate within sight of the graves of more than half of their original number)
It would be well for us to remember…
…remember smiles as well as tears.
And be thankful for them both.
Stepping out into the 7-degree morning reminded me–
Seasons come, and seasons go.
As I stood there sniffing air so cold it tickled from my nose to my throat, I thought of something…
The change of seasons is really a constant cycle of life, growth, and total surrender.
I’m reminded of Bigger Dreams.
But this time the focus is a bit different.
Because before the young tree can hope to grow taller and stronger, and spread more leaves to the sky, it must first let go of everything it has.
Everything it has worked so hard for.
The very current of it’s life…
Every leaf must fall, to make way for a brighter tomorrow.
Those who don’t, might not have a tomorrow.
I’m somewhat a Michigan native, and I remember many times when the snow or ice came before the trees had made their total surrender. Too many of those trees never saw another spring…
Seasons come, and seasons go.
In life, and in the weather.
So while I await the unfolding of the next season of my life, my duty is clear:
Readiness. Willingness. Surrender.
There’ll be more leaves next year.
It was a simple little lesson… Brought to me by the most gracious people I have ever met. But it stirs me even now–
He or she who has lost, and yet loved, may indeed have less to lose…
But also unspeakably more to give.
I have learned that gentleness, selflessness, real warmth and grace are seldom owned in their depth by those who have not tasted sorrow.
They are trophies won in the face of pain and loss.
But they make their possessors the richest, most beautiful people in the world…
So, to my new friends–
Your love through loss has been the gain of thousands…
Thank you.
Isaiah 65
Once again the click of black dress shoes on the floor breaks the silence in my office just before midnight.
Once again the bag goes on the floor, the Blackberry on the desk, and the boarding passes folded in my coat pocket go in the wire trash can in the corner. All is well…
And once again I first drift off to sleep, and then wake up again, exceedingly happy…
Because I have seen salvation come…
I have watched cheeks first pale, then glow.
I have watched empty eyes fill with tears of hope.
I have watched faces turn to the sun like flowers on a spring morning.
Ahh yes, this is happiness.
And the fact that it is my happiness, is a gift of grace undeserved…
“Behold, my servants shall sing for joy of heart…” Isaiah 65:14
I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine. I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil… [Jn. 17]
Isaiah 47-52
Gone for 5 days, home for fleeting moments, gone for 12 days.
We’ll see if I have internet this time…
I have a lot to be thankful for. The last 5 days were spent in the Gila wilderness with my family, 10 miles beyond nowhere. I’ll upload more photos sometime…
Every moment was loaded… But especially memorable were the silent times accented by Isaiah, and Christ’s Object Lessons. If I didn’t have to get some sleep before rolling out of here for my early flight tomorrow, I’d write more… But I just have time for one of my very favorite lines–
“The Lord hath made bare His holy arm…”
As if to prove to all the world that there is none stronger.
Like, none. End of discussion.
Isaiah 45-46
Before the guy even knew God’s name, he had a promise. God was to anoint him, and then go before him knocking down stone walls, breaking iron gates, and setting the kings of the earth on their faces… And this guy was a heathen!
He had a little secret though… God had his right hand, and he had God’s. (45:1)
How much more shall we have power over our enemies when we choose above all to place and leave our hand in God’s… (46:3-4)
Oh, why do we ever do otherwise?
© 2025 Unsatisfied By Average
Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑
Recent Comments