That Grace May Abound

The other night I was sitting with a student of mine who was expressing great disappointment in himself. He had had a rough day and didn't respond to others as gracefully as he needed to. He expressed feeling like he couldn't stay on track; that every time he did something really good he would instantly follow up with something terrible. One terrible day for every really good day, and the better the good day the worse the bad day would be.

This wasn't true, though I can relate to feeling that way. I know that there are many times when I feel that same way. I feel stuck or like I'm caught in an unending, undefeatable cycle.

After expressing these feelings he turned to me and, in a place of frustration and desperation to do things right, he said "Maybe I should just do bad things and then I'll do really good things instead!"

This called my mind to the letters of Paul. "Should we then keep on sinning that grace may abound? HELL NAH!" (Culturally equivalent translation applied).

It's a natural temptation, when we face the long war against sin, to want to give up, or even to adopt a poor theology of grace. I have even thought to myself "maybe I should just get it out of my system" (Theoretically the root origin of Mardi Gras). Though I know these are deceptions and my flesh trying to justify poor decisions, I still feel the pull of temptation. I understand where my kid is coming from.

We go through patterns in life where we are constantly fighting our sin nature, our inner darkness. No matter how long you have been a Christian, you continue to struggle and strive against it. That's ok. You can stop telling yourself "I should be free of this by now!" or "I should be above all this!" Don't give in to the lie that says your prayers aren't working, and don't let yourself fall into despair. Grace isn't to grant permission to sin, but abounds that you might pick yourself back up and try again.

We will often feel like the there is more Darkness in us than Light, but Christ lives in you and therefore you stand as a candle in the abyss. You shine as a shard of hope in the midst of despair. Though you might not be able to see far, get up and keep going. 

Staying Faithful

There are nights when loneliness is so thick that even the intimacy of strangers seems oddly enticing. Days come and go where the thought of abandoning my calling and seeking my own fulfillment and satisfaction lay heavy on my mind. I feel the wretched jealousy in my heart over things that I have chosen to reject for the sake of holiness; for the sake of a God who too often I do not feel or hear.

In the 26 years I have been upon this Earth I cannot remember a time when I did not believe in God, but I can think of many times when I did not trust Him, and even more when I did not believe that He loved me.

Even in the midst of those dark times I some how managed to stay consistent in my church attendance and in my prayers.

Truthfully I think this says more about God than it doesn't about me. I know too much of my own heart and the wickedness inside. While many think that I'm good man, I know differently. Yet somehow...somehow I stay in the Light.

Sin crouches and chases after my heart. It is only grace that keeps me from falling into it again and again. The hardest thing for me to admit recently was that there are sins I don't want to yield, that I don't want to hand over. I want to cheat on God. Yet it is my desire to stay faithful to Him that keeps me form doing so, even if it's just barely enough.

I imagine that this is what marriage is like for many. The great war of desire and the struggle to choose the one you love and committed yourself too over choosing your own selfish desires.

So once again I sit here in full acknowledgement of my wicked heart and my desire to live in sin and say, "God...forgive me and help me to love You. Have mercy on me and change my heart because I sure as Hell don't want to do it myself."

Grace and Peace,

Stephen 

At the Heart of the Matter

It's hard to love people well some days. After giving a thousand reminders to complete one task or another, giving all that you have just to hear someone say that it isn't enough, or redirecting a student for the same thing that you have had to redirect him for every day for the past month it can become borderline impossible to love people.

You ask, "Am I not loved? Am I not wanted?"

Trap set. Slowly step in. Snagged. 

Pride and self-service engaged. 

When I'm really tired and facing the trials of residential service, I have a tendency to reach a point where I stop focusing on why I'm in the industry to begin with. I lose motivation and become locked up in myself. "I don't get enough off time", "I'm not appreciated for what I do so obviously I'm not needed or wanted here", and "I'm not being supported" are all cries for help that actually dance around the real issues at hand. I hear staff say it all the time, but the fact is that even after 2 years of working in the same field I too still fall into that same trap they do. 

I make the mistake of misplacing the source of my own value and I too forget the reason I move half way across the country: to love and serve teens in need. 

Not a simple or incredibly joy-filled position really. It's easy to love destitute, impoverish children in foreign lands for a week, but middle to upper class white boys with entitlement and a set of clothes valued higher than your monthly pay for months and months at a time? Nah. 

That's rough. There isn't glory and prestige in that. There is often very little recognition for it either. But it is beautiful and needed. The important things usually come with some form of discomfort.

Just as the farmer battles the Sun and pestilence & the sea-man wars against the wind and the waves, so must I navigate the struggles of loving others in spite of their false-beliefs and tendencies to cave into negative peer pressure.

Do I feel unappreciated? Yes. Is that the real issue? No. The real issue is that I'm tired and I really just want to see that all my effort isn't for nothing. I want to know that I'm spending my time and energy well and not wasting anything. I want to know that my boys are going to go back to their homes and live successful lives and be happy, and I want to enjoy the fullness of community and relationship with them and others around me. Those are the real issues.

Ultimately I crave to love others well, and when I remember that and set my heart back in line I find that I do just that. Then I am healthy; then I am happy.

Grace and Peace,
Stephen

Until Morning

Loneliness hits when you least expect it sometimes. Like a sudden storm, it moves in and overtakes the skies; blocks out the sun...

I sometimes feel like a fraud at work, telling my kids that there is hope; telling them to keep going and to push through when I myself am at war with my heart to stay hopeful and to not give up.

Tonight I find myself in the midst of that familiar storm. I've weathered it before, but it still catches me off guard even after having experienced it so many times. 

It sucks. Sometimes it takes all you have just to not grow cold and to not succumb to it's power. My wicked heart demands relief. Temptation to look up porn, to fantasize, to wallow in my sorrows, to cycle through old thoughts of self-hatred. etc come creeping in. It's in moments like these when I feel like God isn't listening or that He doesn't care. I know it isn't true. My life has been proof of that, but the feeling is still there and it overrides my logic. 

I hide it from my students, but I too am insecure, hurting, lonely, and craving for love and purpose. 

I know that God will see me through. I know that God is here in this moment. I have had many moments, even recently, when He made Himself known to me and stepped in. He loves me. 

Loneliness is here for the night and she will will be my guest, but I know that she will not stay long. God will always come in to help me pick up the mess she left behind and help putting things in order again. 

"Sorrow will last for the night...but joy comes with the morning."

On Eagles' Wings

When you're a kid, and the world is small, it is easy to imagine that you can make a difference; that you can save the world. Which is ironic cause most kids can't tell you why the world needs saving. They just know it does.

When I was young I fantasized about being a hero. I imagined that I could fly--that I could sweep in and save someone from harm and take them away to my secret hideout in the side of a mountain where nothing evil could reach it.

As I grew older and my world changed, I began to daydream that that same safe haven wasn't so safe. Family situations began to develop and my ability to comprehend the dysfunction started to shake the paradigms that I had developed within my concrete, 5-year-old mind. In my imaginary world I found that I would have to defend my sanctuaries against attack. Regardless, the place I had conjured in my mind was safe because I fought to keep it safe. Looking back as an adult, I can see the direct correlation between my imagination to my real life issues that I was trying to process out through story.

By the time I was a teenager, my imagination begat fewer and fewer beautiful realities and replaced them with stories of pain and struggle. Stories that didn't always turn out "happily ever after." And everything around me screamed that this...this was normal.

                                                                               ***

There is darkness and suffering. That's undeniable. It's everywhere we look. The beauty of the Gospel is that all can (and will) be redeemed! Christ, our great hope, is the foundation for believing and chasing after a world that is filled with peace and unity! In Christ, we can dare to believe that the impossible can happen; to believe that skin color, gender, and a thousand human variables don't have to divide us and that, in Christ, they won't!

Behold! the Light has come and the darkness cannot understand it!

***

Life has a tendency to clip our wings and strip us of our armor. It's easy to fall into the trap of hardship and despair; to forget that as kids we once flew above the tree and fought against ghosts and goblins. We have grown cold in our elder years with the pain of love and loss. The kingdom of elves has been closed off. The land of golden rivers and sapphire tress has all but vanished. 

"It's time to grow up", they say, not even knowing what they mean or why. 

Should growing up mean that we lose our wonder or that hope must be tucked away in a chest like it's just another child's toy that is no longer relevant or acceptable to play with? 

What would happen if we allowed ourselves the opportunity to hope again? to hope for a unified and peaceful humanity? to dare to believe that we can put an end to racism? to live in a world where border control wasn't needed or travel warning lists could all be burned?

What if we dared to believe that we could fly?