Daily Readings by Wild at Heart

You were the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz and emerald, chrysolite, onyx and jasper, sapphire, turquoise and beryl. Your settings and mountings were made of gold; on the day you were created they were prepared. You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained you. You were on the holy mount of God; you walked among the fiery stones. You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you. (Ezekiel 28:12–15)Standing at the head of the vast legions of angelic hosts (millions, as the biblical record counts) was a captain. The most beautiful, the most powerful of them all. The commander of the armies of God. The guardian of the glory of the Lord. His name was Lucifer. “Son of the morning.” Glorious as the sun. Unequaled among his noble peers.And here is where the Story takes its first dramatic turn.There is a danger for the glorious that the humble never know; a trial for the powerful that the weak never face. You see this in the worst of the dictators, the Hitlers and Stalins, the Maos and Amins — they set themselves up to be idols. They want more than power; they want to be worshiped.Pride entered Lucifer’s heart.The excellent captain came to believe he was being cheated somehow. He didn’t merely want to play a noble role in the Story; he wanted the Story to be about him. He coveted the throne; he wanted to be the star. He wanted the worship and adoration for himself.Your heart became proud on account of your beauty, and you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor. (Ezekiel 28:17)Lucifer turned on his Maker. And there was war in heaven. Want more? Order your copy of Epic today

When God begins to shine his light on some issue in my life, be it internal or some issue taking place around me, I often have a hunch where things might be leading. You know what I mean — I see Christians do this all the time. We get a glimpse of what God might be up to, and we start speculating and filling in the blanks, bringing all our biases and inclinations to it instead of simply listening to him for more. For example, you sense God prompting you to help your parents financially, and you’re already inclined to do that, so you just go and do it without stopping to ask, Now? How much? Or, you sense God’s conviction on a long-standing sin in your life. Being inclined to self-contempt and beating yourself up, you just jump to, I knew it. It’s my fault. I’m the idiot, and you start making all your plans and resolutions to change (despite the fact that it never works). If you’d stayed with God on the matter, you might have heard his love and tenderness and his gentle counsel for a different way of handling it.Filling in the blanks. That’s what this is. We are constantly filling in the blanks of what we think God is up to instead of asking him. It isn’t helpful. It’s taking the ball and running with it, leaving God behind. Ask the next question, remember?For the past couple mornings when I’ve sat down at the table to have a quick bowl of oatmeal, I’ve opened my Bible to read a bit, and both times it just opened to Psalm 41. Here is what I read: “I said, ‘O Lord, have mercy on me; / heal me, for I have sinned against you’” (41:4).Do you hear David’s approach to God? He doesn’t expect to get slammed. He doesn’t just promise to repent and do better. He knows he has turned from God, and he knows what he needs is healing. So this is what I prayed: I ask you to heal the things in me that have led to this self-obsession, this looking to my ability to get it done, get it right, stay on top of things. Forgive me. I want to be centered in your love in me. You in me. Heal me. Want more? Order your copy of Walking With God today

Our beloved family dog is dying. But I’m not going to drag you through that tragedy; I want to share something gracious I’m learning through it.Only yesterday our vet told us that our sweet golden retriever is very ill, and tonight we’re supposed to go out to dinner with some friends. I’m torn, because we’ve been scheduling, canceling, and rescheduling this dinner for six months, and part of me really wants to go. But part of me is dealing with the loss of the family dog. What I’m aware of in this moment is how often I need to put my soul aside in order to carry on with the demands of life. We all do. Life goes on, despite our personal struggles. You lose your father on a Wednesday; corporate America expects you back at the office Monday. It’s hard on the soul. It’s hard on our life with God.But tonight I don’t need to put my soul aside. Our friends are understanding; we can reschedule. The question is, why is practicing kindness towards my own soul so unfamiliar that it would be easy to ignore something as precious as the death of our dog to “carry on with things?” This world requires us to keep going at such speeds that we end up having only one emotional state towards everything — a general, haggard, hazy condition of “on.” I’m on for this meeting; I’m on for this call with my mom; I’m on for the news the vet has. There’s no margin for anything else.So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son. He is so rich in kindness and grace that he purchased our freedom with the blood of his Son and forgave our sins. He has showered his kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding. (Ephesians 1:6–8 NLT)God is rich is kindness, and he has showered kindness on us. This is so lovely and life-giving, we need to pause and reflect on it. Kindness. Such a simple virtue, it often takes a back seat to more dramatic qualities like bravery, holiness, or love (kindness sort of feels like the younger stepchild to love). And yet kindness is such a wonderful thing to receive.Don’t you love it when people are kind to you?I sure do. In a world growing increasingly angry and hostile, a little bit of kindness can make your day. Want more? Order your copy of Get Your Life Back today

Think of consecration as “aligning” and “enforcing” — aligning yourself, or the subject in question, with Jesus and all the laws of his kingdom, then enforcing his rule and those laws over the matter in question. The first steps, which we have covered already, are mostly the “aligning” part. But often the “enforcing” requires a bit more “oomph,” especially if you are having difficulties there. Which brings me to the power of “proclaiming.”In Acts 9, when Ananias came to pray over Saul, he proclaimed the Lord’s intentions there: “Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, ‘Brother Saul, the Lord — Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here — has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit’” (v. 17).Interesting — we don’t see Ananias pray to God for Saul; instead, we see him “proclaim” God’s intentions over Saul, and that is sufficient to see them fulfilled. The Scripture is mighty and powerful, and proclaiming it as we consecrate has mighty and powerful effects. Want more? Order your copy of Moving Mountains today

First, our lives are not a random series of events; they tell a Story that has meaning. We aren’t in a movie we’ve arrived at twenty minutes late; we are in a Sacred Romance. There really is something wonderful that draws our heart; we are being wooed.But there is also something fearful. We face an enemy with vile intentions. Is anyone in charge? Someone strong and kind who notices us? At some point we have all answered that question “no” and gone on to live in a smaller story. But the answer is “yes”—there is someone strong and kind who notices us. Our Story is written by God who is more than author, he is the romantic lead in our personal dramas. He created us for himself and now he is moving heaven and earth to restore us to his side. His wooing seems wild because he seeks to free our heart from the attachments and addictions we’ve chosen, thanks to the Arrows we’ve known.And we—who are we, really? We are not pond scum, nor are we the lead in the story. We are the Beloved; our hearts are the most important thing about us and our desire is wild because it is made for a wild God. We are the Beloved, and we are addicted. We’ve either given our heart to other lovers and can’t get out of the relationships, or we’ve tried our best to kill desire (often with the help of others) and live lives of safe, orderly control. Either way, we play into the hands of the one who hates us. Satan is the mortal enemy of God and therefore ours as well, who comes with offers of less-wild lovers, hoping to deceive us in order to destroy our heart and thus prevent our salvation or cripple our sanctification.These are the stage, the characters, and the plot in the broadest possible terms. Where do we go from here?We are faced with a decision that grows with urgency each passing day: Will we leave our small stories behind and venture forth to follow our Beloved into the Sacred Romance?The choice to become a pilgrim of the heart can happen any day and we can begin our journey from any place. We are here, the time is now, and the Romance is always unfolding. The choice before us is not to make it happen. As Chesterton said, “An adventure is, by its nature, a thing that comes to us. It is a thing that chooses us, not a thing that we choose.” Lucy wasn’t looking for Narnia when she found it on the other side of the wardrobe; in a way, it found her. Abraham wasn’t wandering about looking for the one true God; he showed up with an extraordinary invitation. But having had their encounters, both could have chosen otherwise. Lucy could have shut the wardrobe door and never mentioned what had happened there. Abraham could have opted for life in Haran.The choice before us is a choice to enter in.Want More? Order your copy of The Sacred Romance today

Compare the shriveled life held up as a model of Christian maturity with the life revealed in the book of Psalms:You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand. (16:11)As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? (42:1–2)O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; My soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land, where there is no water. (63:1)Ask yourself, could this person be promoted to a position of leadership in my church? Heavens, no. He is far too unstable, to passionate, too desirous. It’s all about pleasure and desire and thirst. And David, who wrote most of the psalms, was called by God a “man after his own heart” (1 Sam. 13:14).Christianity has nothing to say to the person who is completely happy with the way things are. Its message is for those who hunger and thirst — for those who desire life as it was meant to be. Why does Jesus appeal to desire? Because it is essential to his goal: bringing us life. He heals the fellow at the pool of Bethesda, by the way. The two blind men get their sight, and the woman at the well finds the love she has been seeking. Reflecting on these events, the apostle John looked at what Jesus offered and what he delivered and said: “He who has the Son has life” (1 John 5:12). Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

You have been ransomed by Christ. Your treachery is forgiven. You are entirely pardoned for every wrong thought and desire and deed. This is what the vast majority of Christians understand as the central work of Christ for us. And make no mistake about it — it is a deep and stunning truth, one that will set you free and bring you joy. For a while. But the joy for most of us has proved fleeting, because we find that we need to be forgiven again and again and again. Christ has died for us, but we remain (so we believe) deeply marred. It actually ends up producing a great deal of guilt. “After all that Christ has done for you ... and now you’re back here asking forgiveness again?” To be destined to a life of repeating the very things that sent our Savior to the cross can hardly be called salvation.Think of it: you are a shadow of the person you were meant to be. You have nothing close to the life you were meant to have. And you have no real chance of becoming that person or finding that life. However, you are forgiven. For the rest of your days, you will fail in your attempts to become what God wants you to be. You should seek forgiveness and try again. Eventually, shame and disappointment will cloud your understanding of yourself and your God. When this ongoing hell on earth is over, you will die, and you will be taken before your God for a full account of how you didn’t measure up. But you will be forgiven. After that, you’ll be asked to take your place in the choir of heaven. This is what we mean by “salvation.”The good news is ... that is not Christianity. Oh, I know it is what most people now living think Christianity is all about, including the majority of Christians. Thank God, they are wrong. There is more. A lot more. And that more is what most of us have been longing for most of our lives.Want more? Order your copy of Waking the Dead today

We can have joy, because we can know God’s strength in our weakness. Because God’s mercies are new every morning. Because as we walk through this valley of this shadow of death, we are never abandoned or alone. Our God goes before us, and He is behind us, around us, and within us. We can have joy, no matter what sorrow or suffering we are currently enduring, because we have been chosen by the Father and He will never turn His face away. We are loved. Forever. And nothing can ever separate us from that love. We can have joy because we are engraved on our Father’s heart and on Jesus’ nail-scarred hands, and in Christ we are victorious. The suffering doesn’t have the final say. In fact, God is going to use it for even more good to come into our lives. James 1:2–4 tells us to “consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” God is growing us up. He is committed to making us the mature bride of Christ: And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. (Rom. 5:3–5 NASB) The sorrow and grief that come are real, and we have a God who is well acquainted with them. He doesn’t ask us to ignore our grief but to invite Him into it that we might bear it together. No matter what, we can know an internal defiant joy because death has been defeated. Life has won. There is suffering, yes. But always there is the potential for joy. In the face of the ultimate reality won for us by Jesus, we don’t have to pretend that life is better than it is, that we don’t hurt as much as we do, or that we feel happy when we are not. We are invited to be fully alive, awake, alert, and oriented to the truth, and to know that because of Jesus, we can be defiantly joyful. Want more? Order your copy of Defiant Joy today

You are going to have to come to terms with the partial nature of this life. Have you come to terms yet with the partial?Are you able to hold on to your faith when only some prayers are answered?It takes genuine maturity.Most people don’t even try to learn the ways of the kingdom; they just go about their days with a practical agnosticism, hoping things work out, tossing up prayers like they hope to score on a Jesus lottery ticket. They have little to show for it. Others discover the possibility of breakthrough for sons and daughters, allies of God; they begin to experience breathtaking results. Then their Eden-heart gets confused about what it means to be victorious.We can always be victorious — it just depends on what you mean by victorious. Or better, it depends on what God means by victorious. Want more? Order your copy of Moving Mountains today

The battle of desire is not something that just takes place within us or even between us. It is also taking place against us, all the time. Our desire is under nearly constant attack. “We come into the world longing,” says Gil Bailie, “for we know not what. We are desire. And desire is good, for it’s what takes us to God. But our desire is not hard-wired to God.” So we look to others to teach us what to desire. We are intensely imitative creatures, as Aristotle pointed out. It is how we learn language; it is how we master just about anything in life. It is also how we come to seize upon the objects of our desire. We all know this, though we don’t like to admit it.One example should suffice. I was at a garage sale, looking for some tools. There was a table saw at a wonderful price. Another fellow was sort of browsing around, standing in front of the saw but not seeming particularly interested. I opened my mouth and made the fatal error: “Wow, that’s a great price on that saw.” You know what happened next. Immediately, his nonchalance became intense interest, and since he was there before me, he drove off with a table saw that five minutes earlier he couldn’t have given two hoots about.The constant effort to arouse our desire and capture it can be described only as an assault. From the time we get up to the time we go to bed, we are inundated with one underlying message: it can be done. The life you are longing for can be achieved. Only buy this product, see this movie, drive this car, take this vacation, join this gym, what have you. The only disagreement is over the means, but everyone agrees on the end: we can find life now. Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

Now — to find God, I have to look where God is. This might help folks who report that God “seems distant,” or as a friend recently commented (with a touch of cynicism), “He doesn’t seem to come around much.” If I want to find a hawk I look up in the sky, near the mountains where the thermals create an updraft. If I want to find our dog I simply have to find Stasi — he is usually curled up at her feet. Those who would find God must look where he lives — must live in the same manner, for the same things, for the same reasons. “God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16).Every time we choose to love, we take a step closer to God; it’s like he’s right there. Every time we choose something else, we take a step away.I want God, so I choose love. Want more? Order your copy of Love & War today

The way to render a man happy, is to engage him with an object that will make him forget his private troubles. — PascalDon't be fooled by the apparent innocence of the object you've chosen as an idol; what is the function of it? Most of our idols also have a perfectly legitimate place in our lives. That's their cover, that's how we get away with our infidelity. The prophet Isaiah gives an example of this when he marvels at a man who cuts down a tree in the forest, and then puts it to two very different uses:Half of the wood he burns in the fire; Over it he prepares his meal, He roasts his meat and eats his fill.Nothing wrong here. That's the perfectly appropriate use of wood. But it doesn't end there (it rarely does):From the rest he makes a god, his idol;He bows down to it and worships He prays to it and says, "Save me; you are my god."The prophet is incredulous. "Doesn't he see what he's doing?," he wonders:No one stops to think, No one has the knowledge or understanding to say, "Half of it I used for fuel; I even baked bread over its coals, I roasted meat and ate. Shall I make a detestable thing from what is left? Shall I bow down to a block of wood? He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; He cannot save himself or say, "Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?" (44:16-17,19-20)So there you have it: No one stops to think. No one wants to take a good, hard look at what they are really doing, for then we might see the lie. We would see the water hole for the muddy puddle it is. Our idols become the means by which we forget who we truly are and where we truly come from. They numb us. Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

I was reading the prophet Jeremiah a few weeks ago when I ran across a passage that referred to God as "the Lord Almighty." To be honest, it didn't resonate. There's something too religious about the phrase; it sounds churchy, sanctimonious. The Lawd Almiiiighty. It sounds like something your grandmother would say when you came into her kitchen covered in mud. I found myself curious about what the actual phrase means in Hebrew. Might we have lost something in the translation? So I turned to the front of the version I was using for an explanation. Here is what the editors said:Because for most readers today the phrases "the Lord of hosts" and "God of hosts" have little meaning, this version renders them "the Lord Almighty" and "God Almighty." These renderings convey the sense of the Hebrew, namely, "he who is sovereign over all the 'hosts' (powers) in heaven and on earth, especially over the 'hosts' (armies) of Israel."No, they don't. They don't even come close. The Hebrew means "the God of angel armies," "the God of the armies who fight for his people." The God who is at war. Does "Lord Almighty" convey "the God who is at war"? Not to me, it doesn't. Not to anyone I've asked. It sounds like "the God who is up there but still in charge." Powerful, in control. The God of angel armies sounds like the one who would roll up his sleeves, take up sword and shield to break down gates of bronze, and cut through bars of iron to rescue me. Want more? Order your copy of Waking the Dead today

I think everyone prays at some point in their life, even if they’re not sure someone is listening. And I’ll bet that one of the most common prayers goes something like, Lord help me; give me strength.I really like that prayer. It has a genuine humility to it. We find ourselves facing something that overwhelms our personal resources, and we cry out for help, for strength. The man who casually answers his phone on a Tuesday afternoon only to hear that his family has been killed in an automobile accident. The woman who, at a routine exam, learns she has Stage IV breast cancer. The caregiver who day after day labors under the crushing load of providing for every need of their incapacitated loved one.Give me strength, Lord.Jesus liked that prayer.He instructed us to pray it, and he prayed it himself. (Hebrews 5:7) Toward the end of his days on earth, he began to give his disciples clear instructions for living through extremely hard times, knowing they would record those instructions for future generations — including you, dear ones. He assured us in no uncertain terms that this story would sweep toward a climax, and that those days would be especially hard on the human soul. He urged us to ask for the strength that prevails:Notice the fig tree, or any other tree. When the leaves come out, you know without being told that summer is near. In the same way, when you see all these things taking place, you can know that the Kingdom of God is near. I tell you the truth, this generation will not pass from the scene until all these things have taken place. Heaven and earth will disappear, but my words will never disappear. Watch out! Don’t let your hearts be dulled by carousing and drunkenness, and by the worries of this life. Don’t let that day catch you unaware, like a trap. For that day will come upon everyone living on the earth. Keep alert at all times. And pray that you might be strong enough to escape these coming horrors and stand before the Son of Man. (Luke 21:29–36 NLT)Strong enough to escape — that’s who and what we want to be. Strong enough to be the survivors, the triumphant ones. To make it through the storm.This is no ordinary strength Jesus is offering. This isn’t optimism, this isn’t simply feeling refreshed for a new day. Hard times require something more than willpower. Jesus warns us, urges us, practically commands us to ask for strength. The Greek word used here is katischuó and it meansto be strong to another’s detriment; to prevail against; to be superior in strength; to overcome; to prevail.This is a valiant strength. It implies a fight, an enemy we can and will prevail over. Want more? Order your copy of Resilient today