Daily Readings by Wild at Heart

Twice, the refuge of God is described in terms of rescue, or deliverance:“I will rescue those who love me.I will protect those who trust in my name.When they call on me, I will answer;I will be with them in trouble.I will rescue and honor them.” (Psalm 91:14–15 NLT)When we think about God as our strong tower, I think we assume something fixed and immovable, like a castle or those round towers in the British Isles. But war is savage and traumatizing, and this passage takes place in the midst of war. Demonic assault, I believe, is even more terrible; it is dark and overpowering in sinister ways. Rescue and deliverance are very different experiences than the static safety of a great fortress.Perhaps our understanding of God as refuge needs to mature to accommodate something very active and dynamic. What I want you to grasp for this moment is that the refuge of God is not a static thing. Not one and done. You live in a story, friends, not a painting. It is played out in the harsh realities of a dangerous world. And all of the Kingdom of God is involved in our rescue.Maybe, if we learn to find refuge in the midst of this wild and dangerous world, we can discover for ourselves what the mystics have known to be utterly and reliably true.Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

Of all the prayers that rise from human lips on this troubled planet, the vast majority must be some version of, “Help!” That’s why we began with the Cry of the Heart. But second place of “most often prayed” has to be in the genre of, “God — what am I supposed to do?” Guidance, clarity, direction — doesn’t that seem to be one of the main reasons we pray at all? What do we do about our son? Should I take this job? Where should I go to school? What am I supposed to do with my life?When seeking clarity we will almost always ask for the Spirit of wisdom and revelation. Both are needed. Sometimes, wisdom holds the answer. Other times, we need a revelation from God (as did Ananias, when the situation seemed to shout, “Don’t go near Saul!”).The key to receiving answers to prayers for guidance is to let go our constant attempt to “figure things out.” Really, it is almost incessant; I will be in the midst of seeking the God of four hundred billion billion suns on some issue of guidance, and in the midst of asking him I am thinking through the options, trying to figure it out as I pray. I’ve been in hundreds of meetings where Christians gathered to seek God’s counsel on some matter, but they spent the entire time trying to “figure it out.” I must be forthright here: God has some rather strong feelings about those who choose to walk in the light of their own counsel: “Let him who walks in the dark, who has no light, trust in the name of the lord and rely on his God. But now, all you who light fires and provide yourselves with flaming torches, go, walk in the light of your fires and of the torches you have set ablaze. This is what you shall receive from my hand: You will lie down in torment” (Isa. 50:10–11).Lord, help us; Father, forgive us. Forgive us for trying to figure it out even while we are in the motions of seeking your help. We surrender figuring it out; we would rather have your light and your counsel.Want more? Order your copy of Moving Mountains today

Those who live in the shelter of the Most High will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty. This I declare about the Lord: He alone is my refuge, my place of safety; he is my God, and I trust him. –Psalm 91:1–2I will tip my hand—the refuge described here is not merely a state of mind, an assurance for the heart. It is an ontological experience—palpable, enjoyable, an encounter with God. Our being can actually take refuge within the being of God. We can experience being surrounded with the presence of God and his mighty Kingdom in the same way we can jump into the ocean. Situated there, we can go on to experience many other realities of our God and his heavens.Psalm 91 may have been written by Moses; some Jewish traditions believe so. The previous psalm (90) is attributed directly to Moses. Think of the conditions that Moses, his family, and his community were living under when they experienced in the fullest sense God as their refuge. They were slaves—the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of slaves—wandering in a barren wilderness something like the surface of the moon for forty years. Forty years. They were hunted, constantly vigilant against nomadic raiders, having no clear vision yet of the Promised Land.I would suggest it was somewhat traumatizing (living in constant uncertainty is traumatizing).And yet Moses, a mystic who spoke with God face-to-face, “as a man speaks to his friend” could say of God, “you have always been our home” (Psalm 90:1 GNT).God is the home of every human soul. We are from him in every sense of the word. He thought of us before he created the world; he knit us together in our mother’s womb; he breathed the Breath of Life into each one of us. All the days of our life were written in his book for us before one came to be. The mystery of this is exquisite, moving the poet William Blake to say,But trailing clouds of glory do we come From God, who is our home.This is key to embracing the reality ourselves, for if we come from God, then returning to him would be natural; we would be welcome there. We might even remember the way, in our heart of hearts. Can we forget the prodigal son, who though lost and dissolute could still turn for home? He knew in his heart it was still there.The Most High, our Father, is the ultimate dwelling place. Here we discover true comfort, security, and rest. But even more, he is the source of all healing of human trauma. He truly restores the soul as we take refuge in him.Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” (Matthew 7:1–5)When you live in a system of rules and regulations, it’s easy to think you are righteous because you are keeping all the rules. It’s pretty tempting to feel better about yourself by comparing your ability to get your act together with somebody else who’s not doing so well. “I’m on time to work every day. Jones over there is a royal slacker; he’s always late.” What you don’t know is that Jones has an autistic daughter he has to take across town to child care, and you, my arrogant little poser, live five minutes from work. When it comes to true holiness, Jesus had been saying, “It’s the condition of your heart.” Now he spoke to the issue of looking at someone else’s life. Notice that he didn’t say, “Never acknowledge there is a speck in your brother’s eye.” He said, “Deal with your own life first, and then you will be in a position to help others deal with theirs.”Most Christians know the passage, but they think it means, “Don’t ever let yourself get in the mind-set where you think you’re right and someone else is wrong.” But, how will we know when we are right? And how will we help someone who is wrong?Jesus also said, “Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment” (John 7:24). Wait a second. Now Jesus is telling his followers to judge, and carefully. The context of this passage is Jesus’ healing of a blind man on the Sabbath and the Jewish leaders being so upset about it that they wanted to kill him. Talk about missing the point. They had come to worship the law, not the God of the law. As with the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus shows them that they missed the spirit of the law entirely. “You circumcise a child on the Sabbath. Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath? Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment” (7:22–24).Jesus says, “You guys just don’t get it. I established the Sabbath for your restoration. A day of rest so that you may be restored. Now you’re angry with me for restoring a man on the Sabbath?! I want you to start making the right distinctions and not the wrong ones.” He does not say, “Don’t make any distinctions.” He says, “Start making a right judgment.” Want more? Order your copy of Walking With God today

For every beautiful being God created, he has provided a habitat in which to flourish. Brook trout thrive happily in cold mountain streams. If you were to put them in the warm waters of the Caribbean, they would die. Stingrays, however, love that warm salt water; transfer them to a mountain stream and they will not survive a day.Cloud forests cannot abide desert conditions. Coral reefs cannot tolerate freezing temperatures. The examples are nearly infinite—each beautiful creation has its perfect habitat.We do too.Human beings are meant to live within the safety of God, drawing our nourishment from our union with him. Not only believing in God but living within him.We are also made to flourish in the fullness of God’s Kingdom, part of which is this world we see—coffee with friends, bike rides, a good book. Part we cannot see but is equally necessary—the refuge of the Almighty and the vast wonders of God’s Kingdom.Not only is the world we live in constantly pulling you out of the habitat for which you are made, it is conditioning your soul against finding your way home.The life of the ordinary mystic will help you get back.That’s what we are after.Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

No discussion of holiness is true or helpful without a healthy appreciation for how earnestly Satan wants to destroy us. Steal, kill, and destroy is how Jesus described it (John 10:10). Satan lured Adam and Eve to compromise one single act, one slip of holiness, and from there he has brought unspeakable carnage to the human race and to the earth. Friends, he hasn’t stopped his war against us.After years of ignoring this reality and paying for my ignorance (which is often in us a chosen naïveté), followed by decades taking up sword and shield and fighting the good fight for myself, I have come to adore something Jesus says shortly before Gethsemane and the cross. He urges us not to let our hearts be afraid. Then he says to his close companions, “I will not speak with you much longer, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold on me, but the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me.” (John 14:30–31)He has no hold on me?!! Do you have any idea what a relief this would be? Just imagine for a moment if you were fortressed to all the ploys, accusations, temptations, snares, assaults, and deceptions of the enemy. What would it be like if they had no effect on you? Your life would be a joy to live. Want more? Order your copy of Free to Live today

When our boys were young, they would gather blankets, pillows, and cushions in the basement and build elaborate forts. This was their most-played game, a weekly if not daily affair. Once constructed and made secure, blankets tucked into sofas, cushions piled up as barriers, they would take refuge inside. Sometimes to read by flashight or share candy treasures, other times for imaginary games. But mostly just to tuck in and “be,” to enjoy the experience itself.You probably built forts as a child. A refrigerator box was an absolute gold mine of a discovery, for with a few windows cut out and some duct tape on the doors it was an instant fortress.The building of forts is a universal childhood practice that researchers have become intrigued by. Carol Stock Kranowitz, author of The Out-of-Sync-Child, explains, “Forts help children reset their stressed bodies and brains. The darkness inside a fort eliminates the stimulus they do not need and intensifies what they do need ... physical comfort and solitude ... safety and control. We seek out comfort. We need to restore order.”Simply put, it’s a way of making their world smaller for a while.And children are mystics by nature. They don’t need to understand global weather patterns to find the evening snowfall utterly enchanting. They don’t need to know the brain science behind their parents’ love for them; they simply feel safe being loved. And yes— those forts aren’t actually fortresses; they collapse rather easily. But the little mystic within experiences a level of comfort and assurance that I think most adults are famished for.Everyone needs a place to feel safe.Everyone needs somewhere to go to tuck in, where the world can feel small again or at least shut out for the time being. It might be good to pause and reflect: What is your current safe place in the world? Where do you go for refuge—not only physically but emotionally, psychologically, spiritually? We can be situated securely in Jesus Christ and in God our Father, not merely as a symbol or metaphor but in actuality. As the French mystic Jeanne Guyon assures us, I have found it easy to obtain the presence of God. He desires to be more present to us than we desire to seek Him. He desires to give Himself to us far more readily than we desire to receive Him. ... This is easier and more natural than breathing. Easier than breathing—wouldn’t that be lovely? This experience of God’s presence and refuge is entirely available to you. Friends, we live in times just as dangerous as those of our ancient forebears. Let us not be lulled into a false security by the material comforts around us. We must, we must learn the practice of Jesus as our refuge. And here is where it will prove helpful to allow yourself to become a mystic. If you can suspend your disappointment, skepticism, and fear for even a moment and allow your heart to turn toward Jesus, run toward him, you can experience refuge in him. Jesus—I need refuge. Bring me into your refuge, Lord. Be my shield and strong tower. Be my safe place. I turn to you; I run to you. Be my refuge, Lord. Surround me with your presence and keep me.Holy Spirit, awaken my capacity to know and experience God. Awaken my ability to see and hear in the Kingdom of God. Make me an ordinary mystic. Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

God has a beauty to unveil. There's a reason that a man is captivated by a woman. Eve is the crown of creation. If you follow the Genesis narrative carefully, you'll see that each new stage of creation is better than the one before. First, all is formless, empty and dark. God begins to fashion the raw materials, like an artist working with a rough sketch or a lump of clay. Light and dark, land and sea, earth and sky — it's beginning to take shape. With a word, the whole floral kingdom adorns the earth. Sun, moon, and stars fill the sky. Surely and certainly, his work expresses greater detail and definition. Next come fish and fowl, porpoises and red-tailed hawks. The wild animals are next, all those amazing creatures. A trout is a wonderful creature, but a horse is truly magnificent. Can you hear the crescendo starting to swell, like a great symphony building and surging higher and higher?Then comes Adam, the triumph of God's handiwork. It is not to any member of the animal kingdom that God says, "You are my very image, the icon of my likeness." Adam bears the likeness of God in his fierce, wild, and passionate heart. And yet, there is one more finishing touch. There is Eve. Creation comes to its high point, its climax with her. She is God's finishing touch. And all Adam can say is, "Wow." Eve embodies the beauty and the mystery and the tender vulnerability of God. As the poet William Blake said, "The naked woman's body is a portion of eternity too great for the eye of man."Want more? Order your copy of Wild at Heart today

In the dawn of our childhood, we lived with God in a garden paradise. We walked with our Abba Father in the cool of the day, in conversational intimacy. We were ordinary mystics, drinking in the rich company of God and the fullness of his Kingdom. Eden was our home; we flourished in the shelter of a paradise where heaven and earth met.But we lost that home, and we have been seeking refuge ever since.There are many riches, wonders, and adventures to be had as an ordinary mystic, a friend of Jesus, living in partnership with him in this hour. But I think we need to begin by getting into a safe place. We are meant to live within the refuge of God. Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

I have counseled thousands of men and women, and I can tell you with utter confidence — both from their experiences and my own — that whatever else the enemy brings against you, he will always bring with it a feeling of I don’t want to fight this. This feeling is called ennui, a weariness of spirit, a malaise, that sense of I just don’t want to fight anymore. This is Kierkegaard’s sickness unto death, by which he meant “intensified doubt, super-doubt, mega-doubt.”(Charles Bellinger, Summary of Kierkegaard's The Sickness Unto Death)And this feeling is not your true heart.Friends, this is so helpful to understand: that weariness you’re feeling, that Not now; maybe later, that sense of being overwhelmed, that Why bother? Who cares? — this is the enemy, not you. When you know that, you’re much better prepared against it. You can more clearly choose to resist. I reject this feeling of Why bother? Who cares? and I reject this feeling that I don’t even want to fight. I do! I choose the strength that prevails! I don’t want to be one of those folks who get taken out at the end.Some people seem born with a greater measure of resilience. John Muir certainly was. He would leave camp before dawn with nothing more than a hunk of bread in his pocket and hike for thirty miles. The Comfort Culture doesn’t exactly foster that kind of physical and mental toughness!But resilience is also something that is bestowed, something imparted by God into our frail humanity. That’s truly good news.“My strength is gone,” [Daniel said,] “and I can hardly breathe.” Again the one who looked like a man touched me and gave me strength. “Do not be afraid, you who are highly esteemed,” he said. “Peace! Be strong now; be strong.” When he spoke to me, I was strengthened. (Daniel 10:17–19)The first fruit of katischuó (the strength that prevails) is the ability to not give up. It imbues us with that Churchillian grit: Never surrender; never give up! The strength that prevails — this mighty, combative warrior-strength — first comes to us simply as the strength not to quit. Because when you’re tired, when you’re beat up, you just want relief — a bag of chips, a bottle of wine, to lie on the couch and binge on Netflix. Jesus urges us to be on our guard, “so that your hearts will not be weighed down. … praying that you will have strength to escape all these things” (Luke 21:34, 36 NASB). Want more? Order your copy of Resilient today

Chesterton conducted something of a personal experiment to see what the overall impression would be if a person simply read the Gospels without any previous information regarding Jesus. What he found surprised him:It is full of sudden gestures evidently significant except that we hardly know what they signify; of enigmatic silences; of ironical replies. The outbreaks of wrath, like storms above our atmosphere, do not seem to break out exactly where we should expect them, but to follow some higher weather-chart of their own.Oh, but they do make sense, when you understand that this is a man on a mission. That the same man who could be so playful is also a man on fire. If you would know Jesus, you must know that this — his fierce intentionality — is essential to his personality.Nature bears witness. Picture an African lion, stalking through tall grass, closing in on its prey — the ruthless focus, the vigilant keenness. Or the gaze of a silverback gorilla when he turns to confront an intruder crossing the hidden boundary of his band. How about a mother brown bear when her cubs are threatened? Six hundred pounds of unrelenting fury. Now imagine you are watching one of these scenes not on the nature channel but from thirty feet away. Oh, yes, we find a very fierce intentionality in nature — reflecting the personality of the Artist. Want more? Order your copy of Beautiful Outlaw today

Repeated processes shape the soul; this has been core to discipleship for millennia.It was inevitable that years of Internet life would shape our souls whether we wanted it to or not. As a friend said, “It’s not that we’ve done something wrong; something wrong has been done to us.”Discipleship to the Internet has shaped your soul to expect immediate answers to your questions; given you a deep suspicion to all forms of mystery; fueled your addiction that the “practical” is the real stuff of life; while eroding your confidence that you can know anything for certain because yesterday’s facts are savagely overturned. We are all worn out from this way of operating in the world because there is no life in it.There is no life in it.No wonder people have a hard time experiencing Jesus.If you tell a child, “We’re going to the beach tomorrow!” their immediate response is not, “Yeah ... maybe. We’ll see. Did you even check the weather?” That’s the adult response. “Maybe we shouldn’t—did you see online that there is a sewage issue on the coast this year?” A child simply receives the promise of adventure, and they will have the joy of both a day full of anticipation of going to the beach as well as going to the beach itself! Double the joy! Because children don’t operate from a posture of weary skepticism, cynicism, and “I’ll believe it when you show me the science.”Maybe remembering this will help us grasp what Jesus was trying to address when he said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3).Never enter are pretty strong words. Never?Jesus often acts like a firefighter rescuing victims trapped in a burning building. He says extremely serious things because the situation is extremely serious.Here he is trying to rescue us from the barrier to experiencing God and his Kingdom that has been formed within us by the time we reach adulthood—the weary, skeptical cynicism ... the guardedness. Jesus says, “I have so much to show you, so much to offer you. But you’re going to have to let go the cynicism, skepticism, and pragmatism. Open yourself up to belief again. Simply trust, like a child does.”You can do this, friends; you really can.Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

If then you are wise, you will show yourself rather as a reservoir than as a canal. A canal spreads abroad water as it receives it, but a reservoir waits until it is filled before overflowing, and thus without loss to itself [it shares] its superabundant water. (Bernard of Clairvaux)A beautiful picture. The canal runs dry so quickly, shortly after the rains subside. Like a dry streambed in the desert. But a reservoir is a vast and deep reserve of life. We are called to live in a way that we store up reserves in our heart, and then offer from a place of abundance. As Jesus said, "Therefore every teacher of the law who has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old" (Matt 13:52). I'm thinking, Storeroom? What storeroom? "The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart…for out of the overflow of his heart, his mouth speaks" (Luke 6:45 emphasis added).I'm afraid I live spiritually like I live financially — I get a little, and go spend it. I live like a canal. I look like a reservoir when the rains come, but shortly after, I'm dried up again. (My financially responsible readers have just congratulated themselves on living a more disciplined life. But may I ask, are you using those reserves to do things that nourish your heart? Many a Scrooge has filled his coffers while starving his soul). "There are very many canals in the church today," laments Julia Gatta, "but few reservoirs." One woman deeply involved in ministry wrote to me recently that she is "burned out to a crackling crunch." She has been a canal. She hasn't cared for her heart. She is not alone. Want more? Order your copy of Waking The Dead today

Waiting can be an experience of emptiness. Our hands are empty. Our desires unfulfilled. Our hearts feel empty as well. George MacDonald described it this way: ’Tis hard for man to rouse his spirit up— It is the human creative agony, Though but to hold the heart an empty cup, Or tighten on the team the rigid rein. Many will rather lie among the slain Than creep through narrow ways the light to gain— Than wake the will, and be born bitterly. But he who would be born again indeed, Must wake his soul unnumbered times a day, And urge himself to life with holy greed; Now ope his bosom to the Wind’s free play; And now, with patience forceful, hard, lie still, Submiss and ready to the making will, Athirst and empty, for God’s breath to fill. (A Book of Strife in the form of the Diary of an Old Soul)The only way we can wait is if we are holding fast to the hope that we will not be waiting forever. Waiting requires trusting. We will be able to wait with expectancy only if we believe that a great good is coming.It’s an exercise of faith. It’s an opportunity for our desires not to be quelled but to rise, for our hope to become heavier, more substantial, anchored more solidly in the belief that a goodness beyond our wildest dreams will come to us when our Jesus arrives in glory. And He is coming. We are promised His ultimate return, when He will put every enemy under His feet. And even now Jesus is coming. He is present in the waiting. We do not wait alone. We do not wait in vain. Want more? Order your copy of Defiant Joy today

The Internet has taught its disciples that there shall be no mystery to anything. We can get to the bottom of any question, lay open the bare facts to any secret. In fact, if there is mystery, we’ve been thoroughly discipled to question it. Mystery equals some probable deception or scandal. Facts are safe; nothing else is.The eradication of mystery would also be shocking to our spiritual forebears. We feel that in order to experience Jesus and access his help, we need to understand the spiritual like we do nutrition, exercise, or retirement plans. A friend asked me this week, “Yes, but how do I love God? How do I take refuge in him? I mean, practically speaking?”It is the question of the person discipled by the Internet.As soon as you hear the demand for the practical, in simple, clear immediate steps, you know you are talking to a Disciple of the Internet. It is a very different question, a different posture than someone approaching a saint of ages past and asking, “Teach me to commune with God.”If I told you, “The Bible says that prayer is powerful,” you would say, “Sure.” If I told you, “I saw this study on how prayer rewired the brains of older nuns into a more peaceful frame of mind,” you would say, “Wow. That is so cool. I think I want to pray more.”It’s madness, this addiction. My friend was asking how in the same way he would ask, “How do I change the water filter in my refrigerator?” His question (I know him well) was filled with demand for the mechanics, as in, Make God like my refrigerator—not mysterious, but concrete. Give me the practical. Make it practical. Give me the latest science or I won’t believe you; in fact, I hardly believe you now.Do you understand that to make Jesus and his Kingdom practical is to strip it of all wonder, mystery, and power?It’s like asking for the mechanics of falling in love, enjoying sunlight on the ocean, comforting a frightened child. It’s like refusing to trust laughter until someone explains the neuroscience. Honestly, asking, “How do I love God?” is like asking, “How do I love my son, my daughter?” The heart knows how to love without being told the latest research, for heaven’s sake.This is the bind we’ve been discipled into—our weary, skeptical pragmatism keeps us from experiencing the God we are dying without.And there is a way out.Thank God, there is a way out of the madness and into the joys of daily, rich experiences of Jesus. God and his beautiful Kingdom are much more accessible than your cultural moment has conditioned you to believe and experience.This is very, very good news.Want More? Order your copy of Experience Jesus. Really. today

The book “Killing Lions” is a conversation between John and Sam Eldredge about the trials young men face. [Sam] Should you have killed a lion before you commit? Many traditional cultures like the Maasai require a young man to prove himself before he can marry or own land. He needs to "kill a lion", so to speak. It seems wise. What do you think? [John] I am a big believer in having a vision for where your life is headed before you get engaged. You don’t have to land the Big Job or own a house first, but when you ask a girl to marry you, what are you inviting her into? A proposal is not just, “Hey — we like hanging out together. Let’s do it 24-7!” (Or more often than not, for committed Christians, “We want to have sex — let’s get married!”) A proposal is an invitation into a shared life—so fellas, what exactly is that life going to be about? That girl has a right to know where you are headed, cowboy, before she just up and rides off with you. Mom and I shared in the adventure of the theater company we were starting; we knew this was the city we wanted to be living in; we loved the church we were committed to; and we had a healthy community around us. I don’t think a young man should marry hoping that once he does everything else will just sort of fall into place. When she broke up with you, Susie insisted that you address your aimlessness. Back to what we were saying earlier — one firm foundation you do want to have going into a committed relationship is a good sense of your identity. Your fiancée or wife cannot resolve that for you — nor can you for her. This is something you want for both of you — you want your fiancée to have the opportunity to settle some of the deeper issues of her heart and her identity before you marry, and you want some sense of who you are as a man. Now there is grace here; you don’t have to have everything figured out. God loves beginnings. Adam and Eve needed each other to live the life he had for them; so much of the joy of young lovers is discovering together all that God has for you. Don’t picture yourselves as architects coming in with a complete blueprint, but rather as adventurers, trying to decipher a treasure map together.Want more? Order your copy of Killing Lions today

It was in the depths of his personal tragedies that Job uttered the ruling sentence of his heart: “What I feared has come upon me” (3:25). In other words, “I knew it! I knew I couldn’t really trust God—not with the things that matter most.” Job’s idol was control through religion and God was determined to save him from it. When the nits and dragons come, we ask God to remove them and when he doesn’t, we take charge of our own well-being since it appears no one else will. The dragons and nits reveal to us (and to our community) where our attachments and addictions lie. In other words, they reveal where our heart is, other than captured by the love of God.But there is more. Life on the road takes us into our heart, for only when we are present in the deep sentences can God speak to them. That’s why the story is a journey; it has to be lived, it cannot simply be talked about. When we face trials, our most common reaction is to ask God, “Why won’t you relieve us?” And when he doesn’t, we resignedly ask, “What do you want me to do?” Now we have a new question: “Where is the Romance headed?”There is another great “revealing” in our life on the road. We run our race, we travel our journey, in the words of Hebrews, before “a great cloud of witnesses” (12:1). When we face a decision to fall back or press on, the whole universe holds its breath—angels, demons, our friends and foes, and the Trinity itself—watching with bated breath to see what we will do. We are still in the drama of Act III and the heart of God is still on trial. The question that lingers from the fall of Satan and the fall of man remains: Will anyone trust the great heart of the Father, or will we shrink back in faithless fear?As we grow into the love of God and the freedom of our own hearts, we grow in our ability to cast our vote on behalf of God. Our acts of love and sacrifice, the little decisions to leave our false loves behind and the great struggles of our heart reveal to the world our true identity: We really are the sons and daughters of God.Want More? Order your copy of The Sacred Romance today

Life on the road requires recollection of our Love’s past deeds on our behalf and his promise of continued faithfulness to us. We will need courage and patience and those are strengthened by remembering. We will need memory, which is to say, we will need faith.Faith looks back and draws courage; hope looks ahead and keeps desire alive. And meantime? In the meantime we need one more item for our journey. To appreciate what it may be, we have to step back and ask what all this is for. The resurrection of our heart, the discovery of our role in the Larger Story, entering into the Sacred Romance—why do we pursue these things? If we say we seek all of this for our own sake, we’re right back where we started: lost in our own story. Jesus said that when a person lives merely to preserve his life, he eventually loses it altogether. Rather, he said, give your life away and discover life as it was always meant to be. “Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self” (Matt. 16:25, The Message). Self-preservation, the theme of every small story, is so deeply wrong because it violates the Trinity, whose members live to bring glory to the others. The road we travel will take us into the battle to restore beauty in all things, chief among them the hearts of those we know. We grow in glory so that we might assist others in doing so; we give our glory to increase theirs. In order to fulfill the purpose of our journey, we will need a passion to increase glory; we will need love.Memory, imagination, and a passion for glory—these we must keep close at hand if we are to see the journey to its end. Dragons and nits and the noonday demons lie in wait. But the road is not entirely rough. There are oases along the way. It would be a dreadful mistake to assume that our Beloved is only waiting for us at the end of the road. Our daily communion and intimacy with him, together with the gifts he gives us along the way—these are more than enough to sustain us along our path.Want More? Order your copy of The Sacred Romance today

It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger for them. (George Eliot)And I still haven't found what I'm looking for. (U2)There is a secret set within each of our hearts. It often goes unnoticed, we rarely can put words to it, and yet it guides us throughout the days of our lives. This secret remains hidden for the most part in our deepest selves. It is simply the desire for life as it was meant to be. Isn't there a life you have been searching for all your days? You may not always be aware of your search, and there are times when you seem to have abandoned looking altogether. But again and again it returns to us, this yearning that cries out for the life we prize. It is elusive, to be sure. It seems to come and go at will. Seasons may pass until it surfaces again. And though it seems to taunt us, and may at times cause us great pain, we know when it returns that it is priceless. For if we could recover this desire, unearth it from beneath all other distractions, and embrace it as our deepest treasure, we would discover the secret of our existence. Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

Jesus is more impressed with the cunning of “the people of this world” than he is the naïveté so common to “the people of the light.” And then — back to the doves and snakes analogy — he urges us to be cunning: “I want you to be smart in the same way ... not complacently just get by on good behavior” (v. 9, The Message). There’s a certain charm to a Forrest Gump naïveté, the kind your grandmother had as she wore her white gloves to church—but is that the kind of person you could trust with your life?God’s response to the Tower of Babel uprising was cunning — confusing the languages of the earth. It was certainly better than taking away the faculty of speech. Men could make some headway, but they would have a heck of a time uniting the world again in a rebellion against God.Setting eternity in our hearts was cunning, so that every last one of us would be haunted all our days with unmet longings that would cause us to seek the only Fountain that can quench our thirst. I think the movement of the Spirit in the church is cunning — first here, then there, keeping men from systemizing it, keeping the enemy from squelching it. It’s like a game of rugby.Jesus is holy and cunning. Want more? Order your copy of Beautiful Outlaw today

Look again at the story — when God gave us the earth, he gave us a mission. God blessed them: “Prosper! Reproduce! Fill earth! Take charge! Be responsible for fish in the sea and birds in the air, for every living thing that moves on the face of the earth.” Genesis 1:27, The Message Notice the mission is a blessing, as anyone longing for a sense of purpose knows — give me something to do. Something important. The meaning of the passage goes way beyond farming and fisheries management (though they are noble callings). The spirit of the mission is this — we are God’s regents here on earth, sent here to bring his Kingdom in all the many ways his Kingdom needs to be brought. Oh, the thrill that comes when we begin to realize we have a role in this great Story; that there is something we must accomplish with our lives. Want more? Order your copy of Love & War today

I shudder at how easily my heart can be divided. I do love God, I really do. I know you do too. The double-mindedness is revealed when we only sort of want God. Our longing for life to be good again becomes the test we hold up against God — if he seems to be helping, wonderful. We believe. If he doesn’t, well ... we’re going to chase whatever we think will fill our longing and get back to God sometime down the road. Powerful, ancient forces are pulling us in that direction.We are in such a vulnerable moment.We must, we must, we must choose single-heartedness, where we desire Jesus above everything else — above all our other “lovers,” our false Edens, our passing comforts.If you want to become a wholehearted person, you must reach the point where happily, lovingly, you give absolutely everything over to God. You make Jesus your everything, your all-in-all. Not only is this the fulfillment of your heart’s created destiny, it is the source of all recovery and resilience. Nothing can be taken from you because you’ve already surrendered everything.Those flowers on the porch that I’ve been nursing? I noticed this morning that dry rot is creeping over my favorite hanging basket. And in another pot some pest is munching holes through every bloom. You can’t hold on to things, friends; there’s no looking back. It doesn’t do any good, but it can do an enormous amount of harm. Remember Lot’s wife.You can’t go back, especially at a time when God is moving things forward. He wants us to come along with him.I give everything for your everything.This is now my prayer.I give everything for your everything. Want more? Order your copy of Resilient today

Abiding in the love of God is our only hope, the only true home for our hearts. It's not that we mentally acknowledge that God loves us. It's that we let our hearts come home to him, and stay in his love. MacDonald says it this way: When our hearts turn to him, that is opening the door to him ... then he comes in, not by our thought only, not in our idea only, but he comes himself, and of his own will. Thus the Lord, the Spirit, becomes the soul of our souls ... Then indeed we are; then indeed we have life; the life of Jesus has ... become life in us ... we are one with God forever and ever. (The Heart of George MacDonald)Or as St. John of the Cross echoes:O how gently and how lovingly dost thou lie awake in the depth and centre of my soul, where thou in secret and in silence alone, as its sole Lord, abidest, not only as in Thine own house or in Thine own chamber, but also as within my own bosom, in close and intimate union. (Living Flame of Love)This deep intimate union with Jesus and with his Father is the source of all our healing and all our strength. It is, as Leanne Payne says, "the central and unique truth of Christianity."Want more? Order your copy of Wild at Heart today

We do need more of God, much more. Little sips between long droughts will not sustain us. We need more of God in our bodies, our souls, our relationships, our work, everywhere in our lives. But when you live in a culture of the incessant upgrade of everything, the sensational, it gives the impression that if you’re going to have a deeper, richer, amazing experience of God, it’s going to have to come in some sensational way.I have some wonderful news for you: Nope. Not even close.Life is built on the dailies. Consider love, friendship, and marriage.Love, friendship, and marriage are not built on skydiving together, trips to Paris, kayaking the Amazon. They’re not. Perhaps once in your life you might do something like that, but the fantastic is not your daily. Love, friendship, and marriage are nurtured in the context of simple things like coffee together, hanging out, getting a burrito, holding hands, taking a walk, doing the dishes, reading to one another, or just reading different things while you’re together in the same room. It’s the little things that build a beautiful life.I love adventure. I love the ocean. I love rock climbing, canoeing, mountaineering, and motorcycle riding. But here’s the deal–if you want to go to Yosemite and fulfill a lifelong dream of being a big wall climber, your daily doesn’t look dramatic at all; it looks like doing pull-ups at home. If you want to take a motorcycle adventure trip through Scotland, the daily looks like getting on your bike and riding around town. Just going out and getting used to it. Dodging the neighborhood dog that always runs in front of you and stopping when the old lady brakes without warning. You’re making it second nature, so that when you do go out, you can handle the big wall climbing, the remarkable trips.This is how life with God works, dear friends.I think God has amazing things for us, I really do. I’ve been part of some extraordinary experiences with God. I’ve had global adventures with him. But I don’t live there. Getting there, just like getting to love or anything else that’s wonderful in this life, is in the dailies. It’s back here in the little things we do. That is how we practice kindness towards ourselves — in the dailies. Want more? Order your copy of Get Your Life Back today

In our own times of severe testing, we want to be made “holy in every way,” our entire “spirit and soul and body ... kept blameless” (1 Thessalonians 5:23 NLT). Let me be quick to add, I think much of the testing and the Falling Away takes place very subtly in the heart. It’s the small turns from God toward our other comforters, the quiet feelings of being disappointed with him, the early stages of Desolation — this is how most of the testing plays out. But it has momentum like an avalanche.C. S. Lewis’s personal secretary was a man named Walter Hooper. He described the Oxford professor and creator of Narnia as “the most thoroughly converted man I ever met.” (God in the Dock) What a wonderful thing to be said about you. Lewis was a man whose entire being — heart, soul, mind, and strength — had become almost thoroughly inhabited by Jesus Christ. His fragmented self was nearly fully reintegrated in Christ. (Nearly, because none of us are utterly whole until Christ returns. But my goodness — nearly is fabulous.) Many people fell in love with the presence of Dallas Willard for the same reason.Let me pause on that thought for a moment, because while this is known to the saints, the Comfort Culture framed within us other goals. Does your heart tell you that it agrees with this — that the goal of your life is to become the most converted person your friends and family know?Or does your heart prefer the goal to be something else? Perhaps, “I just want things to be good again, and let somebody else live through the end of the age”? Ouch. That hits close to home.The battle taking place over the human heart can be described as Satan using every form of seduction and threat to take our hearts captive and our loving Jesus doing everything he can to form single-heartedness in us. This often plays out in thousands of small, daily choices. Which is kind, really; we want to develop single-heartedness before the severe testing comes. Want more? Order your copy of Resilient today

Do we form no friendships because our friends might be taken from us? Do we refuse to love because we may be hurt? Do we forsake our dreams because hope has been deferred? To desire is to open our hearts to the possibility of pain; to shut down our hearts is to die altogether. The full proverb reads this way: “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but when dreams come true, there is life and joy.” The road to life and joy lies through, not around, the heartsickness of hope deferred. A good friend came to this realization recently. As we sat talking over breakfast, he put words to our dilemma:I stand at the crossroads, and I am afraid of the desire. For forty-one years I’ve tried to control my life by killing the desire, but I can’t. Now I know it. But to allow it to be, to let it out is frightening because I know I’ll have to give up the control of my life. Is there another option?The option most of us have chosen is to reduce our desire to a more manageable size. We allow it out only in small doses — just what we can arrange for. Dinner out, a new sofa, a vacation to look forward to, a little too much to drink. It’s not working. The tremors of the earthquake inside are beginning to break out. Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

The most essential gift you have to give is yourself. When you aren’t entirely true about that, you aren’t true. But we’ve all grown accustomed to committing dozens of little white lies about ourselves every day.Except this man. He is Faithful and he is True.Having given this some thought, perhaps we are better prepared now to understand why God answered Moses the way he did when he spoke from the burning bush. In the midst of the very unnerving encounter, Moses asks him, “Who are you?” God simply says, “I Am.” In other words, Me. Myself. An answer that is holy and full of integrity, wry and dumbfounding all at the same time. But it is the best possible answer he could have given. God is utterly himself. Want more? Order your copy of Beautiful Outlaw today

Who is this God who is so determined that we know His presence that He is willing to allow so much that hinders us to be stripped away, including at times our health and well-being? Where do my beliefs of what well-being actually is not align with my Father’s? It makes me wonder. It also fills me with wonder that our God is so determined, so cunning, so persevering, and so good that He will fight for our hearts through every moment and situation of our days that we might know Him. For it is not in health that we find joy. It is not in living without pain of any kind. No. It is in His presence that we will know the fullness of joy. As Graham Cooke said, “The Father does not give us joy. He gives us himself. He is absolute joy personified.” (Graham Cooke; Joy Is Who God Is) Let that sink in. God doesn’t merely give us joy. He gives us Himself. Joy incarnate. And we are able to receive more of His presence when our hands and hearts have been uncluttered and purified by fire. Oftentimes that purifying hurts. But none of it is without a greater good. And whatever is going on within our lives or around them, we can live with a heart that is expectantly waiting. A heart that is grounded in hope. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15:13). Want more? Order your copy of Defiant Joy today

Ask Jesus to show you his kingdom.Sanctify your imagination to him, all your spiritual gifting, and ask him to reveal to you pictures of the coming kingdom. Be specific — if you want to see the city, ask to see the city. If you want to see those waterfalls, ask to see them. You will need to be open to being surprised; do not “script” what you think you “should” see. I dreamed of ships last night—great, three-masted sailing ships. The day was clear and bright, and we were tacking into the trade winds, driving our prow through the surf at a wonderful speed. I saw other ships to my right and left, and I realized we were racing. The ocean was aquamarine, clearer than usual; I could see marine life below us, keeping pace with us. It helped to shatter my lingering religious fears that heaven is going to be boring!Stay open to surprises; keep asking for glimpses of the kingdom any way God wants to bring them. This is how we reach into the future to take hold of the hope that is our anchor. The more our imaginations seize upon the reality, the more we will have confident expectation of all the goodness coming to us.And if you want to take a really big risk, for an even more beautiful and encouraging picture, ask Jesus to show you as he sees you, as you are, in his kingdom. That one might take a little waiting for, because we are so fearful, but wait for it. It will be worth it. Want more? Order your copy of All Things New today

When the religious (spirit) is operating, knowing about God substitutes for knowing God. And therefore, teaching is exalted. Church feels like a seminar — could be intellectual, could be motivational. Good content is what matters. Doctrine is fiercely defended. Members can explain to you theories of the atonement, or seven steps to success, but can’t name one intimate encounter they’ve had with Jesus. Not once in their lives have they heard him speak to them. I’ve met heads of Christian education departments, chaplains, and seminary faculty who by their own admission don’t know Jesus personally.You can talk about sunshine and live your life underground; you can even go to the sea but never dive in. A great deal of what is adamantly taught about Jesus is taught by people who frankly don’t know him very well.Question: Are your leaders close friends of God? People who actually know and experience this Jesus, helping you to know and experience him? Want more? Order your copy of Beautiful Outlaw today

Jesus ran because he wanted to, not simply because he had to or because the Father told him to. He ran "for the joy set before him," which means he ran out of desire. To use the familiar phrase, his heart was fully in it. We call the final week of our Savior's life his Passion Week. Look at the depth of his desire, the fire in his soul. Consumed with passion, he clears the temple of the charlatans who have turned his Father's house into a swap meet (Matt. 21:12). Later, he stands looking over the city that was to be his bride but now lies in the bondage of her adulteries and the oppression of her taskmasters. "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem," he cries, "... how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing" (Matt. 23:37, emphasis added). As the final hours of his greatest struggle approach, his passion intensifies. He gathers with his closest friends like a condemned criminal sitting down to his last meal. He alone knows what is about to unfold. "I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you," he says, "before I suffer" (Luke 22:15, emphasis added). Then on he presses, through the intensity of Gethsemane and the passion of the Cross. Is it possible he went through any of it halfheartedly? Want more? Order your copy of The Sacred Romance today

The exodus of the people of Israel and their journey through the Sinai desert is one of the greatest survival stories of all time. More than two million people wandering through a land of sand and barren rock, homeless, looking for the land of abundance, a place to call home. When will life be good again? There were no real sources of food in that desert. Water was about as scarce as it is on the surface of the moon. A “barren wilderness — a land of deserts and pits, a land of drought and death, where no one lives or even travels” (Jeremiah 2:6 NLT).This is more than a moment in Jewish history. It is recorded for us as one of the great analogies of human experience, our journey from bondage to freedom, from barrenness to the promised land. Ultimately, it is the precursor to our journey of salvation, from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of God.It is a story about the Primal Drive for Life — where will we take our thirst?This is the choice, the test. Always has been, always will be.This Primal Drive for Life was so compelling it caused thousands of those rescued slaves to mount a rebellion to go back to bondage in Egypt just to have their familiar ways back. Sobering.“The heavens are shocked at such a thing and shrink back in horror and dismay,” says the LORD. “For my people have done two evil things: They have abandoned me— the fountain of living water. And they have dug for themselves cracked cisterns that can hold no water at all!” (Jeremiah 2:12-13 NLT)The great alarm the Scriptures are sounding is that our longing for life to be good again will be the battleground for our heart. How you shepherd this precious longing, and if you shepherd it at all, will determine your fate in this life and in the life to come.We must lovingly shepherd our famished thirst back to the source of life.Want more? Order your copy of Resilient today

There is wisdom, and there is revelation. They go together, hand in hand. “I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better” (Ephesians 1:17). From the Spirit come both wisdom and revelation. We need them both to walk with God, need them in generous doses to navigate the dangerous waters of this world. If you’re the sort of person who tends to lean toward revelation (just asking God for direct guidance), then you need to balance your approach with wisdom. If you lean toward a wisdom approach to life, you must deliberately and consciously include revelation. Ask God.And if you operate for the most part with neither, you are in real trouble. Want more? Order your copy of Walking With God today

You don't need to travel far to find beauty. God has strewn beauty across the globe in such generous portions we have only to stop and notice, paying particular attention to the intimate. Yes, epic beauty is worth traveling to see–the Himalaya, the Maasai Mara, Yosemite, any tropic island. But intimate beauty is just as healing, perhaps more so, and available everywhere. (I shared the St. Albans story to remind my urban readers beauty can be found even in noisy, congested cities.)Really — beauty is all around us. In the shimmering shadows sunlight creates through any foliage. The intricate pattern and color of tree bark (stop and look; touch it). The way sunlight falls on your kitchen table in the morning. The grain of wood. Songbirds in your neighborhood. Fabric. Candlelight. The infinitely creative patterns of frost. The frost on the stalks of dried grasses this morning looked like tiny gladiolas made of glass or the calligraphy of fairies. Water in almost any form. Water on a blade of grass. Water drops on leaves. Leaves themselves — their shape, texture, the lacelike patterns running through them. A field of grass, especially as the wind plays through it. Fields of corn, wheat, any crop. The stars, the moon in all its phases. Rainwashed streets in the city at night, drops of water on your windshield. Human faces are infinitely beautiful. And I have not even mentioned flowers, vases, music, fine art, and the beautiful things we use to decorate our homes.Given beauty’s healing effects, given how it soothes the soul and opens us up to the goodness of God, I hope you will intentionally do two things:Receive it for the gift it is! Pause, and let the beauty minister to you. I receive this into my soul. Too often we just notice and go on, like a pedestrian who steps over a hundred-dollar bill lying on the sidewalk. Stop and pick it up! In these moments you open yourself and receive the beauty, the gift, the grace — receive it into your being. Let it bring to you God’s love, his tenderness, his rich goodness. We live so braced, not openly, but quite subtly — braced for the day, braced by the assault on our attention, braced by the noise around us.Pause when you are offered beauty and make the conscious decision, I receive this grace. We open our clenched soul to let it in. To find God in it. I will often pray, Thank you for this beauty. I receive it into my soul. And with it I receive you, in it, by it, through it — your love, your goodness, your life.That receiving part is key.Want more? Order your copy of Get Your Life Back today

The child who cries out in the dark feels very differently when mother comes in and switches on a light. What felt so real and inevitable vanishes. Let us be careful we don’t embrace the pain in such a way that we forbid God to turn on the light and draw near. Watch how David handles the stormy waters of his own soul:My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God,with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng. Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me?Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. (Ps. 42:3–5)He admits it, he pours it all out with raw honesty, but he does not allow himself to stay there. Don’t you love it that David talks to himself (“Why are you downcast, O my soul?”)? That makes me feel a little more sane, because I talk to myself all the time. He reminds his own soul that things have not always been like this — and isn’t that where we begin to make the fatal shift? When we are in the darkness, we begin to feel like we have always been there. But it is not true. David reminds himself that God has been faithful in the past; God will be faithful again. He urges himself to put his hope in God, because the morning will come.The Cry of the Heart is a beautiful and precious form of prayer. But there is a danger to it (just as romance and friendship have their dangers). The honest release of emotion can at times become a whirlpool that sucks you in. I’m trying to keep you from making agreements while you give yourself permission to have a full, emotional life with God. “I feel forsaken!” is very, very different from, “I am forsaken!” “I feel overcome” is much different than “I am overcome.”Notice how David escapes the shipwreck of the soul: he turns his attention from the debris of his life in a much healthier direction; he turns his gaze toward God.Want more? Order your copy of Moving Mountains today

Emasculation happens in marriage as well. Women are often attracted to the wilder side of a man, but once having caught him they settle down to the task of domesticating him. Ironically, if he gives in he'll resent her for it, and she in turn will wonder where the passion has gone. Most marriages wind up there. A weary and lonely woman asked me the other day, "How do I get my husband to come alive?" "Invite him to be dangerous," I said. "You mean, I should let him get the motorcycle, right?" "Yep." She shrank back, disappointment on her face. "I know you're right, but I hate the idea. I've made him tame for years."Think back to that great big lion in that tiny cage. Why would we put a man in a cage? For the same reason we put a lion there. For the same reason we put God there: he's dangerous. To paraphrase Dorothy Sayers, we've also pared the claws of the Lion Cub of Judah. A man is a dangerous thing. Women don't start wars. Violent crimes aren't for the most part committed by women. Our prisons aren't filled with women. Columbine wasn't the work of two young girls. Obviously, something has gone wrong in the masculine soul, and the way we've decided to handle it is to take that dangerous nature away ... entirely.Want more? Order your copy of Wild at Heart today

During a long layover at O'Hare, I studied the man who sells popcorn from a little stand in one of the terminal hallways. He sat silently on a stool as thousands of people rushed by. Occasionally, every fifteen minutes or so, someone would stop and buy a bag. He would scoop the popcorn from the bin, take the money, and make change-all without a word being spoken between them. When the brief encounter was over, he would resume his place on the stool, staring blankly, his shoulders hunched over. I wondered at his age; he seemed well past fifty. How long had that been his profession? Could he possibly make a living at it? His face wore a weary expression of resignation tinged with shame. Adam, I thought, what happened? Did he know how far his situation was from his true design? Somehow he knew, even if he didn't know the Story. His sadness was testimony to it.Some people love what they do. They are the fortunate souls, who have found a way to link what they are truly gifted at (and therefore what brings them joy) with a means of paying the bills. But most of the world merely toils to survive, and no one gets to use his gifts all the time. On top of that, there is the curse of thorns and thistles, the futility that tinges all human efforts at the moment. As a result, we've come to think of work as a result of the Fall. You can see our cynicism in the fact that we've chosen the cartoon character Dilbert as the icon of our working days. His is a hopeless life of futility and anonymity in the bowels of some large corporation. We don't even know what he does-only that it's meaningless. We identify with him, feeling at some deep level the apparent futility of our lives. Even if we are loved, it is not enough. We yearn to be fruitful, to do something of meaning and value that flows naturally out of the gifts and capacities of our own soul. But of course — we were meant to be the kings and queens of the earth. Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

The book “Killing Lions” is a conversation between John and Sam Eldredge about the trials young men face. [Sam] “We live in the age of information,” says the old recording of an announcer in my head; so why does finding direction feel like a parade of hopeless metaphors? I’m drinking from a fire hose and snorkeling through mud. I’ve been handed a spyglass and told it holds the key, only to gaze through and find the chaos of a kaleidoscope. More information doesn’t seem to help. I feel like I’m drowning in it. I just learned how to tie a shemagh, found the best noodle bar in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul airport (Shoyu), and discovered twelve tips to the ultimate workout (it always involves buying something, which is weird). When I look for a job or try to map out my dreams, or some other future-oriented activity, somehow it almost always feels futile eventually. [John] Yes, it feels that way. The twenties sure feel like the decade of decision making, don’t they? Money, jobs, women, love, revolutions, dreams—everything we have been talking through is going to require some serious and sometimes constant decision making on your part. And though I feel our decisions are weighty, they aren’t nearly as overwhelming as they feel when we are faced with them. I have never found pressure a good motivator for making decisions, nor found decisions made under pressure to be particularly good ones. So let me first try and lift some of the pressure off the decision-making process. The truth is, the options before you are limited and that is a great relief. The open ocean is beautiful to look at, but terrifying if you have to navigate it in a small boat. But you are not facing the open ocean. God puts us within a context, with a limited gifting and limited resources, and that is immensely kind. Want more? Order your copy of Killing Lions today

Lest we overlook the obvious, let me take a moment’s pause here to suggest that in your search for more of God, do remember to ask for it.Such a simple thought, but so helpful. Sometimes we get so caught up in the process we forget to ask. We have not because we ask not (James 4:2). Ask and you shall receive — that’s the promise (Matthew 7:7).So throughout my day, and over the course of a week, I will pray for the very thing I need most:Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit — I need more of you, God. I need so much more of you. My soul cries out for you. O Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit — fill me with more of you, God. I need more of you; I pray for so much more of you. Saturate me. Want more? Order your copy of Get Your Life Back today

John Spillane is a para-rescue jumper sent into the North Atlantic, into the worst storm of the twentieth century, the perfect storm, as the book and film called it, to rescue a fisherman lost at sea. When his helicopter goes down, he is forced to jump into pitch blackness from an unknown height, and when he hits the water, he’s going so fast it’s like hitting the pavement from eighty feet above. He is dazed and confused — just as we are when it comes to the story of our lives. It’s the perfect analogy. We have no idea who we really are, why we’re here, what’s happened to us, or why. Honestly, most days we are alert and oriented times zero. Dazed. Sleepwalking through life.Has God abandoned us? Did we not pray enough? Is this just something we accept as “part of life,” suck it up, even though it breaks our hearts? After a while, the accumulation of event after event that we do not like and do not understand erodes our confidence that we are part of something grand and good, and reduces us to a survivalist mind-set. I know, I know — we’ve been told that we matter to God. And part of us partly believes it. But life has a way of chipping away at that conviction, undermining our settled belief that he means us well. I mean, if that’s true, then why didn’t he _______? Fill in the blank. Heal your mom. Save your marriage. Get you married. Help you out more.Either (a) we’re blowing it, or (b) God is holding out on us. Or some combination of both, which is where most people land. Think about it. Isn’t this where you land, with all the things that haven’t gone the way you’d hoped and wanted? Want more? Order your copy of Waking the Dead today

Let’s come back to Zacchaeus and the town harlot who crashed the party to weep at Jesus’ feet. They were, both of them, very keenly aware of their failures. They knew they had fallen way short of God’s goodness. And not only did they know it, but so did everyone else. So they bore the double weight of their own personal shame and the contempt of their communities. And yet, when they encountered Jesus — a man whose goodness shone like the sun — they ran toward him. How could it be?They knew he was merciful. They knew they would find forgiveness.As will you. God’s promise to us is total forgiveness if we will come to him and ask for it: If we confess our sins he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)This offer is for everyone. It is for you and for me. And it is our only hope. Want more? Order your copy of Free to Live today

A good king brings order to the realm. God brings order out of chaos at the beginning of creation, and then he hands the project over to Adam to rule in the same way. Not as a tyrant or micro-manager, but offering his strength to bring order to the realm. The reason we depict a king on his throne is to convey order, well-being.A good king also fights for the security of his kingdom, battling assault from without and sedition from within. That's why he must be a Warrior first. Look at how tireless David is in bringing security to Israel's borders:In the course of time, David defeated the Philistines and subdued them…David also defeated the Moabites … Moreover, David fought Hadadezer son of Rehob, king of Zobah … when the Arameans of Damascus came to help Hadadezer king of Zobah, David struck down twenty-two thousand of them (2 Samuel 8:1-5).Think of a Churchill, unyielding to the Nazis, and the pacifists in his own government that would not hold fast. Or Lincoln, and his unrelenting efforts to preserve the Union. A family with a good father feels protected. Spiritually, emotionally, financially, physically, he is the one to bring peace and covering to his family.All this in order to bring blessing to his people. "From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another" (John 1:16). Nehemiah discovers that his people are being fleeced by their own officials, and demands their grain, oil and lands be restored. He refuses even to take the booty allotted to his role. David insists that the plunder from the Amalekites be shared among every man, those who guarded the baggage and those who fought. A good king wants his people to share in the prosperity of the realm. Bad kings build their own off-shore bank accounts. Want more? Order your copy of Fathered by God today

After God fashioned this dazzling earth, he gave it to us. Which is a bit like giving your fifteen year old the keys to a Maserati. But, he has his ways of doing things. When God gave us the earth he also gave us all the adventures that lay ahead. No one had yet climbed a mountain, or sailed the sea. No one had yet written a song or a novel. No one had yet discovered that strawberries make wonderful jam. God has “hidden” joys innumerable in the earth he gave us, like Easter eggs waiting to be found in the tall grass. Someone will figure out you can milk that cow, and if you let the milk sit you can skim cream off the top and someone else will discover that the cream goes wonderfully in coffee. The earth is rigged for adventure, like a sailboat. And our hearts have adventure written deep within, like sailors hear the call of the sea.A good story has adventure to it. An unknown terrain explored. A wilderness survived. A mountain won. A destination reached. And the story of how it all unfolded — or unraveled — told over and over again. Sometimes risk is involved. Sometimes danger. Often deep beauty. Adventures can be had on our own or with a group. They can entail discovering a new city or acquiring a new talent. The right kind of adventures help us to become more the person we long to be. Want more? Order your copy of Love & War today

God and Satan each have a design, a battle plan, to capture our heart's devotion. The intimacy, beauty, and adventure of the Sacred Romance are placed and nurtured in the deepest longings of our heart by God himself. God's grand strategy, birthed in his grace toward us in Christ, and nurtured through the obedience of disciplined faith, is to release us into the redeemed life of our heart, knowing it will lead us back to him even as the North Star guides a ship across the vast unknown surface of the ocean.If we were to find ourselves living with total freedom, Jesus informs us through his summary of the law in Luke 10:26-28, we would find ourselves loving God with all of our heart and our neighbors as ourselves. Jesus said further, "You will know the truth [me], and the truth will set you free."The Enemy knows this as well, and his strategy to capture us is simply the opposite: to disconnect us from our heart and the heart of God toward us by any means possible. It is what he no doubt had to do to his own heart to bear the loss of heaven. Want more? Order your copy of The Sacred Romance today

So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more. (Eph. 4:17–19)The loss of sensitivity that Paul is referring to here is the dullness that most people accept as normal. It actually leads us into sin, to sensuality and lust. The deadened soul requires a greater and greater level of stimulation to arouse it. This is, of course, the downward spiral of any addiction. What began as an attraction to Playboy ends up for the porn addict in some really horrific stuff. Just look at the progression of television drama over the past thirty years. What we have now would have been considered shocking, even repulsive, to an earlier audience. Networks have to keep adding more sex, more violence, to keep our attention. We have become so sensual. This is why holiness is not numbness; it is sensitivity. It is being more attuned to our desires, to what we were truly made for and therefore what we truly want. Our problem is that we’ve grown quite used to seeking life in all kinds of things other than God.“For example, God wants to be our perfect lover, but instead we seek perfection in human relationships and are disappointed when our lovers cannot love us perfectly. God wants to provide our ultimate security, but we seek our safety in power and possessions and then we find we must continually worry about them. We seek satisfaction of our spiritual longing in a host of ways that may have very little to do with God.” (Addiction and Grace)And so, Gerald May says, “The more we become accustomed to seeking spiritual satisfaction through things other than God, the more abnormal and stressful it becomes to look for God directly.” Our instrument is out of tune from years of misuse. Want more? Order your copy of The Journey of Desire today

The book “Killing Lions” is a conversation between John and Sam Eldredge about the trials young men face. [Sam] You know, I was really good at thinking only about myself pre-marriage, but sacrificing for the Other really has become a joy. If you had told me that a couple of years ago, I might have rolled my eyes at you. It seems to be something I could only learn through experience, kind of the rule for marriage thus far. Susie has been looking at grad school for a while now, and her program will require all of her time, which means I would need to be working to support both of us. This actually got me really excited. I know it would be a sacrifice of my time to work more while Susie pursues the education she needs to reach her dream, but it doesn’t feel like wasted time to me. I need purpose in my work, and supporting both of us for a couple of years would put work into a larger context. Another example that comes to mind is church. I don’t always feel the strongest pull to go every Sunday morning (how’s that for political phrasing?), but I know Susie really loves it. So we go. And the joy she feels after having been is something I get to share in. By sacrificing my wants for hers I experience the joy of doing something for her, not to mention how happy she is when she gets to go. Choosing to sacrifice for her sake has become a love language in its own way. I want the best for Susie, and sometimes the best isn’t something I would have chosen were I single. But man, loving her by laying down something of my own and seeing her light up (especially if she doesn’t know it was a sacrifice) is one of the greatest joys there is. Want more? Order your copy of Killing Lions today

Every mythic story shouts to us that in this desperate hour we have a crucial role to play. This is an Eternal Truth, and it happens to be the one we most desperately need if we are ever to understand our days. For most of his life, Neo sees himself only as Thomas Anderson, a computer programmer for a large software corporation. As the drama really begins to heat up and the enemy hunts him down, he says to himself, "This is insane. Why is this happening to me? What did I do? I'm nobody. I didn't do anything." A very dangerous conviction ... though one shared by most of you, my readers. What he later comes to realize-and not a moment too soon-is that he is "the One" who will break the power of the Matrix.Frodo, the little Halfling from the Shire, young and naive in so many ways, "the most unlikely person imaginable," is the Ring Bearer. He, too, must learn through dangerous paths and fierce battles that a task has been appointed to him, and if he does not find a way, no one will. Dorothy is just a farm girl from Kansas, who stumbled into Oz not because she was looking for adventure but because someone had hurt her feelings and she decided to run away from home. Yet she's the one to bring down the Wicked Witch of the West. Joan of Arc was also a farm girl, illiterate, the youngest in her family, when she received her first vision from God. Just about everyone doubted her; the commander of the French army said she should be taken home and given a good whipping. Yet she ends up leading the armies in war.You see this throughout Scripture: a little boy will slay the giant; a loudmouthed fisherman who can't hold down a job will lead the church; and a whore with a golden heart is the one to perform the deed that Jesus asked us all to tell "wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world" (Mark 14:9). Things are not what they seem. We are not what we seem. Want more? Order your copy of Waking the Dead today

If you learned about Eden in Sunday school, with poster board and flannel graphs, you missed something. Imagine the most beautiful scenes you have ever known on this earth — rain forests, the prairie in full bloom, storm clouds over the African savanna, the Alps under a winter snow.Then imagine it all on the day it was born.It's Tolkien's Shire in its innocence, Iguazu Falls in the garden of The Mission, the opening scene of The Lion King.And it doesn't stop there.Into this world God opens his hand, and the animals spring forth. Myriads of birds, in every shape and size and song, take wing — hawks, herons, warblers. All the creatures of the sea leap into it — whales, dolphins, fish of a thousand colors and designs. Thundering across the plains race immense herds of horses, gazelles, buffalo, running like the wind. It is more astonishing than we could possibly imagine. No wonder "the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy" (Job 38:7). A great hurrah goes up from the heavens!We have grown dull toward this world in which we live; we have forgotten that it is not normal or scientific in any sense of the word. It is fantastic. It is fairy tale through and through. Really now. Elephants? Caterpillars? Snow? At what point did you lose your wonder at it all?Even so, once in a while something will come along and shock us right out of our dullness and resignation.We come round a corner, and there before us is a cricket, a peacock, a stag with horns as big as he. Perhaps we come upon a waterfall, the clouds have made a rainbow in a circle round the sun, or a mouse scampers across the counter, pauses for a moment to twitch its whiskers, and disappears into the cupboard. And for a moment we realize that we were born into a world as astonishing as any fairy tale.A world made for romance. Want more? Order your copy of Epic today

Our need for attachment, mother-love, and the assurance of abundance opens up for us new levels of joyful experience, even in passages that have been familiar to us for years: “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5).You are a “branch.” Branches have no unending source of resilience in themselves. They need to draw all of their life and all of their resources from another — they need to receive nourishment just as a child does at its mother’s breast. God is the fountain of life. The only fountain of life. His glorious life is meant to flow through us every day — healing us, filling us with creativity, courage, joy, playfulness, and resilience. It comes through attachment, bonded love, the soul’s union with God.The goal of Christian faith is so much more than church attendance or holding certain doctrinal beliefs. The destiny of every human soul is union with God. As the Scottish Puritan Henry Scougal wrote, “[Christians] know by experience that true religion is a union of the soul with God, a real participation of the divine nature.” (from The Life of God in the Soul of Man) Want more? Order your copy of Resilient today

I’ll tip my hand to one assumption I am making. I assume that an intimate, conversational walk with God is available, and is meant to be normal. I’ll push that a step further. I assume that if you don’t find that kind of relationship with God, your spiritual life will be stunted. And that will handicap the rest of your life. We can’t find life without God, and we can’t find God if we don’t know how to walk intimately with him. A passage from the gospel of John will show you what I’m getting at. Jesus is talking about his relationship with us, how he is the Good Shepherd and we are his sheep. Listen to how he describes the relationship:I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. The man who enters by the gate is the shepherd of his sheep. The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.”...“Whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:1–4, 9–10)The sheep live in dangerous country. The only way they can move securely in and out and find pasture is to follow their shepherd closely. Yet most Christians assume that the way to find the life God has for us is to (A) believe in God, (B) be a good person, and (C) he will deliver the rest. A + B = C. But Jesus says no, there’s more to the equation. I do want life for you. To the full. But you have to realize there is a thief. He’s trying to destroy you. There are false shepherds too. Don’t listen to them. Don’t just wander off looking for pasture. You need to do more than believe in me. You have to stay close to me. Listen to my voice. Let me lead. Now there’s a thought: if you don’t hold the same assumptions Jesus does, you haven’t got a chance of finding the life he has for you. Want more? Order your copy of Walking With God today